UHS Winner - Sofia Pantoja - Ecuador
I’m from farms, I can smell the cattle as I drive by
I’m from the sun that makes my brown skin glow
I’m from surprise empanadas and plantains
I’m from soccer, no shoes are on my feet
I’m from the Andes mountains, looming over me big and strong
I’m from earthquakes, I hide under the table
I’m from cold nights and hot days
I’m from the guinea pigs in my Abuelita’s kitchen
I’m from, but I don’t belong
Victoria C Zickas - Grandpa
A grandma sat next to a grandpa.
Head straight down, stifled crying and praying.
The low-lit room was cluttered with silence
And a new family friend held her hand
As one cousin paced, another one left.
His anguish was loud and everyone heard.
The head of the household, barely heard.
They stood and rattles came out of grandpa.
His breathing stopped, making them think he left.
Grandma’s grip tightened, whispering, praying;
Her small, gentle tears falling on his hand.
His breathing returns, blocking the silence.
The cousin came back, filled up with silence
And the rest of the family was heard.
The family stood around, hand in hand,
All staring at their bed-ridden grandpa,
Who could only hear their thoughtful praying
Through his cold ears. His hearing hadn’t left.
This time, the sorrowed, older daughter left,
Scared of the unstoppable future silence. (11)
The daughter, long ago, had stopped praying
For her ill father. Everyone had heard
A horrid noise sounded out of grandpa.
His eyes opened and he squeezed his wife’s hand.
Everyone stopped crying as his rashed hand
Lifted up, a smile appeared. It left
And then Yellow foam poured out of grandpa.
That marked the end of the awful silence.
Beautiful cries were all that could be heard
And his wife let go and she stopped praying.
His strewn-out death was the one thing preying
Their minds. His slack arm fell and then his hand
Followed. The granddaughter’s scream could be heard
As his distraught, younger daughter quickly left
In shambles. Her ex stood in cold silence.
He got his wish, they were there for grandpa.
At home they were heard, quietly praying
For their grandpa. Rosary lay in hand,
He left, but was still heard in the silence.
Simone Dempster - Constellations
There is a constellation on my face.
There are clusters and nebulas that broke through the skin and are continually exposed on my cheeks. Shining brightly. Glowing. My cheeks, my nose, my chin, have become its own little universe. All together on my face. I wake up with a new one every day. There's a Cassiopeia on my forehead. An Ursa minor on my chin. My cheeks stinging with a new constellation, Aries. And underneath of my chin, there’s Taurus. In all of its shining and annoying glory.
I've done everything that I can to make it go away. Everything to make this end.
These stars keep shining on my face. It's all anyone can ever see. All they see, all they will every see, is my private little cluster of constellations.
I've tried washing it. I've tried medication. I've listened to the internet. I did the tips and the tricks. I've emptied my wallet. I did everything right. But why… why am I the only one with these stars marring my face? Why won't they just go away?
Did I do something wrong? Am I being punished? Did I hurt someone in a past life that led me to have this space piece of space left over on my face? Why do all these beautiful people around me have such clear night skies? Why am I the only one with these itchy, red stars across my face? When will they fade away?
When will I too have my own clear night sky?
Keira Lau - the Hero’s Journey
A young God
oh holy heroic heaven sent prodigy
the silent satan suffocating.
No cape and sword,
this hero was a
facade with a heart dipped in
Molten gold.
Pretty boy was a beautiful hurricane and
He never asked for it. Typhoon of egotistical
remarks and witty compliments.
Only missing a beat in his heart with
a drought in his mind.
A young God
just a lost boy, with a numb tongue. A
weak wandering withering child,
drowning in his own ocean.
This hero was an unravelled
diary, and although his heart may be scorched
and burned, he still learned
the difference between a
young God, and the one who
could not walk away from omelas.
Pretty boy was a wreck and
He knew it. An eroded ship full of barnacles and
pirates who lusted over the feeling of land.
And pretty boy knew, his thirst, his ache,
his pain- could never outshine
his role as the toy,
the fraud,
The young God.
Keira Lau - Vena Amoris
Flowery bruises under purple rain,
syringes of pain injected in my veins,
a nosebleed dripping onto my
hands and down my arms,
a severed stitch staining my seat red.
