Loss of youth By Alyssa Trivett

If you never made a paper football,

flicked it across a gum covered desk,

as your friend stuffed a Zero skateboard in a locker or 

had magazine tear outs plastered in your 

room of your favorite bands,

it’s loss of youth. Or is it?

Terrible eyeshadow.

Married couples who were friends,

now divorced.

The scar on your head from when you fell in the hall is 

now covered in curves of somewhat wrinkled skin and has faded.

Multivitamins.

Sunset afternoons without a jacket

as the day ran away and

our parents never knew where we were,

only that we existed somewhere in the ether.

Climbing and scaffolding empty houses,

Bill relieved himself in the corner bucket.

Trampoline thoughts. Broken wrist as I went over the 

fence.

Karate chops.

Softball cleats and chips of plastic pieces missing. Still 

have my mitt under my bed, no use but the relic that it 

is.

Put a note in that guy’s locker even though he never called me.

Asked a guy to a dance. He ended up living with a different parent shortly after that and never heard from him again.

Nickelodeon. Romantic comedies. Disney made for TV movies.

Vintage video games.

Gain of religion.

Some sort of pop punk and emo upbringing. One more Fall Out Boy show.

Scars from street hockey.

Still bad eye shadow. Makeup pads.

Wanting to make it big as a videographer someday. 

College degree. Years went 0 to 60 in a millisecond.

21, bottles of wine, beer, coffee. Nothing else. Only hope in my bloodstream and a light for those who need it.

Men don’t change.

Unanswered texts but don’t worry about that.

Loss of religion.

Seeing Bad Religion and The Academy Is 

at Riot Fest.

Hot Mulligan blasting.

Alkaline Trio. Thrice. Paramore. 

Midwest emo. Indie. Whatever.

Listen to music all millennium.

Focus on yourself, friend.

Count your blessings with cherished memories and VHS fast forward through the forgotten bad ones that should be left in a soppy paper cup in a parking lot somewhere.

I’ve been to more funerals than I can tally. Distance between friends and unintentional lines in the sand of only

 lost contact. 

Reconnecting, too.

Lift yourself into the next year.

You as well, friend, you as well.

Look up.

Alyssa Trivett is a wandering soul from the Midwest. When not working two jobs, she chirps down coffee while scrawling lines. Her work has appeared in many places, but most recently at Ex Ex Lit, and Duane's PoeTree