The Other Side

Hello there.

This is your other side speaking.

You know,

The quiet one,

The one that rarely comes out.

The one that hides behind the familiar mask,

The face that laughs with fair weather friends,

The mask that smiles and tells your mother

Everything’s fine.

When you sit alone

In quiet corners,

Your other side comes out

And you sigh.

When you lie passive and open

In a moonlit bed,

Your other side takes over your dreams.

Your other side is a thready breath,

A secret clasped close to your heart.

Your other side is an alternative truth.

The Visit

I weighed one hip down

With pi-pas,

Perched on my red bicycle

Chin down, eyes up.

I put one foot down on the right pedal,

Kicked another foot back on the left,

And pushed,

Sure and blurring

Up the Walden Street hill.

I bopped up and down

And I was soaring, soaring,

I strained out my chest

And I was flying, flying,

Going up the bumps and holes

With no pause,

Zinging down that court

Like I was stone shot from a sling,

Coming creaking to a rest

Under mossy green eaves.

Heart fluttering,

I lurked like a bird

In my father’s driveway.

On the Slopes

I wrote this a long time ago, when I was either eleven or twelve. Well, two years ago. Feels like a long time to me.

In the high mountains

With peaks like whipped cream

I swing from the lift

Skis dangling below me

Floating in another dimension.

Snow is sprinkled on drifts

And on my face

Still falling from the sky

The sky, white as the slopes beneath me.

Snow trickles from the trees

Soft waterfalls of milk

Wiping away the tracks of skis

Without a sound.

I watch the jagged black shapes below me

Zigzag their way down

Puffs of white erupting as they swerve

Ants scrambling across a blank page.

Poets

I feel middling happy about this poem, but I'm not sure of it's great, mediocre, or somewhere in between. Feel free to comment and tell me what you think.

Poets spend their days dreaming,

Lounging,

In idle bliss,

A drink in one hand,

A book in the other.

Some would say that we dream

Too much,

That we are lotus-eaters,

But I say we spread our pleasure

And our thoughts

To others who need them more.

Through poetry.

Words,

We do not say much,

And hide behind a shield of paper

When unwelcome strangers pass by and seek

the state of the weather.

But our innermost thoughts,

Our soul-musings

And secret exclamations,

Could astound the world.

Through poetry.

Contemplation is our name.

We seek to catch

and give to others,

the beauty of the world,

tricks of word,

wisdom unfolding.

We endeavor to capture forever

The quality of dawn

On a frosty lawn,

Or the tenderness of

A baby’s cheek, and love.

Our cares and trials

We mine for wisdom,

And make rags beautiful,

As was Cinderella’s dress.

It will not last.

All is over at midnight.

What we have,

What we have made,

Won’t last a week,

Nor even a day.

Through God’s eyes,

Lives are but sparks of praise

For Him,

Brief melodies, hymns.

We poets catch sparks despite time,

Despite age,

And nurture sparks into verdant fire.

We capture beauty

For the sheer joy of it,

The halcyon relief

To be found in dreams.

Taste in Music

I'm aware that my taste for music is a bit strange in that it's widely varied, from 1940 hits to heavy metal, mainstream pop to indie rock. My favorite song of all time, however, is Unusual You by Britney Spears. Goyte and Sia are tied for second. Here's a list of random songs I've found by chance or sidebar, and loved.

Solid Ground, by Maps and Atlases
Shattered Glass, by Britney Spears
Eyes Wide Open, by Goyte
I'm In Here, by Sia
If You Want to Be Happy for the Rest of Your Life, by Jimmy Soul
Without Me, by Jamia Nash
Without Me, by Eminem aka Slim Shady
Shut Your Mouth, by Pain
Comatose, by Skillet
Hey Ya, by Outkast
It Wasn't Me, by Shaggy
Try, by Pink
Love Me, by Justin Bieber (tacky, but I can't help sympathizing)
I'm Done, by the Pussycat Dolls
Make You Feel My Love, by Adele
Tigerlily, by La Roux
Maneater, by Nelly Furtado
Maneater, by Hall and Oates
Big Girls Don't Cry, by Fergie
Big Girls Don't Cry, by the Four Seasons
New York, by Alicia Keys
Hurt, by Christina Aguilera
Safe and Sound, by Taylor Swift ft. Whatever
Safe and Sound cover, by Jun Curry Ahn ft. Can't Remember
Sail, by Awolnation
Meet Virginia, by Train
A Team, by Ed Sheeran
Skinny Love cover, by Birdy
I Can't Make You Love Me cover, by Bonnie Raitt
Help, by the Beatles
Pumped Up Kicks, by Foster the People
I Look To You, by Kimbra ft. Miami Horror


Well...I could go on forever.

Journey by Night

I came up with this on the final day of vacationing in Reno. I was in bed, right on the verge of falling deeply asleep, when lines started coming into my head. Sounds more like a mental illness than a skill, huh? Anyway, I kept going over it in my head, until finally I had a poem. So I got out of bed and wrote it down, lest I forget. Here's the result.

Drive home alone

In the snow and the dark

Sleep, swirl with the sky

Watch the moon’s white mark.

Cradled by the rays

Of the quiet moon, calm night,

Travel slow, travel far

Be home by dawn’s first light.

Lovesong

Hey, haven't posted in a while. I'm now going to post a huge bunch of poems I think deserve to see the light.

Lovesong

If I was the wind

That ruffled your wings

Could I sing to your soul?

Could I pluck your heartstrings?

If I was the bird

That touched you in flight

Could I hold your attention?

Could I keep you in my sight?