Childhood Poem (2010)

Mommy and me

Only Mommy and me
and sometimes grandparents
strolling along neighborhood sidewalks
or diving into the brisk bay
never anyone with Mommy
only me
and her
just the two of us in that spacious apartment
just the two of us to keep each other company
Mommy worked hard
and never was there not enough
we were happy
at least, I was
even without a daddy or husband
we could make it
even though he lived in another state
with different children
who I would never know
we were happy without him around
even though he never called
we had a family who loved us
unconditionally
even though people gave Mommy
disdainful, painful glances
she was strong
and I didn't notice the absence
because even though he wasn't there to love me
I knew Mommy would always be there
and even though I never knew him
I'm happy without him
people pity the little girl without her daddy
but this little girl knows
that it was better
without him.

On Writing

To write is to let your heart, all the feelings and emotions pent up inside, seep into the pen at your fingertips and bleed onto a blank canvas. A torrent of feelings, experiences, the past, the future, memories, dreams, aspirations- all flooding lines and margins to create a page of you. Your heart, laid upon a sheet of paper, exposed to the elements of criticism and interpretation, praise and opinion.

Writing is a burden. A demon, hovering on your shoulder, whispering thoughts and ideas into existence, an inception of inspiration, weighing you down, stirring up long-suppressed emotion, lingering on a single fragment of feeling until it swells to an unbearable magnitude, then- release. Pen scratching on parchment, anger and sadness and joy and contentment, striking the lines like bolts of lightning, relieving you of your affliction and scattering it into letters, sentences, chapters- until it is bearable.

When you allow yourself to write, to let loose the words, phrases, and tales swirling in your mind, you lose a bit of yourself to the pen. Letting a paper absorb your anxiety and bliss and memories is like allowing yourself to be opened up and examined- an autopsy of your thought processes. The allowance of such a process can be spontaneous or drawn out- to open up your mind can take any length of time. The art of dissecting your thoughts, molding them into coherent concepts, and eventually fashioning an actual piece to be read by others, is an art free from the chains of time- an hourglass with no set time span.

Whether writing is a battle to be conquered and overcome or a consolation and escape from reality, to write is to capture imagination on simple, lined paper, and expose it for the world to view and perceive.