Literature From the Lost and Found 2015-16

LITERATURE FROM THE LOST AND FOUND

Jake Westra

GREELY MIDDLE SCHOOL 2015-2016 !1

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CONTRIBUTORS Literary Work Tori Bacall Megan Beaulieu Katie Bennert Olivia Bidwell Emma Boynton Sara Carlson Isabella Caron Hayden Cieniawski Grace Cochran Alex Collins Camryn Copp Kaiyla Delisle Caleb Duff Mikaela Estes Katie Fitzpatrick Kira Fried

Luke Gabloff Nola Gallo Lucy Goodman Amelia Greenlee Kate Hahn Molly Hale Maddie Hall Audrey Hankinson Riley Iris Steven Jacobson Audrey Labbe Aidan Martel Sydney Martin Harry McFarland Myla McLain Sofia Mitchell

Conor Nadeau Ella Normandeau Mia Netland Varick Olas Sophia Payson Ana Penza-Clyve Fiona Perrault Taylor Pronovost Anna Raley Corinne Rivera Sara Robinson Elijah Sherr Parker Stair Mathew St. Hilaire Ashley Van Rensselaer Maddie Wright

Art Work Abby Taylor Adam Giroux Anna Raley Anya Davis Isabella Caron

Caleb Knox Corinne Ahearn Ellie Howell Isabella Boisvert Jake Westra Joe Giandrea

Faculty Advisors: Alisha Goldblatt and Jacey Morrill

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Kyle Lamberson Sofia Rico Sydney Pitts Will Nicholson Wyatt Brown

Table of Contents 1

Jake Westra

7 7 8 9 10 12 15 16 17 18 19 20 22 23 24 26 27 28 29 29 31 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 43 43 42 42 43 44 45 45 46 48

POETRY Isabella Boisvert Lucy Goodman Kaiyla Delisle Kate Hahn Nola Gallo Corrine Rivera Sara Robinson Corrine Rivera Aidan Martel Sara Carlson Olivia Bidwell Maddie Wright Sofia Rico Mia Netland Varick Olas Ashley van Rensselaer Mia Netland Luke Gabloff Kyle Lamberson Sofia Mitchell Sydney Pitts Alex Collins Tori Bacall Taylor Pronovost Ana Penze-Clyve Sophia Payson Megan Beaulieu Team Sentinal Corinne Ahearn Emma Nadeau and Nola Gallo Wyatt Brown Caleb Duff Mathew St. Hilaire Steven Jacobson Audrey Hankinson Katie Fitzpatrick Audrey Labbe Sophia Payson Anna Raley

49 49 50

Cover Artwork

Caleb Know Elijah Sherr

Artwork Watch, Feel, Understand Why? Beast Desperate SNAP! The Moon and Sun Working in Tandem Looking Through A Clear Glass Door Overlooked Helpless I Was Wrong, But Why Should I Admit It? Leaf Artwork Joy The White River LOVE Last Race Trouble Man Artwork Cassie and Rocky Artwork A Trip that is a Journey Parallel World Eternity Takeoff Reflections on Time Time If I Could Grant a Wish For You Artwork We Have a Dream

METAPHOR POEMS Artwork Entry A Playful Weapon Freedom Pink Barrell Forward I Stayed Standing Metaphor Poem Artwork

REFLECTIONS Artwork Game Changer

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52 53 54 55 56

57 57 58 60 61 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 75 76

81 82 84 86 88 89 90 91 92

Joe Giandrea Emma Boynton Mikaela Estes Adam Giroux Riley Iris

Artwork Phobia Phobia Artwork Phobia

Will Nicholson Taylor Pronovost Ana Penze-Clyve Abby Taylor Audrey Hankinson Amelia Greenlee Fiona Perrault Anna Raley Molly Hale Isabella Caron Parker Stair Anya Davis Maddie Hall

Artwork Filling My Heart Buffalo Thorn Artwork One Moment The Clock Life Scale Parable The Train Fluorine Francium Artwork Fan Fiction

Isabella Caron Abby Brown Kate Gervais Audrey Flynn Zachary Maestas Laura Howe Matthew Gilbert Corinne Ahearn

Artwork Eyes of the Narwhal The Hunt Inuit Inventions Never Stop Hunting Peace Here I Stand Artwork

93 93 94 95 96 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107

SHORT STORIES

WATERCOLOR POETRY

SHAPE POEMS Ellie Howell Myle McLain Hayden Cieniawski Conor Nadeau Elijah Sherr Grace Cochran Fiona Perreault Ella Normandeau Audrey Labbe Anna Raley Katie Bennert Harry McFarland Camryn Copp Audrey Hankinson Sydney Martin Amelia Greenlee

Artwork The Light A Drop The Fish The Fish Heart Home Home Butterfly Camera Star Raindrop Pencil Star Balloon Music

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Isabella Boisvert

POETRY

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Watch, Feel, Understand Lucy Goodman A poem from three different perspectives The school bell rings, The door opens for the first time since last year.

I try to blend in with the other kids, hoping no one has noticed my ragged clothes.

I stay as far away as I can from Chad.

I know I can hide, but he’ll always find me.

That was a mistake, I looked straight into his eyes.

You know you’ll get hurt if you look in his eyes.

They were wide open and the corner of his mouth was curved into a small smirk, the one I dreaded all summer to see, then I realized it was summer no more, Chad for the rest of the YEAR. The school bell rings, the door opens for the first time since last year.

The first thing I see is Chad holding Lila against a locker, and I know the mistake she made.

She looked him in the eye, I want to help, but I know we’ll be locker buddies if I do.

I now understand there is nothing I can do to stop him.

The school bell rings, the door opens for the first time since last year.

As I walk in with my buddies, I noticed the little twerp.

She tries to hide from me, but the ratty clothes stand out.

I walk toward her and with my big hands, I chuck her against the locker.

I notice other kids walking and staring but look away as soon as I turn and walk fast, hoping not to be caught.

They know they will be smashed into the locker with the twerp.

I don’t know why it hit me or when it did, but suddenly as I was holding her up I start to think as I get my daily glares, would it be so bad to be nice for a change?

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Why? Kaiyla Delisle I am trapped in a world, where pink is for girls and blue is for men.

But why can’t girls wear blue and men wear pink?

Or can they?

I am trapped in a world, where bathroom signs have a girl wearing a dress/skirt for women, and for men they have a man looking like he/she is wearing jeans.

But why can’t men wear dresses/skirts and woman wear jeans?

Or can they?

I am trapped in a world, where many say men are better at sports than women are.

But doesn't it matter more on what sports you practice, and how long you’ve played?

I am trapped in a world, where men have to ask the other man or girl out on a date.

Where the man has to buy the engagement ring.

Where the men buy the flowers.

Where men can’t wear dresses or wear makeup.

But do they?

I am trapped in a world, where the women do the cleaning, where the women do the cooking, where women can’t go to school.

But why do we let people change us into who we are not?

Why do we let society make these decisions for us?

Now I sit here asking myself, Why?

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Beast Kate Hahn I get up out of bed I see the moldy baseboards The cracked walls And the peeling paint on the ceiling And I know that this old apartment is my home But it doesn’t feel like home I walk into the bathroom I brush my pitch black hair with an old brush I splash cold water in my face Looking in the dirty mirror I feel like I’m not your average 19 year old girl Who goes to the mall with her friends And eats ice cream After a comedy movie But the truth is I’m not your average 19 year old I grab a dirty piece of cardboard I open the apartment door And shut it quickly So nobody can see inside Walking down the staircase To the street below I can already tell it is cold Today, my old worn-out fleece, My small sweatpants and tiny gloves, And windbreaker, Might not be enough To keep the high winds and freezing temperatures From chilling me to the bone I walk across the road to the median Every day, I do this People stare at me in disgust Many of them laugh at me But what they don’t know It that my mom works at the local school As the janitor And she, too, makes very little money, just like me

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I pull out my sign that says: “Need money to help pay rent. Every penny counts.”

Some people glance at me quickly And then look away before they make eye contact with me It’s as if I’m not a human BUt simply a ferocious, hideous beast From One of Stephen King's books But I’m not a beast I’m just another person Just like you I guess But I bet That your father wasn’t killed From a deadly brain tumor when you were 7 And you were left with your stepmother Who can now barely make enough money To pay the rent every month And now you Have to stand out in the freezing cold Or blazing hot temperatures Begging for money For the entire day I stand on the median Not a single penny has anybody bothered to toss to me Just as I decide to give up, A young fellow, probably about my age, Drives up to me in his car And Instead of looking at me in disgust Or acting as if I weren’t there He rolls down his window And hands me a twenty dollar bill I smile He smiles “Thank you,” is all i managed to muster I don’t think he heard me though But I like to think he did.

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Desperate Nola Gallo

On the streets of Portland, Maine, in a minivan is a girl, only 11.

She’s no prodigy, only an outcast.

She sits there, on the scratchy seat of the minivan.

This car is her home, her bed, her reality.

Society walks past her, ignores her.

When she goes outside, the snow falls on her hair, and her thin, purple raincoat.

Only last week, the heat in the car broke.

She struggles at night, with only a blanket, and her family, to keep her warm.

Every morning, She eats a $1.00 donut.

She can’t afford anything else, Before, she ate like royalty.

But her dad lost his job.

Her mom left them for someone else.

The government took the house.

Now she eats stale donuts.

Before, she had a big house, her own room, lots of friends.

But here, she’s crammed into a car

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without any friends, except for her family.

And the crows that caw up above, they are free, she is not.

Her brother plays the banjo on the streets, she sings along with him.

Coins clink before them, but it is not enough.

She needs more.

More space, more warmth, more money for food.

When she still had a house, her grandfather told her, about the stars.

How each one was different, how some were always alone, but how they came together to make the night sky beautiful.

He told her the stars were like people.

Some were different, some were alone, how they helped each other through hard times.

Life has been hard for her.

The universe is against her, but life goes on.

And every morning, she eats stale donuts.

And every night, she huddles with her family to stay warm.

She wishes she still had a house.

She wishes the cold didn’t bite her at night.

She wishes people didn’t view her as a nobody.

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But why does she do this?

Why waste away when there is no hope?

She does this for her older brother, her little sister, her father.

She does this to survive.

After months of bitter cold, and snow, and sleet, the tulips come out.

Spring is here!

Warmth is here!

No more nights of freezing cold!

No more shivering!

She sits on top of the van, the sun warms her, and as for right now, She could live in this moment forever, and let her worries drift away.

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SNAP! Corrine Rivera I race to hide behind a nice large tree So many thoughts so many sounds Should I jump in and save the day?

Should I just leave Norman to deal with this alone?

Hearing mumbles from behind the tree Doolin and the other bobcats making fun of him Like he's some kind of bunny that has its head where its arm should be I move my foot a tiny bit to sneak a little peak of the action…….

SNAP! feeling arms grab me from every direction like snakes surrounding you trying to end your life both trapped by Doolin’s tiny army Although only two people It feels as if giant towers are leaning over you And you know This is the end

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The Moon and Sun Working in Tandem Sara Robinson The moon cries a silent tear, for it has lost the sun.

The sun cannot cry for the tear would melt away in its heat.

Each have feelings, but neither can see each other for they have grown apart.

Separated by the earth, always getting in the way.

Until they meet in a lunar eclipse.

They embrace each other, the coolness of the moon comforting the hot sun.

The earth watches and realizes what he has done, then he moves out of the way.

Now, when humans look up they see the moon and the sun sharing the sky together as one, ruling the sky.

Like a king and queen with the other planets as their court, the sun and moon in perfect harmony.

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Looking Through A Clear Glass Door Corrine Rivera A beaming light shines from outside.

I hear the creaking from the old house as I move myself around.

I hear a deep moaning.

