It is I!  I have returned! 

Thank you so much to my sister, Purple Electricity, for posting about my birthday!  I had a wonderful 15^th birthday, and most of it was owing to her kindness and the kindness of the wonderful people on HSB!  Thank you!

Oh my, where do I begin?  I have abandoned blogging for so long that I have a huge pile of things I need to catch up on, and little time to do it in!

First of all, I am so very sorry to all of my readers for falling behind on commenting.  *is ashamed* 

Secondly, I am sorry to all of those wonderful people who awarded and tagged me!  Thank you for being friends with me!  I have lost track of all the tags I am supposed to do.  This doesn’t mean that I don’t care about you!  Not a bit!  I am just so busy that I don’t have time to do all of them!  (I tried, honestly, but I lost the post I was doing them on!  *smashes computer*  )  I am afraid that for the time being I will have to pass on doing tags. 

The reason for all my business is that I have been feverishly working to finish my phase outline for my NaNoWriMo plot.  What is a phase outline?  It is a plot outline that includes key phrases and details of every scene in the book!  My phase outline is already 5,000 words long, and I’m only halfway through with it!  I must say, it has really helped me organize my thoughts, and I feel confident that I won’t crash and burn in November.  I am so excited for NaNoWriMo!!!  I can barely think about anything else!!!

I have been very busy posting on the HSB NaNoWriMo forums.  They are so fun!  We talk about a lot of great writing issues, and we throw our characters in the dungeon when they misbehave!! 

Oh!!!  I completely forgot to say: the day after my birthday, I got to meet MaidenCapitolaBallot!!!!  It was so amazing!!!  I am so glad that I finally got to meet her!!!  She is so sweet!!! 

So, the real point of the blog post was to say that I probably won’t be posting or commenting very much until December.  I’m sorry.  However, I will be checking in every few days, so if you need to contact me you still can.  But please, don’t expect much from this poor old soul who doesn’t know how to communicate with people.  *bashes herself on the head*   

This concludes this post, which I wrote while I was still half asleep.  Can you tell?

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

Hello!  This is Purple Electricity and I have hijacked Cherise's blog to announce...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY POETIC MAIDEN!!!!!!!!!!!

Read a good book, enjoy the outdoors, and havea great Birthday!!!!!

Cherise will be turning an age that she has never been before!!!!  Be sure to wish her a happy birthday (if you want to) and leave lots of comments!!!! 

She as been such a good sister to me and I am glad to be celebrating her birthday today! 

     Yours truly,

                   Purple Electricity

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

When last I blinked it was the summer

Merry in its gold and green

I turned around and it’s September

Almost passing, gone away

I remember spring when it was here

Like I remember yesterday

All was new, the world was blooming

‘twas but a moment, now it fades

I still am young; how will it be

When my moment passes and youth is gone?

Will I still be holding out my feeble hands

Trying to stop the march of time?

I am yet young, but my thoughts are ancient

Many ignore death, but not I.

I see the years flying like money quickly spent

And know that soon the time will come when none are left.

Oh me!  I would but stop the pass of time

If only I had strength in my weakening hands.

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

I am sitting here, listening to Point of Grace while typing this entry, trying to avoid working on Chapter 5 of The Prophet of Einehrowaye, which of course means I managed to finish Chapter 4.  Happy day. 

But that is not the exciting news I want to tell you about.  Last night, while agonizing over the ending of Chapter 4, I managed to reach my goal of attaining 50,000 words on POE before NaNoWriMo!  *happy dance *  I am beyond jubilant. 

Now I can officially stop laboring without end on POE and begin to start trying to work my NaNoWriMo plot into decent shape.  If I don’t add about half a million subplots, I am going to run out of novel halfway through November.  

I also wanted to tell you about the fabulous time I had playing flag football last Friday. 

Now, to fully appreciate this story, you must realize that before Friday, I had never even attempted to play football.  I barely watch it.  So when my gym teacher at my homeschool support group said that the sport we would be playing was flag football, I said, “Huh.  Interesting.” 

