I know some people who walk and talk like poetry.
Meaning, they have a knack for taking something that seems ordinary, and turning it into something beautiful. They take something small, unnoticed, and make it shine as bright as the stars. And they don't even have to try.
I was never one of those people – I was all stutter and no grace, so I turned to writing to try poetry there. It eventually became more than just trying to bring attention to the unknown – poetry is one of the greatest forms of self-expression I’ve ever known. It inspires growth, urges introspection. I’ve learned so much about myself while I tried to showcase the ordinary, and the ordinary within myself.
And maybe one day, I will be like poetry, too.
Meaning, they have a knack for taking something that seems ordinary, and turning it into something beautiful. They take something small, unnoticed, and make it shine as bright as the stars. And they don't even have to try.
I was never one of those people – I was all stutter and no grace, so I turned to writing to try poetry there. It eventually became more than just trying to bring attention to the unknown – poetry is one of the greatest forms of self-expression I’ve ever known. It inspires growth, urges introspection. I’ve learned so much about myself while I tried to showcase the ordinary, and the ordinary within myself.
And maybe one day, I will be like poetry, too.
MYTHOLOGY SERIES
It started with an unnecessarily large book filled with colorful pictures of gods and heroes and muses and vivid tales of triumphs and quests and downfalls – my infatuation with mythology.
Mythology, at its core, is simply another way to explain the goings-on of the world, the whys and hows of various phenomena – for instance: years ago, Greeks would attribute the concept of lightning to the god Zeus throwing down his forged bolts to earth, causing great flashes and crackles of lightning. As a child, however, I saw these myths as fantastic stories akin to fairy tales. I sat in awe flipping through the brightly-colored book, the occasional paper cut marring my hands as I turned the pages too quickly.
This obsession never really left me – the mythology book stayed on my shelf all throughout elementary, middle, and high school, and several others containing myths from dozens of different origins joined it as I continued to expand my knowledge.
You can find a lot of lessons and themes in myths – they’re like fables in that way. Which is why I chose to write them into poetry. The poems “Prometheus”, “Orpheus”, and “Achilles’ Lament” are essentially retellings of the title characters’ stories, with the first two told from an outsider’s perspective and the lattermost from that of Achilles. “Icarus” is a stream-of-consciousness piece where the words follow the theme of his story. “Atlas” is told from the title character’s perspective, but isn’t quite a retelling; rather, it’s a message from Atlas himself. “In Olden Times” is a found poem, taken from the aforementioned large, colorful mythology book. In the book, it’s meant to introduce the mighty and powerful and beautiful gods. The blackout poem is meant to reveal a truer, crueler version of the gods instead.