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The Truth Shall Set You Free

So...I haven't read out of our texts in about a week, but I have to say that I have read a SHIT load. That's right, I said shit. I read Anne "Essie Mae" Moody's Coming of Age in Mississippi this weekend, actually in less than 16 hours, and it was actually fantabulous. It really opened my eyes to the realities of living as a young poor black person in the 50s and 60s. Anne was the oldest of 9 kids, could hardly afford clothes to go to school (her segregated school) and couldn't wear shoes because the one pair she owned was strictly for school. She made great grades in school and actually tutored her white boss' children in math. Anne Moody went to college at a few different institutions and became a civil rights activist and participated in famous sit-ins and marches, including on Washington, where MLK Jr. gave his "I have a Dream" speech.
Anyways, great book--everyone needs to NEEDS TO read it.
Also, I've read The Castle of Otronto by Horace Walpole. That one...not as great. Pretty weird, and I don't think that someone would really gain too much intelligence from reading this, which is reportedly one of the first ever horror stories. A preview: The son of a king gets squished by a GIANT helmet...and then the monarchy falls into chaos. EH. Alright, but not too great.
But, I have been working on my new blog about "A Good Man is Hard to FInd." Check it out ladies and gents! My renderings are pretty sweet. :)

Checker out!

Check out my new blog at www.goodfindchrystal.blogspot.com!!!


I'm pretty proud of my flabulous artwork, but the blog isn't done yet--it's still a work in progress!

Responses to Barn Burning Questions

1. I think the number one way American teenagers find their own individualiy is to expirement with it. Who are they? Teenagers go through many phases, all in the form of rebellion from their parents, which tests their limits as well as their own selves as to who they are and what they really stand for: Some go through a 'gothic' stage, in which they refuse to conform to society's views of 'normal.' Some go through the drug stage, in which they try to tap nto their rebellious and higher conscious to find the truth in what is right and wrong morally. Some go through the sexually intense 'slut' phase, where they attempt to prove that their bodies are in fact their own possessions and not to be ruled by their parents--the same with piercings and possibly tattoos. I went through a lot of things as a teenager, and I think that if I were to try to rule it down to one particular thing I did to find my own values as a teen, it would be really hard, because I had both my mother's values and my father's values, which were totally different things (they were divorced when I was 12). I went through the 'Goth' thing, which was totally against my mother's values, but not beyond her understanding, and then I went through a bi-curious/bisexual period (I was with a girl for 3 years in highschool) to my father's horror, but my mother's ____<--I'm not sure what word goes there.

2. As someone with 2 other sisters, we destructed a LOT of eachother's things to get back at eachother, but we all felt terrible afterwards. I could never destroy purposefully somebody else's hard earned possession and feel justified. Never. I don't think it's really possible.

3. I don't think the story would have much of an impact if it weren't through Sarty's consciousness. The father's consciousness would have left much less of an imprint on anybody's mind I think, and I believe that his only other option if he watned to make this tory a good one, would have been to write it from his wife''s perspective in trying to deal with her husband's compulsive childlike behavior. Captivating her having to pick up the pieces each time he went on one of his rampades would have been good, and maybe even equally as epic, but he didn't do that--Sarty's perspective was a good choice on behalf of Faulkner.

4. I think the number one symbol in the story is the destructive power of fire, which destructs everything in it's path, including the childhood of Sarty. The initial court hearing of Mr. Snopes drove Sarty crazy. He didn't know whether he should lie, or tell the truth or lie...it was complete chaos in his mind, which is exactly what fire is--chaos. You can not predict the path fire is going to take, who it is going to kill, and what it is going to destroy. All you know is that it is dangerous in many different ways. The father tore apart the family by burning things down. His son was dirty and hungry; it is doubtless because his father couldn't keep a steady job for thef act that he took personal matters into his own hands and grudges led him to destruction of property. When it got to the point when Sarty knew he could no longer either look up to or defend his father, it was too late and everything was ruined.

5. Do the class issues ahve any parallels today...good question...I'll have to think about that one. I think that those who destruct property are those who don't understand the value behind that property. Does that make sense? The father in this story doesn't have any worldly possessions--he has a wagon and a family. Burning barns is easy for him, because he never had to earn the money to build a barn. The money he earns goes to feeding his family, and maybe burning others' possessions helps him feel better because he is hurting someone who, in his eyes has all the money in the world to build another one. On the other hand, because he has never experienced that money, maybe he is hoping to devastate that family as much as he is devastated on a day to day basis so that they see that what they ask of him is far too steep. In today's day and age, it seems like the ones to destrcut others' property are teenagers, who have been given every penny they've ever spent and don't know the value of a dollar. Furthermore, upper class teens don't tend to cause that sort of trouble (surely, they cause trouble, but of different kinds) and it is the lower class teens who seem to devalue possessions--possibly because they see them as unattainable, and also that they will be not be held accountable for those actions because they lack the necessary funds to make up for the loss they've caused somebody else.

