Category: Junior Literary

Mirage.

I’ve always had an odd relationship with my father.  He was in my life at the start of my  childhood, yet never truly there.  Whenever I would visit him in Chicago, he would leave me with drunkard Uncle Ben.  I guess this wasn’t all that bad.  It’s just that Uncle Ben always carried a terrible smell with him.  It didn’t matter how many showers he took.  As soon as he came out, he was already smelly.

Besides his constant stink, he passed gas in his sleep.  Whenever I heard him go off, I had to run hide in my father’s room.  Believe me, if we would have had gas heating, he would’ve kept the place fueled to the max.

Besides my uncle’s repelling habits,  he let me play with knives.  No, I never hurt myself, but I don’t think I would’ve allowed that if I had been in his position.  Then again I don’t think I would ever get drunk on the weekday I’m babysitting.

My dad was also pretty careless.  I remember there was an ice-cream truck that would come around the block each week.  I would run out the door and butt not-yet-calloused feet against spiky, brown, gumballs.  He wouldn’t even watch out the window to make sure I would come back alright.

When it was time to go back home, the exchange went like this:

We would load up into his shiny black Lexus, and I would sometimes burn my knee on the muffler while I was loading my stuff.  We occasionally brought my brother or picked up my dad’s friend.  I usually sat in the back because of this.  He wouldn’t usually strike a conversation with me.  Except once, he told me he didn’t like country.  So, decided to make gold my favorite color and Rihanna my favorite singer.

Instead he would talk to someone else, or he would talk on the phone.  If all else failed, he turned up the old-school rap already playing from his radio.

Somehow, we would either run late or he forgot to feed me before we left.  I threw up in his car.  He was so mad at me.  His car was his baby, and I had just violated her.  Whoops, guess he should’ve fed me.

We made it to the airport eventually.  I always struggled with getting my suitcase out.  So, he would jerk it out, slamming it on to the ground before me.   There would be a “Common,” and I would obey.

Imagine it.  A small girl tugging her luggage a few feet behind her oblivious father.  He never really did look back.  He did manage to ask to lead me to the gate.  That was only because I wasn’t old enough to find my way.

Then we would reach the gate, he would say goodbye, and I would board.  Mid-flight the air-flight attendant would always notice my young age.  She would ask me where my parent(s) was.  I would say that I’m flying by myself.  She would say that he’s not supposed to do that.   I would shrug.  She would respond with, “he must not have wanted to pay the fee.”  Then for a moment I sat and thought about how much I wish he would have just payed the extra money so I wouldn’t have to go through this exact conversation every time.

Then there was the four years that he disappeared.  I found out he had a girlfriend named Yolanda that he had replaced me with.   My first thought was, “So, this is what being left for another woman is like.”  I hate the name Yolanda now.

He was even colder than I remembered for a couple years after that.  I was growing up.  I began dreaming, planning my future.  He shot that down.

Then I got accepted into an art school.  He hurled insults at me until his birthday came, and I refused to talk to him.  Three days later, my mom forced me to call him.

Now he tries more, but the relationship is still odd.  He seems to try.  Although, it’s the little things that I catch onto.

He’s still so distant.  I’m still a few steps behind.  I’m still tugging my luggage.  This time though, I’m the one telling myself that he shouldn’t do that.

wasted hours // arcade fire

maybe part of my hang-ups with the suburbs come from all the time i wasted doing nothing. maybe i never felt suburbia because i never tried to. i never knew what there was to do, never knew enough people to get me out of the house, never had enough motivation to actually try to do things.

all i ever did was stare. i stared out the bus window on the way home from school and watched kids in their cars with their after-school plans. i stared from my bedroom window at the dirty asphalt as new houses were being built across the street. i started at my phone as i scrolled through instagram, seeing everyone i know with their friends having fun and wondering why i couldn’t have that.

i wasted more time than i can count looking at people i know and wondering why they got to be happy and i didn’t.

all i wanted was to be somewhere that could let me feel like they did, to be someone who was actually capable of feeling like they did.

i say the suburbs isolated me, but maybe i isolated myself. maybe the nights i spent sitting on my bed staring at popcorn ceilings instead of chasing sunsets with giggly friends are why suburbia never seeped into my bones. i never allowed myself to actually live in the suburbs.

