Math Problems

School is well on its way, and so I thought it fitting to dredge up this poem from the past. I dedicate it to anyone who has ever struggled with a math problem.

Math Problems

By Melody Beerbower, 4-30-14

A thousand numbers scrawled on the page.

A thousand lines scribbled in rage.

I floundered and figured,

Struggled and scratched,

Differed and divvied,

Minused and matched.

I added and altered,

Combined and collected,

Rounded and reasoned,

Subtract and subjected.

Finally I rested, resigned, and reflected,

Trying to reach the answer expected.

And still it simply wouldn’t come,

And that’s when I decided that math was dumb.

P.S. I don't actually think math is dumb. There are just times that it makes one feel better to lay the blame on the math, even though we know it is never wrong. 

An Elegy to Rhyme

Here is a playful poem which I wrote for my Creative Writing class. For that assignment, we were supposed to write an elegy and were not allowed to use rhyme, so naturally, I combined those two items and used them as the basis of my poem.

An Elegy to Rhyme

By Melody Beerbower, October 24, 2015

O Crutch upon which I once leant,

Like a cliché, I thought that if I employed your beauty

Everyone would know what I

Was striving to express.

Should not the language of poetry be ethereal and fine?

To reach this high standard, I thought I must position

Echoing syllables at the end of every

Row of flowing, twisting words.

Without you, O Thread of Continuity, coupling together my mismatched ideas,

I trembled to ponder that my oft prosaic scribbles

Might not, at last, be classified as poetry.

In this fear I labored like a dutiful scribe,

And yet enjoyed my labors

Believing that this was the one thing

To which I must adhere with vehemence

If I were to obtain the ultimate essence of Poetry.

But, alas, ‘twas not so…

Woe, poor Words of Echoing Stem!

And Woe to me!

In a crippling stroke of heartlessness,

You were wrenched from my grasp

And I was pushed forward to find my stumbling way without you.

For I have been forced

To bury your archaic beauty in the tattered notebooks of Junior High.

And now at last the time has come to say

That I can see the reason

For this parting.

How oft dist you bind me in straightjacket form,

Forcing me with ghastly rigidity to twist my sentences

Into convoluted knots the very kindred of that ancient entanglement

Which only sword could rend asunder—  

All of this in order to satiate your voracious appetite

Like that of a toothless lion fruitlessly pursuing its prey.

Time and again, in short poems and long

You coerced me to choose words that were simply

Inferior and lacking in the depth and power I sought.

Loosed from your unmitigated structure,

I no longer have to squint at list upon list of miniature words in a dusty volume

Hoping that I might manipulate one to resemble my intended meaning.

I am at last free to select with care that word which epitomizes my thoughts

And brings them to life.

And yet…

Yet, at times…

I still long to call you back,

And hold in my fingers the steadiness of your polished symmetry,

And catch in my ear the echoing of your familiar cadence,

And know in my soul the thrill of that flawless word drawn from the stars

Slipping, unforced, into your stringent frame.

But alas, O Wiley Duplicator of Sounds,

Who doth both repel

And draw me in

It is my lot that I should’st endeavor

To make this separation last

For the rest of my time here

That I might grow stronger by your absence.

A Once Secluded Psalm

This is another poem I wrote for my Creative Writing class. It is an epistle poem. 

A Once Secluded Psalm

By Melody Beerbower; October 28, 2015

Dear God,

Sometimes I go to the woods

Beside a stream carrying autumn leaves on a gentle journey

Over sleeping rocks and silent sand.

There is no one to fight with there,

No one to disturb my restful contemplations

With crude language or sexual speech.

Instead I marvel at the nature

Which You have designed so intricately—

The thread-like veins of the Maple leaves

Spreading out like miniature streams and rivers;

The seeds that cling to my clothes with Velcro fingers

Until I pick them off and drop them to be planted in new soil.

Each thing I see is a testimony to Your wise design.

Sometimes I sit under University Hall’s stone arches  

In the cool shadow of the domed ceiling of limestone, 

And sing to You the old hymns that I love:

Be Still My Soul and What a Friend I Have In Jesus.

When the Gothic arches echo my voice

Sending it back fuller and purer than before,

It is not hard for me, in that moment,

To praise You.

And when the fog swaddles the trees in an opaque blanket

And nearly drowns the bell tower above me

In its misty damp,

Then, yes then, It is easy for my voice to speak Your name

And for me to know that You are surely here,

Creator, and yet creating still.

But when at last the electric bells compel me to start another round of classes,

Just as the fog scatters from the harsh rays of the sun

So, all too often, my trust and peace flee

In response to the bitter voices of people who surround me.

Once more I am afraid to speak of You.

Instead my voice joins in the battle of words

And the emptiness of deceit.

Those who do not believe dare to speak Your holy name—

In disgust, in rage, in flippant indifference

And still I—who regards the very sound of it as precious—

Remain silent

And pass by with down cast eyes

Pretending not to hear…

Forgive me O God,

And teach me to love you more!

Lock in my heart the peace and trust

You showed me by the shore.

I cannot merely stay beside the stream

Nor remain in archways of stone,

For You have called me to live my daily life

Here in this world

Surrounded by the people

You’ve taught me to love.

Strengthen me in the times of solitude

That I might proclaim You in times of strife

And make a once secluded psalm of praise

The psalm of my whole life.