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Monday, 18 May 2009

I made some A's this semester.

I am checking off the boxes on my degree plan when I realize the end is near. Then, without permission or regard to my sanity, my imagination takes over and I begin dreaming about grad school. I don't know what kind of crazy sees the light at the of a tunnel and looks for another tunnel, but I am that kind of crazy.
I have been doing research into MFA creative writing programs. They are intimidating to say the least. But when I read about them my breath only catches for fear that they will not accept me. I curse myself for caring so little at the beginning of my college career. I wonder who do I think I am to be so presumptuous. I can picture myself around the conference table taking others' notes on what I had written and thinking, "I must inspire pity- a small talent wanting so badly to be good." Then there is that quiet hope that I am good. There is a tiny voice assuring me I can be better. It is amazing how such a small sound can carry so far. Somehow, I am given to belief.
Along with the aspiration, however, comes the pure unbridled fear of achieving it.
Also, I wrote this poem just now:
Had it been me
Shackled to a burdening ambition
Imprisoned by desire
I would have been impotent
Useless against a tide of waking dreams
Yes, had it been me
Nose to nose with rejection
Fist formed against adversity
I would have crumpled
Out before the first round done
You know! Had it been me
Tasting joy in anticipation
Challenge plated as morning meat
I could not stomach it
Starved despite the feast

But you, sweet kindred spirit
Gentle muse
You make me a liar
My name scribbled at the base of the page
In truth, I would sign yours if I knew it

Sunday, 26 April 2009

Semiotics

I am writing a paper for my advanced grammar and composition class. (EDIT: the title is, "God is doG spelled backwards.") I have already begun to go too long, and I need to be careful because I have a page limit. I think this is a very... very funny problem to have.
BUT- it is so interesting.
This is my thesis:
The symbol “(insert any word here)*” is not the same, not equivalent to, or able to delimit the concept it names.
I happened upon an article by Denys Turner titled, "Tradition and Faith" when doing my research. This passage made me laugh aloud in agreement and glee:
"‘Grammar’, therefore, is at once necessary and impossible in any absolute and final way. But it is the fear that language might be possible – might at some point resolve the paradox on the ground of some ultimate, redeeming ‘reality’ – which, as God, haunts this Nietzschean mentality. For were language not denied what it promises, were language to secure its hold on the meanings which it contains, and so be able to make finally ‘present’ the meanings which it seeks to disclose, then speakers would be trapped within their utterances, locked into an utterly deterministic world, a world determined by what can be said, since what can be said would be locked deterministically into its relations with its objects. Total loss of freedom would therefore be the price of any grammar which could be shown to have resolved its own contradictions" (24).
Ha!
*I didn't actually write "insert any word here" in my thesis. I picked a word.
Cite: Turner, Denys. "Tradition and Faith." International Journal of Systematic Theology 6 (January 2004): 21-36.

Thursday, 23 April 2009

Compromised

Every time I merge onto the highway ready, albeit unexcited, for work I feel a pull to just keep going. I force myself to exit. I encourage myself to turn. I will myself to park, and smile. I tell myself in just a little while I'll be free. So, sometimes on my lunch break instead of eating I drive across the lake. I taste freedom for those minutes. I stare out at the water and try to remember the smell of the ocean. I feel incredibly happy for a second when I forget I have somewhere to be.
When I do my homework, or clean the apartment I catch myself staring over at Lilly, my guitar, hanging on the wall. I demand focus out of myself. I rally my spirits to compete academically. I make myself type, and organize. I say to myself in just a little while I'll be free. So, most times when the clock catches up with me I hurry to Lilly, and rush into my room. I rip off my socks, and change into my pajamas. Excited,as the taste of adrenaline pools into my mouth, I lift Lilly off the bed. I trace my fingers down her neck and listen to the tension between my skin and her strings. I feel incredible love for a second when I forget I need to sleep.
These are the compromises I make everyday: each time promising myself the same thing. "I promise someday I will you give you exactly what you want. I promise someday I will drive until I see the shore, stand in the ocean until my skin wrinkles, and watch the sunset over the horizon. I promise someday I will pick Lilly up, play until my fingers bleed, and sing until I lose my voice. I promise to never give up. I promise to live passionately."
For now, as is necessary, I am compromised.

Thursday, 16 April 2009

In regards to being an English major

I have a confession to make.
I occassionally rely on my classmates' difficulty writing to distract from my lack of trying.
*shame*

Monday, 13 April 2009

Lilly and the Cage.

