10-11-11

I felt the heat of we light a coal,

so I sunk in.

And after my kiss had paid the toll,

I had to win

your heart, your soul

and let mine begin

to fill the fresh hole

where yours had been.

Lingering Still

Your name gives me something to look at when it’s wistfully written across an otherwise barren piece of paper.  I don’t even know what time it is and what’s more is I don’t care because time and you have this in common:  I don’t understand how you can move so quickly forward and then at once,  move nowhere at all.  But then again, what do you and time owe to me?  Not much besides the feeling of something gone too soon.  And like time, I can’t  ignore your presence or your existence, for that matter. 

Even still, I long to crook my finger under and around your chin…tell you sweet things over and over again, and for you to hold my face in your thoughtful hands. 

For something we never communicated to each other to still have the ability to survive all this time on lingering smiles and the absence of touch must mean something.  And that something is for you and for me.  And frankly, it’s not going to dissipate at the mercy and power of your careless words.  You misspoke and misstepped when you chose to ignore the reality of our shared daydream.  You took all the rights about this and somehow created and upsetting wrong. 

It’s not over.  This isn’t your call to make.

The Way

The way your face paints a smile on mine

The way our hands touched twice, then intertwined

My soft cheek brushed against your strong neck.

 

In my defense

I never saw you fully

until today.

The moon dripped its light on the night

That I saw you – more than a man

And I had the foresight to keep right

On the path – hand in hand

The grit beneath our feet didn’t stop me

From baring my toes, my heart, my soul

Oh if love is in the air then I swear

I’ll take a breath

Hold it in my chest

And I’ll have you forever…

 

The space between your smile & my mouth

Cannot be measured any less than the pleasure

That I receive, I do believe, with you close to me

Believe it or not – Ready or not

Here we go

Forget me not, tie a knot

So you’ll remember when

Reflection #7

And yes, thoughts are floating around in my head. Like why can some things be so easy for others and just utterly incomprehensible for me? I think too much, I feel too much and I think waayy too much about what I’m thinking and feeling. I wish this on no one,  but I wish I knew someone with a similar outlook or frame of mind.  I want the good advice that won’t make me more angry or jealous of their intellect.  I want that knowing smile, the one that encourages the ego and discourages external influence all in the same gesture.  I need my ego. I feel like I haven’t enough courage with my Id and SuperEgo to muster any sort of worth.  My ego needs its nutrients, the shallow nights filled with gluttony and binges on the self-image.  Recently I’ve had a taste of this and I feel the urge to keep it in my hand.  And with every puff of mindbending complexes, I see a new me, the same stage but a new light system.  Later in life I will hold fast to the securities of institution; for now, I will live each moment as the best and expand my mind both intellectually and philosophically.

Peace.

“A Really Good Thing” is a Terrible Lie

It’s times like these where I have to repeat to myself “It will end. It will end. It has to end soon.”  The way that I can live with people for so long, people who supposedly know me, vouch for me and are patient with me is a lie.  It’s all  just a pretty lie.

These are the people that taught me to always do the “right thing”- to always help out any way you can- and when I try to do this, somehow my view of the “right thing” is skewed and a mistake.  This boils down to me being a bad judge of character, a bad judge of my abilities and completely ignorant of my boundaries and those around me.

But this all leads me to wonder: When will I do something, just one thing, that will be “good”?  Something that both people involved and those close to me who hear about it will ease back into their chairs and look to the side and say, “That was a really good thing you did there. A really good thing.”?

Misconstrued & Underappreciated, Party of One

I don’t understand. Many times I have felt confused but understood why I was confused. Now, I’m just plain con-fucking-fused and bewildered of my parents.

It’s times like these where I wonder if it really mattered if I refrained from getting my nose pierced.

I did a lot of research and spent a lot of time figuring out how it would work with all of us renting a house.

My parents didn’t see me doing this and so they assume it never happened. They assume I’m a complete idiot—I don’t realize how my actions affect others and that I only think about myself and my needs.

I refuse to believe this.

I refuse to adhere to their ridiculous expectations of me. I am NOT an irresponsible person, I am NOT looking for handouts and I especially do not like being insulted by said assumptions.

I have a mind of my own and I do care what others think of me—especially what my parents think about me.

I guess I’ll always be the screw-up, the one who didn’t think before she leapt and the little naive girl who leaves everyone else out of the dark and forced to pay the tab.

Should I cry about this? Probably not. Will I cry about this? Probably so.

