seeing beauty in the ordinary

Poetry·Tatiana Rebecca Shrayer, age 13 — A prose poem imagines the inner life of a crab—its loneliness, fear, and anger—questioning whether people remember the being they've hurt after mounting it on a wall.

Poetry·Tatiana Rebecca Shrayer, age 13 — A nine-year-old city girl boards a fishing boat and watches Hyannis dissolve in the distance like a homeland she's never visited.

Poetry·Tatiana Rebecca Shrayer, age 13 — A young poet transforms a seashell into a golden rose, a spiral staircase, and a tower, finding ancient scrolls of saltwater within its chambers.

Poetry·Tatiana Rebecca Shrayer, age 13 — A bored car ride to Cape Cod transforms when the window frames a night sky full of stars, glowing trees, and the canal that signals almost home.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — A meditation on impossibility and perception, where belief and action create paradoxes, and inner vision doesn't match outer reality.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — Three parks compete to be the best, each amazing in its own way, fighting daily for supremacy while pleasing children who don't understand the rivalry.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — A playful meditation on hair elastics transforms a mundane object into something magical, capturing the physical sensation of summer heat and the relief of pulling hair back.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — A child's poem transforms an empty mansion into a haunted space through accumulating details of abandonment and decay.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — A portrait of a beloved teacher with hairy beard, runny nose, bitter jokes, and hard math who wins students over with cupcakes and stories.

Poetry·Analise Braddock, age 9 — A golden elephant comes alive when no one is watching, capable of human actions like tying shoes and diving in pools, existing between performance and secret life.