expendable
and with the blurring quality of a spanish sunset
i ought to stop dreaming of the miracle
they [nora knows] don’t happen ever
no fool but i expects
a man to build a roof over the pedestal
everyone knows statues have no eyes to worry about rain
sleep like trauma washing over me washing dishes
as if salt could wash away a man-made stain
what call you this
a fading jaded tan line of black bags under the eyes
what am i now
a landing strip stripped bare so there!
Posted in excerpts
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it’s time for answers. or questions. whichever.
a fellow writer inspired me to think about a few. and they started the clock tick-tocking inside my mind: what did a girl like me want anyhow? what is the dream, the true ideal?
1. i’d like a picture of you on my windowsill by my bed: to keep, to hold, to treasure. it will be my reminder that you exist and when i wake up in the middle of the night, wondering if i dreamt up my whole life, i want it there to touch. it’ll be solid in my hands. a relic. and it’ll be in a mosaic picture-frame we’ve yet to buy. in barcelona or in paris (just because i like the way you say it) or in a magic place far away.
2. i’d like to have you on call, running to me whenever i need you there and sometimes just because. you know: for no reason, just because i want to be in your arms where it’s never lonely.
3. and i want you to have eyes for nobody else but me, following me, stalking me, penetrating me anew with every gaze. i want them to ask me for affirmation of my love every morning and i want them to drown me whole, as if they were not eyes but lagoons of clear-blue water in devon, on hot summer afternoon, when all you want is to immerse yourself whole in water .
4. but more than anything, i’d like to know that this is where you want to be: here with me.
5. that will be all.
Posted in chapters of my life
Tagged about, affirmation, afternoon, all, anew, answers, anyhow, anything, arms, ask, away, barcelona, be, because, bed, blue, but, buy, by, call, clear, clock, devon, did, dream, dreamt, drown, else, ever, every, exist, eyes, far, fellow, few, follow, frame, gazee, girl, hands, have, here, hold, hot, ideal, if, immerse, inside, inspire, it, just, keep, know, lagoons, life, like, lonely, love, magic, me, middle, mind, more, morning, mosaic, my, need, never, night, no, nobody, not, Paris, penetrate, picture, place, questions, reason, relic, reminder, running, say, solid, sometimes, stalking, started, summer, than, that, them, there, they, think, this, tick, time, tock, touch, treasure, true, up, wake, want, water, way, were, what, when, whenever, where, which, whichever, whole, will, windowsill, with, wondering, writer, yet, you, yourself
why was the moon shining so bright last night? and the night before last. the night before that it was cloudy but still it managed to peek through. and i don’t know what to say to you. i used to moon-watch when i was studying astronomy at school.
let me fall into this stupour. the whites of my eyes will turn into two big moons to shine on the world in the darkest light. for i am sin.
all sin.
and S is catholic.
beyond all means.
and i no longer know if he believes in love, because he believes in so little by believing in so much. if he ever asks, i shall tell him this much: that i no longer know him, because what he was to me is not compatible with what he is now.
i believe in choice. to me, choice is love.
catholicism is brutal: it gives no choice.
abortion is not an option he told me. what if the pregnancy is the result of rape? i asked. she’d still have to have the child.
my eyes glazed over. i forgot who i was speaking to.
and he’s not sure if he believes in contraception: life hasn’t forced him to think about that yet. how can anybody say that in a world with AIDS?
i’m lost. what does he know of the fire of desire that drives me on and on?
i know sometimes you have to let go and start again, from scratch. but i can’t. not now.
suppose i am Kai, from Hans Christian Andersen’s book, and he is the splinter of troll-mirror that befell into my eye.
how can i run away if it it’s in the mind?
Posted in chapters of my life
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do you reckon we could make snow angels without snow? we could scrape ourselves against the ground, delirium of cold seeping through our pores. then, maybe then, our bodies would scrape away the frost from the pavement without drawing blood. maybe the ice will shatter somewhere inside of us. i’m cold tonight and nothing will warm me.
more than anything, i’d like for the sunset to come around again.
more violent this time, more primitive, innate; heat firing my synapses all at once with broken impulses. and i want it to smell of freshly brewed coffee in a little cafe on a little hidden street nobody knows but stumbles onto by chance. we must always roll the die of life. it’s in the eyes. always in the eyes.
like silence.
yesterday i would have told you it never comes around, but silence came. and now i know true silence is that which lies in the inevitability of it being broken any moment now. suppose it’s like cutting a cake. don’t ask me why.
and when it comes around you can see it lurking like a shadow in the eyes. a vapid corner of pitch black dark. but we are burning embers in the shadows of the light.
come with me: it will be alright.
i have decided that i will be cold tonight.
but i will try to warm you up.
Posted in chapters of my life
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when i was little i wanted to make magic, to pull the rabbit out of the hat and make things disappear before your very eyes. i got little magic kits for bithdays and watched magic shows on tv. i was an avid learner who learnt nothing at all, because now i know the real magic.
this is it.
and though it comes rarely, its arrival like a flight of a flock of swallows migrating south where warmth is surer, lustier, this is it. grass is always greener on the other side. bar this one. i’m not moving.
before you fly away, there’s always a rush of events whose sole purpose is to please me into oblivion until you are gone and the empty space forms where you ought to be. only this monday we found our song as we kissed in the middle of it, shakira singing for the crowd in which we were engulfed. that was your birthday present to me: shakira concert the day before the winter soltice.
today, it was your birthday: a small affair of our closest friends and family ties. but morning was ours. so absolutely ours.
magic is the feeling of being utterly in love. it is when you can’t help wondering qué haré si no te vuelvo a ver. it is melting in another’s arms like snow on warm day. it is falling in love and not knowing how to stop. not even wanting to stop.
and every time you go away, i wonder what will i do if i never see you return.
thank you for the magic.
Posted in chapters of my life
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glittering soot on her eyelashes 