Talent Preview

I know, I probably haven't posted enough for my opinion to matter on this, but I figured I'd give it a shot. I'm not going to say too much, though. If you want to read a good, in-depth review of the preview, go visit Wow.com's Dawn Moore for the healy version of priests or Fox Van Allen if you're feeling a little darker.

Personally, I'm very intrigued by the new changes, especially all of those to smite/holy damaging abilities. While Smite spec still isn't quite viable, it's very very close. Not only that, I think it may be possible that a holy healing/holy smite hybrid build would work... kinda. Here is the build I came up with. If you consider all of the bonuses to smite (Evangelism, Chakra, Searing Light) that's a 44% bonus to damage! Not only that, a 20% extra chance to hit, meaning we wouldn't need hit in holy gear, and Atonement will allow for those chunky smites to heal while they damage. When you get tired of smiting? You can use Archangel to restore a little of your mana and increase your healing output for a few seconds. Now... let's do a little thinking... I've seen my smite now crit for 7k? I think. That's probably just me making up numbers, because I haven't smited in forever. But let's use it anyways... Say I do 7k with a smite. 44% more smite is 10k. That's a nice bit of damage, and if it crit, you can immediately normal smite with Surge of Light. Not only that, but, if you have Atonement, you heal a nearby raid member for around 4.5k. Now... that's not a huge amount, but it's a "smart" heal that immediately helps someone near the thing you're smiting (probably the tank if you're smiting the boss), and it's about the same as a Flash Heal for the cost of a smite. And that's just the current numbers that we see in Wrath.

Overall, I'm very impressed with the possibility of priests (i.e. ME!) being able to do a little damage with their healing. Not at the cost of healing poorly, but with good situational awareness and a little bit of luck, it may be possible.

It's been a long time...

It sure has. I got out of my habit of posting after raids, so I got out of my habit of posting. Basically though, I've been able to get into all the ICCs I wanted to and haven't had to worry about all the extra people (extra people also mean more people that have emergency reasons they can't go). But right now, I'm back to once a week raiding because I have so much shit going on right now. In fact, I'm using posting as a means to put off doing some homework. I still want to try and make a wordpress site just because it looks like you can do more with it (I'll admit though, I haven't tried to do too much with this site).

Uh... I'm back to being dual heal specs. I imagine I'll mostly just holy heal since I'm much better at it than disc priesting. However, I wanted to give our other tank healers (we only have three =X) the option of being able to miss... or bring an alt... or spec DPS for a fight if they want to. I'll admit, I'm probably not the best geared Disc priest, but I've gone away from enchanting or gemming regen simply because I'm good with mana management (generally). If I'm oom... something has gone terribly wrong. I'm trying to save up honor/badges so I can get gems to change all of my gems to SP.

Speaking of honor... I've also started pvping more (which is actually where quite a bit of my honor came from... and was spent on) because of the random bg thing and extra honor. If I know that I'll get *at least* 1k honor from every BG (quite a bit more if you win)... it's a great incentive to BGing. The other night I did 2 and got 10k... enough for a gem. Uhm... I would also like to post a shout out to the new people that have showed up in BoO in the past couple of months. They're all fantastic people (esp Krikket and Penitant). That's pretty much it. Now wish me luck on my homework =].

Updates

I have to go make dinners, so this will be a short post, but basically I've started raiding two nights a week and Jason doesn't seem too depressed about that... probably because I'm pretty good at paying attention to him at the same time (most of the time anyways). However... we have new people coming into the guild... most of them have healing specs, too. The guild is about to go back to only Core Raiders being able to go to raids, which makes sense, but I think there are already enough "Core Raiders" as healers to fill up a 25 man... plus all those people coming in, I feel like I probably won't have a good chance at being promoted. Which is fine with me, I suppose... >_< I just don't like this sense of anticipation I have. Also, since I really have to plan ahead of time when I'm playing for the week (so I can make sure Jason doesn't volunteer us for anything). I'm glad that the guild is going to be better... I just hope that I get to be a part of that.

