Books, Food, Dance and Travel
I wrote a poem for the prompt ‘Imaginary Friend’. I hope you enjoy!
they want me to hate you
they want me to be rid
they want me to not love you
anymore
i could never hate you
i could never lose you
i will always love you
for evermore
but they want me to hate you
they tell me to be rid
they force me to not love you
anymore
i tell them i can’t hate you
i promise them i’d never lose you
and i swear i will always love you
for evermore
Did you have an imaginary friend growing up?
I recently saw a writing prompt which was, “Write a story that includes the phrase “Maybe in another life.””. Here’s what I wrote! I hope you enjoy!
A pink umbrella. It was unusual, to say the least. But Elion couldn’t help but follow it, silently tracing its pattern through the rain, watching as it bobbed and weaved its way over to the small alley where Elion was working. She held her breath, hand pausing over the canvas which was just beginning to be drawn on.
“It’s raining.” The owner of the umbrella’s voice was playful, though its melodious lilt wasn’t lost on Elion.
“Yeah. I’m not an idiot.” Elion was sharp in her retaliation, though she couldn’t help but feel strangely…captivated by this stranger- with her pink hair that matched her umbrella and by her hat with its small, but bright pawprint.
The stranger laughed brightly, “Didn’t think you were. Do you not have an umbrella?”
There wasn’t much Elion could say in response. She shook her head, turning back to the painting, studying in it the faint glow of the streetlamps. “No. I like the rain”.
The stranger cocked her head, though her voice was as bright as ever, “You’ll ruin your outfit. And your painting,” She held out the umbrella, an almost dare in her eyes, the water droplets catching the light- and Elion’s eyes- as they fell off the umbrella, “Here. Take it”
Elion furrowed her brow, “…What about you? You’ll be the one ruining your outfit, then.”
The stranger just winked at Elion, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine.”
And with that she was gone. Had turned and walked away, ignoring Elion’s protests of “Wait! I don’t…”
Elion trailed off in frustration, her hand wrapped tightly around the umbrella. She studied it, a small smile on her face. It was pretty. And…and quite thoughtful.
Her thoughts turned back to the pink-haired stranger. How confident she was. How playful. Picking up her canvas, she tucked it back into her bag, thinking to herself as she got up. Maybe…maybe in another life, things would’ve been different. Maybe they could’ve gotten to know each other more. Maybe the only remnant Elion had of her wouldn’t have been the umbrella.
Maybe.
Here are my top reads for this month!
For an English class assignment, we had to take a very plain and uninteresting paragraph and turn it into an interesting story following certain steps. I hope you enjoy!
The cagey jewel-thief, owner of all the prizes jewels, slunk into the despondent, dreary room, confirming that it matched the photo messages to him a few days prior. As he entered, he shivered, wishing for a brief moment that he’d thought to bring a jacket. he shook off the thought and looked around, slipping his earbuds into his pocket as he did so. His heartbeat quickened and he was forced to press a hand to his chest to calm himself down. Taking a deep breath, the man brushed his greasy, dyed-as-a-disguise hair out of his face with a trembling hand. The room was dark, seeped in shades of sepia and gray, making it hard to see. He walked over to the window and looked out apprehensively, hands shaky as they drew the curtain closed. His steps made a noise on the bare floor as he moved to examining the room. To his nervous ears, they sounded as loud as an elephant thundering through the jungle. He turned around anxiously, looking to see whether someone else was in the room, but he saw nothing but 5 pieces of furniture underneath a thin, dusty sheet. “Is this really it?” he thought, a tremulous grin blooming on his face. Nothing could stop him now. The royal tiara of Lady Martian would finally be his!
This was a fun writing exercise and forced me to be creative with all the details I added!
I recently tried a prompt about pulling a card from a deck and writing a poem based on that card. My card was the Jack of Hearts, which represents young love and playfulness. I hope you enjoy the poem I wrote!
