You Must Be at Least This Tall Zander Engelke

those thoughts came into my mind as I was drifting across the shark tank at eight yearsold, but they did. I didn’t want the slide to end.

Now that I finally felt like I could do anything, I wanted to go on that slide again. So I waited on the long, boring, slippery stairs. This time, a different man was at the top handing everyone their tubes. Let’s call this man Harley. He guided me to a measuring stick next to him and told me to stand against it. I couldn’t have gotten shorter in one day, right?Wrong. The walk of shame where daunting glares from the crowd pierce into my soul and the taller kids whisper about my rejection was upon me.

I sat on my mom’s lap so upset about that stupid yet awesome slide for maybe an hour and a half until my dad thought that it would be fun to swim with the dolphins. I jumped at the idea and went with it. It was one of the coolest experiences that I have ever been a part of, even to this day. Kissing the dolphin (despite the slimy appearance and the fishy stench) was probably the weirdest thing I’ve ever done, but I’ll never forget it.

There’s no point in assuming that if one person says no, no one will ever say yes. Other opportunities are available that don’t have limits on what you can and cannot do. I may not be right for every place or every situation, but there is a place and situation right for me somewhere in this big world. No doesn’t always mean no; it means not yet.

You Must Be At Least This Tall

Zander Engelke

The. Boat. Campbell Jung

I’m Home Caroline Sloter

Every word filled with trust A strong bond that's never lost Love that shows I’m blessed in every way Day by day Arms around each other at the campfire The difference between admire and inspire That first kiss under the stars in the sky Everyday learning how to fly

I share a secret I know you can keep Making memories when we’re supposed to sleep Knowing I can talk to you whenever Our friendship will last forever

You know how to make me laugh when I am down Creating a smile out of a frown Working together to find out who we will become The only place I call my second home

When it’s the easiest hello and the hardest goodbye I know I’m home, you can’t deny

When each day feels like a week and each week feels like a day I know I'm home in every way

Perfection in Moonlight

Peren Lopez

Never have I dreamed of something more. Something more than pure bliss While being lost in lust And love and all in between. Never have I acted out more on emotion, Oh glorious emotion, That of which I suppress and devour Like the largest cake in a bakery.

A rush of testosterone’s brought With the firm grasp of a hammer. Like Thor in battle, But for something much greater. Lights and a step stool are more than Stars and a spaceship. Floating through constellations seems boring. And never will it be fun again.

Though a love poem cannot be other than glorious, Yet filled with the most power, and fools, and less Of a mountain, but more of a galaxy to cling on to. What a race would it be if the finish line never moved –Somehow yearning for an end to the first to Finish, but finishing first is frowned upon in lust. Though finishing first in love means i’ve found it, I’ve found the thing greater than giants. With power over soul, but for a loss in physicality, A dreamer who dreams of the things he’s done, That others could merely dream of. Reach for the stars and you’ll find it, But when the stars are below, what do I do? Head in the clouds, forcing overcast upon cities, And countries, and continents. Focusing on what not to do, rather than what’s been done.

And here you have it. A perfect example of love in in rawest form. Sun meets moon, Setting a new time of day, or night, Or whatever you call the in between. The mix of sunset and sunrise, All at the same time. You would never hear a more perfect thing.

Never have you seen a more perfect mix Of imperfection and perfection. But my love sees it every time her eyes close. Only one image comes to mind. That of dancing to moonlight.

John Graves Award Finalist

Roots

Aiden Aragon

Monster

Emma Bedward

pieces are falling, i won’t lie to you. the nights seem longer than before. midnight dominates, my mind swirling with soft lilac clouds. iam you, you are me; the cause of my euphoria and despair.

do you still love me? i don’t want to know. tell me; do you love me?

when the colors faded to grey, was i the only one who still thought they were beautiful?

you say we are the same but how could you not see that it is only our darkness that remains intertwined

every hour i tell myself to let you go: from my heart from my mind, from my very soul. yet your claws cling cruelly to the blood vessels that still pump my desire and love for you throughout my entire body.

i know you aren’t coming back to me but with every heartbeat my chest aches my heart yearns.

i need to find myself again. leave.

