a sonnet of stars

The most recent writing assignment suggested to me has been to write a sonnet about constellations. After remembering just how frustrating writing in sonnet form can be, I’ve come up with something.

the pre-school teachers tell, “Now turn your thoughts
to page fifteen. Connect the dots from one
to end with makeshift lines as you’ve been taught
to form a common whole. And when you’re done
we’ll look to night. To understand the view,
we’ll plot the dark on graphs and maps.” Our eyes
so trained to see the lines, we look right through
the stars and see some dots. Sky’s twinking guise
is strange; we quickly craft our fabled gourds
and belts, familiar sights in foreign clouds.
We mar its magic with a name, record
its life, domesticate its light, too proud
of faulty facts—when all along a slow,
still, starlit night is better than to know.

something like peace

There’s been a recent surge of people finding my blog by searching for “peace.” It seems like we idealize peace so much when we want it and feel so close to scraping its surface yet remain too far from fully finding it. There’s too many levels of chaotic movement to be found among countries, lives, people, societies, selves. We must still the chaos while maintaining the momentum and interactions that create meaning in  life. There is something of an ungraspable paradox of peace and of everything worth having:

Stillness is what creates love. Movement is what creates life. To be still and still moving, that is everything.

(do hyun choe)

daily scribbles

I’ve recently started something like a real job and quickly discovered how much excess time it provides me for thinking and scribbling words on paper. This week my housemates increased the amount of enjoyable entertainment in each day by giving me small writing assignments to fulfill. 

This week’s task: write a haiku for each day of the week. 

Monday

someone slipped a bomb
in my morning cheerios.
Death tastes delicious.

Tuesday

thirteen stories high,
I spit from the balcony
and wait for the ground.

Wednesday

eyes too wide at dawn
on Christmas morning. Just wait;
movement comes with day.

Thursday
a sudden ice storm.
the doorknob whispers its warmth
but the lock won’t turn.

Friday

sprinting down the street,
five years old in light-up shoes,
chasing a stray ball.