Opera Length: Ars Poetica by Isabelle Kim-Sherman (17, California)

The miner gouges deep
Fingernails like crescent-moons into the throbbing
​
Pock-marked landscape of a bleeding half-thing
Pulls from within the cavernous gaping ravine

A diamond winking like cut glass

Metabolizing masticizing cannibalizing
He rubs salt into the wound to bring out the flavor

He secures it with wide sutures that pull taut
Before the tender flesh breaks free

Meanwhile the oyster squirms in its shell
Winces as it writhes and tries to avoid
This new sand-grain nightmare

The intruder grows iridescent safe
In the loving dark

The miner picks up the oyster like a stone
Pries open its jaw pulls out
The treasure with hooked fingers

He wonders how it shines without tears

He wonders how the pearl’s ineffable roundness
Is born entirely of a secretion
That seems as natural as laughing