The Things We Won’t Admit To Ourselves
“Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know” —Hemingway
I’m better at surprises now. The dreams are enormous. We are lying on a paisley blanket beneath a sunburst sky. I have the hiccups. You have the why’s. Why is it you? You’ve interpolated my verbiage and now all I want to do is go house shopping. Stereotype meteorology by staring stars down. Ruminate in my ruffles. Sing in the shower “I’m a movement by myself, but I’m a force when we’re togetherrrrrrrrrr!” I want to know you better. Better, I want to know. Immobilized manic and idiosyncratic, I’ll curtsey for you. I’ll fiddle enchantless, err enchantress. Had a dream I was dreaming and you and I were staring into each others’ keyholes. Real slow. Not the sinkhole, but the peephole, I meant the eyelid, but really the heartbeat. Was I locked and will I open? Or was it moving slowly enough while I baked organic chicken and roasted vegetables? A blue supernova’d you on the line of barely. A tizzied skyride this is. See. Look at me, no hands? Or fear. And we both watch as the universe reverts, as joy rips holes into—not the line drawn but the line crossed. Not the line but the warning. Not the line but the stepping over, the kiss in which we’ve woven in me is you. Not you, but your butterskin-wandering, maybe you and an endless hot bath I wonder? I’m better at surprises now. The dreams are miniscule. We are sitting back to back on a plaid blanket in the middle of a somewhere beneath an utterly alone, no underneath a broken pie. I have incessant cough attacks. You have the why’s. Why is it I? Why is it why? I Can’t think of anything but how this lemonade is going to taste?
Dreamskating
Dreamskating.
There’s a moment, in the dark, wanted to talk ‘til I sunk.
A sketchwork glow. A patchwork quote. A skeptic overdosing on the tips.
Careful, I might fall in love with the shipwreck. I want. I want.
I want it at the creases where the please starts leaking spring water.
I will start from the matchstick and capture it, every inch.
I will redefine our kisses in skittish, jump from the rim.
And read to you read to you read to you.
I’ll explain later. Too busy.
Spilt
I think he’s drunk dialing me in his sleep,
from a foreign country,
and the background noise is fluffy,
but still I made out how much he loves me.
Grabbing my pinky,
swinging it around,
calling me a clown fish,
telling me to drown here.
He’s coming.
On his way.
Go on ahead without him.
He’ll catch up.
Meanwhile, the petunias are blooming together across the overhead projector.
I cannot teach class today I’m dying of reciprocation asphyxiation.
Just once,
did I want,
someone to play better poker,
wake up playfully humming the peach rose petals out,
slowly, no—slower.
Just once,
did I need,
someone to call my bluff,
blow bubbles in the figments, the harp in my heart, the magic.
Cartoons are on,
acrylics over canvas
and little pink splishes of wine we had until we were silly enough.
He was lights on, then off,
black gate pulling across the entryway,
shaking head ‘no, we’re closed,’
when I can see everything I need in the front window.
The day we hung up
I wanted to walk him alongside that wine glass
two-thirds of the way finished,
but the door evaporated as it closed gently behind him.
They say not to cry over the spilt,
but I’m not sure there’s anything better to cry over.
And the song of the week, you have to hear: “Moving in You, Moving in Me”
The stick figure girl is from my stop motion animations, if I figure out how to upload them as little movies, I might share.
My Poems are featured in The Scrambler today
I read at Beyond Baroque last night, and two of my poems are featured in “The Scrambler” today:
“Went to Bed and a Kite Sunk” and “Wildflowers”
Click my picture to read them:
Performing last night at Beyond Baroque in Venice, CA
Desk Mess, Pretty Lamp, and Betsy Lerner love
I juggle: Write. Read The Forest for the Trees, Betsy Lerner. Study Craft. Sleep. Moscato Asti. Sleep. Fight Pillows. Poetry. Overthunk. Kiss Puppy. New Lamp. School Shopping for 6th grader. Play Writer’s Toolbox. Ipad2. Macbook. Writing Center later. French Vanilla. Revise: Chapters 1-4. PANIC. Backed up laundry. Fashion/Poetry Blog. 10 loads all waiting in my laundry room for me, to get it together. Rinse. Repeat.
The Habitual Poet: Lalanii Grant
My interview has been published in Poemeleon’s Literary Journal.
You’ve just gotta read this post at my Journal. Click on my breakfast.
One of the best quotes ever
“If all we can ever know comes filtered through the lens of our own experience, and if we are readers, some part of our very selves will be the result of what we have read—this is obvious enough. Good writers not only have read widely and deeply, but they continue to do so—not in order to be better writers, but because for them the act of reading is as inseparable from living as writing is.”
Everybody. I’m drowning: in books, new gig, and end of project period responsibilities. I have sooo much work I’m doing a lock-in… for the entire weekend.
Wish me luck, I’m definitely going to die trying. & so it is.
