memories

I always think of my memories like this:
without sound, just lips moving,
playing on repeat, like a silent film
with a few glitches.

i think it's you

i think about the curve of the back of your head
as it connects to your neck
delicate and strong, like bones.
i think of the kisses i've lain there
soft, like a virgin laying on flowers
or stubborn, like wind against a mountain,
think of how this has changed me
like wine unto water, coloring
deep red, burgundy, sweet and pungent.
i think it's you
who i want to hold close
and treasure in my arms, like the
warmest of suns.

lonely

what does it mean to be lonely?
it feels like this:
every time you're home yet i'm alone.
so i sit by the window,
coaxing smoke,
out of dim lit cigarettes.
watch the chill break out of my skin,
and hope i can feel again.

i sit still in the tub,
as if on pause,
and listen to the water fall.

an ache, filled still 

with tepid water from the bath.

how do i still feel so unclean,

unsure and unredeemed,
with soap on the skin,
enclosed from heart to limbs?

now, now, it seems to be so,
my hands are trembling,
and i am alone.

you made me whole again.

lost in deserts
for some time
but you made me whole again.

dear friend,
i cannot comprehend
how you found me after so long.
and now i feel incomplete,
when you are no longer around.

dear friend,

for some time,

(some splendid little time)

you made me whole again.

apart

with eyes that tell how long we've been gone,
and hands that stick and skim,
we hold on to these heartstrings,
while tangled up, limb to limb.

Unfinished- 10/30/11

hello old friend

hello old friend
here you are again
coming from across
the river bend.

hello old friend,

you hold suns 

careless like dollar ones.

and every one

tells me you're no good,

no good for me. 

hello old friend,
is it now you see me?
years you've let me be,
just incomplete.
divide and replete.

hello old friend
did you think that now,
you can demand and disavow
all that i allow.
did you think that now,
i would listen?

after your song was
silent for long-time now
because of our loss of us.

snake skin.

we hold this world in our hands and try to keep it from flooding out, spilling over our fingers like rain. our lives are about survival (survival of the fittest, if you must). This is how I started to view my life. Like I've left behind the snake-skin of my past self, and what is left of me is the part that was strong enough to survive. we talk about moving forward, but we forget about the footprints we leave behind.

but i miss my shell, my safety. it made me stronger in different ways, teaching me caution and creativity and honest love. now all that's left the the parts that have not been skimmed off the top, the parts that have not been burned down like wax. the parts that have been strong enough to withstand the stress and pain. and i'm not sure if i like what is left.

i want me back.

someone.

i hold these notes,
written out events of every time
you were something.
(oh, i know i shouldn't say
but you were something).

i fold them up, and place them
in the book on the top shelf.
pressed and ironed,
skim my fingers across the top
but not too rough
or it may fall apart and
all that i have will too.

regenerating.

now, i've never had my heart broken
but lately, i've been thinking maybe
you can have it broken when
it's already full of someone.

i hold this heart, fold it up,
put it in the laundry, and then, in the sun,
and hang this heart out to dry,
wrung and wore out from loving someone.

pulsing anew in my boned in cage,
i renew this old heart, regenerating,
(but they never heal completely)
they, these scars, they are complicating.

one day, my dear will realize
there are no more cells
to bring this lonely heart
bring it back to life.

old friends.

i wonder if you look for me, my friend
in all the places that you see.
do you see the color of my hand
when you walk out in the sea?

i think about you,
in the dawn or in the dark.
i hold on to those memories,
those memories of the park.
the smiles buried in bottles,
laughter locked up in suitcases,
and hidden behind the lonely trees
are our secrets and embraces.

and, you are my childhood,
and it seemed to grow too fast.
we grew fast apart
and could never make this last.
i wonder if you look older,
or if you are that girl in my memory,
who thought dreams were oceans,
and wishes were fishes in the sea.

so i wonder if you look for me?
as i now look in all these places
and search for you in their faces
because in these empty spaces,
you're the only one I can place
who ever held my hand.

you are.

you are, you are, my summer shine
you are, you are, my world divine.

beastly

the republic tigers are coming
prowling son, intimate at your heels,
like the wind rushes at your back,
pushing you forward before it kills.

and the nerve of these beasts!

like the Grimm villains they are,

holding the taste of poison in apples

blooming like the seeds of the core.

the lions are coming,  oh here they come,

the lions are coming. 

so say you will take a drop,
fall in waterfalls when prayers fell you
take the sky and turn to the moon
water's deep, so plunge in soon.

i remember when your veins poured

black blood like the river at mid noon

take a shot, and call the time of death,

before you try to save me too.

the tigers are coming. oh here they come.

