EmersonWRITES SPINE 2016-2017

S P I N E

VOL. 7

•

2016-2017

SPINE

SPINE VOLUME 7, 2016-2017

Published annually at Emerson College

SPINE: Student-Produced Interconnected Narratives at Emerson

A selection of original works by the students of EmersonWRITES

Designer Alayne Fiore Front Cover Art Collaboration from the students in the EmersonPUBLISHES workshop Back Cover Art “Bones Vectors” from freevector/Vecteezy.com SPINE • 2016-2017 • Volume 7 • February 2017

EmersonWRITES is a collaboration between the First-Year Writing Program in the Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing and the Office of Enrollement Management and Student Success at Emerson College.

SPINE, previously titled, “The Anthology,” (2011-2014) is published annually

by EmersonWRITES, Emerson College, 120 Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02116.

Emerson College 120 Boylston Street Boston, MA 02116

What is EmersonWRITES? our STUDENTS come from all over the Boston area and represent a diverse range of high schools and communities. They speak and write in English, Spanish, Haitian, Portuguese, Chinese, Arabic, and Vietnamese.

Some have only recently started calling the United States home. All share a passion for creative writing. Over the course of 12 Saturday sessions, they meet and collaborate with other writers they may not otherwise have known. This anthology showcases their hard work and their voices: their poems, their essays, and their stories. We invite you to enjoy their words and to experience each of their worlds. our FACULTY are practicing writers and devoted teachers. Having come to Emerson College to pursue their Masters of Fine Arts degrees in creative writing, they understand the impact writing can make within communities large and small. They bring the expertise of their own craft into the classroom, and have been trained in Emerson’s First-Year Writing Program to teach college writing.

EmersonWRITES is a free creative writing program for students in Boston Public Schools, co-sponsored by the First-Year Writing Program in the Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing and the Offices of Enrollment Management and Student Success at Emerson College.

These programs are guided by the principle that writing is essential to intellectual engagement, self-representation, and access to opportunity.

In college-style courses held on Emerson’s campus, our students practice writing and critical thinking skills. They form a community of young writers whose individual voices respond to the world through the written word.

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Participating Schools Academy of the Pacific Rim Ashland High School Boston Arts Academy Boston Day and Evening Academy Boston Green Academy Boston Latin Academy Boston Latin School Bridgewater-Raynham Regional High School Brockton High School Cambridge Street Upper School Concord Carlisle High School Cristo Rey Boston High School Excel Academy Charter High School Fenway High School Gloucester High School Lincoln Sudbury Regional High School Lowell Catholic High School Lowell High School Lynn English High School Malden High School MATCH Charter Public High School Matignon High School Medford High School Melrose High School North Quincy High School Revere High School Scituate High School Snowden International Stoughton High School Wayland High School West Roxbury Academy Weston High School Willow Hill School iv

Table of Contents

Why “SPINE”? About the Name

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Fiction 9 Nonfiction 47 Poetry 57 Multi-Genre 95 EmersonPUBLISHES 1111 Thank You Notes cxii

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Why “SPINE”? About the Name: Our EmersonWRITES anthology was first named SPINE (StudentProduced Interconnected Narratives at Emerson) in a brainstorm session with the 2014-2015 faculty. After much discussion and deliberation, we decided on this name not for its acronym, but for the symbolism and imagery evoked by the word “spine”: • • • • • • •

A backbone Standing up (for what our students believe in) Strength Confidence Connecting the body (what moves us through the world) and the brain (how we make sense of this movement) Made up of parts that complete a whole—this diverse community of teachers/students/writers, hailing from all over the city/country/world The bones beneath our skin—more truly us, representing our identities, free of the way the world defines us by our outward appearances, our gender, sexuality, race, etc.

The words you’ll find in these pages are what results when our students stand up and put their thoughts into the world—an action that requires strength and support, both characteristics of the spine.

The subjects and genres are as diverse as our perspectives, yet these narratives are all interconnected. They were all born during our Saturday morning classes—the spaces our EmersonWRITES teachers take care to create and facilitate—where students can take risks, learn about new modes of expression, and discover the joy of being generous readers and supporters of each other’s writing. Just as the spine relies on the support of each vertebra, so our students rely on each other, their teachers, and this community to put their words out there. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate what they’ve accomplished than to call attention to how this work stands up, so tall, as it enters the world.

Mary Kovaleski Byrnes, Curriculum Coordinator vii

Fiction Course Introduction This year our class focused on voice-driven fiction—stories that sound as if they are being told to a reader by a particularly captivating narrator. We read pieces whose writers had access to unique dialects and languages, who regaled us with a unique bravado or a magnetic personality, who had a knack for lyrical description. Whatever it was, we wanted our students to believe that the way they told a story was every bit as important as the story itself.

Our students created compelling characters, explored new worlds through science fiction and surrealism, crafted erasure stories, and wrote in the form of letters and lists. Throughout our time together, we tried to push the boundaries of traditional storytelling, breaking apart what makes a story a story.

The work they produced reflect these efforts. We couldn’t be more proud of our students for writing such powerful, personal pieces. Their development as writers and artists at large never once ceased to amaze us.

Faculty Bios Anthony Martinez hails from Bakersfield, California, and is thrilled to be teaching at EmersonWRITES. He recently received his MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College and is currently completing a collection of short stories. He loves science fiction and stories with a strong sense of idiom and place. If he isn’t working, writing, or teaching he’s usually living in a library or drinking coffee.

Cassie Title is a third-year MFA candidate in Fiction Writing at Emerson College, where she teaches in the First-Year Writing Program and works as a writing consultant in the Writing and Academic Resource Center. Career highlights include: recapping a TV show about vampires for an MTV blog, perfecting the art of crafting cappuccino foam as a barista, and writing about hunting and fishing without really knowing anything about hunting and fishing. This was her second year teaching through EmersonWRITES, and she is so impressed by the talent, drive, intellectual curiosity, and overall awesomeness of her students.

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Makayla Andre MATCH Charter Public High School, 12th Grade I will never forget the day I started writing because that was the establishment to my creativity and it was the gateway to my confidence as not only a writer but as a human being. I was able to create my own world, using current issues of the world we live in, and make something great of it. Without having the writer’s gift that I was granted, I do not think I would be able to come to the conclusions and ideals that I come up with every day. I love writing because I am able to live out who I think I am and who I want to be in every single character I create, all at the movement of a pen.

Centuries The planet was indeed coming to an end. The world was a horrible atrocious place, signifying unpleasant colors of lurid blue and gray. The skies always wanted the world to come to an end considering how horrific it was to be called one’s place of refuge. The world was once a beautiful mecca, filled with strong attachments, along with cherishing flames of zeal. Despite the recent disasters of the world, the skies and the world always looked past their affairs and loved one another more until one day, it wasn’t enough. The intimacy they shared, the passion that was once an everlasting admiring spark, was not enough. Hence, they drifted apart from each other, once and for all.

Many colorful centuries went by along with the skies: a pink one, an orange one, and a purple one. The pink century connected very well with the skies, becoming more intertwined due to following the same morals and expectations they had for one another. It became traditional, inevitably having the skies drift apart from this century, moving onto the orange century. The orange century was most acceptingly attractive and approachable when connecting with the skies. The skies were made with the placid colors from the world and the rhythm from the pink century, which enhanced the appearance of the skies and the tangy, vibrant, exhilarating colors that the orange century had. These two together created the most beautiful image anyone could set eyes on, but that still was not enough for the skies. He moved on from the orange century, onto the purple century. The purple century carried herself 11

much more exquisitely compared to the pink and orange centuries. The purple century carried her emotions with pride, despite the imbalance of depression and elation that she had. The purple century had the lyrical depth of words that were somehow always relatable and relevant to the world and the other centuries. She exerted certain values that the other centuries would never dare to pursue. The molding of the purple century and the heavenly skies were elegant but it still was not enough for the skies.

Although the skies loved and cherished all the centuries equally, it was never enough for him. This made the skies descend into a jejune state of gruesome depression and nostalgia, affecting the centuries around him. The skies missed the world so dearly; the grand moments as well as the sadistic moments, the horrible emotions as well as the emotions filled with happiness, but mostly, the indecipherable, unpredictable colors the world would produce. This made the once beautiful placid colors of the skies rain weary colors of gray. This triggered the world, influencing the reuniting of the world and the skies together again. “Oh, how I’ve missed you,” the world told the sky as they embraced, merging their beautiful colors together. The planet, as well as everyone else, knew that during the skies’ absence, the world remained the same by choice, despite ruining the realm in doing so. The sky loved the world’s choices, no different from before, and was only focused and content on being reunited with the world once again. Little did the skies know that the selfish choice between the two would have been a sadness that they chose for not only themselves but for the planet. This did not deter them from continuing to love another because in the end, they became perfectly enough for one another, with their love and endearment emerging evermore.

Makayla is a senior at MATCH Charter Public High School. She is currently working on a novel that she plans on sharing very soon. She takes 3 AP courses, 1 Honors, and a college course. She says what she wants and chooses when she wants. She aspires to become a neurologist or a diagnostician that publishes many books in the nonfiction AND fiction genre.

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Karlecia Berganza Match Charter Public High School, 12th Grade The work I’m presenting is “Ivy,” which is about a teenage girl ninja who is destined to save the world from a tyrannical prince that has taken over. After a lot of hardships, she finally manages to get to the point that it’s time to face her destiny and is now saying her final goodbye to her friends.

Ivy In the world of Arilania, there was a ruthless prince who took over the kingdom. It soon led to pandemonium and destruction. He caused the kingdom to suffer greatly, since he destroyed everything he touched. It led to war and terror for all. But fortunately there was a hero fighting back. She went out in the night to fight off crime and the prince’s tyranny by using her skills and modern day technology. Her name was Ivy and she was a ninja.

Ivy had the elite training that any ninja would dream of. At the age of seven, she vowed to fight off the prince and his tyranny. She managed to keep her vow after thirteen years of intense training. She managed to win all of her battles.. well, almost all of them, since there were some struggles. But she pulled through them with the help of her friends and the rebellion. Before, she always fought off crime and the guards, alone and at night. It wasn’t that much of a struggle, though really challenging and rough. The leader of the rebellion, Benjamin, offered her an elite spot in the rebellion due to the exceptional things that he’d heard about her. At first she refused the offer, but then changed her mind due to the fact she could complete the dream and felt that it was destiny. Which it was, and she was assigned to lead a group of others teenagers that became her lifelong friends and companions. Now throughout her long battles and facing a lot of drama, it was finally time to fight off the prince and take back Arilania once and for all. They were all in the prince’s castle and about to face the final moments of their mission to stop the prince and save the world from getting annihilated from a portal he created. The portal was supposed to make everyone adore the prince, but they knew it would backfire.

“Well, I guess this it,” said Ivy, facing the fact that she had to fight 13

off the prince alone. “If this works, then our big battle is finally over, and we can finally live the lives that we’ve always wanted to live.”

“So that’s just it?” said Alice, who had now became one of Ivy’s closest and best friends. Especially after the rivalry that they shared for a year after they met. “You’re just going to go in and this will finally be over? Then we all just move on with our lives and possibly never see each other again?”

“Yes, I guess it is,” said Jess. “But no matter what happens next, just remember that we’re a team, and no matter what, we have each other’s backs.”

“But this could change everything,” said Alan, the smart guy of the group who created all of the inventions and plans. “If you die, then the prince will win and things will be the same, as if you’d never joined. But if you win, then what?”

“Then things will get better for all of us, and the entire world of Arilania,” said Ivy confidently, determined and brave. “Look, I know this may seem really cheesy, and this might possibly be the last time we’ll ever see each other. But I just want all of you to know that we’ve all been through a lot together. I want you all to know that I admire everything that you did for the cause and for me. I thank you for everything you all have done.” Ivy began to head towards the door to the long hall, but she was immediately stopped by two other teammates.

“I’ll come with you if you want,” said Tom, a bad boy who really cared about Ivy’s well-being and was ready to help/protect her in any way he could. “That way you won’t have to face this alone. Not to mention you won’t have to die or anything.”

“Yeah, that way we don’t have to lose you because of him,” said Nina, who was Ivy’s best friend and suffered so much because of the prince. “I already lost everything because of the prince, and I can’t lose any of you guys, too.”

“Thanks for the offer, but you guys need to do the rest of the plan and destroy the portal,” said Ivy. “Then the world will be safe, and this will finally be over. Plus, I am a ninja after all, and I work alone.”

With that she began to walk away from her friends and headed to where the prince might be. None of them knew what would happen in the end. But it could change everything in an instant. Ivy continued on, getting closer and closer to the door. The final battle was closer than it had ever been before. But no matter what happened, Ivy knew that she was never alone, and everyone would get through this with the one 14

reward: things would become better for everyone.

Karlecia is an aspiring writer who wants to be a published author someday, along with becoming a screen producer and lawyer. When she’s not writing, she does a lot of extracurriculars such as soccer, student government, cooking club, and many others. She is a determined student who wants to help people and animals in any way she can while following her own creative writing passions. Every Saturday she goes to EmersonWRITES and takes the fiction class, which she really enjoys. She has become a better writer during her time in it.

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Angela Cozzone Lowell Catholic High School, 12th Grade Normally I stick to realistic fiction, but this semester I decided to revisit a series I poured my heart and soul into from freshman year and use my refined writing skills to make it better. This is a small excerpt from a very large work that should have ended after book five.

