ink on sheets

Creature

2012-02-06T20:58:00.001-05:00

It was waiting for her this morning on the sidewalk outside her house, cold and quiet. She scooped it up with her hands (despite her mother's warnings in her head) and put it in her purse.

It stayed with her all day. Her fingers brushing against small, stiff wings when she reached for her wallet at the coffee shop. A slight smell of earth and rot following her into the office. Beady, glossy eyes watched her as she walked home.

She put it in a shoebox under her bed, because it had no other place to go. At least here it would have company amongst her books and journals and missing socks. The irony was not lost on her, this act of nurturing a thing long dead.

On the road up north

2011-11-04T13:22:00.000-04:00

Nighttime drives and back-up plans in mind: a barn two miles back with the lights on, just in case.

Frozen fog over the lake, postcard mountains, bright yellow leaves.

Abandoned mills with plastic flapping over broken windows, cats curled on stoops.

Girls with names like Bobbi-Jo and Hannah-Dean.

Lunchtime specials on sandwich boards by the road: Trky Sndwch & Soup 2.99. (No diner in sight.)

Aunt and Niece sitting in hallway together, sharing a bag of potato chips and a smoke between classes.

Inns with keys under the mat and letters that say: let yourself in, please help yourself to tea & coffee.

The rapid, without-a-breath sound of French on the radio.

Bits of conversations: Someday we'll get out; Hunting season's about to start; He's quitting school; We could've been something.

Highway signs that flash: Last facility in VT. Canada 20 miles.

Sleepy towns quietly pulsing with heartbeats of untold stories.

what i thought about before bed

2011-10-26T12:01:00.009-04:00

circles around new england; dead squirrels curled around orange traffic cones; hot tea spilling on my car floor.

boots and scarves; leaves falling (they're just bones up north now); sun in rain puddles; where are my mittens?

serpentine hallways smelling of popcorn; boys and girls pressed up against each other, sweating between vending machines; notes with scribbled-out hearts on bathroom floors.

handshakes; life stories; business cards exchanges and melancholy goodbyes; it'll be different next time.

donnie darko; i wonder how he's doing; i wonder when the world will end, i wonder if it already has.

men in green coats winking from across the room, breaking eye contact a moment too late; men in brown coats knocking on passenger-side windows, toothless demands.

men with vegetable names; women with sexy accents and five languages.

small bookstores in small towns, my old haunts; return as an adult, the thrill gone, but the floorboards still creak and it all still smells of real books and must.

broken teeth and wrinkles and aching joints and that deep, deep cough.

three halloween costumes, one pumpkin, ten apples.

dyed hair and waxed eyebrows.

one hundred years of solitude and invisible cities.

the words i still haven't written.

95

2011-10-20T22:28:00.000-04:00

Pulled onto 95 outside of Boston today and I was the only one on the road. It was one of those rare moments when you're by yourself in a place usually swollen with people and somehow you feel safe. It was a ghost town, and I noticed the trees and pavement and dirt and sky and leaves falling all around and for one moment, it was mine.

Pulled onto 95 outside of Boston today and hit a traffic jam. Red lights for miles, they reminded me of the Lite-Brite my sister and I used to play with. We'd fight over who got to punch the little bulbs through the patterned paper and who got the best designs. But then we'd ignore the patterns anyway and make our own images, hectic and clashing and perfect.

the people sitting beside me at the bookstore

2011-10-05T17:12:00.002-04:00

Middle-aged woman, large patchwork bag slung over her shoulder. She smells like baby powder and milk and pulls a homemade muffin from her bag discretely. She sits and eats the muffin, staring vacantly at something above my shoulder, then leaves.

Old man in an oversized dress jacket. He's got a stack of history books piled high around him, like a fortress. He spends his time playing on his phone and calling his grandson, Jim. He wheezes into the phone and asks when he is expected for dinner, he is busy and might not make it.

Mother and son, bickering about how to pay for the damages to his car. Mother thinks he can sell his old guitars on Craigslist, son announces that Craigslist is the biggest scam in the world and only suckers go on it, everyone knows that. Son smells unbathed and mother wears too much perfume. They stay for hours, son watching YouTube on his laptop and mother interrupting to talk about his future, his potential. They leave empty cans and crumpled napkins on table.

Here.

2011-10-02T23:00:00.001-04:00

The last time I saw her, she was 16 and had heavy hoop earrings that tugged dangerously on her earlobes when she spoke. She wore tight jeans and high heels in July, down by the waterfront where kids played frisbee and families biked past us, one after another whipping by. She was secretly engaged to a boy in the military; they were going to elope and move into an apartment on the base. She had no idea how beautiful she was.

Stood beside her in a coffee shop today, 200 miles from the waterfront where we last spoke. She is unmarried, and living in the town I left a year ago. She wraps herself in trendy oversized sweaters and sings in the choir at her local church. She still wears those big hoop earrings, but they don't pull on her earlobes like they used to. She is still beautiful, and she still doesn't know it.

Funny how we both found our way here, so far from home, she said. I was surprised by the thought of finding my way here, and wondered if I'd found anything at all.

The last time I saw her, the sun had just come out after three days of rain. It was summer in our city, the lake was wild before dark, and we both knew exactly where we wanted to be.

on the morning drive, every day

2011-09-25T20:49:00.000-04:00

Boy in purple denim, riding his scooter to school. Swerves on and off the sidewalk; never looks for cars; never zips his backpack. Pencils and papers float behind him.

Long white fence, flowers of every color reaching high and in every direction. She thinks they're Cosmos, he thinks they're wildflowers, the tallest weeds.

Child's car seat, abandoned. Moss growing in the seat, seatbelt rusting, tipped over and irrelevant now.

free flowers before closing, if you don't mind daisies mixed with roses.

2011-08-10T22:20:00.001-04:00

it starts raining, that warm summer kind. so you stand under a tree. talks of lucid dreams and ethics in board games. they want a donation, take two worn dollars from your pocket. they'll play bluegrass all night if you can find them a bowl. stemless wineglass, overpriced art, a bartender that winks at you.

they've got gardens growing in pots on their porch, their kitchen floor, their bathtub. basil and cilantro and tomatoes, life in five-gallon buckets.

positive thoughts, she says, positive thoughts. dreams of meditation and uninterrupted sleep. the river looks beautiful from here, open the windows and don't forget to feel it. lightning strikes the porch but it's okay because it makes it all feel surreal. like you're in a story that you know will end well.

on a walk one night before the rain

2011-08-04T22:16:00.001-04:00

books are in the back, coffee up front. you walk in empty, you leave full. you walk in heavy, you leave light. eternal return. you look for glimpses of what you’ve been waiting for, but it’s never there when you expect it.

three men straddle the brick wall by the library. six-pack of woodchuck divided evenly, side by side. shooting the shit. they contemplate their day and their women and their existence between cigarettes and catcalls. someday they’ll figure it all out, but not tonight.

an old woman presses her nose against the glass, vintage dresses in a shop window. when she closes her eyes she can taste yesterday. a little girl, crawling on her hands and knees looking for her chalk balloons on the sidewalk. thought they would be there forever, but they must've flown away. you be yesterday, i'll be forever. you be chalk, i'll be fading fabric. we are the same, we are flying away.

five mailboxes all in a row, 1-2-3-4-5. a-b-c-d-e. roundabouts, one ways, dead ends. you’ll find me after the cemetery, after the train tracks, before the river. phantom pianos and lightning striking the porch, just to make sure you're awake.

gutted building, broken windows, first floor rented out for real cheap. it took so many years to get here, this used to be a mill, you know. now it’s for ghosts and beggars and it's just where you want to be.

bakery

2011-08-02T13:52:00.000-04:00

Did you walk by my apartment? she asks. I heard you through my window. Were you going to The Church?

No, I say.

I'm on the top floor, above the bakery. I thought I heard you. I thought I heard your voice. She sounds fragile now, after all these years.

It must be nice, I say. Living above a bakery.

It makes life too sweet, everything seems to be covered in sugar now. Everything. My fingers, my chairs, my thoughts. She coughs on the other end.

It was nice talking to you, I say.

Let me know if you ever do go. To The Church. We can steal cakes from the dumpster behind my apartment. So let me know.

I will, I say.

spirit and guts

2011-07-10T22:49:00.003-04:00

You meet these people with fantastic lives. They've motorbiked across America, they've volunteered in third-world counties, they've bicycled up and down mountains. They've lived in a thousand cities and seen a thousand wonderful things and have a thousand more dreams.

