Bored (Shadows & Scars: Update 07)

July 27, 2011

10:14 pm

Location: The White House; Cookeville, TN

Listening to: Linkin Park, Meteora // So Long Forgotten, Things We Can See & Things We Cannot

................

[I wrote a blog about how I'm going through a phase of being bored with my own poems, especially the ones dealing with subject material that I'd rather just move past... and by the time I typed up half of it on here I got bored of that, so I got rid of it.

Writing and editing a book like this is strange because it is like spending hours upon hours talking to yourself. It can become tedious and even obnoxious quite quickly.

I spend too much time in my own head.

I'm looking forward to this weekend and the discussions therein.]

An Introduction to the Wanderer (Shadows & Scars: Update 06)

July 22, 2011

4:08 am

Location: Paris SDA Church; Paris, TN

Listening to: Showbread, Anorexia

He wanders because I wander. The Incarnation entered my world and came alongside me in my journey. Sometimes this makes me angry. Sometimes I wish He'd go back up to His throne and pull a few strings - lift this veil, or tighten the noose around my neck. Anything but the endless unknown.

But He doesn't. He just keeps walking next to me. And sometimes that is all I want: to be with Him, to follow Him anywhere, even if we wander forever through endless wastelands.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Best of You (Shadows & Scars: Update 05)

July 13, 2011

9:30 pm

Location: Lucio's house; Martin, TN

Listening to: Foo Fighters, In Your Honor

One of the interesting things about writing poetry is that you can wrestle and wrestle with a piece for months with very little progress, and then suddenly it will all start falling into place. Sometimes I feel like the poetry is writing me, instead of the other way around. Here is an example... I started working on this about three months ago, but it has only come together in the past couple weeks.

Let His Words Drain into the Gutter (Drink Every Drop, But Leave the Cup on the Table)

She stirs her coffee, slowly,
like a metaphor I can’t quite understand,
while I watch the steam rise and fade
in the morning sunlight, disappearing
like last night’s rain.

Tucking her hair behind her ear – even
her clichés are beautiful – she lifts
the cup to her lips, invites the moment in.

Her eyes are soft and brave,
but they are strangers to her smile,
as if she’d cast her pearls
at one too many less-than-great men.

I want to tell her:
Don’t sell yourself short.
You deserve to be happy.
You deserve the best.

And while I am arrogant enough
to think of walking over
and paying the bill, as if
I could cancel all her debts,
(maybe even a few of my own)

I don’t believe
that my words can be offered
from anywhere but this distance –
close enough to convey,
far enough to retain their meaning.

One Last Disguise (Shadows & Scars: Update 04)

July 6, 2011

9:31 pm

Location: Hamburg, PA

Listening to: Project 86, Songs to Burn Your Bridges By

Progress has been slow. The writing process cannot be done entirely in solitude, but sometimes you do need to disconnect from everything and throw yourself completely into the material your working with. I have had some of these moments but I need like a week or a month, lol. Alas.

Here are a few excerpts from the poems I've been working on:

"She stirs her coffee, slowly,

like a metaphor I can’t quite understand,

while I watch the steam rise and fade

in the morning sunlight, like a metaphor

I’m all too familiar with."

"You put this gasoline

in my veins,

then denied me a match.

Still, I burn."

"Ironic, how

you were so afraid

I would leave,

but you are the one

walking away."

"My own personal Nagasaki.

A Hiroshima hit to the center

of my seven-year-old universe.

Instant devastation

as the mushroom cloud rose

like a headstone over our home."

and a "finished" poem, appropriately bridging UC and S&S:

I Feel the Weight of Every Word, Double-Edged

Sometimes confessions

evolve into inquisitions,

but still I hold the mirror –

covering half your face,

reflecting half of mine.

The blade cuts both ways.

Always.