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A journal/blog about my writing, what inspires it, and the story told throughout it. |
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Some of this is nonsense, but most of this blog is a journal about my writing and the stories that each of them can tell. I do love mystery, but at the same time, I love for people to be able to see the inside of the pieces that have meant so much to me. I am going to start with whichever pieces I feel call to be heard/understood the most. I love for people to be able to put pieces together on their own, but there is a story behind just about every piece. The poems and stories each act as a puzzle piece in one big picture that is my life and my experiences. If you would prefer to try to put pieces together and come to conclusions on your own, I will put the link to each of my pieces above each blog entry so you can read it and take it apart on your own, then you can come back here and compare what you have pulled from the piece vs. what I put into it! Feel free to share the differences between what you extract and what I've built! I love to see the different ways people interpret my work and find ways they may have come to that conclusion!! |
| I am in the middle of writing a new poem and needed a break because it kept making me cry. So, I figured I am a couple of days behind here and should add another entry. I haven't been as involved with Writing.com as I would have liked, but I just started the new semester, so I have been busy. We will see how things look with school, writing, editing, helping others edit, and staying involved here on Writing.com. As mentioned before! This blog is for a sneak peek into the living and breathing insides of my work! If you would prefer to try to put pieces together and come to conclusions on your own, I will put the link to each of my pieces above each blog entry so you can read it and take it apart on your own, then you can come back here and compare what you have pulled from the piece vs. what I put into it! Here is the link for today's Poem(s). "My Dearest"  ~ ~ ~ The poem today was written in the late spring of 2025. As some already know and others will begin to piece together as I continue this blog, I was in a strange and emotionally taxing on-and-off romantic relationship from November 2023 to October 2024. I ended it in October, and that winter, I slipped into one of the longest depressive episodes I've ever been in. It started with grief over this relationship, but melted into a depression completely soaked in loneliness and previous traumas that had plagued my childhood. As mentioned in my blog entry on "The Girl Next Door" , I have always had this need and desire to be chosen and wanted. I hated this, especially that winter. But, it is human to long for connection, is it not?Well, as I was in this depression, I begged and begged God for this connection. I searched for it from friends, from potential lovers, from myself. There was nothing. Anywhere I looked it returned void, empty, and fruitless. It was one of the loneliest times of my life, despite everything I had experienced in the past. This time, I was truly alone. Physically, mentally, emotionally. There was barely even a broken relationship I could attempt to cling to, I was completely alone and I knew it. I wanted to be loved so desperately, and I tried to remind myself in any way I could that I was loved by the Father. But I couldn't. God, despite his promises of love, grace, mercy, peace, and consistency, felt so far away from me. I knew that I needed to search for him if I wanted love, but I didn't know how. After my initial prayers of anger and grief, my prayers began to sound like "God, show me your love for me. Show me your intentional and beautiful love and what that means for me. Please, God, show me how you love me, for my memory is flawed and I continue to forget." I prayed and prayed and his answer came very quickly. It came when I was at the park. My best friend was teaching her dance class on the stage and the clouds were rolling in. Where I am from, it doesn't rain often. Especially around that time, due to a drought. But, rain is one of my favorite things. I love the way it smells, the way it feels against my skin. It feels like freedom or a really good song on a bad day. It makes me want to dance and sing and play and run. So, when the rain poured in, crashing down, in the middle of one of those prayers, my heart swelled with joy and love. I began to think about him, how happy he was to see my smile and to feel the joy wrap around my chest like a fuzzy warm blanket. It was such a small thing, but, in the midst of all the pain and brokenness I was trying to find my way out of, it was everything. I ran, skipped even, around the park like a little kid who had just received candy. When I had reached my fill and swung as high as I could on the swings, I felt inspired, pulled out my phone, and watched as this poem wrote itself by means of my own fingertips. When I tell people that this