I. I had a false dream of the Odyssey. It was in a sleep dark as carrion birds; I was in a cradle of flames,…
Posts published in “Byline: ANNA WESTWIG”
The doe places its hooves between moss-filigreed rocks with the delicacy of a wish. Silent, nose twitching, it bends a long, swooping neck to forage…
IHS Bands Host Virtual Performance
By ANNA WESTWIG on April 2021
The concert opens as any other would: Ms. Zawel, director of IHS Bands, standing in front of a darkened auditorium. There is a polite silence…
Satisfied
By ANNA WESTWIG on April 2021
Wake up, all froth and sea foam, and scrawny dreams. You swear your blood is crystallizing; from the pattering leaf-shade, watch the lift of seven…
Amazon employs more than a million workers across the globe, is worth around a trillion dollars, and, in its 26-year history, has undercut, outstripped, or…
Gideon the Ninth is Worth Coming Back from the Dead to Read
By ANNA WESTWIG on March 2021
Some books you devour; some books devour you. Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir is one of the latter. Muir’s prose is not just hungry,…
Ode to the Dot above the “i”
By ANNA WESTWIG on November 2020
You lonesome ellipsis, the alphabet’s first foundling, gape like opened veins in grey water. You afterthought, you dreaming balloon, scatter like radiation on the page. …
Students Get Politically Involved
By ANNA WESTWIG on October 2020
While Cornell students bustle across a collegetown street under a high, equinoctial sun, three IHS students manage a table stocked with flyers, stickers, and pens,…
Untitled
By ANNA WESTWIG on October 2020
The nostalgia weaves itself like clockwork, smothering you like mist at the edge of the sea, where arthritic hulls rock under the gull calls and…
Admissions Amidst Uncertainty: Interview with Admissions Officers at Local Colleges
By ANNA WESTWIG on September 2020
The fall in which students apply to colleges is a fraught period in any high schooler’s life, but complications due to coronavirus have multiplied that…
Britain and Parthenon Marbles Might Part Anon
By ANNA WESTWIG on April 2020
The Elgin Marbles, otherwise known as the Parthenon Marbles, are the collection of sculptures, friezes, and busts built during the height of the Greek Empire…
As the Sun Falls
By ANNA WESTWIG on April 2020
The sun falls like a silk canopy, Draping itself over the pines, Dripping black gloss on the crow, Teasing the frost crystals Into liquid. Those…
Rebuttal
By ANNA WESTWIG on March 2020
Some say quick haikus Could be done by anyone, But the critics don’t.
Little Women On the Big Screen
By ANNA WESTWIG on February 2020
Greta Gerwig’s 2019 reimagining of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women is a fragmented ode to the story that so many little women grew up on.…
Valentine
By ANNA WESTWIG on February 2020
The bees creep along the doorframe, golden-lacquered wings brushing the corners of chipped, white paint. The gentle rasp of their wings, tucked tight against…
Teacher Feature: Suzanne Nussbaum (Part 2)
By ANNA WESTWIG on December 2019
Last month, I interviewed Latin teacher Suzanne Nussbaum with a series of questions centered around her early life and how she came to be a…
Two Perspectives on Jane Yolen’s Mapping the Bones
By ADOWYN ERNSTE, ANNA WESTWIG on December 2019
The year is 1942, and Chaim and Gittel, Polish twins, are forced from their beautiful home and made to live in the Łódź Ghetto. Their…
Winter Haunts
By ANNA WESTWIG on December 2019
(Inspired by “Stopping in the Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost) I do not know whose woods these are. They must belong…
Teacher Feature: Suzanne Nussbaum (Part One)
By ANNA WESTWIG on November 2019
Suzanne Nussbaum, the only Latin teacher at IHS, is one of the school’s little wonders. Her office, hidden in the confines of K-Building, is stocked…
Tangerine
By ANNA WESTWIG on November 2019
We held the tangerine like a question behind our teeth; an orange globe of sun balanced on our tongue, shards of light splintering out into…
Peaches
By ANNA WESTWIG on November 2019
Fruit is the thing with innocence— so it’s odd that we call it flesh. Holding with hands—omnipotence— children of farmers away from the thresh …
Space Age
By ANNA WESTWIG on October 2019
Today, space exploration is hurtling forward at maybe a little less than light-speed. A dozen men have been on the moon. There exists space probes…
Spoilers: Orpheus Looks Back, A Hadestown Review
By ANNA WESTWIG on September 2019
From the moment I walked into Walter Kerr Theatre on a humid August day, I knew Hadestown was going to be incredible. The stage itself…
moon
By ANNA WESTWIG on September 2019
it sits there like a dinner plate, that moon yellow and wide-eyed on the horizon. mute and studying a girl who is nothing…
Epitaph
By ANNA WESTWIG on June 2019
All words were found from the Wikipedia article on epitaphs. An epitaph, strictly speaking, is name, year, date of birth, and date of death.…
Center Spread: Study Techniques
By ANNA WESTWIG on May 2019
Untitled
By ANNA WESTWIG on May 2019
Spring has swept in, silver and wanting, and the swinging of the axis is giving me nausea as the seas slosh back and forth like…