BAPL would like to thank all of our participants for participating in the first-ever Summer Reading Writing Contest, “Imagine Your Story.” For the writing contest, the community was asked to submit an original prose or poem imagining their lives through the eyes of COVID-19. Participants responded through their writings what it’s been like living through a pandemic. Three winners were selected for prizes, which were generously provided by the Friends of the Library! Congratulations to Joseph W., Allie E., and I.F. Evans who won first, second, and third place in the contest. We’ve included their entries below for the whole community to enjoy!
First Place
Joseph W.
“Breath Like Moths Against a Window”
I wake when the moths knock against my window,
pulling back and diving in confusedly to get close to the light—
that gentle thump of something unknowingly
wrong,
like curiously tapping a fishbowl or piling grains of sand in
a shallow hourglass.
Like them, I’m drawn to the window to peer out at the coming summer pooled in
the moonlight,
and I feel the world breathing again,
with that low April breeze and the foxes snickering and tumbling in the flowers,
with the sputter of traffic stopped up and left in driveways and along streets,
with the grass blades so green and the cherry blossoms so pink,
with the magnolia tree reflecting soft light into my room,
with the moths knocking against my window.
Then why is everything so still?
Why do the cornfields sit pale and cracked like thin-worn hands from too much
washing?
Where are the faraway trains’ click-clack and blaring horns?
Where is the crackle of roaring firepits and grills?
Who’s silenced the playground screams and bus stop chatter?
Who’s taken the jangle of distant festivals and concerts?
Who’s plucked the trudging airplanes from the sky?
Have all the church bells crumbled to the ground?
Could there even be a funeral?
Where are all the gregarious gatherings not tinged with
guilt?
Where are all the goodbye hugs not wrapped in a hush?
Where are all the goodnight kisses not laced with poison?
When will my folks not look so scared and unsure?
When will my brother emerge from his bedroom?
When will my friends and I meet again?
Where is that nightly purr we listen for when we can’t sleep, that reminds us that
we and the world still breathe?
Why is it all just moths knocking against the window?
And like their vision, this window is a contrast of colors and faces begging
me to choose.
What life is in this breath becomes a mirror, an artist, another:
a happy face with bleach on its lips,
an impression with rusted bumps on its skin,
an idle image with eyes bloodshot from blue light,
a squirming, squiggling me trapped in all the air bubbles and
glassy imperfections—
what I see when I get close enough,
with the familiar moths knocking against it.
But this Earth, these countries and states, this land—I still breathe with the
passing summer:
Drumming with millions of marchers in the wake of murder;
Pulsing with the stalwart hum of doctors, nurses, scientists, firemen and
paramedics, sanitation workers and custodians, teachers, shop owners, factory
and warehouse workers;
And writhing with these bare faces, pretty speeches, and acceptable losses
looking in on me from my window on an August night cooled by the remnants of a
tropical storm,
like those moths that would knock and wake me—
too soon to go back to sleep against
these crooked raindrops,
too soon to breathe like before when
we were close enough.
Second Place
Allie E.
“Remember Covid, Remembering Me”
The world has been hushed
It’s early yet
The morning sky is about to burst
Today is no ordinary day
Today I will attempt to home school my daughter for the thirty-second day in a row
I am thirty-two years old
She is five
Most days end with both of us in tears and yelling
I tell myself that I can do hard things
I’ve been isolated long enough that I started to read again
I hold a book to my face and close my eyes
I run my thumb over the crisp pages and I inhale the fictional breeze
That smell
The smell of a new book
It takes me back to wandering shelves in Waldenbooks
I remember getting excited for book fairs at school
I can see myself sitting in my room or in the car
In a hotel or on an airplane
On the beach or in a tent
With a brand new adventure in my hands
Imagination gone wild
There are always people walking past the house now
Some wear masks
We don’t because we are walking the dog to get fresh air
To exercise and to get out from being in for so long
It is inevitable that my daughter has to come grocery shopping with me
We wear masks
She knows that there is a virus and that’s why we wear them
We have to keep ourselves safe and help keep others safe
She knows this
So when we’re in the coffee aisle and her mask slips off her ear she yells, “Oh no!”
Pure panic
Pure calm
I tell her, “It’s okay. We can fix it.”
She is so aware
She is lonely
She is sad and frustrated
She misses her teacher
She misses her friends
She wants to hug her Grandparents again
She wants to play at the park
I tell her that she can do hard things
It’s hot outside
We get ready to go into our new pool that is a mere two and half feet deep
My daughter loves it
Sunscreen
I could breathe in my daughter’s skin for hours after I put sunscreen on her
When I’m finished she closes her eyes, “Mm-mm, it smells like Summer.”
Yes
It smells like a day at the beach
It smells like building sand castles and diving into waves
It smells like a walk on the boardwalk
Water and salt
Sunscreen and sunshine
I had a dream a few weeks ago
There was this undeniable pressure on my chest
I couldn’t breathe I woke up gasping for air that could not reach my lungs quick enough
It was terrifying
Someone told me it sounded like I had a panic attack in my sleep
Awesome
Nothing is normal anymore
Maybe nothing was normal to begin with
I didn’t get much time to do a lot of soul searching during this pandemic
But as long as I have my daughter, my dog, a new book and some sunscreen
I am found
Third Place
I.F. Evans
“Apoppycockalypse”
Pundits and prognosticators, a plethora of prophecies—
pure poppycock.
The apocalypse happened.
We plodded on, pretending it didn’t.
Is it a testament to our resiliency
that we plowed right through,
or a testament to our stupidity
that we didn’t even pause to ponder
the precarious position in which we’ve been placed?
Famine, Pestilence, War, and Death.
The four horsemen arrived. We paid them no mind.
Famine was first, but nobody spoke up.
We produce so much product, but poverty’s the problem.
A preposterous percent of people in the most prosperous nations
struggle each day to put food on their plates.
When Pestilence appeared, it was more palpable—
the first wave of the virus being painfully pernicious.
What we didn’t account for, was it perhaps just the precursor?
More virulent viruses could soon come our way.
Produced, propagated, or new evolutions,
we’re at risk for more plagues as we limp along.
War popped up next, in a devious way.
The wars overseas—while appalling—were distractions
pulling perception away from the wars brewing
right under our noses.
Race. Sex. Gender. Religion. Beliefs.
Integral parts of who we all are,
and sadly, grounds for some people to hate.
That brings us to Death,
the last of the promised horsemen.
I hear the hooves of the pale horse now.
Is it too late to stop it? Are we as a whole predestined to perish?
What panacea can prevent our extinction?
Giving. Caring. Loving. Living.
The four horsemen of a new golden age.
Share what you can with poor neighbors in need.
Take care of others when they’re feeling peaked.
Love one another, as you want to be loved.
Live and help live; don’t be part of the problem.
Let’s turn the end times to party times, and pass into a new era.
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Thank you to all who participated!