Writing

I used to write a lot. I kept a journal for years and won my first (and only) poetry contest when I was eight. I considered double majoring in journalism and graphic design in college, but then reality and a heavy classload took over and I left the English classes behind. One of the things I enjoy about blogging is that it gives me a chance to write again and a voice. And the fact that my voice is heard and is responded to makes it all the better.

As I was sorting through paperwork in my office tonight, I came across a poem that I wrote in my last college English class. If you could see my office you'd understand how a 12-year-old poem could be mixed up with current work. It is modeled on a sestina (although I don't remember which one, exactly) and the same six words are repeated at the end of the lines, with a particular syllable count in each line. I've always liked this one and this is its first time in print.

December wind blows through the door.
The candle sputters, and the weak old man
stands up and steps over his dog
to shut out the howling wind
that threatens to scatter the pages
on which he slowly records his life.

He hopes that someday this colorful life
that is ending in the wind blowing through the door
will speak its tale from the yellow pages,
and never die the death of man.
The thin walls sing with the gusts of wind.
He pauses and says to the dog,

Come here boy, but the dog
is dreaming dog dreams of his own long life
and does not even hear the gusts of wind,
that pound and scrape at the flimsy door.
Sighing quietly, the old man
again begins to fill the pages

with his thoughts. Ghostlike, the pages
float off the table and settle around the dog,
float down to rest around the old man
and his wrinkled hands that save his life.
He shivers and glances at the door
that rattles, and moans with the animal wind.

You can't stop me, says the hungry wind.
I know what you know, say the thin pages.
They have become a portal, like a door
to another world. Then the dog
breaks the spell by coming to life
and resting his head on the knee of his man.

But slowly, while the old man
plays games with the will of the wind,
time trickles and slips away until life
is nothing more than marks on frail pages
that no one will read save for the dog
and the monster finally creeps under the door.

I am your life, whisper the pages.
The old man gives in to the greedy wind
and the dog dreams of another long-ago door.