A Poem

Let me preface the process of this, and why I chose such a traditional or 'rigid' form of poetry. First, I prefer to explain this in terms of painting. If you are starting off, no one teaches you how to paint Picasso or Dali first off. We start with traditional realist methods to portray reality to encourage creativity in looking at objects and people so that the artistic process can go forward with skill instead of just some mad conception of what they want to portray. Otherwise you end up with crap like this:

Without craft and skill, then your poetry can suffer. And so, I wrote this poem in the most traditional of forms: a sonnet. Now, typically, there are only two versions of a sonnet, English and Italian. They both have 14 lines, and their differences lie in the rhyme scheme and stanza breaks.

Here is an example of an English Sonnet: {A,B,C,D, E, F, G added}

Shakespeare's Sonnet 34

A Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day, B    And make me travel forth without my cloak, A    To let base clouds o'ertake me in my way, B    Hiding thy brav'ry in their rotten smoke? C   'Tis not enough that through the cloud thou break, D   To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face, C   For no man well of such a salve can speak, D   That heals the wound, and cures not the disgrace: E   Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief, F   Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss, E   Th' offender's sorrow lends but weak relief F   To him that bears the strong offence's cross. G   Ah but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds, G   And they are rich, and ransom all ill deeds.

There are four implied stanzas, ABAB, CDCD, EFEF and GG. The A lines rhyme with A lines, the B's with B lines and so on. Each line is also in iambic pentameter, which means there are five feet of Iambs. These are a bit confusing to the layman. An Iamb is a metrical foot consisting of an unstressed then a stressed syllable.

An example of a single word iamb is outdoors. outDOORs. The 'door' section has the emphasis.

So one of the lines would be read, with emphasis on the italicized, 'and they are rich and ransom all ill deeds.'

I decided to follow this form, I don't feel like delving into the Italian sonnet. To sum up, it is also an iambic pentameter meter with rhyme scheme [ABBAABBA][CDCCDC] The final parenthetical can often vary.

So my sonnet is more similar to the English form, with one difference: It is iambic tetrameter, meaning there are four feet of iambs instead of five. The rhyme scheme is also ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG instead of the other way. I liked it because it moved it faster, but after thinking about it and the subject, it may have been wiser to use the pentameter for its dwelling power. My mind works better in tetrameter, though.

Now, I'm using this traditional form as a stepping stone to a free verse version of a poem to conceive my thoughts on the event, which was in Damascus, VA at a party. The woods erupted with literally thousands of fireflies, and it just was something I never think I'll see again (which is an element I want to add)

But anyway, here is the first draft of this iambic tetrameter English sonnet that I call "Herald's Sparks."

While walking down the grav'ly road
with friends beside and night so close
the party lights behind us glowed
and waxing night arose.

The three of us we gently wait
in grass so cool and softly rolled
down to the forest's pillared gates
where twinkling stars above patrolled.

And waxing eyes begin to see
the twinkling stars below the skies
emerging from the blackened trees
a host so bright - a thousand flies

Parading as some distant king
girdled with light will morning bring.

Please leave comments!

The Most Incredible Trip Ever Part V: "Pale Blue Dot"

So, I lieu of the fact that it has taken me absolutely forever to finish these posts about Brandon Kelly, Josh Henderson and I's trip to Boston in May of 2010, I have compiled a list of the links below for you to refresh your story experience as you read this new, and hopefully final installment in this epic saga. 

PartI:
http://thecoldword.blogspot.com/2011/04/most-incredible-trip-ever-part-1-smoke.html

PartII:
http://thecoldword.blogspot.com/2011/05/most-incredible-trip-ever-part-2-then-i.html

PartIII
http://thecoldword.blogspot.com/2011/05/most-incredible-trip-ever-part-3.html

PartIV
http://thecoldword.blogspot.com/2011/06/most-incredible-trip-ever-part-iv-stay.html

So, we begin at the close of the final show of The Receiving End of Sirens. Josh was dripping in sweat, Brandon seemed okay and I was almost at dehydration. Utter and complete exhaustion was beginning to set in as we pushed our way to the front for this picture:

The security guards were having a hissy fit to leave, but we still rebelliously took this.

Anyway, we began to funnel out and saw Michael yelling about All the Day Holiday to sell some merch and stuff, so we asked him if they were staying with us tonight. Nathan was beside him, and they both seemed excited to stay in our room. As we passed them, we saw Mark, whose nose was still running like some toddler and he asked, "Yo, we getting crazy tonight!?" Oh silly Mark.