6. This is one of those questions I will have to answer after I read it again, because, to be honest, it took me three days to read this story because it started off so...unreadable.

Final Projectimundo

So...my understanding is that we are supposed to pick any short story from our text and firstly take photos of the elements of fiction with quoted captions from the story itself; pictures of characters, plot, setting, symbols and theme (can we do theme?). We are to know the story inside and out, so that we then can teach that story to the class in a designated amount of time. Also, we should create a blog about and for the story, and write a paper about our experience with this assignment. I'm sort of excited about this project--I just wish there was more time to do it in...My story to follow......

Barn Burning

So...I was impressed by Faulkner's writing style and thought he was pretty (not just pretty--very) talented in the craft of building fiction in the form of short stories, but he sure confused me. Hepworth said in class that it was very obvious who the antagonist was in the story, "Barn Burning," but I think it was obviously NOT obvious, because I thought the first half of the story's antagonist was the Justice of the Peace. The boy in the story, the protagonist (obvious), looked up to his father for most of the story and sided with his father, as most of us would have done, which leads us to believe that those who went against him or his father would have to have been the antagonists. It is not until the end of the story when we actually get proof that the father really did set fire to the barns, and even then, it wasn't entirely clear to me that it was the father ar all at first, or rather they were innocent victims of coincidence. I'm not completely narrow-minded, however, and gathered that it had to have been the father who set the fires, and the son, once enlightened had a huge problem with it, and ran away forever. What a sad ending--he had a mother who loved him very much as well as an Aunt who surely would have taken care of him with or without his father, as is maternal instinct, BUT the fact that they held him while his father took off toward the barn leads me to believe that they were willing participants. Any takers? What does anyone else think? Were they in on it, or were they just simply victims of a patriarchal society in which whatever the 'head of the household' decides is doable is what becomes done--right or wrong. I'm curious.