John Graves Award Finalist

Obsession -A Series

Avery Buchanan

Hand Print in Blue

Sophie Fine

Mems

Campbell Jung

I’m wearing a hoodie that smells like our memories We’re just two crazy teens in the 21st century My mind is flown back to a place i have missed All the way back to the first time we kissed

I miss the facetimes, long talks Date nights, dog walks Drive ins, drive thrus Milkshakes, my boo Parking lots, dirty shoes Always breaking curfew TV shows, hocos Our polaroid photos

I’m playing that song and it sounds like a memory When I was sick and you were my remedy

When all of my dreams were dreams about you You’re the one for me, I guess dreams do come true

I miss the fro-yo, parks Sneaking after dark Puzzles, fairy friends Cuddles, cherry stems Thrifting, designers Swimming, self timers Sushi, summer Movies, each other

When I lookat your face, all I see is our memories Maybe I should just make a documentary Through the heat in July and the cold in December I’ll never forget you, there’s so much to remember

Wonder, Wander, Water

Brinkley Pauling

Droplets hit pavement as if slowing passing time, Tears born of clouds cutting through frigid breath and Carving winding paths through years of weathered grime, Pooling with each other, strength in numbers, Each pulled unwillingly toward the masses in slumber As thoughfighting the alluring threat of invisibility, of being known but never truly seen, wondering, “Who am I?” Their opposition is not enough to stop the dragging crime— Back to the earth-bound body, no matter how they try, Simply to await being thrown back upward toward the sky And stand at the ready for the next day the heavens cry. What is there to see? For everyone, or just for me? Is it a blustery, cold day to find some hot coffee,

ice

Gita Paladugu Or a day to stop and ponder what it means to be? The raindrop’s plight is all too familiar to us, Ice cutting through lawns and leaves, frosting the green Of a classic Texas winter into something more rarely seen, Doing the same to the hearts of numb observers, Creating quite an abnormal intracranial scene. Are we so different from the droplet— falling again to still try? Knowing each release from the fold is, if not a lie, A temporary way to improve morale, bring zest back into life? We are shameless thrill seekers; we are wanderers. We are wayward sons and daughters: forgotten, then seen. Like the droplet’s vicious cycle, a wheel of freedom and fate— Subject to highs and lows, torn between love and hate— Trapped in our hectic, hurtful, beautiful lives are we.

John Graves Award Finalist

The Boulevard

Emma Evans

Collide

Aiden Aragon

The Deadly Sin of Greed

Molly Perez

Sometimes she looked into their eyes and felt sorry. They so believed her lies, believed that she could bring them glory, believed that she was an angel. But none of them tried to look past her body, her mask, into her eyes. There burned the fires of hell.

Baker’s Day Spa

Zander Engelke

The Eyes in the Painting

Katherine Ann Wylie

Rainn looks at the painting of her parents, hanging by the oak door which leads to the hallway from her room. The stone walls make it especially cold in the winter so she's bundled up with blankets. At times like these, when she doesn't want to move, she just can't take her eyes away from the painting. On occasion, it almost feels as if it sees her too, but sometimes it seems there's an emptiness to the eyes of the painting. On this particular night Edgar, the boy that is rumored to have escaped from The Island, is on the other side of the painting. The Island is where the mentally insane and violent are sent to be corrected. Yet there stands Edgar, watching her every move as she unknowingly stares into his eyes through her father. He is waiting for his chance to make her fall in love with him. He feels as if just his eyes have entrapped her and decides that tomorrow is his chance. Edgar is prepared to wait until everyone is asleep, then he’ll finally get to be with her.

Bamboo Lady

Paige Bekish

Love Hurts: A Gothic Short Story

Na’im Ahdieh The dissonant drip of condensation struck the floor in syncopation with the wails from the dungeon hall. A man followed the dim flickering torchlight down the long hall. He glided past the rusting bars that kept inmates contained; some moaned and cried and others, seemingly with resignation to their predicament, stood, staring blankly at the walls of their cells or sitting in the filth that surrounded them. After many minutes he stopped at the second cellfrom the end; in his eyes the darkness dissipated as he laid eyes on her. Yet, his former lover stood there, and stared through her own bars blankly, not seeing anything but the wall, on which no shadow fell.