My gym teacher said that we would be splitting up into two groups: relaxed, and competitive.  Me being to sedentary person that I am, I decided that I would join the relaxed group.  However, I found out that my friend, OutlawedPrincess / Ariana Evenstar / Tinuviel / Meggy T / Whatever you want to call her, was going to play with the competitive team, and I really wanted to play with her.  So she convinced me that I could go with her, and that she would teach me to play while we were playing. 

That was great.  Until we got put on opposite teams. 

I stood staring across the field at Meggy and wondered what on earth I was doing. 

The coach, God bless his soul, yells to me right before the first play starts and tells me that I’m the rusher.  Whatever that means. 

I did the best I could during that play, which meant, frankly, that I botched the whole job.  My teammates, wonderful companions that they were, explained to me exactly what I was doing as rusher.  I had survived for the moment. 

After several plays, during which everyone else took turns being quarterback, the coach discovered that I haven’t taken a turn yet as quarterback and decided that I would take my turn during the next play. 

“Please,” I said frantically, “don’t give the ball to me!  I don’t want the ball!  I don’t know what to do!”

“No,” said the coach, “we are here to learn.” 

I tried not to hyperventilate as my team lined up.  I stood bent over, gripping the leather ball in my shaking hands, and prayed that I would make it through the play without having a heart attack. 

I yelled, “hike!” (at least I had the sense to do that) and threw the ball to a teammate.  He didn’t catch it, of course, but that paled in comparison to the fact that I had not had a heart attack. 

Then it was my turn to catch the ball. 

Now, I have a fear of balls.  If someone throws something to me that I don’t expect, I leap out of the way even if it has no chance of hitting me.  Basically, I am a girly girl who has a better chance of getting brained than catching a flying football. 

However, as I stared at the leather projectile flying towards my hands, I did not run.  Time seemed to slow down. 

And I CAUGHT THE BALL!!! 

Swimming the English Channel couldn’t have made me happier.  Catching the ball told me that I wasn’t a complete mess, and that I didn’t make a total mistake by playing with the competitive team.  It told me that I wouldn’t die within the next hour. 

The rest of the game went rather the same, some ups, some downs, but in the end my team won in spite of me, and I didn’t totally mess everything up.  By my standards a success, even though I was scared to death the whole time. 

So now I can say that I have played flag football with a competitive team and survived.  I am not a wimp.  For once in my life, I did something brave. 

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

Tonight is a beautiful clear night in Colorado, and on the way home from a friend's house we had the windows down, letting the evening breeze blow past our faces.  The moon is almost full, and the stars are clear even though the past few days even though the past few days have been rainy.  The earth still smells of the moisture.  There are some nights that you can't help but feel awake, no matter how tired you are: nights that you long to run barefoot through open fields under the stars and feel the summer breeze in your hair, dancing by the light of the moon, all your worldly cares melted under the beams of silver.  Oh, to dance...

My heart leaves my body and I fly over the midnight plains, swooping over the prairies like a swallow, soaring up to the mountaintops.  The Rockies: land of enchantment to a girl of fourteen.  The scent of pine floats sweetly to my nostrils, and I hear the voices of the streams and waterfalls.  I would choose to live in this dream world, but inevitably I am called back to where I am sitting, back to my life.  I come back, and I remember who I am before I realize that I had forgotten. 

I look at the moon and I cannot help but think that this is but a taste of heaven.  In heaven we will dance barefoot under the moon, and our worldly cares will melt: not for a moment, but for all eternity.  Then we will truly be free. 

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

The ninth month has arrived, and with it comes chilly days and hot tea.  An uncomfortable nip steals around my toes, but there is still enough warmth left to make one remember summer in its glory, before the cold came and the leaves on the trees began to droop.  All around me there is a silence, as if nature holds its breath, waiting to see what winter will do to the beautiful landscape.

Though I mourn the passing of summer, I raise my eyes to the clouds glowing in the west and remember that all is not lost.  There will be days when I will not be able to bear the barren cold, but there will be other days when the sun shines on the mountain peaks, and there will be rumors of spring. 

