World, hold on, one day you will have to answer to the children of the sky

Children falling from the sky

Landing very softly into arms of you and I

World, hold on

instead of messing with our future look up at the sky

Hold on, no necessity for worry when you look up at the sky

World, oh my, instead of looking to the future

won’t you look at you and I

Girl, don’t cry

don’t you see that there are children, falling from the sky

World, goodbye

One day you will catch the children falling from the sky

Don’t waste time, Stop Narcan from crossing State Lines

Sky scrapers scrape skies

Ted bundy raped guys

Fentanyl saves lives

ODs prevent hate crimes

She was wonderful. Dark hair flowed onto soft shoulders and her green eyes could put butterflies in the sternest man’s stomach. Her eyes grinned in a way that gave the impression you shared something secret. Something scandalous and hilarious.

Her white tan lines blessed her otherwise dark shoulders and collarbone. Her cheeks naturally smooth and colorful. She talked with a sweet voice and made little innocent jokes that could stick in a man’s head for days.

Today she ate a nectarine on a sun lounger in your best friend’s backyard. It was pretty hot out and you guys had been playing basketball in the park for about an hour and decided to call it a day and make smoothies. You’re met with her sweet laugh as you attempt to close the sticking plastic screen door behind you and step into the sun. She’s “reading” a book for school and tanning.

Their mom emerges around the side of the house. “Natalya did you walk the dog this morning?” she asks with slight impatience.

“No mom, Erik said he would but he only walked her for like five minutes”.

You and Erik had walked her around the block and then walked to the store to get frozen berries for the smoothie.

Erik and Natalya’s mom is a kind and funny woman. She is both funny on purpose and funny unintentionally but in a good way. For example, two weeks ago, she went on a solo trip six hours away down the Oregon Coast to attend a mushroom hunting weekend in the forest.

Three sheep sit on a brown hill

One sheep rolls down the hill and picks up much straw in its wool

When it reaches the top of the hill after sullenly climbing back up the other sheep start eating the straw off of its wool.

The other sheep begin to cough because they accidentally swallow some wool

8 late

“It ain’t late

It’s only eight

Stack your plate”

“Okay mate”

*eats late

“Wait…”

Annotations and Analysis:

• We are to assume from speaker two’s hesitation about eating late that there is some stigma around eating late.

• Speaker 1 uses slang

  ain’t means isn’t 
  

• Speaker 1 tricks speaker 2 into eating past eight which is considered late

Discussion Question:

How does the story change if it is revealed that the author’s use of slang does not stop at the word “ain’t”, but includes references to the slang word “ate” meaning to do well, impress, or look good?