Either way, things aren’t gonna change.

I’m out of luck but everyone else is perfection, or at least accepted for who they really are.

A Winter’s Wind

Leaves are turning—skipping stones across the pond face down to the earth.

A singing robin improvises soul.

Tweets from the trees since the first breath after birth.

How hollow are the winds that blow those trees?

And how high do they rest on top of those trees?

Does that bird know the words to it’s petty song?

Will you fear the helplessness of a frozen pond?

Not Your Typical Spring Break…

I feel rushed.

I shouldn’t–I have no one pressuring me to write.  But still, I feel this aching need to write about the past week in my life: all the little intricacies that I love.  I’d feel unimpressive and like I was missing my chance if I obstained from writing any longer.  Whether the following is ‘good writing’, ‘so-so’, or ‘forgettable’ – it’s necessary.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————-

What I have learned about life in the past week is that you can plan a day the sunset before and misstep at the burst of dawn.  Last Friday night, I was broke.  I was frantically trying to scrounge around to pay my bus fare to go home for Spring Break.  I decided the best way to do this was to exchange my Euros.  After plotting my trek to an exchange place in MoA, I started walking towards the bus stop.  My brother was supposed to pick me up in Duluth the following day and bring me home.  I could tell he was excited because he kept texting me to affirm (yet again) the pickup time and place.

For a fleeting instant, I said “You could just come pick me up tonight, if you have nothing else to do.”  I didn’t really think my parents would let it happen (he’s seventeen and hasn’t logged many highway hours) so I continued on my way to MoA.  Ten  minutes away from my destination, I get a call from him saying he’ll be in the cities at 7 and our older sister was coming along for the ride.  This made me smile so much because now I didn’t have to worry about a bus fare or live through another lonely night in my apartment.  I decided to run in and exchange my Euros anyway.  When I got to the little booth, I double checked they exchanged Euros and was declined.  Turns out the internet isn’t THAT great of a source.  I smiled again, anyway.  Funny how news travels in just the knick of time.

Let’s fast forward a few days to get to the thicker things.

Family.

I’ve been sucking it up at school lately and have been very aware of it.  I’ve realized it’s not for me, at least not at this time, but I wasn’t sure how to tell my parents without catching a soul-threatening scolding.  Not wanting to lie or keep things to myself anymore, I told them the entire truth–ugly and otherwise.  Looking back, I realize they understood right away, perhaps sooner than I had myself: college isn’t for everyone and there’s a strengthening maturity that comes with realizing you’re the one on the outside of where you should be.  However, that night-that conversation- all of this was encoded in tears, shrill voices and uncomfortably correct assumptions.  So I called my best friend.

Friends.

All I texted her was “I need you to come pick me up at my house now.” She was there in 8 minutes, no questions.

Through a mess of crocodile tears and pure freakingoutedness, she found my sanity.  I remember feeling like my head was a rushing fire and her words, her voice, was the damp breeze that kept things under control and in perspective.  She wasn’t pushing words against my parents like a ditzy cheerleader that doesn’t realize her team could not always win, who may be not always be the best team to support.  Her words were direct and laced with a breath of practicality and confidence.

Skip ahead to the next two days and you’ll find me walking along a woodsy path filled with frozen, crunched snow.  My companion: another friend and her old camera.  We had a sort of parallel conversation: we were both running towards a decision that would stretch us with uncertainty.  I was contemplating my purpose in college, in careers and life while she, concerning her own life, was searching for reasons to explain her trials and questioning her guts to face them or the worth of her hands.  In the midst of our babbles, we created a foundation.

That Wednesday afternoon, on a little known trail in the middle of some woods, two young women made a pact which can mainly be summed up as

We’re going to follow our dreams and not be afraid to scrape our knees, pull out our hair or humiliate ourselves in the name of opportunity. Our lives are our own and we’re going to live them how we damn well please: we might have fears but none that can overcome us.  The books of our lives will never get dusty nor misplaced so long as we stick to our guts and give our hearts to our dreams.

After we shook hands, pinky-sweared & bit on it, halked a loogie and took a picture to commemorate our promise to ourselves and each other, we decided we had walked far enough and turned back to our lives, our issues and our fears.

Myself.

To say I had done a lot of thinking over break would be an understatement but to say that I hold all the answers I need would be a lie.

At any given time I felt like I was saying too much or had to catch one more opinion from someone.  Either way, I was aware I was in a mess and the only way out included shedding my skin and growing a new one.

