Darius S (North Carolina)

This article was originally published by Cape Fear Voices/Teen Scene. It has been republished with permission as part of We Are’s international student voice partnership.

I grab a pencil from my bookbag and a piece of lined paper from my notebook.

I sit in front of my blank world, ready to be filled with life and emotion, and I think to myself,

What do I draw today?

My mind conjures thousands of ideas like a cloud dropping a thousand raindrops,

Each one envisioning a different world inside of it.

I see a world where my friends and I are ninjas going to stop a great evil,

A world where I’m the villain and all my friends are trying to defeat me,

A world where ancient deities exist,

A world of anarchy and chaos.

And then, I see it.

I finally see a world that would be excellent to bring to life.

A world full of lush green hills and trees, beautiful floating islands, countless stars in the night sky,

And where there is always light hidden inside the darkest shadows.

Seeing this world so beautiful, I knew this world could not go without life, and so

my pencil and I work together once more to create another outstanding world.

It’s time to get to work.

My pencil quickly conducts the actions my mind commands it to do without a moment of hesitation.

Scratch-scritch-scratch-scratch

Circles and lines coming together to sing in perfect harmony to form life.

With each stroke of my pencil, my mind can finally feel at ease, like a warm sunny day at the beach.

Not having to worry about the troubles of everything around me.

It all starts to come together now

The landscape

The sky

The faces

The expressions

It’s all perfect

But something is missing,

It doesn’t feel

Alive yet.

And then it hits me.

Color!

I gather my colored pencils and markers and begin to make this world finally come to life.

Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple

Every color I use becomes its own symphony of emotions.

And after the final speck of bland and lifeless white has been filled with colors;

This world has finally been brought to Life

As I look at the new world I created, I feel like I truly expressed myself.

Seeing the inhabitants of my world enjoy their lives fills me with an unfathomable amount of joy.

With my newfound fulfillment, I hang my world on my wall along with all the others, adding it to the universe that I have created.

I go to bed, close my eyes, and I think to myself,

What do I draw tomorrow?