Spawning Pool—Poetry 2023

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Spawning Pool Poetry Chapbook Spring 2023

Shippensburg University

SpawningPool is a literary arts chapbook published at Shippensburg University by a small and dedicated team of undergraduate students. It is composed of art pieces submitted by undergraduate students of the university.

SpawningPool accepts rolling submissions throughout the year, and we publish our chapbook every spring semester. SpawningPool is a publication of The Reflector, which also accepts submissions year-round, and is compiled each fall semester.

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Contact us: Submissions and inquires: reflect@ship.edu

Spawning Pool Poetry Chapbook, Spring 2023

Text set in EB Garamond

Printed by Shippensburg University

Layout by Olivia Chovanes and Maggie

McGuire

Cover and back collages by Maggie McGuire, made using images originally from U.S. Vogue

2020 edition.

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Poetry Editors

Olivia Chovanes

Maggie McGuire

Poetry Committee Members

Samuel Pittinger

Monica Barefield

Kellin Brownewell

Allen Peterson

Pierce Romey

Piper Kull

Katie Huston

Lea Holler

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Letter from the Editors

As we move into a radically different and ever-changing world shaped by the pandemic, we’ve encountered all sorts of growing pains and challenges along the way. Despite these struggles, we can have faith trusting that the sun will set and rise once again tomorrow. We can find peace in our loved ones and in knowing that we love hard and feel deeply. Another constant we have is creativity, and its unifying and inspiring power. These are all just some of the elements which go into our personal, societal, and global wellness. As we negotiate our relationship with wellness, we must learn how to balance and prioritize ourselves and our lives.

We are so proud to be able to showcase poems which tell the resilient stories and experiences of our students and our campus. We also would like to express our deep gratitude for our amazing Editorial Board, our

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lovely contributors, and everyone who plays a role in keeping creativity alive on campus. We hope these poems give you something that you have been searching for.

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Theme: The Eight Wonders of Wellness

The pieces collected in this book meditate on wellness and its’ eight dimensions: financial, vocational, environmental, social, intellectual, emotional, physical, and spiritual.

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Theme: The Eight Wonders of Wellness

As I Sit Here Reading

As I sit here reading, The world shifts into slow motion.

Words become the focal point of the camera, everything else in motion blur.

Lens flares flick through the tree leaves,

Light dancing across paper while Wind whistles through branches, Tugging at the corners of the pages beneath my fingertips.

Emily Dziennik

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Unconscious We Fall

We sleepwalk through our lives unconsciously, until one day, we wake up.

Wake up.

The words, screaming from the back of your mind. Begging you to awaken and realize what world you have created for yourself.

Wake up.

Some days you find yourself, eyes wide open, and you look around. The world fills with color. Wake up.

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You fall back into the dream.

Wake up.

You are never truly awake.

Wake up.

And then suddenly your eyes open wide like they never have before.

Wake up.

You’ve never been so aware.

So alert of where you are.

You’ve slept and crawled through your life. Made so many unconscious decisions.

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Listened to those who were conscious as they told you what to do.

You wonder if any decision that has ever been made was truly your own.

Or are you destined to continue to listen to others? Wake up.

You are awake.

And you hope that you will never fall asleep again

Melissa Ulanoski

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One As Two

Dance with me under the harvest moon

Let’s see how your body moves

The dips and sways of a hard day

Bringing one to two

Steps apart from the rest of the crowd

I want to hear you, get loud

Your light shines so bright

Don’t hide it, show the might

The eyes of the sky

Thousands of beings greater than you or I

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Watch in awe as you stride by

So please, walk with pride

Dance with me under the harvest moon

Let’s see how your body moves

The dips and sways of a hard day

Bring one to two

I’ve seen you become

The northern star

You’ve come so far

The question is never who

When you take that floor

The hush is a roar

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Of held breaths

Because you hold what’s best

Dance with me under the harvest moon

Let’s see how your body moves

The dips and sways of a hard day

Bring one to two

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Pierce Romey

Keep On Keeping On

Another day, another dollar, I think that’s how the saying goes.

But can the same be said for the average adult with nothing to give?

College takes all my money, and it is really starting to slowly show.

Gotta “keep on keeping on,” isn’t that how we are encouraged to live?

Day after day, I spend my time getting yelled at inside the workroom.

