Charlene Delfin's Blog, page 6
April 23, 2015
All the Cards
Just woke up this 7am.
My mother and I watched "American Sniper" last night. Even though my family does not like that type of war movie (the Delfins are a military family in the Philippines, and nobody likes to relax by watching a movie about his job), they had taken interest in the movie after what happened last year.
We've watched "American Sniper" so many times before, but never got to finish it. We attempted again last night, but I tuned out. It's hard to focus when I see the same things. The movie looks way too familiar. Soldiers, guns, etc. Talks about war, war strategies, and military terms. Soon, I was like, zzzZ.
Woke up only after the movie. Logged in to my other account to debate with my friend for two hours about Indonesian greetings. Debates where both parties know very little about the topic can last a liftetime haha
Wrote my poem at 2am, and was about to start "10th Commandment" when I got a headache. So I went back to sleep.
Just added more songs to "Side B." When writing a story, I spend much more time on the creation of the villain than on any character because he's hardest to understand. My initial reaction to all of my villains is fear and disgust, and I can't write a story feeling those things. I need to care about my villain. Just looking for something lovable. I give him heart. The most challenging question in writing the story has been, How can a man who cares about others kill so many people and destroy lives, celebrate it, and waste so much time and energy on devising plans to kill even more? With every scene, I keep writing side notes on how he's weighing the options on his mind, deciding whether to murder, or let the chance pass.
I've gotten so used to spending time with these characters, that it's inevitable to let them go. We are all about to say goodbye. Currently listening to "Tears and Rain" by James Blunt. I associate it a lot with my protagonist, Evelyn.
I have failed to publish my "The Shining" review on Bubblews because, um, I've been asleep. "American Sniper" reminded me that my insomnia had been winning too much.
For NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-Three, we are to choose a playing card from a deck of cards, write for five minutes about it, and create a poem out of what we've written.
I don't play cards. I've always been curious about playing cards, but everyone around me had been keeping me away from them. When I was a child, my mother was like, "It's gambling." She hid all the cards in the house from me. I met this stranger who worked in a Las Vegas casino last year, and he was like, "My advice is that you shouldn't start. It's basically gambling. You seem like a good person. So don't even try it, for my sake." That's why I know nothing of cards.
For the NaPoWriMo challenge, I simply Google image searched "playing cards" and chose whichever card was clearest. I don't know what it's called, but it's black-and-white, has a tree shape in the middle and letter A's on the corners. I wrote about what it looked like and what its appearance reminded me of.
This poem is the one I've written in all of April that has the least metaphors, except for "ram." RAM (Reform the Armed Forces Movement) killed a child in my hometown while they exchanged fire with Camp Aguinaldo over the Delfin ancestral house via air in 1987. It's sad when old comrades fight. Us Delfins had always been on the loyal and good side, and it's truly sad when old comrades fight.
The man who I mentioned in the poem helped me last year in solving a certain code from my past. He's one of the inspirations behind my NaNoWriMo 2014 novel, "Alter Ego."
The Coder
Home was where I came from
And now I face symbols.
They represent like ram,
They remind of rubble
And of a certain game.
I don't recall the name.
They also remind of
A place from my own past,
Where letters were aloft.
But the memories still last.
Now that I think of it,
The reason starts to meet.
It was a house, a game.
It was a coded name.
How can I be so lame?
He advised me last year
That all these roads lead back.
All the terror and fear.
They were caused by a stack.
Nowhere far shall I roam,
For the answer is home.
My mother and I watched "American Sniper" last night. Even though my family does not like that type of war movie (the Delfins are a military family in the Philippines, and nobody likes to relax by watching a movie about his job), they had taken interest in the movie after what happened last year.
We've watched "American Sniper" so many times before, but never got to finish it. We attempted again last night, but I tuned out. It's hard to focus when I see the same things. The movie looks way too familiar. Soldiers, guns, etc. Talks about war, war strategies, and military terms. Soon, I was like, zzzZ.
Woke up only after the movie. Logged in to my other account to debate with my friend for two hours about Indonesian greetings. Debates where both parties know very little about the topic can last a liftetime haha
Wrote my poem at 2am, and was about to start "10th Commandment" when I got a headache. So I went back to sleep.
Just added more songs to "Side B." When writing a story, I spend much more time on the creation of the villain than on any character because he's hardest to understand. My initial reaction to all of my villains is fear and disgust, and I can't write a story feeling those things. I need to care about my villain. Just looking for something lovable. I give him heart. The most challenging question in writing the story has been, How can a man who cares about others kill so many people and destroy lives, celebrate it, and waste so much time and energy on devising plans to kill even more? With every scene, I keep writing side notes on how he's weighing the options on his mind, deciding whether to murder, or let the chance pass.