Summer will come again.  But for the time, I must be patient, waiting hopefully for the day when the warm winds will return. 

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

I would like to make it known to all y'all that I have posted the first chapter of my new story, The Heart of the Wyrkind, on my story blog.  Click here to read it.  Please read it as soon as you can and tell me what you think! 

~The Poetess

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

One word on the page

One word, all alone

A fragment of meaning

A thought half-begun

Words have the power

Of description and memory

Feeling and thought

All bound up as one

They can bind and release

When they stand side-by-side

But when there is only one…

A dream that was strangled

A thought, now forgotten

A word, but if only it was more than a word

Then we would know

Then we would feel

We would recall another’s memory

 But as it is…

We are lost

In a sea of could-have-been’s

We can guess, we can wonder

Only to watch

A half-born thought

Evanesce before our eyes

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

Creativity has its downsides.

I have been trying to write in a more…inspired manner, if you get my meaning.  For the past few months I have been dragging my muse through the mud, and my muse hasn’t liked that.  But now I have been trying to get my muse used to a new idea: letting her pull me around, instead of me having to pull her around. 

I think she liked the idea. 

As a result of giving my muse freedom, she has leapt off at a gallop and plunged into a half-dozen different stories besides The Prophet of Einehrowaye.  I have barely gotten a week’s worth of writing on POE in a two-week time span.  It’s embarrassing. 

Now, since my muse is knocking me on the head telling me that I need to tell you all about her fabulous stories, here are a few summaries:

The Meadow of Moss – A freak weather occurrence leaves a group of campers stranded in the mountains.  When a stranger comes and says that he knows a way out, everyone follows him.  But as the paths they take become more and more strange, the campers begin to wonder if the man is really who he says he is.  Only a brave few will take the final step and follow him into a paradise none of them could have imagined.

Seh-Ryal – Wyreya and Lloyden are two ordinary teenagers who live alone on a farm far removed from any village.  When inhuman creatures break in and destroy their peaceful life, the two are forced to discover their dangerous heritage.

Shorn: The Second Dawn – Laezwyn was merely an orphan before the armies of Lornathix came and burned her village.  But now she has lost everything to the fire, including her long auburn hair.  She is not ready for the discovery that she is the only heir of the Firedancer Queen.  How will she be able to continue her family’s legacy as Fire Dancers if she cannot get past her fear of the element that destroyed her life?

Forgive me for being overdramatic: I couldn’t help myself.  Please tell me which one you think sounds more interesting!  I will be posting bits of these stories on my story blog sometime soon, so keep checking back!  I also encourage you to read Part 4 of the 2^nd Chapter of The Prophet of Einehrowaye, which I recently posted.  I hope you have a blessed day!

Ze Poetess

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A. You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.

Emerald leaves

Dancers in the winds of change

Life was theirs; they made the forest

Seem to breathe

In the winds of time

And I remember they had voices of their own

A sea of dancing, whispering emerald

See the glimmer!  Though the wood would sleep in peaceful shadow

There was light still, golden light

That fell between the leaves and made the shadows deeper

And the leaves brighter

And one was lost in emerald

Light!  Rays of heaven!

There was vibrancy

Still, so still, a many-voiced silence

Louder than sound, louder,

Until the ending of time, that voice that was beyond the silence rang

Stronger

Until all clamor was drowned out and there was peace

All this, as I remember

In my heart, more than in my eyes

That pulse: why I weep at every sunrise

Why I hear the river and I am gone

The sound, the voice that speaks beyond all voices

And though silent, is heard

Why can men long for what they haven’t seen?

They feel the memory that none remember

The song that is beyond the world, that pierces moments, and we weep

We weep for what we do not understand

We see more, we see beyond reflections

And for a moment glimpse the forests of another world 

Copyright 2008 by Cherise A.  You must ask me before using any of my stuff, and my name must appear along with the poem or post if you reproduce it.