STUDENT WORK
Creative Writing II: Middle School
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Why can’t all lights
light up a room? Can a cactus have a heart? How can you find a seed with no living plants? If a room is dark, light it up. - Bjerre |
How magical must these places be
that lie beyond brown bottles? Why does the clock run faster when the world fades into pixels? How does a farm in Odessa bring white wolves in the night? Who gave this jungle the gold crown and scepter? - Evelyn |
Quiet hungry tears--
hospital white lights glare down,
Gone after morning.
Lush leaves of spring wilt
Through winter wind onto cold ground--
Green blooms, blue sky glows.
Warm summer evening--
Cheers of children gently dim
As stars gain their light.
- Lilah
The Bright Sun of Berkton
The bright sun would always shine on the people of Berkton. But the rest of the world did not know that Berkton was a place. It was a dying town where it never rained or snowed. The people who lived in Berkton were stuck in a bubble that no one ever left. So no one ever tried to think into the beyond and experience something different. No one was brave enough to do it. Until one day, someone ran off to the big city only a couple hundred miles away. She packed up her car and got out of town. She sped into the city around 6:00pm. It was breathtaking. Two hours later, the sun went down and the stars came into glimmering view. She thought about what they were missing in Berkton, the town where the sun would always rise but never set. She decided to never go back.
- Bjerre
Ring of Fire
The room was packed, lit up by the orange glow of a dining room light. You and Anya squished next to me. The three of us barely fit in that living room chair. So many of us all huddled in that room together, all of us family in some way.
I don’t know when we began singing. It must have been when Tyler, who was sitting right next to us, pulled out his guitar. We’d shout out songs and he’d strum along with our tired, cheerful vocals. Around the second verse to Rocket Man I remember looking across the room to Grandpa. A tear rolled down his cheek. It was a happy one. I had never seen him like that, the Rocket Man himself. I could feel when you noticed too. “Oh no, no, no, I’m a Rocket Man.” We cheered, not caring how it sounded, just happy to be together.
This time the room was much brighter. The light shone through the wall of glass, lighting up our smiling faces.
I was sitting on the floor with Aunt Jane. You were in a chair near Dad. There were still so many people, some new faces too.
At first Grandma played the ukulele for us, sometimes strumming along to songs we could sing to. Eventually we found a guitar and I remember so vividly Dad asking you to sing your song. You instantly shook your head no, so he turned to me. “Evy, how about you sing Ring of Fire?”
Soon you were playing the guitar as I sang along. “And it burns, burns, burns.” Some of the room joined in. “The ring of fire.” We were all singing now. “Ring of fire.” I think it was singing that song that changed your mind. After the final chorus, you seemed eager to share your song.
That's the last thing I remember from that night, you singing softly with family all around, still as the evening lake outside the window.
- Evelyn
Christmas Cheer
Decorating the crowded Christmas
tree. Warmth, laughter, music.
Inside an ornament lies a world
of carefree innocence. Nothing
can disrupt this world at the top
of the tree. Happiness fills the air.
Then fall, drop, shatter. A moment
of silence. A blissful free world gone--
before we ever really knew it was there.
- Lilah
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Sorrow There I was. In my birdfeeder-sized apartment. Rain screaming past my window. “Why did she leave me?” I cried. Otis looking at me with the face of sorrow. The TV’s glare could not pull me away from the sad truth. “It was my fault. All my fault.” I needed the warm comfort of Otis, the only thing that could calm me down. His furry paws wrapped around my cold dead body. The clouds started to move, releasing the sun to shine. I was only a bit happier. My heart still burnt with charcoal. “I will never let anybody touch my heart again,” I said to Otis, his turned head speaking worlds to me. Otis was the only one who would listen. His ears always patient, eager to hear what I had to say. “I love you Otis.” - Milo Does a bed with spikes
ever give one the chance to rest? Why can we buy anything, but to sell our souls is a crime? Isn’t it funny how any thought is accepted, then once we speak them aloud we are chastised? - Dillon There's Always Tomorrow Deep oceans reign in the orange of the horizon. Restless worry awakens, hungry. My feet sink deep into the sand. Black swallows the sky. No more stars, until tomorrow. - Lilah |
Blue Lamb Through the wind, under starlit sky, her blue lamb soars. Leashed by reality. One day the tether snaps, her rainbow dragged down, down. Longing for the light, sinking into mud. Smoke blankets the blue lamb Creep Mask - Lilah Why even in the harshest moments
do plants still push on? If bugs don't have compassion, does that mean they never truly live? If we were as transparent as glass, would we be happier? - Milo The Sun Was Shining Glistening like a mirror With sparks of gold it shimmers above our heads Far far away But in this world It is somehow near - Chase |
Elevator Pitch
Jonathan has hated Ava ever since preschool when she flushed his fruit snacks down the toilet, but they now find themselves at Alcatraz Extravaganza, a prison escape room at the Wonderland Mall, to celebrate the Sweet Sixteen birthday party of their mutual friend. While everyone is busy trying to bust out through the window, Jonathan spots Ava picking the lock to a metal box when suddenly the lights go dark. “Ava!” Jonathan screams. “What did you do? This is just like preschool!” The group quickly segregates into gender gangs, barking at each other about who’s responsible for cutting the power supply when suddenly the lights flicker and the TV flashes, asking if they need another clue. "Oops!"
