A day in the life: Poetry tit-for-tat

Five days ago I was on Chegg writing short-essay-form answers to scholarship questions and free-typing some poetry. By now we should all know that I go on artistic tangents and put the least amount of thought before venturing into a medium. I've got a basic foundation to lay but the rest is history and free-flow, and minimal editing. (To illustrate example, in the post before this: An ode to coffee, the drawing had only one, single line erased on the right (the drawing's right) cheek.)

Since it's inherently my intellectual property, I'm going to post it here as well: 

{to be read aloud, in spoken word form}

A mass-televised world that isn't real

Where journalism is meant to hide and conceal

I stick with my roots to get me through

Because what I know to be true

Is few.

Fashion design opened my eyes to ugly

That it's not all glamour, fame, and beauty.

And I wish I could see

All the girls like me

Killing themselves

Slowly

Ever so slowly

Just to express themselves freely.

By the time I was old enough to know

By the time I had enough time to grow

It's really who you know

Not what you know.

A year or two passed "Undecided"

because it wasn't by my own gut

Sweat

Intuition

Heart

that I abided,

A year or two passed before I knew

I knew just what it was I wanted to do.

Though my major isn't Public Relations,

I knew I had to give into communciations.

And I'll tell you why:

I live my full life as an underrepresented minority,

APIs stereotyped on media as the media

Goes scot-free.

But I also grew up in that same tradition

Where feminism wasn't in full bloom

Where I felt the sting of male privilege

Because I was born of the other gender

And I had to plant the seeds of knowing

Knowing

Always knowing

I had to rise as a leader.

Even if I didn't want to be.

Dubious means that promise quick drops,

Getting labeled cool and "hip hop",

The competitors will feign their plastic

"Thirsty", "salty", "illest", "ratchet",

But you know they vie for the attention

That not even their brand can mention.

I can't be like them,

Drawing myself to meet the same ends

That see the ends of civilizations

And wilt away with their faces.

Those trends that negate progression

Are the lessons behind my transgressions.

My passion is in my infliction, 

Because I know one day

One day

And that one day will be swift

And soon

I, and everyone

Will challenge the social dichotomies

To end the universal tyranny.

My brand is myself,

And I protect that with the full force

Of myself.

I represent no one

But me.

Me and my comrades

In the struggle.

I am no one's everyday man.

I am no one's quickdraw marketing scheme.

I am no one's pitching tool.

I am made from my own dreams

My own ideals, my own realities,

Molded and haunted by a life

That only bore me strife

And suffering. 

Of humanity and principality, 

Of want and need,

Of oppression and progression,

Of matriarchal feminity,

Of compassion and empathy,

And knowing fully well,

Fully well

That the necessity of the human condition

Is beyond my physical being.

It's written in verse, not prose, and follows the same read-it-aloud style that combines modern spoken word and most contemporary poetry (I don't think you're supposed to read poetry quietly) so it's also a performance piece. Iambic pentameter, haiku, ABBA/ABAB rhyme scheme whatever, I don't really like structured poetry when I'm the poet. Something to do with boundaries and limitations and being a free spirit and hating being tied down. 

To explain the background of certain stanzas and topics I brought up: 

Stanza 1 (A mass-televised world that isn't real):
What we know as advanced citizens (because we're able to self-educate and search different outlets and perspectives to uncover any sort of truth that helps shape our opinion and knowledge, that's what an advanced citizen can do) is mostly filtered by what we can access. Yet, even with the help of powerful search engines, social media, and accessibility to international browsers/servers sometimes we just don't even try. We don't. We're okay with being ignorant but it's not okay to assume what we know is what's actually happening. It's like how everyone's distracted by the Flight 370 disappearance while Crimea/Ukraine is pretty much getting screwed over by Mother Russia and the revolutionaries in Venezuela are not getting anything out because of restricted news outlets. That's happening now, and all we care about is what Iggy Azalea is wearing to the MTV Awards, okay. (Iggy Azalea is a wonderfully-spoken and articulate woman and artist, but I meant to say is that we're really freakin' trivial when it comes to mind over matter.) Rumor and press control is also something that PR handles, which is what I'm getting into (thus the title, PR: Positive Renovation).

