Villanelle

As I sit and wait for the day
The skies are dark and speak of doom
And vengeance and hatred shall reign

I watch the moon be chased away
Dark clouds cover the sky in plumes
As I sit and wait for the day

As good, war and anger do slay
The birds? None call; the wolf doth loom
And vengeance and hatred shall reign

As they lead the righteous astray
We turn our world into a tomb
As I sit and wait for the day

When the sun climbs late in the day
Preferring to stay in her womb
Then vengeance and hatred shall reign

The sunrise our sin makes delay
Our deepest darkness starts to rise
As I sit and wait for the day
And vengeance and hatred do reign

Waiting

Water slithers down the window
Diving down out of view
Whispering the wind blows strong
Searching for things to do

Bright candles flicker in the sky
Drums sound out and echo
Black and solemn, the sky cries out
And still I do not go.

Zeus attacks and Gaia shudders
Standing both firm and proud
Waging war against each other
Unending, never cowed

And still I stand, silent and tall
Awaiting fate's new call.

Boyhood

The sun comes up and peeks inside,
calling out to bright young eyes.
Birds sing soft words with tales of might
and valour, stories of heros
from another age fighting for
the forces of justice and right.

He listens, awed, for a moment
then runs downstairs for his breakfast.

The Liar

The truth is more found on the liar's tongue
than in the mouth of an honest man.
For how many times have we heard of the
fineness of his feelings when we know -
we know that the day is rarely so rich?

The liar is not afraid of his words;
he wields them with a foreign finesse
speaking of unity and discernment.
He delves inside the heart of all men,
he knows the heavy power of a word.

Someday I too hope to know his truth.

I, War

Author's Note: This is a response to the prominent motif of beauty in tragedy throughout All Quiet on the Western Front. In addition, it addresses the pattern of soldiers going off to die for something they neither understand nor advocate, and the brainwashing their superiors force upon them in order to make them fight.

This is not meant to insult anyone who willingly fights for our country. It is merely what I felt the novel was trying to convey.

My heart is black, a freezing void,

space that has lost its stars.

I reach out with my strong embrace, folding men softly into my arms.

Young men, old men, those in between –

I care for naught but their light, pulling it gently toward me

compensating for my deficit. I take it, gifting them in return

showering them with beauty, glory, raining color down around their hearts.

It encircles them, becomes them, fuses their heart and mine into

one.

Together we are strong, courageous, valiant,

standing against all I deem flawed.

Of course, wrong is relative, is it not –

but Brother Death and I care not for such trivialities

Merely for that which feeds our desires.

After all, those men no longer care for anything but what we wish.

Why should we concern ourselves with

mortal wishes?

Holding Back Grief

Author's Note: The goal of this piece is to reflect on an important theme in All Quiet on the Western Front. I was extremely affected by the end of chapter two and there were several quotes in that part that I loved, so I decided to go with grief and its effects. I also tried using alliteration at the end, something I don't usually do and am a bit hesitant about.

When a strong emotion strikes, be it grief, anger, love, it can be frightening and overwhelming. Oftentimes the natural instinct is to shove them aside, push them out of sight and out of mind and forget they ever appeared. However, when one suppresses his strongest emotions they simmer inside, gaining strength and urgency through the boil. It is exceedingly difficult to do this for long, and the more one does so the more attention must be focused on it. In All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque shows the difficulty of suppressing one’s emotions and desires as well as the discomfort doing so can create both through her characters and through her syntax.

As Paul Bäumer, a soldier on the western front, grieves, his internal struggle is depicted through the stilted phrasing Remarque uses as well as through Bäumer's physical responses to his grief. Bäumer sits with his friend Kemmerich as he dies, watching the other boy's pain and grief and sorrow. When Kemmerich is finally gone, Bäumer tries not to think about it, hoping that if he forgets his grief it will simply go away. He finds this difficult to do, however, and his thoughts and words become more choppy and short as his sadness wears him down. He takes his friend's things and goes back to the barracks to see that another friend "stands in front of the hut waiting for me. I give him the boots. We go in and he tries them on. They fit well" (33). They both cover their grief with their actions but the choppiness of their statements betray their inner strife. If they would only show their pain, let their sorrow run its course, they would be able to move on. Yet they do not and condemn themselves to endless despair. Paul's body itself shows its affliction = he begins to "feel a hunger, greater than comes from the belly alone" (33) His body hungers to let his passions out. The emotion eats at him from the inside out, making him hunger for happiness, however hopeless it may be.

Consequences of Selfishness

Author's Note: This is a response analyzing this quote:

"There were thousands of Kantoreks , all of whom were convinced that they were acting for the best – in a way that cost them nothing.

