Creative Writing of December: By various authors

Curve-ball

Unless you have a crystal ball and a flair for the mystique, you can’t predict what happens to you. There may be cryptic whispers in dreams, but they often go unnoticed or gather dust, forgotten. Luck comes around sometimes, and spirits you onto a good or better path. Sometimes luck doesn’t stick around though, or just doesn’t show up.

Hoping luck comes to hang with you,

Mayan Godmaire

Creative Writing Editor

Sometimes I Wonder

By Leo Hussain

Contributor

I’m standing there, my hand held by yours

So they glared, forever stared,

We became a car wreck on a busy road

Wind in my hair, I’m driving 120, semi-comatose

Sometimes I wonder, what’s the point of loving if their voices speak louder than our own?

Sometimes I wonder, what’s the point of living if they say that our living is wrong?

I’m standing there, my hand grasped by yours

They barged in, old kin and men I call friends

So before they glared, and forever stared, I let you go

Sometimes I wonder, what’s the point of loving if their opinions matter more than my own?

Sometimes I wonder, what’s the point of trying if it breaks my bones?

Wind in my hair, I’m driving midair, alone

Winter

By Kayla Joy Friedland

Contributor

the blue silk that spread along the edges

of the sun and all she was

dipped his finger into the earths’ charcoal

used the sun as his canvas

and smeared his fingerprints along the sides of her face

and a single tear drop fell

he wiped it away and handed it

to the birds,

as they soared among the prairies

they dropped her tears onto the wind’s

eyelashes

and the breeze caught them

and they froze, marbled and each

different

and they fell

and he watched from

the clouds he had created

the cold he had birthed

the love he had made

he gave her a name

the hardened tears and the dusted skies

he called her winter

and she was so beautiful

Exploring Void

Nathan McDonald

Contributor

Cigarette in my left, beer on my right,

My phone in its pocket and you on my mind,

Seeing now how life relies on building block dependences.

I’ve tried 8 months without smoking,

4 without drinking,

3 without porn,

And I’m still trying to get you out,

But the void is an ever-hungry traveler.

Their first success becomes the last as soon as its achieved,

And they will find all types of roads to get to what I need.

Why do they do this work for me without a prize in mind,

This I know I will never know before it is my time.

Chin high, this inner-explorer brandishes their encyclopedic arrow towards what I need to, want to, should go get.

As they point to meditation, mindfulness, contemplation, whatever makes me sweat,

Being its vessel, this rogue mind runs to the ropes, ravishing and ranting and reminding and racking all to try and hoist my sails.

This goal, this game, their insatiable pass time.

Serenity, my holy grail, is true North,

But with my bravado-ridden companion, no missions will lead me there.

Now, now that I’ve spoken against their efforts, by the explorer’s decree, my feet lay in sinking cement, a mix of bad habit and false spontaneity.

Sinking, my lungs fill with troubled waters while my body reminisces the time of heartfelt exploration.

Each shore presented different options:

Salty, bitter, bitter-sweet, sweet;

Foamy, infested, turmoil-fret fleet.

I’ve walked, ran, sat along sands

Of coarse, soft, much-trodden land,

Always with my relic in mind, the one I swear I’ll find, to no extent.

For, the calmest, stagnant, lukewarm waters in which I dip myself

Are but short-lived.

Once my forefinger bobs over what could fill the explorer’s void

Time proves itself unkind.

It’s never enough.

Then back to smoke and poison in a can,

To endorphins in all shapes and forms.

These habits compress the exploration of life.

Still are they kinder than the unknown promised land.

Forfeiting the Game of Games

By Alex Merfu

Contributor

curious to see your face full of

shed tears, and your grieving

bellowings when all that pulses

inside me is uneasiness

for me, he had never lived

at all, nor had he ever

smiled or laughed; done

any of the things you

loved him for.

the poet, our lord, grieves

alongside, an earth-shattering

sorrow not shared by me.

perhaps ill see him crossing

the street, or perhaps

again at the park.

for surely, ever surely,

he is not yet dead.

Kalopsia

By Emmy Rubin

Contributor

I saw her walking down the street

Holding her mother’s hand.

She was wearing pink shoes with ribbons

And was eating one of those lollipops

That looked like they could hypnotize talking rabbits

In those retro cartoons.

I was sitting on the sidewalk

Picking at the hole on my knee,

Rationalizing that what’s big is deliberate

And what’s small is a sign of misfortune,

Even though I know that a hole is a hole

No matter what size it is,

And the wayward threads that border its edges

Are the hints I unintentionally give the world that I’m breaking through my seams.

Maybe that’s why I’m so mesmerized

By the girl with pink ribboned shoes;

Because while I’m worried about what I’ll eat tomorrow,

She holds on to her mother’s hand

As she takes another lick of her lollipop,

Never once taking her eyes off the amorphous clouds surrounded by blue,

Not noticing my longing to be looking up there too.

i don’t get any college credits for submitting to the plant

by Ben Bisallon

Contributor

Which priorities

Do I prioritize

My eyes

Are weary

There’s barely time

For enough

Words

To reach tomorrow

Perpetuate cycles

Status quo

Questions are not

Quite encouraged

Quiet conversely

Leads to the same

Place again

I promise I tried

To break it

Beat it

Find the key

That all have searched for

Yet few found

I bring my only

Solace closer

As it approaches

I ask for secrets

Give me liberty

Give me ignorance

Let me set my naive goals again

Like before

I knew they were impossible