Walk Out: When Film Adaptations Go Terribly Wrong

So, I've been sick this week, and under a self-imposed quarantine as to not infect my beloved friends and family with the plague. It got so damn lonely, that I decided to go see The Other Boleyn Girl today, against my better instincts. I read the 660+ page book very quickly earlier this month (in anticipation for the movie release, actually). I loved the book in the same way I loved The Da Vinci Code and The Kite Runner--easy, psuedo-intellectual page-turners that do not require an ounce of effort to follow, digest, or complete. After having a terrible experience with the film version of The Da Vinci Code and an OK experience with The Kite Runner adaptation, I thought my chances were at least 50/50 that Philippa Gregory's historical fiction bestseller would be at least as amusing as doing my taxes (the task with which I was engaged immediately before). It's possible I've never been more wrong about anything in my entire life.
The film, in the grossest understatement of all time, was less than faithful to its literary counterpart. The acting was atrocious (Natalie Portman--it's like I don't even know you anymore!), which didn't really matter because the character portrayal was NOTHING like it is in the book. And the editing just might have been executed by a high school Film Club enthusiast. The writing, filming, editing, and acting were in fact so horrible that I decided to leave in the middle of a scene where King Henry VIII (played by Eric Bana--rrrrrrr) forcibly enters Anne Boleyn from behind--undeniably, the climax of the film. It was the most boring rape scene ever filmed--and, staunch feminist that I am, it does not please me to have to make such commentary!

The last adaptation I saw after having read the book was Atonement. I'm not in love with the novel or the film, but they made me appreciate each other, which is not a common occurrence in the literature/film dichotomy. Usually, the movie is a disappointing rendition of the book (at least that's what I tell my students!!). With Atonement, the movie made visual things that were too damn subtle in the book, and the book fleshed out the details the movie did not have time provide. It was a nice relationship. Movies like The Other Boleyn Girl and The Da Vinci Code, in severe contrast, ought never be made. They unabashedly present themselves as half-cocked money-making schemes, roping in the readers of popular fiction who want the story again, but don't want to spend the time reading the novel twice.

Thus, I exited the dark theatre, leaving the chumps to their mediocre movie viewing, and came home to draw up the financial report for my St. Vincent de Paul conference meeting tomorrow. My cough syrup is more fun than that movie.

Blog Black Out

It's been quite a while since my last posting on my beloved blog space. I was in my car the other day and started constructing "my next blog" aloud. I know I shouldn't care, but I do get faintly embarrassed when, after speaking to myself (aloud) in my car, I look to either my right or left and catch someone catching me talking to myself. I try to pretend that I've simply been singing along to the music as I start bobbing my head and feigning self-possession. Anyway, I had hit on the most brilliant of blog topics, and was composing the loveliest prose, and knew as I was doing so that I wouldn't remember what the hell I wanted to write about when I finally reunited with my keyboard. This, in fact, was the case.
So, I thought it might be fun to construct some would-be blog titles in lieu of any real material this time. A little ambiguous taste of what I've been up to lately--here goes:

1. Gift Card Nation (I was actually going to write this blog after having received roughly 50 gift cards this Christmas--but I only got as far as the title. Sorry.)

2. On Forgetting to Remember

3. To-Do-List, You Scoundrel

4. My Kingdom for a Puff Pastry: On Attempting Atkins Once More

5. Wagon Schmagon

6. On Making New Year's Resolutions

7. On Breaking New Year's Resolutions

8. The Office: A Love Story

9. What is This 'Gym' of Which You Speak?

10. Mozart, Shakespeare, and Other Miserable Failures

11. Forgive Me, I Thought It was Cash Wednesday

12. The Other Boleyn Girl: A Horror Story for the Biological Clock Watcher (I think this is actually getting pretty close to the content of the blog topic I blacked out. It's probably for the best.)

