Finally Posting a Poem :)

If you are new to reading the blog... I will post the warning again...my poems are dark (I'm not a depressed person, it's just freeing to tap into other people's emotions and utilize the full creative spectrum). So, you've been warned :) But this is one I wrote over the weekend because I had just read an article about a mental institution and I was wondering what the people inside of those places felt like. Enjoy!!

Pain and suffering pounce at the door

They ooze through your skin-- from the walls, from the floor

The stark monotony of the halls and the cells

Where “commitment” means shackles and not wedding bells

Locks and bars cannot prohibit

Malicious intent against oneself

And pharmaceutical drugs cannot inhibit

The soul’s regretful journey

Through its own cranial hell

They battle through life—

Every torturous breath

While freedom for them

Lives only in death

So these talking heads
Lay in hospital beds---

It’s not safe where they lie

It’s not safe where they hide…

Scared to be together, terrified of being alone,

They’ve nowhere to stay, but nowhere to go--

Nowhere to stay, but nowhere to go…

Timely Words

It is strange, but I often get random song lyrics or just phrases (often quotes) in my head and while they seem random at first, they always apply to something I'm going through or need to hear at that point in my life. I'm not sure where they come from...maybe my subconscious, or maybe my conscious mind, I don't really know, but I will just be in the middle of something and in what feels like it came out of nowhere, I will hear the words loud and clear. Ironically, that is often how I write most of my best poetry as well. I just hear or even see the words as text in my head and I go write them down somewhere.

But yesterday, I had the experience where I heard lyrics and it was what I really needed to hear. It's kind of cool...it's almost like I have an internal therapist somewhere in there :) What won't come as much of a surprise, I'm sure, is that this and many of the other instances have been Stevie Nicks' lyrics. They aren't always, though. In fact, sometimes they are lyrics of songs I don't even like or quotes from people I don't even necessarily admire or respect, but I hear them when I need to hear them. It's a very strange phenomenon and I'm sort of flushing it out as I write it.

Often times, since I keep a journal, I will go and journal about the lyric/quote I heard/thought of and what it means to me at that point in my life. I didn't do that yesterday, but since I'm blogging now, I will just write it here...although I'm not going to elaborate on what it means because there is a fine line between what I will blog and what I keep in my journal (don't worry, I'm not keeping stuff from you guys, it's just that THAT stuff is going in the memoir!)

...anyway, the lyric was from Landslide and it was "Well I've been afraid of changin' cause I built my life around you..." and no, it's not about a relationship.

Another New Video!

As promised, a new video...I never promised it would be exciting, though :)

A Purist...Or Just Antiquated?

As I juggle back and forth between writing poetry and book material, I've noticed a funny little quirk that I have (one of many).

When I write poetry, I absolutely have to write with pen and paper. When I write for a book, however, I absolutely have to write on the computer. I won't even brainstorm with traditional writing utensils.

It's very strange, but I actually get writer's block if I try to interchange those methods. On those rare instances when, somehow, I am able to force something out, it's noticeably sub par.

I haven't been able to figure out why this is...I don't know if it's because I actually have different writing styles when I write poetry versus when I write novels or if it's because I'm just plain crazy :) I'm leaning more toward the latter! Honestly, though, when I write poetry, it is not linear at all (no pun intended). I will write a line that I want to start the poem with and then go 2/3 of the way down the page and write a line that I want to appear midway through the poem and then go back up and write the beginning of the poem again and the whole thing ends up being a chaotic mess with chicken scratch ALL over the page--in the margins, in between lines, over and underneath words, but somehow it all makes sense to me.

It is that process, of being able to take the words from all over the place and fitting them together like a puzzle of abstract art where only I know what the final product is supposed to look like that I enjoy most. So, to be confined to the neat little lines and keystrokes on a computer screen just completely constipates my thought process when it comes to poetry.

For novels, on the other hand, I find comfort in that confinement. I feel like that keeps me on track. I have weekly word goals to meet and I can fit a certain number of words on each page--they are great little "mile markers" for me. I also feel like I'm always working toward my goal because there isn't any doodling going on (it's amazing how many times one can mindlessly write their name on a piece of paper when sitting there bored without even noticing), I'm not filling the pages with junk that I have to sift through later for the "good stuff" and I'm making sure that all of my time is being spent productively (which often means shutting down my internet connection because I often lack discipline). Regardless, it gets done :)

Case in point...here is a single page out of one of my poetry notebooks. Can you imagine a novel's worth (90-100,000 words) of this?!?

POE-try

Well, since I wrote that Edgar Allen Poe post last night, I've been obsessing about poetry. I've been reading through old poems that I wrote ages ago, I've been writing new ones and I've been looking through old notebooks with half-written poems that I never finished.

Poetry was what really made me fall in love with writing. In fact, I didn't start really committing myself to writing novels until I decided I probably couldn't make a career out of writing poetry. Although, even my first novel is threaded with poetry. That is actually the linchpin in the book. The whole plot swings along a pendulum of poetry and depending on what the mysterious poet is doing in the book, the plot adjusts accordingly...and that is all I can say because the agent still has an exclusive for another few weeks, so I'll leave it at that for that book, but in short, I love poetry.

As I was writing my first book, I actually wrote it around the poetry. The reader doesn't even really notice the poems in there, they kind of seem like an afterthought...an important afterthought, but as I was writing it, I wrote the poems before I wrote the chapters...and then the plot formed around that. I think I might make that my little trademark because I do love writing poetry so much, I can't imagine just writing novels and falling away from the poetry aspect of writing.