Hands all over and under,
warming you up.
Slung on a bed like a teddy bear.
The eyes do not talk but
at this moment I wish they could.
A hand over my mouth like duct tape,
glasses over my eyes like a microscope.
The frames completing the scene,
black border and a blurry world outside.
It is kisses for silencing and mouths for ravaging.
Flowery bruises under purple rain, petals and wind like a couple,
survival on trial.
Keira Lau - Pink Kryptonite
I’m a romantic and a realist.
Love acts like jello on my fingertips,
slipping, falling. A vinyl that has collected
enough dust, a record with dents and scratches.
Holding onto the loose threads of fleeting memories,
the overwhelming nostalgia and longing are
too much to bear.
The stench of forgotten things makes me sick.
I can’t let it go.
Reality sleeps on my shoulder and wakes up at night.
There’s intimacy between us two,
tilted heads and exposed necks. Vulnerability.
It’s when curtains close, lights flicker off and
eyes have a bright neon glow-
something claws at me, rips and shreds me,
like a silent voice struggling to get past my throat.
The heartbreaking truth and most charming reality
tell me there’s hope-
just not for me.
James Schaffer - A Flower in Eternity
In a wide wild field of lavender stalks
and tulip scents tangling together
a blaze runs over the hills
from the horizon’s vaguest reach.
We - a flame-flower blooming in the far stretched fields of eternity.
All that surrounds us ignites - Igniting that all within us.
Among ash-veiled embers fizzling away
our flickering light fills the ever-empty everything.
James Schaffer - Youth and Wonder
A field of corn is where she plays
with painted swirls
by he
at the edge
of eternity's gate.
Bay hatches above let red doves fly
open-winged to the ground,
pelletized and sprouting
unfolded tulips.
Where he draws her mid-dance,
mid-spin
from pitchers of golden oils,
pouring, to immortalize her
beyond eternity’s threshold.
With pearlescent innocence
lusting for a future
of dense strokes
and gentle words.
By bonded tragedy
they are clasped
and forever sealed
in a secret meadow
of youth and wonder.
Emma Dickinson - “What makes the face interesting is the skull inside it.”
Bones cast aside mourning of spirit or soul
You are not your mind
Feel yourself present, fully and physically
Or reject your manifestation of self
You have no choice
Endlessly humans release their minds into nothingness
Time and time again
You are not so naive as to claim you are different
After few generations the idea of you will warp into dust
And leap after its shell into the void
Time takes us all mercilessly
In that one way perhaps we are all equal
Your impact stems from your lack thereof
How fitting
As a rock is mindlessly kicked off a cliff's edge
Hurtling into deep valleys,
The wind will scatter your pieces
After you are demolished
by the harsh reality of the ground
And the uncaring indifference of the foot.
Miya Velasquez - Sestina
We learn to use our hearts
We learn how to love
We teach ourselves how to kiss
When we are happy we hear music
When life hits hard you are left in pain
When life hits hard you are hurt
From a certain age we know that the hurt,
Doesn’t last forever because we have a heart
We learn that life isn’t fair and causes us pain
While we are hurting we also love
We numb our feelings through music
We feel the butterfly’s when we kiss
Hitting our teenager years everyone wants a kiss
Even though we are young we hurt
We dance alone with the music
With all that goes we have our hearts
passion and attraction are love
young and old we will always have pain
it is a part of going up having pain
we look at our significant other and kiss
when we try to hate, we can’t because we feel love
we try to numb the feeling of being hurt
we want to numb our hearts
when we are lost in the world we play music
we attract ourselves to the beat of the music
we smoke weed to numb our pain
we are like the grinch, but we have a good heart
we try to make others feel good, so we kiss
when our family is disappointed in our action we get hurt
with all the fighting we still love
we as human beings we are default emotion is to love
we love the beat of the music
we self-medicate ourselves to stop being hurt
we drink to numb the pain
there are incidences where we do more than just kiss
when we grow so do out hearts
our heart beats a mile a minute when we kiss
by the end of the day, we learn to feel our pain
it is a strong word but, we appreciate the word love
Brenda Nazario - My Favorite Color is Red
My favorite color is red,
And yet I’m told pink suits me better.
