First place: “I Wish I Was Born a Long Time Ago” by Brielle Fox

Second place: “Gifted Kid Burnout” by Dylan O’Brien

Third place: “The Woods” by Allison Urbanski

“I Wish I Was Born a Long Time Ago”

Walking through the pines and forested trees

Which have rotten up and died

The wind blowing in the breeze

Is blowing a growing tide

The thorns that nestle under my feet

Poke harder through my shoes

The new clothes I bought

I never really needed more

82% of Americans buy clothes that

Lay in piles never to be worn

The woods I knew as a child

There are no traces left

This never was my vision

The trees have to be arranged now

For them to truly grow

15.2 billion trees chopped down a year

I never would have known

At almost every school desk is

The animals out in the wild

I thought I saw them often

Until I found out 68% of them are dead.

The oceans that I swim

Every part of our world

The future of our planet is an uprising

We were not born in the wrong decade

We were born to make a change

Not to listen to what were told

But to stand against the façade

Destroy the shackles of years

And create a promised future.

The word I formerly loved

Now the word I hate

A hatred for being judged

But an addict hooked on their praise

Parents bragging I took algebra in seventh grade

Back when I still had an a

Now I’ll get notified at 9pm

To swear I’ll never go down that road again

The grade books see more f’s than A’s

And I wish I could go back to that day

Back to that day and tell them they got it twisted

Back to that day they first called me gifted

Got told growing up how I was so special

But it wasn’t luck that got me those medals

Breaking points taught not as warnings

But instead like obstacles to overcome

They’ll say the kids are learning

While we’re taught to treat breaks like drugs

Taught every word in the English language

Every word except for one

A story from that program a

All too familiar to each and every one

My name is James Cutthorn. And I swear I’m not crazy. Let me explain.

It started two weeks ago at my cabin in South Dakota. It’s January here, so we see a lot of snow. I try to stay indoors when the snow gets really bad, but sometimes going outside is unavoidable. This particular day, I had to go out in one of the worst storms I’ve seen in a long time to gather some wood for my fire as I had run low and hadn’t realized until it was already storming. I grabbed my axe and headed into the cold. The landscape was bleak, and with the blowing snow all around me, I could barely see 20 feet ahead of me. I should have taken that as a sign to turn around and go back inside, but I couldn’t. I walked out into the wind and blinding snow to the small patch of trees about 50 feet from my house. I walked up to the first tree, which was smaller than it should have been due to the previous year’s dry summer and proceeded to chop it down. I dragged it back to my house, planning on chopping it up and taking it right in. I set it down, and as I raised my axe to take the first swing into the wood, I heard a blood-curdling, heart-stopping howl. Not like a wolf’s or coyote’s - it sounded almost human. I thought it might have been the wind. Brushing the sound off like brushing snow from my now freezing shoulder, I swung down and, as my axe blade bit into the tree, I heard the howl again and I almost dropped my axe. I looked up, and thought I saw a figure, 15 feet away, staring at me. I blinked, shook my head, and it was gone. ‘My imagination’ I told myself, but deep down, I didn’t believe it. I hurried to finish chopping the small tree up and went inside with my fresh wood. I had good timing, too, as my fire had almost gone out and my cabin was colder than it should have been. I put more wood on the fire and sat down in my chair with a hot cup of tea and tried to relax; but I couldn’t get the strange silhouette out of my mind. Who was it, or better yet, what was it? I sipped my tea contemplatively until the light from my windows grew dim and I decided that I should eat a bit of something and go to bed.

As I was brushing my teeth, I looked up to see a smudge on the mirror that looked like someone, or something, standing behind me. I tried to wipe it off, but it didn’t disappear. I looked behind me to see if someone was, in fact, standing there; but no, I was alone. I looked back at the mirror, and the smudge was gone. I shivered. I was miles from any type of civilization and yet I felt like I wasn’t alone in my own tiny cabin.

I shook my head as I climbed into bed and pulled the covers up to my nose. Even with my bed right next to the fireplace, I was still cold with the thought that something could be in those woods. As my eyes closed, the figure drifted from my mind and sleep drifted in. Suddenly, I was awakened by a strange sound coming from my window. I bolted up like a shot and flew to my window. I tried to wipe the fog from it and the bleariness from my eyes. I saw nothing in the darkness. I heard the knock again. It was coming from behind me. I slowly turned around, dreading the thought of what I might see. I fully turned to face the mirror, and my heart stopped with what I had already predicted would be there. The figure, now fully visible compared to in the snowstorm, had met my eyes from inside the mirror. I backed away and bumped into the cold wall. The figure, without dropping eye contact, reached forward, and its arm came through the mirror. I screamed, ran for my axe, which I had left by the door, and swung for the figure’s arm. I made direct contact, and the arm flew off. An ear-shattering scream ripped through that cold winter night. It was so loud, I blacked out. I woke up the next morning in my bed with nothing out of the ordinary. My axe was by the door and my fire crackled peacefully. And then I noticed the black goop dripping from my bathroom sink and mirror…