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[open flame]

life
those papers couldn't hold;
couldn't tell it better,
the stories that they told.
flame
can't keep me here in death;
can't take it back,
but this is my best.
damn you
and fuck the rest.  ~

[soul dancing]

A mantra I wrote for myself many years ago as I was learning to be an adult and realizing that you in order to transcend in life, you'll inevitably face your fears, confront your childhood and forgive those that have hurt you.




part one:

you were there for me/
when this child face knew emptiness too early/
when darkness felt around my room and in it things of nightmare gloom/
the things no child should ever dream/
you held me and i let you go and found a way to forget the mess/
and fuck it all for worse or best. but you never got to cry for that/
you never got the voice to speak/
and so now please take my hand in time/ we'll dance in smallest feet with rhyme/
and color our heart with red and blue/
and show the world what got us through-/
so take this walk with me.


part two:

you were there for me/
when i needed to know the truth/
when i had to speak it regardless/
but when i had to see my root/
and turned to twist but all become that none of this is better done/
for who could hurt me worse i thought, but here it is he's got them beat!/
the very seed my soul should need, i need it not I need it not/
but you were there and i am here to let you know we need it not/
and we will shuffle through eyes wide shut/
and show the world what all we've got/
we'll take this skin, its blood not thin, we'll make it work/dismiss the jerks/
and find it lovely in the end/
i'll tarry with you in search for sense, in search of timeless mends and things that never end-/
so take this walk with me.


part three:

you were there for me/
when i hollered terror and ...NO!/
and no one in the world could hear the scream inside except you my dear my soul you keep the voice alive/
and though the moment has almost let us die/
and though i returned thinking i was better off, and this is as good as it got and i'm the kind of person that deserves to be so got/
i've found a way to let you know: it won't make us and it won't break us and that won't take us any farther than it has/
and that voice is louder than any flag could stand any prouder for we have found indifference together!/
we have learned the truth and what it's not and though no book was made for us or rules to follow spelled, we have conquered and created heaven in a place that know true hell/
we have died and come alive and through it all we have survived/
and you were there when no one was/
and so we sing in grandeur praise that if they heard they'd be amazed/
for what earthly soul could gracefully accept the pain they gave and the hurt they made and still walk away with a stronger name-/
so take this walk with me.


part four:
you were there for me/
when i couldn’t face my own/
when i walked in trainwreck footing and followed hungry mouths/
and let them eat and they devoured our very fruit, our purpose, our flower/
they took from it and gained to power and i lost myself in that very hour/
but you were there and i got out if it weren't for you i'd be that doubt that kept me down
and fucked with me/
and i fell down and grabbed the ground and held on tight and let them take without a fight/
but i won't do that i won't anymore cuz/
you were there then and there before and held my heart while i was gone/
and you waited for me and made me strong/
and so my soul, let's dance with this let's take the moment and carry it/
and show this life all it can be/
we'll take its lengths and all its strengths unknown to you and me/
and we will gain a better time, we will know a better time-/
so take this walk with me.


part five:
you were there for me/
when i wanted to forget/
when i didn’t want to feel, and i wanted to be unlet/
when i had to make it worse and i had to fuck it up when i had to eat the goodness and not mean anything to anyone or anything/
and there you sat in hopeless fat and i skimmed from the top of every day, the darkness that can't fade away/
so be here now we sit in this and wonder where is any of it but it's in you, you've held it there 'til i came back or for the first and found anew/
my heart though worse form all the pain, the depth, the shame; you kept my blood like shelter, stayed warm and let me know/
i cannot give away it all for you have kept the best for last/
and now that best will be forever and that will be far better than any day in our broken past/
and we will climb every mountain they give us and we will take the challenge each day/
we will rise above the hell that kept us down and put us in cell and stole the key/
we stole it back and we will find our way on back to life that means more than they can know/
we hike through trails they'll never know, we fall from skies that can't let go-/
so take this walk with me.


part six:

you were there for me/
when i tried to pretend it was good and i didn’t need you to live and i could find happiness in the ways I like to give and here is someone i can give to that doesn’t mind me giving/
so i pretended it meant a damn to anyone else but us and kept on with my vowless face in veil unseen, in ring unworn and loved like forever and nothing was better except what i wouldn’t admit to myself/
so you held it for me 'til i got help/
and i'm sorry i put you through all that noise and i wouldn’t even let you have a voice/
but let's not dwell on things well done cuz i gave it my all and you kept a little back and now we're here on this open road with no one to tell us which way to go/
and so how 'bout this way, another side of Y/
we'll march through the faces and hit all the traces and unmark the makers that made us before/
we are not the abused and we will not be let loose except from the bars that held us so far/
we will take the challenge and conquer every midnight/
we will see in better light and shine in grandeur spots of sight/
and they have never seen such glamour as we pose in our faulty step and stammer/
but we'll survive we always have; without you soul, i never would have/
so let's go find a life to live and give it away in baskets of love/
hand outs for people who don’t know the way/
we'll walk along beaches of better days-/
so take this walk with me.


part seven:

you were there for me/
when i could not swim in water/
when i could not be my age or know a better father/
when i thought the truth was all they said, i knew no absence but the soul of my head/
and no pride i carried nor any hope for you/
i had nothing to capture or try and no reason to live and no reason why it's not better to die/
and the marker on the gallon that told me what to drink is the very bastard that told me what to think/
but you were there for me and listened to the hero that couldn’t be there anymore but he was there 'til then/
and more and he held us like sunshine and gave us a path to trace/
until we could find our own, until we could grow and make it known/
so for him and for you i take this stand now and grab it by horns and run along somehow/
with strength we didn’t know we had but we just take it and go with that/
cuz it's all we've got and it's more than they will/
so come with me and i'll show you what fills/
a life and a heart and a soul and a skin and no one who is empty will ever enter in/
and we will carry goodness and we will care for them/
though they might never understand we'll show them 'til the end /
so take this walk with me/~

Transitions and Transfers

The thing that kills me (about moving) is the loss of my work.  I have truly lost volumes of my writing along the way. 

The way, being, the path from here all the way back to the countless transitions in my life.  The restlessness of my timeline, notably in the past few years, has left me without some of my most fragile words. 

I even once wrote a poem about losing my work and I have lost that too. 

Herein, the moral of the story is print your work and make two copies if you care to.  I don't know why it's so important to me but every time I lose my work, I am reminded of just how raw and personal writing can be.  The same can be said for pictures. 

testing

Every so often I am curious enough to take a personality test if I happen upon one and have nothing else going on. Today I found a link on Facebook and was impressed by the vivid detail the synopsis gave. If you’d like to take the quiz yourself, go to here. Here is what they had to say about me:


You’re a Harmonizer.

Altruistic and thoughtful, you’re generous with your time and energy and definitely like it best when everyone’s getting along. You often put others’ needs before your own and find it easy to see different perspectives on the same problem.

Reliable and trustworthy, you seek harmony and balance in your life. You forge strong, long-lasting friendships, and your friends value your honesty and frank opinions. You tend to value routine and security.With your positive mental attitude, it’s no surprise that things in your life just seem to click into place.

As a Harmonizer, it’s important to learn to trust your intuition and to know that everything will work out for the best. Learn to say yes to new experiences from time to time. Your confidence and self-belief will continue to grow. Sometimes a challenge or a change of scene could be just what you need.You have a strong ability to connect to your inner essence and listen to your heart. Even if you have a busy schedule, make sure you have the confidence to carve out that space for yourself. It’ll definitely pay off in the long run.

You believe in happy endings. By being yourself and feeling comfortable in your skin, you will give off positive energy and attract the kind of love you deserve.As a True Romantic, you’ve got a whole lot of love to give and you like to lavish your partner with romantic gestures. You have strong instincts and a good understanding of who you are and what you want from life. You like to follow your dreams and believe in happy endings. You are expressive and enjoy coming up with new ways to show your partner how much you love him. Intense experiences appeal to your sensual side.

