No More Wishy Washy

Me and N pinky swore and I liked what he said in the car, and it ran through me at the post office.  It was something like, why be anxious chasing new things, when you could just love what you already have? These friends, you know?  His best friend is moving away.  We will talk about it some other time, cause right now, he has nothing nice to say.

We hung out for an hour after the dance.  I crawled into a cubbie mistaking butterscotch for sweetened condensed milk and got called on it.  What is this color?  How many gross words can describe it?  It's not even gross in the end, because it's probably the color of your gross, because in the end I am shifting around on my toes trying not to have a new crush, eating snax, failing horribly.  It's hard trying to decide to stick to what I decide when what I decide could take ten years and no part of my life wants THAT right now, you know?

I got in real close and told him real sternly,"There is something you should know N. People want to hang out with you not only if they are bored, but because you are cool.  You don't have to qualify each invitation with that."

Oh splendid recovery.

The best part of today was the laundry list of the best part of today. The best part of today was everything.  But mostly that time when we were saying goodbye and everyone was coming over to begin again.  When we showed D our symbols for courage and she laughed and laughed.  When P knew about your energy work because I had told her; that somebody knew something about you and that I had helped.  When I remembered we had hung out earlier and melted, the sweat on my upper lip, the polar pop for 74 cents, my first anchovie!  I was scared I would vomit but you of course had advil that O had given you.  Of course she called you to bring some because I told her you still had it. How you asked offhandedly before you left if anyone else needed any, and of course M did.  It felt like caring for each other.  It felt like D's first kale smoothie.  It felt like B admitting he had found one on the table and one in the fridge and he had eaten them both.  Everyone was glad that had happened.  Even me.

H called.  Their trip is over and now they are home.  What was that emotion at the computer?  I want to tell everyone and no one and overflow and gush with this. Oh yes, an appreciation for who we know and what we do for each other.  We should hang out sometime, I have some new poems to share and I am going to learn that song.  How do I know what the words are for this?  Because B called so I had a reason to talk.  "We're just going to post on the website and see if they get to it."

Hey girl.  Remember you ordered a computer part off of ebay without having a meltdown?  Remember you completed a 6 month budget report on excel without having a meltdown?  See. You have courage. See. You are growing.  You're like ten steps closer to having a smartphone with that maneuver.  So what is the wish?  What is the wash?

Self Portrait as a Storyteller

Before we become friends, there is something you should know about me.
I'm not an independent person.  I don't aspire to models of individual success.
This is what I need:
to cast vulnerable expressions in casual conversation
to know my desires have a place to land
to be reminded of lightheartedness and struggle,
of children and revolutionaries.

I didn't expect to know these kinds of stories.  I didn't see this for my life.  Stories of pain.  Stories of empathy.
I wanted stability, but now I am learning how to just be in the boat.
With you and whoever else is here and deciding that yes we are all being in this boat.

There was a dragon, and a lady holding a cup, and a battered soggy flag, and they were the same.
They did an experiment.
Where the dragon tried to make herself small
by slowing all of the avenues that led to pain.  As if these avenues were the root, and they would always lead to pain,
and an external strategy was needed to change the course.
The course was of the lady looking for a drink of water.  

The lady did not go very many places.  But each place she went, she tried to find out more about becoming herself, which looked liked learning to not have a self, which looked like becoming an ally to everyone else.  Becoming a mirror.  Becoming a sponge.  The flag ached for a slight cool breeze.

If we become friends there is something you should know about me.
I am not a codependent person.  I don't aspire to the loss of choice.  This is what I need:
to be the insatiable whirlwind
to walk and dance at the same time
to tell you everything that happened in this lifetime of a day
to speak up when you pause for a moment.

I don't want my quietness to be confused for thoughtlessness.
I am basking in the shades of our shared experience.
I am holding back because of my monster complex: the fear of being too much all of the time.
I know we haven't met for very long, but if you heard what I heard about poetry, you might know what I mean. It's all in how the brains go. And I love how you just go and go and go.

The lady eventually lived what she knew. That things could change at any moment.  That it wasn't all waiting. That there was water in potholes and in saliva. She wrung out the flag and collected a few drops.  The dragon grew because it was in her nature to grow and become everything.  The flag flew.  They started a new experiment, which was loving unforever things.  Which was letting go, I mean really.

The lady sewed a heart patch onto the flag because it was in her nature to reflect love wherever she went.  The allies found her, and the dragon beamed.

As we are friends, there is something you should know about me.  I am an interdependent person.
I aspire to the empowerment of us. This is what I need:
to listen to what you have to say
to remind you you are whole and sweet and strong
to absorb how you move into my own moves.
to utilize your metaphors and share your vocabulary
until there is no me for the sake of me,
only what we've made,
and a mutual understanding of how it is moving us forward.

A Long Road Home

Stick in the mud.  Stick along the fence.
I once gave a birthday present that was an exhibition.
It was at a church on 37th.
There are these tree branches.
They are all detached, and scraggly, and trapped in the panes of a fence.
I can't tell which was there first, or now, if they need each other.

It's St. Patty's day, Hip Hip Hooray.
I walk alone, around the warehouse, with my stick. wwwhhh.
I was never good at sound effects.  I was never good at facial expressions.  I thought I was good at a lot of things until you.
You proved hundreds of unforeseen variables.

My heart is broken.
I didn't know until my jaw started hurting sometimes, and then all the time, and then a lot.
I've never had such a strong body reaction to an emotional problem, but I've talked enough abuse and trauma and chronic pain to get it.
Sometimes when your heart is broken, your jaw starts to hurt.

The doctor thinks maybe it's bell's palsy.
She gave me some handouts on TMJ and told me to come back if I wanted some work done.
I didn't go back.
I started inventing poetry on the spot.  Toni Braxton was playing in the waiting room.  I have a lot of friends, and eventually it will all come out.

We love each other.
I only say it when you say something so perfect that I can't hold it in.  And you only say it after you get out of the car, just before you close the door.  But when I joked the world would be a better place with more yous in it,  I wasn't joking.

I don't know how this story ends.  I'm not a librarian.
I alone will not decide.  I'm not the writer.
I'm just a mirror, a minnion.  A sponge, a kitchen dweller, a super effective stander, a body inhabiting a life, feeling the tension between the two.
Basically a lady walking around with a cup,
looking for a drink of water.