I've written a fair bit of poetry over the years. A number of them are from my Creative Writing class in the spring semester of 1991. Others I've written as the spirit moves me. (Scroll to the end of this page to see the master list of poems.)
I've tried to write a poem for each Christmas, and as well as at least one for the Easter season. The Christmas poems range from hymns to ones filled with light and ones filled with shadows. The 1999 Christmas poem was written for some Jewish friends in San Francisco. They had just had their first child, and I wanted to use that for a theme. The first letter of each stanza spells out his name of faith, Chaim-- "Life." I wanted a poem that would affirm the meaning of faith, family, and life, and I spent a lot of time just getting the structure of the poem right.
My grandparents have all passed on now, but for each of my Grandmothers I've written a poem to commemorate their passing. Tillie (Mouw) Vant Hul died way back when I was still in Junior High. Alys (Eringa) Beltman suffered a stroke in May of 1995, and died in early 1996.
Family is important, and reflecting on all that my dad has done for me led me write about how a father's hands are always there. When my brother Dan got married, I wrote a poem as a Christmas present. I wrote it as a sort of song, though I'm not a very good lyricist.
Believe it or not, I've written what might be called love poems. Stony is somewhat long, and perhaps it sounds a bit stilted, but it seemed just right when I wrote it. Seeker is patterned after e.e.cummings somewhat. Another poem, (I never really decided on a title for it) that is less overtly romantic but nonetheless involved with the addressee, has more bounce and joie de vie or however it's spelled. (I once heard someone remark that the French have great pronunciation, but miserable spelling.)
Once upon a time I took a creative writing class at NWC, and produced seven or eight pieces. I'm afraid they really aren't all that upbeat. Clockwork is partly about my aversion to those high school dances, partly about trying to find a place in the world. Fragment is about relationships-- I wrote it after a friend of mine had a spat with his girlfriend. Desire is rhapsodic, with a lot of bounce. Take it or leave it. I'm not even sure what I was thinking when I wrote Dialogue-- For all I know, it could be an unfinished poem that I forgot about. Persephone is a Greek myth in sonnet form. (Of course one of the reasons the Greek myths survive is because they point to the human condition.) Denial is more of an indictment on complacency and those who prefer to ignore life's unpleasentries. Once upon a time when I was a wee lad, my mom asked me what my favorite book of the Bible was. I responded, "Revelation." Here I got around to wondering what it might be like in the Time of the Prophet. Winter was something I quick wrote out to submit to the Spectrum, the creative writing publication at NWC. I'm rather fond of Rapture-- The creative writing prof didn't care for it though, said it was reminiscent of Donne. (This is bad? Read it again.)
How about a poem based on a dream I had one night? I heard a song in the dream, and copied down what I'd heard-- And then I expanded it into a poem called Falling Down. Interesting how the subconscious works sometimes. Closely related to it is a poem I wrote after getting called out at 2am to help the Beacon staff on campus with some computer difficulties as they were wrapping up the issue. This was fun, basically a sonnet with echoes of Frankenstein. I also recently wrote a poem for mom who broke her arm, a little thing referencing her hobby, counted cross-stitch.
Of course, the Christmas poems are here. The 2000 poem is called The Gift, and arose out of my reflections on what our parents give to us. In 2001 I wrote Roses Bloom, one of my favorites. In 2002 I wrote Christmas Ringing, a sort of tribute to the joy of children at Christmas, and a reflection of the joy we can all feel. In 2003 I wrote An Advent Prayer, a prayer that examines the coming of Christ in the past, and in the future. In 2004 I wrote A Psalm of Snow. I wanted to start experimenting the psalm form. I'm still considering if it's a good idea. The 2005 poem is a reflection on the meaning of the name "Immanuel." The poem actually started out about 4 times as long as it wound up. I kept paring it down until it was nice and compact. The Carpenter at Work focuses on the little-known person of Joseph, and speculates on what influence he may have had. King's Road is less about Christmas then the journey we take. (I really tried to avoid mimicking T.S. Eliot's Journey of Magi.)