You know that true happiness doesn’t come from material things or possessions. It goes much deeper than that and is all about valuing those things you can’t put a price on. You like to care for those around you, and if they’re happy, you’re happy. You appreciate that both highs and lows make up the balance of life and you always try and stay spiritually strong and focused.

You’re a real morning person with the right attitude when it comes to feeling great.You believe in a balanced approach to living a healthy lifestyle. It’s all about moderation.

For you, food and eating tend to be sociable occasions, so you love something delicious but informal.
You’re creative and visually inspired and enjoy keeping on top of fashion.

Your pretty, feminine style exudes low-key elegance and charm. You don’t need to be brash or falling off a pair of stilettos to get noticed. Being at ease and feeling confident in yourself works wonders.

You’re inquisitive, open-minded and interested in history. You love to discover new things and experience new places.

nurse

Its been a decade since I first took this journey by foot, climbing obstacle over obstacle towards being a nurse, an epic largely of selfhood. As I took on God’s mission for my life, I had no idea what sort of challenges I would face. I could never have imagined such strange and purposeful events, hurdles and temptations would eventually turn me closer to my spirit and its Maker. So many times, I thought, God must not want this for me only to realize that in truth, the enemy would not want this for me. Its those truths that helped me charge on even when it seemed so ridiculous to even try.

All the shields I put up to protect myself, God knocked them down. He said, I will protect you.

All the layers I caked on my appearance, my persona, God peeled them back one at a time so I could see what I was doing. He says, but daughter, I made you.

All the obstacles I put in my own way, God stood there and said, “Really Sarah? …Really?”

Only after every stone had been turned, every false concept of my self had disproven, …only after I had completely broken down, I finally found the genuine courage and personal strength to trust God’s will for me. Only after I asked for His mercy, His grace and and His wisdom could I align my will with His and take joy in being justified. I had to trust His path and when I didn’t He still carried me.

Thank you God for carrying me through this. All of this.

[faded brights 3]

again, not so fast;
prepared, colors fade into honest thoughts of themselves-
pastels propelled, tired clouds collecting into a sky of
something …
something protected, or maybe even forever.
the weather,
drifting dark into light-
i am traveling through daylight
and fading into a forgiven thought of myself-
shades faith and days we love;
i float along lines of reflective pieces
and welcome the will of the next season. ~

[painted]

theres a sadness in the backdrop to the stars, tonight;
a wetness in the paint – something less finished than i’d like.
the stars, at least, are still stars -
oiled light for midnight, and they burn
and almost seem to blur in a hope- -
God if i could have the strength to cope and know
that tomorrow will come, anyhow. ~

bigger

my family and i, we call it moving mountains. these are the things we can do with faith. not knowing just what it is we’re moving but trusting and being able to actually feel the power in the movement. faith can be so big that God would even allow a person to see a glimpse of what they’re really doing. i’m not there but my imagine runs wild. with my faith i am free to dream. ~

[from now]

could have been something you thought of,
could be deja-vu.
finally, it took so fast
getting it all out of you.

[slightly acidic]

strange astringent,
a blink of an eye; the water bleeds and the light,
dry as a bone,
ragged and wrung
appears clean, serene, and alive.~

[gravity]

ironing out the inevitable,

the heaviness of metals, like led,

(i can still hear)

sleek chilled water
washes over black coal in the night;

it ebbs, and lets
in the light.

improving the aperture,

the dilution of ink as it bled.

(can't be far now; so i try my joints:)

i can still feel.~

[peaking]

hands against the surfaces of stone:

the dryness seems fit for the polish of the grip,

as i carry my weight up over the cliff and peer down at the height of my climb.

at some point this must align

with an idea God had in His mind.

this must be what its like to come into ones own;

having full faith that the drift, the down, angled calves, the slide of mud, the catch of my step as i bare down down down ...

will not be nearly as trecherous as the lift, the push on angled calves, the slide of mud, the catch of step as i push my weight up over the cliff and peer out at the site of my dreams.

reaching into the depth of fear in my knees, the water up to my hips, i drift with the clutch of a stick;

the dryness in my feet seems fit for the polish of the grip of stone, i chance across a fast-moving water, against the current of time and i think to myself:

at some point this must align with an idea God had in His mind.~

[animals]

honor for the elder;
honor lost to law and lines on contracts
and facts.

an attic scent like damp wood and dusty boxes of pictures; things to help her remember who she is.
despite her demeanor (she claws at the strangers),
she is adorable. and scared.

left here unprepared,

she waits by the door;

waiting to be honored or be spared.~

[rose red]

Approaching the line which isn't a line afterall,

Water meets dawn,

Still grasping to the deep and turbid why.

If I can understand,

I could get by.

If and only then, I'd get by.

Surfacing among the floating ice,

The difference melts; light reflects

The significance of her cry;

But once its hoped; it saves in notes

Bottles and waves to shore.

Approaching the line; this infinite sky;

Approaching the light; the dawn of a beautiful life.~

down through time

I can’t configure in my mind the time of day.  In some memories its dark, in other memories its day.  All in the same memory, the same moment in time.
Then there was the night before.  The phone that didn’t stop ringing.  We all sat there as it rang, slow to respond.  As I finally realized no one else would answer it, I got up and sure enough, it stopped ringing.
Then the morning after.  Again, the phone rang and it didn’t stop ringing.  Slow to answer, my mom sleeping next to me, said,
Is that the phone?
Hours later (so it seemed; light to dark), my mom slipped on clothes and hurried down the hall to answer the endless ring of the phone.
There are no words to explain what happened next.  Just,
“What did you do to Mike!  What did you do to him!”
And the next thing I knew, my brother was dead.
Not one of us questioned how he died until we were told how he died.

[My Mike Poem]
your life hangs over like a lamp
from the path i’ve drifted from
when other lights of color
led my heart undone;
and as i rode through ether
caught in strobes of scattered void
your watt improved in measure
and i could not avoid.
though i thought the world was dark
without your strength to light it,
you are the light that is the strength
with the power to ignite it.
if i made a promise
you would have to keep it too;
we’ll take your strength to lengths
unknown to me and you,
and light the way your life insists
and follow it to your transfer.
we’ll mark the exes, connect the wires
and there will be an answer.~

[between]

improving the aperture-
the forced light;
the swelling of cells,
the yelling through hell -
years of hell and i widen the lense a bit;
tune into the sound,
my own movements
beating rhythms in the ground.
amid the noise,
i tend to my voice -
a quiet light to resurrect her choice.
still as the will
of the angels strum
along to the
grounds quiet drum.~

[scissors]

stammered by the isolated trees
an empty breeze
a trickle of hope
just to trick to fake the cope
the alone, the unknown
found only by the likeness
of a feather on a breeze
drifting alone on an empty sea.~

bread and water

opening the cupboard doors for the tenth time never made more appear. yet the bareness of reality never kept me from reenacting, perhaps in desperation.

hope. maybe i had hope.

the wheels always turned in me and creativity spurred the most brilliant concoctions as a child:

  

• brown sugar and butter makes caramel, sort of
• bread ends with outdated yogurt and raisins
• pilot crackers and canned tuna, of course
• cabbage, lentils and chicken: something i like to call Beluga

growing up and even until now i never understood the virtue in poverty. maybe because i was too poor in other things like spirit at the time.

now though, as an adult, i see how intimate one becomes with God when they are poor. no longer merely self-reliant; when we have nothing else to trust we have only to trust God. if the world turns against us we turn to God. and so in a sense, those we damn and shame and judge (and maybe even yell out the car window, "Get a job!"); those we right off and cast out often have a far more exclusive provision with the Creator, than those who seek to fulfill their needs independently.

