We shall call it: A Poem

Tags

A Poem, Arman Grigorian, Depth, Friendship, Love, Passion, poetry, truth, Words of wisdom

Let silence speak; let silence be tongue.
Shall we not dwell, if not only a fragile moment, in our long-forgotten memories?

Dear old friend; hear my cry,
Hear the echo of a tormented voice; a tormented soul.
Don’t bring upon us the weight of sorrow,
Such burden, dear old friend, leaves trails – leaves scars
I doubt you posses the enlightening ability of seeing beauty in a face full of scars. 

Through the guidance of wisely written words,
I sought comfort in the illusion of hope. 
You see, weakness lies in the depth of our shadows;
please, do forgive me for hoping – forgive. 

Am I to blame for the weakness of my humble heart?
Fourteen years; nineteen ninety-six;
Like craftsmen, we laid the foundation; we laid the bricks.
Who knew the power of life? – Who could foresee the wraith?

As my heartbeat weakens through the ink of my pen;
I shall remain in the grip of my illusionary master,
My forever-burning flame of passion shall prosper,
Thus, no mortal shall foresee the path of future
It can not – shall not – rob me of the dreams that make my humble life this much richer, my dear old friend.

I speak to you in whisper; I stutter my goodbyes
I came to realize, dear old friend, that our bricks were built upon lies.
Life gives and takes; It doesn’t ask permission
Neither shall I, a humble writer,
through each word, my heart has carefully chosen,
The essence of my being, feels the redemption. 
Farewell, dear old friend, we shall call this: A Poem.
A Poem. 

Pioneers – The Novel

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Devil, Light, Lucky Jenkins, memories, New York, Novel, Passion, past, Pioneers

Dear reader. 

I thought I’d share one last piece of my novel: Pioneers. So far I’ve let you read two small snippets, so that you could get to known the mind of Lucky Jenkins. I will most likely be done with the entire novel near the end of 2014, but for now, I’ll share a final piece with you. 

These are some of the beginning lines of Pioneer:

‘Where I’m from, angels can’t sleep ‘cause of the devils light; I’s constantly tormenting you with memories from a long-forgotten past, but all of that changed the moment I packed my bags, shattered the light of the devil and sought true light – a new beginning.

Which greater city would one flee to than the concrete jungle – New York City. It truly was like a jungle: Tall concrete trees, reaching towards the blue skies. Hundreds of different species, hunting ambitiously for some income, even though it was obvious for anyone to see, that they let life pass them by. Even the sun fought to shine through the massive concrete trees – the jungle isn’t for everyone, they say – but I. Loved. It.

The paste of life was different from what I was used to back in Indianapolis. People in New York lived like there was no tomorrow: Amazing street musicians played some jazz, children played on the pavement, the youngsters sought the attention of young ladies and even homosexuals kissed publicly without worrying about … anything.
Life was different – and different meant a new beginning, which I really craved for.’ 

Lucky Jenkins on Love

Tags

Arman Grigorian, illusion, Love, Lucky Jenkins, Lust, Novel, poetry

In my recent post, I’ve let you read a part of my novel: Pioneers, where Lucky Jenkins – the main character – spoke on the essence of poetry. Today, the part I wish to share with you, dear reader, is a part of ‘Part Two’ of my novel, where Lucky Jenkins speaks on the difference between Love and Lust. 

,,Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold, but we all have measured, seen, experienced and felt how much it takes, before our hearts give in and break into million of pieces, which no human being ever will be able to reassemble, but … what about love?
I, Lucky Jenkins, tell you that the heart is bigger that its own shadow and so is love. Even though we might all disagree on what love actually is and how it’s expressed best, we can all agree that it can do wonders, which no great magician will be able to fake. Ever. Love can’t be faked; yes, surely words can portray the illusion of love, even convince you to believe in it, but eventually the lie will be exposed and the liar will die in the name of love. History tells us so.

