Vermont Writes Day2014

A Young Writers Project eBook

Vermont Writes Day 2014

Vermont Writes Day rocked the house Feb. 13!

About 1,500 people submitted their writing to youngwritersproject.org and vermontwritesday.org!

At least 97 schools participated – and we’re still counting. Wow! Entire schools stopped everything to write for seven minutes – students, teachers, principals, all writing furiously and sharing their work in class, on the walls and here at YWP!

We hope you enjoy this eBook, a compilation of some of the best writingof the day.

Thank you to everyone – especially our YWP Ambassadors – who made YWP’s fifth Vermont Writes Day such a success!

– From all of us at YWPGeoff Gevalt, Susan Reid, Doug DeMaio, Kate Stein & Sarah Gliech

Vermont Writes Day 2014 at Wallingford School

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Writers

Ammirato, Henry......................... 56Bahrenburg, JB ............................. 52Banach, Courtney ........................ 76Barbour, Jordan ............................ 80 Barlow, Maggie ............................. 28Bornstein, Quinn ......................... 30Bouchard, Haley........................... 27Bozeman, Yasmin ........................ 31Brookens, Eli ................................. 45Brooks, Zoie ................................... 16Bundock, Erin ............................... 39Burke, Patrick ............................... 69Caplinger, Cecilia K. .................... 27 Carlson, Misha .............................. 66Carnesale, Jared ........................... 67Cartwright, Leah .......................... 26Contreras-Montesano, Alexandra ....................................6Couch, Katie ................................... 63Crist, Melody ................................. 48Crossett, Jessie ............................. 16 Cullen, Phoebe .............................. 11Culver, Taylor ................................ 75Dawson, Audrey ........................... 13 Dhaliwal, Sabrina ........................ 21 Dimri, Aaditya ............................... 46

Drews-Sheldon, Stella ............... 14 Espenshade, Lily .......................... 54Fickes, Julia .................................... 24Freeman, Callahan ...................... 32 Frost, Cassidy ................................ 34 Frost, Margot ................................. 23 Galiga, Philip ................................. 78Gamache, Riley ............................. 43Gibbons, Liam J. ........................... 61Gilmartin, Peter ............................ 35 Glennon, Rhys ............................... 34 Hardy-Mittell, Greta ................... 38 Harper, Liam .................................. 47Hathaway, Kaylan ........................ 64Heath, Harley ................................ 50Hulber, Heather ............................ 30 Ilsley-Greene Lillian ................... 33 Keeton, William ............................ 68Kelm, Christopher ....................... 55Knight, Juli ...................................... 59Kuckovic, Hannah........................ 34 Lacky, Eric ...................................... 77Laware, Danielle .......................... 51Marcellino, Isaiah Timothy ..... 30 Mason, Amellia ............................. 62McArtor, Kayla .............................. 57

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McLean, Avery ............................. 15 McNeil, Carly Grace .......................8Meyer, Marielle ............................. 19 Mmunga, Deborah ...................... 26 Moody, Paige ................................. 17Muir, Alicia ..................................... 40Palmer, Olivia ................................ 41Peebles, Stephen .......................... 19 Pelsor, Craig ................................... 44Perry, Christine ............................ 36 Pintair, Olivia ....................................7Plummer-Krause, Thyme ......... 32 Ray, Emily ....................................... 71Reid, Kayleigh ............................... 31Reynolds, Jackson ....................... 10Richard, Francesca...................... 35 Schneider, Aliya ............................ 42Stark, Sophia ................................. 43

Stokes, Hailey ................................ 49 Sullivan, Casey .............................. 67Taylor, Tracie ................................. 20 Trimm, Kylie .................................. 12Toleno, Malcolm ........................... 24 Voyer, Nick ...................................... 18Wailonis, Hilary............................ 70Walter, Simon Casey ................... 25Winsten-Pinel, Asher ................. 68Zeichner, Oliver ............................ 72

Writers

General WritinG: Any genre, any topic

Vermont Writes Day at Rutland High School, left to right, Talla Caruso, Aliya Schneider, Tessie McDonnell. Photo credit: Hunter Berryhill, Rutland High School

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Remember the skyBy Alexandra Contreras-MontesanoGrade 7, Edmunds Middle School

“You remember the sky,”were my grandpa’s last words.“You remember the world,its twirls and its whirls.I am forever present,”he promised.“Just look to the sky.”And as the sky shone garnet, my grandpa died.When the moon rose high over our funeral night,the clouds wept with us,as black as his eyes.Our walk home was short,but the longest one, too.As we approached our house,the lawn wept with dew.I fell onto the grass,not caring that I was wet.Before I closed my eyes,I looked at the sky,and its colors were bright.Remember the sky,for that is the first light.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

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WinterfishBy Olivia PintairGrade 8, Lake Champlain Waldorf School

The slush on the street is where the winterfish breed.They swim through wet shoes like a ghost through the trees.When the dying birches fell to their white wooden kneesThe passersby sighed as the cold found their feet.

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Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

Kingdom of WhiteBy Carly Grace McNeil Grade 12, Milton High School

Beneath the Washington Monument, that is where I feel at home. Gazing up at its off-white glory and basking in its overwhelming magnitude with

an aura that symbolizes American liberty and the struggles the nation has under-gone to get to where it stands in this modern day society. Surrounding the monu-ment are American flags that represent our nation’s earliest beginnings.

Mingling in the foreground are countless numbers of people; the multiplicity of cultures is easily visible. I join the tangles of people nearby and observe the assimila-tion and interaction.

I realize that underneath the unclouded sky, enclosed by the Washington humid-ity that cloaks my tanned skin, and below the obelisk of limestone towering above, that I and the people around me are becoming color blind. This is where I feel at home.

Hailing from the small town of Milton, Vermont where one is easily able to count the number of non-white people residing there on one hand, I crave for exposure to what the world has to offer. In those regards, that means involving myself in world-wide politics and learning how people of various backgrounds communicate and perceive the world.

One may claim that my goals of becoming a politician as a young woman are nothing but an extravagant fantasy, but I beg to differ. Washington, D.C. is where opportunity drifts unrestricted, allowing anyone – with the sense to know where to look to find it – to also seize it.

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From within the Newseum, the history of our nation is archived in the forms of recordings, newspapers, and photos.

From one wing of the vast museum to the other, one walks through time: the days of our Framers and Founding Fathers, exhibited in enclosed books behind glass cases such as James Madison’s Federalist No. 10 of the Federalist Papers; the short film reenactment of Nellie Bly’s story as a woman reporter in 1887 that pretended she was mentally ill in order to be admitted into a New York insane asylum to bring attention to their poor conditions; and a moving visual collection of witness ac-counts and reporters on the scene of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks.

These raw and potent recollections of our past teach us what our nation has en-dured, how it has prospered, and where it has failed. Here, among the Pulitzer Prize winning pictures, a remnant of the Berlin Wall, and the story of the Kennedy family, is where I feel at home.

Washington is where I will make my home, amongst Muslims, Jews, and Catho-lics, blacks, whites, and Latinos, French, Spanish, and English speakers, Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike.

This is the place where the political battlefield is fiercest, and my desire to be in the center of it is certain.

Glancing up towards the Monument, glimpsing the Lincoln Memorial and Reflec-tion Pond, gazing over the World War II Memorial in front of the tower, and the castle of a Capitol building behind me, I know where I belong.

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SnowBy Jackson ReynoldsGrade 6, Williston Central School

Day 1: There is something very wrong! In the sky the snow is just falling and falling as if it were a time loop but the snow is piling up and it is really weird. I don't know what to do. The government says to stay in your homes because it is going to be a long winter but my calendar says it’s already summer. The other day I was play-ing outside in the summer, but today when I woke up snow was everywhere. The only thing I can do is sit in my basement with my blankets and my fire going, hoping that the snow is going to stop.

