Excerpts from Sculpting the Heart's Poetry, my book.

My personal thanks to Sage Sweetwater who befriended and encouraged me with her reviews, “Joyce’s poems are really good…Feminist godly mythology… sensuous, of love, of women and addictive, competitive drama…Angel-bearing wings, Joyce White’s poetry flies above life’s fault line.”

Of my book, Sculpting the Heart with Art Therapy E-book, she says, “this book is about the possibility of renewing life.”

I’d also like to thank Carolyn Howard-Johnson for her review, “Lovely…Joyce’s poems are like little affirmations for the creative essence in each of us.” ~ says Carolyn Howard-Johnson.

Of my other books she writes: “…Surviving Depression eBook “are liberally sprinkled with four-color images of artwork and photography that will make you smile; these books are about being happy.”

We all enjoy expressing ourselves in some secret way. This book is filled with my secret, inner most feelings. However, both reading and writing poetry are forms of therapy for the reader and the writer. Writing poetry is an excellent way to pay renewed attention to the masters and their art. They inspire us to turn their art into “our art” through films, paintings, poetry or even clay sculptures. None of us write alone without carrying on our back the whisperings of others.

feminist mythology 300x1681 Feminist Godly MythologyEkphrasis poetry like mine makes an excellent conversation between two pieces of art. I want to thank Picasso, Chagall, and all the other artists I partner with in my work.
Most of us get a kind of emotional fuel from looking at the art of past. They kind of give us a foundation to build our dreams on. There is no such thing as writer’s block when we use others ideas to inspire us. Poetically speaking, I think most poets are like honey bees hungrily searching through a grand buffet of literature, film and/or art for that speck of pollen we can turn into honey.
Besides authoring two books, I had a lot to say and needed a way to say it, so I started experimenting with poetry. I am no doctor and I write for fun and wellness, mine and others.

Writing poetry, journaling and art making are creative ways to turn the burning inside our heads into positive thinking, researching and recording. When writing poetry we can’t help but confront our past circumstances to break their hold over us. This form of healing is called Poem Therapy.

I am not always aware; at least on a conscious level how much others drive my art. Reality is too restrictive so I like to play connect-the-dots with Picasso. He walks with me and talks with me. I am expanding his ideas into my own. It is said the human mind is like an umbrella. It functions best when open.

When sculpting our heart’s poetry, it is good to approach our art as poetry as if it were a game. We need to play connect-the-dots with words and feelings, paying close attention to the sound and flow of our memories, as well as their arrangement on the page. It is never too late to be what you were meant to be.

To be a poet, you need to know when to listen and when not, as well as begin every day with a moment of silence, during the day listen to the children who are always on, we can learn as much from them as they us,
Poets need to befriend isolated thinkers, to enjoy their gift of gab, to recognize universal truths, listen to their intuitions, and welcome the muses that are their best fans,
Poets need to give credence to the “unseen” and to know that there is no coincidence, and be appreciative we enjoy free will,
Poets need to ride the winds with glee that blow through their minds, and to write those thoughts down before someone else does or before their forgotten all together,
Poets need to learn to appreciate the sun setting, a bird call, a quiet garden, a clear sky, and a creative effort with an unambiguous pen.

Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt;
Poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.
Leonardo da Vinci

Chapter 1
Feminist Mythology

Women
A kick here and there for my mom, my daughters and me, rivalry inscribed from birth to grave, our mouths disengaging our brains,
Sweet kisses turning into salty tears, do as I say not as I do! Silent wars, screaming hostility, with pods revolting and roots diving deep for refuge,
Galileo painting our minds with jealousy and conflicting opinions, from one generation to another,
Caffeine, Nicotine and Prozac swallowing our kingliest bliss, our happiness depending on our estranged loyalty to one another,
Women are flags of far too many dimensions to unfurl on paper.

Bird of God
I like to begin poetry by exploring phrases,
I am…I am a poet…but then I think
“What is a poet?”
What ever it is, I think,
it must have food for the soul,
It must have generous folds of
thoughts,
and Love,
What ever it is, I think,
it must be arrogant,
to coach the sun to rise,
to kiss the day good-bye,
and Hope,
What ever it is, I think,
Its ecstasy remains intact,
With the Birds of God
for Companions.

