write in the middle The Archer School for Girls Middle School Literary Magazine
2012-2013
Editorial Staff Emma Halfon Tiffany Istrin Audrey Koh Gabriela Lu Catherine Oriel Dominique White Isabelle Wilson Saskia Wong-‐Smith Faculty Advisor Amanda Freiler
Table of Contents Cover Photo...................................................................................................................................................................Alyssa Slagerman Untitled.................................................................................................................................................................................Catherine Oriel Drawing..............................................................................................................................................................Jocelyn Garcia-‐Euyoque The Reality of Chess...............................................................................................................................................................Sophia Fink Untitled..................................................................................................................................................................................Nicole Scruggs Perfection....................................................................................................................................................................................Rachel Pike Diving into the Ocean on a New Night................................................................................................................................Lola Wolf Photo.................................................................................................................................................................................Chloe Holberman The Key.....................................................................................................................................................................................India Halsted Mystery................................................................................................................................................................................Marlena Lerner The Water Droplets and I.................................................................................................................................................Tiffany Istrin Photo.......................................................................................................................................................................................Mari Goldberg Untitled..............................................................................................................................................................................Hulya Sehidoglu Eyes.........................................................................................................................................................................................Nicole Scruggs Dandelion........................................................................................................................................................................Meghan Marshall The Rose............................................................................................................................................................................Summer de Vera Photo.......................................................................................................................................................................................Mari Goldberg A Single Balloon................................................................................................................................................................Hannah Martin The Mirror................................................................................................................................................................Cameron Thompson Wind Was My Mother’s Name...........................................................................................................................................Audrey Koh A Plane....................................................................................................................................................................................Eden Burakoff Photo............................................................................................................................................................................................Halle Jacobs Her Words Were the First Storm.......................................................................................................................Bre’Anna Chatman Untitled.....................................................................................................................................................................................Aviva Intveld Drawing..............................................................................................................................................................................Zoë Webb-‐Mack My Sight of the Widow’s Family..............................................................................................................................Kelsey Mumford Eternal Love.......................................................................................................................................................................Marlena Lerner Untitled............................................................................................................................................................Maren Richter-‐O’Sullivan Autumn’s Soldiers..................................................................................................................................................Gemma Brand-‐Wolf Photo.......................................................................................................................................................................................Leyla Namazie Slaughter House.........................................................................................................................................................................Ruby Krull Fear Is A Foggy Night................................................................................................................................................Eloise Rollins-‐Fife Dust and the Wooden Toy...................................................................................................................................................Audrey Koh
Untitled At four in the morning I decided to stop mourning So I opened the back door To walk into the garden They shouted at me “you are what you eat!” I wanted to be beautiful One by one I picked up a Jlower And put it in my mouth Catherine Oriel ’18 Middle School Poet Laureate
Jocelyn Garcia-‐Euyoque ’18 Drawing
The Reality of Chess Chess, You start with sixteen of your strongest players, but at the end you are down to one. The one. The king. The ruler that is noble but does so little. Nothing. The one you cannot kill, not capture, not take. The one that can lose nothing but the game he set up.
Chess, The board game of life, with the small unuseful pawns to the queen that can still be brought down. The strategy of life. Of war... Of power... The game where the winner takes it all. The game where any others are forgotten quickly. Chess,
Chess, The game where you sacriJice your pawns, trade your knights and keep your queen. The game that only one will win. One will lose. You can even feel open to sacriJice pieces you don’t need. They are just pieces in your game. Your game of life.
The question. The question we don’t ask ourselves is what the game is about. The game to take the king. So often do we Jind ourselves going after the weak, the helpless or the brave. We can often Jind ourselves capturing them before the king. The bad king can never die. Because he stays on the chess board forever. The king you cannot take, and even if he makes the wrong move, cannot capture. The king that is defeated when totally trapped.
