Time After Time - 05/12/11

Well, thanks so much
My darling love
For vague
And unsure heartbreak
And it sure feels great
When the night’s so late
And you pick now
To start a fight
You know it’s love to care
But my heart’s not there
She’s gone looking for sanity

And, yes, I know
I do everything wrong
And, yes, I know
That it won’t last long
I’d like to try to be perfect
But nothing makes it seem worth it
So what are we doing?
Where are we going?
Why aren’t we stopping?
Why aren’t we growing?
We’re the same rigid people
Our derivative’s zero

When you lay it out
It’s all my fault
So what does it matter
You’ve done nothing wrong
This won’t last very long
Just relax
Just breathe
Everything will get better
And then it will crumble
Again and again
The same sad cycle
Time after time
Oscillating like the tides
Tearing down sand castles
Time after time

3rd Grade Math - 04/04/11

I hardly recognize
The old school division sign
The x we used to use
To multiply
They’ve all been replaced by
More neatly spaced
Symbology
The new cryptography
For me to decipher

And whatever happened to 3rd grade math?
Well, I can tell you,
It’s a thing of the past,
Because my little brother,
7 time 2 years old
Can’t divide.
And when I heard that
Something in me died,
Because I remember when I first learned
That 5 time 5
Is the area of a square
With a 5 cm side
Something clicked inside.

See, I like math
Because I like my world to make sense
Because I like to understand
And the surest
Purest
Truest way I can see to do that
Is to add, subtract, multiply and divide
I like to integrate and differentiate
So I can explicitly calculate
The persistent existence of
e and pi.

Or tau,
For those of you who may think it’s more accurate
And who may not hold
The same sentimental value
As I do on that number.

I remember the first veil
Lifting when I was eight
As I learned how to calculate
Combinations and permutations
Although I did not quite yet
Experience the sensation
Of fully understanding
Those implications.
That came later.

But each small step
Has been a building block
To this big picture
To where I can see the world
In equations
And if I know the luscious curve
That built your head,
Why, I could find the area of your face

So maybe you can almost understand
How my reactions
Can sometimes get out of hand
When I realize
That my little brother,
7 time 2 years old,
Can’t divide.

But, then,
There’s this girl,
Who is also 7 time 2 years old
Who is at the same level of math
As others in my class
With a calculator in her brain
Able to instantaneously retain
Any combination of numbers
Add, subtract, multiply, divide


I am in love
With the beautiful, sweeping S
Of the limit sun,
With the big wide curves
Next to their skinny little tangent lines.
With the singsong quotient rule
I repeat when I’m stressed,
I repeat when working on homework
That is boring
Or when I wish is was sleeping
But am instead up so late repeating
The singsong quotient rule,
So that makes it alright.

Sometimes, I wish that
The more strange
And more easily changed
And constantly rearranged
Classes, like English and physics,
Were all purely math

And I like long math problems
Tangles of numbers, letters, and signs
That stretch a whole page,
And pull me in
To a half hour
Of scrambling through its maze
And then, upon reaching the finish
That exquisite exhale
Of complete knowledge,
Perfect understanding,
Supreme control
Of the universe
That is governed by those
Long lines of numbers, letters, and symbols.

So you who speak a different language
Like English,
Let me say, as clearly as I can,
That I love mathematics.
And for you how do speak my first language:
M times A to the power of TH,
Is equal to the integral of
e to the x times y.

Why Did You Do It? - 04/04/11

Although I’ve been told that
just because you can
doesn’t mean you should,
I did it because I could.
From choking and rough,
ripping my throat like sandpaper
to a vacuum of openness,
space stretching out
beyond my lungs’ reach.
Cloudless denim skin
sprinkled with lemon cream,
little star shaped sour dollops.
Reflected in that shimmering sky
beautiful, benevolent, brave, bold,
stood on tall legs,
with a head held up.
I did it to meet her.
She promised with glitter dipped words
that there was freedom,
that the world was open,
that there was air.
I would sneak out again
to find her perfect reflection,
if only I could.
I did it because I knew
I could never again.
I did it to breathe.

Who and At - 04/03/11

He says something about words
And the number of them
With the sad music
Purposefully linger in the background
Just loud enough
For its tone
To suck little rays of my soul
Into its dark density
With general relativity equations
And visions of my body
Crushed
Mangled
And thrown away
All floating through my mind
On the same level
As his words about words
And the number of them
In a certain time.

Frequency.
In the past ten minutes,
It has apparently been four.
I don’t bother to check,
I know that aggression
Drives me to make perfectly calculated points,
As well.

