Irreparable Failure

As always, it has been far too long since I last wrote anything extracurricular. Despite the fact that I tell my students "a little bit every day," I write so infrequently. I think we're all familiar with the ubiquitous penchant for giving good advice but not taking it.

Also! I haven't written a poem since April! I was glancing through my little database, and April was the last one. I feel like I've written something more recently, but it may have gotten lost in cyberspace.

I've been trying to figure out why I haven't written a poem – a serious one anyway – in a while. My first guess is just that I've lost so much heart or heart energy or something like that. The past few months have been rough, true enough, but one would think that'd give a poet that much more material. My other suspicion is that I've been ending my evenings late. Back when I wrote poetry most frequently, it was near midnight when my inhibitions were worn away. Nowadays, I've been watching a few episodes of Game of Thrones, brushing my teeth, and going to bed.

Too many things. I regularly feel like God's world is too big for me and I am too small. I'm trusting Him more though. It's been a piercing, flooding, rejuvenating encouragement to be spending time with people – the body of believers especially. I avoided people for a little while, and it took its toll. Even so, I see bold changes between my current self and my recent self.

Speaking of Game of Thrones, it's been an encouragement to see people battle through harsh realities and come out the other end still alive – and not just alive but still resolute. Alive or dead isn't such a big deal. If I had had my head hacked off in some battle, so be it. The resoluteness is what inspires me though. Even though the show was adapted from a series of books, the characters are still especially well-written. Every one of them has gone through varying degrees of misery. One of my favorite interactions is between Brienne of Tarth and Jaime Lannister who has just lost his hand.

Brienne: "What are you doing? Eat something."

Jaime: "I'm dying."

Brienne: "You can't die. You need to live, to take revenge. You have a taste, one taste of the real world where people have important things taken from them, and you whine and cry and quit. You sound like a bloody woman."

I think I've been like Jaime in the recent past. For too long, I didn't have to struggle; things came easily to me. Then I started experiencing normal, everyday challenges, and I began to collapse.

There have been so many other scenes that have been encouragements to me, but that one stood out most vividly.

I was recently talking to a kind, older man at my dad's church. Long story short, he shared stories about his divorce and about when he went through bankruptcy. It was encouraging to know that neither divorce nor bankruptcy can be a final say on a man's life. I have dreaded the two like they were hell itself: irreparable failures that would permanently tarnish my worth. More and more, I realize they're just shitty situations that have befallen many, and many of these people have gone on to honor God, live their lives, and even see some peace and prosperity.

Too much fear. I have lived in too much fear. I have found myself to be very much like my nieces and nephews – roughly 6-year-olds. I have seen such consuming despair about pajama pants that were too long. I have seen consuming despair about a lost Lego top hat. I have seen such consuming despair about a missing blanket. Add a couple decades, and I have had such consuming despair about a job rejection. I have had such consuming despair about a passing comment. I have had such consuming despair about varying degrees of crap. It's exhausting to say the least.

I'm still pretty poor, but I've chilled out a bit.

In the mean time, I still haven't written a poem in a while. I haven't touched my guitar in months! I try to tell myself that sadness holds me back, but I really think it's just the oppressive heat that dissuades me. I don't sense it very clearly, but I think the lack of guitar in my life has caused a sad gap. I'll get back to it.

I don't even know what's going on with Werbel. He's still stuck in that stupid pit. I have no idea how to introduce Xormite. I have no idea what Brind is doing. I don't what sort of defenses the lizards really have. I don't know what the village is planning on doing. I should probably think less and write more. I've been imagining that I should officially set aside Werbel as a healthy but longwinded exercise in writing novels and just start something in earnest. Tetraearth will definitely have to wait, but I really enjoyed the few pages I wrote about Jacob Jacobsson, my time knight.

And then there's the bloody awful process of trying to get a thing published. But not yet. I have to finish a bloody book before I can start whining about that.

I sorely need a new poem.

Student's here! Gotta go!