-

i don't know what this is about. and I don't really like it. maybe what i meant to write will come back to me and I can edit this into something decent. 

letters I

i like how i talk about all the things you need.
how much you want to succeed.
how much you're in pain indeed.
do you ever, think about
the times i've been all out
in trying to make you see
how much more you could be?
you can change everything i say
into a mess of a mistake
like i'm unfeeling
like i'm just too fake.
and now, tired of all your ways
of making me walk away
and somehow,
all that ends up happening
is i'm all alone in between
the best and the worsening.
you always think hurting me
is the best way to push me aside.
then recoil when you want to be
the girl who's by your side.
so, like im held in string,
waiting for you to come and ring,
now i wait and write letters,
for the person i thought
could make all wrongs better,
letters you will never read,
words that will never show,
how you can take the lead
and make us better than before.
and on the inside, i dwell,
and think oh my, oh my,
this just cant end well.

pocket of snow.

pockets full of snow,

hands cold as i tuck them in.

and in propinquity, i imagine:

that in all the moments left,

so quiet, with nothing to show,

so motionless, we are snow:

falling, from outreached heights

where all we thought was,

oh, how, like air, we are light.

and like a forest of trees, 

we are too tall to see the 

ground beneath our fallen knees.

constellations

we laid our commiserations

to rest in the sand by our hands.

in the sky, we drew in constellations

that mapped out pathways up high

above the sullen, sunken land. 

fingers bronzed, and melded still

we lit the unlit lamps of the stars,

we nursed the young oil to flame until, 

it glowed like the embers of afar.  

on the sea puddled pools of backward suns

that sway and ripple like sounds on waves, 

linked to each other, one-by-one

and lit up, like the path our life has paved,
they hold hands until the night is done.

if love is blue

if love is blue,
organic, it flows through,
like streams in the dew
of the morning blue.
it's azure like a blue jay's wing
as it settles down to sing
of the gentle hearts' coupling
in the blue, blue stream.
if love is blue,
it is the heaven's sky,
caressing life from up high
and stretching far and wide
into the sea's loving tide.
if love is blue,
it is calm and sure,
undulating as the tide who
eats the sullen shore.
magnificent as the
rolling hills on the land.
soft as the warm-sunlit
touch of tender hands.
oh yes, if love is blue,
it is the color reflected in you.

story telling.

So recently I had this idea of writing a novella of sorts, not quite a novel (wow - that would be hard) but longer than the prose and short little snippets I usually write. Now, I did not realize how big of a challenge it is to write a story. Not because of the actual writing, as I write almost every day. But because of the "let's think of a plot" thing. It is hard. People sometimes say draw upon your own experiences. But I feel like I have ruminated and contemplated my own experience to such levels that they no longer have the same poignancy, and actually end up sounding inorganic when written down, so rehearsed. I could tell a story about a little girl, like me, and what mischiefs she did - only they sound trite and boring when I write it down. Fondest memories turn into a haze of mediocrity. So then, I thought, why not write about experiences I wished I had, or was glad I didn't. But they sound over dramatic and over the top. Too much.

The only thing I know to write about (or at least write adequately about) is emotion. I could come up with a  boatload of similes and metaphors, and things to compare this feeling to the sound of thunder or the hint of rain in the air. But, you can't write a story without a plot, a climax, a lesson... and in the end, my writing ends up being about the present. I'm so wrapped up in a moment that I can't seem to string together moments, in a fluid chain of experiences that form a lasting story.

For now, I will keep brainstorming. Maybe one day something will click. Maybe this is why some great authors only write one book. They only find one story worthy enough to tell.

and we are forever in motion

I am.

anxious and worried. should I
not have better words for how I feel?
I wish I could open this frame
that holds my body so still,
and let my cells parade out
in a spasm of words that mean
what i mean to feel to mean.

i mean, what i feel is what
these words will mean.
change the definition
according to this feeling, and
the rating of its intensity,
of its propinquity, of its purity.

these words, they mean that

maybe my life is in a cycle

like running in one place, fast.

tread marks deep in the dirt,

when we try to race like this, past

all these unwanted things.

and we are forever in motion,

but moving nowhere fast. 

i mean, well, i mean is this:
is it fair to say that I am lost?

No direction in sight,

and in a moment,
i find the silence too earthly.
too still, like a rock in space
orbiting endlessly around the light
but never towards it.
this is how i feel.

stay there forever.

the wisdom of winnie the pooh still gets to me. It's filled with child-like, innocent hope and poignancy. 

it's a simple thought, but one filled with a genuine love of friendship. and now, a poem...

Hold hands and hold on.

(do you see its pulse race?

and my whispers, quiet quiet?)

slow down, frantic child.

don’t let it go away now:

the road is a million miles,

a hazed horizontal, the shore.

It’s time to hold on, let the feet

drag on the pavement, hot

Like the star’s organic aura,

And travel 'cross the land, not

Unlike a mouth asking for more of.

More of this motion,

Heading in towards the ocean,

But crawl slow, slow, now, and

Watch the sky change shapes

And wrap you up in a drape

Of sea foam and titanic white.

(do you see its pulse race?

and my whispers, quiet quiet?)

now is the time to slow the pace

and enjoy the scenery of this place.

so let's hold hands and hold on.

who am i?

- What a wonderful thought!