xmas day.

anxiety around the shuffling involved in getting ready to leave. getting ready to leave when there's a holiday in the way of being able to run errands. deciding to work on xmas day instead. really disliking that table i am almost done working on. started having Major fear and nervousness around seeing family again. then a difficult conversation about the likelihood of future in or not in a partnership. wanting to be loved, for me. so the story goes and its boring. no, you can't think i'm perfect if you're not available- and you shouldn't find faults if you are. not sleeping full nights. woke up really early, called parents. last time was thanksgiving. i don't know how many times i have seen or heard them cry about me in one way or another. its never enough, and once i accepted that more into my life was i able to live my life more fully. (and not call them too often). thought i'd call and get it over with for the day, but i'm expected to call again later while my brother and his family are there. never enough. mom cried about her health and that i'm not there to help her. dad's going in for tests and surgery in the next month. he told me stories about (not sure how this started) how he worked that factory nickel-plating job for 10 yrs from 69 to 79. 2 jobs (3 for a while, one overnight), one from 7am-4, came home quickly to eat something, and then other job from 5-11. named so many people that died from that job, including his sicilian friend who worked there for 20yrs. it was extemely toxic. ...oh yeah, it started cuz he was going on about radiation and evil people in the world- and then cell phones and how he keeps his turned off- and, well, he started off our phone conversation with a rant about the (H)oly (S)pirit which is just his thing to do now.
he told me he heard about that job being toxic to people and found 4 houses to mow lawn at. realized he could make a few bucks more doing that than that toxic factory job. he asked me if i remembered him bringing me and my brother along with him to highland park after dropping my mom off at some seamstress job she started (the factory she worked at in new brunswick since 1963 when she moved to america closed down a yr before i was born) while he knocked on people's doors looking for more lawns to mow. 50 houses. no one said yes and no one called him. somehow after a while he said he found 20 houses to work at...
i remember him taking me to that factory to get his paycheck or something. it was scary as hell! NOISey, huge machines and weird chemicals. the best thing i remember was that people were really nice and happy to meet me, and my dad had bought me a canned grape soda which i was carrying around in my little hand.

so i cried after hanging up. my cat licked my tears (it was kinda gross but sweet so whatever, i was sad). he wouldnt stop though and my face ended up feeling a lot more wet!

Leaves Tonight

i tried really hard. i made you warm things and listened well to the way the light moves. gave you things in accordance to that law. wrote in script, cut words out, then glued my saliva onto backsides of leaves. captured sweet smells in little jars and took them to you when you were sad. . . . . . what more could i have done, if we couldn't make sense of each other... linearly, reading a book from left to right... waiting patiently for each day's routines to pass... watching your face glow then sink deeply underground when we couldn't understand the simplest things.......

encircle

why or why not. would i spend my energy resisting that connection. to feel the hurt. spill all over me every time i am in front of it. keeping it detained, every time i am away from it. containing all the emotions within one drop of language. inside the box, that kept me alive when i was alone with it. the moment we embrace, i spill into a lonely little puddle, words fall all over, my breath starts coagulating, i forget i am here now with you, i remember i am missing something big, i am defined by that loss, i am submitting to that place, i see you far in front of me and i cant see you anymore, you look back, i make you out, out-lined in the dusty air between us, you try to reach for me and i just cant make it fast enough, i fall behind even more, giving up the path i am expected to tread on, and just make a little spot there for myself to wonder in. wander around in, in circles for a while.

lowercase

we spend our time- inching forward- pulling toward some slight attainment- just a little more- stretching more- fingers, joints, nails reaching as deeply as they can not- to feel that some-thing, that some-one, there- who we thought was there and is no longer there- found what they were seeking- all along, with you- and how relative is it to you- it is not- it is about what they seek- what they want- what they dream of- which isn't you- it isn't all the agony they placed or dis-placed, you placed and caused and disguised- misguided, i am- foolish and miserable- as is always the case when the attachment arises- like blood in-to my brain, in-to my mouth, slipping further in- a disease- a poison- the bacteria we thought we can hide- sweep under the carpet so that we can have just one more kiss- one more look- one more smile- one more touch- as tough as it has always been- with you- i am seeking comfort- sensitivity- care- love.

Andros. Jasmine. Jade. Sybil. Bastian. Rhodes.

its you, my best friend, that i want to hold. before the muscles on your arms faded into another life, a new life, one where you're happy, with an-other life. a new home, new walls, to breathe onto and not beyond, i am here, waiting, still, for the life we never had. together. my brother. your forehead and forearms b[e]aring signs, that which engendered us, brought us here, from that mist that placed us gently on this dust, here we are now and i can't seem to believe that we were ever more than this in the past. do you remember? the words have bled out of your mouth, faded into pale, and dropped like petals for us to read now from left to right. i miss you.

drink. from thy cup. drink. and grant thee the rest.

moving fast... whether they claim its a river or a creek... and yet, i want to sit in it, still, forever sometimes, lost. alone. together. embraced. forgotten. brought back to life. allowed to float upside down, able to drift into the larger sea, and still float... but really, it needs to be let down. slower. the rice that grows needs to drink and here we are drinking it all dry... waiting, still, sitting, still here waiting, moving fast.

alive, i said.

serious, ze said. the way the feet stepped like letters on the old machine. walking slowly under water. forward, until, ze masked zir laughs with highpitched stones thrown through the air, into the deepest part, pounding in. to plant their way. i can't see this more clearly- as if my eyes are swollen over with pillows drenched with your immobilized dreams. you can't remember, you say, but there they are- like cotton around me, i watch as the set rolls out the characters' acts.
and then they were pulling zir out.
i knew it was my fault. i knew there was more i could have done. .i knew. that if our intensity were less, if our words weren't as heavy and if maybe we had been able to swallow them down.. maybe....... just maybe....... things could have been different . right . now ..
but thats what happens, ze reassures me in my dreams, when we give up floating on the surface.