Ode to the Sea – due 9.27

Memoir

Maryam

https://www.artfromguantanamo.com/moath-alalwi/

Half a Decade

The sea brims waves with foam and the sky with clouds.

I rode in on the latter.

 

I was born in June, a summer baby. And naturally, I have an affinity for the sea. I can’t actually swim well enough for it to be called swimming.

Once when we went on an excursion in the waters surrounding the Dominican Republic, my father and I were strapped into life vests and instructed to swim toward the barriers where the sea life was (there we could take photos with sting rays and admire coral—the standard tropical tourist treatment). I timidly climbed down the ladder of the boat, knowing that this nine year old body couldn’t swim. I knew it was deep, the water was dark. So when I plopped down, despite all the reassuring from my father and the guide, I panicked. I went down before I went up. The life vest on, and I still was submerged before I was floating. I grasped the rungs and climbed back up to the safety of the deck.

This past May we went to Florida for a bit, school was basically over and everyone needed a break of some sorts. On one of the last days we drove out to Hollywood Beach. The water was clear and blue, and of course enchanting. Warm and so, so soothing. Facing away from the beach, and out into the horizon, the water was divided: clear blue, dark blue, and again clear blue. People were swimming past the dark patch and ending up in calf-deep water. So I swam into it. And I got there. (I also convinced my non-swimming-incredibly-afraid-of-deep-water Mom to come in, and later when the tides changed she was stranded… oops).

I am not afraid until I am out of my depth. So my love remains. My love remains because I remember the summers waking up and loading into Oksana’s car and heading out to Coney Island. My love remains because I remember the thermoses we filled and headed to Rockaway. And because I remember the brief visit home and the sand of the Caspian Sea, we rubbed it into our hair and all over our skin, it was just sand.

When we first moved here, it was a lot of plane riding. From Baku to Istanbul, a brief respite, and from Istanbul to New York. It was difficult for me. But not as difficult as it was for my parents. And not as difficult as I made it. Any time I had my hands on a paper and a pen, I drew. And every time the drawing was the same. A family on a plane headed home. I did not understand why I was isolated. Why was I removed from world I knew? Why was I suddenly imprisoned?

I had spent one hundred percent of my life watching the sea bubble around my toes as my mom called from the shore “Don’t get mazut in your hair.” I had sat on light wooden benches built into decks as we sailed, boasting about never getting seasick. I had found fascination at the airport. Everything measured, accounted for, systematic. I loved the flights.

I felt agonizing pain in my ears as we descended onto the runway. The lady in front of us looked back pityingly, as my mom pushed a candy in my mouth and instructed me to pace the aisle.

Being in the sky was different. Surrounded by clear blue. The clouds bubbled around the smooth metal. We were airborne.

The next summer, when my feet felt the Atlantic, I was unfazed by the cold, I’d forgotten the warmth of the Caspian. I’d forgotten that before the threat was oil, because now I was steering clear of plastic bags. I’ve forgotten about the airplanes.

I didn’t hit the shores, I hit the runway, in a vessel nonetheless. My luck brought peace with it, safety. I was not imprisoned, I was rescued.

Muhammad Ansi’s “Statute of Liberty” – Shyann C.

shyc99

 

I’ve made it. I am finally here, I am finally free. My father used to tell me, “Son, America is a hell disguised as a paradise,” but seeing her majesty ahead – her pale green and blue hues fresh and inviting as the ocean waves that brought me here – would make hell seem like a wonderful place to live. Of course, I am being foolish.  I am not physically free – the screams of the damned echo in my head. They are my own outbursts of confusion. Has it been days? Weeks? Months? Time shouldn’t be of essence but I know that soon enough, I will be able to kiss her majesty’s feet, admire her construction, admire her beauty.

She reigns supreme over all. The American pigs do not appreciate her but I do. She stands above all else, a mother to a kingdom, awaiting a hero to save her. While her beauty does captivate, her imprisonment drives a man mad. My suffering shall not be in vain – I will save her.  She gives me a new freedom for my demented imagination. I lie awake at night imagining us, together –  her cold copper on my cold, bruised and battered flesh. Does she know I want to rescue her? Does she even know I exist? Lady liberty standing tall, but for how long?

