September 26, 2014

    For my presentation next week on my project, I've decided that I'm going to design a cover for my poetry collection, which still isn't titled by the way (oops). I have this image in my head that I really hope translates well onto paper.
    I think I am going to do a reading as well, and I think the only challenge with that is that I will have to pick just one to read.
    For how my actual presentation part explaining my work, I plan on starting off talking about how I moved around a lot, how I struggled with depression, and about my long-distance relationship, all of which directly affect how I write. Then I'm going to go on to talk about how I first tried to write a novel based around a long-distance relationship, and how that was going really well, my experiences really helping with the writing process, then suddenly just faded until I couldn't continue it anymore without getting frustrated. With this slide I plan on having some of the character sketches I had done.
    Then I'll explain my poetry collection, and why I picked the central theme of home and how all of the poems fit into this category. This slide will also include sketches I had done. There are a few poems where I loved the imagery that came out so I drew them out, and I think that will be cool to include into this explanation.
    I will then talk about the challenges of writing this collection, and how writers block, rhythm, staying on topic, and trying to tie all the poems together caused some problems. I'll also talk about how these challenges helped me grow as a writer by now being able to take those experiences and apply them to my other writing.
    After this is when I plan on doing spoken word.
    For my closing remarks I'll explain how I hope to add more to this collection, as well as add short stories in between certain poems.
   ---
Abbey Nichole
   

September 12, 2014

   Depths

Everyone always says not to make homes

out of people

especially not boys with crooked smiles

who's calloused hands can so easily repair your splintered bones

but how could they blame me

when they do not know that your eyes

held an ocean so blue that sirens swam in their depths

and lured me into you so easily

that I forgot that there was a world

outside of the waves we floated in.

the water against our skin like blankets keeping me warm

made it that much easier to take your hand 

and swim further into you

the days and the nights fell into one as the depths of your ocean 

made the sun only a shimmer above our heads

like magic

and I swear I could've stayed down there forever,

but your water grew rough

and the tides became harsh 

and I know you never meant to take me down with you

but the currents fueled by your sadness clawed into our skin

and clung to me,

as they pulled us further into the black

and you clung to me too

with your lips to mine as we used our last breaths to whisper

I love you

and 

mine

and

stay with me

and the moment my eyes could no longer see

the  sapphire of yours,

clouded by

the darkness surrounding us,

was the moment I knew I had waded too deep,

and I suppose

I drowned in you.

~~~~

     The past two weeks I've been writing a lot. I have about ten poems written for my twenty percent project. My biggest issue as of lately is trying to find a way to tie everything all together. While all of the poems have the same central theme, I really want to find a way to either break the book into sections, or add short stories in between a few poems, to make it all more harmonious.
     What I think I really want to do it add short stories in between every five poems, resulting in probably four stories. I want them to kind of develop the readers understanding of why I am writing certain things. I don't really want it to be autobiographical though, and while I will base it around my experiences, I don't think it will be my life story being told.
     I'm also not sure if that makes sense, but I don't know how else to describe what I'm thinking. I'm also not sure if this is what I really want to do, or if I will come up with another way to break up the poems sometime soon.
     Other than this issue, writing has been going fairly smooth. I got a lot of really good feedback during the roundtable, and I've been taking a lot of it into consideration, by really working on my rhythm and structure of some of my writing.
     I've also been brainstorming ideas for a book title. That's always been an issue of mine, naming things. I've got a list so far of possible candidates, but at this point I think it will have to wait until I've gotten more written.
---Abbey Nichole

August 29, 2014

 My Body is the House I Can't Stop Setting on Fire

My mother used to tell me that my body 

is a temple

with stained glass and high ceilings and the songs of angels inside,

but it took me sixteen years to realize

that she mistook the flames in my eyes for sunlit windows

and my broken screaming for song.

My bones creak like wooden floors

beneath the weight of my heavy skin

with every step I take,

I have poured so much kerosene into my blood

that it pumps through my veins

and swallowing kindling before the matches

is just an extra precaution

that I am willing to take,
because this house I grew up in

has never felt like home

and I have always been a stranger in my own halls.

I've been growing up alongside my ghosts in this body

doing my best to fend off the darkness that surrounds them

and consumes me

but the nightlight in my room does not keep them away.

 I've found it easier to breathe smoke through my lungs

and let my rotting walls go up in flames 

because the fire shooting through this house 

burns bright enough to be reflected in 

the tinted windows of my eyes

and setting my ghosts on fire is so much easier

than living among them.

 ~~~~

     So as of Wednesday of last week, I have completely scrapped the two and a half chapters of the book I was writing. I got completely stuck and had the worst writers block I've ever gotten, so even though I because extremely attached to the characters and the setting, I decided to change my project because I couldn't find a way around the various plot holes.
      Now, I've decided to do a poetry collection, like I had expected I would do at the beginning of this course. Three weeks into the nine weeks, I've already written many poems surrounding this topic, so I'm already a good chunk into the twenty or so poems I'd like to have in my completed work.
      The collection will be centered around the theme of home. Due to moving around a lot, facing depression and body image issues, and letting various people call themselves my home, this topic has always been one I tend to avoid. Lately however, I've been more and more willing to write about it. One of my good friends once told me that the things that hurt were the things I wrote best about, and I'm trying to take her advice.
      I know that this project will be much easier for me to complete, due to the fact that I'm constantly writing poems.
---Abbey Nichole