THE LIVELY ARTS 2020 Contents New York from My Porch—Sophia Greenaway ............ 3 Where I’m From—Emiri Mogami ................... 25 Queens Kid—Emily Cronin ......................... 5 Finally and Simply, Alive—Mei Geller ................. 26 I Am Not Strong—Miles Simon ...................... 5 Why I Know Nothing about War and Probably Never Will—Lucy Goodman ............. 28 Miles—Brooke Randle............................. 5 The Legend of Zelda’s Jabberwocky—Lina Abdalla ........ 29 The Pretend Girl—Stella McCabe-Soares ................ 6 Love—Ashley Nicole Siriban ....................... 29 The Free Fall—John LoBello ......................... 7 In the Morning—Kelly Ye ......................... 30 The Wicked Stepmother (Modern Version)—Christoph Cardoza ................. 8 Holed up—Jeanne Bransbourg ...................... 30 My Wistful Desire—Nathaniel Santana ................. 8 Louisville—Sarah Meredith ........................ 30 Burnt Out—Jane Wu ............................. 9 Becoming a Black Violinist—Glenjanée Robertson ......... 31 The Grimm QuaranTEEN—Emi Bauman .............. 10 My Love-Hate Relationship with Japan—Emiri Mogami ..... 32 When the Great War Ended—Celia Fung ............... 12 Nessie the Curator—Abby Chen Rose ................. 34 In Defense of U Thant Island—Tara Atluri.............. 12 Observations Outside of My Brooklyn Window—Delia Mandik ................... 35 The Lycoris Radiata—Crystal Huang .................. 13 Childhood in a Park—Jeanne Bransbourg .............. 35 Bien Pretty—Skye Williams ........................ 14 Love—Geneva Foster-Narvaez ...................... 36 Brooklyn—Brooke Randle ......................... 15 The View from My Window—Faye Arranz ............. 37 Exhausted—Clarissa Yen .......................... 15 Riverdale—Luke Alfasso .......................... 38 Suspicion—Abigail Bernardeau ..................... 15 eight twenty eight pm—Maggie Ma .................. 38 Lost—Kristina Sheredos .......................... 15 This Isn’t a Story—Tucker Smith ..................... 39 Saturday Morning—Tara Atluri ..................... 16 Observing a Bird in Early Morning—Lola Simon ......... 39 seventeen years—Paige Levy ....................... 17 The Young Fairy and the Gal—Vanessa Camacho ......... 40 Masks—Fauri Estevez ............................ 17 The Princess and the Misjudged Home—Katherine Hong .......................... 18 Creatures—Fiona Jacobson-Yang .................... 41 Governors Island at 4:57—Lauren Corcoran ............. 19 Gene Luen Yang Research Paper—Henry Mei ............ 42 Lights in the Sky—Glenjanée Robertson ................ 20 A Little Old Gazebo—Tamar Gayle ................... 44 Tourist (after Jamaica Kincaid)—Henry Mei ............. 20 Blackout Sestina—Lola Simon ...................... 45 Hope—Christopher Guthrie ........................ 21 The Revolution WILL Be Televised—Meiling Parrish ....... 46 A Fungi Tale—Meiling Parrish ...................... 22 The Lively Arts 2020 Copyright © 2020 Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts 100 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10023 Yeou-Jey Vasconcelos, Principal Richard A. Carranza, Chancellor, New York City Department of Education Bill de Blasio, Mayor, City of New York Cover Art Front cover: Fiona Jacobson-Yang Back cover: Sharron Qian Faculty Advisor Soula Harisiadis Special Thanks Yeou-Jey Vasconcelos, Principal Julissa Marrero, A.P. English The English Department Linda Johnson Mary Colonna Students of the Creative Writing Classes The Art Department Parents Association of LaGuardia High School LaGuardia High School Alumni & Friends Music & Art 1955 Alumni Class Extra Special Thanks Alan Barnett New York from My Porch Sophia Greenaway My streets used to be filled with a blissful silence. My porch, bare from the hustle and bustle of life in the Big Apple. My brother, a stranger. My life needing constant sleep. Time never seeming to slow down. My streets are now filled with an eerie silence. The reality of the world weighs heavy on us all. My porch is now filled with chairs and a table. A set to view the masks walking down the street. Flowers scattered across her to add a sense of liveliness the neighborhood so desperately craves. My brother is now my brother. The distance of his college and its strain no longer six hours deep. My life needs not sleep, but activity. My body yearning for the countless hours of dancing she used to endure. Time slower than molasses. My streets are now filled with the endless honking of cars. Graduation celebratory moments now condensed into one block. My porch is filled with board games and simple breezes. A slice of paradise in a traveless time. My brother and I are siblings beginning to understand each other. My life no longer in dire need of activity or sleep, but rather safety. Safety from those in power, safety from those who despise my melanin, safety from those who