the bird on fire

The Bird is the Word: Sophisticated Schoolyard Shenanigans

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Kindness

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Every human being is

Equal.

Each human being is an

Individual.

No one has a right to

Look down on someone

And laugh at them,

Or scold them.

We are all unique,

But we’re all

Human.

No one should look

Down on another just because

They’re “foolish” and different

When compared to the bully’s

“Brilliant” mind.

If only everyone would be respectful and kind,

We’d have a happy, peaceful world,

Full of joy,

Where evil, misfortune, and depression

Are extinct.

Sadly, that’s not the current truth.

 

But,

Will you change the world?

Editor: Shelby Armor

Pete’s Declassified School Survival Guide: The Morning Routine

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By Peter Kadel, Senior Survival Scout

*Episode 1 in an ongoing series.

As we slowly acclimate to the total system shock of returning to school, I’ve noticed that many students are struggling with many aspects of everyday life here at Palm Valley. So since I enjoy helping others, I’ve put together a handy guide to school, drawing on my four years of experience and expertise for anybody who needs a helping hand to use. While many people will sugarcoat the truth or tell you lies to keep you ignorant and complacent, my guide will contain only factual truths.

 

The Morning:

One significant change that everyone struggles with when returning to school is adjusting to the change in sleep schedules and having to wake up early while also staying up late to do homework. This change is often a cause of struggle and stress for students. To prevent this stress, I fall asleep as soon as I get home. I strictly enforce a bedtime of 5:00 pm and always, religiously, wake up at exactly 2:00 am. This allows me to have nine blissful hours of sleep. Upon waking up, I proceed to run to the top of the tramway for a bit of fresh air. Now that I have reached the sweet spot of being wide awake after my run and refreshed due to my restful sleeping schedule, I am ready to tackle the assignments that I neglected to do the day before.

 

The key to effectively finishing your assignments before the start of school is speed; errors don’t matter. High school is supposed to be the best 5 ½ years of your life, but they won’t be if you worry about silly academic stuff. Just get it done as quickly as you can so you can focus on the important task of flirting with people your age and getting tattoos or piercings.

 

That is how I tackle the mornings. Stay tuned for the next installment to Pete’s Declassified School Survival Guide!

Editor: Brennan Nick

Heroes

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By Makena Behnke

those whose hair covers their eyes

those who decorate their bodies with ink from a needle or rings pierced into their skin

those whose hair is the color of the rainbow

those who are the rainbow

they don’t judge you as you anticipate, but you judge them as they mind their business

you judge them by their music or their favorite color

not as who they are but by the color of their fingernails

or what gender wears the makeup, or how much they apply and where it is applied

but little do you know the music you call “crap” and “stupid” is the music that helped them

those “idiots” that scream into the microphone are their heroes

and the way you judge is the reason why we need these heroes

Editor: Claire Jenkins

The TRUTH About Canada

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*Ms. Zachik talked about Irony today in English class. This is totally true.

By Brennan Nick

It has become apparent that due to new evidence of the populations of a certain furry rodent, the national security of the United States and its northern neighbor, Canada, are now under an unprecedented threat. With the advent of satellite pictures and increased scientific research of the Canadian north, we have found that gophers are congregating and building up their numbers in an advanced underground dirt complex located in northeastern Alberta. Why are they doing this? Let’s take a closer look. American explorer, Rob Mark, was the first person ever to visit “it,” and what he found was frightening. When he reached the gophers’ home after a 200-mile-long trek, he saw what we’re really up against. Although only seeing one gopher, no doubt the rest were underground hiding from him trying to cover up their operations. What he did see, in his own words, was, “What… I witnessed… was… an…engineering marvel… that was… frightening.” He then used the words, “They were… angry… but…industrious…animals…and were…preparing to–….They had…helicopters!”

*Disclaimer: the previous quotes were lightly edited.