Red is too much like you, I’m told:
Too stubborn, too brittle, too bold, too difficult, far past her peak
And yet I still love red.
I love the red of the pomegranates you peel,
I love the red of the pepper pastes you use when cooking,
I love the red of your red leather jacket,
I love the red of your blouse from the early 2000s,
I love the red of your silk stiletto boots.
My favorite color is red.
You wake at four am just to begin to set those sparklers, those little hats,
those candied fruits, those posters and streamers you tape to your precious TV
Those treats in which you spend what's rightfully yours
after hours of scrubbing and dusting for others,
all for someone who never asked of it.
And so I let you dress me in pink.
My favorite color is red.
The same red as those silk stiletto boots you keep under your bed frame,
with your red leather jacket and red early 2000s-style blouse,
all in that clear plastic box.
As you dust and sweep,
and organize and toss,
you cradle that box gently, and once its been put back, your eye catches glimpses onto the threads of the items inside.
The fabrics have begun to tear
And those threads have begun to run loose
So you go out the next day and make sure to buy me a pink skirt.
My favorite color is red,
but your sister once told you it's too promiscuous.
You change into some old pink sweater before you bid goodbye to her
and you couldn’t bear to see red again.
Woman of sea foam and bright mango trees, these northwest soils were never made for you. The earth here is too cold in January, and these beaches never carried you gently. The mountains here crumble and wither so that you may not wish to see those morning glory vines crawl up their sides like you used to.
One day I hope to take the roots of you and settle them back into those brick and wire walls you grew up in.
When your hands are dried like prunes in the sun and your hairs shine gray like your mother’s, I hope I can be the one to brush them through.
My favorite color is red,
But you watered it down to pink.
I’m not supposed to be you, but rather the best of you.
Take after your long deep dark hair, but never its waves
Take after your hips that become valleys, but never your breasts
Take after your passion, but never your tongue.
Take after your love, but never your temper
To take after you, but only the caramel and never the salt.
My favorite color is red.
You are the red of your mangoes,
the red of your angel’s trumpet flowers
the red of your fresh chili peppers,
the red of your school uniform when you were a girl,
the same uniform you wore the day before you left.
I have learned to see you in red.
Sit down at last woman of south, daughter of sea
Lay your pinks to rest, I will love red for the both of us.
Brenda Nazario - Seventeenth Snowing
Half -smoothed and half-chipped sandstone around the edges, Rivers carving Appalachian peaks like wood.
in gravel soils, a bradford pear's pointed leaf.
Where she'll channel the cold currents to water it
From bright orange to green on the seventeenth spring when bradford’s bloom perfumes the air of the deceased
The petals will brown and its leaves will still give shade to the grasses that point to its stars in clear blue
but the hands of a daisy are cold bitter blue
the petal tips are red from icy river streams
and the bradford pear's pointed leaves will multiply the banks will be paved to kiss the gravel soils
Those new beaches will flood it all, to see the new half-smoothed and half-chipped sandstone around the edges.
Isabella Lopez - Of Soft Skin and Even Softer Boys
I want to write of birds and flowers
Of soft skin and even softer boys
But I can’t write what I don't know
So instead I write of roughness
Of blank stares and pushing back
Your weight on top of me
Crushing my lungs and filling me with fear
It’s never ending
You’re all around me
In every crevice
In every place I have kept hidden
Safe.
From men like you
From boys who don’t know how to take what they are given
Who instead demand all of you
Make you sweet promises and
Dip their lips in sugar
Until you've kissed them clean
So instead you get their venom tongue
Striking you in all your soft spots
Shredding your untouched flesh
Until you are dosed in blood
Messy
Ruined
Then they point at the mess they've made of you
And insist you were always like that
You were never pure
Never innocent or sweet
“You are a wretched beast and I the conqueror”
Looking down at my skin bloodied and beaten
I see the monster you speak of and
Let you make me believe it
Because it's easier to make myself this
A whore.
A slut.