Hearing the whispers from the outside world, feeling as though the world is only a small ball in a pair of giant hands.

I stare out the window, feeling the fists already pounding into my face.

Telling the world I give up, I let them win, over and over.

Screaming for him to stop, pleading for him to leave me alone.

But he doesn’t listen, he doesn’t care.

Yelling for help, screaming at the top of my lungs for him to leave me alone.

Feeling as though I'm trapped, trapped on the other side of the glass.

A soundproof glass door that has been locked with a million locks.

He promised.

He promised he would stop this, Stop the harassment.

Leave me and my friends alone.

Keeping him by my side for months now, Trusting every word he said.

But it was all a lie.

Every word, Every secret we shared.

I never should have trusted him.

I decide to try.

To try one last time.

I gather my breath and be in peace, Tapping the glass and breaking free.

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Overlooked Aidan Martel We are eternal.

We have always been on this planet.

There are many of us.

We are the homeless, the poor, the crippled and lame.

The streets are our home, the slums, the shelters.

We do what we need to survive, but only the determined prevail.

The others starve, freeze or die another way.

Only the ones who know that they will get through the next day survive.

They are the strong ones, even if they don't look the part from afar.

But when you get close, you can see the gleam in their eye, feel the fire burning inside them.

They’re the ones who aren't ashamed of themselves, they accept that, look you in the eye, and they challenge you to help them.

You glance at the ground and not their gaze.

You then feel ashamed and drop a bill into their hat, hand, or basket, then, quickly shuffle away and join the crowd along the sidewalk.

When you walk home along that street, you start to see different things.

People ignoring the man in a faded, too small blue coat, with layers of shirts underneath instead of a warm winter jacket, sitting by the corner of the intersection.

They brush past the old woman, who is asking for change from under her ragged blanket.

When the man you helped earlier says to you, “Thank you”, as you walk by him You stop and say, “You're welcome.”

You will never overlook them again.

Then you sit down in front of him and start a conversation.

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Helpless Sara Carlson Waking up to an early light.

Wishing, dreaming, dreaming to go back in time, and fix what has been done to my feelings and heart.

I don’t want to pick up my head from the pillow, I am too afraid to face the world.

Too afraid to face the bullies, that will stay in my head for the rest of my life.

I wish I could stand up to them.

I wish I could be strong, just like the people in books and TV shows.

I want to leap out of my shell that is holding me back and stand up for myself, but I can’t bring myself to do it.

I roll out of bed and sink my feet into the wool carpet, and smell the scent of New Mexico as it starts to awaken.

As I get ready for a new day, I feel like Fate always had it in for me.

Torturing me with people who don't care about my well being, because I am one of those people who look like a prime target for a bully.

I walk to the window.

And look at the rising sun sweeping over the houses around me, bringing color and light to the earth.

Then it hits me, I realize that I was born for a reason.

I was made to do something in life, and I am not helpless and weak.

I am strong.

After I felt a new light inside of me, I found that I, the girl who is pushed down who feels like everything is wrong, Is not worthless to the world.

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I Was Wrong, But Why Should I Admit It? Three words.

Social-studies-class.

Why? Why did the freak have to be in my class?

Our class.

It was so perfect.

Everyone noticed me every time I walked in.

My beautiful long blonde hair.

My intelligence.

My amazing and cute outfits.

My friends all walking behind me and seeing that I was a leader.

The leader.

But once that new girl came into normal classes and not her stupid classes, all the attention was on her.

My life is so hard!

I love social studies class!

And this stupid freak looking THING ruined it.

I loved the teacher.

I loved the posters on the wall.

I loved all the big books and the maps and everything in that room.

Now, all of that view is ruined.

By the “Ew”! By the “Freak,” as we all called “it.”

It’s all a blur now.

So, in Social Studies class there is this competition thing.

I love history and the world!

So I should obviously sign up for it!

I get to the classroom where we take the test to actually be on the team.

I know I am obviously going to be on it.

I always am.

But when I get there, the “Freak” is ALREADY there!

Ugh! Why? Why? I shouldn’t worry.

She’s not going to be on it.

She’s too dumb!

I mean, look at her!

In that big dumb looking wheelchair and her dumb weird looking face.

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We take the test.

My favorite teacher comes in the room.

Tells us who is on the team, and who isn’t.

He calls my name and a couple other names.

He doesn’t call my best friend’s name.

He calls the “Freak’s” name.

WHAT? How? My “BFF” is way smarter than her.

We are at our first competition.

I’m so excited.

I’m obviously going to get every question right!

I’m way smarter than anyone in this room!

The announcer asks the first question.

Buzz WHAT? She can’t buzz in her answer first.

She answers.

I actually don’t know the answer to this question, but I still don’t want her to buzz in first.

She’ll totally get it wrong.

Never mind.

Oh my gosh!

How did that dumbo get it right?

She must have cheated.

Or maybe…

No! Yes? I don’t know what to think of her anymore.

I mean, it was a really hard question.

Maybe she actually IS smart.

Now I feel bad for all the names I called HER, for all the means things I said behind her back.

I was wrong, but why should I admit it?

-Olivia Bidwell

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Leaf Maddie Wright Sometimes I feel like a leaf blowing in the wind, About to be let go…

Now I am a leaf lying on the ground in the park my family made me leave.

My parents were the kids climbing the tree, When the tree shakes, old leaves must go.

I had to leave the tree.

Now I am a little leaf alone in Central Park, watching the fireworks explode in the New York dark..

Here I sit on a park bench, after a little girl brought me to this bird covered bench.

The days are getting warmer, after the 4th of July, But still even after that, here I still lie.

Now it is September, and I’m still lying around.

I’m still right here, lying on the ground.

The ground is getting colder, and so are all the nights.

When a large storm comes, it brings me way up high.

Up on top of a tree, all that I can see is my family’s old apartment, 10 yards from the tree.

Not long after Christmas, it starts to snow., My family doesn't even know that I can see my past from up in this tree, the tree that I first climbed when I was only 3.

The snow grows deep, I can hardly sleep.

I’m now in an icy winter sleep.

As these memories flood my dreams, The last memory I can remember is going out for ice cream.

Ice cream with my family, we sing in the car as we go.

That is the last thing I remember as I sleep in the snow.

I remember what my grandpa said right before I left.

He said to be strong and always try my best.

I am still trying to remember the rest,

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but then I realize that I don’t need those words.

My family didn’t want me just because they know, They know that I’m smart, and that I love snow.

But they knew these things about me, many years ago….

As you know I feel like a leaf, With 100 memories, With no family, With nowhere warm to sleep.

With no home to return to.

With no money, no food, all day.

That misses their family.

A loose leaf, that will never be the same….

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Sofia Rico

Joy Mia Netland I leap, And I fall.

My hot pink hair pressed up against the floor.

My blue butterfly tattoo telling me to give up.

After all, it’s so scratched up from being on the floor so much.

My left leg burning, Telling me it’ll never be the way it used to be.

When I look up, I take in the view of The calming blue walls in the dance studio.

They encouraged me, told me to not give up.

But that feeling didn’t last long.

My dance instructor comes in, She seems patient as I grow impatient.

While try that leap, over and over again my leg just can’t take it.

I eventually give up, and decide that it’s just not worth it.

I move to the bench in the corner.

Breath in and out.

As I reach out beside me for my water bottle, I take ointment out of my bag.

Then I stare down.

At my prosthetic leg.

Why haven’t I given up?

I ask myself.

I’ve failed again and again, so why do I try?

I ponder this question as I carefully take my leg off and place it Softly beside me.

As I gently rub the ointment on my stump, my dance instructor comes up to me.

She tells me I did very well today.

How could I have done well when I’ve failed?

I ask her this puzzling question.

She smiles and shakes her head.

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Then she puts her hand on my shoulder, and smiles deeply at me.

Almost like I know exactly what she’s gonna say.

“It doesn’t matter that you’ve failed,” She explains to me.

“It just matters that you tried.

After all…

How can you succeed without trying?”

She gave me a pat on the back then quickly left.

As she leaves, I see the same tattoo on her arm.

Except, instead of blue, it’s yellow.

I yell out to her.

Why do you have a yellow butterfly instead of blue?

She smiled and simply said“For many reasons, Yellow is my favorite color for one.

But mostly, it’s an inspiring color Of joy and happiness.

And it gives strength to do what is often thought the impossible.

To try and succeed.”

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Found Poetry A type of poetry created by taking words, phrases, and sometimes whole passages from other sources and reframing them as poetry (the literary equivalent of a collage) The White River Varick Olas Here I am on my raft Going through the impossible Alongside are others that feel my mind I’d forgotten how bad this was But, I was full with courage The river increased into white water I paddled and paddled as fast as thunder As soon as the river was getting faster I was in like a torpedo.

I was going down while bubbles were going up I thought I was worthless Accurately I pushed myself up And I was in a different place Alongside was shore I moved my arms to reach land I fell on the ground like a stick doll All weak and wet.

The others saw me and picked me up into their boat I was amazed that I finally done the impossible.

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LOVE Ashley van Rensselaer based upon the book The Penderwicks at Point Mouette by Susan Denaker Jeanne Birdsall Love can be much more pain Than being smashed on the rocks.

It can be scary, but thrilling.

It can be the time of your life or maybe a disaster.

Your heart can be broken when the love ends.

You kiss that perfection away as he swats you out of his life.

You say something intelligent as he’s squirming out of your love.

You were in paradise, but that is over now.

He was trying to abandon you at paradise.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

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Last Race Mia Netland I’m on the track.

I get on my block.

I crouch down, ready.

I listen attentively to the sound in the distance, the sound of my team cheering me on, yelling Go Jessica.

They rely on me.

They trust in me.

I’m confident.

Confident that I will win for myself and the team.

The starting gun goes off.

I shoot forward.

My kick is good.

Smooth, steady.

My arms are pumping, they’re relaxed.

Then I start soaring.

Flying.

Floating across the track.

Past all my competitors.

I sense someone behind me.

I dig deep.

I cross the finish line.

First place.

But at the same time last place.

Because in reality….

This is my last race.

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Trouble Man Luke Gabloff Trouble Man, why do you stay in trouble?

Is trouble all you know?

Do you like going on trial?

You can’t get married when you’re in prison, no walking down the aisle.

Trouble isn’t good.

Your reputation is severely damaged, and it is only getting worse.

But if you want to, stay in trouble, do what floats your boat, but don’t try to sink mine.

Kyle Lamberson

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CassieI watch you tug at my socks At the drawstrings of my pants and sweatshirt You beg at the door waiting to be let out I expect you to be the puppy I know Who lays down with no command But instead you climb up a hill Stick out your legs And roll Roll Roll You stumble back up And go back up the hill Stopping at my feet to take a quick tug at my socks As if telling me to follow As you run into the woods As if this was our adventure And there was no need for reality where we were going.

RockyYou throw up your head in agony As I hit you with my short crop With a big show in New York coming up We need to be ready I need to be ready You kick out and sprint across the arena I smile and pat you as you start to slow down We’re in a walk I know you don't like this, but I kick you, Hard.

You throw out a buck to throw me off.

I hit you with my crop again.

I saw it coming I had it coming You threw up your head Along with your feet

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I slide off your back as you land back on your feet and sprint away My breath floats in the air as I try to get it back My hands shaking with shock My eyesight is gone But you bring it back to me I see a figure approaching You bend down your head Coaxing me to get back on.

-Sofia Mitchell

Sydney Pitts

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A Trip that is a Journey Alex Collins As some humans rise above other humans, Some aliens must rise above other aliens.

Some must make a journey for the better, Others are forced into the mission.

The mission where they orbit The black hole, The deathly hole, Close to the planet of Unserfly, Where all the aliens reside.

