Ka Wai Ola Issue 80 (2026)

KA WAI OLA

editors’ note

As one of the school’s oldest clubs, Ka Wai Ola has captured the Punahou experience for many generations. Just like the lens of a camera, the magazine snapshots individual moments and precious creations within the fragile student experience. As time passes on, we reminisce on our journeys and realize how connected we are. Behind every camera, every paintbrush, every keyboard, there is a creator who poured their voice into this edition. In Volume 80 of Ka Wai Ola, we embrace the multitude of Punahou’s stories through the theme of “Zoom In,” aiming to encapsulate the now of 2026.

Whether it be majestic desert landscapes, the toll of academic success, or the nostalgic glint in someone’s eyes, this edition is unique in its vulnerability and authenticity. As the Editorial Team, we hope that Ka Wai Ola is a home for our creators to grow into the most authentic version of themselves, and a place where their talents can be shared with our broader community. We hope that through this edition, our readers will be able to learn, feel, and relate through the stories of the KWO community.

This year brought on some changes within our leadership team. Ka Wai Ola welcomed back Ms. Sprott and Dr. Panglinan as our advisors, and welcomed 5 new members of our Editorial Team. We’re so happy to have you.

Thank you so much to all of our contributors this year. We’re so excited to share your work with the world. Whether you swing by on a Friday to help review pieces, or your work is featured in our edition, we could not be a magazine without you. You are the ones who bind together the pages of Ka Wai Ola, and allow us the honor of presenting your work to the world.

We hope you enjoy our 80th edition!

Happy reading,

The Ka Wai Ola Editorial Team

from the senior editors-in-chief

Ka Wai Ola translates to “the waters of life.” Just like the Lily Pond at the center of Punahou, Ka Wai Ola is a place where stories bloom and thrive. It is a gathering place of Punahou’s creative community, and it has brought so much light to my life.

During my time as a co-Editor-in-Chief, I’ve learned so much about the value of art, collaboration, thoughtful discussion, and most significantly, community. KWO has pushed me to become a better version of myself – whether that be in my writing pieces or navigating the various challenges behind-the-scenes. I’m grateful for all it has taught me and all of the warmth it has brought into my life.

In order to put together the magazine, so many moving parts need to work together. I’d like to thank the editorial team for pouring their hearts into this magazine – I’m thrilled at how it has come together, and I’m honored to be a part of the 80th edition.

Thank you, Ms. Sprott and Dr. P, for dedicating your time to KWO and always being an endless source of positivity and inspiration. Thank you to my co-Editor-In-Chief, Miranda, for all of your contributions towards KWO and for making it a safe space. Thank you to Isabella for making this edition possible. Thank you to our newest editors: Neal, Selena, Steven, Kaci, and Olivia. Your dedication and hard work have really made this edition something special. Neal and Selena, thank you for being such amazing apprentices. I’m so excited to see what you bring to KWO next year.

Words can’t express how grateful I am for Ka Wai Ola. I love this magazine with all my heart, and can’t wait to see what the future holds.

Lots of love,

Krislyn Ishibashi

I heard of Ka Wai Ola for the first time when I was cleaning out my stationary drawer at my house in Roswell, Georgia. (Though my parents had met at Punahou, their journey unfolded in such a way that they started their family on the continent.) The pen in my nine-year-old hand was heavy. The black metal gleamed beneath the aforementioned engraving, the perfect complement to the gold brass ringing the ballpoint and pen clip. I was intrigued.

“Mom, what does Ka Wai Ola mean?”

“It’s the writing and art publication I was a part of in high school.”

Though I was almost a decade younger than I am now, I remember being fascinated by the concept of the magazine: a place where young artists could share their voices. And when I moved home to Hawaii, and found myself in my freshman year, KWO was the first club I joined.

For the past four years, KWO has been my sanctuary, a place where I can nurture my artistic voice. Through the nudging of my freshman English teachers and the inspiration of KWO, I began to write poetry. It became an outlet for my emotions and creativity, allowing me to channel joy, pain, and everything in between into something beautiful. Publishing my work in KWO gave me the confidence I needed to submit my portfolio for the Hawaii State Youth Poet Laureate, which ended up earning me the honor of second place.

To my mom: thank you for nurturing my love of words and giving me this legacy and for igniting my spark. You are the reason I am here, in every single sense of the word. To Ms. Sprott, Dr. P, Dr. Noerper, and Mrs. Cowell: thank you for the guidance and mentorship. Your showing me the path to walk means more to me than you will ever know. To previous editors, especially Ash Bu, Crow Villanueva, and KG Pan: thank you for carrying the torch and trusting me to continue the flame. To my fellow Senior Editors, Krislyn Ishibashi, Isabella Liu, Kaci Reyes, and Jaye Kanaprach: thank you for carrying us forward and allowing me the honor to walk by your side. To my brilliant successors, Neal Sehgal, Olivia Schmidt, Selena Hung, and Steven Yang: this issue wouldn’t be here without you. You are the light of this club, and I am incredibly excited to see what is in store for your futures.

To all the current and future members, I urge you to create. In a world full of artificially generated writing and a constant deluge of content, we need you now more than ever to share your voices. It doesn’t have to be perfect, or even good; it’s human, and that matters more than anything. Art is what gives life meaning.

With mountains of gratitude and aloha, Miranda Yap, Your 2026-27 Co-Editor-in-Chief

from the senior layout editor

Ka Wai Ola is something special to me in that it has been a constant in all four years of my time in academy. Not only has it been a constant source of joy, this publication has been a constant reminder of the reason why the arts are integral in any community— school, state, or otherwise.

Out of all the hats I’ve worn in Ka Wai Ola, I have to say I’ve most enjoyed my job as this year’s layout editor. Punahou truly has no shortage of artistic and literary talent, but what inspires me most is the creativity, personality, and vulnerability so apparent in each of the pieces featured in the edition. This spring’s theme, Zoom In, brings into focus the sense of human connection that is a throughline across all of these pieces; though the individual works take shape in different forms, they often feel in conversation with one another, like a call and response rooted in our shared experiences.

Ka Wai Ola has reminded me again and again that art is the language of the soul. The more we engage with it, the more we are able to connect with others and inspire further creation. Though the future is undoubtedly uncertain, I urge the graduating class to make this language a lifelong practice, and to the underclassmen who will carry this publication forward: continue making Ka Wai Ola a space for stories to connect and inspire us anew.

Lastly, I’d like to thank Caleb Lee, for patiently teaching me the ropes of Indesign and preparing me to take on both Ka Wai Ola and Oahuan; to Steven, for being the most communicative and trustworthy apprentice; to Krislyn and Miranda, for their outstanding vision and leadership; and Ms. Sprott and Dr. P, for their continued dedication to us students and the mission of Ka Wai Ola.

All my best,

Isabella Liu

Table of Contents

Writing

Constellations

The Library of Regrets

One in a Gazillion

the orange water is pooling

kira kira

Geology and Other Natural Sciences

The Golden Chandelier

Who am I to Hawaiʻi?

Paper Ball

What We Could’ve Been

Someday

The Duality of Clown

the ballad of the fallen man self-portrait of america as the scent of rotting mildew and decaying swingsets

Maleficent

Less is More

para\\e\ \ines

The Peace In Sorrow Red

Cash Steele ’27

Neal Sehgal ’27

Heikura Leong ’27

Miranda Yap ’26

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

Scorch Zhai ’27

Nikhil Wong ’27

Miranda Yap ’26

Anonymous

Trevor Hu ’27

Sophie Tan ’26

Anonymous

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

Ava Zoto ’28

Ashlyn Hirota ’27

Ashlyn Hirota ’27

Anonymous

Selena Hung ’27

Anonymous

Ava Zoto ’28

Lēʻahi and Lā

Hawai’i Nei

Italy

Ethereal Reflections

The Edge

A Photo of Hong Kong

Island

Seamless

“Sea” the Silver Lining

The Journey

Pepeka

Yoonseul (윤슬)

Volcano Antisana

Family Love

All Eyes on the Ball

Waīkikī

Just Chillin’

Last Summer

Hawaiian Roller Coaster

Ride

Lēʻahi and Lā

Ash Geil ’26

Juliana Kaniho ‘28

Ava Zoto ‘28

Brycen Lew ’26

Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Carolyn Lim ’27

Kenton Chan ’27

Carolyn Lim ’27

Isaac Pan ’27

Chloe Liu ’26

Olivia Schmidt ’28

Liz Chee ’26

Heikura Hererangi

Leong ’27

Carolyn Lim ’27

Anna Choi ’27

Amy Bowers ’29

Killian

Geistkemper ’28

Coco Heahlke ’28

Kenton Chan ’27

Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Brycen Lew ’26

Brycen Lew ’26

Back to the Roots

Alignment

Academic Succes

Broken mask

The Ungloved

三更天

嵩壑城

E Flat Minor

Moth to a Flame

MALEFICENT

The Pink House of Almost-

Belonging

Burnout

The Leading Lady in the Glowing Sun

Anomaly Duck

One Year Away

Anticipating Duo

The Bathroom Weaving

Ceremony

Leftovers in the Kitchen

Sentimental Scramble

A Shepherd’s Work

Açaí Bowl

When a Bowl of Clams Told

the Truth Before I Did

Riley Joe ’28

Jude King ’27

Selena Hung ’27

Anonymous

Kate Yoo ’29

Owen Ren ’26

Owen Ren ’26

Sarah Cao ’29

Jooyung Kang ’28

Ashlyn Hirota ’27

Aika Middleton ’27

Selena Hung ’27

Samantha Harris ’29

Riley Joe ’28

Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Riley Joe ’28

Sophie Chan ’26

Sophie Chan ’26

Sophie Chan ’26

Nakoa McCoy ’27

Sofia Sinnett ’26

Aika Middleton ’27

guardian bunny of all the things that could’ve broken me

hydrangea

Hypnagogia

Taxidermy of a Feeling

Anomaly Duck

Aika Middleton ’27

Nesiah Mettler ’27

Nesiah Mettler ’27

Aika Middleton ’27

Riley Joe ’28

Hawai’i Nei

Handweaving on a Saori Loom | Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Photography | Carolyn Lim ’27

