the complete Works of a Lost Girl
The Complete Works of a Lost Girl is a collection of playlets and poems which capture the beauty, tragedy, tension and freedom that is the human experience. This work contains seven playlets ranging from a Greek tragedy to dystopian fiction and sixteen poems of different styles. Over a decade ago the words which make up this body of work were given a voice and encouraged to find their way out of a tumultuous mind and flow out into the world through the tip of a pen. They may be imperfect, but in their imperfection they are true to the mind which created them and the heart which gave them life.
Access the book through the link icons below or through the following:
https://books2read.com/thecompleteworksofalostgirl
https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Works-Lost-Girl-ebook/dp/B09K6WT1HK
Behind the publishing of
In September of 2021, I ran my fingers through a box of written work which had been sitting abandoned for a decade. This nostalgic action, tinged with sadness of what was lost of myself and a desire for more to come, was not new to me. Over the past ten years I would find myself opening the box and looking at the work that spilled from my soul on to pages and pages. Some of it I didn't even remember writing upon first glance, and some of it I wish I could forget.
But this time was different. This time I saw the worth of the work done, not just as a capsule of my past mind, but for the words that came from my truth at the time. I saw its worth in its very existence, and I knew its worth could only grow if shared. I felt as if I owed the work that - as if I owed the sixteen/seventeen year old girl who wrote it - as if I owed myself as I am now.
So in three weeks I published a book. I did it so the words could live, even in all their vast imperfection which makes them purely authentic. Maybe this work will only mean something to me...but maybe not.
Maybe someone will take the chance of wasting their time, open the cover, turn a page and find meaning in the combination of words dancing together to compose a myriad of thoughts.
Maybe someone will find comfort in a character who they have never met, but seems familiar. Maybe someone will find themselves uncomfortable at an idea expressed either due to to it being unfamiliar or all too familiar.
Maybe just the action of putting these collected works, which may offend literary geniuses and grammatical gurus, into a wonderfully unprofessionally-made book will mean something to someone.
I decided it's worth the "maybe".
It all started on handwritten pages of multiple yellow legal pads. Everything starts somewhere.
Behind the words
So, whateth witheth all the “thou”s and “thee”s?
I believe I was about twelve years old when I went into the “grown-up” section of my local public library and held Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night in my hands. I fell in love in those pages.
I doubt I understood half of what I was reading, but that was part of the attraction. I fell in love with those beautiful words, written in a language I knew and yet, were still a mystery. I found beauty in having to absorb the words, let them fully seep into me and then run the fingers of my mind over and through them - trying to discover all they had to offer. There was beauty in having to take the time - make the effort - to understand the words of another and the thoughts brought to life through a quill pen.
Now, don’t get me wrong, when I wrote poems in Old English at the age of seventeen in 2011, I wasn’t thinking of myself as a modern day Shakespeare (although I think a plume in my hat would have gone well with my worn out converse look-alikes). Rather, I wanted to use beautiful words that were not commonly seen in our current world. I wanted to use words that might make another have to read a line a few times to grasp the meaning it holds. I wanted the opposite of our “LOL” abbreviated language. I wanted to use words that gave a reader what Shakespeare’s language had given me - the gift of having to sit with words, to give them my time, to give of myself to the words rather than just taking from them.
Maybe that doesn’t appeal to most - maybe that was part of the choice of language as well. Maybe these poems are for readers not looking to just read, but for seekers looking to connect.
Favorite Quotes Of