The truth is, I have never seen her up close. But I am here, she is close. Her form appears in my head and I call the guard for my fix. I need to see her. I have to paint her. She is a magnificent sight! Although in reality she may be greater and for that I am sorry for the lack of representation my love. Your arm carries a torch that could burn entire cities in one wrong move – I too, am a loose cannon, they’ve pushed me this far. If you had known my hell here on this island, would you rescue me? Would my 76 hertz of agony awaken you? Perhaps.

            Crimson paint for your oxidation – My arms are bound behind me as the course fibers rip my flesh, “I don’t know anything! I swear I don’t!” Forest green and sky blue mixed for your beautiful copper and iron skin – “What are they planning?” Shock, bolts of electricity dance before my watering eyes in these wavelengths. “I am innocent!” They up the current until –

Black – The ocean casts its shadow on you and brings you to life. “Why are you  this?! You’re going to kill me!” Another shock. His blue eyes suddenly turn black, everything turns black. Now for the sea, baby blue. His eyes. Dip, stroke into the paint. Light coat of brown for your kingdom, it is nowhere near as magnificent as you. His arms grind my face into the ground, his knee in my back – I’ve never felt more helpless. I know he won’t end me, but I wish he would. Then bury me in the land of my love. Let my soul roam free.

 

                

           

           

Ode To The Sea- Isaac Paredes

i43099

From across the sea, I see the reaches of a land far beyond my grasp. A bridge from my end to nothing; a pier for the empty sea between me and the dreams of a new land. It serpentines through the water effectively winding its way towards the center. A dark and gloomy day spreads across the sky, a brown flurry of lost intent mirrored onto the water that is my path. The incomplete lands across the water lay stagnant in their mass.On the pier rests nothing, it binds to the water and becomes one. Where the path meets my end, it fuzes into the ground as if the wooden pier had grown from the dirt itself. Mountains and hills forming a snake like horizon line in a brown completeness. In the blue haze is the formation of life’s formula. Beginning in a pure white to only be corrupted by doubt in the continuation of the path. The darkness soon engulfs the entirety of the person, of the situation and gives way to an entire portion of the painting belonging to the corruption. This eventually leads to a moment of realization whereas the dark shifts to the light. The light being the realization that through the murkiness comes a virtuous perspective of life. The sky is a turmoil of brown gloom fighting with the cloud passing through. Streaks of the blue sky bounce along the turmoil of the land, a new conundrum phasing through an open sea. The gloom adding a new sense of dread and weariness alike. This is the foundation, the core to the world and its future. Whereas we all come from the same land and the same beginning as seeds sprouting out into an ocean of possibilities separate at all points but from where we began. As the colors continue to morph together, we see a pattern to this mass of possible pathways that keeps each person from turning away from their future. The stokes on the pier act as a guiding agent, ever most unchanged by the environment while all the same dictating the direction of the path. Though curved, the path still heads towards a new land of intent and mystery. Unable to stray too far from the path, this curvature remains true as the different possibilities in which we all choose our future without choosing anything at all. This winding of color change gives way to seeing just how much freedom we have in our destinies; none at all. We are guided  by the decisions we make in life, right or wrong. The spires holding the pier together are both the opposite thought process in every situation where an individual could take left or right. This further dictates their direction and all the same continuing to form their path into a new future and path on the other side of the ever so murky water in between. With each decision, we get further from where we all began, eventually coming to a mid-ground  where we realize the fallacies in trying to the to the other side in the first place since it is truly just the end of what we hold dear in our own lives.

Crying Eye

serg319

I promised myself I wouldn’t cry.

I knew it was coming. I’d known my whole life. This wasn’t something one could just avoid. It’s followed me since a time I can barely remember, and will follow me for the rest of my life. Eventually, it had to be talked about. She chose the most convenient time possible; we were alone. I sat on the edge of the bed and looked-for signs on her face. She seemed nervous, couldn’t meet my eyes.

