Page 44 - HEF Pen & Ink 2020

DRUGS
by Marie Romano
Soon in this world
The pollution
Addiction
And our drug fixation
Will now expel out of the picture Like the tar expels out of our lungs
FLAMED BOOTS
by Brandon McMillan
THE CAPTAIN AND HIS SHIP
by Justin Hatzenbuehler
He gripped the wheel tightly. Holding on in this crashing rain was near impossible, but he had to. He was given this responsibility, and he was not go- ing to let anyone stop him. Not even the beast tearing his ship in half. He had to move the boat into posi- tion, the rain never letting up, the waves throwing it like a child in a bath, and the beast trying to demolish what he worked for. The beast towering above the water with massive teeth and leathery skin, taller than the mast.
The sticks and sticks upon tobacco Grow like sticks on a tree
And will soon burn
For our desire
To feel higher
Like society wants us to be
Powder spills from the bag
As if snow was falling from the sky Melting away
At the intake
As we try to get up and rake
Away at the floor to escape
And with the
Drugs upon drugs
We force into our body
They claw out to escape
And leave us damaged...
An overdose that can break you
UNTITLED
Elsa Grebenc
It felt impossible. Until hope rang through the sound of “BROADSIDES READY TO FIRE!”
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All he had to do was wait for the perfect mo- ment. That split second that decided both the boat’s and everyone’s fates. He waited. Rain thundering. Hearts pounding. Wind screeching. This was his time. He saw the opportunity and seized it.
He yelled at the top of his lungs, “FIRE!” The thunderous clap of the cannons going one by one until all ten were fired. Repeatedly striking the beast until it stopped attacking. The beast was destroyed, flailing and falling to the bottom of the sea to be for- gotten, but remembered in the stories to be told.
They all cheered with joy and victory. The beast had been defeated. He led his crew to victory. But everything was shattered when the shower head turned off and he looked at his toy boat and dinosaur, all while the bath started to drain... but his imagina- tion lived on forever.