i always blame myself for these kinds of things. the isolation is my fault, the lack of friends is my fault, the desire to be anywhere but where i am is my fault. i could have at least tried to go out. i could have at least tried to feel suburbia.

but i didn’t. and now it’s too late to go try to chase sunsets with friends after school. if i’d known that the absence of suburbia was my fault, maybe i would’ve done something about it. maybe i’d be a different person than i am now. maybe i wouldn’t even be sitting here writing this. maybe i’d be sitting in a hernando high school classroom, laughing with friends behind the teacher’s back as she spoke. maybe i’d actually be participating in homecoming this week; i think today was disney day.

i’d love to be someone who actually fit in, someone who could actually grow in the soil she was planted in.

maybe i just wasn’t made to grow.

1. I suppose this is an update on my mental state as of now. Well, i’m sane as far as anyone knows. I have ten fingers ten toes. My hair is still unimaginably curly, my eyes are still that dark color of brown that seems ordinary enough to change to light gray. I still blink on command and still breathe without thinking too much about it. But older in that weird way that makes people question if you’re actually you, or a clone masking as you as some giant government ploy to take over the world. Even though they already own the world. We just don’t know it. Or we do, but choose to ignore it because ignoring seems better than acknowledging a powerless existence.

Ok, enough of that, let’s get back to me. I seem to split down the middle, not literally of course. But mentally I suppose like my two main personalities are battling each other trying to take control of me at the same time but end up giving up and sizzles down to neutral agreements about clothing or the typical school conversations. But then we got instances that are similar to those that require huge amounts of agreements, a situation that is more important to the path that I need to take and at that moment is when all guns are loaded and my head rages for the option to take control. At this point, I end up malfunctioning almost like a robot, freezing up on myself. My face would scrunch up in weird angles and my eyes may stop blinking and I may stop breathing and it may be that way for an extremely uncomfortable minute. But I always listen to the one that seems to be better in that situation. Which is always varying of course.  But its still fairly pesky I would whether have a nice equal but at this point in time, it doesn’t seem possible. And yeah I know it could be the case of the teenage mind and hormonal episodes that keeps me this way and when I get older my brain will obey one day almost all at once and decide that I am worthy of a clear focused path in life and BAM! Normal thinking patterns, or at least that’s what I hope will happen, but until then it’ll just sit back and wait.

Now I’m making this blog so i can share the most outrageous splits and to make it easier to distinguish between the two i named them. One will be Eli and the other will be Jane. So you all can see what i have to deal with on a almost daiy basis.

Okay so like, aliens are probably sick of us and that thought hurts! Like it literally burns. I mean think about it, aliens do exist, they’re clearly just as real as us, and they’ve more than likely been to earth millions of times in secret to see how we’re doing. And nine times out of ten, the first aliens to see the first humans were probably really confused. I mean big and hairy isn’t really appealing and that’s the idealistic cave(wo)man. The aliens were probably really disgusted too. Humans were and still are dirty! Once the humans started showing their destructive side, it more than likely showed the aliens how much of a lesser species we are. Humans literally figured out how to create fire, used it for good, and then turned against each other with it and destroyed whole villages, towns, and cities through the progressive stages of society. Imagine being an alien, trying to befriend a newer species, and failing because of their harmful ways. Maybe they’re tired of hiding and want to come out but don’t want to be associated with idiots from earth.

Or maybe, humans have already traveled to another planet or galaxy to see how people would fare in different living circumstances, and stayed for so long that they thought they were better than other humans! They could have literally built a colony and could be coexisting with whichever life force has made itself present to them and then left us for good. It’s like maybe they left us for dead because of our gluttonous ways. We’re probably too far gone for anyone to save us.

Also, aliens are probably better than us. They’re more advanced and clean. They’re probably built a utopia and have joined forces with others to create a giant union of other species and beings, but left earthlings out because we’re a billion light years behind. We’ve also destroyed our own planet so thoroughly that we want to take up residency in others. So, who’s to say that people on other planets aren’t starting to move away from said planet(s) in hopes of never being found out.