For the longest time, my heart would stop anytime she called for me without being straightforward about the reason she needed to speak to me. This was not an exception. An overwhelming wave of nerves pulsed through my veins and washed over me. Every time I found myself in this position I always jumped to the worst-case scenario conclusion that she knew and she was going to say something. My deepest fear was finally climbing out from the depths of where I pushed it throughout my whole life and was ready to tear me apart. But that never turned out to be the case, so why would it be now? I could have relaxed yet, I didn’t.

She began to speak, and suddenly I was cold. Freezing, as I always get whenever my nerves get the better of me. She struggled to form her sentences, thinking of how she wanted to phrase certain statements or questions. She was obviously avoiding certain words. I didn’t know how to feel about that. On one hand, it benefitted me. I could use this to my advantage and spin everything to play in my favor, yet on the other hand, maybe being straightforward about this would end the constant fear I was forced to live in. Her eyes were red. Her gaze shifted between me and anywhere else. I could feel myself shaking as I listened to her muddle of words, statements, questions, accusations, support, insults.

I had been preparing for this conversation for as long as I could remember. I had promised myself I wouldn’t cry. I may be a lot of things, but weak certainly wasn’t one of them. Yet I felt my tears begin to swell up and I cursed myself for it. Crying now was not an option. As she continued to release her pent-up emotions, ideas, fears, I had to make a decision. Was I ready to face this head on or was hiding my only option yet again? At the moment, I made up my mind that I was ready. I was not going to cry. She was waiting for me to respond. The perfect opportunity was now in front of me, I could finally be free.

I lied. I lied and I lied even more. I had become quite good at it and was proud of it in a way that would make others sad. I lied and she challenged me. She insisted she wanted me to be honest but I knew she didn’t. If she really wanted honesty, she wouldn’t have avoided something she knew since forever. I lied until I left that room. She wiped her eyes and went back to watching her television show as I left the room and sat on my bed. I was back where I started once again. Looking back now, I can’t say I know if I made the right decision or not. Emotions tend to blur together. All I can truly say was that I felt cold for the rest of the night.

A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie

dannyfarran

 

Looking out into the horizon; not really knowing what awaits in the unknown. The allure of wonder fascinated me as a child; whether it was looking to the skies and into the stars or below the sea beyond the reach of any man. My eyes fled the existence of the familiar around me and instead searched for the unknown.

In the past I often looked back to the days of exploration and imagined myself a doughty explorer who feared nothing. No land too wild to be tamed. No person mighty or brawny enough to halt my journey. Nothing could stop me in my tracks. I clad with a musket and loyal crew of men explore the lands unbeknownst to even the mightiest sailors and explorer. Heading westward before any even conceived the thought of the manifest destiny.

I find it funny, now that I have grown much older and have long abandoned the thought of exploration and adventure, that the only image to emerge when reminiscing of my youth is A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie. A quite dramatic piece that brought forth this idea of a large untamed expanse that lay in wait for a heroic young voyager, like myself, to claim it’s ripe treasure. I was exposed to this piece at a young age due to its home being the nearest museum to me. I did not know what initially caught my eye but I knew instantly that I was enamored of it. Perhaps it was the sunlight th

at illuminated valley. I always recall it being brighter than it really is. Maybe it was the shambolic way the trees were depicted. Actually, I do think it was the sunlight. It adds that dramatic flair to the piece and induces a sensation of grandeur. And as time went by my interpretation of it changed from land waiting for me, to Gandalf and Erkenbrand’s band flanking the vastly superior Urak-hai army at the Battle of Hornburg, to what I see now: a gateway to a memory.

Of course this was before I learned of the cruelty of these explorers and lamented the suffering of the indigenous people. My attitudes shifted from exploration to repair. I have not abandoned the unexplored frontiers but I do not look to them with same fascination that I had when I was a child. Now I am a man of politics and philanthropy. I still am a staunch advocate for the study and exploration of our seas and of space but no longer do I wish to do the exploration. Instead I would rather push progress from the ground with policy and grassroots organizing. I would rather develop our society and fix the issues that have been and are becoming prominent. So while a tempest may be brewing just beyond the skyline the sun will be there to remind me of dreams; the dreams I once had and what they mean to me now. For now the discovery that awaits me is no unruly strand of distant land but instead remedies for our concurrent affairs. My dream is now of an idyll nation and hopefully that could extend to the world. And knowing just how unlikely it is to come true I still seek solace in the idea that I can move mankind up the stairway of progress; even it be one step of thousands. Hope still stands by my side and when I think of hope I see Bierstadt’s sun from A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie shining through the mountain range as a tempest brew just over the skyline. And so, that sunlight that I was enamored of as a child still infatuates me. Then there’s a little part of me that still thinks of Gandalf.

