Michael Scali

The Legend Of The Schlager
Based On A German Folktale

One day, in a sleepy little village on the countryside, evil lurked. A young girl named Mary was having a normal day, with a normal family, and a normal life. Just that day, Mary had been sent to the potato cellar "Go fetch some potatoes from the cellar, dear Mary." As she walked down the steps, a small creak emitted from the floor. She made her way to the farthest shelf, and saw something that made her blood turn cold. The schlager, of which she had heard tales of as a small child crawled from underneath the nearby steps. "Mary", it said "Don't tell your mother I'm down here." Mary knew there wasn't a chance for her even if she didn't tell her mother. She ran up the steps and said "Mother there is a schlager in the basement! "Don't worry child, I will get it" the mother proclaimed but as her mother walked down the stairs with a puny kitchen knife, she knew there was no chance. "Go to bed child, there is nothing to worry about." Little Mary walked up the steps to her room, once she arrived, it was hard for her to fall asleep. Moments later she heard a voice as cruel as fire, "Mary, I'm on the first step, Mary, I'm on the second step, Mary I'm on your third step. She heard her mother scream, than there was silence. The cruel voice continued "Mary, I'm on your fourth step." Mary gasps as the creature passes up the last step. "Mary, I'm in the hall." The schlager enters the room, but the door doesn't open, for no door can stop a creature of darkness. "Mary, I'm in your room." The floor creaks. "Mary, I'm on your nightstand." She hears the voice again, it says "Mary, I will kill you now." A scream is heard, then silence. There is nothing to greet the soul of Little Mary, but silence and dark. She was not the first to die at the hands of this thing of darkness, and she will not be the last. So if you hear a voice in the night, just know, it is too late for you.

The Life Poem
Most people think life is straight, they are wrong. Life is a circle, with no beginning or end. Life is like leaves spinning through the autumn air, smooth and seemingly endless. Unaware and ignorant of the approaching ground. Life is just the container for what you can do, what you can change. Your Life never stops, even when Death enters. Death is there to take you away, not to end you. You will always be Alive through what you do, the lives you change, the love you leave behind, in the hearts of the people you know. You are the leaf, endlessly falling, the ground will not greet you. The ground already knows you. The ground is the imminent Death you must face, with dignity and courage you will feel the relief of floating, floating away. But your Life is no longer with you, it is distributed among the people you love and the changes you make.
Life is endless, if you make it that way.

The Water Child
He is floating, bobbing in the space behind the waves. That place where the evils of the world you have known are chained to the ground, unable to reach the boy who had wished to escape them. There are people on the shore, walking and smiling. They do not see the boy, who does not wish to see them. He wants to see the water, blue, green, a great swirling abyss of the ones who have come before us. The kind eyes of the sea greet the boy, the boy wishes not to see the eyes go away. He dives down, down, farther until he is lost in the eternal rest of the waves, coasting above him where the works of society cannot reach. He feels at peace, though he knows he needs to breath. He ignores this feeling, he is better than it. The boy stares off into the water, thinking simply of the days, months, years he had spent on this earth. Living in a place he could never call home, living, yet not alive. Now, he knows, it is all gone. For the sea is taking him. He starts to wonder if he is floating away, out to sea. But he knows this is not true, he stares off into the blue infinity, letting the kind eyes of the sea welcome him. His soul is one with the waves. He says goodbye, and is gone.

The Poem Of Contrast
There is Good and there is Bad
There is Love and there is Hate
There is Happiness and there is Sorrow
There is Peace and there is War
There is Truth and there is Lies
There is Life and there is Death
There is no way to Peace.
Peace is the way.
There is a chance for us.