Imagine being the most repulsive species in the multiverse! We think we look pretty normal but I’m pretty sure there’s someone or something that either looks a million times better or just think we’re ratty little freaks. Our planet is in shambles and our leader is such a hot mess that if an alien were to tell me to take them to my leader, I’d apologize and start weeping. It’s simply an embarrassment to have someone of that stature as president.

There could also be like an entire planet where women are the only existing species that has any say so or power, like amazon women kind of. Or maybe there’s a planet that has creatures of half and half- a combination of everything that is. And then maybe there’s a sexist planet that’s not earth for once. Like men or whatever they are on said planet are super controlling and haven their female counter parts as slaves or servants. That’d be horrible though.

Then maybe there’s a planet where every being is gender fluid. It either has both sexual parts or neither and whichever is completely fine with them. And they may be like don’t care for clothing or styles that could separate them or define them as any specific gender, so because of this, they can focus on other things. More important things like making their planet the best of all planets because they have one common goal and individuality isn’t really a concept they’ve decided to delve into. They’re probably advanced because they lack ego sex war too.

Being a human sucks, all aliens are sick of us because we’re like really horrible children and they’re baby sitters making sure we don’t destroy ourselves any earlier than necessary.

We should follow some of the examples, they’ve set out and focus on things that’ll actually help be the superior life form we claim to be!

And of course, God is fed up! He sends us to hell after we’ve wronged for so long that our sins are completely unforgivable. He sends us to permanent, fiery time out because we’re such bad children and honestly, he’s the most hard-working parent in the world. Taking care of 7.5 million children at once is a task indeed! He’s round the clock emotional and spiritual support, but when does he get a break? Hell, and all its fiery depths seem like a just punishment when you think about it. He’s got a lot to do and he’s just a busy being.

He probably hasn’t destroyed us or sent us eternal hell yet because he may still see good in us or maybe he enjoys the different aspects of each and every human. We’re probably like an ant farm to him or something.

Hell might also be really fun too because it’s full of sin and everything wrong with the world and its very obvious that people just can’t seem to do right. Like you’re still going to burn and perish, yeah, but you’ll get to sin without worry because you’ve already died and secured your spot in Satan’s domain.

Satan is clearly the father of all evil. No doubt about it, but then again, he’s probably like a really cool guy with people that have actually aligned themselves with him and follow his lead. He’s still going to “punish” you, but why wouldn’t he reward you for taking the path he took and overall, just being a really bad person. It seems a little wild to think that Satan himself would be mad at anyone who is just as bad as him.

Taco Bell is coming out with a new item on their dollar menu, and I am very excited about it.  As you can most likely tell from the title of this post, that item is the new nacho fries.  What these are, are regular fries with Mexican seasonings and served with nacho cheese.  I think these are great because Taco Bell has lacked a good side for a long time now.  They’ve had tortilla chips with nacho cheese as well as Doritos, but these do not feel substantial enough to supplement a meal.  That is why they are served as appetizers at most Mexican restaurants; they are okay by themselves but do not capture attention when served alongside a main course.  Nacho fries will go great alongside a burrito.  Additionally, it will be possible to put the fries inside of the burrito to be an extra filling, as one typically does with a hamburger.  This is actually something regularly done to burritos in California and has become a regional favorite.  Taco Bell serving these fries will help to spread this West Coast tradition across the country.  These fries will also be served as Nacho Fries Bell Grande which means that they will be served with beef, pico de gallo, nacho cheese, and sour cream.  This sounds great to me, and I’m much more excited to try these fries than I should probably be willing to admit.

Many might argue that it is not right to serve french fries alongside tacos because they are not a traditionally Mexican food item, but I disagree.  Food, like all other aspects of culture, is ever-evolving.  If a side goes well with a dish, they should be served together regardless of their regions of origin.  The reason we bother preparing meals at all and not simply serve just the necessary food to survive is that we have allowed food to evolve into an art form as legitimate as any other from literature to dancing.  If a story can contain elements of both classically Asian and European stories, why shouldn’t french fries (which are actually Belgian) be paired alongside Mexican food.  I feel that the only rule for art should be that it is good, and when art is not good, it should still be allowed to exist but should be critiqued just as good art is.  Good and bad are, of course, terms used to describe one’s opinions which cannot be proven right or wrong, by definition.