So we told them to call us and I could give them a parking pass for the hotel lot and escort them to the room. Once we got back, we took a quick set of showers so they could have them for the morning. We lounged around the room for a while until Daniel called. We met them in the lobby, looking like a crazy rag-tag group of punk kids in this super nice (3-4 stars maybe?) hotel. I handed Daniel the parking pass, and helped carry stuff to the room. Josh, earlier wanted dinner, and like a good gluten intolerant person, wanted pizza. So just before they came we got 8 large pizzas for 40 dollars delivered to the room.

1 large pizza for every man.

They were delivered to the room as soon as they got there, and believe me, that room was packed. But we just all laid around wherever, on tables, chairs, the floor, the bed... maybe the bathtub. They brought up a few brewskies and we just generally had a good time joking, talking and enjoying one anothers' company.

So the pizzas... we literally had 1.5 pizzas by the time we finished. I know I ate half of one, considering I hadn't eaten since 10:30, but Josh, who, remember is allergic to wheat, so that's bread, at an entire large pizza. 

Inconceivable!

But everyone had a slice for breakfast in the morning.  As the night drew on, people got a bit silly. Josh and David both decided it'd be a great idea to prank call the other rooms. This was horrifying to me at first, but now, knowing we'd get away with it, it's rather hilarious.

Josh would call this random room and just ask, "Hello, is Batman there?" To which people would ask either, "Who is that" or "No, I don't think so." We had caught these people right in REM sleep and were totally taking advantage of their grogginess. But the shenanigans stopped, and we got ready for bed.

All the Day Holiday gave us the beds, which was very gracious of them. And they slept on the floor. However, there was one space in the bed open, and Mark managed to get it with Brandon. Since the two of them were both having major allergy problems, it figured they should sleep together. As they got under the covers and the lights went off, I heard Mark turn over to Brandon and said, "Hey, I've got to sleep naked....It's my allergies."

Which, just thinking about it makes me laugh, if you knew Mark it would be 1,003 times more funny, but I'm really writing this for myself, Brandon and Josh.

So we finally went to sleep...


Then we woke up!
The guys got ready, we packed up, I got some of their Merch and packed it up in my bag. We said our goodbyes, I checked out. We got this awesome picture and prayed over one another before they drove off. They offered us a ride to the Greyhound station, but it was such a beautiful day, we figured it's be a nice mile walk.

So we began our trek to the Greyhound through the beautiful Worcester, MA. This was seriously one of the nicest towns I have ever been to in my life. Clean, elegant, well laid out and very very pretty. As we walked Brandon told us about this church service he went to that morning at a Methodist church we could see from our window. He said it was pretty, but didn't really have much of a spirit to it, which made us all a bit sad.

Anyway, I'll show you some pictures:

It took like 100 tries to get this!

As you can see, it's just nice and eclectic

Clearly not a bus

Their beautiful transportation center was being renovated

Anyway, we got our Greyhound tickets to Boston for about $15 and got into downtown within an hour. It was a sleepy ride. I read most of the time and by this time I was over halfway through with Camus's The Plague.

So we wandered around, and decided to go to Chinatown where it was Buddha's birthday celebration going on! Weeee! Well we saw they were giving away some free stuff if you poured water on some crappy porcelain statue, so we did it and got these little hanging things with some Chinese lettering on the back held up by a very pretty knot. I got the crappy one, which made me angry!!!

If you could zoom in, you'd see a sun disk (a reverse Swastika) on Buddha's chest

Anyway, lucky us, we got escorted to talk with this big name Buddhist Priestess about Buddhism. Lucky us. She was bald and had on an orange robe and spoke very good English with only a very slight accent and was very polite to us.

So she asked us about ourselves, and Brandon did most of the talking.

She asked our names and we went around: Brandon, Josh ... Cameron. She had a tough time with my name.


"Cameron? That's a very unusual name!"

A little later she found out we were Christian and tried to show us the similarities.

"Now you believe that if you do good, then that will get you to heaven right?" she asked.

"Well, that's not what we believe. We believe you can't do enough good to ever get to heaven. That's why we need Jesus," retorted Brandon wisely.

"Ah!" she exclaimed, "you are reformed!"

First of all, I was amazed that a Buddhist new that term, when 9 out of 10 American Christians have no real clue about reformed theology.

So in spite of the fact that she knew the differences, she went on with her self-help drivel, full of pithy statements and the importance of cleaning one-self up. She would talk about how people would seek advice from her, and this is straight from her lips, "I cannot help you, until you help yourself."