Day 2: I wake up this morning and try to turn on my water but it won’t turn on. "Strange," I say to myself. I look outside and all I see is smoke in the air. I try to turn on a light. Nothing. Nothing but snow ...

Susan Reid, YWP

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Near the mereBy Phoebe Cullen Grade 12, Hanover High School

The knight was called before his lord,swore to serve with fire and sword.“Burn the witch of the winding mere;she works blood and is known by fear.”He reached the stone house on the hillnear the mere and the misty rill.The house was white as bloodless bonein fire light a lady shone.The frost was heavy on the groundbut roses twined the house around.Their blooming faces sadly waved;it seemed a warning that they gave.Out she came like the Queen of Mayin her hair bells did chime and sway.Her dress was green, her feet were bare,her face was proud and hard and fair.“So you have reached my home at last.I see you’ve traveled far and fast,wherever it is you have been.Ah, sweet Sir Knight, won’t you come in?

The night is rough, the wind she cries,I see shadows beneath your eyes.Come and rest your sore, weary limbs.Ah, sweet Sir Knight, won’t you come in?”She took his shield of rowan wood,beside the door his broad sword stood.She sat him in a silver chairand sang to him some stirring ayre.For Knight Rowan she spread her board;he drank the heady wine she poured.The liquor was both spiced and sweet;he drank it all and fell asleep.He woke on the table of stone.Her house was gone; he was alone.His sword and shield lay him beside;the dew upon them not yet dried.The knight searched through the waxing day,at dusk the wind her ayre did play.As Rowan rode out of the fenhe prayed to find her once again.

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Carry our skyBy Kylie TrimmGrade 6, St. Albans Town Educational Center

Don’t give up, big brother.Mommy is calling for you.She moans and hisses,And grabs at her heart.She whispers, “Get your brother, sweetheart. Get your brother.”Don’t run.Don’t leave. Help her!Don’t ignore her screams at night!Don’t pretend nothing’s happening!Don’t leave us all behind!Daddy’s left.He left us here, with Mommy in pain.He left us with just you, brother.What did he whisper to you before he left?Did he tell you to take care of us?Did he tell you he’d be back?I don’t think he’ll be back.He couldn’t carry our sky,Couldn’t bear the weight on his shoulders,Couldn’t hold up our world.At night, Mommy calls his name.During the day, she calls yours.Don’t leave, brother. Mommy needs you.She needs you to carry our sky.

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The last leafBy Audrey DawsonGrade 9, Essex High School

Lately, I’ve noticed that the wind has been extremely persistent. It has been leaking through cracks in the walls and churning up trees so that every leaf spirals uncontrollably down.

There is a tree that I see every bleary-eyed morning, where the wind has pres-sured every leaf to let go except for one. This one is crisp and wrinkled like the weathered skin of the hard-working. This little leaf lost his green a long time ago, yet he maintains a grip on his temporary home and doesn’t lose faith that one day the wind will settle.

So the little leaf is pushed and twisted by the wind. The leaf is called by his friends who litter the base of the tree. But he doesn’t join those who abandoned him and the trees sigh.

As the days are blown away by the wind, the air gets colder and more irritable. White puffs make the ground an expressionless face of innocence. The world is clean and luminous instead of worn and scabbed.

The leaves at the foot of the tree are buried and decaying, disintegrating into the quick sand of earth, becoming worm food. The last leaf finally lets go the second the wind slows. The sun peeks through the bleak clouds and a crinkled smile lights the leaf’s face as he drifts down to where he is noticed by the teenaged girl trudging home from school and is noticed by the squirrel who pines for green in the world of white.

The brittle leaf is picked up by a rosy-cheeked child with silky wings and the last leaf is taken into the outlined clouds, free from the malevolence of the wind, the doubt of the trees, and the pressure of all those who fall, but don’t realize their doom.

In the end of everythingBy Stella Drews-Sheldon Grade 8, Stowe Middle School

In the end of everything,when the skies make peace with the sea,my mind will have left long ago,but my thoughts will not desert me.My head and heart have no connection;I will weigh my feeling and good judgment.And when the skies turn dark again,I will seek out some replacement.But even with broken bones,I will see a great light in the distance.My head and heart may be far apart,but I would have to be a fool to resist it.But the night recoilsand the day is fled.All should stay is lightand yet all I see is red.

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EssenceBy Avery McLeanGrade 8, Lake Champlain Waldorf School

Your mouth is stained orange with the fever of your lies.They drip down your chin like stardust.It's shady where I sit, behind the sun. Its color is dulled by the hue of your words.You've broken your way through so many people you can barely remember your own name. (It's scrawled on the walls of my childhood,worrying its way across in spidery, bruised writing.) You have firmly imprinted yourself onto my body. Your essence has made itself at home in my soul. I apologize if I remind you of heaven. My spirit has been well trained. Devica Davis-Kilpatrick, Essex High School

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ThoughtsBy Jessie Crossett Grade 9, Stowe High School

Thoughts crash through my brain,uncontrollably put there.They’re driving me insaneand doing so without a care.They started out as a drizzlesomething like the rain,but then started to fizzle,leaving as they came.Feelings like thesecome once in awhile.Almost like a cool summer breezethat causes me to smile.I miss you so much,I wish you could know.Thoughts as suchmake me want to let go.But I hold onfor just one more day,and until dawn,my sadness will stay.

My infernoBy Zoie BrooksGrade 7, Brattleboro Area Middle School

Bleeding lightcarving into the darkness,this infernoburns inside melike a fever.It’s untouchable.Nothing can break it.It’s unloved.Nothing can want it.Without this dear infernoI might be normal,but we don’t want that,now, do we?Everyone has that fire.Something of a wisp,floating, lost, violent, edgy.Perhaps not so wispy after all.Encompassing a being,fact, truth, untold truth, untold fact.This inferno, reined in by everyone.This inferno is a soul, strong or dull.Feed your inferno.It eats despair and procures defi-ance. My inferno.

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Forgotten dollBy Paige MoodyGrade 12, Bellows Falls Union High School

In a dirty little attic,out of everyone’s busy way.Locked up tight, out of sight,hidden in the grey.Here there are no silent, spindly legsor soft spoken, kindly eyes.Caged alone, in a place called “home,”outside the free bird flies.The stitching was all done poorlyby a crippled hand:a rusted needle, under a hand so feebleworking, strand by strand.Oh, perhaps it did something wrongto be left alone so long.The cloth has been unkept,stained from where it wept,stitches strained from how it cried,wishing to somehow die,holes torn in its simple rags — an empty, shaking bag.The sands have slipped away,even they would not stay.

Oh, the pain to be alone,to have love without a home.To what does it belong?What it had to love has all gone ...and perhaps it did something wrong,to be left alone so long.In a dirty little attic,out of everyone’s busy way.Locked up tight, out of sight,hidden in the grey.

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VermontBy Nick VoyerGrade 6, St. Albans Town Educational Center

Vermont is the most fun place to live. The reason I say this, is that nowhere else has the same qualities from the weather.

Sugaring in the late winters, paddling in Lake Champlain in the summer, watch-ing the leaves turn in the fall, and just meeting new people in what I think, is the most safe, great place to be year-round.

I have been living here for 12 years now and I'm still discovering new, fun things. Hiking new places each summer, helping neighbors with different things each week, fishing with friends, snowball fights and forts with family. There is no reason I’d want to live differently.

Bailey Kimball, Essex High School

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The band roomBy Marielle MeyerGrade 7, Brattleboro Area Middle School

Walking into the band room,instruments sounding,the blaring of a trumpet,the bang of a snare drum,the tweeting of a flute,smelling ofvalve oiland cork grease,feeling the pieces of an instrumentslide together,becoming one.We play inunison,or try to, at least.Then different sounds blend into perfect harmony,creating true music.The snapping of a casebrings me back to reality.

ToothBy Stephen PeeblesGrade 8, St. Albans Town Educational Center

It was when I was 6 that I lost my tooth. I thought it was not going to happen, but it did.

