Life is good. Don’t be like a piece of wood— motionless, silenced. Life is good.
Shutters
A tornado warning disrupts a regular school day “This is not open book. You have twenty minutes. And . . . begin,” says Mrs. Mulder, her eyes glancing at the clock. I grip my pencil tightly in my hand, scanning the sheet in front of me. Two pages, front and back, all about grammar and phonics. Right at that exact moment, I swear I can hear about twenty-five inward groans from my classmates. I don’t know about you, but everyone in my class hates phonics and grammar. I sigh and sign my name at the top of the paper. But before I can answer any of the quiz questions, I hear a voice from the loudspeaker in our classroom. It’s Mrs. Batangelo, our vice principal. “Students and staff, there is a tornado warning. This is not a drill. This is not a drill.” Her voice clicks off and the room falls silent. My heart hammers in my throat. Wait. This isn’t a drill? “Come on, kids,” Mrs. Mulder says, ushering us to the door leading to the hallway. We follow Mrs. Shipley and Mrs. Foley’s classes to the second- and third-grade common area. “Lay down right here, friends,” Mrs. Mulder says, pointing. “Tuck your hands over your head and tuck your legs into your stomach.” English Spin Wheel My classmates and I all get into this uncomfortable position. And we wait. And wait. And wait. Minutes pass and feel as long as hours. I hear the teachers’ hushed voices and the howling wind outside, playing with the shutters as if they were a toy. After about fifteen minutes, Mrs. Mulder taps me on the shoulder. “You can get up,” she says. For a split second, I think the not-a-drill is over, but no. I guess they just decided we shouldn’t have to sit in such a position for the next hour, or however long this would take. I lean against a filing cabinet, with the curved handles poking into my back. I wonder if this is any more comfortable than the other position. I look around the room and scan the area. The second-graders are crying and clinging to their teachers and to each other. Some of the third-graders are also crying and clinging to Mrs. Foley. Suddenly, someone touches my hand. It’s my friend Alex. “Lily,” she whispers, “I’m scared.” I look at the dancing shutters. “Me too, Alex. Me too.” After about forty-five minutes, Mrs. Batangelo’s voice comes on the intercom again. “Alright, everyone. The warning is over. Back to your class.” Sighs of relief ripple across the common area. I stand up, Alex still clutching my hand. The wind has stopped toying with the shutters, at least for now. We all shuttle back into the classroom. I realize that we have missed a lot of class time—and possibly, hopefully—our phonics test. But would anyone remember this? Would it be a school legend? Or just a far-off memory? Those happy thoughts quickly fizzle. “Alright, class, remember: this is not an open book quiz. You have twenty minutes.” The rest of the day played out as normal. On the bus ride home, everyone acted like normal. Was no one else affected by this? I wonder. I knew at least Alex was, and Bailey too. They had both been crying afterward. The second-graders, of course, and those kids who huddled around Mrs. Foley, must have been afraid too. But would anyone remember this? Would it be a school legend? Or just a far-off memory? Now, as a fifth-grader, I realize that no one ever really forgot that event. During our personal narrative topic in fourth grade, almost everyone wrote about the experience. This wasn’t the only time there was a scary event at our school. One time, near the end of fourth grade, our speakers cut out before Mrs. Batangelo could say, “This is just a drill” during a routine lockdown drill. Now that was scary. That experience was short, though. The tornado wasn’t. It took up a big chunk of the day and left a lot of us scared for a long time. My memory of that day has become a bit foggy, but the most vivid piece was the shutters, the wind toying with them and blowing them hard against the school building, reminding us of the scary storm outside.
English Spin Wheel
Canon EOS Rebel T7
The Dancing Whale
Watercolor and pastel
Whale Eye
Watercolor and pastel in wood knot in rainfall in streetlight. Calmly, stoically, her ancient eye bores into mine. I dance upon what could be boards, what could be a plain, uninteresting dock. I dance upon what is an ancient being, a creature of deep wisdom. I dance upon her slick, rainwashed, grooved body. I dance upon the whale. She is far from human yet as complicated as the knotted seaweed of her kingdom. I danced on her yet she danced with me— the squelch squelch of my sneakers and the groans of her song, our music. She glittered in the streetlamp like gold, the curse of man. Whales don’t smile. She is not without emotion; her eye tells emotion in its own subtle ways. I felt the deep drum of her heart. The thud as I landed that reverberated through her rib cage and echoed in her body and the sea-sky beyond pumped blood through her vessels. A whale’s heart can beat twice every minute. Every second her blood was building, beating.
Autumn
As autumn brings a sense of spring, I sigh and eat another peach.
