Chloe's ISP: "Between the Bricks"

Between the Bricks

A Collection of Poetry

by Chloe Frelinghuysen

For the students and teachers who inspired me to write. The words inside these pages are written to capture a piece of what you have offered me in my time at Taft.

1 What I love about poetry Is that there are no rules

I can indent when I please!

And start a line with “and” It’s just me

and the page

only my voice

no interruptions

no external forces interfering with me

and the

page

I. Am. Free.

2

The first piece I wrote for you The first piece I wrote at Taft -

Was a two-page description of a sunset The assignment was about imagery I wrote about a lighthouse,

Engulfed in the sublimity of nature.

Man’s work seemed so tiny

Surrounded by cirrus clouds and a blushing sky I wonder if I could recall that sunset today And see the same colors.

Would the sky be melded with the innocent swirl Of pink and orange?

Memory is susceptible to distortion, you know.

I wonder how much this school has distorted me.

Sometimes, all I see is gray and black.

If I searched inside my mind

And pulled out an image of the sunset What color would it be?

3

Wanderlust from her lips,

“Let’s go somewhere� she breathed.

I thought about the bricks

Every red path pointed to the same place Nonetheless, we ran

Past the lull of the indigo pond

Over the hill laden with dandelions And away from the dusty fields Until we could run no longer We hunched over,

Looked down for a moment

And the bricks stared back, immobile run. run. run.

You don’t like poetry.

4

You said, “people should just say what they mean.”

So here is a poem for you.

I like the sound of your name

It sounds like whiskers on roses And raindrops on kittens

I like how you habitually wear your grey turtleneck sweater Like you’re hiding something I like your trusty black jacket

And the ice cream sandwich pins on it

I like seeing you smile with your mauve-stained lips

When we chat about those heavy ideas from Humanities class – what’s the purpose of human existence?

I mean,

I like you

In a dusty practice room Music walked in

5

With guitar strings and a satin voice

Behind crystal lenses, your oak eyes closed Your brows furrowed

And the melody seeped through the creases of your skin Your hands grazed the copper laces Of a wooden guitar And I felt no pain

6

We walked together, braless, wearing sweat pants Screwing societal expectations Until —

You told me to walk into a dance Vulnerable and unpresentable

And I wondered why I couldn’t do it 7

I heard your voice in its entirety Two months into Collegium — It hit me like a storm

Unexpectedly and all at once Its waves gave me chills Even in your silence

The Point “What was the point of this?” a white boy demanded.

It’s ironic that he came to the information session

To hear us talk about why we protested for Black Lives Matter Because he interrupted us, Ignored us,

And then asked us to explain the point of all of it – Excuse me, sir, but you must be blind!

The point was at your feet this morning

When you stepped over a black girl with a sign that said: “I want to be heard”

The point was on your Facebook feed When you scrolled past

A video of an innocent black man Being shot by the police

The point was on a black reporter’s lips When you changed the channel

Because listening to him talk about racism in America Made you feel uncomfortable

The point was in the eyes of a tired person of color When you overlooked their tears

And asked them to support their statements From personal experience With statistical facts

Sir, you must be blind –

Blind enough not to see the point in front of you And close-minded enough not to put on The glasses we gave you

9

Her mind was a black, rainy night

My hand gripped a piece of charcoal

The saturated black smeared across the page

And crumbled like chalk at the force of my anger “Hope can crush you,” I said.

“I never had it,” she replied.

10

Billie Holiday’s voice rang in my head,

Her voice rumbling with jazzy melancholy.

The slate sky hung over me like responsibilites My feet trod on a crumbling path “Gloomy Sunday” she sang

Dear Sanity,

Trying to hold on to you

11

Is like grasping water with trembling hands

12

Three stories high, we shouted louder than our fears Louder than our meekness in the classroom Louder than our silence at the jig

Louder than our fear of not being heard

On ordinary Wednesdays, we finally felt free Singing out the window at boys Who we never talked to

We shouted Miley Cyrus’s latest hit

And for a moment, our fears were irrelevant because

Every breath we took was proof we could belt louder, harder, fiercer…

Boys walking up to the gym questioned

Who on earth was singing so goddamn loud “We can’t stop, and we won’t stop” We sang