I've gotten so used to spending time with these characters, that it's inevitable to let them go. We are all about to say goodbye. Currently listening to "Tears and Rain" by James Blunt. I associate it a lot with my protagonist, Evelyn.
I have failed to publish my "The Shining" review on Bubblews because, um, I've been asleep. "American Sniper" reminded me that my insomnia had been winning too much.
For NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-Three, we are to choose a playing card from a deck of cards, write for five minutes about it, and create a poem out of what we've written.
I don't play cards. I've always been curious about playing cards, but everyone around me had been keeping me away from them. When I was a child, my mother was like, "It's gambling." She hid all the cards in the house from me. I met this stranger who worked in a Las Vegas casino last year, and he was like, "My advice is that you shouldn't start. It's basically gambling. You seem like a good person. So don't even try it, for my sake." That's why I know nothing of cards.
For the NaPoWriMo challenge, I simply Google image searched "playing cards" and chose whichever card was clearest. I don't know what it's called, but it's black-and-white, has a tree shape in the middle and letter A's on the corners. I wrote about what it looked like and what its appearance reminded me of.
This poem is the one I've written in all of April that has the least metaphors, except for "ram." RAM (Reform the Armed Forces Movement) killed a child in my hometown while they exchanged fire with Camp Aguinaldo over the Delfin ancestral house via air in 1987. It's sad when old comrades fight. Us Delfins had always been on the loyal and good side, and it's truly sad when old comrades fight.
The man who I mentioned in the poem helped me last year in solving a certain code from my past. He's one of the inspirations behind my NaNoWriMo 2014 novel, "Alter Ego."
The Coder
Home was where I came from
And now I face symbols.
They represent like ram,
They remind of rubble
And of a certain game.
I don't recall the name.
They also remind of
A place from my own past,
Where letters were aloft.
But the memories still last.
Now that I think of it,
The reason starts to meet.
It was a house, a game.
It was a coded name.
How can I be so lame?
He advised me last year
That all these roads lead back.
All the terror and fear.
They were caused by a stack.
Nowhere far shall I roam,
For the answer is home.
April 22, 2015
Before the Clock Strikes
Camp NaNoWriMo 2015 word count: 38,588
It's 8am of Thursday and I wanted to sleep a bit before I start my day, but Day Twenty-Two of NaPoWriMo will be ending soon. I shouldn't dare be late at publishing my response for their challenge again.
Honestly, I spent last night and some hours of this morning rebelling a bit and just getting busy with myself. I always become like this during the NaNos and while attending HarvardX. It's when I've had enough of my usual schedule, and just do whatever I please. Like, play computer games. Well, that was what I did last night.
In "10th Commandment," the end has begun.
I mentioned in my other post, "The Last Light," that I wanted to change the colors of this blog. Just keeping up with author trends. It's customary for authors to make their blogs look like what they write about. I write crime fiction. Honestly, if I had my way, I'd turn this whole blog pink. Because pink is my favorite color.
I'll be reviewing "The Shining" on Bubblews tonight. Something gives me the feeling that it doesn't have to be reviewed, since many people have watched it already ...
Here's my response to the NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-Two challenge. We are to write a pastoral poem. I've written so many pastoral poems before. I've demonstrated through "Sharing a Secret" how I use Nature as a metaphor for a man's face. The difference between that type of my poetry and my pastoral poems is that my pastoral poems give descriptions through all the senses, not just sight.
This pastoral poem is about a cornfield, a storm, romance and life. It's inspired by everything that it is about. Not much metaphor, except for "As the first stone is cast."
Actually, I accidentally deleted this poem a while ago. I thought I lost it. Glad that my word document has an endless Undo, and I just kept clicking Undo 'til the poem reappeared. Whew! I thought I lost it!
Out in the Cornfields
I smell it in the air,
I see it in the clouds,
Outdoors people hear fair
The bitter thunder loud.
Can you feel the strong winds?
They push hard on my limbs.
The lands darken, it creeps
Like battle formations,
And then the powerful sky weeps,
Soaking the poor nations.
Let us take cover here.
Stay closer, so you hear.
But all things never last,
And life goes by so fast
As the first stone is cast.
The enemy retreats.
The crops are green again.
For my sight, it's a treat
When they're yellow again,
Shining in grass like sun.
And you and I stay one.
It's 8am of Thursday and I wanted to sleep a bit before I start my day, but Day Twenty-Two of NaPoWriMo will be ending soon. I shouldn't dare be late at publishing my response for their challenge again.
Honestly, I spent last night and some hours of this morning rebelling a bit and just getting busy with myself. I always become like this during the NaNos and while attending HarvardX. It's when I've had enough of my usual schedule, and just do whatever I please. Like, play computer games. Well, that was what I did last night.