13. Timeshare Pressure Cooker: Or The Art of Getting a Free Dinner and two Mexican blankets

14. Your Pandemic Flu is Showing

A Long-Awaited Breath of Fresh Movie Air

Originally posted: Friday, November 16, 2007 7:43pm

After what seems like an ETERNITY of mediocre film casting, production, and distribution, we have finally broken into an absolutely excellent film season. Let's compare for just a moment or two, shall we?
Movies I avoided like the Plague of Black Death:
Stomp the Yard
Catch and Release
The Hills Have Eyes II
Georgia Rule
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Hostel, Part II (the first one was sooo unbelievably painful, I can't believe they got funding for a sequel!)
License to Wed (and Jon Krasinsky in IN my Top Five!)
Transformers
Harry Potter 20: Order of the Phoenix
Hairspray
I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry
The Bratz Movie (come ON!)
Daddy Day Camp
Rush Hour 3
Good Luck Chuck



The last few movies I'd seen this year before nearly giving up :
300 (meh)
Premonition (worst movie I've seen in months!)
Shooter (Mark Wahlberg let down)
Blades of Glory (might need to see this one again to fully appreciate it--like ALL Will Ferrell movies I see)
Fracture (way worse than I thought it would be)
Knocked Up (a big disappointment after 40-Year-Old Virgin)
Live Free or Die Hard (meh 'shoot em up')
Ratatouille (good for a movie about rats in a kitchen)
The Bourne Ultimatum (meh)
Becoming Jane (actually liked this one)
The Brave One (intriguing, but not a keeper)
3:10 to Yuma (okay, not great)
Elizabeth: The Golden Age (PALE comparison to the first film)

OKAY--so enough negative--it's finally time to focus on the solution to our movie woes and here they are!! :
Into the Wild (fantastic book, fantastic movie)
The Kingdom
Lust, Caution
Michael Clayton (although I did see this movie a few years ago. It was called Erin Brockovich)
American Gangster
No Country for Old Men
Gone Baby Gone
Lars and the Real Girl (unconfirmed--but seems promising)

Ahh--it's like deep, sweet inhalation of movie choices after a long and tortuous box office suffocation--a damn near complete crucifixion of film production. Go forth, settle in with the kettle corn, diet pepsi, and sour patch kids--there are FINALLY movies worth spending money on these days. Hoorah!

"It's For the Birds": Discourse on Automatic Tipping

Originally posted: Saturday, October 6, 2007 7:16am

Tipping is sometimes an occasion for anxiety for me (and if you've read any of my earlier blogs, you're thinking "Yeah? And what, pray tell, doesn't present anxiety for you?"). So you'll either identify with the following or think, "Good lord, doesn't this woman have anything better to think about?" and be on your way. In either case, I hope you have a fantastic day!

Restaurants are the easy part. I got it--20% of the cost of the meal, 15% if the service was poor, more than 20% if I'm either generously drunk or grateful for some kind of unexpected compensation. It's always the same and I'm happy to do it. I also know that tips help to assuage the poverty of the otherwise criminally low, unlivable wages waitresses and waiters earn. I am slightly less clear about other kinds of services that "require" tips. As I have learned through my keen observations of human nature (someone holding a hand out, or presenting a "tip" line on a printed receipt, for instance), with many many services rendered in this world there is an inexplicable expectation for extra compensation. Into the "less clearly tippable" group, I would put taxi and limo drivers, taxi hailers, airport curbside luggage crew, bell hops, hair dressers, spa staff, piano men, pizza delivery guys, bartenders and strippers. These are all services which have traditionally called for tips. For this category of services I am confused about a few things.

First, how much? The rate always seems to be increasing, but I cannot determine any real mathematical certainty, like I can for the waiters. Thus, if I have paid for an actual service (cab fare, pizza dinner, haircut, etc.), I will usually default to the 20% tip with ONE exception. Any woman (read Leslie) who ventures into my nether regions to remove hair gets damn near 50% in tip--partly out of my own empathy (If I could imagine doing such a job, I would never opt to), and to make up for the uncomfortable time of payment across a cold counter after we've been SO close for the last 20 minutes. It's as close as I will ever come to the feeling some men have when the time arrives to pay the hooker, the latter of which I believe is not tipped for her services--another confusion of mine. For airport crew, bell hops, and piano men, however, there is no initial service cost on which to base my tip amount--thus, the setting for these guys always seems to be between 2-5 dollars (usually depending on the small bills in my wallet and how willing I am to ask and wait for change back).