Updated Readin' List

Updated Calendar

WEEK ONE
Emily Dickinson

WEEK TWO
Emily Dickinson
Walt Whitman

WEEK THREE
Robert Frost
Walt Whitman

WEEK FOUR
Raymond Carver
Ezra Pound

WEEK FIVE
Raymond Carver
Charles Reznikoff
Katherine Anne Porter

WEEK SIX
Amy Lowell
Ernest Hemingway

WEEK SEVEN
John Steinbeck

WEEK EIGHT
Elaine Goodale Eastman
Poetry

WEEK NINE
Spring Break

WEEK TEN
Sarah M.B. Piatt
Poetry

WEEK ELEVEN
Gary Snyder
William Carlos Williams

WEEK TWELVE
Updike
Faulkner

WEEK THIRTEEN
Faulkner

WEEK FOURTEEN
WEEK FIFTEEN
WEEK SIXTEEN

My Version of Trust Me

Trust Me
When her son, Harry was three or four, Harriett had been doing the laundry when she came upon her husband’s pants in the hamper, and as was the routine, dug deep into his carpenter pockets to find miscellaneous items that should not be washed in her new machine. Usually, she would come across a beer cap, sometimes some dollar bills along with pennies and paperclips, but today there was a folded four by six inch piece of paper that she withdrew from the depths of his pants. Upon looking, she noticed the writing--very feminine cursive-- which read:
“I thought you should have my number so we can meet up at the pool again. Maybe my lifeguard training will come in handy! XOXO Roxanne 256-9908”
Pool? Again? XOXO? Harriett felt a little dizzy and knew without looking that her face had flushed, but with her miraculously cunning fem-warfare tactics, she decided playing it cool would be the best way to go about this. Her family rarely went out, and she resigned that on Saturday, they would take a trip to the community pool where this Roxanne apparently worked and then, only then would she know the real truth. Perhaps this fancy-scripted woman with the brothel-esque name was just some floozy with whom her husband had no interest. Her days crept by ever too slowly, but she kept her secret to herself until the weekend; she even left the blasphemous note in his pants to go through the wash, as to avoid all worries on her husband’s part.
When the week came to an end, Harriett went to her son, Harold first, who was thrilled to go swimming, and who also encouraged his reluctant father to take the family trip to the pool. She knew that if something was going to happen here, she had to look her finest, as is woman nature, so she pinned her hair up in the most subtle, yet sexy of ways and searched out her little black bathing suit--the one with the mini-skirt attached, as was the fashion-- and headed for the pool with her family.
When they arrived, she paid close attention to her husband, who seemed to be sweating an awful lot. Whether it was due to the ninety-seven degree summer day or the foreshadowing of his doom, she wasn’t completely sure. She hoped it was the former. There were chairs spread out, where Harriett set up camp and set everyone free to play while she scoped out her surroundings. Harold was sort of anxious about the water and hung back while his dad tried to urge him in with him. Soon, a very shapely red-head, dressed in the custom lifeguard attire walked up to three or four year old Harold and swooned at him.
“Aren’t you cute? Are you going to go swimming, honey?” She turned then, and said something Harriett couldn’t make out but she did make out the face that was painted up the front of her husband’s head. A smile and an unsure glance towards the home wrecker and then toward Harriett left a familiar sourness in her stomach, and thankfully the bodacious red-haired buffoon swished off to her podium before any farther steps needed to be taken. All that Harriett could think to do was to dig through her beach bag for sun block to rub into her blindingly white skin. When she looked over, little Hassy was standing at the edge of the pool, sans floaters, with his father beckoning him to jump.
“Jump right into my hands,” and at that very instant, Miss Roxanne bent over at her podium, exposing her round, freckled buttocks, while Harry jumped, trustingly into the chlorinated green pool, through his distracted, piggish father’s outstretched arms and down into the water. Harriett let out a shriek, which apparently caught her husband’s attention, as he immediately reached into the water and pulled out his son.
Harriett was overwhelmed with emotion, as she stormed to the edge of the pool as Harry was carried out of the shallow end, and without thought--without warning, reared back and slapped her husband dead across the face before taking her son in her hands. That night they fought long and hard, and her husband solemnly swore never to speak to the flame-haired woman again.
Years later, Harry asked about that day at the pool and why his father had dropped him, to which Harriett said nothing and her estranged husband plead forgetfulness. It was best the poor boy didn’t know the truth anyway.

William Carlos Williams

Is anyone else just fed up with this guy?? I'm not too huge of a fan of his, although I do think that his manipulation of English grammar is fabulous and to be looked up to. I just think that sometimes he makes no sense, for instance, the Pink Locust poem is predominately about a flower, which throws me off a little bit, because I get distracted by the title and the early reference to the locust, which turns into a complete neglect of the locust analogy. Not that the poem is bad, but that it is frustrating. He uses so many different metaphors and analogies that it encrypts his message almost. I get upset because reading his poetry is hard work, but even when you delve deeply into it, you don't get anything too jaw-dropping. Consider me a Williams critic I suppose--maybe it's over my head!

Questions Galore

What is literature? To me, literature is something spoken or written which makes you think, and in turn warrants a need to be shared and passed along. Why write it or say it if it doesn't need to be remembered?

Who should write it? I should write it. You should write it. EVERYONE should write it.

What is Modern? When I think modern, I think abstract. It is a new way of thinking or doing, or the refreshment of an old traditional way. The way the book classifies the dates of 'modernism,' though...I'm not sure I follow. I think the modern period should be more contemporary, I guess because I don't think the '30s are modern anymore.

What is Regional? I think 'Regional' speaks to the values, core beliefs and attitudes of a certain group of people based upon where we're speaking about. For instance, the South has more of a romantic feel, the East Coast has a busy, self-righteous feel (biased?) and the West coast has more of a laid-back, liberal attitude. I suppose this is different, too based upon your point of view and your biases, because people from the East Coast may have a different view of their region vs. ours.
Which leads me to my next question....

What are our biases about reading unfamiliar texts?
1. Our regional backgrounds
2. Our values, morals, beliefs
3. Critical reviews
4. What we've read from the same author previously
5. Our education level
6. Our disposition to certain themes (romance, mystery, history etc.)
7. Language choices, is it easy to read?
8. Definitely motivation
9. Are we being made to read or reading for fun?
10. Mental blocks, for instance...My husband says he hates to read, but when he goes out of his way to find something that sparks his interest, usually he enjoys it.
11> Our upbringing.
12. Our fears.

What are your fears?
I have plenty, which I will share...since you're asking...Fish. Crazy, I know but I'd go so far as to classify it as a full blown phobia. NEVER will I be close enough to touch a fish, and have just recently been able to swim in lakes and rivers, although for some reason, the ocean has never bothered me. Go figure. I also am mildly afraid of the dark :) as well as being alone in the woods, most bugs, sexually transmitted diseases, death, the death of family, serious illness, failure, defeat, and most recently, bankruptcy.

What is the West?
I guess, my fantastical view that I imagine when I think "west" would be swinging saloon doors, gravel roads and gun duals in the middle of the road with the damsel in distress tied to the railroad tracks, only to be saved just in the nick of time by the dreamy cowboy who comes riding up on his horse out of the sunset. Also, with my distorted sense of direction, I think that West is always left of me, much like North is always forward. (I get lost often) But in all honesty, I think that West is synonymous with New. Western ideas, Western philosophy, Western frontier. New, new new. Freshness, radicalism.

