Once a poet...

I love poetry. The romantic, spiritual, elegant, flamboyant, beauty of poetry. I used to desire it a lot more than I do now. But, sometimes I remember the feeling writing and reading poetry gave me in my youth. Poetry was the outlet that helped me establish my true self. The written word let my mind free itself. I miss that feeling. I do sometimes feel it coming back as I write more and more in this blog. But, it's not the same feeling, it's grown up and reality driven. I guess I should feel that I have more to write about, but not in the same poetically free way. I love poets like Adrienne Rich, Maya Angelou, and Margaret Atwood. For anyone who knows these poets you can tell that I was also on a Feminist kick in college. I also loved the poetic nature writings of Whitman and Emerson throughout high School.

The first poem I wrote was titled "Silence of an Insane Poet" at 14 or 15.
Here's one line-
Do you feel it?
It's burning it's bright.
The overwhelming, beyond my control.
The hand won't stop

Pretty intense, huh? I continued to write through my High School years and my first couple years of college, getting published in various school literary mags and reading at open mics. It was my most comfortable outlet and my ideal way to express myself. Whenever I would be asked to write a paper, I would include some poetic diction and the teachers would eat it up or think I was strange, thinking back now they probably thought the latter.

I lost a couple loving relatives during this time. My grandmom Jane, my dad's mom. She was a wonderful lady, who also enjoyed poetry. I was inspired to write a poem titled "Petals" about her, that I passed around during her funeral. Many were choked up and some came up to me and told me I resembled her. I felt blessed to have experienced such a profound connection to her that day. We also lost a funny, caring soul, Harry, my mom's dad. He was incredibly fun-loving. I was inspired to write a poem for him too called "Side by Side" and this time had the guts to read it aloud during his procession. I was incredibly emotional experience.

I'll leave you with a verse from a personal fav:
Eyes
Cursed by the vibrations
Shadow like movements from the trees
I see the ghost from my dreams
Place settings on the air like tables floating gracefully
Footprints of the man in the pictures
Cursed by the light
See the raindrops fall from the windowpane
I like the dancing man on stage
Take it off
Paint me a picture of the clouds before it storms
In the background is the one I lost
Cursed by the silence
I make clay-like creatures
Stay here while I make you your favorite dish
Stop me as I drink my last sip of gin
I like the metal rubbing against my skin.....

Cursed by the eyes
Stop staring

I guess you could say that I had some dark thoughts when I was young. This one was written when I was about 16. I hope this once heartfelt passion of mine comes to me again one day, I would love to be able to write in a new style with a mature voice. Poetry will always live in my heart, thanks for reading.