ACARA Years 7-10

Story·Eleazar Reiner — A girl watches a mysterious violin player who controls the seasons, inherits her legacy when she dies, and years later discovers her own way to keep the music alive through...

Story·Nate Varga — A lost British soldier stumbles upon a Bedouin camp in the Arabian desert and is led to witness the rare blooming of the Queen of the Night flower, triggering memories...

Story·Deeksha Rajesh — A soldier on a battlefield, carrying photos from fallen comrades, hesitates to shoot an enemy and is killed, choosing to let another's future persist over his own.

Story·Emily Chang — A year after accidentally injuring her best friend on a snow day, Anna struggles with loneliness until a wounded bird helps her find a path toward healing and reconnection.

Poetry·Shivanshi Dutt — A speaker describes dropping their cheerful public persona when alone, as sunset colors paint the sky and their 'armor' melts away.

Personal Narrative·Georgia Marshall — A granddaughter interviews her grandfather about his 44-year career at a college, discovering how he embodied the parable of the third stonemason who built cathedrals.

Poetry·Daniel Shorten — A clock contemplates its endless mechanical existence, questioning why humans created it to mark time in perpetual, lonely repetition.

Poetry·Steven Cavros — An abstract meditation on the invisible and forgotten, those who lived and died without being seen or remembered by the living.

Personal Narrative·Marti Wong — A girl navigates language barriers with grandparents on two continents, discovering how gifts, food, and gestures become their shared vocabulary of love.

Poetry·Svitra Rajkumar — A poem observes how a duck's serenity triggers envy, then flips perspective to reveal the observer as the ugly duckling and the duck as the swan.