I can't believe
I trashed our friendship with my pen
Can you believe
Renee, Aisumasen?

How could I not know
You would be hurt, so shaken
How can I show
Renee, Aisumasen?

What now can I do
To hear you say, "You're Forgiven"?
I'm such a fool
Renee, Aisumasen

What else can I do
To make us friends again?
What will we do
To make this loss a gain?

What should I have said?
You would not hear my words then
What I should have said
Renee, Aisumasen

What can I now say?
There is a word I have heard
This word I will say
Renee, Aisumasen

12/09/1980

Author's Note: My first real poem, my first lesson in poetry:
The lesson I learned from the inspiration for writing �Aisumasen Renee� has guided every poem I have written since, and may be better understood through the circumstances that inspired it.

It was my Senior year in high school, the same school where I am now working as a Teacher�s Aide. Just prior to Thanksgiving break I had done a terrible thing. There was a girl named Renee who was a very beautiful, sweet, innocent person that I had a huge crush on and wanted in the worst way to date.

I was in Electrical shop and Renee was in Cosmetology class across the hall. After finishing an exam in class early that day, I went to the back of the room and started writing a love letter to her. It started out very nice, but a few minutes later a couple of other kids in class finished their exams and came over to see what I was up to. Well, as teenagers will do, they started teasing me and making suggestions as to what I should write in the letter. This was when all the trouble started. I should have put the letter away and finished it at home, but peer pressure got the best of me and I wound up writing a dirty, nasty letter instead of the love letter I had intended to write. Whatever possessed me to give it to her after "we" were finished writing it is beyond my comprehension still. I gave it to one of the kids in class that was going to have his hair cut in the Cosmo class that day. He set it on her desk when she wasn't looking. What happened next still makes me cry to think about it. A part of me doesn't want to write it here because it's so embarrassing.

I could hear her crying from across the hall. Then I saw her walk past the classroom door into the office next door with tears running down her face. I'm not sure if I was more sorry for hurting her, or more afraid of what was about to happen to me. It's awful to think I was worried about getting in trouble, but it's the truth. Making her cry hurt me deeply, but the fear of the consequences was also very strong.

Then came the moment of truth I had stand up and confess to writing the letter. I had not signed it, and with good reason. But I knew I would not get away with it so there was no point in denying the inevitable.

I went in to the office, confessed and cried my eyes out. Renee wanted to know who had written the letter and she came to the door and saw that it was I. She started crying again and ran away. I felt like the lowest scum of the world and wanted to run away myself. Somehow I managed to avoid disciplinary action at school for it. But it ate away at me for three weeks like a monster in my stomach. Getting away with it was the worst thing that could've happened to me. All I could think of was how could I apologize to Renee.

Then came the night John Lennon was shot just a couple of weeks later. I wrote �Aisumasen Renee� in the early morning hours after his death, shortly after I heard his song "Aisumasen" playing on the radio. I didn�t recognize it, but I'm sure that I had heard it many times before, because my brother had the "Mind Games" album it is on and I know I had listened to it more than once. I must have never paid attention to the words or not realized what it was about before that night. It seemed like such a beautiful word and I knew immediately that it was the right one for me. I hope it's not plagiarism to use the title, and I hope John and Yoko would say it was ok.

I had been up all night and had decided there was no way I was going to school that morning. I got up later that afternoon and went to the mall to see if I could find a card that was appropriate for the poem to be written in. I found the perfect card that had Snoopy saying, "I'm Sorry" and then as I was walking to the counter to pay for it, I saw this little plastic statue of Snoopy crying and it also said, "I'm Sorry" on the base. I picked it up and got the both of them. After I wrote the poem in the card, I packaged them together in a box and mailed them to her.

Renee forgave me and we became friends for a time after that. She cut my hair on several occasions and we talked on the phone often. I have always wondered if I had not written that letter, could we have been more? But it's a double-edged sword, because I would never have started writing poetry that meant anything real to me if I had not. Still, I would rather I had never written any of my poems if it meant I could go back in time and stop myself from writing that one letter. I understand she is now married and has a happy family somewhere in the mid-west.

Soon after she forgave me I came to realize how important that poem had been in the repenting process. I don�t know for sure how much of an impact it had on Renee�s forgiving me, but it affected me very deeply. Knowing that I could express my feelings to someone through a poem, and having my apology accepted, gave me a sincere respect for poetry. It wasn�t just an exercise in class anymore; it was a learning experience in life.

It was then that I decided I would continue to write poetry and only write it when my feelings inspired me to write. Poetry is not a game where practice makes perfect. I will not force poems out just to write something, even though all the books about how to write poetry tell you to write every day, as often as possible. To me, it seems false, like writing to please an audience rather than express what is in my heart. For me, that expression is the only reason to write poetry.
JJ

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Posted on 11/09/2005
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