I write. I wait. I write and I hope.
I write. I tell. I wait. I compose. I let go.
I reveal. I shame. I fight. I bore. I write.
I detail. I write. I read. I fix.
I throw up for gold. I strike nothing.
I write. I bore. I explain. I dig.
I empty. I cry. I cry. I swim.
I connect. I find. I write.
I write. I see. I write.
I draw faces on my eyes. I write.
I hurt. I hurt. I write. I anger. I write.
I pull. I grab. I force. I turn. I write.
I write until I stop. I toss away. I drop...
And still again, I write.
I write, bore, breathe, and write,
Every day.
Sometimes I can't bear myself.
My boring details, my insecurities.
But I don't hide anymore. I write.
I write to myself. I write to a face I see...
To someone who cares...who won't mind
My honesty or my mistakes.
I turn away from the judger, the criticizer
And write to someone else
Anyone else.
Unless I'm mad. In anger,
I'll take her on...that mean bit of
Me-she gets in the way.
I release. I write.
I routine. I write.
Copyright 2009 Cynthia S. Pittmann
I have to admit that when I first looked at this poem, it impressed me as too simple for my taste. But then I read it out loud and I began to understand the ethos you selected for this poem. After all, we all struggle with inner conflict-even as children. Sometimes it is hard to accept that the voices we have internalized are not on our side!
ReplyDeleteThe Pink Cowboy sent an e-mail about his reasons for writing since my survey didn't give him the options that his individual creative spirit needed- still he said I could share them with you.
ReplyDelete"I cannot possibly vote because I do not write on account of the ideas you selected. In fact those four ideas are a starting point for me to express why I need to write:1. To muddle my thoughts into eternal oblivion, The babbling of ages so to speak!!!.2. To dismember what's important.3.To retain stress and jet it into sheer energy.4.To resist. I write because I love, because I hate, because I have the foaming rabies and the delicate tenderness of the human." Thank you, too, for the gift of the "glorious peacock"...I would like to post an image here of one I have in mind but I think the comment section doesn't allow it. (I tried.) Thank you for your appreciation of my poetry and may you alway honor the love that you give and receive knowing all along that essentially, you are love.
Cynthia, your "I Write" poem sort of sparked my interest as to why I love doing the same.
ReplyDeleteWriting for me has always felt like a sort of cocked trigger waiting in the back of my mind, ever ready to unload as soon as I read, see or hear something inspirational.
(Touch and smell should not be excluded either)
Suddenly a barrage of words will shoot off in response to the overall stimuli. Thoughts that work their way through my head in and out of sequence that will need to be re-arranged like those magnetic poetry kits that they sell at Borders.
Inspiration for me can spring from a beautiful movie soundtrack, an injustice that strikes up a specific mood, or even a simple poetical stanza. Sometimes the simplicity of a simple guitar chord or the metric pulse of a percussive pattern is all it will take to send me off into fantasy land.
Whatever it may be, the wheels are quickly set in motion and words will come furiously as I try to keep up with them to capture and organize them on paper, napkin, a recorder, or even toilet paper. (Damn it! I need to carry around a journal.)
Thanks 4 the inspiration!
Eddie V.
Eddie, do you really write from inspiration? I used to approach writing that way but now I just sit down to write, start writing, and then the inspiration comes to me, I guess by invitation. It's true though that music or an inspirational scene in a movie, or an intense event creates a desire to write but sometimes that feeling fades by the time I get to the pen/paper/computer. I do hold images in my mind though so I can write about them later. Thanks for your carefully thought out reflection. BTW the poetry kits bother me because I never feel finished. What about this word I overlooked here... and then I have to change that, and that... and when you are finally satisified-enough-it's all mixed up again...poetry on a fridge...maybe it could substitute for over-eating! I guess I'm not hungry. I think I'll just stop here and move these words around a bit...
ReplyDeleteCynthia, I have to admit that sometimes inspiration does indeed get lost by the time I’ve reached pen and paper. I forget where it was that I once read that writing is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. There is definitely some truth to that
ReplyDeleteThis has also happened to me when I’ve come up with some beautiful melody while playing my guitar.
If I don’t record it right away, I tend to forget it. Now because of the elements involved in music like phrasing, meter and dynamics, it makes it so much harder to remember if you don’t have a way of capturing the idea on the spot.
Lately, I’ve been carrying a small digital recorder in my car just in case. At least that way I can spew whatever words come into my mind or hum a melody into the device before it is completely lost.
I find that when words come accompanied by a melody, it sort of forces my hand to follow the structure of that melody. The only problem with that is that now I have to cut syllables here and there, work out rhyming schemes and make everything fit nicely to flow with the song.
Of course some of what I originally was shooting for may get lost and I now end up with a lyric or a poem. But in the end, it serves its purpose of writing for me.
I agree about those poetry kits on the fridge, just when you have something down, you look over and see that lingering isolated word that begs to be interjected somewhere. Then when you do put it in there, somehow the meaning is lost.
Right now there is something up on our fridge that says “Imagine a dark cloudy dream and a blue mountain song” (Huh?)
BTW Happy Boithday!! (As proonounced in New Joisy).
Sometimes I think I limit myself when it comes to writing; I have a feeling that it will be there kind of frozen and when my mood changes, I won't really agree with what I wrote-exactly. Maybe that's why I just write about what I am sure is a constant. I think I have to let that go, afterall, we all grow and change. Our ideas begin to shift over time-to be authentic we don't have to believe what we wrote five years ago. Like your garden, Cynthia, sometimes our thoughts happen when we are ready for them to happen. namaste
ReplyDeleteKeep on writing! When we do, we create a frame for our memories, our priorities, our jewelled thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThank you lakeviewer. I appreciate your encouragement and your lovely phrasing! <3
ReplyDelete