FALL(2024)
Creative Nonfiction
My Transition and Transformation to High School
By Eli Ziegler
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
The transition from middle school to high school
is something that worries many pre-teens.
Trust me, it is scary, but I found my place.
I am a freshman at a high school
that is 30 minutes away from my house.
The name of the school is Notre Dame Prep.
A Name, Two Dates, and a Sentence
By Gemma Rowe
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
I gaze upon the vastness of rock, cut with clean corners in orderly rows, dotting the fields. Bright fake flowers blow in the cool wind, and a quietness has descended upon the field. This quietness has grabbed onto the rushing river of my thoughts and like a strict mother blows a “shhhhhh” over these waters, silencing them.
Fiction
Shadows of Valor
By Ciara Lieby
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
The young man watched out the window scanning the landscape beyond. The rolling hills and
tall mountains stood in the distance, wide rivers flowed through the valley and through the
dense forest. He turned his head from the valleys and mountains with a sigh. He was nervous,
knowing what was to come, but no idea when it actually would. He’d been waiting for a long
time now.
Space Rescue
By Haocheng Yu
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
Several months ago, the Ares 14 manned rocket completed a 192-day journey and experienced 13 hours of radio silence. Finally, astronauts Charles Milan, Nemo Wilson, and Michael William James successfully landed in the A14 landing zone of the Utopia Planitia on Mars.
Poetry
“Full Moon Fear”
By Padraig Monahan
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
In the basement, shadows loom, I wait,
Against the wall, in silence, contemplate.
The moon hides, veiled by clouds so vast,
But fortune fades, the shade won’t last.
Chained by fate for my transformation,
Lost control, brought devastation.
“Confessions of a Teenage Girl”
By Sophia Leintz
Featured in HeartLines Issue 4
Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.
It’s been a lifetime since my last confession.
Before you,
My knees skinned,
My tongue skinned, but unchained,
My eyes, hollow, yet holding the runes of Rome.
“Storytime“
by Guineesha Bosquet
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
Stories are a virtual reality.
Close your eyes and make believe.
Block out the terrors of the world around you- and write what you see – in the form of a story.
Bedtime stories at night, so you sleep tight knowing you read a story about a princess and a
“Proserpina”
by Sophia Leintz
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
Blushing rain
Descends from the cherry blossom’s
Weeping branches,
Under the veils of glistening spotlight
“Faceless Soldiers”
by Emma McLarin
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
The road’s not long,
A month of a minute
Made out to be at ease
Tragic fate, not a breeze.
“Dear Anxiety”
by Sophia O’Brien
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
Why are you
always with me?
I see you
every time I start a test.
“The Glass Doll”
by Sophia O’Brien
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
I am a doll made of glass and on a shelf.
When people pass me by I feel just fine.
But when people are cruel to me I feel as if I could break
Into a million pieces.
“Masked Waves”
by Sophia O’Brien
Featured in HearLlines Issue 6
Bubbly,
Sandy,
Calming waves.
Cold,
“Writer’s Block”
by Sophia O’Brien
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
When I have writer’s block, it’s tick tock on the clock.
I feel annoyed, and I feel paranoid.
Try to write, but can’t find a chant.
I’m suffering because I feel stuck, and it sucks.
“Someone I never will know”
by Gemma Rowe
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
The lifeguard stands are overturned,
And the sand no longer bites my feet.
There is only gentle humming beneath them.
The sky has deepened,
Fiction
“The Honest Letter”
by Ciara Lieby
Featured in HeartLines Issue 7
The letter wasn’t supposed to exist.
Leo had written it at 2:17 a.m., hunched over his desk with nothing but a dim lamp. All he could hear was the steady thump of his own heartbeat filling the silence. It wasn’t for a grade, or a contest, or even meant to be read. It was just… everything he hadn’t said.
“Corin”
by Konnor Braden
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
Vah dashed through the forest, leaping over gnarled roots and the dense, low-hanging branches of the black oak trees that surrounded him. Arrows whizzed through the air, some flying past while others bounced, dampened but not harmless, off the shield he’d strapped to his back. He knew not where his path was taking him, only that wherever it led would certainly be away from the bounty hunters that pursued him. He’d chosen, aided by a few more cups of alcohol than planned, to sleep closer than usual to the city he’d chosen to camp near for the night.
“Dystopian Paradise”
by Morgan Repasi
Featured in HeartLines Issue 6
Breath.
Think.
Get your mind back..
Where’s Silas? Why isn’t he here? He’s always here, and I really need him right now. Silas?
SILAS!