[penn-kos]

not the touch so much
but the "unreasonableness of it all,"
purge the innocent transfer
of smokey bays;
darkness in corners of whispers in formers-
the frame of shame of a girl.~

[soul dancing, part 1]

you were there for me...
when i thought i had it down,
and didn't.
in it, wounds, rounds of tight knit
simplicities, explicitly spun a
speechless, needless skein.
needles caught in tangled thoughts
of what this me should me.

i needed you.

so let us now be strong and proud,
not raveled by the fads so well;
let's knit the knits
and purl the purls
and share them with the world;

so take this walk with me. ~

[innocent girl]

so take this walk with me -

[an innocent child cries sadly for she is no one]

through the thousands of strands of withered grass,

hand in hand, little soul, see the light reflecting off your heart:

look up and there's the angels sharing light with you

don't be scared. take this walk with me. ~


going through what is left of some of my poetry as a little girl, i was terrified to read one of my lines as a 12 year old girl. "an innocent child cries sadly for she is no one." ... so this post is me talking to me about me. everything's gonna be alright. poor thing.

[is it enough?]

stronger than before
and i dont owe you;

just another chance,
a chance to show you.

i know.
i know.

enough, we've both done so much
to show you, done so much to hold you;

to keep this,
even then, even now,

i hold my breath for now.~

i'll always remember paul squires: his prosepoemthingys, Continuing Diaspora (the first of his i read), that my name goes down in the history of his blog (click here); and all the continuing support i got from this faithful blog friend. this is for you,

[free]

spun out of all their is to drive.
to try,
i write, and pass along what living is to die:

free.
all it is is free.

i.m. me and we'll chat on living and being, and trying;
and dying free.

God speed friend Squires, God speed. ~

[boxes]

fit within the lines of the most restrained

harsh black definitions, and contrary white.



cant stretch my limbs out of these walls,

i'm tied to the cross of their tucked away faults.



and in this resurrection, i'm just me-

gray and dying and alive.



ill-defined and well from the limb of this tree,

i drink from a God who mercifully, mercifully feeds me; keeps me; leads me:



free.~

[the music]

facing down and to the left,
i avert my eyes to what is left;
signature in the peripheral:
an infinite shore, home, bound, toward
what is left:
a deliberate softness in the keys,
in harmony with my beach; steps, prints.
wind hits;
hints of what is left.~

[healing]

Hands lay over a head;
Water runs over.

The spirits led;

Now, this-

Faced, blessed;
Down, kissed;
Wished for things it couldn’t have.

Songbird sings;
Thumbs over strings;

Angels commence and the soul resurrects.

respite in the Perfect;
deserted in the desert of affection;
letting in the love, kept for sudden notices;
moment's notice, not too quick-
just take away the swears and keep it quiet.
in the tundra lost and loved;
kept quiet for my God above.~

[black]

Shot in the dark
I didn’t even hear you come in

Whisper for help
Say I'll be well

I love them, tell them I do.

[gone]

Gone so far… hands out farther than I can reach
Who could reach?

These things, these screams
God prevails in my dreams, keeps me close

I wake up and I feel His presence

[right]

now I don’t even want to write
the words
painted in the smallest letters
given in the quietest notes
succumbing to the transfer of

the answers that I wrote~

[world view]

world sees /
these things are new /
summer sounds loud /
winters whispers; behind the light /
over night /
the colors paint the sky /
if only they could see /
these colors what they mean to me~

lighter brighter

ive been tossing around various tomorrows... tomatoes juggling in the air... trying to decipher the codes of fate and my own difficult desires.

this tomorrow, that tomorrow... one is too cold, another too hot. finally, oh but finally, i have settled on a certain future. decidedly so, i am delightedly insomuch tickled over the idea i've come across. its been staring me in the face, rolling its eyes at me, waiting for me to turn from my scattered thoughts and return to the truth which is always ironic and always magical. God is as lovely and whimsical, deep and dark and mysterious as I love Him to be. and His gifts always reflect all of these infinite qualities.

My tomorrow, lighter and brighter than i could have imagined. detailed and simple, full circle and yet never-done. so much fulfilled in just arriving my eyes in the center of the gifts which have always been there, ready to be opened, noticed.

i spend so much time trying to will my way through life, only to look up and find it's so much easier if you just close your eyes and let God do all the turning.

[world]

world
Another dark night
the lights warm inside
we’d sit on green metal chairs
beside ourselves and the world.
Another Caramel Macchiato
with a straw too tall for the cup,
but proportions were always odd
in our judgments of the world.
Another one last Marlboro
lit despite the outspoken rain,
calming our hazardous obsessions
making something of the empty world.
Another friend I can’t forget
for better or for even worse
despite its worth, I’m gone
into another neck of the world.~

transfer

counting the months and the moons, life in boxes, the flesh in travel mode; the soul in an intimate surrender of the truth and what its not:

i reclaimed a calm i'd forgotten about. through all this weather, i have peace; a deep-seeded joy which had been lost or discarded several years ago. to just be breathes the sweetest sighs within.


there is a lot of cleaning to do; lots of purging, lots of sweeping. but the heart is very home in me. i am very alive. thank you God for keeping me alive.

on days like these, when so thrilled to feel life in every pore, i go back to something i wrote in 2004; another spiritual year. its called [soul]:

You were there for me/
When this child face knew emptiness too early/
When darkness felt around my room and in it things of nightmare gloom/
The things no child should ever dream/
You held me and I let you go and found a way to forget the mess/
And fuck it all for worse or best. But you never got to cry for that/
You never got the voice to speak/
And so now please take my hand in time, we'll dance in smallest feet with rhyme/
And color our heart with red and blue/
And show the world what got us through-/
So take this walk with me.

You were there for me when I needed to know the truth/
When I had to speak it regardless/
But when I had to see my root/
And turned to twist but all become that none of this is better done/
For who could hurt me worse I thought but here it is he's got them beat/
The very seed my soul should need I need it not I need it not/
But you were there and I am here to let you know we need it not/
And we will shuffle through eyes wide shut/
And show the world what all we've got/
We'll take this skin, its blood not then, we'll make it work/
Dismiss the jerks and find it lovely in the end/
I'll tarry with you in search for sense in search of timeless mends and things that never end/
So take this walk with me.

You were there for me/
When I hollered terror and no/
And no one in the world could hear the scream inside except you my dear my soul you keep/ the voice alive and though the moment has almost let us die and though I returned thinking I was better off, and this is as good as it got and I'm the kind of person that deserves to be so got,/
I've found away to let you know it won't make us and it wont' break us and that wont take us any farther than it has/
and that voice louder than any flag could stand any prouder for we have found in idfference together./
We have learned the truth and what its not and though no book was made for us or rules to follow spelled, we have conquered and created heaven in a place that know true hell./
We have died and come alive and through it all we have survived/
and you were there when no one was/
and so we sing in grandieur praise that if they heard they'd be amazed/
for what earthly soul could gracefully accept the pain the gave the hurt they made and still walk away with a stronger name/
so take this walk with me.

You were there for me/
When I couldn’t face my own,/
when I walked in trainwreck footing and followed hugnry mouths/
and let them eat and they devoured our very fruit our purpose, our flower,/
they took form it and gained to power and i lost myself in that very hour/
but you were there and I got out if it were for you I'd be that doubt that kept me down
And fucked with me and I fell down and grabbed the ground and held on tight and let them take without a fight/
but I wont do that I wont anymore cuz
You were there then and there before and held my heart while I was gone/
And you waited for me and made me strong/
and so my soul, lets dance with this lets take the moment and carry it/
and show this life all it can be/
We'll take its lengths and all its strengths unknown to you and me/
and we will gain a better time, we will know a better time/
So take this walk with me.

