A star fell in the field behind the house. 

    Mama was cooking dinner, and Susie was playing with her dolls in the front yard. I was out in the woods, hoping to find the source of the weird sounds that have been keeping me awake the past few weeks. The sun was just setting, the stars starting to peek out in the pink sky. 

    It looked like a comet, the star did. I suppose that is what it is, but logic doesn’t grace my mind in the split second I see it speed into the ground. Dirt and debris flies up a hundred feet upon impact, the ground shaking only slightly. I can hear Mama’s scream from all the way across the field. 

    I am closer to the hitzone than my mother and sister are, so I arrive there first. And the star….

    ...doesn’t look like a star. 

    It looks like a smooth, purple rock, like one of the ones you buy at a museum. 

      I like when the winter air is just the right temperature to make me imagine myself walking through a Victorian castle’s courtyard in the dreary calm just before a bone chilling snow storm, with the natural light filtering through the gray clouds casting the stone building and sky into a bleak pallor. 

      I like when the water in a lake converges over my head, the sun casting the far away surface into a blanket woven of gold sunlight threads. Life is silent in that moment, the whole world a blue haze. There is life in the deep blue darkness below. I can feel their eyes watching me. 

      I like when I can see the Earth teasing me on top of the mountain, telling me See these mountains? These rivers and plains? These are my features. I know they are beautiful because they make me. Can you say the same for yourself? And I sit in silence atop a ridge, thinking of its thought-evoking words. I descend when I have an answer. 

People have always said my mother was magical. I never truly believed them until her funeral. 
It was sprinkling. A cacophony of crows was sounding, their outcry echoing across the still water of the lake she chose for her ashes to be scattered. Johnny, my poor young nephew, oblivious to the occasion, wanted nothing more than to splash around in the water, but his mother, my twin sister Iris, held him back. 
The reverend was droning on, his words overlapping and mixing in my mind. It was hardly a surprise when my youngest brother, Philip, sneaked his way over to my side, and nudged me with his elbow. 
He leaned forward and whispered to me, “Lily never would have wanted a funeral this boring.” He has an uncanny inclination to calling our mother by her first name. 

There is hardly a better place to be
than deep in the archives of a library. 

Libraries are chock full of stories
with direct portals to other universes.

They have a certain cloud of mystery around them, 
a promise of secrets to be uncovered.

Libraries have the architecture that suggests
they have hidden rooms, reading crannies,

winding stairs and majestic overhangs,
tiny aisles, and dusty stacks of books. 

Libraries are the lungs of knowledge:
people entering with greed for wisdom, 

and people leaving with newfound enlightenment, 
their craving for awareness of the world satisfied.

Is there any other place on Earth with such power? 
Any other place with so much overlooked magic? 

The kid’s name is Thomas, Tom for short. 

I know this, as does the entire grocery store, because he is wandering around, tugging on the sleeves of strangers, and introducing himself as such, cracker crumbs dropping from his mouth. Nobody asked where his mother is, or what he is doing, toddling around by himself, which was surprising, considering he looks just days over five years old. 

It didn’t take long before it was my purse strap he was yanking. 

“My name is Thomas, Tom for short!” he spittles, looking up at me with giant, round eyes. I can almost see my reflection in them. 

“Hello, Tom! My name is Annie.”

“Hi, Annie!” he beams up at me. 

Crouching down, I ask him where his parents are. The smile that was radiating from his face milliseconds ago vanishes in an instant. 

I.
Tomorrow, I hope the sky turns green. 
I hope the sea turns violet, 
the fish to start flying and 
the birds to start talking. 

Tomorrow, I hope the trees erupt into symphony, 
the clouds hanging above to lower
and throw the world into a foggy dreamscape,
the stars to twinkle between my fingers.

Tomorrow, I hope for the impossible. 

I hope for the impossible, 
not because I believe it will come true, 
but I solely hope for these impossibles
because I know some possibles won’t come true. 

I know that tomorrow, every table will not be filled with food and drink.
I know that tomorrow, every person will not find a warm bed at night. 
I know that tomorrow, every mind will not have all happy thoughts. 

I know that tomorrow will most likely be exactly the same as today. 

So yes, I hope the trees start singing tomorrow, 

A person can write, though it doesn’t classify them as a writer.
To be a writer, you must know how to play with words, 
to wield them like weapons, or use them to stop wars. 
Writers can strike the flint to start the fire, 
just as they can pour the water to douse it. 

Writers can change history with just a pen and paper, 
they can replicate it, twist it, make it. 
They can elicit feelings, suppress them, 
tie thoughts into words, snatching them 
from their minds like snowflakes. 

Writers have the greatest power in the world, 
and yet they seldom use it for evil. 
They use it to create worlds and characters, 
express themselves, tell others they feel the same, 
to make the world a little more beautiful. 

It is for these reasons that I revere writers, 
long to be inducted into such a state of being.
There is no greater future I wish for myself, 

As a child, Christmas felt like a dream. 
It felt like such a day couldn’t exist,
like we would wake up to December 26th, 
and go on with our lives like normal. 

Christmas felt like not being able to sleep, 
like thinking, If I stay awake long enough, 
I’ll hear Santa. I’ll see him!
and then being pulled into slumber grudgingly. 

It felt like waking up at five in the morning, 
waiting for my older brother to wake up, 
playing my tiny pink DS in my other brother’s room
while counting down the minutes. 

Christmas was bursting into my parent’s room, 
jumping on their bed, 
yelling and asking if we could go see the tree, 
but really, we just wanted presents. 

Rushing out to the living room, 
goggling at the heap of gifts,
my siblings and I pounce upon them
like hyenas upon their prey. 

Christmas was a day of wonder, 

Upon normal occasions, the girl liked water.
It was calm, smooth, rolling upon itself, self-reliant and assured.

But when the wall of water came upon her village, 
when it cascaded down upon her home and life,

she did not like it. 
In fact, she hated it. 

She was on her way to school,
holding hands with her younger brother,

walking on the cracked sidewalk
towards the dusty town center.

Her brother felt it first; 
a tremble from deep within the Earth.

His tiny hands tightened on hers, 
large, trusting eyes looking to her for safety.

There was nothing she could do, 
but she tried. She tried so hard to save them.

“Run,” she whispered to him. 
And they ran. 

In the end, it made no difference;
the water still descended,

it still hit them like a stone wall
and flattened them to the ground. 

I sit in the silence, 
windows open 
wind blowing gently,
And try not to think. 
But the music, the music, the music
No. 
I imagine the silence, 
refuse to listen to my own mind. 
The absence of anything is calming, 
refreshing and
It creeps up behind, 
the melody inching upon my consciousness
like the song of
Stop it, Mind. 
I don’t want to be listening to the music,
the silent music of my mind
That oddly sounds like my
seventh grade music festival song...
The notes stream past my barriers, 
harmonies overlapping with
I box myself in nothing, 
hoping that it will be enough, 
that I’ll finally be at pe--
Full force music from the ensemble
stumbling over one another,
divided and yet coinciding 
to create the mystical 
Nope, nope, nope. 
piece from the 
Fine. 
I let the music surround me,