Cleveland, Ohio -- Patrick Warner has been putting his heart into rhymes since he was 13. At 17, he turned to music to deal with the death of his ill father, and the loss of a best friend to violence a month later. It was where he found refuge when a music mentor died in 2016, and last year, when he lost his beloved Aunt Anna, who always stepped in to support him in any way he needed. “Music has always been my voice, my way of trying to understand life,” Warner, 22, who lives in Cleveland’s Buckeye-Shaker neighborhood, said. “I would write the things I was afraid to say.”

Lynn Ischay, The Plain Dealer

Cleveland, Ohio -- Patrick Warner has been putting his heart into rhymes since he was 13. At 17, he turned to music to deal with the death of his ill father, and the loss of a best friend to violence a month later. It was where he found refuge when a music mentor died in 2016, and last year, when he lost his beloved Aunt Anna, who always stepped in to support him in any way he needed. "Music has always been my voice, my way of trying to understand life," Warner, 22, who lives in Cleveland's Buckeye-Shaker neighborhood, said. "I would write the things I was afraid to say." Read more ...

'This and That,' written by Maurice Philpott Jr., James Banks, Kayla Savage, and Chris Fulford, appears at first to be a typical rap song, but delivers a subtle social justice message as the lyrics continue. The group's goal was to weave in rhymes that "let people know exactly how it is" from their perspective. Read more...

'Achieve,' written by Ahdonis Gordon, James Polk, and Antonio Bridget, is about goals, desires and aspirations, the teens say. The song is also about the obstacles to reaching their dreams, and the path they've chosen to take them beyond the life that many of their peers know. Read more...

To hear all the songs, click on the videos below

"Achieve"

"This and That"

"I Rise"

Listen to Patrick Warner talk about what creating music means for his life

Read the lyrics to 'I Rise' and hear more about what they mean.

Now, it's your turn to write a verse

Watch the videos below for step-by-step instructions to create and submit a verse to the Dear Cleveland project

Dear Cleveland: Patrick Warner offers some rap verse-writing tips

Dear Cleveland: Kayla Savage explains some essential rap techniques

Write your own verseto go with this hook created by Dear Cleveland participants and Refresh Collective.

Learn about students in CWRU's Upward Bound program

Cailah Porter, 15, reads over an example of a short story as she and fellow Upward Bound students prepare to work in groups to create characters who will face dilemmas. Porter is an honors student who plays basketball and participates in debate and math clubs at Whitney Young Leadership Academy. She co-created a character named C'arlos who decides whether to live on the streets or return to foster care. (Chuck Crow/The Plain Dealer)

Dear Cleveland,

Kids here face some tough choices.

As a part of our Dear Cleveland project, where we highlight young perspectives, we wanted to find a way to explore those decisions.

To do that, we worked last summer with more than a dozen students who participated in the Upward Bound Program at Case Western Reserve University.

We didn't ask students to share personal stories. Instead, students worked in small groups to create fictional characters and scenarios where the characters had to make decisions. Click here to read more about how the project worked.

This reporting is supported by the University of Southern California Center for Health Journalism National Fellowship.

Students work on their stories (photo gallery)

To read about the characters the students created and the dilemmas they faced, click on the animations below, created by Plain Dealer illustrator Chris Morris.

For Audrey, 'wanna hang' is a question with no good answer

Without family, C'arlos decides between the streets and foster care

Elizabeth faces a choice between crime and belonging

A gun or a phone: Mo faces a life or death decision

Previous coverage: See Cleveland through the eyes of six young photographers

One-year-old CJ peeks through a slightly open window at his siblings playing in his yard. He had to stay inside for a nap. Air Rodgers

Dear Cleveland,

This is what the city's young people see when they look at you: utopia and dystopia, love and hate, beauty and ugliness, tolerance and fear. Six young women with cameras walked your summer streets, peered into your alleys and backyards, strolled your parks and beaches, and captured the face you turn upon them. Their photos are as diverse, hopeful, creative, clear-eyed and bright as they are. Read about the Dear Cleveland photo project.

Click photos below to view each photographer's work. Portraits by Lisa DeJong, The Plain Dealer

Lai Lai Bonner, 18, lives in East Cleveland is in college working toward an associates degree in fine arts and aspires to be a cinematographer. Her family and event photography business is called Melting Magnets. Her work has appeared in Shooting Without Bullets and gallery shows.

Jasmine Banks, 18, lives in Cleveland's St. Clair-Superior neighborhood. She's currently studying photography at Cuyahoga Community College and participates in Shooting Without Bullets. Her photography has appeared in exhibitions and gallery shows.

Genesis Merritt, 17, is high school student in Cleveland who takes college classes. She participates in Shooting Without Bullets projects. Genesis said looking at the world through a lens makes her feel braver and more outgoing.

Air Rodgers, 16, lives in Cleveland's Glenville neighborhood. She loves the literary arts and has written and performed songs with Refresh Collective and shared her talents by teaching new songwriters. She contributed the idea of documenting "Utopia/Dystopia" based on her observation of the borders of University Circle, East Cleveland and Glenville.

Adora Ezepue, 15, lives in Euclid and attends high school in Cleveland. She has been taking photos her entire life but never with film before this project. It helped her think differently about what she was capturing, she said. She also plays violin and interned over the summer on a cancer research project.

Isadora Waller, 15, lives in Cleveland's Hough neighborhood with her grandmother. She moved to Cleveland from Stockton, California, when she was 8 years old. She wasn't thrilled about the move at first but has grown to appreciate her adopted city.