By Nicola Rodriguez
11th grade, Bear Creek High School, CO
Third place contest winner
With lines from “State of Change: Ancient Trees in North Carolina” by Frank Graff, a Pulitzer Center reporting project
time travel exists
but in my life
I have only time traveled
once
I stood in an ancient room
laden with silence
yet the
mouths of voices
still felt fresh in the air
and dampened
my tongue when
they spoke
the sun was younger then
than he is now,
so
the stained win
dow
panes let him in
gently
and laid him down on the empty bed
in my hands
time unwinded
slipping beyond my reach
as it came undone
I held the thread
and stood alongside
the sun
whose weary eyes
looked into mine
as he read to me
a faded chapter
he had written long before my time
***
i’ve heard stories
about what the sun is like now
and how the ocean
has grown so hungry
it laps at the feet
of cypress trees
two thousand years older
than you and i
i know where
the daughters of giants
reside
on the edge of our busy world
collecting time
like rainwater
in black river
hardwood forests
i know what it's like
to stand in a place
where time wraps
it's hot
arms
around
you
and the sun is still soft
against your hardened skin
as he opens your eyes
so you can see
forever
into a simpler past
where the world doesn’t spin
so fast and
time travel
is just living
from each day
to the next
***
we
will never know
what in their lifetime their eyes have seen
two millennia of weather east
of the Rockies
carved down to tree rings
whose bands run
thinner
in dry years
to fit ‘round the fingers
of little men
who care less for time traveling
than for what greed can build for them
dry
wet
dry
drought and extreme storms
chemicals and waste
poisoning headwaters in the coastal plane
what does greed break?
greed weighs
so heavily upon
the spines of men
that they make
insatiate machines
made to gnaw
on old bones
and to lunge
at the throat
of the earth
the truth is
time travel is a dying art
few ports remain for travelers
ancient rooms and cypress trees alike
the tragedy of the commons is real
and the battle of greed
will carry on through the night
from my journey
i’ve learned
one leap of time
is worth two human paces
and although we cannot outrun it
we must try
Nicola Rodriguez is a rising senior at Bear Creek High School in Lakewood, Colorado. Nicola believes strongly in the positive power of creative expression, whether it be shared with others or used as a personal outlet. Through songwriting, poetry, journaling, and art, Nicola expresses the value she sees in the world around us and the connections we build inside it.
Read more winning entries from the 2022 Fighting Words Poetry Contest.