somedays i want so badly to be taken back to eighth grade. sitting on the bleachers in the gym at lunch drinking sprite which seemed like such a treat. i want to go back to the time when i mumbled latin tiredly as i got dressed on mondays, preparing for my usual quiz. and it just seems so unfair that people don’t remember us anymore. they don’t remember a boy who hazel eyes who had a habit of quoting musicals, laughing with a girl who had freckles on her face. they have long since forgotten us. and some days, i have to. there may be a few people who remember us. but not really. they don’t know of the summer i spent sitting on a lake house porch, letting my fingers mess lazily with the hanging strings on my jean shorts, falling in love with his voice over the phone. they don’t know how grief hit my like a lightning bolt and how my voice caught over the phone in raw sob. they don’t know that this boy told me of adventures that i had never had and i told him stories of ones i wanted to. they don’t know that this boy is the only one of my friends who remembered my birthday and gave me a gift. they don’t know that this boy quoted his favorite musical to me and butterflies erupted in my stomach. they don’t know of the summer that i spent trying to put all the pieces of me back together again and how this boy made me remember my name. That summer i called magical. because it didn’t matter that he was a boy who went everywhere and i was a girl who was afraid of the space between the mailbox and her house. it didn’t matter as long as his hazel eyes met my blue ones, and his voice echoed over my phone. all that mattered was that he was boy who  made me remember my name and i was a girl who said his in a way that he had never heard before. but this magical summer ended. school started and i didn’t see my boy with hazel eyes that much anymore. and suddenly all the pieces i had carefully lined up in perfect order shattered. and there was no lake house. and there was no lazy summer conversations about dreams and the wind. and there was no fudge cake. there was only me and him in a high school that seemed determined to make me forget my name again. and i did. because to a girl like me, changing is unstoppable. i am such a caterpillar stuck in a never ending cycle of unexpected change. the school calls me by a name that seems strange. cold. and i wish that i could go back to eighth grade and hear him call me loudly in the hall. but it’s not eighth grade anymore. and so this new girl that i am under a name that he has never called me, she stopped replying to his messages. she ignored her email. she didn’t give him her sunny smile in the hall anymore. because he might want me to be that summer girl who quoted poetry shyly and laughed loudly. but i am not her anymore. and there comes a time when you realize that i am gone. that girl only exists in photos now. and i miss the boy who quotes me musicals and meets my eyes in a clash of hazel vs blue. i miss how we used to email back and forth, our fingers flying over the keys. we would talk about music and i have never found anymore else in this entire universe who understands my music like he does. and i don’t think i could ever find a better friend in the cosmos. but he doesn’t want to be friends with this new version of me. he wants the magical summer girl that i was. and this boy who i had phone conversations with, he doesn’t understand that i am not that girl anymore. he doesn’t understand the coursing gold that runs through my veins which causes me to shift and mold into new versions of myself. after all he will always be the boy who make me feel lightning sparks at my fingertips, the boy who whispered song lyrics into the phone speaker, and the boy who has never stopped messaging me. he has not changed. and i don’t think that he will. he is as unchanging as a metamorphic girl. and for one magical summer i contained my change inside of my skin and held in the need to shake off people and things. but the magical summer ended and then i wasn’t a girl who had freckled legs tanned by the sun. i was a girl who to pose for a id picture and a girl who couldn’t hold her sharp edges inside of her skin anymore. and so i changed. and i know he keeps calling and messaging. and i know he doesn’t understand why i don’t reply back. but a sticky acidic ball forms in my throat when i see those messages. and my heart throbs, because it is raw. and because a boy with hazel eyes with always have half. i say i’ve not felt love before. but maybe i have. all i know is that there once was boy with hazel eyes who made me, a lightning bolt of a girl, unchanging and nondestructive for a minute. and that minute was the best minute of my entire life. but a minute is only 60 seconds, and after that i am a streaking girl again. and he will always be my target. i’ve felt butterflies and i’ve felt tears trickle down my cheeks when i realize he doesn’t want me anymore. i’ve tried to tell all my friends who say we were perfect. and they just don’t understand. how can you not be the same person you were this summer, they ask. and i can’t tell them. all i know is that when he says our joke and calls me by the name only he has ever said, my heart burns. and it hurts. because it knows that he has half. and i don’t know when i will ever get it back. because i don’t know if he is my first love, because i have fallen in love before. i have fallen in love with poetry, the way my little brother smiles, and the way the sand feels against the bottom of my feet. but he, he was my summer love. my magical hazel eyed boy. and i believe in him as much as i believe in harry potter, the boy lived. i am just afraid that if i hit the reply button, my hazel eyed boy won’t live. because i am a lightning bolt, an ever shifting beam of power. and he, is the steadiest atom-composed thing in the universe. and for one amazing summer i called him mine.