I was eating ice cream and then I saw that there was a bunch of blood on my ice cream. I was so happy, be-cause I was going to get some money if I put it under my bed.

That day I was walking home to tell my mom what happened, but that was when I fell. As I was falling I let go of the tooth and there it went, my tooth somewhere on the street.

After that I did not talk for the rest of the day. It felt like I was losing a big part of my heart.

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Magic boxBy Tracie TaylorGrade 12, Addison County Parent Child Center

I will put in my boxThe hat of a court jesterOn a brisk autumn eveThe last laugh of a dying manI will put into my boxThe tale of a once timid tigerThe taste of exotic dragon fruitAnd the purest of spring watersI will put in my boxThe failures of my sistersThe hopes and dreams of their childrenSaturn’s rings and everything happiness bringsI will put into my boxTwo beautiful emerald eyes with burning embers of orangeThe long lost sweet aroma of Amber RomanceAnd the lip stained cheek of a lover

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I hate school By Sabrina DhaliwalGrade 10, Milton High School

I hate school.It is where most of the English language was so “geniusly” created and where

inventions never even dreamt by man are on constant power. Yes, school is the place of no return.

Every patron becomes a victim to its terrifying caves and tunnels and some even claim to hear whispers from the souls of past victims in the corridors. Stripped of our very being, students are molded and brainwashed into inhuman versions of ourselves. However, some of us manage to escape and are able to tell the horrors of what school instills. We are the ones who become the most successful, and we are the ones who can see what really happens behind those concrete walls.

Those who do not manage to escape are poked, prodded and tested, then classi-fied by the characteristics that are out of their hands.

The treatment of public school molds and transforms kids, who were once all alike, into a life-sized version of their favorite childhood toy: robots of high intellect, Barbies of large ego and action figures of incredible ability. All those characters they once looked up to in a childhood so forgotten have suddenly reappeared, plastered upon them as a plastic shell they cannot rupture. We are then all placed into a caste system and every day, we are forced to walk tunnels under bright fluorescents that amplify the scrutiny each class in the system so requires.

Of course, students are granted “breaks” from the treatment of public school-ing, but they only last long enough for students to realize they’ve been stripped of themselves before they are thrust back behind those impenetrable walls. After just breaking free of the shell they lacquer upon you, they are pieced back together to

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keep you hidden. And the cycle renews itself year after year after year, as you move from hell to hell to hell, cell to cell to cell.

But some us know better. Some of us are strong. Those “some” would be the escapees. That few who somehow fled before they

could be turned into a toy. We are called the “outcasts” or the “outsiders.”We are the misfits. Helplessly, we walk through the tunnels, as brainwashed pa-

trons, huddled in their respective groups, assess our very being.Here come the Barbies talking with cute action figures or whispering with fellow

dolls. Here come the action figures running up and down the halls and somehow utiliz-

ing every one of their abilities at once. Here come the robots who never cease to talk about themselves and use every

opportunity to impress. And here we come — the outcasts, the misfits who “missed out” on the school

transformation — quiet and solemn, and strategizing ways to break free from these concrete walls.

It is the phenomenon none of us can crack. Somehow we become unfortunate in our good fortune. Will we be able to walk through the tunnels without being pushed into the metal siding by action figures in all their hateful fervor?

Will we be able to return to the haven that is home without being told we are worthless, fat, and bizarre by ignorant Barbies?

Will we be able to get through the day without hearing the robots tell us all would be better off without us? It is ironic that such a treatment should be upon us when, in reality, it is them we should be criticizing, for they will cause the most damage in the future.

I hate school.

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The Golden TruthBy Margot FrostGrade 4, Tunbridge Central School

There are hundreds of myths and legends that have been going around for thou-sands of years. The most famous and oldest (my favorite) is the Golden Truth.

The Golden Truth is in the very core of the Earth, and is the most powerful thing in the uni-verse. No one knows what it is. All who have set out to find it have never returned. One brave knight went out and died with the Golden Truth in his hands. The most important thing about it is that, in the wrong hands, the Golden Truth could be extremely dangerous.

There are many stories about the Golden Truth. Some say it's a ball of light or dark magic. I don't know what to believe, or if there even is a Golden Truth.

One day, I will go searching for the Golden Truth. I will find out if it exists and if it does, I will find it. I just know it.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

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SmogBy Malcolm TolenoGrade 7, Brattleboro Area Middle School

I wake up, looking around. Sud-denly, there is a noise 30 feet off or so. I run down an unnaturally straight path, as my pursuer tramps behind me. How? Who knows? Why? Who cares? There's no time for ask-ing myself questions.

Soon, I am trapped, as I reach the end of the path. The undergrowth is too thick for me to go anywhere. I turn, waiting, sensing death dashing through my brain, coursing through my veins, clawing at me. The path is wide enough for five people.

I'm surrounded by darkness, as it clambers through the undergrowth. It flows and eddies, filling the air, too. I'm done for. I dive, lunging through the one spot not yet devoured by the pitch-black vapor. I make it, and dart off. The world is inky, filled with evil. I look at the haze that's enveloping me. I sit down on the grass, living no longer. Giving up. I have breathed my final breath. I am no more.

DistanceBy Julia Fickes Grade 12, St. Johnsbury Academy

Waiting,curled up in a nestof pillows and blankets,for you to come aliveon the other side of the screen.Talking,until the sun setsuntil we part, exhausted.You breathe the airinto my lungs.Send the thoughtsinto my mind.Send the lifeinto my heart.Cramping legs,limp where they curlbeneath me.Calling you hereto me.But then againyou arethere, across the screen,waiting for me.

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Thoughts on peopleBy Simon Casey WalterGrade 10, South Burlington High School

I think that humans are beautiful things. I think that we have so much potential inside us to do so much good. I love just sitting down somewhere and watching other people do whatever it is they do, to have that glimpse inside the life of another person that I probably will never have again.

And I think that a lot of the reason that I want to do art is because I love people and I love looking at and drawing people. I only have one life at a time and it's helpful to look at other people's lives for a little while, to bring my consciousness somewhere outside my world that seems so small at times.

There is no one way to be beautiful and I find it interesting looking at the diver-sity of people and finding beauty in each one. My favorite types of people are ones with really expressive faces. I think it's cool to see the range of emotions that can come out on a single person's face. But I also like people without really expressive faces, ones who look pretty much the same all the time I'm talking to them, because then I remember their face better. I find mouths especially pretty and I usually watch people's mouths if I get uncomfortable maintaining eye contact.

I know a lot of artists who claim to hate people, hate talking to them, hate being around them, and I just find it confusing: first in how anyone could hate everyone, fail to see that beauty, fail to find some comfort in their fellow humans, and second in how they decided to be artists if they hate people. Art is a part of the world, it is an interpretation of the world through the artist's eyes; some part of all art is linked to some part of the world and if you can't stand to look at it, then how could you even start?

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Dream starsBy Leah CartwrightGrade 3, Malletts Bay School

In dreams you don't need to do what you’re told. In fact, you don't have to do anything!

When you’re in a dream you can buy everything you want and still have all the money in the world the next day!

When I have a dream it's normally about girly stuff but it doesn't need to be that way! In dreams anything can happen. You can ride a unicorn that's galloping down a rainbow or fight an army of evil peacocks with a giant corn dog. That's what dreams are for.

My familyBy Deborah MmungaGrade 6, Edmunds Middle School

My family is very important to me. They are the people in my life who want me in theirs, the ones who would accept me for who I am, and the ones who would do anything to see me smile and be happy, and who love me no matter what.

My mom is my everything... My mom is my air and I can’t live without her just like I can’t live without air. I would do anything to make my mom happy ...

