They say poets are born, not made. So I've quietly resigned after the tests showed I don't carry the poet gene.

Yeah. I can't claim to be a poet...at all. It's not my thing anymore, but the work in here is either from gradeschool/high school or poetry writing workshops, which are pretty infamous for turning out terrible poems. But whatever. Everyone has a random emotional outpouring every now and then. So welcome to the explosion.

I haven't really written anything since freshman year of college, after the first poetry writing workshop beat every urge to write poetry out of me. Well, no: let me rephrase that. Since the first poetry writing workshop let me see that I really don't have what it takes to be a poet, and that everything I'd ever written before that is laughable.

Still, though, I'm not embarassed. Everyone has to start somewhere, right? Even if somewhere is...well, you can figure it out.

You can probably divide my work into three categories: Old Style, Early New Style, and Later New Style. Because of this, there's a little something for everyone in here.

There's the corny rhyming stuff in "..:o l d : p o e m s:.." . That's the Old Style of writing, pre-second semester Allegheny. So, if you like fluff, rhyme, strict meter, and teenage emotions, go there.

Then there's "Poetry Workshop Products" , which is a little more sophisticated. "English 206: Writing Poetry"  is a collection from Early New Style, also known as "when I learned what a poem is." They're not so good, and a lot of the content is forced because of the whole writing-workshop thing, and also learning how to write all over again.

Then, there's Later New Style in "English 302: Forms of Poetry" , which are poems that I like a bit more and are a bit more refined. This is probably as good as my work is going to get, so if you hate it...well, it's not going to get any better, because poetry and me just don't really get along too well.

Oh, and then there's ".:h i g h : s c h o o l : w o r k:." , which are technically old poems but aren't the heartbroken, romantic, psychotically emotional style of the other old poems. They've got a bit more meaning and purpose, even if that meaning happens to be staring you in the face. Just like in the old poems, there's not much to analyze, but check 'em out if you like the old poems.

So, like I said, enjoy!