it’s 10:21 at night

and i know i have to get up early

but i can’t force myself to stop

with the fear that i might miss saying the words

that have burst through the dam i let people build

~ my words have been stolen since 11\5

when i little i remember the first book

that i ever could read by myself

 

and i remember a spark that lit up my world

as i discovered new ones

 

 

when i was eight i wrote down stories

in a black and white notebook

mouthing the words that twisted into something

that was strange and wonderful

 

when i was eleven i wrote my first poem

and traced each inky letter with my fingertip

 

and when i was fourteen i wrote my first book

putting my name fearlessly under the title

 

~how a writer is born

When people look at me,

They see blue and grey,

But I️ have secret colors,

My whispered colors,

And they are yellow,

And black.

Younger sister (Randomly)- Do they kill boy turkeys or girl turkeys for Thanksgiving?

Me- I don’t know, go ask Siri or Google, they’re smarter than me.

*Older brother walks in*

*Younger sister repeats question*

Me- *looks at him expectingly*

Older brother (Startled)- Uh, I dunno. *starts to walk away.*

*pauses*

OB- I think they kill mainly boy turkeys…….*shrugs without a care*

Young sister (Gleefully)- So the girl turkeys are the ones left living. *looks very pleased*

 

Behold, Thanksgiving at my house.

 

 

 

He,

Is one of those gloriously strange mysteries.

The kind with,

Messy brown hair,

And green eyes.

He drinks green tea,

A habit started,

By  one of his friends,

But he has to have,

Lots of honey,

Because he is,

Anything but bitter.

He has a picked jean jacket,

With strings dangling off,

The roughly cut bottom,

And dried desert weeds,

Twirled around,

The buttonhole.

His friends are little wild,

And they all hate Twislers,

But the best friends,

Are the wierd friends.

His room is an orderly mess,

Of dried plants pinned to his walls,

A white bed spread,

And index cards,

With latin plant names,

That have a few smudges,

From his hurried writing.

Thick plant books,

And pocket-sized field guides,

Fill his small ceder bookcase,

And a basil plant,

Sits on his window sill.

He is one of those mysteries,

Dotted with honesty,

Quirkiness,

And integrity,

And those are the best kinds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

He has blonde hair,

And the coldest blue glacier eyes,

I have ever seen.

He wears a black leather jacket,

With a gold pin,

Which has a pair of angel wings,

And every day for lunch,

He eats a tuna wrap,

With a pack of,

Blue raspberry sour patch kids.

He doesn’t know,

The meaning of the word trust,

And every night before bed,

He whisper to the picture frame,

On his nightstand,

“I hope you’re proud of me,

Dad.”

He takes fencing classes,

And is on,

The school track team,

But it is a mystery to me,

How someone like him,

Ever became,

So cold.

Everything is color to her,

With muted pink pastels,

Light mauve.

And silver.

She wears,

Dreamcatcher earrings,

And draws,

Medieval knife designs,

On her homework,

For Chemistry.

Her brown hair is always fixed,

In the most symmetrical braids,

And she wears,

A white dove necklace,

Every other day,

To school.

People call her a drifter,

A contradiction,

And an out of tune melody.

She loves peace,

Yet she doodles war weapons,

On her homework.

She is always drifting,

From one subject,

To the next,

Like Greek architects,

To the genetics,

Behind your eyes color.

She is labeled as,

Hopelessly romantic,

And the quiet girl,

Who knows anything,

There is to know,

About fashion……….

And being yourself.

 

 

 

She smiles,

And pretends he doesn’t exist,

Because it is easier that way.

Easier to pretend things are ok,

When she doesn’t know the solution.

They met when she tutored him in Algebra,

Every other day after school,

Because he needed A’s for the school’s soccer team.

Then he was just a boy,

An annoying boy with low grades.

But somehow he made her smile more,

Then anyone else could.

And somehow her perfectly planned out life,

Seemed strict,

And her quest to find x,

Seemed more and more silly,

As she began to question y.

Her life was not the greatest,

And math was escape,

So she wondered why her life was better,

Since she started tutoring.

Maybe the answer was him,

The fall-in-love-at-first-sight smile,

The laugh,

The way his nose crinkled when he smiled.

But then he didn’t need a tutor anymore,

His Algebra grade was high enough,

And she didn’t see him a while.

