You Can't Have it All

But you can have tubs of ice cream for late Sunday nights, and it’s brain freezes, like multiple electric shocks.
You can have soft pink petals of the cherry blossom trees, falling like snow in Spring time.
You can see the world in your own eyes, and use a kaleidoscope of imagination to make it colorful.
You can have hope and the ability to dream, to help you wake up in the morning, even if its a Monday.
You can have the cries of the sea gulls, that aren’t so annoying anymore, relax you and make you drift away from the world.
You can have dreams, where no one can interfere, where you set sail on your own bed to entertain you in your sleep.
You can take a blank sheet of paper and fill it with words, words that can mean something.
You can have springs in your mattress to jump on for when your parents aren’t home to scold you.
You can hear the ocean through the sea shell, close your eyes, and feel the ocean at the tips of your fingers.
You can’t always please your parents, but you can soften their hearts by giving them the puppy eyes.
You can always have the one friend you don’t feel embarrassed around and where your finally yourself.
You can wish upon falling stars, 11:11’s, and good luck charms again and again.
You can have two luminous eyes of the cat staring at you early in the morning, saying “feed me.”
You can have those pair of sneakers that feel as one with your feet.
You can’t have gorgeous hair, but you can have hair spray and anti-frizz’s to tame them.
You can’t fly, but you can jump on a trampoline, higher and higher, willing your hands to touch the clouds.
You can have rain, buckets of rain, to dance, walk, and sing in.
You can’t always have the knight in shining armor, but you can fantasize of scenes in movies, of the kisses in the rain.
You can have adrenaline rushes when he catches your eye.
You can have friends who you can lean on, and best friends to do crazy things with.
You can’t always have the perfect, picture-perfect skin, but you can put on a winning smile to show you don’t care.
You can’t always have the long end of the wishing bone, or find a four-leaved clover, but you can have a choice to pick your freedom, your path, and what you can have.

Ballet White-Benjamin Moore OC-9

Their faces, masked
with make up.
Concealer and eyeliner for older girls,
blush and lip gloss for younger ones.

She begged her mother
for just a puff of soft, sweet make up.
She appeared on stage without it.

Her cheeks red
from pinching them to make it look like blush,
everyone else in fancy make up,
she stood with red cheeks.

A ballet recital,
they got a dress, too white for ivory,
yet not white at all.
Delicate, graceful, elegant.
"Perfect with blush and sparkles."

"Ballet is for dancing,
not to wear make up"
her mother would chide.

Faces masked
with make up, that kissed their skin,
the stage light illuminating,
every brush,
every slick,
every feature.

Her dress so innocent,
irresistible,
everyone looked more
beautiful.

She wants to,
needs to camouflage,
to hide herself,
her beauty, her soul.

The light shines on her,
with just her dress,
her ballet white dress,
to make her feel beautiful.

Their faces masked,
dress, ballet white,
face, unmasked.

As Simple As Snow by Gregory Galloway

Publisher: Penguin Group

Where I got it: It was recommended by a friend.

One Sentence Summary: Anna, or Anastasia, Cayne is a slightly mysterious, or creepy as her peers would say, high school girl; who believes in voodoo and Houdini spells, the protagonist is a boy who falls in love with Anna and write obituaries together; Anna soon disappears, and only a string of clues left for him to figure out.

First sentence of the book: Anna Cayne had moved here in August, just before our sophomore year in high school, but by February she had, one by one, killed everyone in town.

First Chapter Review: In the first chapter, he begins to explain Anna and his life as he takes the reader back to how it all began, from Anna's unusual personality, friends, background, and clothes, to where he struggles to find something extraordinary in life.

Verdict: This book is something I would suggest to everyone, maybe not boys, and would read again to try to figure out the complications that the book holds.

Cover Comments: The cover shows a girl kneeling in a black dress, fishnet stocking stockings, and black boots. I'm guessing this is Anna. Underneath her is a picture of a snow angel in the snow, making it Winter when Anna disappears.

No More Fun

He lost himself
in a maze of thoughts.
This meeting must not be fun,
but business.

Grass was worn away in front of each trunk,
but grew tall and untrodden in the center.
The sun was slanting in,
so that the shadows were where they ought to be.

Ralph turns to the chief's seat.
Grey trunks rose in front, the beach on both sides, and
the darkness of the island.
He lost himself
in deep waters.

"We need an assembly,
not for fun,
not for making jokes,
not for laughing and falling.
But to put things straight."

"You voted me chief
things are breaking up,
we began well;
we were happy."
Jack stood, scowling in the gloom.

"Fear can't hurt you
more than a dream,
serves you right
if something did get you.
But there is no animal."

Jack was a hunter all right.
No one doubted that.

"He said the beast comes
from the sea."
The last laugh died away.
"If there's a beast,
we'll close in and
beat and beat and beat--!"

"If jack were chief,
we'd be here 'till we died."
"Grown ups won't set fire to the island--"
"They'd build a ship--"
"They wouldn't quarrel--"
"Or break my specs--"
"Or talk about a beast."

The three boys
stood in the darkness,
lost deep in waters.

Where I am From...

I am from firework watching from the balcony and barbeques,
from Black & Decker late nights with friends and neighbours
and the beat of explosion in our hearts.