And that is why they let us down so badly."

I wanted to analyze both the message and the way it was delivered, and hope I did so well.

Mankind has in its nature a rather selfish aspect; he often believes, especially in times of crisis, that what is good for him is good for everyone. He forgets that others might be affected differently and he acts without remembering them. This can cause others great harm, in disasters such as war especially. Paul’s quote illustrates the self-interest that all men revert to when threatened and lets the reader hear the thoughts of a soldier affected by that egocentrism. This sentiment is not shown only through the words Paul writes, however. By stopping his thought and breaking to a new line before stating his disappointment, he hints at the subtle way that self-interest can affect others. The effects of Kantorek’s influence came slowly, creeping along and pretending to be logical, to be the right thing to do. The problem was, Kantorek wanted only to be seen as courageous, brave, strong. His selfishness led the boys who followed him into a deadly situation they couldn’t escape: the maws of war. They didn’t see it coming until it was upon them, pinning them down in a living hell, just as Paul’s reaction is sudden and harsh.

The effects of selfishness can be seen nearly everywhere – in government, in work, in family. It is a timeless problem with timeless consequences and will be around as long as man is. The Watergate Scandal is a prime example of this. Nixon wanted to keep his power, both in money and in presidency, and he followed what he thought was the best path to doing so. He ignored the possible consequences of being discovered and as a result threw America into fear and near chaos. He never gave thought to the effect discovering a corrupt president could have on America and its people until it was too late. But even small lapses can have an effect on many people. A teenager who decides to drink at a party forgets all the others who might be affected. When they are caught, their mother and father are humiliated and ashamed of their parenting, their siblings share the bad reputation, and their friends no longer know who they are. Thinking before doing, looking before leaping is necessary in keeping those around you from being hurt.

Short Compilation

Author's Note: I was looking at Mrs. Wood's response to Jekyll and Hyde a few weeks back, and I was inspired to do something similar. I compiled several quotes that inspired me, and meshed them together into one (very) short prose/poetry piece. I'm not sure if this counts as a writing response or not, but I liked it, so I'll post it.

I lingered but a moment at the mirror. At that time my virtue slumbered; my evil, kept awake by ambition, was alert and swift to seize the occasion. It was then my new power tempted me until I fell in slavery. The ugly face of my iniquity stared into my soul. Instantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged, the animal within me licking the chops of memory. This brief condescension to evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul.

Quotes:

“I lingered but a moment at the mirror…” (108) “At that time my virtue slumbered; my evil, kept awake by ambition, was alert and swift to seize the occasion…” (109) “It was on this side that my new power tempted me until I fell in slavery.” (109) “…the ugly face of my iniquity stared into my soul.” (117) “Instantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged.” (116) “…the animal within me licking the chops of memory.” (118) “…the brief condescension to evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul.” (118) “…he thought of Hyde, for all his energy of life, as something not only hellish but inorganic.” (122)

The Fear of Life

Author's Note: As I read through Jekyll and Hyde one last time I came across this quote: “I began to perceive more deeply than it had ever been stated, the trembling immateriality, the mist-like transience, of this seemingly so solid body in which we walk attired.” (105) It really stuck a chord in me – how fragile is life!

At a moment’s notice, life could end. Snuffed out like –that– with no one the wiser. There is no life without death, no morning without night, and yet we fear it. Why?

As men we think we are invincible, and we fear anything we cannot conquer. Death comes, and we watch it take everyone on earth, and we know that someday it will come for us. There’s nothing we can do about it either, with all our medicines and technologies and miracles: everyone dies. It’s a fact of life.

No one knows what death means. No! –don’t say it means we are no longer alive. We all know that: what does that mean? Is there another life we go to? Perhaps we travel to our judgment. Perhaps we all convene in a meetinghouse and torture those who did wrong in life. Or, perhaps, there is nothing. We simply die, game over, adios. The fear of the unknown is man’s strongest of fears, and there is nothing we know less about than death. It’s only natural we fear what we do not know.

We risk death every day, every time we get up in the morning, every time we open our eyes, every time we take a breath. Living, in its essence, means death. Perhaps not today, perhaps not tomorrow, but someday all of us will die. We fear it because it is inevitable, because it follows us everywhere, skulking in the shadows and lurking just behind us with every step we take.

This makes our fear quite ironic, really. Life cannot exist without death: life means death: life is death. And yet we both fear death and idolize life. Ah, such is the petty nature of man, to hate without knowledge and to fear without despair.

