Heavy sigh

I am sitting in Creative Arts class and feeling like I am treading water in life right now.  Just hanging on to everything and not able to be fully invested in anything.  I am already concerned about passing the NCLEX and finding a nursing job.  I want to be more involved and invested into my family's lives and just be with them when I am with them.  I want to have time to write again.  I want to finish my "The boy at the stable", "Let's go home" and "Frankie's gone fishing" short stories.  I want to take a vacation with my family.  I want to take a nap!  I just want to work and I don't want to go to school any more.  Aughhhh! (heavy sigh)
Here is a poem written to my wife:

Hello, My Love!

Hello, my love, good morning

I’ve been watching you for a while

I waited till you opened your eyes,

‘Cause I needed to see your smile

I studied the contour of your lips

And watched you slowly breathe

I still don’t believe that a beauty like this

Could have chosen to be with me

I can see your warmth in evening’s sunset

And hear your whisper in the breeze.

I even love the funny face you make

When you are trying not to sneeze

I watch you kneel beside our children,

Softly teaching each one to pray

Helping them learn of their Heavenly Father

And how to converse both night and day

I hear your whispered words of comfort

See your desire to do your part

To soothe the pain of a hurting child

And to touch the lonely widow’s heart

Hello, my love, good morning

What can I do for you this week

Can I say something to make you happy,

Wash the dishes or clean the sink

Make a breakfast of all your favorites

Get the kids all off to school

Try to make you grin or laugh out loud

By acting like a fool

We may not have the newest things

That I’d like for you, my wife

But things don’t make a sleeping child smile

And are not what gauges life

What can I do to show my love,

Give back, for your life with me

I never knew, when you agreed,

What a blessed life that this would be

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Creative arts test number two

In the midst of struggling through nursing classes, I have a creative arts class that requires that I write things for exams.  Normally, this would be a treat, a creative release, a mental stroll.  But not right now!  Anyway, here are two of the questions on the exam.  These are the poetry, literature, and paintings chapters.

(1)    Write a poem using the style of the poet you have chosen in the first question.

                   (which was Georgia Douglas Johnson)

Plans Unfulfilled

I wanted the smile to last forever

I wanted a lifetime of holding hands

Your touch brightened the darkest day

And lifted the heart of this tired man

We planned for old age together

Planned the trips, the projects, the lazy days

You were to be my support and my ally

The one to accept and encourage my crazy ways

You weren’t to go before the sun had set

The doctors, the beds and the pain

This wasn’t what we saw when at first we met

Where is the splashing barefoot in the rain

What am I supposed to do now

Where is the color in my dreams

When will you lean near and tell me how

To live, move on, to encourage me to breath

I lie in bed, looking blankly at the wall

Listening to the crippling silence of the house

I am alone now and life promises nothing at all

For indeed I have lost my partner and my spouse!

(2)    Reread Blake's "The Lamb and "The Tiger" With or without rhythm and rhyme, write a short poem about another animal using it as a symbol for something else you should not name directly.

From the silence

Silent passage through the grass,

he moves, he drifts, he slides

motion, he stops and licks the air

focus and danger in his eyes.

The other, so unsuspecting

Life’s struggles on her mind

Unaware of the hunter’s presence

She teeters along through life

Teeth, long, hollow and unforgiving

Find flesh, bone and skin

Pain and panic, fear unfolding

Innocence lost before life begins

The hunter, feeds with satisfaction

Then disappears as silently as he came

To find more innocent children

To torture, kill and maim

No warning but for a rattle

Nothing for parents to teach or take

To protect their pure and lonely

from the bite of the deadly snake.

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