poem is a love letter from Jesus, this is what I mean. I searched and begged and prayed for him to show me his love, and this is what he wrote for me. Everytime I read this poem, I am astonished because as a christian who believes that the Bible is the authoritative and infallible word of God, I am reminded of so many pieces of scripture written into this poem. Let me (try to) break it down: To start, the title and opening begin with Jesus recognizing the reader as his "dearest", his "beloved". There is so much behind this. For one, often the bible describes the church as the bride of Christ and Israel as the bride of God, such as in Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Revelation, and 2 Corinthians. God is, throughout the entire Bible, working towards bringing humanity to his side so they may become one with him in spirit. So we may dwell with and in him for eternity. It goes on to say "can you not see? / are you blind to my love? // Are you still failing to see the desperate search of my heart / In need of reaching out and touching yours?" There is a conviction here that I have often felt, and that is this question of "why do you forget?" It reminds me of when Jesus speaks to his disciples in Mark 8 saying "Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail to see? and ears but fail to hear? And don't you remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up? (. . .) And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up? (. . .) Do you still not understand?" We, as humans, are futile and have poor memory. We forget. We are blind. I am blind. So in this poem when Jesus says "are you still failing to see?" or "are you blind to my love?" This is the kind of thing I am talking about. God has given me "basketfuls" of love, affection, grace, mercy, etc. but I continue to forget, I often find myself blind, like the disciples. For the following lines of the poem, we begin to piece together aspects of the crucifixion. It reads "Can you not hear the cry of my blood / As it sheds for your soul? // Can you not taste the salt of my tears /As they fall onto your lips and give you life? // Can you not feel my life pass through you / As it escapes my body in one final cry?" There is so much to unpack here, I am not sure I have the time or your attention to do so, but I will try. One aspect that I really see emphasized here is that the suffering Jesus went through as the "suffering servant" (Isaiah 53) was for us, for our redemption and hope. He did it all for us. Give it a read, if nothing else. There is a lot to unpack here, I would love if you took some time to unpack it yourself and came back to me to tell me what you think. The next two lines "Can you not smell the perfume poured onto my feet / As it mixes with the sins I bear for you?" are a direct reference to the scene in John 12:1-8 when Mary took a jar of expensive perfume and poured it onto the feet of Jesus, wiping his feet with her hair. Similarly, In a separate account in the gospel of Matthew (26:6-13) a woman pours perfume onto the head of Jesus, and He says "she has done it to prepare me for burial." Using this question to call the reader to envision the smell of the perfume mixed with the crucifixion is odd, it's uncomfortable, but it's tangible and realistic. The perfume was strong, and in the account in Matthew it was only a few days before the crucifixion, the account in John being maybe a week. We can rightly assume Jesus smelt strongly of these perfumes for days and he most likely still had at least a hint of that perfume lingering on his body as he sweat in Gethsemane or bled during the crucifixion. So, as he bore our sins, the sickly scent of them mixed with the sweet and rich smell of the perfume he was coated in to prepare him for his death. "How can you ask me- / How can you request I show my love for you? // It’s always been right here. / In the blood I sweat, in the tears that fell..." I am going to pause here for the remaining section of the poem and focus on the sweat/blood. There is only one of the gospels that mention this detail, Luke 22:44. In the garden of Gethsemane, the night before the crucifixion, Jesus goes away to pray with his disciples. As he is praying he is described in Matthew, Mark, and Luke as being in agony or "sorrowful, even to death." He was under immense emotional stress, knowing what it was he had to suffer the hours to come. In Luke 22:44, the detail is made "his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground." This is a real medical phenomenon called Hematidrosis. It is rare, but when someone is under immense physical or emotional stress, blood will ooze out of their skin with their sweat. It has been recorded happening to few people, some of which in the midst of high stressors such as battles in war. This is what Jesus was experiencing in the garden of Gethsemane, knowing the death he had to die. Finally, "And in the roses that grew, / Watered by the water from my side / Which was pierced by your doubt." The first part of this stanza "the roses that grew" does not refer to scripture itself, but is rather an allusion to "Roses" by Andrew Ripp, which was a huge part of my early Christian life (I would suggest a listen). The second part refers to John 19:34-37 where Jesus' side is pierced by one of the soldiers to ensure he was dead. Out of his side came water and blood, as described by John. ~ ~ ~ There is so much in the poem, so I apologize for how long it took me to write this entry and if the entry itself has any issues with flow or structure. There is so much, I know for a fact I did not cover all of it. However, I hope you found something here and if you have any questions, PLEASE let me know! Keep reading, readers! Keep writing, writers! |
