As Promised, A Little Poetry for a Thursday…

On Monday I promised you would get some original writing out of me – and since I can’t publish the fiction bits that are consuming my time/creative energies on here, you’re going to have to make due with poetry. 🙂 I’m going to turn to my good ol’ friend “The Time is Now” newsletter from Poets & Writers, for inspiration. This writing exercise is from their January 19, 2012, issue. For more information on this fabulous newsletter, to subscribe, or to get your own writing prompts, visit P&W here.

Here is the writing prompt I am taking on today:

Take a poem you feel is finished, and divide the poem in half. Write two new poems by filling in those two halves.

The poem I have chosen to use is actually my award winner (teehee) from last year. It is a rather sweet love poem – and I’m going to twist it on its head by going in vastly different directions with the reworkings… I’m going to stick to the original rhyme scheme in the first half; have to make some adjustments to the second because of the organization of the original though. Enjoy!

***

The original poem:

In an Instant
What does it mean, to truly love –
To find the person you are meant to find?
The one whose life fits yours like a glove,
Who turns two ones into a matched set, a two of a kind.

Suddenly a rosy-red sunset, a flash of lightning in brilliant blue-white,
The grace of a soaring flight of birds –
These things take on new meaning when you know it’s right;
Clichés are magically no longer just banal words.

They represent the wonder and amazement, the awe, the bliss
Of all that you feel.  The words themselves are no longer the point –
All that matters is the hope, the spark, the kiss,
The touch of the divine, whose spirit deigned to anoint.

It happens in an instant; the Other suddenly is the central part.
From just a piece they have become the very fabric of your heart.

The redrafts:

In an Instant – Once…
What does it mean, to truly love –
To find the person you are meant to find?
The one whose life fits yours like a glove,
Who turns two ones into a matched set, a two of a kind.

Suddenly a rosy-red sunset, a flash of lightning in brilliant blue-white,
The grace of a soaring flight of birds –
These things take on new meaning when you know it’s right;
Clichés are magically no longer just banal words.

The love, the life, the heart.
When they come together, when they perfectly align
Life is a circle – all about continuity, no end, no start.
Until it all starts to spiral, then fall, all without a warning sign.

The end is a plane crash, a train wreck, a fiery ball of pain.
Blindsided, you are left alone, waiting for a train that never comes – standing in the rain.

In an Instant – Again…
They represent the wonder and amazement, the awe, the bliss
Of all that you feel.  The words themselves are no longer the point –
All that matters is the hope, the spark, the kiss,
The touch of the divine, whose spirit deigned to anoint.

It happens in an instant; the Other suddenly is the central part.
From just a piece they have become the very fabric of your heart.
Suddenly they become ours.  From someone over there, off to the side,
Gleaming like sunlight on water, they are suddenly your heart’s own guide.

And like sunlight, soon you cannot live without them, their glow is your air,
Your food, clothing and shelter, your life-sustaining breath, your prayer.
And so you love and adore and worship and follow –
Because without them your own life is solitary, a fearsome hollow.

The world will never understand your love, your purpose, the walk that you walk.
All you will get are restraining orders telling you not to stalk.

No one understands.  Especially not Them.

***

(Teehee)