James View

Today is the day when Theatre/ Drama club comes together, and reads poems or act out a story. Students are slowly flowing in the auditorium’s first couple rows which are, filling with writers/poets, performers, actor, and dancers. Oh, how it fills my heart to see more students than last year. Now that it is my senior year, it’s nice to see new faces and to be the co-leader of this club. The other leader is a junior named is Annie who is very outgoing and is very well-known with a lot of the students. Mr. Mac & Mrs. Miles are the teachers that supervisors who help students and get guest to come in to teach us how to be better artists. Today is open mic or open stage. To get everyone’s attention I clap my hands slowly then slowly increase clap. Annie, Mr. Mac, and Mrs. Miles join in with the rest of the club.

“Attention everyone my name is James Picer, I am a senior and I am the co-leader of this club with Annie Smith, who is a junior.” gestures towards Annie “I am so happy to see our turnout for this year’s Theatre and Drama Club. As a lot of you guys know, today is Open stage and Open mic. The name itself is self-explanatory some of you know but it means the stage is open for anyone who wishes to show your talent of acting, singing, dancing, instruments, and the mic part is for the all of who may be writers and poets. No judging--just artist beings in one place letting go through what they love.” I step back and Annie steps forward “ Ha very one so if write stories please have a short story, not a long one for we want everyone to be able to show what you got and musician please have your instruments ready before you go up. Also, dancers have your songs ready too. But anyway would anyone like to go first please raise your hand.” Several hands go up “You there with the red hoodie that printed on it Cation” The red hoodie kid with the word cation across his chest stands up and approaches the stage. Goes toward the mic on the stage and speaks “Hi my name is Ryan I will be dancing hip-hop to Jackie Chan and this is my 2nd year with this club hope ya’ll like it.” He carefully moves the mic and types into the computer and the music starts up. He get into position and start break dancing to the beat. He does a matrix/ the collapse move which make the crowd holler and wop then his final move. Which I thought was amazing he started to spin on his head this made the crowded crazy. When he was done, he bowed and walked away. I went onto the stage and grabbed the mic “WOW... Just wow that was really cool but I know there will be more talented people just like that in there own way don’t let his dance discourage you but let it do the exact opposite. Let it encourage you to come up and show us what you got. So who want to go next?” A short girl in all black in the back hand shot up before anyone hand came up. “You there in the back wearing all black.”

The girl came joging up through alley onto the stage. Grabs the mic, puts in the center stage and pulls out a wrinkled piece of paper out of her pocket. She speaks into the mic “My name is Tarah this is my 4th year in this club and I will be doing a poem.”  her voice gets a little wobbly and it seem she starts to get choked up. “This poem is in tribute to  Fernando Sanchez who died last year. The poem is called Dark angel.” I remember hear about this kid he died in a car crash and he was on the wrestling team. She unwrinkles the paper more and begins her poem.

“Death come when you least expect it,

Death is like dark angel and take away people,

When students hear the news that a teen is dead this shakes/shock the school into silence,

Some who are close to this student cry or other fall silent,

The silent hall are filled with sadness and tears

No parent should have to bury their kid but death take them away,

I pray for the lord up above to tell them that this is his plan,

I pray for that family for the pain they must feel.Through all this pain we become stronger with love,

Never forget to say ¨I love U¨ to the one who -loves U because it might just be Ur very last.”

By the end of the poem a lot of people were teary eyed even Annie was had tears go down her face and Tarah was crying. Then the sound of clapping began then the on roar of applause from the students. I see Annie climb up onto the stage and hug Tarah who is still crying who barely can say thank you into the mic and walks off the stage with Annie. I walk up the stage “ Thank you Tarah for sharing that with us, I can only imagine what you went through. Who’s next?” I went a lot like that for the rest of the evening. I had to leave early for work so I had Annie take over. I waved and said goodbye to everyone and left for my car.

Through Ray’s Eyes

The  sound of me breathing heavily and the steady pounding of my feet running through the halls “I am so late” I say to myself while running. I was late for Theatre and Drama Club because my friends wanted to talk to me about Homecoming week and our D&D(Dungeons & Dragons) meetup. I was right about to go into the auditorium when I smacked right into the one of the co-leaders of Theatre and Drama Club, James Picer. “OOF,” as I fall to the ground and land onto my butt. “Hey, you alright?” the sound of concern from Jame’s voice “Yeah just fine,” I reply back. “Sorry for literally running into you.” “Hey its fine. You going in” as he point towards the auditorium “Yeah I am, that is why I was running. I didn't want to be late,but I guess I am… is it over? The Open stage and Mic?” sounding a little sad but hoping it not. “No its not. I just have to head to work. You’ve missed a lot of great stuff but I am sure there will be more amazing stuff I will be missing tho. So what are you going to be doing?” He ask me. “I will be doing a poem.” I reply back with a smile on my face. “Cool, let me get the door for you and I’ll see you around.” He helps me up and we walk toward the doors to the auditorium. He opens the door for me. We both mutter goodbye and I walk in. I see some boy on stage with a guitar in his hands and he's sing a country song. I take a seat in the third row and open my backpack looking for the poem my friend wrote for me. The song ends and then a group of girls goes up and start reading a poem about a school shooting. Still looking through paper, my friend from Steam come up to me. His names is Tyler, who goes by “Ty”. “Hey Ray, so glad to see you here. Are you going to read one of your short stories or sing for us?” Ty knows I can sing, and in my free time I write short stories for fun, but I have never shared them to anyone. Ty just happens to walk into a room, where I was singing softly to myself. “No I am not in fact. I am reading a poem” I reply and find the piece of paper I have been looking for. “Yes I found you.” muttering to myself. Ty looks at me strangely while saying, “Should I clap for you? That’s the poem? Did you write it?” “No need for clapping. Yes this is the poem and no I did not write it. Don't worry, you’ll found out who wrote it.” Ty just mutters an okay then starts clapping for the group of girls that just finished their poem. Annie Smith comes on stage and, asks “Who nexts?” I raise my hand and it looks like she's pointing at me, but I can’t tell so I stand up and ask “ME!?” “Yes you get on up here,” she say replies back. Ty wishes me good luck as I make my way to the stage. I step up the wooden steps and make my way toward center stage. It’s really hot up there and the lights are so bright they could almost be the sun. I tap the mic and begin “Hi I am Ray Scout this is my 3rd year in The theater and Drama club and today I am reading a poem written by my friend PJ. I hope you guys like it.” I look down at the paper in my hand and read my friend’s cursive handwriting.

One Moment

Powerless, weak, fading almost

The Moment still arrives

Inevitable yet small It is Feared.

We Fear its arrival--

We know we cannot avoid its Void

Yet look as we may,

See the power it has

From the Shadow it casts,

When the moment of Future becomes Present,

Embellish and Exaggerate as we may;

Singular--the moment is infinitesimal

And the Shadow nothing more than our Fear--

Present passes.

Part as we may

From the World so loved,

Present becomes Past

The World becomes None--

The Shadow Gone,

One Moment passes

And in the next we move on.