For those who grieve tonight: The friends I hold dear and the families of the victims in Tuscon. It's my hope that eventually all those in pain can move past their grief and remember the joy in living and the lives of those they have lost without regret and sadness.
Smile, I say
Smile, I say, be glad you live,
Be glad you have so much to give.
Be glad you're young, Be glad you're well,
Be glad you still have stories to tell.
Smile, I say, and look around,
There are still many treasures to be found.
Search for happiness, search for gold,
Search for someone to have and to hold.
Smile, I say, and raise your head,
Do not dwell upon the dead.
Do not sob, do not cry,
Everything living has to die.
~Heather Walsh, May, 1993
Was this in our yearbook? I remember this somehow. It is beautiful.
ReplyDeleteNah, it didn't make it into the yearbook from what I understand. I had submitted it (on my sweet Grandmother's request) to Teen Magazine who would publish poetry written by teenagers and they published it and apparently sent a little press release type thing to JCHS. My sister Amy told me that it was read over the closed circuit TV in school. I knew some 1994 yearbook editors who told me they had a debate over whether to use it or not in the yearbook but ultimately decided against it since when I had submitted it, I did so with with a letter about Holly Mercer's tragic accident(which was actually part of the inspiration of the poem)and the magazine included a small excerpt of the letter with the poem which was in the center (and larger than!) the other poems on the page. I guess the magazine decided to run all grief poems that month. The yearbook editors thought the poem would be more associated with her than with the other people who had passed away that they were honoring on the yearbook page. So, they chose one of the other poems from the magazine and put it in the yearbook instead.
ReplyDeleteIt kind of bothered me at the time because the poem I wrote was clearly written to anyone who is grieving and not a specific type poem and it just felt wrong that they would choose a poem from the same magazine and not use mine. I think I would have rather them use any other poem on earth, lol. But ah well, it's ok. It's just that Holly and Greg (two of the featured people on the page) were from my class and friends of mine and I kinda felt left in the cold by the editors of the 1994 yearbook. Plus the other poem wasn't like some kind of pulitzer poem, hehe. If it had been a perfect piece of poetry, I would have gladly conceded. I am very critical of my own work anyhow and I am not sure this poem deserves yearbook poetry status but that other poem definitely didn't! They could have easily chosen poetry from a famous poet, etc. and I would have never thought another thing of it. It hurt my little 18 year old writer's ego! :p
Okay, now I remember, I used to get Teen magazine. Interesting that I thought it was in the yearbook after what happened! It should have been, it would have been more meaningful. Well Teen is way bigger than a JCHS yearbook anyday, ;), think of all the readers it likely comforted.
ReplyDeleteYou have a good point :) Besides it really didn't matter and I never should have been told about the little debate the editors had except I worked with one of the editors lol. Also, I received lots of wonderful compliments from people at the DQ drive thru :P I never published anything else really, well articles in Tech's Oracle and a paper I wrote for english 101 in '97 and one of those silly poetry books where they say "we love your poem, just give us 35 dollars and we will send you the book we publish it in" --such a gimmick, I never did it but they did invite me to read it at some conference in a seperate letter, provided I could afford to fly myself there and back and the hotel stay. Um, thanks anyway!If you really liked me, you'd pay ME!
ReplyDelete