It’s not that I’m trying not to talk to him,
Just that I’m trying not to say certain things,
That can never just be said,
Because of the questions,
And the demands to
“Continue.”
It can’t just be let out
In little bursts.
No, everything must be contained
Until I
“Need to vent?”

There is no one to whom I can say:
“I feel like dying,”
And just have that be how I’m feeling,
As common place as
“Fine” or “Okay” or “Well.”
I have no one who will let me say:
“All my current thoughts involve
My death
And a lot of blood”
And just have that be it,
No questions,
No worries,
No weird looks,
Just acceptance.

It’s true enough, though,
That I couldn’t do that for anyone else.
If someone so slightly puts themselves down,
Even a complete stranger,
I have to help,
Be encouraging,
Try to make them feel better.

But is it not acceptance
That makes us feel the best?
Understanding and love,
Just the way we are,
Happy or not,
Fine or not,
Okay, or not?



I realized today,
That the best friend I’ve ever had,
Is the one who has only recently
Been called “my best friend!”
Where were you all my sad life?
Where were you to make fun of me
When I asked the hairdresser
For side-bangs
That I could hide behind?
Where were you to speak softly
As I sat alone at lunch,
Too scared to make new friends?
For the acceptance you have given me,
Even just so recently,
Thank you,
My best friend.

Seeing vs. Believing - 04/03/11

My skin stands prickly,
On end,
As I type so lightly,
Write so brightly,
Sounds as if I’m smiling
As I say words
As I complain
As I hint at an explanation
For the thoughts in my brain

There’s blood
On the words
Dried and old
Hidden
Missed
Because we hear
What we want to
Our brains make things make sense,
Match lip movement with sounds,
Match memories with reality,
Match words others say
With our own thoughts.

So I’m thinking
That I don’t really know anymore
Whether green is green
And whether you say
What you mean
And whether you say
What you say

What I hear,
Although it seems so clear,
Could easily be yellow sunlight,
Not red blood,
So the fact that all I see is blood
Is probably
Completely
In my head.

Malice could be friendly,
And friendly could be cruelty
And every long moment
Could be short.
So what do I know anymore?

Nothing.
Not even the color of the grass
All I have are assumptions
That things are supposed to
Make sense

Condemned to Wonderland - 03/20/11

Well, you’re a goddamn mess
And worst yet,
This is your best
This is you trying hard
To make it far
And keep the crazy
All inside

You’re upset?
Girl, don’t forget
You’re not through yet
You’ve got to
Pull it together
Be stronger than ever
And never admit
You lied

So honey, honey,
I’m loosing my mind
And darling, darling,
I’m out of time
The life I’ve forged
Has just been floored
With ten minutes of silence
So I’m trying to find it
A place to rest
And this wonderland
Seemed the best
I’ll hold it close
With bleeding wrists
And hope it never knows
The normality it’s missed

The lights cut out
And dripping with doubt
You pull yourself out
The murky waters,
Keep it together
If anyone asks
Don’t answer

This isn’t the time to pout
Shake off the frown
Force a smile as you drown
In the murky waters,
Keep it together
If anyone asks
Don’t answer

And I guess it doesn’t matter
And I guess it doesn’t matter
And I guess it never mattered
But if you could hear the clatter
And the tears’ pitter patter
And if you could see me
Purposefully
Walk under ladders
You might understand
Why it might seem
Why I’m condemned
To wonderland

So honey, honey,
I’m loosing my mind
And darling, darling,
I’m out of time
The life I’ve forged
Has just been floored
With ten minutes of silence
So I’m trying to find it
A place to rest
And this wonderland
Seemed the best
I’ll hold it close
With bleeding wrists
And hope it never knows
The normality it’s missed

What do you see in wonderland?
What attraction pulls you in?
All I see
Are broken dreams
And insanity hung
On glitter-dipped strings
There’s something oh so wrong
With this whole scene

And I guess it doesn’t matter
And I guess it doesn’t matter
And I guess it never mattered
But if you could hear the clatter
And the tears’ pitter patter
And if you could see me
Purposefully
Walk under ladders
You might understand
Why might see
Why I’m condemned
To wonderland