It made me sad to think about all the people who seek salvation from their own broken-ness but don't know about Jesus and his work to save us from ourselves. That's why I love Jesus, he's not an ambulance driver or some motivational speaker, but a heart-changer.

So we wrapped up conversation there, being happy about Jesus.

We walked away downtown in Boston, and Brandon and Josh were making fun of how she didn't know my name, and I went, "I should have said, 'Yeah, well Buddha's a dumb name." I haven't heard Josh laugh that much in my life. He literally squatted on the ground and laughed into the ground like he was vomiting happiness. Luckily, it was a holiday Sunday and almost the whole city was empty.

Perfect Band Picture

Anyway, we walked around for a while taking in the sights and such. We went to the site of the Boston Massacre and other nice places around Boston whose names I cannot remember. It seriously is the most beautiful city I have ever been to. It is the only city I would ever move to in the North. We went around to the Holocaust Memorial in Boston. It was very sad, but hopeful and every bit of its architecture taught a lesson and told, unabashedly about the horrors committed. It was a place of deep sadness and memory that just came down hard on all of us.

A plaque in the memorial.

We moved on to the Old North Church where Paul Revere did his thing with the lanterns alerting the Colonials about the approach of the regulars. Then we went on up the hill to Copp's Burial Ground which has graves that are hundred of years old. It is a very well kept place and is just astonishingly beautiful and peaceful.

Next we went to some dessert shop Josh recommended to us for a snack. That place was incredible!!!! I got some slice of chocolate cake, and I hate cake, but this was brilliant!

Just a smidgen of Boston Commons

So then we moved on to somewhere else, I believe it was Boston Commons, which is this incredible park right in the middle of downtown Boston. That place is beautiful. This park puts Central to shame. It is pristine! There is literally nothing out of place, all the gardens are well maintained and all the fountains were completely clean. There was a wedding shoot going on there, and it was incredibly touching how beautiful it was. We walked through there into some rich neighborhood and stopped in front of some nice clothing store for a while. And by a while, I believe it was about an hour. Our feet were killing us, we had to have walked around Boston for 5 hours taking in all the sights, and were planning on walking to Fenway soon, so we decided to rest. And, wow did we look like homeless dudes. Dirty, stinky, poorly dressed with backpacks.

They had many pretty sewing machines, though!

We sat outside and just waited for someone to tell us to leave, but no one did. As everyone walked by we just said thinks like - "Asians are number 1" "Dresses are number 1" "Being fat is number 1" "Being skinny is number 1" "Being white is number 1" "Being snooty is number 1" "Heels are number 1"

This spawned a huge amount of jokes about everyone who walked by and is forever immortalized by the three of us for just about everything.

So we walked on to Fenway, and then met some homeless guy and got dinner with him at McDonalds. I don't remember his name, but I hope he remembers us. We told him about Jesus and why we fed him. He seemed to ignore us, but I'd like to think that it meant something to him.

We got to Fenway, and there was a game about to go down. It was absolutely packed, and it smelled like beer and hot dogs like all baseball games should.  Then we caught a bus to downtown, then to the airport where we hoped to get inside the gate. Which didn't happen. By this time, my feet began to hurt very badly. I was suffering from tendonitis at the time, but didn't know it. It didn't hit me until I had sat for a while outside the gate.

So we did our usual shenanigans. Made collect calls to people under names like "Batman" and "Bilbo Baggins" [what's with all the B's?] and no one answered but instead said "This isn't real!" It was funny for a while. We grabbed some wheelchairs and some Arab lady took them from us saying that other people need them.

First of all, it was midnight. There was no one outside the gate at all. And what old people are going to use those wheelchairs at midnight!? But we gave them up. I stole another later and used it to get to the bathroom since I couldn't walk I was in such terrible pain. We pulled together some benches and tried to sleep. Josh went over to some restaurant and slept on their booths. I had no clue where he went. Brandon and I seriously thought he may have been arrested. But, being good friends we didn't do anything about it.

Sleep didn't really happen. It sucked. So when the gates opened at 6, we got our tickets and went through and waited for our flight for a few hours. Dawn came up and reminded us how tired we really were. We got on the plane, where I finished The Plague. I can't sleep on planes, so I just read. We had no ride from Raleigh to home, so we made calls and texts as soon as we landed, and luckily the incredible Caitlin Stevens offered to pick us up. We just crashed when we got back. Josh got Cookout, ate, and slept for 23 hours. I had an exam the next day and just spent about an hour studying. I got an A.

That was it. One of the greatest memories I have ever had. Now, leave comments, and tell me how awesome this story was. Here are some more pics.

Our favorite picture

This trip was number 1