Teenager | Page 2 | Young Writers Project

Writing Challenges: Inspiration and ideas to spark your creativity every day

[Art by Amelia_v, YWP]

Who are you and what is your life like as a teenager in 2023? In words or images, explore, but don't feel limited by, questions such as:

Who are you at your core? How, when, or where do you most feel like your true self?
What most inspires you? Where do you find awe, joy, contentment, kindness, love?
What are the major influences in your life – people, places, ideas, creativity, the arts? How do they help to define who you are, what is important to you, and what you hope for in your life?
What issues are teenagers facing that adults don’t understand?

PRIZES AND PUBLICATION IN TWO CATEGORIES: Writing: Poetry, prose, essay, commentary, songwriting; Visual Art Category: Photography, painting, sketching, sculpture, collage, digital art. If your chosen genre or medium isn't listed here, that's OK, go ahead and submit it!
NOTE TO VISUAL ARTISTS: Responses can be abstract, literal, symbolic, interpretive, realistic – whatever best conveys your message.
DEADLINE: March 1, 2023

Return to main contest page for all the details!

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Responses to this Challenge

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

Hcornwell25

Masterpiece

30,000 people visit DaVinci's Mona Lisa every day. She is arguably the most famous art work of all time. For centuries people have marveled, scrutinized and praised her, and for centuries they will. This is in part because she is a mystery. Questions as to who she really was, the motivations behind her portrait, the true meaning of her infamous smile, and whether or not the painting was ever finished, are still studied today. Their power often eclipses DaVinci's talent, which had originally placed her behind glass. As a teenager, it is easy to feel under the microscope in the same way. Grades, goals, and futures are constantly questioned, with the feeling that any change could be caught by countless onlookers. The sensation that all eyes are on you is hard to shake. Mona Lisa was of course beautiful, but you have to wonder if she would have wanted to be constantly watched, or if she would have been happy to have her portrait hanging merely on a wall at home.

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

Adeline

Love in the Dark

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

poetry challenge: Teenager

GalaxyOwl13

Auction

Auction

The faceless ones are chittering in their fancy suits
As they sip sparkling wine—don’t they know that dulls their wits?
My throat is burning, vocal cords worn from the constant calling
I stand up on the stage, one hand over my heart
I don’t belong here
They are laughing, laughing, laughing, as they wait for the sale
Devils? No, I don’t think so, just people
Who have things not meant for them, like
Power or money or approval that they are ready to exchange
For segments ripped straight from my soul
I know the currency well

Item 1: a porcelain mask, cracked, faded paint flaking
Antique, poor condition, free of cost (but not of price)
I was born different, and different isn’t bad
But it’s something to cage, to warp to society’s whims
I don’t know how old I was when someone
Placed the mask on my butterfly nightstand

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

poetry challenge: Teenager

elise.writer

Teenagers

The frowned-upon coffee stain on your favorite sweater
The stamp of the all-too bright winter sun pressed to your eyelids
The sharp sliver under your curling crimson fingernail
The crackle of the radio that suppresses a could-have-been-great-song
There's nothing we can do to avoid them
But we sure can crinkle our noses and mumble under our breaths
Cursing and snarling at what we deny to all have been through.
Expected to lose the inconvenience of wide-eyed immaturity,
To Grow Up like an adult, round out our rough edges and shake hands professionally...
While being treated like a speck of dirt,
Like a slip-away feather on your royal violet gown,
Never meeting the sky-arching standards of real adults.
Real adults who are too far above secret handshakes and fantasy stories to twitch a muscle.
We are treated like children, but expected to never act like one.

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

poetry challenge: Teenager

Drew Thoeni

How Can I…?

How Can I…?

How can I be

Myself
When all people do
Is judge?

How can I feel
Human
When people make others
Feel less than that?

How can I help
Change
When billions of other people
Can’t
Change
At all?

How can I use
Words
When they hurt
More
And more people
Everyday?

How can I believe

That I’ll
Grow up
And be somebody
When most of the world
Won’t know
Who I am?

How can I scream
My opinions
And

No one
Hears them?

How can I not
Constantly worry
When our only
World
Is dying?

How can I not cry
When I know
That everything

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

poetry challenge: Teenager

GalaxyOwl13

Scream

One day, when the itching-crawling was
Too much to bear, I stood at the bottom
Of my driveway, tilted back my head
And screamed up at the clear blue sky —
There was no thunder. I did not call
A rainstorm. The sky remained clear.
I screamed and screamed and screamed
Enough to jostle the puffy clouds, but
Nothing. My cry was insubstantial —
A ghost-call, complete with that burning
Which says, “You exist, you feel too much”
But also, “You are not here, not here at all.”
The sound didn’t echo, just escaped and
Dissipated without pomp or ceremony.
Again and again I screamed at the sky
Until I realized my screaming was not
And would never be enough.

The next day, I screamed into a pillow
And my sound suffocated in the stagnant
Air of my room, was caught in my snot
Was constrained by salty chains of tears.
No one heard. Not because they were

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

Johanna.stone

Peaceful Night

I did a piece that represents peace, calmness, and hope. I ended up doing a monochromatic painting using different shades of purple that compliment each other. My intention originally was to do a painting with different shades of blue as my sky with a green grass but I did not like how the blue sky came out so I decided to make my sky purple and from there I ended up doing the monochromatic design. Nature is a very peaceful place for me.

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

ESevigny16

Who I am

I made this peice to try and show what goes on in someones mind verse what people actually see. The dark side represents the dark side of peoples minds and even though the drarker side is bigger, people only see or focus on the bright positive side which is how I think most people feel that others do.

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

ariannacoombs

This is me

In my piece, I created an acrylic potrait that contains my hobbies and some of the extracuricular activities that I do. Around the center piece I put my top valuse that I admire most.

Posted: 02.28.23

Feb 28

visual art challenge: Teenager

ruth petit

Growing knowledge

Growing knowledge is an abstract, still life in the medium of acrylic paint. I wanted to show two things that I really like in my painting. I love to read and I love plants. Those are things that are very important to me. I thought I could also show the growth of knowledge and its importance. The large plant growing going everywhere shows the growth and the knowledge is in the books. I tried to show realistic leaves. So I added shading and layers of colors. I chose to add titles to two of my books with my two favorite books. Shout by Laurie Halse Anderson, and Into the wild by Jon Krakauer. I also showed a theme in the painting of green, my favorite color.

Posted: 02.28.23

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