I just smile, asking myself why I turn the other cheek and forgive?

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My mental tank is nearly empty, and at this point, I’m running on fumes.

Gotta “keep on keeping on,” isn’t that how we are encouraged to live?

I offer my time and care to others, asking for nothing in their return when honestly could I be doing something far more productive?

At this point, my tank is on empty, and I am ready to crash and burn.

Gotta “keep on keeping on,” isn’t that how we are encouraged to live?

But I am given another day to live, so I have not lost the main battle

There is no need for me to give up and only think of the negatives.

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I grit my teeth, tighten my first, and I jump right back on the saddle.

I will “keep on keeping on” as that’s the life I want and will live.

Josiah Horst

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Unmei no Akai Ito

A single red thread fastens us jointly before we actually knew one another.

Conceal the thread, suppress the thread, or scorch the thread, it will still remain.

No matter the distance, destiny will direct our courses for us to end up together.

This thread may be slim and somewhat flimsy, but it is more vital than a steel chain.

As of now, we are living our unique lives desiring to discover the flawless mate.

When our paths cross, it will be a most sensational moment of joy and fulfillment.

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However, It may be a while until I get there, so I cannot promise you I won’t be late.

Through the valley and mountains, I will stand firm, and I will remain resilient.

We are taking a journey through life, learning and developing in preparation.

I swear this duration of time will most undoubtedly be worth the lengthy wait.

I profess we will find each other regardless of the size of the increasing population.

If you do not acknowledge my thinking, then you will have to leave it up to fate.

Josiah Horst

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Suicide on the Moon

I

I do not often look to the moon with such jealousy. If I was there, the rope would slip from around my neck, and I would fall upwards instead of choking. My tears would float about me and become the stars in the night sky and I would scream, yet all would be quiet.

II

I do not look for quiet

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when I stare upwards and catch the moon in its silence. I look for distraction, or the right night to die. I’m looking up for the highest spot to hang the rope but my search is blurred by tears

and with bleeding throat I slowly fall.

III

I do not often look down when I fall.

I am afraid to see when my mind is quiet, the panic can build from anything, and feeds from my tears.

I think it would be peaceful to die on the moon,

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the see the blood droplets seep from my wrists, to tie them in rope

and feel myself give in to the dark night

IV

I do not often sleep at night

out of fear that I’ll miss my fall

my change to try to tie the rope

around my neck and pull tight and be quiet

so she won’t her my attempt to die, my suicide on the moon as silent and silver as my tears

V

I do not often count each of my tears

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at least not the ones that come freely in the night

Those ones I hide and bury, conceal from the moon

If she saw my sadness she would pull away and let me fall

A fall that far would crack my skull and quiet

my thoughts quicker than my neck hung by rope

VI

I do not often have a need to purchase rope

It is more of a want, a cure for tears

a cure for a mind that can’t keep quiet

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I lay down and allow my body to seep into night. My flesh melts from my brittle bones, the tendons and muscles fall into a pool of red, and begin to lift into the sky, because I died on the moon.

VII

I often try to choke on a rope and die in the night

I choke harder on tears that suffocate me, and I fall upwards into the quiet sky, and I kill myself on the moon.

Sydnie Simmons

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The Visitor

I arrived on Earth twenty years ago, squeezed inside a flesh spaceship crafted from paperwork and promises. Some ten odd years ago I touched down to the grass and when my gaze rose I was encompassed–a glistening void of spider eyes

I have yet to sit alone in a subway and listen to the questioning chatter trickle over my shoulders and down my spine.

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What do I say when the station worker approaches to ask that I remove my helmet?

Would my suffocation suffice?

The constellations taunted me five years ago, waving incessantly and crying my name.

My niche-stained fingers tore through covers but it wasn’t enough to shut out the heat.

I resist going back inside the chrome vessel and losing my sanity in a vacuum.

In a hundred years or so you can

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find my bones on display in a Ripley’s Museum, the corpse that touched stars and the hearts of the nation seeker of comfort, last of her kind.

I wish at times upon my home planet but I know lightyears and illusion hide its destruction.

