After applying the correct protective gear, checking the spell twice more, and making sure I had all the right ingredients spread out on the counter, I was ready. I adjusted my safety googles over my eyes, making sure that they didn't sit too awkwardly over my glasses. If I'm going to create this spell properly, I don't want to be irritated by metal digging in around my eyeballs.

Following the instructions in my grandfather's spell book, I added in three twigs with one leaf each, a pinch of sugar, a spoonful of dry dirt, and a pack of 24 colourful crayons. After I mixed those up and mumbled the first part of the spell, I added in a tear drop of laughter and lit a match to drop into the cauldron. As the concoction started to smoke and fizzle, I recited the second half of the spell. With a minor poof and a sound close to a giggle, the spell was completed, and I quickly covered the cauldron with a ceramic lid.

I took the cauldron in both hands wrapped in a towel and headed out into the street of the town. The town that was in shambles.

The town had long been given up on, the government long forgot about the people and their problems. In every alleyway you saw either a starving stray dog or a group of kids huddled around the unknown. Most of the residents lived in overcrowded shacks or in makeshifts tents patched up with whatever could be found. The few that had the luxury of real concrete walls, were the ones who were left over to provide some sort of "economy" to the town. They sold some food staples like rice and flour, along with fabrics and some other miscellaneous items that were traded in. There were the odd farmers who managed to grow a few crops of corn; but it was never enough.

I headed towards a patch of green unoccupied by the rubble road near the collapsed building that was once a schoolhouse. Once there, I used my hands to unearth the dirt and dig out a hole deep and wide enough to fit the cauldron. By then I had a few children start to gather to see what I was doing. Gently I lowered the cauldron and covered it with some dirt, then I slowly slid the lid off but quickly covered everything with more dirt.

I was no proper mage, but if this worked, it would grow a colourful crayon tree. Why crayons and not food you may ask? Well, because fruit spells were much more difficult, I had no fruit to include in the spell, and because crayons at least were inanimate objects that didn't require any actual biology.

But nothing happened.

I repeated the spell that my grandfather had written down. Even waved my fingers over the plot in wishful dramatics, but the ground did not budge.

The kids left. Just another failed attempt at hope.

I felt myself sink inward. Slowly I stood and felt my joints crack in my knees from the childhood injuries of a rambunctious youth and retreated to my makeshift home.

Well, it was just crayons.

The next morning, I arose with regret and numbness about the day. Looking over at the counter scattered with ingredients and tattered spell books, I scoffed. I didn't want to look at anything magical today, or ever at this point. I headed out through the cloth doorway and squinted at the sun's power which had not been seen in many days now. When my eyes finally adjusted to the brightness, I felt dumbfounded by what I saw. It was as if a rainbow exploded over the walls, the ground, and even many of the townsfolk, who too, were gazing at the world with new eyes.

Kids ran across the main street streaked in colours trying to cover any plain surface in sight with reds and purples, greens and yellows. As one little boy approached me, ready to attack my dull appearance, I quietly asked, "where did you find all these colours?"

"From your tree mister, there's tons of colours" He excitedly answered as my clothes took life in the shape of blues and reds. After I asked the child to lead me to the tree.

There I saw folk as young as toddlers to as old as elders picking up crayons as if it was rejuvenation candy; which in a way, it probably was. I even overheard some mothers talking about how they can melt the wax down to create dyes for other materials. There was a real buzz in the air.

After a few days, the town was completely transformed. Although there was no more or less food available in the shop, the people themselves had seemed to awaken from a deep depressing slumber. More of the town was out and about, helping to tidy up and take care of each other. There were more sounds in the air, as folks tested out words on their tongues and found them to be empowering. And within a few weeks there were suddenly travellers wandering in looking to trade and buy our vibrant fabrics. Suddenly the town was booming; booming enough that government officials had announced that they would be arriving to view this unheard-of transformation.

Many had taken to drawing incredible murals on the walls and ground, while others, with now an increase in food supplies, began to cook up a colourful feast.

The day that the government officials finally arrived they were greeted by a different town. This town smiled, it sang, it vibrated with hope and renewed energy. It was such a spectacle that the government officials were unsure of what to even say or do. So, after a few curt conversations and walking around, they turned and left. They just did not know how to respond.

But let's be truthful, it didn't really matter what they would have said or done. The town folk were empowered. Not per say by a magical tree that grew crayons, rather by the first word written in decades next to the tree itself.

"Try"