my girl is..

anything than i thought she'd be
she's stronger than superman
she's lighter than a shadow of light
she's smarter than under dog and wonder woman the same

the girl has more on anybody than fishnets
on a drag queen or dancer in a dark hall.

she can mesmerize me with her logic
and she can woo me with her wonder
she's one of a kind in a million.

i like to work it loud
on my drums
in my voice
and with my swaying body to a mismatched rhythm

but she's there
winking at me from the basement stairs
on her way up
so aware
of what's going on
so in line with where i'm at
in the moment of release.

i can't forget that what i got is
better than what's out there
she's a believer and an advocate of
everything inside of me.

to her i owe so much.

my love,
my back
my everything.

as she sleeps upstairs amidst my yells of release in some top 40 song
with the dogs uneasy of my angst
i realize
finally
that i have someone who gets this
gets me


and that's everything

my girl is...

my normative..

the last thing before her death that she said was- i'm going to freshen up then i'll be back to suck you dry.

it was that that has stuck with me-
i am besieged by moments like these that represent both insightfullness and ignorance.

i am left with a feeling of despair-
not only in her death
but in the the lack of awakening-
at birth we lose ourselves as we evolve and subscribe to the awkward residence of being human.
i left the darkness of that stage disappointed with myself and everyone i've ever come across because we blindly and willingly lose ourselves to the status quo.

no one challenges the indoctrinated canon anymore.
no one thinks this is all madness to such degrees that they'd rather be blind than to witness such disgrace done to and amongst us.

i am one of "them" and one of "those"
and i hate that.

i hate that my chest is tight whenever someone and something creative breaks open and challenges the so called typical life that i've come to live. i cower to the outsider and seek the shelter of my fellow conformers.
i recognize that my creativity is so boxed- at least what i reveal to the world.
i challenge myself and i fall to the wayside of typical time and time again.

it's not about clothes,
it's not about purposely not using commas-
it's not about feeling like i have to maintain a certain weight to be loved by my lover-
it's not about being polite and feeling obligated to make others comfortable
and it's not about giving a shit whether what i say is kosher enough for the ears that over hear and secretly check in on what i'm saying and how i deliver my message.

i have become a product.
i have become another voice piece for brands.
i have become exactly what they want me to be.
which is nothing.
which is predictable.
which is not the real me.

i was born to a place where i was like everyone else
and i was raised in a place where few looked or acted like me-
yet somehow i have found my sub culture
blends nicely within the masses.

we are political
we are educated
we have opinions
and we are creative

yet somewhere along the lines
we gave in
and gave up
on trying to beat the big boxes
and the big white males
that already had a plan for us

and that was to be exotic,
and to have false impressions of ourselves
and our sisters
and to feel like our own bodies
were not truly ours-
but
available
and purposeful
only if someone could buy our ideas and our minds
and our bodies..

i am angry that i have so willingly given in to this idea
that america-
that loving women
and saying what i have to say as i have learned my truth
out loud is shameful
or likely to get me deported
or likely to get me punished for no other reason than to scare me back into my place.

i need
i want to change who i am
in this
i want to change who i have become
i want to claim myself
for myself
and only me
and be beautiful in my way and no others.

but mostly i want to undo the submission
and the lackluster life that i have come to represent
not just in theory but in every way..
that i know and don't know how..

fuck the establishment
fuck everyone who gives up
and takes the easy way out
fuck you for giving me few options
and telling me there is no other way
i will continue to find the way that is true to me
true to this
and true at all...

summation...

the smell outside reminds me
i am alive.

the scent of her reminds me i've been dishonest.

the warmth of my lover tells me i've changed

and the aches and pains throughout my body
force me to recognize that i am still in training
for this life.

my strong voice and stronger appetite
reminds me that i'm a force to be reckoned with
if that's what it takes.

smiles unreturned tell me that someone has been failed
somewhere along the way.

missing the truest love of my life at this hour
reminds me that i have been healed.

pictures of strangers and the stories they tell...

perhaps my views of her are outdated…
what a fucking concept.

My issues with the mother figure in my life are expansive.
Always withholding
Never fully present
Too much scar tissue to get through
It’s a burden I carry
And one she has faced for 36 years. I don’t know how to fix it
Or me or
Even her.
I am acting out of memory
I am acting out of self-preservation
I am acting out from a place of fear.

I have never been able to describe how deep the fissure runs
Or how wide the gaping void is
I have simply been largely unreachable-
a poker face donned with little makeup.

My memory doesn’t serve me well in causation
I couldn’t give you a lot of specifics
But my skin and my mind remembers all too well
Why it is that I protect my only diamond shaped heart so fervently.

But again the question begs to be asked
Are my views outdated?

This shell of a woman who’s mentally unfit
Physically sick in so many ways
possess’ the very things I’ve always wanted-
Unconditional love
Gentility
Acceptance
Truth.

Yet she has blasted and choked me with the time and tides of her cycle
Angry and then soft.

I am merely protecting myself.
I have learned the lesson so many times.

Like the big bad wolf she has played to my vulnerabilities only to lash out
And use me like a pawn.

I do not know how to un date that.
Explain that to every fiber of me
Who has to remind myself every day that I am not the full grown woman that she once was to me
I am so much stronger and resilient than she ever was-
I have nothing to lose
Only that’s where I lie to myself.
I do have so much to lose
I am afraid that I will never have the motherly things that could complete me
From her or anyone else.
Her 26 years of threats and attempts to abandon me, and her children
Have finally turned me to the emotional stone that you would expect.

