Calling All Readers

So, one of the things I've been having trouble with this semester is that I don't have my usual expansive crew of writer friends readily available to help my workshop my work. I never realized how much I relied on that in my editing process until I didn't have it. A couple people have read this poem, which I wrote recently, and given me great feedback that I really appreciate. Right now, I figure that if nothing else, I can use this blog as the occasional workshopping corner. So, please: turn this post into a discussion board; rip it apart, argue with me about word choice and line breaks, tell me what works and what doesn't. Explain to me what images stick out to you and which ones don't, which ones shouldn't and do, which ones should and aren't. It's not titled yet.

We rowed across the night sky
sailing between islands
built on a seafloor of constellations
swinging around the course in Orion’s belt
playing with how tight
that longboat could turn
and it handled so smooth
when the tide came in on the milky way
carrying us into blue.
I leaned over the starboard side
when we passed over reefs
left by colors of a supernova
trailed my fingers in the air
pulling ripples
and rearranging stars.

We moored in the dipper
and we dipped
in the deep reservoir it made
swimming through the night,
diving down
pulling you under
so you could see what it looks like
to blow bubbles in midnight,
daring you to follow
when I balance beamed to the tip of the handle
we stood with our toes over the edge
dove off the deep end
and raced to the North Star.

We learned what light was
when our fingertips grazed bright white
in the same breath
stunned,
chests heaving
eyes locked
treading bottomless sky
no sound but endless galaxy
ringing in our ears
until you grinned
and I laughed.

We had a splash fight with the night
beads of air dripping
from the tips of our noses
you shook your head, spraying me
with drops from your wet hair
and the pitch of my shrieks and giggles
dissolving into the key of your chuckle
made the stars shiver and blink.

We backstroked to the boat
in lazy crooked lines, listening to the splashes
our skin made against the dark waves
and I bet you if we rode Pegasus
I could stay on longer
so we found wind
to fill our sails
and raced the burning tails of meteors
hoping we’d never reach daylight.

Capstone, Part Three: Bringing Core In.

I'm not entirely sure how this is going to work. My Capstone project is going to be assembling a travel writing publication. Let's see how this matches up to Champlain's interdisciplinary Core curriculum.

First semester, we looked at the self. We studied art and literature, psychology and neurobiology, and we theorized about why we do what we do and what makes us, us.

Second semester, we looked at community. This is the semester that had something to do with the Puritans and economics. I don't really think they knew what it was about, either.

Third semester was an art history class that wasn't supposed to be an art history class and a course on the history of science, and fourth semester we learned about capitalism, democracy, and the sacred vs the secular. Think more anthropology than theology.

Core 310 and 320 in the fifth semester were about globalization and human rights. We studied the benefits of and the challenges we are facing from a rapidly flattening world and human rights and responsibilities.

How does this fit into travel writing publications? Well, I suppose you need to know about yourself in order to write, at least on some level, and that gives you a good jumping-off point to make connections to new people and places. Knowing how to analyze communities would of course help with travel writing, and art, religion, rights, and economy are all part of that. Really, though, that's all pulling bullshit right out my hole.

If anything, Core is going to help with my Capstone project in more abstract ways. As a tour guide for Champlain, I get asked a lot why we don't give tests (mostly by the parents, the kids just sit there vibrating with excitement). I tell them that when it comes down to it, no one in the real world is really going to care if you know the date Napoleon invaded Iran. Although you're meant to walk away from Core with general well-rounded intelligence, Core is more about learning how to deal with things on your own. Core is about being able to figure out solutions to your own problems, communicate effectively, take creative initiative, and work well with people. So this, not self-portraits, not altars, not amendments, not solutions to the water crisis in the OPT, is what I'm bringing to my Capstone project.

None of that was likely what I was supposed to write. But honestly, Core has been heated discussions, weird projects, long papers, and "life skills." You tell me which of those will help in assembling a travel writing publication. If anyone has any idea how I can go about this assignment in a different way that might be more akin to what The Man wanted, please help me out. But if at the end of the project we have to write a reflection paper--as Betsy is so fond of requiring--on what we learned from Core and how we applied it to our projects and how we'll apply it to post-grad life, I'm confident that I could BS my way through that one (which is really what you learn how to do in Core).

Capstone, take two

I don't need to stop and collect $200 at Go. I knew what I wanted to do for my capstone project before I even finished my last post. You can tell by reading it--my "oh wait, I've already done that," my "but I was going to do that for another class," my noncommittal "oh right, I was supposed to have three." The only real option was the travel writing publication. Even though some of you who commented wanted to bring it back and I appreciate your support, Moss on the Moon is done, and trying to bring it back would be too much. It would be too much work to resurrect it--and a lot of that work would be spread out to other people who don't have the time--we'd only be able to get one, maybe two issues out, and then it would die again. Too much to bear, and not a viable option. So travel writing it is.