Ode To The Sea – Dylan Senkiw

Dylan Senkiw

When I ask myself what I want in life, I am always drawn to the allure of new opportunities, sights and experiences. There is nothing more exciting that exploring a new city or finding a hidden gem. This drive to seek out unique experiences and obtain new knowledge can be describes by a voyage of a ship.

First, the ship readies itself at dock. The crew loads the supplies; possibly cargo for delivery, maybe necessary resources and miscellaneous gear, as there are always unexpected events in a journey. In life, I am always prepared to get up and go. I am prepared for what is next, and I am ready to take on the challenge.

Next, the ship departs in anticipation of the opportunities that lie ahead, whatever they may be.  Often, I will embark on new paths in life, unsure of the outcome, but I see a possibly better future. I am eager to try something new and learn something from it. Although this often leads me to spur of the moment experiences, it can also result in rash decision making. Even with the later, I am able to take away life lessons. If I lead myself to a mistake, or a misstep, I am bound to realize how I caused the wrong move, or what I could’ve done more effectively. These lessons shape who I am.

While on the journey, ships can encounter unexpected barriers. To overcome these barriers in life, I must be strong willed and determined. If I am weak, I can sink; however, I make sure that I keep myself up by any means necessary. I work towards my goal, and I don’t stop until I achieve it. There are bound to be restrictions and setbacks, I must accept that, but I can’t let it hold me back from what I want. Surpassing each boundary, no matter how big, or small, or inconsequential, will not only prove to myself that I am fit for this journey of life, but it will enhance my decision making and logical reasoning.

Finally, the ship will arrive, the destination will be revealed and the effort of the voyage will be surpassed by a sense of achievement and excitement. At this point, I enjoy the benefits of hard work and perseverance that has allowed me to get to my destination. I am able to learn new things and grow from my new destination. Once I arrive, there are a plethora of opportunities waiting for me. I will be sought after, respected and accredited, as not many people can make it to where I am.

A voyage is not always physical. In my life, this represents abstract journeys to find an answer, or learn something about myself. It also represents learning in new environments and having new exposures. Throughout the entirety of life, I can expect to be spur of the moment, I can expect to chase dreams and I can be ready for new experiences, knowledge and opportunities. I am sure that my life will be a constant voyage with many different destinations.

The Black and White Flag

Elisa Mateo-Saja

 

Robert Longo’s Untitled(American Flag), from the Brooklyn Museum

Categorized, isolated and divided. The nation of the free has fallen to chaos. I was born and raised in this country. I was taught to believe in equality and encouraged to use my freedoms. There was a constant affirmation in the notion that America was made up of all the different people within it, and stronger because of their differences.

Now this country that is vast and beautiful in so many different ways, expects its people to be all the same. The once colorful flag that streamed brightly, its color a point of pride, has now been dinged to black and white. It is not just the want for us all to look the same but is the effort to make this country something it never was. They shout, “make America great again”, but how would we do that? This country was great because of its immigrants, how can they expect to be great again by removing all the people that build this nation up?

I am growing up in a time of conflict and insanity. I have dreams to do great things for this nation and this world, but quite frankly I don’t know if it’s possible. I see all that goes on around us, the violence and the immaturity of the people who hold our lives in their hands. They all look similar, old white men. And they say I’ll get my chance to change things. But will I? Will I ever be an old white man? Will this country ever be ready to see a brown woman in power? People tell me it will be 2036, that times will have changed. But weren’t they saying that 20 years ago too?

It’s 2017 and what do we have now. We all thought we were headed in the right direction. I remember watching the Obama inauguration in my fourth-grade class. A grainy black and white screen, on a giant TV monitor, the ones they used to roll in on carts and stick VCR tapes into. We all thought we were going forward. When he won again against another wealthy white man, I thought damn were only going up from here. And then we came to this. All night I stayed up and watched our country go from color to black and white. State by state, each time she lost one my heart sank. We are bleeding our red, white and blue. And each one of us drains as our flag does. Losing our color, losing our pride, and losing our differences. The things that once made us so great.