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Sing or shrivelBy Cecilia K. CaplingerGrade 8, St. Albans Town Education Center

Distance can be measured by the pain within your heartYou can be thousands of miles apart and feel closer than everOr you can be right next to each other and feel so distantThe further you spread out, the worse it feelsAnd the closer you get, the more your heart jumps with joyIt’s not the physical distance that ever mattersIts the emotional distance that can make your heartSing or shrivel

WordsBy Haley BouchardGrade 10, South Burlington High School

Can I describe my feelings in words? Can I paint a picture in your mind with just a different combina-tion of 26 different characters?

Words. Words have the ability to change us, to move us, to develop our thoughts, and our actions.

Words for me are the gateway to the mind, the thing that separate us from the rest of the world.

So the question remains for us, for you, what are you going to do with your words? Are you going to waste them away with idle gossip? Or are you going to be mindful of how you speak, how you write, how you communicate?

Are you going to say something, write something that will change someone’s outlook? Change some-one’s life?

As humans, words are our trea-sure, only through communication is understanding truly achieved. So far this document has 148 words; what have they done for you?

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SnowstormBy Maggie BarlowGrade 6, Hunt Middle School

Winds howling in the night,sharp and stinging, frigid, frozen.A man all cloaked in crimson bright,wandering through the dark of night.The snow so white swirling, swirling,enough to block his lantern's light.The darkness presses down on himhe's enclosed in a casket of doom,Its cold, oh so cold, out there in the fieldwith nothing but snow and cruel wind.Despair and death capture his mind,he has only a few moments left.Through the longest dark and the deepest snow,a gleam that twinkles with glory and hope.A tiny being of fluttering wings,clothed in robes of white,guides him home through the darkest night,to a snug home and a fire bright.

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Six WordS: Tell a story in six words.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

By Quinn BornsteinGrade 12, St. Johnsbury Academy

Sparkling suspended crystal swings: impending hurricane.Old dog, grandfather snore by fireside.Winter fills veins with icy blood.Ashes streak faces of urban urchins.Hungry, hollow-faced eyes envy chocolate gluttons. Blooming vines kiss frosted conservatory glass.Chalk’s first stroke gashes ebony blackboard.

By Isaiah Timothy MarcellinoGrade 7, Crossett Brook Middle School

I walked into the pub today.Did you know sunflowers can speak?An octopus showed me the way.I am trying to write this.The flying monkeys scared the kids.The trees stare at me awkwardly!I am wrapping this prompt up.

By Heather HulberGrade 8, St. Albans Town Educational Center

Keep your head up, don’t worry.

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By Kayleigh ReidGrade 11, Milton High School

I do not like to write.Stories are always hard to write.Maybe this student should try harder.The monkey in my closet growls.The bug squishes the surprised person.How hard is writing this story?I guess I don’t lack creativity.Spiders are dancing at the bar.Lions roar in a space ship.Johnny likes eating butter coated waffles.Cars smash in a brilliant fury.The bat flies right side up.Writing six words isn’t that hard.

Vermont Writes Day, Rutland High School

By Yasmin BozemanGrade 11, St. Johnsbury Academy

Lift from the air like butterflies.I’m sorry I never said goodbye.The snow fell like my tears.Flowers open when the doors close.You wrap around me like vines.The crashing waves echo my heartbeat.I store my heart inside seashells.

Your fingers are fire to me.The wind screams like you did.Wipe your lips of blackberry stains.Blood on snow never melts away.Strangers on streets are walking statues.

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By Thyme Plummer-KrauseGrade 11, St. Johnsbury Academy

These days last long without sleep.Steaming hotdog buns under the sun.Where am I, am I home?Keep looking at the passing cars.It's not too early for coffee.There were rings under her eyes.You can almost smell the opportunity.There were days where none were.Are you waiting for the train?It's almost time for dinner, darling.

Xavier Wyche, Essex High School

By Callahan FreemanGrade 6, Williston Central School The stars can't get farther out.When you fall, get back up.Flowers can only bloom with happi-ness.Friends can come in many ways.People are people, deal with it.Only life can bring the lemons.Boy, it’s great when snow falls.

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By Lillian Ilsley-GreeneGrade 10, St. Johnsbury Academy

Empty hearts make poor Valentine’s gifts.Gray snow covers green spring grass.Scar tissue protects my soft skin.Oranges smell best on cold days.You always looked beautiful at sunrise.Devotion only sounds right in Latin.The headline was your face today.My favorite hands are your hands.Callouses, when lost, expose brittle skin.I feel like glass; don’t touch.He broke my sister’s heart today.Doctor prescribed distance, it didn’t take.Noise left when Silence got boring.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

By Hannah KuckovicGrade 6, Hunt Middle School

Love’s seven feet deep, seventy degrees.Breaking the good doing the badWords read the pain in eyes.She is stuck in her daydream.

By Rhys GlennonGrade 8, Brattleboro Area Middle School

Why can’t I find the answer?When you hear it, you know.Impossible? This is more than impossible.When? Today? The day freedom dies?Who crushed the dreams of man?There are more gods. Why not?Do I know you? I don’t.

By Cassidy FrostGrade 6, Williston Central School

Penguins are my favorite animal ever.Pink is the best color ever.I love skiing in the winter.Don't ever live in the past.True beauty lives on the inside.Someday kids will rule the world.

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By Francesca RichardGrade 8, St. Albans Town Educational Center

“Don’t kill that spider, it’s endangered!”“Why shouldn’t I? The spider’s creepy.”“I think it’s kind of cute.”“Really? What is wrong with you?”“The spider is a person too.”“Fine. I won’t kill the spider.”

By Peter GilmartinGrade 11, St. Johnsbury Academy

Up, a monster; down, a lover. Slip and slide, black ice, crack.He left the house. Last year.Six feet under, she will slumber.One might find many things there.If you go, you might stay.“Death”, he lamented, “Shall be interesting.”Six... Five... Four... Three... Two... NO!You have ten seconds to run.Change happened, but things weren’t different.

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By Christine PerryGrade 11, Milton High School

She went away, but he stayed.A mother holds an empty bottle.He hid scars on his forearms.The sunset sang of old memories.I wanted to never speak again.I should have said good bye.Her tragic flaw was excessive empathy.His real name had been Mohammad.Stitches now held her stomach closed.His identity would forever be unknown.Name, unknown. Seventeen - lost in combat.He was excited he was drafted.She wished she could knit love.The child would be sent away. But her blindness proved her strength.His fingers were young and calloused.She walked through her home’s ashes.She had never been loved before.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

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alive: Describe a place where you feel most alive.

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

StarsBy Greta Hardy-MittellGrade 8, Middlebury Union Middle School

It was one of those perfect winter nights: the air was crisp and clear, the cold tingled my face and hands, the snow blanketed the ground below. It was the night when I learned what it means to be alive.

We walked outside, whispering like the wind and laughing like the trees, two best friends, happy and free. Our footsteps trailed behind us, one after another. We lay down, the snow cushioning us, swallowing us.

And then we looked up. They were everywhere — millions of tiny pinpricks of light, dotting the sky. They were lifetimes away, I knew, but that night they felt so close I could grab them. They had enveloped me completely, sucked me into a trance, and I knew I was a part of that moment. I always would be, no matter what.

As we stared up, we smiled, talking of constellations and worlds far away. The night grew colder, and still we stayed, warmed by our friendship.

Since then, I often wander into my backyard in the evening to see the sky. It's always beautiful, but the most special are those perfect winter nights when the air is crisp and clear, the cold tingles my face and hands, and the snow blankets the ground below. On those nights, I am alive.

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ChampagneBy Erin BundockGrade 10, Champlain Valley Union High School

I find myself looking through therose filter from my Minolta film camera.He’s clutching a piece ofglass from a cracked champagne bottle.A fissure in its misted surfacemoors itself to his thumb,which is coarseand has blistered in thedays gone by.His hair catches fire in my lens,his eyes stark in contrast tothe new red hue I have placed here.He skims the glass ontothe crests of the white caps asthey roll and breakat his toes.A fissure runs in his thumbprint,and he tends to sink,just as I tend to staywith the sand below waves.But when we are bothabove the crests,with a rose-colored lens,I call those the alivesort of days.

