P.O.W.

by: Surreal As Sunlight

You were the backstabbing spy
Who though you could take the kill
You ran and hit the trip-wire
And now it's all downhill

You put yourself in a prison
Any time you can you'd go for it
but you just don't know
that you're only losing it

If you knew the truth, it would kill you.

You watched your enemy take victory
Yet you still feel the war is still on
Trying to salvage anything that's left
Too bad, it's all gone

IF you KNEW the truth, it would KILL you.

Sadly enough you think you're smart
Acting a spy, coping every move
Too bad everyone could spot you
A mile away, I could prove

If you knew the truth, it would kill YOU.

You're kept safe in your cell
Sugared by the lies of the guards
You still have hope
Hope that I would disregard.

Amputation

by: slanted

If I could tell you
One thing

Goodbye

I'm better off
Without your
Smiling "whatever"

You don't do
Me any good
Anymore

Because you are real
To me

And you shouldn't be

So upset
Since you made it clear

I never did you
Any good
At all

But then that is much more
Than just one thing

Goodbye

L I T E R A R Y M A G A Z I N E

For those of you who don't know, Literary Magazine is Naperville Central's award winning [yes, it's official and I'm not afraid to brag] art/poetry/story magazine.

How LitMag works is anyone in the school can submit photos, drawings, any type of art, poetry, short stories, essays, dramas, anything LITERARY and the people on the LitMag staff will go through every submission, and basically pick which ones suck and which ones are worthy.

If you'd like to be part of the selection process, our first general meeting is on Tuesday after school in Room 308; whoever wants to come can.

If you just want to submit your work, we start accepting submissions in October so this is to all of you who write on this site; I highly recommend submitting to LitMag. This is just a heads up to everyone. I hope you all submit to LitMag so your voice can be heard.

-steadfast twilight

because she told me

by: Stargirl

She wakes up, she thinks of you
She stumbles into the bathroom, she thinks of you
She brushes her teeth, it's you she's thinking of
She trys to make breakfast, she thinks of you
Sunlight pours in through the kitchen window, a tear rolls down her face
She turns around and hopes to see you

She sits in traffic, she thinks she sees you
She hears a song on the radio that she loves, you loved
She crys because she is thinking of you

She will never be the same because of you

You
Are locked inside her, a part of her, until she dies
She will always think of you
No matter what she's doing you'll be there surrounding her
There's no way out
until
She tells a story about you

You made her laugh
You made her cry
You made her a better person
You made her confused
You made her question
You made her want to be lying there with you

She told me with tears in her eyes she just wanted to crawl in there and hold you
She told me with tears in her eyes she couldnt get close enough to you

She is putting her life back together piece by piece becuase of you
She misses you
She can't make any sense of it now, but someday she will

She will know you were in pain
She will know only you could make it stop
She will know you did it becuase you thought there was no other way out
You were only loved, but you couldn't see that through the sickness
You are at rest, but part of you will never sleep becuase part of you is with her

She saw a rainbow as we drove down the highway
She smiled with tears in her eyes and she said thats your uncle tom
Thats your uncle tom looking down on us
I know this because she told me

I Wish I Could Help You

by: Surreal as Sunlight

You can steal the sun
And then you give it back
And completely reconstruct it
Stronger and better

Sometimes you shine your teeth
At each time the second hand clicks

Vocal cries of joy exit.
Your body truly weakened.

Yes it's true beneath your skin
Your air sacks are blackened like the tire-marks on the street.

Your blood is not fierce enough
To run you on its own

Every now and then it's nice to refuel.

But you just can't say no to endulgence.

It knocks once and the door is open
If only you knew how to refuse.

Night Terrors

by: Johnny Slate

I awoke to kill my silent monster
Just in time to catch dawn's light fingers
Stealing over the horizon,
Pushing the darkness out of my room
To the far corners of the earth
And the palm of the sun
Washed away pervasive dreams.

When I was a kid,
I would huddle beneath a blanket
And clutch the linens over my head
To hide from the dark,
But no black comforter
Will draw me protective shadows
While natures needles accuse my skin
And my nightly terrors come from within.

All too familiar

by Turtledove

You've been had before.
A good-for-nothing lazy ass
Had you
with every gesture

You said you'd never felt loved before
I knew you were lying
Because I've known you from the beginning
Nevermind, before that.

I knew you in your magma stage.

