Monday, December 21, 2020

The Closing of a Memorable Year

 As frustrating and painful as COVID-19 has been for everyone, it has forced us to slow down, think, and -- with a stroke of inspiration -- write about these wild days at the end of a mad, mad year.  

December reminds us that time moves forward, a new year awaits, and like all books, things come to an end.  The reflections we publish this month not only capture a moment in time, but a mood, an era.  We hope you enjoy reading this month's publication.  


“COVID-19”  

The bitter tasting word burnt my tongue   

As it rattled  

Out of my mouth.  

It set off ringing from eardrum to eardrum,  

Making me fume,  

But it was inescapable.  

I peered down to see the phrase  

inscribed across a firetruck red dot under my feet  

As I waited in line to buy a single roll of toilet paper at Target.  

I looked up to see blank masks  

Acting as a canvas for the unspoken word.  

Like the word was a baby goose  

And I was its mother,  

It followed me.  

“COVID-19” was everywhere.  


by Cassandra K., Grade 9


Artwork by Kate I., Grade 9


I stared outside the sad window of my apartment, looking out below at the empty streets. The once bright outside was now dark, reminiscent of all the cold dilapidated cities within apocalypse movies. Well, it was basically an apocalypse. A virus spreading and wiping out humanity is often the plot for many an apocalypse movie. And while it isn’t completely a mass extinction, like in movies, the amount of people outside would make one think it was. Only a few stragglers wandered the streets, avoiding each like the plague (literally). The occasional car passing by frightened those, showing the anxiety and fright hidden underneath the masks they wore, both physical and metaphorical.

            Turning from the window, I plopped down unto the small couch squeezed inside the apartment. I stared at the ceiling, remembering of the past bright lights. The first day of seeing center square, the bright advertisements and lamps lighting up the sky. The busy sound of traffic, people talking and walking, the city itself seemingly breathing and living. Compared to now, that was a distant memory, a light fading away, the once living city, the “city that never sleeps” now dead. In place of the shining city was simply a dead husk of what it once was.

I close my eyes, trying to remember the comfort of the complicated, diverse, bright city New York that was famous, not this one that is cold and leaves a chill down ones spine from the loneliness, the tension, and the pressure in the air. Sighing, I continue to do what I had been doing for a while now, what with the quarantine and the like. I turn on the tv and start looking for a movie. A movie to allow me to escape this reality. I select a movie and begin watching, trying to leave behind the cold, empty, city even if for just a small, brief period of time. The movie starts, and the memory of world outside fades, my mind now occupied with the flashing colors, blinding me from atrocities on the outside for a few moments.

by Nicholas B., Grade 9


Artwork by Olivia M., Grade 9



Stained Rugs


Like an exquisite, white rug,

stained by colorful juices,

everyone has their imperfections.

 

And the tragedy to discover,

our own role models have stains:

dark colors emerging from their walls

of flawless white.

 

But what if…

what if we appreciated these colors?

We all acquire stains:

blues, purples, and reds,

that paint our surface.

 

Let us embrace our stains

and wear them with pride.

Because after all,

what’s the fun

of a blank rug?


by Chantal V., Grade 9