What the Gardener Knows - 03/16/11

To a wet spring sky,
The color I profess my eyes
To be,
Sailing over the tall shining buildings,
Which stand like tendrils
Entwining people.
To the liquid diamonds,
Pouring down on fading motherhood,
Chilling my heart with each
Penetration of the skin,
Of the mind,
Of the soul,
Until every part of me is dulled,
Lulled into a diversion
From the tempests
Who strut by on satin clover fields,
Impervious of Satan’s gaze.
To budding hope
Covered in ammonium
And left to shrivel in the
Sidewalk cracks
And the backs of lockers
And behind closed doors,
And under messy beds,
Forever forgotten
Like a single little ladybug
On drenched tendril,
Coiling and coiling
To something just beyond its reach

Another Reason I Hate That Class - 03/10/11

It’s like delicate egg yolks
Wrapped in barbed wire
Shedding my insides
And it isn’t usually like that

Painful, sure
But not like this.
I shouldn’t be waking up
At 2 am,
Screaming and crying,
Because there is something wrong with that.

It supposedly stress,
Which I would deny,
But all my denial this week
Has been used too soon.
It was drawn like blood
When I held my arm to a heater
Until it went numb.
I wasn’t going to say anything
But apparently
That’s denial too,
Like cross bred plants
Still being organic.

In my history class,
We’re learning about all that,
And all the other things
Wrong with all of everything
In all of history.
I don’t understand
Why anyone would want to
Sit through an hour of pointless debate
Over events long passed,
Just steaming
Angry
Furious
As I hold my arm to the heater
And hope it burns and hurts,
But it just goes numb
And everyone is disappointed
When the bell rings.

I heard my English teacher,
While reciting a beautiful poem
That she had written,
Frightenedly mumble “fuck”
A wisp of what I’ve been told is
A powerful word.
Like someone was going to take offence,
Like a little anger would end everything,
Like if maybe someone got mad
And did something
Something might change
And like that was a bad thing.

You know what I think?
I think too much.
And I think all the time.
And I think in words,
And rhymes
With breaks in the lines
Like my whole life is just one poem
One depressing poem
That just doesn’t know when
To end.
And I think that I fall flat on my face
When there’s something I need to face
That I slip up
When I need to stick up.
That I pull out
When it’s time to put in.
That I can’t get angry
Except at myself,
And even that is slowly jerked into
The sadness of sticky red fingers.
That I want to bleed
But I’m afraid of blood.
That I do the worst
When I’m not paying attention
And then feel the best.
That you still don’t get
What I’m talking about.
That I really wish you did.
That I knew you wouldn’t
And thought that anyways,
Wrote this anyways,
So I could have another excuse to
Hate my poor, pitiful self.

So there should be some hope somewhere
And this is supposed to be the stanza
Where I add it,
But what do I know
About hope and love?
What do I know about happiness?
All I have is a heater
And the sharp point of a forgotten staple.

I Would Be Prettier If I Looked Like Her - 03-03-11

99 cent dreams
99 cent dreams
Come my children
Find the perfect fitting scheme
To wrap your life around
Until it all comes crashing down,
Find something to make your heart pound
Until the failure
Is unbearable
And you find yourself starting to drown
In your 99 cent dreams
All cast on the ground
Like wedding scene
From someone else’s hometown
With some other girl
In your wedding gown
With hundred dollar dreams
And your frown upside down
On the arm of a picture
You’ve tried hard to see
In your own blurry
99 cent dreams
She walks down the aisle
In hundred dollar dream heels
Looking at you
Like your supposed to smile
With your 99 cent squeals
Making her day
Like any other deals
Think about how her hundred dollar
Dreams will break
Once it’s too late
For her to fix even one mistake
But you’ve got practice
On taking stakes
With your 99 cent dreams
Turning peaceful nights
Into restless screams
Struggling to understand
Your fright
Or his flight
Or the famine of love
Or the absence of light
So with your shoes on too tight
You hold your head high
Don’t care who sees you cry
And run off to buy
More 99 cent dreams
More 99 cent dreams

Let Me Take a Note from Tunisia - 03-01-11

Ladies and Gentlemen,
adults with baby brains,
kickin’ back to the glare
and the snare
of FOX News,
listening to whatever
and whoever
is on the radio,
turning the dial low,
making your brain slow

Let me remind you Americans
what the people of Tunisia
recently discovered,
let me inform you
what the people of Egypt
have uncovered.
Come and hear the wisdom
of Yemen, Bahrain, and Jordan.
Listen to the secrets
of Greece, Algeria and Sudan.

We are oppresses
by the clothes in which we’ve dressed,
by the revolutions we’ve missed,
by the chemical lips we’ve kissed,
by the star lit crack addicts we’re caresses,
by the companies we’ve supported,
their causes we’ve donated to,
by the way we’ve paraded to
their mass sales,
throwing workers wages back at you.
The consumed consumer.
The used user.
The obsolete treat
to freedom’s enemy,
the television.
By everything you see,
all the Barbie dolls you try to be,
every advertisement you believe.

