Whispered In The Wind

Whispered In The Wind
Just a fairy blowing in the wind, singing tales to the west wind

Saturday, August 17, 2013

Cut out words

Today my friend Josh came out to my little beach town with a film canister filled with cut out words. He helped me glue and secure lots of little poems all around, created from the words. They are now sprinkled all through town, the post office, sea walls, church, library, graveyard etc. Here are just a couple of my favorites.


(sea wall)
The cry that
anchored
old hand-carved
reflections


(newspaper box)
She began
selling 
books
expressing
her experience
fading
golden sands
howling peak
(dock)
I thought
history
remained silent
A proper girl
eyeing the
discovered
(graveyard bench)
The chaos had failed
all these choices
alive
or dying
the other speak sleep
try to


(park)
any sensible
grown 
ship
flies


shifted out of pocket


 (church arch)
A small town
already
illuminated
questions
turbulent waves

Friday, August 16, 2013

To Be An Artist


Monologue written from the perspective of Adi,a character in a novel I'm working on.

I'm not shy. Everyone thinks I'm shy, but I'm not. I'm just quiet, I think a lot. But I'm not sure people see that. I want them to see me as this quiet person worth getting to know, worth drawing out. You know, like I'm butterfly in a cocoon and if you just have some patience, I'll emerge. Gosh, that sounds stupid. I was trying to sound literary and stuff, but that never works. You're the writer, not me.

You always say that everyone is an artist. I don't really think that's true but I'd like to think that. It would be nice if people look at me, me who doesn't say much and just assume I'm deep in artsy brilliant thoughts. I bet Van Gogh didn't talk much either. He spent a lot of his time in his room, too. And then think of Michelangelo, he spent years painting way up high in that Sistine Chapel. He probably wasn't social either. Maybe I'm like that, maybe I just need a lot of time alone so that I can get to my masterpieces. I guess it's wishful thinking, but it's sure nice to think maybe I can seem brilliant, or I don't know just special.

You know how I collect stuff? Like that bottle collection and all those random sticks? You call me a pack rat, but have you ever actually those sticks in my room? And then there's all the sea shells and sea glass I pick up. But none of it's sitting in my room. You once asked me about that. I didn't answer you. Well the truth is, well part of the truth is, I use it. I use it for art projects. It makes me feel like maybe I could be an artist. I know I'm not, but I could be.

I don't want to tell you what kind of art projects, it's a secret. That's another thing I collect, secrets. Remember when we used to share secrets, before I started collected, before I stopped sharing mine with you? But I guess I owe you at least one secret. I'll tell you one of mine but I can't show you it. I'll tell you what I use those things I collect for.

I'm building a village under my bed. I've been building it since I was 9. That's six years ago. I didn't even tell you about it back then. I've built little houses out of sticks and bark and broken tea cups, turned thimbles into buckets, glued moss to parts of the carpet. I make little yarn figures, place them on popsicle stick chairs. I even have twine hammocks hanging from the bed frame. There's a little pumpkin patch of orange marbles and fake plants. I've even painted the back of my wall with a sky of swirls and clouds and colors. My mom would kill me if she knew. I have a small clay gnome, you know I love gnomes. The village is my secret. No one has ever seen it.

I keep a lot of secrets. They make me feel safe, I don't know, maybe they give me power. I spend a lot of my time alone collecting them or building them. I don't bring you to the Spirt House with me because you wouldn't understand. You'd think I was snooping. I guess I am. But you snoop too, what do you think all your gossip is? I know you're going to judge me for this, but I guess I just like stories. And secrets are stories you know.

You'd be amazed what I've figured out. But I can't tell you. I just want you to know. Know that I have secrets. Then maybe I'll seem important. Maybe you will actually need me. I just want you to know I know things.

Because when people know you have secrets, they know you're important. And you know who have the most secrets? Artists. They steal them and they write them down. They don't just collect secrets, they paint them, they hide them in strokes and in the curves of sculptures. I want to do that. I want to be an artist. There I said it. I want to be an artist. Now, don't gloat.

But I don't know how. I know what you say, that everyone is an artist. But they're not. I'm not. I'm not an artist. Unless the village under my bed, the secrets I collect make me one. But it doesn't. It doesn't make me an artist. Because an artist has to be brilliant, to make beautiful things. Artists are people like you, people who can write amazing things and make people cry and still be elegant. That's what an artist is. And I'm not that. I'm just this quiet little girl with a head full of secrets. That's not an artist.  

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

The Dove


 She sits on the scratched wood floor, her back resting against the slanted wall. It's dark in the room, he knows he shouldn't have picked this room for filming. He adjust the tripod, she plays with a string of her sandy brown hair. Leo looks at the two of them. He tries to ease the tension. “Well look at us, bonding in the storage room, how sweet.” Zara fakes a smile, Patrick refocuses his camera.
“Yeah so, Patrick wanted me to ask the interview questions, while he's doing artsy crap with the camera.” explains Leo.
Zara nods. Patrick blushes, looks to Zara, but not at Zara. “I just want to do a lot of close ups of your face, if that's cool, I mean.” Zara pushes a strand of hair behind her ear. “Um, why?”
Patrick doesn't respond, so Leo answers for him. “Because he's not all that good with like, you know, social stuff, so he's trying to hit on you by zooming in on your eyeballs and up your nostrils.” Patrick turns the color of a cherry tomato, Leo slaps him on the back. Zara reaches for the silver chain around her neck, rubs the silver dove pendant uncomfortably. “Don't listen to him. This is just for the school assignment.” Patrick rushes in, dropping the words at the end of his sentence.
Zara shrugs.
“Okay, enough of this crap.” begins Leo. “First question?”
Zara Nods. Patrick, with evident relief, presses the record button.
“Name, Age, Interest?” Leo asks.
“Um, Zara. Zara Schwartz. I'm 16 and I, well I'm a clown, well, training to be one.” Her eyes flit about. Patrick moves the camera closer to her, he kneels, holding the camera a couple feet away from her.
“How did you get involved in clowning?'
“Um.” she tugs at her necklace. Patrick leans forward, zooms in on her face, the prominent cheeks bones, long lashes. He can smell her, a sweet, soft rose scent, contrasted against the dusty, damp smell of the storage room. Zara tries to ignore him, she stares down at her hands.
“I mean, it's going to sound strange..but..well..I don't really to talk about it. But when I was in middle school, my stomach ruptured.”
Leo shakes his head, “What, why?!”
“I just well, I don't really want to talk about why, just well, I ended up in the hospital then and..”
Patrick scoots closer to her, holding the camera inches away from her face. Through the lens he's starring into her green eyes with gold speckles, long blond eyelashes blinking, he can see the little freckles dotting her nose. She flinches.
“Uh, Patrick?”
He moves the camera down, towards the nape of her neck, to her collarbone, farther.
She quickly crosses her arms across her chest. “Uh, Patrick?”
Leo looks at his friend. “Dude?!”
Patrick focuses the camera on her silver pendant, the dove with an olive branch in its mouth. Before she can respond, he reaches out,grabs the pendant with one hand and with one deft turn, snaps the bird off its chain. The chain falls to the ground. Patrick holds the pendant. All three look at the small silver dove nested in his palm.
Zara begins to cry.


"I want warm summer nights, to lie in a hammock, staring at the stars, telling you stories. "

"I want warm summer nights, to lie in a hammock, staring at the stars, telling you stories. "
"When asked not to make waves, I just smiled and said, don't worry this is just a ripple"