Second, for what am I tipping these people exactly? With the possible exception of taxi drivers and pizza delivery guys, I do not believe their wages are tip-dependent like the waiters--especially spa staff. So the tip, in these cases, is presumably presented to the service provider for pretending he or she actually likes the job they do. And I would imagine it's a fine, cautious, line they tread. For instance, you want your hair dresser to be friendly and talkative to a degree, but if he or she is annoying or intrusive, that might lower the tip amount. In the case of the strippers, our tip seems to be quality assurance, as far as I can tell. Certainly, we want our strippers be "into" their work, not shoving the reality of objectification and exploitation in our faces--thus, we reward them for pretending like they are executing their dream job before our very eyes. Perhaps the same is true for airport curbside crew? If I give you a couple of dollars, you won't throw my bag around like you're slinging trash into a dumpster?

Third, why do we tip some and not others? For instance, why do I tip my masseur for his gentle hands and comfortable chit chat and not my dental hygienist? Why do I tip the cabbie and not the bus driver, the latter with whom I have more regular and pleasant conversation? Why do I tip the pizza delivery guy and not the UPS or Fed Ex worker who brings immense joy into my life by anonymously leaving packages like Santa Claus? Why do we tip musicians and not circus entertainers--or lawyer, ministers, and teachers for that matter?? It's all in the same spirit of performance, is it not?? There is more to say about this particular "hazy" group, but I'll move on to the group that actually spurred this blog to being with.

The third category of "automatic tipping" is a newer group that, to my ability to recall its genesis, began around the era of the chain coffee shop. You know what I'm talking about. You walk into Starbucks to get your grande-non-fat-iced-mocha-frappuchino-with-sugar-free-hazlenut-syrup-and-no-whip. After the ten minutes it takes to order "your" drink, and paying your five dollars, you notice that there is a jar between the cash register and the Joan Baez tribute CDs marked "TIPS" in some creative, Crayola-marker, taily, polka-dot design--as only a high school girl can achieve.

It's this form of tipping we must really stand against, folks. Firstly, and seriously--for WHAT are we tipping in these counter-top cases? One's ability to remember the order I JUST gave (and, to be fair, at Starbucks that does require some amount of skill)? One's ability to work the cash register in an effective way? One's correctly executing the particulars of my order? One's ability to scream out the order for pick up so that everyone knows I'm on a diet this week? Secondly, where does it stop? The next time I walk into Taco Bell am I to be accosted with the passive guilt trip of ignoring the tip jar some kids have set out because they can? The next time I go to pick up my clothes at the dry cleaners, am I to feel I'm being insensitive to the rigorous work of standing behind a counter all day? Where will the tip-on-all-occasions madness end? I, for one, refuse to put one red cent into such an enterprise.

So, go forth and question your future tipping opportunities. Do not be guilted into spending your hard-earned income on the future keg funds of our youth! Save it for the waiters and waitresses of this world who need it to support their cocaine addictions. Just kidding.

The Identity Crisis of Name Tags

Originally posted: Sunday, August 19, 2007 6:29pm

This morning approximately 430 high school freshman boys and girls gathered for a retreat day on the campus of the school at which I teach. I was one of a few charged with handing out name tags and directing kids to the appropriate section of the gym for the initial greeting and address by the Principal. It was an interesting job on many levels, but I was quickly and profoundly aware of how much 14 year olds (and the rest of us, I suppose) do NOT like to wear name tags. And I wondered why this is.

Kid after kid would approach the table, mumble a name, and look completely broken when issued the sticky little rectangle. A few asked, "Do I have to wear this?" I remember the same sense of embarrassment. Is it a desire for anonymity within the crowd? Is it the sting of being known or not being known? If I have to wear a name tag, that means you don't already know me--shame on you!

For girls, the problem is apparently two-fold as customary name tag placement is somewhere in the chest area. For adolescent girls in an almost constant state of social panic, drawing attention to the chest as a method of identification is a horror in and of itself. Thus, many girls chose to adhere the sticker to their hips, legs, stomachs, shirt sleeves--pretty much anywhere except the chest and forehead.

At my last high school reunion, my friends and I (who had been substantially pre-partying before arrival) thought it would be funny to put other alums' names on our chest. In this particular case, I labeled myself with the name of an African-American male classmate. Since most of us had been to school together for 13 years, and no one seemed to have had massive reconstructive surgery since we graduated, I did not understand the need for name tags. Perhaps it was a socially graceful decision made on behalf of the spouses who would not know people and would have a difficult time understanding a somewhat slurred Kaaatthhyyrn Dundiadaosjfof. Or maybe the reunion organizers felt that spouses should not be singled out with the name tags (wasn't high school cliquey enough?!).