Fall Colors
Oil pastel and tempera
Bean
Bored during nap time, the narrator begins playing with a bean It was nap time, and the lights were out. I was four years old, and in preschool. As always, I couldn’t sleep. I thought to myself: Why can’t the people who can’t sleep go into a separate room and play? After a while I felt like I was in a box, and I had to move. As I slowly got up and turned around, I saw a box with beans. As I put my hand in the box, I thought of all the wonderful possibilities of things you could do with a bean. I was going to be the next queen, and I would tell my friends when nap time was over. When I grabbed one bean out of the box, the bean was as smooth as my mom’s purse. I kept touching the bean, and then I started poking the bean against my skin. The bean seemed even smoother like that. The bean touched my ear. I kept sliding the bean inside my ear. Then, by accident, I let go of the bean. The bean was inside my ear. I had a slight moment of panic, as if everything had depended on me but I had failed. Then I noticed I could probably take the bean out very easily. I had confidence now. I tried to get the bean out. But my fingers were too big to get it out. I kept on trying but the bean just went further in my ear until finally I gave up. I couldn’t get the bean out. For the rest of the day, I tried to forget that I had a bean in my ear. Occasionally my ear would hurt; I knew it was the bean, and that it was still in my ear, but I was hoping it would come out on its own. Whenever I lost something, and I couldn’t find it, my parents always said to wait and let it appear. I hoped waiting was good in this situation. I thought it would be cool when the bean just popped out of my ear. Once my dad came and picked me up, I was pretty sure he knew my ear hurt. My dad was trying to get me to say what was wrong. “Te duele algo?” Does anything hurt? His voice was a sweet voice, but I kept telling myself just to wait. The bean had to come out. Then I said, as if nothing was happening, “No.” The whole fifteen-minute car ride seemed like an hour. Then when we got home, I finally let go of the idea of waiting for the bean to fall out. It was like choosing a multiple-choice answer. I chose to tell my dad that my ear hurt, and only that my ear hurt. I didn’t tell him that I had put a bean in my ear at nap time. I was about to throw a fit when I remembered, It is my fault and no one else’s that I have a bean in my ear. That same day, we went to the doctor’s office to examine me. Finally, when it was my turn, the nurse checked my ear. She lifted her eyebrows as she said, “There is a bean in there.” She hesitated, concern in her face. “You have to go to the foreign object removal clinic.” What a long name, I thought. When we were done with the appointment, my dad got an appointment scheduled at the foreign object removal clinic. My ear was hurting, and more intensely. Soon they would get it out, I told myself. Then the lady scheduling the appointment said, “Sorry, we can only get an appointment for Thursday.” I thought to myself, But today’s Tuesday. “Is Thursday okay?” My dad said, “Yes.” My ear was hurting so bad. I needed the bean out of my ear, and soon. I didn’t want to imagine what would happen. I was about to throw a fit when I remembered, It is my fault and no one else’s that I have a bean in my ear. Two days had passed—well, not two whole days—but it was Thursday, and today I was going to get the bean out of my ear. My dad and I were waiting until we got called. I could feel the cool breeze of the air conditioning and the clean air that was filtering through. I started getting nervous. I was realizing the bean was deep and it might hurt a lot when they took the bean out, but hopefully it would be quick. I was lying down on the chair where they were going to get the bean out, and I really felt restless; I wanted to move, but there was something preventing me. I didn’t know what it was. I wasn’t very sure when they were going to take the bean out. It wasn’t very clear, but then I felt a second of so much pain, probably the worst pain I have ever experienced. When we got out of the room, we saw a girl: not any girl, but a girl with a plant growing in her ear. The surgeons couldn’t take it out, and so she had to go to real plastic surgery. Later my parents asked me how I’d gotten a bean in my ear. I said that my friends and I had been playing doctor and I was the patient. The bean was medicine they prescribed for my ear but then it got stuck. I told my parents the truth when I was older.
Toadstools
iPhone 7
A Day in the Life of a Witch
Toadstools My soft, black cat licks me awake. I eat my breakfast of cold, raw steak. I go out into the dark woods and hunt For ingredients for a potion to make my teeth blunt. And when it grows dark, I look for mushrooms, Soaring up high on my flying broom. These mushrooms will help me with many things— Growing long nails and leathery wings. To tell my future, I see the local seer Then I go back home to break a mirror. They say this brings you good luck, you see, Or perhaps that belief is unique to me. At last I curl up in my spiderweb cot And go on to sleep without a thought.
Pumpkin Girl
Plagued by constant teasing, Mari makes a plan Mari was sitting in her room when a brilliant idea hit her. She’d sell more pies, and with the money she’d buy a silk dress and then she could go to Lucy’s quinceañera. But, all the girls of Tulip Avenue laughed at her. And only because she lived in a pumpkin house! “Then I’ll make a plan,” she said to herself. The next day, she bought a wig and got her sunglasses. She sold all of her pies and bought a dress made out of silk. She went to the quinceañera, wig, sunglasses, and all. She came in and ate some cake. It was delicious! But when she was eating, her wig fell off, revealing her face. Everybody started to laugh. “Pumpkin girl! Pumpkin girl!” But then Lucy demanded, “Who is ‘pumpkin girl?’” Everybody pointed at Mari. “She’s my friend, not ‘pumpkin girl,’” Lucy declared. “Uhmmm. Hehe,” they said nervously. Now everything was fixed.