You were there for me/
When I wanted to forget./
When I didn’t want to feel and I wanted to be unlet/
When I had to make it worse and I had to fuck it up when I had to eat the goodness and not mean anything to anyone or anything/
and there you sat in hopeless fat and I skimmed for the top of every day the darkness that can't fade away/
so be here now we sit in this and wonder where is any of it but its in you, you've held it there til I came back or for the first and found a new/
my heart though worse form all the pain, the depth the shame you kept my blood like shelter, stayed warm and let me know/
I can not give away it all for you have kept the best for last/
and now that best will be forever and that will be far better than any day in our broken past,/
and we will climb every mountain they give us and we will take the challenge each day and we will rise above the hell that kept us down and put us in cell and stole the key;/
we stole it back and we will find our way on back to life that means more than they can know/
We hike through trails they'll never know, we fall from skies that cant let go/
So take this walk with me.

You were there for me/
When I tried to pretend it was good and I didn’t need you to live and I could find happiness in the ways I like to give and here is someone I can give to that doesn’t mind me giving./
So I pretended it meant a damn to anyone else but us and kept on with my vowless face in veil unseen in ring unworn and loved like forever and nothing was better except what I wouldn’t admit to myself,/
so you held it for me til I got help./
And I'm sorry I put you through all that noise and I wouldn’t even let you have a voice./
But lets not dwell on things well done cuz I gave it my all and you kept a little back and now we're here on this open road with no one to tell us which way to go/
and so how bout this way, another side of y,/
we'll march through he faces and hit all the traces and unmark the makers that made us before,/
we are not the abused and we will not be let loose except from the bars that held us so far,/
we will take the challenge and conquer every midnight,/
we will see in better light and shine in grander spots of sight./
And they have never seen such glamour as we pose in our faulty step and stammer/
but we'll survive we always have; without you soul, I never would have./
So lets go find a life to live and give it away in baskets of love,/
hand outs for people who don’t know the way,/
we'll walk along beaches of better days/
So take this walk with me.

You were there for me/
When I could not swim in water,/
when I could not be my age or know a better father./
When I thought the truth was all they said, I knew no absence but the soul of my head/
and no pride I carried nor any hope for you,/
I had nothing to capture or try and no reason to live and no reason why its not better to die/
and the marker on the gallon that told me what to drink is the very bastard that told me what to think,/
but you were there for me and listened to the hero that couldn’t be there anymore but he was there til then/
and more and he held us like the sunshine and gave us a path to trace/
until we could find our own, until we could grow and make it known/
so for him and for you I take this stand now and grab it by horns and run along somehow/ with strength we didn’t know we had but we just take it and go with that/
cuz its all we've got and its more than they will/
so come with me and I'll show you what fills/
a life and a heart and a soul and a skin and no one who is empty will ever enter in/
and we will carry goodness and we will care for them/
though they might never understand we'll show them til the end /
So take this walk with me/~

[faded brights]

still, yet so fast;
the colors fade into lighter thoughts of themselves-
pastels
held, and yet so swift become what holds
this place together-
the weather,
drifting time into time;
i am traveling over the colors
and fading into a lighter thought of myself-
laughter
and love hold me together; my colors stronger
and better,
drifting down through time
travelling over and over and living like no other.~

tangerine

The sky here is still. From here, the ground is busy, the earth blurred with nonsense and unsettled souls but above it all the sky is still. I look up and can not find an end. I look up and know no other certainty but that eventually the color will extract from this view, the sun will pass and another day will work its way into the world (God willing).

God willing I'm still here. And I am still with the sky. No matter how fast I go on the freeway, above it all is pause.

[photograph]

The distance closes in from the picture in your hand -
Without it all is dying.
An arched and splendid daylight
Brings a calm to all this trying;
Closer and you come closer,
With this love is living -
Love I'm living.
Salvaging the truth
Of a sweet and bitter youth,
Closer fully always known;
You'll never be alone.~

[farewell]

this is about meeting my father, and then saying goodbye...its called [farewell]:


theres the why,
and then theres beneath it -
the pit, a stone
to wrought in my inside,
as i conjure up goodbye.
and to watch you turn your eye;
a sullen whale over a wave -
dismiss the love in the way
i tried to wave goodbye.

theres the how,
and then theres beyond it -
the question, a mark...
really not understood, but i vowed
to save myself, i’m saved til now
and then when i cry like now;
your child lost while you’re away,
looks for you at night and day,
presses hands hard as she prays.

theres the when,
and then theres behind it -
the dream, a door
closed to the yesterday
i knew, but you were hurt;
couldn’t help for well its worth,
farewell.~

[wax on water]

funny how the smudge on the lens
lent itself to the truth -
the blends of bold hues,
the bends of hard lines;
oiling together until clearly
clarity floats on reality,
like clouds off the coast (a birds eye view).
i fly over a moment captured, gone,
given and taken in the same breath;
the same life and the same death.~

on the exhale~

and as i took a breath i watched the mess wean/ much of this chaos has stormed from stale air/formed from resistance/the force of pain/an inevitable wind/within/
peace/and quiet now/on the exhale~

suffix

the clouds are trying. they will the season. the landscape breathes out a quiet surrender, ready or not. am i ready? i turn my glance against the wind, water fills the lens, stings as i contemplate my progress. the things i thought were important to me are only important to other people whose thoughts were important to me once.

i turn back down the mountain and across the saddle of two, affixing my desires on a very personal agenda. i reflect on myself through a pond of honesty, below the crisp and subtle fog. this is real. i'm tired of trying to meet life where other people say it should be. what if this is where i'm at? this is where i'm at. life will just have to meet me here. if i know all that i know, my whole heart and soul understands the only way to reach pure happiness is to define happiness for oneself; a reasoning unencumbered by others' variations of its meaning (even ones' own). one must consciously afford the will to make someone else happy or to truly make the self happy. and if life is really as short as i know that it is, then may i sigh relief and understanding; for all these things i'm after,...all these efforts towards something i'm scurrying to do… this idea of completion, happiness, success... have a way of keeping me from the ultimate joy. what i actually end up "being," has little substance if through the process i was never actually being.

the weather approaching hurries us: prepare, prepare, prepare. and no matter how much we prepare, it often feels as though we are never ready enough. when is just being, just enough? how much faith do i have in the now, that what i have right now is enough? if i weren't ready, it wouldn't happen. if it wasn't meant to be, it wouldn’t be. ready or not, i'm ready.~

woman in bed

Was this her last? Its easy to remember, easy to forget whose feet we are washing.

As the washcloth rubbed over her edematous soles, the cloth took with it a dingy orange residue, the texture and look of iodine.

She moaned as we turned her. All four, five of us to pull, push her from side to side. We cleansed her, not knowing who we cleansed. We bathed her, not knowing who we bathed.

God forgive me that i didn't have you more in mind.

Thank you God for even in this moment, is your will for me.

Forgive me that i didn't give more of that moment to you.

One eye averted from my business, I kept watch of the lab results, test results printing every so often...more bold, more red numbers...more negatives more parentheses.

Hours hour on; pacing by her room, I watch her monitors settle into their noise now crowded with neighboring noises as if the room is actually quiet.

But now God I have you in my mind.

Now God I'm reminded of why.

I give thanks even in these times. These troubles I give it to you, for I know not why but I know You. ~

pray.

my heart is in deep prayer. we continue to walk with our hands in the air... God we give this to You. we give this to You. we give it all up to You.

[oil burn]

speak speechless like you mean it.
say the words in the movements of the sound.
move in and out of the sound you make;
make me speechless with the breath you take.
living in and living out of the love we make;
each word carried in the act of.... taken by reenacting the words we spoke;
we hope, we love, we laugh... let in the faith that keeps this path.
say speechless acts of words; a rhythm of facts to learn -
i touch you and my heart burns. ~

[city lights]

me and the extremes;
comin down and so much closer than you think.
between the candle and the flame,
we put away the smoke and pick things up again.
take away the night and the sun;
heaven is here between the lines of love.~

[september tenth]

i wait, and as the wait through's through me now,
having in and having me now; take me now but,
but hold breath and hold faith and refrain ;
life waits in the capture of God.
we are captivated by the beauty that remains;
sways patient love; it comes, it stays.
we wait, for a better day and come softly now, for
i will be the last to know.~

[tredge]

the static prevailing clears in clouds,
smoke edged clarity of once upon;
a time will come, a now we’ll know-
for now we know...
this tredge through thick and patient days,
fog (so far) rolls in my heart.
I walk through time and I’m alive.
In you I feel alive.

