I've given up wine
and tobacco
and any kind of smoke
except the fumes of the city
and you

Sweet unholy ghost

Freedom

I've dreamt of you crossing my path
Long before I even noticed I was walking
Of course you didn't knock
and just demanded!
You've wandered the world
Just to cross that path

Of course I fell to my knees and plead
What other options did a slave learn?
But since then
I've worn out the shackles
Tied them to a foreign bed
Until it rotted.


You still walk that path;
This one
You're smoke,
and perfume, and mist.
You're a rhythm
The kind that will persist.

Long after the sound is gone
In the constant movement
Of thoughts and reveries-
That's where we'll meet again
The ancient meeting place.

Dear Friend

When I shall choose to love,
I choose to baptise this love,
To wash my lover and let him wash me
For I continuously wash myself
In the flowing river that leads me towards him,
I wash myself of hardened skin,
Of past dirt and any future hope
Of past names and any future hope.
I wish to wash his back
Of any past that may burden
I wish to wash his arms and hands,
The ones he uses to act;
His neck,
The one through which he speaks
Only unburdened truth
His ears,
So that my truth shall never deafen him
His hair,
So that the mind it covers
Await no moment further
His eyes, through which
He may see me whole
His cheeks,
Of any past tears,
His mouth,
Of any hurtful words.
And then his chest,
Through which his heart shall beat
Without the burden of fear.
Then his vibrating abdomen,
Holding his courage in one place,
And then his legs and feet
So that no shackles ever hold his pace.
And he shall wash me clean,
Although I've cleaned myself
Along the journey towards him
He shall wash me clean
Of all my past awaiting
And I shall call him Free.

The thing is

Look
I take big breaks in my breath
Big breaks in my writing
My voice breaks into vowels
Hides unspoken vows

I claim attention
through introductory exclamations
Deceived some that I want it
Regretfully return it
Why is it still amazing?

'You have 2 min until essay deadline. Hurry!!!'

Luckily, I never waited until the very last two minutes before giving in my essay. But I think there was one time when there was only a half an hour left before my time was up and so I had to rush to the room to drop the hard copy off. I also missed the essay deadline for my first essay- damned laptop, you were supposed to be my friend!

That doesn't happen anymore. I do work on each essay until the last day, the last few hours before the deadline, but I no longer start the said work the night before. I did that on a couple of occasions and, even though the grades I got exceeded my expectations, the stress was not worth it and my own satisfaction with the work could do with improvement.

I greatly enjoy the essay subjects, they're very stimulating. I wish I could work on all of them, but one is a hard enough task to tackle. I imagine that, if I did organise better and started working on about three of the usual 5-10 titles, my understanding of the class work would also improve a great deal. Yet, I still have to manage giving in one essay on time, so I just compare work with friends who have chosen different subjects.

The importance of (not) being idle

I never managed to convince myself to correct any of my texts. The first time I ever did this was for the Ucas application, because I was very much aware that a great deal depended on those words. I have small poems and a play that still await their turn for improvement works.

I don't know yet what's behind this mental block but I still rarely ever change a line; Except for course essays. I now plan the structure and work starting from there. Afterwards, I structure the notes and quotes according to that plan and develop paragraphs related to each point I wish to make in the essay. After that is done, I get to the actual writing of the essay. It's a structure still in need of perfecting, yet it has so far helped me not leave things to the last moment.

After the first draft is done, I check for spelling mistakes and see in which ways I can improve the text. This usually means restructuring sentences, because I am always tempted to write too long ones and so make it less clear who or what exactly I'm talking about. Given that I always pay attention to the word count, I rarely have to cut out too much, or add more than a couple of paragraphs.