8

I guess this is it,
Another long road traveled.
I've been here long enough,
I'm yet to be unraveled.
Although I've spent a lot of my life here,
Roaming through these halls,
I guess it's time to move on,
Build up and break down,
Even more sturdy walls.
I've experienced many things,
Many good, unfortunately, many bad,
And still to think about it,
My heart still seems to sting.
I guess I'm finally here,
With a cap and gown,
I guess it's really nearing,
I'm gonna miss this small-town.
I guess it's time to switch the tassel to the right...
I guess,
This is graduation night.

I didn't mean for it to get so out of hand. I have a perfectly good explanation for this.

You see I got home from school and I heard the outdoors calling me. I looked out the window, then back to my backpack bulging with so much homework that it looked like it would explode if you merely touched it. Back and forth I looked until I was dizzy. Finally, I abandoned my backpack and ran outside, into the fresh air.

Hours passed, and my mother called me in for dinner. During dessert she asked that dreaded question:

"So, is your homework done?"

In a small gilded bowl I sit looking out into the world
I think of what people think of me-
They see that I scream personality into a room,
They know that I reasonably resemble them:
With my oval head and my hair on top.
I am as still as a dormant summer wind,
Yet my ambiance moves, grows, and spreads.
I breathe volume of vibrancy
I call the brightness.
My hair dances off my head:
I’m distinct, unique
I advocate fun
Promote health
I am I,
I am the pineapple.

Insanity
Elizabeth Rushford
Haverhill Cooperative Middle School
Grade Eight

I am mad
I rest in your mind
I breathe in sanity and rip it to shreds
The looking glass shows what you see
You hear words of M in your head like a dream
Mesmerized malice
Makeshift murder
You see words behind gestures
You ponder the facts with delusions
You grab the hand of the deranged
Throwing things never felt better
Whispering to walls began to make sense
Answering the impossible seemed more plausible
Without a doubt there was no doubt of how you felt

Her pearly white teeth beautifully contrasted with the dark shade of brown swathing her skin. She was timid; an innocence in her face that seemed to be lacking from any of the other girls. The tips of her eyelashes curled high, accentuating her glittering auburn pupils.

"Are you new here?" asked the young girl, Alice, who silently chewed on her sandwich in the corner of the lunchroom, holding the book that she had been pretending to read for months.

The Ice Bed

When you think of cozy, you think warm, but I always think cold. The reason is that I am in love with the snow, and cold like you probably are with your home. The difference is, you can't sleep under a house. This is the story of the first time I saw snow in large amounts. I am Graham, and I was in third grade.

Holding hands walking down that path.
I can see the love in your eyes
My heart pounds as you lean in for a kiss.
No one can take me away from you.
The water fallows us down the river bank.
The birds sing and I hear your voice.
Comfortably sitting in that tall grass
I can feel the world lift off my shoulders.

School.

This is
the place
where it
all
goes
down.

This is where
the fights erupt,
where
the learning happens,
(and occasionally,
when the teachers
aren't
looking,)
this is where
we we meet
that
certain someone.

School is
where we spend
seven hours
a day,
five days
a week.

School is the place
we just
can't seem
to get
out
of
our
minds.
Mostly because,
even when we
leave
the building,
the memories
of what happened there
remain
with us
forever.

(And because
we have to
take assignments home-

My mother
isn’t the traditional
idea of a mother.
Warm,
and touchy;
with an 18th century mind
that she tries to apply today.
She’s never been the one
to inhale the concepts
of parenting books
and discuss them
with the mothers around the block.
She’s never reprimanded
the silly tactics of a child,
and scolded for ridiculous reasons.
She wears chic leggings,
sweater dresses,
and high boots
that teenagers themselves
would die to wear.
She’s the idol of fun.