13

As I looked up at the metal wires Of our tiny bunk bed

I saw a part of you that I wanted to keep Your laugh was like confetti, Silly and everywhere 14

You told me that you

Could preserve people through poetry Like a magic man

I wanted to believe you

It was crew season,

My hands oozed with pain,

15

And my torn skin looked like old paint, chipping away You looked at my blistered, calloused hands

And told me that I had long, piano playing fingers, Made for creating

Made for art and music and poetry and passion and love You told me to look at your hands

They were worn from years of playing basketball You said:

You see? My hands were made for toiling And picking things up, But your hands

Your hands are made for art

16

Thank you for making me feel like a kindergartener Teens aren’t validated for stick-figure drawings We see our scribbles and instantly hate them

We believe there’s one way a drawing should look, realistic We observed the still-life scene you created.

Taking a dry piece of charcoal, we were brave, Carving our vision on a sheet of paper

I looked over at my neighbor’s drawing and felt bad for him He had drawn airplanes Instead of apples

Thank you for yelling at that boy,

“GOOD BOY! WHAT AN ARTIST YOU ARE!”

17

“Art is an attempt to organize the chaos of this world” Art encompasses all things irrational Art is an answer and a question In an impressionist meadow

The brushed grass whispers to the poppies

And ebbs with the movement of the dotted breeze What do you see?

Surrounded in a golden laced frame,

There is a man confronting you with his moonless eyes, Shaded in the tender flicker of chiaroscuro.

What do you feel?

Carved out of the earth’s whitest rock,

The moon goddess reaches for her arrow,

Her diaphanous clothing draped around her Like an ancient song What do you see?

Someone asked me,

“What does Van Gogh’s Starry Night mean?”

I replied,

What do you see?

What do you feel?

18

You sang me your national anthem

In a language my ears had no mind to comprehend You told me the first line was

“Where is my home, where is my home?�

And I realized that home Has no location

Not the end of a street or lane No address to find But,

Nestled in your heart, To the left

Is home enough for me

19

Everyone raves about your voice I do, too

Who cannot?

Your voice is like a jazzy fire on a frostbitten day,

There’s a rhythm of revolution crackling about the air, The tender burning of a tune,

Melting like chocolate in our ears Your voice is beautiful,

But it’s embers of your soul

That burn slowly with smoke and passion That draw me in

20

It’s surprising how much color you can notice Given you’re colorblind

Because you saw the green and red details Flecked throughout our fleeting time When you leaned in too close,

You saw that my cheeks were red and pointed it out I told you I was cold, It was a lie

When you leaned in too close

You saw that my greenish blue eyes Were dotted with flakes of mascara You offered to brush them off

But I said that I could do it myself I got used to your seeing color I got used to your noticing

Until one day, you couldn’t see.

The colors of my emotions were painted for you

On a white canvas, Green and red Green and red

But then, it’s not surprising how much color You can’t see

Given you’re colorblind

21

I was told not to judge a person Before getting to know them

I don’t know you well enough to judge you, But I can’t help it

Because a black girl cut open her chest for you And showed you her bleeding, pulsing heart To show you the pain of 240 years

To show you that the blood in her veins Is the same color as yours Yet you looked at it,

Its red throbbing and vulnerable trembling Shown only to make you believe the truth Of the black experience Yet you looked at it,

And told her that you needed statistics And “facts”

To believe her

22

She thanked me for being an ally –

For posting a photo with the hashtag “Black Lives Matter”

I thought about how my friends of color Could walk outside these school walls With a hoodie on, Skin exposed –

I thought about how their intelligence and talents Could be insignificant to a suspicious cop So I told her not to thank me,

“It’s what anyone would do,” I said.

I looked into her tired eyes And for a moment I understood

23

We are a generation of capturers,

A generation of children running after lightning bugs Fascinated with the glow of life

We are a generation of capturers,

A generation that believes in seeing moments through a lens The camera’s dazzle The dancing pixels

Fascinated with the glow of life

24

The leafless trees are scattered like Viens across a white sky As day wilts,

Moonshine glitters on the half frozen pond,

Its delicate beams reflecting on the ripples Silver like a distant memory

To the girl who told me

25

She finally found her confidence Because she is a senior:

You shouldn’t be confident because you are a senior.

