2012 MONTGOMERY COUNTY
YOUTH POETRY CONTEST

10-12 GRADE WINNER

Mini Racker
Abington Friends School

Schuylkill Drive

On the highway by the river, sharp points of light
Reflect back out of the ink basin,
Sliding beneath their realities like interlocked combs' teeth
The trees waver in the pallid glow of the low moon
And I drive with the glass down so the night hits me
Ice air sting rushes, and the cold enlivens me
To the possibilities of the water, where great whales dwell
Deep below and currents thrash the relinquished to the mirror world.
Across the way, a lone car drags along the other pieces
And the dark grass, like algae, and the stone hills
Are a call to the city both and quiet gardens.

I think back to the feeling of the lamps,
Not points in the blackest depths, but stars shaping framework
Of industry and promise against the sunset
And the rapid parachute winds, arms clawing at the rising vacuum,
Like swimming breathlessly, swinging for something,
But this place right here is only
Teleportal, jaguar-sleek, forward motion,
The type to make me forget, and to breathe
The force-fed oxygen which doesn't really harm the eyes
As much as the plains here thought it would.
The houses don't twinkle, and it's the water's very darkness
That attracts me to it.

Except there is the way
In which the colors change. Like magic,
It conjures memories, and even in the empty
Motion-car the voices return and the scent of firs
And Scotch cookies mix in with the sound of smiling
And there's music, too, but that's with me
The beats and the lyrics smoothing my soul alongside the wind.
While every shadow calls for it and the animus itself
Longs to melt into this resolved mirage.

But as the voices and promises and firelight cling,
And the avenues call me back, Ridge and the Boulevard,
Indian Queen, and the coffee shops and
Fluorescent gas stations, all abandoned for the night.
I find my shoulders tense, and this speed too.
And with great effort I pull every muscle down.
And I let go, but now it's only the pulsing poems
From the speakers, and friction with the asphalt,
Dragging that takes me home, where light is only heat
Not perfect iridescent coldness. And I do miss it.
How I miss the Drive.