ICC 25 for funsies

So... BoO went into ICC 25 for the... third? maybe time last night and for the first time (I think) actually killed stuff. Yay! Nothing prolonged this week, I just wanted to hop on, say stuff, then post pictures.

Orithea is a big girl and throws around big girl pally bubbles.



First Marrowgar kill! Boner spikes are bad. This only took like 5 attempts and we ended up 2 tanking it. Bad ass heals, if I do say so myself.



First Deathwhisper kill! We finished her off in the third attempt. Lots of fun, really. =] I called out mind controls during the fight.



First Gunship success! This is cake. If we didn't win on the first try, I probably would have lied and said we did, LOL.

Weekly Raid Report

I think I'm seriously about to change to Wordpress and just call my blog "Weekly Raid Report." That's all I do anymore. I'm okay with that... and if I can get into the habit of writing once a week, maybe eventually I can habitualize myself into writing more often. I'm just gonna keep going with this once a week thing for now, though. Last night... was an utter failure. This was our first ICC 25 since it first came out, and quite a few of us had upgrades, me included, but it just wasn't enough. To be honest, the majority of the blame for our 15 wipes can be placed on the pugs that we took with us or shitty RNG on boner spikes. Beyond that though, I had a smidgeon of fun. On the fail Tuesday raids, I very rarely get to raid with all of the major raiders of BoO... =] Ky was missing, but everyone else was more or less there, and I came to realize just how much I really enjoy my new WoW family. I'm still not around enough, but the idle thoughts I was having about xferring back to Kirin Tor are now long gone. I still don't want to level anything on Azgalor though. PVP realm... /shiver. All that being said... I do believe I'm going to change the name of my blog. In the event that that isn't possible (because it may not be), I'll be making a new blog. This just isn't a Casual Encounter anymore... It's not very much about me leveling alts or real life or other video games like I wanted it to be. It's me talking about my most recent raids with a smidgeon of character added in.

Goals for next week: Run a successful ICC OR run a successful Ulduar in which we keel Yoggy. Either of these would be fun, but we'll see what Amber has in store for me before I make up my mind =].

Sorry

I was mopey last week. I'm not sure why really, but I was mopey. This week's raid went a lot better... kinda. Not ICC. Nope, we didn't even get past Marrowgar (and the next wing is open now? =X) But, we tried twice and then, in a moment of clarity, I said. Well... If we're not even going to get past Marrowgar, and we're still looking for a DPS... why don't we go to ToC and do the weekly? Wouldn't that be a helluva lot more gains? I was right, of course. Not everyone in there needed something from ToC, but alot of us got some upgrades. I got rid of my ridiculous Naxx10 shoes. Now if someone would just take away that freaking offhand. Oh well. Overall though, I can't remember the last time I've had that much fun. Mostly because we kinda goofed off. Kyr probably could have one healed it, but I was there to tank heal while he was making sure the raid wasn't dead. We single tanked Anub... he didn't even get one submerge in. 2 min fight lulz. Needless to say, I think we full cleared the place (this included one wipe) in about 45 minutes. I repeat, I can't remember when I had that much fun on a raid. Maybe that's what I need to do? Organizing old raids for kicks and giggles and badges? The only problem with that is some people don't seem to want old raids. They want new raids with new gear. We'll see... An Ulduar run could be fun, maybe.

C'est La Vie

This isn't a rant per se. It's more like... me being all mopey because my limited play time is catching up with me. Not like I'm getting worse or anything. I don't think I am. But with the fact that ICC is a real raid, and not a thing you can simply hop in to and get loot, and the fact that I only do one day a week, is really starting to show, it seems. I just feel like I don't bring as much to the table as I could and that the other healers are supporting me. This is compounded by the fact that the only night I really can raid, starts an hour later than every other night, yet still ends at the same time. Not really anyone's fault, but the raids never start on time anyways, and Tues seems to be the alt run. This means... we down one boss and I have a 100 gold repair bill. Again. This is really just me being mopey and writing something down, that hardly anyone reads... except a few guildies, which brings me to my next mopey string of words.

