junior damn high school. mrs. allen's creative writing class. it wasn't my first choice of electives, you know. but it changed my whole, entire life.
what if ... naah.
and i've never exactly thought of it like this, but you know, mrs. allen was a saint. can you imagine, your whole career devoted to the care and maintenance of bad teenage poetry (including publishing an entire book of it every year). and believe me i only post the stuff that is waaaaay over to the 'not so bad' end of the bad teenage poetry scale.
there are copies of echoes '75 and '76 that i could seriously be blackmailed with.
hidden by the sun
the future becomes the past
and away you are fading into dust
still and grey, you settle along
the fault lines of my life
then the wind
scatters you over water
and you sink into memory
i dive in, but float on the surface
as you swirl on down
just beyond my straining fingertips
beyond the barren horizon
where the sun always sets
the timeless night finds me
settled in the sand and
passes into the
first dreamless day
the sun's reflected path
rocks over the sea
shafts of light stab the green darkness
the symptoms of dawn are there
but not the feeling
like the stars, it is hidden by the sun
-(me) 1976
remembrance
old memories of
faded tears
long ago but still
inside me
never to be free
unfulfilled longings
that haunt me
from waiting for
dreams to come true
waiting for you
-(me) 1975
teen poetry was just about the most intensely manifested form of teen feeling that there was. I used to write things and carry them around, they felt like they had magic.
i've always been journalistic in style and some of the things i wrote back then are just scary in that respect - kind of a cross between sylvia plath and harlequin romance novels. only more depressing. and cheesier.