12/13- Poems

Annabel Lee
by Edgar Allan Poe
It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee; And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child, In this kingdom by the sea: But we loved with a love that was more than love-- I and my Annabel Lee; With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling My beautiful Annabel Lee; So that her highborn kinsman came And bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulcher In this kingdom by the sea. The angels, not half so happy in heaven, Went envying her and me-- Yes!--that was the reason (as all men know, In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. But our love it was stronger by far than the love Of those who were older than we-- Of many far wiser than we-- And neither the angels in heaven above, Nor the demons down under the sea, Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling--my darling--my life and my bride, In her sepulcher there by the sea, In her tomb by the sounding sea. I've always loved Edgar Allen Poe. Always. I'm an extreme horror fan, and Edgar Allen Poe knows his horror. His works are defiantly up there with my favorites. so when I was asked to write about a poem, I would've never forgiven myself if I didn't do one of his poems.When it comes to Edgar Allen Poe, reading his writings are always a thrill.There exciting, horrific, original, twisted, and brilliantly written. It was actually really hard to decide which poem of his to write about. There all really good. I was really thinking about doing the Raven rather then the one I did. I really liked the Raven since I read it in a collection of Poe's Poems when I was younger. This poem's another one of Poe's most popular poems. Annabel Lee is a poem about the narrators dead wife, and how he loved her so much that he would lay next to her corpse every night since she died. The poem is defiantly a romantic one, as weird as that sounds, as well as a tragedy. It's simple in story, but complex in depth. The narrator lost his beloved wife that he loved and cared for deeply. He even claimed that the heavens only took her away was because they were just so jealous of his and her love for each other. I guess the reason why I like this poem so much is what it's exactly saying. A poor man who went crazy because he was so attached to someone. He was even willing to lay by hear decaying body because he loved her that much. Blaming it on the heavens, seeing as that was the only option he could actually beleive. He thought there was no other reason then that because why would anything want to kill someone as gorgeous as Annabell Lee.

12/13- What is Beauty?

What is beauty?

To me, it's different. The best way for me to describe what I feel is beauty by saying Beauty is Photography.

If you look at photography, each picture shows a moment in life, weather good or bad. It doesn't have to really be 'beautiful' physically in the picture, it just has to mean something more then just 'it looks nice'.
Beauty to me is a moment captured in time that inflicts strong emotion, and creates feelings. Happy ones, sad ones, angry ones, and everything else in between.

I had a previous blog about a picture from National Geographic that I believe means something. Now, when I went to there website I realized what a wonderful example that site was, especially the one collection of pictures about humans and cultures. If you don't understand what I'm talking about, visiting that site is a wonderful idea. It really is beautiful to see.

A lot of pictures might not even have anything really extraordinary about it. Like this picture:
Great. It's a whole bunch of pigeons. But that's not my point, is it. Look at it closely, how dose it make you feel? What does it make you think of? Why? It's only a bunch of birds, right? Or is it really? Does this picture mean more then it leads on?



This picture too. All the colors and movement. Fun, right? The excitement and brightness. This picture has to say something. It's all about catching the moment. Feeling the slit second. It's beautiful.


And this one. Just a tunnel right? But maybe this picture makes you feel curious. what's around the corner? Where are these people going? Or maybe this tunnel makes you feel a kind of loneliness. It's so empty. Are these people running away? Maybe just going away for any other reason. Are they leaving their family? Wife's? Children?

Photography presents beauty.

12/13- What have I learned?

What have you learned about yourself as a writer since you've been in this course?
I've noticed a lot change in me when it comes to thinking about different things. It's more so of the blogs then the articles that make me feel like that. Even when it's something all about why Nate Bailey is "The Boss", the blogs help me think more out of my own bubble.

Describe your writing process.
Biggest thing is the general idea. A subject always comes first. Then think about what you're trying to write. Like if my subject was birds, I want to think about that I'm trying to tell my readers about birds. Birds, they're the coolest animal. NOW, I want to think about how I'm going to tell the reader the bird is the coolest animal. Birds, they're the coolest animal, because they can fly. And TA-DA~

What do you like to write about?
I like writing stories more. I mean, I like Online Publishing, It's cool, but if I had to pick between Online Publishing and Creative Writing, I'd take Creative Writing. I like writing fiction, horror, fantasy. Something imaginative, that I created all by myself.

