How to Not Write a Sonnet

By Logan Lewis

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Part 1:

I’m not a poet, but I’m not a wannabe: I’m who I wanna be

Chew on your words before you spit them out

What can I say? I don’t need to: I already wrote it out

I’m not a poet…I’m a silly poet

 

Part 2: In a Different Place

There’s a reason I buy so many notebooks

A reason why I only use one brand of pen

Enough about this, we’ll talk about the sunshine

If only having a midlife crisis at 22 was accepted on a resume

Which I lied on: writer's block sucks it makes telling white lies hard

A spoonful of salt helps the truth go down

But the truth is overrated

 

Part 3: Congratulations…I’m Sorry

Writers are thieves: I have a guilty conscience, however

I call it, “stealing from the book thief”

My eyes are opened for the years

What has happened and for whatever is to come

I think my placebos are wearing off

 

 

About the Author

Logan Lewis is a student at Illinois Central College getting his associates degree. After ICC, he is planning on transferring to Illinois State University to get a Creative Writing degree. Recently he has been adding confessional, nostalgic and self-reflective themes in his writing. He wants to spend his life being silly, playing the guitar, and writing songs, poetry and stories. His heroes are God, his parents, Mister Rogers, Andy Warhol, Doug Hopkins and Kurt Cobain. You can usually find him thrifting for cardigans…or screaming songs by The Gin Blossoms in his car.

New Life Through Destruction

 By Ember Nerad

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I am a raging fire

One that is haywire

My emotions blooming

Like a flower in a sidewalk crack

With stuff looming

Like the clouds that indicate a storm is on the way

I’m afraid like the storm I’m only gray

 

Oh what I would give to go back

To the happy child times with a simple snack

To others I seem like a light but just know, I am not the light you seek

Especially with my rebel streak

 

Knowing the right and the wrong

My emotions get put into a song

My emotions getting expressed in a poem

A warning so grim

As if on the surface I skim

Barely getting by

As silently I cry

 

I fought many battles

Ones that leave my brain in shambles

Where I feel I am caught in the weeds

With those weeds I discover seeds

 

A chance to start new

A chance for a new crew

To find new life in the destruction

A chance for there to be less obstruction

 

I am like a raging fire

Walking on a tightwire

I know that through the pain I will become like the seeds that only open when there is a fire

They don’t walk on a tightwire

They proved you need to go through hard things to grow

No matter how slow

 

 

 

 

About the Author

Ember Nerad is a student at ICC. They are studying to be a HVAC technician in the Workforce Sustainability Center. Usually, you can find Ember at home with their nose buried in a book or napping with their cat, Sneezy.

Blue and Orange

By Natalie Scott

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Blue and orange,

Isn't it funny how your favorite colors

When blended together,

Look just like a bruise?

 

Colorful hues of your love,

Painted on my skin

Branding me to you.

 

You've colored me blue and orange.

 

 

About the Author

Natalie Scott (she/her) is a queer creative writer in her second year at ICC. She plans to transfer to ISU in the fall of 2025, where she will study creative writing with an emphasis on poetry. Outside of school, she is a barista, a clay artist, and a cat mom.

 

 

 

On the Park Bench I Think Prettiest Thoughts

 

By Abigail Stanton

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Lilac and cut grass kiss me sweetly by means

of May’s first breeze, and the Midwest’s

monsoon season pays an Irish goodbye,

 

giving sunburn a turn to run rampant.

Her rays do in fact prove strong enough to redden

my neck but have yet to render last week’s

 

rain a memory as still boggy fields respond to my

clomping through them by spitting up at

the trim of my skirt. Newness of life in

 

blossoms, an uncracked book, and birdsong

prompts gratitude in abundance. Thank you, for

I’m becoming all I have hoped to.

