Sunday, June 26, 2011

The Beginning...

Dear John,
   There are so many things that I want to say to you, that I have longed to tell you for some time but could never quite get out. I cannot begin to tell you how long I spend thinking about all that I want to express to you when I see you or just simply when I hear your voice. The funny part is that the mere sight of you or the mere resonance of your voice makes me forget the very  words and emotions I spend hours trying to express to. So much so, that I am rendered silent and the very things I muster all my courage to express to you~[about you, about how I feel about you, about our past, present and the future I hope to have with you some day]~ remain within the confines of my mind and my heart. Perhaps this blog will became the holder and keeper of these thoughts and feelings and perhaps one day I shall let you read it so that you may better understand me and understand our past over the years. For now this is it; more to come in subsequent day.
                                                            -W.G. Roo
     I started out writing this blog for an English class this past semester, but I figured while I have this blog I might as well keep using it...

Monday, May 9, 2011

Pink Institution

This book by far has been one of the most interesting and complex books I have read in college. At first, I really didn't like it because I didn't understand why the pages and the text looked so weird. After doing some research on the book and after our class discussions, I started to understand it better. The further I read on and the more I re-read each page or section, the more I got into the flow of the book. The pictures and images inserted throughout also added to the aesthetics and the overall concept behind the book. The breaks or gaps in between the words, the sentences or even the different sections gave me time  to take in each word, which allowed for a bigger and better portrait to be painted within my head about the events that were taking place. I think the funniest thing for me was the section that talked about  foot prints on the ceiling because it reminded me of The Simpsons movie when Homer is excited about the spider-pig who walked on the walls and ceiling of the house. The description of this triggered my mind to hear Homer Simpson singing "spider-pig, spider-pig..." This was a unique book, to say the least, but one that will be ingrained within my mind for some time to come.

Post Modernist Re-write

I decided to do my post-modernist rewrite of a scene from my story "Never Did I Ever". I've never really done this before so here goes my first ever attempt...


Let                     go                         my

          wrists                  gripped                  tight

    arms               pulled                     above.

           
Liquor                I              smell                  you

              don't           stop               can't

 stop                 you              I                      try

             can't                  break                 free

 need                  escape                 help       
    

         some         one          any             one

        help                help              help

 He              spreads             me             open

      open                he              wants             in

  I                  want                     out

        faster                    faster             faster
   
                 harder                 harder

    IN             OUT             IN              OUT

         almost                 there                 thrust
                   thrust                  done

        He                     smiles
              
                    I                        cry

         

Friday, March 18, 2011

The Book that Gets Me Through the Toughest of Days....

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!        
 by: Dr. Seuss

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You're off to Great Places!
You're off and away!
You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know.

And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.
You’ll look up and down streets. Look’em over with care.
About some you will say, “I don’t choose to go there.”
With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you’re too smart to go down a not-so-good street.
And you may not find any you’ll want to go down. In that case, of course, you’ll head straight out of town. It’s opener there in the wide open air.
Out there things can happen and frequently do
to people as brainy and footsy as you.
And when things start to happen, don’t worry. Don’t stew.
Just go right along. You’ll start happening too.

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!
You’ll be on your way up!
You’ll be seeing great sights!
You’ll join the high fliers who soar to high heights.

You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have the speed.
You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead. Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best.

Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.
Except when you don’t.
Because, sometimes, you won’t.

I’m sorry to say so but, sadly, it’s true
that Bang-ups and Hang-ups can happen to you.
You can get all hung up in a prickle-ly perch. And your gang will fly on.
You’ll be left in a Lurch.
You’ll come down from the Lurch with an unpleasant bump. And the chances are, then, that you’ll be in a Slump.
And when you’re in a Slump, you’re not in for much fun.
Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.
You will come to a place where the streets are not marked.
Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked.
A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin!
Do you dare to stay out?
Do you dare to go in?
How much can you lose?
How much can you win?
And if you go in, should you turn left or right…or right-and-three-quarters? Or, maybe, not quite?
Or go around back and sneak in from behind?
Simple it’s not, I’m afraid you will find, for a mind-maker-upper to make up his mind.
You can get so confused that you’ll start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.

The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.
Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.
No! That’s not for you!
Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying.

You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing.
With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high!
Ready for anything under the sky.
Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!

Oh, the places you’ll go!
There is fun to be done!
There are points to be scored.
There are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do with that ball will make you the winning-est winner of all.

Fame!
You’ll be famous as famous can be, with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.
Except when they don’t. Because, sometimes, they won’t.
I’m afraid that some times you’ll play lonely games too.
Games you can’t win ‘cause you’ll play against you.
All Alone!
Whether you like it or not,

Alone will be something you’ll be quite a lot.
And when you’re alone, there’s a very good chance you’ll meet things that scare you right out of your pants. There are some, down the road between hither and yon, that can scare you so much you won’t want to go on.
But on you will go though the weather be foul.
On you will go though your enemies prowl.
On you will go though the Hakken-Kraks howl.
Onward up many a frightening creek, though your arms may get sore and your sneakers may leak.
On and on you will hike.
And I know you’ll hike far and face up to your problems whatever they are.
You’ll get mixed up, of course, as you already know.
You’ll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go.
So be sure when you step.
Step with care and great tact and remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act.
Just never forget to be dexterous and deft. And never mix up your right foot with your left.
And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.)

Kid, you’ll move mountains!
So…be your name

Buxbaum
or Bixby
or Bray
or Mordecai Ale Van Allen O’Shea,
you’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So…get on your way!


