of scary things, bucket lists, and poetry

Writing is my most vulnerable, and poetry the most so. So last fall when I accidentally agreed to show my English prof. a poem of mine, it was terrifying and exhilarating. And then, at her insistence and encouragement, I found myself reading it to the classroom. It was the emotional equivalent of stripping naked in front of the whole class.

It required more courage than I thought I had (vulnerability always does), but it was incredible empowering, once I got it over with. My prof. said I should try and get it published at Siena, which I was flattered by, but laughed at. Yeah right, I thought. I'd used up all my store of bravery.
But I discovered doing scary things is addicting. Plus "be published, small or big" was on my bucket list. So this spring, in an attack of recklessness, I sent it off the the Pendragon (Siena's literary magazine), before I could panic and take it back.
And I got accepted. So yay! I'm published. It's definitely on the "small" side, but it is a start!
And for the joy of overcoming scary things, I am now sharing it with cyberspace. Enjoy.   

         Sirens  

Did you hear them calling, Odysseus? 

Siren song across the wild sea.

Did the sweet sound come back to you in dreams? 

Making you wonder, 

when you had safely stoppered up you ears, 

and sailed away,

returned to reason, 

if that part of you, 

screaming "Treason, treason!" 

treason against their song, 

spoke truth? 

Bleached sculls on white sand. 

Bodies and bones

of unfortunates

who had leapt, 

intoxicated by the wild, 

searing sweetness of their song. 

Madness dancing. 

Where they the lucky ones? 

White sculls, grinning in ecstasy. 

Because they had found it? 

The promise, the pull, the pulse 

of the siren song. 

Life! Unimaginable. 

Awake. 
Alive. 

Had they, in losing their lives, 
found them? 
They were the living ones. 

While you 

were a dead man walking.