The Alleynian 704 2016

blooded began to hang

Crabs Drowning in the Aquarium On Piru Street, 1972

seen through glass screens seeing broken dreams and burst spleens if you look in eyes eaten eating and feeding from scraps barely breathing and those who seeing demons believing you are the reason does the wave cross your mind that realised both lies become fatal, drowning, drowning pits of pain flooded and in its whirl and sceptre you see your own conflicted by sharks

for those stand out, give ’em chalk and tell that the fangs out, cookin’ sand between the toes, ants under tracked skin, waterboard the hood, tsu- beach for those who

crip walk on a blood grave, slave to asphalt ocean wired into red dolphins rollercoastin’ floating, beauty in danger makes the glass half empty but when we cliff jump pistol pump sharks lean purple sling his torso leant broken

their fins glistening

my gills open which pit you from, cauldron you claiming, no anenome nemo’s dead in the gutter chalk from fallen shells rip a crab in half over these crip legs back to scrappin’ with the scraps that we got float with the flotsam, we’ll tie you in knots now get off my curb i’ll puff your candle out, timer out, puffer fish spikes no tracks no track meet put this round your neck

Thomas Whittaker (Year 11)

Winner of the Middle School House Poetry Competition

nami the crack in, human

condition bound to pain swimming behind my eyes hourglass breaking in my frame faded folding drowning in sorrow once lived behind

Author’s note: This poem is an attempt to recreate the atmosphere of hip- hop records produced in California between 1988 and 1996. The poem uses the sea as a metaphor for gang life, which is often commented upon on these records. The ‘Crabs’ of the title refers to the derogatory term used by the Bloods, one gang, to describe the Crips, another gang. ‘Piru Street, 1972’ refers to the formation of the Bloods.

drowned in separation from craters under the surf but close to breaking, lock ups keep dread like a haitian anticipating the next generation of guppies making duppies in the gutter make him shudder make him feel his timer ticking make him run his sand out bullets keep the crowd out,

triple beams and chrome, dreams drowned by smoke and back alleys, crack houses 5000 more i can’t swim they never taught me alone in the water never knew what it was to belong until they caught me on the corner bubbles blowing and my teeth

dead eyes, torso holed lying cold and lifeless, face shorn of emotion a lovelorn fallen angel drowning, drowning, drowning, drowning, drowning,

and tell me how it feels to swim in the shadow of a great white, will bite, teeth not broken, still bleeding, can’t see the c in my words just the sea

tell ’em hollow needlepoints

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