Friday -One Stop Poetry Featuring Poet Jessica Kristie

With the holidays in the States our schedule is a bit askew. Adam Dustus is off shooting ducks or something so I'm (Moondustwriter) standing in with some fabulous poetry by Jessica Kristie
Just wanted to point out that Jessica is another talented lady who I met on - Twitter. If you aren't there, you should be.

Can you briefly tell me when you first started writing?
I began writing when I was about ten years old.  I was always a very emotionally in-tune little girl, and at an early age searched for some sort of outlet.  I believe I found this venue from a school exercise, then realized immediately it was freeing and very healing.  I wish I could say I have written continuously since then, but it has been off and on with a more consistent run the last five years or so.

What inspires you to write?
I have many inspirations and “processes” for writing.  There is certain music that rings to me as poetry. I play those songs to get me in the mood, and the place I need to be to write. Being a stream of conscious and emotional writer, the flow often needs to be stirred.  I have learned through the years to capture it better and even trigger it more than I was able to in the past.  I also find great inspiration in others writing and will often become inspired by even just a word.  Those moments I love the most and always hope I have a pen and paper close at hand.

What are your hopes and dreams with your poetry?
I just finished putting together my first collection of poetry.  It contains 50 poems and 5 prose poetry works.  I am submitting it to publishers along with a children’s book I wrote, that is currently being illustrated.  I also have a very exciting collaboration I am doing with a photographer. We are collaborating to bring to life a poem I wrote in 11 parts that tells a story.  It is more than just doing a photo to match the words; it is bringing the words out in a unique way. We hope to find a great venue to make it available to the public once it is complete. I am already working on a second manuscript of all prose poetry with hopes to also have it published in the future. 

What is your favorite genre?
Classics always seem to catch my eye from Frost to Neruda, but also find myself attracted to such wonderful poets as Maya Angelou. I continue to find that it is always the romance that pulls me in the deepest. Often it is darker, but romance just the same.  I do hold a place in my heart for the more humorous side of things. It always does me good to laugh and I try to - at least ten times a day.


While e-mailing Jessica,we discovered that we grew up relatively close to each other. My father lived in her home town until his death. We may just have to do a road trip to my favorite city (well one of them) San Francisco. Please enjoy Jessica's fine writing.

Tragedy’s Room

Today I want to put skin around my words

Turn sentences into limbs

And reach across the seas

Finding my way to your door

My blankets of consoling will never do this moment justice

History has been broken

A tear in life’s time table

“Why” lingers at the footsteps you watched from birth

Hands by your side that can’t seem to bring enough healing

This time

Trouble feels so beyond

What you can mend

Warmth can roam

Beyond our flesh

Far past aching bone

It will make its way back

Where darkness looms

Where loss and heartbreak

Now claim this room

Bows break future moments

Pausing time

Covering moons

Lingering in our present

Floating in the in-between

But hands do breathe volumes

When crashing into tragedies door

Look now and know

What strength they hold

Your grip

Your reach

Barriers breaking as we speak

This next poem is inserted into prose that Jessica posted. If you want to read the entire piece, please enjoy it on her blog.

~Nothing~

What poetic justice I weep from my pages

Yet I feel no sense of peace

Painting clouds with my finger tips across
an empty palette

A canvas that mimics hope yet whispers
only dreams

You can’t speak of change

When I Look at you and see the same

You can’t speak of love

When I can’t feel you break through me

I remember when

You speak of nothing

No words

No hope

No difference from one day to the next

Mediocre in this questionable decision

Maybe the hope is within a dream

Or maybe the needle has passed through

Now seamless

The two pieces have become

I remember when you told me

You would not give me up without a fight

When I walked away

You laid down so easy

And still you speak

Of nothing

You can contact jessica @jesskristie

Her blog http://jessicakristie.wordpress.com/

Photography:

Derek Tyson

http://www.flickr.com/photos/derricksphotos/189815067/

Ian Munroe

photograph//www.flickr.com/photos/ian_munroe/4059831412/sizes/m/in/photostream/