HEY THERE BLOGGING WORLD! Good gravy, I've missed this. So...there's not really a "step back in" intro today...segue...
So...my high school days were dramatic to say the least. Today I celebrate a month of marriage, and tomorrow I celebrate my 23rd birthday. So why bring up high school? Well, I'll tell you; it just might take me a minute to get there.
So I just moved from Ruston to Kenner. And I hate moving...like I really hate it. I mean--who actually likes putting all their stuff in boxes and wonder to themselves "When the smell did I get all this CRAP?!" But I will say there is one beautiful thing about moving: re-discovering journals. I found a poetry journal that I started in 8th grade. I was only as old as 16 when I finished the journal, and its successor is lost forever. It was recommended to me that I delete the journal I kept from age 17 to age 19 because I would seriously spiral into a depression when I read it. Part of it is because I expressed myself in a painfully explicit way, and part of it was because life really sucked to 17-19 year-old me. And honestly, when I look back at it...I think it would have sucked to anyone. What depresses me about not having this journal anymore is that I don't have the poetry that I wrote in those years.
I don't know how many of you have noticed, but poetry birthed from pain is often the best. Sometimes it's also the worst (ha), but the shadows of those hauntings still dance in the back of my mind. I cannot seem to grasp them, though, to re-write them.
However, I have found 2 poems from my 16-year-old self that I think are worth sharing. So, please, enjoy.
This poem was written on a flight to Washington, D.C. while I was on my way to a leadership conference (HOBY/WLC...best place ever). It may recall Emily Dickenson (not that I compare myself to her), but it actually moves me still.
"Sky" (7/19/2007)
Might I take a piece of cloud
to rest my head upon?
I'd like to sleep away my troubles now
until each one is gone.
May I use a ray of sun
to turn my grey skies blue?
I need a bit of light to find my way
So I can come home to you.
May I use the peace of sky
only for a little while?
I need it to ease my troubled heart
that I may walk another mile.
Might I take a piece of cloud
to bury my sorrows in?
As it grows heavy with my tears,
I'll put it out to dry again.
This next poem was written literally in the woods one Saturday that I hated the pretenses of the world. Yes, I was dramatic, but I can't help but feel slightly proud of my sophomoric insight.
Untitled (4/28/2007)
I dress myself for the day;
quick. abrupt movements
seem to control me.
Irushoutthedoor to be greeted
by perfect sunlight dancing along the air.
My feet take me steadily downhill.
I soon embrace soft scents of
surrounding wood, mud, and plants
of which I do not know the name.
My feet choose their own path.
I fear nothing.
completely alone and all but silent.
Everything hides behind the lie of day.
Simplicity.
This life is not simple--
although everyone, everything
tries to make it seem that way.
Nothing goes about life undisturbed
or without worry...
and yet masks cover our faces
JUST to be sure no one knows our battle.
Like the birds we sing songs to please
others.
But we keep OUR songs inside.
Like a frightened doe we run
because anything could be a threat.
My heart beats no steady rhythm
as I sit here by myself.
Nature continues to surround me,
Anxious.
Afraid of my presence
and changed by time.
I used to know this place;
it used to know me, too.
But that was another lifetime...
is this the start of something new?
So, I'm no Emerson...I'm no Thoreau. I'm no Frost who could write of the woods as if they were a part of him. But there is something about digging up my own old poetry that makes me feel. It just makes me feel--not better or even good. I just feel...deeply. And I like it. Why did I ever put down my pen?
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