Christianna Arango: Up and coming

Turn up the music! I reached forward to turn the volume dial up, my hair was whipping across my face so hard I could barely see. All the windows were down and the wind was muffling the music. My sister and I were were headed to the beach for the first day of summer. Our graduation tassels were whipping in the wind too. We’d graduated yesterday finally after 13 long years of public education and we made it. We were pulling up to the big bridge and I sank down in my seat. I hated bridges, being over all that water with hundreds of other heavy cars. We were so into the music and feeling free that we didn't see the diesel truck 4 cars ahead blow a tire.We heard it and it was like the world stopped. The tire blowing threw the whole truck careening to the right. Its cargo groaned and two of the metal straps broke. The driver turned to the right, hard and then the truck tipped. It crashed to its side and broke the railing on the right side of the bridge. It kept sliding out and half the

I've been all over the world. Traded, handed over, lost and found again. I've been earned,owed and fought over going from hand to hand always wanted but never kept and protected. I've indirectly ended lives and caused wars. I've funded shameful acts and made mass violence possible. While the humans kill each other over me I can't help but feel dirty, i’m the problem, the reason for the turmoil. I can't help what I am, what I cause. I've no family, no home because moving so often with so many owners leaves me no time to make roots. The friends I find are short lived because in the end we're always separated. I pray i'm handled gently , for if i’m damaged I may be cast away and this never ending journey will have been for nothing. I feel guilty knowing the pain I've caused for so many though indirectly, i'm not to blame. I can't help what I am and who I am doesn't even matter it’s not like I even know anyway. There are different numbe

Christianna Arango                                3/16/16 “BULLET” I still remember the heat from being made, the first thing I ever felt. I went from a meaningless scrap of copper, to a cause of death. I was mixed with lead forgetting where I ended and where the lead began. Huge metallic structures took us and pulled, twisted and molded us together into a shape perfect for a black contraption used to kill. Men called it a “gun” but honestly it was I who carried the full burden of death. I was meant to penetrate the bodies of others ending their lives, stopping their heart beats. I knew there was a reason, if I didn't do my part they would come and kill the men who I came from. I don't know why they were fighting but I had no choice. My life has already been determined and chosen for me. I remember the day I was lifted and loaded. I lay in the gun snug waiting to be free of the dark tunnel that I spent days in. The ones before me were shot and gone in seconds,