The Jack of Hearts walks eagerly along a path,
plays with his crowns, tossing it
up, down, up down.
He surveys the courtyard, plucks a rose,
tucks it into his hair.
Sits on the swing, lets
the breeze push him
back, forth, back, forth.
Lets himself relax, lets himself
hear the beat of his heart.
Lets himself feel free,
allows himself a moment to
fall in love with the world.
Recently, I was part of a production of Kannagi, a classic Indian myth. I was part of the ensemble, playing small roles here and there, such as Kannagi’s friends in one section, or personifying bad luck in another. The entire production was around 18 minutes long, therefore being a shortened version of the story.
In the story, Kannagi meets Kovalan, a merchant, and the two fall in love and get married. However, when out on a trip, Kovalan meets the dancer Madhavi and spends all his money on her. Kannagi forgives Kovalan and gives him her anklet to trade and get money for. However, when he tries to get it sold, the jeweler charges him with the theft of the queen’s anklet, which had been missing and looked like Kannagi’s anklet. The king, normally just, orders the execution of Kovalan. When Kannagi hears of this, she is furious, opening up her anklet to prove that, unlike the queen’s, hers has rubies inside. She curses the city of Madurai to burn and becomes a goddess.
In our production, we played the role of Kannagi’s friends, dancing with her when she was joyous and celebrating the wedding, the role of bad luck, chasing Kovalan when he goes to sell the anklet, the role of soldiers, killing Kovalan, and the role of fire, showing the city burning down.
We learned this entire item in a week and I had class most days- Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday- leading up to the performance (Sunday the 8th). We learned the item in the first 4 days, using the last 2 as days to review and clean up the dance. Often, classes were 2 hours long including time to choreograph and practice.
The dance itself was a mix of styles from Southern India as the story originated from there. This included Bharatnatyam (Tamil Nadu), Mohiniyattam (Kerala), and Kathakali influences (Kerala).
During this time, I had the misfortune of injuring both my knee and my ankle. We made sure to order braces as soon as possible, hoping to alleviate the pain. Luckily, the braces did help, providing support for both areas and allowing me to continue to dance while still “resting” my leg. I wasn’t able to properly rest it with all the classes, but over time, as I continued to use the braces, the pain faded, though still there. For the final performance, I did end up wearing the knee brace.
While the performance wasn’t perfect, I was proud of what we’d learned and performed, especially at how emotional and powerful it was. It was an amazing item and I really enjoyed it and hope to learn something like it again.
I wrote this short story based on the prompt “Start your story with people arriving at a special ceremony”. I hope you enjoy!
Suspicious glances were thrown around the circle as everyone lined up in order. For a good reason, really. If anyone had caught word that they were here, that the ten people currently holding hands, cloak hoods drawn securely over their faces were traitors to the king, traitors to the country they stood for, well, there was no doubt. They’d surely be dead in a matter of seconds. No matter that the queen had called them there or that each of them were high advisors of the court. No, no matter their status, their heads would be adorning the wall the next day. A warning more than anything, proof that their king was all-mighty and to be respected.
In unison, the ten gathered around the fire, dropping each other’s hands and pulling out their letters. The queen had hand-written each one on the palace’s finest stationery, the cursive loops elegant, fitting of a queen. A quick glance wouldn’t procure anything out of place, no, everything would seem just as it should be. But reading the letter, even holding it, would be the worst form of treachery- conspiring against the king.
The letter was short, to the point: “Meet tomorrow. 11 pm. Summon whatever you must. Rid this city of my husband.” With practiced ease, as ten hands flung the letter into the fire, watching as the flames greedily gobbled up the parchment, the only remnant, ashes.
A figure stepped forward, the unofficial leader of the night. It was understood, without saying a word, that this was the spellcaster. The one who would be doing the summoning. They withdrew a handful of salt, tossing into the fire, chanting the words written oh-so-carefully on the back of the parchment. They were memorized to a T, their ancient words slipping off their tongue in practiced fashion.
