Migration

"I am not at peace, I tell her. I want to fail. I am hungry
for what I am becoming. What will you do? she asks. I will continue north, carrying the past in my arms, flying into winter."

— Jack Gilbert

Dark, The Absence of Color

dark, the absence of color
black and swirl and abyss
one step above an Escher print,
depending on the viewer’s eye.
the weight of the bleak bends no minds;
thoughts remain satisfactory victims.
whizzing by
breaking windows and sound barriers
an unidentified flying
foreign
object
splatting and sprinkling and smiling
the opposite wall with a thick liquid.
upon closer examination,
(the only kind they are willing to offer)
here we have it, they say.
in reality, two ells from a literally,
a wounded, paint-spilled
spiritless shell of a balloon
whose dying words still ooze from resilient lips:
“through the prism.”
yellow, yellow, yellow…
echoes echoes echoes.
no sooner can the grief swell up within them
(losing such a frightening, mysterious creature causes frightening, mysterious grief)
than does the creature’s army ambush,
through rafters and expectations,
slats and stock and straw.
pigment slips down faces of a shelter’s cube.
the color is relentless.
as dodging truth to protect ignorance often does,
retaining a grasp on the abyss proves futile.
playing hide and seek in the Great Plains.
taping orange leaves to their branches.
pressing eyes closed to hold on to the dark
for no other reason than to secure the familiar
surely paints eyelids.
and as the sun rises
(for how long had it slept?)
and breaks through the broken window yet again
a refracted rainbow brightens the barn
doors and floors and boars.
wilted soldiers,
victorious in their vibrancy,
drape the ground.
color
Color!
drapes the very air.
abyss stems now not from depths of darkness
but depths of novelty.
and through the prism in the pane,
what’s left of rainbow
drifts slowly to the sky.

New York, I love you--but you're bringing me down...ba dum ba dum, ba dum ba dum

Though I am no Englishman, I will soon be a legal alien in New York.

Don't think of it as me leaving you. I chose NYC over Bremen, Germany, so there's something to be thankful for, eh?

Think of it as the greatest city in the world becoming more accessible; starting August sometime-or-other, there will be a person there--living day in and out, opening a Starbucks, grocery shopping, laundromatting, running in the rain, riding the metro--who loves and misses you.

I wish I had someone in New York who loves me. I guess I'll have to take who I find and make it happen!


"Distance is to love what wind is to fire; it kills what's fickle, but strengthens what's real."

[image courtesy of Le Love]
[title lyric courtesy of LCD Soundsystem]

"Write because expression is everything."

Love
is a combination of
finding the person who fits your definition
of love
and finding the person whose definition
you
would love
to fit.

***

"She can be really sweet, but when she decides to be mean, she's...really cutting. She knows how to take you down a notch, you know? And I think [her daughters] have learned a little bit from her."

***

well, yeah.

***

perfect college = the one that tells you not to "beat yourself up about all that Physics stuff." :]

Sponge

I easily absorb others' heartbreak.

Those who can't absorb it break my heart.

Two To Tango

life calls for a dancing partner.

dance to the dishwasher

rinsingrinsingrinsing

tango to the tea kettle’s whistle

boogie to the morning birds.

it’s time for your hands to meet new hips.

smile grudgingly

and secretly glow

when the someone whose chest fits your head

moves those defiant fingers

your worn and calloused, masterpiece-penning fingers

from your hips

to theirs.

wrestle with your furrowing eyebrows until

they pull up and out

up on your eyes

all the better to see you with, my dear.

if the beauty is too much,

close them.

music doesn’t stop.

water will churn, boil, and bathe the birds,

those impossibly incandescent lovebirds,

until your feet stand still.