Writing Contests

Another reason (excuse?) among the many why this blog doesn’t get updated as much as I’d like.  This is a different kind of writing and a style that’s totally at odds with the spontaneity of blogging.   Much labor is put into what amounts to a small, tangible output.  If you’ve the bug, though, you’ve got it bad.  And it’s not something that’s easily suppressed.  Anyway, I thought I’d start adding some of this stuff so that maybe someone will see it.  This is another (among the many) deplorable traits of writers — myself included — lamenting the fact that their hard work goes unnoticed.

So, this is a little poem that I’ve entered in the 2008 Dirt Rag Magazine Literary Contest.  You don’t often see mountain biking and literary in the same sentence.  But I guess that’s what I love about Dirt Rag — the juxtaposition of two of my favorite things.  Now, if I could just get to the trails more often . . .

I’m going to add the cover letter, as I think it’s a good lead-in to the poem itself.

Dear Ms. Brooks,

In my mind, a bicycle is more poetry than prose. My offering to the 2008 Dirt Rag Literary Contest reflects this notion.

The dichotomy and contrast of the still wheel and the spinning wheel seems to me an apt metaphor for life well lived. Each of us is obligated to ride the trail that’s been laid out before us; to this, we have no say. Nor are we consulted as to the construct of this path or of its ebb and flow. Ours is not to question the whys, whens or hows. Ours is simply to buck-up, click-in and push through. But I feel that, if we remain true to our calling, we’ll be handed all we need to carry us successfully to the journey’s end — and be rewarded by having learned a little something along the way.

And, yes – the more “Jeffersonian” among us will sense an intended hint of anarchy in this piece. Not of the toppled government sense, though; more of the wished-for triumph of soul over convention’s rule.

The title of this piece is Firmament. I hope you find it to your liking.

Firmament

The still wheel harbors no opinion

No attachment to this path

Or that

Desireless of motion

Spawned from the core of the spinning wheel, though

Is a fervent fidelity

To course

To angle, and latitude

It is the way of nature, and of souls

To find truth in revolution