GRADES 1-3 -

Fire
by Cordell "TC" Cheng

Dragons breathing fire
Burning up forests.

Thieves setting bombs
Blowing up dragons.

Thieves stealing flames
Killing more dragons.

Bad guys being brave.

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Rhino Haiku
by Molly Cutler

A gray grass eater
Munching, trimming the plants now
A big lawn mower.

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Rhino Couplet
by Molly Cutler

Oh, rhino, with that horn of yours,
Won't you open up my doors?

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Mournfulness
by Ben Helzner

Mournfulness seems gray,
Like the darkness in an abandoned house.
   I small the saltiness of everyone's tears.
I touch the tears rolling down my cheeks.
   I taste the moist, warm air.
I hear the never-ending silence in the cemetery,
as my Great Grandfather is beingk buried.
   I see a man next to a grave.

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Penguin Acrostic
by Ashley Kelly

Penguins are very good swimmers
Every penguin needs waterproof down feathers.
Nest near the shore in groups of 6 to 100 in groups called rookeries.
Good Emperor parents take care of their young.
Uses its beak to climb the ice.
If egg breaks he penguin will die.
Never drop an egg if you're a penguin.

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Fall
by Gavin O'Neill

I see leaves changing color
I hear blowing leaves
I smell cooking turkey
I feel wind blowing
I taste stuffing

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GRADES 4-6

Candy Canes
by Mira Newman

Candy canes are sweet,
delicious with delight.

You hang them on Christmas trees.
It's a pretty sight.

But if you're not careful
your sister will take a bite.

If she does it's not her fault.
It's the candy cane's delight.

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Friends
by Nathanael Cheng

I remember it like yesterday
When I met you in first grade.
You were always funny but shy-
And you are still.

Slowly,
But surely
We became friends.
Do you remember tallking on those crisp October days?

Quickly, quietly, friends we became
Hide and go seek, tag-
The games e played.

Running free,
Running wild,
Running together
Panting like a dog.
Slowing, stopping.

I met a good buddy
that one day during fall.
I met a quiet guy

Who is named
Paul.

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Fireflies
by Julia Kim

Fireflies' lights are as bright as the moon.
They shine through the darkness
As they move to the woods.
When the sun goes up,
They turn off their light
As they wait for the night.

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On a Cloud
by Brittany Wylie

Someone who lives on a cloud
must be very proud
to be living that high
with their head in the sky
but must be careful
not to fall
to the ground.

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Spring
by Prem Vadodaria

Spring break is so much fun,
I won' t like it when it's done.

Flowers bloom so bright
They will stand out even at night.

Hibernation is almost over,
Bears come ou tand so will clover.

Birds fly flapping their wings
Filling the sky with songs they sing.

Outdoor adventures will be here
Mostly because spring is near.

Mother Nature was kind to us
With 80 inches of snow blocking our bus.

When rain comes, it will wash away the snow
And people will ask where did it go?

Even though spring is exciting and fun
Winter was good and now it's done.

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Fall
by Micah Cheng

School days are here.
Parents scramble for last minute supplies.
Then,
THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL.
Nervous kindergartners
Scared 1st graders
Uneasy 2nd graders
Anxious 3rd graders
Nervous 4th graders and
Worried 5th graders
Regrettingly march into classrooms.
Children meet each other
and learn a routine.
Make new friends,
And say, "How do you do?"
Then go home with best of all,
No homework!

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GRADES 7-9

My Life by Subways
by Sam Ritz

See the creamsicle seats on the #6 line
Rushing through darkness lit by cell phones
And dingy lit cabins awry, people occupied
by life's occurrences.

Life lit by men in suits
IRS files fly through the hapless token suckers
Their tongues are blackened with soot
Or is it soot?
Reaching Greenpoint unexpectedly
Brooklynites are sitting there
Waiting for their car to
Arrive
Hasidic Jews
And sweat-suited rappers
Anxious, watery eyed
Waiting so implausibly
In the Greenpoint Station
NO.6.

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GRADES 10-12

Sugar
by Sam Burke

Sometimes I see you on the train,
even though you never took the train,
sprawled out in a two-seater like you used to on m couch
one leg higher than the other, back twisted arms crossed,
you wear those faded cargo shorts that need to be thrown out
and the old gym shirt you took from me when I could still see straight.
You don't look at me as we round a turn and you vanish.