Using the only device they have, To avoid the death ray That can strike at any moment, Fear builds up inside them.

Inside the little bodies of the aliens Both the weary And the desperate, And the strong, And powerful, Their fate depends on one another.

Traveling at light speed, There is no chattering, Only buzzing from the aircraft can be heard.

How much more time is needed?

How long until they touch down On the lit runway And explore the moon?

The only moon of the planet.

How long will this journey be?

At last!

They see the moon, And land safely on the smooth surface.

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Parallel World Tori Bacall

In a parallel world, Aliens are the only life form.

And everything is floating.

Like on the moon, there is no gravity

It used to be filled with people But they time travelled to the future.

And are now millions of years ahead.

The humans want to come back to the present, But no machine can help them.

They are on a mission that doesn’t seem to have an end.

They may be stuck in the future for eternity, On the same planet, And in the same parallel world, Only millions of years later.

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Eternity Taylor Pronovost I am here, unable to leave my enclosed city.

People say we will be trapped, for eternity.

Though I disagree.

I haven’t seen that bright, yellow sun in years.

Or that man in the face of the moon.

Or those small things in the dark called stars.

Our force field surrounding us is white.

So that’s all I see as my supposed to be blue sky.

Our universe is taken over, by the people from five years from now, we call them the future beings.

Replacing our natural light are these white beams.

I have been waiting for my long trip out of here.

The journey of freedom.

To end my eternity.

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Takeoff Ana Penza Clyve I sat in the cockpit, the stars such small, bright, fiery specks in the sky.

It was hard to think our huge sun was one of them.

We were about to take off, to leave our planet Earth behind us.

10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1.

We rocketed upward towards the moon, our destination, the only thing orbiting the earth, like us orbiting the sun.

We passed one of our satellites, observing the earth from above, like a hawk and its prey.

As soon as we cleared the earth’s atmosphere, we jumped to lightspeed.

Our flight at the speed of light only lasted a couple of seconds, then we were slowing down to land on the moon.

That instant ended our quick journey as we landed on the surface, but it was not always that way.

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Reflections on TIME Sophia Payson The ticking tocks of the clock Waiting now for the chime.

Future, theory, thoughts.

Our hands show the seconds passing.

Hours run back to minutes.

As she dances through the woods and sings with the oceans she realizes time is gone.

Reality’s dead Take your turn, she said.

Its circulation gets faster.

Running out of breath, she mumbles, Take your turn, take a chance, before you know, your smooth skin disappears while the wrinkles settle in.

Time takes your place, Filling in the years you’ve lived free and old.

Don’t take the regret.

Fill your slot before time runs out, Many run with sorrow, Few left without.

When you live your life as a broken stool, it never seems enough.

Have the best life you’ll get.

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TIME Megan Beaulieu On the last day of life, knowing it is the end, how would you spend it?

A man who has spent his life trying to make others happy and worrying about what everybody thinks, is going to spend his last day free and doing what he wants to do.

A dierent experience will be done until his time has run out, he first will do something for himself to breathe in his surroundings.

A hike.

Next, he will choose something exhilarating, skydiving.

Next, he will do something that will make him happy and hopeful, visiting his loved ones’ graves.

Last, he would do something that would reflect his life, a drive.

A drive that for him would never end, a drive devoted to his whole life.

One that made him think about all the events the world brings him, and that as one man he was blessed to be able to experience life in his own world.

And on this last drive of his life he knew that it had been a good run, but he was hopeful it was just the beginning.

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If I could grant a wish for you Team Sentinel Students, period 1 and 2 If I could grant a wish for you, I would get a thrill or two.

May no one ever treat you wrong, May you and your friends always get along.

May you never feel the pain of being chosen last, May you never feel like an unwanted outcast.

May you never listen to what the haters say, May you get to live another day.

May you never shed a tear, May you lose every single fear.

May you never be sad and cold at night, May you never have the reason to fight.

May you have kindness, may you have care, May you find people who are willing to share.

May you always have a pillow to rest your head, May you always feel safe in your bed.

May you always have a cloudless view, May the skies above always be blue.

May you always have shelter through the night, May the skies above always burn bright.

May you never have to live life in the dark, May you never be hurt by a rude remark.

May your dreams always come true, May your face never be black and blue.

If I could grant a wish for you, I would get a thrill or two.

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Corinne Ahearn

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We Have A Dream An Essay About Keeping our Earth Clean

By Emma Nadeau and Nola Gallo We have a dream. Not a dream from our sleep, with flying elephants and pigs, but a dream of a clean U.S.A. But more than that, a clean Earth.

Pollution is causing many problems across the world, including the U.S.A. Car exhaust is filling the atmosphere. Forests are being chopped down carelessly. And the two largest landfills on Earth are in the hands of our great Pacific Ocean. Our union needs to be aware of these problems. It’s a tragedy that we can only fix the pollution problem if we put our minds to it, and never give up hope of clean continents in the future.

Let’s handle the first problem: car idling, which is leaving your car running for no apparent reason. “I’m warming up the car in the winter,” you may say. However, modern electronic engines don’t need warming up, even in the midst of a cold winter. If you really want your car to warm up, just drive! So what real harm does leaving your car on actually do? The answer it that it leaves a blanket around the Earth. This blanket of hot air makes the Earth sweat, overheating unnecessarily. You may know this as global warming, or climate change. Global warming is raising the sea levels as it melts the polar ice caps. This is destroying many animal homes, as well as the homes of the Inuit. If global warming continues, in the next few decades, many summer homes on the coast could be partially submerged in water. Carbon dioxide is the main source of global warming, and every 10 minutes that your car engine is off, it prevents 1 pound of carbon dioxide from being released into the air. Not many are aware that lots of gasses that come out of cars can destroy the ozone, the layer of the atmosphere that protects animals from the sun’s ultraviolet rays. Without it, humans would perish and the animals on earth would all die. According to the U.S Environmental Protection Agency, “More than half of the air pollution in the nation is caused by mobile sources, primarily automobiles.” As well as polluting the air, gasses in your car can cause asthma, heart disease, chronic bronchitis and cancer. The elderly, children, and people with asthma and chronic health problems are more vulnerable to the dangers of car exhaust. To add on, car idling wastes both fuel and money. Moreover, some of the fluids in car exhaust include motor oil, antifreeze, gasoline, airconditioning refrigerants, and brake, transmission, hydraulic and windshieldwiper fluids. Most of these fluids are toxic to humans and animals, and will pollute waterways if they happen to leak from a vehicle, or if they are disposed of incorrectly. Air pollution is a problem that will be hard to fix, and one of the few natural air cleaners is slowly slipping away from us.

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As we said before, car exhaust makes a blanket around the Earth. One of the only natural air filters are trees. Trees may be our only hope for clean air. But sadly, many forests are being chopped down without a second thought. Trees have an extreme value to the earth. It keeps soil from eroding, produces oxygen, and much more. Furthermore, the tools and vehicles that it takes to cut down these forests and haul out the trees adds more air pollution. Currently, humans are creating too much carbon dioxide for the trees and plants to recycle into oxygen. Smaller crops of plants do pull in carbon dioxide and release oxygen, forests store up to 100 times more carbon dioxide than small crops of the same area. What’s more, is that all the carbon that the tree was storing, gets released into the air when it gets cut down. Because of this, it is estimated that over 11.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide gets released into the air every year. Deforestation also drives climate change. The soil of a forest is moist, but if there are too little sun blocking trees, this soil can quickly dry up. This could make what was once a vast forest into a barren dessert. Doesn’t everyone love chocolate?

Well, trees are the reason that we have chocolate. It comes from the cacao bean. But unfortunately, the cacao tree that grows the cacao beans is on the endangered species list. Although many people are helping by planting trees, people are killing trees much faster than they can grow. The simplest solution to deforestation is to just stop cutting down trees. And although deforestation rates have slowed over past years, it is unlikely to stop completely. Rainforests once covered 14% of the earth; now they cover 6%.

Experts estimate that the last remaining rainforests could be cut down in less than 40 years. 1 ½ acres of rainforest are lost every second, which is way too fast. So many animals live in the rain forests. There are sloths, jaguars, many types of butterflies and insects, frogs, lizards, snakes, birds, primates, and many more. Some trees in the rain forest are around 200 years old. Many trees are disappearing due to deforestation, and we can only hope that that our beloved trees will make a comeback on this planet.

The greatest landfills on Earth are not on land, but in the water. The Pacific Ocean, to be exact. It is called The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. There are actually 2 very large garbage patches. The western garbage patch is located between Japan and Hawaii, and the eastern patch is between California and Hawaii. “So what?” You may think. “It’s in the ocean, it can’t harm us.” But that’s not the truth. These garbage patches are around twice the size of Texas, and will probably only get bigger in the next 10 years, doubling in size at least. However, it is hard to tell the exact size of these patches. We don’t know how deep exactly they may be, although we estimate up to 9 feet deep, and they are constantly moving due to wind and waves. In the

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garbage patches, there is about 7 million tons of weight in trash. Around 80% of the plastic in the garbage patch come from land. The 20% of plastic that is left comes from ships. 80% of the trash in the garbage patches are plastic. 30% of the world's trash is from the U.S.A. This is proof that our society wastes too much. There is also a 3rd garbage patch, although it is slightly smaller. It is the Mediterranean Sea Garbage Patch. It has around 250 billion pieces of plastic and about 500 tons of trash. Most of the plastic particles that were found were microscopic, they individually weighed 1.8 milligrams or less. Because they are so small, they are often missed in coast clean-ups. Hawaii gets lots of trash because of these garbage patches.

Some beaches in Hawaii are buried under 5-10 feet of trash, while some other beaches are made of “plastic sand”, or tiny pieces of plastic. When there are small pieces of plastic in the ocean, they are called “mermaid tears”, or “nurdles”. In fact, all 19 islands of the Hawaiian archipelago get a massive amount of trash. Some of this trash is decades old or more.

Chemicals in plastic is harmful to humans, as well as fish. Scientific research has shown that 5-10% of the fish in the world contain pieces of plastic.

Furthermore, chemicals in plastic have been found in people in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. This can sometimes lead to the limited or no possibility to reproduce. In addition, all this trash is extremely dangerous to many marine animals. When they eat trash, it can choke them, or poison them. Trash affects the marine food chain when plastic and other harmful materials gets into plankton. Plankton gets eaten by small fish, who get eaten by seals, who gets eaten by sharks. Sick plankton means a sick small fish, which means a sick seal, which means a sick shark. Then if people illegally hunt sharks, they get sick. All the marine animals could die due to this horror, and then who knows what our oceans could becomes as a result.

As you can see, plastic is deadly, to both animals and us. We have to stop using so much plastic and other trash that can cause harm.

So you see our country and whole world needs some improvement. We leave our cars running unnecessarily, we are cutting down forests too fast for growing trees to catch up. And there’s the 3 biggest landfills on the planet, right in our ocean. But many people can help to make a cleaner earth. We can use cars less, plant trees, and don’t chop any down, and we can be more careful about our amounts of trash we use, and where it goes.

Perhaps if everyone develops awareness of what is happening, and helps to pick up the earth, we may have a clean planet once again. But despite everything we’ve done to alert people of these problems, some people just don’t realize that the future of the earth is at stake. The key to cleaning the earth is everyone's help. This is an opportunity for a clean world, and we must take it.

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Wyatt Brown

METAPHOR POEMS !43

Entry Caleb Duff I click with my friends, sometimes stay separated for hours, days, even years.

I come from the forest, other times from a factory I’m transparent, yet shut the outside world from seeing the world within.

Goofy, serious, and just simple, colorful, plain and different sizes and shapes, a dog's worst enemy, and taken for granted every day.

