Ship/Wrecked

For now,
I have a reprieve
from the sea sickness caused
by my own feelings -
they are the waves
crashing against the sides
of my matchstick vessel,
tossing me about on the blue-grey expanse.
I am keeping my eyes on the horizon
and keeping you at arm's length.
I am nothing to you,
I am nothing to you,
I am nothing to you...
This, I repeat with each list of the hull -
I am nothing to you,
to the starboard,
I am nothing to you,
to port side...
Eyes locked on the line
where the ocean meets the sky.
I pace my breathing,
keeping myself steady,
keeping my heart
carefully tucked away,
out of reach of your charm.
The only way
to avoid disappointment
is to want nothing from you.
And give as little as possible.
Eyes on the horizon.
Steady breathing.

Addendum -

Perhaps a better mantra would be
You are nothing to me.
Let's give that one a shot.

Shifting Sands

Keeping you
at arm's length
is the greatest feat of strength
I've yet achieved.
My shoulders shake,
my skin weeps
with exertion.
My mind is a dark
and shrunken place -
I've closed all the doors
that lead to you,
leaving me
nowhere
to point my thoughts.

Keeping My Distance

You are poison
disguised as confection.
I must expel you
from all the places
I'd allowed you to saturate.
Traces of you linger,
haunting me
with reminders of the joy
you used to engender.
Now, your forced overtures
spark a wince of pain,
and I recoil from your falsity.

Major Flashback

94 was a rough year for me
but also a good one -
one man broke my heart
another my hymen.

In 94 I was obsessed with kiwis.
It would be another decade before I became obsessed with a Kiwi.

Spot On

Rain
drops down -
polka dots on my polka dots.

Licking Old Wounds

So this is a tough one...

I was looking through old emails and stumbled across this submission I made to Lick magazine (a brilliant little undertaking by a talented blogger in my circle, back in the glory days).

The premise was that you could send in anything you wanted, anonymously - contributions were limited to women, I think.

This confession breaks my heart for the girl I was then, although it only scratches the surface of the pain I lived with. I remember writing it and feeling wary of discovery. I worded it carefully so that I wouldn't hurt his feelings if he happened to read it. But distance and wisdom allow me to see that this is another way in which I just didn't stand up for myself and speak my No's loudly enough.


Date: Fri, 8 Apr 2005 15:01:49 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Lick Magazine

Sometimes when we're making love, I hate you. I want to push you off, I want to cry. What can feel so incredible when I want it, feels like torture when I don't.

And you don't listen to me. I have told you what not to do. A thousand times, at least. But you still do those things because YOU like them. It makes me feel like a blow up doll, a life-sized sex toy, instead of the wife you say you love. I send very plain signals, but you choose to ignore them, because you can. You have been able to get away with pleading ignorance if I bring it up. But I know that you can tell the difference between the moans and screams of a woman in blissful torment and the hate filled sounds of one in pure torment.

I don't want to risk upsetting the delicate balance of our life, so I keep quiet. But please, for god's sake, if you're out there and somehow through cosmic intervention you get this message--pay attention to my eyes, my breathing and don't continue to be selfish by ignoring these signs. And know that I only hate you sometimes.

Battlefield

Love is possession
                  ownership;
love is you are mine.
Love is pain...
       uncertainty-fear-longing.
Love is I am yours forever.
Love isn't a choice -
it is an avalanche.
Love is a waterfall pounding you into my soul,
crushing my chest and filling my lungs -
I gasp and fight and try to survive you.

Vivid / Vernal

The sky is full and rolling with grays;

the earth is lush with new life, 

shades of green licking up all that wet air.

Soon there will be deep blue skies 

and blossoms of pinks and yellows,

with a sun that bakes and steams.

So I will savor the coolness of these gray days,
splashing through puddles,
breathing in the soil-scented mist.

Father Time

My son paced in the other room, on the line with his father. 

His calm, commanding voice brought comfort to us both as he offered tech support over speaker  for the elusive solution to the problem our son's newly built computer was having. 

