Simply Sincere Sentiments

I began liking poetry in eighth grade. Before that, I hated poetry. I didn’t want anything to do with it. But in eighth grade I began reading poetry, watching spoken word poetry, (shoutout to Sarah Kay) and most of all, writing poetry. Since then, writing poetry has been one of my biggest hobbies. I now have a huge collection of poems, so I thought I would share one of my favorite ones with you today because while I still don’t love analyzing poetry, I usually either understand the poem or I don’t, I do appreciate the chunking technique that we have been learning in class. It makes analyzing poetry much more tolerable.            This is a poem called Numb. I chose this one to share because not only is it one of my favorite poems that I’ve ever written ( I still don’t know how this specific combination of words came out of me) but because it has a clear shift and can be chunked for analyzation easily. Numb Take her on a roller coaster She’ll sit in silenc...

An interesting concept that I was recently introduced to is the concept of how people play hide and seek with their identities. I never realized before how often and inconspicuously this occurs. Sometimes we are the ones doing it, and other times we are the ones  being fooled and only made privy to fakeness - someone hiding her true identity.            This concept has two variations. The first is the more common one and the one  I just mentioned; people often change  the identity  they choose to present to the world. They change what version of themselves the world gets to see. They frequently, but thus temporarily, change how the world perceives them and, therefore, who the world comes to know them as. This is done by changing the way one acts. One adjusts one’s personality so that one identifies with different people than one normally would. One acquires or achieves a new perception, and thus a new identity, as both are very much int...

Identifying mentors is not something unfamiliar to me. I have even gone as far as to thank my mentors before and let them know I consider them a mentor. I think this is important in order to develop a deeper relationship with them and establish their place in your life.           The whole concept of mentors can be complicated. In my novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the grandmother Nanny is a mentor to the protagonist Janie. When Janie doesn't want to marry who Nanny advises her to, Nanny forces her into a loveless marriage. When I first read this I was immediately appalled. I would never let someone do that to me, but when you see Nanny's point of view and perspective you can discern that she did it out of loving and protective reasons. Nanny simply wanted Janie to be financially secure and well taken care of as soon as possible. Unfortunately, back in the day, women weren't seen as capable of becoming those things themselves. An...

I have grown up so much in the past year. I've been told my whole life that I am mature for my age, but this year I really feel like I'm seventeen going on forty. I just feel like I've gained so much wisdom. I got my first job over the summer and having a job, making your own money, and filing taxes is the definition of growing up. It's the most real-world experience I've had so far in my life that I wasn't sheltered from because I was a kid. It opened my eyes to how stressful a stereotypical adult life can be. It opened my eyes to how much my parents do and go through to provide me. It opened my eyes to how well they handle and balance it all so that my entire childhood I never knew how much stress and pressure they were under and how much they had on their plates. Now I tell my little sister not to beg for things she wants because I understand the concept of money so much better. Now I'm not picky about what my mom makes...

Though the public only got wind of the one telegram I sent her on her wedding day, I followed her life very closely. We were never best friends, but we sent correspondence back and forth occasionally. We knew of each other like most people in our business.           As the years went on, Grace became increasingly unhappy. She couldn't connect with her children especially as they got older. Her husband became more and more domineering as his politics became more controversial and harder to control. He took his stress out on her. He let his opponents drive a wedge between them to consequently divide the kingdom as well. It wasn't hard to turn them against each other when they each harbored so much anger towards the other already. They were so different; they came from different worlds. Neither one of them could've anticipated what their life together would've looked like. They were both so unprepared and naive if you ask me.    ...