Writing Through Transitions

During transition phases in life, it is easy to stop writing. The notebook gets buried under a pile of books, packed away in a suitcase, stuffed under bags of groceries. You lose pens. You lose the only pen with which you’re willing to write (for me, its a simple bic ballpoint – black). So you think, I’m tired, I should go to sleep. You tell yourself, The new episode of SNL is really good, I’ll watch that instead. So you go weeks and weeks without writing, when nestled just beneath the surface of your cool self-care is a lot of turmoil.

Transitions are turmoil by definition. A lot of people try to pretend by nature we are like birds, flying wherever we please, but I’ve always felt we were more like trees. I put down roots wherever I go. To rip those up and lug them 2/3rds of the way across the country is painful – emotionally, mentally, physically.

I just moved to Denver. I lived in Washington, DC for six months after my tenure in Brooklyn. That’s 3 major cities in a single year. Suffice it to say, I’ve had a lot of time to think about transitions.

They’re harder to write through than my morning commute. I made this blog because I didn’t want to forget that writing gave me life, made me feel like myself. Yet here I was, sitting idle and ignoring my pent-up emotions during some of the most important parts of my year.

Writing is cadence, is eloquence, is symphony of language, sure. But that is to the reader. To me, as a writer, putting words down on a page is like letting air out of a pressurized container (me being the container). It isn’t so much about what comes from it, but the act itself.

So now that I made it safely to Colorado, I am trying to write again. I am also trying not to put so much pressure on myself that it isn’t fun. Like most things in life, I think its hard to find the right balance. All I know is that writing keeps me sane and 2016 was a crazy year.

I don’t have a lot of wisdom, but I’d say, even if you aren’t a writer, to journal during transitions. That could be a career shift, moving, breaking up, getting together – any change that makes your heart thump a bit harder and your head swim if you think too hard about it. I’ve been keeping notes on post-it notes. There really is no wrong way to write. 

Kansas

Peering out

the driver’s side window, I understood

that the world is flat and the earth is round.

Mountains are just wrinkles in her skirt,

and the rest has been ironed out.

 

I saw a chapel there, jutting out of the earth, nestled

amongst a lot of air. It was poetry

in its purest form, an expression of the exact feeling

that moves them to write. That moved me

to create for the first and the last time.

 

That chapel,

a testament to the human hunger

for faith in wilderness, reminded me

that my life has always been more

profound and beautiful than a morning commute.

Ever Blue.

My eyes were surprised at the seeing.

Perception and sight merged for a moment and the truth

leaked into me –

 

the sky is just as blue today as it was forever before.

 

I was baffled, at first, that the sky

would shine, the sun filtering through all the dust

floating around. That the sun would bother,

that the trees would bother

to rustle in the wind.

Heartbreak Haiku.

Calluses can help

on fingers, but not on hearts.

Leather hovers here.

Fainting –

Did you know I’ve never fainted, I muttered.

 

But, you asked, What about the time

you said his words collided with your skull

and you felt yourself drop to the floor, unable

to get back up?

 

Ah yes, I said, that was

wishful thinking. 

 

To obliterate a moment with sheer will,

to dive into denial by flipping a switch, turning off

the world. No, I’ve been entirely too conscious

this entire time. Wide awake, absorbing it all –

I can barely blink.

 

So, when his words slapped my skull, I cursed

my strong heart, blood pressure, good constitution.

It would have been nice to hit the rest button, if only

for a moment. To lend appropriate gravity

to the occasion.

Because I still eat, brush my teeth, shower, walk around.

 

Looking at me is not like looking at the results

of plate tectonics – no one could tell upon inspection

that I am

a rift,

an earthquake,

a tsunami,

a mountain range

thrust up from the molten depths

of this life. No one can tell what power made me –

I look ordinary

as anything. I can’t even faint.

Origin Story.

I have emerged, exploded, elaborated upon my life in a sudden flurry

of what feels like transcendence.

It could also be called inspiration.

 

I am limited now only by my wild, unencumbered imagination.

This is how I was born to be, how I was

originally, before I believed him

when he whispered be smaller. I hunched

my back and shut my mouth and kept in line

as best I could. Dumped all my confidence

down the drain each morning as I brushed my teeth.

 

Now, though, I feel tingling at my fingers

and my toes the ability to do it all.

And I will.

 

I’ll do it while fucking skipping.

 

Oh yes, I’ll dance all I want and to my own rhythm.

Oh yes, I go left and go right, up, down, here, there

as I see fit because no one is ever going to

make me small again. I am not a foot stool, a ladder,

a way for you to feel validated about your life.

 

Validate your own damn self.

 

I’m going to wear buttons and neon shoes

and skirts to the floor and skirts barely covering my ass because

I feel like it. Ha!

Oh yes, I will, and it will be better

than it ever has been before.

This is my origin story, my nexus,

my big bang.

A Purpose

I thought my life was collapsing and came to discover

that it was actually just the rumble of confining walls collapsing.

Now I look out over the water stretched before me,

watch the sailboat as it rocks lazily near the shore.

I haven’t sailed so far before, but I know inside, somehow,

that I’ll get exactly where I need to go. My heart is big

and full and pumping blood

all over the place. I was put here

on this earth to spread love –

spread it like strawberry jam

in summertime, get it all over everyone’s faces.

 

I was put on this earth to giggle,

to dance, to be silly, to spread joy.

I cannot take myself too seriously, or really

seriously at all. What is the fun in that?

None at all, let me tell you.

Harbor

I have spent my entire life

trying to fit

my experiences between the three stars

of Orion’s belt. Maybe, maybe,

my life is a galaxy,

my life is not to be contained

even by poetry.

 

I am not confined to the elegance

of numbers or the coincidence

of days. I am in uncharted territory,

and it is only upon arriving here that I realized

the harbor I thought was safe

had been more dangerous

than these waters.

Cannonball

She went on small or large adventures the way

some people order

small or large coffee.

 

She created and recreated,

joined leagues of birds in their flight

as much as a soccer league.

 

She yearned always to feel her chest expand

with an energy she used to think must pass

from one as their brain settles into middle age.

 

She had been told she cried too much, felt too much.

But life is beautiful in the unique way it it weaves

sorrow and joy into

gold.

 

When she sees that gold weaving itself

into a sunset, the wink of a star, the roots of her hair,

what can she do but cry? Her tears contribute

to a vast pool of humanity that most people cannot help

but dive into.

She, however, tends to cannonball.

Hearty.

I am a child of chicken pot pie,

of hearty soups to give you the energy

required to survive brutality

in the form of snow, wind, ice,

the back of his hand to your face

and heart.

 

The layers of a shepherd’s pie provide

solace in a darkness that would take a weaker

soul. I am Ireland and Scotland,

the French resistance with baked brie

and wine that whispers fuck you to any that would dare

weaken us.

Dare to think they could.