Tonight was an interesting night. I began a new writing project, and decided to break out some old writing. My English classes all throughout high school were filled with great amounts of writing - stories, but journaling especially. I began to reread some of my journals tonight, and found myself laughing aloud. The things I thought about and wrote about... I began to wonder if 8 years from now, I would do the same thing looking back on this writing. The things I wrote were so funny (as well as the comments from my English teacher). Anyway, I also began to browse through the poems I wrote from age 15 to 21ish. Some of them were kind of interesting. A while ago, I had resurrected "The World Through His Window" - a poem I wrote when I was 15. I think that maybe every so often, I'll resurrect a new one. Some of them may be decent, some of them may be ridiculous. But for tonight, I'll share this one with you.
I wrote this one when I was 19. You'd think at age 19 my writing would be in decent shape, but I was still a fairly new writer. Therefore, I find this poem kind of funny. It's not terrible, but it's awkward (plus, you can tell I read a little Frost before I wrote it - the whole Road theme). But, for whatever reason, it kind of stuck with me as I was paging through some of my old poems. So here goes...
The Road
In an attempt to discover oneself,
It seems as though life finds them first.
There are two roads to which I can travel.
One, I've already run down.
Naive and foolish.
The one where I threw caution to the wind
I allowed myself to be seen
And for the inner me to be exposed
Only to be trampled on by the same as I -
Naive fools running down the same road
Just as fast.
I pulled myself up to try again,
Only to pursue failure over and over.
Day after day, I put my heart on the line
Day after day, choice after choice
Everything seemed wrong.
But day after day, I became stronger.
I made it down the road a little further
I have now come to the place
Where the road splits in two.
I can stay on this road,
Or follow the one well traveled.
A road where no one gets hurt
Each in their own line
Oblivious to those around them -
Emotionless... unhurt because of it.
I glance down that road
Then continue on my way.
Though hurt and weakened at times
I became stronger on this road.
I went through every emotion I thought possible
Yet there were more to come...
And others were with me.
I even met some pretty interesting naive fools.
Ok, be nice... Remember, I was only 19 and still kind of new to the writing world.
But I kind of like resurrecting these old poems... Makes me enjoy how I've grown over the years, and how I still have a very very long way to go before I'll feel like an accomplished writer. Maybe that day will never come. But I'm totally enjoying the process.
4 comments:
It doesn't rhyme?
I'll be commenting shortly Tory.
(Not sure if the rhyming comment was meant as a joke. If not, it should be noted that simple rhymes are not common on modern poetry. There is a greater emphasis on the meter and feel of the poem.)
Ha, finally back around. Thanks for sharing this. I think it has some good reminders about life.
I did have a hard time connecting with the rythm of the poem myself. My guess is that you could tighten it up significantly, and I would suggest you pursue the improvement of it. We all need pictures of choosing what's difficult because it's right and beneficial.
total side note - I never learned anything about poetry. I never learned about the methods of rhythm (ie iambic pentameter). But, all that aside, I've always enjoyed offbeat stuff - maybe it's because it's the way I think. Who knows. I guess they're not even poems really, more thoughts. They're not quite stories, but not quite poems... Just somewhere in between.
But thanks for the feedback. Doubt I'll actually work to develop it only because there really isn't much for me to do with poetry. If I ever decide to attempt to publish my poems (ha! that's a funny thought), maybe then I'll toy with them for a bit. Right now, I'm just enjoying reminiscing about older days of writing.
The most recent thing I wrote though (in the "inbetween story and a poem" realm) can be found in my archives - the month of February, second one down called Checkers.
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