[more like one]

i'd like to believe in something
no one could take away,
or tinge, or fade into other schemes of faith.
i am a believer, but i believe outside the box.
there is a God inside and out;
with us whether we are there or not;
not to take away but to contribute.
i'd like to believe that through something we become
more like one. more like Him. more like One. ~

[oblivion]

leaping over oblivion -
i could not subject myself to tyrrany.
so in my act of opposition,
i pirrouetted ’round the irony.
with a focus on my Orion…
landing my life violently -
in line with destiny.~

[arid eye]

nothing to wipe from your vacant apathic eyes;
no water to collect, just whimpers for affect
lack of tide to me, no rain no bow no cry;
no shore to line the isle, the ithaca, the eyes.
the stoic in your step stammers at my soul.
the depth of such amazing tears, no cry could ask for more.
carry on the mess of depthlessness and blame me for the chaos if you must.
watch the sand as it hits my shore...
those dreams were made of dust,
collecting in clumps behind closed doors.~

[relief]

shamed by my presence, alone,
i slept in the graces of God tonight
and welcomed the love as it lives in You.
impeccable, God, your love...
thank You; i cannot forgive Your time.
Lord God, You give me strength
and a beauty that is all mine. ~

Isaiah 54:10

"Though the mountains be shaken
and the hills be removed,
yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken
nor my covenant of peace be removed,"
says the LORD, who has compassion on you."

Isaiah 54:10

song of ascents

1 I will lift up my eyes to the hills—
From whence comes my help?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
Who made heaven and earth.

3 He will not allow your foot to be moved;
He who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, He who keeps Israel
Shall neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The LORD is your keeper;
The LORD is your shade at your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
Nor the moon by night.

7 The LORD shall preserve you from all evil;
He shall preserve your soul.
8 The LORD shall preserve your going out and your coming in
From this time forth, and even forevermore.

psalm 121:1-8

truth

"Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit." the genius, Ralph Waldo Emerson

[ribbons]

God seeks
ribbons through the heart
traces the depths for intentions
i pray to be forgiven
goodness and light crept
felt through fate
of chapters, words, lines, run-ons~

[virtues]

Your time;
should i have taken it so quickly?
but Your love;
the crown, the jewels -
forgive me God but i keep You in mind.~

[avenue]

havin' down the avenue -
down so far...
kept in the graces of face value;
pain so old with pain,
splinters down the spine of someone new.
time gets borrowed; borrowed time.
my home belongs to a heart not so oh so ziploc blue.~

down through time

I can’t configure in my mind the time of day.  In some memories its dark, in other memories its day.  All in the same memory, the same moment in time.
Then there was the night before.  The phone that didn’t stop ringing.  We all sat there as it rang, slow to respond.  As I finally realized no one else would answer it, I got up and sure enough, it stopped ringing.
Then the morning after.  Again, the phone rang and it didn’t stop ringing.  Slow to answer, my mom sleeping next to me, said,
Is that the phone?
Hours later (so it seemed; light to dark), my mom slipped on clothes and hurried down the hall to answer the endless ring of the phone.
There are no words to explain what happened next.  Just,
“What did you do to Mike!  What did you do to him!”
And the next thing I knew, my brother was dead.
Not one of us questioned how he died until we were told how he died.

[My Mike Poem]
your life hangs over like a lamp
from the path i’ve drifted from
when other lights of color
led my heart undone;
and as i rode through ether
caught in strobes of scattered void
your watt improved in measure
and i could not avoid.
though i thought the world was dark
without your strength to light it,
you are the light that is the strength
with the power to ignite it.
if i made a promise
you would have to keep it too;
we’ll take your strength to lengths
unknown to me and you,
and light the way your life insists
and follow it to your transfer.
we’ll mark the exes, connect the wires
and there will be an answer.~

liberation

When the self is alone, this is said to be the attainment of liberation
Restraint for the sake of freedom from remorse
freedom from remorse for the sake of joy
joy for the sake of rapture
rapture for the sake of tranquility
tranquility for the sake of pleasure
pleasure for the sake of concentration
concentration for the sake of knowledge and vision of things as they are
knowledge of things as they are for the sake of disenchantment
disenchantment for the sake of release
release for the sake of knowledge and vision of release
knowledge and vision of release for the sake of total unbinding without clinging – Vinaya Pitaka, book 5

[some perfect]

re you is the most truth you’ve ever known:
the plaid fading into the flannel it really is;
the coffee staining to the cup where it lives;
the eyes you see from pressing to read-
you struggle still for spotlight as you watch
the colors bleed.
this is what it means but i don’t think you’ll listen;
centerstage is no one there when you’ve prepared to glisten.
reality is paisley as it skillfully adheres to plaid~

nicu

…walks into a delicate trance;
slow motion witness,
mouthpiece cupped over mouth;
infant fights to live and life.
a cold mixture of death and depth
numbs the pace;
the prayers gets informal now;
oh God,
then the swiftness of grace;
i am a just a witness to this place. ~

[puffy]

slow and puffy-eyed sunrise;
i feel the dance of the day.
rise and shine but cloud and glow;
the temperature tepid;
wide-side alaskan eyes timid.
its only inside the colors appear vivid,
and the melody plays as soft as the sky
emits light
to my day, good morning~

breath

it occurred to me as it had not before (as summer morning wrestled with spring’s night, my mind delighted in the swirling tastes of meaning, existence, self-reliance and other misunderstandings),

the breath of life, beyond the first, testifies to will.

(like taking off a set of training wheels, pushing off on one’s own for the first time. like testing the waters, the strength in ones wings, we are given nothing more than a head start).

it appeals to me how the nerves expand and learn to thrive on curiousity and confidence. i adore how we cultivate, adding more to our spectrum by the life we find around us. in fact, diversity must be the greatest fertilizer.

it occurred to me, sensationally (the daring of fresh perspective), in one life we are both living and dying:

the first breath and the last, manifest in the hands of God
but the air between them hang in the balance of will.
Beside the occassional stirring of immortal fingers and the mysterious eyes of storms and of course, disease and physiology; largely, to accept life is optional.

[pedastal]

fallen from the
highest shelf,
i hear through the glass
your slams at me:
couldn’t i be less broken?
but watching you fall;
the pieces of my art,
(shards of it embed the heart).
tones of pause
and gut cries:
couldn’t i be less taken?~

leave your problems at the door

Prelude (explanation of the title page), The Scale:




I made 10 hours of time and a half today suffocating in a small hospital room with an innocent woman who thought she’d been rat-poisoned by a Wal-mart worker who followed her from Chicago because she’d won the lotto and the slithering Wal-mart lady was after her for the only four pennies she had left.
I took care of this woman but by “care”, I do not mean I bathed her. I did not help her with anything, really. I sat with her for 10 hours trying to keep her mind occupied on the cartoons; and off the clock or the window, or the thoughts in her head.
This is nothing new for me;
…Nothing new and not because I work there. I mean of course I’ve come across some crazy stuff in the eight years I’ve worked in healthcare: Thrown across rooms, bitten, kicked; punched; you name it.
That’s not what I’m really talking about.
In fact, being around those people takes me farther from my work and closer to the door where I left my proverbial baggage, next to the time clock.
And if we’re going to be brutal here, that old baggage is actually the thing which dragged me here to start.
At one time, yes, this was something new. Back then, (young and stupid) (audience nodding heads) I thought because I was so drawn to these people, I should help them somehow. I could devote my career to understanding them, their behavior; set up some nonprofit thing for other peoples’ old proverbial bags.
But now I know…
They don’t need some stupid .org, generously gifting 20 percent of proceeds to research (salaries of researchers). No psh! please… That makes them seem like monkeys or rats or something, minimizing them to their disease. I mean do we know these people? They aren’t monkeys. They aren’t that at all. They are actually far from foreign.
We, the “normal”, are just as screwed up and strange. It only so happens, I’m pretty good at speaking their language. or making their food,
12 deviled eggs
32 oz muddy black coffee
1/2 carton cheapest menthols
2 French bread pizzas
2 mg valium for a midnight snack
Let me tell you a little more.
I’ve been rather vague and when I am being vague on purpose,
I also tend to be long-winded. Forgive me.