In any case, whenever there are name tags there is some measure of social anxiety. Sure, in a situation where people would be unfamiliar enough with others that name tags would be necessary, the social context itself would incur some measure of discomfort. But there is a special kind of anxiety brought on by the name tags themselves--embedded in the act of identifying oneself with a posted sign--and I thought it was past time I should bring it to light.

Back-to-School Blues: A Teacher's Perspective

Originally posted: Sunday, August 5, 2007 7:44am

Normally, I preface my blogs with some diplomatic preamble disclaimer so that the following material may be set in the context of a loving, open heart that needs merely to express the short-sighted view of her limited and confused perspective on this world of ours. In this case, I will only preface the following to say that I LOVE my job, truly feel I have been called to my chosen profession of teaching, and would rather drive toothpicks under my nails than sit in a cubicle all day with a phone in one hand and a calculator in the other.

About 70 days ago I remember feeling a tinge of embarrassment when I responded "Nothing" to the frequent question, "What are you doing this summer?" My answer did not carry with it any inherent shame, as I am no stranger to unabashed loafing (an inherited family trait, I am almost positive). The person asking the question, however, would almost always accost me with a furrowed brow of disapprobation, as if remarking in his or her head, "Hmmm, she looks like a decent, upstanding member of this community, but I suppose I've been fooled all along." With painful reluctance I would hear instead, "Oh. . .well. . .yeah, I guess you deserve the break!"

You bet your ass I deserve the break. If any of my readers are teachers, this all goes without saying--so, this is for the rest of you who think that you've got a bum deal because you work your tail end to a bloody pulp every day and have to beg your employer for two days of vacation time put together, while the teachers of this world (while, okay, maybe not paid quite as much as they should be) total a minimum of 85 vacation days (not including weekends, mind you!). Why that's 17 work weeks, you say, that's four months out of the year those teachers aren't working!! (It actually turns out to be more like four and a quarter, I think). It's right about now where the cynically minded snigger just loud enough to be audible, "No wonder our kids don't learn nothin' these days."

So, as my vacation days wind down--and they have been lazy days, my friends, I will attempt to illustrate for you the beloved occupation that demands such extensive "break" time and why back-to-school sales always carry with them a slight feeling of dread and mourning for the expiring summer.

I heard once that teaching is among the top five most stressful jobs because of all of the decision making involved. The decisions may not carry the heavy weight of those of say, a brain surgeon, a military commander, or the President (and I mean whoever makes the decisions for the President, of course), but in sheer volume equate nearly to the amount an air traffic controller makes throughout a single day. In fact, a traffic controller's job differs only slightly in the details from that of a teacher:
"Controllers are often responsible for several aircraft (read classes) simultaneously. The number of craft varies with size of airport, time of day and weather (read location). Controllers must be able to work under extreme pressure, often without a break, for up to four hours at a stretch. They must be able to visualize the whole traffic picture, establish priorities, and think clearly in emergencies. They must have a good memory, and be able to listen to morethan one pilot (read student) at a time. The pace is often hurried and controllers must make quick and accurate decisions. Any indecision or delay could contribute to a catastrophic loss of lives and property (read self-esteem, GPA, college admissions, intellectual curiosity, etc., etc.)."

These people are REQUIRED to take breaks every few hours where they are ushered into a little room to be completely alone and make absolutely no decisions whatsoever. There is usually a television with only one channel (lest they have to decide what to watch). They are also REQUIRED to retire at age 56 because of the level of concentration the job requires. But, therein, I digress.

For someone like me, a middle child with virtually no authoritative weight in the family structure, I got used to not having to make decisions. I have always been very content to follow along and only "jump ship" when absolutely necessary--usually without warning anyone that I'm about to do so. Teaching does not allow me the luxury of passive observation. In my classroom, I am the decision maker (meaning I make them and I create them) and any decision that comes from without is only being made within the pre-fabricated decision possibilities I have constructed. Among other things, this job has a great capacity to breed control freaks out of otherwise very easy going people.