Turning Into Mom
I hear my mom’s voice many mornings when I roll out of bed, her eyes looking back at me in a mirror, both of us crying a little,
it was our habit to refer back to minutes, weeks, months, or years gone by, when forced to keep doing, as opposed to enjoying each other,
when we sat eye-to-eye, we were estranged, waiting for our bodies to stop hurting, and our minds to stop accusing and excusing,
but now that she is deceased, I try to simplify my twisted feelings by trying to forgive and forget, and remember our anger at the world did not compromise our love for each other.

Birthdays
Do you carry your past like a stone in your pocket?
Not surprisingly birthdays come on like villains knocking at our doors, tap, tap, tap, shifty-eyed fast speaking salesmen
peddling love, wisdom, youth and popularity pushing substitutes in bottles, tiny millimeters of hope Shifter stones, natal lovers, dark aliens, eaves-dropping our days, troubling our nights,
Feigning possibilities of youth and good health, intertwining hope with dread, Fantasy with fact
Re-defining gravity as incidental, promising regularity as attainable, shifty fast speaking salesmen console us with companion pillows, heating pads, Flex all and Unisom,

Un-pearling our hopes and dreams a little while longer, Old age is no party, No matter, No, No
Sometimes we swallow their lines greedily with regular doses of Metamucil, Centrum Silver and Maalox,

So what if Lady Clairol is our friend?
When we can’t sleep, not without all those young hot lovers who mused our days and pleasured our nights, Come you now with wrinkled skin and beer barrel waists with high, high foreheads
No matter, No, No, meet us at the Vender’s Market in the Land of dreamy plenty. We will love you and will sing for you of good times
Bottled and Preserved just for our Birthdays!

Happy Children
Happy children are all-stars, curious jugs of sunshine, their faces radiant,
their eyes metaphors of emptiness and fullness perfectly contained, their naïveté keeps us entertained,
they don’t think about anything too long, peanut butter keeps them energized, they have happy feet, elastic faces, like acrobats they ride bareback on wild stallions with wings, they train smarter, not harder, slow and steady gets them there,
they balance fun with rest, and they lie on their backs and take pleasure in moments of nothingness.

Crystalline Clear
I sometimes imagine us like we use to be, together holding hands, kissing, fighting, just being,
I reach for you too late, my nails biting into my flesh, I clutch nothing, just bloody me,
never in reality, would I ever imagine you not with me, have I seen you everywhere watching me, watching you,
I see you giving me a stoic farewell salute, in clouds rolling over and over, then disjoining and vaporizing,
in my afternoon Coke, tiny air bubbles fondle and nuzzle, as if us, then the ice cubes dissolve, my future crystalline clear.

Journaling Love
As if over-ripe 40 year-old grapes on a vine, sorely waiting to be plucked, aged curves and sun-toned appeal,
not soured by time but improved like wine, hot days and long nights, wanton juices burst, in love at last,
I am free, until,
bright neon lights, fears and scars illuminated inexplicable pain, a new seedling in a new time,
and captured in her tiny face is love, whose heart in a few years will be ripe for the plucking.

Becoming a Poem
As an artist I will admit there were unfortunate moments in my intensity, when crippling insecurities left me limp and passion-free. When I’m busy doing something I love,
there was progress to my spirit. Keeping busy always put me in a better mood. I am many, but not always the fairest to gaze upon, my smoldering aura embodied the holy, unholy and the human form; I confess I’ve opened my exalted head and body to Pablo Picasso who perceived me in strange and abstract ways; and there were times when I’ve summoned the most evil, known as Satan for a few hot unholy days, then joined Moses and the Greatest Mother of them all, until I tired of their perpetual sermons, on the hills, if I recall; three watery graves once called out to me, I offered John, Jr. a Water Lillie, as well as his wife, Caroline and her sister, too,
lastly with an urge to breed, I began following John Travolta around when his quivering wings reminded me of a night spent in the arms of the angel Michael, I offered him a Lilac Blossom plucked from my own bosom…laughed and kissed him long and hard, becoming this poem for you.