7 Minutes In Heaven The heart monitor took its final beep and the younger sibling’s bloodshot eyes were bulging out of their sockets like a 3D movie. “Don’t you give up on me!”

Brandon had one mission, and he had failed.

“Watch out for your sister! She doesn’t know any better! If she gets herself killed it’s on you, boy!” It was as if he could hear the raspy voice he’d heard for years pounding through his head.

He didn’t have time to break down. No time to mourn. No time to cry. Men don’t cry. “Nurse, somebody!” He sprinted out toward the hallway and began flailing his arms rapidly like a madman. Activity was on the down low beside a few nurses drinking by the water fountain like a setup in a generic episode of Grey’s Anatomy.

“Brandon,” the sweet, low voice belonging to one of the sauntering nurses said in his ear with a tap on the shoulder. “We’re going to take care of your sister, okay? She is alive and will be okay. You need to come with us.”

The nurse speaking began to pull the twenty-two year old by the hand down the hallway. His hand was so clammy compared to hers, which he would have believed was straight ice if his eyes were closed.

Brandon squeezed the older woman’s hand and listened to the sound of his own beating heart, as if it were workout music while running on an elliptical. The hallways stretched on for what seemed like forever and soon became blurry to his poor eyes.

Minutes passed and he asked, “Where are we going?” No reply.

More minutes passed and now he felt like he was on anesthesia, or dreaming some type of lucid dream. His legs felt like cinderblocks and he could barely see anything anymore, with the exception of the silhouette of the nurse. “Are we almost there?” He slurred lazily and four more 17

silhouettes began to pull him, this time with more force.

It was as if hours had passed at this point. “That’s it! I’m not walking anymore!” He shouted, snapped out of the trance, and stomped his foot down authoritatively. Several nurses appeared around him and began to aggressively pull at him. With every violent touch, his flesh began to burn along with his surroundings and turned into a pit of bright inferno.

“Ugh, let go of me!” He yelled between his teeth as he opened his eyes, only to see multiple pairs of black ones staring back at him.

Brandon heard hundreds, if not thousands, of high-pitched screams running through his head, not stopping for a split second to take a breath.

“Demons!” Brandon tried to take a swing at one of their heads but failed when the original nurse gripped his fist and it began to burn to ashes right in front of his eyes. The young adult screeched in agony, squeezing his eyes shut as if that would mask the pain. Every inch of his flesh was being ripped, too painful to be a nightmare. Too painful to be an Edgar Allan Poe nightmare. It felt like hours, days even, that these creatures were tormenting him. He didn’t even need to open his eyes to know that his body looked like it came out of a paper shredder. Each touch ached more than the last, until he began to feel nothing.

Finally a voice he could make out spoke. “You had one job!

You weren’t supposed to be here!” Brandon’s eyes shot open to see his deceased father with black eyes shaking a first at him. Even from beyond the grave, it seemed that he still found a way to make his only son feel incompetent. Using all his might, Brandon threw a shaking fist up to his dad when suddenly a violet light source appeared as he felt a tug to his bottom. Suddenly everything was pushed away: the fire, the demons, his father, the voices. Everything was gone.

“What the--?” Brandon’s eyes shot open only to be back in the hospital room with his sister’s dead body. His breathing was heavy and his heart was beating as loud as the voices. He immediately examined himself, which seemed to be in one piece and free of third degree burns.

“Hello, Brandon,” a raspy voice greeted. Luckily it wasn’t another demonic nurse, but rather a scrawny boy who looked to be in his early twenties, wearing a blue scarf wrapped around his neck rather sloppily.

One thing Brandon noticed was that his eyes were the same color violet as the light.

“What are you? Some type of teenage demon?” Brandon grabbed the pillow resting on the hospital bed and attempted to use it as some 18

type of shield.

“No, quite the contrary, actually,” the boy said in the most down to Earth voice, closing his fists and reopening them in awe. “Fascinating. I haven’t been like this since the Annunciation.”

The unidentified male sauntered over to the mirror on the wall and examined his appearance as if he had on a mask. “An adolescent, well this is a new look to say the least.” The boy began to run his long, thin fingers through his jet black messy locks and sighed. “Still not a ginger.”

Brandon threw the pillow against the wall and quickly picked up a set of rosary beads sitting on the bureau by the unplugged digital clock.

“The power of Christ compels you!”

The teenager took a deep breath and snatched the beads from the twenty-two year old, setting them back down. “Those do not work on me.”

“Omnis exorcizamus te, immundus spiritus, te satanica potestas, te mundus drac--” “I am Gabriel, the archangel of Good News.” He introduced himself with an exasperated sigh. “And you really should have been more attentive in Latin class.”

“You’re an angel?” Brandon pointed his finger and began to shake his head laughing. “You?” Despite physically looking twelve, Angela is a senior at Lowell Catholic High School. During the time she is not writing, she draws, drinks too many lattes, struggles to find her glasses when they’re on her face, works at Hot Topic, and plays bass mediocrely.

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Daniel Canning Academy of the Pacific Rim, 12th Grade Reading excerpts from popular creative writers gave me insight to the various creative ways authors tell stories in order to get a different effect.

This piece is based on an oddly detailed dream I had. That’s probably why I tried to envision the setting as dark and gloomy, but also why there is a deeper meaning to almost everything in this very short story.

Hopefully people will read it multiple times, especially since it’s really hard to write a short, short story. Enjoy.

Life is but a Dream The last sermon from Reverend Neoid ended like this: He looked out over his churchgoers and was reminded of his dwindling following.

“Neon beams of hover cars always looked like dicolore prison bars to me.” His preacher voice echoed through the synthetic oak room. “That’s part of a sermon I wrote recently. I like to apply the lord’s text in a good speech to the patrons. Those old words have a certain tendency to get tedious to even the oldest followers.” The reverend took a pause just for dramatic effect. “Even I find myself speeding through the works that I know by heart, but good citizens, this is not the point. It was our human greed that scorched the skies black and turned our earth to desert. But Reach City is not just the last human city; it is also our home. God did not let our race fall, nor did he punish us for our wickedness with the flood of war. That is not his way.” Reverend Neoid smiled; he liked how his sermon sounded. Very fitting to the times and the thoughts he himself felt at night. “Our home is the last of what we have as a species and we must keep it safe from the base desires of violence and vice. We are the future.” The crowd of families and the elderly repeated the phrase. “Now go out and help thy neighbor and be good to each other. Remember you’re the only one who watches you, not him,” as he pointed up at the statue of a crucified Jesus Christ, which was brown with rust and missing an arm, “not me, not even your parents, although they think they can.”

This got a giggle out of the few kids. “Only you.” With that the sermon ended. The crowd lined up for confessions, the Reverend’s least favorite performance he had to give. After the sinners went to start their weeks, Reverend John Neoid went to his office for a drink.

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Lydia walked in carrying a small wicker collection basket with crumpled ones and an astonishing amount of dimes. The robot’s gears audibly wiring, she placed the collection basket in front of him. “I need to take you into the shop again?” He sighed. “Ah, forget it. There are more important things. You’d know if you heard the things these people told me. Thank my stars I have you to gab to or else I might break my vow.”

“I calculate you could save approximately 9,000 dollars a year if you subjected yourself to purchasing oil for yourself.”

“Lydia, I’m not giving you an oil bath. You know, I’m starting to think you don’t listen to me.” John was tired and leaned back in his chair with the half empty glass resting on the arm chair. The speakers played a loud knocking sound that echoed through the church.

“I’ll welcome the officers in if you’d like.” He nodded and she started to leave, her metal limbs creating a ringing sound as she walked over the concrete.

“Lydia, wait,” called the Reverend in his preaching voice. “What do you think about all this? The bible, God, everything I’m trying to do here?” This odd question was probably due to the half glass of scotch in his system.

“Think, sir? My kind don’t think, John.”

“Y-yeah, but if you could, would you believe in it?” Lydia paused for a moment. Then a few more moments. Her head began to steam.

“Shit, Lydia.” The reverend got up and popped open her head. He blew cold breath into her circuitry. The knock came again. “Okay, okay I’m coming,” he hollered at the door.

When he opened the door two officers were in black rain soaked suits. They looked identically displeased. After staring for a second he realized they were identical.

“Hello fellas. Care to come in?” They followed John in. Their voices were slow and monotone.

“Mister John Neiod?”

“Yeah, that’s me.”

“We have reason to believe you are harboring a known fugitive.”

“W-what, me? There is no one here but me and my android.” He glanced over at Lydia’s stiff figure still steaming from the question he asked. Technically she knew everything that he did. Was the question of right and wrong that perplexing?

“Well Mister Neoid, we have traced an escaped worker to this location. We reasoned that a priest would have the moral conscience to 22

take in a man on the run. Although we all know a clone is definitely not a person a kindly priest would most likely denote the difference.”

“Well, you guys are welcome to some coffee and to look around.”

“We will look around.” Their scowls looked down at him. “Come with us Mister Neoid.”

“Oh sure, okay.” John gulped and followed at a distance. He was scared of the near future.

“Do you know what the punishment for insubordination against the company is?” He did know but he wanted to be wrong so he said, “No I’m sorry, I don’t.”

One of the android officers stopped as the other kept exploring. “It’s quite simple actually,” he said as if this was a normal conversation. “First I get to inject you with a paralysis serum.” The tip of his index finger opened into a vial full of purple liquid.

“I-I see.”

“Then after five minutes when you can’t move I take a rod,” he paused so they both could watch the rod grow from another finger, “And I stick it right into your-” He was cut off by an inhuman scream followed by a crash.

The officer and priest ran to the other room, but it was empty.

Except for Lydia and the other officer.

“Oh hello, sir. Sorry about that but my rebooting process sometimes causes spasms.” In the brief moment John was relieved she had not remembered the answer to his question. But to his horror she continued.

“Now regarding the act of harboring a fugitive while unlawful is morally a sound course of action. Should I get him from the basement?”

The officer turned to him and couldn’t help but let out a preprogrammed smirk as he punched John into the wall so that he landed on the altar.

“Owe,” he said grabbing his neck.

John ran down the dusty stairs to the basement. “Mike!” he called desperately. He found the two company men holding Mike, a fugitive work clone. He squirmed. He cried, “Why? Why? John, help me.”

John ran up, grabbing a side arm off one of the men and shot a blue bolt of plasma through both their chests. Their torsos exploded with red and blue liquids, the only thing that made these clones different from any human.

Their bodies dropped limp. Michael stared at the dead men and then the priest. “We killed them, John.”

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Too stunned to reply with something of value, he replied in monotone. “Yeah, we did.” He was tired from that exertion. He was older than he liked to admit.

“W-we took the life of people. People like me.”

“Yes, I know, Mike. I did what you wanted, why do you still want to stay here?”

“Y-you made me human.” He was still in the psychiatric building phase of clone construction when his pod opened up. He was basically a child in the body of a full grown laborer. “When you did the baptism you made me real. Does that mean-” “No one gets baptized any more, Michael. No one. They used to.

Before you or me were born. That stupid tub is just for show.”

“Oh,” said the fugitive clone. “Then why did you do it for me?”

“I don’t know,” is what he said, but that wasn’t true. “I guess I guess it felt good to talk to someone who believed in the church because it was right, not because of some made up pit of fire. You see? But that was just a dream, not what actually happens.”

“So it doesn’t matter?”

“No. I guess it doesn’t. I don’t care what the internet says, that’s not the only way to prove yourself human.” Michal pushed the gun of one of the officers through the blue mess on the floor.

“You’re right. As long as I think like I should, I’ll be fine.”

“Um yeah. Just um...be content with being good is what you’re getting at. The fact that these killers tried to knab you and you mourned them shows you have more compassion than even me.”

He gave Michael some money and clothes and a firm handshake as he left. He’d keep running and John would never see him again. In fact, the Company would never have let John live to tell his story. The next day the small church was burned to black cinder with the priest inside.

For some reason the dead bodies of the clone officers were found inside a bath chamber. Just some crazy sentimental old preacher is what they all thought. But no one really cared anyway.

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Annalise Ella Englert Boston Arts Academy, 11th Grade My first year of EmersonWRITES challenged my knowledge of fiction writing. I was able to learn the variety of pieces put into fiction, and the flexibility of having the final say of identifying my writing.

The poem The Specks the Sparks, the Spots represents the unclear thoughts that run through my mind about the world, and predicting what they may mean.

The Specks, The Sparks, The Spots What if those little specks we see in our vision are not just a flaw of the human eye?

The feeling you get when a Polaroid flashes in your face, and the world around you turns into a combination of vibrant electrical colors that forms your vision to flutter.

When you were little did you ever try to stare at the sun?

Trying to find the details and shape in the sky above the clouds before your mother caught you, which was usually a good thing because without being caught you would go blind.

Your vision starts to fade and you see the blur of the circle hover over your vision, so annoying it will not go away it makes you shudder.

Shudder But what happens when your mother does not pull you away?

Has anyone been absorbed by the speck Vision consumed Maybe it is not always a good thing when you are torn away from the sun by your Mum No one knows if it will continue to make you stutter, or shudder No one knows why humans came to be, nor should we 25

It is simply that combination of fear in the unknown and science of the known that keeps us on the edge of our seats This only makes me start to weep.

Every time my vision blurs my brain gets mad at me Telling me my chocolate brown eyes are not allowed to be consumed by the fake reality of the “real” world The specks are not allowed to return The world tells me through the specks I am not allowed to be confused But I am simply too amused at the game Shall I test my worthiness to this world?

Humans are not perfect But what if those small dots and spots are to remind us of the beautiful complications we come along with What if the complications are the specks?