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Where there is no endBy Alicia Muir Grade 11, Milton High School

The one thing we are all sure of is the end. There is an inevitable fate. Everything in life will come to a halting stop. Something new will begin minutes from now, end-ing the old. And at some point life will find its long awaited conclusion.

So why is it that the one place I feel most alive is when there is no end? There is something peculiarly special about that indescribable joy.

When I am in that certain place with those certain people, I want nothing more than for that moment to last forever. Freeze time. De-stroy the finish line. For I am alive. I am living for now.

The future does not exist and the past has no value. My heart is beating, and each sound wave is picking up the beat of those around me. Life is in that place where there is uncontainable laughter, a smile on every face, and a group of fearless passion-seekers, who are blind to the end.

There is no race, the mountain has no peek, and end is not a word. Now take my hand, grip tight, and join me, because that is living.

Julie Pearce, Essex High School

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In a treeBy Olivia PalmerGrade 6, Browns River Middle School

I feel alive in a tree. Like the wood speaks to me. In a tree I can be who I want to be, not get judged whether I am good at something or not.

I feel alive with the bees (as I do with the trees) as they work for some sweet reward.

I feel alive with the flowers as they open around me saying, “I am here. We are here. We are together.”

I feel alive with the garden where vegetables grow, where they all say, “Come join us, be calm and relax.”

I feel alive with the grass as I look at the clouds, as they say, “Look, there’s a flower.” And as I return, “I see a bird.”

I feel alive with the houses. As old as the dirt. They all have personality like noth-ing else in the world. I feel alive with nature!

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

PinkBy Aliya SchneiderGrade 10, Rutland High School

I feel alive in my pink cave of wonders. My wonders. Some say the warm colors of the wheel are too outgoing, the antagonists of relaxation. To me, they’re life. They’re alive.

I live on the left side of the wheel that doesn’t stop turning, hanging, spinning, churning – around the clock.

The grabbing shadows don’t distract, they create. My wonders. A gray cave may seize the day – may sizzle my sadness, evaporating from an old cup of ginger ale.

But in my pink cave resides my speeding carousel. 50 mph? 40 mph? 60 mph? 100! The sporadic boosts of energy come from the coffee-stained walls themselves, the self-rejection and projection, burned with the fire of my drive. My drive of my lime green SUV with the turned-out lights; it’s driven through the scene.

Sadness – screaming tears. Joy – unstoppable laughter. Sugar highs – madness. Stress – migrainous. Silence – like death. Peace – like quiet. Love – like Dove choco-late on Valentine’s Day. Comfort like tender steak broiled with garlic that doesn’t make your breath smell.

Pink like a strawberry munchkin rolling in raspberry stains, falling on its neon-splattered spine. Vibrance like wildness. Rain like floods and – well, the best things come in extremes.

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Pond skatingBy Riley GamacheGrade 6, St. Albans Town Educational Center

Alive. That is how I feel as I glide along the smooth ice of the pond. Alive. I hear the sounds of the wilderness around me and take them in. Breathe in,

breathe out. Alive. Pure energy pulses through my veins as I begin to skate faster, more swiftly. Alive.

Complete concentration. Nothing but that. I feel a wonderful sensation as I skate, as if I am flying. I can feel the adrenaline as I move.

MinecraftBy Sophia StarkGrade 5, Barnet Elementary School

This may sound ridiculous to you but, it’s not for me. The place where I can get away from everything and feel alive is Minecraft.

In Minecraft I can make my own world the way I want it to be. I can build my house into my dream house, and when I am walking around my city it feels like I’m there.

Strangely the same feeling comes when I’m reading a book. Once you find a good book it’s like you are the main character and that maybe they exist, they are here with us. But, once I close that book it’s back to reality.

Once I close my computer to go to bed I’m all alone again. Now they will only be in my dreams, until tomorrow when I will be wandering around Minecraft, building my dreams, reading my favorite book and being that character. I still am here and I am alive.

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Alone in the wilderness By Craig PelsorGrade 11, Milton High School

What is more alive than the woods? Every tree, every bush. The squirrels and the deer. Even the rocks to a certain degree. To leave the pavement and sheetrock walls for the endless roof of leaves.

Even during the brutal winter, when nature appears to be frozen in time, the stinging air brings up the life within us.

If I was without obligations and dead-lines, I think I would take on a life in the woods, like Henry David Thoreau or Richard Proenneke.

But alas, I have to get into college.I have to get a job and do well on my SATs.I have an obligation to my family that I will be here to support them later in life. I relish the idea of having a steady career and a big family, but the woods still call

to me, and I will go whenever I can.

Anna Mechler, Essex High School

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Because we make it soBy Eli Brookens Grade 8, Crossett Brook Middle School

Why is life worth living? Because we make it so.You, and only you, can dictate the path that you travel.There will be others, but none like you,none able to follow exactly in your footsteps. And the closer they get the further they becomeswept up in the whirlwind that is your success.There will come a point when you will question your path. Don’t. Nobody remembers the second.And there will be others; they will try to slow your advance,veer you off your path, untying the process of progression.You must never let them.What is living? you ask. The only person who can truly answer this is you.

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You’re aliveBy Aaditya DimriGrade 10, South Burlington High School

If you are movingwith an eagerness in your heart,then you are alive.If you’re movingwith the sparks of dreams in your eyes,then you’re alive.Learn to live freelylike the gusts of wind.Learn to flow like a river does.Meet every momentwith your arms open.Every moment these eyes shouldwatch for new weather.If you’re livingwith a flow of happiness,then you’re alive.

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The rushBy Liam HarperGrade 8, Crossett Brook Middle School

I race down the mountain on white fluffy snow that covers every inch of

land as far as the eye can see. It’s the most refreshing thing that could ever hap-pen to anyone on a brisk Sunday morning.

As I breathe in through my nose I get a rush of energy that delights me. Going down the mountain feels like I am going down a cloud that can hold the weight of the world.

I look behind me. There is no one there. Then I redirect my vision in front of me as I soar down the mountain.

I feel the most alive after I have just finished the first run of the day. Al-though it is only a warm-up, I feel like I am at the peak of my skill level.

As I race further and further down the mountain it becomes more popular with flatlanders, who have little experience on the mountains of Vermont. As I fly by, I shoot them a look that hopefully frightens them.

I get down the mountain in record time and beat my old lift chair that brought me up by at least 20 chairs, as I get ready for my journey back up to the mountain’s peak and the great snow white kingdom of Vermont.

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WritingBy Melody CristGrade 8, Brattleboro Area Middle School

I feel alive in my writing. When I write I can travel anywhere I want to, and be anyone I want to be.

Writing gives me complete power.

Writing is where I can live my life through a character.

Writing is a place I can live my life and speak my mind, without being afraid.

Writing is a whole universe, where words come alive and make me feel infinite.

Writing is a true form of magic. Writing is the one and only place I truly feel alive.

Vermont Writes Day, Rutland High School

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Tubing By Hailey StokesGrade 4, Willistion Central School

I feel most alive when I am tubing on the lake in the summer time. I love when you go speeding fast on the lake and feel the warm but windy breeze on your face.

I love when you feel the water shoot up from the rope on the tube when it touches the water.

I love how you can scream and there is no one to stop you from it!I love that you can just hold on, put your face on the tube, relax, feel the breeze

and have a good time around the lake. And then, you can have someone go with you, also. I go with my cousins and we

go super, super fast. You can barely see! You feel even more of a breeze; you scream so loud until

someone looks back at you and you can tell they think you are crazy! That is when I feel most alive!

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A step away from deathBy Harley HeathGrade 11, Milton High School

The wind whips through my hair. I can feel the power underneath me. I know that one wrong step and my life could end. This makes me feel the most alive.