A Playful Weapon Mathew St. Hilaire The elastic clause our founding fathers used as a binding for the country, Mesoamericans stole us from the trees, The tubular dimensions differ from one to another, Synthetic and natural resources are used to create me, Can survive through polar opposite temperatures, I come from humid, tropical areas, The thickness from the inner circle envelopes me, I shrivel, and grow like technology.

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Freedom Steven Jacobson Here I stand, alone, away from all of my fears, somewhere safe somewhere free, away from sadness, and from violence.

Here I stand, alone, free from hatred and death.

Here I stand, alone, away from war and crime.

I hear the sound of liberty and justice.

I stand like a bird on its perch.

Pink Barrel Audrey Hankinson I am a car on the highway, taking away my opposite’s blunder, but leaving mistakes of my own.

I pause.

I am overturned, I move with my counter, until I can be effective.

Then I am once again inverted, and my polar moves with me.

I’m just one part of the wand.

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Forward Katie Fitzpatrick I am the powerhouse, The undefendable force, gaining possession from the steel lip, drop-stepping my way to victory.

The volcano began to rumble, causing chaos within.

The final ring and the volcano erupts.

I Stayed Standing Audrey Labbe I represent so much.

I show history.

Movement is no option for me.

I stay where I stand.

I am the old glory, I flow with ease.

I come to a point but I also move with grace.

I am used every day.

I am worshipped.

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Metaphor Poem Sophia Payson What is the best way of going, Saving and spending money every hour?

Moving forwards 7 hours, some turbulence in the stomach.

Silver flights, taking on curve balls.

Looking through, the grey cotton blows back, moves forward, A face through time.

Tickets for the arrival, racing the sky-lines’ track, circling the earth for the best adventures.

Heart fastly forming, softly singing, Seeing crazy cats on the way.

Trampling once, faces bright to dark.

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Anna Raley

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Caleb Knox

REFLECTIONS !49

Game Changer Elijah Sherr In my common everyday middle schooler life, I’m afraid of jumping off swings. It sounds ridiculous but it’s true. Even when I stay after school and we walk to a friend’s house but stop on the playground for a little bit, we swing, but sometimes I don’t. I just stand off to the side on my phone, watching my friends. When I hop on a swing, I don’t swing high. I sort of gradually swing a couple feet forward, then back. To hop off, I have to have the swing completely stopped. I cannot jump off of a swing.

It happened at one of my parents’ meetings in Waterville, Maine. While my parents were in session, there was a school next to the building and a playground out back. It was a fairly decent playground, big swing set, big jungle-gym, and a newly paved black top.

I had my sisters and brother there with me, just trying to find anything to do. My brother and I raced to the swing set. The swings were giant! Way bigger than any we’ve seen. The chain that connected the swing to the metal bar at the top was extra long for higher swinging ranges. He and I hopped on the swings and began pumping our legs. He went higher than I did, so I decided to “challenge” him to a swing off.

You know when you swing super high and the chain becomes almost loose-like at the top and then when you come down it's almost as if you're thudding against the swing when it picks up your full body weight again? Well, our swings were doing that except we were so high, we were swinging above the top bar and the slack would tighten right before we hit the ground.

My mom came out and told us we had to leave. Now, as my mom is watching, J.P., my brother, decides to jump off at the top. He jumps and sticks the landing just perfectly. The swing sets that are made now or that are put into a playground have woodchips for the ground. At the edge of where the wood chips end, there is a piece of long wood that tells you to keep the wood chips no further than this line. That piece of wood was closer to the swings than to the jungle-gym.

When it was my turn to jump off, I took a couple more swings to get situated at the edge of the seat so that when it was time, I could just slide off of it and land perfectly like my brother did. But that didn’t happen. Since I was young, I hadn’t quite mastered the art of balancing myself out and keeping it that way while in mid air, so when I slid off of the seat, I did what they call a “nose dive” into the ground. I fell straight forward at an angle, so my hands and head were headed straight towards that piece of wood.

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Natural instincts tell you to put your arms out to catch your fall, which is what I did. I put one arm out but my other one was stuck behind me. I was yanking on my arm to come unloose and when I finally did, I had already hit the ground. My first arm hit the wood chips right before the piece of wood. But for my other arm, I smacked my elbow on the piece of wood.

My mom came running to me. I was screaming and crying. At that point, it was the scariest part of my life. My mom tried to calm me down and get me to stop crying but it hurt like (excuse my language) hell. I couldn’t stop crying, but I had to so my mom could ask questions about where it hurt, how bad it hurts(if she couldn’t already tell), all those basics.

Next thing I knew, I was being picked up by my dad, still tears running down my face. He brought me to the car where my mom ripped off the sleeve of a long sleeved shirt and wrapped it around my forearm and over my neck to make a sling-like contraption. She put ice on it but in the wrong spot because she didn’t quite know where it hurt; I never stopped crying. All the ice was doing was just making my arm numb and making it really uncomfortable. My dad and mom hopped in the car and drove me to the hospital. Luckily, it was just down the road, a few blocks.

As we pulled up in front of the hospital, my mom had already unbuckled her seatbelt and was ready to hop out of the passenger seat. We halted to a stop in the U shaped driveway. My mom jumped out and grabbed me next. I was still small enough for my mom to carry me, so that’s what she did. She carried me into the Emergency Room and nurses rushed over to me.

I was brought into a room that had an X-Ray machine. I had never seen that type of machinery before. It was big with a table below it that had a plus sign on it. They took my arm slowly out of the ripped off arm sleeve and slightly adjusted it on the table so that my elbow was on the center of the plus sign. Lights turned off and the nurse went into a room off to the side that had a glass window. She told me to hold still, and then a flash of white went off. She came back out and repositioned my arm on the table. She did that about 2 more times.

I had been waiting in the waiting room for about an hour now replaying the event over and over in my mind. It was so odd what happened. I’d never had anything happen to me like that. I was scared out of my mind. I kept jolting in my seat whenever I got to the part when I hitt the ground in my mind. In my mind, and I still jolted! That was the most scared I’ve ever been.

As the doctor approached in his clichéd white lab coat and clipboard, he had this look on his face as if to say “I’m sorry in advance.” He sat down next to us and told my parents and me that I had broken the growth plate in my elbow. He said I had

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a disorder where I had floating bones in my elbows and knees. What had happened was that little floating bone in my elbow had hit up against my growth plate and, from the force of the hit, my growth plate shattered.

My mom just sat there staring at me. I didn’t know if I had done something wrong or not. But after a minute she said, “I made that. I made you with those floating bones. Your father and I did.” I didn’t know what to say to that back, but my dad seemed to know.

“We made him along with Emma, J.P., and Molly. Out of love for each other.” I think my parents were “having a moment,” so I just pushed aside the fact that my arm was throbbing and that I needed medical attention for it.

My parents realized they were fighting and not paying attention to us kids which is making us fight. They call this story “The Game Changer.”

Joe Giandrea

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Phobia Emma Boynton Having a fear is something that nobody can control. It’s simply just a part of life. Public speaking, ghosts, needles, and the dark are all immense fears that many people share. Spiders are also one of the most common fears throughout the world. Although this gives me a comfort that other people understand my anxiety about spiders, it also proves that I’m not insane and I have every reason in the universe to be petrified of these disgusting insects.

Following my sister, my dad, and my two dogs through the woods of Twin Brook I finally start to see flat land. My dog pulls me forward to the perfect open area to run and play in. It had been a while since I had practiced my soccer skills, so I took the ball and started dribbling around my dogs who were now lazily laying in the shade of a tree.

What I now call a typical girl problem, I had to keep pushing the extra hairs that didn’t fit in my ponytail back and away from my face. Only this time as I stroked my hair back, I felt something on my head. It felt as if I had gotten grass stuck in my ponytail when I was doing my hair. Annoyed, I peeled the grass out of my ponytail. Although I was almost positive what had been sitting on my head was grass, it had never occurred to me to be any type of living thing. I quickly look down and see the biggest spider I have ever encountered in my life... right there in my very hand. Not really thinking about what I was doing, I quickly flung the spider out of my hand, ran, and screamed for my life.

When I was younger I had always been afraid of spiders. There has never been a time in my life when I wasn’t. My fear has always left me calling my dad up to my room and asking him to kill the spider on the wall for me. He’d laugh at my fear, and kill the spider. Then slowly, he’d pick up the spider and try to chase me with it. Although I was petrified from the spider my dad was about to throw on me, I was also confused. I could never understand why someone would want to pick up such a dirty, creepy, annoying creature and enjoy it. But little things like this never got my heart pumping as fast as the incident at Twin Brook.

To this day every time a spider comes close to me I scream and run. I always try to avoid the trail that I walked on and the spot where I found the actual spider on my head. I still can’t imagine the things the other people at Twin Brooks were thinking. Hopefully it was clear that nobody was being murdered and it was only a little 13 year old girl screaming over a spider that landed on her head. After I started to calm down, I saw my dog rolling around on the ground where I (hopefully) flung the spider onto. My poor dog… if only he knew.

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Phobia Mikaela Estes Since the day I was born, my sister Robyn and I have had a, well, an interesting relationship. When she came to visit mom in the hospital after I was born, she shoved right past little baby me, whining in daddy's arms, and started barreling towards mom. She had been stuck at home with Jewely, our babysitter, for 3 days. Even 13 years later, she still always pushes past me to go hang out with someone more interesting, like her friends or mom. Although we’ve never had a great relationship, we have always thought the same way.

Somehow, we grew up with the same fears, became potty-trained at the same age, and always reacted the same way to something.

One night, my dad, Robyn and I were watching some weird show about spiders. This show had anything from tiny jumping spiders, to huge tarantulas.

Every time a big, hairy spider showed up on the screen, Robyn and I screamed.

The bigger the spider, the louder the scream. When the show was over, dad sent us to bed, with the images of the spiders locked in the front of our brains.

We brushed our teeth, put on our pj’s, and separated into our own rooms to sleep.

Later that night, at about 12:30 am, I woke up in my dark bedroom. I turned my head, and my eyes met a huge spider crawling up the side of my bed. It was over a foot in diameter, not including the legs. With black and brown stripes of long fuzzy fur, it looked like a crawling dust bunny. But worse.

I screamed louder than a howler monkey as I backed away from the terrifying monster with 8 legs. I bounded up, trying to throw my blanket over it so it couldn’t see where I would run away to. I jumped off my bed and just about ran into my dad in the doorway to my room. I grabbed onto the protective waist of my father, and squeezed my eyes shut, wishing I could wake up from this nightmare.

“What’s wrong Mikaela?!” Dad asked me. “Are you okay?”

I rushed him out of the room, trying to get us both far away from the hairy beast that tried to eat me. Then Robyn came out of her room and looked at us and said, “What the hell?!” Dad told her I just had a bad dream, but I could tell she knew it wasn’t just a dream. He told her to go back to bed and then brought me into his room to talk. I was a blubbering mess trying to explain what I had seen. I slept in his bed for the night, after I had him check his room for spiders.

The next day, I got up, momentarily confused as to why I wasn’t in my own bed, but then it all came back. I tried to act normally, and did everything I usually did in the morning, but I couldn’t get the image from the night before out of my head. I went to daycare, and started the day, but I refused to do anything without checking for spiders first. I couldn’t even sit in a chair

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normally. I sat with my legs up on the seat so the spiders didn’t reach out and grab me while I wasn’t paying attention. During lunch, my teacher called my dad to come pick me up, because I was too traumatized to be there. I stayed at home with him and mom for a few days until we thought I was ready to go back.

That spider I saw was only a hallucination, but every since that night, I’ve slept with my door a few inches open, and the hall light on. I never really liked spiders, but now I wanted absolutely nothing to do with any spider with more than a one inch diameter. Robyn and I have that in common. We’ve been alone in the house, and seen a spider and both sat there throwing things at it because neither of us are brave enough to go up and kill it.