Constellations

Cash Steele ’27

When we look to the skies

We connect and draw lines Between fires infinities away

When the pictures appear They look closer from here Between unquantifiable space

And the stars They hold, they hold

When we were both young When you twisted your tongue When you made all those melodies wrong

When you rang in my head With a mind full of lead You spat out your serpentine song

And the stars They sang along

Constellations connect And they spell more than text And they make all the things we could not

Constellations connect Colors shine, and I’m left On the earth alone with my thoughts

And the stars They know, they know

When we look to the skies

We connect and draw lines

Between fires infinities away

All the secrets above

In an alien tongue

Watch the ink as it dries into fate

And the stars, Keep shining on

Ethereal Reflections

Photography | Kenton Chan ’27

The Library of Regrets

Neal Sehgal ’27

Everyone avoided the bottom of the bridge. I mean, who could blame them? Rumors from worried parents painted it like a child’s worst nightmare, a place with slithering serpents that would devour you in an instant. After a certain point, adults started avoiding it too, almost as if they were scared by their very lies. In reality, shards of glass crunched underfoot, and the river angrily crashed into surrounding rocks. But, for Tyler, the underpass was his sanctuary, his escape from home and high school and harm. Every day after school, he would walk a few blocks south, passing by the wandering cats that would always purr and the dimly lit alleyways occupied by druggies, before reaching the bridge, where he’d climb down the steep rock wall, always leaving a bruise on his left leg. The peacefulness felt like stepping into an oasis, the resolve he desperately needed after what happened. Today, however, he ventured too far and stumbled upon a wooden door guarded by vines, engraved in the rocks. Has it always been there?

Of course, Tyler had to open it; curiosity drove him to. Besides, whatever was inside couldn’t break his shattered soul.

To his shock, Tyler stepped into a seemingly endless… library. Large, shining lanterns encompassed the old atmosphere, and circular shelves stretched higher than the eye could envision. Yet, no books were in sight–only small, colorful spheres, each breathing as if it carried its own heartbeat, its own story.

“You’ve finally made it,” a voice said. Tyler turned and saw an old man sitting on a chair. The man had gray hair that formed a puffy, thick beard, and a leather eyepatch rested

on his right eye. He wore a bright red trench coat and a paper name tag, but the name was scratched out too many times to tell.

“Who are you?” Tyler asked. “And, what is this place?”

“It’s a library,” the man responded simply. “You’re drawn to this place only when your past mistakes become too loud to handle. About time you showed up, Tyler”. He spoke like they had known each other for years. Like long-time friends who meet once every decade and can still talk from sundown to sunrise. Tyler’s jaw was still open when the librarian stood up and signaled for him to follow, as he walked towards the endless corridors. The two strolled past a vast number of never-ending shelves before stopping in front of one. The librarian plucked a few spheres off the shelf. Each contained a memory that replayed: a kid yelling at his parents, a woman dropping her ring into a drain, and a man standing alone in front of a tombstone.

“What are these?” Tyler asked. “These are regrets, the librarian replied. “Everyone has a mistake they wish they could take back. I keep them here, where they lie securely.”

“Why would you keep someone’s biggest regret?” Tyler questioned.

“Because, if left unattended, regrets slowly eat at us. The past isn’t supposed to interfere with the future.”

The librarian grabbed another regret. This one was bright red, and it glowed radiantly. Tyler looked inside, and his eyes widened. He could see everything just as it was. The sunset above the beach. The flowy blue dress she wore, the one he got for her on her birthday. Her smile as they locked eyes. Then a frown, brimming with disgust, when he asked.

Her shadow as she walked away, roses bleeding on the ground. They hadn’t spoken since.

The librarian handed Tyler the sphere. “You can choose to leave what happened as it is. Or you can erase it from existence, from your mind.”

Tyler, startled, looked up. “I–I can just permanently erase it? I get a second chance with her?” he asked, eagerly. The librarian nodded. Tyler could feel his heart beating out of his chest, and distant memories coursed throughout his body. Her incandescent smile glowed throughout his mind, her laugh that numbed his heart, her presence, one that mimicked heaven’s radiant ease. He looked back down. The sphere shone even brighter.

“Why wouldn’t I take it?”

That was a dumb question, one he knew the answer to. It wouldn’t be the same. Each conversation they would have, each laugh they would share, would only continue to mask what he felt. He would continue to live in pain, knowing that the stars just didn’t align. That their relationship had a timer that ticked with every stab his heart endured. Tyler couldn’t return to that. Or could he?

The librarian didn’t answer. He simply reached up and adjusted his leather eyepatch, which, for a split second, revealed a faint scar. A scar shining in the lanterns’ light, one that radiated loudly with failed chances and regrets the librarian too faced. He then stepped back, patiently awaiting Tyler’s decision.

Tyler grasped his fingers around the crystal ball. Each second thumped louder. He imagined being by her side again, talking as they used to. But he also imagined the version of himself he would leave behind, the one who was learning

to accept rejection. He couldn’t sacrifice himself to return to what, deep down, he knew was just a second chance; a chance that required divine intervention and the world to stop in its tracks just to work. Maybe that’s the point of regrets. They aren’t past mistakes, but the doors that keep our hearts open to new beginnings.

They help us realize that some things just aren’t meant to be. But that’s okay.

“Keep it safe,” Tyler said as he handed the librarian his regret back.

“You made the right choice,” he said, smiling. Tyler smiled back and left, closing the door behind him, which slowly faded away into the rocks until it was only a memory.

As Tyler climbed back up towards his home, a faint shatter echoed behind. A small sphere dropped from the sky and crashed into the ground, its colors absorbed into the concrete, as it joined the other countless shards.

The Edge

Mixed Media | Carolyn Lim ’27

A Photo of Hong Kong Island

Photography | Isaac Pan ’27

One in a Gazillion Heikura Leong ’27

Makes me extremely curious

Locks coiled alike the ocean breeze; loose yet firm

Hair so golden, the earth’s mineral is ashamed

Tan skin with an underglow of tangerine, citrus yet “moreno” at once

As if a bodily-halo always followed everywhere

How could one achieve this?!

Endless hours spent in the sun

Seemed to have literally soaked up its rays

But doesn’t glow

Not how the sun does

Shimmers

Like that blinding last reflection on the ocean surface during sunrise and sunset

So shimmering that after staring, vision greens

Endless hours spent playing with the ocean

A pure-salty essence

The great feeling when you are gifted expensive earth salts

Or a salmon-pink mini jar of Himalayan

Precious.

One In A Gazillion

Seamless

Photography | Chloe Liu ’26

the orange Miranda Yap ’26

YOUTH:

i detested the taste when i was young the sugary ichor hurt my teeth

tang circling around sweet, too sweet it confused me i liked a fruit that could make up its mind, so my tongue ached chasing flavors

and the pith, oh the pith, my nemesis great spidery veins stick in your teeth reminding you this fruit is also alive

SUMMERS PAST:

sara offered me a segment from her towel next to mine sand warmed our bellies filling quickly with our provisions before sun stole integrity “it tastes better cold,” she said, hair dripping salt onto her arms

and when my teeth burst the skin and sunshine poured onto my tongue, i couldn’t remember the sickly sweet

the cloying tang

the pith

bathed in sun, an invincible young woman eats an orange and thinks perhaps i have been healed from the ailments of my youth

NOSTALGIA:

mother dressed up seldom when she did, she smelled of citrus

an elixir brewed bubble baths, filled the basin with foam an amber bottle, turquoise spelling “tangelo woods” i, wide-eyed youth, confusing mysterious elegance with naïveté –what is a tangelo? where are these woods?

mama glowed when she smelled like zest maybe it was magic, because of course, tangible tangerines never measured up to her sweet citric scent

FORWARD:

jab the peel four times: north south east west

twist until you hear a crack, like the lid on an ice-cold bottle of water but skin does not sweat, as refreshing as it is sitting under a blazing cloudless sky it tastes of summer all the same slide a thumb under its rind and gently reveal untroubled fruit resting beneath firm flesh arises with each turn, each push against relenting skin, until victorious

i hold my unearthed treasure, as its shroud falls into my lap, forgotten for a moment then rewind the spiral,

a patchwork skeleton of the fruit

a color this vivid, this loud should not exist in nature and yet, and yet i could name a hundred sunsets and scales and flowers and fruits that sport the same fiery hue

i swear i am holding the sun

“Sea” the Silver Lining

Photography | Olivia Schmidt

’28

When taken alone, A new pathway

water is pooling

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

Can lead you astray down the winding streets. Follow the lightly scented fog that expands the horizon, And fall with droplets through the heavy sky.

The ocean current snakes through your heart, then slips down the city streets, smearing the scent of cinnamon and bourbon in its wake. An unfinished sentence lies on the moist ground.

Old tales were once told of a sailor who drowned in the soil, Who could not sail far enough, Whose pearly bones were found underneath a blooming spring. To escape the clutches of the sirens below, You have to first learn to swim.