The One
Day 1
I have seen the shadows that haunt me, I saw them in the street, in the school, in my home. The shadows whisper to me prophecies of The Day. At least that's what they call it. I keep telling them to go away, but they say I'm The One.
Day 2
The shadows now whisper everywhere, all the time. I cannot touch them, they are always watching me, laughing and looking on. They seem to know something I don't. Today I was on the brink. I saw a shadow during English. It was laughing, on and on. Watching me and my classmates try to spell the vocabulary words on the board. I dove for the shadow, it laughed some more. The teacher asked if I was feeling well, I was not. I started ranting on about the shadows and the words they whisper, she told me to stop. She begged me, again and again. The world went dark.
Day 3
I woke up in a room, but this was not my house. There was a pink carpet, near a bed covered with pink hearts and a deep, red circle. There was a little dollhouse in the corner. As I stood up, I realized my hands felt wet. I looked down. I saw something that made me nearly fall to the floor, my hands were covered in blood. The shadows were laughing again, they whispered "Little Sophie's parents won't be happy." Another one whispered, "Tsk tsk, this is not the day yet. She still has work to do."
I look over in fear at the bed, and I see a little girl. Her pajamas are stained red. Once again I see darkness.
Day 4
I awake once again, wondering why I feel so tired. I slowly make my way downstairs, and pour myself some cereal. I turn on the TV, the news pops up, the newscaster proclaiming "This morning, a young girl by the name of Sophie Harkinson was found dead in her bedroom, she seems to have suffered death by-" I shut the TV off. A flood of memories come back to me from the night before. I wonder frantically around the house. Hoping my memories are wrong and guessing as to what the shadows are doing to me. The shadows are laughing, they whisper three words to me in between their hysterical laughs "You did it." I scream. The darkness comes again.
Day 5
This time I remain conscious, there seems to be a red haze in front of my eyes. I look around, suddenly my body moves forward at an unnatural speed, running forward, jumping and landing on a young child who screams, I then kill him. I scream, but no words come out, I am not in control of my body, yet the shadows allow me to see the evil I am performing. I run, jump, and kill. Every time I get a little faster, a little stronger. There is a red light coming from inside of me, burning with the light of the fires from the land of the Dark Prince, who the shadows often talk about. I begin to float in midair, rising, up and up and up. The land beneath me starts to quake, fire and ice raining down from the sky. I feel the darkness of the shadows being released onto the Earth. I am swept away, once again, in a sea of darkness.

(5 entries, 43 sentences in "The One")

**Marking Period Two Starts Here**
To Smile
To smile is to face the world, and hum a happy tune.
To smile is to eat way to much candy... for breakfast.
When you smile you give the world a little break, from the gloomy tunes that press you down.
To smile is to think that maybe, just maybe, it's not so bad.
Smiling is no regrets and lots and lots of hopes.
To smile is to find your happy place and joke around with your friends.
But...
Sometimes you can't smile, you won't smile, the happy tunes just won't come back.
You think the world cannot get worse, that the sun will never shine.
But the clouds always part, right?

I Am From...
I am from surfing, salty winds and sun-bleached hair.
Six in the morning with a long board by my side,
Bobbing up and down behind the swift morning waves,
Hoping, just hoping, for one to make my day.
Sitting and hearing the ocean breeze blow, the seagulls squak, the waves crash, my friend yelling "The dolphins are here" as they swim by us, playing and leaping in the smooth morning water.

I am from music, reggae on the beach.
With the steel drums droning in my ears and sand in between my toes,
Indie rock on the streets of the Italian market in Philly, the songs that I think are amazing, but no one listens to.
I am from Bob Marley, Matisyahu, the Districts, and Citizen Cope, the best musicians you've never heard of.
Loud reggae concerts with jerk chicken, and quiet ones in the snack shacks by the beach.

I am from Nicaragua, my favorite vacation place, with the warm water and fun waves.
Nicaragua, with the street chicken and the happy days, filled with relaxation and sunshine.
The jungles with the howler monkies that sound like vicious beasts,
They look like limp stuffed animals, sleeping on the branches.
Nicaragua, where you can surf all day to end it with a hammock, or the pool at Pelican Eyes.
Breakfast at El Gato Negro, and no FDA to speak of.

I am from steak, or maybe just chunks of meat in general.
The savory, filling, yet artisan taste fills me with joy and, well, steak.
Foga De Chow, with the endless steak and the bacon wrapped (gasp) filet mignon!
Cornish hens and delicious decadent sirloin, not to mention the juicy "Du Jour" wonder.
Big old chunks of skirt steak from the smoker, an explosion of hickory flavor, packed full of too much salt.
Broiled, grilled, smoked, baked, whatever it takes to make a steak a steak.