That moment when you stop perceiving
and start following.
The moment when you stop following
and sit down.
When we sign our votes to companies,
and disregard epiphanies,
and throw poets away
to the modern day Gulags
of writing crap pop songs
that someone else will sing.
When what Lady Gaga
wore to the Grammy’s
is more important than the riots in the streets.

And here’s the ultimate plot twist,
the deadly kiss,
the last lisped words
of hope:
they look to us.
People in other nations,
praying for freedom,
marching for liberty,
bleeding for basic, human, rights
look to us.
We symbolize freedom,
we symbolize progress,
we symbolize equality.
We have women senators,
but I still wouldn’t earn as much as a man
for the same job.
We have a melting pot of culture,
but Portland only has nine Synagogues
among endless churches.
We have the first black president,
and we beat gay men to death.

You know,
I won’t debate over the second amendment,
because we were given it
for a reason:
so that when the government
- our government -
commits treason
we can correct them
and protect
what we are currently
neglecting to respect.

Freedom.
It’s more than a constitution,
it’s a state of mind.
and the reason not every dictatorship is revolting
is because some have bigger things on their minds,
like their next meal
and clean water
and their children’s lives.

And we?
We have the Oscar’s.

Roaring 20s - 03-01-11

Should’ve been born in the 1920s.
Shouldn’t been a rebel girl
with my rain boots unlaced,
flapping around like jazz notes
blowing away all the German spiders
and sticking to billboards like price tags.
Should’ve bobbed my hair short as my skirt.
Should’ve given Queen Victoria the finger
and caresses Langston’s black neck
the way his words wooed my soul.
Should’ve sang with Margret Sanger
about ending the pain in my ovaries
and spreading my legs without worry.
Should’ve run around with DuBois
and lynched the freaks in the sheets,
not the knights in Harlem.
Should’ve run to the lights,
to the glamour and clamor,
to the growing cities like healthy children,
rocketing to the sky with hopes.
Should’ve laughed in the flowers
and gazed at the clouds with Georgia O’Keefe.
Should’ve head butted the traditionalist for firing Scopes.
Should’ve stayed out late with the Jewish.
Should’ve danced with the Polish.
Should’ve drank bootlegged beers with an Irish fellow,
out in the woods with painted lips
that sneered at mothers and puckered at men.
Should’ve seen the world for the first time
in a black and white news reel
with maritime music.
Should’ve cheered for Babe and laughed at Chaplin.
Should’ve lived and loved.
Should’ve drowned in culture and possibilities.



Historical context:
In my history class, we are currently learning about the Roaring Twenties.  This was a time of cultural revolution.  The traditional Protestant ways of the United States were being challenged by Pluralism - being of more than one belief.  This was the time of Woman’s Suffrage and the sexual revolution, where flappers wore short skirts, drank beer, and defied their mothers.  The flapper was named after the fashion of wearing rain boots without lacing them up so they made a flapping sound.  This was also the first instance of birth control, promoted by Margret Sanger.
This was the time of the Harlem Renaissance, an explosion of African American culture in New York, of jazz, poetry, and art.  Langston Hughes was one of the foremost poets of that time, and if you’ve never heard of him, please look up “Mother to Son” because it is amazing.  African America rights movement took off, With W.E.D. DuBois advocating for blacks to not just accept what they could from white, oppressive government, but to fight for their rights.
This was the time of mass immigration and the true beginnings of America’s “melting pot” idea, that, until then, had honestly not been followed.  People of all races moved into cities and learned about each other.  Old ideas were replaced with a conglomerate of the new.  Catholics in the USA formed a tradition of football watching.  A person could be of two worlds, that of their decent, be it Polish, Jewish, or Irish, and also be an American.
This was the time of learning about the world.  Mass use of radio and the first movies with sound brought news from all over the world to American citizens, letting them expand their view.  It was the time of the skyscraper, of the big city, of innovation.
I have been greatly inspired by this era.  Yes, I know it wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty freaking awesome, you have to admit.

It Takes a Certain Kind of Person to Ruin Snow - 02/24/11

It's snowing,
snowing in February,
angels of ice glittering from the sky
with the grace of stars,
in flurries
in gallops
in dance steps
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3
I throw my head back
and let their cold kisses hit my tongue
before the bickering
and the fighting
overwhelms my senses,
cuts off the feel of the cold
and smell of the water
and the taste of the flakes
and the sight of stars falling to the earth
with a dance.