And so it begins, a new graying slate, Worn with thoughts heavy from the past, Glistening in swift rivers, tearing through the glass, Thinning air gathers around your feet.

The water is threatening to lose its hold on your skin, Tears burst from every fiber of your being, The tinge of water and salt mix and morph Into a spouting fountain of remembering.

The mist is fading from the city streets, Settling on top of chimneys,

Water is pooling,

The world is waiting.

The Journey

Digital Art | Liz Chee ’26

Pepeka Graffiti Spray Paint | Heikura Leong ’27

kira

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

kira kira

The day is bright. The waves are fierce, thunderously crashing against the rocky shore, their blue crest shining like a knight’s armor. Seabirds cluster on the sand, diligently picking at rocks. On occasion, they become flustered, hopping away as the cool sea lightly brushes against their wings, just too close for comfort for creatures of the sky. Pale sea lettuce sways, its half flowers glistening with dew as the ocean breeze sweeps through.

Suddenly, a family has stepped onto the shore, and a boy runs ahead, not stopping as the sand slows down his sprint and engulfs him in warmth. His dark almond eyes are lit with excitement as he takes in the beach, the sky, the air. The boy rips off his shoes in a hurry.

“Come on!” he shouts at his sister as he runs into the water. She is standing at the shore with her mother, a slight smile on her face as she watches her brother dance through the waves. Her long, dark brown hair catches on the wind and it whips around her face. The girl is not very young, but not very old. She’s caught in between her childhood and her future, swaddled with mild confusion about who she is.

“Okay!” she shouts back, sliding out of her slippers and joining him, the current gliding past her legs. Her large eyes are not perfectly almond like her mother’s and brother’s, but they shine in the daylight just the same.

In Japanese, kira kira is an onomatopoeia for things that sparkle. Having taken Japanese for six years, the girl thinks about the word as she dives under the waves. All she can see is the glittering aqua of the sea, small black fish occa-

sionally darting around the rocks. The water is clear andcrystalline, a blessing on a sunny day. She paddles along, grazing the rocks with her hands, her goggles slightly clouded. Her smile grows as she scoops up an algae-covered rock, bringing it above the waves to find a baby octopus slowly crawling amongst the seaweed. Her brother is also thrilled, and he shouts for their mother to see.

Kira kira doesn’t just define the sun, and the waves, and the beauty of the light hitting the water just right. It is the spark in the boy’s eyes when he sets the tiny creature back into the water, the shimmery sound of the children splashing, the wind whipping the girl’s hair, the silent sound of a smile forming on their mother’s face.

Kira kira is when the day, the moment itself, sparkles, in all of its youth, beauty, and light.

今、全部キラキラしています。

Yoonseul (윤슬)

Photography | Carolyn Lim

’27

Geology and Other Natural Sciences

Scorch Zhai ’27

Awaken, lift your lids and swallow stones And choke down gravel. Rub your eyes sand-dry. The salt of blood on tongue—your heavy bones Awash with gravestones, centuries passing by.

You watch as ceiling shadows dance around, And run the list of why you’re still not dead, And pray for when your feet will leave the ground. Relieve incessant pounding in your head.

Then go outside. Remind yourself of light The shivering wind, the rolling sea, and there— Due sunrise east, flocked parrots taking flight— You have their wings. Stop moping, taste the air.

You find the sun a grateful, holy deed, And inhale, exhale, slowly start to breathe.

Volcano Antisana

Photography | Anna Choi ’27

Family Love

Photography | Amy Bowers ’29

All Eyes on the Ball

Photography | Killian Geistkemper

’28

The Golden Chandelier

Nikhil Wong ’27

Thatha’s golden K ring, for Krishnamurthy, oriented away from him, glinting in anticipation, a reflection of Thatha’s one playful expression in only the luster of a ring. A moment passed, then he slowly plucked a card from his hand, lifting it and, like the answer to a call, flung it to the center of the table. A collective noise emerged from the table, it was a two, the second most powerful card in the game, besides a joker.

I was dealt cards from separate decks, mismatched designs, rubbing against my fingers as I inspected them, carefully rearranging the faces in order. One deck, a black-and-blue set bearing the old United Airlines logo, and the other, a lustrous red deck of foil-lined poker cards from my brother, the result of a poker craze that started a year earlier. He brought the game “Rich Man, Poor Man” to the table, learned from damp swim practices with musty playing cards, like how I learned Egyptian War, sitting cross-legged on the urethane-cement floor, in a polygon made up my friends, our hands red from slapping the cards, or in a crowded RV with my Dad’s side of the family, playing as the cards slid across the small table. There’s never a bad moment with cards, really; the bored faces of the kings and queens comfort me in that sort of innocent way.

Overhead, the foggy warm lights coated my foggy warm family in sepia tones. The rug underneath the lacquered wooden chairs was textured, not too soft, and not too tough for a person’s feet to rest on. The space was full, not just with family but with light and memories, streaming down from the ceiling to the floor, rays intercast and interwoven, like the strands of memories made at this table. And all the recollections that I can’t quite recall, building like the verdigris on a storied coin, like those old houses with the chipped paint and rusted door hinges, standing tall and proud in this room. In this house,

this house, which was not the one that my mother grew up in, not the house on Springfield Road or Avenue, because I can’t quite remember her telling me the name of the street. That Springwood house is stripped of the ornate crystal and candle chandelier that had hung there, but now shines brightly in this dining room that awkwardly leads up to the stairs, adjoining the living room in a weird, walled-in way. The taste of the Matar Paneer and butter chicken is underneath our fingertips, sloshing around in our stomachs, but with all of that is hope, a hope that we will not forget.

“Pass,” I sighed. The highest card I was dealt was a king, so luck wasn’t exactly on my side this round.

“Pass,” Patti 2 said, after looking at her cards a bit.

“Pass,” Uncle Vijay said, without looking at his cards.

“Wait, so a two is higher than an Ace?” Mom asked, and Taj rushed over to try to explain things to her. Then, my cousin’s turn awaited him. He looked carefully at his cards, pausing for several seconds, his eyes making small movements, tracing the suits in his hands. Then, he slammed down a Joker.

“Kiran, you’re wasting all your good cards in the beginning!” I said, fake-jealous of his good luck. He only gave a smile in response.

“It’s just like real life, it’s better if you’re next to the rich man,” Uncle Vijay quipped. We laugh. The background was a blur of orange, brown and shadows, the card game fuzzy, the background fuzzy, but the faces, drawn shapes into my hippocampus, were distinct and bright. A yellow melancholy overlay drew from the chandelier as we play the family game. Tonight, even when in deep concentration, there’s was little residue of a smile on everyone’s faces. And, although it wasn’t how the game was supposedly played, my Thatha, always the competitor, insisted that we keep score. I’ve al-

ready forgotten who won. I can trace the details all I like, but it won’t change how faded the lines are.

My Thatha sat at the head of the table, cards in hand, the glow of the ornate chandelier lacquering his brown skin. As I admired him from my seat, the creases of his face interwove as he glances at his cards. The darkness cast by his wrinkles seeped into his skin, and his features faded into the foggy ambiguity of remembrance. I remember him.

My mother remembers him, upright, a head full of curly hair, his speech crisp and clear. The faint trace of a cigarette (always smoked outside) quit for her sake. Strict but not humorless. He cracked wry, witty jokes at the dinner table as the family discussed business, Reagan, and the fall of the Berlin Wall. Immigrant parents expect a lot from their children. He was not the exception. He pushed her to excel. He came to this country with a pocket of loose change, a suitcase of clothes, and no room to stay. So straight A’s, no less. He stayed up late with her, writing proofs and doing constructions. But as she started to drift off late into the night, she awoke the next morning with sheets of paper with his engineer’s meticulous handwriting. She was closest to him. The first one to yell, the first one to cry. The first to volunteer to be my mom’s soccer coach (a game he had never played). Always the winner of chess or carrom. Always a close voice and a warm presence.

He remembers. The humidity was just sticky enough to be uncomfortable. The sweetness in the air, parading through the monopoly money, chess pieces, and playing cards. The dirt from the work of the day rested under their fingertips, nestled under the chins of their smiling faces. These moments, every day after school, were like feathers in amber. The company of the neighbors’ kids, along with the presence of his brothers and sisters, seemed to fill the spaces of darkness with the sweet orange light of memory. After the hours had passed, his Appa would call them in, and they would wash their hands

and feet before stepping inside the house. He would take out his homework, Geometry or Algebra, and ask for his Appa’s help, even if he didn’t need it. As the fans squeaked overhead, he would bask in every moment of his Appa’s company, as only one child among eight. He would spend his days like this, coming home after school and playing with the neighborhood kids, playing cricket until the sun set—their cricket field a patchwork of the front yards of their four houses. Only when he was 16 and saw tanks and soldiers coming through his street did this idyllic cycle stop. His neighbors and most of his family fled to India, leaving him only to finish his last exams. On the boat to Madras, he looked back at the receding place of his childhood, the neighbors gone, his family soon to be dispersed throughout the world.

I am still there, playing cards with my family around this table—just a haze of memory. Thatha nods as he looks down at his cards, throwing a card into the center of the table. “Maya,” he pauses for a second before he starts, “it’s your turn.” My sister’s features abruptly contort, and she shoots my mother a sharp glare. It’s the he-got-my- name-wrong-again look, characterized by the knitting of her eyebrows and a pout from her lip. My mother looks at her and gives an inaudible sigh. If you call him on a bad day, he can still tell you exactly when he got let out of school. If he could stop his hands from the rhythmic trembling, he could write a perfect bildungsroman. If you come up to sit beside him, even if his speech is mumbled, he will still teach you how the angle between the minute and hour hands opens and shuts. But on occasion, he will call your sister by her cousin’s name, or forget bank passwords, or get lost in a conversation.