They're the ones who've got spirit and guts. They jump headfirst and hope for the best. It's all faith and freedom and insatiable desire.

And you, you freeze at the smallest notions of nostalgia. You've got one of those lives crammed with people you care about and causes to fight for. You think, I've got too many reasons to stay and only one reason to jump.

But then one day you realize that everything you're staying for, everyone you're staying for, doesn't wait for you. Everything moves on without you and hardly anyone looks back. But that's how you get those guts. It's where that spirit comes from.

Things left in the hallway outside my neighbor's door

2011-06-10T10:13:00.002-04:00

- The stem of a rose. First it was green and strong, recently clipped. Now it has rolled in between the carpet and the baseboard, gray and forgotten.

- An earring, tiny blue charm. Maybe slipped off in a rush to work or the bedroom. Not pretty enough to miss, or to even notice on the floor.

- A Q-Tip, yellowed and pulling apart like milkweed.

Stagnant

2011-05-25T20:54:00.000-04:00

There's a woman peeing on your bed. Legs spread wide, dress bunched in her fists, urine trailing down her leg and she's spraying like a cat. She looks at you, and you look at her,

and you're both wondering how it came to this.

React

2011-05-02T15:37:00.003-04:00

"Given the news in the last 24 hours, I'd like to encourage anyone celebrating to check themselves. Celebrate the end of one era of American fear. Don't celebrate the death of one human being. Rejoicing in death was his way. Peace, all." - CDS

My thoughts exactly, but not my words. Words from a wise friend.

‎"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that" - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Words not spoken for this occasion specifically, but meant for times like this.

(Part II) The things left behind

2011-04-28T22:46:00.010-04:00

Or maybe it's a way to be remembered.

My close friend's friend/roommate died in a car accident last week. My friend is Wonder Woman, the way she's flying around, re-stitching their lives. The phone calls, the errands, the trips to the PD, the morgue, the arrangements, the things left behind. Cracking pass-codes and throwing away secrets found in pockets and drawers. Cleaning out the fridge and sorting shoes and jeans and underwear. IDing the body. Saving voicemails and texts, indefinitely.

To me it all feels like the tornadoes in North Carolina. Swept up in something I had never really equated with reality. (It wasn't until I felt the air and saw the sky and the news and the damage that it really hit me that tornadoes aren't just in The Wizard of Oz.) I've been to funerals, for young people and old people, for distant friends and close family, but somehow this is different. This wasn't from illness or drugs or old age. It was circumstance, timing. Technically, I'm hardly affected by this at all, I am just an observer. But, like most people, I'm shaken up. I'm suddenly finding meaning in cliches: forever young, untimely death, awful tragedy.

And I wonder about the things I'll leave behind. Shelves packed with book sale victories and tokens from national parks. Hard drives with half-finished stories and thousands of pictures. Stacks of unmarked burned CDs, colored discs for every mood. Favorite movies, home videos, video projects. Socks with holes in them, piles of worn-in flip flops. Clean and unwashed lingerie. A Facebook page, a couple e-mail accounts forever collecting junk mail, this blog.

I wonder how to go about losing people. And how to differentiate memories from things left behind.

(Part I) Why I write this blog

2011-04-27T22:08:00.003-04:00

To write a successful blog you are supposed to:

network
find a niche
update regularly
appeal to your audience
teach people something
etc. etc. etc.

I don't do any of those things.

Breadcrumbs

2011-04-05T15:27:00.003-04:00

They're moving to Indianapolis, Ashville, Austin, New York City, Providence. They're jumping from the ground and drifting in the wind, floating, floating, until they land home.

They don't know what home looks like, but they know what it is not: It is not drafty houses and belligerent in-laws, it is not crumbling apartments and groups of trendy teenagers, it is not yellow grass and tall, looming ex-boyfriends.

I want to believe they will look back on this place fondly.

I wonder if I will always be longing for someone or something. Anywhere I am, I think of the places I am not. I want to split myself into a dozen pieces. I find the most mundane things nostalgic. I think melancholy is one of my favorite emotions. (Not to be it, but to feel it.)

I picked up my feet and got swept away, to the east. I think most of my breadcrumbs have disappeared.

exercise in silence

2011-04-02T01:25:00.004-04:00

First day of April, and it's cold outside. Rain that leaves you damp all day, wind that slips in under the door and bites your ankles.

I wait for the days I can open the windows and breathe life into this place again, let flowers crop up in the carpet and have bees buzz in my ears while I make dinner. Feel renewed, alive, awake.

But I don't mind these days, the winter ones. I become the things around me, the old yellow chair and the antique table with the dents and scratches. These nights, wrapped in blankets and tucking my legs under me, I am comfortable being quiet and alone.

3.20.11

2011-03-24T13:07:00.009-04:00

Remembered the moon. Just three of us, telling stories, holding big wine glasses with both hands. It was supposed to be the biggest, the brightest, the closest we would ever see our whole lives. Ran outside to catch it. First morning of spring. Stood by the river barefoot, wondered what it felt like to be up there, all alone.

Sat with a family by the beach, wrapped up in hats and scarves and mittens. Full up on kale soup and fireside conversations. The moon rose up from behind the cliffs, we listened to waves, breathed in the coldest air. First night of spring. Stood with crowds of moon-watchers, wondered what it felt like to be up there, always whole but always changing.

Reflections on tragedy

2011-03-15T22:14:00.004-04:00

Never thought an earthquake all the way across the world could shake me up so bad. I was quietly obsessed for hours, until I knew he was okay. I was relieved, then felt bad for feeling relieved. 10,000 people the world just swallowed up. I sat in a cafe that afternoon, watching everyone bustle around me, wondering what used to make me feel so invincible, so untouchable.

Staying in a city this week, nights in hotel rooms, mornings in traffic. I'm already used to sirens and shouting; how quickly I've grown deaf. You know one of my biggest fears? Genovese Syndrome. Not being a victim, but being indifferent, cold. I used to think the word "pacifist" was "passivist." I never could tell if it had a negative or positive connotation.

Called 9-1-1 the other night when I saw a car flipped upside-down on the side of the highway. Black ice and sleet, late night on I89. I couldn't pull over, or I'd go off the road too. But I wanted to feel like I could help something, change a tragedy just a little bit. The operator on the other end of the line thanked me, said they didn't know.

Another piece of unexpected wisdom

2011-02-15T16:08:00.013-05:00

"The world is too fragile for people to be untrue."

I took this picture in New Orleans four months before Katrina. Unapologetic, full of life and history and pain and love. It's like seeing a lost friend again. I hope to know myself as well as I did back then, someday.

Writers

2011-02-10T14:45:00.000-05:00

I'm going to sit down with a girl today who wants to be a writer. Actually, she says she already is a writer and no one, no person, no piece of paper can tell her otherwise. Some people would call her naive, and maybe she is. It is my job to ask her question after question and determine if she is, in fact, a "writer."

But I've never believed that you can do that. Look at a handful of papers, stitch together a couple conversations, and place someone in a category. What a limited existence that would be.

I was at a bar one night and sat with a woman who, according to her various degrees, is a writer. She teaches classes and has traveled the world and has been divorced several times. She spoke of the world as if she had seen it all and nothing was capable of shocking her anymore.

We all know there's supposed to be a beginning and an end. I hope that until the very end, I am open to possibilities and I always hold onto that passion that is mistaken for naiveté.

Pumpkins and Oak Trees

2011-01-18T20:14:00.003-05:00

Someone threw a pumpkin from the third floor and it landed in the snow outside our window. I wonder if whoever threw it was aiming for the river. It's rotten, and the black seeds and insides are all over the snow. I heard it thud to the ground while I was alone in our apartment, reading a new book and drinking tea. It was the kind of moment you think can’t be interrupted because it’s so peaceful and lovely, but then somehow it is.

I stood by the window a long time, looking at the exploded, frozen pumpkin. I thought of when I was a kid, taking my nighttime bath, moving back and forth in the tub so tidal waves crashed over my head. I had short hair then, short and wild. I was rinsing the shampoo from my eyes and suddenly there was this boom. The water in the tub rippled around me and the walls shook. I got up, naked, from the lukewarm water and looked out the window. All I could see were branches and leaves, like a forest had grown around and into our house.

The oak tree from our yard had fallen in the high winds, smashing right through the side of our house. Until my dad came home with friends and chainsaws, I thought we were going to live inside that big tree forever.

