I've long avoided putting my writing (beyond fanfiction) on the boards here for some reason. I guess I was always afraid you would all hold me to some ridiculously high standard, since I teach English. Despite this, I've decided to give myself over to your criticism.
Be kind, most of my writing exists to make me happy, not to win an award. So I'll be posting anything I write that isn't fanfiction or 'social' worthy here. Enjoy, feel free to critique. I won't get offended, I promise!
The first bit I'm going to post is a poem I wrote earlier tonight.
Writer's WriteSitting
Alone.
The silence of a summer's day.
Open notepad.
New pen, fine tipped.
Facing
Business.
Can't help but slip away.
Computer screen.
Open Word, commence freedom.
Screaming
Nightmares.
Jar you from where you lay.
Post-it notes.
Jot inspiration, cannot forget.
Consuming
Blankness.
Pages wrought with potential display.
Fixated mind.
Pervade emptiness, destroy void.
Satisfying
Discourse.
Emotions, dreams, fears conveyed.
Satisfied talent.
Deep breath.
Breathe deep.
Begin again.
This next bit is a short stream-of-consciousness I wrote about two years ago, shortly after I moved to Texas. My husband was still finishing school in Ohio, and I was very much alone in a very strange place. I was feeling quite nostalgic and self-pitying when I wrote it.
I Was a Child, Once
I was a child, once.
I ran without fear of falling, convinced that if my steps were long and my faith strong I might take flight.
I laughed without fear of judgment, knowing that my youth lent me infallibility.
I cried without restraint, the armor that would hold my emotions thin and malleable.
I invented worlds that could never be, and for every question I created an answer, needing no more plausibility than the limits of my own mind.
I lay my head on the pillow with grass between my toes and the taste of fresh air still in my mouth. My eyes would close before the sun fully set.
When I awoke trembling in the night, my mother would lie beside me and all would be well.
Now.
Now I walk quickly, for if I run I might stumble.
I laugh only when prudence allows me to do so, for I know that my fallibility is endless.
My tears are harnessed tightly: bursting through the chinks of a nearly impenetrable armor only when no one is there to bear witness.
Invented worlds require laws and boundaries: even those defined by magic.
When I lay my head to sleep at night it is with my feet freshly scrubbed and the taste of hours long past midnight in my mouth.
When I awake trembling in the night, no one comes to lie beside me. A tattered brown bear, stuffing gone and nose ripped off, is all that is there to hold me. I squeeze it tight, and pretend that all is well.
I was a child, once.
Now I must walk among the land of the depressed, decrepit, and diseased. Good morning, adulthood.
I know, none too cheerful. Sorry, I'm not the 'happiest' writer around. Hope you enjoy, will post more as I come across it.
