A Lost Poem Found Begins it All

 

                In my final days in California, I have to say I was quite resentful of having to pick up and move to Colorado, but I realize that it was probably for the best now. Back then I was upset about being torn away from all of my friends I had, it seems I had the same friends from kindergarten to junior high school. I thought of moving to a far off distant land would be like being imprisoned in a tomb, void of anything that would make me happy. For the most part I was right about this assumption, but I did make friends here in Denver, and I also found ways to lessen the burden of my prison sentence, through reading and listening to music. I became a fan of Black Sabbath and would save my lunch money up for the week and walk to the used record store and I would buy an album whenever I could afford it. I read a lot of books back the as I had more time to do so.

                One night in 1987 while sitting in my room listening to music, a storm blew in. It was a harsh winter’s storm. The flakes were small, but were driven by a wind from the north that was like an ice knife slicing you through and through. I remember this because these types of storms I did not like to go out in. If I had learned nothing in my two years of being a Denver resident it was that the storms like this were not something take lightly. I didn’t really for the most part; I would have hot chocolate or coffee and read my way to a sunnier day. I would keep a fire going in the fire place and I would survive the storm the best I could. I did go out and shovel the snow off the sidewalks when I had to, but other than that I would stay in. I had no clue how much this one storm would change my life.

                This storm I was caught unprepared. I had read all of my books over and over, and I had made a habit of pulling one or two from the library when I knew a storm was coming in. This storm however I did not see the weather forecast and was stranded with nothing but old books to read. I began by cleaning my room, that way if I said I was bored to my mother and she told me to clean my room, I could tell her I had done that already. Then I played some penny basket ball for about an hour. I finally started snooping around my father’s office in search of one of his horrible spy novels to read. I happened along an old high school annual of his and picked it up. I could not resist trying to see what a dork my father was back in school, so I thumbed through it in search of his picture. A folded sheet of paper fell out from between two pages. I opened it up and read it, and it was one of the best poems I ever read. It was hand written on a piece of typing paper. I folded it back up but did not return it to its place in the annual. I kept it out and took it to my room. I must have read it four or five times before folding it up once more and setting on my head board. I knew when I spoke with my father next I would ask him who wrote this piece.

                The following evening at dinner I brought the piece to the table with me. I quizzed my father, complete with reciting the first two lines, before my father joined me and then finished the recital on his own. He delivered it far better than I was reading it so I stopped and listened while my father finished from memory this incredible piece. He asked where I had gotten the poem, and I told him I was looking through his annual when it fell out at me. I ask who had written the piece, and he informed me he was the guilty party.

                After dinner I adjourned to my room and gave a listen to a Black Sabbath’s first album, listening to the poetics held within the song’s lyrics. The idea hit me like a ton of bricks, I was still bored and without reading material, but I could write! I knew I would not be not be nearly as good a writer as what I had read that father had written, but I surely could write a piece or two. I cannot tell you to this day what my first piece was for that was lost in an event I call “The Burning” which I will post here in a while. I know it was not nearly as strong a write as my father’s. I sat down and penned out what was on my mind. My first few pieces were on loose typing paper, but I saved them. I would type them up on our early home computer and post them on a “BBS” or Bulletin Board System which was a precursor to the internet. I knew some of the response was good, and that is what kept me writing through the beginning. I eventually started buying spiral bound note books to keep my work in.

                Now many years later, coming up on twenty five years, I know what a good choice it was to follow in my father’s footsteps. I filled notebook after notebook while without computer, and now have transcribed or entered them in my home computer. Most of the notebooks that is I am still plugging away. I have published two volumes of poetry and I should have a third out by February. I host an open mic, and I am getting another poetess I know published as well, and I am not quite done yet, who knows what I might do this year.

               

Reviews

[Raven Starhawk]

Such a exquisite venture into a mind of a poetic master. Hope that came out right. Loved reading this.