These gophers are poised to create a small, elite army in the coming years that, within the first month of their invasions, I project that they will be able to overrun everywhere from Alberta to British Columbia to Northern Wisconsin. Their army numbers in the thousands with their average soldier looking like this:

 

We can also see previous attempts of gopherite control in the United States in the 2010 Congressional Election when a candidate for Montana’s At-Large District, Melinda Gopher, tried to take control of the state during the election. The important thing to note here is that she is named GOPHER and that she is a supposed native from the northwest of the state, directly bordering Alberta, Canada. Is this a coincidence? I think not!

Furthermore, this is not a joke, this is not some fringe idea, this is not some tin foil hat, snake oil, scam (I pinky promise! swearsies!). This is not something to be ignored. Advanced and extensive military action must be taken to curb the strength of this hostile gopher society. Others have reported on this as well. Other experts have had articles dedicated to Rob Mark’s discovery on DailyMail, Independent, CBC, Telegraph, and other smaller news sources. It is now the time to take action against the threat posed by the gophers to the north. Join the Gopher Defense Society today!

Editor: A.J. Patencio

The Girl Without Hands–A Fairy Tale Re-Telling

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WARNING: As in Grimm’s, the following fairy tale may contain violence; proceed at your own risk.

Artwork also by Harlow Berny

Retold by Harlow Berny

Centuries ago, when an old miller was out gathering firewood to sell for food, he had a chance encounter with The Devil. “If you give me what stands behind your barn,” said The Devil, “I will make you richer than any king in all the lands.” Pondering for a minute, the miller decided that trading the family apple tree that stood behind the barn for generations for vast riches was an outstanding deal. I could buy hundreds of apple trees with the wealth that he promises! thought the miller. “You have yourself a deal!” he shouted as he shook The Devil’s hand. “Excellent. I will be back in eight years time to collect what is rightfully mine.” In the blink of an eye, The Devil was gone in a wave of fire. When the miller went to look at the old apple tree that was going to make him rich, he was mortified to find that his only daughter was standing behind the barn and in front of the apple tree, and he realized how much of a fool he was to think that The Devil would give him vast riches for a measly tree, and further realized that The Devil was waiting eight years for his daughter to become 18. The miller knew he couldn’t go to a priest, for he would have to pay heavily to free himself and his daughter from the deal, if not persecuted for making the deal in the first place.

He did the only thing he could think of to foil The Devil, and eight years later when The Devil came to collect his debt, he found that the girl had been kept free of sin and her hands cleaned with holy water and was therefore untouchable. Infuriated, The Devil demanded that the girl’s hands be cut off so he could drag her down to hell or he’d take the miller instead. Fearing the loss of his own life more than his daughter’s, the miller took his axe and chopped her arms off, but when she cried her salty tears, which had become holy water due to her sinless soul, they cleansed her stumps and made it impossible again for The Devil to touch her. Infuriated once more, The Devil swore that the father would one day take his daughter’s place. Saying goodbye to both The Devil and his newly crippled daughter–now unable to work to pay for her food–the father kicked them both out of his barn. The daughter ran and cried until she stumbled into the royal garden, where the king took a fancy to her, and he married her within a month and commissioned a local blacksmith to create iron gauntlets to replace her missing hands.

A year later, and the royal family was welcoming a newborn boy into the family, and the king was off to claim more land in the name of his son. When he sent a letter home, though, The Devil resurfaced, and he altered the letter to order the queen’s execution. The queen saw the letter, and, in a panic, she threw it into the fireplace and took her child and ran into the woods, fearing her husband’s return.

When the queen was running in the forest, she found an angel calling out her name. When the angel got closer, the queen asked, “Oh, beautiful angel, what have I ever done to deserve your protection?”

“Nothing,” the angel shouted, “it is what your father has done to deserve my punishment!”

“My father, the old miller?”

“Yes. I shall reunite you with your husband and his army, and then you shall order the punishments that I whisper into your ear.”

“But will my husband not chop off my head once he sees me?”

“No. The letter you received was a forgery by someone who despises your family as much as I despise your father.”

“I don’t know who that possibly could be! What would stop them from trying again?!?”

“Do not worry, my child. Once your father is given the punishment he so rightly deserves, this nightmare will all be over. Let us hurry; we must meet your husband a mile north of here, and I will tell you what to say from there on.”

“Why can you not tell them yourself?”