What do you not like to write about?
Myself. In the blogs when I'm asked 'What do you like?' or 'What's your favorite...?' or 'What do you like to do?' I'm not really SURE why, but I really think it's not enjoyable to write about. Maybe because I like creating stories rather then repeat something I go through daily.

What impact, if any has this class had on your writing?
Mostly, It's made me think in a completely different way of writing. As I said, I really like writing fiction and stories, and now that I'm writing articles and events that are actually happening, it's defiantly something new to me.

12/9- "What's really going on..."

'Oh god the sun.' The summer was blistering, and the yard work wasn't done. 'Oh sweet Lord, The SUN' It was only eleven in the morning, so I really had all day to do the work, but realisticaly my parents would've chewed and spit me out if I didn't get it done before there work day was over. To bad I have to get this all done at the peak if heat throughout the day.

My now grimy hands tugged at whatever weeds they could scout out. The strawberries in my mothers garden were ripe, but sadly, there was little that even grew. No one in my family really had an outstanding green thumb.

tap tap

My patience was wearing thin, but I knew my strict mother would scan and make me redo any parts I missed.

tap tap

I blew out a strong, heavy sigh. Today was going to be long...

tap tap

I turned, viewing what was poking at my side. "Oh! It's only you Starchy."

"G'mornin' Miss'us!" I saw the chattering gnome waddle his way to my side, addressing me like he always did.

"Morning Starchy. What's the scoop today?" I leaned back, clapping my hands together in the way you would wipe dirt from them. The soil is under my nails.

"WELL, here's what's really going on." He gave me that look that ment he was really onto something today. "The pentagon has a plan to get rid of some of the population, because their planning to move to Mars, and because Mars is smaller, we need to get rid of some people to fit the world. That's why they created the Swine Flu!" I looked at him skeptically. Here he goes again.

"I thought Mars was inhabitable..." He leaned towards me in a whisper.

"That's what they want you to think." Oh geez. Here we go again.

12/9-My fav. Childhood game.

Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy. All the way. It's the first game in the Jak and Daxter series.

It's a video game I played when I was younger for the PS2, when it first came out. The creators of the game were called Naughty Dog. They're the same company who made the old Crash Bandicoot games, and currently make the Uncharted series for the PS3.

I even play the same game to this day, with it's outdated graphics and all. When I was a kid, the game was so challanging, but now, as I'm older, I can beat the whole game in a matter of hours. It's extremely easy to me now. Like...pathetically easy. Then again the game is for little kids.

That game was so much fun, no loading screens or anything. It was a platform game, meaning if you saw a mountain off in the distance, you could literally walk all the way to that mountain. A free roam kind of game.

And of course, now there's sequels of the game which are way more mature and complicated. Like JakII, Jak3, JakX, and Daxter. I'm such a nerd, I have every single one of those games, except Daxter, because I don't have a PSP.

To this day, if you ask me to play that game, there is no way I'd deny the offer. I'll play that game over and over and over again, until there were no counsols left in the world that you could play a PS2 game on.

12/9/10-Fav. Childhood T.V. show

My favorite television show would probably be Dragon Ball Z.

I used to watch it religiously with my older brother Adam. he's almost exactly 10 years older then me, with his birthday on June 1st, and mine and my twin brothers on the 7th. When he turns 29 next June, I'll turn 19 a few days after. I looked up to him a lot when I was younger, even to the point where I'd watch him play Resident Evil, a zombie based video game, even though I knew I'd get nightmares the day after.

So the fact that I liked a television show that he'd want to watch with me was really important to me. He would always shoo me away when his friends were older, and kick me out of his room when he was playing Resident Evil because he didn't want me waking him up because I was scared to be alone late in the night. It's as simple as he was older, and didn't want to hang out with his annoying little sister.

So every week night, around 6p.m. the show would start, and we'd sit in the living room together, wondering if Goku will really be able to save the world once again, or if Vegeta would betray the team of hero's. Maybe a new bad guy would come, or maybe the guy who died last episode would turn out alive, and just did some awesome trick to do so. It was super fun to enjoy the show with him.

I always loved that show, but the biggest reason I liked it so much is because I had someone to enjoy it with me.