I attempted to read a book as they moved through all the usual suspects. Eyes flickered across the page, landing on disjointed words and phrases, but eventually I gave up and closed the book, leaned my head back, and closed my eyes. 

It was warm, familiar, familial... I wanted to nestle into the imagined Good Times of yore, but I liked the moment too much to slip into a memory. 

Miles Above

I sprinkled notes from Bitches Brew
in a crumb trail across the ocean....
That was...kaleidescopic?
Trippy...
The hush of a darkened cabin,
the loud quiet of the engines...
Almost comfortable,
almost asleep...
Thoughts suspended
in the sky of my mind,
like our bus full of humanity...

Old Friends

Your face fills my mind's eye
as I write these words -
the letters slide across the slim lines of your body -
muscle
bone
scars -
all the places my hands can't touch.
Your face
so deeply known to me,
is craggy now with the decades that have passed since
you were part of
the scenery of my life.
Time lays across you in sheets 
the stubble on your cheeks
draws my hand to your face.
I blink and we are 20 again,
blink again and the present sharpens into focus - joy, laughter, distance 

Starving Artist

He said I look like one of DaVinci's sketches
I smiled sadly
(maybe that's why?)
and told him I didn't feel like one.
I feel like Monet inside
with Klimt's gold burning my skin.
I feel like he sees all of me,
'though none of me is visible.
I have memorized every false detail of him,
as he feeds me half-truths and flattery.
These do not nourish me;
I hunger.

Real/Dream

I dreamed of you last night.
I almost never do,
which is surprising,
considering how much I think of you.
It was raining and dark,
I drove slowly through a parking lot.
When I put my hand on your knee,
you followed suit, then went higher.
I urged you on,
then parked and you moved in for a kiss.
It was funny at first, but beautiful

I wanted to stay asleep all day...

I'm My Own Kryptonite

I caught a glimpse of superman again today.
Focused on my own routine,
my eyes swept across the room -
there he was
and it took my breath away.
He rippled across the surface of you, obscuring the metaphorical glasses.
I swallowed hard and turned away.
Better to stay in the antechamber
way
out
here
where it's safe.
Where all I see is Clark:
my pal, my brother.

Three of Hearts

An image -
two bodies
intertwined
violent kisses
greedy hands,
                 legs 
parting,
wrapping (around)
pulling into
panting with urgency.
And while we race to the crescendo,
your throaty whispers are of him
- what you would do to him,
or let him do to you -
and it makes me wetter,
you harder...
We peak together and collapse
in a sweaty heap,
smiling,
still dreaming of each other
and him.

Slumber Salvation

The weekend has been filled with heavy,
richly detailed dreams -
my mind is trying to soothe me
by weaving stories of comfort
and intimate moments of friendship.
I want to stay asleep
so I can inhabit these alternate realities
that branch off from my actual world.
I want to wedge myself back into
the fictions of my mind's creation
and rest there,
far
    far
          away
from the worries of my present.

Morning update

I walked into your office to say to A.W.,
"How do I walk around all day,
knowing I'm garbage,
without bursting into tears all the time?"
But before I could speak,
her face lit up and she said,
"Your hair is a beautiful blonde mane today, and I LOVE it!!"
I lit up in turn,
and then said,
"I came in here to ask you how do I walk around all day,
knowing I'm  garbage,
without bursting into tears all the time?" but before I finished speaking,
Br. peeked out from behind her and with a very somber face said,
"You are not garbage.
You are a kind and lovely person,
please don't say you're garbage."
Aaaaaand THIS dumbass burst into tears.
So embarrassing.
I just wasn't expecting genuine kindness like that -
I was hoping to pop in
and joke about the misery of life.
A.W. did provide her wisdom, though,
"From garbage you came,
to garbage you return,
and the garbage in the middle isn't so bad."
Anyway, they asked if it was You-related sorrow,
and I had to admit that was at least part of it :)
Mostly it was just me being a Moody-ass drama queen,
but it turned my day around,
so who am I to argue?