“Because you are the only one who can see me. Now hurry!”

As the angel promised, when they were a mile north they intercepted her husband and his army–right in front of her father’s farm.

“My love,” said the king, “what are you and the child doing so far from the castle?”

The angel started whispering into her ear, and she spoke the angel’s words in her own voice. “I have something of great importance to tell you, my love, and it involves this old barn that I was born and raised in, and the man who raised me in it.”

“Darling, is it truthfully so important that you must tell me here and now?”

“Yes. The man who raised me here, the man who was supposed to be my father, made a deal with The Devil, promising me to The Devil as his servant when I came of age. When The Devil came to collect me, he found me sinless and my hands clean, so he ordered my father to chop them off, but when my untainted tears touched my stumps, they were cleansed again. The Devil could not touch me, but still my father kicked me out since I could no longer work for my food.”

Stunned, the king waited before he spoke again. “M-my word, I… I am at a loss.”

The angel whispered again, and the queen relayed, “Scorned by my father’s deception, The Devil has now tried to end my life. The only way to make this stop once and for all is to punish my father for his sins.”

“But h-how is one p-punished for such… heinous crimes?”

“He must be publicly punished in the same way he maimed me, then hanged. He will serve as an example to those who wish to make an unholy deal.”

“… Yes. He shall.”

The king’s army stormed the barn and brought the miller back to the village in shackles. As the angel commanded, the king had the miller’s hands cut off and then promptly hanged. What no one saw, however, was The Devil standing behind the miller as he died, and then slipping the miller’s soul into his hand. The miller had finally paid his debt, and now the riches that the devil promised the miller were in the queen’s hands as she lived a peaceful life with the king and their child.

Editor: Shelby Armor

 

The Ultimate Therapy

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By Charles Schnell

 

When you write down

Your thoughts and your feelings,

Truthfully,

You materialize it.

Your thoughts and feelings

Are a physical substance,

Made by ink on paper.

Your brain recognizes them

As real, and

Not all in your head.

That’s why

Writing

Is the ultimate form of

Therapy.

No one controls your

Thoughts and feelings

But you in your writings,

Just like how

I am writing this poem

And sharing my thoughts and feelings with you

Now.

Editor: Peter Kadel

First Day, New School

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By Renee Vazquez

 

Waking up,

6 o’clock am,

nervous to an extreme,

get ready get dressed try to impress,

or leave yourself floating out in the void.

You’ve done this before,

oh many times, but those experiences,

cannot compare at all.

Don’t you dare get lost in those halls;

do you want to be the fool again?!

Well what a surprise the teachers are actually nice,

this is a welcome change of scene;

WAIT the textbooks are actually from this century!?

End of the day,

I’m completely exhausted,

but it didn’t end in a complete tragedy.

Maybe this school really is for me?

Editor: Makena Behnke

Note to Self

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The Bird on Fire welcomes and promotes feature writing, news stories, graphics, satire, and, especially in Makena’s case, creative writing.

Note 1  4/20/17

by Blogger Poet Makena Behnke

All my life i’ve been a normal, average, girl who sat next to you. i’m sick of being normal, because normal means being forgotten. Do you remember the girl in middle school with the dark hair who followed the popular one around? No. Why? Because she’s a People. A People is someone who doesn’t listen to themselves, someone who is forcing themselves through one door and trying to fit in the stupid, boring mold. There are too many People in the world; we each need to be a Person. To be a Person we need to be fearless. For example, i don’t know half the stuff i’m writing right now, but i was talking with a Person, and she explained that you just need to be you to be a Person. Right now, i am me which means i am a Person. Mind you it is 1:48 am, and I could read this tomorrow and say what the heck was i thinking, but i could wake up and have written an eye-opening piece. Unpredictability is the miracle of life without the placenta. No one can tell what will happen tomorrow. Who would have thought that today I would be crying over a two-sentence chat that told me I’m me for a reason. I think we all need someone to help guide us through life and hold our hand.

–2:13 am

We’re Back, Baby

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Warning: The following may contain irony.

