Jes Lee

A New Year

I have started, and deleted this blog post three times already.

This year has already had so many ups and downs, it hardly seems like a new year anymore! But it is, and like every other year, standing at the top of it, I do think back on how many things have changed, how I have changed, and look forward to the shiny new year to come.

What do I wish for this year?

For more peace and goodness in this world.

To survive my job and the challenges it brings.

To learn what I really love, try new things, and know it is ok if I don’t love/choose to do/enjoy all the same things the other people I enjoy being with do. I know that seems simple, but it was a big revelation for me last week.

There are a few people who have already made a huge difference in my little world this year, more than I can ever tell them.

My goal: to live with more gratitude, not that I was living without it or unable to express it before, I am just feeling today like there can never be too much. The more, the better.

This year, John and I ended and started 2014 and 2015 in one of our favorite countries, visiting some amazing and very generous friends. I am very lucky! There will be photos and posts about that trip very soon.

In fact, one other thing I realized already this year, is that I like this little blog, and even though I have made many resolutions to post more, I believe I actually will this time.

 

 

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I am not pretending…

…that these poems are good, or finished. Many of them will never make it any farther than this blog, and that is ok. A few of them will be edited, and re-worked and added quite possibly added to something else farther along. These poems are first drafts. It isn’t easy posting first drafts here where anyone could read them, but it also isn’t easy writing a poem a day and for a week I have accomplished exactly that.

Day 1:

The urge to run
Still tastes new to me.
To go get my love
Jump in the car
And drive.
To pick a cardinal direction
At random
And see what it will eventually show.

My muscles tense as I drive
A sense of responsibility keeps me
To freeways and roads I know
As expected.
Always as expected.

It isn’t all that bad
Staying here.
The princess doesn’t like car rides anyway.
But the desire to escape
Only gets stronger.

Someday
I will just drive.

 

Day 2: (Writing about Digital and her latest persona. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, ask me! Or come see the artwork I will have up in June at MCBA!)

she makes maps
from the photos
plotting journeys
and adventures
making mementos
and journals
keepsakes
a human would treasure.
her treasure
is the raw data
the digital paths
left without knowing.

 

Day 3: (a long meandering poem)

She ticks off tasks
sets reminders
organizes
alphabatizes
everything she has been programmed to do
and more

long work days end
where i find myself
tired
brain dead
but there is relief
and a bit
of hope.

The urge to run is a little less today.
buckle down
instead
finish tasks
check mark
check mark
check.
maybe it was the sunshine today
the need to get paid
the need to complete something
the need for relief.

Tomorrow is new
and hopelessly hopefully incomplete
for now.

 

Day 4: (two short poems about Digital)

She wove stories for
Her human
Using resistors
Like thread
Delicate needlework
Her only hope
That her work was
Appreciated
And that she could
Be loved.
Trees built like train maps
Each branch scattering off
Junctions
Cross roads
The end of the line
The tip of a leaf
Routes meandering
Journeys to and from.

 

Day 5: (a haiku, just because)

Snowflakes in April
Seem not so uncommon here
As each spring day flees.

 

Day 6: (from inspiration on the NaPoWriMo blog: write a farewell to something)

farewell to the night
farewell the the skyline
lit up in millions of tiny lights
farewell to the atmosphere
with the billions of stars and planets
farewell to the moon
farewell to it’s shadowy face
and farewell to the river
the collector of reflections
gathering the lights in it’s watery layers
replicating the atmosphere
duplicating the skyline
and rocking it all to sleep with the waves.
farewell to the night
until tomorrow.

 

Day 7:

Today was work
nestled in between
two lovely drives spent
listening to music
blasted through car speakers.

Today was work
stuck in between
the not quite daylight hours
that exist at either end of the day.

Today was work
jammed in between
day dreams of trips
of long car rides with music
of finishing this day
this project this series
and floating away.

Today was work
but I am no longer in between.

 

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