My favorite west coaster turned east coaster

I owe a great deal to the teacher that introduced me to Sharon Olds. Jody, my former creative writing teacher, told me to research the famous poet when I started showing a curiosity for contemporary poetry. Allow me to explain this fascination with you. Words enamor me. A blank piece of paper has always been my canvas and words have been my art. I live and breathe writing; it ignites something in me that I cannot explain. I carry around books of poetry because it is an essential for me. I feel it is something I need to have at all times of the day; it makes me feel secure. The first time I read Sharon Olds it was like coming home. I thought to myself, finally, someone understands what's going on in my head. Her words are colorful, daring, gritty and embody what I want to accomplish as a writer. If I want to mentor with William Eggelston for photography, I want to kneel at Sharon Olds' feet for writing. I'd like to say that I am somewhat dignified when it comes to being a women, but I never felt that sense of girlishness when I compared myself with other girls. I was always a bit off. I was too much of a tomboy for the girly girls and too much of a girly girl for the tomboys. As the years trucked on I started defining myself like all girls do. I liked to read; I never complained when I was assigned book reports in school. When I read Sharon Olds for the first time I finally realized that I was proud to have some sort of grit accompany my womanhood and I thought that any good woman should. Sharon Olds is not afraid to be sexual, she is not afraid to say the things others are too apprehensive to say. She accepts these feelings as an aspect of her work and she has never been anything but truthful about her life. She is not afraid to feel feelings and reminds her readers that it's OK to be honest. Some of the best writing known is the writing that tells the truth and I wouldn't have that any other way. After reading a handful of her poems I purchased one of her books titled "The Gold Cell". I would read her poems to my then-boyfriend and he would look at me as if I had two heads. He didn't understand the depth, it wasn't his "thing" and I was OK with that. I don't follow Sharon Olds' work because it is trendy, common, or famous. I read it because when I am alone with her work I want to stand on a diving board and plunge head-first into her words. If that doesn't sound like admiration I'm afraid I don't know what does. She is a wonderful women. Below are a couple of my favorite poems from "The Gold Cell". Have a great night :)

Why My Mother Made Me
Maybe I am what she always wanted,
my father as a woman,
maybe I am what she wanted to be
when she first saw him, tall and smart,
standing there in the college yard with the
hard male light of 1937
shining on his black hair. She wanted that
power. She wanted that size. She pulled and
pulled through him as if he were dark
bourbon taffy, she pulled and pulled and
through his body until she pulled me out,
rubbery and gleaming, her life after her life.
Maybe I am the way I am
because she wanted exactly that,
wanted there to be a woman
a lot like her, but who would not hold back, so she
pressed herself hard against him,
pressed and pressed the clear soft
ball of herself like a stick of beaten cream
against his stained sour steel grater
until I came out the other side of his body,
a big woman, stained, sour, sharp,
but with milk at the center of my nature.
I lie here now as I once lay
in the crook of her arm, her creature,
and I feel her looking down into me the way the
maker of a sword gazes at his face in the
steel of the blade.

The Moment the Two Worlds Meet

That's the moment I always think of--when the
slick, whole body comes out of me,
when they pull it out, not pull it but steady it
as it pushes forth, not catch it but keep their
hands under it as it pulses out,
they are the first to touch it,
and it shines, it glistens with the thick liquid on it.
That's the moment, while it's sliding, the limbs
compressed close to the body, the arms
bent like a crab's rosy legs, the
thighs closely packed plums in heavy syrup, the
legs folded like the white wings of a chicken--
that is the center of life, that moment when the
juiced bluish sphere of the baby is
sliding between the two worlds,
wet, like sex, it is sex,
it is my life opening back and back
as you'd strip the reed from the bud, not strip it but
watch it thrust so it peels it else and the
flower is there, severely folded, and
then it begins to open and dry
but by then the moment is over,
they wipe off the grease and wrap the child in a blanket and
hand it to you entirely in this world.