faulty nature

Grade 11 Literary Arts - Chapbooks

Looking for beauty in broken things

Find beauty in the ordinary: Birds perched on tree branches, The smell of morning dew, The way the sun rises every day, And the moon every night, Knowing the stars stay with you, even when light hides them from view. Look for it in the colours and smells and textures of life itself. Petals falling from a dying plant, The melody from a lonesome songbird, The glossy path left by tears on a cold day, A stray dog, with colourfully contrasting eyes, A paint can spattered around a spotless room, The light glistened off shattered glass, Sketching with broken pencil crayons,

Every time you were rejected, told off, denied, ignored, excluded, all to end up here. Look for beauty in yourself: In the depths of your mind, your dreams,&nbsp; your thoughts,&nbsp; your imagination, Find your uniqueness, your talents, your skills, All your weaknesses turned into strengths.&nbsp; Look for beauty in your body: The way you feel wearing your favorite outfit,

violence. After years and years of fighting, thanks to your grandad who was the general,” He poked the boy, who giggled. “our kingdom won the war.” “To solidify the victory, our ruler wanted to make sure the other kingdom never forgot the border lines, so we built massive walls out of blackstone and blocked the kingdom in. We started to patrol their walls and control all entrance points. In fact, I was in one of the first classes of soldiers after the war.” “I want to be a soldier! Just like you and Grandad.” The boy said firmly. “Well,” his father continued, “Hopefully you won’t have to be. But, that kingdom spent almost 18 years inside the walls, until one day…”&nbsp; “What happened?” Asked the boy, who was now sitting up.&nbsp; “One day, our ruler grew tired of having to expend resources and guards on the walled-in kingdom, so he approached them, threatening war once again. The only way to avoid it was if they abandoned their homes and

let us take control of their land.” “So they left?”&nbsp; “No,” his father replied, with a sad smile, “They loved their land and kingdom more than anything and couldn’t bear to leave it.”&nbsp; “But what about the war?” “They believed that they could convince our ruler to leave them in peace, and they tried for weeks, but there was no changing his mind. The invasion was planned and the troops were assembled, yet when we marched inside the walls, there was nothing. The entire kingdom was empty.” “What happened? Where’d they go?”&nbsp; “Well, during all this, secretly, there was a young soldier who had fallen in love with the enemy ruler’s daughter. He was completely smitten with her and when he heard of the invasion plans, he couldn’t stand to let them be attacked.” “So he betrayed his kingdom?”&nbsp; “Love can make you do crazy things.” The father paused. “But it worked. He told them of the plans, told them it was futile to fight against us and they escaped into the night. We

The comfort it grants.&nbsp; Your body, which accepts you even when you cannot reciprocate. Even if you think you are damaged and broken and bruised beyond repair, Even if you think healing is beyond your reach, Find beauty in yourself anyway.

“Tell me a story, Papa!” demanded the little boy, tucked into his cot with a stuffed bear clutched in his hands. His father laughed and looked out the window. The moon was full and bright, and the stars twinkled in the open sky. The kingdom was quiet, with nothing but the wind to occupy the silence.&nbsp; “It’s already dark outside. Besides, I've run out of stories!”&nbsp; “No you haven’t!” the boy said, “What about the walls? You said you’d tell me why they’re there!”&nbsp; The father hesitated for a moment before lowering himself down onto the edge of the cot. A grin spread across the boy’s face and he snuggled into his covers.&nbsp; “Alright.” He paused for a moment to collect his thoughts. “Once upon a time, there were two neighbouring kingdoms, and for a long while there was nothing but war. You see, these two kingdoms could never agree on the borders, and found that nothing would be solved without

I like to say I know who I am.&nbsp; I could look into a mirror anytime and see eyes I’ve known my whole life. See the body I’ve known my whole life. I’d see every sharp edge and misshapen part, every hurtful thought and hateful emotion. I have spent far too many days agonizing over these broken pieces of myself, and I assume that I’ll spend many more. It’s a possibility that I’m not the one who should speak on the beauty of flaws when I still struggle to see them myself, but maybe that’s that way of life. Attempting to befriend the cruelness inside of you, shedding light on your darkest corners and becoming unashamed of them.&nbsp; Perhaps it's in the belief of a future where my flaws do not control me, that I can put these words on paper. I long for a time where I’ll love myself unwaveringly, until it becomes a habit I cannot kick. A time where I know who I am and love myself for it all the same.

Thank you Ella Macdonald and Sharon Xu, for all your help and for listening to all my crazy ideas over the years. Thank you Mom and Dad, I love you. Thank you to my very own Love, Hope and Joy, for always believing in me and being the best hype people. &lt;3 And of course, thank you Mrs. Dobson and everyone in literary arts. You inspire me every day.