For the past five years, most days kick off about 4:45am. This is when I actually get out of bed, the alarm has generally been sounding off and on for the past thirty minutes. I am a HUGE "snoozer." In the shower I am beginning to visualize the day. Usually having some plan about the daily lesson (based in what we did the day before), I start considering what needs to be read, copied, graded, and assigned for the lesson to tie into what we've been doing and what we'll be doing later. Do I have what needs to be read? Where is it? If not, where am I going to get it? Would another reading work better? If so, where is it? etc. Do I have what needs to be copied? Where is it? . . . Should I be creating something new for this or rely on what I've already made? If the former, when am I going to create it? Have I graded everything that needs to be graded in order to proceed? If not, when am I going to get things graded (this line of decision making ties heavily into lesson planning because perhaps there is a thirty minute "laissez-faire" activity in which I can get it done during class itself). This "grading" question really only applies to quick, objective quizzes that require no further decision making. I'll get to essays in a minute. What am I going to assign today to make sure they invest in the lesson? Is the assignment worth their time? Is it worth the time it's going to take to grade it? Should I rely on a pre-made assignment or come up with a new one? If the former, do I know where it is? If the latter, when am I going to create it? Then, dear hearts, I get out of the shower.

I review, reverse, reconsider, resist, renew, reorder this line of questioning throughout my morning activities of making coffee, flossing, brushing my teeth, drying my hair, getting dressed (which requires a microcosm of decision-making, of course), applying the teeny bit of makeup I wear, and driving to school.

I generally get to school before the sun has even begun to peep his sleepy head above the horizon--about 6am. From here on until the last bell rings, there is a constant barrage of decisions to be made, all sprouting their own offspring that (with enough care and nurturing) will grow into adult-size, anxiety-ridden, receding hairline and pop belly decisions in due time. These consist of picking material, deciding what's "important" and/or relevant from the material, teaching material, assigning material, and grading material (each having a bevy of decisions in their own right).

Which brings me for a minute to the last of these categories. Every year a benevolent-minded counselor assigns a teaching assistant to me, presumably to lighten my grading load--and I don't care what this statement kicks up--NO ONE grades like an English teacher grades. The math, science and language department can cry their "partial credit" sob story all they want--at the end of the day, the answer is either right or wrong--end of story. Every year I inevitably meet the wide-eyed lass (it's always a girl for some reason) and break the news to her that I can't use her. IF I give an objective vocabulary or reading quiz, we grade them right there in class--as part of the pre-lesson that day. And I'm quite sure I would be fired if I handed over even part of the bottomless essay stack for a 16-year-old to grade. Only on a very rare occasion have I assigned some creative visual component, in which case I don't see how my subjective assessment of art is better than anyone else's, thus my TA has a rare job to do: "Here--rate these on a 1-10 scale, and don't give anyone anything less than an 8."

Analytical, expository essays, the bulk of my grading load, is the beast with which I (and any other English teacher I know) wrestle every year. It takes me, on average, 25 minutes to grade ONE essay. Multiply that times 130 (for each student), and then multiply that times 6 (for each essay assigned). Having difficulty? Let me help you--that's approximately 19,500 minutes of essay grading (luckily, not every student turns in every assignment!)--that's 325 hours, you say, that's thirteen and a half straight days of reading and marking up papers. If only I could compute the amount of decisions that goes into that 25-minute period with regard to main argument (thesis) content and structure, introduction funneling, topic sentence (claim) content and structure, evidence (data) content and incorporation, commentary (warrant) content and structure, reverse-funneling conclusion, to say nothing of grammar, mechanics, and formatting. It is not only safe but accurate to say that I spend more time thinking about some essays than it took to write them in the first place.

I do it to myself, you say? Be quicker about it, you say? Don't care so much, you say? They're friggin' high school student essays, you say? It's all true, but it doesn't matter. Because if I didn't take that time, I wouldn't ever really read the essays. They're not good. They're never good. Some are more surprisingly insightful than others, and that's about it. I HAVE to take that much time, or I wouldn't take any at all. And some small part of me thinks that even though the kids hope and pray with every essay submission that I would just lighten the hell up--some small part of them appreciates the fact that I care more about their essays than they do.
And this essay grading takes place somewhere between the end-of-school bell and 4:15am when my alarm first sounds (and I then beat it into submission with the accessible because overwhelmingly-sized snooze button.) It's perhaps no wonder that I have not yet been blessed with the pitter-patter of little feet in my life. I clock about 14 hours a day of work time, on average, and work about 40 weeks a year. If I were paid $15 an hour (a reasonable wage for rearing and expanding the minds of our nation's youth), I would earn approximately $42,000 (before taxes)--a seasoned teacher's salary by most state standards (though unliveable in the bay area, of course). But, I digress yet again. That doesn't leave much time for cooking for, cleaning up after, playing with, and tucking in children--unless it's around Christmas, spring break, or summer (haha!). I will have to make adjustments eventually--start bribing and blackmailing TAs to keep their adolescent traps shut about grading essays, I guess.