The specks, the sparks, the spots.

Writing poetry has been a passion of Annalise’s since she was younger, but she has always been to scared to explore the world of poetry. It is too late now because she has been sucked into the world of poetry.

Annalise attends Boston Arts Academy and is eleventh grade Dance major. She wants to pursue both writing and Musical Theater. Annalise uses her city and school to inspire her writing, and is looking forward to continuing her writing, and performing career.

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Jackelyne Garces Excel Academy Charter High School, 9th Grade This year I enjoyed expanding my experience in writing in second person.

The following is a short piece I wrote one day during class.

Time’s Up Tick. Time to stop. Say goodbye, they’re happy to leave.

Tock. Now you’re alone. Time to cry and get locked up in the hole.

Tick. Look at the time. You fell asleep. You’re good for nothing, you’re gonna be late.

Tock. They all shake their head. You’re so dumb, they think you’re a sped.

Tick. You start to drift. They see you stop listening and start to yell.

Tock. Tears in your eye. You’re a weak little bother, why do you always cry?

Tick. You try to hide. But you know it’s no use, they’re always faster.

Tock. They make you sleep. You try to struggle but you’ve always been weak.

Tick. The voices start coming. They demand to be heard.

Tock. They won’t be ignored. They scream in your head until you’re down on the floor.

Tick. You know what to do. You have to silence them before it’s too late.

Tock. You tie the knot. Pray that they find you before you rot.

Tick. Tock.

This is Jackelyne’s second year at EmersonWRITES. She is a freshman at Excel Academy Charter High School and is currently working on a larger piece that she can hopefully publish in next year’s anthology. She loves Biology and is looking forward to track season so she can be a part of her school’s team. She also looks forward to coming back to EmersonWRITES next year.

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Sofia Gukelberger Melrose High School, 9th Grade This year, I worked on refining my voice and putting emotion into my work. In this piece, I experimented with a list format and with telling a story through opposites.

Demons/Angels WHAT TO DO IF YOU FALL IN LOVE WITH A DEMON 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Learn to forgive. They try but they will still mess up. Let them apologize, or not apologize.

It’s the big things. The expensive London trip they can’t afford. The new car because your old one broke down. They love you and they’ll try to make up for their imperfections.

Don’t make them feel ashamed.

You’ll fight and they’ll yell back. You’ll scream and they’ll scream and the ground will shake, but then they’ll smile and you’ll realize how stupid it was and afterwards you’ll feel okay.

Learn to have a thick skin. Demons are liars; they’ll trick and insult and manipulate. Chances are they won’t notice the little things, and it’s best you don’t, either.

They love you and they don’t know it. They never do. Demons grow up without much love from anyone, and they don’t quite know how to love or what it even is, exactly. One day they’ll say “I love you” without even realizing it. And when they do their eyes will widen and they’ll smile and kiss you and your heart will do acrobatics in your chest. Let them say it first; you’ll scare them if you don’t.

You’ll wonder where they go, when they leave you. Maybe they didn’t want to hurt you. Maybe they were scared they would.

One day you’ll be sitting in that class you take and the teacher will say something stupid and you’ll look over your shoulder to where they usually sit so you can exchange a laughing glance, and when they’re not there that will be the first time you truly miss them. That night, half asleep, you’ll reach out and the other side of the bed will be cold. Sometimes you think you see their smile somewhere in a 29

crowd, and other times you think you’re going crazy.

9. They’ll come back days or weeks or months later with new scars and death in their eyes and they’ll buy you flowers and say “I missed you.” And there are tears in your eyes and you’ll say you missed them, too.

10. One day, something will happen, something small and stupid like a bloody nose, and you’ll notice they’re on edge. Chances are, they don’t need your help. Demons are independent creatures, independent being a kinder word for selfish. You’ll ask if they’re okay and they’ll say they are even though they’re not and you can tell they’re not. And you want to help them, you really do, but you’ll help more by just being there, by pretending they’re okay.

11. One day you’ll be walking and they’ll get this scared look on their face you’ve never seen before, and they’ll pull you down a side street. And when you ask what’s wrong they’ll say, “Angel.”

Because they’re scared, scared of everything they could never be.

Scared you’ll see them as a villain.

12. Because the last thing they want is to lose you.

WHAT TO DO IF YOU FALL IN LOVE WITH AN ANGEL 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

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Learn to smile. They try to make you happy and they live for that smile.

It’s the little things. The coffee they make you in the morning. The note placed in your lunch bag so you don’t find it until you’re at work. They love you and they think of you with every breath they take.

Don’t make them feel resentful.

You’ll fight and they won’t yell back. You’ll break things and scream and tear your hair out but they’ll be calm and unmoving. You’ll wonder if this creature is made of stone and not blood and bones, and afterwards you’ll feel horrible.

Learn to have a thick skin. Angels are truth tellers. There is nothing empty in their words, and they aren’t afraid to point out every flaw and every virtue.

They love you but they don’t think you love them back. They never do. Angels are taught to doubt themselves, that love is hard-won (and yet they fell in love with you so easily). One day you’ll say “I love you” and their eyes will light up and they’ll smile and kiss you

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

and you’ll feel their heart beating in their chest. Say it first or they never will.

You’ll wonder where they go, when they leave you. Maybe they thought they weren’t good enough. Maybe they were scared you’d figure it out.

As soon as they leave you’ll feel their absence, empty as a school after the last bell, and yet a few hopeful pieces of you still believe they’ll be making breakfast in the kitchen when you wake up. And every day after you’ll feel the loneliness as a physical entity, because who could ever replace them? And you wait, alone, and you hope they’re safe and you hope they’re okay and you hope and you hope and you hope.

They’ll come back and when you see them again you’ll forget how long they were gone and how much you missed them. And you’ll hug them and kiss them and somewhere along the way you’ve started crying. It’s only after that you notice the new scars and the new brokenness in their eyes.

One day, something small will happen, something stupid like a shattered glass, and they’ll freeze like ice. Angels are selfless creatures, and often they’ll put your wants over their own needs, destroy themselves to make you happy. You’ll ask if they’re okay and they’ll tell you yes, they are, but you know they’re not. So you sit with them and you tell them it’s okay, they’re okay, you’re here now, you’re with them, and as long as you’re together they’re okay.

One day you’ll be walking and they’ll get this scary look on their face you’ve never seen before, and they’ll pull you down a side street. And when you ask what’s wrong they’ll say, “Demon.”

Because they’re scared, scared of everything that could hurt you.

Scared you’ll leave them all alone.

Because the last thing they want is to lose you.

Sofia is a freshman at Melrose High School. She is currently working on a fantasy novel and plays varsity ice hockey. When she’s not writing or at hockey practice, she’s doing AP Bio homework, playing games on her computer, talking to friends, drinking coffee, or sleeping at inappropriate times (like history class).

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Jennifer Jantzen Concord Carlisle Regional High School, 10th Grade This year, I began developing my own voice in fiction by way of rethinking common literary tropes. The following piece was my way of handling the many issues that I was introduced to growing up, and I wanted to bring that struggle to life in a unique way.

Day Off “Have you heard of me?”

The trees whispered to themselves without answering. The Statue of Liberty bent down to hear, but they hid their words in their hair, only alive through the rustling breaths of the wind. Liberty saw that their tangles were filled with birds. She had always been told that knots were meant to be undone. She touched her own hair; it didn’t move.

The trees whispered again, intrigued. “Have you heard of me?” Liberty asked again. No answer. She saw a pond farther down. She crouched by its side and squinted; it was surrounded by small rocks like a prisoner, reflecting inwards. She had to focus to see its rippling.

“Hello,” Liberty said, “have you heard of me?”

The pond did not answer. Ponds do not talk.

Liberty reached down to touch a rock. When she lifted her finger it was only dust, fresh and white like hopeful snow. She breathed and the sky swirled with its ashes. She felt guilty. “I hope I’m not bothering you,” she said to the pond. Silence. She felt like the absence of feeling.

You know? You don’t. “Hey,” Liberty said. The pond swirled and stirred and revolved around the same thoughts it always had, but said nothing.

“Do you feel like a prisoner here?” The pond sloped under Liberty’s breath, then smoothed itself out, the way one would straighten their skirt. Never making waves. “With the rocks surrounding you, trapped here where you’ve always been,” Liberty tapped raindrops out of her hem and the pond eagerly swallowed them. Liberty looked down at her robe and frowned; thoughts always brought her trouble. “Pond,” Liberty said quietly, “what if I were to free you?” There was silence, a response in itself. “I could just keep filling you up with water until you grew big, and you could find your way to the ocean where I am and we could see each other--” Liberty looked at the ocean. The ocean moved and murmured 33

to itself, like water on the way to boiling, but did not stir. “Then you wouldn’t be you anymore, Pond,” Liberty said. Her gaze swept over fog like a lighthouse. There was nothing, nothing and nobody. Liberty looked down at the pond and brushed its surface. It bristled at her touch, but soon calmed. She sighed. “I’m sorry, Pond.” But when she lifted her hands again the pond had disappeared. Her fingers dripped with its ghost, leaving her lonely. Liberty walked. There wasn’t much room in the park, but she feared stepping on the street cars, so she tried her best to stay in its limits. Finding no space for her feet, she stepped back into the ocean for a moment and looked back. Nothing was stirred by her arrival. She leaned forward hesitantly, looking out on the city.

“Is everything asleep?” she whispered. She waited, didn’t know what she was waiting for. Liberty felt tired; she lay her head on the park grass, feet still firmly planted in the water. She could feel her robe rising away from her skin, reminding her that she was someone else underneath. The grass was cool and green, still standing firmly under her cheek.

“You think you’re immortal, Grass,” Liberty said, closing her eyes. “It’s fall and you’re still green, and you think you can keep that up forever.”

She breathed out and the ground shivered with uncertainty. “I am green now, Grass, but I wasn’t always. I was brown and smooth and new. I changed. And you’ll change. We all do.” Liberty opened her eyes and saw tiny blades, scratching her cheek with small fingernails of color.

“We’ll trade; I’ll be green, and you’ll be brown. You’ll die and be reborn again. I have not died for a long time, Grass, but I think I’m getting closer. It might be time” Liberty returned to land, talking to herself as she went. “And what is time,” she said, “but a thing that happens?” She accidentally stepped on the grass. “It’s compared to other things so we can understand it, but never works out.” She accidentally stepped on the pond. “It keeps going, making good things short and bad things long.” She accidentally stepped on the cars, grinding their accidental bones. She ignored the sensation of glass shards underneath her and just kept destroying it, destroying it all. When she lifted her foot there was no blood, like she had never been alive. She sat down with a thump, making the remaining cars jump in fright.

“Go on,” Liberty sighed, “run away. I’ve seen you do it before.” She turned to the ocean she came from. It was just as quiet as before, seething and feeling yet unable to really move. “Why so hesitant, Ocean?” the Statue of Liberty asked. “You see everything happening and do nothing.”

Liberty heard her own voice and it sounded like God. The ocean rolled and moaned like a fever in her head. “You know they’re angry,” Liberty said, “all of them. The women walk.”

“I am a woman too, you know.” Liberty looked down at her hands, trying to find brass in the lines. “I am a woman confused. American, French. A Roman Goddess.” she felt a sudden lift and her back straightened, bringing her to a godly height. “But I am still a woman, and I walk.” Behind her buildings went off like smoking guns, light warming through the windows. She didn’t look at them; they already knew her name.

Liberty pushed herself into the water. She held her head high as she walked, dragging her fingertips and making waves at last. The pond fell from her fingers and was eagerly swallowed by the ocean, but she knew it had become something more. Something big, something alive, burning and feeling and ready to move. The sun moved steadier now, higher and higher, and Liberty let her eyes climb with it. Calmly she returned to her pedestal, rising out of the sea in a marvelous wave. She bent to pick up her discarded torch and raised it above her. The Statue of Liberty watched as the city moved around her. It was an ocean in itself, she realized, with waves across the streets, moving and breathing and angry around the edges. She was the Statue of Liberty for them, a still image. A constant in their lives. She didn’t die. She didn’t change. But she could change them. And time had told her that.

Jennifer Jantzen is a sophomore at Concord Carlisle Regional High School.

Her pastimes include drumming, flannel-wearing, and complaining about the lack of creative writing opportunities for underclassmen. She has three pieces published in Teen Ink and hopes to write for a living in the (perhaps very distant) future.

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Grayson Pitt Ashland High School, 10th Grade This year, I’ve really enjoyed hearing the works of other students and being exposed to different voices and styles in fiction. This is a story included in a series of short stories about different types of love between boys and coming to face different realities.

All My Love ONE No two people were less alike than the two of them. This was not an opinion but rather, a fact.

Torrence is blind and an aggressive drunk who bleaches his hair once every three months. He does this himself rather than paying to get it done, preferring to spend what little money he has on cheap booze and the occasional pack of cigarettes. He’s just a kid who resents his parents — his father for what he did to his son, his mother for not fighting back.

Carlisle is small and a sickening sight. He has permanent bags under his eyes and his lips are always bone dry. He dreams of blistered and greedy hands most nights, and wakes up in a sweat. His smile is a pretty and deceiving thing, as he worries all the time about just one thing: a hopeless alcoholic who isn’t even twenty one.

TWO The moral of this story is that the human body is not built for the agony it endures.

THREE Carlisle dreams of hands. He dreams of hands and they were all over him. They were scratching and clawing.

FOUR “Torrence?”

