A link sent over from Juhi Masi over in California.



Every once in a while I find myself questioning myself because there's a feeling of being incomplete. And then come along reminders like the video above that show me why I need to rely on myself completely first.

I hope you enjoy the video.

Of all the things that could have changed
on the day that you woke up
and stumbled out into the fog,

when you felt your way through the mist
and found the grit of the world against your fingers

you fell against the walls, blinded,
and found no passage through the changing surface,

when you thought you had found
a glimmer of light
to bring back with you from the mist,

you turned around into the fog
and brought the darkness home.

I have spent my life
spinning on my heels

from door to doorway,
from life to life

from desert to ocean,
from heart to mind;

And dancing on the tree tops with the breeze
I know if I spin fast enough
The dust will not settle on me.

Go Vote. Seriously.

....teaching against all odds. Video link from Alive in Baghdad.

I woke up entirely too early this morning. I have a poem to show for it. My day might just be complete even before it begins. I'm breaking rules.

Dawn Breaking

today, i watched the dawn break through a rip in the sky, and thought about the leaves turning color, falling with a soft scrape, tearing slowly, speaking last words at their brightest in life, and i saw myself turning as they did and saw myself playing in the puddles by the trees, not wanting to turn to brown before i had lived.

From Juhi Masi, over in Los Angeles.

Why do memories linger
like shadows, or a fog, rather?
Thick and opaque
and soft to the touch
but quickly becoming
wisps of air when I try
to hold them?

They're almost invisible, you know.

Almost without texture,
but still somehow abrasive.
And always dense. Always
around. Never lifting or fading to let the light in.

They linger like you do,
in the creases of my couch,
or in the folds of my sheets.

You linger still in the warmth
of the dying fire
and in my cold fingers
wrapped around a cup of coffee.

Why, tell me, do you linger?

When you know I cannot live
on memories alone.

I've been stuck at home for the past four days because I have the flu. Or rather, the flu has me. I'll spare you the gory details of survival, but I have acquainted myself very well with all the walls in my house. So I wrote a poem to commemorate this occasion. I call it Cabin Fever.

Cabin Fever

I spend my days
smoothing out wrinkles
from the creases in my sofa
or tightening the corners of my bed sheets
when all I really want
is a wooden desk with drawers
that can hold my life in them.

I can't do this on my academic blog, but this one belongs to me. Have a look.

and sitting by the edge of the cliff
where the waves lapped against the shore
she turned to the rising sun bathing the sky
in glows of pink, breathing in the world with the ocean;
and then she leaned over and whispered
"let's make music together"

One of the earliest pieces of advice I had received regarding writing was to pick up a rock or a pebble, imagine the life it would have had and write down its story. I'm really not a romantic writer, so I don't much look for meaning in rocks and pebbles, but when the objective is to write one poem everyday, a writing exercise is a good way to make myself think.

My newest coherent poem.

Yeah. It happens. I'm a fake -- I fully admit it. For someone who supposedly teaches writing and wears her love for writing and the written word on her sleeve, I haven't written a decent word since the summer of 07. I've dreamt about compiling my own poetry chapbook, been to poetry readings, wanted to mingle with the funky artistic circuit in Connecticut, and then I've gone ahead and procrastinated myself to death and back again.