cute brown dog, dead bird

i need to pay more attention
i need to learn to dodge bullets
i need to figure out how to say no
i need to stop getting myself into these messes
i need to stop caring about why
we all have our reasons

it's so easy to make friends with animals
not like people

sleep catches up with me
blindsides me
i have dreams about losing my mojo

why does rain smell like metal sometimes?

this is my life / love story

tonight i went to a fundraiser at a gay bar where i saw a drag queen named sofonda cox do her rendition of a kelly clarkson song. i don't even know who kelly clarkson is, but i'm sure sofonda cox is way more awesome. i watched my friend (wearing a gold sequined unitard) jump on a mini-trampoline in time to some techno song while my other friend (wearing a shiny metallic speedo) humped a leopard-print covered bed, also in time to the music. i saw a few old men, and even a dog, dancing (on film). i smiled. i also won a raffle prize and caught up with an old friend in between acts. all the young gay boys love me too, and i, them. it is safe to be honest and easy to be kind.

next week i will travel back in time. the secret fantasy is that i will also travel forward while i'm at it. then an awkward work gathering, editing and cleaning, a birthday, a birthday boy, a goodbye, an anniversary, an investigation, and a hello if all goes well. i no longer sleep so this will not be too much.

i wonder about absence, i am surprised by presence, i am trying not to take everything so personally, i am trying to no longer be as resistant to change as i have always been. he was riding on oceans, someone said the other night. i will learn to surf.

new carpet

it looks like they're planning to tear down the rest of the fire trap on the corner...i imagine the lilac will be destroyed in the process...i understand the idea of having to sacrifice something beautiful in order to avoid disaster farther on down the road, but it doesn't mean i have to like it

i keep having dreams about the place i lived growing up...it only occurred to me tonight that this might be about him

the wisteria in the tree blooms this year and the seeds i gathered have overcome both pests and poison

feeling optimistic tonight

the sky was a lovely shade of purple this evening

surrounded

lullaby
it's astonishing how many of them heard me
dark, love, sleep

daybreak

it's basically irrelevant since no one comes around here anymore talking to myself find a way to make it through one week until this passes maybe then it will be fine - i hate this now how it goes how it turns how my head spins sick from it all i may not return have lost my will my faith my hope my words my ability to make logic and order it all runs together how desperately i wish i could sleep maybe the end of this place i will breathe and lie and dream of planes and love and pray

the unbearable...ness of being (me)

it warms my heart (and my ego) to know that at least there are lots of old gay men who love me

flirting with germans

my investigations are centred around the following questions:

- if we hadn't been waiting for godot, would i have had the nerve to sit right next to him?
- what exactly is it that necessitates my exclusion?
- did he wonder what i was writing the whole time i should have been watching him?
- does it have to be dangerous for me to be interested? (exquisite craft on one side of the coin, real gambles with chance on the other)
- when we made eye contact, did it count for anything?
- how many of us wish we could go back and start this dance all over again?

my money for the best lover is on the one who listens, not the one who shows you he can

green socks and mixed tapes and black angels and karaoke

hawk valley afternoon / erasure

testing my own lies
finding the ground under my feet
unexpected
welcomed

for a change i'm not actually sad about anything (except maybe the plane ticket the computer won't let me book), i just have this this song stuck in my head.

nightmares

haven't had one like that in forever

disappointment ball

watching the wrong path, i follow mine
twitching, this energy is fast and dark
(rapids on the river prut)
brace myself...
only go as far as you know how to come back from
training wheels
less release on the left side
blank
open
beautiful
it's too bad you missed this

i need to pee
i need to write

i found my anger in the place i least expected it
in hindsight, it all pulls to the right,
away from the left
tears when i go out to the edge
feet asleep
gather the energy back to the centre
relax
it is not time yet to turn my head to the sky
choke
breathe

i need to explore my painter side
rest in the image
the lights are on
i am home
don't look now,
i will find him if he's there
i wish i could sculpt the pictures inside my head
when you close your eyes, that's all there is...

acrid smell of ballpoint
i push my cheek into this grey floor
it was here in this brick room with its yellow band that i danced my you
for me

break

midnight

what's weird is when you randomly meet up with your ex-husband on an empty streetcar

rainbows

Q. why is a math book so sad?

A. because it has so many problems.

green

i still wish you were who i know now you are not

magic seed eaten down to nothing
sprinkled with poison, it grows again

it is hard not to covet
when everybody but me has what i want
(yes, i owe my relatively youthful appearance to the fact that i am still a child)

dinosaur tails and cupcakes

my life is pretty strange sometimes
so are other people
incomprehensible, actually
i'm trying not to stress about it
tonight a young untouchable one hugged me while a rejected old one looked on
that was fun

no wonder

full moon in scorpio
he said
mercury in retrograde
she said...

this is the real shadow test
deep sea diving
dying before my eyes,
i still can't look
draw near
touch...
find a way to stay here
open
until it's time to come up for air
that glint will save me
(we have matching glasses)
magical three
i will practice remembering the bright side
while i search the bottom

vigil

i was thinking about how sometimes it's best not to look down
i was in the middle of writing something important
when the lights went out again
i was perplexed but of course it's the moon
good thing this time i knew exactly where to look for my candle holders
missed a call
ignore the sounds
damned if i do and damned if i don't
he told me he just sleeps his life away now
"just like they did in the gulags"
i will leave the candles on long enough to breathe
and find my way into the luxury of sleep
the trick will be to catch the moment between
there is a strange sort of satisfaction in watching it burn down to nothing
goddess of mercy
pray for me
i know not what i've done

baby food

cherry blossoms
full moon in a navy blue sky
a gathering of strong, smart women
i haven't been to school in at least a year
my keys no longer work
my ID card now does magic things
and they have since invented ways to cite electronic media
my beautiful bald brown man still works at the library
and it's still the only bus in town where every guy will be most intrigued by the girl sitting alone in the back, lost in her thick book and its big ideas
(they think she doesn't notice them staring, but she feels them, she does)

maybe they are here to make me see
all i need to breathe is light

mystified

resigned

how is it still here?

he saw me smile today

tonight an old man approached and asked where he knew me from
"are you on TV?"
it was the boots, no man can escape their charms
(balanced by the cute $12 on sale dress score)
requisite friendly polite response
his wife was less than impressed

eloquent writings on the ignoring of miracles
one mustn't...it is as simple as this

i don't know what she means
freedom...what did it say to him?
where have they gone?
my eyes burn with the tears of fatigue

variations on the theme of empty
stay, okay?

i miss not being afraid to go to sleep

it ate my fucking couch
in happier news, he reminds me of things I have forgotten
(in good ways)

estuary

now i have to watch the matrix again to see if it's true that my keanu is a bad actor
(he should never, NEVER, do a foreign accent again, that much i concur)

wait and see...
i wish i hadn't lost that song

search party

most of the time i really prefer to be still and quiet
listening...
i trapped the little guy from returning to his home
so now he will die in mine (if he hasn't already)
serves me right

beside myself

calm
storms and moons and armies of fire
showers of magnolia petals
what if this is where the river ends
and not where it left off
travelling upstream
plant some monkeys in the tree
watch the torch light on the other side
finally, dusk has come

little buddha

twenty years later and everything is still pretty much the same
"great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds."
that t-shirt saved my sanity then, as being reminded of it does now -
actually a misquote of sir einstein from a 1940 issue of the new york times...
sometimes it's nicer when the poetry wins
even if it's wrong