Family.

At the end of the first “conversation”, we had agreed to finish discussing later in the week.  Holding true to my word and my parents to theirs, we finished “the talk” much more diplomatically and empathetically than initiated.  I left my hometown with a new direction, a new support team and a scarily new life plan.  College may be in the rearview mirror, but the “real world” is flirting with my headlights.

Freckled

I have a freckle on the back on my hand.  It’s perfectly centered as if on a grid between my thumb and forefinger.  It’s on my right hand, the one I use to write, point, raise and throw.  This is the freckle that I see everyday, that everyone can see.  I love this freckle because it’s a lonely constant in my variably-based life.  I can count on it being there when I wake up, a blaring dot of reassurance that I’m still ‘me’.

I Need A Spot.

I wish I had a spot.  A safe spot that I could claim as my own and shut out the distractions and obligations that could honestly wait.

In this place I would have a desk paired with a comfy chair suitable to lengthy writing sessions.  To my right would be my piano with my notebook and pencil stacked casually atop my wooden confidant.  The light pouring in through my window would reflect in my waterglass that’s perched next to my empty pages.  In my little cove I would be able to connect to my insides and reflect what I see outside my walls.

Music would create itself and use me as its translator.  Words, coming from someplace indescribable, would add a layer of guidance to my newfound melodies.  I long to visit my piano and fiddle with the keys or play one of my memorized songs.

Maybe I’ll find this spot.  Maybe I’ll get to be at the mercy of my music once again. Hopefully soon, hopefully soon.

Susie Sells Shells Down By the Seashore. Maybe I’ll buy one of hers…

I feel like my protective shell, the one in which I feel most comfortable, is cracking and soon will shatter.  This would reveal the worst thing an introspective soul could imagine: themselves, wholly and transparently.  Keeping up the front, holding the nightmares at bay and protecting my insides from the outside is the purpose of this shell.

With it, I have a crutch.  Without it, I can’t walk.

I really hope this storm passes soon and spares my shell.

The Trouble with Being A Prince

You stand tall among your friends.

You’ve learned it all: how to speak and be a gentleman.

That mask you wear, well, it goes good with your hair,

but style and smarts aren’t why you came over here.

Now what do you wanna tell me?

 

You can’t sleep ’cause you can’t eat

’cause you can’t be honest with yourself.

I know it’s hard to say you’re hurt

and feeling guilty just can’t help.

 

But you play it off like you were only flirting

with the idea that a prince could ever not want his crown -

that what you feel inside isn’t really worthy

of sympathy or even talking about.

 

Well, everybody gets confused.

And the answers, I swear, are somewhere

inside of you.

 

That kingdom called Potential people throw at you

has got you feeling like there’s something you ought to do;

something big, a place of command,

but you just want to be a man

who knows the meaning of his own name.

 

You can’t sleep ’cause you can’t eat

’cause you can’t be honest with yourself.

I know it’s hard to say you’re hurt

and feeling guilty just can’t help.

 

But you play it off like you were only flirting

with the idea that a prince could ever not want his crown -

that what you feel inside isn’t really worthy

of sympathy or even talking about.

 

But I’m not gonna let you down.

You should know by now that for sure I’ll stick around

because I care to see you safe and sound

and I know that smile is covering a frown.

 

I know you’re lost and that you feel

like you should have it all worked out.

This misdirection is quite affecting

how you feel inside and out.

 

But I don’t want to feel like I’ve been cheated

from getting to know you all the way around.

You’re my friend and I’ll love you, no questions needed.

What you say I will believe and I’ll wanna help you out.

 

So tell me what’s been on your mind.

I promise you, I’ve got the time

and even if I didn’t, I would stay

to listen to your troubles and

help them go away.

 

We’ll make it go away.

Voices

I can hear the upset and hushed voices from the other room.  My ears are burning as one voice tries to protect the respect of my choice while another depletes my name of any worth. Do they know I can hear them?  Surely, they must realize voices, even those slicked with gossip, travel down hallways and into the ears of the crazy, idiotic or pathetic.

Surely, they must know.

And tomorrow– what will happen tomorrow? Will I reveal my knowledge of the secret slanders?  Or will I keep it under my breath, inside my core– just outside any shred of light, in order to forget?  To bury the humiliation out of my mind and possibly out of ever existing?