What Is Hope
Music is created on a blank sheet of silence, desolate, clear, and empty.
Art is created on clear white paper, unscarred and new.
Hope is far more complex,
Hope is created through a great expanse of darkness,
Hope is made of fear, oppression, and the absence of Light.
The atrocities of the world combine to let its inhabitants Hope,
To Hope is to see Life and Love in a sea of Fear.
Hope is natural optimism, unrefusable and constant,
It has conquered the hearts of the oppressed and lets us wander into the world's darkness,
With its Light as our guide.
Hope is the candle on a window sill, warm and welcoming,
An asylum for the victims of all Humanity's mistakes.
Yet how do all the horrible things of the earth simply result in Hope?
No one knows,
Yet can a reason be found to Hope in happiness?

What Is Reality

What defines Reality?
What physical divide separates Reality from it's opposite,
If there were to be a distinction between the two,
Then what opposite is there to Reality?
Is Reality the world that we tread upon and the air that we breath?
Or is Reality what our minds make it?
Can our imaginations be considered Reality
Or is Reality limited to a physical world in which a strict set of rules
Confine Nature and it's products?
Reality is what we make it, for we are Real to a certain extent,
So our Minds cannot be confined to an Unreal state.
Even after we no longer tread the Earth and breath it's air our
Minds still remain in full Reality as a Void of ideas.
Though the theoretical line between Reality and it's opposition
Is often considered to be blurred,
I am here to say this line simply does not exist.

Night
The Sun is cold
The Moon arisen
From its icy prison
The Night has started
Dank and Dark
The Flowers weep
The Crickets sing
For the Sun has passed,
And the world is Hidden.

Nightmare
You run
You run
As fast as you can.
The thing is chasing, close behind.
You are not fast enough,
You stumble,
You fall.
The thing is behind you
Waiting to strike.
You run
You run
The room gets smaller
The air is warm.
You can't get a breath.
The walls are closing in
You panic,
You pray,
But you can't get away

Walking By Sunrise
There is a girl, who walks by Sunrise.
She is the one that roams the Horizon,
A pioneer of the brighter places in Life.
She will walk, and she will walk.
Until the sun has risen.
Then she must go,
She cannot stay,
She doesn't belong.
But where can she go?
Even the Sun doesn't know.
The girl can only walk and hope,
Can only sing and smile,
Until she reaches the Sunset.
And she will continue to walk,
As Life continues to move ahead.
Because the world needs her,
And so do we.
When she arrives,
The world will rejoice,
All fighting will end,
All battles left unfought.
The Sun will shine bright in her presence,
As the children laugh,
As the poet sighs,
As we all become free of Hate
And its destructive weight upon our shoulders.
Her name is Peace.

**Marking Period Three Starts Here**
French Fries
I’m being carried forward with all my friends! How much happier could I be?
I see a bubbling, frothing pot of greasy yellow substance. I’m sure its a jacuzzi, or a hot tub at the least. For my friends and I to relax in, as we drink the finest lemonade, from the plastic tub by the register. My fellow fries are starting to get nervous, as small salty tears come to their crispy little eyes.
The bubbling gets louder, the stench unbearable. I start to see the source of their worries.
But I know that my red and yellow clad friends will never lead me to harm.
They drop us in, the screams resound, from the walls of our basket-like prison.
Burning oil sears through us like lemon juice in a scar.
An eternity, it seems
Before we are lifted out of the oil, it was obviously an accident, of dropping us in.
Such an outcome was obviously not intended.
They pour us out into little groups, my friends and I get the biggest carton.
(We are awesome and that is why)
Onto a tray and on top of the counter we’re placed.
All ready for our next adventure, which is surely not a deception.
Two small hands, as plump as plums, pick up our tray to set us down at a table.
A small happy face is looming overhead as two grubby little hands prepare themselves over our carton.
How great it would be, to be friends with this thing.
Its bright red bow a perfect contrast against its knotted blonde hair.
I can see the hands swoop down and grab my friends, who are on the very top of all of us.
They yelp in confusion as they are stuffed into the mouth of the ferocious tot.
I am sure it wants to be my friend, it is just removing my friends so it can pick me up.
So it can join me in my adventures.
Of course!
That’s it, it is really quite clear.
I simply can’t wait for it to get to me,
Oh how marvelous it will be. Finally, the time has come. I wave goodbye to Little Jim,
The friend below myself.
The hands come down to pick me up, the fingers soft and warm.
The grip tightens and I am a little uncertain, although I am sure it’s just a hug.
The thing pulls me towards its mouth,
And with a pang of fear I soon do see,
The darkness ahead of me.

