Sunday, March 28, 2010

i carry your heart with me by e.e cummings


















i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

Friday, March 26, 2010

buzz

curled up in an overstuffed leather chair, notebook balanced on my knees,
my mind wanders lazy over disjointed prose and the chattering clatter
of customers wandering in like a steady tide as the
deep roasted aroma of coffee beans hovers in the air.

ice clinks in a plastic cup, melting slowly into diluted remnants of chai tea
as i twist the straw up and down - mindless in a dull, slow, echoing scratch,
repetitious harmony and the whirring whir of a blender
lulls my mind into a heightened sense of wait

the touch of my skin pulses with artificial frenzy
to the beat of some indie song no one knows the name of,
buzzed high on caffeination, anticipation, the hazy humidity of a summer day
and the falling in love with each stranger that walks through the door.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

THIS SONG

Do you ever get in one of those weird moods where you can listen to the same song over and over again on repeat and never get tired of it? In fact, it's like you can't get enough? Well, this is that song for me right now. The entire album is fantabulous and I'm in love with every second it it but this song especially has caught my attention.

The lyrics. The lyrics! Oh my gosh, it's like some one wrote a song about the past year of my life. Amazing. Get out of my head Frightened Rabbit.

So here you go:

Not Miserable by Frightened Rabbit


Well this is easier now
I've found all the pieces that I lost in the flood
And it wasn't that much

And though it's easier now
I will always remember the night that I almost drowned
All alone in a house

And the love that I lost
With all of the shit that came out in the wash
Just a pocket of fluff

And I'm not put upon
I'm free from disease, no grays, no liver spots
Most of the misery's gone
Gone, gone to the bone

(I am)
Not miserable now
No one knows
No one knows
I'm not miserable

So the hymns that I sung
Prayers for the fucked, from a bitter, forked tongue
Sing of history now

Though the corners are lit
The dark can return with the flick of a switch
It hasn't turned on me yet, yet

(I am)
Not miserable now
No one knows
No one knows
I'm not miserable

(I am)
Not miserable now
No one knows
No one knows
I'm not miserable

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Ellipses

…want, this thing I want but cannot name
that sits, tantalizing, at the tip of my tongue,
dancing along the edge of my brain, (tap-dancing over curiosity)
My lips make shape of the formless word,
yet sit there silent – continue.

What is this thing? Where am I stuck
restless, legs sticking to green vinyl
as the waitress asks me again,
pen at the edge of the table, tapping out my indecision.

I am consumed with craving for food that doesn’t exist.
Some unknown taste concoction
of tangy and sweet and spicy and smooth.
This empty ache in my stomach persists, persists
for something that’s not even real.

What is this thing? Where am I stuck
restless, legs sticking to green vinyl
as the waitress asks me again,
pen at the edge of the table, tapping out my indecision.

This faceless thing that chases me.
feels perpetually close, closing in
The hair rises on the back of my neck
but when I turn there is nothing and just this emptiness
of something I didn’t know was lost.

What is this thing? Where am I stuck
restless, legs sticking to green vinyl
as the waitress asks me again,
pen at the edge of the table, tapping out my indecision.

I itch to jump up and run out the door, legs pumping, feet pounding the pavement in steady rhythm where there is no path, on the way to somewhere new, unknown, dancing over the edge of a cliff to where I can swim through satin dreams of yellow and pink hues and climb back up raindrops through a dizzying lightening storm whilst screaming myself into a million pieces of light and sound and fury.

Impossibility.

Running in a circle to places I can’t name.
And this is wanting… And this is wanting…

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

City Street

I am born in the middle of the week. In the middle of a hospital. In the middle of a busy city. My parents hold me close and count all ten fingers and all ten toes. The nurses bustle in and out. In the room next door there is another sharp cry. Down in the city below a steady stream of business men and women cross streets and hail taxis.

You are born on a Saturday. Local news channels report record-breaking heat and monsoons. Your mother almost passes out after you take your first breath. Your father holds you in front of the hospital window as lightning streaks across the night sky.

I see the Pacific Ocean for the first time when I am three. I run across the beach in a pink bathing suit. My mother leads me out to the water. Her belly is growing again. They tell me I’m going to be a big sister. The wet sand is squishy between my toes. The water sprays up and I run away shrieking as a white foam wave chases me to shore.

You are four when you break your first bone. You’re climbing a tree with your brother and a branch snaps. You hit the ground and can’t breathe for a moment. Your arm is bent at an odd angle. You don’t cry much but your mother almost screams when she sees you. You’re in a cast for six weeks.

I fall in love for the first time on a Tuesday. I am ten years old and wear my hair gathered in a large pink scrunchie at the side of my head. He makes me laugh and my stomach begins to feel funny. I slide down in my seat and wonder if he will turn to face me again. The teacher stands at the front of the classroom and talks about fractions. The dry smell of chalk is faintly in the air.

