A poem for now...


Little Stones at My Window

Once in a while
joy throws little stones at my window
it wants to let me know that it's waiting for me
but today I'm calm
I'd almost say even-tempered
I'm going to keep anxiety locked up
and then lie flat on my back
which is an elegant and comfortable positionfor receiving and believing news
who knows where I'll be next
or when my story will be taken into account
who knows what advice I still might come up with
and what easy way out I'll take not to follow it
don't worry, I won't gamble with an eviction
I won't tattoo remembering with forgetting
there are many things left to say and suppress
and many grapes left to fill our mouths
don't worry, I'm convinced
joy doesn't need to throw any more little stones
I'm comingI'm coming.

Mario Benedetti

Two old ladies in a rocking chair blowing bubbles with purple hair

Today is bob's birthday. She is one of the group of three that is our trinity. bob came into my life over a decade ago. The first time I saw her speak I thought, "I need to know this person because she is brilliant." We didn't really talk too much and then I went to France for a year. Fortunately when I came back we ended up at a foreign language magnet school together. She was studying Japanese and I pretended to study French. We rode the bus together and after a few awkward times where I would sit next to her and say nothing for an hour she warmed up to me. (Neither of us can remember how or why so maybe it was just destiny bonking us over the head and saying, "Damn it! How many more signs do you need!")
The rest is history because we have spent the last 13 years reading each other's minds and being each other's best confidants.
I can't say words to define how grateful I am to the universe for this human being. She is full of light and hope and can always make me laugh. (That is a big deal because we all know I don't have a sense of humor). On her birthday I honor who she is and the beauty she has brought into my life. I love you bob!!!

Town Greeter

This morning I had one of those moments that I really like on the bus. I was sitting there with my music and my book making a little world in my head. I love those moments because I am surrounded by things that are beautiful to me regardless of the outside environment.
I thought to myself about how I was living outside of my present moment and that maybe I should take a break and observe people the way Bug does. In response the universe put a very angry man next to me. He had a crate that he slammed on the floor with newspaper in it. He took some of the newspaper and put it down on the seat and sat next to me looking at the time feverishly and occasionally making gestures I didn't understand with his hands. I was thinking about what might be the conflict he was feeling. I didn't really like this opening to the outside world but he reminded me of someone else.
When I lived in the north of Italy, I was surprised by the coldness of people. I always had this stereotype that Italian people were warm and friendly. A lot of them are but in the north people are more reserved until they know you. I would walk down the little streets of my tiny city, Seregno. The weather would be cold and the unsmiling faces would make everything seem a little greyer. There was this man that walked up and down the streets. He was the town "crazy" person. Every day make his rounds smiling at everyone and saying hello. It was a compulsive kind hello. He dressed in beautiful suits and just stuck to his greeting occupation. I used to think he was the only sane one. He wanted some human interaction and all he encountered was the winter of a society's busy obsession with nothing.
Today I thought of the man in Italy and wondered why the man next to me was so angry. Was he once a town greeter too?

Holi's hands

(Don't tell her because she will get embarrassed)

Holders of my heart
Warm, caring
Beautifully scarred
echoes of motion
Creators, Artists, Lovers
Tools and Feelings

holders of my thoughts
Fingers made out of my emotions
Recreation of the exact moment
Recreation of my Self
I know I am when I am touched
"How am I not myself"

Coffee Shop

I am in a little coffee shop trying to concentrate on my work and thinking of writing. It really doesn't matter what I write. I want to dedicate my days to writing and reading. I am currently reading E.M. Forster. I am reading a collection of his posthumous work. This concept freaks me out a little bit. I always wonder if it was meant to be published at all. It is sad to think about how we commercialize creation. ...I digress. When he died they found all manor of unpublished works. There were plays, poems, short stories, essays, talks....and that is before you consider that he also had letters diaries and notebooks. Right now this is the best I can do..This and my emails and about a poem a month. My fingers are sore anyway.
I love this moment because I am listening to beautiful music with my book nearby. There are ideas everywhere and there was a bird here. The door opened and a bird flew in. It stayed over the place where my head is. The door stayed opened and the sun came in to be part of the idea of a Sunday afternoon. I was comforted by the idea of a creature hanging with us while people screamed for fear that this being might attack him. Strange.