We don’t mourn the passing of every banal memory we create. But it’s the ones that we cherish that are slower to succumb to that fate. The unspoken weight of the dimming of the light hangs above us, the idea that the waxy beams that comfort us, playing cards at that table, will be slowly put to rest.

But I’m lucky. I am the torchbearer, the one who carries the light of the setting Sri Lankan sun to the glowing chandelier in Morrisville, North Carolina. And weave them into something that won’t be forgotten. Panes of light, scattered across the ground, all our memories of him, trying to put the pieces together, trying to put him back together in our heads. But there are too many small slivers of memory to reassemble, too many hazy recollections from too many perspectives, and half-remembered details of stories that transpired far too long ago: my memories, my mother’s memories, his memories. The picture we form is neither perfect nor complete. But we cannot fully know a person; we cannot fully know ourselves. But what we can know, as the sun sets and the twilight streams through the glass of our memories, is that the echo of him will resound long after the light goes out.

Photography | Coco HeahIke

’28

Just Chillin’

Photography | Kenton Chan ’27

Last Summer

Color Pencil | Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride

Photography | Brycen Lew ’26

Who Am I to Hawaiʻi?

Miranda Yap ’26

Who am I to Hawai‘i when plantation workers wore blisters into hands, shedding my same blood? When my kin can’t speak Cantonese, it was so long ago? My grandma knows only a phrase or two, but in this melting pot place, it’s enough to make do.

Who am I to Hawai‘i when I was born on thirsty earth, my cradle closer to Great Lakes than Atlantic sea?

A “yes ma’am, no sir,” veils tigress eyes and raven hair I learned proper phrases, utensil placements, until I can blend into all y’all over there?

Who am I to Hawai‘i when summertime saw shakas, shave ice, beach days at Bellows, and millions of musubi, cousins and I climbing endless banyan trees? Yet Autumn always traded brown for the palm, evergreen and snow might masquerade as sand under booted feet

Who am I to Hawai‘i when at family functions I slip into familiar phrases

A whirlwind of faces, But no can remember any names and my grandma’s cousin’s sister-in-law says eh, you get one small kine pidgin accent, yah? Oh, maybe I do?

But maybe I only talk lidat around you

Who am I to Hawai‘i

when my soul only feels peace by the seaside, the beach?

Winds sweeping soft sands under an ‘iwa’s wing When salty waves wash ashore and lull me to sleep

Who am I to Hawai‘i with slippahs on my hapa haole feet, and a sweet tiare in my hair? A body born in Georgia, but my heart was made here?

Lēʻahi

and Lā

Photography | Brycen Lew ’26

Paper Ball

Anonymous

Ridges and Folds

Wrinkles and Crumples

Memories written into each crease

Discarded

An attempt gone wrong

Tried to be forgotten

Each ridge a wrong word

Each fold an act of frustration

Each wrinkle a moment left to starve

Each crumple a closed could-have-been

… A mess, of paper balled up

… With no intentions of opening again

… I lie defeated

Ridges and Folds

Wrinkles and Crumples

memories tattooed into each godforsaken crease

Back to the Roots Photography |

Riley

Joe ’28

Alignment Photography |

Jude King ’27

What We Could’ve Been

Trevor Hu ’27

“So your PSAT score was 3 points short of merit semifinalist index.”

“Uh huh.”

“And you didn’t make it to ISEF.”

“I did not.”

“Aaaand… your college essay was about discovering yourself.”

“Guilty as charged.”

“We get thousands of essays like that every year.”

“Oh.”

“Thank you for your interest. I think our work is done here.”

“Wait-”

“Is there anything you want to add?”

“Our topics are the same but our experiences differ.” There is life beyond academics, I hope we know that. We’ve been so caught in using our grades As the ultimate indicator of self-worth. And forget there’s a whole world out there. When someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up,

I wanted to be a berry: wild I wanted to be an egg: free range I wanted to be milk with enzymes: cheesy but popular

I wanted to be milk with enzymes: cheesy but popular We should do something with the adversities thrown at us And make something beautiful out of it.

We should fill our lives with experiences

Like that time we dove into a crystal-clear lake without looking And laughed and screamed while scraping the leeches off of our backs.

Or when we “accidentally” threw my frisbee into the elderly neighbor’s yard again

Just to get the rush of our lives as we ran from his German Shepherd after retrieving it.

I want to do something fun and stupid again, Because my good memories didn’t come from good ideas.

Is that something I want to do for the rest of my life?

Maybe not,

But my mind drifts to these fleeting moments like my eyes drift to sleep.

But all I can do is speak from experience. It’s when you feel like you’re in love with what you do. You wake up every morning feeling alive, even if you hadn’t slept

When you know you’re going to look back at it and be content of what you made. It’s what makes every sunrise show the boldest shades of red, orange, and yellow

And not a day goes by without your longing to finish what you started.

[Slowly, the person across from me at the table gets up and leads me to the exit of the room.]

“I think our work is done here.”

Academic Success

Digital Art | Selena Hung ’27

Someday

Sophie Tan ’26

5

I click “Barbie: Princess Charm School” into my Memorex DVD Player, because sometimes, most of the time in my case, being five is the worst thing in the world. At school, the other kids run away from me like I’m invisible, and I’m left counting down until the clock strikes time for my parents to get me. The clock moves so slowly, like it’s trying to keep me here.

I close my eyes and imagine I’m wearing pink, sparkly ball gowns that shimmer when I walk. My hair is beautiful, and a handsome prince takes my hand and spins me. Suddenly, I don’t feel so alone anymore. I hope that when I’m older, my life will look just like Barbie’s. Everyone will smile at me, my clothes will be stylish, and adventures will be filled with magic instead of silence.

When I open my eyes again, no one is next to me on the swing. All my classmates are playing on the other side of the playground, making me feel more isolated than ever. I feel tears start to trickle down my cheeks. I wish I could step through the screen and live there, where it would feel like somebody cared about me. Someday, that will be my reality. Someday.

17

I sit within these four walls surrounded by college brochures and essays, but can’t help but close my eyes and wish that when I open them, my hands will be tiny again. Despite being in what many say is the “peak” of adolescence, I’m overwhelmed by the coexistence of emptiness and fear.

“Where are you going to college?” seems to be the only thing worth carving out of me. I feel as if my GPA is hover-

“rating” and guiltily, I’ve even started to imagine it above my peers’ heads too. I compare, measure, and rank us to see who is more likely to capture this “dream” that we all so desperately seem to think we want. What happened to playing together, not against each other?

Even so, my greatest envy is not the peers who surround me, but who I was 12 years ago. I take out old photo albums and study the girl who will always live inside of me. I look to see her untrained smile, who didn’t know what a GPA was or how easily her worth could be shrunken to a number. She existed without feeling unknowingly evaluated. In her eyes I see innocence that only belongs to childhood. Jealousy consumes me, knowing that not even someday I’ll be able to go back to being her.

Broken Mask

Digital Art | Lilly Kimoto ’28

The Duality of Clown Anonymous

Crazy grin, tormented within; White skin hides secret sin; Wild hair; thousand yard stare; Peals of laughter, then sobbing after; Silly cantor in the aftermath of disaster; Jiggly dance masks unclean pants; Goofy gait disguises secret hate; Spinning plates to spite his fate; Teeth with yellow sheen; the stench of nicotine; Hands quiver, betraying cirrhotic liver; No word is spoken, he is broken. Red honking nose—missing teen knows

The Ungloved

Digital Art | Kate Yoo ’29

CSP | Owen Ren

CSP | Owen Ren ’26

the ballad of the fallen man

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

the day exhales and earth begins to tremble mountains bracing for the mist that falls down down down

shrouding all voices into silence hush hesitant long black fingertips stroke the fallen angels and muted starlight is shielded by gaea’s hand hush

i am the shattered my emptiness drapes over the warm air breathing in softly over the rolling land

It’s almost time to sleep shhh

i have not seen a single bird tonight

where did the mourning dove go? she lives here i know her feathers under my fingers soft and silky my little angel now the mourning stars have settled beneath the earth’s breasts the nightingale flaps its wings

coo-ooo-ooo coo echoes of my little dove tangled in ribbons of fractured glass

coo-ooo-ooo my little ghostly girl

soaring above a dark stain on earth’s stomach ashes floating up and down sidewalks carry no voices twisted remnants soak into air warm air buildings just crumbling fortresses of a facade nothing more

coo-ooo-ooo

she drifts down into an open palm empty fingers cradling her nested amongst

warm air she falls asleep

oh little dove broken wings twisted amongst the blackened ashes ashes we all fall down down down

a ghost giggles where did the mourning dove go

i linger on the earth waiting for nothing

little dove nothing is mine wings are gone holding ashes where do i go nothing is mine flickering amongst the ashes small beads of blue my dove

i should go to sleep but these eyes are piercing me i am no one no one waits for the mourning man cast out into the warm air warm air broken man waits for his dove will wait no more the earth dies as he walks alone striding amongst the blackness no light and burnt feathers all say ashes ashes we all fall the dove is gone he is gone the night remains fingertips coax the world to sleep down go the wings fly no more

warm air

coo-ooo-ooo hush

coo-ooo-ooo coo down down down

E Flat Minor

Digital Art | Sarah Cao ’29

self-portrait of america as the scent of rotting mildew and decaying swingsets

Ava Zoto ’28

the casket is open, but it’s not you that lies in its sweet offwhite folds because my. grandmother. cannot be a wax statue, face painted bright with makeup I’ve never seen you wear.