The knowledge of the risk I am taking each day when I saddle up, pumps adrena-line through my veins. The power of the horse, the fact that they are instilled with the flight response, makes my heart pound and my mind churn.

I am an equestrian. I feel most alive on the back of a horse. I know that a single mistaken distance, or a single buck with too much energy could send me flying through the air. But that's why I do it, to feel that energy that drives my soul.

The energy transferred from horse to rider, the energy with each pounding stride. It makes my body whole. The soundless communication with a thousand-pound animal, an animal that makes its own decisions.

The ability to identify what a horse needs, one who cannot tell you with words, sends chills through my spine. I ride to feel this, this fear, this adrenaline and this happiness.

I have never sat on a horse and truly feared for my life, because a horse trusts you just as much as you trust them. They look to you for reassurance and for direc-tion. Knowing that this animal, who could take you out with a single mistaken move-ment, looks up to you and trusts your guidance makes one know that this bond is one worth risking a life for.

A horse, with whom you have a speechless bond, will soon become the one who makes you, a best friend, a perfect teammate.

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AutumnBy Danielle LawareGrade 11, Milton High School

I feel most alive when the leaves start to die. I feel most alive when the wind flows through my hair. I feel most alive when the colors of nature begin to multiply and blossom.

I cherish the season of autumn. When the weather starts to cool and those warm summer nights turn to breezing autumn evenings. When Halloween gets closer and closer and those chilly high school football games become a weekly event.

I feel most comfortable in the fall, when I can wear jeans and sweatshirts with-out feeling that pinch of constant cold, or without enduring hot flashes or getting sweat marks underneath the pit of your arms.

Fall is my element. It is the time when I shine and everything else dies away in nature. It is a time for fresh starts and new beginnings after a summer filled with misconceptions of reality. I feel most alive because this is my season.

This is the time when I push myself to succeed, when I strive to improve both my physical and emotional aspects, and when I feel like I have absolute freedom. The quiet, calm, and collective days when I can take walks in the afternoon and feel the soft wind blow through me. This is a time where I can free my mind of any uneasy thoughts and find confidence in my own independence.

I am most alive in autumn, when I feel like I can truly express myself.

On the lineBy JB BahrenburgGrade 6, Mater Christi School

I was at the line. The score was tied in the fourth quarter with 0.1 seconds left. Only a few seconds ago I had been charging down the court with the ball. Right as I took a shot, a kid screamed in my face. The ref had already given him a

warning, so he went to the bench with a technical foul. I made it, to tie the game, and still was going to the free throw line. As I stood

there waiting for the ball, I felt the weight of all those eyes staring at me. Even the eyes of the basketball coach at the high school I’m going to were on me. That made the pressure even worse!

I got the ball in my hands, bounced it off the ground a few times, and went into a crouch.

I shot the ball and it looked like it was going in, but it didn’t. I had one more chance. The ref tossed the ball at me one more time. I went through the same routine then took a deep breath. I came out of my crouch and shot the ball.

Everything seemed to slow down for second. My stomach felt like someone was squeezing it as hard as they could.

Then I heard the sound of a ball swishing through the net and the roar of the crowd. The other team was screaming to get each other in formation; they threw the ball deep, but there was no time.

The buzzer rang and my team piled on me. I could have never felt so alive.

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Spider: You are about to crush a spider when something stops you. Describe what happens.

Dominic Herrera, Essex High School

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Dragon-fly pieBy Lily EspenshadeGrade 8, Lake Champlain Waldorf School

You are about to crush a spider, but then you see its web. In its web is a tiny baby spider and the baby spider says, “If you crush my mummy, I will surely die.

“I will have no one to tuck me in bed at night or feed me dragon-fly pie!”And you say, “Yes, that is true. But if I let your mama live, you might die, too. “She might get so hungry one night and you look so plump and fat, that she will

eat you just like that.”Baby says, “Oh, my. We all must surely die. But her time is not today, so good-bye

friend. Be on your way.”You walk along and realize that you have saved not one but two lives.

Lillian Kolbenson, Essex High School

Existential crisis and bug-stompingBy Christopher KelmGrade 12, Homeschool, Milton

My Nike-clad foot hovers over the little arthropod, preparing to deliver swift judgement upon its form.

As my foot rises in preparation for the final descent, the tiny creature lifts itself onto its hind legs, forelimbs raised in an almost supplicate gesture. I freeze. Here I am, condemning this being for the crime of daring to exist. What does that make me?

I withdraw my foot, lower myself to my hands and knees, and regard the spider again. I find tears beginning to well in my eyes.

“Look at you,” I cry. “And look at me! I am the monster here!” I let loose a sob. “How can I even ask for your forgiveness?”The spider skitters forward and bites me on the hand. I pull my hand back and bring it down hard. “Stupid *#@$&%! spider!”

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Spider: PunishmentBy Henry AmmiratoGrade 6, Mater Christi School

You are about to crush a spider when something stops you. You fall endlessly in a deep void-like place. You then think that you never should have tried to kill that spider. It has a soul, too.

“Well, that’s karma for you,” you say to yourself. You then see the bottom ... when you land you see it’s like Earth, but it’s much

bigger than before. The trees look hundreds of feet tall. You run around until you see a piece of glass. You see your reflection and scream.

You are a spider now; you sit there and let it sink in. When you accept the fate you walk over to a familiar looking place. You see what

looks to be your former body. When it gets closer a look of disgust appears on its face. Its foot moves up and it squashes you.

You find yourself in the same void-like place again. This time you land on a cloud, you look into a droplet of water, and see you’re a butterfly. You fly over to the same place and see yourself, or your former body, rather. Its foot moves and another foot comes down. It is hundreds of feet tall.

“I’m tired of living in this nightmare,” you say to yourself. “I’m sorry I tried to step on that spider...”

“You know what you can do to fix this,” a heavenly voice says, and you fall back into the void.

This time you are a person again. You see the spider you were going to step on. You think, I can change fate, and stop yourself from stepping on it. That’s when you realize the meaning of life and death.

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Eight eyes on the ceilingBy Kayla McArtorGrade 8, Fairfield Center School

You ever get the feeling that something is watching you? Well, this time, when I got that feeling, I was being watched.

I was in the living room when I happened to glance up in my search for the location of the said watcher, and there it was. A black, grotesque creature with wiry appendages spread out like poisoned veins from a misshapen, bulbous ellipse of a body. Its multiple dead, glassy eyes were fixated on me.

Immediately, I froze. After all, how could I risk moving an inch and creating even the slightest shift in pressure that could loosen its gravity-defying grip? But the fear had my stomach clenched tight in an icy fist. I couldn’t stay seated where I was. I had to move. And soon.

Ever so slowly, not daring to take my eyes off the creature, I slid my feet off the couch. I did not sit up; the thing had a repulsive aura that wouldn’t allow my body to come any closer to it, now that I was fully aware of it. And I wanted nothing more than to be far away from its black, spindly horridness.

Suddenly, its spread-eagled position on the ceiling shifted. I squealed involun-tarily and, powered seemingly by reflex alone, darted straight across the room to the far wall.

“Honey, what are you doing?” My mom peered over the edge of the door close to my left, then walked in and closed it behind her when she saw me huddled on the floor.

But it wasn’t her that caught my eyes so much at what she was holding: a broom! Without thinking I jumped forward and snatched the broom from her. I would kill the terrible creature once and for all!

(continued next page)

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“Hey!” A hand gripped my shoulder just as I was about to jab the thing with my newly acquired weapon of extermination.

I squealed again, though this time in frustration and fear that the creature, an-gered, would take this opportunity and strike.

“What are you doing?” my mother asked, exasperated.“The thing on the ceiling!!! Look!” I shifted the broom so she could see, but the bristles would still be between its

eight staring eyes and my body.“What thing?”I frowned agitatedly. “The spider!”She inhaled slowly. “Oh! Hah, didn’t even see him at first; he’s puny. Can I have that back?” She took the broom from me and flipped it so its bristly head was on the floor

where it belonged, and went back into the kitchen. I glanced over my shoulder once at the centimeter-long arachnid, shivered a bit,

and walked grumbling into the kitchen where the smell of dinner quickly made me forget about the itsy-bitsy spider.