Pagans and Christianity

Lately, I've been seeing in all of the literature I've been reading for my 3 lit classes some very interesting Pagan symbols in a predominately Christian world. I want to look deeper into this new finding, so I've been doing some thinking. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, there are obvious and definitely magical things happening, and that whole story is interesting in that it was a very religious time, and Christianity was at the forefront as well as Catholicism, I believe. Here is where my problem is, I suppose; I don't know enough about the history of religion to tie into the literature, but I do know that Merlin was married to Sir Arthur's sister, Morgan (I think LaFaye) who was behind all of the magic of tricking Sir Gawain into his tests.

Even as far back as Beowulf, there is the battle and triumph of Christianity, which is usually characterized by the known, or the civilized, and Paganism, or the wild and scary. If you think about it, Grendel came from the depths of a cave, lived with his mother underwater in that cave, and underwater would be the utmost unknown--especially in that time. The Green Knight came riding on his glowing green horse out of the woods, and nobody knew exactly from wherehe came.

Really, the comparisons are eerily endless, but never looked at in depth. Shakespeare was also very much into the occult, especially when King James came to the throne after Elizabeth died because James had quite the fascination with ghosts and magic.

In early American fiction--since this IS an American Lit class, I'm finding a lot of crosses between the two as well. Irving refers to some Pagan views in Rip Van Winkle, where there are "fairy mountains" and the mythical creatures who live in the woods and who also gave Rip the liquor that made him sleep for such a long time. Rip Van Winkle occurs obviously around the time of the Revolutionary war which was very much underlined by the strong religious values of our fore-fathers.

So anyways, this is my journey. Before I graduate I am going to become a professional in the realm of hidden Paganism throughout literature. Maybe it had to be for fear of religious persecution, or maybe not, because some Pagan values and ideals are not subtle at all. But I got on this roll here lately just because I'm noticing interesting ties between different things. And I'll stop this rant only to tell you of a poem I read for this class in the 5th edition of our book, in the sheafs of poetry section because it falls very well into this whole theme. It's called The Pagan and the Christian and I stinkin' LOVE it! I'm going to push to read this one in class, because it is definitely worth reading, and I wonder if the author, Elaine Goodale Eastman was an Indian woman...in fact...

So mid-sentence, I decided to google her and she was actually from a Puritanical New England family and moved to South Dakota to live among the Sioux, and actually opened a school there. Hmm. Read it and let's chat about it!

John Donne

Hepworth one day told me that he thought I would like to read John Donne's poems, so I took some time out of my busy schedule :) and dove into one of my other anthologies in which was a surplus of John Donne to discover. My overall first impression was something along the lines of, "woah." He is very almost cryptic in the sense that he combines metaphors that don't necessarily work together so I found myself going..."why the hell is that there, and what does that mean." Okey sort of helped me through a lot of it and with his pluthera of seemingly useless knowledge about little historic tid-bits made my reading make much more sense. Here is my favorite (of what I've read, surely there is more out there) of his poems, and it actually one of his Holy Sonnets, as I found out, he was a preacher or something like that and had twelve kids with his wife of a different religion. Anyways, it is Holy Sonnet 6 and the first line will sound quite familiar, I think. I did to me anyways:

6

Death be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so.

For, those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,

Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me;

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.

Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with popison, war, and sickness dwell,

And popy, or charms can make us sleep as well,

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And death shall be no more. Death thou shalt die.

I really liked it, but I think that some of his other poetry is not simple like this one. Read it, though because it is unlike anything you'll read. The words are pretty awesome, even if cryptic. I really liked his poem, "The Good Morrow" which is a very romantic love poem, but was not as much a fan of the flea. Good read! Oh and he looks just like Shakespeare with a beard!

Delving into Poetry

I love love love poetry, and really enjoyed reading Amy Lowell. She had such beautiful and vivid imagery in her words, but threw in a lot of death as well. It was as if she saw the death in all things, but somehow twisted and tweaked it until there was beauty in that same death. "In your eyes Smoulder the fallen roses of out-lived minutes." She wrote a lot about flowers, and I especially liked The Grotesque, as twisted as it is, with lillies' corpses lolling, and putrid...in somebody's hair! Typically, if somebody is wearing lillies in their hair, you'd say, "how pretty!" Once you think that those lillies are dead and lifeless bodies, decaying the whole time that same lady is dancing--it's kind of gross! I just can't get over her writing. Poets are artists. They are people who really mold words, paint with words. Her words...

"I am tired, Beloved, of chafing my heart against

the want of you;

Of squeezing it into little inkdrops,

And posting it.

