Palmtree Contemplations

My girls made me stay in the bathroom for ten minutes before sending someone to lead me back to the cabin. We made very exaggerated small talk on the walk back through the trees as though there was nothing going on, although we all knew there was. When we reached the cabin, they threw open the door, pulled me in, and proceeded to serenade me with a parody of Kelly Clarkson's "Breakaway". It was silly, filled with references only we understood, and incredibly off-key. Halfway through, I wanted to cry, but there was more. They made a neon green "Early Birthday" card (VERY early, since my birthday's not until November), bought me a Blue Lake shirt that they all signed, and filled a Blue Lake mug with Skittles, M&Ms, and AirHeads. Then they presented me with a picture of WonderWoman. "See? I gave her green eyes and brown hair like you," one of them told me. "And her suit is blue with white and black because you like blue and play the piano...

It is evening and you are four, Walking in your nightgown To see the golden, gleaming moon. It is morning and you are sixteen, Scribbling a prayer in vivid blue ink Beside the dew drenched field. It is twilight and you are ten, Jumping and sliding in thick mud While night-swallows swoop by. It is afternoon and you are seven, Running in your bathing-suit Beneath the gutters gushing rain. It is barely light and you are fourteen, Sighing with simple delight As you wake and warm the piano. It is midnight and you are eighteen, Swinging with happy eyes shut 'Neath stars and a trembling tree. It is June and you are twenty-one, Writing remembrances by lamp light To keep away forgetting.

When I was nine, my father built a large bookcase that stretched from the smooth cement floor to just below a crossbeam supporting our rafters. You could say that the Palm house was held up by all the knowledge stored on that bookcase. Over 500 titles stood proudly on its shelves. If they were particularly large and cumbersome, they knelt pages down and spines up with their fat, attractive corners silently pleading to be grasped and opened. Even then, I saw myself living out my days in some apartment filled with books: leather bound journals featuring my own adventures, novels that should have been read by everyone but were not, volumes of poetry in original languages, and dusty histories with photos of the author on the back of a fraying, half-torn paper cover. Scattered throughout the apartment would be all the books my father had passed onto me from his own exquisite bookcase. Two weeks ago I arrived home to Brasil to help my parents move back to the States permanently. One of m...

I sank into a blissful dream Of mysteries and hidden things, Never caring for the consequence The stolen moments soon would bring.   For when the mists receded And dreaming was no more, I woke to find myself in sunlight, Not more rich, but poor.   Then I wept and hid my face, I filled the silence with my cries. For the blissfulness was only dreaming. All I wished had been a lie.  

It was late Thursday night before Spring Break when Sean drove me back from Pour Jons. Thursdays are always long, but this one was particularly draining, and cold besides. I had neglected to turn in a rough draft of the Music History final paper a week earlier, and was attempting to complete it before Spring Break. This involved hours of typing, highlighting, and analyzing alongisde all the regular homework I was doing. After an hour at Pour Jons with some friends, I left to try and rest before the chilly morning arrived. As Sean pulled into the parking lot, we discussed our current papers and future projects. "Honestly, I don't think I want to do all this for the rest of my life," he said. "Do what?" I asked. He had just finished animatedly explaining his idea for a History paper, and I could not see where the conversation was going. "All of this. In the History department the professors push becoming a teacher or getting adoctorate, but I really don...

The Swan Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river? Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air - An armful of white blossoms, A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned into the bondage of its wings: a snowbank, a bank of lilies, Biting the air with its black beak? Did you hear it, fluting and whistling A shrill dark music - like the rain pelting the trees - like a waterfall Knifing down the black ledges? And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds - A white cross Streaming across the skyt, its feet Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river? And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything? And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for? And have you changed your life? Explication of Mary Oliver’s poem “The Swan” This poem dramatizes the speaker’s memory of seeing swan and being struck by its beauty. Using metaphors and similes, the author recreat...

Dear Susan, Ever since my parents told me about your cancer, I have been meaning to write you. Also, last week, I read that wonderful Shakespearian sonnet that Emma Thompson put in Sense and Sensibility and immediately thought of you. Then again, I almost always end up thinking of you when I read Shakespeare, ever since that first day when I walked into your class, and you taught me how read the Bard properly. It's been years since I was your drama student, but the memories of drilling lines on that bare, black stage have stayed with me. Many of the best memories from that time are of you. I even find myself mimicking some of your "Susanisms." For example, whenever I lead a small group study in classes I almost always end with that line of yours, "Any comments, questions, or concerns?" Do you know, it's funny, I heard you say it so many times that now your inflection has become mine. Also, if ever my hair is being willful, my mind conjures up an image of...