I don’t think this pumpkin in the snow will be cleared. Whoever threw it never wanted to see it again. I could move it myself, but I’ll watch it freeze, unfreeze, rot, become part of the soil, and maybe pray (hopelessly, childishly) for a pumpkin patch in the fall.

One January

2011-01-16T01:42:00.008-05:00

750.
Seven-hundred and fifty words a week, something to look forward to. A voice, a letter, a memory, to remind me. New books in the mail, open them at work because it's too exciting to wait. Look at the cover, feel the pages, get used to the weight because it'll become a part of me soon enough.

091512.
She wants a cherry blossom wedding, and we scroll through endless images of delicate little flowers. Strands, branches, buds, petals. We're excited like we're little kids and I hope that everyone feels like this, as often as possible.

4.
I take out our new wine glasses for the first time, a gift from a Vermont friend, and they're lovely. We've got candles lit and our New Hampshire friends are telling stories. The wine glass in my hand has a fingerprint melted into it. Whoever made this glass left a part of themselves for me to find.

28-21.
He write me messages and we talk through the game silently supporting the unpopular team. He's in Japan and I'm in New England and sometimes it's nice to feel like you've got someone on your side. Sometimes I'm not as resistant to the progressively consuming technology when it means I can reach all the way across the world.

Snowed in

2010-12-28T15:35:00.003-05:00

Song for a cold night. House buried in snow. Hot cocoa with Bailey's in hand. Reading by the fire. Bliss.

Words that feel like secrets

2010-12-20T16:24:00.009-05:00

Firecracker told me that "aletheia" means truth in Greek, but not truth as we know it. It is, instead, the deliberate uncovering of omissions. Discovering the things we hide. I love words that feel like secrets.

Sometimes, I imagine myself overgrown. Roots and veins crawling out of me, blooming from the top of my head and out of my ears and mouth, attaching to buildings and trees and the sun and the moon. I wonder if anyone notices as I walk around in a tangle of overgrown thoughts.

This feeling isn't snobbery or boredom like I used to think it was. There are just so many ideas and dreams that I've left unexplored, and they've learned to move on without me. They're still connected, even though they won't wait around for me anymore. I can tug them back down, like holding onto the string of a balloon that's trying to fly away, when I'm ready.

Sirens

2010-12-07T19:10:00.001-05:00

Cold & Snow

2010-12-03T16:01:00.007-05:00

He grew up in Guadalajara, but he loves the cold. He loves ice skating in Fenway Park, watching the ball drop in Times Square, walking around the Nuit blanche a Montreal. He wraps himself in long, hand-knit scarves and drinks black coffee hot and steaming while his friends talk of cruises and travel agents. He thinks of the sun and he is warm. He thinks of the snow and he his home.

quellazaire

2010-11-30T19:37:00.013-05:00

I remember the neighborhood, a quiet little roundabout city. I remember the man in the red house. Tall, handsome, friendly. Blonde wife, two kids, Golden Retriever. 9 to 5. Blue Subaru. I always liked running into him as we got into our cars in the morning: he'd flash this smile and his face would stay with me all day.

I remember getting back to the house late one night and seeing the man sitting on the stoop in his garage. It was summer and I was feeling invincible. He wore a pink nightgown, black stilettos, and was smoking a cigarette from a long plastic holder (a quellazaire, my friend told me to call it, quellazaire.) The look on his face: defeated, solemn, melancholic. But he shot me that smile again and waved with his smoking hand before crossing his legs and looking down at the floor.

It's bullshit, my friend told me. He's just trying to mix up an otherwise monotonous existence.

But I gave up the search for ingenuity a long time ago. You never can tell, not really. Everyone has a story.

mill thoughts

2010-11-17T18:58:00.009-05:00

Bookworm: "It was one of those nights, the kind you don't want to forget."
Sunshine: "Will you?"
Bookworm: "Maybe, eventually. I wish you could've come."
Sunshine: "Me, too."

inside

Almost-empty parking lot outside an almost-adandoned building. Step out of the car, cold air hits us, remember: it's getting colder, clearer from here.

Broken, old lift elevator. Spiral staircase wide and forgiving. Reminiscent of one time in Europe.

Dim lights, antiques, canvases, peeling ceiling, warped floorboards. Authentic paint stains on the floor, the wall.

Smells of pine, musty furniture, fire smoke, cigarette smoke, oil paint.

Big bottles of red wine, brown bottles of beer, two wine glasses that have traveled all over and have not broken yet.

He wears a purple flannel shirt and girls watch him intently. He wears it before, after, and while it is trendy. One of the reasons to admire him, to love him.

Would he be able to move his fingers up and down, keep time with his foot, sing up to the ceiling, if he was carrying all the love I've got? We do not live for each other, like they do in stories, and that makes me happy. There is so much love, so much life, to share.

Lights on, new faces, calloused fingers, empty stage. Feel different, renewed, a little drunk, a little dizzy. Pepto Bismol-pink door. We compartmentalize things. Music. Art. Love. Words. A shade of pink in an otherwise dark oil-painted room.

Try to use the elevator, even though it is broken. Run, for fun, down the spiral staircase. Help carry keyboard stands and guitars out into the cold air, only getting colder. But I like it. I wouldn't be here if I didn't.

I always wanted to be Harriet the Spy

2010-11-09T16:02:00.002-05:00

“Don't you want to be a writer, Sport? Gee, your father could even help you.”
Sport almost collapsed at the sink.
“Are you kidding? You know I want to be a ball player. And if I'm not a good ball player, I'll tell you something, I'm going to be a C.P.A.”
“What's that?”
“You don't know what a C.P.A. is?” Sport screeched.
“No," said Harriet. She never minded admitting she didn't know something. “So what,” she thought; “I could always learn.”

[Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh, 1964]

Private Lawns

2010-11-02T16:01:00.001-04:00

Angus & Julia Stone <3

Old home, new life; New home, old life

2010-10-29T09:57:00.007-04:00

Driving by

I’ve been driving by our old house a lot lately. Work takes me south, sometimes to Boston, sometimes to the Cape, sometimes even farther. But I usually find myself driving past Haverhill on 495 and, without thinking, pulling off the exit. After weeks and days and hours of exploring new places and sleeping in an apartment I still haven’t settled into, it is nice to feel comfortable. Even if it is just for a moment, sitting on the porch reading a book, locked out and watching my old neighbors walk by.

Explorer

I have a strange sense of familiarity when I see signs for the surrounding towns: Methuen, Salem, Plaistow, Lawrence, Lowell. The funny thing is, I hardly spent time in those cities when I lived nearby. Now that I live an hour away, I explore them. I try to pick out the good things in each place, try to see what makes people want to live there. I still haven’t figured out why these invisible town lines dictate different cultures, different ways of life, but they do. I'm determined to not isolate myself: I don't want to see the same side of every city. I know there’s more than coffee shops and arguing couples and trash buildup and art walks.

Catching the train

When I fall asleep late at night in my new bedroom, I can hear the train whistling somewhere far away. There’s something inexplicably compelling about trains, something beautiful and melancholy. I could hear the train from Haverhill, too. I remember discovering the train tracks behind the cemetery with my cousin. It was like we had stumbled upon this long-forgotten secret. The tracks ran along the river and we walked on them for a couple miles. It was just a day in September, back when he was secretly planning on running away to Argentina and I was secretly missing him already.

Intimacy

I wake up to the sound of neighbors all around me. Quiet, private sounds: water running, breakfast-making, good mornings and good byes. Waking up in Haverhill was different. The dog across the street was chained up outside and would howl without fail every morning. Our bed was up against this beautiful window alcove and we’d leave the windows open on warm nights. In the morning the air would be perfect. The room would be dark except for the glow coming in under the closet door. There was a small window in there, I’m not sure why, but it guaranteed us a little bit of light, always.

Ghosts & possibilites

I thought it was weird when my family took pictures of my grandmother in her casket after the wake. After we broke the receiving line, after they turned off the music and dimmed the lights, my aunts and cousins snuck up to the altar and snapped a couple photos. She hasn’t looked this good in a long time, they said. I disagreed, because I was 19 and still trying to figure out where social norms and familial norms intersected. But the truth was, Grandma hadn’t looked like herself in years: she had looked like Diabetes; Cancer; Alzheimer’s; Emphysema. She’d been sick a long time. But the point was, in the end, in that casket, she wasn’t sick anymore.

