By: Cristina Kiefaber
ghosts.
the only reason we fear the dead is because we cannot bear their revenge.
By: Kennedy Holtermann
By: Addison Mata and Emilia Haynes
By: Finley Ralston
A Tiger is kinder than you.
They retract their claws from your skin;
Your claws stay firmly in my neck.
A Tiger devours, leaves almost nothing,
But you ate every part.
A Tiger leaves their marks, visible and ragged,
While your own are not to be seen.
A Tiger hunts and waits for its prey;
You created us.
A Tiger shows love for their own;
You showed anger.
A Tiger shows itself;
You smile and laugh,
All plastic and shiny.
A Tiger is a predator,
And so are you.
A Tiger is kinder than you,
At least it ends their prey.
A Tiger is kinder than you,
At least there is something to envy.
By: Lindsey Haase
By: Jai Nolen
You find yourself at the loneliest times of your life,
Young men pleading and wishing they had a wife,
For someone to understand and hold you on cold nights.
Oh, I wish I found that in myself without the help of another body.
Those love yourself mantras don't help everybody.
Apply makeup, haircuts, slimmer waist all you want
But you want something that can't be taught, oh just to love yourself.
Just get what you want, it took me years to find that light.
Where boys and failures aren't willing to put up a fight.
Loving me was the greatest accomplishment, for I didn't get a reward
But somehow my heart was restored.
By: Paloma Lopez
By: Analise Guerrero
By: Natalie Libby
By: Angelica Vasquez
Feeling so strong it's incomprehensible
Truly sets my heart from my mind
Times can be tough and even dark.
But there's only one light that I find
I search deep within to the feelings I possess
And realize it's you as my guide
Leading me to the happy place
Where I know you're always on my side.
By: Ireland Denning
Have you ever been in Love?
Like truly in Love.
To the point where it physically hurts your heart when you leave?
People always tell me you’re in high school, you don’t know what love is.
You can’t understand that emotion yet.
You’re too confused.
I’m tired of it. I hate it when people tell me what to do,
not to mention how I’m supposed to feel.
Yes, we are young, but why does it matter!
Love is willingly giving your heart to someone and hoping that they won’t break it.
Love is jumping in front of a bullet for your person and not caring, because they’re safe.
Love is being in physical pain when that person leaves you.
Love isn’t a word that should just be thrown around.
Love is so special.
So, I don’t care what age you are, if you are in love,
Don’t let that go.
By: Gia Garcia
By: Isabella Brown
By: Lilo Herr
The legend of the Naupaka flower begins with a princess and a commoner. Princess Naupaka fell in love with a commoner. This love went against Hawaiian tradition. As the young couple, Naupaka and Kaui, traveled together to seek answers for their dilemma, they met a kahuna (wise man). He told them they could do nothing but pray. As they were praying, the gods rained on them showing they didn’t approve this relationship. At that time Naupaka took the flower from the right side of her ear and tore it in half. She gave one side to Kaui and told him to live by the ocean while she lived in the mountains. The commoner went down to the ocean as the Naupaka Kahakai, as she stayed in the mountains as the Naupaka Kauihiwa. When put together, these flowers create one allowing them to be together again.
By: Ansalma Rodriguez
By: Marlyn Gonzales
By: Olivia Rodriguez
Green Gatherings are spring flowers blooming as a bunch,
Early in the year, we see the start.
Green Gatherings can last a while,
They slowly fade away.
Green Gatherings are not just nature,
But a community together as one.
Green Gatherings are the Incarnate Word,
We are bonded through the faith.
By: Lauren Engates
By: Elva Rubio
It’s been four hours. This is the eighth store you’ve been to. The 200th article of clothing you’ve tried on. And still… nothing. Everything is too big, too small, or just totally and completely not your style. Nothing in any of the stores has made you feel good or cute or confident in yourself or your body. You blame it on the dressing room - the florescent lighting and cold environment. The fact that you’re uncomfortable trying on clothing outside of your bedroom or because your bloated since you just ate. You blame it on everything except the real reason; the reason you are too prideful too admit to yourself, and to your mom outside the dressing room door asking if you are ready to show her yet. The reason is you. You are the reason nothing is fitting. You are too tall or too short, too thin or too fat, too dark or too light. You are simply too ugly for anything to feel or look good on you. You are the reason; the only thing you can change is you.
From a very young age, I thought I had to look a certain way; from the covers of magazines my mom was buying to the TV shows I was watching. I never saw anyone that truly looked like me - no model, no actress, no Disney princess. I never even felt I looked like the traditional Mexican women around me, the ones with a small waist and a tiny chest. I felt like an outsider in my own world. Society had molded this image of beauty in my head, and it looked nothing like me. I felt I had to look a certain way to be considered beautiful, and I would never be able to attain that kind of beauty. My body and looks were simply not good enough and I just had to live with it.
