“I learned how to add and subtract in school, but I learned more about being human by reading poetry — Neruda, Octavio Paz, Maya Angelo. Poetry has been a great liberator — making me intimate with myself, awakening and empowering my mind. And so, even more than my song-writing, it stays closest to my heart..” —Jewel
Jewel, one of rock musics most popular performers, has just released her first collection of poetry: A Night Without Armor: Poems (HarperCollins/Publishers). Highlighting poetry taken from her diaries and journals, as well as poems written specifically for this book, this collection is sure to inspire an appreciation and expression of the inner voice not only with Jewel’s many fans, but with everyone interested in being intimate with the human experience.
“Poetry is the most honest and immediate art form that I have found, it is raw and unfiltered,”says Jewel. “It is a vital, creative expression and deserves to find greater forums, to be more highly valued, understood, and utilized in our culture and in our lives.”
Enjoy these five excerpts from A Night Without Armor: Poems.
——————————————————————————–
I Miss Your Touch
I miss your touch
all taciturn
like the slow migration of birds
nesting momentarily
upon my breast
then lifting
silver and quick–
sabotaging the landscape
with their absence
my skin silent without
their song
a thirsty pool of patient flesh
——————————————————————————–
Insecurity
you don’t call
I check again
I become uneasy–
is this a frame?
Suddenly I’m not so sure
I check my sources
each conversation becomes a crumb
how easily I’m led
how stupid I’ve been
to believe
you could be
loving me
you who can not be seduced
by anything other than
the temperance
of need
each one facilitating the next
and suddenly I see my place
the phone rings
you say hello
but I don’t believe you
——————————————————————————–
I Say to You Idols
I say to you idols
of carefully studied
disillusionment
And you worshipers
who find beauty
in only fallen things
that the greatest
Grace
we can aspire to
is the strength
to see the wounded
walk with the forgotten
and pull ourselves
from the screaming
blood of our losses
to fight on
undaunted
all the more
——————————————————————————–
It Has Been Long
It has been
long and
Bony since
your willing
ways since
those thirstful
days of
summer nights
and Burning Beds
——————————————————————————–
As a Child I Walked
As a child I walked
with noisy fingers
along the hemline
of so many meadows
back home
Green fabric
stretched out
shy earth
shock of sky
I’d sit on logs like pulpits
listen to the sermon
of sparrows
and find god in Simplicity
there amongst the dandelion
and thorn
From A NIGHT WITHOUT ARMOR: Poems by Jewel. Copyright (c) 1998 by Jewel Kilcher. Reprinted by arrangement with HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jewel was raised in Homer, Alaska, has lived in Hawaii, attended art school in Michigan, and now resides in San Diego, CA.