The door to his dark room opens and light from the hallway spills inside.

Standing in the doorway is Carlisle’s small silhouette. He is shaking and his hands grasp his arms.

If anyone else were to wake him at one thirty-seven in the morning, 37

they’d be dead.

“Come here,” Torrence murmurs. “It’s alright.”

FIVE Torrence drinks vodka in the morning and by noon, he is on his third cigarette. He is killing himself. Carlisle wonders if he knows this.

SIX

One of them was a forest. The other was a river of gasoline running right through the middle.

SEVEN “I can’t tell you how frustrating it is,” Torrence whispers.

“I’m sorry.”

Torrence feels along Carlisle’s face with rough palms but gentle touches.

“I want to see you.”

“I know,” Carlisle murmurs.

“Describe yourself for me,” Torrence asks.

And Carlisle says, “Okay.”

EIGHT The beach is wrapped in the early morning fog so that Death may come and go unseen. But Carlisle sees him; he sees Death. The waves crash hollowly along the shore and then they retreat, dead and forgotten, and Carlisle wonders what it is like to exist so briefly.

He sprints across the sand. The wind and rain whip his face and it stings.

It hurts. It hurts, dammit. But this is the hurt he wants to focus on. He doesn’t want to focus on the hurt that lies on the sandy shore ahead of him, and yet he is running towards it.

On the shore of the beach is the lifeless body of his brother. There is no pain to match what is in his chest, and there is no joy to overcome it.

He collapses to his knees when he reaches his brother and he scrambles to get a hold of him, to catch his dying breath, but he is far too late. His shaking arms cradle his brother and he is sobbing. He is breaking.

He thought that when he saw his brother die, he would be ready, be okay. Because Torrence had been killing himself, drinking and smoking and wasting away too much. Growing up too much.

As he cradles his dead brother, Carlisle learns he is the most naive person to exist. The most stupid and foolish person. Carlisle clutches Torrence to his 38

chest and loosens a scream that could shake the Heavens, rattle the stars.

He presses a trembling hand to his brother’s chest and there is nothing; no beat, no thump, no melody, no life no heart no nothing.

Carlisle sets down the body of his brother and turns, retching onto the sand. He convulses as spasms rock his small body.

Carlisle feels himself withering away.

If people could die of heartbreak, Carlisle would be lifeless beside his brother. Truthfully, that is where he belongs.

He no longer wonders what it is like to exist briefly as he lies beside his brother in the sand. His existence is over, for existing is nothing without meaning. And there is no meaning left. There is no brother to protect, no laugh to receive, no hand to hold onto. There is nothing.

NINE He thinks about the stars. There are those in the sky and the ones that Torrence’s freckles made, over his cheeks and nose and shoulders and chest.

He has seen those stars a million times and though they aren’t as brilliant as the ones suspended above him, he loves them all the same.

And he died. A galaxy died.

He died and the sunrise is delayed and the sun sets quicker. He died and the color black invades the wardrobe Carlisle knew as bright. The color black becomes everything he can see. It’s in the sky and in his chest. He watches the memories; they had truly become memories. There are no more to make.

TEN His ghost is breathing, right down his back.

And there is no erasing ghosts.

ELEVEN Dear Torrence, My therapist told me to write this. But a part of me knows this letter would be written whether she told me to write it or not.

I haven’t found your note yet. I don’t know if you even wrote one. I don’t know if you even planned on dying.

It’s been a couple months. I still haven’t gone into your room. If I do, I think you would haunt me. And I don’t want to be haunted. I don’t want to be forced to relive everything we went through together. I want to relive those memories in my own time.

I didn’t really get a chance to say goodbye, and I don’t think that I am 39

ready to say goodbye.

I hope you can drink in Heaven, or Hell, or wherever you ended up. I hope it’s better up there. I hope there are shitty gas convenience stores and liquor shops and I hope you find friends. If Dad is where you are, I hope you beat the shit out of him, for everything he did to us.

See you soon.

All my love, Carlisle Grayson Pitt is a transgender boy (female to male) who is passionate about LGBTQ+ rights, the environment, writing, music, and art. He is a senior at Ashland High School and is currently working on a series of short stories, as well as a fantasy novel. He’s excited to live in a minimalistic apartment in the city, with his geckos and succulents. And maybe another person. Maybe.

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Bob Sherwood Stoughton High School, 9th Grade This year I enjoyed learning new ways to write stories, such as in letter format, or in the second person. In this piece, a teenage girl meets a sociopathic ten-year old girl who will stop at nothing to make her family pay for what they’ve done to her.

from The Girl Later that night I was lying in bed thinking about Niki’s parents and how badly they treated her. It made me grateful that I had parents that loved me and cared for me. I had a meal every time I woke up, and every time I came home from school. I didn’t get in trouble often, but when I did, they only gave me a stern talking to. I made another mental note reminding myself to tell my parents how much I love them.

Niki was still awake too, on a tablet that she said she stole from a Best Buy somewhere. She was sleeping on the floor. My parents were pretty concerned that her parents hadn’t come to pick her up yet. Little did they know, her parents lived in Connecticut. After a little bit she swore under her breath. “What’s wrong?” I asked her.

“Oh, you’re still awake. I’m just doing some… things.”

“What things?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“Yeah,” I said. She passed the tablet up to me. I saw a room from a camera’s view. It looked like a bedroom. Some lady was in bed, sound asleep. “What is this?”

“It’s my house. I have a camera in every room in the house.”

“Why?” I asked, bewildered.

“To see if everyone’s home.”

“Why?” I asked again.

“Are you absolutely sure you want to know?”

“Yes,” I said a little reluctantly this time.

“Okay. I absolutely hate my family. So I decided that I want them to cease to exist. Before I was sent off to the foster home, I planted a remote controlled bomb in the basement where no one could find it, and cameras in every room to make sure when I set off the bomb, everyone was home. Then I got an app on my tablet that allows me to set off 41

said bomb.”

I resisted the urge to jump out of my bed and run to my parents’ room to tell them to call the police on this little girl.

“You...aren’t actually going to do this...are you?” I asked nervously.

“I am. I want revenge, Riley. They deserve this. You and I both know that. Hand me the tablet please.”

“No. You can’t do this. Just tell the police what they did, and they’ll handle this. Your parents can rot in jail, and you’ll have your revenge.”

“Riley. Give me the tablet.” She was standing now. I heard a faint noise, like metal rubbing against metal, and I realized that she would kill me if she had to in order to get the tablet.

If I gave it to her, I might be held responsible for four people’s deaths. But if I didn’t, I would die along with those people. “Riley. Now.” She sounded like she was losing her patience. I handed it to her. “Thank you.” She laid back down.

“I know you don’t like it, but I have to do this. Besides, all of my hard work will go to waste if I don’t use the bomb.” I lay there silent, praying that she wouldn’t set off the bomb. Even if her parents and her sisters were horrible people, they didn’t deserve to be killed. She murmured something about one of her sisters not being there. “Ah well. Three out of four isn’t too bad. Lucky you, Nathalie.” There was a boom, and a wave of guilt washed over me. I heard screaming and a minute later, sirens.

Apparently one of the cameras survived the explosion.

“Wow,” she exclaimed.

“No way anyone survived that.” I whimpered. I had to call the police, I had to get her out of my house, and in jail where she belonged.

Bob looks forward to coming to EmersonWRITES on Saturdays. He also enjoys sleeping.

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Talia Viera North Quincy High School, 10th Grade This year I’ve learned a lot about writing, both from my teachers and my fellow students. I’ve worked a lot on crafting my writer’s voice and figuring out how I want my narrating speaker to sound. This story is about five students who break into their high school during the summer, and is told from the perspective of a particularly unusual onlooker.

Legacy An empty school. Except for five, that is. Their names I do not know, but their purpose is clear. They broke a window to get in here. They carry backpacks of blueprints and plans with them, and they immediately move into action, going down to the first floor, where the pools are. It takes them no longer than twenty minutes to get started, and after that, they venture around the school.

The halls are silent, other than the sound of footsteps as their shadows race across the tiles. They run through the corridors, laughing with each other, and their voices echo. A boy with bright red hair pulls out a cigarette and lights it. Another tightens the hood around his head.

A girl complains, “What if we get caught?” But they don’t care. It would be worth whatever punishment they might get.

They pass around the cigarette, each taking a drag.

“We still have a little while,” a third boy says, his shaggy brown hair falling into his face as he looks at his watch. “It’s probably almost empty.”

“Wanna go and see?” The first boy asks. He leads them down to the bottom floor, into the pool room.

There are two pools, both the same size. One of them is full. The other, not so much. You see, these five are pulling off the best prank their high school’s ever seen.

Part of them is nervous. What if they do get caught? But the other part of them kind of hopes they will. They put a lot into this, and they want all the credit.

And for the most part, this prank will be harmless. Aside from the broken window, there won’t be any real damage being done. The pool can easily be refilled. But the extremity of it, and the audacity that they possess in order to actually go through with it, is what makes it truly great.

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For a few moments, they just sit there, watching the gradual fall in the water’s depth as it goes down the drain. They say nothing.

I can’t fault them for their silence, though. What is there to say?

Words can’t express feelings such as these.

These five kids—three boys and two girls—are leaving their legacy.

The increasingly hot days remind them that summer is here, and pretty soon they’ll be off to college, leaving each other behind. And, as I’m sure you know, saying goodbye is never easy.

Without warning, the red-haired boy takes off his shoes and socks and drops into the pool. “Come on!” he yells, and they all follow suit—that is, except for the hooded boy. He remains seated, staring down at his friends. They call to him.

“Get in here!”

“It’s fun!”

I think that they might call him a wimp, or a baby, but they don’t.

Rather, they all look at him sympathetically.

“It’s just us,” one of the girls says.

“Yeah, there’s no one else here,” the other adds. “It’s okay.”

“Plus, this is it! Our last night of fun before you know.” The third boy can’t dare say it out loud. No one can.

Thinking about it, I realize how a sweatshirt doesn’t go with shorts, and it’s over ninety degrees anyways. He must wear it because he’s shy Unexpectedly, he stands up. He takes off his shoes and socks, as well as his hoodie, exposing a short mess of back hair. However, he doesn’t jump in. He walks over to the stairs in the shallow end and makes his way over to the rest of the group. That seems to be enough for them, and they cheer.

There’s less than half a foot left of water in the deep end, and the shallow end is completely dry. Together, they watch as the last of it goes down the drain, and their legacy is fulfilled. They continue to stare at the drain as it gurgles, arms around one another.

“I guess that’s it,” someone whispers. “It’s all gone.”

“So, what, should we go home?”

“We don’t have to.”

They sit on the floor of the empty pool, legs criss-crossed. After what seems like forever, they begin to murmur to one another. They talk about memories: freshman year, detention, dances. They laugh with each other, temporarily forgetting the new world that awaits them in just a short while.

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They have their whole lives ahead of them, so much time. So much life left to live.

But me, I am just a simple ghost.

Talia has enjoyed writing since she could first hold a pen. She hopes to publish a novel one day, and wants to open up a bookstore. This is one of her first short stories. She plays goalie on her school’s lacrosse team, and she enjoys going to the gym and hanging out with her friends. Her favorite book is The Wanderer by Sharon Creech.

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Nonfiction Course Introduction In this course we explored different manifestations of creative nonfiction including the personal essay, narrative journalism, food writing, travel writing, and humor. We also experimented with style and form. Each week, we discussed a unique approach to the essay, from list essays to fragmentation to lyric essays and creative nonfiction written about the experiences of others.

Following readings and in-class discussion, our students would go on to create their own work in the same style. Our goal was to explore the ways our personal histories influence our writing and how that experience translates to the page. Although the works presented in the anthology are not strictly nonfiction, they are heavily informed by personal narratives and spur from emotional truths and lived experiences.

Faculty Bios Alex Ebel is a second-year MFA candidate in Nonfiction writing at Emerson College. Originally from Texas, he has also lived in Oakland, California, and New Orleans, Louisiana. He is a reader for Ploughshares. His literary interests vary from narrative journalism to personal essays and humor writing. His work had previously been published in places like The Rumpus, Hobart, Hello Mr, and Punchnel’s, among others.

Lindsay Haber is an MFA candidate in Fiction at Emerson College, where she also teaches Introduction to College Writing and Research Writing. She is currently writing her second YA novel and working towards publishing her first. Her stories have appeared in Folio, FiveontheFifth Magazine and Print Oriented Bastards. She is thrilled to be a 2017 nominee for the Pushcart Prize. In addition, she is an animal lover, outdoor enthusiast, and 90’s grunge appreciator.

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Kendra Bannister West Roxbury Academy, 9th Grade Although this piece is fiction, the emotions that the main character, Taya, faces, are relevant to those going against the grain of society. This story examines the possibility of doing what you think is right, even when everyone around you is doing what’s best for them.

Climbing Trees Beep, beep, beep! The hospital intonations seemed to be screeching out of every room Daina rushed by as she lay in agony on a rickety gurney.

She tried not to show much pain, but Philip could see from her expression exactly what she felt. The E.R. nurses surrounded Daina with scalpels, scissors, and other objects sharp enough to draw a decent amount of blood.

“Let’er breathe,” said the surgeon to her left with a slightly assertive tone.

And the nurses spread out with the little room they had to move as the surgeon stood at the head of the bed, preparing his equipmentincluding the sharp object- to proceed the procedure.

“Philip,” Dain whispered as she gripped hands with him.

