I appreciate these moments I have,
	these instances that overwhelm me
		with melodic rhyme.

Sometimes it is so strong, these feelings,
	I cringe in a warped fetal position,
because I feel my breath will leave me.

Whatever this sense may be...
	my eyes are seeing brillant shades of life,
		a neritic blue sky over me,
	vermilion pink clouds swaying my way,
and a feeling as if I was young again;
	where food and love
		was all there was to hunger.

	Yes, I feel poetry in
		my bones and my knees,
	that were bruised black and blue,
are no longer.

Sometimes I think
we (people) force ourselves
	to feel some sort of truth.
Given that, in light of reality,
	we really need truth to be good,
		to make sense to us.

But, this feeling I have
is not so good, but it is genuine.
	I do not know how to explain it.
I've always welcomed
every entity of my life
	to hit me any way it finds best.

		Perhaps that's why I spend
	so much of my time alone.

I love these moments,
because I will not lie to myself;
I have no expectation
	of the outside
to give me a feeling
I so desire,
and I remember my idealism.

	Like a child, looking out the window,
		dreaming child-like wishes...
believing in it so much,
	I can almost hear it -- 
	like crashing waves along
		a white sanded shore.

	Then,
as I close my eyes,
	I see corals of colors coming close;
and I think to myself,
	"this is what is going to make me strong."

I want to be completely taken by truth --
	give me the ugliness with the beauty.



-- Corine Michel, January 2000 --

Watercolor Trees by Emily
Nghiem, Rice University, 1988

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