I wrote you a speech last night, or wrote me, on a smudged index card

I find it odd that I

the sky is always a bright, vibrant blue on these kinds of days.

we’ve learned to pinch ourselves harder because bruises don’t come so easy anymore at our age. and then, suddenly, they do.

Moth to a Flame

Digital Art | Jooyung Kang ’25

Maleficent

Ashlyn Hirota

’27

I double dare you to take the “Which Disney Character are You?” Buzzfeed quiz

Were the words that came out my pint-sized best friend’s mouth seven years ago

Little did I know that my first mental breakdown ever Would crash through me

Somewhere between “Next Question,” “Submit,” and “See Results.”

You see, it’s an ultimate letdown for your 4th-grade frontal lobe to process

That while your friends have popped up as “Rapunzel” or “Elsa”, You’ve popped up as Maleficent

This anomaly purged my innocent brain mass like a serial killer,

And maybe that’s when the horns started to grow. Maybe that’s when the happy ending ended for me

In every story, “Why must you play the villain?”, I asked myself

But as years pass, and handwritten Valentine’s cards crumple, and chocolates spoil I deflate deeper into doomscrolling, delighted Disney-dreamscape duos

While all I can do is dream

Sure, a part of me knew deep down that life partners

Couldn’t be discovered and sealed in a total of 2 hours, and 9 minutes, and 21 seconds

But couldn’t one hope?

Not Maleficent, I guess.

Maleficent was fighting her own demons

Auroras and Phillips everywhere, reminding her to curb her dragon

Contemporary crush culture

A chasm of careening confusion that I’ve coveted crawling out of The craving and the curse are too much for even the ensnared evil

Trapped

Between the tiles of an online quiz

If Maleficent were to spread her wings and fly

She would have to slay the sticky-sweet satisfaction Of sultry seduction

Trudge through the tar, Pull through the heartstrings, And let the blade pierce through the heart of the dragon

MALEFICENT

Colored Pencil on Paper | Ashlyn Hirota ’27

Less is More Ashlyn Hirota ’27

“Less is more”

Was a cynical thing

That kindergarten preaching nailed into my state of trust.

It was a phrase that would paint me a picture of perfect panic, In the girl-world galaxy that would tear me apart One text at a time.

“Less is more”

Was an obsession of need and anger, A whirlwind of shattered standards That would be social suicide to stray from

“Less is more”

Meant no double texting. Streaks, stories, socials, situationships Try-hard, low-key, Makeup and misinformation, Poison and Perversity.

“Less is more”

Was lucid, lipglossed dreams, Nagging questions buzzing like angry texts at the back of my head

“Less is more”

Was a society full of worshipping the non-abusers Beholding the bare minimum and Tightly smiling through the tears in your soul

“Less is more”

Meant less pain now,

Hiding more pain to come

It meant loving you more

By loving you less

It meant learning too late

What more really meant

I was no less a puppet, Strangled by the strings

Malleable, ductile

I would give more to you, I would

But all there is to give Is less

The Pink House of Almost-Belonging Oil Paint |

Aika Middleton ’27

para\\e\ \ines

Anonymous

1. To get it out of the way, it’s annoyance. At the world, really, at yourself. Really? Really?

a. This too shall pass. Not fast enough, never fast enough. Mold grows faster.

b. Better catch up!

2. They teach you a couple ground rules for what defines a living thing: you remember one. Well, here’s your stimuli.

3. If you call a cat dog for long enough, it eventually will bark.

a. Get this one out of the way as well: Rage.

4. Who hides the whetstones, but not the knives?

5. Ah, there it is. Liquid gold. Dizzying, heady molasses. You can lap it up, like a child on a teat, if you’d like.

a. Side effects may include higher blood pressure, involuntary jaw clenching, nausea, vomiting, and restless legs. Nothing changes.

6. Still water breeds death.

a. Nothing changes nothing changes nothing changes

7. A leech of guilt lays eggs in your belly for this.

a. Red is the color of love and devotion.

8. You snap bone between your teeth. You understand the jungle cat intimately.

9. You know this, too: curiosity killed the cat.

10. Woof!

Acrylic Paints | Selena Hung ’27

The Peace In Sorrow

Selena Hung ’27

Thump. Thump. Thump. My heart won’t stop beating, but I feel so dead inside. Why is it that my mind is already in another world, but my body insists on staying? No matter what I do, his voice still consumes me. The little laughs, the quiet cries, the annoying little phrases he’d say on repeat. I can’t imagine what his voice sounded like when the vehicles collided, and I was nowhere to be found. I always knew this day would come, but I never thought I would have to witness it. And the worst part is that the blood is on my hands. I still remember that morning, he begged me to drive him to school in my truck. His whiny pleas made my ears bleed. “I’m the older sister, I should’ve been there to protect him—! It should’ve…been me.” I scream at myself in the mirror, as if scolding myself will release the guilt that anchors my very soul. If I had just known that the bus was going to crash, I would’ve never left my little brother to die alone and crying, wondering why his pathetic sister couldn’t have given him a ride to school. I stare at the mirror, but what reflects at me is not a human. It’s a monster trying to pass as one in this disgusting body.

Suddenly, I hear my mother whisper through the bathroom door, “Sweetie, you’ve been in there for a while, won’t you come out?” Her voice is so delicate and soft, as if it were a soft pillow protecting something fragile. Except that the fragile thing she is trying to protect is me. It makes me sick. Why won’t she yell at me? Why won’t she blame me? It’s my fault that her precious son is gone. “I don’t want to.” The words tumble out of my mouth; they’re blank, robotic. That’s all my mother needed to leave me be on the bathroom floor. Each hour that passed left me more hopeless than the last. My pain didn’t dilute; it hardened into a painful boulder in my chest as new memories flooded my head.

“Sam always begged me to play tag with him at the most inconvenient times.” “Sam loved dipping his chicken nuggets in ranch.” “Sam always overslept and just barely made it to school…” I pause. “School…bus…ah…AHHH,” I grip my hair tight, as if doing so would numb out the guilt that continued to grow within me. It feels like my heart is being ripped out for each detail I remember about my beautiful little brother. I need to do something, I can’t stay like this. Hesitantly, I rose from the spot on the bathroom floor that I refused to leave and just stared at myself. There’s a thing I read about in psychology: If you stare at yourself in the mirror long enough, you’ll discover things that you’ve never thought of before. All I want is to see myself as something other than this hideous monster. For the first 10 minutes, all I could see myself as was a lump of disgraceful flesh. “It’s your fault.” “You don’t deserve to be called his big sister.” “How can you bear to look at yourself?” I wanted to run, to cry, to turn away, anything except listen to the thoughts that I feared to be true. After the next 20 minutes, my perception of time warped. I’m not sure what exactly happened. All I can recall is my mother opening the door ever so slightly to place a plate of food on the floor, chicken nuggets with ranch.

It wasn’t until one hour had passed that I finally started to unveil what was under the monster’s disguise. Honestly, I don’t think I deserved to see myself as anything else. The pity I gave myself, do I even deserve it? But what I saw eventually was too depressing to ignore—a little girl who was overjoyed about the news of getting a little brother. A girl who was brave, strong, and loving. She only wanted what was best for her brother. So, where did that precious little girl go these past couple of years? Suddenly, every time I teased Sam, took his things, laughed at him when he was in pain, it hurt me more than any guilt I felt. After what seemed like an eternity, I was finally able to ask myself, “Why do I feel such immense guilt when the bus accident that happened was out of my control?” I stared into my halflit eyes and wondered. I was never one to worry about

things that I couldn’t change. I usually shrug off unfortunate events as something that was supposed to happen. It is then that I realized. It was not the fact that it happened that was haunting me. It was the fact that I’d lost who I am over the years. The girl who wanted to care for her little brother and others became someone who could dare laugh at someone consumed in sorrows.

“Why would I let myself go that far?” I asked this question to myself until the sky outside was pitch black. I slowly pulled open the bathroom sink drawer and stared at Sam’s toothbrush and toys I had stuffed away the night he died. I sobbed, but not from guilt, from love and a resolve to improve. “Oh, Sam, I wish I treated you better…I wish I could’ve wiped away every tear you had and told you everything was going to be okay. That’s what I promised you when you were born, and I broke it. I’m so so sorry, Sam. I love you…” The last words came out softer than the rest. I slowly turned my head to face myself in the mirror. However, this time, it wasn’t a gut-wrenching monster or a pitiful little girl; it was just me. A girl who made many, many mistakes, who wants to be better, who will do everything in their power to become the version of herself she promised long ago. I slowly creaked open the bathroom door. The hallway was quiet; everyone had fallen asleep already. I passed all the family portraits in the hall and crawled under my blankets, the cool sensation caressing the warm sweat on my body that had formed from fear. I stare at my ceiling and recall all the versions of me I saw. I realize now that all those versions I saw were all a part of me, just at different times in my sorrow. But if that’s what led me to gain this resolve and hope of who I can become in the future, maybe it was worth it. My breath hitches. I understand now. How foolish I am to have disregarded my sorrows if it meant gaining the pleasure of experiencing such bliss as I am now. Maybe, just maybe, sorrow is misinterpreted to be a negative emotion that is seen to bring pain, suffering, and as a nuisance. When in reality, it’s the gateway to joy; if we didn’t have

sorrow, we would lose a part of ourselves we may have never realized was missing.