And I Scald alone, here, under the fire

Of the great moon."

...are beautiful.

I am the Spring

My blue smoke which lungs purge out
leaves my temple and becomes one
with all that is and was and will be.
The Green Knight's luminosity I see,
Springs coming--He's hiding in the White fir trees.
My legs kicked up, toes chilled
at the end of my bare feet, as I sit.
I listen to the coming of spring,
married to the aged winter, old,
dying.
The pregnant sky pours that life,
and the earth recieves it with subtle song;
the sweet rhythm of the rain,
that dead grass, those strangled blades,
as one they breathe. Pulse. Green,
as the paleness recedes, that whiteness secedes--
and out of the quiet, I hear a roar...
motorcycles out of hybernation
come to life once more, and here I am.
I bore through the words of the dead
bringing them immortality
wishing at once, that I could be
immortal. And here I am.
I am becoming the literature as I sit,
as I put out that ember in the tray,
as I look to the sky and watch it fall,
as my fingers tap-tap on the keyboard.
as I lick the backside of my stamp for this world.
I put it here, here
with the birth of a new season,
is the birth of new craftiness,
new words, for someone to read,
to label and chew up, to criticize.
Here is my legend, world,
I wish you'd digest it.
I hope it leaves an everlasting taste
in your mouth.
Bitter.
Sweet.

Something Inspired by Classtime

What are my beliefs, you ask?
I've got a list eternally long,
But the beauty of beliefs, my friend
Is that they're often magnificently wrong

We argue our beliefs as if
They're solid--cast in gold
But most of us go to the death
Believing what we're told...

Question my beliefs, you say?
I'll die the day I lay down to bed
without a doubt about my "knowledge"
Or my politics boomeranging within my head.

Your fathers and your mothers
Shove their bibles before our eyes--
I've chewed faith up--I've spit it out,
I count them all as spectacular lies.

I say, question your own beliefs
Or they will ruin you from within
To question your whole living,
friend, is to be born again and again.

I don't know, I think this one has some potential, but I don't think it's done yet. Any suggestions? When 'Hep' was talking about beliefs today in class, I was struck by his words "when beliefs are wrong, they're usually spectacularly wrong." Heavy words. They made me think, and when I think, I think in rhymes...so I spent the rest of the period admittedly in and out of the conversation, but more driven into playing with these words you see here, love 'em or hate 'em!

A Hot Spring Moment :)

The beer, my dear, it is no consolation
and the warm water caressing my body no relief

the rocks I sit upon in the spring--they dig

just like the pain I'm feeling on this pebble reef.

I ache to feel you cuddle near my chest

I yearn to run my fingers through your hair

Away for just two nights near drove me crazy
To know you live and breathe without me there.

My heart could self-destruct from pain I'm feeling

though I must admit I haven't shed a tear

Their eyes look down upon me from all directions

And the wolves would have a frenzy upon my fear.

You grow and learn and try new things each day now

And I'm not the center of your glorious world

I'm not so naive to think you'll die without me

But the sense of need is wanton from you, girl!

I sit here in this hot spring--naked, lonesome

and the steam can fill my lungs, but not my heart

I'm leaving this pool to find you, love, my life-line

Because true Hell is you and I apart.

Some V-Day Reading

So this weekend, my husband did the sweetest thing on earth and sent me on a two day escape to a cabin out in the middle of nowhere towards Montana with a bunch of middle-aged, menopausal hens who cracked me up from dusk 'til dawn, and who poured beer and liquor down my throat for hours on end...woo, I hadn't done that in quite sometime, as a baby sort of hinders your party life :)

The last night there, though, I was kind of a party pooper because I was having Morgan withdrawals, so I curled up with some literature and got my read on! I read quite a range--some of Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography for my Am Lit I class, I finished Chaucer's 'The Miller's Tale' in middle English for Goode's Briterature class, and finally some smokingly great poetry by a new (to me) poet named Sarah M. B. Piatt. My favorite by Piatt was hands down, Shapes of a Soul, in which the author tells her husband that over her dead body will he have married this saint of a woman...she is not a gentle housewife, but rather a ravenous tiger, wild and crazy. I loved it!

I judge a great writer on their ability to inspire me to write, which she has done. I needed to get some poetry out of my head, so next on the agenda: a little poetry from yours, truly!

Phew, that was hard...Flash~~Sonnets.

My Love Story...well, I decided to get REALLY creative, and challenge myself to the extreme here--It's not all that long, but it's definitely flash fiction, with a twist of sonnet and a splash of ALL IAMBIC PENTAMETER! I don't know about you guys, but I'm pretty sure I just blew myself away. It isn't the best, but I completely feel 'one with Shakespeare...' I hope you enjoy it!

