Editor’s note: Young Writers Project, a Vermont nonprofit dedicated to helping students write well, will be sharing several exceptional pieces of best student work each week at VTDigger.org for special display over the weekend. We hope you appreciate the young writers’ viewpoints, imagination and experiences. Please let us know what you think.
My Sister’s Room
By Gracie Childs
The Grammar School, Putney
It is lonely here, say the sheets on the bed
No one sits on me anymore, says the blue chair in the corner
She enjoyed reading, says the pile of the books on the floor
She liked the color blue, say the dusty baby blue walls
I never get to feel the warmth of being turned on anymore, says the lamp near the bed
Her name was Francesca, says the crack in the ceiling
I miss how she used to hold me in her caring hands, says the purse on the wall
I loved the way she would open me up on a sunny morning, and let the warm sun shine in, says the window by the desk
She would always smile at me, says the I Love Lucy poster hanging on the wall
We all miss her, but we have to accept the fact that she is growing older now
We all have to accept the fact that she is gone,
Says the younger sister, sitting on the floor,
With tears in her eyes.
Listen to the audio:
About YWP
YWP publishes about 1,000 students’ work each year here, in 19 newspapers across Vermont and in parts of New Hampshire and on Vermont Public Radio. It runs an online teen writing community, youngwritersproject.org, which has only one rule: be respectful. It works with teachers in 63 schools who use YWP’s unique, free digital classroom platform and provides many with ongoing professional development mentoring and other teacher training. And it is developing NxN, a writing center at its Burlington headquarters. For more, go to youngwritersproject.org or ywpschools.net.
