OTTAVIA PALUCH
Sonnet on Escape
At the end of the tunnel, there’s always
light. Somehow, I know that’s a myth because
the sky is black, and I am still alive,
like how a bird runs into a building
the way a building runs into a bird.
By accident. By mistake. By a choice
between life and death. But birds fly. They don’t
walk fine lines between sleep and salvation.
Which is to say I do it all the time,
and find a way to somehow call it flight.
I have grown out of my shoes; I’m ready
to leap off of the subway and into
the sea. I want to be like the water—
waiting years to turn blue, and then drowning.
Previously published in Plum Recruit Mag
Ottavia Paluch is a disabled high school student from Ontario, Canada. Her work is published or forthcoming in Four Way Review, Hunger Mountain, Gigantic Sequins, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and Best Canadian Poetry, among other places. She’s also an alumna of the Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program, Flypaper Lit’s Flight School, and the Iowa Young Writers Studio. She writes the Substack newsletter Things You Otter Know (ottavia.substack.com) and her portfolio of published work can be found at ottaviawrites.weebly.com.