I have been writing poetry in a journal for years. I am currently on my fourth journal since I started writing by hand rather than on my laptop. Even though typing is faster and often easier than writing, I always thought there was something inspiring about the way the words stain the page.

Today, you will read some of my old poems. Writing itself is a vulnerable act, and someone else reading this pages is terrifying. So please remember that these are rough drafts of my chaotic thoughts and emotions.

This poem is titled “Groceries.” As you can see, my handwriting tends to be messy because it is hard to write as fast as I think. There are words that were scratched, even in this first draft, and even more words would be changed if I decided to turn this into a well-developed poem.

I don’t remember exactly what inspired this poem. At this time, I was a Creative Writing student, so often my inspiration came from either my peers or poems we read in class. I tend to romanticize the small acts of my every day life, just like I did here. I tried finding a connection between grocery items and emotions.

As you can see, one of my favorite things to explore is form!

Even though writing is often my preferred form of art, I also get inspired by visuals. When I struggle with inspiration, I like creating collages of things that inspire me. In this case, I created a collage which I believe captures who I am as a person. On the following page, I wrote a poem titled “Who Am I?”

This poem, titled “Captured Moments,” represents another one of my favorite poetic devices. I love metaphors and similes! I often think they are some of the most insightful devices to be used.

Just like I did in “Groceries,” I turned polaroid pictures into a metaphor for love. As you probably noticed, most of my poems are about love– even though I also like to write about immigration, the self, and nature.

Lastly, I wanted to include two shorter. A lot of my poems are more like phrases or short excerpts. When an idea comes to mind, I write it down. Depending on what it is, I may go back and expand it to be a full length poem, or sometimes I just keep it like a short phrase that may be powerful on its own– like the last picture.