Whoever believes that love can be differed, I tell you now: Love is the same, regardless of whom you give it to. A man who loves his best friend, loves him with the same passionate love, he does his girlfriend. One mustn’t be ignorant and deceive oneself into comparing lust with love.
You cannot prepare yourself for love, it will surprise and overwhelm you, when you least expect it to, but don’t be afraid to flow in the stream of love. It is after all the rarest gift ever given to mankind.”

The poet.

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Depth, Love for poetry, New Yorker Weekly, Novel, Passion, Pioneers, poetry, truth

Dear reader. 

Today, I thought I’d share a little piece – a fragment – of my newest work: Pioneers, which is a Novel I am currently working on. The part I am to share with you is the part where Lucky Jenkins – the main character – writes a piece for ‘New Yorker Weekly‘, which is the news paper he is working for, about Poetry. With this fragment of my Novel, we are allowed into the heart of Lucky Jenkins and his humble thoughts about the essence of poetry – True Poetry. 

“ There was a time where poetry was more than sophisticated wordplay and craziness. It seems clear for those whose hearts beat passionately for the art, that poetry is on a new course – a course which ultimately will lead the craft out of the right path: Modern poetry lacks the depth in which we readers can get lost in to. Who are we to dismiss the fathers of literature – the fathers of the craft – with our arrogance? If you are to ask me, true poets aren’t people who write clever lines with metaphors mixed with sophisticated wordplay. No. To be a poet is to live like one: to live in the moment and capture the details of life, which we ‘ordinary’ people aren’t capable of. We tend to oversee the beauty of life and that’s why we need true poets to remind us of the hidden beauty, which our deluded eyes aren’t capable of spotting. The art of poetry is a lifestyle with a philosophy hidden for the unworthy – a philosophy that will only reveal itself the day you’re willing to live like a poet, and die like one.

Don’t dare to take poets for granted – not even those whom we tend to forget due to the time that has passed – each and every one of them has participated in the shaping and molding of the art of poetry, and deserves to be honored with respect – and one way you can do that is to lay down the pen and stop ruining the art of poetry – If you aren’t willing to live and die as a true poet”

The fear of a humble writer

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Death, Edgar Allan Poe, Fear, hope, literature, Love, Loved ones, Passion, Time, unkown, writer

I will begin todays post with sincerity … with honesty: I don’t know where to start, which words to use, how to paint the perfect picture – so that you, reading this post, can sense the silhouette of my fear, hidden in the depths; hidden behind layers of fragile walls not stronger than feather, but I guess that I have to start somewhere, so here it goes. 

We all have fears – there’s not one single human being living on this planet who can claim to be fearless; fearless only exist in the world of terminology; it is something like a myth. Even though our individuality generates the different type of fears within our souls, we somehow unify around one specific type of fear: Death.
The majority of the world – not all of us, I’m aware of this – fear death; maybe because death reminds us of the fact that we’re here on borrowed time. How long we individually are given remains unknown, but one thing is certain: We are all going to leave at some point; but … what comes after death? I guess that’s the question most of us wish to know and maybe even fear to some extend. Or, actually, the right question might even be: what if there isn’t anything after death. What if Michael Jackson nailed it with the name of his world tour: This is it. – What if this is it?

However, death isn’t what I fear. You may claim that it’s easy to say such things when one sits in his room in secure surroundings, but I promise you that if you sat down with me and took the time to get to know the essence of my being, you would know that I’m not lying; I don’t fear death. So what do I fear? 

Before I reveal my biggest fear – before I reveal my only fear, I want to emphasize the importance of the people whom I love deeply; The people who love me for who I am, the people who have never abandoned me despite what society asked of them, the people who without hesitation would give their life for me, just as I would do the same for them: you know who you are. So, why am I telling you this, dear reader? Well, I’m telling you this because at some point I actually thought that my biggest fear was to leave these amazing people the day of my last breath; to cause them pain, suffering and tears. The thought of putting them through such a struggle is unbearable. I guess I’ve convinced myself that they would survive – they might not forget immediately but they would eventually have to accept the loss. 

