Today

I found my old notebook with all the poems I've written since 8th grade. Some of them were very interesting to read while some were just plain embarrassing to think I had ever written something like that. I think I may be posting them regularly over Spring Break ... yes, I will. I'm looking forward to writing more during the break and I also wrote a new poem today, reflecting on the past few months. It kinda just flowed out and when I looked down to the Latin grammar review test I was suposed to be taking, there was a giant blue poem all over it ... hehehe, that's Ana for you ... Anyways, I think this blog is haunted cause everytime I log on, my first post has a new font ... very weird, I still believe it is haunted by some sort of electronic poltergeist.

Finding My Beliefs

Finding My Beliefs

As a child I had no beliefs. I lived by what was repeatedly dictated to me by my parents and my piano instructor. Things were either black or white, either I was wrong or I was right. My piano instructor sat me in front of the piano keys every Thursday, saying: “Play me a chromatic scale,” I simply obeyed and played. She became angry if I missed a note and would make me play the scale until it was perfect; somehow, I could never get it quite right. For eight years, I believed what others told me to and never questioned them. I believed in a black and white world where I saw no shades of grey because, to me, they didn’t exist. I had my first head-on collision with grey in the fourth grade. I had joined the chorus and found that there too I had to warm up with that dreadful chromatic scale. If the teacher would have let me drop out, I gladly would have done so; except she wouldn’t allow it. Three weeks later I was standing by the piano, singing “Down by the Bay” while she accompanied me. Her hands suddenly smashed into the piano keys and images of Beethoven flashed through my mind as she declared: “Your voice can have more than one sound, and I don’t mean note wise. I mean tone.” Odd, I thought, but interesting. By taking her advice, I learned to appreciate music and art from new angles. I had found my grey. For the remaining two years of elementary school, I remained in the chorus, learning to control the tone of my voice and finding grey in the very places I thought it couldn’t exist. But, I did not realize until I entered the orchestra that colors existed behind the grey. My teacher was a perfectionist. “Play it right,” he always said, “or we play it again.” I became annoyed, and found myself disagreeing with him constantly on the way he told us to play; eventually I built up courage to talk to him after class and ask him why there was only one was to play “Jingle Bells.” Reeling with laughter, he brought out a copy of the music and pointed a million ways to play it but the composer had left absolutely no room for interpretation so we were limited to play it just the way we had been. Disagreeing, I brought out my violin and showed him that the song could sound happier if only it was quicker. He smiled secretly, letting me know I was right. Through orchestra class, I found a whole spectrum of colors hiding behind the black dots on the pages, and everywhere else too. All I had to do was look. As time goes on, I purposely search for the hidden colors and other ways to broaden not only my mind, but the minds of others, because I believe that an open mind can find colors in the bleakest of times.

D.A.T.I.N.G. ... and feeling overly sappy

Diving into those sweet pools of obsidian darkness
Aiming to be nearer to you, missing your heart beat
Thinking about your mellifluous voice floating in air
Imagining why on earth it didn't happen sooner
Not caring that it's raining and I'm soaking wet
Giving you all of my heart

02/18/09

Dedicated to Colin, a great friend and musician

nothing comes from empty thoughts
food offers no comfort
tears give only more confusion
Music, only Music, heals.

note by note, sad chords,
serene melodies, and sweet sounds
offer the only solace
comparable to the embrace of loving arms.

a cold numbness surrounds me,
fatigue and fragility,
unstable thoughts and tears.

tears that come and go,
gripping my heart with unrelenting grief,
but I can find no solace, no relief.

empty words on paper will fade in time,
harsh light and unbearable darkness,
nothing can help except for the sweet sounds.

lovely violins and calm baby grands,
smooth six-strings and angelic harps,
melancholy horns and mourning woodwinds,
within them I am lost, forgetting,
forgetting everything and remembering nothing,
nothing except for the sweet sounds
calming the tides of pain and grief
and bringing me peace,
like a pair of loving arms,
wrapped tightly and protectively
around me, surrounding me
in love and comfort.

sweet Music, play, play for me,
help me forget and remember,
play for me, play,
play, sweet Music, play.

~~~ written March 28th, 2009, in memory of Colin Green