Walking around the house (it used to be our house) feels like looking at those pictures of grandma. It’s familiar, and in an intangible way it’s still mine, but it’s different now. It’s a skeleton of a home and its emptiness is full of possibility. I feel nostalgic and eerie. Not like I’m trespassing, but like I’m the ghost that haunts the place now.

The first morning

2010-10-13T11:47:00.001-04:00

Woke up at 5 am and watched the sun rise for the first day in my life without her.

The first morning in 90 years without a fern.

Multi-grain bagels and mugs of coffee that I still find hard to stomach. Usually it is tea for breakfast.

Boston in the morning; gossiping girls to my left and an old man on a cell phone to my right.

Home is green mountains, home is across the lake, home is how many folding chairs you can fit into a hospital room.

I'm in New England, but not the New England I am from. This is a different New England: faster, louder, cruder, bigger.

I live here now, drive here, sleep here, walk here, fit in here, but I still hold on to the sweet, kind, and good.

And here it is warm inside, autumn-cold outside.

Scarecrows with child smiles erected in a cemetery for Halloween.

Giant green and orange pumpkins in row along the side of the highway.

It really is a beautiful day to be alive.

... drive steadily forever

2010-09-23T22:56:00.003-04:00

Not a huge Miranda July fan, but this movie has some great moments.

Gypsy; Nomad; Vagrant

2010-09-22T22:59:00.005-04:00

Four extra seats, for the hitchhikers I'd like to pick up. I think of all the people I could have taken places, all the stories I could have heard.

Fifty extra dollars that I didn't spend on extravagant meals. Instead, I went to the grocery store and had broccoli with alfredo sauce for dinner and raspberries for dessert. I think of the people I could've met at a bar, the people I could have fed.

Three extra beds, three nights in a row, waiting to be slept in. I curled into a ball like I always do (bad for your back) and left the other side of the bed untouched, the bed across from me unruffled. I think of some of the places I've slept in my life. I would've killed for that empty bed across from me.

I don't mind traveling alone. I am, by nature, a private person. I like to do things on my own, in my own way. Even though these are not the places I dream about seeing, they are something new.

I'm not used to having all of these resources at my disposal. Somehow it seems wasteful, like I should be sharing it with people that need seats and dollars and beds. Just give me a little bed, a nightstand with a lamp and a book. I realize that I could not easily transition into a life of frivolity.

(I think of how you can always clean the slate, always start a new life. It's unsettling and comforting to see how possible it is.)

three hundred words and three hundred ways to miss you (an attempt to understand the ever-present longing without backspacing because i'd be erasing a moment i'd never get back)

2010-08-25T00:07:00.041-04:00

Missing you has become a part of me. I actively miss you, I think of you every day. But there is not something missing inside me, not an emptiness in my heart. I, very simply, just miss you.

I live fully and completely inside your absence. It is not sadness, I do not feel broken or damaged. Missing you is in between the cells in my skin, it is in my blood and saliva and I can feel it, taste it; it is in my heart and brain and bones and lungs.

You are not a single person. You are a handful of carefully selected thoughts.

You are not dead, but I will wonder every day if you are alive. I probably always will. Sing, Night Owl, sing. I feel you in my chest. I have shallow breaths when I think of you, I am swimming in the lake at night again.

You have not changed and I will never see you again. I didn't ask for it to be this way. Run away, Tough Guys, run away. I feel you most in my skin. I become hot and red and never want to feel that way again. I do not want you back in my life. I do not want to miss you. I do not try to miss you.

You are dead, but you come back to me. Lost poems in text messages, old articles in new newspapers, your smile in a picture taken yesterday. Sleep, Sad Woman, sleep. I feel you most in my fingers, you buzz and you creep out through my fingertips when I least expect it.

You always remind me that the world is full of passion, even when all I've got is old ticket stubs and letters to jog my memory. Dream, Beautiful, dream. I feel you in my head, words and poems humming to me like a city. I get dizzy and hope that I can keep this high with me forever.

Now that you're gone, you have become a part of me.

So I'll remember the little things

2010-07-21T23:37:00.002-04:00

The universe & the start of the world

2010-07-20T21:33:00.008-04:00

Piano Man: You can see the whole world from here.

Brother: He means the universe.

Piano Man: No, I mean the world. You can see the whole world from here.

Texas Love: I dig it. The world.

Bookworm: Didn’t I tell you the driveway is the best place to see the sky?

Piano Man: I can’t believe you have this view every night.

Bookworm: I’ve been taking it for granted.

Brother: We all do. But the view is almost perfect. Except for this big-ass building blocking Cassiopeia.

Bookworm: I used to live there. All my life until I was fourteen.

Texas Love: It seems like a nice place.

Bookworm: I used to climb up to the roof and watch the sky with my friends. They’d throw rocks at my window -- that window right there -- to get my attention.

Piano Man: I didn’t know people really did that. That’s awesome.

Bookworm: I took it for granted.

Brother: All those stars up there. Most of them are already dead, we just can’t see it yet.

Piano Man: Light years and red giants and shit. It makes me feel so insignificant. I fucking love it.

Texas Love: It’s all so beautiful, and it probably doesn’t even exist anymore. What does that say about us? Right now, admiring something from a distance that might not even be there.

Brother: We’re human. We’ll always see what we want to.

Bookworm: It's all rooted in astronomy. We’re in a world created by the stars, but they could've died before we were even conceived. I can’t tell if that’s morbid.

Texas Love: It’s just how it is. It’s life.

Piano Man: And it’s fucking great.

Brother: And it’ll always make me think of this, right here, right now.

Bookworm: I take it for granted.

The universe & the end of the world

2010-06-28T00:15:00.004-04:00

A warm night in June. Full moon, rain clouds in the air, blankets wrapped around our shoulders. We both knew we wouldn't have many nights together like this again.

I get overwhelmed at how big the universe is, she said, looking at the sky. It could just never end.

Whenever I look at the sky, I said, I think of sitting in my driveway with my dad. He showed me that even if you can’t see it, the whole moon is always there.

It’s funny how something that makes me feel so lost makes you feel so at home, she said. But I think I know what you mean.

Then we started talking about the end of the world, and how we will take it as it comes. And it will probably be beautiful.

Great Hudson River Revival

2010-06-22T22:09:00.007-04:00

9^th year at the festival and it feels like it’s yours, but it’s only been 34 nights of your life. 72 hours volunteering. 96 hours driving there and back. Feeling like you never left. Missing a part of yourself when you’re not there.

Eat breakfast elbow-to-elbow with other blue-shirted volunteers. Compostable plates and silverware, food fresh and organic: that’s why you’re here. Makes you feel like you’re a small piece of the earth and you could take root any day if only you’d stop moving.

Call it a fiddle here, call it a violin, just play it. Dance under the tent until your body feels like it’ll never stop sweating and beating. Musicians with big sunglasses and top hats play their instruments like they’d die if they ever let go. Wonder if this feeling is a little bit of the elusive peace everyone’s been talking about.

Girls with colorful strings and beautiful faces. Boys with jack-o-lantern smiles and crumpled-up joints. Some are from the city, they are glamorous and edgy. Some are from upstate, they are lovely and natural. Two o’clock alcoholic kisses and underwear smelling of sunscreen and expectation. In the morning everything will be different, but tonight you appreciate the laughter and how everyone looks beautiful in the firelight.

Activists scream demands, petitions smudge with sweat from forearms, old women in tie dye play banjos and curse. They are louder if you ignore them. Pick your battles. Remind yourself you can’t save everyone, but you can change the world (if only a little.) Know that underneath the aggression and anger is a deep wanting for basic good. Walk on and smile.

Fall asleep by the river. Moon, grass, laughter, music. There’s a couple just a few feet away under the willow and an old man snoring in the grass and a party going on in the dance tent. But it’s just you and the water and an entire year gone by. Wonder if you’ve changed since the last time you were in this place. Hope you’ve grown like the river, stronger each year.

Promise to stay in touch, promise to visit. You know it rarely happens. But these people, they know you. In the night, the day, the sun, the rain, the best, and in the worst. Promise you love them, promise you’ll see them next year. And you start to count the days.

The living & the dead

2010-06-10T01:06:00.000-04:00

"Mexico City" - Jolie Holland

What I know

2010-06-09T12:03:00.007-04:00

What I know about this moccasin:

. Found on a Sunday evening before the rainstorm

. Lost in the sand lot by the dam

. Survived at least one winter in the North Country

. No mate to be found

. Small, maybe belonged to a small person
. Not authentic: plastic beads and material

. With a Cyanotype filter it looks tragic

Conversations not to be lost

2010-05-25T14:04:00.004-04:00

[A weekend of words.]

