Click on the link above to print your Book Cover Redesign submission form. Covers will be judged in three categories: digital art, freehand (drawing or painting) and collage. Deadline is May 31, 2013.
Springfield Public Library has a new review blog for teens. Teens are invited to submit book and media reviews to share with other teens on this blog: TEEN READS from SPL.
Please proceed to the blog to find out how you can participate!
7th - 9th Grade Division
1st Place
One of a Kind
I was made one of a kind
I am like a penny within a stack of dimes
You can always see me bright and clear
Even though I'm nowhere near
I am like the moon against the black night sky
Always joyful, always bright
Without me the world would be
In a complete and total anarchy
So if I were to get a new personality
I would also get a new name, body, and family
I am like a penny within a stack of dimes
And I was made only one of a kind
-Zara Hammond, Agnes Stewart Middle School
2nd Place
Untitled
The right to love and marry whoever you want
Is like the air we breathe
And when those rights are restricted
Our air is constricted
And we start to suffocate
From the small mindedness of others
Others who say it's not okay to be gay
That it is a sin against god
You know what really is a sin against god
Not loving your neighbors no matter who they choose to love
Standing in the way of their happiness and proclaiming hateful opinions
Opinions like pollution
Black smoke, black words
We all need to open our minds
Make marriage equality a reality, a basic right
So we can take a deep inhale
And finally start to breathe again
-Emma Wu Shortt, South Eugene High School
Third place (tie)
Where Do I Come From?
Where do I come from?
From the thoughts of God,
before I was formed.
From the hands of God,
that knit me together.
Where do I come from?
From my mother's womb,
deep in the South.
From rejection, from abandonment
by a young woman.
Where do I come from?
From sadness and pain,
from poverty and imprisonment.
From a sea of blackness,
from acceptance and identity.
Where do I come from?
From the land of peaches,
from the city so tall.
taken from a life,
I will never know at all.
Where do I come from?
From questions unanswered,
that I will ask some day…
Mom… Where do I come from?
-Sam Thurman, Pleasant Hill High School
Life
Everyday people worry
The world spins and things get blurry
Time flies when you’re having fun
It all stops with just one gun
No one expects the tragedies
They don’t realize it affects people like you and me
In the end we all want to be loved
Spirits leave us like a flying white dove
Balloons fill the sky
Who expected children to die
People miss their dearest friends
The world spins until it all ends.
-Tyler DuBell, Pleasant Hill high School
10th – 12th Grade Division
1st Place
Keep breathing
Keep breathing keep moving step by step
Closer and closer to my goal
Down the road and around the corner
I’ll keep running till I make it home
Closer and closer to my goal
Breathing hard and moving fast
I’ll keep running till I make it home
Around the corner down my broken path
Breathing hard and moving fast
The stopping point seems so far away
Around the corner down my broken path
So many road blocks in the way
The stopping point seems so far away
Another turn is plain to see
So many road blocks in the way
Maybe I’m lost after all
Another turn is plain to see
Beads of sweat on my face
Maybe I’m lost after all
But I can’t stop yet
Beads of sweat on my face
My heart beat pounding in my head
But I can’t stop yet
Keep breathing in the cold air
My heart pounding in my head
I fall, tripping over my own feet
Keep breathing in the cold air
It’s so hard to get back up
I fall, tripping over my own feet
Blood on my hands and knees
It’s so hard to get back up
I must keep pushing forward
Blood on my hands and knees
I push myself off the ground
I must keep pushing forward
There is too much at stake
I push myself off the ground
Down the road and around the corner
There is too much at stake
Keep breathing keep moving step by step
-Sydni Clayton, Pleasant Hill High School
Second place
Trust
Fallen leaves
and broken dreams,
are all you ever leave me.
You raise me up,
And throw me down.
Again,
and again.
Crushing me.
Yet I give you trust.
Again,
and again.
I’m fine,
I’m always fine,
because all you ever leave me,
is fallen leaves,
and broken dreams.
And that,
is what keeps me
alive
-Brynne Webb, Home School
Third place
The Tree and the Pebbles
I stared at them
and they stared back.
No thoughts were thought
by either party.
Despite our mutual silence
there was a deafening, throbbing energy
We were still—
I, standing; them, sitting.
And so we were.
-Kory Schneider, Pleasant Hill High School
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