to a party
of her own making
storied twice
and added never
confetti birds and
sun balloon
frosted ribbon
and dancing bear
carried home in the fold
of ripe chance
.
.
.
an abundance of optimism
can’t ever be a bad thing
really
though sometimes the glare
can force you to turn
from those stricken
with the smile of this affliction
as you raise a filter
to the black hole sun
you grew up singing
singed by this little too much
and all that nothing
and color color everywhere
when some days you just want some
black and white
grey matters
taupe tenacity
anything to make you look away
because there is always dust in the corner
and hemingway said all you have to do
is write one true sentence
There is always dust in the corner.
.
.
.
I feel the cold seeping into my bones
on a day too warm for that to be true.
But some days are like that,
filled with mysterious ache and ailment,
and I think, again,
how tied to the earth we all are,
and how often we forget to listen.
Everything feels frozen.
Time, my feet,
the calendar, this heart.
I find myself holding my breath,
watching the sky for a sign.
The crows will carry me home.
.
.
.
those were the words you left on the counter
next to the cat food and two bananas gone too far ripe
the kind just waiting for someone to make an effort
but that takes foresight and a dash of clarity and instead
you wrote a sentence on a red-stained slip of paper
more resignation than wish
or at least
acceptance
already i know what my answer will be
but i like the look of empty space
the box of possibility left unlined
in the corner of a kitchen meant for tea
and forgotten pots boiling over
in the corner i write corrosion
in pencil small enough
to be practically invisible
just before i flip the page to map out another list
half-filled with crisp greens and purple edges
in the shapes we’ll throw away
Some days I think it all comes down to self-preservation. The things we do to survive. Then I remember that it isn’t about anything at all, there are no answers, only questions. And survival is such a relative term these days. Read a book about the way life was lived 100 years ago, or 200, and survival becomes an entirely different word. By necessity, survival used to be a physical accomplishment. For so many of us these days, it’s a mental one.
I find this fascinating.
The internet was birthed to take up that slack, the distance between all my basic needs are met and now what do I do with all these thoughts? We share everything these days, and still, everyone seems to be looking for something. Already it’s changing the world.
I find this fascinating and frightening, all at once.
The other day I heard a story on the news about a program that’s being developed that will take all of a person’s social media input and, after they die, use it to create an artificial intelligence type of interaction, creating new output to mimic and offer new things that person might say. Using everything we have ever said on the internet to re-create our personality. It was presented as a way to cushion grief, so that people could still have a relationship with someone they have lost, at least virtually speaking.
I keep thinking about this, wondering if we would all like the artificial self that would be created by the things we type and offer up on all these venues. How true would it be to who we really are? Would it be a better version of us, or a worse one?
Again, fascinating. Again, frightening. Also: enchanting.
I sit and watch Mother Nature outside my window, here on my own tiny piece of earth, and then I watch the whole word inside this window, a computer screen that contains infinity. No wonder my brain hurts.
I drink my tea and watch the birds forage for their breakfast and think that I should walk outside and feed them.
And then I start thinking about survival all over again.
There is so much information. When what we really need is food.
At least that’s the way I think it goes.
.
.
.
you never mentioned you were in love
she says
words falling to the ground
with the whisper of melt
landing
trapped
in the outline
of forgotten footprints
heading off
in a different
direction
.
.
..
.
and here i sit, waiting for something i’ll never have and
my mind keeps screaming about wasted time
and the words are all stacked in the corner
neat as a pile of laundry
and my heart is always racing
even though
there’s no time to begin
four walls and one window and i am cold
but never frozen and two crows just flew by
to remind me of balance
as the sun pokes it way through a cross hatched horizon
painting colors with a brush of no hurry
spinning yarn for another day’s sweater
i found an arrow on the floor
three days ago
and just left it there
pointing southwest
it didn’t seem to be meant
for me
.
.
.
Everything around me crackles with electricity.
January would be silent, except for your anger.
When the whole world is frozen,
even a white flower becomes prism.
Last night I held a piece of glass to the moon,
hoping for eclipse.
The dead of winter whispered giggles of mockery,
and I walked back inside, bruised
but never broken.
I keep reading about survival.
Already, we’ve forgotten so much.
It used to be that everything was relative,
but now, everything is virtual,
and you can’t fake the smell of narcissism.
(I meant to say narcissus.)
Our collective soul is starving,
and we feed it the new truth.
Suffering was always meant to save us,
and laughter is a sky
filled with birds.
