Instead of grief
try calling it your soul
holding your hand through the winter.
Last February, I
saw a white car belly-up on the freeway.
In the mosaic window was the body—
the man—
coiled in splotchy milkweed spurting from
cracks in the pavement, in a pressed shirt crusted with brown.
The brevity of life is like the campfire burn of
childhood—we’re inhaling chlorine at the community
center swimming pool, but in a breath we’re butterflying
across the water. We forget the third grade pizza parties
and the construction paper hats we cut out for the hundredth
day of school. I’m trying to remember. The feel of light
on my face after snow cut the city into contours. The wild
strawberries erupting red and plump by my driveway. The
New York cheesecake crescent moon. I love this life but I am
constantly moving in my own shadow. Some days it’s like my mind
is 238,855 miles away, buried in gray lunar dust under
my bed. Laughing with my friends from a sticky alien
mouth. I would like myself back.
holding your hand through the winter.
Last February, I
saw a white car belly-up on the freeway.
In the mosaic window was the body—
the man—
coiled in splotchy milkweed spurting from
cracks in the pavement, in a pressed shirt crusted with brown.
The brevity of life is like the campfire burn of
childhood—we’re inhaling chlorine at the community
center swimming pool, but in a breath we’re butterflying
across the water. We forget the third grade pizza parties
and the construction paper hats we cut out for the hundredth
day of school. I’m trying to remember. The feel of light
on my face after snow cut the city into contours. The wild
strawberries erupting red and plump by my driveway. The
New York cheesecake crescent moon. I love this life but I am
constantly moving in my own shadow. Some days it’s like my mind
is 238,855 miles away, buried in gray lunar dust under
my bed. Laughing with my friends from a sticky alien
mouth. I would like myself back.
Fall 2026
Sierra Elman is the 2026-2027 Santa Clara County Youth Poet Laureate. She has been recognized by The Adroit Journal, The Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, DePaul's Blue Book: Best American High School Writing, and many others. Sierra is also the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Marmalade Lit and is an alumna of the Adroit Journal's Summer Mentorship Program and the Kenyon Review’s Young Writers Workshop.
Art: L. I. Henley
“Scorpio Girl: After Rebecca Hart Olander's Singing from the Deep End,” 2026
Colored pencil, acrylic, notebook paper, found The Jesus and Mary Chain album art
“Scorpio Girl: After Rebecca Hart Olander's Singing from the Deep End,” 2026
Colored pencil, acrylic, notebook paper, found The Jesus and Mary Chain album art