So when did this fear get less significant? What could possibly be more scary? Well …
Today ‘Life’ told me that I should prepare myself – It revealed the path that it had chosen for me; it told me that I wasn’t among the people who would pass much more than the fifties, if I was lucky I might reach sixty, but I shouldn’t get my hopes up. Today ‘Life’ took a swing at me and hit right in the heart – it blew out my air. In this desperate moment I realized what my biggest – most honest – fear was: Time. I fear that I won’t have enough time to achieve my humble dream of becoming a well-known writer. I don’t want you to understand ‘Well-known’ as a synonym for ‘famous’, because those are two different things. What I mean by ‘well-known’ is that I seek enough time to write beautiful novels, Essays, short stories and poems, so that when I take my last breath, people will remember me as someone more than ‘just’ a man who lived at some point in the human timeline. What I’m trying to say is: My biggest fear is to be forgotten. I fear that my loved ones will forget me; I fear that my grandchildren will have a vague memory of the essence of my being; I fear that the world won’t appreciate the passion I have for writing and literature; I fear that I will be forgotten. 

Maybe life will surprise me – maybe I will end up as Edgar Allan Poe – one of the greatest writers ever to have lived, but remember that he wasn’t always seen this way. His writings didn’t get the same admiration back then, as they do today. It was only when people carefully read his novels, poems, they understood his depth and passion for the art of writing; they made sure that he always would be remembered – and never forgotten. 

I wonder if they will do the same for me when I am to leave this humble life? 
– One can only hope, even though hope is the greatest illusion ever to have existed. 

The Artist.

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Arts, Christopher Hitchens, craft, Love, Oscar Wilde, Passion, teachings of art, tenderness

The secrets of art are best learned in secret, and that Beauty, like Wisdom, loves the lonely worshipper
– Oscar Wilde, The Young King.

In my ‘The complete illustrated works of Oscar Wilde’ I, a humble reader, and an eager student of his craft, often stumble over his amazing talent to hide fragments of pure wisdom in between his written lines. Just to mention two amazingly written novels: ‘The Picture of Dorian Grey’ and ‘The Young King’, we are to feel the great passion Oscar Wilde, like many other great writers, has for the craft of Arts. In ‘The Picture of Dorian Grey’, Oscar Wilde starts his preface by stating: The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim. The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
What a passionate description and definition of art.

These two passages remind me – as literature often does – of a beautiful artist, whom I have the pleasure to know personally. I’ve had the great pleasure of spending years in a passionate atmosphere, observing her femininity dominate the empty canvas with passion and tenderness; she is always in a complete trance of lovemaking whenever she is to paint, and the secrets she hides underneath the paint, is nowhere to be spotted for the untrained eye. Surely Oscar Wilde was right, when he said that secrets of art are best learned in secret, because it doesn’t matter for her if I’m standing next to her – admiring her sincerity, her honesty – or not. Because when Oscar Wilde said: ‘In secret’, he wasn’t referring to physical secrecy, but mental secrecy. The beautiful artist paints abstract paintings – vivid memories – which we, as Oscar Wilde says, must transform into what-ever beauty our souls’ desire, crave for. 

Christopher Hitchens said: It is important for an artist to mingle and live among other artists – at least have artist friends – and he is absolutely right; I am forever grateful of the passionate soul, the artistic being who thought me the importance of Arts, because her teachings, her love for the craft of arts, has made me truly understand the mind of Oscar Wilde and his teachings – and being a student of his writings, there’s nothing more I can wish for.

When ‘We’ mattered.

