The Forgotten Stories

I heard the bad news. It had been since 2010, and i wrote that poem on the wall sometime 2008 when i was president of the Literacy Circle and literacy sweetheart. The young new administration of my old highschool decided to paint the walls a prision grey, covering all the art in school. Luckily, a design student studying animation and drawing at Ringling Art and Design, took photos of the Literacy Circle room and the pillars so she could have memories of her highschool days. I wrote the poem and a girl named Jesse drew the anime girl. I was pleasantly surprised to see the added artwork: the ortherkin holding a book out to her and all the cosmos. I wonder when that part was added.  The Latin quote to her left is “In books, freedom.”

Back when I signed my work G. S. Malave, here’s the poem I wrote on the school house wall:

I’ll go to the back of the library

My fingers walking on their spines

I could hear the stories screaming

“When will you read mine?”

I try my hardest and take a peak

I open the book and let them breathe

The forgotten stories are so thankful

That as I begin to read

I begin to only wonder

What it will be like for me.

How long will by bright new book

stand on the shelf?

How long until my story

Becomes as lonely as everyone else?

How long will I have to wait

for a girl just like me ? –

Who will walk to the back of the library

And lose herself in all of

the forgotten stories?

 

Thank you to Mrs. Railing, the librarian who let me do that on the wall. When I read this poem  I’m a little bit chilled. I thought I’d have a book of my own by now and also, I am the girl now walking back through the books, looking for the person I used to be.