Yet,
besides that,
my mother is a thriving
business woman,
filling in
the compulsory cracks
in society.

if we all cared
would it be this way

would trees still stretch
when the wind whispers

would birds sing
after a huge storm

when the clouds cry
waves smack against rocks

guns go off
what happened to our voices

do we know how to talk
without releasing pain

if we all cared
would it be this way

a kid on the streets
never to see his parents

a girl snatched away
tears falling to that van floor

a man high jumps off a bridge
the friends walking away as if it never happened

if we all cared..
would it be this way?

The ocean
Waves lapping on the shore
Seagulls crying
Shells sparkle in aqua waters.
The sky
Always there above me
White clouds
Bright sun
One seamless blue canvas.
The flowers
Blooming in the spring
Peeping through the snow
Bursting from buds
Tender petals lightly tinted blue.
His eyes
They stole my heart
They looked into mine
They sparkled in the sun.
The sun that rested in
The sky
As we walked beside
The ocean
Gazing at
The flowers
On my blouse.
All these things
I looked
And saw blue.
It was
The most brilliant color
Blue I'd ever seen
But was was it?

There on the dirty city sidewalk I saw a blue marble. I picked it up; it was the most brilliant blue I’d ever seen. Inside there was the most brilliant, perfect blue. It was many wonderful shades of blue all mixed together to become one gorgeous, brilliant color. I could see the richest, darkest blues. Oh, there were also the soft, lighter blues peeking out of the beautiful blue. There in the center I saw the faintest hint of an ocean blue so extravagant my eyes were glued to it.

In a six-person booth, here sits one person, me. With my black coffee -- no sugar, no milk. Cigarette in hand. Wasting time and watching the clock as it tells me that no matter how many times the hands move, the people in this booth will not change. I keep telling myself something will happen.
Waiting, waiting for my other black, bland coffee to be brought by the large-breasted waitress, waiting for the ashes from my cigarette to fall. Waiting for somebody to come, to possibly introduce themselves to me. Then I will gladly smile and tell them, "Oooh, it’s a pleasure!” and mean it.

It was the most brilliant color blue
The days are getting shorter
It must be turning into winter.
The sky won’t be this summery shade
Of blue anymore.
It will be taken over by a dark gray
And snowy days.
The dark clouds come by
And will not go away for a couple of months
With people relying on the groundhog’s shadow.
It will be winter.

The single tissue, I had seen her toss it. I couldn't exactly make out what she was doing in that long booth all by herself. There was only that one tissue thrown. It might have even been a napkin. I couldn't tell from my seat on the bar stool across the room.

The color blue, the color blue is a beautiful color. It’s the great, green trees of Vermont in the autumn mist of noon. It’s the sand between your toes on a hot summer day on the beach. It’s like watching the cold sun go over the horizon of small glimmering ocean waves. It’s like watching a human friend or family grow over the years of laughter and excitement. It’s as beautiful as the color blue. The color blue isn’t just any old ordinary color, it’s a special kind of color, and it’s beautiful and brilliant.

It was just like any other morning, waking up at 6:30 a.m. to go skiing, questioning why I chose to wake up an hour earlier than I have to for school every weekend during the winter. Like every other morning, as soon as I asked that question I reminded myself that I love it more than I hate it.

I got dressed into my ski gear. Again, like every other morning, I asked myself how is it that I hate tight clothing but I wear a neck to ankle spandex suit every weekend. Well I guess when you love something stuff doesn't always make sense.

I was walking up my driveway on my way to my bus stop, which takes twenty minutes to get to. I have a little brother and I have to walk with him in the summer to get to my bus stop, but in the winter if my little brother and I have to walk it would be because my parents would have to leave for work to early to drive us to the bus stop and leave us there. Sometimes I listen to my brother and try to be a nice sister, but on that day I just wasn't in the mood to listen to him ramble on about his new video game for his X-box 360.

The most brilliant blue I have ever seen

The magical blue haze daring you to take a peak

but your eyes think the you are to weak

you think that you should have a look

your body feels like its being reeled in on a hook

then you open your eyes to see

the most brilliant blue you have ever seen.