Sisters
One freezing winter day, Marie finds a sickly kitten on the street The wind stung Marie’s cheek. She shivered, despite her warm jacket and hat. “I knew I should have brought a scarf,” she said out loud, but there was no one but the wind and her dog, Kora, to answer. It was the time of winter where people stopped being happy at the cold and the snow and instead stayed inside. All except the people who had dogs. Marie—though she loved Kora—did not necessarily want to be outside. But Kora needed to be walked, and so here Marie was, outside in the freezing temperature. The relentless winter. Regina never walks Kora, Marie thought grumpily. It’s always me. Not that Marie minded when it was still warm out, but now it was all cold and unforgiving and Marie had no desire to be outside. I’m making Regina do it tomorrow, Marie thought with resoluteness. The weather reminded her of a poem she had read in English class just the day before, just before winter break started. The whipping wind, Red cheeks, Cracked lip— A winter cold and unforgiving Yep, Marie thought bitterly, that describes the weather right now. That was the only stanza Marie remembered. There were probably more, but Marie was not known for her memory. It also probably didn’t help that Marie spent much of her day daydreaming. She only remembered that stanza because she had liked the play on “cold” in the last line. The winter was literally cold, and it was also cold as if distant. Marie dug her face into her coat and kept walking at a brisk pace, dragging Kora behind a little. “Come on, Kora!” Marie said, exasperated. “Don’t you want to get out of the cold?” Kora, in response, sat down. Oh, the advantages of having a fur coat, Marie thought wistfully. Not that Marie would ever buy an actual fur coat. She was an animal lover and could never stand even the thought of that. Marie bent down to scoop Kora up, meaning to carry her the last block to her house, when she saw something: a shivering kitten hidden in a bush. Its fur was covered in dirt in some areas but so shiny in others that, for a second, Marie thought she was hallucinating. Can frostbite do that to a person? she wondered. Can hypothermia? Did I slip on the ice and hit my head? Marie closed her eyes, but when she opened them the kitten was still very much real, and very much in need of help. Marie dropped to the ground and then sucked in a breath as the cold snow reached an unbearable temperature. But Marie kept crawling toward the kitty, who was shivering under the bush. Marie gently pulled the kitten out of the bush and ran the rest of the way home. Kora, remarkably, didn’t put up much of a fight. Maybe she sensed that something was urgent, or maybe she just knew that Marie wouldn’t stop for her. “Regina!” Marie called, bursting through the door. “Look what I found.” “What?” Regina asked, gliding into the room and bending down to unbuckle Kora’s leash. “A kitten!” Marie explained, holding her out to Regina. Regina sucked in a breath. “Yikes.” Regina was a veterinarian major in college, home on winter break. “That cat’s on death’s door.” “Can you help it?” Marie asked, eagerly. “I don’t know,” Regina said doubtfully. “Oh, please, Regina. Please, please, please!” Marie begged. “Alright! Fine . . . Go give the kitten a bath while I go get my kit.” “Oh, thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” Marie exclaimed. She would have probably jumped up and down as well, if not for the frail kitten in her arms. “Bath,” Regina said sternly, but Marie could see that she was smiling. “Oh, right. I’ll do that right now!” Marie said, hurrying up the stairs. I have a pretty cool sister, Marie thought. Marie cradled the kitten and sang it a soft lullaby; it stirred a little but didn’t wake. In fact, it wasn’t until Marie started washing it that it fully opened its eyes. It took a while for Marie to clean the kitten, due to the fact that she was doing so slowly and carefully. She wasn’t sure if the kitten had any open injuries, and she wanted to make sure to be extremely careful and thorough. When she was finally done, you could see the kitten’s fur: it was beautiful, the color of an ocean pearl, with an adorable little black splotch on his left ear. Marie thought that he, for Regina had told her the gender, was the most beautiful kitten she had ever seen—not that she had seen many kittens—and nothing could sway her mind. Marie cradled the kitten and sang it a soft lullaby; it stirred a little but didn’t wake. Marie had never really considered herself a cat person. Her family had had three dogs during the span of her lifetime alone, and up until now, she had never even held a cat. Maybe I’m not a dog or a cat person. Maybe I’m both, Marie thought while gently drying him with a towel. She carried the kitten downstairs to Regina, who had set up a makeshift veterinarian’s office. Marie had wanted to stay while Regina did a checkup and diagnosis, but Regina insisted that she leave. “That’s not fair!” Marie protested. “I found him!” “And I’m fixing him,” Regina said calmly. “He doesn’t need fixing!” Mare shot back. “He does if he’s sick. Marie, I’m not a professional—not yet anyway. I know enough, but if I have to operate I can’t have you in the room. You’ll just make me more stressed out,” Regina said, in the same tone Marie found irritatingly calm. “But it’s just a simple diagnostic!” “Maybe yes and maybe no. But if it is more, and I’m not saying that it will be, then I can’t have you