| What little pieces of yourself have gone astray? Like a lamb that wanders from its shepherd. How many pieces of your heart have begged to be bled onto paper, but have oozed away in the showering string of thoughts that tell you no one wants to see them, anyway? How many small, insignificant words, sentences, phrases, poems, have gone and emptied themselves onto the unrecieving surface of a battered shower floor. No ears to absorb them. No hands to hold them. No one to know who you really are? What little pieces of yourself have gone astray? ~~~ I know it's been a few days since I've added something here; I've been busy preparing for a flight back to my college campus, which is halfway across the country. I have also been in a bit of a frenzy in my poetry. I have been wanting so badly to write, and the process -as many of you probably know- is so irregular that it can take days to write an idea for one poem, or a few minutes to write the entire, finished work. Regardless, I wrote two poems in the last day or so. I would love it if you could check them out. Here are the links. "The Girl Beyond The Glass Wall" and "Scalpel-Edged Fountain Pen" .My topic for today is partial nonsense, but I wanted to take the space here to share some of the short poetry that I have written over the years. Small pieces that are more thoughts than poetry, and therefore I find to be "too insignificant" to give their own static item or space in my poetry folder. Most of them were written either before I had really started getting creative with my poetry, or when my heart/head were not in a great place, so many of them are not written well. They, like the rest of my poetry, are sorted by when they were written. Here they are sorted OLDEST on top, and they slowly progress to new ones (there is a story to be found here, lemme know what you think it is). ~~~ *unnamed*- I'm a poet Unable to get My feelings for you Into words. Some people would call The things we have A mess. Some would call it beautiful But either way, it's ours. First- Your eyes burn like fire, Hot against my skin. But, wow, yours are the first To look into my soul. The first eyes to search me, To see my heart And ask to treat it carefully. Please treat her carefully, She doesn't heal easily. Pages- If your eyes only met mine with contempt, I'd still savor your gaze. But maybe that's my brokenness talking, When I'm too scared to turn the next page. Art- I drew a picture of you once It was almost as handsome as you are in person. I'm impressed I can imitate art, Though we can't make any of our own. Occupancy- I really hope that when I am gone, You will finally leave the room in the back of my mind. I didn't keep myself a secret from you- If you really wanted to know, You would know I was tired. If you really wanted to know, You would know that I am exhausted. If you really wanted to know, And really meant it, You would have seen it. And, Babe, you'd know. But you don't What does that tell me? Wildflowers- Every flower that grows, From the fields to the cracks in the sidewalk, Each one I designed for you. You cannot tell me no man has ever gotten you flowers, When every flower you've ever seen, Was placed in your path for your eyes. *unnamed*- I wouldn't be leaving in August If you hadn't left me in April Or, maybe you'd be coming with me. Think about it, your indifference. It led to God's plan. Your indifference was your choice, but God used it. You are still accountable, but God's plan is underway. Sometimes I think I can't be heartbroken, Because this was God's plan. But you're still accountable for your lack of effort. I dream about you sometimes. A Christian's Suicide- I want to go home, Jesus. I know you do, my child. Why can't I be with you? Please. You are, my love, I have never left. But I'm tired, it all hurts so bad. I know, but death is my gift to you. Let me- What? *unnamed*- You left me, not only to mourn you, to mourn us But to mourn the girl I was before you. Don't Make A Flaw Out Of Me- I have a tattoo on my chest now. I know if I were to be with him now and he saw it, he would become less attracted to me. Isn't that stupid? His loss. *unnamed*- I have never felt like the prettiest girl in the world But you make me feel like you've never seen anything Quite as gorgeous or bright as my eyes. Whisper- Do you ever think of a gust of wind as a