About the Author

Abby is in her second year at ICC studying English and education. Aside from her studies, Abby also is involved with Cru and enjoys working as a barista at Leaves 'n Beans. Her favorite drink is (currently) a breve cortado with brown sugar cinnamon and her favorite book of the Bible is (currently) Ephesians.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

tucson

By Abigail Stanton

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i thought being nameless would

make goodbye easier

but character often finds itself to

outshine any given title—

it’s an air freshener hung from

a broken vent and two years

of bagel crumbs embedded

beside strewn bobby pins

beneath a glovebox and her

attitude in falling onto unsuspecting toes

 

 

cozy for gas station trips late at

night—the only time we talked—or

a life raft equipped with plenty of

flares, O, vessel

what joy it’s been to name you mine

 

About the Author

Abby is in her second year at ICC studying English and education. Aside from her studies, Abby also is involved with Cru and enjoys working as a barista at Leaves 'n Beans. Her favorite drink is (currently) a breve cortado with brown sugar cinnamon and her favorite book of the Bible is (currently) Ephesians.

A Bloody Fallen Tale

By Scott Jackson
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We all know of the nursery rhyme of Jack and Jill. But what truly happened when Jack fell and broke his crown with Jill tumbling after? We ask because not everything written in those tales long ago was entirely true to what may have happened. Here is just one possibility for the doomed children.
 
Jack continues falling and rolling down the hill that they both climbed up to fetch a pail of water. Just behind him on the hill as well, we have Jill trying to chase after Jack until she trips. Her falling path is just slightly different from Jack’s path. Once Jack had come to a complete stop, he tried to get up, but he got hit on the head by the bucket they had for the water and collapsed. Jill’s tumbling stops as she rolls off of and falls into a thorn patch.
 
Jill cries for what sounds like hours before she stops. She notices her feet have not touched the ground, yet she is in pain. As Jill looks at her surroundings, she sees numerous thorns sticking in her and even a few through her. With the terrible pain going through her just from a slight movement, she begins to cry again.
 
After a while Jack finally comes to; he cries as well from the pain he feels. Yet after placing his hand on the area that hurts, he sees blood on his hand. Which once again causes more crying from Jack. Jack then notices the other crying sound and thinks it must be from Jill. He then shouts out to her, “JILL?” Jack tries to find her by following the sound of her cries.
 
Jack finds Jill stuck in a thorn patch. “Jill! How did you get there?” He asks her while looking around the spot she is stuck in.
 
Jill sniffs partly crying and responding back, “I-I-I don’t know, I just fell after you did and-and-and ended up here. AND IT HURTS!!!” She continues to cry some more.
 
 With his help, she eventually gets out, but Jill does become injured badly as well. They hold each other’s hands as they attempt to limp their way back home. But because of how much blood has been lost, they have been fading in and out for a while.
 
After what feels like walking forever, they look around and find themselves in a forest, then they realize that they are lost. “We’re lost Jack. We’ll never get back home now. Wait, what is that smell?” They both notice the smell of some baked goods cooking.
 
“I don’t understand, who would be baking in a forest?” Jack questions their discovery.
 
“Does it matter? It means someone who can help us.” Jill cries back to him. They make their way through the woods by scent until they come across a house that looks to be made of gingerbread. They both hear a cackling laugh around them. “I-I don’t like t-t-that noise, let’s go back home.”
 
They look at each other for a moment, nodding. They both begin to turn around, but instead they finally collapse and immediately a wrinkled pair of hands grabs them. Dragging them into the gingerbread house, as we hear a witch’s cackle one last time. 
 
 
About the Author

Scott Jackson is a native of Central Illinois, living with his girlfriend and four cats. He loves video games, musicals, comic books, 80s and 90s nostalgia, Doctor Who, and overall, a good story to enjoy. After finally reaching his limits with retail work, he decided to re-invent himself by returning to school to pursue his dream of becoming a writer and teacher. In his spare time, he picks up extra roles in local indie films, works with a local community theatre, and works on his next novels.

 
 

The Longest Walk

By William Utech Jr

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One night he decided to leave,

Took a long walk down a desolate road.

I would kill to know what he thought as he went,

to understand what pushed him to start that walk.

But I'll never know, and off he walks

Questions unanswered, Pain in his gait

Aren't you mad? He chose to take that walk?

I'm furious.

 At the world that didn't deserve him.

 

 

 

About the Author

C.J. Utech is at his first year at ICC. CJ lives in Pekin, Illinois. He aspires to be a writer and uses poetry to practice and refine his skill. Besides school and work, CJ plays Bass guitar and practices his writing.