By Lylyan Yenson Without a doubt, “Sans Papiers” by Lê Thị Diễm Thúy is one of the most confusing poems I’ve ever read. For most poems I can vaguely understand the author’s message, but with this poem I couldn’t take in anything at all.

By Lylyan Yenson “My Grandmother washes her feet in the sink of the bathroom at Sears” by Mohja Kahf shares the story of a strong woman who wasn’t swayed by others’ opinions or words. Her grandmother stood firm in her beliefs and never swayed her opinion despite what people said. …

By Lylyan Yenson “Introduction to Poetry” by Billy Collins describes how the narrator tells people to admire the poem, read it, learn from it. However, the people overanalyze the poem and try to learn everything about it rather than appreciating its art. My first thought was less about poetry and…

By Lylyan Yenson “To converse with the greats” by Vera Pavlova is a short poem with only eight lines. When I first read this poem I had to reread it multiple times to understand its meaning. …

By Lylyan Yenson Humans are blessed with our senses: smell, sight, touch, hearing, and taste. Using our senses we get a feel for the world around us and can choose to appreciate our blessings or choose to disregard them. Artists like Agnes Martin chose to take in the beauty of…

By Lylyan Yenson In the podcast by John Green on Agnes Martin, many things resonated with me but the main thing would have to be this quote: “Beauty is in your mind, not in the rose.” …

A Million and One Questions By Lylyan Yenson The first thing that came to my mind when watching the video about Ed Ruscha was why? Why gas stations? Why were they so popular? Why did he start taking photos? Why did he start painting? Why those words? Why those colors…

By Lylyan Yenson Nathaniel Mary Quinn’s portrait “Mend” showcases different aspects and images to create a single face. The unique aspects are haphazardly put together to represent the different parts of a person that make the whole. …

Whether it is in a positive or negative way, the community has an impact on who we are as an individual. The community affects how we act, how we think, and how we identify ourselves. Oftentimes we don’t realize how we’re being influenced until we look back and focus on…