The Leading Lady in the Glowing Sun

Digital Photography | Samantha Harris

’29

Anomaly Duck

Digital Photography | Riley Joe ’28

One Year Away

Ink | Gisella Lau Jong ’26

Anticipating Duo

Digital Photography | Riley Joe ’28

The Bathroom Weaving Ceremony

Oil Painting | Sophie Chan ’26

Leftovers in the Kitchen

Colored Pencil, Watercolor, & Alcohol

Markers | Sophie Chan ’26

Red Thread of Fate Anonymous

A compass without directions; A prophecy never spoken: My fate quietly dissolves Into the devouring sands of time.

I am not a fully formed thought, Only a soul tethered to fading memories. Bound by a single red string, I still belong to you.

A sparrow cannot soar beside an eagle. But a moth can chase the moon, Mistaking its light for a lantern.

Even if the stars stay silent, I lift my voice to the divine. For destiny was always fiction Until I met you.

So tell me, how long may I linger in your myth, O Goddess of Youth?

Sentimental Scramble

Watercolor & Colored Pencil |

Sophie Chan ’26

A Shepherd’s Work

Digital Art | Nakoa McCoy ’27

Açaí Bowl

Glass | Sofia Sinnett

’26

satiated

Ava Zoto ’28

do you remember how you used to make us udon on friday nights fat, slug-like noodles, naïve abominations of flour and salt and god knows what else coated meticulously in fine yellow broth backspace backspace backspace across the wood floors, you would walk them to the little marble table---i can’t fall asleep lately cannot---and yesterday night i was desperately trying to calculate how many people it would take to lift your marble table. specifically, how many it would take to lift the marble table up and off the carpet, hold it there, suspend it in the air as dust seeps in through the wide-eyed windows with the plywood slants that only let them open a few inches so robbers can’t come in, but then i realized that would never happen because why would we want to see the imprint of the original color of the rug beneath it, why would we want to see what exposed, untouched looks like after decades of trademark neglect. i tried when i was younger, me and stella, we tried to lift the table but it must have weighed tons, and i was so curious. ive started to question if forgiveness is even an option, does god lay awake wondering how many people it would take to lift my coffin?

When a Bowl of Clams Told the Truth Before I Did

Oil Pastel | Aika Middleton ’27

guardian

bunny of all the things that could’ve broken me

Mixed Media | Aika Middleton ’27

Every Sense of the Word

Ash Geil ’26

“What even are you?” Said those who squint at the billions of stars in the sky in Disgust, who cringe and jeer and coldly sneer “I hope the sunlight reaches you someday"—when I am made of light!

But those same people forget the Sun is a Star too.

I live my life in flux, I float betwixt binaries upon binaries upon binaries Shooting through the cosmos, I am made of stardust and flying across the Universe a million miles an hour—I am a Comet! And if you don’t understand maybe you’re not meant to, but I appreciate that you tried anyway.

Let’s start from the beginning: I was Birthed, on a sunny spring Sunday morning from the hips of generations upon generations of free thinkers holding up middle fingers, hoping to hear a timber, fighting just for the right to linger a little longer I come from a long line of Strength, Perseverance, and Morality, weathering lethality and fatalities from corporal amorality just so we can emerge from marginality and I will Never Let That Go.

I live for all the joy and all the queer things that life naturally brings—all the music, art, and lovely little moments that make this life worth existing. Like

Holding hands, unafraid and dancing like butterflies swirling around one another singing songs of resistance and triumph becoming one, and when the sun finally sets over the smog-filled city knowing that we have a Place with each other. And that the smoke won’t choke us anymore. This is what I hope to find wandering the streets and

Just Being.

But I have just started Living.

I am the future emerging from the past like a Moth, I have my own colors, iridescent and bright, black among white and yellow over purple and pink bubble-gum loved by some but Hated and feared by others who’ve gone numb to first-serve, first-come, when there’s enough to go around for Everyone

The fact that I even exist is because of Them I am what They fought for They, in ragged dresses and torn suits; brave hearts and missing parts, who Hid from the world because someone long, long ago said they weren’t Good Enough.

I come from Women who long to curve and flow like their mothers and sisters, who see beauty in the Fine lines of our bodies, and Men who—only in secret—wrap their chests in lines upon lines of love and joy, and

Humans of all sorts who make a living in the lines between words, who Dance in the margins of the pages, who were called Freaks and looked upon as if they were the Dirt beneath our feet and left to find slurs like stabbing whispers surrounding them like a Hurricane, drowning and waiting for their self-worth to wane

Those same people who claim we can’t be part of this Earth— who sit in the branches of a Dying tree—they Refused to Understand, but instead of Embracing the Unknown, decided to Purge Them, and called Them “it” and Tore from their very souls that which connects us all— I am humanity reclaimed! And as long as there are those who can be juxtaposed and aren’t afraid to fly alone—

—We will never leave this world. When we pass on, we create legacies that Soar zestfully through endless cities until the next Generation of moths living among butterflies Picks it up and examines the covers that hold colors none of the others can describe It begs for someone to Recognize its tattered pages, empathize, and breathe Life in its eyes once again.

I am a never-ending breath, ebbing and flowing in the atmosphere, thriving, made to break down veneers, never to be fully consumed by Fear—

I am queer, in every sense of the word.

hydrangea

Digital Art | Nesiah Mettler ’27

in my eyes

Juliana Kaniho ’28

When we locked eyes, I knew there were scarce places to hide

From that auburn gaze which none seemed to willfully seek

After years of being told your appearance needed to mend

Neither request nor command, a way to repair a physical sketch

But looking at you again, I thought, “What is there to erase?” I shook your calloused hand, feeling the pulse of your beauty.

“You’re a silly one,” you said, “but your studio’s a beauty.” It was our tenth meeting, and there was nothing to hide

Laughing, I smeared something I hadn’t meant to erase

So I want to know: what trait do I have that you seek?

Not artistry, since I struggle with every portrait sketch

You smiled. “What if an ugly face is what you need to mend?”

Ugly? I insisted you weren’t some rookie sculpture to mend

But you couldn’t stand it, lamenting your absence of beauty

Hold on, I blurted, rummaging for a new canvas to sketch

Your anxious, rueful fidgeting which betrayed your plan to hide

Stay there. I was sly: It’s not “ugliness,” but fresh imagery I seek

When you were finally still, I knew to draw, mark, shade, erase.

The pencil shook in my hand; there were rarely strokes to erase

My breath hitched— was there nothing before me to mend?

I had a shattering revelation: I found what great artists seek

A compelling graphite figure, a model of amorphous beauty

The bony nose, angled eyes, winding neck, curls you can’t hide

I knew I couldn’t capture all of your appeal in just one sketch.

The feeling was all-consuming— was I melting into a sketch?

It was our forty-first meeting, and I didn’t dare to erase

This fervent sensation, its radiant warmth impossible to hide

These unfamiliar emotions were what my art needed to mend

You became more enchanting, and other faces held less beauty

Hourglass sand, they lent themselves to the looks you seek.

Dreams can’t be attributed to the common stature you seek

And the raw perfection of your being is no amateur sketch

Instead a monument, a postulate, a paradigm of real beauty

Which deepens the marks of ink in my mind I can’t erase

Permanent passions, not misjudgments aplenty to mend

For your face is not something you should ever want to hide.

I’ll burnish the hues you hide, shade the “pretty” that you seek

If it means your scars will mend, I will redo every sketch

No matter what I erase, still, you are a beauty.

Hypnagogia

Digital Art | Nesiah Mettler ’27

Taxidermy of a Feeling

Oil Pastel | Aika Middleton ‘27

Ava Zoto ‘28

and my arteries, em balmed in a waxy, pla stic shell, i call it glu e. my heart is in m y throat. it alway s is these days, pinna

cle of exertion on my f eeble organs, i can’t see m to walk. you were mor e of a silent, black catfi sh, tail to head in the s teel pot, waiting for its skull

to be chopped clean o ff, then any sort of sigh tless bird. yes, sigh tless, but not blind. an d it hurts to talk these d ays, with a dumb, unw ieldy heart beating awa

y like some childish ve rsion of hypocrisy. it n eeds to grow up. I do too, and in some dar

k, flustered recess o

f my mind, ive come t o realize ive never spok en a truth in my entire life. ive never lied, eithe r, and you would have—d o—know(n) that, you cou

ld always tell. murmurs a

nd stifled silence, you cou ld always tell. i would lik

e to have said you wer

e indifferent, that I saw i t in your eyes, and i sup

pose i did in a way, but i really saw it in your hands. when your thumb began contorting itself like some blonde anaconda, a perfect 90º angle. it was always there.

Writers’ Statements

Cash Steele ’27, Constellations

This piece is the lyrics to a song I wrote for my final english project. I made an EP, six songs long, and released it to streaming services. This was my favorite from those songs.

Neal Sehgal ’27, The Library of Regrets

Everyone has their own regrets, and I know personally that they can have a huge impact on ones life. For a while, my regrets took up most of the thoughts in my head, almost like books, or orbs, in the library of my mind. However, I recently have taken a new perspective on the concept and purpose of a regret. They aren’t just things we wish we yearn to fix or rewrite; they are the doors we have to enter, the past memories that shape us into stronger people for the future. They are the lessons we must learn, whether we like it or not. Erasing your biggest regret would be erasing the person who learned to live with it. Do you really want that to happen?

Miranda Yap ’26, the orange [neroli]

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26, kira kira

The last sentence translates to “Now, everything is kira kira.”

