I was inspired to write this piece while my mom was dying my hair. She was telling me about how she used to dye her friend's hair in New York, and how she missed the friends that died. I told her I wanted to write a poem about her, and she strarted telling me as many details as possible. I spent a few weeks working at it, fixing it, and trying to make it as realistic as possible. Her reaction was the best part of writing it. I'm happy with the result of the piece, and am so excitied to submit it!

This creative nonfiction piece is a tribute to my late grandfather, who instilled in me the values of kindness, humility, and, above all, resilience. While my piece compares the before and after, I aimed to focus most on the idea of lifelong love—how unexpected life events brought us closer together. One of my fondest memories was searching for and taking photos of various flora together in China or at nearby parks, so I include metaphorical imagery of constellations, mountain ranges, and other scenes in nature to describe our unbreakable relationship. The symbolism of paradise birds, a type of flower referred to at the beginning and end of the poem, brings the narration full circle. Ultimately, to me, writing is a method for catharsis and introspection. As a second-generation Chinese American living thousands of miles away from her parents’ hometowns, I have had a tumultuous relationship with writing. While writing this piece, I tried to not only let go of my own insecurities but also interweave them into the paragraphs to leave a deeply personal message. The story attempts to capture several intense feelings: my initial apprehension toward what lies in the future, the stage of acceptance associated with grief, and the pure joy that comes with familial love. Pursuing creative nonfiction has challenged me creatively and technically, and I look forward to continuing to develop my voice.

My film takes place in my homeland, the Bay Area and has to do with comedic elements I've drawn from my everyday life. The scene is set in Oakland, California, where an upcoming Muslim-American rapper struggles to balance his faith with the provocative nature of his song lyrics. I have always taken an interest in telling unconventional stories that challenge the dominant narrative. As a third-generation Iranian-American, many of my films tackle identity, environmental, and social topics in unique ways. From a salamander loving environmental film with elements of Fight Club to a film about a Bay Area rapper who struggles to balance his Muslim faith with the provocative nature of his music, I have always tried to cover global issues by adding an unexpected spin.

I wrote this piece as a reflection of two intertwined works: on Virginia Woolf’s “A Room of One’s Own” (hence the title) and Hèlene Cisoux's concept of "écriture feminine”—yet it's not a direct application of her theories of free-flow feminine writing because I did partially stick to the "rules" of poetry. However, despite the poem's lines in strict 10 syllable counts, there's an uneven number of lines—17— hopefully bringing some sense of disruption to poetry's formalities. The second line's "abstract" was originally "Rembrandt," but I wanted ensure that there was less of a reliance on male artists within my poem. While I briefly considered replacing his name with that of a female artist, I chose against that because it would undermine the message of the poem as a whole.

Summer's End is a creative flash fiction piece depicting the emotions and memories that the transition from summer to autumn evokes. I aimed to touch on themes including coming of age, time, purpose, and youth. I explored different flash nonfiction pieces in my school's Creative Writing elective, and was inspired to experiment with unique writing styles.

"Marinara & Alfredo: How Do Rainbows Work?" represents the fusion of my love for science, passion for writing, and aspiration to inspire young children, particularly girls, to cultivate an interest in science. I authored this book to teach the science of light and rainbows through storytelling and charming characters, tailored to resonate with a 5-year-old's understanding. Much of my free time is devoted to sharing this book in pre-K and kindergarten classrooms across the Bay Area, where I relish the chance to influence young minds. Additionally, I am in the process of having the book translated into various languages. My ambition is to expand "Marinara & Alfredo" into a series, with each book introducing a different scientific concept in a manner that engages and sparks the imagination of children throughout the United States, and perhaps around the world.

This is a short fantasy-drama about two high school age kids that discover the door to their basement leads to a magical forest.