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Friendship, Leo Tolstoy, Love, Modernity, Passion, Respect, Unity, War and Peace, We

As I was reading ‘War and Peace’ by my hero, Leo Tolstoy, I was mesmerized by the humbling fact, that our society has lost the ability to make ‘We’ matter; it has lost the ability to embrace, empower and perhaps even value values as: Sincerity, Friendship, respect and Love. – I mean lets really think about it, lets really take a look at our own world – lets tear down the facades, lets tear down its’ walls and take an honest glance at reality. 

It is claimed that ‘We are more connected than ever as a society, as a world‘. I mean, you can read what people ate for breakfast on Facebook; you can read ignorant and self-centered twitter-updates; you can Instagram a picture of your ‘lady legs’ lying beside a pool sunbathing. If that is enough to make you happy? If that is really all the depth you need in your life? Then be my guest – I don’t have a problem, but what about the rest of us?

In the books of Leo Tolstoy, you as a reader will be introduced to values we in our modern era have long forgotten. Values such as: Sincerity, Friendship, Respect and Love. (Just to mention a few) So how is that? Or I should perhaps ask: Why is that?
We all experience life through different glasses, we have different points of view – I’m well aware of this fact, but that doesn’t really justify the fact that – and I can only speak of my own generation – our youth doesn’t think highly of such values anymore. 
When is the last time you sincerely listened to your ‘best’ friend? – I mean turned off the phone, computer and simply sat face to face and … listened. When is the last time you made a complete stranger’s day? When is the last time you allowed yourself to fall in love? – and to escape the misleading expectations of your generation? – You aren’t ‘supposed’ to do anything, except to live life as you want to, when you want to, I promise you – you won’t be missing out on anything. Because what truly matters in life are our long forgotten values; our ability to make ‘We’ matter, so when one says ‘We’, one truly means it.  

‘We’ is much more than ‘just’ a word. ‘We’ indicates a unity – a bond, no matter if you define ‘We’ as you and a friend, you and a family member or you and your soul mate; ‘We’ unifies the both of you into ‘One’. So how can you be ‘One’ if the values you are to share are long forgotten? I beg you, dear society, I beg you to rediscover values that make life worth living – and when you rediscover these values, please, don’t be afraid to embrace them and to live through them, because the only ones’ who can bring ‘We’ to its’ glory days are We. 

I wish more people would read Leo Tolstoy. 

Immorality

Tags

Arman Grigorian, dreams, Edgar Allan Poe, Love, mortality, nightmares, Passion, poetry, writing

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven

I’ve cloaked myself with fragility – a stupid act one could claim when living in such a terrifying world – I’ve followed the path of writers who all have peered, wondered, doubted or even feared dreams they knew to be the truth, but simply didn’t dare to dream.
Edgar Allan Poe – one of the greatest writer of all time, in my humble opinion – wrote the amazing poem: The Raven, which reminded me the importance of dreaming; freeing oneself from the chains of reality. Daily, I walk in the heart of Denmark; daily I spot fear in countless of eyes; daily I hear the chains of reality rattle against the cold concrete; daily I feel the fear in the souls of the people, and not once have I been able to fight the sadness that whisper mockingly in my ear. 
Being a writer I embrace my dreams; for me there’s no difference between dreams and nightmares – I get inspired by them, but people in our modern era tend to forget an important quality with dreams, or visions if you like: They are not understood properly the first time one sees or feels them. I guess what I’m trying to say is: If only people embraced dreams; If only people dared to dream; If only people fought the chains of reality, we all could achieve the ultimate state of being – we all could become immortal. Once we’ve freed ourselves from the shackles of reality – We have freed ourselves from physical shackles; Dear friend, if you truly believe in passion, if you truly believe that there’s more than the eyes can see, if you truly believe in love; you will find the courage and free yourself from the shackles and become immortal. – Dream the dream no mortal has ever dared to dream before.

Yours Truly.

