i spend my whole life waiting for midnight

both my horoscope and my guide say it's time to move on

so many thoughts and yet none

according to einstein, god does not play dice with the cosmos
but merce cunningham did
as a young student i was terrified at the idea of using elements of chance procedure in dance performance
afraid of mistakes, unaware (yet) that improvising is really just a lot like living
ironic now, so much am i a subject of lady fortune and her caprice

a pirated photocopy, a gift from a friend...
i swore to never distribute it so you didn't read it here
rule 9: be happy whenever you can manage it. enjoy yourself. it is lighter than you think.
(from "10 rules for students and teachers," typed and handed out by john cage in his classes at the cunningham studio in new york, at around this same time my worldview was exploding)

tonight, a line from a poem i wrote when i was a teen
just before the veil of fear was lifted from my eyes
stuck...really, i don't know
i went looking, in the spirit of breaking my own rules
in times like these one must be able to laugh at oneself
but the dig was too deep
easy to dismiss, not worth it
sometimes i suppose shit is meant to be left buried

from rule number six: there is no win and no fail

with gratitude to two of the greats
and peace to mr. cunningham as he joins his love in the silence

Here we are. Let us say Yes to our presence together in Chaos.
- john cage

so many things are like so many other things

c-clamps on my brain
i miss him like a limb
even though it never really worked
i gave up writing to talk to him today
which is okay
since the whole fun of writing was always to impress him
(and his kind)

photos and deserts and skaters and bombs
clouds and bridges and big big love
my home and my wound
no more
version x.o

rainbow over belfast

free pastry
no luck
dancing in the alley behind the donut store
secret handshakes
biscotti
beer belly
nettle tea
clear mind courtesy of my young heart

wool sweater in july (albeit a thin one)

i've been a vegetarian for more than half my life but i still love the smell of fast
food fried chicken

i can count my real friends on a hand or two
they're the ones who can disappear for a decade
and walk back into your life like they've never been gone
one reappeared today
the second boy i ever kissed
(on the same weekend as the first and third boys i ever kissed)...
a portent of my future slutdom,
which he witnessed with patience and care
he was one of the first boys i knew who would act like a man
but for all his love of asian strippers
i suspect it broke his heart when i married his best friend
(he told his mother to warn my mother about him - i found out too late)

in his honour, a list of my favorite childhood sticker smells:
grass (the lawn kind)
gasoline
grape

i'm sure there must be more

dinner invitation

terrible mistakes are exhausting
i'm going to bed

it wasn't supposed to rain today

why do people fight so hard for things they don't even want?

it already feels like so long ago
the whole world has fallen away now
i still see shadows when the steel grey fog creeps in
the path of the river
he stands with arms outstretched
sometimes he looks away
his shirt, their smiles, the distance
i float, gone away from my watch
maidens and willows and tears...
can't get out from under it

look back, way back
i am going to add "rebound relationship" to my list of special skills...
right after "zombie"

next page

mid-year resolution:
try to get to the end of my to-do list everyday
whining about men has been moved to the bottom
"as long as he was living his life, he could not write about it"
(mr. bowles again, from the desert)
at least, that's the plan

three hundred years of solitude

feels like i should have something special to say
it seems july is the time for signs
as always
i have no idea if they are pointers or warnings
only that they all go backwards
you didn't see me smile at her
too reserved to write beauty but you know i see it
i breathe my optimism
you read my cynicism
and so the truth will out
too much about recognition for these pages
speak to me friend, or not at all

perfect weather

stand at the bus stop with my eyes closed to the wind
listen
think about you and me
three year olds shouldn't know yet how to frown

time machine back to when my world was all possibility
regrets, perhaps a few
but i'm not here now without them
make do with watching the kids i used to babysit grow up
semi-professional musical theatre is much more entertaining than this broken record
it's nice to be reminded
it's never too late to gesture toward someone you have let go

what can't be said, what doesn't it mean?
you will know i am back when i feel like dancing again

ready for the world

Then for a few hours the idea of his actually writing a book had amused him. A journal, filled in each evening with the day's thoughts, carefully seasoned with local color, in which the absolute truth of the theorem he would set forth in the beginning—namely, that the difference between something and nothing is nothing—should be clearly and calmly demonstrated.
(Paul Bowles)

the colour of the wheat

you made me into the her who did you wrong
he made me into the her who could have done him right
i made me into the me who finally sees
sit with this
the heaviness of realization will pass and
i'll be okay on my own
push myself back into reality
i will miss the poems

wicked/inertia

with apologies to dostoevsky
i forgot to notice if he had slipped me his phone number

there's a guy i always check out when i'm in the coffee shop,
he owns the restaurant next door
there's a woman who rents space to teach her yoga class in the building where i work,
i hate her without explanation - i'm mean whenever she asks me for help and i scowl when i pass by her in the halls
yesterday i saw the two of them holding hands on the street
funny how we know our enemies,
who knows what we know, why we know...but we do

for martin

so many times me and rosie were the only girls in the pit, where we talked back to university jock bouncers and came home with black eyes from being kicked in the face with steel toe boots. i wouldn't give it back for anything.

thanks martin, for late nights making me feel not so alone, in bed or driving home, listening to the radio.

grocery store

that's my soul up there

possibility and the fool

the pattern of infinity
slippery ground
saturated, immobile
blind
turn your back, as i stand here and crumble back into the sea
dreamt last night of a dead but beautifully preserved blue peacock, lying on the ground on its back, the delicate aura of plumage gently surrounding his frame
there's a lot out there these days that breaks my heart
they just got the timing wrong is all

requiem

one day i will have a garden

pina

without this woman, the world as I know it would not exist

respect, thanks, and wishes of peace...