claudiapena.com

Anyone who says that life is clear,
Ain’t never seen a mirror
Talked to my mother,
Or met my ex

I lost a suitor today
‘Cuz I’m too thin,
He beamed and said,
“I knew you back when,”
When?
“Back when you was sexy,”
I laughed and left
Ain’t no winning for me here

I lost a suitor before
‘cuz I’m too thick
“That ain’t the way I met you,
That ain’t the way you been,”
I laughed and left
Ain’t no winning for me there

I picked up a cigarette
And told myself to smoke
I felt the sounds of Didgeridoos
And the currents rushing in

I woke up the next morning
Craving just one more
I laughed and
Promised one next week

Sometimes there’s just no winning
No breaking even
Just a giving in
So I laugh and wonder
Where the wind will wish
What I’ll be giving in

To Bukowski, this freedom, this explosion from the gut, was his reason to write.

Poetry: B&N is coming out with the 50th Anniversary Publication of Leonard Cohen’s poetry Book of Longing, plus they have the excess Sinatra book (with a cd) for under $10 if you are an educator. (yupee!!!) While you’re there check out Kerouac’s Manuscript of Howl. He had well over 18 versions an kept all the revisions as well as editor’s rejection letters and revisions, which by the way were brutal. Also, I totally dig the audio in Skywater’s journal…nice touch!

Local: For educators, the Chronicle’s forum is one site you definitely have to keep track of. This is one place I praise the internet for being a truly democratic community. A parent’s voice matters just as much as an administrator’s. Don’t forget the HAMP event today at St. Arnold’s.

Blogosphere: I like Linder’s take on freelance writers, the artistic view of our generation by Chris Jordan, and the positive words of Gurashabad. I was really impressed with Ivan Illich’s educational philosophy for the informal educator. If your surfing days/hours are becoming a prob, check out Yvonne Russel’s blog and some of the resources she has to offer. Mr. Brittain made me giggle with his signature line: “Happiness is often doing what you want to do. Longevity is, quite often, doing what’s right. Life is, more often than not, balancing what gives you happiness versus that which gives you longevity.” Amen, brother.

I’ll end with the best pick up line by one of my girl friends, the Nunez: “Baby, you so fine. I want to pour milk all over you and make you part of my complete breakfast.” When he doesn’t call or bite, she’ll come back, “I’m sorry baby, I didn’t know you were lactose intolerant. Let me pour orange juice instead…Soy milk?” LOL!!

I hear you in silence:
Living life wishing you were dead,
negotiating with your body to just let go in its sleep,
bargaining with the heavens
to rescue you from misery.

At least in sleep
your brain is turned off and free,
in an endless muted weep for the
Maybe tomorrow,
Maybe next week
I’ll turn the corner
and be as I wish I could be

Chorus - There’s no point to anything,
What’s the point of this?
When you’ve lost your faith in everything,
You lost your will to live

Drugs and alcohol
are not an easy access
So now it’s rock and roll
and tobacco
You can make the noise louder than the nothingness
But how long can it keep?

I wish I could have enough faith for the two
An extra portion of love and care
But the more I give the less I have
And now I don’t even have enough for me

I stopped answering the calls,
checking the mail,
searching for you in all the avenues and wells
Wondering how you been
Do as you will
You always do, and always will
Get some help
Talk it out
Love your self
If not for you, than for the service of others

Chorus 1 and 2

Dear reader and essentially my family,
I sat down long and hard to think about bearing so much of myself to the world. I was always taught that family sticks together no matter what. I know that my decision to cut my brother off from my life monetarily and physically was going to cause alot of feelings, specially for my brother. I had to think about all the possible consequences to endure and the how: What if he actually commits suicide from his depression and how would I deal with it? I really hope my grandmother doesn’t stop talking to me because of this. I hope I haven’t lost my brother’s friendship. What if there is something I could have said or done to help him and I didn’t? Why in all my years of education can I not find the words or actions to cure this? I don’t know if I have lost “face” for my family but I know I’m not the only one dealing with this.

My best friend finally sat me down and lovingly said, “Claudia, I have heard you talk about your brother like this for two years. You are doing him more harm than you are doing good.” Two years? I think I have exhausted all avenues in this time and the feeling of failure took over, which for me means apathy and inaction. I can no longer honestly say maybe next week he’ll get better. I can do nothing for him at this point but listen and love him from a distance because up close it really hurts.

So, if my brother and family read this, hopefully more than once: I didn’t give up, dude. I just faced the music. Sometimes, I wish others would have been as persevering as I have been with you, but I guess that’s how we learn, quickly. My prayers, love and ear are yours.

My heart and support goes out to the families of those who persevere with mental diseases. Keep strong.

Sincerely,
Claudia Pena

Drum up the djembe,
stomp off the dust,
Make it primal,
Make it real,
Like excited monkey talks

It’s the last week of poetry month
Let’s all disassemble
We gotta get wicked,
We gotta get wild,
We gotta make poetry
out of every mound

We gotta speak our song
Howl at the wind
Make the colors
sound sound sound

Let the ghost of every past and present
ranter, writer, poet
possess my soul
Treat me like a ragged doll

I’ll take you, my poem
all tethered and bound
This is the last week of poetry month,
Poetry, come caress me
Set me loose, set us free

I am encouraging anyone who reads my site to write a poem, if you send it and it’s clean, I’ll publish. Come on closet poets, I’ve already gotten a emails with beautiful poetry. Celebrate national poetry month and give the soul happy words and twinkle feet. This poem was written in a laundry mat:

OOPS! A couple of corrections have been made to last poem if you get it on Google reader. Thank you to my loyal readers for helping me catch mistakes and making my writing better. A comment from the man himslef, Mr. Baca, via email: “thank you for kind words…and i like your poem very much…” Call me darling and slap the gloat out of my face tomorrow; today I bask (Texas, ya’ll, Texas.) Did you know Sandra Cisneros, Maria Palacios and Ed Sanders have been among the few famous visitors to this blog? Famous bloggers also include tisha, latimer, tonnet, mailart, Ronald, Jonathan, Marty, villager and you. (Marty, I am so not techy savvy but I promise I will do some more updating to my site and getting a feeder button.) It’s about the art form and the connection and I appreciate everyone’s feed back; thank you for reading.

Around town: My mentor will be presenting her original craft on the life of Frida at TBH this weekend.

Poetry News: The joy of being in the blogosphere have brought me these wonderful sites starting with Lederer’s “have tongue will travel” site, Kurt’s rules on writing poetry from gotpoetry.com, and the wonderful wordorigins.com. The website I gravitate the most still continues to be poets.org now with a find a place where you shout the poetry that quivers in your little soul: the poetry map. BTW, I have to thank MyBlogLog.com for the amount of exposure and connections to my site. The Blogosphere will observe a day of silence for the victims of the Virginia Tech incident, pass it on.

I’ll end with the following: “When women love us, they forgive us everything, even our crimes; when they do not love us, they give us credit for nothing, even our virtues.” given by L. Rivera from Ry’s and Flaco’s version of “Girl’s from Texas.” Because the wrong man can drive a woman to insanity and the right one can bring her back in motion.