Back when you were still malleable and moldable
All your smiles were genuine
Every laugh was true and deep

The earth itself caved in
The day your heart broke
And all the stars themselves held you
when you cried over the loss

Of something not that great to begin with

For a while
You tried facing things
But like the coward you've made yourself to be
You couldn't trust yourself to be alone

I've blinked
And you're nothing but a wide-eyed doe
again...
Hypnotized by the headlights

This is all too familiar
Like the cycle's started over
And this time around, you don't even have
Innocence
Ignorance
Or Inexperience
to blame it on

I'd like to grab you
And melt you down to magma

You liked yourself more then
And so did I.

Shotgun in the shadow

by whitehorse


today you ran further
then the horizon.

you broke a barrier
that my eyes and this earth
have created.

but you find no comfort in that
or at least very little.

and my confession comes with a price
just a kiss goodbye

and fingertips that linger
until the door closes for good

and they came to the crash
hours after it happened.
you couldnt tell whose blood was whose
the cars were soo mangled they were one.

The Picture

by: Surreal As Sunlight

My eyes are glued to this picture
Tracing every detail that shows
The line must be somewhere
I don't understand where this goes

I ask you that question
The one you've heard twice before
The answer is ambiguously pleasant
So that I can think some more

My fingers trace the edges
Wondering just where the edge is

We are here trapped together
In Kodak rich colors
And if life was that image
I would need no other

Silence is Sound

by brown cow

The renaissance man
Sits alone with his thoughts

Life's regrets hit him last night
And he thought about his thoughts
And they bit him

The blood was not red
Nor is there a visible scar
The tension was released in the form
Of a breath
Another lost cause
A wrong that can't be done right

Retracing his steps
Brought him back to
The place, time, and face
That started this all

The ring is louder,
But he still hears
The same sound

Silence

Fate's Toll

by brown cow

Unfortunently,
for you,
the battle
is already lost
You've paid fate's
toll
It's done
It's over
There is nothing
you can do
but take this as
a lesson, learn
and become
stronger

Live Every Day As If Its Your Last

by Kester Henrick

You're late to school, you walk in, your friends ask you where you were.
Doctor.
That's all you have to say. Not what kind, not what for. Just doctor and everyone will understand.
They don't really understand, they just will drop the subject at that and continue on with their previous discussions.

Is it that they don't care or they don't want to pry? You decide.

I have a desease. It digs deep into my daily routine and controls me, making my very existance it's home.
It's a lot like an earthworm living underground; You can't see it but you know it's there.

I cannot tell you what the desease is either than it's symtoms are chronically there and it will soon over take me.

I am dying.

And because of the above statement you will find the answer to every question you have ever asked about me.
Why is he so much different than everyone else.
Why doesn't he have a girlfriend.
Why is he so friendly.
Why is he so weak.

I will stop there and allow you to come up with the rest on your own.
Now that you know, please do not make a big deal about it.
Nothing has changed.

Video Games Are For Kids Who Can't Face Reality

by Kester Henrick

The greatest friends I've ever had are ones I've never seen
that hide behind a screen
and pixelate their dream
There's no reality
each friend is family
and I've never found a better place to be

a soft poem with hard thoughts

by line dry only

we could just be friends
but that'd lead us to heartbreak
why did we end our friendship in the first place?
you're so far away, i don't know who you are
but i feel messy and insincere
i want to be soft
and hold hands with someone
grab myself a coke
and drink through a cold straw
sit under a shady oak tree
on a sunny summer's day
but those days are all gone
when we decided to feel our pain
whoever told you that we could follow our dreams
i don't know why they'd give you false hope about me
whoever made you feel like you were truly in love
it's all because of me
it's all because of me
why did i break your heart, when you're so far away
why do i feel so complicated with not much to say
don't cry with those salty filled tears
the ocean level's going down so much now
and i know where it leads so
we could just be friends
but i want to feel messy
and no more insincerity
i want to be softly held
in the arms of your heart
but too many mushy love poems
written about you to no one that i know of

i want to be soft
and hold hands with someone
grab myself a coke
and drink through a cold straw
sit under a shady oak tree
on a sunny summer's day

but you're nowhere to be seen
and i can't find anyone left here with me

where are you, my
unacquainted - soft and simple - holding me in dreams - lover?