Then one day in the hall,

She tried to talk to him,

But he just laughed,

And acted like she was just another random girl.

It hurt,

But she understood why she had emerged herself,

In math.

Everything made sense,

And everything had a findable solution,

Except this.

Except for the apology text, he sent her.

Except that he was so afraid from judgment of his friends,

Judgement of the school for having a “Math nerd,”

Friend,

And maybe more.

That he stopped talking to her,

Said things that he didn’t mean,

But still said.

And it was then she realized that some things,

Do not have an answer,

And that some people are like x and y,

Constantly attrached to each other,

And sometimes ok for a short time (xy),

But never together forever.

 

 

 

“Your hopelessly romantic, you know that right?” He asked teasingly his eyes lingering on her face. She shrugged, and said, “Everyone has their always, and infinity, I just haven’t found me yet. So until I do, I can always dream.” He shook his head, his eyes twinkling a cobalt blue. “How would you know when you found your okay?” She gasped, and pointed an accusing finger at his face, ” You did read Fault in our Stars!” A slight pink blush covered his cheeks, and he mumbled, “Back to the question.”  He didn’t want to admit that she had been the reason he had read it and held her tightly the next time he saw her, afraid that he would lose her.She giggled, the sound utterly enchanting to him. She said, ” When you find your okay, or your always, then you will know somehow. A feeling deep inside your heart, blooming and blossoming to the fullest. You will love that person until the stars die, or the universe completely stops existing. You will be utterly captivated by their flaws, endlessly love their little quirks and fetishes, and never give up on them. They are the person who lights a flame inside you, but sometimes heartbreak follows.” Her eyes were saddened, and she said, ” Because the worst truth is that the person who lights an endless match inside you, might not always stay.” He was quiet, his blue eyes like the stormy sea swirling with emotion. She sniffled slightly, and rubbed her eyes mumbling, ” How utterly tragic.” He sighed, and hugged her she said, “Have you found that person yet?” He stared into her eyes, which always reminded him of a fern, the light enchanting green that had captured his attention the first time he saw her. His emotions were conflicted and twisted into knots of doubt and apprehension. He, at last, said, “Have you?” She said with a smile that was almost blinding to him,  “No, unless you mean the fictional ones.” He laughed, and she wiggled out his hug, sitting more comfortably on her beanbag chair. He took a deep breath, nervousness invading his lungs as he said, ” I might have found my okay.” She smiled and clapped her hands in excitement. “Who? Who?!” She demanded, and his eyes were tender when he said,”You.”

Blue

I can look at you

And I can see it in your face

You think you hide it,

But I see you.

 

I see the hurt,

The dark circles underneath your eyes,

And the quiet plea dancing on your bottom lip.

Too afriad to be voiced

Too afriad to be heard

Because you’re too afriad

To be hurt.

 

And I just want to take you,

And wrap you up in my arms,

Hold you,

Console you,

Tell you things that you’ll believe,

But you don’t seem to believe

Anything anymore

Because you’ve been decieved far

Too many times.

 

So I’ll just look at you,

And see the pain in your fake smile,

And I’ll smile back.

 

And I’ll hear the attempted deception,

When you tell me you’re just tired,

And I’ll say me too.

 

I know you’re broken on the inside,

I can see it in your face.

 

Violets are blue,

And so are you.

~M.K.

 

 

 

Not Saying Anything At All

And I think the saddest thing,

is how it is so much,

easier to

just not

say anything

at all.

~kpk

Void

I think the hardest part of loosing someone,

isn’t having having to say goodbye,

but rather learning how to live without them.

Always trying to fill the void,

the emptiness that’s left inside your heart,

when they go.

~SD.

Leave

I watched my friends,

leave my life,

and the worst part is,

That I felt like I deserved it.

~S.W.

Mess

She was the most beautiful,

complicated thing

I’d ever seen.

A tangled mess of silky string.

And all I wanted of life,

was to sit down cross-legged

and untie all her knots.

~ Atticus

 

 

Truly Beautiful

It doesn’t make sense to call ourselves  ugly

because we don’t really see ourselves.

 

We don’t watch ourselves sleeping  in a bed,

curled up and silent

with chests rising and falling with our rhythm.

 

We don’t see ourselves reading a book,

eyes fluttering and glowing.

 

You don’t see yourself looking at someone,

with care inside your heart.

 

There’s no mirror in your way,

when you are laughing  and smiling,

and happiness is leaking out of you.

 

You would know exactly how bright and beautiful you are,

if you saw yourself in the moments where you are truly beautiful.

Left

When things got hard,

you left.

Because it was easier for you

to walk out

then to stand by me

and fight.

