In what will probably become a yearly tradition (two years in a row does not a tradition make, but three definitely does so I look forward to calling this a tradition next year), it is time for my yearly Haiku post! Before I share all these little glimpses into my day-to-day life in 2023, though, I’ve got a couple notes. First and foremost, they’re all titled as the date I wrote them, which can be a bit troubling sometimes since there’s a few from the same date, but they’re not necessarily connected beyond sharing the title. I leave it up to your interpretation to decide if they’re a part of the same message or disconnected expressions. Additionally, and probably most importantly, these aren’t traditional Haiku. Or really Haiku at all, since the structure of them is a part of the poetic form and the whole 5-7-5 thing is an English adaption of a Japanese form of poetry. Unfortunately, we changed a poetical form and reused the name, so I’m pretty much stuck calling them Haiku for the time-being. If you’re one of the handful of people who was about to bust my chops before I wrote this disclaimer, just think of them as structured free-verse poetry. If you weren’t about to bust my chops, then it’s fine and we can keep calling them Haiku because language shifts and changes and I think its fine to reuse names in new ways for things that people used to be confused about.
Continue readingPoetry
Cell Phone Thoughts
I used to wonder why I never saw my cell phone in my dreams, or why I never even thought about it while dreaming. Then I was grateful, since it meant I could escape it’s constant presence in my life. Now, I wonder if it’s been a part of my dreams all this time, just in a way I didn’t recognize because the parts of it that matter in the way that dreams matter seemed so similar to my own thoughts.
Continue readingSelf-Destructive Repetition
In Time
A thousand idle dreams
Race through my mind
In the time it takes
To change lanes
And I fly down the highway,
Windows open,
As the stereo blasts
A melancholic upbeat tune.
Dreaming of The End
A Year in Haiku: The Emotional Arcs of 2022
I haven’t had the time or energy to finish the chapter of Infrared Isolation I’ve been working on, so I decided to collect the highlights of my daily haiku from last year. They’re more of a way to do some daily journaling than a proper attempt to employ the traditional poetry format, but the following poems are representative of the year I had, each one of them named after the day I wrote it. It’s kind of funny, but looking back through my collection of thoughts and feelings without context, I can’t remember what about a quarter of them are referencing. It’s nice to see that my pursuit of a simple, quick emotional expression has done just as good a job of managing my general anxiety as journaling did, but without all of the frequently frustrating and depressing details attached to it. Now I can look back at what I wrote and not worry about being reminded of specific troubles. Instead, I can focus on reviewing the emotional arcs of my life over the course of 2022.
Continue readingIntentionally Past Tense
Content Warning: This poem references loss of parents, grief, mourning, and also non-specific references to childhood trauma.
I speak about my parents in the past tense.
It is an old habit,
Hard-won as the only measure
I could take to build the distance
I needed to feel alright,
But this years-long practice
Of linguistic intentionality
Has served me well
In more ways than this.
Recorded and Reposted: A Moment of Imperfection
The early dawn light,
Too strong and eager to ignore
Even under the cover of sleep
That calls to me like a languid lover
Not ready to release me
From my place by their side,
Breaks apart the restless peace
Of a night I hardly marked
As I tumble from my bed
In an admission of defeat
And slowly begin a sour morning
I had hoped would instead be sweet.
Recorded and Reposted: False Summer
It takes only a moment,
The space between whispers of wind
On a scorching September day
As the sun roasts pavement
Two feet from where shadow shelters
A wilting garden unaware
Of how little time it has left,
And the past mixes with the present.
Fingers tracing rows and lines,
Too large now to intertwine
With the holes left in the table
Made of rubber-coated steel,
But still looking for something to hold.
Recorded and Reposted: Hollowed Out
A simple shifting of feet
As movement changes from past my door
To through it and I,
Lost in some deep reverie,
Move from past to present
To catch a smile, warm and expectant,
But betrayed by a furrowed brow.
Hollow words meet hollow eyes,
Or at least they should read as hollow.
I can never tell if what I feel
Is written as plainly on my face
As it is written in my heart.