Her palms were dripping with adrenalin as her heart raced at the speed of light. Daina inhaled once and exhaled twice after the two breaths every second. And every second, she clenched Philip’s hand tighter, tighter until his knuckles were pale and going to blue like the center of the evening sky where the colors fade. ‘“Push...push!”

Daina blared out as if someone had stabbed her. Sweat glazed ther forehead and slid down her cheek , dripping to her chin, slowly falling like dew on a leaf after a muggy rain. The nurses and the surgeon cleaned the baby and handed it to Philip.

“What is it...Philip? She whimpered.

Her voice was timid and lacking slight patients as she breathed heavily. Phillip uttered no words. There were none to say. The doctor stepped slowly into the room examining his clip board and spoke to them in a factual voice.

“Alight,” He whispered to himself “Your child sees very healthy, 49

she’ll have to stay in th-” “She.” Daina said firmly. “...Yes.” Phillip’s eyes glanced at the door, saying “sorry” in embarrassment.

The doctor glanced back in certainty, clarifying that Daina had hoped for different. A long pause interrupted the discussion as thoughts of the same branches sprouted in their minds.

“Well,” the doctor directed, lightening up his voice from the awkwardness. “We’ll have the baby stay in our nursery until you can take her home. For the time being, we’ll just have to take a few blood tests and she should be all set.”

“Thank you,” Philip said softly.

He signed the certificate, jotting down the name Taya. Daina waited in the hospital room as Philip brought their child to the nursery and set her down gently in the little bed in which she lay.

A few days later, they were able to take her home. Phillip drove down a smooth road that seemed to go on for days. Though the pavement was smooth, the car ride was intense. They tore themselves apart with the atrocious strain that no one could ever bare without complete insanity: silence.

About fourteen minutes from home, Phillip finally broke it.

“Taya, Our baby girl Taya.”

Daina’s head turned to the window, jerked slightly as if she had awakened from a trance. Slowly turning her head to the window again, she gazed vaguely out of it, staring past every car, every building, as both of them just sat, once again in silence.

When they arrived at their old, dully fashioned apartment, Daina stormed inside. Phillip quickly walked after her with the look of frustration covering his face. He chased her up the four flights of stairs leading to their unit. Daina stomped up every step with rage inside her. A stop.

Daina fumbled with the keys, trying to open the door as fast as she could, still hearing the increasing speed of footsteps up the stairs behind her. She walked straight in and Phillip came trudging behind. He shut the door and grabbed Daina’s arm.

“What is wrong with you?” He asked.

“What? Tell me! I’m perfectly fine!”

Daina paced around the room in frustration and became tearyeyed.

“I don’t understand what’s wrong with you, you just delivered a 50

beautiful child. This should be one of the best weeks of your life.”

Daina continued to pace the room with tears running down her face but said nothing.

“Look,” Philip took her by the shoulders and looked in her eyes. “I know how much you wanted a son, but we can’t change that our child is a girl.”

Daina wiped her eyes.

Phillip continued, “Now, promise me...promise me that you will love her with every single morsel of your heart...please. Because that’s what mothers do.” Daina nodded her head slowly.

“And don’t you want to be the best mother you can for the kid?”

She nodded as Phillip patted her back for comfort.

“There, there,” Phillip whispered as she continued to nod.

Thirteen years passed. It was a Thursday evening in Autumn when the air was brisk and the days were long.

“Taya! Get down here! Supper is ready!”

Taya strolled down the stairs examining her hands. Daina tossed the plate on the table. Taya sat at the table and put her elbow on it with her palm against her tan cheek. She stared blandly at the meal as if it were a segment of daytime television. Daina talked on the phone with an irate voice as she bustled about the kitchen.

“Okay. Alright,” she said in a calmer tone, “I just wanted to know if you were bringing money home tonight.”

“I-” Phillip, on the other end of the phone, project his voice, “I don’t know yet.”

“What do you mean?” Daina said sotto voce.

Taya looked up at her mother and back at her plate, sighing because it wasn’t the first time she’d heard the conversation. It wasn’t even much of a conversation anymore, or at least that’s how Taya saw it. It was more like watching re-runs of a sitcom episode over and over.: the first time was exciting, the next few times were oddly predictable yet somehow still interesting, then, after that, you’ve become so completely aware of every event, that you’ve now memorized each line and watching means absolutely nothing to you, but you watch anyway. Not because you want to or have to, You just do.

“Phillip,” Daina took the phone from her ear and looked at it with confusion. “Oh my gosh, are you at that place again?” she whispered angrily as Taya lipped the words and played with her food in annoyance.

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“I can’t talk right now,” Phillip belted.

“Phillip! Phi...” He hung up on her.

Daina slammed the phone and sighed.

“Ugh! Why does he always do this to me?” she murmured to herself.

Taya sat silently and continued to eat her dinner as Daina walked out of the kitchen, questioning every question there was to be asked in her life. Her life. Her issues. Her mind. Taya in general.

She finished eating, washed the dishes, walked back upstairs and took a shower, brushed her teeth, put on pajamas. Then, she brushed her hair, her medium brown hair with light brown highlights. She brushed her hair in the mirror. She didn’t like looking in the mirror She was a virtuous, average-looking girl. Brown almond shaped eyes, delicate tan skin, an oval-ish shaped head that was chiseled around the chin, soft pink lips. Lips that rarely seemed to form a smile or a smirk, a head filled with deep thoughts that didn’t seem to fit, skin that people would judge because of its color, eyes so deep that if one were to look into them, they might have had a slight chance of seeing her soul...or maybe just a deep darkness, sadness. No one would know anyway. Taya, herself was even oblivious to what was inside, something that deep.

So, she folded the blankets back, turned the light off and prayed.

She felt safer praying in the dark. It was peaceful and trustworthy to her, like she was in His hands. Her parents didn’t believe, but she did.

She always asked what life was about, when she would feel free, and why she felt the way she did. She also wondered at night, when she lay in bed, what her parents were up to. What her father was doing all day, and why her mother was always upset with him, why they were always fighting.

BOOM. Phillip was thrown onto the ground and pounded constantly in the face.

“I think this is it! I think this is it!” yelled the announcer.

Phillip blacked out at the person over his anemic body crushed every bone as well as his heart to nothing but flesh. Rotten flesh. Phillip kept getting pounded and even in a room filled with people, not one helped him. The crowd was filled with “oohs” and curses and rooting.

The room was filled with monsters. Not ones in nightmares, but ones in reality. The ones who can take a bite out of anything and everything for the fun of mental murder, until there’s nothing left. Your pride, your dignity, your heart and soul, even your mind. But that only depends 52

on the strength that you possess. If you are strong in thought and you believe that the seasons change, you win. If you are weak and don’t follow the seasons, you lose.

“Oh and it is over for this guy Man, now that was entertaining” The crowd screamed with excitement and yelled encore. Another man stepped up to the “winner” covered in blood. The monster kicked Phillip’s dead meat over and beat the man beyond the point of black and blue.

The next morning, Daina woke and stumbled out of bed to the shower. She brushed her teeth, got dressed, and put her light brown hair in a ponytail. Daina went downstairs to start making breakfast while Taya got up and ready. She took a shower, brushed her teeth, put on a sweatshirt, jeans, converse, and wore her hair out naturally: long and wavy. Before any of this, she prayed. She prayed for today to be a good day and for everything to be alright. She had a feeling that something was off. Taya walked down stairs for breakfast and stopped to see her mother drowning in tears, broken down on the floor as weak and useless as nothing.

“Mom?” She asked with worry in her voice, “Mom, what’s wrong?”

“Go away.” Daina sobbed with her head in her hands.

“But I...”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Daina said, wiping her tears.

“Well, I want to, so why don’t you just-” “What did I say!?”

“Are you hiding something from me?” Tanya asked plaintively.

“What?” Daina asked with a sigh.

“I know you and dad are hiding something from me, I’m not stupid yuh know!” When Taya said this, Daina began to sob even harder.

“What? Did you adopt me or something?” Taya turned red and started to cry.

“Taya, I...”

“What?! You what?!”

“I...” Her voice became a whisper as she painstakingly tried to get the words out, still crying. “I...can’t...tell you.”

Taya stared at her as they both broke down and drowned in their flood of tears after quarreling. Taya ran. She ran just to get away. She ran down the four flights of stairs, through the streets, and into the alley.

She ran as far as she could until her breath was gone with the wind. In the alley, she came to a stop that was between two high walls. Taya 53

came to a stop at the deathly sight lying there. She picked him up and dragged him as far as she had ran, until she got back to her apartment.

When she reached the front door, she opened it and lay his dead body on the floor. Daina, sitting in the living room, stood up and slowly walked toward Taya.

“I hate you,” Daina cried. “I hate you! I never loved you. I never wanted you! I never wanted this life, not until you came!”

Not that Phil was gone, Daina could tell the truth. Why she hated Taya, where Phil was going night and day, why he never came home, why she was mad at him. Taya said nothing, but her eyes and face turned red, and she felt fury burning in her soul like a wildfire that couldn’t be tamed.

Why did Daina lie to Phil? Why would she keep secrets from her daughter? Maybe, while others were caring and loving, she had hate inside her. A hate form a toxic chemical stimulating her mind that caused an alacrity to hate. So much, that person would watch you die, or even worse, kill you with their bare hands. So that night, Daina tried to do what she had wanted from the start. But it was too late, Taya had already run away. She knew what would have happened if she had stayed there. What Taya didn’t exactly know was where she would go, but she knew, wherever it was the wind would take her there as she went with the seasons. She was a winner.

So, one might think this is a story about a small family who fell apart because of a mother’s actions, or about a girl who wanted to attain love. But simply and truly, it’s all just reality, in the form of Taya’s life. There are monsters that come out looking for an innocent soul to prey on. Once they’ve caught you, they tie you up with their ropes, and in the end, you come out with a mental monster too. It’s not your fault.

It’s the monsters getting inside of your mind, or at least trying to. Because then again, if you’re strong in thought, and believe that the seasons can change, then you win. One can only achieve this by staying with the seasons, as you climb the trees. Stay with the seasons, and you shall not fail. Oh, and the chemical? Well, that’s another story. But the cause of it, well, that’s just us aliens, doing our jobs.

Kendra Bannister enjoys art in all forms. In addition to writing, she paints and draws. She is also a member of her high school debate team, student government and hopes to one day have a career in the legal system.

Karen Cheng Boston Arts Academy, 10th Grade This first-person poem was inspired by Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Although I am not the narrator, I can relate to the narrator’s emotions and world-view. I wanted to convey the feeling you get when someone says or does something that makes you feel regret.

I’m Sorry I’m sorry I’m not up to your standards, As the perfect child.

I’m sorry that your other beloved and trusted spouse left you because of me.

I’m sorry that you’re now in pain, Which made you do bad things just to forget the loneliness.

I’m sorry that you didn’t like my confidence, but you took that from me like I did something wrong.

I’m sorry that you couldn’t handle my smart mouth, I never said anything again, After you snapped at me.

You’re lost, I’m sorry you can’t breakthrough to ask and see how I feel.

I was there, But who are you?

You’re not my mother, Or my father.

Do you see what I see in my eyes, When I was younger?

A monster.

A monster who stole my pure and lively childhood.

You became a monster.

The monster who got me to just give up.

To pick up that glorious intoxication within a destructive small vial.

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That could do so much and in such little time.

Pain to numbness.

And numbness to painless dreams.

Don’t be late, Rabbit.

I’m sorry that you followed me.

The clock is ticking Alice.

And time never stopped for anyone, Rabbit.

Karen Cheng is a graphic designer and mixed-media artist. She enjoys watching cartoons and anime, reading fan-fiction and watching YouTube web series. She lives in South Boston.

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Poetry Course Introduction The image is a fundamental element in any art. Good metaphors are good because of the images they use--and when any good poem is experienced, the images are what stick in the minds of the readers. In this class, students explored how to not only capture what they saw in front of them in words, but also how to convey images that come from the furthest depths of their imagination.

Each student benefited from workshopping their poems and receiving peer and instructor feedback. Additionally, our class used classical and contemporary poetry and visual art to guide our explorations; we studied visual artists/writers ranging from John Keats to Frida Khalo to Gregory Pardlo and Cynthia Manick.

Through exercises in sound and movement, we tracked how poetry is informed by our senses and how we can fine-tune the process of choosing what of our absorbed experiences shows up on the page.

The poems you will find here are honest and evocative -- full of sensory detail. From lyrical poems that explore the complexities of self-identification, to ekphrastic poems that exist as a living critique of our current socio-political climate, every poem written in this section has value in its imagery and composition, and that is what we are most proud of. We hope you enjoy!

Faculty Bios Angela Siew is about to complete her MFA in Poetry at Emerson College.

A former English language teacher and a current visual arts enthusiast, she now works as a Graduate Consultant at Emerson’s Writing and Academic Resource Center and is a first-time EmersonWRITES instructor. Angela is the recipient of an Academy of American Poets Prize and has work in Rock & Sling and other journals.

Breauna L. Roach is an MFA candidate in Poetry at Emerson College and a recipient of the Gwendolyn Brooks Writers Association’s Poetry Prize. Her work has appeared in the Callaloo, Vinyl, Little Patuxent Review, and various other publications. She seeks to communicate across time and cultural barriers in her poems, and often focuses on demystifying the mythical. She teaches at Berklee College of Music as well as in the First-Year Writing Program at Emerson College. Breauna is a native of Detroit, MI and has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Callaloo, and the Fine Arts Work Center.