I am from the tall apartments and freshly mown grass
that felt like rain againt my legs,
I am from the lillies in vases that always smelt burnt.
I am from plucking petals off daisies;
"He loves me... he loves me not...", with the many petals
and the yellow core that's all is left.

I am from yearly family dinners, and family trips to Disney Land,
from road trips with brown bags ready.
I am from watching baseball on the couch the ice in the oolong tea melting.

I am from don't wear my make up and don't touch my clothes.
I am from the insults from my sister,
and the hand-me-down clothes.

I am from neatly stacked books, newly cut flowers
and the daily polished windows.

I am from smiling will get you far in life,
and don't jude a book by it's cover.

I am from my mother stuffing me in stiff clothes being dragged to church.
I am from don't do this and don't say that.
I am from saying a prayer before meals
and suppresing eye-rolling.

I am from Kawasaki, Japan.
I am from sushi with aunts and ramen with giddy uncles.

I am from strawberry picking on early Summer mornings,
from cards with worn edges,
I am from car trips to grandad's farm.

I am from reach for the stars,
and you can do better than that.

I am from the pig tail wearing girl in the glossy picture
of the family trip to Sydney.
From the porcelain Japanese doll that sits on the piano.
I am from the trunk that stores hundreds of those pristine photographs of our family laughing.

I am from the stiff, strong, and elegant branches of the sakura tree that grows in my grandmother's backyard with the forever changing leaves.

Tsunami Hits Japan

It was 2:46 when the ground beneath us began to shift. The capacious classroom was soon filled with copious amounts of tumbling textbooks and flying paper. The ground continued to shake and we were thrown back on to the wooden floor. Screams were audible from down the hallway as the teachers hastily tried to regain control over the students when it was obvious it was crucial to get the students to safety. Miyagi, Japan was where the tsunamis hit, we had to get to the roof fast.

The kids were fitful older brothers and sister were shouting out for their younger siblings, the azure blue of the sky was now filled with fire and dust as the nuclear plant near by burst into flames. The fastidious teachers took attendance quickly and the banter among the boys were silenced. The shaking earth decelerated before shaking even more furiously, throwing us back on to the floor.

Settling down the children were facilitated once on the roof. Emergency blankets, water, and food were deployed as the cool March wind howled with smoke. A pang of debris and sea water filled our noses, we looked down to see a wave of water pushing it's way through the city. Cars, dirt, broken parts of houses floated helplessly in the power of the wave as citizens pushed people aside to get away from the horror that chased them. We watched people scream for loved ones, looking frantically even if it meant going into buildings that could crumble any minute now.

Wasted: A Memoir on Anorexia and Bulimia

The title of the memoir I read, is Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia. I think that the title Wasted reflects on the main character, Marya Hornbacher. She became an anorexic and bulimic person as she grew up, so the title shows how she wasted her body and life because of her obsession with food and her paranoia of becoming an over-weight person.

Marya Hornbacher became so conscious about her weight ever since she turned three years old. She would call herself fat in front of a mirror, play with her food, and refuse to eat ever since she could remember. Her father was warm towards her, and was going on and off diets. Her mother however, had continuous mood swings, one time, playing Barbies with her, another, picking at her food and acting very much like who Marya grew up to be. Her parents were constantly fighting, taking their arguments out on her, competing to be the better parent. Marya would try to be like her mother, cool and collected, while her father would tell her to stay a kid forever, and her mother wanting her to hurry up and grow up.

The memoir was written as a novel and how the Marya Hornbacher today, looks back onto her childhood and how she became a bulimic-anorexic. The memorist, Marya came to know how she pushed away everyone in her life, refusing to eat when she was so small she shouldn’t have to worry, and already getting an eating disorder. And then eating as if her stomach was a bottomless pit and then puking it out as a child. hooking up continuously with boys she hardly knew, getting pregnant during high school twice. She worked hard at a newspaper company as a journalist as she became older, and refusing to take a break, and working more than she’s paid to. She became obsessed in to keeping herself occupied so she wouldn’t have to constantly eat.

I think the book was really creative and how she described how she felt as she went through hospitals, homes for the mentally ill, and then her parents. She makes the reader feel as if they could feel their own bone jutting out awkwardly the way her’s felt. Although some may find it endless and tiring to hear about the memorist’s weight, other girls can relate to what Marya was going through, growing up with the fights with her parents, and being targeted by the boys in her grade due to her early puberty.

Some lines I loved are; “I would lift off into the sky, float over the iced white streets, yes, that was death, and I was the princess trapped in a cage, dying of a broken heart. That was death.” And “The self I’d had, once upon a time, was too much. Now there was no self at all. I was blank.” And “checking my bones, feeling for signs of softness, my brain veering back and forth from pig-pig-pig-fat-pig to stop-it-you’re-okay-it’s-okay-okay-okay”.

I thought the book was very insightful and helped the reader understand how bulimia and anorexia is not just about their vagueness and how they only care about their weight, but Marya Hornbacher shows how there is also fear and how she was unable to open up to anyone and didn’t feel like she can live a normal life. The memoirist went through a suicidal phase so I thought that would help the reader understand and be able to connect to her.