So, no--I'm not quite ready for the bonanza that is "Back to School"--and neither is my subconscious, evidently, judging from the dreams I've been having lately (see "A Teacher's Nightmare" in The Starbucks Chronicles). The break from decision making has been necessary and wonderful. I've been burdened only with choosing my next pleasure read and MySpace profile song. The time is now upon me to sink back into The Grapes of Wrath (sophomore summer reading--a decision made at the end of the year) and decide which passages to propound, whether to make a new Depression Era powerpoint or stick with the old one I've grown detached from after three years of using it, whether or not I'm finally going to tweak that beast of a test to cut down on the grading load, or keep it as it is to effectively set the tone of an "honest-to-God honors level class" (if the former, what to cut out? what to leave in? add more?), decide what activities we'll do on the first few days of school, how much time to allot, how to assess their engagement with the material, how to smile (not too big, not at the beginning of the year!), how to dress, how to decorate the room (finding a keen balance between fun and professional, as well as functional and not too babyish), how to. . ., how to. . ., how to. . ., how to. . .
So long Summer, you've been good to me.

More From the Pretend Poet

Originally posted: Saturday, July 21, 2007 8:27am

At Home with a Headache

The dishes are clean
the laundry's put up
the bed's nearly made
and yet you remain—
plaguing me since the afternoon hours
when I didn't take you seriously.

Perhaps it's the reading—
banal essays and unpoetic poems
that make me long for the next
overread masterpiece.
You hate what I'm reading
and beg for a change with your throbbing pulse
and your obstinate presence.

Perhaps it's the lighting—
the luminous glow
of the computer screen
emitting the freshest complaint,
emailed confusion,
or handout on thesis statements.
You'd rather the lamp—however dim—
of inspired imagination.
Candlelight would be nice, you think.

Perhaps it's the bottle—
neglected since Tuesday.
And you're feeling a little dried out,
a little too perceptive,
a little naked all of a sudden.

Or perhaps it's the noise—
the din of preparation,
the screech of undeserved praise,
the blare of human ignorance,
the booming teenage apathy.

You most certainly prefer
the perfect silence
of Aristotle,
flickering tapers,
and pinot noir.


Ash Wednesday

Hers is perfect:
a beautiful symmetry of crossed ash
revealing the faultless state of her soul.
The black edges blend into the skin,
as if the particles knew not what it meant
to be separate from her brow—
the home of patient expression,
inexplicable love, and assurance
in those around her.
Everyone knows her faith today;
her ashen forehead reveals her order,
her inner-peace, her integrity.

Mine is horrid:
a smudge—something like
marks on police reports—
revealing chaos within.
The muddled blob sits clumsily
until someone remarks:
"You have dirt on your face."
"No," I say, knitting my sullied brow,
"It's Ash Wednesday."
But the tacit truth remains:
I have dirt on my soul—
disclosed to you now
through the guise of piousness.


On Halloween

I know it doesn't make much sense
to dress up like a cat—
to don fake whiskers on my face
and prowl around in black.
And never should I reason with
a devilish attire—
two horns, a tail, a miniskirt
That mocks a dark desire.
And surely draped in princess robes,
I link with the insane;
while masking mediocrity,
I claim a regal fame.

Then why is it not lunacy
when daily I disguise
a fear quite well concealed
behind a forged facade of lies?
Deceptions of adulthood
whisper confidences clear—
asserting strength and aptitude
that's never drawn up near.

"Halloween is kiddie stuff,"
the wiser ones will say,
"a time for silly pretenses—
imaginary play."
But I see something sinister
in practicing disguise—
in wishing we were other things,
in cultivating lies.


On Re-creation

Now I understand
Why God let Noah live.
When starting something new,
It's best to use a sieve
To keep that which we love the most
And junk what we don't need—
Preserve our precious works,
Else essay a hellish deed.

At times, though, in my haste
To purge the unessential,
I scrap my written works,
My publishing potential.

Then I must create anew
A piece that I cannot—
The images, the dialogue
Escape my present thought.
Trapped in a paralysis
Of "what I said before;"
Haunting new endeavors
Like a fickle, phantom whore.