You should be confident because you are you.

Besides, you’ll be a freshman next year,

And that’s how life goes.

Boarding School Boys You double tap my face on your iPhone screen We live under the same roof We break the same bread Yet, I have no idea Who you are

Modern Romance Pokes (3)

Messages (1)

*Insert your crush’s name here* liked your photo

28

I remember the poster above the chalk board: “This is the universe…

You are here” it said

We are a pixel, an infinitesimally small dot

In a galaxy of exploding matter and curious possibility

We are a constellation defying (or following - I’m not sure) the laws of physics So I rebelled, too

I sat in my squeaky chair,

Unable to comprehend Newton’s equation And fled to my head space

Letting my mind float beyond gravity’s pull

29

Life is an opportunity -

A consummation of quizzes and daily trials that challenge The very purpose of our existen-But first!

Solve this equation:

5(-3x - 2) - (x - 3) = -4(4x + 5) + 13 Life is an opportunity Life is a pop quiz

Always catching us when we’re tired or unprepared Like at 8:15am on a Saturday

30

Tournez à la page

What does Morrison mean by funk?

Tournez à la page

Let’s just skip The Bear, no one knows what the hell is going on in it

Tournez à la page

This is how the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper Tournez Tournez À

La

Page

You told us to find the page,

Giving us the map to find the story

31

You told me that history

Is the study of common people Doing uncommon things — The voices of the past Linger like scars

We have not forgotten

We have not forgotten yet 32

In a Prentice booth — First to the left —

You handed me a letter — And I realized that

What courses through our veins When our colors come together Is a story that our skin can’t tell

Video Games I didn’t realize being your friend Was leading you on.

You told me I played the boys like a video game Like I had a controller

I must have turned on the game When I texted you back.

I hit the “GO” button

When my hands typed on grey letter keys.

I pushed the forward button

When I answered your redundant question.

What a twisted game I played

Telling you about my passions,

Believing you were interested in them too What a twisted game I played Sitting with guys At dinner

What a twisted game I played Spending time with boys

Reading books, sharing music

What a twisted game...

It wasn’t twisted until

You thought I was playing And kept score

34

“I can’t hear you, Chloe! This is the 21st century!

I’m a woman, hear me roar!”

It’s the 21st century, but women roaring isn’t new.

Neither is men cutting women off when they are trying to speak.

Isn’t it ironic that you interrupted me to shout that?

I am a woman, but I am not quiet

I am a woman, but I am not feeble

You are an old man who has difficulty hearing Do not blame me

Do not blame my womanhood

For not roaring to accommodate your needs

35

Teenagers pack the unruly hall

There are no smiles, not one at all

We trudge to class in hopeless dismay Wishing that school could wait a day But look! There’s a man in a bow tie!

Waving and beaming while we walk by

He nods and chirps “Good morning” to me For a grinning moment, I agree

36

Before you, this place seemed So formal and meticulous Like a hive

Everyone flits and flutters in calculated combs‌ Busy and forgetful–

Rushing too many thoughts in their minds Like drones sticking to their daily grind You took me by the hand

And showed me there is more to life than Living fast and dying slowly When our wonders frolic And curiosity has a soul Life tastes like honey

Golden and diaphanous,

Reminiscent of grassy meadows and orange trees Wafting like a whisper about the breeze Sweet and syrupy,

Trickling down goose-bumped fingers Sticking like a thought that lingers

37

Our adventure begins at the gates,

Its vague promise floating in our minds.

On rainy nights, we stand out in the cold Looking into hope’s window The warm luster,

Our hungry yearning.

So

Close But So

Far

Special thanks to Mr. Brown, my editor, for being the poetry lover that you are. Your ability to recite poems from memory has been both fascinating and inspiring throughout this creative process.

My gratitude to Avery Smith for reading my poetry and to Gabby Gonzalez and Mr. Yee-Fun Yin helping me publish this book.

Copyright Š 2017 by Chloe Frelinghuysen

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author.