I
He woke up from the craziest dream he’d
Ever had in his non-conformant life
He dreamt of his childhood, and through his teens
A flash even of his beautiful wife
But of the picture images he saw
And remembered when he awoke, he knew
The biggest problem, she wasn’t his squaw
It was the face of the girl all in blue
As she walked her fingers across his chest
And his spirits grew for his mistress’ charms
His affair was in his eyes by far best
But awake now, he was not in her arms
He’d fallen asleep in a cave so deep
Into his mind, unconscious his life seeped.
II
A cry, he heard for his love was too far
“I’m dangling my dear-- an edge over here
I can’t see you and can’t tell where you are”
He reached for aching rear, and wretched in fear
His arm was trapped beneath heaviest earth
To save her was what he must try to do
“My mistress,” he replied, “not since my birth
Have I wanted something so much as you,
But my arm is held tight beneath a rock!”
She whimpered at this, held her composure
“You will be free, love, to come save the day
Or I’ll die here from overexposure!”
He tugged on his arm, but sadly stayed caught
He absolved to die, though his love would not.
III
The black bird of the deepest hole stood guard
And tongued his massive leather wings of doom
The insect eater’s guild drew up upon their card
For those who flourished on the dead here loomed.
Echoes of them carried deep into Hell
Where the odds were stacked high against lovers
And creepy-crawly critters reside well
In carcasses they build their perverse covers.
The drip, drip, drip off the stalactites
The rapid and unsteady pulse of breath
Whimpers from the lady, nearly falling
All these noises foreshadowed early death.
But from his jeans produced a single blade
His only hope to cut himself away.
IV
“Come quick my love,” She said , “ farther I’ve slipped!”
He tensed his arm under the rock and groaned
As into his bruised flesh and bone he ripped
Blinded for a moment by pain he moaned
Cartilage fought him, and tendons did snap
While the poor lady cried all of the while
She knew not of the two inch and a half
Or perhaps just merely in denial
The surgeon swore at the virgin mother
Whenever he had but a breath to spare
One side of his arm-- through to the other
Love’s adrenaline kept him unaware
Free of the boulder, to his love he flew
Saved his woman and proved love so true.

V
He may not bring you Valentine flowers
His absent mind might forget a sweet card
Dumb guy might snot rocket in the shower
Or call our mother things we think quite hard,
A toilet seat up is a thrown fit, too
As is empty ketchup in the cooler
Gifts for your birthday are too much to do
And he may somehow think he’s your ruler
A diaper for him may be Herculean
A man, though sure does seem to try his best
Or times he’s drunk and can’t get the key in
There is something better than all that mess;
A man who without fail loves his queen bee
Will every time give his right arm for thee!

Oh, Sweet Jesus.

I hate it when I write a TON of amazing stuff about Walt Whitman and then my DAMNED computer erases it because I'm an IDIOT and navigate away from the page. I'm seething.

Reckless Kelly, "God Forsaken Town"

This song is by a band from Stanley Idaho, 13 miles up the Yankee Fork, who are making a big impression on Texas country right now (go Idaho boys!) Anyways, they wrote this song about Hurricane Katrina, and since I am inclined to find beautiful literature intertwined with music, I wanted to share this with you. You can listen to this song at Recklesskelly.com or just ask me and I'll bring it to class, because it is a very heavy piece of literature.



"They say we've got to leave but there's no place to go

This ain't the first time we've weathered out a storm

I ain't got nothin' but at least I know it's mine

And I'll be goddamned if I'm leaving here before the day I die,



So let the rain sting my neck

Let the mighty Mississippi take this God forsaken town,

Let the storm and all its fury come and carry me away,

Take me to that place somewhere on higher ground



The voices on the radio were cracking off and on

The court is underwater and the levee's all but gone,

There are children in the treetops, and soldiers in the sky

It's too late now to leave, we'll never make it out alive



So let the rain sting my neck

Let the mighty Mississippi take this God forsaken town,

Leth the storm and all its fury come and carry me away,

Take me to that place somewhere on higher ground



Everyone sit tight, help is on the way

I don't think Junior is going to make another day

We've got a sawed off and a red hot .44

So all you looters best come heavy when you're knockin' on my door



So let the rain sting my neck

Let the mighty Mississippi take this God forsaken town

Let the storm and all its fury come and carry me away,

Take me to that place somewhere on higher ground



We all know this crescent city just won't be the same again

And I'll still be standing when the saints go marching in



Xs on the windows say there's no one left inside,

If you count the painted numbers you'll know just how many died

And I'm one in half a million so at least I'm not alone

The hurricane is over now, but the storm keeps raging on



So let the rain sting my neck...