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Sydnie Simmons

Woman’s Walk

I went on the walking tour of womanhood and became a stuttering plate on an all-youcan-eat cart of dessert that stops in front of him

I know that one day I’ll end up dead in the constellations and change into the dress of blood that he leaves on my thighs

it’s supposed to feel like a gentle rain outside of a barn but instead its seven centuries of stand-still

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my future is my history the one where my God is a twin torment man and crimson

Sydnie Simmons

The Mind

Perhaps it is better that I lose it

The care that comes with it and the doleful fringes

Of the pressuring and tempering.

I speak and therefore I am, and I am what they speak.

Perhaps there was less in losing it

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And

the memory making held beyond immortal bridges Shall vapor into the mist

One day to fall softly like a comfortable rain

But that rain shall not fall unto me Because identity is the devil

Perhaps I had found it all and lost myself

Perhaps there never was a self.

Trevor Dixon

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Purifying Pain

My back screams with the agony that my voice cannot

the symbol of God’s divine love is torn from my soul

dove white feathers stained with dirtied blood

My temples pound from the weight of a broken halo eyes straining to see without the shining light the darkness crowding my vision

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My joints ache from the burden of the shackles tied bind and confined in this divinely broken body of mine bending breaking and bearing the weight the heavens have given

Lea Holler

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Growroom

I am in the bedroom that I reached teenhood in

The room I became a woman in The one I left behind for college

There is no night light shining reassuringly Sunlight is blocked from entering The wall I repainted from my favorite colors as a preteen

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To the ladylike green of sophistication

Every time I come back, emotions seep through the walls and flood me

Anger, sadness, jealousy, hate, enjoyment, nostalgia

My room remains as unfinished as I am

My closets still don’t have doors Or flooring

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Or trim

There is a new heat pump

And moldy windows

My bookshelf is from my grandfather's house

There aren’t many books on it now

Some packed away, and others moved to a new larger shelf

My bedframe still has the teeth marks of a dog that passed away years ago

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I passed all of high school in this room

I passed college classes in this room

I’ve grown in this room

As much as it would let me

Lea Holler

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skin.

stretch marks and scar lines among moles and freckles, and oh so many imperfections. feeling everything and nothing all at once.

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hot.

burning hot, up my thighs and the backs of my arms. cold.

freezing, numb.

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tingling

buzzing

itching.

sleepless nights awaiting peace from my skin.

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Jenny Russell

Youth

A golden shovel comprised from a lyric from Flora Cash’s “You’re Somebody Else”

I wish these words felt like a fountain of youth, I go to swallow that liquor of life, moving forward hoping that time might be kind and break these bones slowly. This poem isn’t a fountain, it’s a cry for help as a 20-year-old not able to see a future or a reason to stick around. I race into oblivion with knots in my heart trying to

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slow down the passage of time, the journey that leaves me nothing but dust and dirt in the end.

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Hannah Cornell

Creek Language

Why is it so hard to learn the Muskogee language that belongs to me anyways?

I should have been born with the words in my chokwv.

Though it was not so I had to look it up on my catē laptop.

Only to run into so many pay for my own language.

The words you can find are so simple to use.

Oh, it is so hard to learn my language as a Hokte so far from the tribe.

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At night with the Hvresse peering through my window I know I need to learn.

I can Pohetv my ancestors telling me not to let it dye like them.

The Muskogee Tribe maybe faraway in Oklahoma.

I will Mvskoke opunakv opunayetske because it belongs to me.

Plus, if I have to do it slow and steady, because I will not pay the hvtkē man.

My language should be free as much as English.

Taryn Good

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The mind feels empty, completely devoid of thoughts, but is it truly empty?

No, it is just numb.

When so much chaos hits the brain daily, numb is all that is left.

The thoughts that come are painful, yet tempting.

I will never give way to these thoughts, but I will admit the emptiness,

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Untitled

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the relief of it, would be wonderful.

Raylynn Hupp

this isn’t a cause for concern being alone is just how life tends to go it is impossible to learn but know this moment isn’t all you know you may grow to be decrepit old and gray in your bones yet to you this matter will still be unknown

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just know that you were never on your own to others it may be done with ease remember all you need to do is be

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Pierce

Romey

Lilith

Our precursor, Flown away

She is worthy, Of the kaleidoscope.

Thousands of eyes that peer

Here now the future Pointing to women that know their limit the universe

And refuse to be tethered to HIS earth

Not a vessel for bad seed

Instead seek refuge in their dark deeds and gleefully rest their soft lips on the crest of a silver chalice

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She who embraces her sin onto this world may pick sweet fruit from the tree of life, and in turn

Gains her wings.

