You’ll find countless articles and memes and inspirational posts telling you that it is times like these that need poetry more than anything.
And it is times like these where I need poetry more than anything. To find myself lost in language, swimming in the sounds and nuances of words, patterns, orders and all.
To make a line or two that sings, so that there is more song in the air.
And yet. It is times like these that make me silent.
It is spring in the northern hemisphere and I have no doubt there are flowers blooming near Kiev, in spite of everything. Perhaps to spite everything, to show the world that spring has come again.
And yet who am I to write poetry about the flowers in Ukraine?
And yet, are the flowers in my yard, reaching for the sky any less worthy of poetry?
The weight of the outside bears down on the pen, the weight of the news, of the struggles from January to the present cannot be sung away. They must be sung about, sung to. Lifted up high to the light.
I’ve said before, that it is not “write what you know” it is “speak for yourself” and myself is wanting to get lost in a spring garden.
It is a post about guilt? How could it not be. How dare I lament my poetic silence when there are real issues, real problems, real poets facing them, out there.
How dare I want to write about the fireflies instead of the flares falling, instead of the darkness of an El Salvadorian cell, instead of love and identity endangered even if it hasn’t yet been found. Especially if it has not yet been found.
How dare I be safe at a time like this, safe enough to lament not being able to write poetry without guilt.
How dare I write a self serving blog post about it.
Sigh.
Times like these make poets, they forge poetry in fire, blood, in the flowers that grow from the ruins left in the wake of time.
But who am I to pretend to be one of them.
Also, trans rights are human rights. Fuck terfs.
