Still Life with Passive Penciling
The mannequin’s arms came off at the seams.
Roses stripped to fit the mouth of the vase.
A black scrunchie in the drapery.
You set my hand
and called it composition. Stems
cut on the bias.
Thorns pared to nubs.
The vase shaded, never filled.
Light left white.
Years nicked the table beneath us.
My left hand learned the pause before your nod.
My other hand kept to landscapes:
ditch grass, wire post, a hill
creased by plow lines.
Eraser crumbs caked at my wrist.
By November the room had gone metallic.
Heat withdrawn. Graphite honed and laid down.
I learned your mahlstick:
how to hover a hand
just clear of the page,
how not to touch
what you mean to alter.
Petals pinned open.
Water changed before it clouded.
I pulled the pins,
took the flowers,
and left.
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Read by Kimmy Chang
Kimmy Chang is a McKinney-based writer and computer vision engineer. A 2026 Writers’ League of Texas Fellow and Pushcart Prize nominee, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Apple Valley Review, wildscape. literary journal, Qu Literary Magazine, and Third Wednesday, among others. Read more at https://www.kchang.xyz/.