Then to remember that I'm just a girl
Who can be tricked and lied to
Who can lick the sugar from the rim
Before I realize it's a poisoned glass
So instead I write of cautionary tales
Hoping to one day have the vocabulary for softness
Aidan Johansen - Fragile, Gentle Honeycomb
I remember it as a glimpse of personal legend,
Preserved in an amicable amber lens in my mind:
Through the living room windows that were rimmed with cobwebs, the morning’s rays striking through,
Slanting to alight upon your concerned face,
That fragile, gentile honeycomb
That crumbled and dripped upon me telling you that I’d had a nightmare - That I’d had a dream that you’d left us;
Carried and wisped away upon wayward winds;
A fate as horrible as we could both conjure up,
We embraced to comfort and melt and seal each other back up together
I’m not religious, but I was sure your loving face to be angelic, and your presence divine, It was all the more heavy when your beeswax wings melted and you were pulled to an earthy fate.
They say that “your heart was too big for this world.” I know that it’s a balm on the stretched wound of loss,
But I can’t bring myself to think that way;
Like your heart was some bulging, meaty mass
Your valves clogged with nectar, arteries overflowing with honey,
Until it as a swarming, pumping, cloyingly oversweet fetid hunk of flesh, burst And then stopped.
I can’t revere your memory that way.
Maybe you were like a bee who to protect its family
Uses its body to suffocate and overheat an intruder;
But for all the strife and grief that you wanted to shield us from
I wouldn’t willingly forfeit you to that grim spritely martyrdom
While I’ve emerged cauterized and stronger from that heat
I wish that we could’ve grimaced and beared the brunt of that wasps’ venom together Instead of seeing your overheated body get carried off by those yellow jackets
Sometimes I still see and remember you, especially in sweet honeyed sleep Sometimes it’s like pollen, makes my eyes swim like a bug’s final death struggle in water, Makes my throat swell and constrict shut tight,
Sometimes it’s like a pleasant flower smell,
And I’m able to blissfully cherish your enveloping lingering after-scent All in all, in your form of pollen upon fallen flowers,
I love you, Mom.
Drelyn O. Van Deinse-Diaz - I Might Be Bad at Poetry
Oh lord who art in great heaven above why give me many blessings but make me bad at poetry
I slave away trying to understand different words and phrases just to be bad at poetry
I stood atop chiseled stairs to attempt and profess my love through a poem of wonders. She kicked me
down. Tears so very large you could see them from space. I don't think she liked it. I might be bad at poetry
Why? Oh Why! My mom shouts and kicks, this isn't coping she says it doesn't make sense. You can’t live thinking this way.
How am I supposed to know? Wrote what sounded nice. She didn't get it or I might be bad at poetry
She threw my poem, might as well rip it. Have I not been listening right? You know I spent time on that?
Not a traditional professor. Reads it out loud, picks it apart, I might be bad at poetry
Not a time to myself, I hate everything I write I feel like nothing ever gets my point across.
I spout nonsensical bull, that has meaning only to me, am I really bad at poetry?
My friends read poetry as I sat and listened. Deconstructing everything, things I'd never thought of
He turned to me, Drelyn, what do you think? I don't know man but I think I might be bad at poetry
Milly Weng - Fade
White walls filled with paintings and tapestries, Small rooms filled with murmurs and nonsense, Night sky filled with shimmering stars.
The walls caves in just a little more.
The room sinks just a little faster.
The night gets a little darker.
Nothing feels right.
I don’t belong.
This is not home.
The blandness is catching up.
Nowhere to run,
and nowhere to go.
This feels like an eternity,
but I know it’s only temporary,
so I let the thoughts fade away before I do.
Kevin Henning - Spark Ghazal
The wires collide and generate a bright yellow glow. The beginning of a spark,
Suddenly, time again appears, ticking unyielding metal hands, to combat spark.
The daydreams of a right, bright, young man, blasted away through a hammer-forged barrel.
In the time where he, swamped in sludge, pleads for a glow. That man is denied by that spark.
Flings of thought coming and leaving, noses deep in life, seeking for that unique sight.
Repetition, reclusion, recession, and once in lifetimes, the dazzling spark.
It’s kept fathers up at night, their crippling bodies ensnared in polyester.
Pondering about legacy, wondering if they will have a frazzling spark.
To recognize that light for the first time, in setting, in self, in soul, in science.
New eyes set on a fantastical journey of seeing the first, then latest spark.
Spontaneous roars in the vast void, like a chain of light, all across the cosmos.
Each chain now points toward you, Kevin, for it is the time to forge the faintest spark.