The likeness of a girl resigned to be a cheap counterfeit brick
in the hulking wall of dead poets stacked to heaven and back
fifty times. She wishes, when there is not a word on earth that
feels pristine, that the artists would just take their goddamned
art with them to the sky. But the words, with a sudden glint of
lotus flower feigned virginity, rub the thought from her head
every time. So she remains a girl, fraught with words that are far
more beautiful than she will be. And how sad it is for a girl to know
that she’ll spend her life trying to get close to the shrouded part of
her soul that can touch words as if they were lovers. How sad it is,
she thinks, for a girl to write up a fleeting midnight portrait that is
completely bodiless, yet more substantial than herself.
Packingtown Review – Vol.15, Spring 2021
Emily Bornstein is presently the Editor-in-Chief of her high school’s literary
magazine and the school newspaper. She also enjoys playing the guitar
and piano, and volunteering in a social skills group for children with
special needs.
