First Run

First Run
By: James Dubeau

Wind blows
Chilling my bones
Fire burns
Down my legs
Water falls
From my brow
As I run
Across this town
From the sewers
To the prairies
I run
Not as fast
As I want
Not as fast
As I need
But as fast
As I can
On this early
Spring morning

Bad Habits

Bad Habits
By: James Dubeau

Please excuse us while we interrupt the creative writing with some actual blogging.

Over the past six months I have fallen back into the bad habits which I had worked so hard to leave behind in the previous six months. Eating out was always the easy alternative to grocery shopping and cooking for myself. Finding time to exercise became increasingly difficult after acquiring a new job with still working the old one. Writing had fallen by the wayside too with less poetry being posted upon the blog until the posts had all but stopped.

We are now once again at the end of the year. A time in which people commonly reevaluate their lives and habits while creating a list of resolutions to improve upon things. Hopefully at some point before the start of a new year I’ll actually create a list of New Year Resolutions. As for now I’ve started making some changes. After work I decided to finally join a gym.

Right now I’m in the early stages but I’m thinking of running the 2012 Madison Marathon. I know that after I ran the last one I swore that I would never do it again. The time commitment at the end does become a huge drain. However planning to run a marathon is a great reason to kick start an exercise regimen and gives me a goal. I’ll have to run it faster than I did last year.

As of right now I’ll plan on running the Madison Marathon on May 27, 2012. Over the next few months I’ll blog my progress at least once a week here. I’ve also wanted to do a photo timeline where I take a picture of myself every so often to see how things change over the course of time. These running blogs will be a good of place as any to track these changes.

It was hard to get back onto the horse today. I have only run a handful of times over the past six months. I am back to the same square one that I was at a year ago. If I include my warm-up and cool-down I actually made it to 5k. That being said my speed was much slower and there was a lot more walking then I would have liked, I was doing about 5.5 mph with 2 minutes of walking every 10 minutes. All that can really be said was that this was a start. Maybe not the best start ever, but at least I am now onto the right track. Hopefully over the course of the next week I’ll be able to make it the full 5k without counting the warm-up and cool-down. As of right now I fear the soreness which will most likely ravage my poor legs in the morning. Hopefully I did enough stretches tonight.

Only A Few More Days

Only A Few More Days
By: James Dubeau

Only a few more days
To go
Only a few more days
To live
Only a few more days
Until I die
A painful death
Beside the road
With an exploded knee
Gasping for breath
Crawling across gravel
And burning asphalt
Attempting to absolve
My soul
In sweat, blood, and tears
And like always
Falling flat
Failing

Race Day

Race Day
By: James Dubeau

When the race
First began
There was shouting
And cheering
And bands
But soon I
Fell into the groove
And nothing but silence
Over labored breaths
Rounding the corner
Down the street
Drunken frat boys
Cheer on their feet
But the event
Had just begun
And there was no support
Not really
Soon the cheers were behind me
And silence crept back in
As I labored on
Trying to make progress
I could finish
I knew I could
But it reminding
Of that important fact
Over and over and over
Again
As I kept moving
Making my way
Only pausing slightly
At the rest break
But still pushing forward
Faster than I expected
Still keeping momentum
Even after all this time
Rounding the last corner
End is in sight
I sprit for the finish
And hop on all right

Running Body

Running Body
By: James Dubeau

It’s true that fresh air is good for the body
Especially when running on city streets
Pounding feet against burning concrete
Gasping breaths are the only reprieve
For this exhausted body
My mind and soul scream
This is our body

Marathon Haiku

Marathon Haiku
By: James Dubeau

Legs are churning hard
Just one more mile to go
You can finish it