r/OCPoetry • u/Cool-Studio1238 • 1d ago
Just Sharing A/S/L?
I need to come clean,
This has been weighing on my mind,
Since before I was sixteen.
Influenced by those online,
I opened the computer.
My naivety took the better of me,
I don't mean to be an accuser.
But there is a website on there,
That I'm sure you're familiar with,
Or I know you are,
Now though its nothing but a myth.
I would skip through faces,
Not knowing what I was searching for,
Clearly knowing i was breaking the law,
But no one ever saw.
Except those who watched,
Who stayed up all night,
Who talked to strangers,
Who gave me the spotlight.
So they ask me the question,
Of age sex location?
Oh the temptation,
To lie to their faces.
Only nine years old.
I could've sworn I was older.
I hope my family doesn't hear this,
We were just starting to grow closer.
But I'm sorry,
I'm sorry to those who I lied to,
I'm sorry to those who I cheated,
And I'm sorry that no one ever knew.
But most importantly,
I need to say sorry to myself.
Because the nine year old is still within me,
Waiting patiently to become free,
Who would get on her knees and plea,
Begging for a way to flee.
But why should I be sorry?
When it's you who asked the question,
Could you not resist the temptation?
Age, sex, location.
2
u/Competitive_Treat_34 1d ago
I think you have something here conceptually, and with phrase ASL. I wonder what happens if you start the poem with “only nine years old” or if the phrase Age, sex, location? Could repeat throughout the poem.
Conceptually, my brain went to Ocean Vuong’s on Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (the poem rather than the book) there’s a stanza that goes: “I wanted to disappear—so I opened the door to a stranger’s car. He was divorced. He was sobbing into his hands (hands that tasted like rust). The pink breast-cancer ribbon on his key chain swayed in the ignition. Don’t we touch each other just to prove we are still here? I was still here once. The moon, distant & flickering, trapped itself in beads of sweat on my neck. I let the fog spill through the cracked window & cover my fangs. When I left, the Buick kept sitting there, a dumb bull in pasture, its eyes searing my shadow onto the side of suburban houses. At home, I threw myself on the bed like a torch & watched the flames gnaw through my mother’s house until the sky appeared, bloodshot & massive. How I wanted to be that sky—to be filled every flight & fall at once.”
1
u/innermonologue4526 1d ago
This was beautiful. I'm new to poetry and attempting to get back into writing. I too found myself on the unspoken website mention within A/S/L. Your use of words is enthralling and kept me reading. Your flow is almost lyrical and I can see the effort you put in. On a deeper note, please forgive yourself if you can. You were just a child as we all were.
1
u/Legitimate_Shift6294 1d ago
This is beautifully worded and so so evocative. Really takes me back to a similar time in my life, why is it that the guilt never truly leaves? I love the rhythm of this, particularly how you used the format, please continue to write about these moments in our lives that linger and how we remember it in such strange detail.
1
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