Adam Giroux

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Phobia Riley Iris I was going down the ski slope as fast as I possibly could. I saw someone next to me do a small bunny hop. I’m intrigued. I see a little bump coming up. With all my might I jump...and get about an inch of air. What else would one expect from a 5 year old?

Since I was little I’ve loved to jump. My neighbors had a trampoline. My favorite thing to do was to got to their house and try frontflips. These kind of activities led me to do a lot of extreme sports. I ski, skateboard, and jump on my trampoline. All of these things could cause serious injury, or even death. Every weekend during the winter I go skiing. I do flips where I land on icy snow. People have DIED doing that. The odd part is, I’m not frightened of getting hurt. Sure, I try to avoid injury, but it seems inevitable that one day I will get hurt. What I’m scared of is permanent pain.

Once I was talking to a friend, Scott. Scott said that one of his friends once hit a tree while offroading. For the rest of his life, this person wore a neck brace with nails screwed into his neck. And every once in awhile he had to get the brace worked on.

When they worked on the neck brace, blood would come out of the screws. This freaked me out. I don’t want to be someone who has no legs, or can’t move his neck for the rest of his life. I just want to have fun.

Maybe one day I’ll break a bone, or get in a concussion. I would not mind this. In fact, one of the coolest people alive, Travis Pastrana, has broken over 60 bones! He has also had 25 concussions. But he has never had an injury so serious that he was permanently damaged. Today, still, he does extreme stunts on a motorbike, and is a professional rally car driver. I want to be that guy. The 80 year old skier, or the 50 year old skateboarder. That’s going to be me. I’m going to do what I love until I am physically not able.

I am not afraid to break bones. I am not afraid to get a concussion. I’m afraid to have permanent damage happen to me. I never want to get paralyzed. Even if I lose a limb, I can still ski, but if I get paralyzed I’m done. I’m afraid to go into a coma. I would hate to be sleeping for several months, then get the plug pulled on me. Most likely none of these horrible things will happen to me (knock on wood). Hopefully, I can live my life happily, with maybe a few scars to show off.

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Will Nicholson

SHORT STORIES !57

Filling My Heart Taylor Pronovost

The air was damp and cold. I shivered as I attempted to wrap myself in my torn gray blanket from my last foster house. After about an hour of trying to sleep, I slowly told myself it wasn’t going to happen. I pushed myself up and looked at the dark sky, but with all the lights from Time Square, it didn’t seem so gloomy. Everyone knows Time Square is the place for all of us to lie and beg for the measly amounts of change.

As expected, both the locals and the tourists weren’t much help. When walking by us they always act as if we were gross stains on the pavement. Anyway, what will a quarter do for me? Buy me a gumball? See, absolutely nothing comes from the left over change, because at the end of the day when you’re counting it all up, that change doesn’t even add up to a dollar. I looked at my tarp and slowly drifted off to sleep.

I dreamt I was in a place far from here, a place with my real parents and a true home. I was awoken by the classic sound of the car horns honking at one another in protest of the other’s abilities. I reached for my backpack thinking about the letter, and also the apple I was given. The letter’s corners were torn, but that didn’t matter, all that mattered was the note that keeps my hopes up for no absolute reason. “I am so sorry for putting you here, I wish I could’ve been a good mother but I just can’t. Hopefully someday we will meet again. ” I hate how those 26 words mean so much to me, but it is all I have had since I was three years old. The power and attachment I had to this letter remained strong, even as a fifteen year old. It was a strong breeze today, a woman who had a folder of papers fell and all of the paper blew everywhere. I loosened the grip on my letter to put in my backpack. I heard the ruffle of my tarp and suddenly the letter was grabbed by the wind and landed across the street where the woman was.

She assumed it was hers and swept it up and quickly scurried down the street. “ Stop!

That’s mine!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, though it came out like a whimper. She was gone. My life is over, I have no purpose, I have no evidence of who my mother is.

My heart ached and all I wanted to do was sob. My eyes sparkled as the tears fell from my eyes and rolled down my cold and empty heart.

When I looked up I saw a girl around my age standing at the edge of my tarp. “ Here we go again,” I thought. Even better, she gets to see my bloated face. “ I was wondering if you would need some food, my parents have extra food again today?” The girl asked hopefully. “ I’m fine, just like every other day,” I told her for the millionth time. Every single day, this girl comes and tries to give me some food, though I don’t want her help, I don’t

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need her. The girl started walking away and I let my tears slip. Though she looked back, I knew she had seen my tears and I was filled with despair.

I wandered as far as I could into the city full of bright lights. The letter remained an imprint in my brain since every step I took made me wince with the pain of the abandonment that filled my life. Tourists scattered the streets. At one street stood a man shaking a cup, and people ignored him though he still sat there smiling. It wasn’t until a moment of staring when I noticed the woman sitting next to him holding his hand.

I, too, smiled for the couple and thought about what way they made me smile. My heart lifted as I walked towards my corner and forgot all about that torn letter’s words.

The doors stood in front of my eyes that wished they could see no more. My heart pounded with nerves as I slowly turned the door handle to the restaurant across the street. The wood doors creaked and opened up to tiny cafe. I heard the chitter chatter of all their customers and the cook asking the waitress to hurry up. Instantly I realized the waitress was the girl and noticed how hard she was working.

“Micheala can you please hurry up?” The cooked asked impatiently.

The restaurant itself looked peaceful, but behind that counter I could see was absolute chaos. As I was staring I noticed the sets of eyes watching my every move. My eyes narrowed as I, too, looked down at my ratty clothes and became embarrassed for myself.

Michaela's heels clicked on the tiles for each step as she began to approach me.

“I thought you didn’t need any help?” Michaela asked “I need help, and I want a friend.”

After being hired for the first time in my life at the restaurant, I walked across the block with Micheala.

“Michaela, I can’t thank you enough.”

“Kaily, thank you for becoming my friend,” she replied to me. Of course we weren’t skipping holding hands like eight year olds, though we were having more fun than I ever imagined. Growing up, that piece of paper was always my friend, but now that it was gone, I can breathe. I know that every morning I will wake up on the side of the road, but across the street awaits a new life for me to start. For myself, and for Micheala, we both know how we became friends and what we mean to each other.

Without her, I wouldn’t be able to have a fighting chance in this world, or be able to escape the harsh cycle of homelessness and poverty. One thing I will always remember is how to ask for help. Yes, I am a strong person, but every now and then I also need someone to take my hand and say everything will be alright. I am living a life with someone who will always be by my side and that truly is all I need to fill my heart.

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Buffalo Thorn Ana Penza-Clyve I slowly opened my eyes to the faint light of the boat’s interior.The smell of unwashed bodies overwhelmed my nose. The sound of snoring neighbors filled my ears. Bodies crammed into me from all sides. I sat and leaned against the cool wall of the boat. My little brother turned over in his sleep. But my stomach ached and growled, a message to get food. I stood and thought, maybe because it’s so early there might be more food for me and my family. I made my way toward the stairs, and noticed others were missing. I guessed they had the same idea. Then I reached the place they served the food, and I said the only words I know in English. “Food for me and my family please.” The man throws me an apple and a loaf of bread. That’s all. For four people. Barely enough to feed my sick little brother, let alone a whole family.

Back to my family’s sleeping space, I pulled a box closer and cut the apple and bread into fourths, making my brother’s pieces sizably larger. His fever had not left for days. All he did was sleep. My mother and I had to beg him to eat a bite. When I felt his forehead, I could feel the heat and the sweat. It’s gotten worse,was all I could think.

I ran to the water basin, yanked off my scarf and soaked it in the cool water. It dripped as I ran back to him. “Yumis!” Mother! I whispered in her ear. “He has gotten worse!”

She said nothing, just leaned over Zaire. He opened his eyes and a stare full of pain looked up at us.

“You have to eat, it will keep you strong. Just a few more days until America.”

My mother tried to persuade him. She held a piece of bread to his mouth, and he nibbled it, barely enough for a mouse. Then she gave him a piece of apple. Again just a bite. I flipped my scarf on his forehead so the cool side was on his head. “Leave him.

He needs to rest.” I reluctantly obeyed her, and grabbed my portion of the food. You think you know hunger and pain. You know nothing. That apple and loaf of bread was all we got. One meal a day. The sailors could not afford to give us any more. But we dealt with it; we are refugees.

I still remembered the smell of the rainforest of our home. But bombs and soldiers destroyed it. The rustling of leaves in the high branches. All gone. The comforting embrace of my father. Dead.That’s all of what's left. Death and destruction.

What used to be my home. Ashes. All that I care about now is who is with me. And a carving my Father carved. A dove. I have never seen a dove. He used to say “This dove will help you see the light in the darkness that might surround you in the future.”

That is what I need right now. Hope. I gripped the piece of Buffalo Thorn wood. It is said that they are a very resistant tree, and can survive frosts and droughts. I needed to

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be like the Buffalo Thorn. Surviving anything. But the thought of losing Zaire overwhelmed me and I had to tell myself over and over. He will be fine. We will all make it to America. We will all be Buffalo Thorn.

I blinked and took a bite of food, chewing it slowly as I tried to forget the peacefulness of what used to be our home. The apple was soon gone and the bread too. I left Zaire’s food in case he woke up hungry and better. But I knew. I knew that was not going to happen. Again I tell myself He will be fine. We will all make it to America. We will all be Buffalo Thorn. People around me slowly woke up and headed to where they served food. For a little while they came back with the same portion of food we got but slowly it got smaller until people came down empty handed. I knew that some people who came on this ship in the beginning would not be getting off.

Zaire was one of them. The moment the docking clamps grabbed onto the boat, and the sound awoke cheers throughout the ship, I knew it was too late. But as I held onto the dove, I found the light in the darkness. We were in America, and I still had my Yumis.  

Abby Taylor

!61

One Moment It was only one moment. Just a few seconds. Yet I can say so much about it. I was watching when it happened. I saw him. He was standing in the living room, and I had a clear view thanks to the huge French doors leading inside. Glass was everywhere. She ran downstairs. She screamed. Something that sounded like a muted gun went off. I stood there. Watching. I finally gathered up enough courage to run outside. Blood.

Hers. But also his. I heard someone crying, who I thought would be the girl. He was looking down at the gun. I was right, there was a mute on it. He was crying. I looked at the girl. It was more than amazing that she was breathing. A hole. In her neck. Filled with blood. He was running now. He was running upstairs, yelling a girl’s name.

Chelsea. For some reason I felt I needed to follow. I brought the gun. It was only a minute since I saw the glass of the French doors shatter.

Time finally started to slow down. It was too slow. I reached the top of the stairs.

He was standing in a doorway. I looked past his shoulder. A nursery. There was a crib, a table, a lamp. Not much else. He walked towards the crib and turned to look at the baby. He saw me out of the corner of his eye. He stood up straight.

“Give me the gun,” he said. He was hyperventilating. Angry. At himself? Me? I couldn’t tell you. He was covered in blood, angry, and had just killed someone. I knew how he felt. I told him he needed to calm down and think. I told him just to think. Not about what he was doing, just what would happen if I gave him the gun. He leaned on the wall and slid down until he was sitting on the floor.

“I’d kill myself,” he answered. I told him he couldn’t have the gun. It wouldn’t make anything better.

I ran downstairs after tying his hands together with a thin blanket I found in the crib. He needed to stay put. I checked on the girl. Miraculously, she was still breathing, with a weak pulse. I found the phone. I called 9-1-1.

“9-1-1 what is your emergency?” The dispatcher started. I didn’t know what to say. Time was starting to slow again. A minute felt like an hour. I whimpered into the phone.