In "10th Commandment," the end has begun.
I mentioned in my other post, "The Last Light," that I wanted to change the colors of this blog. Just keeping up with author trends. It's customary for authors to make their blogs look like what they write about. I write crime fiction. Honestly, if I had my way, I'd turn this whole blog pink. Because pink is my favorite color.
I'll be reviewing "The Shining" on Bubblews tonight. Something gives me the feeling that it doesn't have to be reviewed, since many people have watched it already ...
Here's my response to the NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-Two challenge. We are to write a pastoral poem. I've written so many pastoral poems before. I've demonstrated through "Sharing a Secret" how I use Nature as a metaphor for a man's face. The difference between that type of my poetry and my pastoral poems is that my pastoral poems give descriptions through all the senses, not just sight.
This pastoral poem is about a cornfield, a storm, romance and life. It's inspired by everything that it is about. Not much metaphor, except for "As the first stone is cast."
Actually, I accidentally deleted this poem a while ago. I thought I lost it. Glad that my word document has an endless Undo, and I just kept clicking Undo 'til the poem reappeared. Whew! I thought I lost it!
Out in the Cornfields
I smell it in the air,
I see it in the clouds,
Outdoors people hear fair
The bitter thunder loud.
Can you feel the strong winds?
They push hard on my limbs.
The lands darken, it creeps
Like battle formations,
And then the powerful sky weeps,
Soaking the poor nations.
Let us take cover here.
Stay closer, so you hear.
But all things never last,
And life goes by so fast
As the first stone is cast.
The enemy retreats.
The crops are green again.
For my sight, it's a treat
When they're yellow again,
Shining in grass like sun.
And you and I stay one.
April 21, 2015
Turning Homer into Edgar Allan Poe
Camp NaNoWriMo 2015 word count: 37,287
My villain is losing his mind. I make him real horrible in the story, but I know what his real problem is. I just can't tell that to the whole world because he has a scary reputation to keep haha
I finally published my "K-19: The Widowmaker" review on Bubblews. Let that be my review for today, because I'm already so tired. I need to save energy for the rest of this day.
Here's my response for the NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-One challenge. We are to take a page from a book, print it, and erase any word to create our own poem out of the remaining words.
It didn't feel like being original at first, but I soon started to have fun doing it. I chose the article from Wikipedia about Odysseus. I loved the character of Odysseus since I was 10-years-old. I have a whole Spotify playlist dedicated to him. The songs say the things that we learned in HarvardX when we studied Odysseus.
I simply erased the words depending on how Odysseus himself would erase them. It's easy to write a poem from the point-of-view of Odysseus, because I've been doing it for years. He is the primary topic of all of my poems. The result of my creation for this challenge got me sniggering in front of the computer, though. It's like Homer became Edgar Allan Poe haha
I removed every part that mentioned Palamedes, because the real Odysseus would do exactly that. Philostratus has written so much of how Odysseus bribed everyone into wiping Palamedes' name off history. Also, "Odysseus convinced a Trojan captive to write" is funny because people during Odysseus' time can't write.
For this image, I copy-pasted the article from Wikipedia into a word document. My erasures are pretty messy. I cut up the image into two images to make them bigger and easier to read. Just use the zoom tool of the browser if they're still hard to read.
My villain is losing his mind. I make him real horrible in the story, but I know what his real problem is. I just can't tell that to the whole world because he has a scary reputation to keep haha
I finally published my "K-19: The Widowmaker" review on Bubblews. Let that be my review for today, because I'm already so tired. I need to save energy for the rest of this day.
Here's my response for the NaPoWriMo 2015 Day Twenty-One challenge. We are to take a page from a book, print it, and erase any word to create our own poem out of the remaining words.
It didn't feel like being original at first, but I soon started to have fun doing it. I chose the article from Wikipedia about Odysseus. I loved the character of Odysseus since I was 10-years-old. I have a whole Spotify playlist dedicated to him. The songs say the things that we learned in HarvardX when we studied Odysseus.
I simply erased the words depending on how Odysseus himself would erase them. It's easy to write a poem from the point-of-view of Odysseus, because I've been doing it for years. He is the primary topic of all of my poems. The result of my creation for this challenge got me sniggering in front of the computer, though. It's like Homer became Edgar Allan Poe haha
I removed every part that mentioned Palamedes, because the real Odysseus would do exactly that. Philostratus has written so much of how Odysseus bribed everyone into wiping Palamedes' name off history. Also, "Odysseus convinced a Trojan captive to write" is funny because people during Odysseus' time can't write.
For this image, I copy-pasted the article from Wikipedia into a word document. My erasures are pretty messy. I cut up the image into two images to make them bigger and easier to read. Just use the zoom tool of the browser if they're still hard to read.