On The Hill
The man on the hill,
He sits and watches the children play,
Running and laughing in the dawn of day.
The man on the hill,
He sits and watches the children move along,
The cold ashen playground left in lonely song.
The man on the hill,
He sits and watches Autumn fade to Winter,
And Winter blush into Spring,
Until the man on the hill
Can sit and watch the children return,
A fleeting moment of quiet joy, that one can neither capture nor discern.

**Marking Period Four**

Summer
Crashing waves,
Seagulls rave,
Ice-cream cones,
Sea-worn stones,
No more school,
Sunglasses that look pretty cool

SpringSnow is melting,
The weather is sweltering,Pollen is in the air,Spiders are here to give a good scare,The grass is green,There are flowers to be seen,How long until Summer again?

Winter
Snow everywhere,
The weather no longer fair,

There are birds about,
Nothing happy to shout,
A cold barren wasteland,
Resulting in an arthritic hand

Nature Haikus

Bright dawn light shines off
Morning waves on the shoreline
Calm icy winds glide

Breezes ripple through
Idle green forests crying
To Fall’s stoic gaze

Plump red apple falls
To its peaceful ending place
Grass and Flower weep

Snow melts to feed the
Icy Spring streams flowing to
Anxious flower sprouts

Pollution’s dark smog
Flowing pungent to the end
Of another life

I Am From (Actual one)
I am from backyards,
from 69th street and seaglass.
I am from 6 AM at 6 years old,
walking on the beach at Avalon.
I am from hamburgers (no cheese),
from Ramen Noodle soup on sick days,
and olive oil-garlic pasta.

I’m from UE and URA,
from ice cream and baseball teams.
I am from smooth morning waves,
and frosty snow covered hills.
I am from laughing too much,
and talking too loudly.

I am from “Triple Chocolate, please!”,
from giant oak trees and a cool Fall breeze.
I am from the smell of Italian roast pork,
that is responsible for the disappearance of a few rosemary plantations.
I am from good music,
and having good times.

A Weird Dream
It was a gray, cloud-coated Saturday in the middle of December, the perfect day to sleep in. Yet whatever part of my half-baked brain that controls sleep failed in its job, waking me up at 6:00. Unable to sleep, with the sun straggling its way to the bland, steel-colored horizon to my East I rise from my bed to binge on whatever carb-filled food I could salvage from my kitchen. After watching enough TV to kill a small animal, I walk outside. To my complete and utter surprise, I found two blueberry muffins dancing a lively jig on the sidewalk. I of course, dressed in my green coat and red wig, danced along with them. They then led me to a blimp which transported me to the Stein Inn, a small hotel/classroom inhabited by strange creatures. One of these creatures, dressed in some purple shower curtains, proclaimed its name to me, “Bry-in Kayrk”. It led me to the entrance of the hotel which was adorned with statues of watermelon. The doorway was marked with a small whiteboard proclaiming “Welcome to the Stein Inn” in blue sharpie. Absolutely horrified, I quickly walked through the entrance hall and proceeded down the corridor with my guide. Suddenly, Bry-in stopped, turned around, and scampered away. Approaching us was a grinning teacher, the original Mrs. Steinen, asking if we had last night’s homework. Realizing they were doomed, several small creatures wearing matching lampshades desperately searched their folders for the assignment. Right at that moment, a magical alarm rung, announcing a fire drill. Several creatures scampered through the doorway with relief; among them Bry-in and the snarling group of lampshade-wearing critters. Upon arriving outside, the pair of blueberry muffins came toward us, evacuating us all just as an ear piercing buzz announced the official end of the day at the Stein Inn. Upon waking up from this nightmarish specter, I realized my Wiki hadn’t been completed yet. Panicking, I wrote down a quick story about my Seventh Period English Class. After falling asleep once again, I dreamed of a much more horrifying predicament; Thirteenth Period Literacy.