“Are you hurt? Do you need an ambulance?” The dispatcher was starting to yell.

To keep me awake. But I wasn’t the one dying.

!62

“Yes,” I said. “But not for myself. This girl… she lives across the street from me… she was shot. In the neck.”

She asked me where I was, how long ago she was shot, all that stuff. I was still on the phone when I heard sirens. She asked if that was what she heard too. I just hung up.

Time. So slow. A minute, like a day, a half-hour felt like a year. Yet it happened all so fast. Police were upstairs, yelling at him. Paramedics had brought the girl to the ambulance. I was standing in the driveway. A woman in an officer's uniform was asking me questions about what happened. But I couldn’t speak about it.

“And did you ever answer those questions, Miss MacDonald?” I snap back to reality. I look around. Still in court.

“No,” I answer. “Not until today, sir.”

“And this IS the man you saw in that house, correct?” He motions towards David.

Yes. My neighbor. My forever friend. My rock. The man I thought knew.

“Yes.” A tear. “Yes, he is.” Another. They stream down my face. I can’t stop.

I shouldn’t have agreed. I shouldn’t have run to that house.

“I’m sorry,” I said, still crying.

“It’s okay, Miss MacDonald,” the lawyer said. What was his name? It doesn’t matter.

“No, not you,” I yelled. “Him.” I pointed towards David. He knew what I was saying. Why I was saying it. Because he knew what I had done. What he had done.

His young wife, near dead. His little baby, certainly to be without a father. He blamed himself for what I caused.

- Audrey Hankinson

!63

The Clock I sat, curled in a ball between the couch and the bookcase. I watched with burning eyes as my mother and father were dragged away, kicking, but quiet.

“Please…” my mother whispered solemnly. The men in the grey suits with the guns and blank faces ignored her. My father turned his head and looked at my terrified face. He mouthed, “I love you,” and they were gone.

I waited until I could hear the big white van with the prison bars driving away. Silence filled the room as I slowly uncurled myself and stood up, only to burst into tears and sit down on the couch. I was alone, completely alone. My long brown hair hung in front of me and my dark eyes looked like an empty void in the mirror across the room.The nail on the wall looked as empty and alone as I felt.

Without the usual clock, with its round yellowing face, and walnut outer edge on the wall, the room looked dead. The soft tick, tock of its hands was gone. The black numbers had vanished. Time didn’t exist. Time couldn’t exist. At least that's what he said. Sebastian, the king of England, had set that rule in stone. Anyone with a clock or watch found in his/her possession would be sentenced to death. But my mother wanted to keep the clock, as it had been in the family for so long. It was originally my great grandmother’s who won it at an auction, but it become a representation of the family and was important to us.

It all started because schedules were too tight. No one had any time for anyone or anything. Nothing got done because of time. So it was banned. No one in the whole of England knew the month. No one knew the year. We went to school when we felt like it. We woke up when we thought we should. We went to church any day we felt that god was needed.

My mother’s face exploded into my mind, her last words soared through my thoughts. “I’m sorry Astrid, but you need to run.”

“From what?” I remembered asking.

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“Yourself,” she had replied. I hadn’t known what she meant then, but now it made sense. When your world is taken away, and you have no one left besides yourself, you think. You can’t stop thinking. You ask yourself why you were born, only for this to happen. You start to believe that there is no such thing as life. You think you will die before you even get to drive your first car, or have your first kiss, or get married.

So what was I supposed to do? I ran. Straight out of my house. I bolted down the road. I headed for the edge of town. Tears streamed down my cheeks, but they weren’t mine. They were my mother’s tears, my father’s tears. They were the tears of my peers and my neighbors. The tears belonged to England. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the end Astrid’s parents were killed the day after their imprisonment. They were hanged and died immediately after the trap door was released.

Astrid Jones was sought out for the possession of a watch, but in the end, it was her own knife that took her life. She was dead four months after her parents. Her body was found in an abandoned house in the outskirts of London.

King Sebastian died three years later of natural causes and time was once again restored to the country.

The old clock was found by a father of two with no job. He hopped from residence to residence and sold the antique clock along with some other possessions in order to buy food for his family. It was sold to a merchant who gave it to his wife for her 80th birthday. The clock was passed down through the generations and eventually was lost in history.

- Amelia Greenlee

!65

Life Scale Seventy-three years, four months, eleven days, and forty-five minutes. I sat and watched as my life scale continued to decrease. At twelve years old, this seemed like plenty of time left to live. I used to worry about how much time I had left, but eventually everyone seemed to become immune to the life scales. There was no point in worrying. At some point, we were all going to die. Most people pretended the little clock-like structures that the surgeons implanted into our arms when we were born didn’t even exist.

I was jerked out of my trance by my mother’s shout from downstairs. It was time for school.

“Coming!” I lied as I forced my binder, lunch, and some random pencils into my backpack. I quickly threw on a shirt that I found on the floor. I recalled possibly having worn it two or three days before.

I swung the strap to my bag over my shoulder and dashed out my bedroom door. I was out of breath by the time I was sitting in my mom’s truck. My mother, with her almost masculine presence in her jeans and messy brown hair, trudged to the truck and plopped herself down in the driver’s seat. She got in and attempted to start the ignition but failed. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she mumbled under her breath.

She got out, lifted the hood, tampered a bit, and then tried the ignition again.

Luckily, she had been successful on her second try.

“We’re a little late,” I mentioned as I pointed to the clock. She put her hand up, which I noticed was covered with grime from the vehicle, signaling for me to stop talking. “You know, it might be time for a new truck,” I pointed out. She glared at my refusal to acknowledge her gesture and backed out of the driveway.

I knew that she wouldn’t get rid of the truck. I also knew that she wouldn’t be able to put up with constantly fixing it for much longer. It had been her father’s, my grandfather’s, and he had given it to her right before his life scale hit zero.

!66

I noticed that she was rushing a bit in order to get me to school before the bell. I disregarded it, which I soon found to be a bad idea.

We were gaining on the only traffic light in our small town, and I had noticed that it was red. Unfortunately, my mother hadn’t. “Mom, slow down,” I suggested.

“Jess, I really don’t need your backseat driving right now.” I looked at her, then looked up again. I figured we were a mere twenty meters to the light by now.

“MOM!” I screamed. I saw the white line that she was supposed to stop at, and then I saw it pass behind us. We were past the light. It was too late. Neither of us had seen the eighteen wheeler coming, but come it did. I saw the driver pulling frantically on the steering wheel, trying to turn sharper. That exact moment was when I realized what was happening. I could feel the knife of fear stabbing into me. I heard a loud horn, and then the scraping of metal on metal.

I woke up minutes later, and my first thought was my mother. I noticed the sirens that were headed this way. The truck had hit on her side, directly where she had been sitting. I needed to see if she was okay. Our truck had flipped on its side and the ground was inches from my face. I tried to sit up, but couldn’t. I somehow got into a position to reach my mom’s arm. I gently lifted it, and before looking I hoped with all I had that I would still see numbers ticking away. I turned my eyes back towards her and looked at her wrist, directly below her hand.

I felt the heat behind my eyes but I couldn’t stop it. I let a tear slide down my face. She was going to be fine. She still had many years to live. Then I thought of something else. I looked at my own life scale. It read three hours and thirteen minutes.

That was when I noticed the pain.

- Fiona Perrault

!67

This is a parable about time, life, suffering, and, sadly, death. The people we meet along this journey are not real, but they are just the moments of our lives organized in months and concepts. However, the man could be real. He could be sitting behind us in our local cafe or brushing by us on the street. He is one of us just walking his life away.

There was a man who walked down a beach. The sand softened underneath his feet and the wind wrapped itself around the man like a coat. He kept his head down, his eyes to himself and continued to walk, not having a designated destination in mind . It wasn’t until he noticed a pair of boots that he stopped. He looked up to see a woman, a woman with skin so pale that it appeared to be translucent. “Hello. My name is December. I’m sorry we have to meet. I know I’m probably not welcomed, but I am needed.” The man felt a heavy weight upon his shoulders, yet the source was unknown. “I don’t bring light things to lonely men like you. I only bring the feeling of emptiness. You aren’t a child of innocence and joy, so you get no gifts. You are not a mother of three caring for youth, so you do not receive warmth. You are a man of lonesomeness and I am here to remind you of that.” The woman took the man's hand and they continued to walk down the beach. Yet now the man felt colder. The man only stopped when he felt something brush against his leg. He look down to see a dog with pure white fur. The man bent down and read the dog's collar: Snow. The dog looked up at the man inquisitively almost as if he was asking the man’s permission to stay. The man nodded and the dog stayed happily by his side.

The man had almost instant regret.

The man, woman, and dog walked. They walked without stopping. That was until they spotted a young boy flying a kite. Once they were in an arm's reach of the boy, the woman let go of the man’s hand. “I have to go now.” The man was sad, he had just started to get used to the feeling of the woman's hand in his, but she had to leave and he spoke no words of persuasion to stay. Once the man and the dog had reached the boy with the kite, the boy immediately took the hand of the man.

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“I’m January,” the boy said. “I’m here to make sure you don’t go back to see December. You see, she’s not welcomed here. I’m here now, so don’t worry.” The man said nothing in return. “The name of my kite is Regrets.” The boy opened his hand and watched as the kite flew and spun into the air. “I don’t need that anymore now that I have you.” The man, the boy, and the dog all walked. It wasn’t until a bit further on that the man realized the weight previously on his shoulders had lifted.

So the man, the dog and the boy walked on. The boy soon left and a young adolescent named February took his place. The man realized that it wasn’t in his control whether the people he encounters remain. He knew that once the time came, each person he came across would let go, and he had to accept that. Though it wasn’t until the man had met a woman named March that the dog Snow had to leave him. The dog looked at the man and started to leave the man’s side. The man had tears in his eye, yet he said nothing. He watched as the dog turned and walked away. He did not look back for he felt no need to, but he still had the cold feeling of the of the dog by his side.

It was when the man had met the teenager, March, that he felt a strong pain in his torso. “I think we need to stop,” the teen said. The man tried to continue forward but the teen held onto his hand with a strong grip. “No,” the boy said, “We mustn't go on, for this is where we need to stop.” The man cried out for he was stuck there. He could no longer continue his journey, he was now perpetually in March.

- Anna Raley

!69

A quiet whistle rings in my ear from the lady sitting next to me, and a cool breeze crosses my face from the opening door across the aisle. I sit quietly on the train reading my book, trying to calm myself from a long day. I had just come from a long day at work with lots of busy work and grumpy customers, and just when I think I’ve found some peace and quiet, I hear a loud laugh and a thud. When I peel my glazed over eyes off my book, I see two boys, maybe 6 years old. One is lying on the floor of the train and the other on top of him. I hear the doors slide closed as I look around for the parents. The boys get up then run towards the end of the cart and talk to a man, eyes glazed over, staring at the ceiling. They say something to him that I can’t understand and then turn running towards the other end, one yelling tag as he slaps the other on the back. They continue to run back and forth, tackling each other along the way, causing a great deal of noise. Many people look up from their devices, and their readings, and give scowls to the young boys. They then glance at the man and then back at each other, confused and upset. I look at them as they turn back to their previous actions and I realize that none of them are going to say anything to the boy or the man. Finally, I close my book and set it down on the seat next to me and slowly start to get on my feet. I make my way down the aisle that seems never ending, until I reach the man. I stand in front of him and wait for him to remove his eyes from the ceiling, but he does not. “Excuse me?” I say. The man continues to sit motionless as I attempt to get his attention again. “Sir?” I say again as I tap him on the shoulder. He then wakes from his daze and moves his head, fixing his eyes on me.

“What was that?” He asks, groggily.

“Are those your children?” I say, more sternly than intended, as I address the children tackling each other at the other end of the train car.

