Competition

Highly Commended

Sever Lingering Maths-itis
by Nina Carpenter
Karana Downs, Qld

I look at my timetable
And groan.
Double maths

Maths is simple
1 + 1 always equals 2
But.
Maths is complicated...

In one house, Theta has left Alpha and Beta
And is now deciding whether
It should go out with Sin, Cos or Tan.
Next door, Pythagoras is working out
The sum of the squares of the other 2 sides
Down the street, the Exponentials are
Having a fight with the Polynomials
Over growth and decay.
Across the road, the Surds
Are having a fight with the Indices
And the Simultaneous Equations are
Angry because they weren't invited.
Upstairs, Area and Perimeter are
Getting to know Volume, who's
Gossiping about the relationship
Between Expanding and Factorising.
And in a corner, the Quadratic Trinomials
Are having a conversation with Measurement
About Chance and Statistics moving house.
And meanwhile, Money and Factorials
Have run away because
Nobody understands them.

All this leaves me with a headache
And a bad case of
Severe Lingering Maths-itis

Highly Commended

Spoken
by Clara Fannjiang
Davis, CA, USA

blood of imbeciles
the taste of steel
against charred lips
will you speak? to me
silence
fingers of ashes smear your vivid eyes
paraded as a narcotic romance
Paris in the folds of night
yes, what a rebel you are.
Strachybotrys atra death-drenched mold plumes in this color
the inside of a lock
stenches with a nothingness
you can't explain.
your voice is a city
with its streetlights and stars
shot out. no one can touch your face
it hazes here in my eyes
sable, gritted teeth in misled agony
the putrid lung of a smoker
you will not give words. to anyone
my tears drip, my spittle turns black
from the cigarettes.

but maybe you will not be missed
in a world of such red-eyed insurgents
they swallow you with lust
this is what you wanted
is it not?