Fish on Dry Land

Letting go

is never easy.

(Why is it always in pairs?)

I just need to find my balance.

It was wonderful to want again,

but now...

it is a relief to not care anymore.

...although this carefully cultivated apathy

 is harder to maintain

than I expected.

Or maybe I just miss the exhilaration

of infatuation.

Still, though.

So far so good.

Except for that other loss....

the one I didn't work hard to attain,

the one I didn't even see coming.

I'm gutted.

Music in My Veins

A long weekend filled with live music -
                                talented musicians
                                   sexy lead singers
                                          great friends
                                            cold drinks

Tonight I drifted on two different clouds at once
up high
and down low -
the thoughts were smooth around the edges,
but sort of blurred out in the middle;
I wanted
to want
to be
wild and magnetic -
I didn't want to keep yawning,
and jokingly complaining about the excessive volume
(so hard to be witty when no one can hear you...)
The bar, so familiar, but
instead of a quiet week night,
and trivia with the crew,
it was a buzzing, thrumming place.
Happy.
Tart blueberry cider,
comfort and unfamiliarity
all mashed together;
that singer...
he looked so much like you
that I would have
used him
               as a substitute if I'd been able to slip away from reality.
But he was also just plain sexy of his own accord -
his reputation just dirty enough to increase the appeal.


         *   *   *   *   *

I've been weaning myself off
the euphoric adoration
that swelled within me for so long.
I think I'm winning the fight;
many days I feel so little
that I forget to even think dirty thoughts at all,
let alone to orchestrate paths through the boundaries that divide us.
It is a relief,
and also a loss.
I miss the glittering sense of purpose and meaning
that euphoria added to my daily grind,
but I am relieved to own myself again.
I am relieved to have not fallen through the ice
and drowned in frigid water
as I clawed at the unbreakable ceiling rushing overhead...
It's good to be free.

Freedom is a Winged Thing

She stood at the edge of a broad field,
the land dropping away to rocks and waves below.
She felt the wind's currents rushing past her,
pressing the salt air up and over the dry grasses.
She looked out at the islands,
the sun just sliding up behind them.
She smiled a little, no teeth,
and burst into a run
for the few yards between her and the air -

          her arms spread wide,
she caught the updraft and soared.
Her hair fluttered behind her like a cape,
her bare feet poked out from her long skirt,
like a little bird's.
She always loved the feel of the wind on her face,
the warm pockets and cool pockets,
reminding her of that time
she wrapped herself around
the man named Freedom
as they wound through the desert on his Harley.
She closed her eyes and climbed higher,
forgetting Freedom and his too-big cowboy boots
(but not before smirking at their lie).
When she felt the cool mist of morning clouds all around her
she flipped and dove straight down again -
hurtling toward the shore of the nearest island,
in an almost-fall, but still just barely in control.
She slowed her descent and fluttered to earth,
cheeks rosy from exertion, hair a little bit wild.
Hey, mama...
She turned at the sound of The Voice -
the one that gave her wings.
Her whole being glowed,
Hey, yourself.
He pulled her to the blanket he'd spread out on the sand
and asked her to tell him a story.
They lay back and looked up at the soft blue of the new day's sky.
She traced a path along his arm
as she told him the tale of the pirates and the mermaids;
he didn't know where the fairy tales ended and her truth began,
so he believed every word.
Somewhere around the part where the pirates walked into the sea
he rolled onto his side and watched her face.
Her voice had grown softer,
and tears slipped silently down into her hair.
The pirates were bad-guys in her story,
unequivocally -
murdering innocents,
stealing from those who'd worked hard to earn honestly -
but
but still
her heart ached for them
because they loved the mermaids so much
that they lost their ability to reason -
they lived on the sea,
so they knew they couldn't just walk into its crushing depths,
but their eyes were filled with golden love for the green-eyed beauties.
She remembered that night,
and how the moonlight glinted off the hilts of their swords
as they left this life.
She wept
knowing this sweet man at her side
would follow her into the sky if she asked.