Hidden Selves

Author's Note: As I read through the chapters of Jekyll and Hyde, I was struck by the repeating motif of 'twinship' and duality. This was the result:

As man goes about his life, he carefully selects the things that he chooses to hide and those he chooses to share with others. In every man, there is a side he hides, a part of himself he locks away and refuses to let anyone see, including himself. However, the more he acknowledges this side, the more he shows it or considers it, the better he can understand himself and that who his truly is. This self-understanding and control is the basis on which the novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was written. Stephenson, however, adds a second layer of description of this through a constant motif of ironic duality. Jekyll himself states that “man is not truly one, but truly two.” (104) His own second side, which he gave the name of Hyde, is the complete opposite of the side he shows to society. However much Jekyll hates the new man he discovered, he can never quite bring himself to destroy it. This is because it is an innate part of him, a part which he had merely ignored until that point. If he had given that side of himself a small chance to rise before giving it free reign, Hyde would have been better controlled, better behaved, better received. Because Jekyll had pushed Hyde back, completely repressing him until Hyde was suddenly given complete control, Hyde didn’t know how to control himself; he went primal, responding in ways that kept him safe but were not socially acceptable. Had Jekyll taken the time to know his other half, he would have been able to control it: his lack of knowledge made him helpless to mediate between his two sides.

Good vs. Evil: Is there really a difference?

Author's Note: I read this quote from Jekyll and Hyde: "There’s a rather singular
resemblance; the two hands are in many points identical: only differently
sloped.” (55) It made me realize that there is very little difference between a good person and an evil one. Good and evil have exceedingly similar qualities. The only difference between good and evil is the perception one has when judging
them.

"Killer!"
The muttered word echoes through the otherwise silent cell. The guards shove the prisoner inside, lock the doors.
"You don't deserve such a light sentence, you murderer."
Thirty-five years.
That was the sentence. Thirty-five years in a prison cell for pushing a man out
a window and down four stories. The time seemed so little, and yet so much.
The prisoner sat hunched over, clutching her knees and hiding her head behind her hair. The silence was oppressive, a more menacing presence than the guards or the other prisoners. A small sob escaped her mouth. Her shoulders shook, and she
succumbed to the tears.

She hadn't meant to kill the man.
He had been standing over Julia - her precious Julia - and she had heard the girl crying. Her daughter didn't cry for much, she knew that. Her daughter was brave. And that man - she didn't know who he was, and no one had the right to be so close to her Julia! She had rushed over, pushed at him, made him back away from the child.
He swore, but she had paid him no attention. Julia was bleeding, and that was of more importance. She lifted the girl gently, prepared to take her home, but the man grabbed her roughly. "Stop it!" she had cried. "Leave us alone!"
"I don't think so," the man had growled. He pulled at Julia, tumbled her from her mother's grasp. The girl screamed.
At the scream, her mother had snapped. Letting out a ferocious cry that only a mother knows, she hit at the man, anger suffusing her body. Her intensity surprised him, and he flinched backwards. His weight hit glass and the crystal shattered. He fell backwards, crying out in fear as he plummeted downwards.
He had been hurting her daughter, but now Julia was safe. That was all that mattered. She hadn't meant to kill him.

Author's Note: While reading Jekyll and Hyde, I noticed many places where Stevenson includes the Faust theme, warning against beeing to devoted to finding knowledge. The quotes "...hitherto it was his ignorance of Mr. Hyde that had swelled his indignation; now, by sudden turn, it was his knowledge" as well as "but now his imagination also was engaged, or rather enslaved" in particular caught my attention. This poem is a response to those quotes.

Uncertainty, curiosity, mystery
Driving me to question all-
What I had been told
What I had thought truth

I don't know but want to
Need to
Will
Will find the answer

And do, but only to find a
Question

Another question
Another problem
Another need to know

I don't know but want to
Need to
Will
Will find the answer

And do, but only to find that
The answer enslaves me
Closing me in a labyrinth of mystery

Never to escape.

Trapped

Author's Note: This is the short story I wrote for the final. The goal was to depict a defense mechanism and work on characterization. There's really no background info you need to know, so... enjoy!

The walls were moving.

That was the first thing he noticed when he opened his eyes. The walls were moving.
They were rippling, changing, the fading and peeling white paint creeping closer and closer so slowly it almost seemed that it wasn’t moving at all. He narrowed his eyes at the attackers, jerking himself into an upright position and hugging his knees to his chest. They were trying to trick him, but he wouldn’t let them. He could see the movement, and he refused to be pulled into
their deception.

Getting up, he stumbled to the center of the room and dropped back to his knees. Staring. The walls noticed his anger and faltered, ending their movement for a moment. The boy let his breath out in a harsh puff of satisfaction and heaved to his feet.

He walked to the door and tried to open it.

The handle was stuck again.