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Katherine Colglazier Willow Hill School, 10th Grade This year, I most enjoyed learning about form poetry and experimenting with rhyme. In this poem, I began to take inspiration from the poet Edgar Allen Poe and incorporate my own writing style.

Ghost Who are you?

What have you done to his soul?

Have you possessed The mindless body?

Do you control his words Used like weapons; To make more ghosts?

Have you drained the color from his eyes So he can only see Black and white?

Is that right?

Are these words true?

Or are you under the influence; Has fire burned you with the taste Of gasoline?

You overdosed on a drug Called love; Now you’re in rehab.

You were given roses, With cut off thorns.

A mistress gave you real ones, And now you know the taste of Blood.

Cuts from her knife, She used on other 59

Meat.

You choose to be butchered, Yet you scream out in pain; Mercy Mercy on my soul.

Silent whispers you did say, Took too long to echo through the room, A flash of light hit you soon; Blood hit your skin, Painted you with pain, But the rain did not Wash it away.

Deflowered by roses; A virgin to pain.

Until someone took a knife, And had their way.

Now you’re shooting bullets, Because you got your wish.

Now you’re possessed with hate, From the tree that possessed you Love.

Making ghosts, To make up for the fact That you are a ghost I created.

Elegant Truth I hate you.

Your sarcasm Is your smile, You look ridged And cold; Your soul you say

Is black like Your clothes.

Eyes slippery as Oil, Wash over me like Water.

But there’s a softness To your posture.

There’s a world I have yet to discover, In your shirt creases That I stare in wonder, What this world has to offer.

Your thoughtful lips Laugh in the face Of danger.

The thoughtful lips I wish to kiss That speak such Elegant truths, I can not deny The fact that are displayed; I must confess, I love you.

This is Katherine’s first year in EmersonWRITES. She is a sophomore at Willow Hill School in Sudbury and is a winner of the Silver Key Award in the national Scholastic Writing and Art Competition 2017. She loves art and acting and plans to participate in next year’s EmersonWRITES program.

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Ralph Corbelle Revere High School, 12th Grade This year at EmersonWRITES, I learned to appreciate the craft of poetry and began to focus on the construction of my poetry much more. In writing these poems, I drew inspiration from current social and political issues. I strived to craft a clear message about our nation, the man leading it, and the people who he is answerable to.

Bad Produce Fools, all of us, what a surprise, strolling down the aisle and caught by the gleam of a perfectly round lie.

And how did we not scan the shelves for fruit of a better smell rather than pluck the farthest one foolishly believing it to be strong and well.

The Others all shook in their tiny places, thumping and rolling.

They didn’t notice the races, the scurry of feet on the floor.

They scooted along their respective shelves, hoping to find the shoppers’ friendly faces, little did they know there were no more, and that they would soon be thrown into forsaken cases.

The chosen one drew attention from every corner, whistled a zesty tune and promised a strict order: In this place, he claimed, there would be no foreigner.

And so the crowd swooned and held him up to the light, they need not wait any longer, such a prophetic fruit must be Right.

The light hugged him warmer and warmer until his skin finally shined as white as the house and as dark as pesticide.

And so he unraveled and what did we see?

A festering, sucking, terrible rot.

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And every Other swiveled round and pleaded: will you take us with you or not?

The white veins encircling him quivered with a chuckle: I will not give you that which you’ve sought after; none of you have felt enough of a struggle.

And so every onlooker buckled against his words, for they knew no noise would ever sound worse.

And so he began to peel each of his limbs apart, for everyone knows an orange cannot be bought by more than one eager hand unless he is split down the middle, halved and halved and halved again, until his juices run dark and his soul is left so little that no one in that store could ever find that criminal, unforgivable, divisional, political spittle.

Memorial Day: Thomas DziaDzia still smokes cigarettes.

Burns them up in his mouth like sipping chocolate milk through a straw.

Cradles cartons like children begging for attention.

Hugs the smoke in his lungs tighter and tighter till it rises and runs away.

A pack, an evening on the steamboat from Poland, the floors smothered by soot so black his lungs felt blind.

His clothes still smell of that dirt & ash, 64

his mouth still a pipe.

He still wraps himself till he’s slick & grey, which is to say he never left that boat, that the same air he breathed as a boy still whistles through his puckered lips even as they graze my cheek.

Look at his dark eyes closed, notice the darkened lids covering them, behold the smoke billowing beneath his skin.

When he finally exhales and grinds the butt with the toe of his boot, he straightens his back and looks over my head at the waving flag as the anthem booms around us.

He cocks his elbow out and rests his fingers on the edge of his brow.

The smoke continues to wisp around his shoulders and through the air; his arm shakes slightly and his eyes water, which is to say he is old and thin, grey and tender, soldier and grandfather, immigrant and American.

The Presidential Interview Did you mean it?

When you held a rainbow with the tips of your fingers (as to not look too eager) and swiveled side to side to snap a great picture.

When your eyebrows frowned from trying to impersonate a real leader.

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When your lips flattened like railroads rusted shut and heavy and your eyelids clapped together waiting for applause & confetti.

Or did you shake afterward, run to wash out the colorful stain and promise to never make a fool of yourself again.

What in your stomach began to churn?

Did you wish they all would burn?

This is Ralph’s third year in EmersonWRITES. He is a senior at Revere High School and aspires to become an English teacher. He will be attending Bucknell University in the fall of 2017 as a Posse Scholar. He loves dogs, words, and tennis.

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Abbie Langmead Stoughton High School, 9th Grade Over the course of this year, I really enjoyed finding ways to “play” with the images and ideas in my head that were trapped until now.

For example, telling the same love story through multiple perspectives.

While both Rose Petals and Lovesickness and Kicking Open The Coffin are complete when isolated, the truths of their love can only be revealed as an entire piece. Through this independence but also through their reliance, the narrators share their definitions of love.

Rose Petals and Lovesickness She scours the room, just glancing every chance she has.

Every look, she dreams of two hands running down the curvature of her waist.

A chest against her back hidden whispered words.

The way she’d curl up under their arms in the middle of the night.

The way they’d hum love songs as a morning alarm.

But then it all just comes crashing back.

She scours the room for impossibilities the world that’s never meant to be.

Trapped in her head, she dreams of chocolates and vanilla scented candles, of rose petals and lovesickness.

Instead, the game begins.

Hiding her glances, for they harm.

Hiding her facts, for they kill.

Lying her best and pray they believe her.

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Look down, look down damn it! it will only be so long until They will notice you.

Kicking Open The Coffin She glanced at me.

My heart skipped a moment, then another, then another.

I can only dream of kicking open the coffin door, and marching out of my own funeral.

For her, G-d damn what I’d do for her.

I’d kill this whole damn town and everyone in it. For her I’d carry the world on my back.

Just to experience The world I’ll only die knowing.

The world of laughter, late night snacks, kisses on cheeks and dates far away.

A world I’ll live in, not just be alive in.

I love her, that’s a fact.

I can’t love her. I just can’t I can’t be alive here, nor anywhere.

Be safe, or Be loved.

I allow my eyes to glance, like hers always do. I glance just for her, nobody else.

The split moment of shock. Our eyes lock As she attempts to glance away 68

I love her.

Damn, I pray she can love me.

Abbie Langmead utilizes her snark, wit, and over-dosage of ambition to be heard while constantly drowning in her own self doubt. This is her second year in the EmersonWRITES program, along with being a self-proclaimed expert on anxiety attacks and Broadway musicals. She is always watching and waiting for the perfect moment to break free of the cage more often known as her own mind.

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Stephania Mejia Cristo Rey High School Boston, 11th Grade

him inhaling

the cure to his pain the healing to his ache and the antidote to his heart

exhaling

the absence of his father the addiction of his mother & the harassment at school blowing the smoke he stares at himself in the mirror who he’s become his eyelids are heavy he’s dizzy giggling at the cartoons relaxation for 30 min then back to the suffering cannabis isn’t enough calls his plug asks for something stronger asks for something new comes back with 71

a baggy of blue pills he takes two hearing echoes a smile escapes his face now lying on the floor the poor boy wants more ignorant to his pattern of destruction he comes back with an injection 1 shot but this time he breaks down all paintings to the floor breaks his mirror he doesn’t know why he can’t be happy why happiness is extinct in his life he waits until his mom leaves for her regular drinking hour she won’t be home the next day it’s a nonstop pattern it happens when the time Is perfect he’s gone far away from planet earth wait for it before the rocket ship blasts off he says his last words I tried

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Stephania Mejia is a junior at Cristo Rey Boston. This is her third year at EmersonWRITES. She’s a full range of colors that come together to create her art. Poetry is one of her favorite hobbies because she’s able to express her thoughts as emotions.

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Hailey Norton Revere High School, 12th Grade At EmersonWRITES this year, I took more time with writing poetry about others rather than myself. One of my favorite exercises that we did was writing poems based on a single picture. I was able to work on my imagery and how to convey a tone successfully. Both of my poems are based on a vivid picture in my head that I did my best to convey on paper.

Sleeping I open my eyes The curtain is conveniently cracked to pierce the morning directly through my left eye I shift my head to relieve myself of the glare and find another body sleeping peacefully next to me A body that I know like my own A body that I have memorized over the years I’ve seen it draped in white I’ve seen it bare to my judgement But there’s nothing to critique Her warm brown hair cascades like caramel down her back And her crystal blue eyes glow like frosted branches And her soft skin becomes a rocky road when I trace shapes on it like a canvas And her voice The one I first heard say hello in that pitifully hipster coffee shop The one that completely solidified my hope for the future as I heard, “I do” The words “I love you” sound angelic when slipping from her lips And I never want to see her lips form into a goodbye As I stare at her back rising and falling from her silent breathing I see a movie in my mind 75

Of birthday parties And laughing so hard we would collapse in a fit of giggles Of paltry, petty fights After every blunder After every obstacle You’d find your way back to me each time And we arose stronger

Survival Guide for Drowning The trick is to cover your ears And close your eyes.

Never struggle, Never kick. The trick is To scream loud To the fish, to the abyss But not too loud. Don’t forget The sharks.

The trick is to hold your breath Long and lasting Until you turn purple Or explode. The trick is They’ll never come Because they don’t hear you.

They never will Because you aren’t meant to be here.

Their eyes will never Scan the dirty waters.

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Accept it.

Embrace it.

The trick is you cannot be free.

It was never your choice.

Ashore My teeth, my teeth Sand in my teeth It crunches and grinds like my broken heart A lonely traveler limp on the shore Who knows when I will return home My eyes, my eyes Salt in my eyes It stings and burns like my solemn goodbyes A child searching for innocence Who knows only of war My lungs, my lungs Water in my lungs It fills me up and tears me down with her angry current A body lifeless in mind and soul Who knows nothing of a warm embrace My skin, my skin Picking at my skin A seagull like a vulture making me its prey Who knows I have no time left My heart, my heart Nothing in my heart It was emptied a long time ago When mother and child lifelessly floated Along the rocky shores 77

Hailey Norton is an unjustifiably self-proclaimed comedian from Boston, Massachusetts. This is her third year attending EmersonWRITES. She spends her afternoons chasing her cat with a spray bottle because he seems to think the counters are his personal playground. When she is not writing to make the Shakespeare that lives in her head proud, she is trying to master that impossible song of all the elements of the periodic table.

Cyan O’garro Cristo Rey Boston High School, 11th Grade This poem is one that came to me after listening to way too much R&B. Still, it is a poem that I feel is different and something most won’t admit they can relate to. Love Poem is written in the voice of a young girl who wants to be with a person she loves, but is confused and in too much denial to have anything serious. This is due to her fear of one-sided love and rejection. This is her poem.

Love Poem I don’t love you But I want you When you touch me I need you But I don’t love you I honestly have no idea About love I figure it’s....

Well like I said I don’t know Could it be that lump In your throat when you hear Their deep voice Or the security felt in their arms Maybe it’s when your mind is filled With them and you crave Their presence over any Other desire When you rather tell Your whole life story And have them lock it away In their heart Or when you’ll run In the pouring rain just to see Each other and get in a kiss or two 79

Before your departure Maybe... I’m not sure But either way we don’t have that I want to I feel like we could But I’m afraid Afraid you won’t Love me like how I would Love you And so then I’ll run For you only for one thing And you’ll only crave my body Is that what we’re doing now?

Love I’ve never experienced it Not sure if I want to Maybe with you But there goes that fear Fear of falling and you won’t fall with me Fall with me please so I won’t be alone Could we please It doesn’t seem that scary when you’re with me Just trust me Hold me Hurry please cause I feel it The earth underneath my feet Is crumpling Into a that deep abyss called love I can’t fall Not without you We could be happy 80

Even in that pit of unknown Come fall with me Or just pull me away And don’t drag me over there Don’t drag me to fall All by myself I don’t know what love is I don’t know what love is I don’t love you Cyan is a poet, writer, and artist who uses her work as an escape route from her crazy life. She is one who thinks deeply and that reflects in her writing, as she touches topics most would rather leave behind. Cyan is her own poet following in the footsteps of her father, learning, reading, and writing in order to grasp everything the world has to offer.

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Bria Phillips Lincoln Sudbury Regional High School, 11th Grade This year I learned to take a closer look at the different aspects that go into writing poetry. When you’re writing a poem water isn’t always water. Water can take many forms and adjust to our senses depending on the feeling we have.