So, broken and breaking even more,
we walk home
past the pretty, purple strip club.
Woman on their break,
their cigarette smoke meeting the snowflakes,
dashing together like star-crossed lovers,
but eventually both dying;
past light posts that illuminate the snow drift,
showing each dancer in her own spotlight,
then each flickering off stage;
past spouses holding hands
with their children laughing.

Snowflakes hit the ground and melt
but the atmosphere my family creates
makes it feel like they turn to water
before they can even hit my face.

I Wish I Was a Whore - 02/23/11

Some skinny little skank,
leaning callously against a blue bus stop sign,
her fake red hair contrasting,
taking a long, brutal drag
off a bummed cigarette;
looked at me as I passed and said,
"You're wrong, girl."

I stopped, in my orange tennis shoes,
my fading jeans,
my tangled hair lazily assembled because what matter was
what was underneath it.
I stopped because she said I was wrong
and I was going to be a physics major,
and I was in the
amazing, stupendous, rigorous, monumental,
over-hyped IB,
and I was good at tests.

I stared at her seductive clothes,
clinging perfectly to her curved body,
like she was a store mannequin come to life,
like she was made to look good.
She used two painted nails
to throw the cigarette to the curb
and black, shiny heals
to stomp out the flame.
She exhaled smoke and perfume and said,
as she breathed,
"You're wrong, girl."

Buses come to that stop
with a irregularity
that makes my mechanical heart twitch
like it's organic.
But she stood there,
leaning,
breathing,
inky eyes cast down the street
with a carelessness
that must be what makes sex sound so good.

"You're wrong, girl,
because you know, but you don't understand.
You don't wait:
you jump in on the lab before you know how to do it.
You don't stop:
if it's written, it's written, and you're turning it in.
But you're wrong,
because you are good at taking tests,
but you've never been tested.
Because you're smart,
but you've never smarted.
Because you actually have,
and you won't admit it,
Because you're not a physics major,
you're a poet in denial."

If I Was a Poet - 02/20/11

If I was a poet the likes of
Pablo Neruda
who fills my teammates' memories,
quoting him like a deity
like Buddha
like all the words of all the languages,
were his
to mold and cradle with the tender kiss
of a mother,
then maybe I could find a way
to explain
the stars’ attraction,
pain’s satisfaction,
and why I feel the need to be needed,
want to be wanted,
and love being loved.

If I was a poet the likes of
Charles Bukowski
with his sarcasm,
his energy,
his honesty and lack of apology,
maybe I could then just tell you all
that it sucks
everything does
but you do it anyways.
just do it.
That you live and you live and then you die
and that is okay,
as long as you lived.

And if I was a poet the likes of
Mikel Jollett
then maybe I could serenade
the broken hearts with music
with rhythm
with chilling images
with pure emotion
with love and hate
mixed and mingled and torn
torn right down the middle and taped together

If I was a poet the likes of
Tori Amos
if I had a voice to yell my words
my words and my soul
to tell the world my soul
then maybe I could be free of paper and pencils
and trying to convey inflection
though line breaks.
Maybe I could make life make sense.

So We Both Love Rivers - 02/19/11

Here,
in the dying light of a year long Saturday,
the sky already so dark that I,
a writer so practiced,
can barely make out my pencil’s tip,
do write on the back of a map that was supposed
to lead me to victory so sweet,
how I ended up by the river,
a year passed and no change:
it flows.
The river gathers and flows.
So everly it flows even as darkness
of sky and soul
cloud my vision.
It flows.

The trees arch over it
as they did last year,
as the will next year,
one dead and I remember.

Remember the way back
perfectly, not one wrong turn,
even though I doubted,
but here I am,
flowing.

The river does not whisper to me
the way it did the Brahmin prince,
does not tell me its secrets.
Have I not lost enough?
Have I not completed an experience ascetic enough
to beg pity from this river,
flowing?
So, alone, I sit,
where I once stood,
holding a love,
touching lips for the first time,
learning, passing on.

Back to the setting sun,
I sit.
The river flows.

And I love so I will
flow back
to where I came from
but wander slowly shall my feet
with my heart’s slow beat
of mourn.
And as I wander, I do wonder
what has happened by the river?
I fell beside it,
empty and heavy,
dreading to move,
feeling so little,
but as I wandered back and wondered,
there was the river,
filling my heart,
filling it, but making it light.

So full and so light.