Let the mighty Mississippi take this God forsaken town...

Let the storm and all its fury, come and carry me away...

Take me to that place somewhere on higher ground.......



I think you should definitely listen to the song--the lyrics are amazing but the music does it much better justice.

Writers and Homosexuality

Isn't it fascinating that some of the most romantic poems, songs, and such come from gay writers? Not all, but a lot. And not all of them are black and white gay or straight. It has been speculated that Shakespeare was possibly bisexual, Dickinson may or may not have been bisexual and Walt Whitman was obviously gay. Melissa Etheridge writes the most BEAUTIFUL heart-wrenching lyrics about love, and she is a great big lesbian (not that she herself is great or big, but that she is totally, 100%, indisputably a lesbian)

I don't think it has anything to do with the fact that the bat for their own teams, but the search for love brings forth these raw emotions. Love is such a powerful thing, the ability to do so plated deep within our beings, and without which some feel they can not survive. It is the story of the love birds; one can not live without the other. It's The Notebook where the elderly couple give up living in eachother's arms and take their trip into eternity together. Gays have a ridiculously hard time finding 'the one' for a lot of reasons: most people who are gay (if not all) go through this period in their lives where they have to hide their sexuality and actually deny it to those they love the most. In this point in their lives, they may fall in love with someone that they end up turning their backs upon because society deems their lifestyle unethical. Can you imagine? If ever you have thought poorly about someone on the terms of their sexuality, think about having to muffle and bury your inner lover, think about forcing yourself to turn yourself off to love!

The search for, denial of and final embrace of love for somebody makes it so much more explosive when you finally allow yourself to enjoy it. There is my theory as to why homosexuals and bisexuals write some of the most beautiful poetry and prose about love.

Now how about if I throw in a crazy controversial picture just to see what y'all think!? How do you feel when you look at this picture? The way you answer this question should tell you a lot about yourself; Do you feel offended? Disgusted? Jealous? I feel very happy that love like this exists, whether or not they both have penises. I find it beautiful, because love, my friends, IS beauty.

My Love, For my Husband on Valentines Day

My heart,

it literally hurts

when I look at you

not a broken, bruised pain.

XOXOXO

XOXOXO
It's a green gas, caught

beneath the covers with your lover

And the hurt in your ribs

after you laugh until you cry.

Wowzers, Whitman

My goodness...what a movie, what a life, what a man! Walt Whitman was a man who strove so hard to do great things for people--to find that greater good, and he didn't even know that he was that greater good, and that he himself, was completely unique because he didn't just say; he did. What a beautiful man. Wow. Now, his writing I'll be getting deeper into as I lay down in bed tonight, but simply reading through it has not really done much for me because it's a little too...something, I can't quite put my finger on it. For one thing it's long winded, like Will said in class. Now that I've seen his biography, though I'm pretty sure I'll be able to understand it better. How amazing that our two first big writers were never appreciated until after their deaths? Two dozen copies of "Leaves of Grass" were sold in his lifetime, and there are millions of copies circulating now...think about that! Through his life of doing good and writing it down, trying hard and writing it down, struggling and writing it down...he was building his own immortality--but he knew it. Gosh. I was really impressed and I wish that I wasn't so sickly right now because I would babble for an eternity, but if I'm going to drag myself to class tomorrow, I'd better go to bed so i can kick this cold, which is making me feel awfully zombie-esque.

Just for Heather

Sonnet 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;

Coral is far more red than her lips red:

If snow be white, why then her breasts be dun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I have seen roses demask'd, red and white,

But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

And in some perfumes is there more delight

Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know

That music hath a far more pleasing sound:

I grant I never saw a goddess go--

My mistress when she walks, treads on the ground:

And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare

As any she belied with false compare.

My Best Friend is an Answering Machine

I couldn’t breathe without you here
But now you’re gone and I have to say I care
I don’t know why you push me so far away
Either way I want to bitch cuz it’s not fair

I live with just our memories
I call day and night--you never answer
When I’m so hurt I want to reach to you
I feel my screams seem like a whisper

And now I feel after all these years
That we were nothing but a dream
Because my best friend in the world
Is an answering machine

I have my husband
I have my baby girl
But you’ve always been there
Through every triumph in the world

And now you’re gone
I can’t possibly get you back
Is there something that you need
That somewhere I must lack

Through the drugs,
through the smoke and lies

You can tell me you're so busy

I don't believe your alibies

Boston College is so expensive

and your education is supreme

If you feel that I'm unimportant

I feel my best friend is now an answering machine....

