If I Wanted To

Artwork by Helen Liu, staff artist

Free will is a silly mistake from God.

I do not challenge Him on my many qualms but I do

ask why sin was made so enticingly. I am a sinner. I am

a murderer. I am a porn star who has cum too soon

for the mouth to spit. Spitting should be sinning

and I hear the horse’s hooves in the sky. My time nears

so I spit my hairy saliva out on the ground. Where my

spit embraces the ground, a crack emerges. I place my

eye above to see Hell but all I see is dirt which is also

where I will end up one way or another. Hell is not

underneath. It is here, in my mind and always has been.

It is a drunken man with half his penis out. He drives a

limousine yelling “I can do anything!” and because

he is a man, he can.

Because he is a man, nothing in him is built to break

quite yet. When he does break, what does he do? I am

riding with a horseman to Venus. What do I do? I

finish, of course.

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Jabez wants to die at the age of ninety but is not sure of how yet (probably of old age whatever that means). He is eighteen and a freshman at Yale University, where he wants to major in English and possibly Film and Media Studies. He is attending as a QuestBridge scholar. In the past, his writing has been recognized by Scholastic Art and Writing as a Silver Medalist for his short fiction.

Helen Liu is a seventeen-year-old Chinese-American from Basking Ridge, New Jersey. When she isn't swamped in schoolwork, she likes writing late into the night, playing piano, trying her best at watercolor, and spending time with friends. Also, at any given time, it's more likely she's listening to music than not. Though her stories and poems are often focused on her personal passions and struggles, she also takes inspiration from her favorite pieces of literature and important current issues.