July’s Writing of the Month, An Anniversary, comes from high school senior Mina Seckin. Mina is a 2011 Portfolio Gold Medalist.

Jimmy with his crushable
wool hat is in the living
room but I can’t hear
him making a sound.

Who likes to think that there is a place in the human mind no one has ever been to or can go. Who likes to mold the shape of heads in the exact way they want heads to be.

I can scoop out
with my fingers his
hair from under the soft
wool of his hat. I can tug,
change his directions. Change
the way that water can only slip
between fingers. Change the way you

think that the hole in the living room floor can’t be covered up with a rug, can’t be stuffed with some blankets. Everything has holes, the issue then is how to fill them with something that will stay.