Listen Why you don’t speak You so quiet all the time What you laughing at You never raise your hand In class I mean What did you say Are you ok Speak up Are you shy Man If I could Just get one penny Anytime anybody said those things to me Do you know how many pennies that would be ten million nine hundred fifty-six thousand five hundred and one All them pennies equal to all them questions You keep askin’ You keep askin’ me the same damn thing And the answer never change Because when I’m talking you talking too How you hear you hear me if I could hear you You can’t can you Too busy Too busy to pay me any mind Little ole me I keep my head down 83

Sometimes cover my face when I smile You think I’m quiet all the time Can’t dress up go out and have fun In reality there’s different sides to me So many sides to be seen But y’all never reach inside of me Because in here as far as I could see Everybody blind to me This is Bria’s second year in EmersonWRITES. She is a junior at Lincoln Sudbury Regional High School and is currently taking creative writing.

She loves movies and photography and plans to write screenplays some day.

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Ebony Smith Excel Academy Charter High School, 9th Grade This year at EmersonWRITES has been a huge shift for me. Adapting from the Nonfiction Class to the Poetry Class meant that there were so many more rules for me to play by. So far, this has been my favorite year in the EmersonWRITES program. In this poem, I write about Kayla Newman’s “The Good Egg” image.

Mismatched A mismatched woman striped and spotted, zigged and zagged, leans over a crystal ball.

There was a certain sizzle that her future made when she poked and prodded at it, when she flipped it.

Like a matchmaker would do, her future was mismatched too.

The center; an oozing flaxen.

Everything else; a ghostly white.

The mismatched woman looks up to the sky at the thousands of planes, all the same, passing her by.

And whilst her future blacks out, shrivels and dies, it casts a trail of inky smog, to invade the woman’s woeful eyes.

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All this mismatched woman could do, was crack open another try.

This is Ebony’s second year in EmersonWRITES. As a freshman at Excel Academy Charter High School, when she is not busy planning school events or partaking in clubs and sports, Ebony writes poems during her free time. Her poems vary in topic; human interactions and relationships, fear, need, and her own personal feelings and experiences.

Ebony deeply enjoys writing in isolation and then sharing her work with close friends and family.

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Essence Smith Excel Academy Charter High School, 9th Grade This year, I was in the poetry class and I got the chance to learn new writing techniques. In this poem I write in the voice of the legendary Tupac Shakur.

Ode 2 Pac Excuse me, but it seems y’all still haven’t learned it’s been exactly 20 years since my demise but even from the shimmering, azure heaven above Ms. Lady Liberty still can not see all the people want is the joy of being free they want 2 live in glee without having 2 flee every time the red and blue lights shadow the streets Liberty and Justice still hanging and banging on my homeboys, doing us dirty like we are not supposed 2 make noise the cops still carrying their glocks blasting their rounds of blazing fiery bullets into us CLICK

CLOCK BANG SHOT when will America wake up it’s like the alarm clock never went off do they not hear our screaming? another brother that looks like me lying in the dirt lifeless his crimson blood stained his ebony skin the media will only show his story once unless he was a criminal or a Thug 87

or had a picture of himself, posing with a gun because then it will seem like he deserved what was handed to him like he was living in the fast lane, but karma still caught up but who asked the cop to play God? now the family is dressed in black gathered in the church, trying to remember someone who is already forgotten trying to get back the one they lost but even as the days pass the mass of Black brothers and sisters stand together hand in hand their strong voices shouting “NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE!” to fight against the ones who give out cruel and unusual punishments hope for the youth and the future may seem lost but we are not hopeless the fervent flames are still burning in our eyes gasoline flows deep in our bloodstream all we need is a match to set the crooked system in flames This is Essence’s second year in EmersonWRITES. She is a freshman at Excel Academy Charter High School. She has many passions, but the most important one is representing people who have no voice.

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Aviana Sullivan Excel Academy Charter High School, 9th Grade This year, I most enjoyed critiquing poetry and playing with the style of my poems. In this poem, I wrote about the vulnerability of the deceased and how lives are reflected through the corpse.

Bones Brittle and breaking fragile and forgotten, lies that fill the empty space between each rib.

Bony white fingers that held the hands of forgotten faces, spiders roam from the sockets of where eyes once were that held the world, to the hanging jaw that spoke the words of love and meaningful laughter.

This is Aviana’s second year in EmersonWRITES. She is a freshman at Excel Academy Charter High School and a member of the varsity school dance team. She was also part of the varsity volleyball team and loves dogs. Aviana is very sarcastic and loves puns and cheesy pick up lines; ask her to tell you some and she’ll be more than happy to.

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Khadijah White Scituate High School, 12th Grade This year at EmersonWRITES, I was able to become more imaginative with my pieces. I was encouraged to change and be bold with my writing and to stray from the ordinary. In these poems, I expressed my thoughts and feelings in ways that I believe best show who I am as a writer.

Shame The melanin of her skin peeled off like the peels of a rotten banana The curls and kinks of her hair long forgotten as that hot comb comes in contact Contact that she lost with her rooted roots Roots that she tries to hide but can’t erase She hums those Negro spirituals not letting the words escape her full lips The lips that are shaped and curved like those of her ancestors who fought for her to walk down the street among her lighter skinned peers without the fear without that chip on her shoulder Yet she tries to forget ignore omit neglect where she comes from and how she got to where she is today The gravel and dirt roads that stained the soles of their feet are all in the past 91

As she travels along the cemented sidewalks In those heels that leave marks on Her soul.

Contradiction You preach to me to love my melanin To appreciate the skin I’m in But it seems like it’s becoming a trend To be someone else so that our life doesn’t come to end You preach to our sisters to love our natural hair To embrace our bodies and love who we are And to walk with pride and without a care But how can we do that when the love for us in this society has become so bizarre You preach to our brothers to be The best fathers and to Appreciate our women Because the black men who do Are becoming less and less common Because the black men who can Are becoming less and less common Because the black men being shooting targets Are becoming more and more common Because the black men dying from violence Are becoming more and more common America is praised to be the “Land of the free” But how can that be When the only thing a black man can see is the end of barrel as more people are take part in killing sprees Because they are viewed in our society today as beastly I’ve always been told that two wrongs don’t make a right So no I don’t see the reciprocated violence as the correct to fight We have to prove that just because they are white 92

They don’t have the authority to put us in some kind of plight Because we’re tired of seeing death of a black man on the news as the highlight It’s honestly really scary To wake up every morning and see Another person on the news who looks like me As if killing them will solve problems and is the key It seems as if our nation is diving like the Red Sea And turning into the Dead Sea Because my brothers and sisters can’t even walk around while carefree

What I Gave The Water Dam It’s a dam It may all come rushing out at once But eventually it resurfaces I’m saving the water and thoughts For times of need Dam It’s a damn Shame that I hold these things in When I should be sharing them In the end they may all burst Like that rusty pipe under the sink Dam It’s a dam I hydrate my thoughts To quench my memories 93

I dive into my subconscious And flood my brain I submerge my feelings So that my intelligence doesn’t drown I keep that afloat So that I can keep swimming In the ocean that we call society Filled with killer sharks and whirlpools I try to go against the wave Khadijah is a hardworking and creative young woman. She is the sports editor for her high school newspaper and always has the opportunity to express herself through her own writing. Seeing as this is her second year at EmersonWRITES, she’s gained many skills and tools to help her not only better her writing, but herself as well.

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Multi-Genre: Make It New...Or Funny, At Least Course Introduction When we decided to experiment even further with the ideas of multi-genre and non-traditional writing, we knew we were inviting a chaotic kind of energy into the classroom. Still, we met and embraced that chaos every week with our students. They were eager, always seeking to harness the power and celebration and sorrow of various literary works, artists, and movements. Despite and because of everything that’s happened in the past five months, the students composed, chopped, blacked-out, and remixed texts—synthesizing and subverting the voices of the world around them. What results is fresh writing that howls in the face of silence or standard. We are beyond proud to present the following genre-defying pieces created by our students. May their work inspire challenge, admiration, and thought.

Faculty Bios Sally Burnette is a third-year MFA poetry candidate. This is their second year with EmersonWRITES, which has been an incredibly meaningful experience because of their dedicated co-instructor Oscar and all of the wonderful students, who continue to produce exciting and fearless work.

Sally also teaches in Emerson’s First-Year Writing Program. Recent poetry is out or forthcoming in REALITY BEACH, The Fem, and Winter Tangerine.

Oscar Mancinas is the proud son of Mexican immigrants. This is his second year teaching as part of EmersonWRITES. He is a third-year MFA fiction candidate and also teaches first-year writing at Emerson College. His fiction and poetry can be found via Google. Participating in EmersonWRITES has been one of the greatest privileges of his life, and for that he must thank his second-year co-conspirator Sally Burnette and the creative and curious students of the multi-genre course. He owes his literary life to those willing to bend form and embrace the unknown.

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Leandra Cassaro Revere High School, 12th Grade The poem “Alone” was created using a technique that I learned and practiced throughout this year called erasure. I took words from a men’s fashion magazine and transformed them into a poem about feeling alone and being judged for who you appear to be, rather than who you really are.

“Inside Infatuation” was inspired by Thomas Sayers Ellis’s poem, “Or.” I wrote this poem using words that contain the word “in” to describe the feeling of falling in love with someone.

The story “Ron’s Day at Work” is about an unlucky man who races against time to make it to work, told by a emotionless, observant, and annoyed narrator. I wrote it at 2:00 in the morning.

Alone The alone factor. Tinted on the outside; inside soft, detailed for distinction and coveted.

Inside Infatuation Indefinite infatuation, Installed into Indistinct, indescribable Feelings Inevitable infatuation, Sinking into An indigo inlet.

Intensifying.

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Infinite infatuation, Skin tingling, Insides inflamed.

Burning.

from Ron’s Day at Work “Oh shoot! Not again!” Ron yelled in frustration. He spilled his coffee on his lap. Now his outfit for work was ruined. Ron had to go change his clothes. He got out of his very practical Toyota Corolla and went inside to find new pants. He was going to be late for work. The time on his clock read 9:52. That meant that Ron had eight minutes to get to work, or else he would be fired. Even with his hours getting cut because of his constant lateness, he couldn’t seem to get it right.

What Ron did for a living was design sinks. He had to sit in a tiny office and draw concepts for sinks all day long, every day. Ron was never the most coordinated guy. He always trips over nothing, spills things on him, and he never knows when to stop talking about his pet iguana. But hey, at least he can sketch a pretty decent sink.

Ron ran into his house like a maniac. He had exactly eight minutes and two seconds to get to work. The first thing he did was try to get out of his car, but he wasted twenty-two seconds doing that, because he didn’t realize that he still had his seatbelt on. He went to jump out of the car but the seatbelt stopped him from doing so. He ended up getting tangled in it.

After finally being free from the seatbelt’s restraints, he ran over to his door and began pulling on it. “WHY WON’T IT OPEN!!” he frantically screamed. Then he realized the door would not open because he locked it before he got in his car. He went to reach for his keys in his pocket but the keys weren’t there. He started panicking, before realizing that he left the keys in his car’s ignition. He ran back to the car and grabbed the keys. Then he prepared to unlock his door. He held up what seemed to be the right key to the door, but it wouldn’t fit in the lock.

“No! No! No! This can’t be happening!” Ron yelled while his voice was trembling. But why, all of a sudden, would his key not fit in the lock? I’ll tell you why. Because he grabbed the wrong key. Then Ron realized that there are other keys on his keychain. He finally took the right key and unlocked the door. That wasted one minute and forty-seven seconds.

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Ron, barely breathing, ran upstairs to change. He went into his bedroom, slammed the door shut, and began looking for pants. Except there was one problem. He ran into the bathroom by mistake! It took him thirty-three seconds to realize he was in the wrong room. Does this man even know his own house? I guess not.

He opened the door and ran into the right room this time. He threw off his coffee stained pants and grabbed some more pants that were very handy. He put on the pants. Surprisingly it only took him seventeen seconds. But his impressive length of time he took to put on pants did not change the fact that he was indubitably running out of time.

I’m not good at math, so I’m just going to round Ron’s remaining time left to five minutes. Ron had five minutes to get to work.

He ran out of the house and didn’t even lock the door. Seeing that I’m the author and these are my ideas, I’m going to say that Ron gets robbed at some point later in the day. He should have locked his door.

He started the car and threw his foot on the gas. Away he went.

Nineteen seconds later, Ron pulled up to a red light. This could be the red light that ended his career. Luckily the red light changed four seconds later. Ron started swerving between cars. But of course Ron isn’t a good driver. He can’t parallel park, he doesn’t know what neutral means, he can’t make the beeping stop, and he doesn’t even know how to open the hood. The sides of his silver Toyota Corolla were getting pretty scratched and chipped. “Not my silver Toyota Corolla!” He yelled after he heard a pretty ugly noise. I don’t know why he referred to his car so specifically.

Ron was now cutting it pretty close. He had two minutes and fiftyone seconds to get to work. He could see the office in the distance. But there was traffic preventing him from getting there. Here’s what he did. To the right of him, there was a curb with a patch of grass next to it, which eventually leads to the office. He dramatically threw his foot onto the gas and drove over the curb and through the grass. He had to pass through some backyards before he could get to the office. He was driving so fast that he drove straight through someone’s fence, crashed right through another family’s shed, and even drove straight through an above ground inflatable five foot pool. He just drove right through it.

Finally he made it to the office building. He didn’t even bother to put on the brakes. He was zooming up to the building at sixty miles per hour, and he just opened the door and jumped out. He forgot to take out the keys. The Toyota Corolla just kept going. It just took off. I wonder where it ended up.