Elysium is found in the furthest corner of the eye, where deliverance is heard in echoes of the wind

Revel in their revulsion, the feminine grotesque is not to their compulsion

Here gather hands and sing a song

To which they cannot join along

Jennie Gildner

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i’m drunk ily

in your eyes I hang the sky, spread the stars with calloused fingertips, until the sun is a mere painting on white, empty space but what if I told you the sky is a lie? a myth whispered by the gods to fool mortality and tamper with love so compelling it could split molten earth?

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for you, I would sculpt the universe, carve a corner so small, to remember that all we need to do is be be with each other and no one else until our skin withers and bones rot until the world forgets our names long buried in putrid mold and soot

I do not hang skies or sculpt universes but what if I told you

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your eyes are my Jupiter?

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Megan Gardenhour

Bohemian Climax

rough hands

gaping tongues brush waists grab throats and squeeze. dripping in sex and honey and warm beer

all you gotta do is spit and suddenly you’re there there among the clouds and Phoebe Bridgers lyrics you are allegory a myth

a scary story told in a smoked out doomsday and yet you are exquisite

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I read you like an extended metaphor grazing fluorescent words in a crack journal that they don’t consume with robotic swallows flowering buds sweet of lime dripping down walls of veins only you are the hymn behind closed eyelids the mirror in the shattered bathroom. Megan Gardenhour

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An Apology to a Past-Self

I am sorry about the gaping ribs –the hollow spaces that I created to plant roses in before the soil dried out and the seeds began to rot.

I am sorry about purple sunset skin –the grey and violet marks that I created with a ping-pong ball mindset.

I am sorry they looked nothing like

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the marks he gave you when he thought you looked beautiful.

I am sorry about the crooked edges –the knobby knees and elbows that arose from tightened skin like empty mountains in an oasis after the dessert swallowed them whole.

I am sorry about the hollowed cheeks and corpse-skin.

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I am sorry about mental calculator and the doctor that looked at you in concern.

I’m sorry about the perpetual A-cup and jeans held up by shoelaces.

You’d be proud now, if you could see the oasis. The paradise of curves and luscious mountains, full and alive.

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Hannah Cornell

Sometimes the sunlight hits her face just right, and those amber eyes shine. The sun trails along her cheeks kissing them gently once on each side.

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Sunlight

She lifts her face into its beams, closes her eyes, breathes deepand turns away surrendering her beauty to the shadows.

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Paige Shope

Wonders

I wonder daily

I wonder if I should sleep No says my inner thoughts

I wonder should I eat No says my eating disorder

I wonder should I go out No says my anxiety

Wonders fill my head

Fill my heart with dread

Make me nauseous with inconsistency

I wonder is this really me

I wonder if I can pull myself out

I wonder if therapy will help the doubts

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I wonder if friends and family are support enough

I wonder if I’ve had enough

I wonder if I love myself I wonder if my motivation has changed my perspective

I wonder if my drive has altered my perception

I wonder if I could help someone else

Someone like me

Someone full of “I wonder”

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Alexis Jones

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Acknowledgments

We would first like to thank everyone who submitted work to us. You truly are the heartbeat that keeps creativity alive on campus.

Secondly, we want to thank our poetry committee for all their help, and of course our lovely E-Board, who guide and empower us every day.

Another special thanks to Kim Hess, Creative Services Manager, for all her help with producing this publication in print.

Finally, we also want to thank Neil Connelly, the advisor of The Reflector, and the other faculty, especially those in the English Department, who continually advocate for the arts in their lives and on our campus.

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Spawning Pool—Poetry 2023

Shippensburg University

Poetry Editors

Poetry Committee Members

Letter from the Editors

Theme: The Eight Wonders of Wellness

Theme: The Eight Wonders of Wellness

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

As I Sit Here Reading

Unconscious We Fall

One As Two

Keep On Keeping On

Unmei no Akai Ito

Suicide on the Moon

The Visitor

Woman’s Walk

The Mind

And

Purifying Pain

Growroom

Or trim

Youth

Creek Language

i’m drunk ily

Bohemian Climax

An Apology to a Past-Self

Wonders

Acknowledgments