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.

Welcome! (again)

Re-Introducing: the Chrysalis.

The purpose of this blog is to provide a safe place for writers to grow and develop. As a community, we can help each other become better writers, both through honest constructive criticism and through mutual encouragement and inspiration.

Whether you:

• simply want to share something you've written,
• are looking for feedback,
• have a question about writing, or
• just want to share some thoughts on your own writing process,

we welcome you to the Chrysalis.

For an invitation to become an official member of the Chrysalis, please send an email to: balmandblade@gmail.com

When You Pray, Close the Door (Shadows and Scars: Update 03)

Day 101: June 18, 2011

9:46 pm

Location: Hamburg, PA

Listening to: Red, End of Silence and Innocence & Instinct

I've been working on gathering all my unpublished poems and poem fragments together in one place so I can sort through them and figure out which ones will end up in this book. Once I've gone through this process, I can work on writing new material.

Most of my writings are sufficiently organized on my computer, but I had to search through a number of various folders to gather up a few wandering sheep. The search turned up a few amusing results:

• A parody of Sheryl Crow's "All I Wanna Do" that I wrote during the summer of 2006 when I was preaching an evangelistic series in Alabama, and yes it is about preaching that summer with my fellow field school classmates. Lol, good times.
• A document/poem entitled "Now I Will Tell You What You Mean To Me"... the document, except for title and date, is empty.
• A document created at 1:18 am on August 15, 2008 and entitled "224" contained only the following:
  "110
  10
  40
  =
  
  160"
  Something isn't adding up here... lol.

Besides that, I did find some good material, too. But it is a lot to sort through, both in quantity and content. Which brings me to something I've been thinking about for a while in regards to this book: I want/need prayer support. As some would say, I want this process to be "bathed in prayer." As I mentioned last time, I expect this to be a very challenging book to work through, and I'd appreciate all the prayer support I can get.

So I'd like to have a group of people dedicated to praying for me for the next number of months (hopefully not more than a year), at least once a week. I'll leave it up to you whether you set aside a certain day/time or whatever. Let the Holy Spirit lead you as to what to pray for, and also keep reading these updates to get an idea of what I might need specific prayers for.

But here's the catch: I don't want to know if you've decided to pray for me or not. God is not calling all of you to pray for me, and I don't want you to feel pressured or obligated to pray for me or say that you're praying for me, so I don't want to know one way or the other. Keep it to yourself. :-) I trust that those of you who God is calling will pray for me and knowing that God has chosen some of you is enough encouragement for me.

Now, of course if you want to pray for me randomly for whatever reason, by all means go for it... but what I'm talking about specifically here is dedicating yourself to at least once a week until the manuscript is finished. It is a big commitment and I hope you'll take the time to ask God before deciding, because it is not for everyone. But to those of you who do decide to be a part of the official Shadows & Scars prayer group, I thank you in advance.

~Jason

P.S. In my searching through documents I also found a document I forget existed: a poetry suite entitled "A Return to Purity." This collection of poems, put together in October 2006, would eventually become Unspoken Confessions. I'm not sure when the title changed, but it was sometime between then and when I turned in UC as my final project for Advanced Creative Writing at the end of that school year. Actually, I think the idea for UC came after this collection, but that many of the poems fit so well with my plans for UC that they were transferred over. The leftovers were either discarded or saved for later... some of which will end up in S&S, and some of which still await a future project. So there is your random bit of trivia for the evening.

Healing Tears-for the writing assignments, weddings

Healing Tears

Such deep pain from so many years,
Ran in the tracks of tears as they flowed,
Down over our cheeks,
And into the crumpled and shredded pieces of Kleenex
In my and my sister’s palms.

And so much garbage fell away,
In the falling tears of so many,
As my father, the patriarch of our family,
Walked down the isle of the church alone,
To the seats reserved for the grandparents.

He was frail and leaning heavily on his cane,
He sat in a pew all alone, In front of my mother.
But from his being shone so much pride,
In who we all had become,
And that all of us were together here,
In one place, at the very same time.

And tears of joy replaced those of pain,
As my brother walked with his child on his arm,
Angry words were forgotten, divorces and battles irrelevant,
As the service declared the purest of love,
Love more binding than any past ire,
That of God for his children and them for one another.