poem: alana hayes
How I Feel about being the Glue
You know in friend groups, or squads, or whatever,
we each play different roles,
like some of us are the adventurous types, trailblazers,
always captivated, curious, ready to wander off on their own.
You might find them in a tree, or
trying to scale a smooth cliff face with no footholds,
and, somehow, they always successfully make it to the top.
Some of us are fun, outgoing, can-talk-to-anyone-about-anything types,
“Oh, you think buttons are cool? Me too!
Did you know the first buttons ever were made out of seashells? Rad right?
Some of the oldest buttons g to humans date back to about 2000 BC,
think Ancient Rome, Indus Valley, Bronze Age China!
I was totally on a Wikipedia binge about this just the other day.”
“Oh my god, I like making toast for breakfast too!
I usually don’t put avocado on mine though,
it’s just too mainstream hipster for me.
I actually make and jar my own jam and I like to have it with my toast every morning.
It’s 100% natural, gluten free, animal friendly, organic, fairtrade, locally sourced,
cruelty free, dairy free, no sugar added, and completely vegan. Very good stuff.”
“Oh you’re not vegan? Me either. Really I just couldn’t give up cheese
even if my life depended on it.
But I am vegetarian every 3rd Tuesday of the month,
and I’m pescatarian during Shabbat.
Just no shellfish because I keep Kosher.”
And some of us are the glue.
And if you’re anything like me it probably takes your friends a good minute
to come up with something before they say this.
“Alana is...um...”
“You’re uh...”
“You’re the glue! Yeah, Alana’s the glue.
She’s what brought us all together.
We wouldn’t know each other without her.”
And when I’m told this it feels like that time in middle school,
really any time, in anyone’s life, in any middle school,
where everyone who tries out for the class play gets a part.
Even if they’re terrible. Even if the teacher has to make up a part for them.
Like, instead of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
it’s, Snow White and the Seventeen Dwarves, Two Badgers, Three Bears,
and a Glue Stick!
“And the part of the Glue Stick will be played by... Alana.”
Glue? Really? Who wants to be glue?
No one likes glue.
Glue is boring.
Glue is forgettable.
One year for Halloween I decided to dress up as a steampunk Mad Hatter.
I got a top hat, stuck some goggles on it, and glued gears everywhere,
and people would come up to me and compliment me on it,
ask me where I got it,
and when I told them I made it they’d be so impressed,
“Oh my god! How?”
Uh... I glued them...
literally any five year old with Elmer’s glue could do this...
But, of course that’s not what I actually said to them,
instead I was like,
“Oh... um... magic”
and my boyfriend at the time just shook his head and looked at me incredulously.
But, it’s like, for tonight I am from Wonderland, okay,
a little blonde chick literally fell down a rabbit hole doubling as a portal to another dimension
and ended up in my world.
If that can happen, then anything is possible
including these gears sticking to my hat purely by the power of magic.
Ain’t nobody want glue.
Glue is like that one thing we all need
to, I don’t know,
modge podge a table, or
put rhinestones on our tiaras with,
but no one actually wants to deal with it.
It’s messy, it gets everywhere,
and if you’re using a hot glue gun sometimes you accidentally burn yourself with it,
and you get those stringy things all over the place.
Glue is a nuisance
that we’ve all just accepted into our lives
because there isn’t a cleaner way to do sticky.
So when my friends tell me I’m the glue I feel a little cheated.
Left wondering, if I’m only the obligatory friend
that they hang out with because I brought them together,
and if not something less boring, couldn’t I at least be something more pivotal?
Like a door hinge, or an elbow.
Like if there are three of us, me and two friends,
If my friends are the humerus and forearm,
and I am the elbow,
then I’m definitely an important part of this trio.
Then without me we’d be more mall mannequin, barbie doll,
than human.
Without me we either wouldn’t have doors in our apartments, or
every time we opened a door instead of swinging out the door would just fall to the ground
because there's nothing attaching it to the wall.
I just want to be more important than glue, okay!
Actually, ideally, I’d like my friends to see me as complete
enough to be more than the binding substance between two complete objects.
Like between scrapbook paper, and photo, is Alana.
One all structure, one all color,
me sandwiched somewhere in between the two,
out of sight.
And what kind of glue am I?
Because if I’m just that Elmer’s glue
that the five year old who made my hat used,
then I’m water soluble.
If you decide you don’t need me around for the story anymore,
then I’m like the Wicked Witch of the West,
throw water on me,
and I melt away.
about the writer: alana hayes
you can learn more about alana hayes here.