Growing up, shopping really meant crying in the dressing room, and a night out really meant comparing myself to the other girls: what they were wearing, how they looked, how their makeup was done, and how I could never compare. I wanted to be like them so badly! I wanted the same clothing, to follow the same trends, and to have the same hairstyles; but I knew I never could. The perspectives and opinions I listened to for so long completely effected the way I saw myself and my self-worth. In my head, appearance was everything, and I had none of it. I lived with the burden of never feeling confident in my skin, and always in need of reassurance from other people. It wasn’t until I hit high school that all of this changed. The fashion industry had started promoting body positivity and self-acceptance. I would watch the commercials of the models with no photoshop, with bodies like mine. It was empowering and different. I knew I had to become comfortable in my own skin because this “image” that the world created about beauty was only one. Beauty is universal and everyone has their own depiction, so who can say that mine doesn’t fit the description? I worked on viewing and treating myself with love and care, embracing the young woman I am, and respecting the body that was given to me. I want to own my identity and use the clothes I wear to express the way I now see myself.
Fashion played a big part in this realization. Without it, I probably wouldn’t have hated myself the way I did – but with it, I am able to be my true self; dressing comfortably and confidently. This is why I want to pursue a career in fashion, because I believe that making a little girl or little boy feel bad for looking like themselves is wrong. I want to be able to help promote a healthy self-esteem and freedom in personal expression: for individuals to be themselves, without trying to meet outside expectations. I want everyone to radiate their own kind of beauty, not only in their appearance, but also in their soul. No one can take my beauty away… and the dressing room isn’t so scary anymore.
By: Alexandra Camarena
People see what they want.
They say the grass is always greener on the other side.
this is believed until they are there.
Envy and greed,
cast a shadow on the reality of life.
We should focus on loving ourselves.
When we compare ourselves to all we see is what we don’t have,
rather than everything we do have.
This shadow blinds us of our beauty,
and permits us to love ourselves.
God created everyone perfect,
therefore, we should view ourselves as perfect.
We should direct our attention loving and appreciating our life,
and not let the shadow cloud over our love for ourselves and others.
By: Sophia Scott
By: Karen Palacios
By: Gabriela Martinez
So much has changed
in the short, but long past few months.
Lost a lot of friends,
found something, amazing people.
Thought I found him,
turns out it wasn’t.
I used to rarely cry,
now sometimes it’s too much to handle.
Tried to find my self-worth,
still looking for that.
I have changed in many ways
in such a short amount of time.
Learned so many things,
maybe it was a blessing in disguise.
By: Anonymous
It’s rather interesting, what instances become the memories that get replayed and re-watched in your mind. If someone were to pop open my skull, dissect my brain, and look into my hippocampus they’d find a girl in the very back, a miniature of me you could say, staring intently at an old TV and flipping through channels. Her eyes are glued to the screen, snuggled in a warm fuzzy blanket, the kind with a big picture on it that only your Abuela ever had. All the lights are turned off so that bright technicolor blasts on her face, imprinting unto her. She knows her duties are best served in the frontal lobe, being productive, moving around, acting in the moment, yet she still finds herself drawn to watch, and watch, and watch.
I think she likes to watch old reruns of fuzzy memories from when I was five, conveniently forwarding past the scenes where the adults were crying in lieu of the ones where I chased cats around the house for so long I could only remember their tails. Sometimes she’ll snuggle up for the night and put on ‘My Most Embarrassing Memories’ making her laugh until she’s crying while I blush with shame.
Then sometimes she decides to be mean, and put on the worst kind of scary movie, that is more sad than horrific, turn up the volume, and perch herself in the far regions of my occipital lobe leaving me alone to watch. I cover my eyes, so I don’t have to see the gruesome details of family fights with angry words lit up in loud voices, crying friends who push and pull at my limbs, tearing me apart like vultures.
That’s usually when I have to get involved and argue with her about changing the channel, which after much contention I usually win. By the end of her binging, she decides to finally bring herself away from the tv, leaving me in reminiscence instead, because it’s my turn with the remote.
By: Van Nguyen
By: Sarah Doski
Christmas is watching Hallmark movies with my dad while my mom and sister protest and fight for the TV remote.
Christmas is driving through neighborhoods with elaborate light displays in a van packed with family spilling hot chocolate all over each other.
Christmas is leading the children's choir at church while the little angels and shepherds in the Christmas pageant wander through the pews and forget where to go.
Christmas is receiving already constructed gingerbread houses in the mail from my grandfather that need total reconstruction after the trip.
Christmas is going to the Christmas tree lot and playing hide and seek between the pine trees with my sister.
Christmas is baking and ultimately burning Christmas cookies with my grandma while she complains about her cats and her oven.
Christmas is joy, Christmas is togetherness, Christmas is love, Christmas is family.