I still hold on to my dreams to change this nation. I am scared and know it will be hard but I’m going to bring the color back! Not just the reds, whites and blues to the flag. But the color of our people, and their pride of their color.

A black and white world isn’t realistic, and even if it was, it isn’t one I’d want to live in. I want the clash of the yellows and the greens. The shouts of the reds and purples. And the vivacious energy that blue and pink bring the table. I want a country that pops off the wall. I want a flag, a nation rather, filled to the brim with colorful life.

I don’t think it will be easy, but I know that slowly we will get our color back.

Rocky shore — DK Rule

dkrule

There was a place I used to go in the summertime. It wasn’t very popular since it wasn’t sandy like the other beaches. It was covered in rocks and the water was full of dead man’s fingers seaweed. I would usually find myself alone for miles around.

After every big storm, I would walk down and look at everything the waves and the wind had brought in. More rocks and seaweed, driftwood, sea glass. Every once in a while I would find a washed up buoy and bring it back, slung over my shoulder, to add to the collection my father had begun thirty years earlier on the side of the weathered old shed. They were hanging on top of one another right beneath the peeling “DK’s Delicious Lemonade” sign.

On cloudy days, I would buy some fried clam strips, a Del’s frozen lemonade, and sometimes a new book from the Island Bound Bookshop, and go down to my rocky shore and just sit and read and stare at the sky and the birds for hours on end. The sun would inevitably begin to set. No matter how many times in your life you see a sunset, it will never get old and it will always be beautiful.

I’d walk back, flashlight in hand. Even though it was dark and I was alone, I never felt afraid. I felt safe, calm even. A rustle in the bushes was just a deer. Everything around me was illuminated by the night sky. Without light pollution, I could see what felt like every single star in the universe, but it never made me feel small. I don’t remember ever having that “I’m just a small speck of dust in the universe and I don’t matter” phase. If anything I felt lucky that everything lined up just so, that I came together, that I can look at the stars and the moon.

The next day might be golden and sunny, so I would go to the sandy town beach with the crystal clear, ice cold water. My friends and I would make sand castles and accidentally cut ourselves on the sharp dune grass. We’d go into town to get ice cream cones and walk out to the end of the jetty, and those are some of my fondest memories. But when I go back to the island today, those aren’t the places that I’m drawn to. I find myself going back to my rocky shore with the murky water.

It is different going back there today. It isn’t as familiar as it once was. I suppose that is true of most childhood memories and hideaways. But that doesn’t diminish its importance and the purpose it served me, as a respite, at the time. Things change, and that’s ok. Trying to force something into what it once was is a waste of time, in most instances. Life, I’ve found, is about moving forward and building new memories in new places.

I still love cloudy days, though.

Looking at the night sky

jasonwaitkus

As I lay and look up at the sky my eyes are immediately drawn towards the brightest and biggest light I can find. Just like most people I ignore the little stars winking into view because they’re so small and flicker in and out of sight. Thinking about this I realize how much we do the same thing with finding happiness.

We’ve been conditioned as humans to always be searching, always trying to find our idea of true happiness. But sadly, in doing so we completely fail to pay attention to all the simple joys in our lives. For me this idea used to be all too true, and still can be at times. I first began to understand that living in search of happiness tears you apart just before I began 10th grade. Being diagnosed with depression and anxiety finally made me realize the truth. When I was hospitalized I had to face the things I always attempted to avoid. I had to actually let myself go and just express myself. In my first therapy session, we talked about what made me happy. And I realized that I had always been living and saying to myself “you’ll be happy eventually, just get through each day.” That day I realized instead I should’ve been finding even the small things in each day to make me happy, those small bursts of starlight that happen for each of us every day.