In April 2003 my Mom broke her arm. It wasn't serious, as breaks go, but it was restricting. She was unable to enjoy her hobby, counted cross-stitch, until it had healed sufficiently. I gave a card with a poem that I'd written for her. It starts out with the phrase, "A stitch in time..." In February of 2004 I wrote a poem for the campus creative writing journal - They'd asked for people to submit poems to be used on the cover, and then they decided to forget about the whole idea and do something else. Anyway, the poem was supposed to be something that could be posted on a fridge with those word magnets, and I came up with "words fly away". I rather like this one.
I wrote a total of five poems on my London trip (and I've a few more that are only roughly sketched out). As we visited art galleries and museums, we were tasked with writing a paragraph apiece on various works of art. Six we chose from a list, six we chose on whim. I chose one piece from each day as the inspiration for a poem, and four came to fruition. I'm going to get my London journal transcribed to a web site here, and you can get more details once that's up. Briefly, they are The Artisan (which I think may be my favorite), Meditation on Antibes (vaguely zen-like), Parabellum (another favorite), and The Threefold Gift. I also wrote a poem, Cyrano's Cadet, inspired by a production of Cyrano d'Bergerac. (Which isn't really successful; I may have to rework it, or come up with something new. I've got an idea of writing something about Black Rider.) And here it is, A Bullet for Me. I'll try to put links in these poems to the works of art online if I can find them, and I'll have links in my London Journal as well.
02/23/2005 - Five new poems now, all with bird themes. The first is a one-off that's been rattling around in my head for a few years now. I was out scooping snow in the dead of winter and heard a meadowlark sing. It was uplifting, and now it's in A Song in January. I've also been working on a project of a series of four related psalms. They give reactions to the various seasons, involving different birds.
05/11/2005 - A simple little sonnet called Morning Glories. Nothing profound here, but I came up with the first line and decided to see where it took me. It's kind of in the Italian style, and somewhat Romantic. (Slightly out of character for me, I know...) [edit] I just tweaked the second line, because it was a little clunky with 'flower stems' in it. I think it works a little better now, though I'm not that happy with just the word 'stems' - Is there a better single syllable word that her hands can 'twine around?'
Christmas 2005 - Finally updating the site. In addition to the Christmas poem (see above), I've added two more poems. The first, "Speaking in Tongues," is a tribute to a young lady who was a school teacher in Pella, Iowa. She was a friend of the family, and suddenly died this summer from liver cancer. It was terribly unexpected and sad. I came up with this poem to reflect both her life and ministry in her work as a teacher, and also the hope that we have in the resurrection. There's also a poem that I wrote at the request of Tom Hydeen, at First Reformed Church. He knows I like to write poetry, and asked me to read a few of my poems in the evening church service a couple of months back. I went and wrote a new poem based on the sermon text that evening: Jesus' saying "I am the Vine." It's a longer poem than I usually write, but I wanted to explore the topic a little more in depth, and also I wanted to develop it in a way that the audience would appreciate. "Root and Vine" is a collection of four sonnet-like stanzas (Shakespearean, but only 4 metric feet per line rather than iambic pentameter). I even have an MP3 file of me reciting the poem that night, but unless there's widespread agitation for it, I don't think I'll post it.
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One thing I've come to appreciate is the need for structure in a poem. It doesn't have to be in rhymed stanzas, of course, but there must be a reasoned order to it, it must be coherent in all its parts and properties. (Not surprisingly, I tend to favor sonnets, but I’m not exclusive.) Indeed, nowadays when I start to write a poem I almost never just sit down and start scribbling; I first sketch out an outline of how it should progress, and I detail key images or emotions that I wish to invoke. I'll also decide how it should sound, since "the sound should be an echo to the sense." Even on those occasions when I just start writing and wind up with a first draft that's nearly ready to go, it usually means that I've been working and reworking it over and over in my head.
Here's a table of all the poems, in roughly the order that they were written. The dates may not be accurate, especially since some of the creative writing class material may have due dates rather than creation dates. (I hope they aren't one and the same.) Time to get started writing again. Now, where did my muse go to...