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.

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.

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. 

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.

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.

parched.

Three days without water.

Drunk on air and sun-dappled leaves, 

but we're heading out to see

All the grains of sand that each could be

A dream undreamt by broken minds.

Lost in all this unchanged time,

these shards lay parched and confined.

Melded into a mirage that must show

All the dreams that we did throw,

Now that we’re dried up and ready to go.

small, yet magnified.

Is there a moment that I do not know myself?

Yet, I find you, my soul, there, in silent footsteps

On the outreaches of the dimming twilight;

Her tiny hands, palms out, open, holding the

World, telling me: now, do you know?

The world is smaller than it appears, and

Your spirit is not so big that you cannot see it:

Pressed against the glass window, small yet magnified,

Your soul is encased in this animal body,

And you know it, like you know your own mind.

Do not be afraid now. 

---

Well, I'm basically unsatisfied with how I've been writing lately. I like what I wrote above, but it just doesn't say how I feel sometimes. Like I've changed and I don't know what or who or how I am anymore. It's a scary feeling, to feel at a loss. I'd also like to note that I now understand how people write so many things about love/heartbreak because I feel as though when I've gone through that this past year, I wrote like crazy. And some of the poems were ones that I'm most proud of. 

On another thought, I reread Plato's allegory of the cave (or skimmed it at least) and I remember how much of full and wonderful thing it is. I want to write something so eloquently elegant and original that it has staying power. Maybe someday. 

---

qu'est-ce que c'est?

what do you mean?
am i beyond help?
has the wind whispered defeat?
do i luxuriate in the sound
of the melody of the ground
as it shakes under my feet?
(je te souhaite, dans mes mains.)
and do i, do i much
hold onto cotton
with the feel that its
my first soft touch?
qu'est-ce que tu desires?
je veux ce que je veux 
quand je le veux.
why do i do what i do?
pour quatre nomes sur ma main,
oh, nomes que j'adore,
for the languid taste on 
my tongue they lay.
qu'est-ce que c'est
que je rêve?

We're too young to know better

I want to court love again,

Make a mix tape, hold on to a hand,

Travel together across the land

In a cooped up little car,

Like we think we’re going someplace far.

And we’re too young to know better.

Fall in love with no reservation.

Live life in perpetual youth and sun.

Try and try again with utmost compassion.

Oh, oh, this is my love song to you,

My dear, while we’re driving away,

Never fear, let me sing you this tune,

Run through this field to the moon.

Maybe this is the beginning,

This is the year I fall in love,

This is the day I see a smile like light

In the shadows scattered above.

reading alice.

Live life through a screen,

In between four rooms, boxes, places.

Touch the world softly, twenty paces.

Back and forth, and dream of and

learn about life through dappled drunk days:

reading about alice in wonderland,

wondering why the world won’t fade away,

into this bright, merry band

of misfits and introverts and mad hatters.

dream of days where I finally matter.

Live without feeling quite so alone,

(i hold a hand, but turns out it’s my own).

But, I’m scared, I’m scared

(oh mama, I’m so scared)

Hold me now, closer, tighter, stronger

Hold on longer and longer

So that I don’t fall apart like rain

Shatter from the dancing clouds,

Won’t wash down the drain

Yelling (“please don’t let go!”) loud.

So, Alice, Alice, will you take my hand?

Say you will live this life with me if you can,

the roses and violets and posies all understand,

Things are always better in wonderland. 

Where the red queen says, "run in one place!

Faster, faster now, to get away!"

Things don’t always have to stay the same

We can thunder in a different way.

telescope thread.

there's this thread, this tie
between my heart and your eyes,
like a telescope, you look in:
suntanned rocks that can't win
against the tumult of the sea rocking,
and a marked hand with a gun cocking
a reddened door with the bolt locking,
that won't unseal even when
your eyes come knocking.

so you turn your key in the lock, and
it won't open up, even when it's broken up
door's quiet, but it's spoken up
and said leave me alone:
stop trying to slip in behind
the masquerade when all you'll find
is the tumult of the sea rocking
a technicolor ship into the docks.
dressed in torn sails and misdriven nails,
it'll slip under the bridge, skim the top,
if it just bends its back
and picks up the slack.

so take a bow, and bow out, my man
you have tried and taken a stand
but now is the time
when you must comprehend,
that this ship has failed
to show you the secrets of the trove.
so must you continue to rove
through the clutters of my heart
and take all this glue apart
that held together the herds of hurts?

please take away your telescope thread
and leave me laying on this ship's head.
tie a knot and hook and lay dead
the other cracked hearts that may tread
along the path of your mighty gaze.
if you cannot, cannot resist,
might i suggest something instead?
let this ship of hearts crash and sink
letting its treasure trove drown ahead
and lay to waste on the ocean's bed.

take your smile (and twist it out)

I hate that you made me hate you
close that rage in a cage
and let the fire burn out,
looking past the bars to shout.
shut down the time you said you'd
bring me ice condensation stars
just to make the smile come out.

bring the world into this room
and see the hurt bloom
and maybe you'll see all the
moments you could've set me free:
like ice glazed crystal trees
that are longing to reach the sun
before the day is done and done.

oh, and i lose control:
tugging at the strings you hold me in.
and oh, i hate that you smile;
i want to take it away for a while
tear it up and hold the scatters
while you lose everything that matters.
and oh, i hate all that you say,
want to mar the steel in your ears
with crusted rust so you can't hear
all the jeers that i can't contain.

curl my fingers into my wrist
and make a skeleton tight fist
and twist it in your heart.
take away the crying eyes
from the socket like a pocket
in your face, you don't mean it
anyways.
all the cries, i know they're fake.

so, take all the hate that i feel,
burning under confined tan peels
like kindling in the fire,
let it consume all that made
us you and me, me and you.
just end this mockery, charade before
i wilt like petals to the floor
exhausted from the hate forming
clots under my skin.

---

Wow, didn't mean to make this long. Just an emotion purge, once again. It's probably no good.