Fifty-seven hours with no contact

Eight parents

a pair of detectives

Cigar smoke

Traced

From homes to cabins to roadside attractions

A dead end and a bend in the case

At the entrance of a cranberry farm

Seas of red bulbs

Green trees like curtains

Hiding a stolen car

Pops and gurgles

Cadaver dogs yowl

Yanking on the leash 

Circling the cranberry-crowded pools.

Detectives detailed the procedure

The pond draining by mid-morning

A crew finding cadavers

Followed by a confession,

Conviction, 

Incarceration. 

 The art of being artistic 

 Whether it be 

 Singing your emotions away

 Drawing your sorrows 

 Writing down your life 

 Or speaking poetic justice 

 Using your art to express yourself

 To show you can feel much more

 To show you can be as creative as anyone else 

 To show others your point of view 

 To have them relate to you

 Relate to your life 

 You can write a story

 Write what you’ve seen with your eyes

 Sing and dance like there’s no tomorrow 

 Express yourself with your movements

 Draw what you see and feel

 The world how you see it

 From what you understood

 For what you want others to see

 And understand

Waking to a world of grey

The blaring alarm rings for the 3rd time today

HFDWBV! JFEWBF! NBFDBNF!

Sauntering from room to room

With one job to do

Same day to day

Never serving a different purpose 

A full day ahead of nothing you planned

Set from the moment you walked in 

Time dictated by alarms and bells

The monotony of life drags on

One choice made

Dictating future for years to come

Stuck in everlasting time loops

Spent doing arbitrary tasks demanded from others

Working till the day we retire

Day by day following the same routine 

Unable to differentiate between the days

Never escaping to a truly free and meaningful life

By Tonio Pellegrino

Jelly jar jiggles

Once filled with sweet juicy jam

Bugs now rule the land

Slugs chug and chug up the side.

What the bugs doing:

The humble bumble buzzes

Too fat to fly

But he doesn’t mind

Defy the lie, man

Stick bug creaks and squeaks

His joints ain’t like they used to be

The wisdom of the trees lives in his knees

But them’s the bees knees, man

He’ll bust ya caps

AHHH!!

WHAT THE BUG DOING!!!

I don’t think the bees should live with the stick bugs, man

Ugh

The horrendous sound

Both bitter and sweet

This morning, not so sweet.

*alarm*

6:00 am on a FRIDAY!

That orange snooze button

Standing out like a sore thumb

Just nine more minutes

*alarm*

Okay, time to get up

No more snoozing 

No more losing 

Time to get up

*alarm*

Cripes alfrighty it’s 7:00 am

I hit the hay 

But it will be okay

It’s just one class

*alarm*

That one class

Became three

Mom is going to kill me

But not before 

I get nine more minutes

*alarm*

I didn’t know when it had happen

When I stopped waiting for my dad to come home from work

When my mother’s words didn’t bother me anymore

When my siblings and I stopped fighting.

I used to cry for attention

Now I don’t want to cry in front of anyone.

I used to say my friends are the best

Now I know that not everyone stays.

I didn’t know when it had happen

When I realized that I was insecure

When every part of my body didn’t feel right

When I tried to change my facial features to fit in

I used to fight with my sister

Now all I want is for her to listen.

I used to scold my brothers

Now I only want the best for them,

I don’t know when it happened,

When I realized that everything wasn’t as I imagined.

When everything was slowly changing

When I realized I was growing up.

By: Kevin Najera 

*click*

It lives amongst everything 

Everyone

It feeds off of the fear in others

Fear it or not it's there

The shadow that follows every step of your very own 

You see darkness is a nuisance 

A burden

It's what gives you the nerve to watch your back at night 

*click*

The silence of darkness

The feeling of it 

Overcoming 

Its makes it if 

The sun was extinguished 

Silky blue sky into nothing

*click*

As the shade blocks the heat of the sun 

Relieved of the burning feeling

An odd feeling 

Your sitting in the mild darkness 

Sitting with your own demise 

*click*

When you sleep your eyes close as darkness

Takes over your sight 

 when you die the darkness is there 

When your walking it follows you can't escape 

Like a cemetery the loneliest of places

Darkness reminds

It's lonely but below is 

Caskets full of bones walking over people

Making the place feel crowded 

As they also 

Are sitting 

In darkness

Don't feel lonely because your own 

Depression and sorrow are there to 

Keep you company 

Darkness really always gets its ways to you ……..

*Click*