. He wore a sombrero and stood in the corner of the elevator. “I don’t know how to work this thing,” he told us. “I’m lost and I don’t know where to go.” The key in his hand said 932, so we took him to the 9^th floor. When the doors opened he said, “I don’t want to go back. This is my home now.” He lied down in the elevator and fell asleep, sombrero titled over his face.

. A man came up to us on the street, he had bagpipes strapped across his chest. We’d been walking a while, heels in hand, tired and lost. "I'll play you a song if you can give me directions," he said. We told him that we were lost, too, and he played for us anyway. I wondered who was waiting for him, whose song we were listening to.

. Our cab driver was Haitian and had a smile so handsome I couldn’t help but blush a little. His family kept all of their money in a safe box under the house, but it is buried now under the earth. “The house is gone,” he told us, “but you can rebuild a house. You can’t rebuild the people you love.”

. “We came into a bit of money,” she said. “Now we’ve got our own business, we provide tents for festivals and events.” They bought the tent for their ceremony and they will be the ones to set it up on their wedding day. Just the two of them.

. The ocean past midnight is louder, you can hear it wailing and groaning and singing and sighing and roaring. We wail and groan and sigh and sing and roar with it, together, maybe for the last time. “It’s so hard to say goodbye,” I said. “That’s why you NEVER say goodbye, my love…” she wrote.

. She got tears in her eyes when she talked about the baby. “We’ll never know,” she said quietly. “We’ll never know.” She’s got so much love inside her, and it is heartbreaking when a piece of it is taken away. I want to help, I want to fix her, but nothing is broken. No one could stop her from loving so much.

. “We’re in it together. It’s up to us. We’ll save the world with books and words.” We looked out over the cigarette smoke and into the dark night.

Lykke Li & Bon Iver doing 'Dance Dance Dance' in L.A

2010-05-21T15:17:00.000-04:00

Don't...

2010-05-21T00:14:00.002-04:00

Some well-intended (but unwelcomed) advice I received: Don't get a 9-to-5. Don't become one of them. Don't let them take advantage of you. Don't forget you are an artist. Don't sell out.

Some happened-upon, unexpected wisdom: Don't let anyone ever make you feel like you don't deserve what you want.

For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fatherless In Ypsilanti

2010-05-13T14:12:00.000-04:00

Peace

2010-05-12T23:49:00.001-04:00

We walk by you some afternoons, to get away from chaos and monotony. To find a place to breathe. This time, it's raining and I keep my hands in my pockets. My nose gets cold even though it's May.

I wonder what it's like to be frozen and unfrozen, year after year. I wonder what it's like to die and bloom. To be struck by lightning and drowned. You hear the train whistle and you breathe in the exhaust. You let the quiet woman push the sad man's wheelchair beside you and you feel the ash drifting from their roaches.

I like to think that, really, you are at peace.

I cannot want you with all my heart

2010-04-16T00:50:00.021-04:00

i
"How rarely do we see people living, or for that matter, creating by them."

.Yellow walls, purple curtains, red couch. Knowing there are cities and stories there, somewhere. Holding on to the days we live. The days we really live. Fighting to never forget them.

ii
"What are the best things and worst things in your life, and when are you going to get around to whispering or shouting about them?"

.The worst: wanting, failing, losing what you loved, isolation, wondering why they don't care to listen anymore. The best: laughter, kindness, family, beauty in the unexpected, comfort and strength in being alone.
.WHISPERING. shouting.

iii
"What do you love most in the world? The big and little things, I mean. A trolley car, a pair of tennis shoes? These, at one time when we were children, were invested with magic for us."

.The smell of an old book, a favorite baseball glove, sharing a blanket and a room and a story, grapefruit at night, the lake in the morning before everyone else is awake, the air in Pompeii, the rooftops in Venice, the rocks at Zion, the spices in New Orleans, listening to a life-changing song with someone who understands.

iv
"What do you want more than anything else in the world? What do you love, or what do you hate? Find a character, like yourself, who will want something or not want something, with all his heart."

.He wants to be the music that makes people breathe slower, makes them remember. She wants to save the people around her again, she wants to be hope. He loves to hate. She hates to love. He wants to pull fame out from the elementary school hallways and shake it out. She doesn't want to believe in ghosts forever, she wants to live.

[Quotes from Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury]

3:02 - 4:35

2010-04-07T00:02:00.001-04:00

Fear; revisited.

2010-04-06T02:34:00.011-04:00

A year ago, I was on top of the world. It was all possibilities and late nights and awards and love. Now, it's stagnancy and shaky hope and confronting my fears (not because I want to, but because I have to.)

My fears have been showing up almost every day now, always new and more intimidating. Some people say that's life, they say it'll never end. I hope it's making me stronger and that I won't be afraid forever.

I met one fear when I opened that first letter: now I can move on. I met one at an afternoon party and introduced myself: now I'm not tormented. I met one when I felt that pain in my chest: now I can breathe. I met one late at night dreaming beside me: now I can sleep.

~~A year ago, I was terrified. Of losing my world, my foundation, my future. Now, I realize that I can have everything that matters, I just can't stop fighting for it.~~ I never considered myself much of a fighter, but I can be. Now I've got to be.

Quieted

2010-03-26T11:16:00.003-04:00

We saw an old man in an old church talk about writing last night. He was famous, accomplished, but when it came down to it, he was really just a man. A chapel full of readers and writers and I think, at times, none of us had anything to say. It wasn't the actual man we were captured by, in his button-down shirt and worn baseball cap, it was his words and the memories they evoked.

A conversation in the last pew; A conversation during a funeral

2010-03-12T10:22:00.001-05:00

."I'm the only one left now. Soon no one will remember us."

-"You've got Sue."

."No one should have to bury their little sister. Or their little brother. I'm the only one left."

-"They lived good lives."

."Did they? How can you tell?"

-"They had people who loved them."

."I don't know if that matters."

-"It matters. Besides, you've still got Sue."

."We buried her a long time ago. I'm the only one left."

A whole world

2010-03-10T03:13:00.001-05:00

There's a whole world out there, he told me. There's a whole world and we're gonna see it, he told me.

One day

2010-03-07T10:10:00.004-05:00

The windows are all open so it feels like spring. There's blue paint on the side of the court, little boys with signatures that will outlast their youth.

There's a woman dressed in layers, tending to her garden of broken objects. Spoons and tin cans hang from a tree and she's maybe what you would call "an artist", or maybe what neighbors would call "eclectic".

The India House has been closed for years, but the sign and menu are still up. The sun shines on the windows like the lights are still on, and I'm sure when people walk by, they smell the spices.

There are buildings, four stories high, where the refugees live with prayer flags hanging from porches. In dorm rooms and hippie chicks' bedrooms, the flags are just a passing notion. Here, they represent a past, a life, a memory, a future, a need.

On Cold Nights

2010-02-22T23:44:00.005-05:00

The space heater by my feet has got an orange light and it makes a tick, tick, tick sound every now and then. When I hear that sound and see that light, I feel warm again.

The tip of my nose is cold and when you touch the back of my neck, I get goosebumps. I eat soup and curl my body around the bowl, sucking life out of the steam.

I'm under down blankets and the feathers sometime poke out and stick in my hair. I'll pull one leg out from the warmth we've created and let the cold settle on me.

When it is cold and the moon is out, I look around the world and think, I belong here. But I may never come back.

Antifreeze

2010-02-09T00:21:00.003-05:00

He looked at me and said, "tell me something I don't know about you."
So I told him about the time my cat died when I was eight.

The look in his eyes, the smell of his fur.
Cross-legged, enveloping him.
The antifreeze he'd been poisoned with, the neighbor kid who did it.
The first time I saw anything die: the air changed and my fingertips tingled.
The first time I understood there was cruelty in the world.
But kindness, too. Cross-legged, enveloping him.

He looked at me and said, "I've already heard that story."
But he hadn't. I'd only ever told him I was eight, the cat died, antifreeze.

Profoundly sad

2010-01-04T23:20:00.006-05:00

Sometimes I read her words and think I don't understand love. I think that, maybe, I missed something. I think that, maybe, I've been too cynical. Sometimes I wish I had that in me, that love, like sadness, that can seep into everything if you let it. And I wonder if I'll ever change.

