What chilling words

What chilling words
Ryan P. Wilson

A couple of balls set in motion the few poems presented below, and you’ll have to stay with me as I ramble through all of this. So, you have my apologies up front.

First of all, I have been an avid consumer of poetry since my earliest school days. It wasn’t until junior high that I dared to take up a pen and start writing poetry myself. It was, for the record, not the first time that I had written anything, but it was the first time I felt that I was good at writing. I continued with poetry, filling more notebooks than should be legally allowed, until just a few years ago, when my writing for the Gazette and other projects forced me to shelve my poetic side.

Through brief conversations and following the work of J.B. Conway, I was once again inspired to reach for my pen and paper in the quiet hours of my day. If you are not checking out Conway’s work with the Mouse of Zen project, I recommend you start straight away. Haiku, or as Conway puts it, “daily Disney inspired, mouse-sized poetry,” have never been my style though.

I do, however, feel that the shorter the verse the more emotional punch and resonance it will have. This is precisely why, since my first year of college, I have written all of my poetry in the tanka form. Most remembered by the body of work by Saigyō Hōshi, tanka is similar in form to a haiku. Where a haiku follows a pattern of 5 – 7 – 5 syllabic units, the tanka uses a bit more space with a 5 – 7 – 5 – 7 – 7 pattern.

So, these are my first real steps back into poetry, which, coincidentally, is mostly not about Disney. However, Walt Disney World makes just as good fodder for the written verse as any other location, and I have an emotional connection to the place, which makes the writing that much more heartfelt. Let me know what you think, and let me know if you would like to see more verse here on the Gazette.

splintered fence post seat
rests along the dusty trail
under stone towers
yesterday’s rusted whistles
tumble tumble roll on by

sleek slumbering stripes
in crumbling halls of hunters
honoring your fall
in the shade of the banyan
quiet restitution reigns

Dean Finder still dreams
while horizons slowly spin
and odyssey floats
as the moon waxes and wanes
tomorrow’s memories change