A World of Choice.

I'm a writer, I think...Or at least I was.

I have not written anything for months. I have not had time and I have been afraid of my own words; my own voice.

Between forging a new career and studying I have had no time to write...correction, I haven't made the time. Part of me has fallen out of love with the process. Some of the attraction/my passion stemmed from the dream of one day seeing myself published. I don't have that dream anymore. Despite this colossal realisation, not even my new career can match the passion I once held for writing.

I have decided that I am having a love-hate relationship with my writing. I'm sort of at a loose end. Kind of like a relationship you have with another person that has soured because one of you cheated (that would be me) and though the passion has dimmed considerably, the nostalgia prevents you from moving on. The memories plague the back of the mind and old feelings resurface, but then you remember your present situation and you feel so tired. Tired that you bothered to remember and too tired to want to try again.

I'm at a 'minor' crossroads in my life. I now have time to focus on my writing, though I'm not sure that I want to. I have told people that I will, because I think that is what they want to hear or should hear or whatever. Not only am I battling...deciding what to do in respect of my voice, I am mulling over a number of choices/decisions at present, some of them life-altering. It's not uncommon for me to wonder if I did myself, my writing, a disservice by not taking it seriously earlier on. Then it flips; perhaps I should have never tried to turn my first love into anything more than it already was. I ran out of steam. I over-analysed. I let fear and failure grip me and push me into a completely different direction.

I have this space which I use sporadically. I do not advertise or promote it on social networking sites. On the odd occasion I have linked some pieces to family and friends, to get an opinion from those who know me best. This place is what it is.

As a writer...as a person who truly used to love writing (even the very act of writing!) I am at a crossroads.

Between Me and You.

Our disputes. Arguments. Fights. That's what I called them.
You referred to them as discussions or disagreements.
I always feared these because to me an intense and often heated discussion was not a good thing. Growing up in a matriarchal household it was what we did.
Argued. Constantly.
And it wasn't good for the soul. For the heart.
If my mother argued with my father, it wasn't passionate. It was bitter. Ugly. It was what I knew.

I did not know two people could have a heated discussion and it was just that.
I thought it meant the end of something (positive) and the beginning of something else (negative). My views of positive and negative were, and still are, all over the place. When we would disagree I would get angry, frustrated and believe we were arguing; thereby ending something (what it was) and beginning something else (what it wasn't). I did not know that a man and a woman could disagree, argue even, and it be ok. It always spelled the e-n-d for me.

Thankfully my view on this is shifting.

Revelation

I did not know that I could write my name
With your anger,
In my own blood.

© shellyhu

Workshop

I sit humiliated.
White paper empty.
Black Biro silent.
Its scratchings prevented from occurring,
As it lies beside its master.

My eyes rove around the room.
No eyes meet mine.
Heads are bent to paper.
Brown hands diligently writing away,
And I tremble slightly.

The feeling of not belonging creeps over me and begins to suffocate and I wonder why I am here.

The clock is ticking nearby.
The scribbling continues all around.
With the exception of where I sit.
I sit humiliated.

© shellyhu

Thought.

Within the deepest parts of me
I know what I truly want,
But I tell no one.
And God? He already knows.

© shellyhu

Only Human

At times I feel like I don't belong anywhere.
Always having to prove the goodness of my heart,
And my intentions.

Your dislike for me becomes a dislike for myself.

How do I stop your thoughts from clouding, and becoming, mine;
Ingested and digested but never excreted.
Too much waste for one person to carry (around).

To you, my exterior is like a cactus.
But to me, on the inside, I am the plant without sunlight:
Fragile.
© shellyhu

Crickets In My Bed

Sometimes I cannot breathe,

Oftentimes I cannot sleep.
And I wonder...

My heart tells me I loved you first.
According to them He was there before,
And I wonder if my heart is big enough for the both of you.

You are all consuming and I want it this way.
I have names for you: Friend. Lover. Husband. Soulmate.
But I am promised to someone else - that is what they tell me.

Humanly speaking, you are the closest person to me.
Yet, at night, when the lights are out and my bed remains cold
I speak to Him.

There are fragments of me that you are not privy to.
I feel the need to hide the smallest parts of me,
And offer them as proof that He has all of me.
Am I kidding myself?

His message of Love is how my life should be;
Everything else is just a mass of confusion.
I feel myself changing and within the deepest parts of me
Metamorphosis is painful.

My throat aches from holding back the 10,000 tears
That threaten to drown us both.
I feel like I'm fighting for the three of us,
And I wonder if my heart is big enough.

Sometimes I cannot breathe,
Oftentimes I cannot sleep.
And I wonder...
© shellyhu