For Who I Once Was

Who I once was
has changed.
I am no longer quiet.
No longer still.
I am raging.
For I cannot find
the shores.

I am the violent waves.
But I am a tempest
that grows weary.
I long to be
the tide that comes.
To be the docile
waves that ebb upon
the shore.
Anywhere I can call home.
And rest my head
upon the sand.

Who I have become
is ready to go down
drowning.
With arms raised.
But who I once was
is a gentle wind
calling. And it
whispers to me,
“Oh, the strength
you have.
Don’t stop looking
for those shores.”

Perhaps My New Favorite Poem

Thanks to Dr. Wildeman, I've got a new favorite.

Introduction to Poetry 

by Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem's room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

Dog-Eared

"Sometimes,

life becomes

too black

and white,"

I said.

"And we get

dull and

dog-eared

from the

monotony

of routine."

I said,

"Why not

revel

in the

magic

that comes

between

the two?

Why not

dance

in each

dapple

of grey?"