I've been in the guild now for a few months, but I'm still not really making friends like I would have liked to. Maybe it's because a lot of them are already friends irl... I just feel like... I'm there for business and that's it. I want to be there for more than just heals. They could get pugs for that. I don't know... maybe it's just the "bad" run last night that has made me kinda down, but I just feel like it's not getting fun. Once again, though, all this stems from me only being able to raid once a week. It sucks, but c'est la vie.

I was tagged =O

Ky at Casual Hardcore, a fellow guildie, filled out this survey of sorts and tagged me! And, since I'm currently sick with a cold, wounded from putting up christmas lights, and feel like doing nothing more than vegging, I'm going to fill it out...

My Warcraft Year in Review Meme

Please leave a link to your meme post in the comments here. Please tag 5 other folks to complete the meme and copy these instructions and the questions into your blog with your answers.

What did you do in the World of Warcraft in 2009 that you’d never done before?
What was your favorite new place that you visited?
What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
What was your biggest achievement of the year?
What was your biggest failure?
What did you get really, really, really excited about?
What do you wish you’d done less of?
What was your favorite WoW blog or podcast?
Tell us a valuable WoW lesson you learned in 2009.

What did you do in the World of Warcraft in 2009 that you’d never done before?

Played Alliance. That's not entirely true. I have a level 35 warrior, but for the most part, I've been very anti-alliance. And for good reason. A large majority of the people I've met that haven't been in my guild have been asshats, but find a good group to play with and it's, I dare say, even better than Horde.

What was your favorite new place that you visited?

Icecrown! Although it's a huge zone, and I kinda despise having to do things in it, the lore nerd in me goes "amgamgamg ICC. Arthas I'ma keel u!"

What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?

More max level characters! Seriously. I don't know what my problem is, but I just can't grind any of my other characters up to 80. I have two that have been within 10 levels for six months now.

What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Doing cutting edge content. I think this is the first time that I've been able to do new content AS it comes out. A week or so after every major content patch, I've been able to go into and do the new content. Not always successfully (Ulduar, I'm looking at you), but I did it. Something that makes me very happy.

What was your biggest failure?

Not being as good a player as I should be. I still only have one high level profession. I still don't have max fishing or cooking. I don't raid nearly as much as I'd like to (twice a week would be nice ;.;)

What did you get really, really, really excited about?

GETTING AN EPIC MOUNT FINALLY! Seriously.

What do you wish you’d done less of?

Uhm... Not much really. The thing about me, is that I'm a decently disciplined person (about most things /glares at exercise equipment), and I'm not one to do something to excess.

What was your favorite WoW blog or podcast?

Well... no podcast really. But I have a few blogs on my roll. My FAVORITE... is probably Amber. In fact, I enjoyed reading it so much, I eventually transferred and faction swapped so that I can raid with her!

Tell us a valuable WoW lesson you learned in 2009.

It doesn't matter which faction you choose. Both sides have asshats. Both sides have wonderful people.

Title #1

I know. Very original title, but I really don't have much to say. Also, I've always been horrible at titling any of my stuff.

First - =] Turns out I'm number 36 in the guild (according to wow-heroes) on the level of my gear. ^^ I think that's pretty good. I'm missing an enchant on my new cloak, but I do have all epic gems. I really should try and level my inscription all the way to 450 since it's only like 150... or at least high enough to do the special shoulder chants.

Also - I need to know what to do with my emblems. I have 24... Should I buy a new ring? or the T9 boot?

