2017-18 Submissions – Page 49

Water

Water: Elliot Bochey

Dark, heavy, and wavy, but darkness falls
Showing all creatures

Salty but tasteless and many
Many miles of it

There is
Also another form
Clear, cold, and pure

Both ways
Are considered dihydrogen monoxide: water

Gorzycki Middle school

Christmas
The snow falls on the leafless tree
The lights on the neighbor’s house is the prettiest sight to see
The hot cocoa and marshmallows add the feeling of delight
The star on the tree never has shined so bright
The family spends time making treats
Every threat is made so sweet
The presents make me smile
I’ve been waiting awhile
A holiday I wouldn’t pass
Christmas

gorzycki

7th

Christmas

gorzycki

7th

When Will People Realize?

When will people REALIZE?
Realize that abandoning someone hurts.
When will people feel REMORSE?
Remorse for leaving someone behind.

Shutting, shutting, shutting doors
BAM.
Another tear cried.
Another child abandoned.

When will people HURT?
Hurt for the pain they’ve caused before .
When will people THINK?
Think of the trust issues they’ve caused.

A child’s cry to their mother.
When is daddy coming home?
Never the mom replies holding back tears.
He chose to shut that door long ago.

A child’s cry to their father.
When is momma coming home?
Never the father says through clenched teeth.
She couldn’t put down the needle.
The drugs shut the door for her.

Shutting, shutting, shutting doors
BAM.
Another tear cried.
Another child abandoned.

W. Charles Akins High School

One More Time

One more time
One more hit

I said I would stop
I said prison changed me

I said I would do it for the kids
I said I would do it for my family

Now I sit begging for another dose
Heroine
Meth
Speed
Cocaine
Why do you control my life?

One more time
One more hit

Sirens blare
Police men yell

My instinct tells me to run
My instinct tells me to hide

On my knees I sit
On my knees I am cuffed

4
5
6
7 times

How many times will I visit prison again?
Heroine
Meth
Speed
Cocaine
Why do you control my life?

One more time
One more hit

My eyes roll
My eyes close

Overdose takes over
Overdose takes me

Now I’m gone
There won’t be another time
There won’t be another hit

W. Charles Akins High School

Cloud

Cloud
I am a cloud
Now you probably think I’m joking
Or a kid who has dreams of flying with nothing holding me down
No
I am a cloud
But not the nice kind
I don’t float freely in the sky
I am a cloud that’s chained to the ground
No I’m not fog
Nor am I actually a cloud
Just a kid
I hold a cloud
In my band
It weighs me down
Like the challenges I face
I want to be like a cloud in the sky
Or even the fog on the ground
Only because
They are free
Free to do as they wish
My cloud it chains me to the ground
Why couldn’t it be real
And allow me to float free in the sky
I am a cloud
Not the free kind
But a cloud
Not a real one
Just a prop
Barley noticed on a field of performers
I’m a cloud
Who doesn’t float free

Bowie High School

Today’s Fight

today is not the day to
stand down
today is not the day to
take cover
today is not the day to
fall back

today is the day to
rise up
today is the day to
fight back

for our sisters
persecuted
proclaimed
beautiful

for the people
undone for being
themselves
and the love they feel

for the dreamers
who will not be silenced
the most American of
all of us

for anyone
oppressed
deprived
unable to see
the love through
the haze of fear

yes, there will be a day to
stand down
there will be a day to
fall back

but that day will only come when
the battlefield is
a sanctuary
the fire
a field of wildflowers
and the enemy
is walking home with us
hand in hand

Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders

My Scrawny Nightmare

My dear love is scrawny and a nightmare,
Glowing eyes like knives cutting the darkness,
Appeareth grey shadow with matted hair,
Why she cometh from the trees such a mess?
A lion’s roar quieter than her cries,
Begone meowing feline vagrant pest!
What is this dancing bear before my eyes?
Persistent, unwelcome hobo houseguest.
Yet, her wails pluck my delicate heartstrings,
Caressing my leg with whiskers and love,
Purring motorboat sprung from its moorings,
Precious, fuzzy gift sent from up above,
This unexpected present on my door,
Barbed thorn now beloved forever more.

James Bowie High School

If childhood had a flavor,

It would not be this: Scraping
shards of glass into a dustpan
Dim lightbulbs
spit out a
warm light. Sticky, sour,
fermented lemonade
mixed with sweat,
a bottle shaped dent
In the dirt-brown tile.
It would be: Blue
buttercream frosting
sticking to your tongue, swallowed
sodapop still fizzing,
fingerpaints still staining hands,
even after three or four washes,
like the faded glow
of a nightlight
you’ve already turned off.
Still, I can’t get
the bitter citrus out of me,
Even after three washes.

James Bowie High School

Suburbia

There’s something
no one ever talks about when
they’re in suburbia.

It’s supposed to be a
flawless middle class union, half
metro, half marsh,

but steel edges
of silver silos and skyscrapers
teeter on tearing

the fragile fabric
of the starless almost-city sky.
You hear it most

nights when the
street racers wrench through
pitch highways

and the crickets
punch the identical houses’
plywood shutters.

You hear it when
there’s yelling next door, one
half matrimony,

one half the
inescapably loud swarm
of change.

James Bowie High School