A Time to Remember

Last week, Reluctant Housewife issued a challenge to readers and fellow bloggers to post some of their early, early, early work. I was intrigued by this idea and eagerly read the offerings of those who were brave enough to accept the challenge.

It is fascinating to see how those with distinctive voices have evolved as writers. It is interesting to note that those who have a passion for writing seem to have realized this passion early in life and then pursued it with the kind of ardor and vigor that does not often follow us into our third decade of life. I also think that this work contains a depth and a purity that is untainted by artistic conscience or intellectual prejudice. It is raw, naked emotion. Embarassing to be sure, but also beautifully expressive and poignant.

When I left home at 18, all my beloved poetry, fiction and prose was carefully boxed up and stored away in anticipation of someday being published (We all thought that right?). Twenty years later it was still moldering in the basement of the home I grew up in, unpublished and mostly forgotten.

Prompted by RH's little exercise, I called my mother and asked her to unearth some of my work and email it to me. Several days later a package arrived. When I opened it I found my beloved pleather portfolio, which I had once thought looked very "literary" and which bulged with my most prized work. It is now cracked and musty smelling, but holding it in my hands brought back some of the tentative, furtive, irrepressible pride that its contents inspired in me.

I laughed and cried as I read some of what it contained. I remembered the powerful emotions that inspired these outpourings. I both rejoiced at the passing of such an angst ridden era, and mourned its demise.

So yes, I will post some of it, and you can even laugh at it if you like. It is silly, and clumsy, and sometimes overly concerned with rhyming. But it is a very stark emotional snapshot of the girl I was. Perhaps, if I study it carefully, I can avoid screwing things up beyond belief when my boys reach that precarious, bewildering and blessedly transitory phase.

Strangely enough, I don't write poetry anymore. I don't remember when I stopped or why.

Without further ado....

A Time To Remember (Mourning the simplicity of childhood I believe)

Do you remember
when the world was big
and laughter came as swiftly as speech?
When running with the wind on your shoulder
was as easy as falling asleep?

Do you remember
when the night was still long
but the sun eager
to shine in a sky
that was always friendly?

And do you remember
the safety of arms
and the power of kisses on tears
when the most tragic thing in life
was tomorrow?

Untitled (Reflections on the first deep and abiding love, if I remember right)

Our thoughts enfold
and souls entwine
Minds reach accross a chasm
to speak a wordless caress
Understanding the lovely pain
knowing that anguish makes it real
Tears fall
that kisses need not sweeten
and a cry accross eternity
can always be heard
My heart still knows
what reason denies
forever is too long
spent apart
But the warmth of embrace
and the security of you
is a presence like the sun
I'm smiling in the brightness
of your beauty
but not blinded
If this should linger
whispered at the edge of a dream
the chasm may close
and choosing will no longer matter
Conscious love
is more precious
than the most brilliant gem.

The One (Not really sure...rebelling against responsibility?)

One child
born in the glow
of the first coming
burning
fueled by ignorant expectation
one seed
nurtured and fed
basking
in the radiant love
unaware of a cloud
on the horizon
rooted
in her life soil
unable to bloom
and the child too
shall have muddy feet.


Edna St. Vincent Millay...eat your heart out.