Soon, my girl

I leave in two weeks. 12 days, actually. Holy crap. TWELVE DAYS. That can't be right. Twelve days. I'm 17 years old, I'm a high school drop out, and I'm leaving home in twelve days. And I still have nothing packed, have only gone through two boxes of books (that's out of 15, my friend), and....and...I don't even need an and, do I? I know that leaving home is an important step, and though I don't think I'm ready, I'm pretty sure that now is just as good as time as any. There's nothing left to do here. As it is, I'm just staying at home, working a little, but not doing much. I move, I start gaining my residency, I start going to college, I become a teacher, that's something. My dreams will never just happen if I stay at home.

But twelve days? That makes me want to stay at home, makes me want to find my little sister and tickle her and read to her, makes me want to chase the cats and then dangle lunch meat in front of them (they do tricks to write home about, I tell you!). It makes me suddenly not want to leave.

Most awful of all? I'm so stressed I can't even write poetry. Le SIGH.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

Nine to five.

Yay job!!

my cup runneth over with words; they become poetry

i have a photo album
sitting on my dresser
it is filled with love
my Lost Boys and Girls,
smiling at up at the camera
and me, as I walk away.

is this what life is?
giving love and then,
leaving, with one last smile,
a hug, muttered "I love you?"

that's okay, then.
these pictures of my TJ and Danielle,
Maria and Kevin,
all I have left of them,

it is enough to know i loved them and they smiled
back at me, my broken children, born to be left behind
and beautiful.


we humankind
we put up so many shells.
first the shell of our clothes, than our body,
our muscles, our fat,
the red of our blood, coursing through thick veins,
but all this cannot cover our center,
not our heart or our minds
but our spirits, hidden safe inside.
let down the walls.
lay yourself bare.
we do not touch skin to skin,
flesh to flesh,
but truth to truth,
love to love to love to love,
and spirit to spirit.

Is it possible that one's anti-depressants only take affect after 0ne in the morning? Because here I am, after having an abysmal day, utterly overjoyed. Of course, it also happens to be 2 AM. How terrifically helpful.

None the less, today was surprisingly good, for a non-working high school drop out. Oh man, that description of me does so much justice. I love it. Anyway, I made food for dinner guests, which makes me feel productive, and I tried to curl my hair, which was a waste of time, as I have hair that would not, could not curl for a .... pearl? It's just that stubborn, Seuss. A surprisingly good day, and yet it felt abysmal until just now. Huh?

Also, most fabulously, I will soon be babysitting during the day, which will be a relief. Especially since an almost one year old--pretty much my favorite age EVER. Toddlers are so adorable, especially when they are first walking.

And that's me. Bowling with kids from the Center for the Visually Impaired tomorrow here in Atlanta...yeah, I'm freakin' excited. Haven't got my dose of that since I quit school. Man, I need me fix.

I'm leaving Oz.

I've been clicking my heels
Since I saw the golden fields
Fade away out the back of our van,
Frances the cat mewing beside me.

It was hard to let go of
Thunderstorms and tornado warnings,
The smell of my uncle's farm,
My grandma's salt licks,
Waiting for the deer she loved.
Every time I thought of home,
I saw the Taco Bell on the corner.
Dillon's, red cursive bright against the tan building,
the D always looked like a G.

I'm still clicking these heels
And it seems I have finally got a pair
Of ruby red shoes,
and as they click this last time,
the Kansas sun catches their sparkle
and I land safe in the flaky Midwestern snow.

not poetry number 1

Today was my last day of high school, so I'm thinking, hey, why not turn over a new leaf? I think I'm going to start writing in prose now and then. Bad poetry is fabulous and what not--and it is certainly fantastic with a bottle of sparkling grape Mormon wine--but I want to actually get my thoughts out, not just the children of my thoughts or the parents or the second cousins or you really honestly get the point.

So, today, October Seventh, Two Thousand Seven, new leaf, new way. Doens't mean I'll stop the poetry, it is still my oh so favoritist thing, but I'm going to try this new thing, this prose thing, this journal thing.