Soon enough, a figure began to rise from the center, its body seemingly forming from nothing, the mist coalescing into a ragged shape of a figure. Its voice roared around the open field, more than one person clasping their hands over their ears.
“Who dares summon me to your pitiful excuse of a realm?” Looking around to see cowering figures, the brute smiled- a terrifying, ghastly smile, but a smile all the time, “Ah. I see. What a bunch of cowards.”
With a sweep of its arm, the pasture was set ablaze, the screams of the cloaked figures just white noise to its ears. It didn’t take long for the fire to spread, to burn throughout the town, to run up the buildings. A proclamation of chaos, a foreshadowing of death.
That was the last sight to many- a city on fire, the smoke choking the sky, the fumes thick and stifling. Within a few hours, it was all gone. The city was burnt to ashes. The ritual hadn’t gone exactly as planned, but, well, it had worked. The king was dead. Long live the queen.
Recently, for English class, we had to write a short story were we starred as the superhero.
As Phantom ran through the streets, dodging angry pedestrians and the occasional scooter, she couldn’t help but wish that her power let her teleport short distances. “I mean, what use even is teleportation if it only works to faraway places?” As she finally arrived at Minute Maid, she huffed, running a hand over her face. Looking up, she found herselves face to face with Typhon, the behemoth that had the nerve to be terrorizing Houston for weeks now. Normally, the problem would’ve been handed off to a larger superhero, someone way above Phantom’s pay grade- not that Phantom was getting paid- but all the local superheroes were “off on vacation”, a likely excuse. So the case had been assigned to Phantom. Lovely.
Typhon was…an interesting problem, for sure. Phantom had read her fair share of Greek mythology, devoured it in fact, and the so-called “father of all monsters” would be no small feat to defeat. Last time he had resurfaced, it had taken Zeus burying him underneath a mountain to keep him gone. As Phantom ran her eyes over his figure, she tensed, preparing herself for the onslaught of battle. She wasn’t one of the fighters, normally, that was handled more by the likes of Sylph and Undine, two higher-ranking superheroes, but she could handle a low-grade monster. Typhon…wasn’t low-grade. In the slightest. As she got into position for the upcoming fight, the advice her trainer had given her ran through her head and she took a breath, getting in stance to run and jump onto Typhon’s body, hopefully giving her a better chance to- wait, no way that was a rock, it was too... She shook her head, wrenching her gaze away from the rock, forcing herself to focus. Distractions were…unfortunately common on the job, especially shiny things…like that rock. She took a sharp breath, gazing back up at the beast in front of her. Well, better to get it over with, right?
That was the last fully formed thought she had before the fight began.
She woke up in an unfortunately familiar bed, groaning as the room came into focus. The agency that had recruited her, ACE, had rooms for each of its members, not that there were many. Phantom’s room was decorated sparsely, a few of her favorite books on the table and a poster or two of her favorite artists adorning the walls. She forced herselves to get up, wincing as her weight rested on her sore legs. Not only had she just fought Typhon, she had been to dance class just the day before. And now she was paying the price. “Not that I knew that I would be fighting this guy today,” her inner monologue reminded her.
She made her way downstairs, fidgeting with the pendant around her neck as she did. The powers that she had, well, really, she could’ve been anybody’s. She had been walking home from school one day, when something shiny caught her attention. She had kneeled down to pick up the object, a medallion, delicately engraved with a star. And…nothing had changed. She had tucked the medal into her pocket and thought nothing more of it. Things had taken a turn when, later that night, she had wished to go somewhere else, anywhere else. Being deposited in the harsh, stinging winds of the Sahara wasn’t exactly what she meant, but the medallion opened up a whole world of possibilities.
