HELLI FANG
ars poetica
caged in the herring’s rib, my throat,
bleached blue by silence, pulled
the last latch, limbs still
strapped to a bullet
belonging to someone else: &
when my body entered flesh
it turned into rain, an arrowhead
boxcut from stalactite
and salt, trying to spin a bowl
of wedding rings back
into clay, miming a language
with ice cubes for teeth: not about
where the lake hides, but whether
it wants to be seen. to write a poem
is to build a burning body.
Helli Fang is a senior at Walnut Hill School for the Arts in Natick, Massachusetts. Her writing has been recognized by the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, and she has attended the Iowa Young Writer's Studio. Her poetry has been published or is forthcoming in the Adroit Prizes 2016, Wildness, Yellow Noise and Glass Kite Anthology. When Helli is not writing, she enjoys playing the violin and climbing trees.