It's like a blog. Geesh.

and oh they growed up so fast

i looked at my parents tonight
and did not see the superheros of my childhood
or the demons of my teenage years.
i saw a man, in his forties, overworked,
tired, concerned.
a woman, early fifties, worn down,
frustrated.
i saw friends,
my first friends,
who have given themselves
to me, progeny,
and i love them,
human kind,
brother, sister.


i categorize my belongings in mind.
this i will take,
this i will leave behind.
value is lost and gained
by portability,
functionality.
two suitcases and a purse
don't carry much baggage.

all houses have stories

My house was built
On a bed of dead leaves
Fallen in the autumn of '84.
The workmen's' boots crunched in the piles
their sickly sweet cigarette smoke
Mingling with their breath in the fall air
Faces and ships taking shape in the fog
and taking off for a better place.

new world

early morning intoxicates me
like wine nor gin ever could.
my body is alive at the possibilities
existing in the dark out my window.
i can still hear the bugs
gathered like pilgrims on my roof,
i slip out through the window and stand.
no queen, no king,
but a disciple, bowing before the bzz of the mosquitoes
my arms and legs sacrificial meat.
katy dids scream out their methodical clamor
and i bow to that too.
a firefly passes by
and i almost fall off my roof, stretching to pet it.
it's soft glow is all the light we need in this new world.

i have no poetry now.

it's been too long. :(

laundry

regrets? i got a few.
wishes? show me mine and i'll show you yours.
dreams and goals?
they're on my sleeve
and i'm washing my shirt.
i'm washing my conscience, I guess.
it seems like it could come in handy.

Sunday morning, you are my sunshine

I smell Sunday morning in my dreams
Long before i stir.
My blindless window catches fire
With the rising new day
And the birds sing out of key
Warming up for later praises.
Sunday morning shakes me
I read postsecret in my bed
and write poems on my roof.
On Sunday mornings,
a Veil is torn.
And all over the world,
Truth falls, rain from the Sun.

sliced apples
sitting
in the
pink bowl
on the
dirty table
is
summer.

dragons are no match
for my hands,
strong and sharp
on their slimy golden scales.
i go against the pattern
and they squirm in discomfort.
success? yes.

walk down to the chatahoochie.
look into the ripples of the river.
see the past in the bank and the sand.
write my name in the tide
and walk away, back to home.

smooth air of atlanta in the spring
you make my breath smell like rain
and stories and lore
of the southern voo doo land.

Swinging: An Epic

I. The Girl

My hands chafe already
the callous of a ten year old long fallen
into their epidurmal graveyard.
I kick against the ground and rise
rise into the blue sunshine.

II. The Revelutionary

Thoughts gather inside me--
whole armies lined up straight--
and they are itching for battle,
cascading into the boom of a canon
as I decide, once for all,
I will change the world
falling back into the arms of the wind
kicking down the walls of gravity.

III. The Girl, Again

My legs caress the clouds
and my head soars like Icarus and Daedalus.
My backyard is so real this far up
and as I fall back into it
I can see the future.

IV. Last

I rise.
I fall.

at night I am not the owl
but the mouse.
and sleeplessness pounces on me
and swoops down on me
and devours me
and leaves me with no protest.


look at you my generation.
you don't want to know who you are
so you drown it all in the glossy amber glow
of late nights and the fragrant clouds
of afternoons left blank.
I've got a cold bucket
filled with nature's finest
and I'm not afraid
to intoxicate you with freshness.
wake up, kids.
there is too much to do
to lie there...mind gone.

jack and i go way back, son

On the Road
The hands of asphalt snake up
Kraken under concrete
Twirling round my ankles
they hold, firm.
Jack Keroauc set out with twenty
and his name.
I've got a little bit more--
maybe thirty and my hope
in something better
found in tar painted wilderness of America.
I want to wake up somewhere
with my back sore from the ground.
I want to fight for my right to live
on the battle ground of all America.
Maybe Jack was running away.
Maybe I'm running away.
But I think--
I think---
it's better to run to something you want
than to stand still in somewhere you hate.

Under My Dreams There Are Dreams
Foghorn coming through my window
midmorning birds calling to each other--
"come away I've found food come away
I've found you"--
I am asleep.
I put my clothes on asleep and I eat my breakfast
asleep and I look in the mirror asleep and I see
the dream in a little girl's eyes.
My alarm clock is broken
and I am do not know how to fix it.

can you see my black emo roots? dagum, cuz HERE THEY ARE

i threw my running shoes into the give away box before i left.
they were too big for me. and i wouldn't need them in georgia.
i keep wishing for them.
i want to put them on and start out slow in the rough paved road in front
and then let speed catch me up as i move further and further away.
i want to out run emptiness and loneliness and a good many other nessess.

who waterloo?

My father can make few things in the kitchen
the whirl of hard counters and ripe fruit sensory overload
to his engineer's mind
but on Sunday's when my mother has
fallen fast and soundless into bed
he strides through
Napoleon in a white shirt and tie
first the bread, thick and brown, lathered with sweet cream butter
The cheese now
sliced by sword and his determind shaky hand
the smell of the dirty griddle rises through the house,
last weeks' sandwiches now burnt on
he slaps his babies down, like spanking the griddle for some misdeed
it sing sizzles into the afternoon air
and calls us in.
We have never heard of Waterloo.


the later it gets
the hotter my room
it's my early morning bath
in the moist sleepless humidity.