Scorch Zhai ’27, Geology and Other Natural Sciences

I wrote this for a class where I wrote every single day of the summer ([S] Creative Writing with Gammarino. Would recommend.) Broadly, it’s about living, and wanting to live. And not really about rocks at all. There’s also a less edited Petrarchan sonnet version living somewhere in my notebooks.

Nikhil Wong ’27, The Golden Chandelier

I started this piece a year ago, for a writing competition I missed the deadline for. The prompt had to do with memory, and so I tried to encapsulate the memory of staying over at

my grandparent’s house in North Carolina during the holidays. I later expanded the piece by interviewing my grandpa for snippets of his experience. I tried to encapsulate not only what I thought about memory, but the process of writing.

Anonymous, Paper Ball

This was created as part of an exercise. Numerous objects were laid across the floor, and we had to write from the perspective of an object of our choosing. I was going through my first serious breakup, so I was excited to be in the right headspace to write all these breakup poems for the first time. This was reflected in the content of the poem.

Trevor Hu ’27, What We Could’ve Been

My writing piece is about the pressure of balancing (and more often choosing between) getting a good college application and living a life full of memories. School and homework take up so much of our lives, so much so that when we try to think of memories when we felt young, stress-free, and whimsical, we can only recall are the ones that have long been gone. There’s a point in your life when you realize that time is temporary, but the past is permanent.

Sophie Tan ’26, Someday

Savor this moment, one day you’ll envy it.

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26, the ballad of the fallen man

When learning history, we often overlook those who remained after wars had ended and many people had died. This poem takes place after the closing of World War 2, where a man returns home to find that his daughter has died as a result of an air bombing. I wrote this to showcase the complexity of a parent’s grief, and the aching finality of death in a cruel world. The style is inspired by the modernist era, but also by specific pieces such as The Book Thief by Markus Zusak and The Wasteland by T.S. Eliot, both covering similar themes of wartime grief. My hope is that the poem is not only startling but allows the audience to challenge their own perspective of war.

Ashlyn Hirota ’27, Maleficent

Does every story really have to end with ‘true love’? Does not being able to find it make you a villain? Maleficent is about contemporary dating culture, and the fact that not everyone can comply with that standard. Sometimes, we need to paint our own stories. And maybe sometimes, we might have to be the ‘villain’.

Ashlyn Hirota ’27, Less is More

Less is More is a poem critiquing the phrase “less is more”. What happens if we are more? Should we try to be less? What defines us? Why is social culture so polar and hypocritical? Hopefully, this poem can probe deeper into this question.

Selena Hung ’27, The Peace in Sorrow

I wrote this piece in my English class. We were told to define a type of emotion, and I chose sorrow. I wanted to explore the stages and variations of grief and sorrow and make people see this emotion in a different light. I believe that where there is pain there is also hope, and while it may not always be apparent, I hope this piece can show or make other’s feel heard on their experiences with sorrow.

Anonymous, Red Thread of Fate

I never composed poetry, and I never saw myself as a writer. But love has given me the courage and motivation to try something unfamiliar. I find myself writing because the emotions refuse to stay quiet.

Ava Zoto ’28, satiated

This poem means a great deal to me. It does. It encompasses my childhood, my adolescence. This poem is an extension of my soul, of my insecurities, of who I wish I was and who I think I am.

Ash Geil ’26, Every Sense of the Word

I wrote this piece as an assignment for my Arts & Letters class. This poem is about the importance and history that

having queer and trans identities holds to me. It is an ode to those who have come before me, those who still struggle to exist, and those who thrive today. This poem serves as a story of self-empowerment, knowledge, joy, and confidence despite challenges that arise from existing as someone whose identity deviates from the norm.

Juliana Kaniho ’28, in my eyes

Conventionally, art is seen as beautiful. But what is “beauty,” and who is “beautiful”? The muse, with her misplaced eyes, prominent nose, cunning demeanor, and rough hands, isn’t “beautiful” to anyone. The artist, who specializes in portraits, adores her because these atypical features are respite from more traditional subjects. I used a sestina—a 39-line poem that repeats six ending words in alternating order—to capture the changing intensity and passage of time in their transformation from an artist-and-muse partnership to a closer relationship. The six ending words are all based in art, aesthetics, or the idea of hiding and fixing what we find shameful. Thus, at its heart, this sestina is my interpretation of the cliché “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”

Ava Zoto ’28, graduation

I’m not exactly sure why I decided to call this poem “graduation.” It was only after my English teacher, Mr. Dyke, brought it to my attention that I noticed the name. I’d like to say it was intentional, that this poem was really about my grandmother’s death and my missing her as I approach my high school graduation, but I don’t think it is. I’ve tried to get myself to fall in love with the name, with the idea and the conceptual understanding of everything it entails, but I find myself unable to do so. I don’t know why that name came to me, to be perfectly honest, but there’s something profoundly uneasy about it having nothing to do with my actual graduation that drew me to it, I suppose.

Artists’ Statements

Gisella Lau Jong ’26, Hawai’i Nei

Nowadays, machines are beginning to take over human activities, such as “art,” “writing,” and even certain styles of weaving. However, machines cannot replicate Saori weaving. Saori is a type of Japanese freestyle weave made on a loom that is founded in being human. Its loose style was designed to embrace mistakes and uphold improvisation and individuality. Through the process of making this weave, I learned to let go of expectations of perfection for my artistic vision while reflecting on my time growing up here in Hawai’i.

Carolyn Lim ’27, The Edge

This piece was my first art creation during 11th grade Studio Art. I was inspired by a photo that I had photographed on a trip to South Korea (shot in Mapo-gu). Through the utilization of watercolor, charcoal pencils, and pilot pens, I was able to bring to life memories that I had previously made during that trip while incorporating my own creative experimentations.

Chloe, Liu ’26, Seamless

As I stood on Sandy’s during Senior Sunrise, I snapped a shot of the seamless mixture of the clouds and the waves. The way the rays of the sun hit the edges of the salty water on the sand, rustic color of the morning sky, and the almost identical look of the crashing waves and the skimpy clouds created a perfect atmosphere for our first final morning as seniors.

Olivia Schmidt ’28, “Sea” the Silver Lining

Every cloud has its silver lining. Unfortunately, people often only see the storm. Human perception tends to skew towards pessimism, focusing on what is absent instead of appreciating what endures. I took this scenic photo at my favorite weekend escape. Rays of sunlight peaking beyond the clouds remind me of the glimmers of hope, endurance, and promise that emerge even in moments of hardship.

Heikura Hererangi Leong ’27, Pepeka

Graffiti spray paint is dismissed before it is understood. I painted an endangered monarch butterfly because butterflies have been my favorite since I was little. I even gave myself the middle name Pepeka, meaning butterfly in Rapa Nui, because it felt like who I was becoming. This piece is about protecting what is fragile and respecting artists who are too often discredited for how they choose to create.

Anna Choi ’27, Volcano Antisana

On my trip at Ecuador this past summer, I had the incredible opportunity to visit Papallacta. Papallacta is a natural spring resort at 10,824 feet above sea level. I was walking to the breakfast hall to drink some green tea when I looked behind me and saw the Volcano Antisana surrounded by misty clouds. I was stunned, because this volcano was hard to see during the day. I instantly went back to my cabin, and got my camera. I went to a spot where the volcano was clearly seen (which was behind a fence and surrounded by flowers). My journey to drink morning green tea helped me to capture this beautiful scene from Ecuador.

Amy Bowers ’29, Family Love

My friend wanted pictures of the family of ducks so I followed her and I thought “How would this look in black and white?”. I started out crouched down then I ended up lying on the grass so I could get to their level. I took many pictures, and each time they moved I went with them. When looking back at the photos I realized that this one photo looked as though the ducks were swimming in a heart shape.

Killian Geistkemper ’28, All Eyes on the Ball

I shot this image while photographing a water polo match; aiming to convey the intensity of the entire game in a single moment. As the player prepared to shoot, so did I as I noticed the entire defense converging in a split second to block him as well as all of his teammates pausing to watch. The timing was almost pure luck. I pressed the shutter at the perfect instant, and the resulting image captured the ener-

gy, focus, and strategy of the game in a single frame. It was only afterward when I realized that all the eyes were on the ball.

Gisella Lau Jong ’26, Last Summer

Last summer, my last summer in high school, was a dream. The textured, fuzzy coloring of the piece attempts to capture the wonder of exploring one’s homeland independently for the first time. Each component references real-life beauty I found throughout the island this year.

Brycen Lew ’26, Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride

My close friend Christian Haraguchi and I along with my friend Lauren decided to do a photoshoot for surfing. It was a beautiful day on the North Shore but the waves were sporadic—they would come and go. So there was a lot of waiting. But one of the things I appreciated was spending the time with one of my closest friends doing something we both are passionate about; photography. It was certainly one of my favorite photography moments as well as my favorite moments in friendship. I got some great photos from that day, this is one of them. Lauren still has this as her profile picture on instagram XD.

Brycen Lew ’26, Lēʻahi and Lā

I’ve always had the same view of the sunset growing up at my house. But I never really shared it or captured it and it never really occurred to me just how magnificent the beauty of watching the sunset at home was until my friend came over to watch it. I remember him reminding me that people pay thousands of dollars just to see that once. I decided to try capture the next beautiful sunset and sure enough, I caught one beautiful sunset waving goodbye to Lēʻahi as she slipped beneath the waves.

Riley Joe ’28, Back to the Roots

This was after a nice hike, and I really liked the look of the tree’s leaves. I had my dad look out at the surf (which he was doing anyways) and it was nice set against the natural backlighting.