Sitting Pretty in Your Dreams

I’m just going to pretend that what I say next will be perfectly expressed in such a cliche: I love my life.  I’m so thankful for it and I’m honestly stuck in “happy disbelief” at how it all turned around so quickly.  A year ago today I was physically very sick and spiritually challenged.  I questioned my strength and courage to rise above the puddle I surrendered to.  To look back to that time is strange because I feel so different, almost as if that was a character I had played in a show once.  I knew her well, in and out, but she was a separate entity from me.

So as I sit in the reality of what I dreamed a year ago, I wish the same for you.  I hope you challenge yourself to see what you can do.  To find out what it feels like to have, accomplish, try what’s been rolling around in your mind.  Make a small improvement today and strive for a better one tomorrow– and acknowledge even the minor triumphs because every stroke, every pace and every inch gained, is one closer to where you want to be.

The Un-Friending Process

When the staleness of a past argument is left in your mouth, nothing tastes right.  Nothing feels right either.  Things you once used to enjoy are laced with a frown, pulling at your smiles.  Words spoken or unspoken keep you from progressing anywhere back to “normal” or forward.  Why can’t a friendship be stronger than honesty?  Why must two people reevaluate their friendship if a disagreement arises?  I suppose, though, in the end, it’s the friendships that are willing to accept the honesty that become stronger.  Those relationships are stronger than honesty and willing to put aside differences instead of foregoing the friendship.

Even with an understanding why a friendship breaks or disintegrates, a mourning of sorts still follows while the pieces take themselves apart again. “Goodbyes” are barely spoken and “hello” muttered even less.

Friend, even if these words never reach you, please let the universe know I spoke with honesty because of our friendship.  If not for our connection, I would not have been provoked to be genuinely honest.  The irony is the hardest to swallow since the very words I spoke to protect you are the same words that led our paths to un-cross.

Dreams for Dreams

I still have many hours I have to get through before I can rest my head on my own pillow and empty whatever clutter is roaming around up there.  But still I envision it happening in my daydreams.  And still I’m hopeful my daydreams will override reality, if only for a nap’s time.  In this moment, I’ve realized that this daydream could be a recurring nightmare for as long as I keep my lifestyle just so.

But I will keep it so until I’m completely satisfied or fed up with the amount of time traded with my dreaming bed and spent out in the world, exploring, laughing, learning and finding new things to dream, explore, laugh and learn.

The Spinning Plate Challenge I Call Life

I need to settle down. I have to keep myself in line and realistic. I’m not sure where this aching need to do everything at once originated but I sure as hell could stand to ache a bit less these days. What is it that makes me utterly patient with others, forgiving and understanding of flaws or setbacks they may face but when turned to myself I’m reckless with that patience and judgmental?

For me a goal-no, a challenge- permeates its way into my mind and after recognizing a way I could try to conquer it, I immediately decide it has to happen or else. The fuel for this haphazard road trip to success derives from my even more maddening thought process: I’ve thought of a possibility and have only a handful of time to produce a reality from thoughtful daydreams.

It’s always a race against time but I keep tripping myself up by increasing the work load while simultaneously (and rather subconsciously) reeling the deadline in closer and closer and closer. Spinning ceramic plates higher than I’ll ever get used to but slower than I’d ever admit to myself while constantly scolding myself that I should be faster, better and yeah, stronger. Has what I always feared about myself snuck up from the back of my head only to emulate a taunting carrot dangling from a stick in front of me? Yes. I’ll never feel the sense of satisfaction, true, genuine satisfaction. I’ll always want a bit more to feed my greed of feeling the best of myself, the champion of my masochistic flight path to a better time, better place, a better Me. And with this I risk understanding the value of what I do have, do trust, do love.

So maybe I need a buddy? (The Buddy System and the vast areas of life it applies to will always amaze me. Thus I will always vouch to use it for nothing more than to learn from it repeatedly and refreshingly.) Someone that I feel has the capacity to fully understand the trials I force myself to face and has the ability and devotion to help me be successful in my own eyes. I want to make very clear that I am aware I have been blessed with true and genuine friends (my parents included) who have “been there” for me and continue to do so all while shaping their own lives and futures. Except my parents treat me as an adult and trust that I make good decisions on my own and that I *shock* know what I’m doing. Maybe this is because I’ve gotten really good at muffling the sound of crashing ceramic? And my peers appear to share the same sense of support, but ultimately I feel like they have so much on their Plates of Potential that my set of questions are highly unrelatable. Plus I fear they think I’m hardly ever in a state of confusion, my frequent dwelling place.