“Yes, yes those are my boys,” he slowly responds. The man, more awake now, sits up straight and steadily sets his feet, as if making an attempt to stand up, but he stops.

I see him watch his boys and glance at the people around him who are looking at him, at his children.

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“Could you please get them to calm down and be quiet? They are disturbing the whole train,” I say. “I am trying to read, and it is very hard while they are running around and tackling each other.” The man looks at me for a second before saying anything. His eyes then glance at his boys before responding.

“I am very sorry,” he stutters. “We are just coming home from the hospital.

My...my wife just died.” He stutters. I stand still, as if frozen, and with that small bit of information, everyone's perception changes.

I turn away from the man and try to begin the walk back to my seat. I try to lift my foot but feel the weight of guilt on my body. I feel my heart sink as I slowly attempt to lift my other foot, but my feet don’t seem to move, as if they’ve been glued to the floor. I then finally gain enough strength to make it a couple steps but feel as if I’m stuck in slow motion. I feel eyes on me as I turn to my right and just catch someone’s eyes move from me to their book. I then look to the left and see more people watching. After what feels like an eternity, I reach my seat and sit down. I cup my face in my hands and wait for my stop to be called.

- Molly Hale

!71

Fluorine Isabella Caron My story begins in a small town in Mexico. I was a young, bright girl with the dream of becoming a scientist. I had big dreams for a small girl, and dreams they stayed. I was planning to go to Harvard in the U.S. to study classes in the subject of science and environmental studies. I was going to become the next best scientist to ever walk the Earth. In the third grade, students were introduced to the Periodic Table of Elements. The first time I saw the perfectly organized structure, I became obsessed.

My obsession grew with each science class we had through junior high. I studied each individual element. I memorized information on their physical and chemical traits. I memorized atomic numbers and masses. But, my all time favorite element was Fluorine. Fluorine was destructive yet helpful in modern technology. I memorized all the information I could get on the reactive element. It has a chemical symbol of F, has an atomic mass unit of 18.99404, a melting point of -219.62oC, has 10 neutrons in its nucleus, and it comes in a crystal like form, but at room temperature is a yellow gas.

Having an obsession isn’t always a good thing. Every day I would walk into school and face the teasing and laughing. I was sometimes even harassed and beaten up. One day in particular, I was heading to the science room after school in 8th grade.

My teacher would go down to the teachers’ lounge to correct papers after school. She said she would leave the door open for me so I could do experiments, as long as everything was put back after I used it and that I cleaned up any mess I made. Well, that day after school in late January, I was about to open the classroom door when I heard footsteps down the hall. I looked quickly, eager to get into the science room.

Fear swept across my face as I saw the school yard bullies running down the hall toward me. I turned the door handle, but it wouldn’t budge. I kept pulling with all my strength, but nothing was happening, the door was locked. I quickly ran to the other doors along the hall. Before I could get to the 6th grade wing, I found myself face to face with Tucker, the leader of gang.

“Looking for this?” He said, a sneer crossing his face. He held up the science room key. “Found it in the staff room after 5th period. Thought it would come in handy.” Some of the people behind him snickered.

“Look, I don’t want any trouble. Please just let me leave,” I replied. I looked down to find my hands shaking in both fear and anger. I was scared to get beaten up once again, and anger, an anger I never understood before then, was growing inside of me. I was angry that I couldn’t defend myself against Tucker and his little posse.

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Sometimes I wished I could be an element. To get revenge and show them how cool I really was.

“I don’t think so,” Tucker said. His fist came in contact with my face. The blows got worse from there.

They left me in the hall, bleeding from head to toe. Tears were falling down my face. I left the building and ran into the woods surrounding the school. I ran, faster and faster until I came across a dark, gloomy looking cave. With curiosity, I walked into the cave. It seemed to be going deeper and deeper into the earth’s crust. Some parts were very steep, others just a small slant. I kept walking for about an hour, until I came upon a wall of crystals. The crystals were a blue gray. It was very cold down in the cave, but I didn’t care. I walked over to the wall and placed my hand on the tiny crystals that I knew must be fluorine. A searing pain went through my hand to my arm. The pain was overwhelming, and now it was spreading to the rest of my body. My hair started turning into a yellow gas, my fingers were catching on fire, and my feet seemed to be blowing up, then growing back… The pain lasted for days, and for years I stayed in that cave. I mastered my powers. I had become the element Fluorine. I could now turn into a yellow toxic gas, shoot fireballs out of my palms, and blow up almost anything from the reaction of Fluorine with another element. I was unstoppable. I wouldn’t be like the Fluorine that was used in refrigerator fluids or fluoride to help strengthen teeth, I would be the kind of Fluorine that destroys. I would get revenge on all of my tormentors. I would be named Toxic Fluo.

I found people like me in my early twenties. Scary Sodium, Horrific Hydrogen, and the H2O Twins are my closest friends. Sodium and I work together to form sodium fluoride. Hydrogen and Fluorine form to make hydrogen fluoride, but when we combine with the H2O Twins, we become Hydrofluoric Acid. I will almost always be found with my villain friends, making it harder for people to find me. My nemesis is Platinum Man because he does not react to any of my powers. He is the only person who can withstand my toxic blows. But I am Toxic Fluo. I will find a way to destroy all of my enemies.

!73

Francium Parker Stair In March, 1934, Ral Ka’rak was born into a wealthy family of doctors. He grew up with borderline ridiculous luxury and later went on to become one of Poland’s most respected scientists. Ral became fascinated with the element Francium, but not much was known about it at the time. It was a known fact that Francium could only exist for about 20 minutes before decaying, and Ral found that iron molecules that were constantly moving helped slow or even stop the process of decay. However, he received a lot of speculation went it was rumored that he was experimenting on the local prison’s inmates before they were executed. These rumors were confirmed when he accidently killed a young man on death row. He was thrown in jail, where his inmates repeatedly disappeared, leading officials to believe that he was conducting his own, crude experiments on the inmates. Suddenly, Ral got terrible news. He was diagnosed with stage 4 Sarcoma cancer. As a final attempt to preserve his experiments, Ral injected himself with a large amount of Francium, and thus the tyrant was born.

Having just received his powers, Ral started to experiment. He already knew that Francium’s melting point was about 80 degrees, and after some reluctant testing on himself, his nose started to drip and his eyes started to tear up. He also found that when he touched water, he had a violent allergic reaction. He later learned that the heavier the alkali metal is, the larger the reaction is to water. With Francium being the heaviest alkali metal, his reaction was (quite literally) explosive.

Ral, (now calling himself Francium Fiend) tracked down Marguerite Perey, the person who discovered Francium and preceded to kill her with his radiation, fearing that she knew more about Francium than himself and therefore could become just as powerful.

(Marguerite Perey actually died from a radioactive disease).

Francium Fiend is still at large and continues to lay waste to city blocks.

!74

Anya Davis

!75

Fan Fiction based on Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs Maddie Hall A bird was perched on my window sill. Still as a rock, her beady eyes stare into my soul. I sat for a minute thinking. Her eyes were somehow familiar to me. And then I remembered. It was twenty years ago, and could it be, to this day, my birthday...

I was just given pictures from my grandfather’s room as a “birthday present” when all in one moment it grabs me. I’m not sure what at the moment but I knew it was no accident. The bird stared down at me, her eyes a soft brown and green swirl. She had the eyes of a caring mother. And without a moment to lose she dove. She dove through a tunnel, did a loopty loop around and flew back out. There was a blasty gust of wind and I couldn’t hear a thing when my ears popped. I looked around and noticed it was pouring and huge cracks of thunder were happening every five seconds.

She flew me into a small-looking shack but as soon as we entered it was a huge mansion.

I was put down in a chair and the bird landed in another. She did a little dance and “poof” she was a human. She stared at me for what felt like hours, when her booming voice scared me out of a trance. I stuttered to say anything. But I didn’t need to say anything anymore. She took control of all talking.

“Hello Josh, my name is Ms. B.B. I knew your grandfather.”

This news had changed everything.

“How do you know him? I didn’t even know him. No one did.”

“I was his teacher, his mother, and his friend.”

“His mother! You are not his mother. I met her and she was not a freaky bird lady, trust me, she’s much worse” “I was not his birth mother, but I might as well been. There was much pain in raising him. Especially when he didn’t want to be seen.”

“What do mean by ‘didn’t want to be seen?’”

“Why, he was invisible. Well sort of.”

From the second I heard the word, I froze. I didn’t move for hours.

Hours later I stood up, walked up to the bird lady and asked, “What year is it?”

She said “Why, it’’s 1948.”

!76

“WHAT!” Before she could even open her mouth, I bolted outside. I looked around me. It was pouring, in California. I knew something was off about this place but I never thought that I went back in time. I blinked, I pinched myself, I even slapped myself across the face. Nothing. It was still pouring, I was still standing in front of a tiny shack. But then I thought, “Have I seen this place before?” And then I remembered, there was a picture of this very shack on my bedroom wall.

I looked back at the bird and smiled. She was the reason I met my grandfather.

It was almost suppertime and a little boy went zooming by me. He was so fast I swear I spun around. Ms. B.B. called me inside for supper. As I almost sat, everyone yelled at me.

“No!” “What, the seat’s empty.”

“Not exactly,” said Ms. B.B. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that someone is sitting there.”

“So you’re saying that someone is sitting here?”

“Yes.” “Who?” “Well let’s just say without him you wouldn’t exist.”

“Wait a minute. You mean to tell me that my father is sitting here!?”

“Not exactly. Guess again.”

And with the lift of a cloth I saw him.

In a pitchy little voice he said, “Hi, I’m Jake. Or as you know me, Grandpa Jake, I think.”

“Woah!?”

“You sound surprised. I told you he was “invisible.”

“I know, I thought you were saying he hides a lot.”

“Yes and no.”

And then I fainted.

I woke up the next day with a harrowing headache.

“What the...?”

I got out of the bed and walked to the stair case. I looked down and immediately got dizzy. I sat on the top stair and thought...

!77

“Okay, down stairs my eight year old grandfather is sitting at the table eating breakfast. I time traveled back to 1948 and flew through the sky by bird. What did I do to deserve this?”

At that moment Ms. B.B. looked at me from the bottom of the stairs. She started speaking but I didn’t hear her over the thunder clap inside my chest.

Before I knew it, I had vomited all over the stairs.

Again I woke up hours later with a brutal chill. I looked over to the door and saw my grandfather sitting staring at me. The moment we made eye contact he jump up and ran out of the room shouting, “He’s up. He’s up!”

Suddenly what felt like the whole world ran into my room. Ms. B.B. stormed through the crowd like an angry bull, yelling, “Move! Coming through!”

That’s all I remember of that day, for soon after that, I blacked out cold again.

It was day two in this strange far off land, and everyone still eyed me awkwardly. I felt as though they were picking through my brain figuring out who I was without asking. I walked down the stairs and everyone avoided me as I walked by them. Once I got into the sitting room Mrs. B.B. pulled me aside. She stared into my eyes for a long agonizing time before she turned away. As she stared at the window she said, “You want to leave, don’t you?”

I stuttered but couldn’t think of anything to say, so I just sat in airy silence.

“You don’t have to you know. You are welcome here as long as you wish.

“I... I... I can’t. I have a family and friends who will worry.”

“We know, and we took that into consideration, but we came to the decision that we want you to stay. At least for a few more days.”

I sat thinking, What would my family think. Me gone for days without word.

I must be dreaming or something. I can’t stay, I won’t. But I want to.