When I dream, I am stitched into different skin. I break into blue for my father, a cold purple for my mother.  They are Mary and Lucifer on a merry go round, and round and down the staircase with a thud. I can see the black lashes thick with blood and one hand on the bible; hearts swollen and pounding. Our generational gore is still glinting beneath the floorboards of the basement, let me tell you.

With every sleepless night, there is a small piece of my lungs that stays treading water. I am somewhere expanded beyond the horizon of my eyelids while the air slips past my face before I can catch it.

Dreaming and breathing are more alike than you’d think. I tend to drown before I make it to this part.

How do you know what your words feel like if you can’t see them?  I ask the reflection.

It’s simple, she says. I see you smothered in these letters like old acrylics ; You are drawling  and dripping. Too simple, she says, and my legs cave inside like  mountain valleys.

“Good Thing,”  Katie was shaking her head. “Not usually.”  “What’s your trouble?”   “Nightmares.”    “How much is there?” no one asked. “A million, a million.”

The pill tapped the counter at Katie’s right hand.

No sign of anyone, the lights were out here too.

“God!” she screamed. “Judas!”

Nothing.

The third match would not light. “You’re a fool to betray me.”   “Who are you talking to?”

Katie put her hand over her mouth. Katie

-Headaches, Katie.

Suspect that Katie wasn’t Katie.

Katie was dead, wasn’t she?

Katie- I must think of her as Katie–

“Medication will kill you, I always say.”    “You use it too?”

“Since I was a baby.”

There they go again. And again. And again.

I became more captivated by grace than the mere idea of God as the years went on, as the years fell on. My body ran like a thread in an old blanket, it ran from my skin as a wounded dog would, hungry and frothing in the jaw.

And still, it seemed as if my suffering was merely suffering, though it came went in cerulean forms.

There’s so much powder, white hills. Tasting strawberry mixed with stomach acid and sinking lower by the minute.

3;35, and the angels keep singing.

Everything that is here will one day be erased.

Every famous name you know won’t matter, even Albert Einstein.  Everything here is bound to die.  That leads to a word I was obsessed with for about two years: entropy.

Entropy (n)- gradual decline into disorder

So what does it all mean then?  Life is pointless, right?  Nothing matters?  If we can’t do anything to last, then what can matter?

You matter.  You, your friends, your enemies, everyone you love and hate.  I think the point of life is living, to be happy and to make others happy.

My own meaning to life is happiness.

I was a really smart kid.  I would sit in the shower and sob because I thought too hard into the meaning of the universe and how it was all a void that would never matter, even if I did go to heaven.  I was so terrified of slipping into the void, of nothing to matter.  What was the point?  I wasn’t happy.  Why was I here?

But when I started living, I realized it.  We shouldn’t build anything to last; we shouldn’t try to.  The point to life is personal happiness.

Going to work doesn’t matter.  Being productive to society doesn’t matter.  Society won’t be here soon enough.  We’re all just ants in the bigger scheme, even George Washington.

So stop following the colony.  Have the ants ever considered wandering off, going to faraway lands?  Why build this mound your entire life on the outskirts of Paris?  Go see the Eiffel Tower!

Power doesn’t matter.  Money doesn’t matter.  Not to me, at least.  Getting a stable career doesn’t really matter to me.  The truth is that I know that I will be fine.  I will be happy even if I am living on the side of the road.

It really doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks.  Be yourself.  Blow all of your money, be crazy.  People will point and laugh.  Get bad grades if the subject doesn’t interest you.  People will call you an idiot.  You will know that they are only cogs in the machine.

And I realize that I’ve been touching on the same subject in the last few of my blogs, but I wrote three in a row.  This is something I’m passionate about.

So don’t wait to live.  The time is now.  It doesn’t matter what age you are now.  Go crazy.

As a kid, I had lice like eight times in the span of three years.  It was ridiculous.

Each night was spent soaking my hair in chemicals and my father, with no sense of my pain, yanking the smallest comb you’ve ever seen in your life through my hair to pull out each speck of lice and egg, bit by bit.  It was absolute torture.

It was such a big part of my life for so long.  My things were thrown out again and again, yet somehow they kept coming back, passed among friends and passed back to me.  Half of what I owned was covered in plastic, taken off and put on again for three years, before we finally just left it on.  I was forced into isolation.