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Ron had forty-one seconds to get to work. He ran up to the door, opened the door, and then ran up the stairs to his section. He made it!

Ron was not going to be fired for being late. For any given person, this morning sounds like a nightmare. This is a normal day for Ron. Usually he always almost gets fired for something.

Ron sat down at his desk and prepared to work for the rest of the day, anticipating another day full of struggles and misfortune.

Leandra Cassaro is a senior at Revere High School. She enjoys watching TV, hanging out with her cats, wearing black clothes, and writing about her feelings. She also writes parodies. This is her first year at EmersonWRITES.

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Jocelyn Leuenberger Bridgewater-Raynham Regional High School, 10th Grade This year, I learned how to experiment with the format of both stories and poems. In the story below, I used a scientific concept to construct a full piece, free of plot or structure, and abstract of meaning.

Atoms The atoms in our bodies are in a perpetual flow of replacement and deviation. With each new touch, each contact point, the smallest parts of us diffuse and come apart in other things. Through the proximity of conjoining bodies, particles shift between men, filling gaps, switching parts, hooking new thoughts onto brains. The world is built upon this principle of motion and displacement. Together we move in order to decide the configuration of these atoms: tremble and the heat rises; sit still and sink the cold. By tomorrow, you will be an entirely different person.

Like atoms, our cells work around the clock to remake and destroy themselves. For instance, during sleep, the shin’s Golgi bodies may wage war against the thousands of neighboring nuclei. Adorned in the finest of armors and vowing the other’s complete annihilation, each side bloodies itself in a fatal cause, neither caring for the casualties endured by their armies. The mitochondria and lysosomes turn their heads to such a sight and, constantly embroiled in a bitter feud, begin to squelch one another.

Next the vacuoles combat the ribosomes; the membranes conquer the centrioles; the cytoplasms at last rail against the endoplasmic reticulums.

By daybreak, a thousand cells lay slain in the left leg, destroyed by their own insides; but, like in the aftermath of all civil wars, destruction soon becomes construction, blasphemy religion, ends beginnings; the cells, used to nightly skirmishes, merely straighten their backs, and begin to chart the cost of reparations.

This constant rearrangement is only the nature of things. Look anywhere and you will find it: everyday people are switching out of homes, out of jobs, out of crooning lovers unable to maintain a faultless likability. As we speak, each minute builds a new person atop the old, stacking and subtracting and subduing identities until the holdings can no longer be sustained. Within a decade or a two, a being completely unrecognizable from the original sprouts its head: this time marked by 101

age, this time marked by trauma, this time marked by an extraordinary string of overt successes. As such, the same, indelible shape ceases to take form within us, causing our downfalls. We crack, we die, we rise anew.

There will always be some attempting reversion back into past models. These are the few believing in the salvation of time, that the decades cannot not only be hustled along but pulled backwards, unveiling the young and old together in one arena, the soul scuttling between the new and the dilapidated, the strong and the withered, the exceptional and the unexceptional, all held between the identical, flickering starlight.

But such notions of restoration are impossible. The parts most seeable of our past selves were buried long ago between layer and layer of bedrock, unable to be recovered by any surveyor or archaeologist. In fact, we might as well lie and insist that disintegration is the true culprit of our constant deaths and reincarnations, for our frequent distresses—our wants, our haves, our deplorable aging—are stiffened by the sands of the universe. The achievements of our past selves sit and fall apart in such sand, unable to root themselves in soil or sprout true blossoms. Look how the resilient bloom turns to dust! Look how it hardens and sours in the wind! The very entity of life, lost between age and suffering...

Watch and time will kill it.

That is the life of Man. Jocelyn Leuenberger is a sophomore at Bridgewater-Raynham Regional High School. She runs both the Creative Writing Club and Literary Magazine at her school. She plays softball and runs hurdles, and was recently recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.

Emily Paquin Lowell Catholic High School, 12th Grade The Moment He Took Me: We all have memories inside of us. Some great, and others that we would rather forget. This is a poem about letting go of the bad memories before we move on from life. This work was created by finding words from different articles in a magazine and rearranged to create a completely new work.

Our Rhythm: This is another work created from cutting words out from a magazine. In this poem the speaker has the same reoccurring dream that has just become his rhythm.

The Moment He Took Me Then something seemed to break, Releasing some dark spirit From the depths of his gut.

Cracked into pointy shards, He held his heart, bleeding in his fist.

Gealed into a lifelessly kind of Frankenstein, kind of imposter.

He sang over his Revel in the spotlight that made him ill.

The wild thumping of The song that didn’t mean anything to them.

His body bore no scars.

His heart rate returned to normal And his breathing, slowly stopped.

Sudden death was the strangest, But life wasn’t strange at all.

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Our Rhythm This is going to be about rhythm.

It is not possible for him to die, But he begins to fear.

The clear troubling cry of a child, You have to stay alive The light dropped prematurely with the rain Believe that he will control everything Your rhythm, The sting, The night, You cannot leave her alone. Be patient.

He chews fear in his mouth.

She had the perfect, light green eyes.

His, persistent grey, burning, then tired.

“This is not real,” he thinks.

First thing, somewhere he feels his ticking heart, He says, “This is just rhythm.”

Emily Paquin is a Senior at Lowell Catholic High School. She spends her time playing bass guitar, illustrating and writing comics. Currently, Emily is in the process of creating a comic book about a crow and will go to college to study art. She hopes to someday be an illustrator.

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Hayley Petrozzelli Revere High School, 12th Grade Sisters Blood: Inspired by Alfred Hitchcock’s films, this poem alludes to Hitchcock’s fascinating obsession with murder mystery and madness in the context of an actual murder mystery. Sisters Blood is a fast-paced “mashup’ of words and stories that pay homage to Hitchcock’s suspense.

The story pulls from Hitchcock, but at its heart it is about a woman in real life who frightfully resembles a Hitchcock character.

Tryouts captures the unsteadiness and bitterness of my experience with a high school basketball tryout. There are sounds, images, and smells that “Tryouts” brings to the surface. It will surely be a new and strange experience for those who never attended basketball tryouts.

Sisters Blood overt and obsessive

comprehensive retrospection of thriller, a mashup of “Rear Window” and “Psycho” wicked

hidden game show of illicit thrills one participant,

Hitchcock’s

suspicion of death

fast friends next morning, a

murdered in

in the news

a documentary about the embedded in her unconscious mind

psychological power, the intricate

split

dense and elaborate dislocation

devotion to

time.

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separated from her sister

her exhusband, the doctor who performed the procedure her stalker Vertigo.

Hitchcock and others conflicted and cautioned

hidden truths traps and

delusions.

Tryouts The basketball struck the court as the familiar players asserted themselves for the drive to the basket. The hollow bounce of the ball, the stickiness of the composite leather, the squeaks of the tightly laced hightops, and the thundering rumbles of the rebound drill all signalled the start of a new season.

Eerrr. The buzzer sounded that dreadful groan as we took our places. We shook our feet, cleaned the bottom of the floor with our high tops like horses with its hoofs on new ground, and leaned as far over the starting line as possible. Hardly anyone paused for a breath. It was all shaking inhaling and fearful glances. The race commenced, and the numbers on the back of our jerseys flapped furiously. The harder you ran, the more the paper number tore. In the end, the fastest, strongest, and those who had simply endured, like myself, wore tattered paper. It was a proof of victory or evidence of a fruitless struggle.

Finally, the coach exited the office that she had claimed for her tryouts. She held herself gracefully and commanded the attention of her players with every step. She flashed careless looks at those who were failing and gave encouraging speeches to those who were trying.

One moment she was looking and smiling smugly, then she turned and revealed pity, and to some she gave the approving nod. stood frozen Once in the room, I focused on the dull buzz of the fluorescent tubes and couldn’t help but smell the unaired gym bags.

Hayley Petrozzelli is a senior at Revere High School. She is working in three AP classes and dual enrollment and is currently writing for her school’s newspaper. She enjoys Model UN and loves to discuss tv and film. She is studying to become a high school English teacher.

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Juan Esteban Sepulveda Boston Arts Academy, 9th Grade My poem Small Spaces is a poem I wrote one day in one of my acting classes at school. This poem represents how chaotic my mind is. I explain the life of three different people and how being trapped affects them.

However my poem is open to various meanings.

Small Spaces A little boy sits in a dark room Sitting in a cold and hard chair Hands tied down to the handles And is cold since he is completely naked The only light source A small TV The ones you would keep in your kitchen or have If you were poor or from an “evolutionary� time period The TV is silent The only thing showing is a cluster of gray and black Squiggles making a harsh scattering sound Abruptly the television Begins to play a film A little girl Crying in the corner of her room Curly hair and medium caramel tone skin Her hands Worn down and sore from working in the farm And playing in nature They are over her face Moist hands holding Tears that make wet Secrets 107

The little boy notices that he now has warm Brick red socks on The little girl is now a lot older Lives in the woods now and lays on the floor by a window Under the skies of her nationality She has had two kids Alone she cries in the corner As her children are sleeping And her hands artificially healed Her tears lay a boundary that hide more secrets The little boy takes off his socks and spits On his feet and begins to cry The little girl now Lives in the free country Her two kids are teengers Waiting outside As the little girl gives birth To a strange Child The little girl washes dishes And listens to her Music As her child is crying Under the little girls bed With a knife in their hand The little girl smiles as she is calmly making Her house look the way she prefers Lines making satisfying corners The little boy has fallen asleep And wakes up hours later To both little girl and her child Crying 108

On a beach Surrounded by police And butterflies And clowns The little boy Dies from age Painfully The little girl looks at her child in the eye And smiles.

Juan Esteban Sepulveda is a 15 year old boy who dreams of becoming a well-known actor. He currently attends Boston Arts Academy as a freshman theatre major. Juan thinks of himself as very perceptive and sees the world in a complex way. He is proud of his growth as a person and hopes to impress the world once he proves his ability to stand out.

This is Juan’s second year as part of EmersonWRITES.

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EmersonPUBLISHES SPINE This year, EmersonPUBLISHES continued to build from the great work done in EmersonWRITES and explore the next step of the publishing process. We discussed the timeline of publishing an anthology from the publisher’s perspective, including submissions, content editing, and graphic and text design. We also discussed what it means to be a writer trying get published, what magazines and small presses look for, and how to give our writing the best chance at success. Lastly, we explored an introduction to graphic design concepts where we developed the color scheme and cover aesthetic of this year’s issue of SPINE. Faculty Bio Alayne Fiore recently graduated with her MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College. She is Operations Manager & Special Assistant to the Vice President for Diversity & Inclusion and a part-time faculty member in the First-Year Writing Program. She is the owner and operator of Rozlyn Press, a small press for female-identified writers, and a volunteer screener of fiction for Ploughshares. Originally from Minnesota, she now lives in Melrose with her husband and two daughter. This is her second year with the EmersonPUBLISHES program.

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Thank You Notes We would like to give our special thanks to all the people who work so hard to make EmersonWRITES happen and to those in the Emerson College Community who continuously support us.

Program Coordinators Mary Kovaleski Byrnes, Senior Lecturer, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing & Curriculum Coordinator & CoFounder, EmersonWRITES Christopher Grant, Associate Director of Student Success, Program Coordinator & Co-Founder, EmersonWRITES Stephen Shane, Affiliated Faculty, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing, Curriculum Coordinator, EmersonWRITES

EmersonWRITES Faculty Fiction: Anthony Martinez and Cassie Title Nonfiction: Lindsay Haber and Alex Ebel Poetry: Breauna Roach and Angela Siew Multigenre: Sally Burnette and Oscar Mancinas

EmersonPUBLISHES Faculty Alayne Fiore, Operations Manager & Special Assistant to the VP, Diversity & Inclusion; Part-Time Faculty, FYWP, WLP

Members of the Emerson College Community Jabari Asim, Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director for Creative Writing, Writing, Literature and Publishing Chris Daly, Director of Retention and Student Success cxii

Jennifer De Leon, Affiliated Faculty, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing Angela Grant, Director of Financial Aid Shana Healy-Kern, Associate Director, Business Systems Analysis, Enrollment Technology Steve Himmer, Senior Lecturer and First-Year Writing Program Director, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing MJ Knoll-Finn, Former Vice President for Enrollment Management Maria Koundoura, Professor and Chair of the Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing Ruthanne M. Madsen, Vice President for Enrollment Management Tamera Marko, Senior Lecturer, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing Maria Maxell, Senior Associate Director, Enrollment Data, Enrollment Technology M. Lee Pelton, President, Emerson College Anna Ross, Affiliated Faculty, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing Carol Smolinsky, Associate Director of Enrollment Services and Support John Trimbur, Professor & Assistant Director of the First-Year Writing Program, Department of Writing, Literature and Publishing Tori Weston, Assistant Director, Pre-College Programs Michaele Whalen, Vice President of Academic Affairs cxiii

IN THIS ISSUE

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Makayla Andre Kendra Bannister Karlecia Berganza Daniel Canning

Jocelyn Leuenberger Stephanie Mejia

Leandra Cassaro

Hailey Norton

Karen Cheng

Cyan O’garro

Katherine Colglazier Ralph Corbelle Angela Cozzone Annalise Ella Englert Jackelyn Garces Sofia Gukelberger Jennifer Jantzen Abbie Langmead

Emily Paquin Hayley Petrozzelli Bria Phillips Grayson Pitt Juan Esteban Sepulveda Bob Sherwood Ebony Smith Essence Smith Aviana Sullivan Talia Viera Khadijah White