I totally started writing this post a week ago and on a further note, this topic is rendered more or less irrelevant because of the fact that 3.3 is coming out tomorrow, and hopefully I'll be running the 5-mans enough (since they are the same ilevel as ToC10) that I don't need to worry about that. Have fun with 3.3 tomorrow guys. =]

I Raid Lead IRL

Turns out I'm a raid leader IRL.

Okay, not really, but the parallels I tend to draw between things makes me laugh. This one in particular.

Backstory: My parents own a BBQ restaurant here in Texas where I worked as the manager forever (read: a year and a half). Recently, since my only source of income is from substitute teaching (gg failing economy and lack of jobs), I'm working there again in the mornings so that I can have some income.

The other day one of the older ladies walks in and I'm standing there cutting onions or something and she asks "Where am I working today?"

Immediately, I start sizing up the strengths and weaknesses of the people I work with. This person has probably got the lowest IQ I know of; however, she knows how to cut things without removing a finger. That person has horrible people skills and shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the customers. etc, etc, etc... And then the idea hit me "I'm like a RL, but IRL." I laughed at the idea, but then realized that I backseat RL all the time. When someone says "Hey, let's do X," I sometimes say loud enough for only me to hear (unmute the mic? nowai) "I think y would have been better" or "Man, that's a good idea." It gave me a good laugh, if nothing else.

Interwebz slow because...

Patch 3.3 on the background downloader! I suppose that means I'll have to occupy my time by folding clothes or washing dishes. Or I can just play Neverwinter Nights 2. In news unrelated to how I while away my time...

Blizz released news on how the next tier of raiding is going to be activated. Some people in the blogging community have strong opinions of it. Positive and Negative. Personally? I'm on the fence. Like Seri says, it seems that it's a little pandering to the casuals, which devalues the effort that top raid guilds put into the game, on the other hand... I'm a casual! Well... not really. I consider myself in the grey zone between casual and hardcore. If I could, I would probably try to raid 4+ days a week; however, I can't. So, what I do is raid when I can. When I do raid, I go fully prepared. I'm pretty business. I don't listen to music, I don't have the TV on. I have vent and headphones (well, had headphones. The land shark pomeranian known as Dexter saw to it that it was no more).

TL;DR I'm neither casual nor hardcore.

I see the merit in wanting the hardest dungeon in an expansion cycle to be practically inaccessible to all but the most hardcore of raids. It's so they can wear their leet gear and say "Look, I have this awesome stuff that you don't have." It's elitist, but, like I said, there's merit to it. I understand it. On the other hand, the game isn't just about "leet gear." It's about challenge. It's about story. It's about working with other people to the best of your ability to achieve a goal. That's the part that I like most about the game. I want Myss to beat Arthas. I want to see what happens with my own eyes. That is EXTREMELY important to me. So... we'll see how much I like this new raid system.

In news about Myss: I got more T9! Gloves this time. I've almost got enough Triumph emblems to get her another new ring too, so that means my only piece of i 200 gear after that will be her offhand (those, apparently never drop). After that, I'll have very FEW 213 (or whatever the next half tier was). So... =] I think I'll have caught up after I buy that ring. Also, starting next week, I think I'll be running 25 ToC instead of 10 ToC. Meaning... I GET BETTR THINGZ. Maybe. Until next week!

SPOILER ALERT! LICH KING IDENTITY REVEALED!

I was wandering around on facebook, when suddenly I spotted it. A picture proving something that I think I should have known all along. --.-- I knew that there was something wrong with the Lich King. He was just... too evil to be Arthas.

My favorite part of 3.3 (besides getting to kick in Arthas' teeth)

I suppose today I should review an upcoming feature of patch 3.3 that I'm really looking forward to. And by review, I mean I'm going to talk about something that I've never experienced and pretend like I know something about it. I absolutely LOVE the idea of the random PUG dungeon. Why? Because I despise most DPS specs.