The king that only gives up when everyone has left, everyone has died. The king is only forgotten when they wipe the chess board clean to start the next game. CHECK MATE CHESS Sophia Fink ’19
Untitled A sonnet, what is this? A poem different from all the rest? Must it be of bliss? Or can it be a quest? Can it be all dark? Full of mystery and queer, Or should it be of spark-‐-‐ A romance blooming near. Maybe they have to be Of sadness or of sorrow. Yet now I really see That there’s not one answer, no. A sonnet is your life story So tell it with all your glory. Nicole Scruggs ’17
Perfection Why must we be perfect? Perfection perforates our every thought. It whispers stories of life as a reject And lies about what you are and what you are not. We jump through burning rings And climb mountains that touch the sky. We plaster our faces with countless things Just to look pleasing to the stranger’s eye. Although we strive for this impossible goal, Some manage to look through the cloud. They manage to jump over the inevitable hole And steer away from the blind crowd. Does really matter if they aren’t spotless? At least they can say they aren’t thoughtless. Rachel Pike ’17
Diving into the Ocean on a New Night Starlight shone ripply through the smooth waters. Night has come, the moonlight totters. A small silver Jish passes by my view. The ocean cools, the night is new. Secrets of the waters come out to dance, Putting me into a deep, deep trance. As I drift to the sand, compressed in blue, I stick to the powdery substance like glue. What I’ve experienced, some haven’t a clue. The Earth is old, the night is new. Lola Wolf ’19
Chloe Hoberman ’17 Photo
The Key The key to life is all I see, Shining on her neck, In front of me. It’s gold and rusty, In the shape of a heart, The whole is dusty, where it starts. I stare and wonder where it’s from, How something unattainable to me, Is so useless for some. I long for it as badly as my heart lets me, I can’t see where I am anymore, All I know is where this girl has left me. The key is mine, But not yet, I have to steal it before we’ve met. But he couldn’t stop staring at the key, For it is all, his senses, And his future life of glee. India Halsted ’17
Mystery A mystery’s a question never answered That slides about in soundless ways A mystery’s a secret Hidden in an endless maze A mystery’s a riddle In which no one seems to solve A mystery’s a puzzle That can almost never be resolved A mystery’s an enigma Something cryptic and something sly A mystery’s bizarre That can’t be answered on Jirst try Why does this mystery lie so deeply So far down inside of me Oh how I wish to Jind the key That holds the answer to my mystery Marlena Lerner ’18
The Water Droplets and I Sometimes I wondered about the water droplets I wondered if they felt as insigniJicant as I did In comparison to the never ending expanses of space and time The billions of stars and unknown far off planets We were nothing Sometimes I wondered if they tried to speak to me Or what they would say if they could As I listened to their pattering as they hit my skin or the tub Or the ground I walked on Sometimes they sounded tired to me Or sad Or like they longed for something they could never reach Like they needed to speak to me I wondered if they felt sad As they departed from my skin As the forces of gravity harshly yanked them away Or if they too weeped as they were taken from me Or oppressed as they sank down the drain Into the oceans or lakes with out any say but their pattering I wondered if their pattering were softly murmured goodbyes
As they were forced onto and into positions they didn’t ask for Part of it was I Part of it was the moons doing Part of it was the clouds or the stars Or of what is I had trapped them at their freest in the tiny tubes and vessels of me In the walls of my lungs And small castles that were my cells and very being And I hadn’t stopped to listen to them as they sank up into my nostrils As did the drain I wondered how they felt when the moon grasped them roughly by the throat And pulled them in as our waves How they felt when the clouds had rejected them and let them go How they felt when the sun burned them up to be placed in our lungs And how they felt as they were born from the shoots and sprouts of a tree Or Jlower if they were lucky enough to be as signiJicant And if they felt benevolent, torn or bitter or even unappreciated
Either way I felt they knew what it was like to be me Like they had found a single moment of solace on my skin And if within their faces and the highlights of their own skin If they were trying to smile softly at me And lastly I wondered if they felt as trapped as me As they slipped away Or as they conformed to the walls of their cages Whether that be my lungs, or yours, or a Jlower’s Or maybe the face of a glacier or ice cube Maybe even the endings and coastlines of the oceans Or the dome that is this earth I wondered if as big as their own cages were If they would like to run away like me And if they knew they could never truly leave Much like I Because when I was younger I had believed That the land was like a scab sticking to the face of the water And if you were to scrape it off All you would Jind was water And the only reason why our planet is as round as it is Was because the black that is our space was like ink or oil That could never meld with the sky or sea
And the two would always remain sad For they were destined to only kiss each other softly Much like the water droplets and I* Tiffany Istrin ’17
*The grammatical error is an intentional stylistic choice.
Mari Goldberg ’17 Photo
Untitled One cup of tea, It is for you or me. My stomach is calling for food, but there is nothing I can do. Hunger is slowly taking away my soul.
As this dark place around me is slowly going, Everything will be gone, gone, and no one will even remember us. We will be empty as a sky without clouds.
Can you smell the sweet honey of the bees while you pass around the tea? My hands feel as warm as the sun, holding the little cup of tea.
But we will always know that if you have hope, and pray and cope, that we can survive. And now you have heard my story so remember: We are the people who can survive on one cup of tea.
I take a sip of the warm herb tea. As it rushes into my mouth, I remember now what it was like to have food. There was no gloom. I pass it around. Dark clouds now cover my head as despair shouts at me. What can I do but wait for my turn to come?
