Why?

Why does life have to be so difficult? Why can’t people get along? Why do we hate, and why do we kill? Why do we hurt those we love, and allow ourselves to be hurt? Why do we seek our own happiness while denying another’s? Why does the grass always seem greener on the other side? Why are mountains so hard to climb? Why do I feel despair when I should feel joy? Why? 

Kick Me Again And I’ll Come Up Grinning

A body blow,
A psyche slam,
I know I should have let it go,
But Hope’s a stubborn thing you know,
And so here I am,
A crippled wreck,
My emotions at your beck
And call, and all I ever get,
Is kicked again, and then again,
And then, just when I think it’s better,
Hope peeks out,
Till I get your letter,
Like a bitter cold and icy wind,
And Hope rescinds,
My house of cards blown well apart,
Knives twisted in my naïve heart,
Shattered,
Though my face won’t show,
Still I know,
This will repeat itself,
My Hope won’t stay up on the shelf,
It’ll peek again, try to be brave,
Till one day you dance upon my grave.

Rewriting Parker

Love deludes.
Friends betray.
Joy eludes.
Jobs underpay.
Success evades.
Beloved pets die.
Depression invades.
You might as well die.

Dorothy Parker’s original brilliance:

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren’t lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

My Little Demons: the book

Due to the popularity of last year’s book, I decided to do another one for this year’s Christmas. It’s a lot bigger in size and content than the previous edition and has a hard cover. I’m also super pleased with the title.

It didn’t take nearly as long to put together since I made the decision to limit the content only to pieces written and pictures taken in 2012.

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Reflections on 2012

It turns out that 2012 was a pretty good year for me, despite the setback of losing my job. I did more traveling this year than I’d ever done in my life. I flew to California in February, visited London for the first time in June, and then flew to Oregon to visit my sister and stay with my dad. In between those big trips, I traveled to different parts of Sweden to meet with old friends and make new friends.

All these experiences were reflected in my creative output for 2012. I wrote a lot poetry and did a lot of paintings, the latter of which I usually ended up giving away as gifts. I was also invited to contribute at K Shawn Edgar’s collaborative poetry site, Carbon Noise Poetry.

If you’re just as curious as I was about what I was posting online, here it is, without further ado:

I wrote approximately 80 poems in 2012.

Rhyming pieces outnumbered free verse pieces three to one.

I posted twenty-five pieces at Carbon Noise Poetry, three of which were totally original to that site.

In addition to the poetry, I also posted about fifteen longer pieces, in which I discuss, analyse, or simply complain about things.

Finally, I posted nine pictures of paintings I’d done, though I actually painted a lot more than that.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with what I’ve written and created this year. Out of the dozens of poems I posted, there were quite a few pieces that I’m very happy with and proud to have written.

So goodbye, 2012. You gave me lots of stuff to write about. Here’s hoping 2013 will be just as inspirational.

My Dickensian Christmas

Christmas Eve 2012,
And as darkness settles down,
Swedes around me celebrate,
Through all of Stockholm town,
But me I sit reservedly,
As that’s where I come from,
Awaiting Christmas ghosts deservedly,
Past, Present, and Yet To Come,
For I like my Christmas Dickens’ style,
With just a slight dark edge,
Putting everything I’ve done on trial,
Having many bets to hedge,
You see Christmas Eve for me,
Is all about anticipation,
More good than bad? We’ll wait to see,
The result of that equation,
Perhaps old-fashioned, I’ll admit,
This weighing up and warning,
Yet for me somehow it makes legit,
The magic of Christmas morning.