The week, backwards...

Last night, lit white lights, we lounged poolside, tipping white-wine and playing catch-phrase. I looked around at some of my favorite co-workers and thought to myself, man, this is picturesquely wonderful. And then I realized, I'd thought that just the day before at dinner with my family as we choke-laughed about the rules we followed growing up (and let me tell you, it's pretty fun to be able to laugh with your mom and sister about that). Wednesday evening, we (Joseph and I) devoured sinfully good bread pudding with burbon sauce after a long, lovely ramble through Hearst Castle. Tuesday we camped, feasting on gloriously charred hobo meals and a marshmallow-smeared yam before snuggling down in our tent at San Simeon. Sunday, I hosted a picnic in the park (complete with badminton hijinks, obviously) followed by a fairly intense game of six-person Scrabble. Saturday, poetry-college crafting with a dear college friend, then a walk to the monastery while dissecting lenten discipline, boys (all of them) and the creative process. I am blessed tremendously in this Sabbath. It is a gathering time.

drafts

It's not that I've stopped writing, or even stopped using this blog. It's just that right now, everything is in draft status. I count 53 consecutive drafts since "Sweet Potato."

That stat makes it pretty clear: my resolve to share my writing got trampled under the craziness of life. A full-time job, a new (fantastic) relationship, great friends, wonderful but hurting family, a church worth investing in, more creative outlets than I can, well, let myself out in. (?)

...See, sentences like that are responsible for all these drafts. I write a line like that, gag a little, promise I'll go back and tinker with it, and then forget all about the entire piece. I've been pretty disciplined with so many other things: teaching, grading, doctor's appointments w/ my Dad, evening running and cooking,...writing is the thing that gets shoved aside.

But that has to change. I'm taking a leave of absence from work and going back to school for an MFA in creative writing. I've been planning and saving for an opportunity like this since I started my credential classes. And this is the year: everything, from my pink slip being rescinded just yesterday, to my leave of absence letter going through with the board, has worked out perfectly. I have a little saved up, and I've made it into a program I'm really excited about.

Of course I'm nervous. I worry I've lost all hint of voice in my aforementioned lovely chaos; I haven't written a poem, really, in months; and my identity has become so rooted in my job that I wonder if I'll ever be able to relax and not need to be seen as "Ms. Lee."

But I can't stay with a job simply because it gives me an identity. It's so important to live honestly. And for me, right now, it would be dishonest not to take this year to write.

The discipline piece is the toughest for me. See, even this sad little whine-of-an-essay floated into draft status yesterday as I wandered into my room and started pushing furniture around, creating a "writing space" for myself. I spent the morning dreaming of thrift-shopping for a vintage tea station and painting a wall with chalkboard paint. It's so easy to neglect work in the pursuit of the romantic idea of "being a writer."

...I picked this up out of "drafts" on Monday, read it over, and cringed. But this little draft exists only to point out I've got to stop drafting. So the irony of it staying a draft is just too much.

On a happier note, I found a wellspring of hope and inspiration in this Ted-Talk sent to me by a dear friend. It's pretty much perfect, expresses all the reasons I want to write and teach writing, and I'm super tempted to simply delete my paltry thoughts and copy the transcript. But I'll let my draft live, and share hers as well:

http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kay_if_i_should_have_a_daughter.html

And immediately after listening, I wrote three poems of my own, which I hope soon to polish out of draft status and post up here.

sweet potato

I like songs that tell half-stories. This is one of those songs. The specifics still leave space for your own story. It is so charming, and it sends out a clearer mood than message. Listen to it, and if you are like me, you will like it and listen to it several times, and make up characters for it.

