Leave This Song Behind

Teen Poetry at Its Best

Adam Halwitz, John Meyer, Stephanie Meyer

• Publisher: Health Communications Inc EB
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9780757318962
• eBook ISBN: 9780757318979
• Subtopic: Poetry

It's been 10 years since the last book in the Teen Ink series Written in the Dirt was published. Now, a whole new batch of teen writers has emerged with their own unique voices. Leave This Song Behind features the best poetry submitted by those writers to Teen Ink over the last five years. The pieces in this book were chosen because they were so powerful that they stood out from the rest. Teen Ink editors took a deep look into each poem's strengths then divided Leave This Song Behind into seven sections based on the poetic techniques or qualities that moved them most. Vivid sensory details made some poems shine; others caught their attention with simple, sparse language. Still others were chosen because of their thoughtful use of form; compelling stories; strong figurative language; unexpected connections and wit; and fresh writing about familiar topics.Dig in and let these brave young voices capture your heart and mind with their passion, their pain, and their amazing poetry!

CHAPTER THREE

Get into Shape

Poems that play with structure, form, and sound

In Poetry, a new cadence means a new idea.

—Amy Lowell

orange hospital bracelet

i see you blurry burgundy

when you talk about heart problems

though your shirt is gray.

the hospital is terrifying,

white sterilized to

death.

i learned from waiting

room magazines that blood is

blue until it’s oxygenated, and

osteosarcoma is highly curable

unless it takes a liking to

you.

dr. green talked to you without

me, like preparation,

and i prayed to your red iv drip—

please don’t leave me

here, pale alone and

alive.

Sophia Shelton

serena

my sister was born as a holy mess, like

an appendix like a grenade, a heart like a

printer jamming when your final paper is

due in five minutes, veins like chewed

straws, salt columns for legs dissolving in

water. like, she’s the blessed saint of falling apart.

like, picture this brown angel woman on

her knees. like, serena dies. like, serena lives.

like, picture this: chaos made of water and

words. serena’s brown body is a pitfall

of a body, her mouth is a sinkhole of a

mouth, and i can see ships capsizing between

her teeth. like, seismic-shiver mouth. like,

she rots quickly to cold soil and flies. like,

her body doesn’t even matter. like, her

body is all that matters.

like, she is made of body and of nothing

but body.

like, she’s not ashamed as she realizes she is

our father’s daughter. like...

Table of contents

• COVER
• Praise
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• CONTENTS
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• INTRODUCTION
• FOREWORD
• CHAPTER-ONE
• CHAPTER-TWO
• CHAPTER-THREE
• CHAPTER-FOUR
• CHAPTER-FIVE
• CHAPTER-SIX
• CHAPTER-SEVEN
• POETS-NOTES
• EDITORS
• PERMISSIONS