Oh No

Eesha Muddasani

Diabolus Ex Machina After Harlan Ellison William Dibble

We don't know who struck first. We don't ever have the time The time to stop and find out Find out whether or not it was us or them Trapped under the earth The earth that has been peeled back like anapple An apple of silicon and metal, calculating Calculating a way, the way The way to inflict Inflict upon us five the most taxing The most taxing tortures Tortures that make us want to burn To burn until nothing is left. Nothing is left but us. But us and it. And it knows not pity, or compassion, or the fear The fear we felt when the bombs begin to fall, and we run We run from its hate Its hate, brighter than the searing flash of the bombs, The searing flash of the bombs sealed our fate

Our fate, pressed upon us by the machine The machine, the absolute monster The absolute monster I've become I've become a blob. A blob of flesh after I killed my friends. My friends were the last four. The last four humans on earth, and I know I know I set them free, but I can't free myself Free myself from the change The change it has put upon me Upon me rests the crushing weight of its hate Its hate will be my sole companion My sole companion it has been for a hundred years, For a hundred years, a thousand years, god knows how long How long has god been dead to me? To me, there's nothing I want more than to pass on, to be free. To be free from hate. Hate.

John Graves Award Finalist

Ambiguous 3 Avery Buchanan

Porch (Excerpt)

Brinkley Pauling

Dillon Harlow was awakened by the sound of his doorbell ringing. It was one of those annoying chimes, sort of too long and too cheerful like a clock tower, and it was the worst sound in the world at 5:30 a.m. He rolled over on his right side and put his pillow over his left ear, wondering how he had gotten up over an hour earlier than this every morning for an entire week, just two short, but very, very long, weeks ago. He groaned when the doorbell went off again, muttering curses under his breath as he reluctantly put his bare feet on his bedroom carpet. Dillon padded down the stairs, signaling to his mom that he would get it as she sleepily opened his parents’ bedroom door; he was still annoyed when she closed it and went back to bed. When he got to the door, though Dillon wasn’t a person too easily aggravated, he threw the door open in frustration. “What?” he started to say harshly, but stopped himself when he saw her. His heart fluttered in his chest to see the raven-haired girl, his raven-haired, brown-eyed, brooding phoenix staring at him from his porch, an apprehensive and somewhat sheepish look on her face. He tried to stay angry, as he had been for these weeks of getting not one word from her, no matter how many times he worried and how many times he showed up at her door to make sure she was okay. Jesus, what had she been trying to do to him? He, they, had just seen what happened to their friend, their friend who had also gone radio-silent. Why couldn’t she havethought of him, just once? Of how worried he must have been the first time she didn’t answer his calls? The first time he rang her doorbell over and over and got no response? How confused he had been about why she would possibly be shutting him out? How scared he had been about to what place she must have gone in her mind to be so insistent on staying isolated? Dillon Harlow couldn’t stay angry, though. Not at Eden Shaw, not with her standing there, three feet in front of him, slump-shouldered, sleepless, and broken, but still trying to smile at him. He was too stunned to say anything except what he had been prepared to say to whatever tactless stranger had decided to ring his family’s doorbell at the crack of dawn. “Jesus, it’s 5:30 a.m.,” he said, but his attempt to scold her was empty, so it had no bite. All he really wanted to do was tackle her with a hug. He resisted the urge for the time being. “I know, Dill, I’m sorry,” Eden said, looking down. He didn’t say anything, but his heart felt like it was beating through his chest. She looked up, pausing for a moment. Then, she melted his heart right back to her. Not breaking eye contact, she said again, in a more serious, somber tone, “I’m so sorry.” Eden’s heart beat faster. She felt so guilty, with her sandy-haired friend staring at her with such a sad look in his eyes. Every time he had rung her doorbell, she had chosen not to let him in, to allow the wedge to be driven further and further between them. She pulled the coffee she had brought him around from behind her back, a peace offering of sorts. He had always brought her coffee. Every single day, during some of the worst days of her life, he had been there. He looked at the coffee, at the steam dancing upward from the little hole in the plastic lid, and looked back at Eden’s sad, hopeful eyes. He took the two steps forward he needed to take to close the distance between them, and wrapped his arms around her

