Madness & Poetry

There is something very calming about reading poetry aloud.

A couple of nights ago at the height of a raging hormonal PMS fit, my sister dared to utter those dirty little words that always follow, "No offence but . . . "

". . . you're not a mother. You can't understand."

When I'm not a hormonal mess and in completely good spirits this drives me nuts. Not because it isn't true, because it is. I am not a mother so I don't know what it's like, how it feels.

I'm also not a homicidal maniac, a pubescent boy, a victim of rape, or a holocaust survivor. I can't understand what any of those things feel like either.

The thing that drives me absolutely mad when my sisters play the "you're not a mother" card is that somehow it implies I'm incapable of feeling a love that strong.

But all of this is neither here nor there, the point of this post is the poetry. After my sister uttered the hateful words, I couldn't sleep for crying (yes I'll admit, mostly due to the hormonal battle being fought inside me. Rarely have I sobbed so loud and with such gusto. It was my Oscar worthy crying scene.

I worked myself up into such a state, only reading poetry aloud could calm me.

I read mostly P.K. Paige and some Allan Cooper. Soon, I was smiling and wistful. Poetry does that. I highly recommend it when you've got the blues. Stereotypically, all poets are mad, but maybe the relationship between poetry and madness is really as the cure for madness rather than created by madness.

Something to think about.

I've just learned that there will be a poetry workshop in August. I think I should take it, learn how to express myself in poems if such a thing can be taught.

Mood: Lazy
Listening to: Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini
Drinking: had a timmy's earlier, extra large, double cream
Hair: brown and straight