Wouldn't that be cool? To always write books with some sort of poetic aspect laced through, where the reader might not even know they're reading poetry?

Again, hats off to my idol Stevie Nicks for incorporating the most beautiful poetic prose into some of the most wonderful songs the billboard charts have ever seen and people who ordinarily wouldn't have, enjoyed poetry without even knowing it.

I'm considering posting some of my poetry up here, but for some reason, that's a big step for me :) Not even my blog entries, which in their own way are a form of journaling are as cathartic as my poetry...those are about as personal as it gets...but the good thing is that most of them are pretty cryptic. I learned from the best!

The Raven and Me....er...The Raven and I?

Just as I predicted, I was up all night writing.

Writing through the night always feels a little Edgar Allen Poe-ish to me. For some reason, though, when it rains, that feeling is overwhelming. I love it! I feel like I've plunked myself right into The Raven.

I remember the first time I heard The Raven. I was in elementary school and we were sitting in a little assembly room. They read it to us as some sort of "culture" thing to broaden our horizons, I guess...I don't really know the logic behind it, I was about 6-- all I cared about at the time was that it didn't cut into recess (it didn't).

That was one of the first times I realized that I had a special relationship with the written word. After our teacher, or whoever was reading it (sorry person who read it, I'm sure you're a great person, but I don't remember who you were) was finished, everyone said how stupid it was. They all ran around on the playground shouting "nevermore" and I remember being haunted by it for days. I remember thinking in my head that I wanted to be just like that guy who could FEEL stuff like that.

I wanted to know his secret.

To be honest, I didn't even know what the heck most of it meant, but I knew it was heavy and the things I did pick up on were powerful. I had this crystal clear vision in my head of what his "chamber" looked like and of what he felt like sitting in there with this bird taunting him, unleashing his own private hell on himself. I didn't know anything about anything at that age--I didn't know about wars or bombs, evil or hate, money or poverty, or even love or heartbreak, but I knew what that man was feeling when he wrote that poem simply because I felt it in my soul when I heard his words and that changed me forever. That made me want to be a writer. I wanted to do that to touch people that profoundly.

That was when I started writing poetry...and I have never stopped.

Will I ever touch people in the way that Edgar Allen Poe did?

It's a lofty goal...but the way I'll keep trying because I am the kind of person who never says never....more :)

Stephanie Lynn Nicks

...or better known as Stevie Nicks.

If you didn't know who I was talking about before, I bet you do now.

She is known for many things, most notably, a rock and roll icon. Many musicians even cite her as being their inspiration in terms of voice or style, so how can it be that me, who has zero musical ability whatsoever (for any of you who have heard me sing or play an instrument, you know there is solid empirical evidence to support that statement) has been unwavering in my insistence for over 10 years that Stevie has been my inspiration to write?

I was sixteen years old when I was first introduced to her music...in fact, her career had arguably hit its peak before I was even born...although she's still going pretty strong even now. But what did this woman have to offer that nobody else did?

Rhetorical brilliance, that is what.

The only way I can come close to even vaguely capturing the essence of what Stevie does is by saying she is a Michelangelo with words. She takes pain and makes it beautiful "Rock on gold dust woman, take your silver spoon and dig your grave..." [Gold Dust Woman], she takes struggle and turns it into something verbally aesthetic "...well I've been afraid of changing 'cause I've built my life around you..." [Landslide], she even makes heartbreak hauntingly alluring "I know I could have loved you but you would not let me...I'll follow you down 'til the sound of my voice will haunt you. You will never get away from the sound of the woman that loved you..." [Silver Springs]. But the best part about Stevie Nicks, believe it or not, isn't her beautiful voice because it does convey all of those emotions and really make you feel what she is singing. She has an incredible gift for doing that. What she is even more gifted at, however, is writing those words. Stevie doesn't walk into the studio or on stage and sing what someone else wrote. She isn't an actress with a good voice. She is a writer, through and through.

In fact, I believe that is what makes her performances so much more compelling. But even when other people are singing Stevie's songs...even when Dixie Chicks are singing Landslide (which I thought was well done) or Lindsay Lohan is mangling a cover of Edge of Seventeen, Stevie's words are still there, the message is still there. Brilliant writing shines through, no matter what.

Stevie is a masterful artist with words. When I am struggling or get stuck, I just sit and listen to her music or read through her lyrics and I'm always inspired. Truth be told, she's inspired me in more ways than one. My most precious thing in my life, my dog, Bella Donna, is named after her first solo album. In fact, there is a little bit of her in everything that I write. I feel like that helps me raise the bar every time I put pen to paper. You can't read Stevie's stuff and follow it with something terrible of your own. It's like playing baseball and going up to bat behind the person who just hit a grand slam and striking out. It simply isn't an option. So many times, I have been reading through her lyrics and thought to myself "if only I could have written something HALF as good as that..." The crazy thing is that she kept surpassing even her own best and making it look easy...and still is.

Is it crazy that as a novelist, my absolute idol in the writing world isn't a novelist at all? Perhaps, but being as I started as a poet, I suppose that explains some of it. As for the rest, go read some of Stevie's lyrics and then try to find ANYTHING in the literary world that weaves words together more beautifully :)

"Once in a million years a lady like her rises...." [Rhiannon]