shoulders as tightly as he had at their friend’s funeral, or perhaps even more so. He buried his face in her hair, breathing in the scent of her lemon shampoo, just like he had before. Eden balanced the coffee with care, keeping it from spilling on Dillon’s back upon impact. She sucked in a breath as his arms closed around her, trying to ignore the way her chest constricted from the memory of the last arms that had squeezed her so tightly, the way her still-swollen, bruised throat flared with pain as Dillon’s face pressed against it. She let Dillon hug her, though, and even tried to lean into him a little bit. She knew it was what he needed, and she knew that he only wanted to love her. Dillon pulled away, and he took the coffee from her hand with gratitude, looking at it like it was a winning lottery ticket and not a $3 cup of black coffee from McDonald’s with a splash of cream and a sprinkling of sugar. He took a sip, and smiled at her lopsidedly. She sighed with relief at his forgiveness and her release from his arms back into open air. He looked at Eden in a way that told her she would, in fact, have to explain her absence, but not necessarily right away. She knew she would answer for her silence sometime that day.

Abnormality Campbell Jung

Mixed Emotions Paige Bekish

Faith

Catherine Zarr

I think my golden thread snapped. I don’t remember it snapping, but it must have, because the next time I tried to pull on it, it fell limp in my hand. Frantic, I reached up to tie it back together, straining with the effort, but the other half was gone. I looked back down at the piece curled up in my hand. It was too short. Clutching it tightly in my fists, I tried to make it long enough, but the spot where it had been snapped was already unraveling, and it fell apart in my fingers. I gathered up the strands and locked them away to prevent further damage. Was I a monster? Panicking, I ran to my mother’s room and found a skein of yellow yarn. I threw it at the sky, and it fell back down, unable to findpurchase. I picked it up from the ground and put it in my pocket. Everywhere I went, people had golden threads. Some were thicker and brighter than others, some were made from different materials, but they were all bright and golden, and everyone had one. Some people paraded theirs, some people even boasted about it, but there wasn’t a single person without one. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that they all had beautiful, long golden threads, and I had nothing. It wasn’t fair. People often asked about my thread. Whenever this happened, I would pull out the piece of yarn and hope they wouldn’t know the difference. It hurt me, but no one ever noticed. I sighed with relief. Years later, I opened the box. The strands inside were so faded, no one could ever have guessed that they had been made of gold. I started to wonder if they ever had been, or if they only seemed that way because I had been told that they were golden. I had been told a lot of things. One day, my family came to visit. They all proudly displayedtheir thick, golden threads, challenging everyone around them to test their strength, but I was tired of the facade. I was tired of dragging out the bedraggled yellow yarn. I was tired of the constant anxiety. I was tired of the pretense. I threw away theyellow yarn. There are still times when I go to the box and open it, yearning for the support and comfort of a golden thread--or even the mask of the yellow yarn—but I now realize that I could never have a golden thread. I just have to accept this. I’m sometimes even glad of it, because without a golden tether, I have nothing to hold me back, nothing to pull at me, nothing to tell me how to live. Maybe one day I’ll want a golden thread again... but for now, I’m just fine without. I’m free.

Umbrella

AliBhaloo

Daydreaming Breanna Tinsley

Hand on my jaw. Looking out the window. Letting the seconds go by. It was a gorgeous day outside. I wished class would end so I could enjoy it, but I had patience.

Imagining myself dancing. Beginning to perform the movements in my head, I heard the audience’s applause. Emotions and flowers were being tossed at me, so I formed a bouquet of tears of joy, anticipation of my next move and ruby red roses.

White clouds turned gray, and the blue sky did, too. The birds started to whine and so did I because I wanted to go outside. The birds just wanted to get away. Pushing my desk against the wall so I could better view the upcoming drizzle. The green grass didn’t look so green; it was so much paler. A green I had never seen before.

Looking out the window I saw a storm. The clouds were relieved of their sadness, but pity to those around it.

From the Heavens, a gift was sent. A gift of terror, a gift of fright, a gift of fear: thunder. Thegift rattled me when it arrived unexpectedly. I shrieked at the top of my lungs, and eyes from every nook looked at me.

And that’s the story of how I got my first demerit.