Tonight as the strangely yellow moon dipped behind a rain cloud I was sure I wanted to be writer. Lord knows lately I've been racking up enough experience to inspire volumes of self indulgently written prose. At first, with that last sentence I wrote "self indulgent prose" but then reconsidered. The words themselves are not self indulgent. They don't have their own life. Then again, they do. This is why even the idea of trying to put any of this down on paper is so entirely intimidating. Writers, artists, musicians... how do they do what they do? How do they put out into the world those phrases whispering around the darkest parts of their minds? I know they must feel this. I know it because I hear those whispers. They distract me until I comply.
Someone called me a closet musician the other day. My cork board is littered with scraps containing half written verses, but I don't need the papers to remember. All of the words, every chord, I can't forget them anymore than I can leave my own body. A closet musician... what I funny thing to say. "Will you be coming out anytime soon?" he laughed. My thought in response was far too incensed, "And put my love out there so you can touch her?!"
I've been thinking about that comment for weeks, and I know now why it (pardon the pun) struck a chord. After my grandfather and Uncle were killed- after Michael tore me to shreds- after Tahoe I went back to base without the usual songs on my shoulders. What I had then was a burden too heavy, too large to leave room for expression. I promised myself I would not share my creations anymore. Somehow, it was not just my music that slipped into the dark. Everything linked to feeling was shut away. My poems were moved into a wooden box, my music was saved for an empty house, and my writing was kept to fragments- undeveloped, under appreciated, unusable pieces of trash.
So it should come as no surprise, seven years later, when she called me "songbird" I began to cry. She asked me why I was crying, and I told her the stories. I told her about the days when everyone called me songbird. I told her about the music filling the hallways of my barracks. She recognized something in me I had tried so desperately to hide, and when she did I had no reason to pretend. So, I took out my papers and held them up to her. I took down my guitar, and uncovered my piano and played for her. I sang my heart into a room where there was more than a wall to hear me. I had been so afraid of expression. For so many years I protected these things- I protected myself- from observation, from criticism, from change... from molestation. When I finally opened the darkness up to the light again I looked onto all that had been locked away, and I did not feel afraid anymore.

I felt joy.

This is the song I wrote for her:

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I was asleep
I didn’t know
I never saw my eyes were closed
You arrested me
Awakening
It is strange to stretch these weary legs
Weird, getting out of my own head
Dreaming, finally
Awakening
You prove one heart can change everything
One kind word can make it spring
The summer comes
I am different than I was

Now that the world is bright and new
What is a dreamer left to do?
Take me away
Awakening
Clouds are caught within the sky
A bird can only fly so high
Love is weightlessly
Awakening
You prove one heart can change everything
One kind word can make it spring
The summer comes
I am different than I was

Thursday, 09 April 2009

C Am E G Dm E G ... and so on

After thought--- I was going to qualify this, but, what the hell... hi.  This really is the way I am.
Life is sometimes not interesting enough to write about. This isn't one of those times. Life is very very interesting right now, and complicated. It is so interesting, and complicated that I should not write about it.  So I won't.

The other day I saw a rainbow against a brick wall. The midmorning sunlight pushed through the window, and cast its colors against the stones for me to see. It was beautiful.
Today a piece of string stuck out from the rest of the weave on my patio chair. It curled, and shivered in the breeze. I didn't touch it because it was beautiful.
My roommate came home. I pointed to the smallest leafless new growth on the tree across the street, and stated that I would like to be that twig because closest to the sky.  I remembered the rainbow and the string. I gasped, like I do when I remember something I wanted to tell someone about, and told him about the rainbow, and the string.

"I was going to text message someone," I laughed, "'I just saw a rainbow, and it was beautiful' but that seemed silly. I was going to call someone and say, 'I just saw the most beautiful piece of string' but I realized I was crazy."
He laughed, and asked about the string. I showed it to him, and he agreed it was beautiful. He also reached out and moved the string. It was an offensive thing to do, touching the curl, and it shocked me. I would never... I looked from him to the sky and to him again.
"I really am insane," I mumbled, "I see all these small things."
"You saw the flower that was going to be mowed down," he agreed with my self assesment.
"What flower?" I was confused, but thought that seeing a flower sounded like a lovely idea. He reminded me it was almost ten years ago, according to me, in high school.
Then I remembered telling him. I smiled, "It was a dandelion." And like I had been saying so often, "It was beautiful." I paused because my emotions were pushing themselves into the front of my mind. "I think," I continued, "I see the small beautiful things, because I feel I am a small beautiful thing, and I would like it very much for someone to see me."

He said, "We all are."
This song came before this conversation, and only tonight did I see how very similar the two are-
One more song before I go to bed
One more song before I rest
One more chance to make it all make sense
You know life's hard when you write your own lullaby
You know shits weird when you can't stand to see your own self cry anymore
No more
Don't you see me standing here?
Don't you see me? I'm so scared
Don't you see me tie the rope?
Don't you see I've lost my hope          and
Everybody gets tired of the sad song
Everybody gets worried when it's too long
But we are all invisible
And I am so f miserable

But... lu-lu-lu- lullaby
lu-lu-lu-lullaby
Just one more song and then...
Don't you see me standing here?
Don't you see me? Do you care?
Don't you see me with the knife?
Understand this is my life          I know
Everybody gets tired of the sad song
Everybody gets worried when it's too long
But we are all invisible
And I am so f miserable

But... lu-lu-lu- lullaby
lu-lu-lu-lullaby
Just one more song and then...