Bringing It All Back Home

So I'm back.

I took a long Blogger break for a couple of reasons. The most important one is that I broke up with my boyfriend of four years. Naturally, it's been a very hard few weeks. The adjustment has been extraordinarily difficult. I didn't just break up with Charlie, I broke up with his friends, his family, our shared hobbies, our plans, and some of my hopes for the future. It's left me shaken in a way that I haven't felt in a very, very long time.

The breakup has made me question a lot in my life, including this blog. I considered quitting it permanently. I started writing here to help with my job search--the idea was that I could use this space to showcase my writing ability, my journalistic style, and my ability to write lots of prose really fast--but it's outlived that use. It's transformed into a place to talk about things that I love, about what I read and write and bake and listen to and watch and experience. It's become a place to connect with family and friends and other bloggers. It's become a casual place, a place of impressions and expression.

Largely, I like it that way. I like that my audience has changed from an anonymous potential employer to people I truly care about. I like that this is casual, that I can post as frequently or as rarely as I would like, and I like that I write this largely for me, not for anyone else.

So I've decided to return to writing here for as long as it makes me happy. I'm also working on a chapbook of poems, which is, honestly, a much larger priority than this; if you ever wonder why I haven't posted here in awhile, just assume I'm neck deep in poetry! I'm also taking a class in letterpress printing, spending a lot of time with friends, going to concerts, and listening to music voraciously. I'm spending a lot of time on me and on doing my thing, on figuring out who I am and what I have to do in my life to be happy.

As hard as the last month has been, all this, I know, is a good thing.

And now, an extremely beautiful and extremely convoluted Gerard Manley Hopkins poem that's been on my mind lately.It's a tough read, but it's lovely to hear out loud. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Yours with much blogger love,
Lesley

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Carrion Comfort

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

NOT, I’ll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
Not untwist—slack they may be—these last strands of man
In me ór, most weary, cry I can no more. I can;
Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.
But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me	5
Thy wring-world right foot rock? lay a lionlimb against me? scan
With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones? and fan,
O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to avoid thee and flee?
Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer and clear.
Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod,	10
Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, would laugh, chéer.
Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling flung me, fóot tród
Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each one? That night, that year
Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my God!) my God.