Author's Note - I would just like to share this quote with you. It really shows the importance of sentence length and what I remember not understanding at first during a seventh grade class when Mr.Johnson was talking about the importance of sentence length, but of course now, being older and a more experienced writer, I understand the importance of sentence length.

“This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say listen to this, it is important.”
— Gary Provost

This I Believe: The Fear of the Night

Author's Note - This is a writing piece that I did for an English speech this year, as a freshmen. The topic was This I Believe, which started as a radio station show in the 1950's. If you want to know more about the actual This I Believe program, visit www.thisibelieve.org. My idea for my speech was to talk about something that was more personal to me and I wanted it to be orginal as well -- no one wants to hear five speeches about "I believe in God", "I believe in the power of love", or "I believe in silence".

I believe in the fear of the night. Not the darkness that the night brings, but the silence — the time when there is nothing to hide my myself from my own screaming thoughts. The time when I cannot escape my demons, for my demons are inside of me. The silence unleashes them into my mind, enabling them to eat away at my soul, at my insecurities, making them weaker than they already are.

I believe that at night, I am at my weakest point. I am alone, vulnerable to anything and everyone. However, sometimes, I find comfort in the loneliness, but nights like that are limited. Most nights I find myself eating away at different thoughts, often keeping me awake for hours on end. During these insomnia filled nights, it’s as if there is a jar of thoughts in my head that has tipped over and all the thoughts have spilled out, scattering into the open and then hiding in every crevice of my brain so that I must stay up just to put all the thoughts back into the jar.

Stephen King once said, “Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.” I believe that this true. Surely the monsters and ghosts inside of us our not literal, but metaphorical. The night is the time in which monsters and ghosts come out to get us. My monsters are my insecurities, I call them my demons. My ghosts are my memories, they sneak up on me when I am least expecting it. At times, my haunting memories can bring back a sense of happiness that used to fill me, but at the darkest hours of the night I’m only left alone with a cold nostalgia of what I used to have.

That is the root of my fear of the night – the monsters and ghosts that come out. I don’t want to be alone and vulnerable. I don’t want to go to bed because I’m scared. I’m scared of being alone with my demons and ghosts. I’m scared of letting them inside my head. I’m tired of letting them in my head. I’m tired of the burden of my demons and ghosts. I’m tired of the silence, of the loneliness, of being vulnerable. I’m tired of my fear of the night. But this fear of the night, of the silence and the loneliness that accompanies it, is what has made me who I am.

I have come to believe that this fear is something I need. I believe in this fear for it is something I cannot run from nor can I hide from. The world doesn’t stop spinning, the paradox of night and day is never broken, the monsters don’t fail to come out to get me, and the fear is never ending.

An Eternity in Hell

Author's Notes - This poem was for a partnered -- my partner was Emily Collins -- creative writing piece based of an art piece of our choice.The art piece we had chosen was The Beekeepers and Birdnesters by Pieter the Elder Bruegel,  which is pictured below. The main concept behind this poem was concieved by the idea of the people in the painting being hollow like. If you look at the painting you will notice, number one that it is not colored, simply just black/brown and white, but also notice the people in the painting  have head's that are made of wood, kind of like a tree stump. This gave us the idea of hollowness, also branching off that idea we came up with the idea of the people somewhat relating to Dante's Inferno and it's nine levels of Hell, including the one where the people who had wasted their lives becoming intombed in the ground only with their heads above the ground forced to live an eternity in Hell.

We are hollow,
No faces, no expressions,
We are numb.

Work, work, work,
Our punishment is cruel,
But we are stuck here.

No colors, no life,
Only black and white,
No light to see our souls.

Feeling pain, hurting,
Is better than feeling nothing,
Knowing our soul is wasted, going to hell.

We look, but we don’t see,

We listen, but don’t hear,

We search, but can’t find our purpose.

We live in fear of life after death,

Where will we go?

Is there anything beyond this life?

As we lay numb, we are trapped in this layer.

We are in between two worlds,

Our bodies are empty.

Our minds are in one place,

Our souls in another,

Our hearts far away.

We were created with eyes to see,
Ears to hear,
Hearts to feel.

Then we are fed to the devil,

He carves out our cores,

And fills us with lies.

Injects us with evil,

Soon we are nothing,

Nothing, but a hollowed shell.

A shell that once housed life,

But now it is gone,

We are dead inside.

We waste away,
All the same, every day,
An eternity in hell.

Untitled

Author's Note - I started this about three months ago. At the time things were quite different, it's scary to see how much things can change in the course of three months, but it's just a part of life. I had actually forgotten about this poem, until coming across it in my onenote.. whoops. I didn't intend on finishing it but I ended up making some adaptions to it and now posting it, so enjoy.

The cool water licks my toes,

The water almost illuminated by the sunset,

I remember how we once sat here,

And then every memory of comes back.

