Highlighting some of the best student poetry from the fall season

Beginning this week — tomorrow, in fact — we will be highlighting each of our 27 schools' performances from the 14th Annual Poetry Slam! each week on this blog. Before we get to that, however, we want to showcase some of best poems written this past fall that might not be featured in the performances you'll see.

For over two months, students — many of whom didn't even know what a poem or Haiku was prior to joining DC SCORES — learned how to write poetry and express their feelings on paper. These original works represent a small sampling from that experience that culminates in each school's 5-minute performance at the Poetry Slam!:

I Wonder

I wonder if the world sleeps

When I am awake

I wonder if I ever shrink, my thoughts will increase.

I wonder if I can ever fly

If I can lay on the clouds.

I wonder if Ms. Oliver-Kee

Can find a key to a golden chamber

And unlock all my thoughts to be real.

Telma M.

Brightwood Education Campus

Happiness

Cotton Candy

Got a big rollercoaster

With a little laugh in your favorite toys world

Your mom comes and gives everyone a fun sized cupcake,

With a cherry on top.

Then comes the rain

And the darkness covers the sky

Black

Sadness

Marks and drowns the world a little

Sun won’t hurt so sun comes along

Then birds come out

Tweet their little song

The rain goes away

With the sad clouds

Count and Bye Bye sadness

Here comes happiness in the world.

Leo

Bancroft Elementary School

Pure Love

My heart shimmers.

I fall in love

My heart is breaking,

Of lakes.

I am in love,

While swans flow,

My love,

A mystery as I go on.

Where is he?

This is my best friend

My best friend’s name is Joredine

He is not here today.

He is gone.

I end in tears

Swans turn into dust

The river is no longer fast,

It is slow.

The animals look sad, I walk through the park.

They Run,

Looks like God’s Tears

It starts all over again.

Aniyah W.

Noyes Education Campus

In My Life

In my life there is track and soccer

And I always smile

In my life I feel energetic

And I eat chicken

And I go to soccer games

And I want to be allowed to do two things

In my life I heard birds sing

And it makes me feel joyful

And I want to tell the world I smile a lot

In my life people think I am smart

And never go crazy

In my life I am an athlete

And I want to be a professional

And I give 100%

Lydell V.

Aiton Elementary School

I am what I am

I am someone strong,

I have my own beat to the drum!

I call the shots down to feet.

I’m an unstoppable force of wind, I don’t think you can handle me.

Well I’m what others don’t want me to be

One day when I wake and look in the mirror, I’ll be able to say I’m more than what anyone expected me to be.

That’s why I am what I am.

Tadjanique P.

Kelly Miller Middle School