Posts tagged writing poetry

in Poems

red flag

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Pay attention to the signals ahead. I missed my exit because I was skipping a song to one that didn’t remind me of him and when he loved me more than he does now. Be wary of any short hugs and apathetic answers, and stop wondering whether a separation will help, because it won’t. Remember that we have one single life and for all we know, we only have a handful of years left to live. Pay attention to the signals. And if you see a red flag, it’s not just okay — it’s the right thing to run.

Today’s … Read the rest

in Poems

Attention

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You can tell I’m nervous when I don’t shut up, when I turn into a chatterbox that will do or say anything to avoid having to do or say what has to be done or said. I am not brave. I am not fearless. I am not even casual, ever, it’s always all or nothing for me, this or that.

But when it comes to you I’m able to slow down. Really, I have no choice. Your skin against mine creates a still silence that comes from nowhere else, only you, you soft mouse.

No one will hear you unless … Read the rest

in Poems

keep choosing

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When you were younger you read that Robert Frost poem like everyone else in school and spent years dreaming of that point in your life where two paths finally diverge. All those years you spent trudging down that pin-straight road, fretful for the future, trying not to detour into the thick woods like the thickheaded people who think they know better.

You keep your eyes forward and back straight, plodding along as more and more people fall by the wayside or disappear into the forest, and you can feel it when you’re finally alone, when there’s nothing but you and … Read the rest

in Poems

What a Life

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It’s been twenty-five years since you’ve stood with your friends singing Hallelujah on a stage, feeling the vibration of a hundred voices lifting from the platform to the sky. It’s been twenty years since you listened to that same song on the way to your friend’s funeral. He’d shot himself to death at work. What a life. Now you can’t listen to that song without crying and you will always wonder how you couldn’t have seen it coming, and why no one ever usually sees it coming. There should be a prescription everyone gets at birth, an RX for love … Read the rest

in Blog

I’m not a good poet

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In approximately eight and a half months I am going to be going on a six day, five night writing “retreat” all alone, and this will be the first time in my life I’ve had the opportunity to do anything like this. 

My favorite living writer has a tiny house / AirB&B on per property that she is offering to writers and artists as a place to visit, relax, and I suppose most importantly of all, to create, and to create in solitude. 

I love being alone. 

I love being with friends and family, too, but I am definitely … Read the rest

in Poems Written Promptly

patience for the pilgrimage

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there are so many months between me and here and there
but I can’t wait to prepare. I can’t wait to go from wistful dreaming
to actual planning, to opening a duffle bag and beginning to pack.
Clothes and deodorant and soap, various and sundry things to fill 
the space in me (the bag) just like where I’m going will fill the space in me.

a whole entire winter and spring need to pass before this chance comes
and I have to remind myself it’s still a chance, anything can happen
in that amount of time. illness, death, job loss, … Read the rest

in Poems Written Promptly

skin twin

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there are so many things about us that one could make 
one say we mesh. we call each other our skin twins, 
the same light shade but sprinkled with freckles. if we put our
arms against each other, i can’t tell where he ends and i begin.

there’s a comfort here i’ve never had before, the feeling that
i can let go a little bit, not be so close, not be so clingy, not
be so afraid all the time that he will leave me.

(and trust me, i have an excuse for the fear i can’t release)

but for … Read the rest

in Poems Written Promptly

city song

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right now there’s ringing in my ears, and besides that the drip of
the cat’s water fountain and the hum, perhaps, of a water heater,
and i want none of those sounds, i want silence unless it’s something
i’ve been wanting to hear.

i want to travel to florida and see my friend Todd, i want to hear the
dull roar of a plane cruising at altitude, i want him to hear his eggs
crackling over easy, spitting and popping butter, before the whoooosh
of him pouring my scrambled ones into the pan. And the drip of his
coffee pot, … Read the rest

in Poems Written Promptly

here you are

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here you are. you had one foot over the fence and now here you are. 
no more of that painful limbo, no more wondering “what will happen
that will make him leave again?” even if you are the one to facilitate the leaving.
set it and forget it, you tell yourself. you get what you get and you 
don’t get upset. if you start to stray into thoughts that cause you fear,
remember the times you were comforted, and remember the things that count.

tell yourself you don’t need anymore manifestation or magical thinking, 
you just need to be the … Read the rest