Welcome to the poetry hub!
I breathe in. My lungs fill themselves with cool morning air. By the smell of it I can tell that there was rain last night; by the feel of it I know the fog has yet to burn away. I breathe out.
Writing poetry is like that. It’s like breathing. If I think about it too hard it doesn’t seem quite right: it’s irregular, unnatural, forced; and, somehow, even if I go through all the right motions, it still feels like I’m suffocating.
So I don’t think about it; and I don’t force it. I let the words flow as they will. I feel the rhythm of language rises and fall. I watch as an intricate pattern of words and the sounds they make comes to life.
They breathe. Not because I gave them breath, but simply because of what they are: words and sounds—given complicated meaning by the mind—but innately beautiful in their simplicity.
That’s the funny thing about words, sounds, and my mind: I so often overlook the subtle beauty of a sound, or simple meaning of a word.
My mind craves something more. So, naturally, just as my lungs take in air on their own, my mind combines these words and sounds together in a way that creates deeper, more beautiful meanings.
An analogy here. A metaphor there.
It takes an abstract as complicated as a feeling, assigns to it a beautiful sound and a meaningful word, and turns that abstract into something tangible.
This is its instinct. This is what the mind was made to do. To make sense of abstracts—to gain understanding.
Poetry, to me, happens in the place where the simplistic beauty of words and sounds come together with understanding to create the greatest beauty layered upon deepest meaning that language can achieve.
It has nothing to do with my own ability: beauty eventually shines through despite my linguistic shortcomings. It has nothing to do patterns and structure: meaning will form regardless of the framework I use. It’s not about finding words to rhyme or counting beats on a line.
Poetry is not something that I can force or will to happen—or carefully craft from a set pattern where I fill the blank in.
If I were to treat it that way, it wouldn’t last the day.
It would feel forced, like that line. It would suffocate. Its beauty would be lost: its meaning therefore pointless.
But…
If I let it happen naturally—if I let my pen wander and allow the words to trickle from my mind on their own, just as breath trickles in and out of my lungs without my control—I can let my mind do what it was made to do, and simply watch as beauty unfolds before my eyes.
Featured Poems
Moment
Sometimes I live for the future
Sometimes I long for the past
But when I live within the moment,
True beauty’s within my grasp…
Now
Mass hysteria wave after breaking wave,
washed over the field, filled with graves.
Valiant the few, brave the many,
but how many now can be found if any?
Gifts from the Heart
Cranberries, garage sales, and an old watch
have nothing in common—except for this:
that each portrays a feeling of home
and each will remind you of where you belong.
Because each is a gift,
although that may be hard to see.
One that comes from the heart,
when it comes from you to me..
The Road Home
I travel down this road alone,
driving home on my own,
and pass by the roads I’ve never known
on this set course I know as my own…
You and Me
Perhaps that’s just how it is to me,
I say as her lip trembles so desperately.
And maybe not how it’s supposed to be,
she cries, giving real voice to her entreaty.
The Poetry Master List—all of the poems on surviving the novel
Gifts from the heart—A slightly whimsical musing .
Irrationality (finally)—Holding to hope despite pain and frustration.
Moment—Be patient, don’t look back, living in the moment.
Now—So much depth to this simple piece.
Prey—A poem that is pure fun.
Quiet Chaos—Weathering the storm brewing in your head.
Sing it out—Relaxation inspired by the band Switchfoot.
The Road Home—Thoughts on breaking routine.
Trapped—Emotions: the only prison we want to be in.
You and me—Three’s a company when two decide to be.