Every Line

Every line is like a symphony,
Every word a song,
But if you try to force them,
Then every word is gone.

Bittersweet Memories: Teri’s Archive

Introduction: I’m not very good at poetry. It isn’t my medium; meter and rhyme don’t come naturally to me. Even more than my other writing, poetry feels like something given to me rather than something I create; at best I’m a transcriptionist for something lurking in my dreams. Even then I’m not very good at it, but it’s a profoundly moving experience, something magical and almost divine.

In the evening of Halloween 2004, I broke three months of writer’s block. I can tell you this day exactly because I spent the day with a girl named Teri, and for the next two months I gave her credit for every word that came. It was beautiful; I woke up almost every day with something new, something wonderful, some new and interesting turn of phrase to consider. The best part was the poetry, dozens of pages every week, scrawled in that fuzzy half-awareness between slumber and first light.

I believed it was all from her, and I wanted very badly to know her better.

Ultimately that didn’t work out. We haven’t spoken in years.

She is not the girl I dreamed, and I am not a kind of boy she understands. I burned most of it, trying to find a suitable goodbye to my fantasy. Some of it survived on my old website, but for quite a while I wasn’t sure if I should move it here. I’m proud of it, in my own small way, but it’s also a little badge of shame; it’s a testament of delusion as much as any skill.

Ultimately I think it’s better to be truthful.

Just Like This

On this night, I'll hold you close,
Just
  Like
    This.

Kiss your cheek and breathe your scent,
Then taste the girl that Heaven sent,

Just Like This.