luv2writepoems

I find it interesting that my e-mail adddress states that I "luv2writepoems", and yet I haven't written but a few in the past two years. It really got me thinking as to why that was, and the conclusion I came to is this: poetry makes me dig deep and doing so has just been too darn painful. I won't go into a chronicle of all the heartache the last two years has offered, but I will say it has been the two hardest years of my life.

Over the years, my self analization has brought me to the understanding that emotionally, I'm a stuffer, which has resulted in many an explosion of nervous-breakdown proportions. So, to battle this tendency to stuff, I had to do the opposite: express myself - and how better to do that than in a beautiful, poetic form? Poetry turns pain into art. I chronicled the lives of my boys from the day I found out we were going to be able to adopt, to their terrors in the neighborhood, and I discoved that it helped me find humor and joy in their progress. So why now, when I need it so terribly, have I found it hard to express myself in a form I love so much?

The answer is that writing got in the way. I know that sounds a little funny, but I think I made a mistake when I joined a poetry group. All of a sudden I found myself comparing my poetry to theirs, which is nothing like what they write, and it just didn't measure up.

I stopped writing.

Instead of allowing myself to be plain old me, I fell into the pit of comparison and couldn't find a way out. I rationalized that it was okay, that maybe poetry wasn't my thing after all, that novels were my TRUE calling, but I forgot one thing: I never wrote poetry for anybody else. I wrote it for me. By no longer expressing myself poetically, I let myself down.

Well, once I realized this, and being the stubborn, contrary person that I am, I decided I was going to write a poem, even if I had to pry it from my screaming heart one word at a time. And you know what? It worked. Sure, it's not the best poem I've written, but I felt like it at least captured the essence of the place I was, and that's what I wanted - but most importantly, it finally freed my heart to express itself again.

So, I'll share my poem here. Not for praise, or glory, but because I need to share the fact that my soul is awakening and learning to speak once more. I need to share it so that I know the world hears the voice crying from inside of me. I need to share because I love the music of the words.

Settlement Canyon

Mustard moss on twisted bark.
A maze of spindly branches and leafy fans.
Sharp rocks jut from the hillside
and a fallen tree with still green leaves, broken.
Bare wood points skyward - accusing fingers
not sure who to blame for the pain.
Blinding sun plays peek-a-boo,
one minute harsh and painful,
the next offering welcome warmth.
Crickets sing in the middle of the day.
A crisp, autumn breeze cuts
through a narrow ravine while a jet
streaks overhead.
An occasional whooperwhil sounds.
A chipmunk explores left-behind food.
Flies and bees come to see the bright cans
and shampooed smells-like-a-flower girl.
Tick-tick-tick the locust start their song,
while the ash-powder dirt stirs in the breeze.
The usual green leaves are painted now-
half up the mountain's side
freckles of orangy-red change the view,
and here the girl sits to write,
here the woman comes to find peace.


So, the moral of my story is this: Be true to yourself. Write what is in you, and don't you dare judge it. Express it. Let it be what it is. Learn. Grow. But most of all, allow yourself to speak. Be who you are and love it with everything you've got, because it's precious -more precious than you know.

Quote of the Day: "You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club." - Jack London