~To Mathew Caldwell, my best friend who has become my "friendly stranger" (the next poem to come) since he traveled to Spain for his schooling. Next he's off to the Columbian stock exchange...good for him...but he's my best friend, but I'm selfish. He's always been the only one to understand me, even when, back in the day when I thought I was gay. He may be, but apparently I'm not :)

My Favourite Book

Imagine being hypnotized and taken to a land far, far away...not just physically, but subconsciously and not only distance-wise but historically. What if that place was locked deep within your subconscious and happened to be one of your past lives? It would change your life forever. In Brian Weiss' first book, he explores the realm of the impossible with a real-life patient of his he calls Catherine. When he first meets Catherine, she is suffering from tremendous phobias that have made her life riddled with pain since she can remember. He tries multiple different types of therapy, when he finally turns to the less renowned and highly controversial hypnotherapy, which to his surprise leads her not to her early childhood memories, but to life memories from many centuries ago on completely different continents.

He leads her through many different lifetimes, where she comes face-to-face with some people whom she holds very dear to her in this lifetime, also confronting the harsh realities of the origins of her worst fears present-day.

While she heals from her afflictions, she also learns important lessons about life, her faith and in turn, death.

This non-fiction changed everything I thought I knew about life and death. I read it when I was probably fifteen, again when I was eighteen, and once again this summer, along with the rest of the series of Weiss' including Only Love is Real, Same Soul, Many Bodies and Through Time into Healing.

Read them! I give them twelve thumbs up! Dr. Brian L. Weiss is the psychologist of the millenium!

Scarier Than Thou

I have this childhood memory that haunts me. It scares me to the core of my being and the thought of widespread bibliocide disgusts me so much that when I think of it, I want to lean over and purge my guts of the hideousness which scars so many of my peers, my fore-generation, and surely generations to come. The memory is this:

I am a third grader, sitting at my third-grade sized desk--the ones with the cubbies full of crayons, cut up construction paper, and littered with folded up notes passed among giggling children. The class is being obnoxious and noisy while the teacher attempts to teach why it is that we celebrate Thanksgiving (the G-rated version without all of the Indian killing and slavery), when suddenly Mrs. Huddle turns around, noticably annoyed. That piercing staredown she gives us informs us that we are in serious trouble.

What is she going to do to us this time? Will she slap our hands with rulers like the horror stories my Dad told me of his growing up? Will she, heaven forbid, call our parents into the Principal's office? Is she going to keep us in from our beloved recess, or worse, make us stand on the wall and watch all of the other third-graders play four square and tether ball while we wish beyond wishes we could play?

No.

It is worse. "Fine. You guys don't want to pay attention to me, pull out your books." The class groans as we all go to the book case to grab our fifteen pound textbooks.

"Read the next three chapters before recess or you'll be staying through your recess until it's done." In unison, the class cries NOOOOOooooo! Not reading!

Punishment. Reading? Yes.

No wonder half of my peers can't spell or read. My college peers. College students (and for that matter, some of my teachers) can't spell simple words like "scarier". OUR FORMER US PRESIDENT, for crying out loud!

So I'm hoping for a revolution--I'll call it the RR, Reading Revolution...come on people, let's open a friggin' book!

For all mothers...

oh, mother in-law,
with the best of intentions,
I'm sorry to say--
this is your intervention....
I've tried oh so hard
with a smile on my face,
but subtlety is failing,
and I'm losing faith.
So I'm saying here now,
before this heads south--
Get that piece of pie
Out of my baby's mouth!
She's too young for a sucker
She's not big enough for cake
When I tell you No
that advice you should take!
And don't let your dog
Lick her poor lips
Would you let him lick you there?
He licks where he sh*ts!
You got to raise your kids
and you did just fine
But step back, oh mother in-law,and Let me raise mine!

Blossom

She is the first true love I ever knew besides her father
Don't want to be apart, but I study so I can be her provider
But there's something ripping me apart
Because all day I'm not beside her
And the tears well up and they pour onto the wheel
Of the car that I'm steering down this road.
The lines are all a blur but I somehow make it through
as my shoulders crumble beneath the weight of my load.
But I'm coming to her now, to bring her home where she belongs
I choke down my tears so I can finish up the songs,
The love I feel for her proves some God up there is awesome
I just wish, my child that for just one day, she wouldn't blossom.

I've lost track of how much she's learned since I'm in college
I was keeping a tab, but she's overflown with knowledge
Somedays I feel like she's running away
But she's nowhere near that yet-hasn't gained that priveledge
Daycare is a thief, now stealing my time now with finesse
Nobody knows it but I'm an emotional mess
For the first time not seeing her sprout each day
Has me holding myself together less and less,
But when I see her in the evenings, I fall in love again,
And when I wake up in the mornings, I know that will never end
My Morgan Baby, MoJo, my fingers, I will cross them
That at least you'll take your time...wait for me to blossom.

A work in progress.......