Writchcraft: Handcrafted baubles, gewgaws and other frippery.
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I love your new poetry form writch 
You are a true artist and I value your friendship.
Thanks, Dianna.
To gewgaw is always better than to war-war
enufem wrote:
To gewgaw is always better than to war-war
And to bauble is always better than to battle.
(traditionally though, neither has been used as a verb)
but is to bubble better than to babble?
enufem wrote:
but is to bubble better than to babble?
The former is the result of the latter - just ask a brook.
oh Writch very good... some time ago i used to do that... i think i should start again!! =D very good way!
an ancient minute
with its rust-barb seconds
wraps itself around
a shard of last night's dream
so tightly that i must need soak it
all day in a slick bath of synthetic memories -
releasing trapped archetypes
for scouring, buffing and polishing.
these i plan to retool tonight,
refitting them into the motif engine
i've harnessed to my mind
possessing the power and force
to pull me kicking and screaming
into my next life of next week
About five years ago, I was in one of my journaling phases. This period happened to co-incide with the dating, engagement of my wife, our marraige, her pregnancy with our son, etc. I came across this journal recently, rediscovered and dug out from the box-shuffle of many moves ago. You know how you can't resist opening these time-capsules and perusing? Afterwards, I decided to share some of this writing here.
First off, you should know that when I journal, usually I write at night in bed, just before drifting off - it helps me unload the day for more restful sleep. And I always pick a specific audience - it helps gel my thoughts and keep them coherent. Another note about style: in Hawaii where this was written, I was big into haiku and dabbled with it within my entries - often included some crude sketches of my own too.
When I was younger, as a teen it was myself that I chose (of course - we are the center of our worlds back then) but imagined myself reading it later, only much older. During college years, I chose my mom and dad as the audience - like "letters home." Now, for the time this journal I mention above, I had started a new one about a month after my engagement to Akiko (Feb, 2004), so chose her as my audience. What's primarily different about this one is that I wrote in it with the intention and knowledge that she would read it the mornings after, sometime after I left for work.
So here's a sample scan of one of those pages. To "set the stage" on this one, she was six-months pregnant with our son and we often discussed the nighhtime dreams that we were having then. This entry describes what I saw earlier that morning while I was getting dressed for work in the same where she slept.
I'm not sure about the cat & haiku, but I think I was riffing-off Pointilism because often when writing in bed before sleep, I'd jerk-awake only to find dots on the page where my pen had rested while I nodded off.
Another page from the old journal mentioned in post #13.
Some haiku I wrote while my wife was about 6 months pregnant.
Chalk Outlines
urban image haiku by Writch
‘Nam vet on the stoop
“Welcome home” they say! Bullshit…
“Buddy, spare some change?”
locked in the play pen
baby cries in empty house
can’t afford sitter
blue sirens wail past
chased close by an ambulance
drive-by gang shooting
dollar filled garter
mommy dances for tuition
costly education
binging and raging
young mother prays he’ll pass-out
bruises heal with time
walking Christmas Eve
Johns stay at home with their wives
no drugs from Santa
here in Juvie-hall
only cockroaches visit now
I feed these friends
two dozen cats
playfully chase the flies from
granny’s dead body
Shhh! froze in fear as
dad passes teen lovers’ room…
fire-escape exit
Korean grocer
immortally saved on film
mortally wounded
tenement roof top
pigeons jostle near exhaust vent
shared by runaway
condemned houses house
by-products of slumlord greed
penniless squatters
long sleeves slip downward
expose a well kept secret
track marks up her arm
floral print dish rags
from trash, become the curtains
of her cardboard home
wearing hefty bags
screaming at buildings and signs
pausing to pet strays
thirty stories up
fifty years, eight kids, no rest
cleaning skyscrapers
window ledge retreat
pain… addiction… over now…
diving to pavement
Scans of haiku from one of my chapbooks.
Meditation
You sit in a forced half lotus on your cushion. Your back straight and stiff threatens to rebel. Your heart beats heavily, but slowly in your chest. Your eyes half-shut and cast downward wrestle against the gravity of a full days work. Moments ago, your legs stopped complaining after what seemed an eternity. Except for the swaying curtains near a cracked window, the room is motionless - all the action is in your mind, a desperate struggle to still the crowd of thoughts vying for attention. You hear a crow outside dismiss the day and greet the night.
I see shadows dancing on the wall. Fleeting faces grimace and mock me from a water stained wall. Phantom threads of incense smoke linger around my head teasing a tear from my eye. My heart starts then leaps for joy when I hear the bell signaling the end of the session.
You chant in unison with the rest of the group. You mechanically recite memorized called up from some ritualized mental groove. The others’ voices stumble and follow each other like bleating sheep.
I savor the words as my tongue and teeth massage them into their precious shapes and place them upon the scented air.
You slowly lean off the cushion into kneeling posture and straighten the pillow, buying time for feeling to return to your legs and tension to leave your shoulders. Times-up, you tentatively venture to stand upright
Pins and needles prick my awakening legs, and my body sways unsteadily, unable to yet feel the floor. Whimpers of agony I quell with rediscovered discipline found during the course of long sit.
You turn and bow to your cushion, your friends, your idols on the shrine. You head for the door of the attic room cum temple. You approach the staircase, and pause at the landing.
With great effort, I drag the almost useless sausages down the stairs, my hands hovering and constantly searching for emergency grips if need be..
Down the stairs you head, saying good-bye to your fellow seekers and head for the door.
(C) 4/15/2001