whisper from God? An invitation to take a breath, Count to three, And take a look at his work. A simple love note That rustles your hair And says, "I made it for you, I painted the sunset Across the rocks And I did it for you." Drown for me- I am intoxicated But drinking in fear. I am not the type to write love poems. But with you, I worry I cannot help myself. It feels like drowning to care for someone and be so unsure if they are drowning for you, too. One- I want to be one with you Physically, emotionally, mentally. I want to be in tune with the sound of your breathing as you sleep. I want to sense the tightness of your shoulders when you hold me and be the one to release it. I want to see when your eyes are dark, and your soul is tired And soften to give you rest. I want to sense when you feel something is missing And be the one to make you complete. Disease- I am supposed to be napping But I have been thinking about you all day. The girls think it's cute how much I like you But it feels more like a disease to me. It consumes my thoughts, body, time, and actions. I am completely consumed by you. *unnamed*- Somewhere in my past I created this messed-up way to cope. By fully giving in as if I had no strength to begin with. And I can't find the strength to fight back. I can't get the words on a page Because it hurts so badly to find them. |
| As mentioned before! This blog is for a sneak peek into the living and breathing insides of my work! If you would prefer to try to put pieces together and come to conclusions on your own, I will put the link to each of my pieces above each blog entry so you can read it and take it apart on your own, then you can come back here and compare what you have pulled from the piece vs. what I put into it! Here is the link for today's Poem(s). "The Girl Next Door" ~~~ "The Girl Next Door" was written in the winter/early spring of 2024, right at the beginning of the year. At the time, I was 17 years old and lived alone in a janky little studio apartment above a music studio. I was a freshman in college, studying to get a bachelor's in psychology. The idea, the thought, started one night as I was sitting alone in December 2023. I was seated on top of my 2001 Saturn S-series, reminiscing. I have always had this need and desire to be chosen and wanted, and, right as I turned 17, I had to end a long-term relationship that gave me that. So, a lot of my 17th year of life was me frantically trying to fill that space. Because of this, I got into a relationship around November 2023, which lasted less than a week due to his parents' incessant need to control his life. In December, I was lost, confused, and trying to fill this space inside of me. I was outside, thinking, when across the street a truck pulled into the driveway, and a boy about my age got out and began unloading firewood and building a fire. I didn't find the guy attractive, but the thought crossed my mind, "What if he looked over and saw me? What would he think? Would he find me attractive? Interesting?" Now, many people read "The Girl Next Door" and comment about it as if I, myself, am in love with the girl. They give me advice on how to make my move. They tell me to just tell her how I feel, and it will be okay. And I never have the heart to tell them that I can't because I, myself, am the girl next door, and the affection within this poem is fabricated to ease my temporary loneliness. Kind of pathetic, isn't it? Well, this is where the idea began for "The Girl Next Door." I started, then, brainstorming how I wanted this poem to go. What I wanted it to say, how I wanted it to look, to sound. I began trying to determine how obvious I was going to make it that the narrator/speaker of this poem wasn't real. I considered writing things that no one with a simple "crush" on someone else would know. But, as time went on, the idea died and stayed inside my notebook. Classes started, and I didn't have time to work on it. So, it sat unfinished, hoping I would come back to it someday. Which I did. After a few weeks of school, I had wiped the poem from my mind. Until I was in my creative writing class, and we finished going over short stories. It was time for poetry. I was in a bit of a writing frenzy after we worked on our short stories, so I was ready and motivated. I searched through my notebooks to find ideas for what I would write when I came across some old stanzas written for this poem. Inspiration struck, and I brought it everywhere with me to work on it. It took a little while before I came up with the format; it is self-invented, as I was in a frenzy with inventing and experimenting with stanzas, meter, and rhyme. The rhyming scheme is as follows: ABCD BCD EFG AEFG HIJ HIJ AKLM, so on and so forth. The rhymes are in a series of three, with A repeated at the beginning of every third stanza. The meter is as follows: 9, 11, 1-2, 11, break, 11, 1-2, 11, break, 11, 1-2, 11, break, repeat. The poem begins with the first 10 stanzas describing the girl next door, introducing the fact that the speaker loves her