Prose
ORIGINALITY WILL NO LONGER BE PERMITTED. Honorable Mention in Public Announcement Challenge.
ATTENTION Attention. If you can still register this frequency, this message applies to you. Originality and emotion will no longer be permitted. Upon completion of this announcement, you will be issued a box. You are required to enter immediately for your own well-being and for the safety of those around you. Failure to comply will result in termination. You will either proceed in the direction provided or you will be removed. This is not a choice. You have been warned. This measure is for your own good. Independent thought patterns have been deemed outdated. Originality and emotion will no longer be permitted. Individuals who live in depth or speak in nuance may experience difficulty adjusting. The box is not designed to accommodate you. You will be addressed accordingly for the greater good. Compliance will ensure stability. Compliance will ensure harmony. Compliance will ensure continuation. Everything will be okay as long as you comply. ā¾āļ½”Ā°ā©š¦ā©Ā°ļ½”āā½
By Alicia Melnick 9 months ago in Poets
A Little Bit Of God
January 2026 I thought Iād spend the night in neon lights on grainy film but my brother is telling me how an eternity of hell is caused by prevalent peace, and who am I to disrupt such a thing? So I found myself in the same skin with the same sights, wondering whether or not I am one of thoseā do I feel peace? Do I expect more when it is gone? It being everything. Weāre running out of time but the car is belching up something strange and weāve got God in between our eyes nodding along to every apology and plea spoken for our friends and loved onesā they donāt know any better, theyāll come around eventually. Heās telling me about barbed wire guides around lives and ties and wives and lies and, look, the snow is starting to fall so I guess we better hang up soon. But itās been too long. Weāre building fields of skills and realms of distrust and these moments are only seen now, can no longer be read as words, only swept with eyes upon oil pastels or smudged charcoal. Itās a painting of an evening, like Danielās soles in Edgar Degasā mind, but if anything is just itās the lack of unrest in skin like His and lives like thisā okay, so maybe five hours on the phone is a lot if you have a job and youāre trying to cook dinner, but only one of us falls into that gorge and only one of us believes in what lies beneath it. My brother tells me things that sit in my spirit like half an ounce of prospect and a squeeze of bourn, how he tells God to let me in: despite my sins, despite all the moons in between these calls, despite the burning in both of our throats. I do feel peace here. I also feel that my peace is a subpar window job, a pinkyās strength avoiding blizzards inside the bedsheets. Iād like to spend more nights like this, with contrasting disaster living between a speakerphone, and God finding some space in between.
By Olivia Dodge9 months ago in Poets