Hulya Sehidoglu ’19
Eyes Eyes. A whirling, chalky blizzard A frigid chunk of ice A silky feather of the raven A frost kissed window A slushy sky of snow. Eyes. A crackling blaze of Jire A striking, crispy crunch A dewy drip of molasses A dusk blanket of smoke A warm apple Jlurry. Eyes. A swirled, creamy sky A sweet, honey-‐melon tune A Jluffy sea of green A smiling bed of lilac A frothy brook of foam.
Eyes. A beam of dripping gold A salty, citrus maze A sticky trail of vanilla A slathered, coconut glaze A tangy, turquoise splash. Eyes. Nicole Scruggs ’17
Dandelion There she sits, Resting so daintily in solitude. Her pretty polite petals linger. She waits. She waits for you, longs to listen. Listen to hear your secrets, your hopes, your dreams, yearns for your whisper to send her away and make those hopes come true. Meghan Marshall ’17
The Rose I pick the petal For all the times you deceived me For all the times you’ve lied I pick the petal Never forgetting the times you abused me Thinking, “Why did I ever try?” I pick the petal Remembering when you had a heart And gave me kisses under our wedding arch I pick the petal Now knowing who you really are Nothing but a stem is left In the hand that you used to hold The thorns piercing me like you did Your heart now very cold Summer de Vera ’18
Mari Goldberg ’17 Photo
A Single Balloon A single balloon is entitled to wait. It is waiting on a weight Like a slave waiting for freedom. The weight is limiting its chance to dance around the sky. The balloon dreams of whirling around the cotton-‐like clouds. The balloon waits, and waits, and waits. As the balloon starts to deJlate, the hope is also starting to Jlatten, But hours, minutes, seconds couldn’t stop his dreams. As time goes by the weight gets lighter, and lighter, and lighter And the weight snaps from the string. The balloon slowly Jloats higher, and higher, and higher. The balloon twirled and swayed all day long. Until the balloon noticed it was all a dream. Hannah Martin ’17
The Mirror The shining metallic glass Folded up in a purse Or mounted on the bathroom wall. We gaze at the perfection of ourselves, Our hair, nose, eyes, and teeth. We Jlash a smile of conJidence as we continue our day, Or we notice all of our Jlaws. The Jly away strand of hair, the cornJlakes in our teeth, The big, red zits on our forehead. We try to cover up as we continue our day In embarrassment. A mirror. We all look. What side are you? Cameron Thompson ’18
Wind Was My Mother’s Name Wind was my mother’s name Her full name was Whispering Wooshing Wind Naturally she hated it So she shortened it to just Wind I couldn’t see her But it didn’t matter I never questioned why I couldn’t see her Because I knew She would never tell me But she made up For her invisibility With many wonderful things She lifted me up On her shoulders Crowned me the queen of all Spun me around in circles Her laugh sounded like The Liberty Bell Flew me through the air Set me free in the sky Let me dart through the clouds Until one day she suddenly disappeared Where did you go when I needed you most I realized the next day
A windstorm killed everyone in my neighborhood Except me Why? Tears running down my face I screamed at her Shouted the things I knew would most pain her You are nothing Useless Now I know why you’re invisible Because everyone hates you Then all stood still I never knew silence could Be so deafening Until that day Ever since Wind stopped coming I thought I could Hear her Weeping gently I regret that day I denied that Wind was my mother’s name Audrey Koh ’17
A Plane A plane is Jlying, swirling, as high as the sky. It crashes, gets back up and goes on again forever... It’s loved, it’s called stupid, and bumped into any sort of object you can name. But it keeps on Jlying. Batteries are changed. It brings smiles all around. It gets a scratch or two. But it keeps on Jlying. It’s left on the porch, watching cars speed the streets, and it has been forgotten. It can probably Jly if it tried.