Eternity

Black Charger

Never shall I forget that night
The one that consumes all my fright
The first night in camp
The night my heart turned black
Seven times cursed
And seven times sealed
My life changed forever
And destiny revealed
Beneath a silent blue sky
Hell stood right in front of me
Nothing the heavens could do
While everything around me was askew

Never shall I forget those flames
The ones that consumed my faith
And everything I believed in
When all my thoughts turned to sin
The nocturnal silence
Which deprived me from living
And the God I thought I had
Stood nowhere beside me
Those moments that murdered my God
And turned my dreams to dust
Where everything around me
Was completely unjust


A found poem based off of Night Pg. 32
By: Elie Wiesel

How could you?

by steadfast twilight

When are you coming home?
The dishes need washing, my mind needs mending, and the cabinets need to be sewn back together.
It's 10:28 and your flight's in two minutes.
You unclose your eyes from dreams that were hiding behind black pupils.
People were blurs passing you by through your mental airport.
You believed your plane was landing
as the sound of the vacuum seeped into the dream projected onto comatose eyelids.

Naer loct


When you watch a relationship fall apart
You realize that it was wrong from the start
Especially when you look back
And remember that it was yours

You see that new girl move in
And push your sadness away with a grin
As you wipe a tear from your eye
Did you do the right thing this time?

Not saying a thing, reacting with apathy
It was your fault for not moving in
Again to afraid and remembering the past

You had it within grasp but let it slip away
Out of your hands letting your feelings fray
Without holding on to what you have its gone
Nothing else will come but you alone

Again.

Looking for a Stranger

by: Surreal as Sunlight

You smiled at me with the most inviting smile
I learned who you were, and you the same for me
I followed you outside, I was a child

You vanished from my eyes
And I was lost
Under a black cloak
that posed as the sky

I searched.
Left, right, behind every few seconds.
Nothing.

I crawled.
And then I saw it.
Bluffing.

I threw myself away.
I choked.
I drowned.
I survived.

You felt the same tragedy.
You were left unconscious.

I walked away.

The heart of a giant came to the rescue.
Not with any bad intentions.
But only to keep a soul together.
And to keep another pure.

I woke up that next morning,
Feeling a vacancy under my left lung.

Learning Washers

By line dry only

you seem to be obsessed with cleaning yourself of me these days
tearing out the pages of the books that live in your walls
watching movies on the sofa, but you never heard the phone ring
you talk listen talk talk listen talk talk talk talk talk talk
talk
i'm tired of hearing rules and regulations
for "the life you only live once"
how many times did you make me cry?
weren't my words less than a dog's?
i didn't think i had a place here
did you?
you seem to be obsessed with cleaning yourself of me these days
normal talk listen no listening allowed
sacrifice your life to make your leaders proud
wasn't pride a sin?
but i thought that was politically incorrect
or am i just thinking about the women you raped
all incorrect, you didn't
rape
them
you didn't
rape
them
you didn't

rape

them

you seem to be obsessed with cleaning yourself of me these days
tearing out the pages of the books that live in your walls
watching movies on the sofa, but you never heard the phone ring

talk talk killing me talk talk talk sleeping now
talk talk talk grab a new
life
you don't interest me anymore
talk talk rape listen talk life rules listen
listen

i won't hang your dirty laundry out for everyone to see anymore
because everyone's been invited inside to see it

Redeption

by Turtledove

You knelt
Asking for forgiveness that morning
demanding mercy

When just the night before
You knelt

Who knew that being friends with benefits
Is far more beneficial to his libido
than your knees

It's so hard to be pure these days
When that dainty cross around your neck
always gets caught
In his pubes

Have you read this one before?

by steadfast twilight

Rainbow in my mouth
Tasty O's go down my throat
I love my Froot Loops.

A Slow but Sure War

by: Surreal as Sunlight

They
fell
without
the
slightest
indication
of
resist.
The
heat
beat
down,

yet the change is in order.

