Hot sun does not deter the boy shooting a basketball in the driveway
Past the hoop, green leaves are still on a cloudless day
A block to the left and three up four polos engage in semantics
The party meanders on around them
A boy sits in the chair on the lawn reading a book,
At the same time eyeing the plastic table at the other end of the yard
Not for what's on it but for those who reside in its vicinity
The mosquitos shatter the idyllic scene and the boy turns the page
Elsewhere, a girl looks out of her window
The pool she did not dig lies outside
Her thoughts betray a deep desire, as deep as the pool
Yet she turns from the window nonetheless and retreats to her desk
Scared of what would be exposed should she end her ensconcement
In the East, there is a field
A game is being played
The players ebb and flow around the ball
The parents look on, before notifications overwhelm their parental sensibilities
In the West there is a house on a street
A gray wall marks the end of its yard
But it can’t keep out the sounds of hundreds of cars
In the center of town, a man, always a man, sits
He hopes to laugh at what he hears but he is always shocked
Overwhelmed by his own self importance
He is run over and lost in it all
In the supermarket, the people walk for hours
Oppressed by fluorescent lights
Pained as they may be, only half realize it
The cart gesticulates across the reflective floors,
Jumping over its own broken wheel
In the park the children play
Far from the slides, in their own world
The older ones scoff when they pass,
The much older ones sigh
In one house,
A house with an uneven yard,
A nobody chaffs at the attitudes of those surrounding them
A garden party life is not one they will accept
Regardless of whether or not they realize their quest is based on vanity
They wish to turn into somebody, anyone at all
Lest they become what they fear the most:
The bargain-brand, stripped-down equivalent of whatever they aspire to be
These people are the kind where no matter their direction, can never reach the end of either side
To the nobody, they are simply fake
Whether or not the nobody is correct, only they can determine
Van Damiani is in the 11th grade at Randolph-Macon Academy in Front Royal, Virginia. He is a founder of both his school’s debate club and literary magazine. He spends his free time writing and playing guitar with some video gaming on the side. He hopes to study abroad in Italy someday and eventually beat Elden Ring.
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