Photo credit: Kenzie Dera

Helena’s Poem: ‘Love’ is not always synonymous of ‘soft’, And yet it’s too malleable between lips Curls easily in the ear Nestles smugly within the heart. Such a pliant word can’t describe the monstrosity between us; There is no space for anything fond When it’s an incessant disaster aiming to explode at our throats Clashing like dark clouds full of thunder, destroying like starving hurricanes Leveling the earth itself as the only thought is to cause pain, to make it hurt- But by god, I could draw the scars on your knuckles blindfolded, And you could just as easily map constellations upon my torn back For it’d be far too simple to label our hand-made madness as ‘hate’, If not for the damning sweet aftertaste the word leaves upon our tongues.

Poetry is often known as expressive literature with a specific, clean rhythm or structure, the opposite can be said of senior and Harbinger club president Helena Piacenti-Rodriguez’s room at home. There, you can find a desk with scattered writing materials and loose papers full of ideas waiting to become stories. This is just the beginning of the creative process that she goes through. 

The first step in Piacenti-Rodrgiuez’s writing process is to understand what emotions she is having, a skill she has learned to master. Thanks to her process, Piacenti-Rodriguez has the opportunity to express herself creatively. 

“I write a lot of poems, they help me let out creativity and emotions and things like that. I’ve been writing a lot.” Piacenti-Rodriguez said. 

As the president of Harbinger, the school’s literature and poetry club, Piacenti-Rodriguez has high hopes for the club’s expansion. She looks forward to advancing the club’s membership and in turn give students the same opportunities she’s had with creative writing.

“This year, I want to have a more stable population of people coming and to keep producing the literary magazine and keeping up the tradition we’ve had,” Piacenti-Rodriguez said. 

Since there are so many different forms of poetry, Piacenti-Rodriguez believes anyone can find something that interests them in writing. She likes to explore many different forms of self-expression.

“Poetry has a lot of different types–one of them is visual poetry. You can draw something out of little prompts you get if you’re not a big poetry person,” Pacienti-Rodriguez said. 

Whether through verse or prose, putting a pen to paper allows Pacienti-Rodriguez to express her true feelings and share her words with the world. Whenever she feels the need to express something, she starts to write. 

“Writing, to me, means a way to not just vent about my feelings, but also explore them more in-depth and verbalize how I feel,” Pacienti-Rodriguez said. “It can be done in different ways, through a story or a poem, but I think it’s a really cool thing. I’m really big into linguistics. It’s just a way of expressing myself.

Q&A

Favorite Holiday?

Christmas.

Favorite season?

Between Summer and Fall.

What hobbies do you have?

Listen to music, take naps, draw, read and play piano. 

What sports do you play or extracurricular activities?

Volleyball and Harbinger.

Who is your favorite artist?

Maneskin. 

What’s your favorite type of music?

Anything besides Country. 

Favorite movie / movie character?

“Howl’s Moving Castle.”