• Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

Danika Dinsmore

Author / Educator / Activist

  • Writings
    • White Forest Series
      • Song from Afar (Coming Soon)
      • Brigitta of the White Forest
      • The Ruins of Noe
      • Ondelle of Grioth
      • Narine of Noe
      • Voyage from Foraglenn
      • Omnibus Edition Vol. 1
    • Poetry
      • 3:15
      • Her Red Book
      • Everyday Angels and Other Near-death Experiences
      • Between Sleeps
    • Other Words
      • And the start line is…
      • Now reShowing
      • Reckoning Press
  • About
  • Events
  • Resources

Previous Lives : Poems ReFound

Monday Potes: ReFound

January 17, 2011 by openchannel 11 Comments

For kicks and giggles I randomly opened an old journal to see what I would find. I found the original version of a poem from my book Every Day Angels. Because my kicks and giggles quota is down, I decided to edit the original journal poem again, to see what I would come up with. My only rule was that I couldn’t end or start with the same lines.

I ended up with something completely different.

HERE: mysterious one HRB is the version that ended up in Every Day Angels

BELOW is the version from today.

I highly recommend this as a writing exercise if you are having muse issues. Take the original (hand written / in journal if you can find them) from years back, another lifetime ago so that you are in a new place, wiser, more experienced, more cynical, whatever. Write an entirely new poem from that place.

the field

I was up all night
(she said)
turning pages
pulling weeds

we drown or swim or let the tide
take us somewhere new
we are ships
even in (the) afterlife

I dreamed it was the
end of my world (she said)
and wrote it down

knowledge is a kind of rotten fruit

little deaths
are what save us
from wanting
too much

smells like tornado weather
(she said)
high above the plains

for a thirsty world
touch   is matter
not minutes

or anything anticipatory in the mail

but I exist in books
(she said)
and

things on earth are definitive

squirrels die in trees
magpies gather in roads
we run out of gas and ink

the sun admits clouds exist
the foot
a path

it goes or doesn’t go
(or becomes something else)

my hands are tied
(she said)

we don’t imagine pain
but imagining there is something else
keeps us here

I think I’m going a little crazy
(she said)
and did

no plan
just dizzy in the sea

***********************

I don’t know which I like better. The one in EDA has some lines that are not in the hand-written version and I’m not sure where they came from. The one I wrote today doesn’t flow as much as the other – it’s more fragmented. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing – it just reflects something about my state of mind.

Here is most of the hand-written version. You can see that it was written in fragments even then.

Filed Under: Archived Blog, every day angels, monday poetry thang, poetry, Previous Lives : Poems ReFound, writing exercises Tagged With: every day angels, poetry, writing exercises

Footer

Subscribe to Danika's Mailing List

Get updates on upcoming books and events right in your inbox.

* = required field
AMAZON GOODREADS
  • Archived Blog
  • Contact
  • Credits
  • Cookie Policy
  • Privacy Policy

© Copyright 2023 Danika Dinsmore • Developed with ♥ by Ming Liu

Manage Cookie Consent
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use. To find out more, check out their Cookie Policy & Privacy Policy
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}