Introductory Post by Blogger Peter Kadel

Hello, ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! People of all ages! It is my privilege to introduce the return of everyone’s favorite blog squad…. The Bird on Fire! We took a brief hiatus because our secret lair was discovered by the Canadian Gopher army. But once we showed those rodents that the pen is mightier than little rodent claws and took back our secret sanctum, writers came in droves to join the crack team. Here is a quick overview of our freshly assembled staff.

Brennen Nick–When he sauntered in wearing a tin foil hat and screaming about the lizard people, we knew that this man was of sound mind and dedicated to telling the truth. You can expect reliable sources and sound logic from this writer.

 

Claire Jenkins and Shelby Armor–The dynamic duo! Blonde and blonder. Back after spending summer undercover in the criminal underground of Palm Valley. They have returned with evidence that a cold-blooded killer stalks the halls of our school. Be sure to stay tuned for their startling account.

 

Charles Schnell–Yeah, I think he has like some poems or stories or whatever.

 

Renee Vazquez–After we regained our lair, a flock of storks arrived and dropped Renee on our doorstep. When we asked her if she liked writing, she responded with an enthusiastic shout of “Yeah, sure.”

 

Harlow Berny–Perhaps the most mysterious member of our staff–he arrived dressed in a black cloak in the dead of night. He would only give us his name, and when we asked him what he wanted to write, he said, “ Stories of old made new.”

 

Makena Behnke–Another gift from our feathery overlords, dropped at our door shortly after Renee. When she landed, the lead stork said, “The prophecy is complete” and burst into flames as it flew off into the sunset.

 

Peter Kadel–The Harbinger of Joy, the Dragon of West Virginia, the man voted most likely to cheat death. After a stint as a guerilla journalist for Word from the Bird he has joined up with the Bird on Fire once we appeased him with offerings of plastic toy dinosaurs.

 

The Overlord–The mastermind of it all, the one who defeated the Gopher King, better known to you as mild mannered Ms. Zachik. We know her as the vicious pit boss who cracks the whip and lights fires under writers who work too slowly.

 

 

And so, there you have it folks, back with a new team following the same dream! Stay tuned as we bombard you with WORDS.

Go Live a Wonderful Life

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by Charles Schnell

Charles wrote this story for a fiction contest. He shares his wisdom with us.

She found herself in an endless sea of fog. There was no horizon in sight. In front of her was a faint hint of a shadow of an empty, humongous bird cage with the gate wide open. There seemed to be a lot more shadows, but she could only make out that one. Then she heard a deep, powerful, commanding voice coming from the empty, inanimate cage.

“Hello, my child. I am God. Welcome to the afterlife. You have passed away,” the voice said.

“W-What?” she asked terrified, “What’s going on? Why me? There’s so much I wanted to do in life.”

“Your time was up. You only get so much time in life, afterall. Now, let me ask you this: How did you like your time alive? Do you feel like you spent it wisely?”

“Well, sure. I mean…” she was struggling to find the right words.

“I don’t believe you,” God said, “Do you really think that you spent your time wisely, or do you just want to think that?”

“Well… but I…” she tried to answer.

“You know the truth,” God said, “You wasted your time in life doing nothing but planning your future, which you’ll never get to see now.”

These words pierced her heart. She knew they were true. She remembered going through all of lower and middle school doing nothing but studying. She spent her whole life never going out with friends or family, never playing with friends or family, and never having a normal childhood. She was so excited to get out of school and go into the adult world. She spent all her time studying and fretting over grades that she never got any enjoyment out of life. She never got to live life to the fullest. Once she realized all of this, she broke down into tears.

“Well, I guess I really never got to have friends, or have fun, or relax with my family. I just studied my whole life to have a good future,” she said sobbing, “But now that I am dead, I guess that doesn’t even matter now!”

“Then, tell me this,” He started, “What has this experience taught you about life? Have you acknowledged your mistakes?”

“Yes, I think I understand now,” she started, “While grades are important, they mean nothing if you don’t take the time to enjoy life. If… if I had been able to balance grades with the rest of life, then maybe I’d die happy right now.”

“So, you’re not going to die happily? That’s unfortunate.”