I guess you never

loved me like you

said you did.

 

 

Nothing More

It was in that moment,

that I realized that we are three people,

who sometimes talk,

but nothing more.

Not anymore.

Because we are strangers again, nothing more.

~M.W.

Fall Apart

We aren’t really close anymore,

but then again were we ever?

I told you my secrets,

and I let you in

but you never got to know

the little things.

So were we close?

Or was it only the big things,

that kept us together,

and the small things that

let us fall apart?

~K.B.G.

 

Forget

She wished she forget them,

And maybe try again.

But they where everywhere she looked,

And everything she had ever wanted.

But they where gone.

And she didn’t know how to forget.

~ M.W.

Another fun way to journal is to make a totally awesome bucket list. You can get creative, and try to cross everything off. Adding a dead-line helps you not forget, and it is a great way to spend a summer, or for a group of friends to complete to together!

So, an example would be:

The Best Friends Bucket List

1. Take a picture everywhere you are together, and make a fun collage. ( Goal of at least ten pictures)
2. Pass around a journal and write everything about your day in it. That way you can keep up what happened in a friend’s way, as well as journal something on your own!

 

 

And so on. Making one would depend on your friends, you, and what you like to do. Try to do stuff that is outside of your comfort zone, this makes it even more fun!

52 questions  ( And prompts) that will invole digging through your memories, and expressing them on paper. Let’s get started.

• What are you thankful for?
• Write about the place you call home
• What are five things you would like to do more?
• What is the view from your window right now?
• A qoute to live by?
• What was the best thing that happened this week?
• Write down something that you are stressed baout.
• A book that has influenced your life?
• A childhood memory.
• How do you see the world?
• Your playlist(s) right now?
• Write about some of your favorite places
• What holds you back?
• A vivid dream.
• What are you wearing right now?
• Five things you should do less often?
• What do you love about yourself?
• Something you are excited for?
• Write about someone you love.
• What fictional character would you most like to be?
• How have you changed in past year?
• What are some of your favorite movies right now?
• Something you are proud of?
• Write down one regret.
• What do you feel strongly about?
• How do you relax?
• A few small things that make you happy?
• Best book you have read this year?
• Write a letter to your teenage self. (Past, present, or future.)
• 10 Places you would like to visit?
• What is your dream job?
• Who would you invite to your imaginary dinner party?
• Where were you ten years ago?
• What where your highs and lows this week?
• A fact about you, that you do not often share?
• Something you want to remember?
• How would you like  people to describe you?
• Write about somone who admire.
• What do you need to be content?
• What is one of your earlier memories?
• What is your favorite song to sing?
• Three things you do well.
• What are your priorities in life?
• One way you woud like to grow in the next year.
• Write down five wierd things you like.
• Something that scared you?
• One thing you dream of doing?
• What was the last thing you celebrated?
• Sum up what you believe on one page.
• What would you be doing if money was no object?
• Things you love about this time of your life

 

 

This VERY long list can help you understand yourself a little bit better, and add some personal flair to your journal, and give you a lot to think about.

Journaling is super fun and is a great way to express creativity. What this post is about, is Question Journaling. A list of questions is below, and answering them is a great way to get started.

1. If you could have one wish granted, what would it be?
2.  Yahoo or Google?
3. If you could rule the school for one day, what would you do?
4. What is one thing that you wished you could have said once?
5. What is one thing that you wished you had?

 

Ok, notice how there are two ” If” questions, and two “What” questions. And one random question. This is a good way to make your first page interesting. Like for me, the 2nd answer would be Yahoo.

It is really more interesting than starting out with a list like this.

Name-

Favorite Color-

Age-

Favorite Season-

School-

Family-

Pets-

 

That is the usual basic list, but this is a more spiced up version. Because you can always add in those questions later if you want to add more personal flair.

 

Corner

In the corners where nobody goes you will find her.

Her nose buried in her new favorite book, a smile on her lips.

Her curls spilling across her shoulders, her eyes as grey as the sea.

There you will find her.

Captured in that moment of time, hidden in the corners where nobody goes.

Hidden away where nobody knows.

~MW.

Broken Look Beauiful

She made broken look beautiful.

From her laugh to her smile.

When tears gathered in her eyes, she made broken look beautiful.

When she was awake at night until 2AM, she would smile, and make broken look beautiful.

When no one saw she was sad, she would go home and cry.

And make broken look beautiful.

~MW.

 

Daydreams

She is caught up in her daydreams,

in a different world.

Where she has no worries,

or fears.

And she doesn’t cry any tears.

~MW.