The objective of this poetry collection is to illustrate the struggles and humor of the relationship between an elder sister and a younger brother. Interwoven with memories of the times I spent with my sibling, these three poems describe how we both came to understand each other despite our large age gap. To me, his presence has been a reminder to laugh through times of sorrow and a shoulder to cry on. When my family immigrated to another country, watching him grow gave me a sense of comfort as we both struggled to adapt to our new environment. He enchanted me with his curiosity and ability to look with awe at seemingly ordinary objects. Although we both still see the world in different ways, he helped me rediscover my internal sense of wonder. My brother made me realize through his example that no matter where we both live, we will always have each other to depend on. His restless smile was the inspiration for my poetry collection, Musings of Sisterhood. Through these poems, I aspire to capture the concoction of emotions in a brother-sister relationship as I narrate the story of overcoming our differences amidst difficult circumstances that only served to strengthen our bond.

I wrote this story as a dedication to my Grandpa who grew up with a difficult childhood, yet never failed to live his life to the fullest despite the original lack of love he received due to being put up for adoption and placed in the wrong hands at a young age. I've always admired his dedication to his family which he built from the ground up, never allowing them to settle for less, for he knew exactly what less felt like. His childhood led him to be a uniquely lovable man, which I hope to illustrate in this piece.

My writing largely centers around things I have struggled with in my life. I find it easier to work through things by writing them out. Husks is about my own experiences with burnout and how I have changed since childhood. It centers around fire, specifically wildfires, with each section titled as a phase of a wildfire, and signifying a phase of my life. Through this poem I attempt to display the desperation to go back to the way I had been, and acknowledge the fact I cannot go back to the person I used to be. The three sections each show how I have worked through the change from childhood to near-adulthood. They highlight the ways I have come to accept the parts of myself that simply won’t relight, no matter how strongly I wish they would. Each word in Husks was carefully chosen to best display the mess of anger, grief, nostalgia, and hurt going through my mind. It is a testament to the most vulnerable and complicated parts of my heart.

My submission is a letter written by a young woman living out in the costal country, to an ex lover who has left her suddenly and moved to the city. The letter is the speaker's mourning of the relationship. I love driving out by Bolinas and through the more rural areas of California and as I drive I always like to imagine the lives of the people who live in the old houses and what the world looks like to them. This is I suppose one of the stories I made up.

I wrote these poems about the relationships I've had with my close family members. Some are purely just letters of love to the people I'm closest with and explore the strengths of our bonds, while others focus more on the complexity and tougher emotions of family. I wrote the first poem in the collection first because the feelings expressed in the poem were something that I was struggling with at the moment, and the poem was a way to express these emotions. The other two poems that follow were written purely because I wanted to continue to express the complexities of family and love. My main process while writing is just to put pen to paper and see where it takes me.

As a collection, "Popsicles" is the description of the tangy, growing-up phase that awkwardly illustrates the contemporary teen. I approached the collection through the lens of how I view my childhood from the place I currently stand. "Popsicles" encapsulates the process of growing up as not becoming more than who we initially were, but instead as chiseling out who we are today from all that we consume around us, letting the rest melt away. This melting, this growing, and this change all morph into the bittersweet elegy that is “Fruit Juice Tears” which is the thesis statement for this work. From there, it made sense to write "Backyardia” as a tale of endless nostalgia told from the voice of my younger self. The final piece, “Shotgun” serves to juxtapose the previous work. It is written from my present self to my older sister. The work proposes a simple question. What happened to us? This question guided my process of creating the collection. Speaking from the heart, "Popsicles" is a giant, messy hug from ourselves where we stand to the children we once were. It is meant to be read aloud like a children's picture book and recited aloud and free, like Pop music on the radio.

Chicka is a children’s story about a baby bird who is scared to try new things - especially flying. She isn’t afraid of heights, but she is afraid of failing and being judged by her siblings, who easily fly, chirp, and help out around the nest. Chicka finally realizes that her siblings didn’t do any of these tasks with ease. In fact, before they became good at those things, they failed… a lot. The only difference was, they loved the challenge of trying over and over again. The story ends with Chicka finally trying to fly… and failing… and trying again. Growing up, I have always been driven to succeed. But sometimes that drive has kept me from taking on challenges because I didn’t want to fail or look stupid. Chicka’s story is my story. Not only does my mom call me “Chicka,” but the story was inspired by my experience learning to drive. I was never scared of driving, but rather I feared the judgment from my peers if I failed the written test on my first attempt. I put off taking the test for nearly two years. When I finally took it… I failed. But I also learned something very valuable. It wasn’t a big deal. In that moment, I finally understood how failure is an important part of the journey to success. I wrote Chicka’s story because I want little kids to understand this important life lesson that failing is essential for growth.

