Spent a little bit of time this evening adding some blackout poetry to my scrapbook. Clippings courtesy of old Writers Magazine issues, word-twisting by me.
Also, here is the front cover of my scrapbook – isn’t it gorgeous?
Tag: writing (Page 2 of 7)
This is a guest blog post by Sheryl Chan from A Chronic Voice. Read on to find out why you should write your way through chronic illness, and discover more about Sheryl below!
Why Write?
Blogging about chronic illnesses can be hard work. For some, the exposure of their privacy or the intimacy of the topics can be a
deterrent. Others struggle with expressing their thoughts, or posting content on a regular basis. Vicious, unconstructive trolls who don’t even bother reading are an energy drain. Usually, it is a combination of all of these factors. So why do we even bother?
I have three poems in Bindweed Magazine! The poems are on the website right now and they will be in the print version of the magazine in October. You can read them here!
Two of these poems are about my brother and the middle one is about me and my parents trying to distract ourselves from my illness back in the day. So they are really important to me and I’m quite proud of them, so I’m very happy to have them published!
A bit of time travelling this morning – this is the first poem I had published in a literary magazine. It was published in Obsessed With Pipework, a Flarestack publication, in 2006 when I was 18. Before that, I also had poems published in two anthologies (in 2004 and 2005, so at the age of 16 and 17), but this was my first magazine publication. I actually submitted a longer version of this poem, but the editor decided he liked the firs three lines and asked if he could just publish those. I still remember the full poem off by heart:
I have four poems in this anthology, Dandelion In A Vase of Roses! Available in paperback and on Kindle.
reasons why my body is awesome:
low blood pressure
very little trouble sleeping
haven’t vomited since January 2011
bones all intact
badass scars
cute dimple at old stoma site
super-efficient waste disposal system
tattoos
clear skin
soles of feet have a pleasing arch
mad hair that sometimes looks pretty good
ambiguously-coloured eyes
back curves in, butt sticks out
boobs
pretty good legs
GREAT hands
ticklish
baby face needs ID for buying alcohol
can smell onion rings cooking at twenty paces
Little old me reading a couple of my poems. Rare sighting! I’m running away and hiding now.
stand back:
I’m writing poetry
this requires two hands
one to hold the pen
one to grasp a piece of star
and determine how it feels –
what’s it like when those
jagged edges cut the skin
and does the blood glisten
as much as this artefact I
stole from the sky
stand back:
this is going to get messy
there is crimson on the page
crimson on my palms, crimson
on the pen and now crimson in
my mouth and the metallic tinge
is how I imagine stars taste but
I have to know for sure so I
lean down and touch the tip of
this fragment of space mountain
with my tongue and it is like a
silver shard of sugar tainted by
the darkness that has tried to
engulf it for a million years but
it has endured until now – now,
now it heaves its last breath as
it lies in my hand. I have plucked
it from its habitat and I have
killed it. turns out the darkness
was the only thing keeping it
alive, and it flushes gently,
dimming for longer with each
pulse until it is nothing but a
piece of grey coal and my
vermillion hands are glowing
as if it has given its life to them.
someone opened the cage door
but I have nowhere to fly to.
I fear my wings won’t take me
far enough. what is the outside
world like? which way is right?
who would want me to fly to them
anyway? I’m sure I’ve no idea. they
might as well just shut me in. here I
will collect dust while those
around me take flight. I don’t
know where to fly or if I’m even
capable of flying, much less
going on my own.
I can’t remember who I wrote this for or why, but it was probably important at the time.