“As long as I know that I didn’t live life the way I should have, that I worried too much about the future and not the present, then I’ll never rest in peace!” she exclaimed as silence sank in for a few seconds.

“Let me ask you another question, my child,” God finally said, “Do you want to know what this bird cage in front of you is?”

“Sure,” she said, some tears still coming down her cheeks.

“Alright then,” He said. As God spoke, she was risen and pulled into the empty cage. Once she was in the cage, the gate slammed shut, and all of the fog had lifted.

What she saw was extraordinary. It was now a sea of a bunch of empty bird cages with their gates wide open. There was no horizon in sight, only cages. The ground was grass. There was a clear sky with a big, bright sun, but something was different about this grass, sky, sun, and these cages. They weren’t any common colors, but instead colors no soul has ever seen before. They were entirely different colors than any other color that has been seen by souls like her’s before. These new colors were so beautiful and unimaginable. No human would ever be able to think of these colors without seeing them first.

“This place is one of the many treasures of life, the greatest gift I have given to all of you,” God said, “It is connected to everyone’s souls. Outside of these cages represents the full experience of life. These cages represent the entrapment of souls who deep down actually want to go enjoy life, but aren’t. In order to enjoy life, they must leave the cage. You were the only one left who had not left the cage, as you can see. Make sense?”

“So,” she started, “you’re saying that I had get out of this cage–my cage, in order to have enjoyed life?”

“Correct,” God started, “but now what are you going to do? You are dead. You wasted all the precious time I gave you on stressful labor. You never truly experienced the thrills of life.”

“I know,” she started with a tear pouring slowly down her cheek, “but now that I am dead, what’s going to happen now?”

“You shall join me,” God said, “Come, my child, with me to Heaven.”

Once He spoke those fabled words, her vision was being slowly enveloped by light. Pretty soon, she could not feel her body anymore. She lost all her senses, except for one.

“Tell me child,” she heard God say, “when you hear ‘Heaven,’ what is the first image that comes to you?”

“What do I see?” she asked herself. As she pondered and wondered, she finally thought of it: what Heaven meant to her. Then, she was suddenly there; she was at the place which Heaven meant to her.

She found herself in an endless sea of green grass. In the horizons were the beautiful mountains that surrounded the small desert valley she lived in. She always loathed that small desert valley. It filled her with nothing but despair. Yet, whenever she looked at the horizon, with those thick clouds mixing in with the mountains, she would be filled with hope. That spectacular view, that piece of artwork, would inspire her to keep living. Those beautiful mountains, coming together with the gorgeous clouds, made her sense God inside of her. God would give her hope.

“Heaven,” God started, “was created to be one thing: genuine peace.”

“Genuine peace?”

“Genuine peace is beautiful. Genuine peace is a truly unfathomable state of mind that all souls yearn for. To be free from all negativity, to be in your own personal sanctuary, where all of the evil and demons of the world cannot touch you, to be able to look into anyone or thing, and see only the beauty of them, to have someone you love love you back, to have everything you want: that’s what it means to have genuine peace within you. This beautiful scenery fills you with that genuine peace, right, my child?”

She had nothing left to say. Looking at those beautiful mountains and clouds, that living artwork she loved so much, with God’s teachings in her soul, made her drop to her knees. She mentally broke. She bawled like nothing of her life was left. She was done. She remembered her childhood; she loved staying up every night to look at the sunset in the mountains. It would be even more beautiful with the clouds merging right into the mountain. It was such a beautiful sight.

“Why? Why did I waste so much of the so little precious time I had doing nothing but laboring with no enjoyment? What was my reward? Tell me! Why couldn’t I have fun like I wanted to? Why couldn’t I run away to those mountains, and find new adventures and stories for my life, like I wanted to?”

“Maybe you should not have taken your time on Earth for granted. You should have lived life bravely. You should have taken chances in your life. You should have gone and lived a wonderful life. Death is an inevitable fate. Live life to its fullest always. Memento mori.”

And so, there she would stand for all eternity. Staring at those beautiful mountains, and wondering why she lived life with limitations. Why did she bind herself? She yearned for emancipation, for liberation. She should have enjoyed life.

Go live a wonderful life.