What does that have to do with anything? Well, I don't know if anyone has ever noticed, but it is EXTREMELY difficult to heal a mob to death. You hadn't noticed? Well, let me tell you. It's extremely difficult to heal a mob to death. It's also difficult (albeit not as difficult) to let mobs beat on YOU until THEY die. So, if you prefer your spec to be of the tanking or healing variety, you are out of luck, my friend. Maybe...

With the advent of the random dungeon (which includes, most importantly, a cross-server LFG), Blizz will be, once again imo, pandering to the heal/tank-nuts like me. SERIOUSLY? SLAP IN THE FACE, BLIZZ!!! Okay, but really, I think this is fantastic. Now, maybe my poor druid will actually... I dunno... get to level 68, where I hear running as a resto spec isn't nearly AS painful. Or... Maybe my pally will actually get to some level higher than 30 because letting things beat on you by yourself isn't nearly as fullfilling or experience-ful as I had hoped it would be. The reason this is great is because you queue up for dungeons much like you do BGs, and let the machine do the work for you.

It's so difficult to find dungeon runs that I've actually been trying to pvp my way to 68 on Apa. PVP! What the hell is the world coming to? Fortunately, now that it looks amongst many servers (I'm assuming within battlegroups), the 1 person that's signed up to go to Underbog becomes 4-5? That's amazingly cool, I think. Now maybe I'll be able to dungeon run my way to the top and heal and tank to my heart's content. Running dungeons and raids is the best part of this game by far for me, and now, being able to do it just a little easier on my way to 80, makes me want to give Blizz a big gold star. <3

In other news, my average gear ilevel is up to 220.88 now! only two more ilevel 200 items to get rid of, and something that, I'm thinking, should happen somewhere after next weeks raid.

In other other news, I'm trying to decide if I want to go to wordpress with this blog. I really don't know if I post enough to justify switching to a new medium, but I suppose I'll let my... 4-5 readers decide. (/sigh)

Why I Don't Blog as much as I'd Like

So... I was scolded for not posting enough (Sorry, Jov). I suppose I will actually have to ATTEMPT to make an effort to post more often.

Last night, another successful ToC run. I got some pants and enough badges to buy my first T9 item. Yay! Maybe my average item level will start rising to something that better represents the content I'm doing? Doubt it.

Also last night, a bigger success than the gear, I began talking more to my new guildies. I think I must seriously have real social anxiety problems, because even IRL, I have problems talking to new people. I used to not be so bad on the computer (chat room RP ftw), but lately I kinda just get on WoW to run my ToC, maybe an Ony, then I log off for a whole week. Yesterday, however, I was on early and was just chatting with Amber and Cel. Something I don't do nearly often enough. I'm going to stop here, and start to actually think about making a post that is more than just "Diary of My Toons."

Monthly post time

I really should get into the habit of posting more. Like... more than once a month, maybe? Maybe I'll try and make it a habit to post after my weekly run with BoO. Those have been going swimmingly, btw... I mean, when I actually sign up for the right date and not a raid that went on a week ago. I hope no one noticed that, because it was pretty embarrassing. And I suppose if no one noticed it then, someone will get a good lol out of it now. The ToC run on Wednesday wasn't all that bad. I don't remember dying too often... Faction Champions eated my lunch, though. They're pretty rude to healers, especially those of the clothy variety (aka PRIESTS). So... this blog was supposed to be about, what?

WoW + RL? Well... It's more RL than WoW now... especially since, for some reason, I just can't bring myself to do dailies. I hate repetitiveness, I guess. It's ALMOST too much for me to raid once a week, same raid, same day every week. Almost. However, each time there are so many factors that could possibly change what happens since the other 9 people you play with all have minds of their own (Well, most of them do, at least I suppose). Unlike dailies. Dailies can DIAF.

On the other hand, Faction swapping completely reset alot of the quests I did Horde side, so I can now go back and redo quests for money. Not a bad idea actually, and I've already done quite a few. Wrathgate, Bronzebeard, and Shadow Vault quest chains are completed. There are still a few more phasing quests that I haven't completed that I need to.

