Year 11 What Matters?  English Writing Competition

The Girl in the Mirror - by Charlotte M

Red hair, black glasses, green eyes.

That’s all you see when you look at me, the shell of my disguise.

Spine straight, shoulders back, chin up.

Just put one foot in front of the other, keep walking, never stop.

As I look at my reflection, I realise that’s all they see.

My pink cheeks and pale skin, but is that all there really is to me?

Hey there, girl in the mirror. With your head held high.

Your confident smile and walk are quite convincing, but your eyes give away your lie.

I know you’re insecure and I know that you’re scared.

I know you don’t like how you look. And you wear this attitude to keep from being bare.

So you use your confidence as a shield. Of which you hide behind.

And you smile through it all so they’ll never know what’s on your mind.

Hey there, girl in the mirror. How are you now?

You want to keep on hiding, okay, but how?

I know you think you’re ugly. I know you think you’re fat.

You think that no one really loves you, because of all of that.

So you keep on smiling, and now and then you laugh.

To make sure no one can see how deep the scars really are.

Hey there, girl in the mirror. How are you holding up?

I can see the struggle behind your eyes, but please, don’t give up.

No matter what happens, I’ll always have your back.

Because we’re the same, you and I, in what we have and what we lack.

Because pain isn’t beautiful. And fear isn’t strong.

And you say, ‘I’m always right’, because you’re scared to be wrong.

Hey there, girl in the mirror. It’s going to be okay.

We’re all here for you. And we’re here to stay.

But no, you don’t believe that. Do you?

Even if what we’re saying is completely true.

Because you’re feeling lost, and you feel that you’re alone.

But you won’t let them see, in case they break you down bone by bone.

Hey there, girl in the mirror. Please just give it a chance.

Come out to play, come and dance.

Just stop being scared and feel something.

It doesn’t matter what they think, open up and sing.

Cause this is who you are. Come out and be yourself.

Let it out, stop caring about everybody else.

Hey there, girl in the mirror. Please, don’t slip away.

We got so close this time, maybe we could try again some other day.

No, don’t go! Please just come back.

You’ve gone behind your shields, waiting for their attack.

You don’t trust anyone do you, it won’t matter what I say.

Oh my poor girl in the mirror, what did they do to you, to make you this way?

The Storms of Life by George I H 

Much of my childhood has been punctuated by anxiety. A general aversion to

anything foreign or unfamiliar in nature. A restrictive and limiting sense of

inadequacy. Most pressing of all was the desire to control the uncontrollable, a desire

equally as draining as it was persistent.

To me, anxiety can feel like being a puppet to my subconscious mind. Throughout my

life, I have found it difficult to cut the strings which have allowed my subconscious to

take charge of me …

For most other students in my class, it was just another day at school, they seemed

to share a sense of blissful indifference. However, I knew something lurked, waiting

to overthrow the innocent skies and summer sun. It was something my mind

ruminated over that day and many before it. Today, there would be a thunderstorm,

one of the new fixations that had interlaced its way into the fabric of my ten-year-old

mind.

On that morning, I was dedicated to monitoring the weather forecast, yearning for it

to portray the idyllic sunny day. I was allowing myself to become consumed by the

dread of my powerlessness over my circumstances, and therefore had invited fear to

manifest itself in my mind.

As the school day wound to its conclusion, it became apparent that there was no

event to fear, the dreaded storm did not eventuate, and the anticipatory terror snuck

back down into the recesses of my conscious. The irrationality of my panic brought

into the forefront a challenging thought: “was there really anything to fear but fear

itself?”

This question possessed a great significance in relieving my subservience to my

subconscious. I was enveloped by triumph as the true origin of my fear exposed

itself. Retrospectively, what truly formed the greatest fear was the anticipation and

not the event.

Equipped with this newfound knowledge, I was able to muster the strength within

myself to loosen the clasp of fear through exposure. This time, as the tell-tale

cumulonimbus clouds gathered ominously in an obscuring sky, I would not hide.

Instead, I would conquer the darkness, and maybe, in doing so, I would come to

appreciate the fascinating and beautiful ways of nature.

It didn’t come without its adversity, but I found the capacity to cut the strings that

bound me to my inner fears, relinquishing my status as a puppet for fear. It is a

universally experienced sensation to strive to control the uncontrollable but doing so

has only caused me to lose control of my mind.

It is so important to me that young people recognise that they are stronger than

their anxiety tells them, and that they can overcome the seemingly insurmountable

storms of life.

Student Contributions in The Messenger