I had an Edgar Allan Poe moment...

A Dream Within A Dream
                   by: Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow--
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand--
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep--while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

On Revisions...

For most people, when told to make revisions to a piece that they have written whether it be a peom, a story, an esaay so on and so forth, they make what I call surface changes (i.e grammatical or mechanical changes). For me however, revisions are extensive changes that are applied throughout a piece. If an idea, image, character, or scene need to be developed, re-written, or deleted entirely, I do so; but i can only do so after I have had a few different people read my work. Than and only than, do I make alterations based on the feedback from readers. I find that if I re-read my own work, I do not catch half of the mistakes or changes that need to be made that others do when they read. Revisions are an author's chance to enhance and perfect (and I use that word loosely) a piece of writing.

                                                                                                                           -W.G. Roo

10 Stories from the past 3 days....

1. The time I fell down a flight of stairs and dislocated my hip...
2. How my duck got the name Jorge...
3. My boss is all over the place...
4. I joined a sorority because I lost a bet...
5. My mother and I don't get along because...
6. My niece and nephew...
7. I was walking to class and a girl busted her behind in front of me...
8. Car accident on my way home...
9. Went to Connecticut for a Greek Leadership conference...
10. I was engaged; then I wasn't...

Story Ideas Within My Mind...

1. Young girl runs away from home; after years of her mother's mental, physical and emotional abuse, she packs a backpack of clothes and essentials, and leaves everything behind.


2. 18 year old, college freshmen gets engaged and finds out  a few days later she is pregnant. What to do, what to do?


3. Teen boy gets pulled out of class one day during school, and summoned to the prinicipal's office; he enters the office to find two cops awaiting his arrival. He soon finds out his father has been killed in the line of duty.


4. Stay at home mother of two; work-a-holic father; the youngest of the two children vanishes.


5. Young man loses his job of 15 years; married, father of three, and now unemployed. He is told by some that he is overqualified, told by others that he is underqualified, etc; the weight of it all is bearing down on him;

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Poetry Magazine: Published Work

Insincerity
   by: Carla Marie
{ http://www.poetrymag.com/poem.php?id=1563&listtype=1 }

Sweetness is the weapon of choice
Used by you
To lull me
Into complacency,
Sex me
Into assumed feelings,
Titillate me
Into counterfeit impressions

The kind of hurt that your weapon brings
Is the kind of hurt
That ultimately
A fool like me
Cannot even
Cry her way through…

Sweetness is the weapon of choice
Used by you
To sing me
Into Artificial Notions
Affirm me
Into contrived emotions
Tranquilize me
Into false belief

The kind of hurt that your weapon brings
Vacillates between
Insult and indignation
Insult
That you underestimate my intelligence
Indignation
That you continually choose
Hamburger over
Steak
… Metaphorically speaking

Sweetness is the weapon of choice
Used by you
To fool me
With the tenet
That I am a well loved woman

Your sweetness is an effective weapon

For a while…

But your sweetness is insincere

And insincerity

Has no staying power

Food for Thought....

"The role of a writer is not to say
   what we all can say,
   but what we are unable to say"
                    ~Anaïs Nin

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Touched by An Angel

 by: Maya Angelou

We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.

Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.

We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free. 

http://mayaangelou.com/

Delectably, Supple You Are to Devour

This is my metered poem, Assignment #2 for anyone who did not receive a hard copy in class
You consume my
every thought;
yearning to 
feel you,
to taste you,
to bask in your
supple glory.
Stiff you are not,
nor rigid are you;
adaptable
to my touch
to any touch.
Flexible,
malleable,
Oh so soft and sweet.
Your sweetness
enticing it is,
mouth-watering
that too it is.
Pleasure comes in 
devouring you;
enough of you
is never enough;
catching every drabble
every dribble;
delectably, supple
you are to 
devour.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Ode Poem of My Liking

Body

by: Alissa Leigh

Map of terror and pleasure,
ardent junk, passionate congress
filled with the arguments of chemicals,

Echo chamber for the fanatical cries
of stubborn generations, all the quaint invisibles
death has grown a beard on,

labyrinth of desire, playing field of impulse,
factory where decay's silent armies clock in,
philosopher-clown blowing a horn at each epiphany.

Washed by the rough nurse of morning,
wheeled into the ward of the afternoon,
feeds, grateful, on the rich broth of dusk.

Reads the erratic cards of dreams,
turns on the rack of insomnia,
steals the two-bit grace of sleep.

Loses its name in foreign embraces,
forges a passport to the country of tenderness,
gestures like a child at the thing that it wants,
opaque from its own breath on the glass.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=30911

Saturday, January 22, 2011

my FIRST post

Hello! I don't really know what to say because this is actually my first time blogging. This isn't so bad actually. I guess I should start by telling you all a little bite about myself. I'm 21 years old, a senior in college (due to graduate this upcoming December hopefully), I'm in a sorority, and very involved in school....I'm what you'd call an overachiever. I came into college as a nursing major; I loved nursing but I'm not a trash receptacle for information. I love to questions things, to argue points, to analyze and read between the lines all of which nursing did not allow for me to do. Writing and reading (English) in general was always my thing so I changed majors. I have now been an English (writing concentration) / Middle School Education major since my sophomore year. College has definitely been great! I've learned a lot about myself in the process and I've actually learned some too. I've had to read a few works by this great writer Ian McEwan absolutely fell in love with his writing. Check his website out some time http://www.ianmcewan.com/publicity.html.... You know this blogging thing isn't half bad. More to come, soon!
W.G. Roo