Chino Villanueva, a senior taking AP Literature, won 2 categories in the Broward Literary Fair. 

   His pieces are an Ekphrastic poem titled “Woven Thoughts” and a Shrinklit titled “A Shrinklit of Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” 

   He chose these categories because he had trouble coming up with topics for the other categories. He says, “More ideas came to my mind when I looked at Jacob Lawrence’s art and recalled the literature that Mrs. Phelps taught us.” His inspiration for the Ekphrastic poem is Jacob Lawrence’s The Seamstress.

   For his Shrinklit piece, his inspiration came from a variety of things: Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, 4th period’s discussions, and “Mrs. Phelps’s enthusiasm with teaching and talking about the book.” His favorite out of these two pieces is his Ekphrastic poem. 

  “Writing that poem made me appreciate poetry more because I understood that poetry is much more than just the rhymes and sounding poetic. It’s the choices that poets make that produce meaning.”

   When asked what winning these categories meant to him, he said, “I am very grateful to represent the school in the Broward Literary Fair.”