Katy

black charger

Crying myself to sleep that night
You knew just what to do
You took my fears
And made them untrue

The inevitable scares me to death
When I think about taking my last breath
So we stayed up late that night and talked about those fears
But everything you said only brought more tears

Something you believe so strongly without any proof
Is amazing to me when I think it’s all a big spoof
You speak like you know and your words all make sense
But I can’t comprehend something this immense

With all the uncertainty there’s one thing you know
You believe with all your heart it’s something that shows
To have such a deep faith is something I want
But for me seeing is believing which is something so avaunt

I know I can’t grasp this and I probably never will
But with fighting this battle that is all uphill
One day I might understand the love that you feel
For something to me that seems so unreal

I would kill myself if I wasn't afraid of dying

by Naer loct

Sitting there
With your last breath
What would you do

Do you breathe it in like a disease
And let it slowly overcome you
Until it fades to black

Or do you reach out
Not knowing what you're groping for
Just die knowing that you tried

'Deja Vu' got me TU

by brown cow

You sit there
Expressionless
It's happened before
It's happening again
Like a recurring nightmare

Visions zap through your mind

Cluttering your vision

Your pupils shrink.

What's happening is real,
It's there

Again.

Haunting you
You question it's existence

Fate?

A sign?

Mayyybe

It leaves you dumbfounded
With nothing but your thoughts
It comes and goes like the sun and the clouds

Don't even try to put together this 1,000,000 piece puzzle

To A Forgotten Father

by Kester Henrick

Who are you?
What are you?
You can't be the same person my Mother 'fell' for 25 years ago
I find it hard to belive as the only thing you care about is your drugs these days
Your medication
You are constantly fixated on them
You have been married to them for just as long

I've tried to imagine what a day with a healthy father might be like
No medication. No back pain or other problems you claim you have with your body
Would you talk to me then?
Would you accept me for who and what I am?
Your son.

It's always good to dream

Parasite with no Fore-sight

by: Surreal as Sunlight

It's true that ants will take any offer
Whether it pummels them to the ground
Burns them alive
Or floods them away

But the realization must occur
that insects are everywhere

The bees that left your mouth
Stung the neck of moral

The fireflies that shined once
Are now nothing but a beautiful smeared glow on white pavement

How many innocent spiders
Must become martyrs
Before you realize that this relfection
In those 8 eyes
Is yourself?

another terrible poem because i honestly suck at this shit

by whitehorse.

i was yelling at you
maybe for the first time
but maybe not

i try to forget those moments
when i hate you

but they come upon me like shadows

like barcodes

because when you look at it
you have no idea what those lines mean

its a clean slate to create any sort of feeling from

but maybe not.


i have this problem with alone time.
it starts when i get home
and it hollows out my chest

until im practically nothing
and i know that i love you

there is no doubt about that,

its the other parts of my day
that keep me guessing

I Hope I Feel Different Tomorrow

by Kester Henrick

I miss you.
I never thought I'd crawl back into the same situation, the same lust to talk to you again and hang out with you after school, but I do and I miss you.

You use to talk about how people in the hallway bothered you because you knew they were thinking or commenting on how much of a bitch you were.
My answer to that was, "Don't worry about it. They don't know you."

Now I walk down those halls and when our eyes happen to meet I think to myself, "What happened?" as you quickly look away in hopes that someone else you know walks by that doesn't 'hate' you.

The reality behind hate is that half the time you think someone hates you they honestly don't. Your parents love you, your teachers admire you, your friends respect you, and I _ you. Deep down inside there is that same feeling I had when I wrote my first song about you.

And as much as I want to remove it, I don't think its going away.

The 49th Time

by Kester Henrick

It's the 49th time that I've tortured myself
for letting you go without saying good-bye
I read all your letters and try not to die
trying to hold back on the tears that I cry
It's the 49th time that I'm saying good-bye

It's the 49th time that I've lied to myself
by packing my feelings away on the shelf
and going to work and pretending I'm fine
while you're out in the world and I can't call you mine
It's the 49th time that I'm saying good-bye

It's the 49th time and you'll laugh when I say
it's been 49 years since you left me that day
and I hope you're not dead cause I wanted to say
that your life has touched me in the greatest way
Your life has touched me in the greatest way
It's the 49th time that I'm saying good-bye

Watching You Talk

by steadfast twilight

I would rather gently pull my eyes out of their bony caves
As you sit me down to talk about "years back."
You wait for your turn to speak,
inching forward and taking a breath before sentences exit your mouth.
Wrinkles stretch at the corners of your eyes when you smile
And the cracks in your leathery hands from 40 years of work are white
while you wave your left arm to emphasize some word.
I start looking from your glassy blue eyes to another point of interest
in this kitchen that's straight out of a magazine which you've so willingly
composed with you wife.
Good thing I know how to tune you out.
Anything to distract me from realizing that my father is old.