Poetry Class

Tonight was the second class of my "Introduction to Poetry" class. I missed last week because of the Work Conference, and went back to happily find that the really annoying girl from the first class wasn't there anymore. Isn't that awful of me? I feel so selfish because I want to know what the teacher thinks of my work, so that I can send it out and see what happens. But I also don't want to hog the whole class with my own mini-egotistic impression that I'm smarter than everyone else. Because I'm not, but there are only so many bad poems one can come across in one's lifetime. Thankfully, the other poems discussed tonight weren't all that bad -- lacking polish, but still good.

Of course, I'm terrified of reading in public. The last time I did it actually on a stage I made myself so sick before hand that my period was two weeks late. It stressed me out that much. Tonight, I read a poem called "January (My Violent Heart)," the first in a series of twelve poems I wrote, each with a title of one month out of the year, as it would suggest. When I finished reading it, shaking, stuttering and shivering, the teacher said, "Wow, that's really strong." Which was nice but it scared me a little bit because I've lost all ability to be objective about my work at this point.

In the end, I did it, sort of half-conquering the feeling that I can't do it, can't write, now my only goal at the end of the course is to publish the poems I workshop. We'll see how lucky I am. I'll keep you posted.