Then I think about love, and I think of the smell of sawdust and snow. Opening that door with the three little window panes. Sharing a bedroom and talking in the dark. Patchouli and spices. Guitars and champagne. Watching those memories, packed so tight, escape slowly and finally find a place to sleep. Hidden pictures of skinny dipping and late night road trips. Canyons, castles, cities. The feeling of saying goodbye. Marking time by moments apart, not calendars. Quilts folded on couches. There are tears sometimes, screaming sometimes, but why waste your sometimes?

My love isn't better, it isn't as consuming. It's not that can't-breathe, got-fire-and-butterflies-in-your-stomach, cry-all-night-'cause-you-can't-live-without-each other kind of love. I couldn't live that way. My love is a quieter thing, melancholy at times, but usually, it's right where it needs to be.

Quiet stories

2009-12-01T11:32:00.004-05:00

Sometimes you find stories in the most unlikely places.

"I knew it was over when Mom had me try on her wedding dress. I was five and it was Halloween and I stood on a stool while she cut off the bottom so I could wear it. Dad walked in the room and saw me and Mom with the dress and I knew it was over. They're still together, but the dress is gone and I'm still waiting for him to leave."

"So we were driving across town, right? We had this big U-Haul with everything he ever owned it in. We've only been together three months now, but we've been living together for two. It was weird that day when we were moving because he was driving the truck and I was sitting beside him with his dog's ashes in my lap and his ex-girlfriend's engagement ring on a chain around my neck. They were up front with us because they were the most important things he owned. His girlfriend cheated on him before he could give her the ring -- his grandmother's, re-sized to fit the girlfriend -- and now he doesn't know what to do with it. He won't give it to me, but he wanted me to keep it safe while we drove across town."

Not to be confused with

2009-11-01T23:53:00.003-05:00

You can tell by the paint on the walls that they've got money, which most of us confuse with class. Rich colors; New England colors; reds and yellows and golds. You can tell by the beers in their hands, brown bottles with local brewery labels, and the tables with trays of steaming food. They've got nice smiles and all is well.

In our pictures, we've got old barns with Christmas lights and people sitting in heaps on the floor. We've got boxes of wine and bowls of Chex Mix and people dancing. We wonder what people will confuse us with.

Masking tape names

2009-10-28T09:00:00.004-04:00

He got it in Rio De Janeiro, he said, but it's got pictures of his trip to Antarctica. When most people say they've been there, you don't believe them. But he's got the pictures to prove it.

He was handsome back then and was the only one on the ship with the camera. It's a waste now, he says, but I thought it'd mean something someday. Just like he thought he'd always be handsome. Some things don't last forever.

He wrapped us up in his mother's furs 'cause it's the only way he can keep us warm. We won't wear them. One of us is allergic, one is vegan, and one lives in Florida. But it's nice to be warm for a few moments on that cold night.

He wants us to put our names on the things we want, 'cause he knows that he'll die someday. He knows that his things aren't safe with anyone and might as well give it all away 'cause he can't keep the thieves out of the attic.

what's under your pavement

2009-08-18T00:04:00.004-04:00

we used to slide back there. it seemed like miles. we'd get a running start and hit the ice and our boots were like skates and we'd go all the way to the end, where the river cut the field in half and was still runnin even on the coldest days. sometimes we'd jump it and get our boots wet and knew we were in trouble. frostbite happens, especially out here, mom always said. so we'd carry the person with the icy boot back home like they were already dead and get into the house with yellow warm lights and mom would pick the burrs out of our mittens and wrap up the icy foot.

daddy knew we'd outgrown our backyard when i bust the seams in my baseball. he made us these bats out of the spare wood in the garage and they were the most beautiful things in the world, smooth and the perfect weight and size, just for us. well one day i hit a pitch so hard it landed in the drop off behind our apartment, with the old rusted fridge and broken glass and tangles of thorns. daddy said then, we have to find a new place to practice. so he took us out to the field and we made a baseball diamond with some of daddy's old shirts as bases. the ground was uneven and there were burrs everywhere, but we could hit the ball as hard as we wanted. i hit those pitches so hard i cracked my bat and my dad never looked so proud.

there was this time i was all wrapped up in something, 'cause my friend kissed the boy i loved, so i went out there to the field. it became this place that i could go and it felt like it was mine, even though it never really belonged to me. i found this old broken down barn under layers of yellow grass and got these pieces of coal and metal and kept them in my pocket. i went to the tree on the other side of the river, the tree that grew sideways. i tried to climb it but couldn't so instead i just sat under it and watched my house. it looked so different from the back, lined up with the other townhouses like big, quiet people just waiting for something to happen.

Late night thoughts in the Vineyard

2009-07-24T23:40:00.004-04:00

I can hear the ocean through my window and my skin's got sand inside it now. I'm on someone else's vacation, in a house that no one ever lives in. There are natives and vacationers and workers and I'm a little bit of all of them.

No return

2009-05-08T14:26:00.003-04:00

I'll send you letters without return addresses. And you'll open them, one by one, and wonder who in the world could love you so much. You won't know it's me, and it's better that way.

people don't smile much anymore

2009-03-15T18:32:00.002-04:00

"to the pretty brunette at the bagel market in essex: your friendly smile brightened my gray vermont day. thanks."

It's people like this that make me realize everything will be okay.

Listen

2009-03-13T14:47:00.002-04:00

I want to write you back, but I'm not going to. I have a lot to say, but you wouldn't listen.

sincerity

2009-03-10T21:14:00.001-04:00

Funny how I don’t even know if I was sincere. Sometime I’ll be able to talk again; sometime my voice won’t catch in my throat. Trying didn’t get us anywhere so we’ll sit back and watch now. We can’t make the world happy, baby.

It’s days like these that I remember you can only ever count on yourself. Cheers, friend.

nights with

2009-03-05T09:34:00.003-05:00

It's the nights with poetry that I don't want to think about deadlines. It's the nights with artists that I don't want to look for tomorrows. It's the nights I'm already looking back on and realized I took for granted.

It's the days I wake up not knowing what's going to happen next. It's paralysis and freedom and what now?

Letter to no one; Letter to everyone

2009-02-11T22:32:00.002-05:00

Someday, I hope you'll understand. I promise I won't wince when you smoke your cigarettes. I'll be honest and you won't put your hands over your ears. We'll look through all those pencil markings on yellow paper and know we've found something.

Someday, I'll let it all go. I promise I won't hold on forever so you won't have to be so sad. We'll stop walking in those circles and catch a boat over the Atlantic. We'll drink and eat strange foods and I'll throw my arms into the wind and everything will be right.

Someday, I'll understand why you love me. I promise I'll believe you and you'll stop worrying like I know you do when no one is looking. We'll do everything we always wanted and you'll let me go and I'll stop pretending like I'm cut out for this.

Life & Art

2009-02-11T01:15:00.001-05:00

Even if I don't like their styles, Man Ray and Dali maybe had the right idea.

If life doesn't make sense, why should art?

an old response to an old beatnik

2009-02-09T00:43:00.001-05:00

i watched my grandmother die
in the yellow room
next to the man who masturbated with the door open.
while she asked for her “damn cigarettes” he was
coming on his hospital sheets
for me to see and the nurses to clean.

my father’s face is clay now,
the kind crumbled at the bottom of the craft bag
and you can only think about how many guys i blew
before you.

i have your voice in my phone, save it for 21 days,
there’s ink on my sheets and
i only miss you because i haven’t eaten and
right now i’d lick the chicken grease from your lips.

i went back to that place where i live
with a lost soul on my mind and
old man semen under my fingernails
and you wanted me to cry with you over
the sounds and smoke through the window
through my walls
through my door.

it’s early in november and again i taste snow,
but you look away like we,
we were never naïve.
i remember when we could change things,
but our new found intellect tells us that we’re,
we’re too good to use our minds anymore.

i missed her by half an hour
and i’ll never forgive myself
for the hours wasted
watching them play activist, play revolutionist,
when we all knew they just wanted to hear
their voices in the stars.

you told me to hold on tight or i’d lose my way,
you told me, baby, it’s a wild world.
our words have been falling into the ocean and someday
they’ll wash on shore and
everybody will know but, baby,
i can’t fight your wars.
i’ll draw my way with sharpies on maps and never forget
the nights i remembered why i’m alive.

i watched my grandmother die
in the yellow room
full of cigarettes and words that i wrote on my hand
and the illusion of companionship was gone with her
and the ink washed away but the words are still there,
old words, real words, a lifetime of words,
and this is how we die.

summer nights

2008-08-03T02:22:00.001-04:00

i remember driving to find the sunrise.
i remember nights that taste like storm.
i remember laughter and tears in the dark and warm stars and cold water.
i remember thinking that anything was possible, that we'd always have each other.
i remember you whispering that everything was changing, that things would never be the same.
i remember sleeping in the backseat and knowing that someday we'd find what we were looking for.

green boat

2008-07-31T00:45:00.002-04:00

There’s this green boat and it’s tied to the shore with a double knot. There’s paint on the floors and a hole in the side and it’s sinking slowly. I ran to it when no one was looking.
I didn’t cry tonight for money or love, I cried for independence. I didn’t cry for my generation or my causes, I cried for my freedom.
It’s the one thing I’ve always had and the one thing I fight for the hardest. I’m afraid of what it means and need everything it is.
I will never be able to describe the sinking, desperate feeling I get when I realize I’m tied and double knotted. I will never be able to describe how beautiful it is to fight for my life.

forever

2008-06-30T23:51:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I walked by the room she died in and I saw that my whispers are still under the bed.