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Spider: little known factsBy Juli KnightGrade 12, Milton High School

There is a little known fact about spiders; most of them can actually talk. People don’t know this because of the propaganda spread by other insects about the atroc-ity that is spiders; the other insects fear the spiders.

If humans ever learned that spiders could talk, spiders would become a domi-nant species of insect.

However, this will never happen, because most people don’t give spiders the time of day, let alone listen to them talk, before simply squashing them under their shoes, or newspapers, or fly swatters.

Those that do hear the spiders talk simply write it off as an illusion, or hallucina-tion, with the belief that no other species can talk, and to hear one do so would be preposterous, because of course, humans are the dominant species, and any other talking species would be a threat to our dominance.

Every once in a while, somebody will give a spider a chance, and befriend him, not killing, or throwing him out of the house, and they will learn the next unknown fact about spiders; the spiders know everything.

There are spiders nearly everywhere in the world, and many of them are con-stantly around humans, so they know things, and when a spider befriends a human, they may be inclined to tell the human some of those things about other humans in order to endear themselves to said human.

This is how some of the rich and famous became rich and famous. Each and every one of them befriended a spider and that spider gave them the keys to success.

If the human proves that they are not a threat to any spiders anymore, then that human can be introduced to other spiders, some of whom are old and wise, and know much about life on Earth.

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If they are lucky, they will meet one of the ancient few, who know not only how to bring a person success, but hold the key to the meaning of life.

This is why nobody has ever found this key before, it is held by the spiders, and only the spiders can pass it on.

So, next time that you are about to crush a spider, stop and think about it, then slowly, so as not to startle the spider, put down whatever you were about to use to squish the spider, get down on its level, and say hello. The spider just may say hi back.

Elizabeth Powell, Essex High School

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Crushing spidersBy Liam J. GibbonsGrade 11, Milton High School

I’ve seen the thing before, and it’s creepy as hell. Brown, hairy, elusive, and, for lack of a better word, gross.

So, I put on my slipper so as to make as little contact with the spider as possible, and I walk over. I lift my foot up, and holy mother of Zeus, look at that big mother right next to it! That’s right, a second spider, maybe twice the size of the original, so I run to get a magazine, because I don’t even want to be close to that thing. And then, would you look at that, I’m going to need the Hammer of Thor if I’m going to crush this third spider. I think I’m going to need to call an extermina-... BY THE TENTACLES OF THE MIGHTY KRAKEN!! A fourth spider that’s the size of my head!

I run to grab my baseball bat, and then a football helmet, because I’m not taking any chances with this.... By the manger of Christ. This thing belongs in “The Lord of the Rings” it’s so damn big. Is my home located in the Valley of Spiders starring Wil-liam Shatner, because good Lord, this is ridiculous.

I run down to the basement to grab a gun, because this eight-legged Goliath is going to take a lot of fire-power to kill. I run upstairs, and then I take a good long look out my window. One single spider is covering my front lawn.

I think this has gotta be a dream. I can’t believe it, I can’t handle it, I mean where the hell are these things coming from? What have the gods wrought, why ar-...

And then, boom, a single hairy, brown, gross leg the size of a respectable office building comes down on my house and my head. Crunch.

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I understandBy Amelia MasonGrade 6, Edmunds Middle School

I see a tiny spider resting in the corner of my bedroom. I quickly grab a couple of tissues and rush over to the spider. I hate the way its little legs are twitching and I hate the brown color of its body.

I have always been afraid of spiders. I shudder as I look at it. I am about to crush it, but stop. It’s like something came over me, an apprecia-

tion for something. An appreciation to not have something so much bigger than me always trying to kill me, screaming: “Eeew, get it away, get it away!”

An appreciation that I’m not that little spider who just does its job — makes a web, minds its own business. That tiny little spider never did anything wrong. Trying to imagine being the spider and seeing a huge figure loom above me, holding a wad of paper towels, coming closer, closer, closer.

Before I change my mind, I grab a plastic container and slide the spider in, using newspaper. I step out the door, and gently place the spider in the garden outside. I run back in, glancing behind me once. It sits there, doing nothing.

I’m still afraid of spiders, and maybe I’m crazy, but I feel like I understand them better now.

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The dancing spiderBy Katie CouchGrade 8, Mater Christi School

My hand was tight around the bottom of the rolled-up newspaper. I was about to pull my arm back to slam the paper down on the little spider when

I saw something. I stopped and set the paper down to get a better look. The little black spider was

looking up at me with big eyes. He held his hand up and waved me to lean in closer. As I did, he began to move

around the floor. After a couple of seconds I realized the little spider was dancing! He moved with

such grace and ease and never tripped over his many legs. A couple of times his feet left the ground and he would do a split in the air. After a

minute or so he stopped and looked up at me again. I put my finger out next to him and he high-fived it. Then he crawled away under

the floor board.

Jenna Rice, Sharon Academy

Spider lessonBy Kaylan HathawayGrade 8, St. Albans Town Educational Center

As I raised my massive boot to crush that pesky spider, I froze. A sudden feeling of dread washed over me like the ocean. What if I was that spider, about to have the life squeezed out of me, left on the ground as nothing more than a worthless insect?

So when I never came home my family would grieve for me, not even knowing what happened.

Could I murder this innocent creature that happened to be in my way, extinguish-ing a flame that once walked the Earth? It’s a tragedy that anyone could do that, take someone’s life away, and not feel bad or have remorse.

Although this spider is not a human, it shouldn’t matter, it’s still a living being. It’s just trying to get through life to have kids and start a family.

It wasn’t its choice to come in front of my path. It was the luck of the draw, and it lost. It would lose everything it held dear, under my mighty, gigantic foot, cower-ing, praying that there would be some way out of this, hoping I would show mercy like no one else would, wishing to be able to say goodbye to its family, to say it loved them one last time.

What is even the difference between humans and animals? There is none; we are kin. But in this world we are regarded as the superior intellectuals over the dumb and slow animals.

That is what has happened to this world, we have segregated everyone into groups, when in the end we are all equals.

I lower my boot, and pick up the dumbfounded little spider and whisper, “You’re free. Go live your life.”

It gets caught in the breeze and I walk on, a better person. Thank you, little spider, thank you.

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valentine: I love you because ...

Kevin Huang, Burlington High School

My, my loveBy Misha CarlsonGrade 10, South Burlington High School

I love you because you are one of the few people I have ever met who is genu-inely good, down to your core. You have one of the last remaining hearts that is untouched by society’s temptations and scratchings, its hateful scorn and jealousy, one of the only honest minds that still exists.

I love you because you are so unbelievably different from me, my absolute mag-netic pole. You like rap music and big sandwiches and Breaking Bad. You love the winter while I hate the cold. And that’s because you are just like the world when it sparkles with snow and all is quiet and even and dependable as ice crystals, while I like the wild asymmetry and vitality of summer heat, alive and pulsing with blister-ing energy.

I love you because I see absolutely none of myself in you, because I am a constant disappointment while you glitter with new hope and beginnings in every new fold of your fabric I uncover. I love you because you have given me no choice but to do so, because my heart aches every time you leave.

I love you because you cried at that Folger’s commercial and your shave is never even and because the capacity of your heart is larger than the miles between us. I love you, my darling, because you are you, and you are wonderful.

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Best friendBy Casey SullivanGrade 3, Malletts Bay School

I love you because you are my best friend.You play with me at math centers. You read with me at Read to Buddy time. Most of all you play with me at recess. Finally, you sit next to me at lunch. That’s why I love you.

