After My Last Game

Contest Winner

Teagan Oliva

Half past five in the morning

I lie on the half court line

of my high school gym

and can’t move

and can’t think

and can’t breathe.

Freshly inflated with brand-new logos

the basketballs lie there too

but they mock me now,

with silence

and stillness.

There is a strange 

new emptiness in my bones.

And in that moment 

I know I have to get 

up off the floor because 

you can’t lie with the 

basketballs forever and 

the half court line won’t

ever move.

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Teagan Oliva is a sophomore at RMC currently majoring in English education. She loves her ENG 122: Creative Writing class and her entire women’s golf team with all her heart, and she can’t survive a day without a cup of coffee.