I wrote this piece in celebration of my struggle with personal hygiene and the mundane, but trying, battle of teaching myself “uncomfortable” skills. As much as sex ed classes can verbally instruct kids on how to have safe sex or science teachers can describe the process of menstruation, there’s no amount of talking that can take the place of physical experience, demonstration, imitation. I didn’t actually know what deodorant was until freshman year. Vaguely, I saw girls pull out bottles and tubes in the locker room, but nobody was excited to be seen with a stick of deodorant to their armpits. Combined with my mom’s complete lack of deodorant, I had to go on that journey to understanding alone. It was embarrassing at times as I’m sure every teenager has experienced, whether it be with deodorant, periods, shaving (I’ve still not learned how to use a razor). And it’s never our fault, but it can’t be our parents' faults either. It simply has to be up to us to learn from ourselves and each other, to reach that independence no matter how new it might be. My purpose with this piece was to take some of the shame away from that process, to instead make it something of pride, to tell everyone with their heads low over their first deodorant purchase that there’s nothing to be afraid of. Only an immense amount of strength and accomplishment awaits you on the other side.

I wrote this poem at 2am after nine hours of studying, staring at a screen endlessly and wishing more than anything that I could float away. I was exhausted and burnt out, missing the ocean so deeply that I decided to write it a love poem before going to sleep. I modeled "The Same Sea" in the physical shape of a wave, mirroring how the sea has seen me and every other person on earth in every stage of their lives. It is more ancient than anything on Earth, a constant cycle of old waters. I believe that water has memory along with peace and power, but it does not reveal its many secrets at a surface level glance. I concealed a second poem within the larger one in the form of bold words to convey the nature of the ocean: the true essence of its being and history is always below the surface.

In the environmentally conscious, wealthy city of San Francisco, some of its poorest residents spend their nights collecting empty beer bottles and soda cans in exchange for nickels at Our Planet Recycling Center.

"Sky Sisters" is a fictional short story about the sun, the moon, and the North Star; however, there's a twist: they are all sisters. Our view of these beings are very black-and-white in that half of us believe that it is science that makes the sun and the moon cycle across the sky everyday, while the other half believes that it is magic and the work of the gods. Instead of focusing on one of these halves, I decided to create an entirely different theory and gave these celestial beings names and sentience, allowing them to make their own backstory. While making my story, I wanted to keep most of the details realistic and somewhat factual, so I did some research beforehand about supernovas and the ages of the sun, the moon, and the North Star. To put it simply, this story is essentially the tragic backstory that answers the question of why the sun and the moon travel across the sky everyday. I had so much fun creating it, so I hope you enjoy reading it too!

Growing up as a lesbian in the religious Midwest, I faced the shame that my feelings had some inherent wrongness to them. I spent my adolescence fearing my developing identity. My unease dulled and erased many of the experiences I made then, which I’ve sought to recover in my writing. These works document my realization— years after the fact— that being in love is ordinary and human.

This summer was creatively interesting. Usually I don't write very much outside of my school arts program, but this year has been spent building up to writing a book and every experience I have has been filtered through a poetic lens. This collection has three poems. I wrote the first, "June," about how my summer felt compared to now, when I'm back in school. The third poem, "September" describes my experience with fall and how it's connected to wildfires, or at least the fear of wildfires. September is a busy month. June is not. I wrote the first act of "September" in 2022 and didn't finish it, and this year used it as a launchpad for the second act. The years I wrote them are in the names of the acts because they reflect different aspects of September across different times, and I felt it was important to show the gap between them. The second poem, "Gender Nonconforming," is a reflection on community and language failures of my existence outside of gender. It's bookended by "June" and "September" to place it in time.