Love surely resides
But it comes in fits and starts.
That seamless river has been damned and severed

And as much as I’d like to say I’m untouched and unscarred
I am not.
The result in me is a knotty fleshed muscle so capable of strengths
But afraid to fully unfurl…

letter to a talk show...

a million

that's how many times i've asked myself the same question.

how much?
how much can i interrupt her in this journey?
how much should i intervene?
change the outcome?
manipulate her into caring?
or at least thinking she's worth it?

i struggle on most days
which i suppose means i've gotten better at taking care of me and taking on less of her emotionally.

you see i gave up years-
carried a guilt that was never mine to carry
thinking i wasn't working hard enough, trying with all that i have
to make her happy.

sometime ago i let it all go
and stepped aside to hand off the baggage that i was carrying
that belonged solely to her.
i've been happy and more light in my own journey as a result.

i've been reading more about the soul's immortality and how we each must learn lessons and work through our earthly vices in order to fully move on.
if we don't or aren't able to we carry those burdens into our next life.

on some level i think to myself that she is merely not learning her lesson
and in this life she is suffering
she may or may not mean to cause others suffering but when you love
you're inevitably, unequivocally affected.

i think i am not her nor capable of showing her the lesson that she fails to see-
though in my naivete i thought could fix her.

how wrong i was.
and how depressed i was.
to learn that love cannot heal the sort of void she carries.

i could give a thousand explanations for why i think nothing can help her at this point
because she has long but given up
but my reasons are from my truth which may not be hers.

to say that i struggle many days of this life, as her daughter born from another womb,
is to say that she understands who and where she is as opposed to what she is-
the answers are opposite, i know
just as the recognitions and seeming awareness in each of us.

today as the solar storms plummet unseen distances with a force unknown
and the moon shines in her delicate and fierce beauty
i hurt a little
with the familiar thought

that i've asked the same question a million times
and still can't come to a resolution...

15 minutes of possessions...

15 minutes is what i've committed to for writing.

where to begin.
i lost another man in my life feb. 19th. and in that i got a visit from my father bringing possessions of grandparent's that i cherished.
dust has settled in places my eyes have passed over since i was a child and only now do i see the details up close.
dresser drawers with hidden secrets of forgotten socks, always golf socks and so very soft, and a head scarf for hair that was fuzz when i last saw her. i begged her not to be ashamed of her beautiful bald head- i rubbed it and told her it looked good on her.
stories he told us in my new living room, in my new house, while i sat her her chair turned his chair as he held on to anything that brought him closer to her. the chair, it was a surprise. i wasn't expecting to get such a prized item, that i secretly wanted for years- only because it fit her and it fit me so well.
my father brought needlepoints and paintings. the one of her front porch and her favorite flower and two hummingbirds- exactly like what it looked like for years. even after she died..
grampa held on to all those precious things and lived among them until he had nothing to give. he wanted to go to be with her and at last he was..

my home feels more complete now that i have my haven of loved one's possessions. too many at once but all individual and perfect just the same.

the day dad left i opened all the boxes and i wept and finally let it catch up to me- that all of them had gone. the pain was seamless and spilled from every broken place inside of me.. the hurt caught up as the blind went up. the dog barked and i knew one of them was with me.. it's all i needed- the reminder. if only everyday was a day spent recognizing when loved ones are with us. with time and tide we wander further from the one's we anchored ourselves up to. i am thankful for the reminder of each of them. i am happy to relate to earthly possessions to be closer to them for a little while..

my 15 minutes of possessions is almost up. and my mind is at ease and slowly falling blank...

colorless stand alone..

how can we truly know what it takes to sustain another
small gestures offered in periodic attempts
prove to be insufficient again.

i blame and i judge myself thinking i could have done more
i could do more
but don't and i didn't.

or did i?

too many people in my arena of this familial circle
believe in little
and give maybe less than what is needed in certain situations
and in this case it seems i've been handed the same sort of shortcomings

it hurts to lose another man in my life
it hurts that others have shut out and down on their own-
just out of reach.

pictures remind me that she has moved so far on from him
and she's taken a daughter with her.
she is deserving of the love
they both need someone they can rely on
but it's like swallowing something sideways to see evidence of their joy so soon.
i don't know if i'm protecting the brother who didn't offer more
or if i'm protecting what i see as loosely mine or ours.

so many things are shifting as i try to lay down my own roots in a 4 walled little house.
i'm beginning to realize roots have nothing to do with where your materialistic accumulations lye.
i think they are deep and unseen in letters that tie you to others.

T A N G Y E.
you have felt foreign to me at different points in my life
but now i am burrowed in your crevices
i am searching for some shelter in what you've held in the years i've belonged to you.
it seems the clan is dismantling quickly and things have begun to unravel.

who will remained aligned
and who will jump ship?

i'm needing some space
and some creativity mixed with a little self destruction.
i want to fill my lungs with the smoke of my youth
the careless wandering
and the endless resolve.

i want to forget the missing parts of this clan
and fall back to when things were quiet
out of choice
and not abandon.

can i get there if i wish hard enough?

i'm insatiable
and not finding what i thought i was looking for anymore.
perhaps feeling lost is where i will find myself again.

they say being lost is the best way to find creativity.

i could use a little of both..