- Ryan & Zoe
On a hill there sat a house
A big blue house
Inside, a monster lived.
Sad children wait around all day.
Are they waiting for the bus?
- Dillon
The Naked Truth
The tailor was helpless. Hours were wasted making dress after dress, failure after failure. His pins had bent. His needles would snap. His thread always seemed to tangle. “No one has a harder life than me,” he would tell himself after throwing another disaster in the bin. If I could have rolled my eyes I would have. Each day his weeps grew louder until one particularly bad Tuesday I marched right up to him. He stared at me shocked, as I scolded. “Quit weeping and give me a dress already! I despise being naked.”
- Evelyn
Fly Away Finances
It was a cold winter's day in London, when the wind whipped like a tornado; sudden and violent. A gentleman in a bowler suit hurried along the river Thames sipping eagerly at a cup of clear brown liquid one could only presume to be tea or brandy. A fly flew by and landed in his cup. The man took no notice and drank a little more. He stopped for a second, confused, then walked on. When he reached a building with a sign that read, “Fly Away Finances,” he zigzagged his way through a busy lobby into a gaudy conference room with five other men who went silent. He began to speak about their business when suddenly, he felt a little scratching in his throat. He stopped talking, to see if it happened again, then when it did not he continued. Two minutes later he felt it once more. “Scratch, scratch, scratch.” Again he stopped talking to see if it continued. It did not. Three minutes later: “Scratch, scratch, scratch.” This time, a fly flew out of his mouth and through the open window into the dusky city.
- Dillon
Jamie & the Seventeen Boys
Jamie had started a ruckus in the Cottonwood treehouse. “Everybody, please, calm yourselves.”
He rose to his feet. He wasn't very tall. “I know sneaking out is dangerous and against camp rules, but we have to keep it together if we want this plan to work out.” All the young boys’ eyes were on him. He held his chin dramatically. “We already established that Cabin Aspen would be in charge of snacks, but we need a bold” -- he emphasized with his arms -- “and brave crew to lead all of us to the Treehouse of the forbidden Hemlock Cabin.” Jamie’s eyes glittered with determination. “I’ve thought about this for a while now and I think--”
A voice rose up from the back of the room. “You think the counselors will just sleep through the sound of eighteen boys running into the forest to find this made up treehouse?”
Jamie whipped his head to face this obnoxious fellow, looking rather unamused, and took a few steps forward. “How DARE you call Hemlock Treehouse a myth.” The heckler snickered as Jamie continued. “In all my proud years at Camp Warlington I have heard many tales about this magical structure and I will NOT let some rando RUIN this planned expedition.”
Some of the kids sitting below them nodded, one might have even clapped. Jamie studied this mystery boy’s unchanged, smug look. He tried his best to upset him. “Plus, you’re pretty short.”
The boy’s grin fell flat. He pushed himself off the treehouse walls and headed for the exit.
Pleased with his little victory, Jamie turned to continue his speech, but he was interrupted once more. “I guess you won’t mind some rando telling the ten-and-under kids about your little master plan, right?”
Eyes wide with fear, Jamie watched the boy now descending the ladder. “You wouldn't.”
“Oh, but I would.”
And with a snarky laugh the kid jumped to the dirt, leaving Jamie and the sixteen other boys in horror.
- Evelyn