And now I'm leaving more whispers, placing them carefully, the I love yous and the remember whens. I don't want this room to become a memory, too. But we all know that this is the last summer.
I try to find the compassion and sweetness everyone says I inherited from her, but it's been missing. I try to find that place where I'm strong, but that's missing, too. I try to tell them what I'm feeling, but my words are wrong.

I just want to know that goodbye doesn't mean forever.

honesty

2008-06-24T01:09:00.002-04:00

It's funny that I can call myself a grown woman. I have to now, if I want to claim everything I've done as my own.
And it's funny, that as a grown woman, I still can't seem to be honest. It was always easy to convince myself that if maybe I just told the truth, I'd be an honest person. But that's not honesty.
Instead of facing the frightening or uncomfortable things in life, I've learned to evade it all and stay withdrawn. In some ways it's become easier. The distance helps. In other ways, I wonder how I've maintained relationships this long.
I could say everything. I feel the honesty in my mouth sometimes, but my voice carries it away with sarcasm or roughness or dismissal.
To me, honest people are the bravest people in the world.

don't you let me go tonight

2008-06-23T01:41:00.000-04:00

sometimes i wish romance wasn't so foreign to me.

love, to me, isn't something precious and fragile. or even beautiful. to me, it's strength and trust and and comfort and honesty, visited with nice moments. normally i don't mind my rough version of love, but there are some nights when i wish i understood romance and that i could handle the delicate nature of it.

it's songs like "tonight" by lykke li that make me want that. don't you let me go, let me go tonight. don't you let me go, let me go tonight. god, it's passionate and sad and fragile and beautiful. but sometimes i wonder if that type of love doesn't exist unless it's pushed by sadness. it's that epic love, that fighting-together-forever, that is born from tragedy. when you're in love, the smallest things can become tragedies, and somehow, that's beautiful.

so i suppose i don't want to understand romance. i just want to know that love can exist without the constant sorrow and pain that seems to glamorize it.

bring me here

2008-06-22T23:00:00.003-04:00

it's that sawdusted spirit, those cigarette breaths, that sun-dried skin that brought me here. it's that simple passion, those story-telling eyes, that stormy laughter that keep me alive.
and sometimes all i can do is smile and walk away even when no one else will stay.

just a minute

2008-04-29T02:03:00.002-04:00

homework. sunshine. meeting. work. drive. friends. childhood dreams. concerts. late night letter writing. eight a.m. fingerprints. drive. old folks. smile. grandpa's house. sleepless nights. thinking nights. grandma's looking better, doesn't she look better? fake smiles. new friends. chaos. swallowed pride. occidentals in armchairs. drive. dusty town. baby love. grown-up love. drive. family reunions. late reminiscence. homework when the house is quiet. is she still there? wake up. more smiles. walk past the yellow room. answers to questions i didn't want to ask. brake failure. teenage ambition. uncomfortable, elaborate dinners. returning to nature. dust and lights and music and dancing. five a.m. laughter. hasty mornings. forgotten clothes. drive. rushed goodbyes. drive. bitter anticipation. home. drive. sleep on someone else's bed, just once more, just for a few minutes. drive.

degredation in numerals

2008-04-21T11:36:00.003-04:00

I. it’s getting late and you won’t stop drinking. we’re sustained by telephone electricity and i’m afraid this is our last call. drop the pieces on cobblestone streets and smoky barstools. you say you want to forget it all but, honey, you know he’s coming back.

II. it’s getting late and it’s getting cold and i can feel you shiver through your t-shirt. i want to hold you but i know that it’s more than just a touch right now. it’s forgiveness and plaster and lets-just-forget-it-all. darling, just let me go alone tonight

III. it’s getting late and you’re changing. or maybe you’re not because you always are. prop it up with polytheistic unspecific prayers and tell me how beautiful the degradation is. it’s all for one, all for you. sweetie, how long ago did we lose you?

result of sleepless nights and beat lit

2008-04-11T02:06:00.003-04:00

sometimes i wonder if i'll ever be good enough.
it's one of those things, you know, one of those crazy things that nobody believes but me but hey what can i say. i'm lost in these ideas of perfection, not your perfection, and suddenly i see it slipping away. i want to see the world, see the things that everyone else overlooks. i want to be the one that really understands, i want the streets and sidewalks to remember me, i want the cracks in the concrete to call me back.
i go to all these places and i never return, but i want to see them again so desperately. they're like a piece of myself that i never knew was missing. there's saxophones and spices in new orleans. there's red and orange and freedom in zion national park. there's thunder and dancing in west palm beach. there's discoveries and love in pompeii. there's ancient dreams and tear drop stone in rotenberg. there's citrus air and sunset sand in san jose. there's glass and sleeping rooftops in venice. there's underground secrets and silent gardens in london. there's twisted bedsheets and candle laments in paris. there's hinesburg parishville bar harbor chester croton on the hudson loon mountain the adirondacks the st. lawrence the atlantic rome austria sharon four corners potsdam home.
i think of these things and these places and sometimes i feel like i can't keep it all in. i miss them all and it's this weight in my chest, this weight that's telling me i can't have them all back. it's telling me some of them are gone forever, maybe they're blown away in the sandstorms, maybe they're washed away in the ocean, i can't return. and then this weight, the weight in my chest, is telling me i'm running out of time. i want to see so much more, it's not over it can't be over this can't be it. i've had so many nice things and i want so much more and who does that make me. this insatiable thing.
i think of her when i feel greedy, i think of her small room and her rosary on the doorknob. i want to tell everyone how much it hurts i want them to know what it means to me, but it's all the same to them. it's just another loss, something we all deal with. so i deal with it, because what else can i do? i hide it, i pretend i'm not dramatic, but god, sometimes i want to drive across the whole country just to have time to talk about it, talk about her, talk about me. she's me and i'm her, do you see? we're the same but she's so different and so far away now and i wonder if i can do it for her. can i fix it all, can i make up for the sadness? maybe if i try hard enough, if i live enough, she'll see me and know that i'm doing it for her. no one knows why i do these things and sometimes it hurts.
sometimes i wish i soaked t-shirt shoulders and didn't pretend. sometimes i wish i could write and let them see, let them see everything, it's all true and i hate things and love things and wish things and am more than this being, this walking talking thing. i'd talk and not worry if they were listening, just know that they cared.
they walked in and walked out and i was red dresses and smiles and they never knew. so i have this thing called pride, i can keep it in my pocket where no one can see it but i hate it actually. i don't like this thing called pride this ugly thing this face-saving fuck-up. it erodes away at me, it eats away at me and i still fight for it. it's like cigarettes or coffee or cancer. i used to take care of myself, i used to be good to myself. strange things happen when i lose the things that are important. i used to know home. i wanted to be there but now they're foreign and she's pushing us away, she's pushing us all away. like removing a sickness from her veins. we'll always be there, but she can pretend we're something else, she can pretend we're better than we really are.
sometimes i wonder if i'll ever be good enough.