If I said that it’s been easy trying to think that way, I’d completely be lying. Even though I truly believe that there is something in every day that can bring you happiness, I still struggle to find it for myself sometimes. There are so many little bursts of brightness in each day, little things to bring about true happiness. One of the places I tend to look when trying to find a little starlight is my best friend. The only person who has truly stuck by me and showed me what a friend is meant to be like is her. We met in 7th grade and every day since she somehow manages to make me smile. Even on some of my worst days trying to cope and make it through, she manages to make me smile. The truth is without her so very sarcastic, but supportive attitude I wouldn’t be where I am, wouldn’t be here writing this.

Friendships aren’t the only place to look for the happiness that exists in each day, there’s also finding the activities that make you feel alive. For me, it’s music. Listening to music, playing instruments, talking about music, it all makes me happy. The idea that we as humans have the ability to create such beautiful sounds and rhythms along with some artists writing the most meaningful and resonating lyrics is amazing. Music is my escape from focusing on myself and the future, it lets me just live and enjoy the moments I’m listening to it.

Instead of looking for the moon, looking to find the brightest possible light and searching for the largest amount of happiness possible, why not focus on the small bursts that come to each of us every day. Everyone’s life has drawbacks and everyone always says “The future will be better” but why not live in the now, try to find what makes today better. Focusing on the negative, and believe me I know how easy it is to do so, will only make things worse, instead try to find even the smallest happiness and enjoy it. We are around much too short a time to be searching for whatever idea we each have of true and complete happiness.

The Road I Walk – Sterling Lipscomb

sterlinglipscomb

There is darkness all around, a suffocating, yet expansive darkness. It’s like a black hole: cold, uninviting, and empty. A noise, what is it? Voices… Laughter… I hear people, I know they’re right in front of me, but where? I can hear them, but, somehow, I see no one in this dark void. I see nothing, except a path in front of me, distinguished from the surrounding area vaguely by dull, gray lines, resembling stones you would see separating a lawn from a sidewalk in the suburbs. One step forward, two steps forward. I start running, desperate to get to the end of the path, scared of where I am and where I’m not all at once. Who’s yelling? Is that me? It must be, that voice is so clear. Where’s the end? The path keeps building itself as I run forward, winding around nothing. I stop, spinning around in circles, looking for anyone, screaming for anyone, but, still, there is no one. It’s just me, trapped in my head.

I experience the most peculiar loneliness in the company of others, ever since high school. Surely, being with other people should make the path brighter, right? Or more tolerable to be confined to? One would think this path becomes a skeleton in the back of the closet that is my mind when I’m laughing with friends. But it doesn’t, it only shifts in the center of my conscious to make space for the other thoughts rushing by, weaving in front and between them to remind me of the lurking darkness in my head. So, I’m stuck watching a cinematic of myself with other people. In the oddest way, it feels like I’m not really there. Depersonalization, it’s called, by professionals and the dictionary. To me, it’s simply a bad movie with an uninteresting main character, no real development, and too much repetition.

Obviously, there’s a difference between feeling depressed and having depression, kind of like how there’s a difference between being friends and being friendly. I was afraid of friendship, I still am. I’m afraid of anything intimate, really, and, if you were to ask my old therapist, I’m sure she’d say those feelings stem from my insecurities and lack of stability. I moved around a lot when I was younger, so I never really held onto friends. That’s fine, never seemed like an issue… until I started walking down that path, until that path became a part of me. Abruptly, I was alone in a new way, even having friends felt like having no one. Despite the people around me, I was completely alone on a cold, dark path that lead nowhere, but ran in both directions forever, existing out of sight to everyone but me, since it was and continues to simply be the constant state of my own mind.

With time, I came to realize that this road will never be flooded with light, or bright colors, or other people for that matter, but that doesn’t mean it has to be dreadful and scary. If I want, it occurs to me, I can walk along the beach, my mind would allow for that. Of course, it’s night time, whenever I imagine it.It’s like sitting at a beach on a spring night, with clouds whisping around my head to block out the light of the moon. There’s no moon in sight, but there is water, lapping at the sides of the walk way, just out of reach. The path becomes wood, resembling a boardwalk, and the surrounding area has tints of the deepest shades of blue and gray.  This only occurs in quiet moments though, when I am at peace or, at least mostly, relaxed. At times like those, I feel like I can stop walking, sit down and enjoy watching the world I’m stuck in become new. This is the one moment I find peace in being lonely.