Tangled hair and painted ideas

Today I went to the beach. I went for a walk with some music that puts me into the world outside of the chaos called normalcy. I went on a job interview earlier this week and I thought of the difference between who I am and who I am pretending to be. I don't think of myself as a sell out. I genuinely care about and enjoy the philosophfy that I put into my work. What I don't like is the politicking. I don't enjoy wearing a suit or blow drying my hair. I like to have messy, sandy, windy, dancing hair. I like to wear tank tops and flowy skirts. I like to have paint in my finger nails and not on my finger nails. I like to wear glitter not coordinate make up that makes me look like I am awake when I am not because I am not a morning person. I just want purple dreads. I will be just as professional and brilliant and I am sure I will be more helpful in jeans. Maybe I could teach English on the beach...I actually have done that. I think you learn better when you your soul is learning with you and you aren't trying to pretend that your mind is some formality that someone else created for you.

Friends

I am so grateful for my friends right now. My job has been draining on me in a very intense way. I feel so uninspired everyday and it is taking a toll. One thing makes everything better. My friends.
Right now I am feeling really gushy about these people that make every day more beautiful. When I say my friends I include these people:
Holiday: Not only my lover but my light. My constant companion and friend and partner. She fills my days when the world keeps working on emptying them.
The trinity: Moo and Bob are my soul friends that can feel my heart without words. I can't say what it means to have people that are in your veins at all times.
Bubamara: These people show me that art and creating are in everything. Politics are in your everyday life and you can live for a higher bohemian ideal. They make me believe that another society is possible.
My home friends Aubri and Becca: These two girls fill my days with witty emails and creative ideas. Just when I start taking things too seriously they send me a skit where I am dressed as a superhero or a picture of a shushing carrot.
Michelle: Who is always there for me even when she is not there.
Nicki: Who always asks me what color I am.
My new friends: I have been so inspired to meet Heather and Mia and just sit down and find someone who loves literature and someone who loves political activism in my world.
Because of these people I feel I have built a family out friendship. I am grateful for all of them.

I have so many things to say all day and then I sit here with nothing.
My life feels somewhat surreal most of the time and yet seems so boringly normal. Go to work, rant, read, rant, rant, rant....sigh....rant, apply for job, rant, go home after really long day, love my girlfriend and rant, do work, relax, eat, rant, sleep, wake up, go to work....blah
Where is my balloon ride?
I need some more glitter.

Lists of lists and lists within lists

Some of you already know I have an obsession with lists. I have a project where I ask all of my friends to write 100 things that make them happy. I love these lists because it makes people sit down and actually conceptualize things that they sometimes take for granted or forget. I like to do one every year. I like to do one for my relationship, one for my books...well if you get to know me you will realize I like making lists out of everything. Anyway I digress. A friend of mine had the idea that instead of giving me her hundred things, she would do ten things for every day. I am going to start that again. Today I will incorporate it here so you get the idea but I am going to create a seperate blog for THE LISTS :) here is yesterday's....

Top ten things yesterday.

1. Sleeping in for an hour
2. Reading a short story
3. Reading Bob's blogs (blog is such an ugly word)
4. Going to whole foods
5. Eating an apple pie
6. Taking off my shoes
7. Getting a wonderful anniversary present (early)
8. Eating a delicious dinner
9. Smelling my new conditioner
10. Giving a foot massage with apple cream

no writes

i am slacking on the blog lately..
i don't want to
i want to write in it all the time
i want to make little lists
i want to write things that don't matter
i want to write little fictions and little facts
i want to write poetry
i want to make a brilliant symphony of dreams woven together into words
but right now it seems i can only write
a list of i wants
without the actual writes

idea separated

TRINITY
not in three words
simple plain easy
how to explain a meaning
that took a whole life to find

in one
question -- one question
by a stranger
in search of an answer
not mine
Mother Daughter
Holy Spirit

Trifecta
Wrong-Right-True
lines faded
by a start-like evolution

It means three
but more importantly
It means ONE
a unity in difference
an idea separated

my truth

my truth is in love and full of art and color. my truth is studying literature and writing poetry. my truth is being around people i love and not having to put my calls and emails in between work and school. my truth is creative and restless. my truth has purple dreadlocks and smiles a lot. my truth has little jobs here and there and lives with people that make her happy. my truth isn't worried. my truth knows. my truth is spiritual and loving. my truth is also bitter and angry. my truth is not freaked out by paradox and doesn't fear herself. my truth gets tattoos when she wants them and falls in love every day. my truth sees birds when others forgot to look up. my truth is quiet and playful and loves glitter. my truth is loud and serious and loves dark clothes. my truth speaks all of the languages of her past and doesn't forget how to spell meaning. my truth is in love every day.