another moment of melted snow and self-discovery

2008-04-03T01:12:00.007-04:00

We felt the rain yesterday. It's that kind of night that I want to soak in the storm, breathe it, drink it, be it. We leaned out my window last night and tasted it.
With spring finally here and the snow melting, I feel like I'm re-discovering things. There's this whole new perspective that comes with a new season in New England. I'm seeing the world, my world, again under all the gray. It's been all adopted bitterness and preoccupations with sex and processed compassion, but I'm waking up again.
Maybe it's crazy, maybe it sounds cheesy, but it's there. Small parts of myself are resurfacing and it feels so good. I guess they were lost for a long time, years maybe, but sometimes it takes a whole lot of crap to get back to where you want to be. I know there was a time when I used to feel human. I remember the girl I used to be and I've missed her.
There's love in passion and strength in independence and truth in desire. I can still feel it all underneath my skin. I'll play piano at midnight, I'll taste rain, I'll stay awake at night because I can't do anything but think about writing, I'll crave the typewriter keys and fresh paper. I'll jump in a car and drive, I'll put pins in maps, I'll whisper bedtimes stories.
This person that I used to be, she played catch in the spring, she was sweet and polite and good, she was an inspiration, she sang with kids when their worlds were broken, she had big dreams. I spent so much of my youth trying to convince people I was more than that, more than what they saw, but I've come to discover it's silly to try. I focused so much energy on that, that I've turned into a person I'm not proud of, maybe even a person I don't like.
I remember when I was happy. Not just content and living, but honestly, truthfully, happy.
It's been awhile. I'm ready to come back now.

blasphemic provocation

2007-09-18T00:14:00.001-04:00

my flowers are dying and my bookshelf reminds me of everything i might have to give up.

i've been all talk and no submission, i've been all mind and no provocation.
i speak blasphemy from my pedestal and once believed i was invincible.

this is the real world, honey.

sleepless words

2007-09-12T09:48:00.000-04:00

i wore grandma's beads and took a deep breath. it was for her. weeks of sleepless days and nights and it came down to that. there were hours of driving and flowers and sometimes i forget how lucky i am. a night like this reminds me who's there, who really understands. my life is motivated by words, but sometimes they're really not enough.

i'm not

2007-08-29T20:16:00.000-04:00

There's flowers and paper and missed calls and books and wind and she's there and I'm not.

the midnight thoughts

2007-08-12T23:59:00.001-04:00

What is it that encourages us to explore the world? Why is it that it takes drastic change in setting to change us? We neglect to find depth in the places that are familiar to us; we use those places for comfort and refuge and nostalgia, but we don't have the capacity to see past our preconceived notions of them. Why is that? Can we gain objectivity without physically stepping back? Do we have to see new things in order to understand what we have?

I've always been fascinated with the world; I used to draw my dreams on maps with black sharpies. When I travel, I'm opened up to these new injustices, new ideas, new opportunities -- to me, it always seemed so glamorous to take on the world and stand for something.

Going to church this morning didn't necessarily enlighten me to a renewed Christian lifestyle, but it made me realize that it's people like that, the people that sit in the pews every week and attend all the routine church events, are the people that can see the entire world inside a small town. They're the ones that understand the need for revolution and action in even the insignificant places. They don't dismiss any gradient of pain -- it all means something.

Can people change when they stand still?
Can people find themselves when they never look down?

What does it mean to change the world?

it's a lonely job

2007-08-09T23:23:00.001-04:00

"I wanted to be a writer once. But I didn't work hard enough at it... it's a lonely job."
(I accidentally watched Lifetime today. But I got this quote so it's okay.)

Today I took a route to Burlington that I didn't know. I ate whole wheat pizza and bought green glass bowls and listened to a static-y radio station I've never heard. I was bitter in the morning about being abandoned, but I realized for the first time that I'll be ok. I've always known I could survive on my own, but I understood today that I can be happy.

I'm ready for the job.

there's a place

2007-07-31T20:50:00.000-04:00

there's this place i belong to
where i walk barefoot on graves and swim in the dark and touch the honest world.
it's the place i'll never forget. it's the place i'll always return.

wild world

2007-07-19T00:20:00.000-04:00

baby, it's a wild world. hold on tight or you'll lose your way.
baby, i can't fight your wars. hide a knife in your boot and breathe.
baby, it's been a long time.

baby, it's a wild world.

a storm like this

2007-07-09T23:03:00.000-04:00

i've never seen a storm like this before. there's lightning every night and i can taste thunder in the mornings. the clouds are purple and the sun is taking a break from the world. i'd live like this forever, inside the storm.

someday

2007-06-30T23:58:00.001-04:00

someday i will ask you if i was a disappointment.

books and a water glass

2007-06-25T14:55:00.000-04:00

i spent my entire paycheck on books and organic tea and drinks last night. i found calvino and monroe and others. or maybe they found me.
we met by the flower shop and walked the streets at midnight. i put my last two crumpled dollars under my water glass.
i have two dimes, some pennies, and a bunch of british coins in my wallet. but there are six new books on my shelf and i'm happy.

Your green-eyed girl

2007-06-24T11:28:00.001-04:00

turn around and look at me. i'm seven letters and a smile, i'm your green-eyed past, your blonde-haired girl.

4 am summer

2007-06-24T07:12:00.000-04:00

day four and i've gotten used to missing you. i'm learning to ignore the pain in my stomach and constriction in my chest: it's a part of me now. you're a part of me now.
it's my summer morning. 4 am just like i always told you. it's my time and you're not here. you're in baltimore where there is no 4 am light and no thunder air.

not like there is here.

i wish i could have you forever

2007-06-23T05:23:00.000-04:00

"i wish i could have you forever."

sequence still sparkles when the sun goes down. sunglasses are glamour and glitter is magic. they sing from the porch; be strong, be strong. the beach is caught in their tangled hair and the salt is in their skin. blanket laughter and bedtime secrets and eyelashes dusting cheeks.

i wish i could have you forever, just like this.

spray paint memories

2007-06-21T06:30:00.000-04:00

it wasn't the kind of day for a man to die.

spray paint on sidewalks, pictures in boxes, faded artist statements... you're inside it all.
they'll toast to you tonight. it's your memorial, boy.

piano in the river

2007-06-18T04:30:00.000-04:00

these are the nights you remember, the ones with old friends and good music.

we sat on the hood of my car and talked about travel. under planets like fireflies, we talked about the world. we shared blankets and beer in the dark. we listened to piano and violin under the lamppost. small under the sky, our words fell into the river and we knew they meant something there; they'd been waiting to sink to the bottom and claim it. it's been seven years; the words are piling up. soon they'll reach the surface and everyone will know. everyone will know.

these are the nights you remember, the nights you remember why you're alive.

save pompeii

2007-06-04T03:01:00.000-04:00

we found home that day.

we were the first to cherish those lost ruins, the only ones to feel the secret city beneath our feet. we were explorers. we were natives. we were friends.

we were heroes,
saving the city thousands of years too late.

lost affairs

2007-05-02T02:50:00.000-04:00

.paint-stained denim and midnight walks and whispers into palms.
.2 a.m. coffee and secret ambitions and laughter stumbling into tomorrow.
.knotted ribbons and sporadic escapes and the inevitable returns.
.ocean afternoons and galaxy nights and storm mornings.
.kissing friends and dances with strangers and love affairs with art.
.passion under fingernails and music in pockets and just one reason to keep going.
.pebbles at windows and smoking at sunrise and goodbyes with closed eyes.

there are things we have to give up. cigarettes and alcohol and sugar and old friends. we always thought it'd be hardest to give up the bad habits. but no, it's you.
goodbye, old friends.

teach me

2007-03-11T23:32:00.000-04:00

teach me how to kill and how to hate teach me how to destroy it all show me how to make love and how to die show me the sea on your doorstep tell me about candles and sand and castles and God tell me everything i don't want to hear

ink-stained sheets and melted snow

2007-02-20T01:17:00.000-05:00

.i.

There's an old receipt in my pocket, from that road trip last summer. Sometimes I pretend it's a picture of you… I like to think I can carry you around with me. (You can live in my pocket if you want.)

.ii.

Sometimes I try to speak, but the words dissolve in my throat. I think the sea witch stole my voice. I bet she keeps it in a shell around her neck. I don't know what I traded for it, but I really hope it wasn't a prince.

.iii.

You want to sleep in the snow, but I can't let you. It's the kind that you'll fall asleep forever in; you'll never wake up. Stay with me, just for a little while. I can hear the snow melting outside, all the icicles have disappeared; it's almost over, stay with me, just for a little while longer, this winter is almost over.

.iv.

Ink-stained sheets and callused fingers. He died with a paint box by his side; I'll die with a pen in my hand. I'll put words in the Atlantic and wait for them on the other side; they'll be buried in the sand and I'll find them someday. Ink-stained sheets and callused fingers, it's only natural.