I long for your touch, but I know better,

Wishing you were here again never ends well,

And as the tears flow down my face,

I wonder if I ever cross your mind.

I look around me, but see no one,

The bitter taste of loneliness strikes again,

My thoughts drift back to you.

Tears

The tears flow down my face onto my neck where you used to kiss me.
The blood drips down my arm to my hand you used to hold.
I sit alone, the memories my only friend.

You say I’ve changed,
But I’m still the same,
Just hiding the scars you left behind.

You said that if there was ever a way out of loving you,
You’d lock all the doors and throw away the key,
I should have been the one with the key.

You promised me forever,
You said you loved me,
The world was ours, why did you take it away?

I miss everything we had,
You took it away, without any second thoughts,
You turned my perfect world into a living nightmare.

I see you, long for your touch,
The touch that used to send chills down my spine,
Now the thought only brings back memories that cut to the core.

At night I lie awake,
My mind a never ending whirl of memories,
This broken heart is endless, I needed you.

What happened to us? We shared something so real, so rare,
But now I’m alone, with only you to blame,
Yet I can only blame myself.

What if I would of said, “I love you,” more,
What if I had kissed you every time I wanted to,
Would it had changed your mind?

There is no changing the past, but the future is still ours,
And there’s nothing I want more than you,
But you don’t want me.

How does it feel to be the one who causes my pain,
The one who left me broken?
This is me putting the pieces back together.


Authors Note - It's been awhile since I've written anything on this blog! This new entry is a poem that is kind of depressing, but it's just a way to get my feelings out, and writing is a great way to let them out.

Sunrise with My Sister

Pastels of the early morning fill the sky. The morning sun rises above our heads, lighting our faces. We walk in unison down the pebbled path towards the lake -- the water so still it could be mistaken for glass. Our feet kicking the pebbles out of the way leaving imprints where our young feet have been. As we take the step from the pebbled path to the wooden pier, the sound of our feet becomes unmuted as the aged wood creaks. At the end of the pier we sit, our legs dangling off the edge, the water licking our delicate feet. Youth: such an innocent part of life. I tell myself how lucky I am to have a sister like you.


Author's Note - I did a stream of consciousness about the sunrise and I came up with this. It's about a walk my sister and I took in the early morning down to the lake while we were up north last summer. I would like to refine it as a poem maybe, but I'm not sure.

Not Knowing

I look at you,
You look back at me,
We walk closer to each other.

I take another step forward,
You do the same,
Our fingers entwine.

I ask what's on your mind,
You say nothing,
We both know you're lying.

I ask you again,
You laugh and say nothing again,
Our minds now stuck on your thoughts.

I wonder about what's really on your mind,
Is it bad, is it good?
But it's too late now,
The moment is lost as we walk away.

Author's Note - The novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, the main character has Autism which makes understanding people and their emotions even harder than someone without that disorder. When talking to someone their emotions and facial expressions are key in telling what kind of mood they're in or giving little hints of what their thinking about, but for someone who has Autism is really hard to read someone. So it brings a question to my attention: do we ever know what people are thinking? I wrote this poem around that concept of reading emotions, yet you never know what someone is thinking... even when you think you do.

Infinity

I chose to write about the Ininity Chamber, so here's my attempt at another poem!

Infinity never so touchable, so real-
the glass and mirrors fooling-
creating a perfect box of infinity.

Endless, unlimited, unbounded-
Shinning, every light like a star made of diamonds-
Going on forever in every direction.

Inside you're walking on air-
As if you were in space-
Hundreds and thousands of lights boundless-
Confusing to the eye.

Looking all around it never ends-
Infinity is unbounded, unlimited, endless.

Last Day of Summer Poem

Sun setting low-
Sky full of pastels of the night-
Laughing , we run-
Chasing the ducks;
Screaming like little girls again.

Sitting on the
                  cold
                       grainy
                              sand,
Reminiscing
                hot
                    summer
                               days.

Walking - the wet sand between our toes-
We leave our footprints behind,
to be washed away by the
last
day
of
summer.

Prince Charming - Stream of Consciousness

Walking through the warm, open forest we can only hear the echoes of our voices, the trees moving to the wind, chipmunks and birds running to and fro, yet we don't seem to notice as we wander aimlessly, talking and getting lost in the maze of trees. We come to realize how lost we've become in each other's presence. You keep talking, while I think about fairytales -- the princess rescued by the knight in shining armor, that true prince charming. I wonder if you could be my prince charming who rescued me from my castle.

The Last Day of Summer

The sun setting low -- filling the sky with shades of pinks and oranges -- shines dimly on the lake's surface. We run, laughing as we're chasing the ducks, screaming like little girls again. Sitting in the cold sand we reminisce about the hot summer days until tomorrow's reality is forgotten. Walking in the wet sand we leave our footprints behind only to be washed away by the last day of summer.