While I was in Venice, Florida on my April vacation my family and I went to a muscle car show at a town right outside of Venice. The muscle cars at this show were some of the best I have seen in my life. Every single car there had a full body restoration from the frame up. There wasn't a speck of rust on any of them. Every part on every single car was polished completely down. The chrome on the cars was so shiny you could see yourself in it. The muscle cars looked better than cars coming off the production line.

It was the most brilliant color blue I'd ever seen

the color filled my eyes like a beautiful sheen

I saw it when I was on a boat in the ocean

the waves rocking the boat in a swift motion

It filled the sky in a beautiful light blue

most definitely a brilliant hue

The blue could only be found in a dream

and only if you were eating whipped cream

the blue was as blue as a blue spotted salmander
as innocent as a lonely bystander.

The doors slide open,
Phony music spills out,
I walk into the small room alone with no doubt,
I stare at the buttons,
Amazed as can be,
As i see 38 blue buttons staring staright at me.
My eyes wander around,
Dancing from button to button,
When my hand pushes one all of the sudden.
I glide up and down,
Level to level,
Slide from floor to floor,
Having a whole lot more fun than I have ever had before.

Perhaps it was the clams,
That made me feel this way,
Perhaps it was the rotten eggs,
I ate yesturday.
Stomach turning,
Bubbling up,
So painful so severe,
About to erupt,
The feeling inside me,
So crazy so true,
Or maybe i'm just coming down with the flu.

It was the most brilliant color blue I'd ever seen; and it was too bad it's peaceful aura couldn't have soothed me any longer. I peered over the ledge, they were coming, full speed, dashing up the mountain ledge. . . . . to get to me.

We moved here, to the Philippines,just west of the volcano Mt. Pinatubo. It errupted in 1991, and shortly after, when the land was recovered and new homes were built, we'd constructed a house by the sea-side. I went to approach her, Jenniana, but she kept walking. I of course followed her, 'Private HQ Do Not Enter!' a sign read. I ignored the warning sign, but then I saw it, a camera. No! I heard a warning alarm. 'Trespasser Alert! Trespasser Alert!' it alarmed; and so I ran.

I have moved many times, have lived in many different houses
I think the grand total is nine different houses
Houses ranging from just outside a big city in Massachusetts
to a small rural home here in Vermont
One home in particular brings lots of memories to mind
Not here in Vermont, but where lived a good chunk of my life.
Plymouth, Massachusetts

It was a small house
a blue-ish white color
I lived in that house for the first ten years of my life
So many memories
Some good
like the time I spilled paint on the carpet, and my dad turned it into a smiley face
some bad

Waiting
For what?
I don't know...
The neon sign outside the window of my booth flashes on and off
I don't know if it's supposed to be that way or it's just broken
"What am I waiting for?"
The thought creeps into my mind.
I honestly don't know
For him?
No.
For something to happen?
Maybe...
I tap the cigarette in my hand and swirl the glass of water in front of me
Then I continue to stare off into space
Listening to the electric buzz of the neon lights,
the click clack of the waitress's heels on the floor,
and the clattering of plates at the other booths.

Elegant and refined,
These words describe the colors of black and white,
Black and white photos,
Showing everything with glamour,

Truths and lies,
The manipulation of object's color.
The two colors also are choices,
Black, maturity, shadows.
White, childhood innocence, light lit paths.

But do those show everything?
Even in the photos of yesterday,
There isn’t only black and white,
Grays tint the objects that aren’t quite one or the other.

Isn’t that how it always should be?
You can be this,
But still be that to?
Why are we forced in to the boxes,

Honesty, my dear
is as significant
as the others you say matter,
if not more.

Don't tell me when you look at me,
the curve of my nose,
or the glimmer of my lips
are what loom out at you.

It's my heart,
that should charm you.
Pure, and golden
is what I sought to hear from you.

Your beauty inside,
is what makes the rest of you beautiful
Flatter me.
Tell me what you want to say,
rather than what you think I want to hear.

Darling,
I've been there before;
in a pool of lies,
but soon enough,
it'll be you who drowns.
And I can assure you,