The Whale's Song

For the past few weeks I had been working on an assignment for my professional writing course that I've been doing. I had to create a web presence with a main node (website) and three supporting nodes. Because I am a writer I decided that, obviously, my web presence would be based on my fiction writing.

This worked well because last year for NaNoWriMo I wrote a science fiction novel that I dreamed of making interactive. By interactive I mean I wrote an Appendix to go with my novel and the idea I had was if I publish the novel online then by the use of Hyperlinks people had the choice of going to a separate part of the novel to read facts and further descriptions of things in the book. By this means my story wouldn't be convoluted with abstract facts that take away from the story. The idea was genius.

Flash forward half a year later and I'm required to make a web presence, and so it seems natural to base it off my NaNo novel.

So I give you my new blog: 'The Whale's Song'.

Updates to it are every Tuesday and Thursday. 8 chapters are already up so if you're interested in reading a comedy/action/adventure/scifi novel then check out the link.

Of course, this blog is entirely dedicated to my scifi novel. I'm not going to be posting other things on it. Unless sometime down the track once I've finished 'The Whale's Song' to use the blog for posting other stories, but that idea is a long way away and I'm not ready to think about it.

So this blog is still active, though I haven't been on it all that often lately due to studies and rehearsing for another show, but believe me, I'm still aware this is here and I mean to keep it going.

Cheers
Peter

The Truth (Is Out There): A Reflection and Poem

As anyone that knows me knows, I love poetry and that I also love to write it. I don't know when this love first started, how or why, but it's been with me for a long time. The poem below is, I consider, one of the best poems I have ever written and is certainly my favourite. I have changed practically nothing since I first wrote this some 6 or so years ago. I was 14, and I wrote it because I knew the girl I had a crush on at the time was out of my league. We were too close as friends for anything further to develop, but I wished we could have been more. And out of that wish came this poem, but spread throughout is still the knowledge that we could never be. Since then my feelings have moved on, but this poem still remains my favourite. Probably due to the layer of nostalgia that covers it.

The Truth

I sit at your side as you cry,

And you sit at my side as I die.

We both know the truth,

And we both know the lies.

The truth is unbearable,

The lies make it so.

We will never know why,

And we will never understand.

No, we will never understand.

You heard the news on the radio;

I heard the news through a microphone.

You couldn't dare to bare the pain,

And I couldn't dare to not bare the pain.

We both believed only to be pushed down;

We got back up so that we could live again.

Everything we know,

Is everything we never knew.

Everything we ever wanted,

Was all we ever had.

Life is unfair, you said so yourself.

But who was there to tell you it was?

And who was it that said it wasn't so?

I guess we will never know.

Just like everything else we won't know.

I cared for all the wrong things,

And you cared for all the right.

I never knew that 'till I was told,

And you never knew until I was told.

We laughed and played until it was dark,

Never realising that it was the dark,

That caused more tears than happiness.

We shared our life together,

And now it's about to change.

You never cared for change,

And I was never bothered.

We just didn't believe enough to believe it.

I wish I could tell you how much I care,

But the words always become lost,

And I forget.

Of all the many things we both know,

We both know the truth.

And no matter how unbearable it is,

It will always be better than the lies.

And the truth is I love you,

And you love me back. 

But it can never be,

For many things never are.

But how do we know?

It's simple, we don't.

And we never will because it's not for us to say,

And that's one thing we're sure of.

(C) Peter Van Werkhoven 2011

To edit or Netflix: that is the question

To edit or Netflix: that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to edit,

Pour hours into a novel for publishing,

Or to waste all on Netflix -procrastinate-

And so achieve nothing? To Edit: to write;

And by write, I mean stare at my monitor

Reading words that lose their meaning so quickly

As they blur into each other, tis a waste

Again we find ourselves. To Netflix, to chill;

To chill: perchance to relax: ay, there’s the rub;

For in that relax state what time may pass

when a TV show is complete, finished,

Must give us pause: chance to reflect

On what we must then next do after it;

For who would bear the sad after show blues,

The next season, provided it is now out,

The pangs of despised love, we dedicate,

The insolence of TV and the spurns

That patient we unworthy folks must be,

Time he could have spent editing his novel

Could have been put to use? Who do edits bear,

To grunt and sweat under computer heat,

But that the completion of something done,

The fulfilment that awaits an author

Only when the work is done, not before,

And makes us suffer through many blank screens

Is it not better than after show blues?

Thus discussion does provide an answer;

The analysis of the situation

Is overcast with what is right and wrong,

But the decision has not been made lightly

With all prospects taken into account,

And so stake reputation on the choice,

The great Netflix it is! Vice, is good TV,

May all my sins be forgiven for it.