On a totally unrelated note, I was wandering around Terrokar trying to heal things to death on my broccoli sprout and an old guildy asked me where Myss was. I explained that she's now a space goat and he made sure that I knew that Draenei racials were inferior to Human racials for a healer type. As if that ever made me think twice. Human females are ugly and have huge hips. Don't even get me started on Dwarves. I almost did Night Elf, but for some reason... I've always disliked night elves. The only viable option for me was draenei. This, however, may change when Cataclysm comes along. Gnome priest? kthx I'll have.

A new day dawns...

I know... the title is a little melodramatic. HOWEVER! >_> It's true. This morning I went through with a faction swap and server transfer so I could join the folks on Azgalor in Brotherhood of Oblivion and my new second favorite priesty spacegoat Lyrandre. Why is she my second favorite?
Because... Myss is now a priesty spacegoat. Unfortunately, the faction swap means that I now have to redo ALL of the Argent Tournament quests... Except the Black Knight maybe. I still have that achievement, so I may not have to redo that chain. We'll see... in like two weeks. Also, notice how the horde picture is bigger, shows more of Myss, and is just better overall? While my new home is with that ugly blue color the alliance tends to like, my heart will always beat red. =/ I already miss my hoardie friends, but this was as much an experiment in trying new things as it was an option for a new raiding home. =] And I already know I'll make great friends on this side of the Wrathgate as well.

I've been cheating.

On WoW

I feel like some salacious harlot standing at an MMO intersection. Champions Online, Dungeons and Dragons Online (free to play now, btw), Guild Wars. What's wrong with me?

To be fair, the majority of the people that I enjoyed raiding with in my guild left for greener (i.e. more active) pastures while I was on vacation, and the guild most of them joined is now full of healers. Hopefully my plea of "I won't even raid if there's no room, I just want to be where my friends are" might win over the powers that be. Not only that though... the few people that were there and active raiders were discouraged and have stopped playing those toons. So... not only am I not raiding with the people I want to, but the people I don't even necessarily want to raid with aren't even raiding.

You guys can't see it, but there is an extremely unhappy sad face going on right now.

That being said, since I'm not doing much on WoW, I've been playing other games. Champions online is fun, but not really healer friendly. DDO is mostly just because I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons since I was 12, and the fact that it's free to play. Guild Wars is *amazingly* healer friendly. You really don't do anything without a group. If you're not one to enjoy actually playing with other people, you enlist the help of NPC henchmen. These NPCs aren't the smartest cookies in the box, but they do a good enough job that I can just heal away while they take care of the mobs. =] I enjoy this a lot, but I still miss my friends and my Myss.

=/ Anyone looking for a decent Holy Priest to add to their arsenal of healers? I may be willing to faction/server change. I don't want to leave my friends, but I'd rather not put my hard work to waste.

In which Myss goes Holy and pwns....... hard

AMG Not much time: work soon. Quick post before I go... O.O I'm actually doing Ulduar. I've been disc almost exclusively since the expansion, but a lot of my guildies have been down on the spec (DIAF all you Holy paladins, stop stealing my tank healing slot). So, yesterday I went Holy for our Ulduar25 ran (with an allied guild). And...





I outhealed and under overhealed a large majority of people geared significantly better than me. WTF?! Is this what Holy priest healing is like? I know I know... the meters aren't important. I should realize this. Especially after being Disc for so long, and I still prefer disc more. But... if I do this well as Holy (the meter doesn't lie about how much healed, and being number one for the majority of the run is nothing to scoff about, imo), and more than just that, if people STAY ALIVE a little more when I'm having to raid heal most of the time anyways, then I will probably be Holy for most of our runs. Yay for looking impressive again!

On a side note: I have been feeling down about myself in our progression stuff in 10 mans (which we do prominantly with only guildies), because people die and the other healers always say "Disc is shit, go Holy you'll pwn." I suppose the VERY succesful 25 run helped lift my spirits significantly.