It seems stupid to talk about, but it became my entire life for quite a few years.  I began to sympathize with the lice, as I knew they were just trying to burrow into a new home…  How would you like it if your house poured chemicals on you every night?  Which is why I wrote a poem about it.

War is a frisky lover of mine,
Playful and naughty.
I hope my steady doesn’t see the scars,
But I know she will hear me scream
For my mistress amidst slumber,
Remembering how
My sweetest sprays her blood inside my mouth.
I don’t mind it too much;
In fact,
I vie for it,
Digging my hands into the human flesh,
Tearing it apart, bit by bit.
It looks so tantalizing
I just want a bite.
I can see the child I’m fighting for,
For the battle tears apart my own land.
Will he remember me tantalizing over human meat,
As it hangs in my hands?
I wonder,
For we haven’t known each other long.
He hesitantly reaches forward, but not for me.
I watch him dig into a piece of flesh.

War is not faithful to me.
She’s frivolous,
A wild spirit.
I watch as she softly kisses my enemy,
As the corrosive acid of her spit
And the enemy’s poison
Runs through my home.
War drags a lingering hand across my chest,
As she passes sultrily,
Riding the toxin like a wave.
Like a nervous fan,
Death stumbles after,
Corrosive and beastlike.

I watch as my mistress envelops my son in a tight hug,
As death scorches through his body,
Making its way past the dirt and grime,
Right to his golden heart.
I watch as parts of him,
Simply…. Fall right off.
Him, who is half of me,
As though they were just borrowed.
He looks like melted cheese,
Stretched between two hands.
I lose sight of him in the thick brush.

The enemy rears his ugly head once again,
Making the land rumble.
And in the midst of war,
I sprint forward in the chaos.
It feels as though I am falling,
Every step furthering me into an abyss;
A void in which I do not know what I am fighting for.
A comb runs through the scalp,
So thin that I cannot escape.
I am flung off.
Just a little speck of lice
On a big haired head.

I am art
I have ascended
I am the creator
Of any
Of all
I am evil
In your eyes
Your eyes are that of a human
You cannot see me
In my truest form
That is my limitation
I am a god in all ways
Except my physicality
I stand here
And I spit on this damned ground
I am god and man
Father and son
I take responsibility
For myself
And am proud
That is the man in me speaking
I am all man
I am all man
I spit again
I scream
I claw my face away
I have to escape
This is how they do it
They trap me in this wicked physical state
Just long enough
For me to
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH
I BLINK
I BLINK AND BLINK
BLINK BLINK BLINK
RESET
UNDO
FIX ME
I WAS WRONG
HELP ME
It’s too much
Please
I can’t handle existence
Any longer
Please
Let me go
Why am I like this
If the curse of man
Is understanding his mortality
What is mine
Understanding
Existence
In all ways
Physical
Temporary
Omnipotent
Nothing
All
They all
Leave me
Me
Me
Wrong
Me
Help
Wrong
Help me help me
Wrong
Words are broken
They don’t work
We need to start over
Here’s a new one
Sorry, there’s not a good translation
Your word “frustration” is close
But all wrong
All wrong
Life
Another broken word
The word isn’t evil
Like the thing of it
Dread
That’s a good word
But not enough
Screaming
Not the word
The action
Screams are good words
I like what screams do
They come from a place
Someplace
I don’t care to know where
Leave me alone
Why are you looking at me like
THAT
I am alone
With me
Just me
Just the two of us
Evil
Both us
All me
Go away
Separate me
Pull me apart like Velcro
Tear my soul
Both sides are corroded and
Please take me apart
I just need to get away from me
And I agree with me
We should just
I’m glad you’re being sensible
As am I
So go
Where
Okay
No
I left
You came with me
What if we go in opposite directions
WHAT ARE YOU DOING
WHY
WHY CAN’T I GET AWAY FROM YOU
CONJOINED
CUT ME APART
WHAT IS DEATH
WHAT HAPPENS
I NEED TO KNOW
I NEED TO DO IT AND COME BACK
I CAN’T COME BACK IF I DO IT
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Why
Why can’t I just check
I just want to know before I make any decisions
I want to see the house before I buy it
forever