What truly matters

Tags

calmness, Friendship, important things, Love, moon, nature, Passion, truth

Before I conquered my demons of the night, I remember looking at the midnight Halo, which appeared proudly behind the careless Moon. I remember thinking that there was something passionate about the way the humble Halo surrounded the Moon – as if it was protecting it – loving it. 

Early this morning my older brother ‘V’ asked me to take a walk with him: ‘it will be good for you, brother’ he said to me. Without any hesitation I conceded and followed him. We arrived shortly after at the beach. The sun was shinning proudly, the skies had driven away, as if they did us a favor, and the wind was warm and kind. As we were walking he asked me: ‘Brother, what does truly matter in life?’. As I began to answer his question, he stopped me before I even got to say five words. ‘I know you will try to rationalize my question,’ he said to me ‘so let me ask you one more time, but this time, don’t give me an answer, dear brother, not before we are to go home. Okay? I simply nodded with a humble smile on my lips. ‘What truly matters?’ he repeated himself. 
We walked down the beach in silence; we didn’t always have to speak in order to show affection, love, interest; we saw birds flying high, singing out hymns; we heard the waves whisper; we felt the affection of the wind. We sometimes glanced at each other and smiled. I remember thinking: ‘I truly do love my brother.’ 

As our walk was to end, we found a huge swing. ‘Sit and I’ll push you,’ he said to me. As I slowly sat on the swing, hesitating a bit, I was starstruck by the beautiful sight. As we were swinging I couldn’t help but thinking about the Moon and the Halo from last night. I felt as if I was the Moon and my older brother the Halo; he was standing behind me, protecting me against the dangers of the world; he was my Halo, shining bright and giving vision – clear sight – on the important things in life: But when it all comes down to it, there’s only one thing worth fighting for, worth seeking, and that is: Love. – Regardless if it’s passionate love, family love, or love for your friends. 

‘So, brother, what does truly matter in life?’ he asked me, stopping the swing. 
This time I didn’t rationalize, I didn’t argue, nor did I try to ‘think‘. I simply heard the whisper from my heart saying: I. Love. You. 
that was my answer, that was the final words, that is really all that matters in life: Love. 

Writing in the shadow of fear.

Tags

Arman Grigorian, Fear, fearless, Leo Tolstoy, literature, Mark Twain, Passion, rejection., Shakespeare

‘Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear’
– Mark Twain.

I dare claim that we all know of fear. Those who delude themselves into believing that they are without fear, let me tell you this: you’re only fooling yourself, dear friend. I’ve never been very good at hiding my emotions; you can probably even sense the amount of fear hidden behind my carefully chosen words, but that’s okay, that’s okay. Being a writer doesn’t make you fearless, doesn’t make you invulnerable, nor does it make you better than anyone else – however it does make you quite the opposite: vulnerable and full of fear.
Whenever I write a piece of poetry, an Essay or even perhaps a memoir, I constantly have to battle the great amount of fear which automatically comes with the writing process. Surely there are writers as E. L. James who most likely didn’t even notice the fear knocking on her door, (she was busy fantasying about Mr. Grey) but if one is to read a masterpiece, such as: Hamlet, Romeo & Juliet, Anna Karenina, The Great Gatsby – one would feel the great amount of fear we writers have to face when writing beautiful masterpieces. Surely I’m not comparing myself to these fathers of literature, but I honestly do believe that every sincere writer does have to face fear when writing. – Why? could one be tempted to ask. – Aren’t you just typing random words that come to mind? The short and obvious answer would be: no, but there’s far more to it than ‘just typing down random words that come to mind’. When I’m ‘typing down words’, I’m trying to create new worlds where my readers can seek refuge; I’m trying to fill empty spaces with my emotions and visions, so its far more than just ‘random words’. The reason for the great amount of fear is that, if you readers turn down my work, you’re not turning down my written pieces; you’re turning me down – the entire me – and I’m just as human as you, regardless if I’m a writer or not. The fear of rejection is always there – it’s inevitable.