How to write a poem–
I wish I could explain.
I just know
it starts to grow
somewhere in my brain.
May One Thing Never Change
I just went back and read my last post here, written while I was in my last segment of college life, looking forward to getting married and moving to Bogotá that summer.
It seems so very long ago,
and just like yesterday.
“Some things change, some stay the same.”
That’s what we always say.
Everyone has noticed this.
That’s why it’s a cliché.
For instance: I’m not in Bogotá anymore, but I’m still married!
You can read more about the changes and samenesses in my life at these other blogs I’ve kept:
Our time in Bogotá: http://rrmckvr.weebly.com/blog.html
My daily poem blog while living here in Sioux Falls: http://poemdiem.blogspot.com/
And may one thing never change: may the joy of the Lord always be my strength.
It Would Have Been Easy
If I could have only seen
exactly what this year would bring
this would have been easy.
I could have locked myself behind a door
and written every poem beforehand.
It would have been easy.
But this hasn’t been easy.
Have you seen how fast time passes?
And so now we have these glasses
but we still don’t see twenty-twenty.
No, this hasn’t been easy,
A year ago today
I sat just twenty paces away.
So I might not have gone far, but I have plenty.
If I could have known
what I would feel inside each poem
it would have been easy.
It would have felt more like a ride
and less like a black diamond
and it would have been easy.
If I had written every poem this past year
to publish them in the coming one,
I could have spaced them all out perfectly
but they never would have gotten done.
It would be just another idea I had
that never went either well or bad,
but only stale like a passing fad.
But it would have been easy.
And what if I had said “Enough!
Does anyone even read this stuff?”
It would have been easy.
But I had things to write about
just to breathe and get them out
because it wasn’t easy.
No, this hasn’t been easy.
Have you seen how fast time passes?
And so now we have these glasses
but we still don’t see twenty-twenty.
No, this hasn’t been easy,
A year ago today
I sat just twenty paces away.
So I might not have gone far, but I’ve done plenty.
Each
I will pick the pears, for you’re too small too reach.
And you shall test the pears. Just take a bite of each.
Thoughts on a Popular Poem
She heard “Dance as if no one is watching you,”
but then she didn’t know why she would.
He heard “Love like you’ve never been hurt,”
so he loved only for his own good.
She heard “Sing as though no one can hear you,”
so she didn’t sing at all.
And they never saw heaven on earth.
They just kept replaying the fall.
(note: I would give credit to the original author of the part in quotations, but according to the internet it has at least five original authors.)
Repeat
Until that lunch when we broke out some MREs
you had never told me all those memories.
There are years you’d probably never even think about
if they weren’t arranged in layers in the closets of this house.
And I never really realized just how far my poems go back,
but there were quite a few scattered through that schoolwork stack.
The smell of drying leaves and dryer sheets
brings me back to university.
And then there’s all the warmth and chill I can remember
when I hear the song I played on repeat last November.
Creative
I tell my husband my ideas; some are smart, some just wild.
He says “Don’t quit your day job!” as he smiles at our child,
and “Go for it! You’re home, so what are you afraid of?”
I get to be a mom and I get to be a creative.