stream of teen spirit

exercise #7

Close your eyes.

Relax. 

Think to yourself: "Nothing exists but this moment. 

There is no place to go, nothing to do. Everything is perfect."

Imagine yourself in a landscape that feels good to you: safe, inviting.  You may or may not have ever been there before.

You are walking & you know you are looking for something.

Feel everything, see everything, hear everything, even taste everything.  Use all your senses.

You round the corner & suddenly you see a  dwelling of some kind: a tree, a shack, a cottage, a cave, a hole in the ground, a ripped up box on a street corner, any kind of dwelling.

You know what you are looking for is inside & you climb/walk/lower yourself inside.

Again, use all your senses once inside, reacclimate yourself to your new environment.

You realize there is someone else inside.  Surprise yourself: Who is it?

You realize they have what you are looking for. 

You approach them.You ask them a question. What is it?

They pull out a magical box, beautiful, special.  You know what you are looking for is inside.

The box is locked.  You realize ~ you have the key.

Inside, wrapped so ornately, so carefully is one of your biggest challenges, one of your hugest hurdles ~ & right next to it, the tool that only you can use to solve it.

Start writing now.  Start anywhere. Start now.

a tool & a challenge (the key) (exercise #7)

Down the warm, familiar road with

stones, sharp and plenty

I continue not fast but not slow

my bare feet hit the

ground

               dancing

                                twirling

the green skirts of my dress

swirling.

The path off the dusty

road is soft and cool

warm streams of sunlight

fall.

My river splits around my

throne of rock

comforting breeze

and bird calls.

Lush, green trees sway

I only stop for a moment to feel

crystal waters glide over

and around

obstacles.

Following a path only I can see

I walk with the river

rounding the bend

I find home

safe, warm, caring.

I don't hesitate long

drawn in.

HE is there. strong, trusting,

my better half

holding a box of silver shining bright

instinctively my hand goes to my necklace.

Unlocking the box I find

a challenge and a tool.

Beauty brings tears

strength unknown fills me.

~ lindsay osgood, 15, (chester, vt)

the key and the cave (exercise #7)

My dad is standing in a cave. He looks at me and says he loves me so much, that he will love me forever. The key opens the box, revealing a bible and some other things - but it's fuzzy and I can't make them out. He says, "don't make the same mistakes I did, I'm sorry for being such a lousy father, I didn't mean to hurt you or mom but I did and I can't say how sorry I am for everything."

~ marissa varga, 16, (chester, vt)

a crush, a box, a key (exercise #7)

I open the box with a key

Getting over grandpa's death. Choosing between a crush and a boyfriend. The truth of things and of people. I am a little amazed when I see what I have overcome but appalled by what challenges I face. I take out a heart with chains and locks on it. I feel my neck and I feel the silk ribbon and I smile.

- shelby, (chester, vt)

believe in the lord (exercise #7)

Walking down this winding road, green grass, warm air, children playful and smiles. What better to come upon than a little cottage with a flowered boarder looking like a picture.  I step inside. I know this place. I've seem it in my dreams, it comes to me at night. Now I am here, waiting. Waiting for what?  A beacon of light makes me squint. An angel from heaven has come to take me - he beckons me forward. I feel my feet move, but I am not moving them. I feel safe. The angel hands me a box of gold -light and shining. But the box is locked. I look up at him and he motions to his neck. I do the same. A large, old, Victorian key hangs around my neck. I snap it off and with a shaky hand I unlock the golden box.  Inside I find two objects: a tool and a thought.  The thought is in an envelope, I take it out and light flows out. I know what it says:

"why does this happen to me?" "why am I alone?"

The angel smiles. I look into the box and I pull out a bible, old and locked. I use the key to open it and in perfect cursive it says, "believe in the Lord, he is the key."

As I gape at these words, the angel kisses me on the head and disappears. I am alone again but with a new found strength.

~taylor lefevre, 16, (chester, vt)

the key (exercise #7)

The box now empty, you still feel like there is something in the box, still you look closer and discover a hole neither big nor small. Just a medium sized hole. It glows with the brightest light, almost destroying any problem which it hits. Putting the key up to the light you notice it's not a typical key, but a key of splendiful power because with this key you can solve all your problems - just with a turn of a key.  You start to think , "would I really like to get rid of all my problems, or would I like to solve them myself?"