and pays very close attention to her. I intentionally had it begin with more physical aspects, so it seems like a genuine crush with someone you might "see across the way." But, as time goes on, the speaker begins to get deeper into things not many would notice, helping along this idea of affection and admiration. For example, noticing the "tears and fears" that fog up and cloud her glasses. As this continues to increase, the speaker brings up things that many wouldn't know unless they had already established a strong and trusting relationship with the girl. For example, "A girl who loves to learn more than she is taught, / Laughs, / And couldn't imagine a world without God." Or "Who just can't let go when he says his goodbyes, / Cries, / And can't get his name out the back of her mind." This makes it clear, already, that this is more than a "across the way" kind of crush. This is an established friendship, something where the speaker knows a lot about the love interest. However, the poem then switches gears by saying "And I wish, from the depths of my soul, to tell, / Express, / Just how much she means to a "nothing" like me. // She is real and feels more than someone like me, / Impressed? / I can love her so much? Though I'm nothing more, // Than a vision by the girl next door, / Just a figment of the imagination, / Dreams, / Of the girl who lives on the corner of 'lone." This takes the poem from a pattern that speaks of the girl, slowly showing more and more about her, and brings it towards the speaker and who they are. The speaker describes themselves as "nothing," " a figment of the imagination (. . .) of the girl," and " a vision by the girl." Some may read this and see someone who feels as though they are nothing to the person they are in love with. I love that interpretation and that the poem can be read or understood in many ways. However, the intent is for these lines to be read literally. The last stanza is supposed to stand out in a very distinct way, saying "I'm made to bring her to illumination, / Beams, / Of the minds and thoughts of more and less than none." When someone reads this poem, it is common for them to assume the previously mentioned idea, that the speaker feels as if he is simply perceived as "nothing" to the girl next door. But this last stanza goes into the idea of why he was made, which is intended to make the reader think and wonder. Even if someone were to have a crush like this, where they feel as though they are nothing in comparison, it is not common for someone to get to a point where they are convinced they are created for the sole purpose of bringing the other person to light. Many pieces of my original writing made their way over to the final, formatted version, but I have "bloopers," so to speak, from before I created the format it is written in. The first is- "I am in love with the girl next door Who sits outside on the curb I am not sure what she is doing But she looks cold And she seems lonely." This stanza is one that I eventually decided did not fit the format I had and didn't quite fit the feel I had wanted for the poem itself. But it does capture so much of the creation of the poem itself. The "girl next door" sits alone on the curb, and she looks cold and seems lonely. This is how the whole thing started, and would have also left the reader wondering why they wouldn't just go talk to her if they were already close enough for them to know all of these things about her. Another "blooper" includes- "I am in love with the girl next door Who wrote her name on her shoes A couple of years ago, and it still sits there Faded, Even though that name is no longer hers." This, if people knew more of my background, would have helped readers understand the purpose of this poem. "Even though that name is no longer hers," refers to a time in my life when I did go by a different name and identity. My actual/current/legal name is not to be shared with my writing, but when I was 15-16 years old, I identified as Transgender. I went by the name Kayden (there are a few references to him in my poetry, such as in "Versions of Me" ). When I was 15, I bought the shoes mentioned in this poem and wrote the name "Kayden" on them. So, even though it was no longer my name by the time I was 17, I still wore it on my shoes. I decided not to add this piece to the poem later on, as I didn't want to introduce that aspect specifically to this poem, and it didn't fit into the format. The last "blooper" was- "I am in love with the girl next door Who writes about everything, but doesn’t think that any of it is worth keeping I’ll keep it." Again, this didn't fit the format. However, I did love this idea. That even though I didn't think any of it worth keeping at the time, someone may want to, and until I meet that someone, I can be that someone. It is an odd way to think about it, but it worked, and I have actually kept just about all of my writing since I was 17. Maybe because of this line, maybe not, I'm not sure. I also didn't add this piece because it made the speaker feel too real, which wouldn't work, as I needed to at least hint that the speaker was not real, but invented for the sake of this poem. Hope you enjoyed the poem and have learned more about it! Keep reading! |