Jude King ’27, Alignment

I took this photo on the flight home from archery nationals. I didn’t even notice how well everything aligned until I took a look at it a few days later. It’s funny how things seem to fall so perfectly into place specifically when we aren’t paying attention. Unlike my arrows. Those did not fall into the right place. Thanks for the memories, team.

Selena Hung ’27, Academic Succes

My piece is about how many times grades are used as a determining factor for someone’s mental state; with some people believing that if someone gets good grades or performs well, they’re not struggling as much emotionally. However, in some cases, it’s the opposite. Many people suffer behind this facade of success; while I believe it is reasonable to see grades as a warning sign, I believe there are more important factors to keep an eye on. If grades are taken as greatly as an indicating factor as they are, many people’s issues may go under looked with no one to reach out to. My hope is that people can view this piece as a way to feel more seen in a world where it is often easy to get overlooked and to emphasize a struggle I don’t feel is recognized enough.

Anonymous, Broken mask

This piece was an exploration of identity and how the outer “mask” differs from what’s behind it. The character is an oc of mine, and she struggles with finding her true personality, so I thought this would be a good way of interpreting how that struggle may feel.

Kate Yoo ’29, The Ungloved

I created this piece to explore Aloisio, a character I made after reading Don Quixote this previous year. After a difficult event in his life, Aloisio pushed forward and eventually reshaped his identity to help himself cope and keep himself in control of his own world. Gloves often symbolize some sort of purity or distance, and Alosio’s bare hands represent his choice to face the responsibilities he has chosen to carry and the decisions he has made on his own. The color red is a reference to the saying “caught red-handed”. Addi-

tionally, the slightly ornate frame around him reflects how he has manufactured himself, turning his story into something larger than life. I included Emily Dickinson’s quote, “Much Madness is divinest Sense– To a discerning Eye–”, because it reflects Aloisio’s mindset: what may seem extreme or unusual to others makes sense to him, and is part of how he navigates the challenges he faces.

Sarah Cao ’29, E Flat Minor

This drawing depicts a soldier laying in what is supposed to be the hallucination of a tranquil field, the uniform and landscape intentionally left ambiguous. This piece is intended to be a commentary on how war and the military strips individuals of their personalities and morals. When these people, later turned soldiers, perish in wars, they are just another addition to a statistic, but this piece shows a glimpse into the pre-war life of one soldier. The soldier in the drawing is intended to be a musician, as seen from the dream-like musical measures and symbols around the piece. In this drawing, music and instruments are seen as a contrast against the brutality of conflicts, as musical instruments are intended to be handled with care and they create beauty, unlike the handling of a weapon.

Jooyung Kang ’28, Moth to a Flame

The simile of “like a moth to a flame” obviously inspired this drawing, but the almost magnetic pull of the light really parallels the characters’ relationship with one another. It also represents the tether that holds the spirit of the ghost character to the living one. I drafted multiple versions with different poses, but the one that seemed to stick was the straightforward angle I went with in the final piece. I was very direct with the moths and candles, and I didn’t want it to be subtle at all. I wanted it to be direct in every way possible with the poses and the symbolism.

Ashlyn Hirota ’27, MALEFICENT

Over the course of a few years (when my fear of Disney villains ceased after a few traumatic childhood memories), I have come to admire Maleficent as a Disney villain. Espe-

cially after the Angelina Jolie version of the movie, I realized that, after all, we may not be so different. She is a misunderstood, hopeless romantic with a delicate soul. It hurts to love, and she’s found that out the hard way. At the end of the day, Maleficent is a youthful girl with a hard feather shell. She deserved this youthful tenderness of a portrayal.

Aika Middleton ’27, The Pink House of Almost-Belonging

This painting allowed me to return to a place I don’t consciously remember, but that shaped me in ways I’m still learning to understand. The scene, a small white rabbit in a row of identical cribs, is based on a real photograph of the orphanage in Kazakhstan where I lived as a baby and spent my most formative months. The rabbit represents me, not as a literal self-portrait, but as a symbol of how early experiences print themselves on the body long before memory forms. In this context, the rabbit becomes nervous, observant, and torn between curiosity and fear. It symbolizes the overactive fight-or-flight response that I struggle with, a hypervigilance that many believe began in my early months.

The room is inspired by Baker-Miller pink, a color historically associated with stress when used in certain environments. The orphanage itself was painted pink. I wanted to recreate the oddness of a space that’s meant to feel gentle but experienced as overwhelming. The softness of the pink contradicts the discomfort of the scene.

This piece is less about recreating a moment and more about acknowledging its emotional effects. Through the rabbit, I found a way to visualize both fear and resilience, the instinct to look over the crib bars, even before understanding what lies beyond them.

Selena Hung ’27, Burnout

This piece is supposed to represent the toxicity of society’s expectations of work. The candle/girl is supposed to reflect the audience. A candle is supposed to burn occasionally to bring light as many of us do, however, if it is left to burn for too long, it will melt faster, and the smell will over-saturate.

bring light as many of us do, however, if it is left to burn for too long, it will melt faster, and the smell will over-saturate. Which is why we often light a candle and put it out to rest for later use. Our minds are like this candle, if we let it work for too long, we will end up fizzling out faster than we needed to. I want to help connect with others and remind everyone, myself included, that it’s more than okay to rest our light every now and then.

Samantha Harris ’29, The Leading Lady in the Glowing Sun

This picture was taken during the sunset at the lily pond. This specific duck was always leading the group of ducklings and leading them to wherever they wanted to explore in the lily pond. This is what led me to name this photo, “The Leading Lady in the Glowing Sun”. This was my top pick of all the pictures I took of the new ducklings at the lily pond because it captures the chapel stairs, many ducklings, and the golden sun, beaming on the chapel walls.

Riley Joe ’28, Anomaly Duck

This photo is one my favorites I’ve taken this whole year. It was for a Photography assignment about negative space. My mom and I were planning to take photos at the beach park near our house, but on the drive there, my mom made the wrong turn and we ended up at this little lake. And then the perfect subjects just happened to be there. A flock of all regular ducks (the ones that were dark in color) and 2 white ducks. I could not have dreamed of a better subject! So that’s how we ended up with this. The only thing was i had to go in and edit the unnecessary highlights in the photo.

Gisella Lau Jong ’26, One Year Away

One year away, everything will be different. This piece signifies the end of an era and a vision for who I want to become following my time here at Punahou. Even through trials and tribulations, I’m exceedingly grateful for my opportunities, experiences, and supporters from this school. The piece draws inspiration from drawings by another KWO contributor, as well as my favorite book, Frankenstein.

Riley Joe ’28, Anticipating Duo

This was for a photography assignment, but it’s a photo of my cousin (she’s almost 1). I really like the intentional grainy-ness and the chiaroscuro. The framing wasn’t ideal since I had about 7 seconds before she ran off, but at least I got the desired lighting and rule of thirds.

Sophie Chan ’26, The Bathroom Weaving Ceremony

In traditional Korean culture, braided hairstyles display femininity. Through this piece, I aimed to paint non-customary braiding practices, showing a departure from traditional values and a shift toward an “Americanized” view of hair-one that is centered around friendships and interpersonal relationships as the source of femininity.

Sophie Chan ’26, Leftovers in the Kitchen

고추장: Gochujang (chili paste). 참기름: sesame oil. It’s a little confusing for “개안” because it means “opening one’s eyes” or gaining enlightenment. I aimed for this to signify “seeing” these ingredients for the first time through a cultural lens, and becoming aware of culture in one’s everyday life (connecting to the themes in my other paintings). However, since I do not speak Korean, my mom helped me with each of these translations, and she said that Korean word made the most sense.

Aika Middleton ’27, When a Bowl of Clams Told the Truth Before I Did

I didn’t mean for this bowl of clams to become anything more than a quick study, but something about them kept me thinking. The way they sit, half-open, half-closed, like they’re trying to decide whether to hide or reveal themselves. There’s something strangely human about that. I found myself drawn not to their literal colors, but to the emotional colors they carried. A quiet energy, a held breath, a tiny creature folding in on itself.

As I worked, the clams stopped being clams. They became little containers for every feeling I didn’t have the words for. Small, stubborn things I’ve tried to hold shut. Letting them

glow with colors that don’t belong to them felt like letting those emotions leak out in ways they never do in real life. It was chaotic, impulsive, maybe even a little absurd, but it felt honest.

In the end, this piece became an exercise in letting go. For once, I stopped trying to achieve realism and let myself choose colors without accuracy. The clams could be anything, so I let them choose to be whatever they wanted. And maybe that’s what I needed, too. Permission to open up, even a little, and let go of the expectation to stay neatly, realistically contained.

Aika Middleton ’27, Taxidermy of a Feeling

The size of this painting is 12x24.

Editorial Staff

Flag Editors-in-Chief

Writing & Management,

Art & Administration

Krislyn Ishibashi ’26

Miranda Yap ’26

Layout Editor

Twine

Senior Editor

Junior Editors

Apprentice Editor

Glue Advisors

Isabella Liu ’26

Kaci Reyes ’26

Steven Yang ’27

Selena Hung ’27

Neal Sehgal ’27

Olivia Schmidt ’28

Jill Sprott

Mark Pangilinan

Ka Wai Ola seeks to showcase original visual and literary artwork from the Punahou community that displays knowledge of craft and impactful artistic intent. KWO celebrates the artistic gifts and talents of Punahou’s students, offering an authentic space for storytelling, expression, learning, and sharing beyond the classroom.

Would you like to see your art or writing published in the upcoming issue? Check out our website at kawaiola.punahou.edu for information on submitting.