CNR #10

The stage, two rolling hills

Splash the sky, ripple filled

Brown intentions, Green reply

Squinted eyes, clamor ‘why?’

I don’t always have diarrhea, but you don’t write an action movie about the days the cops don’t get shot at.

CNR #9

Life For Two

Let us breed and take life into our hands.

We will make love with smiles and charms,

And watch sunsets like movies and consume nights like carnivores.

Craft bridges that we may later burn and do so without regard for anyone but us.

Touch fingers and allow what makes us to converse with subtle delight.

Plant ideas in each other’s minds until the blooming thoughts become entwined weeds that cross through skin and bone and forever tie two wandering souls.

Kiss gently what may have been bitter sadness and cold remorse.

We will never look down and the walk will never intimidate.

I will never break sight and the road will illuminate.

The world won’t watch or care and we will have feelings mutual to live in a storybook that will one day close with such ease and silence because the only energy we gave was to each other and nothing else.

In a world by ourselves.

CNR #8

Claire De Lune

True love, I’ve learned, is far from what I’ve been told.

Real love is not what is portrayed, or sought after.

It is a quiet understanding, and a slow burning flame.

You do not feel it all at once, but in the depths of the night it trickles little by little

And lulls you to sleep.

It doesn’t blind you like divine light. It swells like spring and takes its time.

And suddenly there is a beauty you had not seen before.

A familiar comfort, a small sigh at the day’s close, regardless of the view.

The intermittent realization that everything will be wonderful in the end

Because not only have I found what I never knew I wanted,

But I’ve found it in the most wonderful vessel I couldn’t imagine.

I never knew you until this moment, not truly.

And although I am myself, and you are you.

I’ve realized that you and I will always be.

Like flesh and skin we are akin,

And we always will be.

CNR #7

True Love

When I haven't slept well in days

And I'm well into a haze,

at the piano I will gaze

with disdain and amaze.

The incomplete alphabet

repeated over and over

and the manufacturing of this device

still floors me through and through.

I can't help but feel small sitting on the bench,

the wood beneath, in front and inside.

Maybe I am made of wood, and someday I'll compose a song.

I have sat sweat-drenched, furrow-browed, and bug-eyed

And made the keys weep so I'm not the one who cried.

Swirled drinks in my throat til they flushed like worries

til the blood in my head swam down through my neck.

And I've woken beside wood with no memories to my name.

drunk off more than just alcohol's stain.

I've thought to myself no never again

but tonight I will beat the sweet ivories

and punish the keys so they can't punish me.

Call the tuner in the morning to fix all broken strings.

Maybe tomorrow I will finally sing.

CNR #6

Things to Remember: An Essay by Rory

Whenever you think of things you have to remember, they’re always these big important things. Things like, “Where did I put my keys?” or “Did I leave them in the car?” or “Where did I leave the car?” But those are not the types of things that I believe should be remembered, or even be punished for. I think the things you should remember are the little things that you have forgotten.

However, after sitting at my computer for around an hour trying to remember things that I had forgotten I came to a startling conclusion; I forgot these things and cannot remember them. So I got my old photo album and looked through the pictures of myself when I was young. You wouldn’t believe this, but the memories came flooding back, like a flood.

For instance, I could not find one picture where my friend Jack was not by my side. Jack and I were really good friends when I was a kid. We would always play this game called ‘who can get in the most trouble.’ The game started as ‘Who could make the loudest noise?’ but we thought the former name did not fully encompass the game, so we changed it. We would also play this game where I would lock him in the cupboard and he would scream and scream. It was similar to “who can get in the most trouble,” except I always won. I was really good at it. Then one day Jack had to move away from the neighborhood because I got tired of my mom saying, “Aren’t you a little old for an imaginary friend?” I was like, “Look who is talking, bitch, you are older than me!” Except I didn’t actually swear when I was kid because I was stupid and didn’t know any better.

After I finished reminiscing about Jack, I looked through more of the pictures. However one of these picture enraged me because it made me remember the injustice I had gone through. I must have been a young kid, maybe nine or ten, and I was at the zoo doing what animals do, and nothing more. And yet I still got thrown out. Everyone knows that monkeys fling poop unless you show them who is boss. I saw this on a documentary or cartoon or something. So when I threw my lemonade (which was warm anyway) at the monkey to show him how wrong it is to fling things, I could have never expected to get such a stern talking to. It was like the zoo was out to get me. Oh, and then once they found out that I “apparently” didn’t know the difference between the information booth and a porter potty, they said to my dad, “You are going to have to leave.”

When I saw the zoo pictures of me punching the staff and screaming at the penguins I suddenly became ill of remembering things, I was like, “this is not fun.” But then I remembered another thing! This was when I played hockey. I remember being the best one on the whole team, but because of everyone’s jealousy I would pretend like I was bad. I would be out on the ice, about to do some awesome goal scoring and then I would think, “I should give this to someone who needs it.” So I would pass the puck to someone else, so selflessly. The coach would play along too. He would yell things like, “Put your skates back on! You need those on!” I would just smile and wink back, “You got it coach!” And he would act like he was angrier; he must have been an actor before he was a hockey coach. I was so selfless in Hockey that I never scored one goal the whole season, and I actually quit the team half way through. I passed on the beacon to those kids who needed it; I was content with the knowledge that I was the best.

Some people don’t get what you should and shouldn’t remember. For instance when I write a beautiful story about the time my dog was sprayed by a skunk and how funny and smelly it was, my math teacher says things like, “This is math class.” Or “You do realize tests are half your grade?” She wants me to memorize big things like formulas and whatnot. The last time this happened I told her, “Life is about the little things” and when she murmured, “then you should care about your average” I knew some people would just never get it. The good news is that I now have all of summer school to try to explain it to her. It took me a while to get it, but now that I do, I feel enlightened. And I can only hope, after reading this, you do too.