Author Archives: kristenringman

My Life on the Water in Four Haikus, age 30

by in boats, poetry, the ocean and tagged , , , ,

1.  Winter

With lovers I fight

to not be their twin, every

day take myself back.

 

2.  Spring

Like a small child, the

sea wakes me at night without

remorse or regret.

 

3.  Summer

Is there a place in-

side the hulls where I can write

into the old wood?

 

4.  Autumn

When the sea dreams, bird

feathers on its back make brief

tattoos and waves sigh.

 

 

poem fracture – age 32

by in dogs, excerpts, poetry, wild writing, Willow and tagged , , , ,

Paper edges surround me,

the only things besides

your shattered bones and old

blankets that I can hold.

 

I can smell you fading,

While wishing you were here

despite the knowing

That every day, you get farther

and farther and farther

Away.

*I haven’t been able to write much about my beloved Hearing dog, Willow, that was more than just a dog to me for 11 years.  He was a son, friend, soul mate, companion.  He was my everything.  My better, kinder, wilder half.  Every year he is gone hurts.  I hope to write more about this feeling, but every time I try, it feels more like excavation than writing (though the most important writing likely is an excavation).

Willow, wherever you are, whatever form you have now, I love you.

willow by the falls
willow by the falls

Gone Wild

by in India, Makara's Roots, poetry, The Rewriting, wild writing and tagged , , , , , ,

I have dreams

of you in the mountains.

Meditating yourself into a

perfect state of bliss and oneness

with Shiva.

You as Shiva—because

you looked exactly like him when

you covered your forehead in the white

powders, lines proving your soul

was never mine,

you were never mine.

 

And now you’ve gone to the jungles

instead of the mountains, and a part

of me wants to find you there:

Imagines the big cats you last told me you saw

(your spirit animals),

I see your eyes meeting their eyes

within the rubber trees of Kerala.

 

You’ve gone wild

the way I wish I could go wild, too.

 

Would you have let me follow you there?

If I stayed, would we

have traversed the jungles together?

I wish.

 

I wish.

Sometimes, in my rewriting,

I return.

 

I slip towards you,

a striped orange shimmer,

between banana palms

and the sky.

We slink off together,

too busy feeling wild

to bother

reaching for the pen,

the insults,

the threats,

the leaving.

 

Because we would be leaving together,

both of us leaving the Lands of Rewriting,

the places where humans keep adding

to their own rules.

 

We would choose the jungles.

We would choose to be

Wild.  

*For those who are curious: this poem is about some of my experiences living in South India that inspired my first novel, MAKARA.  I’m working on some poetry right now that explores those memories and I’m thus far calling the series of poems Makara’s Roots or possibly The Rewriting.