Boasting Like Beowulf
Yesterday on Novel Matters Latayne Scott challenged us to a Beowulfian Boast. The elements of such a boast are 1. Declaring identity (who he or she is) 2. Place of origin (where he or she is from) and 3. Why he or she is fit for challenges ahead (like fighting Grendel’s mother or putting together a spreadsheet). So, the following is what I came up with.
I be Susie Marie of the Riggs line married into the Finkbeiner Family.
Writer of novels. Weaver of tales. Wonderer of words.
Wrought in the palm of Michigan’s hand
Whilst blizzard blanketed the land.
Descendant of author and sometime postal worker,
Artist and most time administrative assistant.
Immigrants and Germans and Jews and Protestants
The leaves on the tree of heritage.
Trained in the classics.
Sophocles and Shakespeare and Dostoevsky.
Enamored of the Americans.
Steinbeck and O’Connor and Lee.
Studied their words. Stories. Craft.
Ventured my own.
Pushed it to fly.
Tried another. And another.
And more still to come.
Out from mire and wreckage.
Seeing glory and light and wonder.
Marveled by mercy and gobsmacked by grace.
Looking back to the thrashing,
The frantic struggle.
Writing it. The pain.
Tapping it out on keyboard. The tension of determination.
Scratching it on paper with pen of purple. The victory of daily waking eyes.
YOUR TURN! Come up with a boast of your own! Boast of your ability to drive through rush hour traffic without burning with road rage. Or that you keep your laundry pile down. Or…well…just about anything! This is for FUN! No pressure to be whoever the dude was who wrote Beowulf.
susiefinkbeiner.com 
Hmmm….
Savage dane face or New York City cabbie snarl….
Good boast though.
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