writing

Essay

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

Can I write a long essay
instead of creating a PowerPoint?
should I hear words such as this
when writing, writing, writing is my life
and that is all he’s asking to do
and all that I’m denying him?

Yes I should, because I am building
twenty-first century learners
who know how to create action buttons
and add in Googled graphics
transitions that pop and sparkle,
and change the colors of their fonts.

Yes, these are the important skills
that will carry them into English 101
where they will sit amongst 600 others
and struggle to understand thesis,
paragraphs, critical thinking that I,
with this PowerPoint, have denied him.

How to Write a Poem

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

just take two words
something plus something
combine them together
in a mix of machinery
(metaphorsimileassimilation)
and you have yourself a poem.

Example:
my phone is a bleeping cockroach
hiding in the closet
all day long
creeping out on vibrating legs at night
and flashing its bleary eyes
at me when i open the door
and release it to freedom.

The Mighty Pen

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

it’s nice to hear a bit of cheer
when sometimes darkness chimes
to know a student can be prudent,
despite the wrath, choose the right path
i am beguiled by what was worthwhile
the mighty pen led him in
now med school awaits his tools
i hope one day he’ll come to say
that education is the way.

Journal

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

she begged me to read
the private words
(what would she discover?
what did she want to know?)

i had to remind her
of her age, her attitude,
her focus on the future
(even if it’s just tomorrow)

she’ll forget by then.
and the words? they’ll
still be there, waiting for
the day when someone
other than me is
ready to pry open the book
and discover the
window to my soul.

Writing (Riding)

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

the sun is writing on my back
with an early morning marker
(yellow-orange, scented like
moist soil and ripened pollen)

and i am writing on my bike
as I take hill after sloping hill
under my tires, the curves beckoning
me to the end of the road.

there she waits, a giant sloth of
spring-muddy water creeping
toward the gulf, either side lush
with full-leafed hardwoods.

i wait for them here, moisture
writing on my back, as i relive
the momentous views, the perfect
ride that I never thought could be here.

the sun is higher now, writing across
the sky its midday mark of southern heat,
and they pop out of the car with hugs,
smiles that we will ride into the night.

World of Words

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

after the backyard pool
and sprinkler,
the iPod, iPad, and DVD,
all I ask is that you sit
and listen to a story
for six minutes.

but my competition is too
fierce for us,
and the dropping sun,
the humid air,
and my readiness for your
bed time
lead to exhausted screams
from all of us.

tomorrow we will try again
when all the electronics
and water contraptions
are tucked out of your mind,
when we have a quiet moment
to pretend that they don’t exist,
that books could draw us
together with their magical
world of words,
when we can be
mother and daughters,
not slaves to the technology
that brings these lines to you,
that simultaneously
tears us apart.

Only One

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

You were the Only One I chose.
My sister would call me from New York
and ask periodically.
“Only One?” she would say,
her voice apprehensive and expectant.

I knew. I always knew, even then.

Perfect. Small town,
old architecture,
friendly professors,
far away from home,
one of the few with
a major in creative writing.

How could you deceive me?
Your price tag floating down
from the clouds and stabbing me
in year one, your ridiculous parties,
your drunken frats and sisterhoods,
the teachers who were too snobbish
to help me with the simplest questions.

But I can’t say I didn’t follow you,
didn’t tuck my gumption into my pocket,
pack my bags, and head east.

It didn’t take long before I realized,
filing cards in the catalog at my
tiresome, tedious, minimum wage and hours
library job (the one that made me gag
about going into a library for years afterward),
that I wanted to be a teacher.

So even if you didn’t hand me my dream
(as you had promised in your glossy brochure),
the wind blew me west again
and my Only One stayed put,
waiting for another deception.

Thread

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

my thread always pulls toward words
words that come flying out of my mouth
in frustration or anger or coldblooded truth
or words of happiness and love

they come to me in all sorts of places
when i’m speaking with people in pain
i think of the words deep in my soul
that would work to heal them (me)

on my bike with a song a sunrise a wind
i might hear the words trampling across
my mind, forming pieces of a poem that
will, hours later, meet its page.

my thread includes the snippets of speech
from my daughters, the bits and pieces
of other authors, phrases from lyrics
and emails and letters (tied together)

always, the thread pulls me toward words
(I was born with them in my mouth, caught
like blackberries, their juice pungent and sweet
at the same time, ready to drip down my chin)

Reality Check

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

What is real?
Transformation of stuffed animal to live one?
Something that is truly authentic?
An emotion that brings forth great sentiment?

It could be anything
in the media’s eyes:
Made with real fruit!
Real cheddar in every (highly modified) bite!
Parenting advice from real moms!
Water from a real spring!

It makes me wonder:
if everything they’re saying is real,
have we been eating fake fruit,
synthetic cheddar,
growing up with alien mothers,
and drinking from the ocean?

Someone ought to write
a real poem to clarify this
(maybe we need a real poet?).

Write My Heart

/ lovizmytrio / Leave a comment

my first broken heart shattered
more than an organ in my chest
the parents who didn’t notice
(they never liked him anyway)
the sister whose world revolved around
school, work, boys, reverse
the friend whose own budding relationship
took the place of the grieving conversations
I longed to have.

I was in AP Euro when I wrote
the last pages of that journal,
tears seeping out of my eyes
in the small class when he, usually cool,
called on me to answer
and when I looked away,
the saltiness gushing down my cheeks now,
he snapped at me
(snapped up every last piece of my heart)
and I couldn’t care about
school
God
work
friends
parents
anything
until I found a way to heal,
to seal the wound with words
(the same words he wouldn’t allow me to write).