Something soon

Yesterday I went home after work with the idea of unconsciousness embedded into my entire being. All I wanted to do was weave dreams in the state of mind that does not require any living energy. I was completely exhausted...Exhausted from sex, dancing, playing, singing, laughing, kissing? No. Exhausted from working, teaching, thinking, worrying, cleaning, and the other things that make life seem like something you were sent here to do on an hourly wage.

I was more than a little grumpy and took a nap that lasted until my stomach and cat woke me up. I ate and slept and that was it....I guess everyday can't be like walking into the novel that no one has written but these days are starting to take up more and more space. Something has to change soon.

Deep

I keep thinking this should be something deep. This, being a poetry world where I reveal my ability to do beautiful things. The truth is they are boxed into a song I haven't heard yet. I am waiting for an idea that will let go of itself. I had a professor that used to tell me I was afraid of myself. I was blocking my writing. I think I am getting better and better at it (the blocking not the writing).

My friend said I am taking myself too seriously. I will let go and the next blog will be about something that happened instead of an idea that is still holding on to a brain cell that won't let go.

Feeding the fish

Is it wrong that I have fantasies about throwing Bug's phone into a lake? Is it wrong to happily consider the thought of the jeopardy song slowly gurgling and drowning before my eyes? Is it wrong to imaging putting crackers in the phone where the battery goes so that some duck may eat it? (Well that one REALLY IS bad. Don't tell PETA)

I went to lunch with Bug and the Jeopardy Song wanted to be the theme song for the moment. I was sitting there, bored, after having already cleaned out my wallet, thinking about ways to terrorize the evil phone. On the second phone call when I was wondering why I had left my book in the car, I suddenly heard, "Excellent, Very good, ...." I thought to myself, "NO NO NO NO NO" A freaking survey!! If we had a penny for every survey she does, we would be billionaires.

I guess it is wrong but I can fantasize.

Multiplicity

I have decided to divide my life into a few categories today. I am not sure what I want to talk about so I will talk about everything. This is, of course, not everything that matters but everything that is taking up space in my life....and a few things that matter......

Librarylapin#1 Employee: Yesterday was a full day of the same nothingness that I have been doing for three years without change. My illusions went up and down about employment changes that may or may not happen while I wondered and worried about the other Librarylapins you will soon read about. All in all a good day of screaming at nothingness and praying to the Dilbert gods.

Librarylapin#2 Professor: Apparently, by professor, I actually mean babysitter. Yesterday was one of the those frustrating days when I wonder why I do this in the first place. I was looking at a sea of blank faces for an hour waiting for my evaluation to take place. The evaluator never came and I did not manage (for some strange reason) to make punctuation the new meaning of life for my students. I left demoralized and tired.

Librarylapin#3 Student: She is one of my favorite characters. She gets to say what she wants, wear what she wants, and feel the way she wants. After the wonderful teaching experience, I changed into my civilian clothes and went off to my class with Faulkner in my hand. I had a wonderful rant about the shadow of shadows in the shadow next to the shadow that Faulkner uses to describe darkness. You know when you use SO MANY shadows its just dark. They lose their effect. Heather said I may not like it. She was right. I am going to try though. I am going to read all of Faulkner and I am going to get it but yesterday was not the day. I think he needed an editor. Anyway it was fun in a torturous mournful kind of way.

Librarylapin#4 Girlfriend: Who? Oh yeah I exist. Poor bug, she takes such good care of me.

Librarylapin#5 Friend: I don't know how I would get through my day without the fabulous emails of a core group of fabulous friends. Phew...

That was yesterday. Today I don't want to be anyone but napgirl.

Being a wagon

Yesterday was a long day. I moved in with my girlfriend, Bug. Well actually I moved in with Bug eleven months ago and have been on a perpetual eternal cycle of getting all of my things to her house.

Yesterday was bookshelf day. Bookshelves are very important because I am a book fiend and the cats are quickly taking out the towers that have stacked up on the floor.

The bookshelves were easily wheeled down to the truck because Bug is tetris girl and can make anything fit anywhere. I was in charge of the elevator and became an expert at the "ho-de-dow" game.

I realized that in ten years I would like to have a picture of the next part. After all the bookcases went into the truck we had to put all the actual shelves into it. Bug stacked them on the roller cart thing and then, for steering, I sat on them while she pulled me by the hand. We were on a second floor balcony and were doing all we could to steer using my arms. Aside from thinking about how ridiculous it would be to die falling off of a second story building while sitting on a bunch of wood planks, I realized that this was the most fun I had had in a while....sigh
I need to get out more.