Normally I wouldn't use this as a forum to post my poetry/writing--if I was interested in doing that I'd create another blog with a nice, clever, avant-garde title--but I'm kind of proud of this piece. It's a sestina and it took me a couple weeks to write, which is the longest I've ever spent on a poem. The way I see it, even if a sestina seems forced (which mines does, at least to me), it's a good writing exercise--a way of disciplining and organizing your thoughts that can lead to new forms of expression. This is also why I am a fan of rhyming poetry rather than free verse, although some free verse (especially that of ESM and COS) is just as powerful in both form and content as rhymed poetry.
Anyways, here it is. The title is tentative, pending a lawsuit from Clint Mansell.


Ghosts of Things to Come

The moon is cold, the wind is bright and clear,
I shiver, clutch my coat, and think of home--
But home - where's that? Is it the place I live?
Or where I've lived--my house of eighteen years?
For as I close the door, I greet the room
That holds me, but upon me has no hold.

These fragmentary thoughts are hard to hold
And in their scattered ramblings nothing's clear.
I lie, exhausted, in a foreign room
This transitory place that isn’t home.
For home has ceased to be these past three years
As in suspension I have come to live.

Yet there's a certain joy to know I live
This way; my future is my own to hold,
To mold and sculpt through all the passing years.
It would be nice if something here was clear,
And if I knew which place to call my home--
But for those luxuries, I've had no room.

And when I've moved to yet another room,
Another place to sleep and eat and live,
I'll let those things convince me it is home
A place that that lets me keep some kind of hold
On who I am--but even that's not clear
Since who I was has vanished with the years.

The days go by. And weeks. And months. And years.
My overbearing schedule leaves no room
For idle thoughts. The future seems quite clear:
I'll find a girl, a house where we can live,
A bed to share--a place where we can hold
Each other close. Yes, then I'll have a home.

And when I've found this imaginary home,
That dream that kept me sane throughout the years
Maybe then this doubt will lose its hold
On me, and calm contentment will find room
Inside my worried head and help me live
In quiet peace, with mind and conscience clear.

I'd like to think there's room to hold these hopes
Within me, and live out my numbered years
With that clear sense of home to soothe my soul.