Stanza 2 (Fashion design opened my eyes to ugly):
Taking notes from my "get to know the girl" post, I am Danny Nguyen's sometimes assistant, and ex-intern. Most of his interns and apprentices were "fired" by the guy himself, but I had the luxury of just quitting (and quitting again and again, but I know this guy needs my help sometimes). This is also noted on my Tumblr. A lot of girls filled my inbox (on Tumblr) asking me what it's like to be a fashion designer's assistant, while feigning some sort of professional and well-worded bite of interest. I do say this bitingly, because though I am involved in the circle of artists in Houston, I've met and heard a lot of crooked things and it broke my heart. I say this with a heavy burden: If you've read Kelly Cutrone's "If You Need To Cry, Go Outside" and don't really "get it", when you join the ranks of failed interns or wannabe apprentices and sky-high model management you will know. It was when I was interning with another girl on Danny's SS2013 campaign just three seasons ago and I was just fed up. Fed up maybe, because I took fashion, art, composition, detail, and all those other elements - too seriously. And everyone, including myself, just wanted some idea of what this "fashionable crowd" really was.

Abeer (the other intern) and I. Flapper '20s meets '80s design pop. 

I pop into the video only for a few seconds (0:18-0:20, in the faaaaaaaar right strutting towards the guy in the red shirt), but even though my short-lived internship gave me a winding disgust for the fashion industry, I came back to help Danny with his FW2013 campaign as well.

We're not going to talk about my fluorescent bra. Never. Never ever never. Middle guy's Danny, the designer, heads up.

The next 4 stanzas (By the time I was old enough to know/Even though I didn't want to be):
Korean Asians are the only Asians getting on-screen attention compared to the rest of the APIs (Asian/Pacific Islanders) especially with the peak of K-pop as a trend in North American (Oppa Gangnam Style, let's face it, it's catchy, but none of us know Korean so Psy's parody of society goes mostly unappreciated) but they still play the weirdo or the awkward geek. Except in The Walking Dead, - thanks, Glen. Being Asian, Chinese/Franco-Vietnamese exactly, I either had to be in law, engineering, or medical. I was the medical kid. My parents have been "lovingly" trying to suppress me into dentistry or surgeon practice so they can pretty much bum off their doctor daughter. Literally, I have four years of medical training (in and outside of a medical program offered by my alma mater, Hightower High School, by the way) and they don't listen to my sound advice so what's going to convince them to listen when I have a PhD? The PhD? Naw. I'm their subservient daughter, I'm stupid and supposed to be quiet and to myself and a be wallflower and generate grandchildren like a freaking baby factory. Hence the mention of feminism in one of the stanzas. I'm not condemning housewife-ry, but I sure as hell have been oppressed by the only, not-so-much consoling idea and traditional role that that's what I "must" and "should" do, or be doing. What I do condemn is the idea of "should" - because no one really ever has to do anything. 
Take kindly to the example of knowing what you want to earn a degree in to settle for a career field that you may or may not want to commit suicide at the end of your career life because your unwitting 18-year old self did not YET enjoy the full extent of the world. It's like Russian roulette. The education system needs a huge turnover much less REFORMATION, because at this point in society, education is like a prison system with allusions to the meat industry (cows to the slaughterhouse). It took me two years to be comfortable enough to say I wanted a degree in Social Psychology, Cultural Anthropology, and Marketing. Funny, because I want to do PR. Funnier yet, I know a degree in PR won't actually get me a place in PR. 

The next 2 stanzas (Dubious means that promise quick drops/And wilt away with their faces):
I'm actually referring to Twitter and Instagram culture. People put themselves on blast in hopes to be famous but they burn out like comets, like fads that die out in a few days and have no lasting power. The poem has a lot of free flow like I mentioned, but I'm surprised I rhymed "plastic" with "ratchet" phonetically. Others might disagree, but I'm not a hipster: I don't have a particular fondness for what's "in" - like certain slang words (coughswagcough) or other distastefully short-lived things (sending each other nudes through direct tweets). 

The last 2 stanzas (Those trends that negate progression/Are beyond my physical being):
Pretty much my war cry.

