Young Writers Project is an independent nonprofit that engages students to write, helps them improve and connects them with authentic audiences in newspapers, before live audiences and online. YWP also publishes an annual anthology and The Voice, a digital magazine with YWP’s best writing, images and features. More info: youngwritersproject.org or contact YWP at sreid@youngwritersproject.org or 802-324-9538.

This week, we present responses to the following challenges: Frost. Read the Robert Frost poem Design. In describing the industrious spider and the flower, he says so much more. Choose a simple plant or animal and create a poem in the style of Frost.

Winged creature

By Amica Lansigan

Age 12, Hanover

As I walked the abandoned streets alone

and into the dark, eerie dead of night,

I saw a bird flying up and away,

a black silhouette against the moonlight.

It called out to me — a desperate cry —

of suffering, sorrow, and despair.

I saw it had a broken, feathered wing;

it could fly and soar no more through the air.

I understood the poor bird’s anguished call,

for we all are wounded and broken, too.

But once we are healed, we can fly once more —

it is from up high that we see the view.

We are all fragile and delicate things,

but from our downfalls, we emerge with wings.

Seasons

By Rhys Rountree

Age 12, Lyme

Time flits by in the blink of an eye,

leaving not a moment to spare.

And if only I could think of why

seasons vanish, each gone elsewhere.

The vast, grassy plains transform in fall,

coated in bright layers of color.

The snow lays down her gown, to top it all,

but spring lifts it for the others.

Summer’s heaven turns to autumn’s hour,

and autumn’s leaves to winter’s glow.

Snowy winter gives way to sweet spring flowers,

and spring flowers too soon go.

Time flits by, in the blink of an eye —

if only I could think of why.

As free as a gale

By Rhys Anderson

Age 13, East Thetford

Some people take the well-walked road;

others take the road where no one goes.

But I say blaze your own trail —

to gain a sense of independence,

to be as free as a gale.

A fox’s cry on a cold winter night

By Eli Hoffer

Age 13, Hanover

I heard a fox’s cry over yonder.

It was as rough and sharp as a piece of magnetite,

permeating the air like a laser

and echoing throughout the clear, open site.

The creature ran through the densely packed, wet snow,

stealing through the calm, quiet atmosphere

to put on some sort of wintry show —

for me, being the only audience there.

I wonder why that fox made that shrill cry —

perhaps to signal to a friend for help,

perhaps to find a fox to mate with nigh,

perhaps for no reason but just to yelp.

But that snowy fox’s cry still made me stir

as I wandered into the night.