Monotone was a socially awkward pony. Common sense always seemed to go out the window whenever he needed it the most. As a result, his path to making rational decisions and having normal behavior seemed like a long winding road. Now, when he spotted a beautiful mare sitting across from him in his creative writing class he started blushing heavily. All he knew was that he wanted to start a conversation with this mare. But, how?
He leans in her direction. “Do you think turtles should have equal rights?” There it was. The alphabet-soup like pointless analytical question that he was trying to avoid asking. Now hopefully it doesn’t scare this one off.
The mare seemed to be bouncing out of her seat as she turned back to face him. “I’m sorry what did you say? Something about tadpoles? I’m Tragic Focus by the way.”
Tragic focus was magenta colored with a short cut brown mane. Awfully short by a mare’s standards, but Monotone thought it was kind of cute.
“I’m Monotone.” He said with an expressionless face. Come on, have some emotion! Passion! He thought. “I’m the most robust pony you’ll ever meet.” He said firmly with an awkward crooked smile. Really? That’s the adjective. Robust? Might as well be a pack mule. Self-defeating thoughts like these raced through his head as he realized he might be screwing up his only chance with this mare.
Instead, the mare laughed. She thought he was kind of funny. Robust? Interesting choice of a word. This brown-gray pony with a messy blue mane and geeky glasses who was hard to distinguish from a mare was talking himself up like he was some kind of robust stallion? She liked that he had confidence. Although confidence can be misleading. “Well that’s interesting. I think the word you’re looking for is… Naïve.”
Monotone laughed nervously. “Well, maybe I’m naïve, but you’re beautiful.”
Tragic Focus blushed. “Do you really mean that?”
“Of course.” He smiled heavily at her and his anxiety about the situation seemed to leave with it.
The school bell rang and we sat quietly in our seats waiting for our teacher. Ms. Attention Deficient to start our lesson. “Okay.” She said. “Your next lesson is to write a poem about what moves you.”
Monotone was wondering, what moves him exactly? He was never before moved to say that a mare was beautiful. His internal anxiety-driven filters always stopped him from saying all that he wanted to say. But this time he was moved, compelled, to say something to this mare. He knows what moves him.
He wrote,
You move me
You move me like all of the times I failed miserably
And when I finally manage to do something right.
You move me like the Wonderbolts
You move me like perfect harmony
You move me like frosting
You move me like enchanting music
You move me like love, as far as I know
You move me like running with the leaves
You move me like the sheer beauty of spring
You move me like alligators with no teeth
You move me like the perfect ending of a good book
You move me