Yawning Hollow

For my English 3440 Class (Intermediate Poetry) we were asked by our professor Dr. Laura Hamblin to create a chapbook. What's a chapbook?  Well, I had no idea either so don't feel too stupid.  Basically, back in the old days in England a chapman was a bookseller, and a chapbook was a small, inexpensive book of poetry, ballads, stories, etc.  At least that's what the Internet Machine tells me.  So basically my chapbook is a small 20-page book of 12 poems and photos from our trip to New York City.  It's kind of cool.  I ordered two of them (one for my professor and one for me) and they should arrive on April 8th.

A quick story about the title.  One of my poems contained the phrase "gaping hole" which everyone in my workshop considered to be too cliche.  So in the revision process it eventually became "yawning hollow" which is more unique and has a really nice sound with the assonance.  In fact, I liked the two words together so much that I made it the title of the collection.  Runner-ups included A Burnt Out Match and Gin-Soaked, also phrases from the included poems, but in the end I just fell in love with Yawning Hollow.  So yay for workshops and harsh criticisms!

Anyway, the book is just $8.99, and while I originally wasn't planning on selling it, some extra cash doesn't hurt anybody, right? Ha ha.  So buy one if you love me.  Or you can read it for free right here in the preview...

Yawning Hollow by Jack Garcia | Make Your Own Book

The 850 on a Wednesday Morning

Riding on the bus this gray morning. A man with a goatee asks a woman in a beanie two rows away how her kids are. Apparently they know each other. She tells her sad story. He tells his. One of them works too hard at a low-paying job. The other has cancer. They laugh about it. Maybe they didn't know each other. Maybe they just met. A kid with a sharp part in his hair interrupts them to ask about the Front Runner. Immediately maps and transit routes are pulled out and everyone seems to have a different opinion on how to go about it. The boy nods his head, looking more confused than ever, but the other two are happy to have helped. The group conversation turns to fish sticks.

I'm not sure why I'm writing any of this down as I eavesdrop, but people-watching is one of my favorite hobbies. I suppose I just find people interesting. It's a strange thing how we all live our separate lives, weaving in and out of others and their lives, yet somehow we bump elbows and pause just enough to make some sort of connection, even if it's with a stranger on a bus.

We need each other, don't we?

Hurt

I am hurt.
I'm hurt because I hurt you,
I'm hurt because he hurt me,
I'm hurt because I hurt the both of you.

You can hurt someone by loving them
too much or not enough.
We hurt the ones we love,
for love is often pain.

Passionate fingers leave purple bruises
on skin as soft as silk.
Pulled hair.  A bit lip.
An aching separation.

We love yet we hurt and we hurt yet we love.
We only hurt and go on hurting
until we find the pain pleasurable
and convince ourselves we're happy.

Disney Magic

So... I made a goal of blogging at least five minutes a day and true to Jack fashion have not followed through. I am not a follow-througher. Follow-througher? Apparently I can't keep my resolutions but I am one hell of a word-maker-upper.

I'm also a good excuse-comer-upper because I blame the lack of blogging on our trip to Disneyland. I was busy flying through space and saving princesses and meeting talking tow trucks. So blogging? Ain't nobody got time for that!

So here we are driving back home from our trip... Some place called Primm, Nevada. We need to pee. And blogging from a gas station urinal gives me the perfect opportunity to reflect on this crazy trip. It was four days packed full of Disney magic: rides, shows, fireworks, a tiki room full of singing birds and great pineapple floats. Oh, and let's not forget the Monte Cristo sandwich and pommes frites. We got them two different times.

But unfortunately our sore feet, empty wallets and overstuffed bellies weren't the only casualties. Some nerves were frayed, some relationships tested and we learned that magic doesn't come from a mere flick of a wand. Sometimes magic has to be fought for and worked on and seen through to the end... but if you're willing to put in the effort, the magic really is worth it.

So I need to stop this not-following-through thing and make some magic in my life! In school, in work, in love... Otherwise, it'll all go down the toilet.

Waxing

I've decided that I really need to try and blog more. Not so much because I need to get a higher readership or because I'm particularly worried about keeping you all updated on my life, but because in my day-to-day schedule I find that I'm not writing very much. And what I do write is for school. They say that every writer should at least make it a goal to write for 5 minutes every day. So start the timer.

Yesterday I got waxed. My legs and my eyebrows. Millions of hair follicles were gently coated in a warm, soothing wax, lulling them into a sense of false security. And just as things were starting to feel really nice, they were yanked awake in one swift motion, ripped from their home in my milky flesh and left for dead, abandoned on a strip of paper to be discarded forever.

The result? After an hour and a half of this repeated process my legs were smooth as a baby's. But did that make me feel any more attractive? Any sexier? Any more confident? Yes and no. The yes is more surface level and the no runs a lot deeper. Wax can't seem to pull out the insecurities and negative self-image I've let set root in me. If only that we're the case.

February?

I'm not sure if any of you are aware, but it is March now.  Yeah, March.  I'm not sure what exactly happened to February.  Maybe March ate it up like chocolates in a heart-shaped box.  Gobbled it down so quickly that it didn't even notice whether it was coconut-filled, caramel or raspberry-creme.  Just gone, like that, in a flash.

Well, over President's Day weekend Brian and I flew to Colorado to watch my little brother get married.  It's pretty crazy, but in a 6-month time frame my entire family got married.  My sister in August, me in November and Daniel in February.  All of us 3 months apart, can you believe it?

Of course, how could any of you know that considering I haven't blogged about it!  I'm so sorry.  The trip was great.  I enjoyed spending time with my family, especially my adorable baby niece!  My dad and I had some good talks over coffee, my mom took us out to dinner and my brother's wedding was simple and small, but very sweet.

The rest of the month was a blur of work and school and friends.  Some of us went out to a really fun piano bar in Salt Lake City called Keys on Main and had an absolute blast.  Our friends even paid to have the pianists play "It's Raining Men" and somehow coerced us to get up on stage and dance.  Well, either they coerced us or the cocktails did.  Probably the latter.  Then our month capped off with Oscar Sunday, which is by far the biggest and most celebrated gay holiday of them all.  We had a great time watching the ceremony with Brian's family followed by hot tubbing with friends.

So while February came and went in just one bite, it left me pretty full and satisfied.  Now we're almost a week into March... yikes.