{"id":22942,"date":"2025-05-20T14:30:37","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T21:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/?page_id=22942"},"modified":"2025-05-20T14:33:30","modified_gmt":"2025-05-20T21:33:30","slug":"2025-peter-sears-poetry-prize-runner-up-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/2025-peter-sears-poetry-prize-runner-up-2\/","title":{"rendered":"2025 Peter Sears Poetry Prize Runner-up"},"content":{"rendered":"

Aubrey Laine Baker “<\/strong>Snaggletooth”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I caught a nosebleed in the bonfire light<\/p>\n

and by some synaptic snap I’m back<\/p>\n

to your snaggletoothed smile.<\/p>\n

Watercolor-rolling<\/p>\n

to puddle in gray,<\/p>\n

I reach, and it stays<\/p>\n

like a pin-prick promise in a pin-drop splash\u2014<\/p>\n

the memory comes through in the smell<\/p>\n

of campfire smoke and dry blood in a nostril.<\/p>\n

I remember\u2014I never used to get nosebleeds<\/em><\/p>\n

until the night I told you you’d never be pretty<\/p>\n

with teeth<\/p>\n

like those<\/p>\n

and your marshmallow-on-a-stick caught fire<\/p>\n

and you dropped it in the sand\u2014<\/p>\n

the sugary fireball of a dream too sweet.<\/p>\n

You turned to me with crooked canines<\/p>\n

carrying the tears you tasted<\/p>\n

when your mom said it too.<\/p>\n

You punched my nose<\/p>\n

and broke the bridge;<\/p>\n

I put my hand on the pain<\/p>\n

to feel what it was to drip with hurt.<\/p>\n

It painted my fingers sticky and red, but<\/p>\n

the lines in my unfolded palm kept clean<\/p>\n

like canyons the acrylic sea could never touch,<\/p>\n

and I wanted to scream<\/p>\n

I love you<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aubrey Laine Baker “Snaggletooth”   I caught a nosebleed in the bonfire light and by some synaptic snap I’m back to your snaggletoothed smile. Watercolor-rolling to puddle in gray, I reach, and it stays like a pin-prick promise in a pin-drop splash\u2014 the memory comes through in the smell of campfire smoke and dry blood […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1424,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-22942","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/22942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1424"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22942"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/22942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22948,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/22942\/revisions\/22948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}