3.1 Update

Hrm... I haven't posted in a long time. Ooops.

On Dual specs:


Right now I'm specced Disc/Shadow. It's very nice to be able to do my dailies in less than a bajillion hours then be able to heal a heroic/raid without batting an eye. However, I'm thinking about changing my shadow spec to Holy... because I really like healing, and this would make me like... the Superman of all healers.

On Priest stuff:


I'm very excited about the different priest changes, despite the mana regen nerf (which I have felt, but still not even enough to like... use a potion... or a shadowfiend... or even an arcane torrent). Disc became even better, and Holy suddenly became very good. I was very unimpressed with some of the changes that happened in 3.0 (For example: Holy concentration and Serendipity). The newer versions of each, however, are vastly superior. I'm in love. On a Shadow-note: Critting dots makes me feel strange.

Wherein I talk about real life a little bit.

This blog is not just about me and WoW (though I wish I played a little bit more now-a-days to actually talk about WoW some more). It's about me and life too. So if you came here looking for my thoughts on maybe the new T8 stuff (which I probably won't see), I'm sorry.

For some reason, this week I got back into the habit of doing what I hope will be my profession in the future: writing. Specifically writing poetry. It started when I went back to my alma mater. That makes it sound like I took a cross-country visit to some college, but not really. It's kinda on the way home from work so I stopped by one day (also note, I only graduated a few months ago... I just like saying that I have an alma mater). I stopped by Lamar University to pick up the most recent issue of our literary magazine where I have two award-winning poems published. I got some money for them, and they were the best! (out of the 100 or so English majors that actually submitted poetry at the school).

Without much further ado, I'd like to present those two poems, plus the one that I wrote after talking to a few of my professors while I was there. =] Enjoy.

First, winner of the Eleanor Poetry Award. Which is the category for the best overall undergraduate poem.

An Address to My Father

The first time I saw you cry was the day your father died.
I was outside playing when you drove up.
You hugged me then told me the news,
and that he wasn't coming back.
At first I couldn't understand, but seeing you fall apart,
sad that you had forever lost that piece of your life,
told me that this was death,
and I wept with you.

The second time I saw you cry was the day that
I explained that I always felt different.
You turned away and didn't talk to me for weeks.
A month later you drove me out to the cemetary,
where your father lies, and held me close
while tears ran down your face,
sad that you had forever lost some piece of your son.
And I wept with you.

This next one won the Barnes Poetry Award, which is the award for best structured poetry. It's a sonnet, to be specific, and I was told by both of the professors at the university (who are both well-established poets) and by Morri Creech (who was a visiting and even more well-established poet) that it was one of the finest sonnets they'd ever seen. =] I had a big head for a little while.

On Shelley's "Ozymandias"

A traveler from an ancient land once said
that kings and kingdoms all to rubble fall.
But common people suffer too. They dread
the graveside mourning and the ghostly pall.
For when the peasant piece is gone and dead,
a whispered letter in the poem of man,
no soul remembers all that came before;
no soul believes the lightness of the span.
So on my stone--it's owner, friend of sod:
"My name is Garry, son of workers poor.
Look on my grave and feel despair, ye gods.
All men and kings live only for decay."
And so amount to nothing but foul clods,
until their time when they are washed away.

This last one is one that I just recently wrote, and if anyone actually reads these, I would *more* than appreciate any comments (good, but especially bad) that you have. =] Thanks.

Fleeting Moments

Sex is most profound in those moments
just before two people first make love.
It’s in the way two people, almost unsure,
almost scared, touch and look
and feel each other in those
vulnerable seconds before their
bodies bond.

It’s the way his breath washes
over you like cinnamon,
sweet and hot and bitter.

It’s the way, just before things
get heavy, my pulse speeds,
my breathing deepens.

But only when the act was over
and we fell asleep looking
into each other’s eyes,
I realized that a moment
had slipped away,
and I’d never get it back.