So until fate catches up with me and a once beautifully spinning plate falls on my face, I will fear that I lack. After a broom washes away from my soul the dust of everyday life, I will lack the fear.

My Life in Scratch Paper

Lately I’ve been writing more lists than usual except the content is greater than the amount of characters used.  In some way I’ve made it possible to acutely detail my necessities at any given moment and for any other given moment all squished on a Post-It.  It’s strange but I’ve revealed more of myself on pieces of scratch paper than on pages of my journal.  When it’s laid out for me, to remind, to reflect, to keep, I can remember that every moment counts and carries into the next.  Sometimes I feel like it’s all going either way too fast or                     my  relationships     (like my days)                               are disconnected                                                           from one another

and eventually

may not be a relationship

at all.

Can I ignore the aches in my smile when I wish it was for someone I saw yesterday? To surround myself with friends and family is not only a thing I would like to do, it’s becoming a ‘need-to’ thing.  This isn’t me, not me at the core, at least.  I’m pretty decent with floating around so long as I have some anchor time here and there.  For the past few months I’ve only put my ship at shore for a couple nights in a row at most.  This gypsy fling is great and all but when I crave time to be around people who center me, I know something’s up.

To speak like a proper 20something, this shit ain’t cool.

So since I barely have time to diagnose my emotions, a list will have to do to remind, to reflect and to keep me aware that my life isn’t made up of random bits  sprawled across the continental United States– that I am a part of a continuation of flecks and promises of goodness, messiness, beautifulness and love.

Heart First. Always put your Heart first…

For myself, I am not.

I can’t seem to find a simple remedy to hold the gaze in the mirror without choking on my vomitlike pride. That gaze that judges and seethes once it realizes who I am. That I am the one that messed up, the one that chose wrong over right. I kept my head in the lead when my heart was the one that was in desperate need to put its foot first over the line.

I listened with my ears to those who didn’ t use their eyes. And again, those who were led by their head as well.

Foolish, I should have kept my course and felt deserving of the happiness along the way.

Sad, I lost out on what I sought to gain– what I so FIERCELY sought to gain.

And what am I, now, to take another’s heart?

The same heart I fed to the wolves. (No pun intended.)

The same heart I would bleed to love, to hold, to protect, to call Mine.

The same heart that would bleed to love, to hold, to protect and to call my Heart his.

 

 

One Afternoon

A pursed set of lips caressing skin

The underwater feeling, the suffocation and the sweat

Are too much to hold all at once

A glance to acknowledge an entrance

Stiffened poise but spineless under passion

Giving in to pouts

Stained with crimson, glossed with lust

I want to write your name a thousand times

Slowly tracing the letters on your back

With my fingertips emphasizing curves

The Confrontation

You brought about an honest stare

when I asked what you were feeling.

And you kept me under a playful glare

to make your words much more appealing.

 

A solemn gaze before the chilly breath

you drug in to set the mood.

I took a fearsome look into your eyes

and saw a spirit so lewd.

 

The words were clear but they’re meaning not,

a fuzzy tenderness was missing.

And all the while that I had fought

I never knew that you were hissing

 

into my ear and through my thoughts.

I kept you by my side.

I never knew that I was caught -

still planning where to hide.

New Cracks & Old Sand

I sat down today

wondering if this was the right way

So here’s a fresh page

with blank stares

and foreign cares

 

To everything I’ve tried and lost

for every time I knew my cost

And with all my choked courage

Here I stand

with a mouthful of sand

Running out of the cracks of my lips

The ones you used to touch and kiss

Dream Girl

The door is locked – bolted & cold

His life was here from the stories he’d told.

Against his face trembled a tear

slipping loosely but making clear

what he’d already known – what he’d already feared.

 

Since everyday held the chance of a miracle,

he’d pray the day would soon be spiritual.

Her absent smile filled his head.

His absent luck making him dread

the day she chose her heart instead.

 

Not to fake – not to break

& not to make the same mistake.

He’d held her once, she must have felt

his honest hands & the heart she’d melt.

 

But she was only just a dream…

Napkin Holder

Save the blizzard near my window,

I’m fine here without you.

Keeping the cartoon on the napkin

that for me you sweetly drew.

 

I framed it

in my mind.

 

Are you flattered by my attention to the detail of your neck?

Are you lost in the confusion of starting off where you left?

 

I hope so.

 

Since the footsteps that you followed

led you clear across the state,

furthest from my home,

farther from our fate.

 

I have loved you more.