Before long, the word of her power had reached ACE, and she had reached out, offering a job and a promise of a “back-to-normal” life. Phantom had been hesitant to accept at first, but now, a year later, it was the last thing she regretted. She had been able to go back to school as Iniya- living a normal life with normal friends and normal classes. Most of the time, she was free to be herselves- going to dance classes, reading a lot, everything she had done normally. However, ever so often, her pendant- that medal she had picked up that fateful day- would begin to glow, softly at first, then more intensely, until she went and battled the villain that had chosen to terrorize the city that day.
The power to teleport was fun, sure, but…as just a high schooler, there wasn’t a lot to do with it. One day, far in the future, she wanted to be known. Known for doing good. Known for being a strong force in the world who people looked up to. Her dream of all dreams, not that she would tell anyone, was to rescue people around the world, freeing her from situations of peril and conflict. She could only hope that ACE would sponsor that dream of hers.
Even with that dream, Iniya hoped to settle down for life later, not as Phantom, but as herself. Get a good, steady job, have a nice house, a few cats, the works. She didn’t hate being a superhero, far from it, but she didn’t want that to be her entire life. She wanted a life dictated by her, not by a medallion picked up on the street or an agency that happened to realize her power. But that was in the future. For now, all she wanted was to survive in high school, no, more than survive, thrive.
Iniya left the agency with a backwards glance and a smile to Rose, her favorite concierge. As she headed home, she permitted herself a glance at the window of her favorite bookshop, admiring its neat and colorful displays. She had been hoping to buy herself a copy of ‘If We Were Villains’, one of the best books she had read in a while, but it had been sold out for a while. Reading was one of the things Iniya genuinely enjoyed and nothing could pull her away from a good book. Ever since she was young, her parents had encouraged her love of reading…which had potentially backfired as Iniya now needed a book in hand to even think about going to any social event.
Breaking away from her thoughts, Iniya focused on the tasks ahead of her. She would need to get home, recharge, work on homework, then get ready for the next round of fighting, after all, there was no way that Typhon would have been killed from just one volley of attacks. She headed home, already formulating a plan for her next attack. Phantom’s fighting style wasn’t anything incredibly unique, other than added acrobatics, usually just to show off. She had been hoping to add archery into her fighting style for ages now, though ACE had been picky about sponsoring her classes. Rolling her shoulders back, she let herself into the house, disappearing into her room to start studying for her math test. “Really,” she thought, “Math teachers should be more forgiving towards students who are quite literally superheroes.”
A few hours later, Iniya was ready to go, this time as Phantom- (hopefully) killer of Typhon. Typhon had retreated slightly, moving over to the Botanic Gardens and as Phantom ran through the foliage, she couldn’t help but wonder at the flora. “Maybe I should come here sometime…”. She ran up to Typhon, standing there, with the sun at her back, flanked by both Sylph and Undine, offering nods to her both, though her inner voice was screaming at her just casually standing next to the two greatest superheroes the city had. But now wasn’t the time.
So with the sunset fast approaching, the three stood together, one final force against the father of all monsters, one stand against death. It was time.
I hope you enjoyed reading!
In just a few days, I’ll be in my sophomore year of high school. I’ll be taking more AP (Advanced Placement) courses and my workload will increase. I’ll also be spending more time on dance as well as other extracurriculars. All the same, I’m looking forward to that time and am excited to get back to a solid routine!
In school, I’ll be taking English 2, Chemistry, AP World History, AP Pre-calculus, AP Statistics, Spanish 3, and AP Seminar, a research based class. All of the AP’s are going to be tough and I’ll have to take a test for each of them at the end of the school year. Additionally, I’ve heard that Spanish 3 is a tough course, so I’ll be sure to put in a lot of time and effort to study for it.
Even though I’ll be doing a lot of work this year, I hope that I’ll have a fun time overall and will learn a lot from all the classes!
Here are my top picks for July!
Top Books of January
Top Books of February
Top Books of March
Top Books of April
Top Books of May
Top Books of June
