The Zingara Project

Tag: Plans by Jen Schneider

  • Temp-orality

    For today’s prompt, write a poem inspired by one (or more) of these quotes about time. Feel free to use the quote as an epigraph for your poem.

    “The past is now part of my future. The present is well out hand” Ian Curtis

    “The timeless present is not merely a moment in time, but a quality of awareness that transcends time itself. It is the realization that the moment is, in fact, the only reality we directly experience.” ~Everyday Buddhism

    “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” ~William Faulkner

    “Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind.” ~Nathaniel Hawthorn

    “Time does not pass, it continues.” ~Marty Rubin

    “Arboreal-time is cyclical, recurrent, perennial; the past and the future breathe within this moment, and the present does not necessarily flow in one direction; instead it draws circles within circles, like the rings you find when you cut us down.” ~Elif Shafak

    Poems about Time:

    “Years Go By” by Haley Sui

    “spring is a time of death” by J.C. Mari

    “Plans” by Jen Schneider

    “My Son’s Renaissance” by Melissa Zamites

  • Plans by Jen Schneider

    One question. That’s all I have.  How long did you plan?
    I’m a planner. Are you?
    Earlier that day I took a test after years of prep.
    And a lifetime of crap.
    At 12 PM, the testing timer buzzed.
    High pitched and loud. Others jumped. Not me.
    I planned my time well.
    Dropped my #2 pencil. Wiped
    my sticky palm across my leg.
    Twisted my ring counter-clockwise, twice.
    Heck, I’ll take good vibes any day.
    The computer processed scores.
    I passed. Like I had always planned.
    At 2 PM, I was a newly minted EMT.
    Planning to save others my entire life.
    First, I’d celebrate at a favorite club.
    Like I had always planned.
    With my study pals. Friends for life.
    Wearing matching leather jackets and our favorite denim.
    Before scrubs would become our preferred attire.
    At 8 PM, we waited at the crowded entrance.
    Joking about the trick question,
    the one about cardiac arrest, that we each got right.
    At 8:09, I felt it.
    At 8:10, I felt nothing.
    I never planned to be the victim of a random act of violence.
    One of many. Last year, our city lost 100s to drive-bys.
    The year to date rate climbs higher.
    I planned to be an EMT my entire life.
    Studying manuals. Saving pennies.
    A day off from my minimum wage
    dead-end job at the warehouse,
    near the corner of Broad and 10th,
    to sit for the test that would change my life.
    Then, it was over. Because of you.
    How long did you plan?

    —

    Jen Schneider is an educator, attorney, and writer. Her work appears in The Coil, The Write Launch, Anti-Heroin Chic, The Popular Culture Studies Journal, One Sentence Stories, and other literary and scholarly journals.