Clocks

Author's Note: This is another writing circle piece, even though it's not finished, I had to post it. Does anybody have any suggestions on what I should do? Maybe have the intro be like a "flash-foward" or something? Let me know.

 

I sit in the room undisturbed, except the clock mocks me with every tick. Tick. What have I done? Tick. I don’t deserve to believe alive. Tick. Are they coming for me? With every tick, my anticipation begins to rise, until I can not take it anymore. I pull the knife, covered with blood, out of my jacket and throw it. The clock no longer ticks, and I hear a knock at the door. It’s the police,  delivering the news I do not want to hear:”Ms. Hollen, you are out of time.”. I have no choice but to follow them, after all I was out of time.

                     

The Hateful Cycle

Author's Note: This piece is a writing circle topic. I haven't really participated in writing circles for a while, so I found it difficult to agree on a topic. But we we all agreed on the topic hate, I brainstormed and brainstormed and then I had an idea. I hope you enjoy this piece :)

Hate. Whenever this word is mentioned, many thoughts come to my mind, although one sticks out above them all: why we hate. “It is easy to hate and it is difficult to love. This is how the whole scheme of things. All things are difficult to achieve; and bad things are very easy to get”, a quote by Confucius. Hate is bad therefore it's easy to get; love is good therefore it is difficult to achieve: simple logic. An average person will come across the feeling of hate, sometime in their life. And there are many theories of how and why, this event occurs. Is it caused by a feeling of emptiness? Or possibly due to envy? A huge cycle that never ends?

You’re empty inside but not because you starved yourself. You’re empty due to an overwhelming jealousy, that causes you to forget who you are. This jealousy soon will begin to brew into a deep hate, and will grow deeper overtime. But before this emptiness turns into hate, it becomes envy.

Envy. A feeling of discontentment or resentful longing (often for other’s possessions or qualities), in other words a deeper jealousy. If you have three new pairs of shoes, and your friends has six. Your family is struggling financially, meanwhile your aunt takes a big family vacation. Envy lurks: quietly yet it can be extremely harmful when it becomes hate.

Now we are back to the idea of hate. This pattern of brewing hate seems to be continuous, a cycle that never ends. Jealousy turns into envy, and then envy into hate. There is no escape, until we learn to do the difficult: love. Love is stronger than hate, no matter how hard it is at achieve. It will break the cycle. And you will be hate-free.

Playing In Burn

Author's Note: This is another piece I was not comfortable writing. But after some revision and advice from peers, I believe it deserves a spot on my blog. Once again, I was asked to work on "Literacy Devices". In this piece it's mostly metaphors, similes, and personification. Can you find them?

The sun is beating down on me. My already reddened skin, is beginning to scream. Its burn is getting to much to bear. The only thing that can save me, is the whistle shouting the game's end. Until then, I play through the burn, awaiting the whistle and hopefully a win.

Suddenly, I am interrupted from my thoughts, as the ball flies through the air; speeding towards me. I jump up in to the air, to greet the ball, with all my strength. I barley manage to stop the ball in mid-air. The ball drops to the ground. Within the few dribbles I take, I kick the ball down to the other team's goal side: to an open player. My hopes begin to rise, as time passes in a blur of excitement; a goal is scored.

Everyone quickly lines up again. We are ahead 2-1. Coach Cod commands us to play cautiously, to maintain our lead.With two minutes left, the anticipation is beginning to get to me. My burn is on fire and I am trying to remain cool. But due to my distractions a goal is scored; on us. The score is now tied, like our hands because there are only 30 seconds left on the clock.

And to everyone's dismay, the final whistle blows as loud as a cannon shot.We have tied and I am burnt. After skaking hands with the other team, my teammates and I gather. Even though the game is over, I wish it could continue. This burn is becoming to much to handle. I need relief yet all is done.

The Earth Was Good

Author's Note: I usually prefer to away from poetic styles of writing, yet I was inspired to write a meaningful piece dealing with the temptations we all face. I focused on including "Literacy Devices". Let me know if any are noticeable, and if you think I should write more poems. 

The Earth was good,
At least in God's eyes.
Yet the serpent came,
To tempt us,
And make us die.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,
At least that's what they say.
But every now and then,
The serpent comes to play.
Convincing and deceiving,
Every age and look
Until
There's self-hate brews among them
And begins to overflow

A husband and a wife,
A bond to strong to break.
They're a promise to each other,
Until
The cheating and the lying become open to all,
And their demons become visible to the big and small

It started out as a simple dislike,
After all she was rich and well off,
Until
The hate overtakes her to such a degree,
She breaks a commandment,
Murder has occured

We love the land, and the seas,
But that's not how it's supposed to be.
As a temporary home,
The world seems better
Although in reality we,
Until
Begin to forget this.
Once again,
Falling in to the serpents trap.

The Earth was good,
In the beginning before we learned to play,
The devils games.
Now we hate,
Cheat, and lie.
Wondering why such a beautiful place,
Can perceive its self as a pleasant hell.

Your Treasure

Author's Note: When I first read this short story, it made me think of someone who has helped me, Dr. Allison. But I also tried to focus on symbolic language, although it wasn't plentiful, there was still some within The Treasure of Lemon Brown. Even so, this piece I focused on my transitions, a lot. Please give me feed back!

Greg Ridley has always wanted to play on the school basketball team, yet he never got the chance. His grades weren’t high enough, and his dad was disappointed in him. However, in this short story, The Treasure of Lemon Brown, the main focus isn’t on basketball. This story also deals with having trouble with your parents, meeting someone who has changed your life, and the lesson of each man’s treasure.  Throughout each of these elements, the author also finds a way to use symbolic language.