It’s moved to the attic, collecting a million dust particles. It’s unknown where it has been. A huff and a puff every day or so. The same thick air Jills its nose. Its wings are weak as feathers. Flying days are over. Eden Burakoff ’18
Halle Jacobs ’17 Photo
Her Words Were the First Storm Her words were a cool wind that escaped her mouth. They were impending and cautious with every word, like rain before a thunderstorm. It was all she said, but her voice dawned on me . It seemed like she was worried more than ever about something, Or maybe it was just the way she spoke. But she was a glass that was too close to shattering. Her words were ice. They were sickles of frozen water that deviated from the cave that created them With eyes as cold as winter, she spoke. Frozen. Isolated. She was a glacier slowly melting in the middle of the Arctic. Her words were a dreary rain that danced on your window pane. She was a solemn song. She was not Jirm but not at all loose-‐-‐a lifeless portrait maybe. She was sinking slowly, Steadily, leisurely. Titanic. Her words were a Jlood. They trickled out of her mouth hastily. Her body shook crazily, like a robust earthquake. Her head swirled like a tornado that had the power of a thousand cities. This is the Jirst storm. Her words were the Jirst storm. Bre’Anna Chatman ’17
Untitled Spring-‐-‐ Come back. How long it’s been. The cold winter has taken you Crushed you Destroyed you. I thought I would never see you again. But then you come-‐-‐ In a burst of bright daisies and butterJlies Making the air smell like honey, While I sing Melodies in the air. A smile lit on my face. The sun beaming down on me. And I wonder, Why do you go away? What makes you leave? Disappear? Die out? I missed you. While other children played in the snow, I stopped myself. I didn’t go out and play with them. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I would start for the door, my head full of ideas, and then I would remember.
Aviva Intveld ’19
Zoë Webb-‐Mack ’18 Drawing
My Sight of the Widow’s Family when i look out my bedroom window and look down, i see a poor widow suffering on the ground. her two little children wait for a long while, ‘cause just to get some water they have to walk about Jive miles. if they want some bread, they come to my door. but if i say no, they just ask for more. i feel like a bad person when i ignore the poor, especially when i’ve just walked out of a store. when i back away from my window and sit on my bead, i just think to myself “i’m just glad i get to have bread.”
Kelsey Mumford ’19
Eternal Love Sometimes love lives Sometimes love lies But when love’s true It never dies Day by day Year by year Side by side Laughs and tears And when one’s beloved begins to fade Their passion never goes away The soulmate never leaves her side Until the day his soulmate dies Marlena Lerner ’18
Untitled I. Wind danced Across the Jields Through the grasses Wush, Wush Seeping through the cracks Of the farmhouse Small And alone Whistle, Whistle Brushing the face Of a child At rest Woo, Woo Bringing moisture A dense, wet fog Again Again Again
Every Night Every Morn Wind plays In the grass Wush, Wush At the foot of death Seeping through the cracks Of a casket Whistle, Whistle Brushing a face The small face Of the person it killed
II. Wind dances Across the Jields Through the wheat The ripe, ripe wheat Wush, Wush Over the back Of a Jigure Bent over in toil Seeping through the cracks Of the farmhouse Small And alone Whistle, Whistle Creeping over the small chair No longer Jilled Brushing the plate Still at the table Empty
Before it slips under the door It sees that Jigure Kissing the place Where that little hand lay Maren Richter-‐O’Sullivan ’18
Autumn’s Soldiers Leaves fall like colorful skydivers Soldiers in yellow, red, and orange Soldiers with broken limbs and broken hearts Litter the sodden earth, martyrs for the seasons Damp with the tears of the storm, scattered with the screams of the wind Still and lonely, quiet and empty Quick lives that end in triumph The light of the sun reaches through leaning branches To touch its children, to touch brave soldiers Gemma Brand-‐Wolf ’18
Leyla Namazie ’17 Photo
Slaughter House It’s hard to change what’s already begun Although sad to say what’s done is done Their voice is unspoken in our ear No sign of emotion, not even a tear It’s hard to picture what really goes on Born in a second and already gone Day and night they have no fear No sign of emotion, not even a tear There is no saying if it will end Our plan to help we often suspend Before we know it they will disappear With no sign of emotion, not even a tear Ruby Krull ’18
Fear Is A Foggy Night Fear is a foggy winter night That blinds both weak and strong. When there is no sound made There is still noise heard, And minutes seem extra long. It engulfs you in its velvet air With the strength of Hercules. It clutches you in its silky grasp And simply echoes your pitiful pleas. Although there is an ending near, You can’t see any light. You wait and shout, but the path won’t clear. fear is a foggy night. Eloise Rollins-‐Fife ’17
Dust and the Wooden Toy A dream crushed Is a little bird With a broken leg Who didn’t listen to Mama Trying to run from Death Tender and fragile Tears running down The little bird’s face The Grim Reaper stands tall Grins his toothless smirk that reeks of death Mama Over the little bird He raises his gleaming scythe Sparkling of blood and despair Don’t run too far now And the bird shuts its eyes Knowing it can’t do anything It watches its life spiral away Into darkness Tries hopelessly I’m sorry One last time To stand on its weak leg That’s when She came And tried to mend
Its brokenness But it could only lay there Like an abandoned wooden toy Living among dust It was too broken Now son, that’s too far Audrey Koh ’17