you were a jack, and i the Queen of spades,
the day they broke her majesties away.
they could not tell, the words came much too dear,
about what some poor innocent had here
endured, with but a fleeting breath,
and looked upon the very face of death.
she knew not where or how he would attend,
or whether she had minutes left to mend,
but only that this body he would rend.
the sand grew hot as glass and just as gloss
and nevermore the sower cast his lot
among the salt of sea and sea of swine.
a pillow's crest may touch your cheek,
but never will that cheek meet mine.
-----
"conceived 17 Jan 2009"
the rhyme scheme is weird, and the closing couplet is not in iambic pentameter, but i didn't write this one: it came through me. i don't feel it would be right to mess with those things.
the sonnet number is question-marked because i'm convinced that i lost one somewhere and it will turn up eventually.
27 January 2009
24 January 2009
6 years
today marks the sixth anniversary of my being out to myself, which means tomorrow is the sixth anniversary of my coming out for the first time.
i'm sure that could explain a lot, if you want it to. personally, i'm just going to notice it and go on living my life.
i'm sure that could explain a lot, if you want it to. personally, i'm just going to notice it and go on living my life.
21 January 2009
confidence & frustration
I have incredible confidence today that i will find myself where i need to be. be that Boston for two years, California for a week, Europe for a month, bumfuck Illinois for a weekend, or Pittsburgh for the rest of my life--it doesn't really matter. i'll get there someday, and i know it will be right.
in other news, i learned this morning that the Department of Health and Human Services implemented the "conscience rule" that former President Bush (oh that sounds delicious!!) signed into law in december. for rant, see this entry. for fair & unbiased reporting (i assume), read the New York Times article.
in other news, i learned this morning that the Department of Health and Human Services implemented the "conscience rule" that former President Bush (oh that sounds delicious!!) signed into law in december. for rant, see this entry. for fair & unbiased reporting (i assume), read the New York Times article.
18 January 2009
statement:
the very unprettyness of things has been making them beautiful these last few days.
-----
upcoming:
-something flowing through me over which i had absolutely no control produced an almost perfect sonnet last night. expect to see it soon.
-a new mixtape (or two).
-----
upcoming:
-something flowing through me over which i had absolutely no control produced an almost perfect sonnet last night. expect to see it soon.
-a new mixtape (or two).
17 January 2009
thought
the problem occurs when you know you have something profound to say--the solution to all the world's problems, or at least the one that's most pressing to you at a given moment--but you can't get to it, it's blocked up in your brain somewhere and the pathways are closed, you just need to open them somehow and get that thought through. it's tougher than it sounds, or than it should be.
i know there are things from the last two nights that i have not written down, which were way more important than the things i did manage to write down.
i know there are things from the last two nights that i have not written down, which were way more important than the things i did manage to write down.
13 January 2009
[untitled]
what? writing? i don't do that; what are you talking about?
unless you mean crazy poem-emails
and overthought text messages
and jottings of mind refuse
and cryptic facebook statuses
and brief journal entries, just to put pen to paper.
i might be an artist
if you consider a constructing a playlist to be a form of art
or tracing the marker-lines that just aren't visible on the paper yet
or copying in very neat handwriting words other people have written
to be hung on the wall as a reminder.
unless you mean crazy poem-emails
and overthought text messages
and jottings of mind refuse
and cryptic facebook statuses
and brief journal entries, just to put pen to paper.
i might be an artist
if you consider a constructing a playlist to be a form of art
or tracing the marker-lines that just aren't visible on the paper yet
or copying in very neat handwriting words other people have written
to be hung on the wall as a reminder.
10 January 2009
07 January 2009
happy
i am inexplicably happy.
i have no good reason to be, and maybe that's the best reason of all.
i made a new friend in my spanish class. that was what started it, really. then as i was walking home, my ipod decided to play "one thing" by finger eleven, which is quite possibly one of my favorite songs ever (though i'm not sure how close to the top of the list), and "times like these" by the foo fighters (instead of "everlong," which it started to play). i walked past a woman on my street, and we smiled at each other. how often does this happen? we both seemed unsure of whether we could get away with it, but when we parted, each of us was smiling more broadly than we had been before.
as i walked, i started thinking, as i have so many times in the past: this is my city, and i own it. this is the city that built my confidence, cemented it, and, when necessary, rebuilt it. i can look at the sky instead of the ground when i walk, and look at whomever i want. i love this city, and the idea of leaving it doesn't even really occur to me today.
when i got home, i meditated. this is hard for me, and it takes motivation, or at least a lot of energy. but i had a surplus, so i figured i might as well put it to good use. it seems like such a waste, when i have so much positive energy, to keep it all to myself. somebody else out there in the universe must need it.
i have no good reason to be, and maybe that's the best reason of all.