To MomBy Jared Carnesale Grade 3, Malletts Bay School

Mom, I love you because you don’t give a lot of chores.I love you because you take me to fun places.I love you because you do my laundry.I love you because you take care of me when I’m sick.I love you because you gave birth to me.I love you because you hug and kiss me a lot.I love you because you love me.

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You’re so smellyBy William KeetonGrade 8, Edmunds Middle School

I love you because you’re so smelly, you’re so ugly, and yet you don’t care.That’s what makes you so great.All the other girls are so pretty, but only because they really care.They are too afraid to be themselves, but you don’t care.You accept the fact that you’re not perfect.Your beauty comes from within. And that’s why I love you.

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Asher’s dogBy Asher Winsten-PinelGrade 2, Lake Champlain Waldorf School

I love to walk.I love to play.I love to chase a ball all day.I love to run circles, faster and faster...But most of all, I love my Asher.

Sally by Asher Winsten-Pinel

Big risk, bigger rewardBy Patrick BurkePrincipal, South Burlington High School

I love you because … I can be myself.I remember when I stopped trying to impress you; that was when I knew that

I loved you. It was also the time I took what was a very big risk.You see, I was afraid to make the commitment to just be myself with you …

because I wanted to be with you all of the time and I feared that if I was my true self (imperfections and all) you may not be interested, you would move on, you would decide that we were not the perfect match I hoped we were.

But when I started to say what I wanted to say (not what I thought you wanted to hear), and to ask for help when I needed it, and to not make excuses for my faults, we became closer than I imagined two people could become.

The risk was worth the reward … I love you because you let me be me.

Jamie Ferguson, Milton High School

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DadBy Hilary WailonisGrade 6, Peoples Academy

Dad. That word swirls around in my head and heart every day, and I just can't let go of it.

I love you more then anything in the world, Dad. Sometimes you have a different name, possibly like Papoo or Kooky face, but it

just means one thing to me: love. You are always there to bring in sunshine for me on my darkest days, always

there to tuck me in at night, or maybe play My Little Pony. When you get mad you always say, "Princess, if you're here, I'm the happiest

person on Earth." I always love you so much, and wish I could see you more. When we go out in

the woods together we always find the most awesomest things, and when we go to waterfalls it feels so magical, but only when I'm with you.

Thanks for always being there for me, Dad. I love you and I always will. One more thing, will you be my Valentine?

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Every single dayBy Emily RayGrade 10, Champlain Valley Union High

I love you because you come to my locker with meEvery single dayEven when I take too longTalk about my dream where you kissed that kidOr tell you about my vision of macaroniYou’re usually quite patientAnd then I push you away to look at myselfIn the reflection of the dark doorwayYou know I’m kiddingYou know I love youYou smile too bigYou spend endless hours writingYou hug me Even when you’re in more of a punching moodYou can see through meBeyond the pale skin and straight brown hair You know what’s rushing through my headwhen I make that embarrassed faceOr that “I failed my permit test” faceOr the face I make when I’m mad at him specificallyOr my “I know you’re lying” face Because I can read you too So watch out —I love you

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Valentine flurryBy Oliver ZeichnerGrade 12, Vermont Academy of Science and Technology

I love you when you wrap your arms around meand blow a flurry of snow in my face.I love the element of surprise, the novelty of being grounded;I can’t fight against your will, I’ll wait and enjoythe timelessness that you impart.Valentine snowstorm, you blow me kisses from outdoors and your Valentine’s cardto me is a warm fire inside and a cup of teawhile the elements howl at me from the sky.

Jessica Barnett, Essex High School

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Prize: What is the best prize you can imagine?

Aliya Schneider, Rutland High School

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Vermont Writes Day 2014, Lamoille Union High School

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Prize of loveBy Taylor Culver Grade 8, Crossett Brook Middle School

The greatest prize you could ever receive is love. Someone who cares for you in all ways, no matter what the circumstance is.

Someone who is always there for you in a time of need, someone you can talk to about anything and they don’t judge you, they accept you for who you are.

Someone close to you. Someone who stands by you no matter what the problem is. Someone you can care for and they let you care for them.

Someone who thinks of you first instead of themselves. Love isn’t bought; no, it has no price. Love is given.

You can’t make someone love you, it just happens. No matter what kind of love, like the love of a mother for her child, or the love between a husband and wife. Love is a prize.

Winning heiferBy Courtney BanachGrade 12, South Burlington High School

I am a 4-H kid with a focus in dairy. Each year I lease my heifers from Shelburne Farms. Last summer I took my heifer Shazam to some county fairs. I knew I had a special heifer, but I was just hoping to do OK and have fun.

My summer started off great with the first show. This was the multi-county show at Shelburne Farms... My heifer ended up winning her age class (fall yearling) and that was great, but then going on to be named Junior and Grand Champion Brown Swiss was even cooler. I then got to vie for Supreme Champion, which is the best overall animal present, and I got Reserve, which was amazing.

The rest of the summer went great and I continued to win my classes. Then came the last hometown show of the year, Champlain Valley... I placed and won the fall yearling class again and I guess that was just the start. The judge said without a doubt that fall yearling would be my Junior and Grand Champion Brown Swiss, but then it came time for Supreme and the cow that beat me earlier in the year was vy-ing for Supreme again.

My cow was starting to get fussy and I was starting to get nervous until the judge came over and slapped my heifer as hard as she could, saying she was undoubtedly her favorite and was going to be Supreme Champion. I was elated and speechless. I gave the judge a huge hug and was still in awe over what had just happened.

Shazam’s ribbons and awards are now proudly hanging on my wall to remind me of what a great summer it was!

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BaseballBy Eric LackyGrade 6, Williston Central School

The prize I would want to open would be a Jackie Robinson baseball card, signed by him.

The other thing would be to go to see him play baseball. I would want ‘meet-and-greet’ passes. I would also want to have a seat in the front row.

I would love for him to sign one of my bats that I play with. I would like him to come over and we could talk baseball.

I would ask him how he felt when people were shouting rude things about him. I would also ask him if he would sign my LA hat.

Then, I’d ask him to come in a time machine back to the present. I’d want to show him what he did for all of the kids who really wanted to play ball but could not because of their skin color.

I would have my friend over to see if he wanted to play a little ball. He would come over and we would play ball and Jackie would show us how he blocked out all the mean words, and how he felt when coaches would call him bad things, and how he would just nod if they were here now.

That would be the best surprise to me.

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Given at birthBy Philip GaligaTeacher, South Burlington High School

I was given this prize when I was born. It allowed me to do almost anything I want. It gave me opportunities that no oth-

ers have. It allowed me to make life mistakes without suffering the consequences. The prize gave me power, prestige, sex appeal. This prize paid me well, better

than any other person on this planet. My prize makes me embarrassed. My prize makes me foolish. Sometimes I want to give my prize back even though I cherish it. My prize makes me humble at times, proud at others. My prize is being born a white male.

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Gothic: Write a story based on American Gothic.

© Grant Wood (Feb. 13, 1891-Feb. 12, 1942)

Gothic taleBy Jordan BarbourGrade 6, Barnet Elementary School

I am old. These bones weren’t meant to stand and watch the solemnity sur-rounding me.

My eyesight has become poor and my hands are gnarled from years of holding a pitchfork, throwing hay to the cows.

The rough denim of work clothes, the white itchy cotton undershirt, and the thin black coat. All is solemn.

My wife’s hand on my back is soft; that hand is my only comfort. She knows how I feel; we will endure this together.

She is wearing the dress. The red dress with the tiny yellow flowers and dots, the one with the white collar and tiny lace.

She’s staring at me with her piercing eyes, asking me the question, “But why?” I won’t look at her for fear that my dark eyes will fill with tears.

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Alexandra Contreras-Montesano reads her work on Vermont Writes Day, YWP headquarters, Burlington, VT

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Vermont Writes Day, Lamoille Union High School

Thanks to everyone who participated in Vermont Writes Day 2014!

Let’s do it again next year!