Sia-Sweet Potato

She cooks you sweet potato, you don't like aubergine
She knows to boil the kettle when you hum bars from Grease
She senses you are lonely but still she can't be sure
And so she stands and waits, stands anticipating your thoughts

How can she become the psychic that she longs to be to understand you
How can she become the psychic that she longs to be to understand you

He brushes thoroughly
He know she likes fresh breath
He rushes to the station
He waits atop the steps
He's brought with him a Mars bar
She will not buy Nestle
And later he'll perform
A love-lorn serenade, a trade

How can he become the psychic that he longs to be to understand you
How can he become the psychic that he longs to be to understand you

So give her information to help her fill the holes
Give an ounce of power so he does not feel controlled
Help her to acknowledge the pain that you are in
Give to him a glimpse of that beneath your skin

Now my inner dialogue is heaving with detest
I am a martyr and a victim and I need to be caressed
I hate that you negate me, I'm a ghost at beck and call
I'm failing and placating, I berate myself for staying

I'm a fool
I'm a fool

He greets the stranger meekly, a thing that she accepts
She sees him waiting often with chocolate on the steps
He senses she is lonely, she's glad they finally met
They take each other's hands, walk into the sunset

Do you like sweet potato?

poetry 101

In the evenings,

my neighbor and I nod

checking in on the state of ourselves, we inquire

and respond robotically,

he does not sound fine, and neither

am I, but it doesn't matter.

It's understood that there is no room for

more. Our insincerity hangs there, as

we fish for our keys

and then we shut our doors on it,

leaving it to dissipate in the warm butter circle of

streetlight.

My mother's hair curls out in two

even tuffs that are

perfectly symmetrical, when she talks

she looks like she could begin

flying, any moment, with a slight wiggle

of the ear.

My first poetry teacher talked of

the power of suspended images,

sans narrative. Day one he instructed us

on the end of the need for a story.

The next night he broke both his feet

at the Cat and Fiddle

stepping hard on a stair he thought

he saw. (He was wrong.)

He was

replaced.

Now I can't get it out of my head:

our tragic small talk, the streetlight circle,

the wings behind her ears.

All poetry.

It's distracting. I try not to

think about it, though. And I watch carefully for

staircases.

polish

these words are unpolished

like the way I feel

about you, not

mulled through yet

tumbling, though, heavy

through the day they will whir

and knock against other words,

until I return home

exhausted and sore

from the clunking concepts

on spin cycle

inside me

(it's always like this, especially

mornings)

and sift through

in search of something

smooth.

wholly.

Sun, morning, spills

Yolk of the world, breaking

over me, sizzling.

The bare bulb behind the stove

softening the whiteness of dawn.

God, I hide my face

from your Holiness. I know.

Besides, I've received

all the guidelines, drawn neat,

and I fall outside.

So I watch Your mountains

tinge pink and green and white

and writhe at

my independent wretchedness.

Isn't this, too

(coffee-soaked confessional of a morning)

Holiness?

No, I'm not boasting of it

What then, shall we sin more?

No, I am just

thankful for

grace and the mountain's graciousness

abounding.

full&complete

On what should be beautiful days of rest, like this Saturday morning, I find my mind moves at its fastest. Is anyone else like this? The first real spot of peace, and I'm off in a million directions: clubs I could start at work, poems I ought to write, books I ought to re-read, friends I can't believe I lost touch with, goals and accolades which I ought to eventually work for, places I should move, letters I've got to write. Mind you, I'm not working on anything this morning, I am simply dreaming, reading a book and drinking coffee. So it's not a productive musing. It's chaotic and guilt-inducing. And mostly, annoying.

A few Januaries back, I resolved to pause for a full and complete stop at every single stop sign. (I live in a town with no traffic lights, so the resolution was sure to be tested.) It was not only tested, as most resolutions are, it fell completely by the wayside (as most resolutions do) and the result of that was a horribly wasted day last spring, slogging through the slowest online traffic school in the history of the World Wide Web.

The goal of my failed resolution was to give myself the reminder to stop. Just stop, even if only for two seconds of the day. The hope was that this habit would work its way into other areas of my life.

I'm invoking the spirit of that failed resolution this morning, to give myself permission to just roll back and feel that pure moment of suspension before I continue racing forward--sip my third cup of coffee, (oh right, my resolution to give up caffiene? failed.) look up at the mountains, and be alright with a full and complete stop.