Five Questions to a Poet: Shyla the Super Gecko

Shyla the Super Gecko ( aka KriJon Resident), a published and well known Second Life poet, kindly agreed to answer five questions on her poetry. Her poem “PAIN” is featured after the fifth question.

FIVE QUESTIONS

What, or who, first motivated you to write poetry?
I don’t know. I wrote it from a very young age. What moved me to read and write more was a teacher in High School who introduced me to Emily Dickinson, who I feel in love with right away. I wrote only occasionally when I worked in a corporate environment and am glad now to write more avidly and seriously.

What was your first piece about?
I have no idea really. I was young and those are lost. But from what I do have from around the age of 11, they are mostly about my mother, father and philosophical questions, at least those a young person could contemplate.

What, or who, is your primary muse today?
Feelings.

Who is your favorite poet and your favorite poem?
I don’t think I have a favorite poet or poem. I still love Emily Dickinson. The more I write and discover poets, the greater the number of poets I appreciate. So there isn’t really any one I read.

When is a poem done?
I have no idea. I tinker all the time, even with my published pieces. They are like puzzles to me that I can’t really ever solve, or maybe they have multiple solutions which depends which I discover as my perspective changes. But I don’t think I’ve really ever finished one.

PAIN

My body revolts winning attention;
My heart’s compulsion flooding sentiments.
Oh! The physical pain’s extreme laments
Is sedentary in my room’s isolation.
The world I love, I crave to rest upon;
I love our planet’s pathways, so content.
I love children’s sounds, dusk shadows’ descent.
Yet there is a freedom in isolation –
A freedom in great meditation, awareness;
Loneliness replaced with inward seeing’s,
Surreal realities without bitterness,
Lost in wholly independent healings.
Understanding my peace hosts a finesse
Unintended for earth’s able weaklings.