| As mentioned before! This blog is for a sneak peek into the living and breathing insides of my work! If you would prefer to try to put pieces together and come to conclusions on your own, I will put the link to each of my pieces above each blog entry so you can read it and take it apart on your own, then you can come back here and compare what you have pulled from the piece vs. what I put into it! Here is the link for today's Poem(s). "Raising Monsters" ~~~ I wrote "Raising Monsters" around the summer of 2024. For some backstory, I am the bio-child of licensed foster parents (hence the poem, "Storks Don't Bring Perfect Babies" , which I wrote around the same time as "Raising Monsters").Not only this, but I am the second oldest of the bio-kids, and the third oldest kid overall. My parents have taken in 20+ children in the span of 7 years, adopting 5. I am the oldest girl of all of these kids. Growing up, "Sissy" became my role, my responsibility, and my identity. It became a short-cut to "third parent". It was my life, my name, my everything. "Sissy" was who I was. Around 2024, two of my previous foster brothers went home. They were reunited with their mom, yay! That is good! They were reunified and had been for several months before my mom told me something that one of them had just done (I will not give details). It made me feel a little sick. See, this boy is autistic, and he has Reactive Attachment Disorder. The boy was, and still is, fairly young, not quite in his teens, and he had done something I didn't even think him capable of. It scared me, as a psychology and trauma student with a fascination with "The Body Keeps The Score" and "The Anatomy Of Evil" (real book by the way, very fascinating). I saw his life, and I heard his actions, and I knew he was on the path to becoming the very thing that had hurt him in the first place. It is safe to say my heart was broken. Holding a "motherly" and "big-sister" type of role, it made me think about all of the kids that I had helped raise. How many of them would become like those who hurt them, and how many would find healing? How many of them would break the cycle, and how many would expand it? My heart hurt to know I had loved these kids, so many of them, and someday they may become the same kind of people that I hated their parents for being. Therefore, I felt the need to write. I wanted to get this feeling, this experience, into words. The poem can be broken down into bits of my experience. Saying "I’ve seen a thousand monsters growing" gives this feeling of masses, many. I added this detail to emphasize how overwhelming it can be to have children come in and out of your house in matters of days, weeks, or months. New kids coming and "old" ones leaving. Especially put in a nurturing role at a young age, when you are in a developmental stage needing security and stability, it seems like so much more than it is. The numbers. I did not start with raising them, rather with them growing, as that is such a huge thing, seeing the growth they experience in the home, but then there is the hit in the gut with "Reaching for something undefined / Impure, inevitable. I watch, knowing, / They’re reaching for something predefined." They are growing! I am watching them grow! But the growth that they make, much of it comes from this reach they make. They are reaching for something undefined. This is a turning point, in a sense. At this point in the poem, they are reaching out for something they don't know yet. It is undefined. But the problem is, a trained eye can watch, and see -or know- what it is they are actually reaching for, and that is, often, impure or broken, and seems to be the inevitable or predefined path they have been given, because of their brokenness. It is "predefined" because it is the most likely; it was "undefined" because, despite their experience, there is always a choice. No matter how hard ...Right? The rest of the poem begins to wrestle with the idea of loving the predator they become if they walk that "predefined" path. It wrestles with the idea of a "childlike innocence / of a predestined evil spirit / might leave room for indifference". This section tackles the feeling of indifference to the "evil" one commits because of the childishness or innocence they once held. It plays with the feeling of loving a predator because of the reality that the thing that created the predator was innocence. They were once the prey themselves, and now have become the predator. When you sit with the idea of this (at least when I do), I get uncomfortable thinking about how we, as humans, fall prey to our own kind, and we prey on each other. It is sick. But compassion can do a lot with it and twist your understanding of a person so deeply that you don't know whether to hate them or to love them. |
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