Love is...

As a part of National Poetry Month festivities, I'm using my blog to participate in the first national Poem In Your Pocket Day. The point is for the participants to share their favorite poems - preferably a pocket sized one. I love poetry and I love sharing things that I love - so I'm gonna share two of my favorites with you (though admittedly one is not as pocket sized as the other).

What Love Is Like

Love is like
a pineapple,
sweet and
undefinable.

- Piet Hein

--

Coal

I
is the total black, being spoken
from the earth's inside.
There are many kinds of open
how a diamond comes into a knot of flame
how sound comes into a words, coloured
by who pays what for speaking.

Some words are open like a diamond
on glass windows
singing out within the crash of sun
Then there are words like stapled wagers
in a perforated book - buy and sign and tear apart -
and come whatever will all chances
the stub remains
an ill-pulled tooth with a ragged edge.
Some words live in my throat
breeding like adders. Other know sun
seeking like gypsies over my tongue
to explode through my lips
like young sparrows bursting from shell.
Some words
bedevil me

Love is word, another kind of open.
As the diamond comes into a knot of flame
I am Black because I come from the earth's inside
Now take my word for jewel in the open light.

- Audre Lorde


What do you think it says about me that two of my favorite poems just happen to be about love? Would you say that these poems are speaking about the same sort of love?

(Things like this make me miss being an English major - and make me wonder why I'm in law school.)

How things can just change...

Recently I came across some old pictures of me in high school and college - and it reminded me of just how much I've changed these past seven years (since graduating from high school) - more mentally than physically (the hair is what's changed physically- and dramatically) and for the better. I'm just so much more self-assured and confident, much more positive - and as a result of all my stumbles, much more wise...

Thinking of the old me got me to thinking of the kind of crap the old me used to put up with from men... most importantly, The Ex (I have two ex boyfriends but really in my mind, there's The Ex, and then the other one... both significant, but the first one much more so). The Ex was and still is the most selfish person I have ever come across in my life and in so many ways - not just with the way he treated me. Just absolutely ridiculous... and when I think about how I endured a "relationship" with him and then a subsequent "friendship" for a few years later... man.

The poem in the previous post pretty much sums up how I felt about him during our relationship. I wanted to be his EVERYTHING - and only because I wanted him to be my EVERYTHING. I was wrapped up so deep and for the life of me, I don't really remember why. I mean, I was in love - but what was it about him that made me fall so deeply? My theory is that he reminded me of my father with his selfishness and I guess deep down I wanted a man like my father... I guess? But then, as selfish as my father was/is - The Ex even managed to surpass him. Pops definitely set a trend with the type of men I've dated... and when ending it with the other ex I realized that I had become really comfortable with really selfish men (and ended it because I was no longer comfortable damnit!). But The Ex? I don't know what it was... thinking about him inspired me to jot down a little something... when I was with him, I wanted to be his everything but Lord knows I couldn't. And I think that was best. He definitely didn't deserve that much from me.

I just sat and re-read the poem and remembered once again what that was like. Sometimes I wonder if I would ever really feel that way for someone again... Is it even reasonable to be everything someone needs? I know people sing and talk of "you're all I need to get by" and all that... but does love mean that the other person becomes a complete necessity?

Ha. As I wrote that question, I answered it.