While this is not meant to be the main topic of this post, I have to share something with you, dear readers, about one of my life goals: I would like to experience (without any harm coming to me) some natural disasters. This seems like a goal that, while not in my control, I could accomplish without too much work. For instance, I've lived in the heart of Tornado Alley my entire life but have yet to see one in person.
This weekend, Oklahoma (one state to the south of where I live) experienced a 5.6 magnitude earthquake. To be sure, the rumbles and grumbles were felt in my city as well, but I did not feel them because I was in a well built area of downtown swing dancing (or at least enjoying the music while having a few drinks) and did not feel a thing.
Oh well, there's still hope for a Kansas hurricane.
Now, the main reason for posting this is to say that long before I considered creating a blog, I have been posting some of my creative writing on my Deviant Art account, and wanted to share a poem I wrote in college that was the inspiration for the title of this blog. It was written in about 20 minutes with the specific intention that I would provide minimal edits or revisions, and was intended to roll forward at a quick pace with a stream of consciousness feel to it. I hope you enjoy it.
Something Latent
Stream of Consciousness
First draft April 13, 2008
Revised September 8, 2008
Sour days and sleepless nights
A walking dreaming soundless sight
A pale beneath a harvest moon
A song that holds a hollow tune
Bring me beauty, bring me rest
Bring the crows back home to nest
Slide the skating, skirting tongue
Across the breath of those to come
Believe tonight comes but for you
Believe, beneath the harvest moon
And when you see me ‘neath your door
Where I have stood, as times before
Lend a thought and drop a tear
And whispered lips belay my fears
Two beds for one, two hearts but none
That beat together, sound apart;
A rhythm stops before it starts
And feel your mind grow numbly now
Feelings stumble, falling down
But then a hope over the line
Not practical, but soft, divine
You’ll brush away and ask no more
Of memory citing months before
Of movement ‘neath such waves of sheets;
We moved together, our tides so breached!
Alas, your figure won’t yet shine
I cannot take your hand in mine
Your frame is but a shadowed form
A silhouette, for you I’ll mourn
But move along with tasks familiar
I’ll place the gold beneath the silver
I’ll bask in sun, and sweat, and stir
And live! Oh live! And not defer
Nor shake, nor quiver, no not for me
And still your eyes, that solemn sea
Where I once swimmed, now find I drown
Whether from drink, or salt, or sound…
But raise my head, a smile bright,
And remember why it’s you I write!
The buried sun that calls me home
The rain that falls from wrongs atoned
We’re on the edge of our new lives
You drank it through my voice last night
You watched the wheel, you watched the light
You shrank beneath your covers cold
Shrinking restless, growing old
Put out the candle, pour out the wax
The fire’s gone but heat still clasps:
Something latent, still implied
Please be patient, be so kind
Spend a day to turn the time;
My myriad futures in your mind
I’ll hang your tokens up to dry
And once folded, tuck them away
Filed for another day
You may think of this tonight
Of harvest moon, of beauty bright
Through growing farms, and sleeping cows
Past rivers, pastures, fields unplowed
And when you find what we could not
I hope you take the time to drop
A word, a rhyme, a song, a note
And when you see you’re home alone
Remember that I would have come.
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