It was always stuck, but that was only to be expected. It was conspiring with the walls, he was sure, and so of course it would resist him. He sneered at it, twisted it one last time before letting it go, assuring it that he was not done.

Moving over to the opposite wall, he pressed his back against it and slid down until he was sitting on his heels, his arms crossed before his chest. The walls – they were the apparent enemy – were his worst challenger and adversary. But the boy knew that they were by no means the only one. He settled in, waiting. GLARING at the door and ready for any move it might make. It was nervous, he could tell, and refused to stir for a long time. He waited for the inevitable. Sooner or later it would relax, and he would have to show it his superiority again.


He was right. The door opened.
He flinched and stiffened, instantly regretting the show of weakness. Too much of that, and the walls might get ideas. They might begin to think they were getting to him.
NO. Can’t let that happen. Surrender is impossible, of that he was certain.

Now the door was trying to tempt him into submission. It was a regular ploy, and he supposed that the door thought he would someday succumb. It was a valid thought. The food did smell good. And he did always eat it, in time, as soon as he made sure the walls were pausing in their attention. It was hard work, watching them all the time, but necessary work as well.

Then the voice came. The horrible thing always did. The most human thing the walls ever did, it crept into the crevices of his mind and his heart and struck deep into his soul. It enthralled and yet it repulsed. It twisted and coiled around and around and his body and chipped away at his carefully crafted defenses.

……… can ……… you ……… hear ……… me

His eye twitched, and he firmed his mouth. Closing his eyes tight, he swallowed, a hard gulp ricocheting in silence the echo left behind. As the floor below him creaked, his eyes snapped back open, wide and frantic. Focusing on the door, he forced himself to still once more.

……… can ……… you ……… hear ……… me

He refused to answer. He would never succumb to it. Defeat was out of the question.

………look………at………me

The boy trembled, almost imperceptibly, and tried not to blink. Mustn’t show weakness – mustn't let the walls win.

The voice gave up, as it always did. The door closed, and the resulting BOOM echoed throughout the room. He smiled, exultant, and stood up. Walking over to the closed door, he yanked at the handle, ensuring its security and establishing his control. The handle was always stuck, he knew, and that was good, safe, right. Imagine – a door not stuck! The very thought was absurd – ludicrous, even – and a small smirk appeared on his face. He made certain that it lingered just long enough to let the room see it.

He was laughing at them – didn’t they see? – they had no power over him. It was he who ruled here, HIS door that stuck, HIS walls, HIS food – oh!
He remembered the food quite suddenly, and tentatively – very tentatively – the boy came to touch it with tremendous caution, and to jerk roughly from its terrible strangeness. He reached down a second time and lifted it to his mouth.

When it was gone, he stood, wiped his mouth on his arm, and paced to the corner. Leaning into it, he slid down until he was crouching low on his feet. He wrapped his arms around himself and settled in. His eyes darted around the room.

It was starting again. The walls were gaining back their courage. They inched, bit by bit, less slow, less fearful, less caring of the belligerence of the boy. He shuddered in the wake of their newfound power.

The walls kept sliding, penning him in and driving him toward the center of the room. Frantic, he dashed to the door and rammed his body against it.


It didn’t even flinch.

He backed up and, letting out a war cry, sprinted forward. When his second assault had no effect, he hammered his arms on the door, sobbing, crying, begging, screaming out his anger and fear. He couldn’t breathe – his head was spinning – his vision was fading –

His body slumped downward. His hands scrabbled to keep their body erect, but to no avail. His head drooped to his chest.


The door flew open.


He drew in a shallow breath, nearly unconscious. A puff of air brushed his skin in return – then another– then another.


The air gathered and pushed at him, lifting his head. He moaned – of course the air would join the conspiracy! – and slumped in defeat, all his fight gone. The air solidified under his torso and legs and raised him up easily. He floated through the room and was set down on a bed.


He watched frantically as straps fastened themselves around his limbs. He sensed the proximity of the walls nearly closed around him. They were going to win, he realized. They were going to win, and he was helpless against them.


He didn’t want to watch, didn’t want to give them the absolute power of triumph. He closed his eyes, and gently drifted into oblivion.

---

The walls were moving.

That was the first thing he noticed when he opened his eyes.



Mimic Lines (from The Black Cat)

“I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others.” (86)

They inched, bit by bit, less slow, less fearful, less caring of the belligerence of the boy.

“Pluto – this was the cat’s name – was my favorite pet and playmate.” (85)

The walls – they were the apparent enemy – were his worst challenger and adversary.

“…and gradually – very gradually – I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence…” (88)

…but tentatively – very tentatively – the boy came to touch it with tremendous caution, and to jerk roughly from its terrible power.