When I can't write

A few things:

I am learning about loss. This past week, I've done a lot of thinking about LJ, regretting my actions, being angry at him, angry at myself, and overall just being sad. I am learning, though, that loss doesn't only come in the forms of breaking up or people dying. Lots of things in life qualify as life. Relationships are life. So even loss of a relationship is akin to a death. A friendship ending, even if sometimes it's for a good reason, is a hard thing. I think loss is hard because it's usually filled with so much regret. "If I had only been there that night," "If I had only not caused that fight," and other self-destructive thoughts make loss so much harder than it would be if we would just accept it. But we're human. Sometimes, though, the loss really had nothing to do with your actions in any way, but still, then it's hard because you wish you would have been in a place of influence to stop it from happening - but you couldn't be.

Leaving Ruston will be a loss, though sometimes a very welcome one. I realized yesterday how many remnants of loss are left here for me to see. Places where I've spent a lot of time but can't anymore, precious people I can't talk to anymore... They do nothing but sadden me. Almost everyone I know is leaving soon. I'm holding on to memories of what Ruston has meant to me, and those are priceless memories and I couldn't be more grateful for my experiences here. But it's time.

I've started sending in my paperwork to teach in Korea. In my mind, I'm ready to be there now. But there are a few things keeping me for a little while. Treasure's having her baby at the beginning of August, and I really want to be here for that. But as for Ruston specifically, I want a little more time because of the creative community that had recently grown around me. I don't want to stay here forever, and I know it's close to time for me to leave, but at this moment, for the next few months, I want the creative side of me that's been awakened to continue to be fostered. I don't know that I could flourish in that way in Sulphur, where I will likely be for the last part of the summer. It scares me to be taken away from this community right now. I imagine that once I live in Korea I will find such a community of writers, artists - people whose souls are alive in those ways. I really hope I find that.

I decided a few weeks ago that I want to be a poet. At least I want to shoot for that. My mom has always believed I'd write a book one day, and I always disagreed. But maybe I'll write a collection of poetry. I would love that. I do know that I'm a better poet than prose writer. I don't know what that means - it could just be that my prose isn't very good. But it could mean that I have some potential for being a "real" poet one day. I know that's an aspiration that a ton of people have and never achieve. But if you don't have the goal, there's no chance. Here's a poem I like that the guys in my poetry workshop told me was the best I'd written so far. Again, "best" is relative, but here it is. It motivates me when I'm frustrated.

Revelation

Morning breaks brilliantly,

surprising the sleeping sparrows

on narrow branches, nearly

toppling them. Tiny creations

awaken with soft, new light

to an unmatched warmth.

Under delicate talons, ice

cracks slowly, steadily betraying

sparkling boughs as damp mahogany

and drab.