Before we forget, this poem was typed up in not even 20, 30 minutes. Even after some editing. And it's for a scholarship about a dream job (which went haywire and ended up being a social diss on matters). Ha. Oh, me. I am ridiculous.

xoxo

Edit: P.S., can we appreciate the unintended microcosmic poetry scheme in the beginning and ends of those stanza groups (By the time I was old enough to know/Even though I didn't want to be & Those trends that negate progression/Are beyond my physical being)??? They're really... wow. Even though this is war cry-esque and very much improvised, those two pairs of lines combined break down the confidence and momentum of the entire thing.. 

A day in the life: An ode to coffee

Just the right mixture of French-dripped coffee with chicory and amaretto-flavored creamer and suddenly my anxiety is anti-climatically gone. Poof. Buh-bye. Don't come back. Jerk.

I thought I had to get caught up in a swirling maelstrom of ambiguity and slowly crescendo-ing hysteria having to metaphorically "die" to be "reborn" again to get out of my depressive funk episode. (Which is usually what happens by the way, especially in October and April of every single YEAR UGH.) It's very melodramatic if you're not the one having to be stuck in a rut of impending doom and suicidal ideation. Very,very bittersweet. But THANK YOU, COFFEE, for relaxing my liver and other physiological aspects into a more relaxed, happy state. Basically, I think coffee is how I should self-medicate.

Taking the advice of a certain NOLA-based artist I met this Spring Break, Lionel Milton, and another certain cool kid friend-from-high-school who's also an up-and-coming painter, Sebastian Tristan: "do whatever you want" and "do you".
Lionel actually was answering a question I asked him while in his attic-studio: What kind of style were his paintings? And he really said more something along the lines of "whatever" and a mix of "it's whatever I like/whatever I want it to be". But really, do whatever you want, because we're in that post-modern age away from the "-isms".

I don't sketch daily, only when the feeling moves me, and I think they turn out phenomenal when they're inspired yet not-really-where-you're-starting-out because to be frank I didn't know what I had in mind to draw. I just kept going, and ended up with this:

Not sure why I sketched this image though: Maybe because I miss my long hair and running my fingers and palm to get that edgy, indie-grungy, sideswept look? 

As an artist... to be very technical, my illustrations are very manga-inspired (old-school CLAMP, specifically) with some influences from Alphonse Mucha and tid-bits from here and there from other contemporary artists. As of late though I've been doing more "cameo" work where it's just the head and upper bust. I like it as is, though. It looks very earthy, very pretty (I'm very aesthetically inclined to an almost perfectionist level, which is why I went totes anal on my angled bob and choppy nasty bangs). My art's never consistent because of the third/fourth/fifth ever-changing influence so asking me if I sketched one illustration because another doesn't look quite the same compared to another, is a huge, HUGEHUGEHUGEHUMUNGO DISS.

Someone accused me of that when I was 14 - when in reality that's just how I draw. Never forget. 

Detailing, detailing, detailing.

The doodle above that I did tonight and this doodle (done several weeks ago) aren't very alike. The only thing consistent I've ever kept with me is clean lines. Edited to bright with contrast because this was lightly done.

Self-medicating and doodling aside (which by the way, explains my nickname, "Doodles"), color is reviving itself in my life. Fluctuating moods galore: I've opted to wear a lot of grayscale and monochrome the last few weeks, even if I did spend a small fortune on a wardrobe of salmon pinks, floral prints, royal blues, soft turquoises, peachy oranges, and sheer numbers. Now I'm slowly getting back into the color spectrum. Slowly. Like a turtle. An awkward turtle.
But probably like a cute awkward turtle, like something chibird would draw.

Drizzling Sunday afternoon, I donned a pullover and headed towards a Whole Foods because I'm in the market for lotion moisturizers with SPF now. I was just a passerby, appreciating the colors in bloom in the floral section and packaged fruits in the grocery aisle.

Oh, and this is my new tea-only mug. The style reminds me of Lilly Pulitzer which caught my eye, but the clever (because it has some truth to it) quote on the side: "Sooner or later we all quote our mothers". I'm not sure if I want to quote my mother but sure, yeah, maybe I'll have the same technique. My mom uses a lot of imagery metaphors, by the way... which I already d--crap.

My Sundays usually suck eggs but today was pretty chill, laid-back, and not really as introspective and maddening as those other days where I wanted to run someone through Velvetine. Oh, what was yesterday? That was yesterday. Yup. *sharp inhale*

We'll see how the rest of the week goes before I make a concrete decision on whether this is a good or bad thing.

xoxo