Unlike Greg, I have been fortunate enough that I haven’t had any major trouble with my parents. While we both have struggled with math, there are still two major differences between Greg and myself. My parents would never consider taking away my sports privileges, or even threatening to do it;however, that seems to be all Greg’s parents do. The other difference between he and I is that he “ran away” from home, and that is something I would never even think about. Even though, I would never run away, I still recognized the symbolism written by the author. Running away from home, usually shows an act of rebelling, yet in this story it symbolizes running from your problems or even the truth. This author, probably incorporated this idea to show children there is always another way to deal with issues, something my third grade teacher taught me.

Someone who has greatly impacted my life was my third grade teacher, Ms. Allison, who is now Dr. Allison. She taught me to look at things differently and often encouraged me to think from a different points of view. The most impactful thing she has done for me, was allow me to realize what my treasure was, my family and my friends. This relates to Lemon Brown and Greg, because Mr. Brown made Greg think differently towards his situation, that involved his parents and his grades. Lemon Brown, symbolizes that person in your life, who often does something mentionable but is usually forgotten. His treasure, doesn’t have much symbolism to it,  yet it is something worth while to think about.

Lemon Brown’s treasure was an old rusty harmonica, that his son bought for him. Oddly enough, the neighborhood was shocked when they discovered what his treasure actually was. They assumed that the treasure of Lemon Brown would be “valuable” and would be worth something to everyone. Two men even tried to steal Lemon’s treasure. The robbers, trying to steal the treasure, teach the reader never to assume anything because everyone has their own ideas when it comes to an object’s worth. The author obviously wanted to use this idea because he wished to provoke the reader into thinking more deeply when they hear the word treasure.

The main focus in this book, when you aren’t analyzing it, would be basketball. Yet when I really thought about this story, I took so much more away from it, through the symbolism and the relatable situations.  I really focused on the treasure aspect of The Treasure of Lemon Brown, which is not to assume anything and to respect others’ treasures. Lemon Brown, a unique fictional character, is an amazing example of all of this. He helped others, much like Dr. Allison did for me. At first, I wished Lemon Brown would be in my life, and now I realize everyone has a “Lemon Brown” in their life.  Mine is Dr. Allison!

Things of the Past and the Present

Author's Note- I'm not going to lie, I struggled with this book analysis. Over the coarse of three weeks, I have written three different versions. Thankfully, I had peers and teachers to help me focus on a good topic and work towards some of my writing goals. For this piece I mainly focused on my vocabulary and conclusion. After focuses on those things I began analyze things such as; stereo-typing, gender discrimination, and racism. Hopefully, this piece allows you to remember the amazing things America has and the people who have worked to maintain this outstanding country.

The United States is a wonderful place. We have freedom to be whatever we want no matter what gender or racial backround. Although, America has not always been this lucky. Kathryn Stockett, author of The Help, has captured the time before we were so privileged in America. This time was 1962, at time of racial and gender unfairness. Even though this novel reveals the truth of the past, it shines a light on the present, provoking the reader to think of the changes that have been made and who was brave enough to stop the horrors we are dealing with. Things such as; most stereo-types, most racism and most of gender discrimination.

In The Help, Skeeter, one of the three fictional women, was working towards getting a job in the local newspaper. Since she was a young woman, they at first rejected her. After some convincing, they gave her the housekeeping column. Women’s rights activists such as Susan B. Anthony and many before her have been working to prevent gender discrimination since 1848. Some other jobs women have struggled to get hired for, back then and still today, include; jobs in government, and many other high rated jobs. Yet, in 1962 up to today, many women still struggle to attain meaningful jobs which involve an authority role. Even so, women have struggled, and are currently struggling, many other issues have occurred in the United States.

Another issue, in The Help, is the stereo-typing of other races. Miss Hilly, a character in this book, is stereo-typing all African Americans. In 1962, many white employers forced their help to use separate bathrooms, even though these working women have cleaned their employer’s house for years. This was done because; people stereo-typed African Americans as “dirty” and “diseased”.  People like Martian Luther King Jr., have worked to prevent those racial actions. Stereo-typical actions and racial actions go hand and hand.

Racism is a terrible thing; a belief that one race is superior to another. It occurred in this book, and is occurring now, unfortunately. A lot of people in the United States still think things like, anyone from a Hispanic culture is involved with drugs or All African Americans are “ghetto”. None of these statements are true. Stereo-typing people and racism go hand and hand, and also have something to do with gender discrimination. Therefore, America needs to remember their role models.

In modern America, we salute all our heroes. Thanking them for standing up for others, and stopping racism, gender discrimination, and stereo-typing. This being so, there are still some of these actions occurring. To stop these actions it takes bravery from everyone. People like, Martin Luther King, Susan B. Anthony, and Kathryn Stockett, for allowing her novel to reach out to others, and not being afraid to write about difficult subjects.

A Rough Vouge

Author's Note: For my third piece, I chose to write a poem. Even though I am not a poet, this piece should symbolize the hard choices and the temptations that we face in life. I really tried to have a conclusion, although it was difficult referring to a thesis. Hopefully, you see a good conclusion, that suits the poem.


Sailing through rocky waters
So numb they almost sting
Which way to go
Is there land ahead
I am lost
Hoping to find my way
In this huge sea
With good fish and bad fish
Which one will I be
There are rocky waters up ahead
But soon follows land
Will I be a shell that's cracked
Or a dolphin swimming freely
Sailing through these water
Learning things and finding my way
Through an array of troubles
I will fight the sting and remain uncracked.