"Watch and pray, dear, never get tired of trying, and never think it is impossible to conquer your fault."&nbsp; - Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

Arachnophobia

They had always terrified him. With their spindly, thin legs and dark rounded bodies, moving with such an unnatural grace. They stared at him with their dull, lifeless eyes, skittering around in his house. He seemed to find them wherever he went: in the shower, on the arm of his lounger, slipping through the cracks of his bedroom floor and in the depths of his nightmares.&nbsp; He killed them often. Smashed under the heel of his shoe. Squished in tissues. Whatever was the fastest method. Recently he’d found a particularly large one, right by the edge of his bed, and hit it with a rolled up newspaper. Another took its place a moment later, almost the size of a blueberry. Andrew killed that one too. He looked around his house warily, still armed with the day old paper. One was waiting for him in the bathroom and three more in his kitchen. He was sweating when he made it back to the bedroom, and fell into a fitful sleep, reluctant to close his eyes for a single moment.&nbsp;

The next morning he’d woken up with a pounding headache. There was a smell of dampness and mold in the air. He tried to sit up, but something was restraining his body. Groggily, he opened up his eyes and a scream tore through his lips. He was face to face with a monster, one with eight legs and webbing spinning out of its backside. It had a smooth black body, bigger than what should’ve been possible and it’s eyes stared straight at him, gleaming and shining and full of hatred. Andrew flailed and thrashed, but he was wrapped tightly in the thin, sticky web. He couldn’t do anything but watch with a thundering heart as the spider crept closer, weaving the webbing around and around his body.&nbsp; The spider hissed out strange words, sending shivers up his spine but Andrew’s mind was too full of horror to fully comprehend what it was saying.&nbsp; The webbing wrapped around his mouth and the unconscious part of his terrified mind wondered if this was all just a nightmare. But, he could wake up from nightmares, and he would not wake up from this.&nbsp;

A pure white marble statue stands in the middle of the room. The carvings of false features and lifeless eyes have stared at me for my whole life. It follows me in silent solitude, lurking behind me at every corner, gleaming a white shine. I thought it was perfection in art, and I sought to keep it that way. When I was younger, I would tiptoe around it, mimicking its stillness. I brushed off every piece of dust and every speck of dirt. I wanted to preserve every piece of glowing marble. It held a never changing expression of indifference and I wished for it to speak to me, but its lips never moved no matter how many questions I asked.&nbsp; Yet, who was I to complain, when it was perfect and I was not.&nbsp; One day, I stood next to my easel.&nbsp;The statue was next to me, basking in the golden sunlight from the open windows.

I was an artist who would spend the rest of their days trying to create something as perfect as the piece beside me. And yet that dream was broken by slipping fingers and a full palette. When I wiped my eyes, I saw the statue, stained with a mirage of endless colours. I tried my best to get them off, I scrubbed and I wept and I washed and I yelled, but it was stained. The statue was tarnished.&nbsp; He stayed like that forever. With so many fading colours it was hard to believe he had once been a glossy white. The statue wasn’t perfect anymore, but if it minded, it didn’t show. Its expression never faltered and the curves and angles of its face never diminished.&nbsp;

There’s a girl I know by the name of Anger.&nbsp; Born from the essence of every hardship and hurtful thing in this world. She stews in her own hatred, Building up walls that threaten to collapse back down on her. Her words come out like lashes of a whip, With no thought to who might be in reach, She infects all those around her, And poisons every good thought she has. Anger could topple mountains if she wanted, And she did. She wanted every tree to collapse in her wake, And every being to feel the extent of her nature.&nbsp;&nbsp;

She wished to be known as every sour thought in her broken soul. She needed them to see that she wasn’t good or kind, Anger knew she would taint everything beautiful in this world, She knew she had no place alongside them.&nbsp; And yet when Hope, Love and Joy found her buried in her own rubble, Her friends did not cast her out. They taught her how to sing and scream and find beauty in broken things. And they loved her for every hateful part of her heart.

There’s a hole in my cup, small, miniscule, tiny, petite, a mild nuisance, it drips as I walk, it drips where it sits, draining, slowly,&nbsp; slipping through the cracks, There’s a puddle on my desk, it grows as time passes, a sizable pond at first,&nbsp; expanding into a vast lake, it threatens to take over, to consume everything, one drop is all it takes,&nbsp; one splash could overwhelm me,

There’s no way to fix it now,&nbsp; the tape is wet, the glue won’t stick.&nbsp; It keeps spilling and spilling and spilling.&nbsp; Why won’t it stop? I’ve done all I can do,&nbsp; it fills my room, my head goes under, and I'm drowning from a hole in my cup.

The water won’t stop leaking. The water won’t stop leaking.

never heard of them ever again.”&nbsp; “Did you know him? The soldier?”&nbsp; “No. No one ever found out who it was.” “He didn’t leave with them?” “No, he stayed behind in his kingdom.” “What was the point then?”&nbsp; “Well, when you love someone, sometimes you have to make the hard choices. The two of them loved each other, they must have, but they were from different worlds and I don’t think there was ever a chance they could have made it. So, the boy took a risk to save her, and loved her enough to let her walk away and the girl loved him enough to never look back.”

Unacceptance has been a friend for quite some time. With her soft, presumptuous voice, She lingers in the back of my mind, Whispering sweet lies and telling my Courage lullabies.&nbsp; She’s consistent, unmovable, tenacious, She knows the workings of my mind, My fears and my pains, My insecurities and sensitivities. She is my ruination, the root of my own destruction, She leads me down into my own hell, Away from happiness, away from hope, She threatens to throw doubt into every piece of who I am. And I let her do it every time.

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