Then I notice the second keyhole. I turn the key again and I am in a different place surrounded by grass and in the far distance I notice a tree. This tree is magical. Unlike most trees, this tree flies high above ground. Before I get there, a bird flies from the tree and I am back where I first started, with all the same problems I started with.

~ nathan a.,17 (chester, vt)

what i find in the box is my future (exercise #7)

I am at a pivotal point in my life when I have to make many decisions that will heavily influence the rest of my life. A tool that will help me work through all of these decisions is not something that can be seen of felt physically. It is internal. My tool is strength, perseverance and will. The will to become the best person I can be. The strength to be able to make important decisions.  The perseverance make it through and to know that everything will be ok.

I face many obstacles that will block my path. The largest being my own lack of strength, perseverance and will.  I must keep my goal in mind in order to keep hold of my tools.

Every now and again, I get to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  A fleeting glimpse of what can happen; what I can make happen.

~ evan d., (brattleboro, vt)

defeating myself (exercise #7)

I open the box held in the mysterious, dark, swamp-thing like man's hands then taking a quick glance into his hole-like eyes, I snatch the box from his frozen, stiff, rotting grasp and quickly unwrap the tools as I drop the box with the beautiful troubles crashing and smashing all over the porcelain tiles. As I make the first tear in the wrapping, I find myself unraveling my lost saber. The man figure astonished and wheezing takes one feeble step backwards before I lunge the knife into his chest.  Light bursts from him revealing a new, omniscient being.  His face is revealed. I have finally defeated myself. All is resolved.

~pat s., (brattleboro, vt)

the key (exercise #7)

I didn't know that the place I would end up could ever be so different from the outside world.  Feet away, the colors of a warm summer day lived; a utopia I had always imagined and had somehow stumbled across.

It was warm, with a faint breeze that cooled but did not chill.  The leaves were impossibly green on each tree I passed. The trunks aligned as if into a path for me to follow. So I did. I walked down the path, as if following a giant arrow pointing the way.

He took me to a beautiful pool of water; small waterfalls flooded down the cave with a massive one pouring down in the middle - a little too perfect.  There was a cave opening behind the large waterfall. Aren't there always?  But now wasn't the time for an original landscape. So I crawled my way slowly along the side of the cliff until I was behind the water.

Inside it all changed. I was in a coma following along in a never ending dream.  It had all kinda made sense up until now, or at least I had no problem playing along. So why had my subconscious brought me to this lair?  What happened to the pretty butterflies and sweet flower smells?  I didn't like it but I kept walking, because that's just what you do in a dream. Part of you tries to reason but your feet still take you where they are supposed to go.

That's when I saw him standing tall and beautiful amidst deep reds and blackest blacks of the shapes all around him: couches, shelves, tables and chairs. I had stumbled into his hidden home - Borderline Goth and verging on tacky and somewhat regal. Still, I felt I was somewhere important.

I calmly walked up to him. We knew each other and his name was on the tip of my tongue. Looking at each other, he reached into his chest pocket without taking his off mine.

The silver box caught a flicker of the candle light, and my eyes shifted.  He was old, scuffed and charred, but still beautiful.  I knew that what was in that box was mine, but I needed to hold it in my hands one more time before I could let myself accept that it had found its way back to me.

~ christine w., (brattleboro, vt)

   

the key (exercise #7)

I come out of the arched exit from the woods and see the vibrant colors of the quarry.  The rocks don't seem to have lines that define them, and every color seems to . I walk down the path that leads deeper into the rocks and the trees strike me as being alive with the reds and oranges of Fall.  I round the trail to the left and the reds of the trees vanish to the pale but striking contrast of three walls of stone and the bright reflection of sun off water - a pond made by rainfall and as temporary as the bright leaves.  In the center of the barren rocky clearing whose life could be summed up by its sparing grasses and the occasional bird, is a small cabin.  The cabin is simply made, with log walls, and little in the way of luxury, though builders did afford the luxury of glass for the windows.  I walk in and see a girl standing in the center of the cabin which is lit beautifully with the natural color of the wood it is made from.  The girl is also very beautiful, and she wears the same coy smile she does every time my eyes have the pleasure of her company.  The room stands still as I enter and I notice a wonderful smell akin to her name - Lily. The troubles of the world forgotten. I am happy in this place

~ anonymous (brattleboro, vt)