Without saying a word, Mrs. B.B. ushered me away, leaving me with the children. I paused, feeling their stares, but said nothing. I walked slowly towards the door, not turning my head to see the others. With my hand on the doorknob, I heard the slight shuffle of many feet on the floor. I looked back and saw the many, many eyes that were silently picking my brain. With angry and annoyed feelings I shouted, “WHAT? WHAT DO YOU WANT? I HAVE BEEN HERE BARELY TWO DAYS AND NONE OF YOU FREAKS HAVE ASKED ME WHO I AM, WHERE I’M FROM, AND IF I’M OKAY. SO WHAT IS IT THAT I CAN DO FOR YOU?” And noting their blank cold stares, I opened the door and stormed out.

!78

I sat under the willow tree and set my head between my knees. Lightheaded after shouting, and with no food in me, I wasn’t feeling so good.

When suddenly there was a small “Hello”.

I jerked my head up to see a small girl, who looked slightly frightened.

“Hi,” I replied trying not to sound too rude.

“I’m Violet,” said the small girl. “Do you want to eat breakfast with me? I have a secret berry bush no else knows about.”

“Josh.” I stared at her for a moment, thinking there might be another invisible person next to me that only she could see, but then she said it again. Without a word I stood up and walked up to her. Three words escaped my mouth: “lead the way.” She took me by that hand and started to walk.

After eating mixed berries from one bush, I felt stuffed. We walked back to the house, but I stopped at the door.

“I...I.. I don’t want to go in. They only stare at me and make me feel uncomfortable.”

“Take my hand. When you are with me they won’t notice you.”

So I did. I took her hand and we walked in. I looked around but no one acknowledged us. So I asked, “Why don’t they see us?’”

“Because, when I don’t want people to see me, I simply disappear.”

“So you’re invisible.”

“No, I can control my appearance. I can fade away, or stand out like an elephant in the room. But normally, I’m like a ghost, my presence is there, but it is not seen clearly”.

And with that, we walked upstairs to my room.

I was trying to nap off my headache, but when I was about to doze off, a loud bang went ringing through my head. I stumbled out the door and down the hall. I looked down the stairs and made eye contact with the most frightening creature ever. While stuck in a trance, I was scared when Violet grabbed me from behind and pulled me into her room. “What were those?” I asked with a sputter.

“Those were the Its.” “The Its?” “Yes, the Its. They are creatures that are sent to capture children like us with peculiar powers, and I guess I’m not the one who should be telling you this, but only you can see them and kill them. Our powers aren’t strong enough to fight them off, but you are like no one else, the first of your kind, and only you can help us.”

!79

“Now you tell me why I’m here. What took you guys so long? I have been here for three days and no one told me that I am the chosen one!”

“Well, I wouldn’t call you the chosen one, but OK.” So with the new information, Josh and Violet sat in silence in her closet.

“So, what’s your story? Why are you here?” I said, my whisper sounding more like a scream.

“Well you know my power, but I guess you don’t know my past. I was born in Wales and raised in England. It started at an early age, my disappearances, but only when I was sad or wanted to be alone but couldn’t figure out why. I thought I was blessed, but my parents thought I was cursed. They tried to remove the curse with potions and magic, but all it resulted in was mental and financial pain to my parents. So I left. I went to London hoping to find a shelter to stay in until I had a plan, but the day after I arrived Ms. B.B. came and got me. So, in other words, I left on my own. I was not forced out, I just wanted out. What’s your story?”

“Well, from birth and on I lived in Paris until I transferred high schools to a fancy boarding school in Colmar. And over break while I was home “celebrating” my birthday, I was swooped up and taken here. That’s my story. Yours is much more interesting, if I may say so.”

“Well one could say that, or one could say that I created my story, but faith created yours.”

And with all that said, an It came crashing through the door.

Violet grabbed my hand and made us invisible. The smell of the It was sweet like honey and flowers had a baby. The smell reminded me of home. While stuck in my sweet thoughts of home, Violet pinched me.

“Get out there and work your magic,” Violet breathed at me.

“Okay, okay. But how does it work?”

Just get out there!”

And with that, I leapt out of the closet and into the giant room, not knowing what I wanted to do. I just leapt and looked around the room not seeing anything. But in the faintest light in the room he saw her.

I rubbed my eyes. I pinched myself, but the image wouldn’t fade. Mom? No no no, you left me years ago. You left forever. But she looks so real. While I was silently thinking, my mom, a.k.a. The It, came after me. And with the muffled screams of Violet, I was dragged into the oblivion.

!80

Isabella Caron

WATERCOLOR POETRY !81

!82

Eyes Of the Narwhal I know, and you too I shall not survive You raise the harpoon of death and anger.

I shall not survive.

The piercing point sends flames to my back.

I shall not survive.

I dive deep down with fear and hatred.

I shall not survive.

At last I see the light that has come.

I, the narwhal I did not survive

By Abby Brown

!83

!84

The Hunt My paddle skims across the water But I must do this for my daughter The frostbite nips my face But I know I must keep up the pace My harpoon is tightly gripped in my hand As my boat glides across the water filled land I see a whale come up for air I throw my harpoon as I whisper a prayer He dives under in attempt to get away But I chase the sealskin float all around the bay After a while the float seems to stop I am so tired, I wish I could drop I grab the float and start to head back Shivers running down my spin as I steady my kayak As I get closer I shout for my family And I see my hungry daughter smiling with glee They help me drag the whale onto the land I’m sure this whale meat won’t be bland And immediately we start having a feast But all I can think about is that innocent beast -Kate Gervais

!85

!86

INUIT INVENTIONS

Finally hiking in the blinding sun Snow goggles are what had to be done,

Living in a land that’s made of ice, The Inuit learned what would suffice.

Some of these things we use today, And the Inuit’s inventions are here to stay

With no trees for fire to help them through they thought seal oil will have to do.

Audrey Flynn

And since it was almost impossible to grow crops with a thick layer of permafrost, They turned to meat And created an ulu, it could not be beat.

An inusuk scared caribou away, where hunters wouls spear them so they wouldn’t stray.

!87

!88

Never Stop Hunting As the Inuit hunter gets ready to go out to hunt caribou in the cold, deep snow, The sunrise drags him to his perfectly crafted bow made out of driftwood found by the flow.

After days of work the hunter got his prize, a caribou he shot, just at the sunrise.

As he pulled the heart out and took a bite, he realized to himself he no longer has to fight, because his family will be fed for this night.

Zachary Maestas

  !89

Peace The sun awoke peeking just over the top of the horizon.

Blood red rays flew across the frozen tundra.

A pround falcon’s long looming shadow cast dark shapes across the lands.

The seals were beginning to awaken and climb out of the water to bask in the partial sun, A distant thrummnug started to arise from the ground as the caribou herds ran across the tundra.

The beauty and peace was endless.

Crack, an iceberg was set free as a young Inuit stepped upon it and threw his spear.

Everything was quiet. “Qujannamiik Sedna”

!90

Here I Stand As an Inusuk here I stand, Built of rock and stone by man.

As an Inusuk here I stand, To keep safe the food, hidden for man.

As an Inusuk here I stand, To lead the hunter through the land.

As an Inusuk here I stand, To drive the caribou into the hunter’s hands.

Matthew Gilbert

!91

Corinne Ahearn

!92

Ellie Howell

SHAPE POEMS
 !93

- Myla McLain

!94

- Hayden Cieniawski


!95

- Conor Nadeau

Wanna be a fish.

Have a slick head.

Spread.

Fish jam on my fish bread. All’s good ‘round My bowl today. Don’t like it? I’ll swim away. Bubbles For my friends. Swim loops without end. Shiny treasure Chest. A castle of my own. Plastic kelp fully grown.

If I was a fish, I’d be the best, not copper, not Bronze, not silver.

I’d be a Gold fish.

- Elijah Sherr

!96

Steadily shaking keeping a firm base Not letting go of the faith, not related by blood or by soul, separated not by will but by force, Keeping hold of what's important,pushing strength above the weakness, autumn wind wafting through the eyes, looking through all the lies, taking in hate to realize happiness, walking the path to new fortune, letting go of what's been broken, and when it's all said and done, she will have always been the one, she watches them grow with A soft eye keeping the negatives in the sky, holding all that is known, while letting go with both hands, Always doing what is best, even if it upsets the rest, not listening to the words the tiny daggers that are so absurd, and when it's all said and done she will have always been the one, her beliefs are strong but her heart is soft, She does what she must even if there is a cost, she must stay calm, she must stay strong, she must’nt allow any harm, for those she loves She is the light, she is the love and when it’s all said and done, she will have always been the base of all existence

- Grace Cochran

!97

The doorway.

New home?

My new house.

Can’t call it home.

Doesn’t feel like home.

Home is where the heart is.

My heart is somewhere else.

I know my home, know it’s not here.

Step in, feel a wood floor on my feet.

My home doesn’t have wood, it has carpet.

This house doesn’t know me, not like home did.

It’s cold, even though I hear the humm of the heat.

In the kitchen, no food, the living room, no couches.

Back outside. No friends, no family, I’ll be forever alone.

Deep breath. I can do this. Wait, no I can’t.

I can’t. I feel eight, not eighteen, not adult.

I can’t. Nobody to talk to in this new place.

I can’t. No parents to help me when I cry.

I can’t. Too many prices, no money, no job.

Another deep breath. Just maybe, I can.

I can. I’ll make new friends, see old ones.

I can. I can get a cat or dog, won’t be alone.

I can, soon, this won’t be a house, but home.

- Fiona Perreault

!98

Many go hoping they catch a foul ball, like a large sibling rivalry, who will win this one, they all ask, it will be fair and two-sided, a parent of neither making the call, hitting and chasing, throwing & catching knocking each down once, twice, hit hard or soft, they still move forward with a CRACK if hit hard enough, until someone wins, leaving the other in the dust from home

- Ella Normandeau

!99

- Audrey Labbe

!100

- Anna Raley

!101

- Katie Bennert

!102

A raindrop rolling down down car window racing each other like sprinters running down a straightaway. The rain keeps falling, while we get out of the car.

There are people gathered in another one of God’s acres. Dressed in black like the color of the stone that my father lies under.

The man in the white robe speaks, but nobody is really listening. They are too busy weeping at the feet of my father. Their cries sound like they have passed themselves. Like they followed my father’s path. But I am strong. I do not cry. But my family’s tears fall, like the rain that blankets us.

- Harry McFarland

!103

- Camryn Copp

!104

Star, star, In the sky. Always shining, never dies. Shows up every night, might be in another place, but always shines bright.

Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, never dies. My eyes never wander from the star I always knew. Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, never dies. When I was young, I wished upon it all the time. Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, never dies. I always wait for my star, as if it were my pet, coming from afar. Star, star, in the sky.

Always shining, never dies. Seem as though it’s polar-white, every time I look upon it. Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, never dies. You look down on me all the time, and I wish I could join you. Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, never dies.

My mother tells me you could go with a “P OP!”, but I refuse to believe. Star, star, in the sky. Always shining, nev er dies. I wonder if you wish to see me, I wonde r if I ever could. Star, sta r, in the sky. Always shi ning, never dies. I see y ou shining, I see you bri ght. I wish I may, I wish I may, I wish I might.

Star, star, in the sk y. Always shini ng, never dies.

I went to th e field, just th e other n ight. I saw y ou shi ning, I saw you bright.

- Audrey Hankinson

!105

isolated in the palms of subjects, in search of a flash of happiness, fragile yet submissive I carry their elephant sized emotions, sighs of relief as I take the weights off their shoulders and float away letting go of worries, letting go of the troubles, I twirl in the air like a dancer e x p e s s i n g . e . m . o . t . i t o t h o n e n si i . r . p . i . e . c . e - Sydney Martin

!106

music, singing the sound of beauty and pain, to help bring friend and foe together for once, a simple note rings out through the wind, bringing all the people together at last, whether they differ in size or color, music . makes it all . the same, . listen . .

- Amelia Greenlee

!107