Introduction, The Overhead Compartment:
My brother, who died when I was 12, suffered from manic depression, a life marked by season, pulled by weather… Inducing unmanageable moods.
Mike’s genes gave him this; brought down by his father and his father. Sadly, I knew very little about what ailed him, growing up. as a young girl, I don’t think I even knew he suffered.
When he died, I determined to know more. I wanted to understand this complicated mind. At the age of 13, I stumbled over a very enlightening book: Touched with Fire. It examined the dumbfounding link between madness and genius, citing case after case of remarkable people terrorized by voices and moods beyond their own power. While it was a bit too researchy and grownup for my pre-teen mind to wrap itself around, it also changed the way I saw the world and its aesthetics. Mike was a profound artist…could have easily been an architect, an engineer. He had these mystically detailed drawings…that just came up and out of the napkins he drew them on. his mind was magical, however troubled, as I came to understand.
And so are the minds of these suffering people…plagued with severe bouts of emotion, wretchedly damaging thoughts screaming at them and no one to turn off that damn noise. God, I’ve been there. Haven’t you? Not every day, I mean I don’t think rat poisoning is running through my veins but …I’m pretty sure I’ve seen some things that weren’t there a time or two.
Think about it
Well, it just blows me away…to live in this alt-reality. I wonder at what points in their lives they lucidly comprehend truth.
Or is it them who see perpetual truth, unwritten before us? Only explained in pictures, even those we don’t get. Truth so big that words are not heavy enough. colors they vividly impress us with, our knuckles pale for grasp. We fall short.
Chapter 2, Checked
My mom sat me down in the middle of a mall (where we’ve always shared life-altering conversations) one day and told me,
the person I thought was my (schmuck-for-a) dad actually wasn’t, and my real father didn’t know he had a daughter (which I later discovered was also not true, lol).
Before you jump up with an oh my god or what the hell…don’t worry, there was, in her well-laid defense, strong justification for the whitening out of facts.
Shortly after my parents split (never married), my dad turned out to be sort of a creep. One day she was at the mall in San Diego with toddler Mike. She tells me the whole time at the mall she felt followed…Looking around, feeling uneasy. At one point, she turned around and he’s right there, my dad, Joe.
But get this, he says to her;

Why did you follow me here?
(… uh… ….)
No … you followed ME here.
My mother locked the deadbolt after that day, even slept in her living room with a baseball bat.
Fast forward, 16 years later… Phoenix, the middle of another mall, my mother and I sat. In my hands, I cupped truth and irony (the irony, an entirely separate blog post lol). Months later, I set out to find this man, Joe. After all, he had the right to know about me.
After writing to several Pitkat’s (his last name) across the country, I finally found my father (relatives I’d apparently written to found him for me). He wrote me a letter. I knew it was coming, this letter I’d been waiting and hoping for…still checking the mailbox that day, it seemed so out of the blue. On yellow legal pad paper, Joe explained to me, he’d been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when attending the University of New York, years ago (majoring in English and Art History…what I also majored in at the time).
Creepy mall story, finally made sense.
The Duffle:
The genius and magic once glittering around mental illness, as I perceived it, quickly faded into a murky hopeless pit with vacant eyes as I endured a year or so dabbling in father-daughter relationship.
Joe marveled me, nonetheless, with his fascinating talent of turning this tragic, deep, dark disease into something…almost, beneficial. Indeed, his mania seemed to get him a lot of things (leather couches, drugs in the mail) and out of a lot of things (prison, state hospitals, guardianship). I could never figure out if he was just manipulative or if the poor man was being told by several scary voices in his head to be this manipulative. Either way, being schizo had its perks, at least for him. Innocent by the name of his disease yet guilty by the genius behind the scheme. Every untruth worked to protect him.
And so be it, shit. If you have to live with shadows and the phone talking to you all the time, my God, have a beer. Ya know? Collect political buttons, blow a lot of money. Whatever. Take your drugs, get your government check. I can’t say I wouldn't!
It’s survival. There are these schizophrenics who seem to be in this state of survival, often. Like pigeons, they rummage and never stay in one place for long. They know they need shelter and cigarettes, food on occasion and all of these they’ll find because they have to. They don’t have the capacity to live in a society based on earnings; career; monetary success; picket fences. Money would never be their friend; in fact it would kill a dying man. And drugs don’t really help either because their mind is the thing which is already high.
In its raw, frazzled state, genius abounds and so in its natural wild, this creature transforms canvas to art. puts its stamp on life that says: THIS IS WHAT YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND. And we the “normal”, stand before it in pencil skirts and legal pads, criticizing a level of genius we know nothing about. (Written off simply, insanity) In museums and studios across the globe, we buy framed complicated concepts and hang them on our walls so that we appear more genuine and sophisticated.
Meanwhile sleeps the loon in its empty sea of padding, overmedicated, tamed by tazer now after the weeklong episode which finally manifested into the painting which you spent 7000 dollars on. But they’ll get better. They have lots of doctors blending precise concoctions of antipsychotics for the individual, an art itself. Somehow, these ungrounded spirits settle into their illusions…Befriending, if possible, the spiders and snakes, shadows and voices. Befriending the enemy, still never sleeping sound without its haunt.
The Claim
I don’t want to help them anymore,
but when I’m around them, as they should stumble into my rocky ascent, I want to know how they can help me.
So I always start with the universal truth: Art.
Do you paint, I asked the woman?
Her eyes lit up. It seemed to bring her the most joy in those ten hours; sharing with me, the beauty she creates – the light she’s made for her darkness.
I don’t try to understand anymore. I don’t have to know how she’s helped and why she’s here with me and not the other way around. I watch the clock as she watches cartoons. I look for the door, eager to claim my proverbial baggage, get the hell out of here.
Nothing new.
Getting the hell out got me here, watching the clock, the door. There’s no rat poisoning coursing my veins but my father’s blood taught me something. Mike’s suffering, the book I read, the dizzying list of illed people I’ve met, from it all I’ve learned. Winged things live in the most vivid spectrum; they live inside the rainbows we chase and we’ll never get that close to the truth. We don’t fly.

[shored]

these deserted searches
for the self,
drift as is compliant
with the tide.
these reverted senses
of whats good,
recovered by a comber
of a storm & shore collide.~

[training camp]

this evening is my first day on the job. the training trial period, sort of like life:
preparing
for some heavenly duty of sorts; a military nurse for God. The idea is to go
and pick up the wounded angels of Armageddon running along the front lines, (some dimension
prepared just for this) pulling them aside, relieving them of their armor.
i’ll take out my bag of tricks: God’s morphine and His tourniquet. Now and until then, he tells me his potions
are potent and his pre-hospital care is powerful … so i start with this. its small but its a start
and its taken me long enough to conjure up some sense of purpose.


you first have to realize you are small
your big plans are skepticism. your small ones, volunteer work.
your life is a resume; practicing in the mirror for the long awaited interview
i could be wrong but i’m not
i could be wrong but what if i’m not


i tucked in my polo shirt which i never do but they never have uniforms in extra small or even small, because uniforms were not meant to be customized or to fit. i tried to fit the profile, hair tucked away in bun, slippery nose with falling glasses.
i tried to look pressed, ironed, worthy. i go to open the cottage door (cottage is their term for
anything not plastered with stucco and pink paint; not uniform) but its locked. Of course. I knock and a woman twice my age but shorter opens the door, baring the same tucked polo, thrift store khakis hemmed, sliding thick rimmed glasses with question-mark eyes.