You fall in love for the first time on a Sunday. She goes to your church and wears bows in her hair. She sits next to you in class and answers all the questions. Two hundred miles away I turn around in my sleep.

My first broken heart happens in the middle of July. I spend my days working and he comes to see me and tell me at lunch. When I get home I curl up in my mother’s arms and cry. She strokes my hair and offers me chocolate. We eat a tub of Rocky Road that night and watch three romantic-comedies in a row.

You have sex for the first time at her house. You are both nervous. It’s awkward and afterward you lie next to each other and stare at the ceiling. She holds the sheets against her body and you think about how she used to wear bows in her hair.

I have sex for the first time after a late night study session at the library. We are laughing and high on caffeine and lack of sleep. The sofa upholstery is scratchy against my back. He kisses my neck and tells me he loves me. There are tears in my eyes. Outside the moon is low in the sky, full and round, surrounded in silvery wisps of clouds.

Your first broken heart happens in the middle of her second year of law school. She drives two hours to tell you. You stare at a dry patch in the grass while she speaks. A door slams a couple houses down and she is gone.

I meet you on a Thursday. It’s the end of August and the air conditioner is broken. You walk in and make a comment about inflatable pools. I laugh because it’s too hot to think up a comeback. Later that night I will recall the way the corners of your eyes crinkled when you smiled.

We kiss for the first time on a Wednesday. We are watching a movie and I can’t even pretend to know the plotline because we are sitting so close and I have never been so acutely aware of someone that it’s made my toes curl like this and I’m thinking too much. And then you get up to leave and there is this voice screaming in my head and then suddenly you’re there and your lips are against mine as I practically breathe you in.

We have sex for the first time on a Monday night. It is frantic and hurried and full of want. You whisper words against my hair. I am shaking. My toes seem to pulse with electricity. The room falls away. In the morning you will find crescent shaped marks from my fingernails in your back.

We are married on a Saturday. In the church of my childhood. The bridesmaids wear green and we eat cake and dance until midnight. My feet are aching and your dress shirt collar is hanging open. Afterward we collapse onto a hotel bed and fall asleep within minutes. Down the hall a pair of lovers moves in gasping rhythm with the night

You almost leave in December. We’ve been fighting again about money and I’m crying into the phone as tears roll down my cheeks and under my chin. I’m sitting against the refrigerator door when you pad into the kitchen in your bare feet. We sit next to each other and talk until the sun comes up. You don’t leave.

Our daughter is born in the middle of the night. The contractions have been strong since we finished washing the dinner dishes. I lie on the floor in the living room. Counting. You run back and forth between rooms. We arrive at the hospital before midnight. I ask for drugs. I am worn and tired when they place her in my arms. She holds tightly to my fingers as I curl her tiny body against mine.

We buy our first house in our fifth year of marriage. The children run up the stairs to claim rooms. James helps you lug in all the furniture. We stay up late that night, cross-legged in the middle of the living room and unpack a box labeled “Knick-Knacks.”

It is June when our family first visits the Pacific Ocean. The kids pile out of the car and run toward the water. I have made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for everyone. Susan dives headfirst into the waves. I hold Davey’s hand as he walks toward the water. The sand is squishy between our toes. The water sprays up and he runs away shrieking as a white foam wave chases him to shore.

We receive the call at 2:23 a.m. My heart pulses loudly in my ears at the sound of your voice. We drive toward the hospital in silence. Four days later I will lay a yellow rose on my daughter’s casket.

It is a Monday. Or a Tuesday. Or many days when we sit around the dining room table. We lean back in our chairs telling stories. Lucy tells a joke she heard in school. We laugh so hard our bellies ache. Later that night you move against me, whispering into my hair. The rest of the house is silent and still.

We dance at our son’s wedding in January. There are lilies in the bride’s hair. He rests his hand over her ever-growing belly and they laugh. You stand and say something with tears in your eyes. A photographer snaps a picture as you kiss the top of my head.

We fly over the Atlantic Ocean in the middle of the night. The vast waters are spread out beneath us in inky darkness. You hold my hand when the plan lurches suddenly. Two hours later we step out of an airport into blinding sunlight. Buses and taxis whir by in a blur. Strangers walk past murmuring in an unknown language.

I lose you in the middle of January. It’s been a long fight. Our children cry at your memorial service. I hold little Jenny on my lap. She asks about grandpa. I sit on the edge of our bed that night with your pillow in my arms. The night quiet is disturbed by teenagers laughing as they run up the street.

I learn yoga in the middle of my seventy-sixth year. It is Lucy’s idea. She and her husband want me to move into their house. I look at the framed photos scattered across our walls. There are marks in each of the door frames measuring our children as they grew. I wake up each morning and make my own coffee and try to master Downward Dog.

I die in the middle of the week. In the middle of a hospital. In the middle of a busy city. I don’t feel much. Someone is holding my hand and saying something far away. I love you. Down in the city below a steady stream of business men and women cross streets and hail taxis.