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Tuesday, January 27, 2009

An Untitled Poem

I'm moving in a few weeks, so I spent today going through boxes and trying to throw away everything I can. It's a long process because I invariably get wrapped up in nostalgia...and believe me, as a person who keeps every strange little memento, there's a lot of nostalgia. One very large box I pulled open was full of poetry I wrote from the ages of 12 to 18 or so, and let me just say....wow. Reading them again was like looking back at myself. It was like I was sixteen again, feeling all those hormones jumbling around, but I was also reading it with eyes that were ten years older, ten years wiser. I was laughing at the more horrible ones, and feeling a little proud (& surprised) by the better ones when I realized something. I started my love affair with writing by writing poems. I've written literally thousands of them, in every style about everything under the sun. But I haven't written one in a few months. And that's just crazy because I love writing poetry sooooo much! In poems, anything goes. There's no set form, nothing that can't be written about, no grammar, nada.

So I think I'm going to start trying to write something poem-ish every day, just a few lines, because it is so cathartic for me. This was one of the last ones I found, written in 2008, and I thought I would share it with y'all.

Feel free to criticize-I don't bite my tongue, you shouldn't either!


~*~
Fifteen
that one word seems to somehow encompass all the rest of them
He wasn't her first love-
He wasn't even love.
But he was something big,
Something formative, something shaping
A movement, a vehicle
From who she'd been to who she wanted to be.
He was a mask she pulled on
to play a role she'd otherwise be too frightened to try.
She learned, she grew, she stretched beneath his hand
Until he no longer recognized her smile
In the bared teeth she showed.
No claws, not yet, but they aren't too far behind
And now-
Adult.
That one word, like an answer to all her questions
and yet it only makes her more confused.
He doesn't know her, he never did
Although he thinks she is his soul mate
His other, his all
She knows better.
She knows she is only poison in a river
Delicious poison, and more deadly for it
He asks for the heart she gave to him
all those years ago
And when she says she cannot find it
She is lying
She never gave it in the first place.
She kept it tucked away
Safe from herself
So there are no pieces for her to gather out from underneath his skin
Nothing but memories
Begging to remain nothing more than that
Not immune to her own poison
the price of being so sweet
Why can't she stay her own hand?
Knowing it is it's own sweet death
Only makes her want to temp fate a little more
Finding the tipping point on the dagger blade she's walking.
Seeing through her own deceptions makes her ill
but excited too.
She wants to fall down just so he can catch her
knowing she will resent him for it later...or sooner...
And how he did make her head swirl!
For a moment of those colors flying in her brain
She thinks she would trade anything.
Adult?
Just a word she uses to convince herself she is stronger
better, different.
Funny though, at fifteen, she would have been so much more decisive.
At fifteen, there was no gray
Just black just white
~*~
History grows morals crumble
Mysterious mortals start to mumble
Age answers youths questions
But rarely in the dulcet tones we think we want to hear.
~*~

And in a completely unrelated tangent: my spellchecker is adamantly informing me that "ya'll" is not spelled correctly.

Well Mr. Spellchecker, I must assure, it is. I'm a southern girl, this is North Carolina, and "ya'll" is a bonafide, contracted way to say "you all"....but better. =)

4 comments:

Laura said...

again, love it!

I guess spell check isn't so smart after all! lol! You know... come to think of it, I've always spelled it "y'all" because it's combining "you" and "all" so I guess I figured the apostrophe would go between the two words rather than half way through the second...... weird how I've always spelled it that way and just realized why i did it that way....

Sweet Caroline said...

Okay. WOw. I started to tear up reading this poem. I, too, write poetry. (I know. I know. We are a lot alike!) I stopped after years and years. A friend recently brought it back out of me. It is very cleansing. I think a lot of people don't get it--and I have been told it is too deep--but, your post made me realize that poetry is for the author. So, I think I will start again, too. Please, keep sharing. I absolutely felt every emotion reading it.

(I will email you later about the other stuff)

Sweet Caroline said...

Ali-Another thing: I am going to copy your playlist song choices. Your music just seems to be "hitting the button..." with me today!

Word Ninja said...

I'm glad YA'LL enjoyed it! ;)

I can't wait to read some of yours Carolyn! It's so hard for me to share my writings, because I have always been deeply private about them, but blogging is slowly helping me overcome my fear...something neccessary if I'm going to try and publish this book.

I'm thrilled you like the music!! I am so obsessed with music, it is vital to everything in my life!