Brace Yourself. It's Thesis Time.

Thesis semester is hard.

Poems are hard.

Thinking is hard.

Organization is hard.

Revision is hard.

New Poeming is hard.

My level of distress is clearly mounting, as made evident by my uncontrollable overuse of memes. I started the meme thing to cheer myself up over rejection letters. Now I need a meme for every day. Not because I don't think I can do this, but because I want it to be perfect.

Perfection is hard. 

Perfect poems are like unicorns. If you find one, you better get on it and ride it. The fact that that makes sense in my head clearly signifies that my mental state is deteriorating. It's because of these poems. And how hard they are. And how hard it is to revise them.

And hard, hard, hard!

But it's not all stressful. I do now have 12 completed poems. TWELVE. It's like a Christmas miracle in September. I don't want to think about Christmas. My thesis is due before Christmas. 

But those twelve poems I am very proud of. I also received my copy of Zone 3 in the mail awhile back, so, you know, little things like that help boost your confidence and make you feel better, and I've been sending out my twelve completed poems in hopes that someone will pick up a few more and make me feel even better about myself. 

Anyway, I'm writing this blog post mainly to avoid the poem I just revised. I have that horrible problem where sometimes I look back on old stuff, and I just want to gag. That's sort of the problem here. Well, the real problem is that I feel like I know what this poem needs to do, and yet I can't figure out how to make it do it. Like I know it could be really good, but there's something blocking my brain from functioning in a creative, pretty way. I need to go live in a small room with no windows and only cheese and crackers to live on for a month. Maybe then my brain would unclog. 

I hate that horrible feeling that all the right answers are at the back of my mind, but I can't bring them forward. It is going to be a really long night of revising and banging my head on the wall. Maybe that will shake something loose. 

What also sucks is that I hurt my knee, so now, for like a month, I have to take it easy at karate. I don't do easy. That's probably why I hurt my knee, because I like to think I can go from nothing to Chuck Norris in a month. But I am extremely competitive, and I can't stand the fact that when I was 14 (yeah, I know, that was ten years ago), I could kick over my head. Easy, no problem. Now, if I get limbered up a bit first, I can do it (not as high) but it hurts. I'm only twenty-four. Why does my body hate me? I know, I know. You don't use it, you lose it. But I'm going to get back there. It's going to happen. As soon as my knee heals, it's on. 

I've also never been able to do the full splits, and that is one of new goals. I thought about working on my splits while revising, but I just think it will be even more difficult to be creative when my legs are screaming in agony. 

Anyway, I am still amped up about being back at karate. Next to poetry, karate has always been just about my favorite thing to do. I like the challenge and dedication and skill it takes. And I was able to keep my brown belt 1st degree, I just have to work back up the ranks and learn all the new stuff before I can enter black belt candidacy in December. Which is fine, as I am clearly out of shape and need the time to get back into shape. But it's cool, because I'm relearning stick fighting, the bo staff, and eventually nunchucks. I'm also on the Demo team again, which was probably my favorite part about karate back in the day. I'm going to be doing more teaching of the Demo team than participating, but the chances I have gotten to do little performances have been a lot of fun. All in all, I've missed it, and it's definitely helped me work out my frustration when I'm unable to write poetry. 

Random meme. Because.

Alas, now it's time to get back to poetry, because I love it, even if it hates me. I just like to complain about it when it's not cooperating, but there's nothing like the feeling of a fully realized poem that makes you feel successful and brilliant and the best ever. Hopefully I can crank one out tonight while I labor over these evil spawns of my soul. 

I might have to get the muse down from the shelf and beat him up a little.