For many years I have been authoritatively informed that confessional poetry is something to be scoffed at. Yes, heard it from friends, internet opinionators, reviewers, strangers at a conference (not one aimed at writing/poetry), and more. Standing in line for some steamy breakfast at that conference I was reading a collection of Sylvia Plath’s work and the man in front of me, maybe bored during his wait, said “Plath, too bad she wasn’t a writer. Dumb (mumble mumble..).” I was shocked and stood silent for a long moment. Gathering up my backbone I said, “I would love to read the collection of your works!” Met with silence, I sighed and said, “Looks like they’ve got a great load of beans at that bar that we can load up on.” Then I got to pick up a plate and load my breakfast with eggs, potatoes, and my share of beans.

Confessional poetry; the naming of the particular style of the work has seemed odd to me, pretty much when I took different writing courses in my long ago undergraduate years. The meaning of the word confess that was embedded in my mind was connected to a church, Catholic or any other that requires some type of questioning and supervision, and it seemed to be an admittance of wrongdoings. To let in the fact that one had done wrong, and to push it out and hope for forgiveness in the repentance of the sins described, is the meaning that the word confess carries as it puts on the “ional” wear and sits as a noun or goes to work as an adjective; that is the place where it takes me. I know, I know the name was applied to writers who pushed through social, academic, and artistic boundaries and that is what I wanted to do as I learned as much as I could about writing. Break down any walls that I saw around me or had built; a solo construction worker, I was. Those ramparts are the hardest to plow through. Accept the name, I do, and placing it in both the meaning of admitting of wrongdoing, to the confessing any doing I wonder; what will I admit?

I love candy, at some moments of the month, I confess; I wear socks with holes in them, I confess; I think many people are not bright, I confess; I change the word bright–along with the not–to naming them stupid, I confess; I curse often at people driving the speed limit in front of me when there are cars all around and I am blocked in, I confess; Sometimes I drive the speed limit and laugh snarkily at someone whose face, small in my rear-view mirror bares their frustration, I confess; I love the sticky sweetness, the processed questionable flavor of fast food when I am sad, I confess; I did not dress smartly, sharply, with an ounce of fashion at many points when I wandered through Paris for a month, I confess; I can speak about four or five words of French but love to don a French accent, and am good at accents, in order to sound uppity, I confess; I worry about living in a limited mind country that seems to wish for only one language, I confess; I love poetry, I confess; I do not understand some poems at all and wonder what in the heck they are talking about, I confess; I am a writer, I confess; neglect of writing is one of my everyday activities, I confess; the sock on my right foot is bunched about my toes, I confess; I have allergies and am full of snot, I confess; I think of a line of a poem from Sylvia Plath–daddy oh daddy with your big black boots–and am crushed in the thought, I confess; I love the words of writers who offer a wide world of thought to connect anything and everything with what they may say, I confess; I despise narrow, empty, unwilling to fill, minds, I confess; as I recovered the ability to live, speak, write, and think, after a severe brain injury, surgery and the lot, I was told that my recovery was a miracle, that I was blessed, I confess; when I hear some say that a god, any god, their god does not care for, ok let’s add the nasty word, hates, gay people I want to push my miracle, my personal blessing, in their scrunched thin faces, I confess; oh, I hit myself in the eye when pulling my bra-strap up, I confess; Right now I am using a press pot to make my coffee, I like the name French Press more as I press along today, I confess; At times I love myself, I confess.