despise my loved ones. Time seemingly turning back. The Lively Arts 2020 | 3 4 | The Lively Arts 2020 Art: Kaayla Lee Queens Kid I Am Not Strong (Inspired by “Where I’m From” by George Ella Lyon) Miles Simon Emily Cronin I am not strong as we have been taught to know the word. I am from the hand-painted puppets from Delhi sitting I break easily, and cannot push past in the attic and staring at the plastic American without being drawn to look back. wrestlers fighting I am not the rock that weathers in their little ring since the ’80s. whatever is thrown at it. From the organized baseball card collection sitting I am volatile, in the image of that “whatever” underneath the old baby bed, I break easily, and cannot seem to be and the records in the garage from 1970 to 1988 purged of a pity from Prince to the Breakfast Club soundtrack. (that wandered in while I was lost in thought The 2012 presidential debate blasting on our boxy television set, and stayed when it was accidentally loved). and freshly cut hydrangeas I break easily, but when I do… in the vase at the center of the old wooden dining room table. From socks getting stuck in the tiny nails sticking up Oh! from the wooden flooring To dip the shards of me I can find next to the piano you hated because you were forced into the space filled to take lessons by that hallowed hollow rightly called a soul every Wednesday. (that tar-like wine) (Classic rock would play on your dad’s car radio And to be humbled on the way there and to bathe in delicate rapture. you were fully convinced there were eight days a week All I am is the example I know because the Beatles told you so.) best of what a person can be. I’m from tea kettle screams, super glue mouse traps, and chana masala. I’m from sandy sneakers at Jones Beach field 6 Miles in between the green flags, Brooke Randle and watching the Belmont Stakes at Triple Crown Diner At 3 around the block. I could spell my name From the old ladies with fancy hats passing by I could recite my ABCs almost perfectly the Salvation Army, I learned in bedrooms and the mango on the ground of the Patel Brothers One with my sister in Riverside getting crushed by shopping carts and One with my mom in Harlem kids with Burger King crowns. Half a mile apart I was a monkey I am from the smell of hand sanitizer in the hospital and Half a mile from the blow-up mattresses chlorine from the YMCA pool. The green playground From the words Half a mile from Cafe Max BREAKING NEWS I was an illegal barber blinding me in the darkness, Half a mile from the hill I hated walking up and the man in the subway My sister remembers 0 miles playing the steel drums. Half a mile to 1 mile to 3 miles The Lively Arts 2020 | 5 The Pretend Girl Stella McCabe-Soares Once upon a time there was a young girl who lived a for adventure and now she wanted to be well liked at very ordinary life. She had two parents who loved her school and wished for the admiration of her peers. very much and a younger brother who always com- She did not have many friends and so she decided to peted with her. She loved books and playing pretend, act like her classmates who were more popular. She and envied the adventure and drama that existed in bought clothes that looked like theirs, cut her hair them, resenting her ordinary, simple life. like their hair and began to talk like them and did her The girl’s fascination with books and envy of the best to live her life the way they seemed to live theirs. characters made her want to be like the people she However, for some reason she did not gain any friends read about, and so she began to act like them. She and lost the few friends she had. She was no longer a studied the words they used and the clothes they favorite of her teachers, and her new hairstyle did not wore until one would swear the books had been writ- suit her face shape at all, and so she decided to go back ten about her. First she was Lucy Pevensie from The to being herself. Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Then she became Again she threw away her pretend clothes and she Annika, and soon morphed into Annika’s more excit- fixed her hair and she lay in bed hoping that when she ing neighbor, Pippi Longstocking herself. woke up, she would be herself again. Although the little girl tried and tried to be like the Who am I really? She asked the sky, and again the book characters, she found that no matter how much old cat appeared at her window ledge and, pitying the she hoped and pretended, the wardrobe would not girl who did not think she was enough, said reveal another world to her and the adventure she You tried to be someone you are not sought would not come. I will help you Begrudgingly, the girl decided to become herself If you promise never to imitate a classmate again. again. The girl eagerly agreed, and when she awoke she However, after so much pretending, she couldn’t was happy to find she was herself again.