Haley King

Emotions Are for Children

I ate anger like candy. It fell down
my throat coating it—sticky, and sat
in my stomach until I felt hollow. I buried our time
together in the sandbox out back
and stored our pictures and my sadness inside
the stuffed bear on your dresser. I threw the smiles
you made out with the schoolwork and junk
mail. Your concert tee is folded
neatly in a locked box, but the passcode is your
birthday— the only numbers I couldn’t
(I tried to) forget.

Haley King is a current student at Salisbury University minoring in Creative Writing, and this is her first publication. Her work explores the uncomfortable tensions of loss.