Lillie - Heat

Escaping the heat
is an impossible feat
Whirling  around the dashboard,
palpable.
Seat belt metal is
perpetually burning.
Air-conditioning weakly
pushing warm air.
Windows down, sleeves rolled, hair up, shades on.
Escaping the heat is an impossible feat, but at least I stay cool.

Lillie, age 17

Lillie - Rhythm

Rhy rhy rhy thm
               Snares hitting beads hitting hands hitting t a m b o r i
n e s
Rhy rhy rhy thm
               Feet tapping slate cracking hooves slapping reigns

Lillie, age 17

Lillie - Down in New Orleans...

Down in New Orleans, winter isn’t an actuality.
Clouds bound down heavily and humidity proliferates.
Temperatures remain around New England spring while spirits rise and fall.
Down in New Orleans, sea levels are inconsequential.
Storms are what re-energize and charge the static energy that this city runs on.
Oaks produce the fresh shade of which air-conditions dream.
Down in New Orleans, directions go south to the river swiveling around north.
Cracks and potholes are in the streets, not on the streets.

Lillie, age 17

Lillie - NOLA Myths

No, your visit to Bourbon will not be the highlight of your trip.
                (those sketchy blocks are the dirtiest your feet will ever see)
No, I don’t have an alligator in my backyard.
               (that would be inconvenient seeing as most people have only grass patches in the front)
No, we don’t eat beignets every morning.
               (those actions would lead to a serious over intake of sugar and most likely diabetes)
No, ghosts don’t roam the streets.
               (the carriage driver probably didn’t even read the pamphlet of historical facts)
No, New Orleans is not constantly under threat of drowning.
               (although if or when it is, we will all be ready to float on in our decked out houseboats)

Lillie, age 17

Lillie - Winter in NOLA

Wintertime in New Orleans is similar to any othersub-tropical city. It’s muggy and border line cold, with a few wintery showers sprinkling against the streetcar lights. Nothing seems to change in thebackdrop, save more clouds invading more days. Coffee and hot chocolate reign without reason, as if only to comfort those yearning for snow.  Regardless, the best feeling in the world is created after a walk through the French Quarter on an especially dreary day, after the flagging down of a streetcar, after the opening of a window, and an investment in warm liquid accompanied by a coozy.


Lillie, age 17

Lille - There's a Feeling in the Air...

Whenever I hear the phrase:

                “There’s a feeling in the air,”

I think of thousands of millions of little particles

                floating and fleeing through the atmosphere,

feeling that feeling in the air.

I see them feeling, but what feeling are they feeling for?

                I guess I feel like those feelings are feeling some feeling, but why not having emotions in the air?

 It would make more sense because then I would be thinking of thousands of millions of particles

                 e-motion-ing with their little feelers all the way to that feeling somewhere in the atmosfeel. 

Lillie, age 16

Lillie - Anticipation

 [ an-tis-uh-pey-shuh ]

the waiting for that moment, that one instance of aha

the anticipation is coming home, not for artificial comfort

                but for that feeling.

not exactly pinpointing what it means, but knowing it’s there.

the je ne sais quoi  c’est mon raison d’être in the background.

                the (treesonst.charles)(potholesoneverystreet)(moldingonthebalconies)(foreverpuddlesbythepark)

                                make the [ an-tis-uh-pey-shuh ] worth it.

Lillie, age 16

Lillie - Message to young NOLA

Season your years with what feels right,
but never forget what the flavor of home means.
         (lavender and dog breath to me)
Forge your own path,
but never speed through the good scenes.
        (Kodak moments are rarely caught on film)
Support everyone who needs you,
But don’t let your own infrastructure succumb.
        (muscle strength has nothing to do with this)
Don’t coast your way through life,
but always remember where you come from.
        (home isn’t where the heart is, but where the mind often wanders)
But most of all,
don’t worry about every rough edge
because the world is round.
        (and about 131,479,713 and a half feet around)

Lillie Martin, 16

Lillie - As the streetcar persistently creaks...

As the streetcar persistently creaks

                                air twists

                wrrrming by

                                exposing faces through the latched windows.

As the branches hit hit    hit   

                                leaves bend,

                                and veins are crushed for clearing ways.

Benches flow from two to four

                with the passengers

                                leaving and going and leaving and going

                like the tide of A 28-Foot Storm Surge Projected For The New Orleans Area: Evacuation Mandatory.

Picture the streetcar (1835) struggling through chunky fluid

                full of tears and trash and home and bodies and childhood and and and

   the streetcar steadily creaks to a stop.

                The wake sloshing against sides,

                                  receding memories

                                                down

                                                                 the

                                                                           streets

                                                                                         and                

                                                                                                over 
                                                                                               levees.

Lillie, age 16

Lillie - Nighttime in NOLA

New Orleans nighttime smells like stagnant water and cigarettes.
It has the gritty feel of aged plastic beads, hanging on the trees,
the ones that never fall.
The light never fully recoils, leaving sanguinity in the sky, but despair is in the soil.
Those who crawl come out, multiplying hastily, and blood is drawn.
The ones that never stand again.
The New Orleans night,
it isn’t concrete and streetlights.
It is the fight,
the build,
 the battle,
 and then the recovery.
It is New Orleans past mourning,
and after the darkness


- Lillie, age 16

Lillie - I am New Orleans

New Orleans has a certain feel to it; one that can’t be found anywhere else. I would be lying if I said the air was nice and crisp, complemented by the sun gently smiling down on you, because that’s not real, and if nothing else, New Orleans is real. The air here isn’t nice and crisp, but rather humid, and for the most part, miserable. The sun is brutal and summer is nearly unbearable without air-conditioning and at least a few pounds of snow balls. Heat stroke is not uncommon because of the summer days filled with either sunbeams or hurricanes in rotation, but it’s still hard to resist going out for a bike ride, even when you know you’ll be sweating within seconds. Growing up here, I have learned that the “hard” way, but I still think it’s worth the trouble to see the oaks bloom followed by the Japanese magnolias, and even sometimes the azaleas in the dead of winter. 
  
New Orleans is so indescribable because, in truth, it is such a distinctive and bizarre place that couldn’t be altered, not even by a corrupt government or increasing hipster population. New Orleans has shaped me more than I could ever describe on paper because I feel that I am a part of New Orleans and it is a part of me. I see that as something that could never be taken away from me, like an inherent or natural right that I will forever possess. Although city residents actually live in Louisiana, you would never know when surrounded by the New Orleans vibe. Regardless of racial, sexual, cultural or meteorological obstructions, New Orleans has agelessly stayed as cool as a cucumber.

New Orleans is ageless, although many floorboards creak in disagreement. I see my city as being ceaselessly active. New Orleans is alive in every sense of the word; awake at all hours with lights flashing, drinks sloshing and inhabitants carousing. New Orleans is as diverse as the adjectives chosen to depict it: easy, mysterious, rich without being wealthy. It cannot be embodied into one description or contained into one interpretation, in the same way that the inhabitants cannot be all jumbled into one. In the end, we are all true New Orleanians, and we even made up the word to tell the world exactly who we are.  

Lillie, age 16