You must be the new girl.

yes, yes of course
in time with the persona.


you then have to realize where you fit
because some people learn best in quiet light,
others in do or die situations.
and God lets us figure that out
through one painted window at a time


immediately, i felt awkward, like an intruder. sorry. this was a quiet place with
musky, milk glass lighting; antique static. the living room straightened with old people in rows
of withered skin and aimless eyes. they don’t say hi or welcome me because they don’t know
me but they know that much. Dusty roses and muted green damask tapestry stuffed tautly
forming against their bony backs, paints a false picture. Fake flowers abound, the TV
is just on and a waxy wipe-off calendar blares pathetic goals for each day:

exercise, Thursday the 1st.
bingo, Friday the 9th.

Today is staring off into space with applesauce and Respiradol dried to corners of cracked speechless lips and blank daydreams shuttering only by anything familiar and nothing here is… but that’s not written on the calendar.


the next ambition is discovering falsity,
because where one hopes many doubt.
this will take a lifetime to sift through
but with earnest virtue you will.
if you love this, than you will.


she leads me into the medication room and in my loud young limbs and pin-tucked mouth, i ask too quickly:

what do you want me to do.

let me put some of them to bed and then i’ll show you around.

so i sat there observing, tarrying with the moments passing. is this God’s idea or mine?
i’ve already judged the room and my place in it: too fake. too boxy; plastic antiques. replicas of
comfort. its a shade too quiet for my age and i’m a tad too quick for their hands.
i can’t take it anymore:


Ya know i can help; i don’t want to just sit here.

well that one needs to be changed; she goes at the very end of the hall behind you on the right.
she’s pretty easy but use a high pitched voice, she likes to be pampered.


what is she talking about? i’ve never even held a baby. i’m too proud to ask. i reach for the cold clammy creature, walk with her down the hall. young and old, new and used. its sort of purposeful like Mary and Elizabeth; we’re fulfilling something… perhaps me.

last you realize small hands do big things
your place is where God puts it
The truth is in the moment, what you skim from the top of it.
i could be wrong but i’m not.
and we’re all just really practicing, aren’t we?

i caught on to the quietness. they live in dreams of things that made sense once. so i pretend
with her. its the only thing i could think to do. are we in the 40′s maybe? two young damsels
glorifying our best features in a powder room, fixing a loose hem, a snagged stocking:

here let me help you with that.
i fumble with the washcloth; well this is awkward. what? God i don’t know.

wait Hon’, umm..you’ve got a punch stain your dress.

Oh thank you sweetheart, she says to me.

Can you believe she said thank you? and here i am sweating and shaking trying to work with this discomfort: the interplay of dignity and delirium.

it wasn’t bad for a first day; i broke my own mold and washed the feet of God for the first time.~

[naked art]

written about a man and his art...someone i shared a day with once, touched my heart deeply.

with fists he 
claims the courage 
in raw configued art.
naked in front 
of spews of 
bodies, pointing at 
her painting.
with words he 
calms her dignity,
trashed by the
 ignorant mass.
jaded in front
of spews of bodies,
she can not hide
her face. ~

[soul eyes]

a patient choreographer for my thoughts,
words stage nervously; pli’e,
turn quiet to leap away.
dark rows and vacant misleading spotlights,
mistep and darken my toes; miss my deliberate limbs,
turn the thoughts away.
poor oh quiet director,
hums a pleasant Soul Eyes;
nods the head
bows the hat
and shuts away the stage;
good night you quiet dancers,
sleep for better bravery and
a quiet beautiful tomorrow.~

[ode to analemma]

I could not turn from her;
I fixed myself on the line between my reality and her light.
It was comforting to be loved
And to watch Love bend with light;
Ascend with grace; give life its shape -
Beautiful Analemma.

[lost]

game trails to hidden treasure.
one hand to hold the sun,
for relief; then measure and give the news.
another move:
this is going to be the last time, she said,
but she couldn’t admit the truth-

and we kept going.~

peaking

when the pinnacle of your life was escaping something, you tend to live life as if you've just escaped and easily find yourself caught up in trying to feed the rush of actually escaping. the past nips at your heels, you can't think beyond just taking another step...one more step thats all you know, box out everything else, just focus on the step in front of you...one foot at a time. when you reach a finish line or a wall, you get bored. your body is still triggered, it jumps by anything familiar to a chase. escape. run. it runs, it flees. at the drop of a hat. and when you find something good, when the finish line is better than the start and whatever the fuck you were running from, you jump. you just jump in place. because your body still wants to move, your heart still races but you know you've ran as far as you needed to go and so just jump up and down, jump for joy!! this is it!! you've made it!! this is the escape. life is no longer a reaction to something negative. but the act of something positive. and that forward motion, the light of positive will be the cycle which continues.

[127th Drive]

127th drive]

our hope is not here.
in my heart, i watch the
colors fade.
i wash your hard day at work
i mend your button
and watch your color fade.
your cheek will turn,
not fade; it cooks,
burns, it bleeds
and soon too hot to touch.
i mend your buttons
and wash your troubled day.
i stir pots for five
or six, then seven til close
to morning, ready for your
comfort, i prepare my best
peace with patience and
prepare for the fire which
will come cause you are home now.
your cheek swells as you
trance through the walls,
around the edges, lucid your
pace, the arms begin their
swing your skin anxious
it builds upon its layer of
cooking coals, a blaze, you
raise a fearful fist oh,
but not so quick -
just enough to empty any
hope i had for the day
i prepared with peace.
you press your strength
against my weak
limbed kindness;
my deep rooted patience
and brand me with your long hard day.
my one day off
from my days i wash the old people
but i wash you.
i wash your plate
your bowl, your socks, your boots,
your hate, your potatoes
and your meat.
i wash as i watch my color fade.
i sew and cook,
clean and hook
on to any hope i can muster
for the coming day.~

[schatz]

i have no mind
for the thickness in the gas,
spraying onto a child’s skin -
but i have the thought
that your alternative to the conflict
counts not for sin.
and if it did, i know
my God has forgiven
you, before the guards
who brought you there,
or the man who took your bribe.
in some brown and dingy
image, i piece up
the war you lived:
the hands that held you down;
the tattoo above his tongue;
and the marks of beasts he obeyed.
i try to uncloud what earthly will he had
to make you some sort of slave,
but these things are not known to me.
i don’t have the focus
for the picture, sitting in your mind:
it must come before most thoughts
and boil under others.
it must denature joy
and any hope you build for forgetting all of that.
and i guess for this life,
(a child looking both ways;
both ways are bombs)
i hope the chaos paused
somewhere along the way;
though only to return, once you began to think it wouldn’t.
if you’ve had to earn the quiet beyond your bones,
(for having nothing to believe in)
so be it;
but now its yours! this calm from Earth’s whole storm!
i hope Heaven makes a room for you thats all yours!
even if its just to polish floors,
rest assured, there’ll be no war:
no wooden shoes or embedded shrapnel to your limbs.
i’m sorry you did not have more happiness
but what calms you now will be forever,
so says our God who art in Heaven,
there, i pray you’ve found your way. ~
this was for my grandma who passed away in Dec. 04. She was an orphan in Nurnberg during WWII and as a young girl, offered her body to one of the guards to avoid the gas chambers. she lived a very promiscuous life with never much guidance and had it not been for my grandpa (an american soldier), I can only imagine her fate.

[same as one]

says words that never meant
God could be a pawn
but GOD would be the ____
we'd live upon
for where there is nothing, HE's there
like the nameless he is famous for a name we'll never know
and so its not to convince someone of something
but that through that something we could be someone as one; same as one.~

[jazz]

swing in, to the languid Monday night affair:
a romance between pandero and bass,
Rhythm and reason.
unexpected Time;
not to be forgotten but be listened.
the sense of a season,
steps in, from behind the Tap Root door:
Voice approaches microphone,
with closed eyes; and an understanding of what for…~

[irony & wine]

Don’t act like you don’t know me.
I eye you,
knowing;
and for what you’ve done you owe me
to just be fucking normal for once.


