Things that bother me
I’m wondering when I’ll finally sit and churn out that kind of poem, that kind of poem that looks at the quiet beauty of life but in a different and special way, and it does it in a way that is so thought provoking, so subtle, so perfect in its mix of show not tell, but telling and showing at the same time, and I pick the right title and it maybe even comes with a double entendre of some sort, I love that word, entendre, to intend, to mean it, mean something so directly and indirectly but not so directly that it makes the whole thing annoying, annoying like my brain right now as I make this, but I have to get it out now, see? This is what swirls in my mind each day, the poem, many poems, their infinite structures and boundless forms and subjects stretching from the obscene to the rage filled, rage fueled, rage induced, even, to the mournful and nostalgic and dream-tinged works that arise out of the deepest parts of the psyche, my psyche, in a place tucked in far more cozily than all that rage that pulses in my veins when I think about things too much. Too much! It’s all pouring out of my fingertips to the keyboard at once now, and it’s the same feeling I used to get hunched over the toilet bowl with a bout of that childhood flu that comes through and knocks everyone on their ass at least once during youth and then you never experience it again until some new bug comes in and you’re there again, heaving, begging god to let this hurl be the last so you can just get some fucking sleep tonight god dammit. You feel awful but the weight of whatever was in your stomach gets replaced by air and your eyes are watering for the first time in ages because you don’t let yourself cry enough, but that’s because you can’t find a place in the house that isn’t the bathroom that feels secret enough to you in order to truly have a cathartic, soul-healing sob. And so you bottle those in, those physical releases, and you store them up in the crevices of your brain to age them like fine wines. I started with me and I, and now I’m talking to you. Who are you, are you me? No, no, you’re the reader, and then so am I, as I make this. Glad we made that distinction.
Lauren Royce is a senior at SUNY Oswego, where she is studying journalism and creative writing. She is currently working on both creative and news interviews. She is happiest living as a bridge between these worlds. Her work consists primarily of news stories and entertainment reviews in The Oswegonian.