slapdash poetry

As of late--and by late I mean in the past calendar year or so--I've been writing poems for fun. I'm not sure what clicked in my life and I can't nail down the exact moment that I decided to turn a journal entry from prose to poetry but it happened. And I have to say, it's kind of addicting.

Maybe it was after reading The Sky is Everywhere, Jandy Nelson's brilliant novel debut. Maybe I fell in love with the concept of scrawling half formed thoughts down on anything to scatter across my world, haphazard messages to the unknown receiver. Maybe I was feeling a bit pretentious or purely poetic.* Regardless, sometime in the last twelve months, I've taken to scribbling things down in verse and I like it.

But why is it that when I actually want to write a poem about something specific, when I need the words to be poignant and inspired and true, it just doesn't happen? How come I can doodle something beautiful and simple in the margins of my notebook when I should be paying attention to something else, yet when it really matters, I can't fit things together? Why can't I even force my thoughts into coherency?

So I'm trying to write this poem.

And it's important. It really means something. I'm trying to say something, do something, be something. But it won't fit. That's the thing about poetry, it's tricky. It's not just words slipped onto a page, casual and lazy. It's line after line massaged out of nothing and it kind of hurts sometimes. It's hard and it's work. But I'm not giving up.

--- because you stuck around until now, here is one such poem. just a meandering thought, no real editing or filter. enjoy. --

Some people expect apologies
like snow in the winter
But climate change should seriously
be messing with your expectations

How can words dragged
fighting off my lips
even faintly be something
you'd desire?
It's like tricking someone
into saying 'I love
you,'
then sighing and swooning
for those three little words

*Why do those words come together so often in my mind?