Don’t stare at me like that,
like you’re so San Francisco.
I know where you’ve been,
and there’s no gas lamps or disco
3 miles into shoveling snow -


There’s no… yah there was no.
Yah, you know,
about pulling back the throttle -
the last drop coursing down the bottle -
about the time the lights went out;
the doors shut, closed.
we discovered new outs in our fucked up pose.
dreaming just to live, dying just to love, or know how.
I’m learning but you’re still something I could live without.


like you now;
same as before,
just a longer neck, a sexier sway.
you found a way to sell what you couldn’t give away.
because the poor know enough about being needy;
but the rich know too much about being greedy
and so you stain the weakness in the glass
of the promises they make,
counting every crack as you watch their futures break -
promises they never should’ve made.


So I eye
the casual approach in your disguise.
I’ll not be fooled by your social glue,
or give in to what held my glass for you.
you dilute the pain,
but you’re just a sleepless night.
you don’t comfort me…
unless I’ve already given up the fight.
toast to the spirit of a seasonal night
the sparkle in the smile of an otherwise

practical light. ~

lamp for the path

shine on as flashlight in my tunnel, for this vision
align lights in this room just so
no flicker too irradic, no clouds to overcome its glow
the full moon this week tightened the screws in my timing; oiled its automation that i might understand,
how things must come to be
i’d be a fool to turn an eye, i know i would to the eccentricity with which the stars, however pale in my alaskan sky, ding the majestic chords to my life, soft mallots making melody. i’d be ignorant to deny the force of gravity…the tide, the moon and whatever other bigger things face me to this direction…
light is on me now; spot
solo
here
now
small acts build into the bigger thing
and every so often what seems small explodes into a transformation of the mind, magnitude off the charts…unknown lengths of satisfaction.
tragedy, understanding, peace and then joy.
~~~
once the beer room, twice the junk room…it had been the place to hide things which had no home. forming a long convoluted twist of things to do later on:
brew beer
boil jelly
knit a hat
have people over;
there was not even room to step.
an inch for the eye, the turned knob of this room revealed abandoned life. virtually, fulfillment tossed into a monopoly of the untouched.
but beneath all the suppression, vision had not yet escaped me. i even knew back in february what i wanted of that cubicle space. though smaller than the master bedroom, i had painted it a pleasant wasabi hue over the winter and it did not meet the heat of the rising sun. it had potential; it spoke to me and i couldn’t wait to speak back. anymore,
i am a sorter, jason is a hoarder and so into piles went our things. objects idenitified by their use, their color, their size…
under every nook and cranny, eagerly, i stole the crowding creatures and reestablished them into labeled sections of my living room, attaching each to a like-minded category. when all had been named and tagged, only dog hair and pennies remained. and even those, then were vacuumed up by my bagless hoover.
piece by piece, i arranged into this vacant space, filling in with furniture. placing with purpose, confident its alignment be necessary to the whole room. the bed, the bedside tables, the poppy art painting from Horchow, specific pictures, accenting pillows, linens. the room was complete in a matter of hours. swiftly, without concern or confusion….the room simply became what it should be.
~~~
the new beer room, now,
had a bit more challenge to is construction. not merely could it be a beer room, any longer…considering the junk that had eventually piled into the prior establshment. i knew i had to expand this idea of a dedicated room, and dedicate it to all our hobbies, our projects. make them easily accessible, eager, inviting.
and so it was done…over a few days, in an open-pantry style, our to-do list unmangled into an effective space with which to live them out. soon, we will have people over, invite them into our favorite things. our substance. our hearts now will be tangible to our friends, shared with our closest.
over those long, laborous days, though,
seeing this project through
much more was done for my heart than had been done in years. though i have found clarity and understanding in many things, these last couple days brought to me, beyond my own will or wisdom, the reclamation of my heart in its most unabused, unsubjected state.
you see, the upturning of boxes, invited me to explore these dust-laden interests, long-buried under heaps of wasted medium, purpose, expression unexpressed..muted.
as i uncovered my yarns, my woodburning tools, my paint, my fabric, my color…
waves of imagination ebbed and frothed over my thoughts.
and certainly,
this may seem the natural sequence that any ordinary person should follow when opening something left unopened for a good length of time. its true…i followed this story up to the catharsis of the end…i walked away from this experience renewed
but with something more, a double ending. and times that, as well:
for one thing, i recognized a pattern. instantly, it was, this discovery of rhythm, the discard of self so that what walks about in its given days, hours and nights, be void of any sense of soul, loving…mercy, compassion…the things which allow a person to thrive rather than go through the motions, unoiled hinges, chaotic behavior, misunderstood frustration. distance, static.
without meeting the needs of one’s heart, it can not grow. perspective does not cultivate if you can’t even catch the thoughts spinning through one’s head
or slow them down or hear them.
one box, in particular…long forgotten, pushed aside: an old army chest which belonged to my grandpa during the second world war. (there were two of them actually). he cared for these so much, he once had them dipped in oil before transport by ship over the atlantic. now, these oil-dipped crates, aged and worn, gave no notice of their former concern but the contents still maintained immeasurable value.
the innards of these boxes, locked away, i had misplaced the keys and mostly, wasn’t sure how much i really wanted them open.
but this day, i found the key and as the boxes could be used for other things, i knew it needed to be done. purposeful in my pursuit, there was not one star or one cloud hung in my sky which did not mean to be there.
on this full, unshadowed moonlit night, i lifted the lids of these crates,
filled, i thought, only with mystery, pieces of a puzzle which has never added to much. fragments of a death, a sullen 23rd of june some years ago: pictures, stains, intentions, handwriting analysis, ballistics, motive, means, opportunity.
i knew all this remained in the box, as it has for months and years.
but as i took each one by hand and lifted the objects from their casket, ironically i also came to discover hope. yes, an illuminated coffin also a discarded hope chest. a tunnel with one teardrop of light, enough of it to guide a focused heart. i discovered substance, which i only knew to be lost.
a piece of me, i could no longer smell. a piece of me, i could no longer feel, taste.
the lifted objects gave way to Mike’s sketches, his art displayed in the museum, pictures, souvenirs of something good, something quenching for thirst in me, dryer than a desert this deep yurning to sense him near, to sense me near.
and here it was, in my hands, videos from my childhood. pictures i thought been trashed. gnomes which he collected. yearbooks, sketches, awards…
i spoke out loud in this rotation of moment, philosophy leaning into tomorrow, night reflecting a glimmer of day,
“i will not bury you this way. you will not be buried, not your soul. your body has been buried, yes, but i will not bury your soul.”
and then i turned to me,
looking around at my crafts which had been heaped, buried alive under dirt and discard,
“i will not bury you this way….you are meant to live, i will not bury your soul, you are not dead.”
like a ritual, i took in hand the things which made my life a mystery and replaced them with care into one of the army chests (the other blending into the abstract idea of home). when all the mystery had been replaced, i looked at this and said,
“all this is suffering,”
my brother Alex taught me this, he is a buddhist man. what i said to this box, had not been a plan in me. i had no agenda, but it came from my soul. somewhere inside of me, i needed to let this go.
i needed to tangibly acknowledge the parts of my past which are suffering.
and in the same instance, glorify all that which even once brought me joy.
you can not, please never
bury that which brings you joy.
life is not worth living without it.
like dawn rising from a dream, like the roosters singing hallelujah to another morning come…i entered into a new day that night,
the lamp for my path, reignited, fueled. i am able to drive on, sinking into my motions, the soul sets itself at ease in these bones,
the fuzzy wake from meditation, i completed a long thoughtful breath and swiftly shifted gear.