i made a new friend in my spanish class. that was what started it, really. then as i was walking home, my ipod decided to play "one thing" by finger eleven, which is quite possibly one of my favorite songs ever (though i'm not sure how close to the top of the list), and "times like these" by the foo fighters (instead of "everlong," which it started to play). i walked past a woman on my street, and we smiled at each other. how often does this happen? we both seemed unsure of whether we could get away with it, but when we parted, each of us was smiling more broadly than we had been before.
as i walked, i started thinking, as i have so many times in the past: this is my city, and i own it. this is the city that built my confidence, cemented it, and, when necessary, rebuilt it. i can look at the sky instead of the ground when i walk, and look at whomever i want. i love this city, and the idea of leaving it doesn't even really occur to me today.
when i got home, i meditated. this is hard for me, and it takes motivation, or at least a lot of energy. but i had a surplus, so i figured i might as well put it to good use. it seems like such a waste, when i have so much positive energy, to keep it all to myself. somebody else out there in the universe must need it.
04 January 2009
Year in Review: 2008
so much has happened this year.
when i think back to last january, i can barely believe it was the same lifetime....i've changed so much as a person, but i suspect that if i really thought about each year as a discrete unit, i would say this at the end of every one.
and no, i'm not necessarily pleased with all the ways in which i've changed.
one of the more important things i've learned is that there is no going backwards. so even though i may not be pleased with some of the directions i've gone, all i can do is move forward from there. for years, i've had this image in my head of your life as a path with many forks, winding its way through the woods. sometimes, you can see one of the divergent paths through the trees, the way your life might have gone; other times, the trees are so thick there's no way to even glimpse it. occasionally, two divergent paths might come together again farther along--but i haven't yet found a way to tell if it's happened, much less if it's going to.
i've hurt a lot of people this year, some more seriously than others. because of this, i believe that all the pain that's been dealt to me has been well-deserved. not all of the pain that i've dealt has been as well-deserved. (most of it probably has not been, but i'm not the karma police.)
i like to think i've done some good, too. strangely, the only instance i can think of that might serve as a clear example of this is the day i skipped class to take a friend to the hospital--which just goes to show how hard it is to write a year in review, because that was in april, and it's inextricably tied to something that became pretty predominant for me in just the last two months or so. perhaps as i get older, i will continue to have this much trouble returning to the past--which probably would not be a bad thing, but then i worry that i will forget where i came from and what i've already learned.
maybe it would be a more useful exercise to try to tell those stories from this past year that i am forgetting.
however, i can't think of the year in terms of stories. i think of it in terms of people and in moments. i could write a chronological list for you of the people i've been involved with, and perhaps a brief sketch of what that involvement was. i could write a series of instants (which is way more fun). but i could not tell you a coherent story about any one of them--at least, i would find it extremely difficult.
furthermore, the summer looks like a void, on the map of the year in my head.
i should be a visual artist instead.
when i think back to last january, i can barely believe it was the same lifetime....i've changed so much as a person, but i suspect that if i really thought about each year as a discrete unit, i would say this at the end of every one.
and no, i'm not necessarily pleased with all the ways in which i've changed.
one of the more important things i've learned is that there is no going backwards. so even though i may not be pleased with some of the directions i've gone, all i can do is move forward from there. for years, i've had this image in my head of your life as a path with many forks, winding its way through the woods. sometimes, you can see one of the divergent paths through the trees, the way your life might have gone; other times, the trees are so thick there's no way to even glimpse it. occasionally, two divergent paths might come together again farther along--but i haven't yet found a way to tell if it's happened, much less if it's going to.
i've hurt a lot of people this year, some more seriously than others. because of this, i believe that all the pain that's been dealt to me has been well-deserved. not all of the pain that i've dealt has been as well-deserved. (most of it probably has not been, but i'm not the karma police.)
i like to think i've done some good, too. strangely, the only instance i can think of that might serve as a clear example of this is the day i skipped class to take a friend to the hospital--which just goes to show how hard it is to write a year in review, because that was in april, and it's inextricably tied to something that became pretty predominant for me in just the last two months or so. perhaps as i get older, i will continue to have this much trouble returning to the past--which probably would not be a bad thing, but then i worry that i will forget where i came from and what i've already learned.
maybe it would be a more useful exercise to try to tell those stories from this past year that i am forgetting.
however, i can't think of the year in terms of stories. i think of it in terms of people and in moments. i could write a chronological list for you of the people i've been involved with, and perhaps a brief sketch of what that involvement was. i could write a series of instants (which is way more fun). but i could not tell you a coherent story about any one of them--at least, i would find it extremely difficult.
furthermore, the summer looks like a void, on the map of the year in my head.
i should be a visual artist instead.
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