Once, about a year ago, we dined al fresco at a cafe that served Italian.
As the breeze rustled around us, our paper napkins taking flight,
you took my menu (there was a map of Italy on the back) and used
sugar granules to trace a trip across the countryside.
Then we licked our fingers and dragged them across the trail,
along Florence and siena and down to proscuitto and panini.
When we finished the loop we went to taste the sweetness of it all,
instead our mouths puckered.
It was salt sitting in little clumps on our tongues.
You made a mistake, always thinking the bitter was the sweet.

But it wasn't you I tasted when I let my eyes slip open this morning.
I didn't even feel your hands clawing around at me in the dark that night.
Instead, I pushed myself further under my covers
and looked up through the seams of my comforter,
the one from my childhood, the one I put back on my bed when I ended it,
and stepped inside my own church, glowing with stain-glass windows
of all colors and shapes, their fuzzy warm outlines above my head,
still forming sinister shapes in the morning light.

When the food comes, my tomatoes sizzle, redder than my hurt,
blanketed in mozzarella and sprigs of green basil more alive than I am
slip onto my tongue, textures mingling,,
covering the saltiness of moments before with something tanbgble.
For months after I leave you I can't eat without m tongue lighting on fire,
a phoenix finally beginning its beginning.
I knew it was salt as soon as you picked up the shaker
and spread it across Italy.
I didn't stop you.

Sugar would've been a lie.

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I couldn't sleep, so I read a journal entry from my birthday, and wrote a poem...
by Ben Schrager

My Birthday.
It's my Birthday.

And I'm on the edge,
the very tip
of the world

where winds blast through
like an unwelcomed houseguest
and leave a trail of dust behind
for miles to come.

Punta Arenas:

land of the three-hour sunset,
home for stray dogs,
owner of the largest sky,
the slingshot to Antarctica.

It is supposedly
barren, bleak,
an asphalt-covered
techicality.

I don't give a shit.

It's the southernmost
point; home of Evil Santa
and Skin Cancer.

It's the end of the Earth.
I'm only just beginning.

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Up High in the Tree
by Alexa Katz

Tree bark scratches, scrapes
Against my bare legs.
Grab, get up,
I pull myself to the next limb.

A network of branches twist high towards the sky.
The next, nuzzled in between

Ants stampede sufficiently
Through crevices and cracks of the wood.
They are on a mission.
I am on a mission

To scrape my knee. Rough, dry hands
Grate against the grain.

Leaves scrunch beneath my fingertips
As I clutch the twigs,
And bring
Myself up to the top,

Up high, at the top of the tree.

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Christie
by Dylan Curry

Shhh!
The crowd hisses like steam from a teapot.
The velvet veil ruffles;
Cheap metal rings grind on rough rope.
On the dirty, discarded plateau
She stands. No, she floats
Like a lovely lily petal falling, no, gliding, across a
Purple plain
Of less graceful beings.
In the moment of stillness, your every expectation is filled; she hasn't moved.
Above her stands a ruder character reading her heart.
The petal smoothly slides
Into a state of bliss. She is a snake,
Slipping through the air, silent save for the
Soft shuffling of her shoes.
She coils, ready to strike at the silent audience.
Her body shows beauty,
Her face explains famine,
As she tries to make the world understand.

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The Shovelers
by Ar Yeh Harris-Shapiro

It's so cold out here. I'm afraid.
I'm afraid of Winter's grip,
that glacial ache that worms its way beneath your skin
and soaks into your bones.
I'm afraid for the men who labor beside me,
stark black against the sterile glare of sun on snow.
I'm afraid I'll miss a patch of ic on the tracks,
that I'll move on to the next drift
and the next train will crash
folding into a scarred heap of metal. What then?
Will the company fire me?
Will we starve?
Will my children look at me with eyes already dead,
when all I have to offer is snow?
What then?
I might get lost in this field of white,
with only silence as company.
It wouldn't be difficult.
A few steps away from the others,
a few steps into Winter's arms.
I could just lie down, and wait for the next storm,
wait for the delicate white flakes to cover my body.
I might die out here,
numb and forgotten,
in the snow,
and the cold.

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Nowhere
by Hannah Ehlers

She decided to be indecisive
(therefore making a decision).
She understood there was nothing to understand
(she knew nothing).
She rationalized in all the irrationality
(you could call it hope).
She was simple in all her complexity
(she was constantly confused).
She was on a straight line that swiveled and curved
(this line never ended).
She was ordinary being extraordinary.
She wasted trying to conserve.
She defined things with no definition
(her dictionary was insufficient).
She comforted others, but could not comfort herself
(her frustrations grew).
She cried as she dried her eyes.
She fell apart, while being put back together.
To contradict a contradiction, brings you back to the beginning
(nowhere).

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