Miles

"I find a map and draw a straight line
Over rivers, farms, and state lines
The distance from A to where you B
Is only finger lengths that I see." -Snow Patrol + Martha Wainwright

One of my classmates writes in her poem "I walk in and the florescence dies." That line in itself, could be, and is, a poem. It's crucial to keep the florescence. I admire, I smile, I wave, I laugh so that I could evoke smiles, laughter, self confidence in others. In return, their joking and smiles fill up my need to please. Their candor fills up this confusion about my place in the world.

I'm so reserved but I want them to smile. Honest, pure, smiles. If I can't do anything else, if I can't ace my test or drive a car--- I pray to the lord, give me the ability to provide joy and understanding... but it doesn't always come to fruition. There are people who walk in the room and literally make it brighter with their aura. People smile--- it becomes contagious. And then there are people who try... sometimes I wonder if I'm in the latter position and where the life is when I'm around... and if I'm bitter about where the life is on their end... it makes it harder for me to exude light. Although my heart keeps trying, my mind is simultaneously resistant to the embarrassment of being that lame. I'd rather be cool and reserved instead.

No need to crack jokes, or be other than, or try so hard--- just walk in and their hearts are twirling with butterflies and jumping with joy. It's my need to please because if I don't please them... I can't please me. And then I'm just this empty reserved shell of a thing. I write these things when I can't concentrate on homework... like the extremely terrible little free write below.

Not tall, dark, and handsome,
But inhaling his cigar
reminiscing about the footsteps of his soldiers,
taking pride in past wounds,

more soulful than this moon, and keener than my pen.
With blood truer than war
that spills and pours
from white eyes
which eloquently pace
with quiet vulnerability
and presents
the strength of a man
who holds more than
mere words
In his lungs-- it has danced
from the pink of France
to the red of seas
to the black pupils and drenching pores
tasting like
a salt of authen-ticity

not just super-ficial-ly
tall, dark, handsome
but beau-tiful-ly
He. Is. Human.

---

A lot of poets use such soft words that there is no energy in their poems even when they are lyric poems-- the kind that I love. The word "meadow", the word "soft", the word "embrace", the word "dawn", the word "hollow". My God. I don't know how to describe the style but just that the imaginary is too soft, and it's almost too innocent and beautiful-- even when they're talking about sex, death, hate--- all the classic stuff poems are about. Maybe I just like them more powerful, more visceral, to have some kind of a rhythm that is more like jazz and blues and less like a love letter, less beautiful.

A slender classmate of mine tells me that my poem is a bit violent, it uses violent verbs--- well, they're either violent verbs ala "pounding", "pulverizing", and "chanting" or they have energy.

------

For several years, it's just been Peter, Kelvin, Jacqueline and I holding it down the second generation of Huynh's here... but now we have another. Six pounds, 14 ounces Tianna-- it was evident that she put her mother through quite the journey. I didn't even know how to hold her, where to put her head-- I'm old enough to be her mother but the thought of nine months of labor, of carrying a child inside me, of making that sacrifice and letting go of my childhood, of having that one person that will connect me to another person for the rest of my life-- by lord, I may never be ready. It's fascinating how such a small, beautiful, helpless thing can instill such fear. Greatest congratulations on the gift of life and for the enviable ability to have everyone's attention when Pete/Jackie/Kelvin go to college in a few-- it's when she reaches her teens that the parents really must worry.

I start off on a good note, but like all the striking words I write down when I read a good book, the theme of mixing the beautiful words together creates some work of poetry or some image in my head who's theme is a bit more solemn.

I think it's safe to say that kids make the world what it is. They love hugs. They smile. They keep the world bright despite everything adults do to mess it up. So when they do crazy adult things like drink and drive... it's such a life wasted and such a life of regret ahead for those who survived. It surprises me going back to Portland every time, from Colby, how many kids are having their futures crushed by external forces or how many kids do stupid things because they start to believe that they're not worth very much so they sink into that world of lethargy and hopelessness.

A very rough copy of the poem "Blanket"

---
Blanket

He doesn’t understand why we
hate on his luxury to pity
when it is we who have the ability
to rebound

and it was he who befriended the friendless
Weeds
On that roadway.

Those foulest, mirthless, crusty weeds
sprawled against the
nasty, starving
semblance of
branches
gagged of light by their presence.

Until we brought he along
body full of luscious sweat from adrenaline
courteously
thrusting himself
like a blanket
on the world of collapsing weeds.

His thin, slender,
body
Defiant against wind and snow

With but a soft moan
followed by
still and quiet

It was he
who revived them with his youthful glow

And it was he who had the luxury
to pity the weeds’ need to endure

another friendless winter.

And to pity the stupefied us left cursing
those godforsaken things
and

left feeble
from
his unrealized ambitions
or our need to endure

While he plays hero with the Gods
Indignant He.