inside

waiting
wanting
to see you in my eyes
finding feelings
I thought had died

Julia Who

Julia who laughs like crisp Autumn
and talks like boiling water
who is books and shoes
who is a shard of glass and a cotton ball
whose eyes are framed with raven feathers
is home today
who tells me of the city
who tells me of the train
whose purple paper cranes
can't unfold today
sleeps in her heart-wallpaper childhood room
who used to be there every day
is home
is a sponge on a kitchen sink
is a light bulb tossed away
doesn't stay here anymore
is hiding behind the curtains
who giggles and sways on her flag pole
is chestnut cabinets and radio songs
who comes and leaves and comes and leaves again
is the orange sweater tucked away
asking why don't you visit me
why don't you come why?

Clarity

The leaf moves
just the amount of breeze
The body swoons
just the greatest turmoil

Building after building
from one to the next
house by house

When it tears
there can be a clarity
it is enough
Arrow fit exactly
into the wound it makes

And when the heart
knows truth
the precision
is a tornado -
with just the amount of breeze

beauty.

slight breeze
sunshine
reality, not skewed
building, breathing, blinking
shifting, movement
slow motion
laughter

Steel?

Nothing was hidden in the darkness,
everything had just changed colors

The air,
heavy from the rain
My arms,
goose bumps crept up the skin

On that black steel park bench
lights cast shadows across the grass
Surrounded by chatter
and wine sodden laughter

Cars honking
footsteps echoing off brick walls

All I heard was your sharp breathing

They escaped
wouldn’t stop fighting

Could I calm the storm?
Could I break the haze?

On that black steel park bench
lights cast shadows across the grass
Surrounded by chatter
and wine sodden laughter

the clock ticking in my brain
down
down
down

quarter turn and I am falling

five crimson tear drops
four smothered screams
three blinks
two shaking hands
one deep breath

so sweet and full
so timid and haunting
pressing on my lungs

puts mind into a frenzy

My life is an integrated circuit
I’m inside of my body
But I don’t feel it

You just think its funny

Grave

One by one,
the days fall beside us
like yellow leaves.

We have no conscience
of what we're becoming.

Month by month,
the rings on our tree trunks,
like old wise eyes,
grow wider.

And winter lends them a dead disguise.

Now time-
like an ocean knows tide –
like a notion to toss about the house
and lose inside the couch.

And piles of our thoughts run miles in the dark
Just tryin to get home.

Age by age,
we rhyme with our seasons' rehearsed routines.
Still turning and returning.

Now I'm wide as the ocean.
Now I bleed roses.

And you are just a mark on the map of my past.

But I am a road I wind along alone all day until the coast.

It's easier being alone
You're a shadow of the old
And I want something new

We're walking in the sand,
And you are holding my hand.
Your eyes are sparkling like the sea.
And I just see you and me.

Come quick,
the water’s up to my neck and I can barely breathe.
Yet all you say is “take it slowly”.

I was swimming in a sea of strange bodies
One of them was
Me

I can hear the clock ticking in my brain
down
down
down


I would just
wake up every morning with a new bird in my cage
I would just fly away

quarter turn and I am falling
so dangerously
so precariously
off that cliff

so sweet and full
with crimson lips
and amorous hearts
they are dying

I would just
float away in to the mist
into the frost
into the dew

The bitter light filtering through the leaves
casting eerie shadows amongst our hearts
and tangled limbs

So timid so haunting
I cannot breathe
altitude
so cumbersome

Pressing on my lungs
the breeze so sweet
puts my mind into a frenzy
wondering


If that box I buried is
A grave or a time capsule

I believe

One of the most difficult challenges I have had to overcome is my parents splitting up. I had to throw away all my childhood notions of love and all that I had learned about family being infinite. I had to watch my dad cry, hear myself scream, envy my sisters strength, and hate my mom. When something as strong as a daughter’s love for her mother twists into a terrible, sickening hatred, it takes so much to forgive. All my sources of strength were depleted – the vision of my future, my childhood (fragile on pillars of lies), my family – shattered.  All during a time where I needed so much strength…

She sat me on my bed one summer night. She said it. Said she was leaving my dad. I screamed. No. I don’t even remember leaving my house; I must have flew down the stairs. It was late and dark. I was running down the sidewalk, not even feeling it scrape my feet. Running faster than I’ve ever run in my life. And if you know me, you know that I am the opposite of athletic.  My dad was yelling my name, crying for me to come back. Suddenly I was. Back, I mean. Collapsed in the grass crying. My dad scooped me up and I could tell how hard it was, for I’m not a child anymore, and most of the time I forget that.

Pain striped me down, grounded me. But it also sent me reeling. Pain is something tangible. Pain is something real. Pain is undeniable. Only after I hit rock bottom, could I truly appreciate happiness again. Only after I collapsed, crumbled, cried, I could begin to feel again.

Time moved on, but it took me a while to move on myself. To let go. But one day, about three years after, I realized how truly hard it is to ever forget. I blended the edges, smoothing over the awkwardness at holidays, the quiet house, the scheduled dinners, the avoided questions, the prying neighbors. I moved on, I thought, but all it took was an old family album, with yellowing pages and priceless baby pictures to make me realize that strength is really just an illusion. I encountered one picture of my father and mother, in high-rise, faded denim, and out-of-date sunglasses, smiling at the camera, with their arms around each other to make it all come flooding back. A pile of bricks was on my chest; I couldn’t catch my breath, I went numb. I allowed myself to cry for one minute and closing the photo album and myself to all that I used to believe is love.
Now I believe in a different type of love. It evolves, it changes, it even switches persons. But it is always there.