une belle année ou quoi

oh no?

or was it?

what happened?

who cares?


just a little older

is all

a little younger

a little sadder

a little happier



i did some terrible

or

impressive

things



more time

inside me

or

less?



ah

who cares

kiss me

dead mothers

dead mothers

who are still dead

i am alive

you are in my blood

dead mothers


dead mother's

single daughter's

mother's mother

has dementia


dead mother

you had cancer

i was a child

one time

dead mother


single fathers

raising daughters

so much blood

in my blood

dead mother


9 months in your womb

dear natasha,

i read your poem 'monarch butterflies use the earth's magnetic field' and i just want you to know

it's a great poem and all but what do you mean the magnetic field is preparing to flip

what exactly does that mean

is this like a real thing or a thing you made up

because i don't have a back-up system

how will i get home

it is 4am and i am really worried about this

i could look it up on the internet but i'd rather have you explain it to me

please write back soon

your friend

emily


ps natasha

it's 4am and i'm reading your poetry on the internet

sometimes the world is wonderful

a cold sky, drunk and crawling

all my stories started outside in the middle of the night. it was always cold. i was always drunk. they were always about other people and how i would crawl home at night, drunk and cold, needing people but needing loneliness too.

i'm not anywhere tonight. there is no moon. there are only christmas lights and a dim lamp in this cold room.

i imagined a perfect stranger and let it be perfect. i buried my face in her shirt. i let the sun stream through white curtains onto her back in the morning. i let myself kiss her shoulder blade and i let myself out the door. 

perfection is painful. happiness is the worst. i could make it all up, i could put it all in there. secret desire. that's what the writer does. the writer causes two people to bump their lips and stumble through the streets at night when it's cold and they're drunk. the writer writes the answers for two people. the writer creates warmth and places it in between two bodies. the writer makes the bodies sweat, the sweat slightly sticky and odourless. the writer makes sure the bodies stay warm.

am i a writer? the writer inserts themselves under the covers. the writer chooses the person next to them.

am i a writer? but the writer is alone. i'm not anywhere tonight.

the writer is just sad. the writer is unhappy with the world so she creates another one. the world is a room, rectangular in shape, with painted white walls. the window faces south. the world has a large closet and a double bed and a TV and a night stand with an alarm clock. inside the world is a woman with staticky brown hair which sticks to her wool shirt and her cheek.

but the writer hates what is not real. she apologizes to the woman with brown hair and lets her sleep peacefully and then she closes the door on that dream.

a writer is a dreamer.

all my stories are my dreams.

all my stories are my desires.

i imagined a perfect stranger and i kissed her on the mouth and i told her i never wanted to know her. i told her no matter how much i beg, to never love me, never ever let me bury my face in that favourite place, never lift my shirt and kiss my spine, never let me touch the skin which is as smooth as i make it which tingles when i make it, never let me feel what will consume me from the inside; the desire to touch again, to taste again, to kiss again and again and again, to be kissed again again again.

there was a real girl, once, who i wanted to kiss in the middle of the street in the middle of the night in front of the mountain under the cross under the moon and the moon shining off the just rained on street with my hands in my pockets and my heart kind of warm and i wanted her hands on my face and i wanted it to feel like how i imagined it feels to be in love but it didn't feel like that it felt like going home alone at night underneath a cold sky drunk and crawling and needing someone but needing loneliness too and needing to keep the illusion that love is out there somewhere, and it is real.

i'm not sorry for what i did. i'll rewrite it someday.

look at what i did now

in an airport hotel
so i touch your bones for the last time

the sun rises through the window

planes lift their heavy wings
fly over our heads

this balcony gives an excellent view of sky

so at four in the morning i pack my bags
and dive right in

sweet blue tastes like sugar sticks and nescafe

asphalt tastes like clean sheets soft mattress all alone

so i guess what i'm trying to say
is that i'm home

some people i know, some things i've seen

click on them

san francisco

katie

old friends, the best kind

jeba

cat

cate

and absence ate the year

october 21 2010

now, now, it's broken now. all of it, all of us. i am up late again, waiting for a bus. the sky is a worn midnight wash, i mean, that's a real colour. i felt i knew it all along, and now i feel it, painful, hungry again, lonely on the way home from work.

i would like an invitation, would like to stop dreaming about a white shirt i've never seen you wear. would i even go? no, no, no. can't stop dreaming. would like to say, i like your smile. just saying.

no, wait, wait, yes. it's still pretty. would like to ask permission to kiss you outside but i'm too shy. ok, go, i am sure, this is a bad idea. lean. leeeeean.

the man asleep doesn't know when he's missed his stop. is he dreaming of you like i do, no, is he haunted by a ghost, hungry for something real. no. i am tired and i know, i shouldn't kiss you on the mouth, shouldn't accidentally touch your blouse. but, i know. i am hungry for something real. i am cold on the way home from work because it's windy and that's how the world works.

++

stephen dunn: "from the start all i wanted to explain was how things go wrong, how the heart's an empty place until it is filled"

i can never say how we got here. how i became me and you became you. how we believed that no one would leave before we were ready, until they did. how i learned that absence can grow or diminish, and nothing is for sure. how absence is easily replaced by another body that makes the same motions, and then it's fine i guess. how absence is actually just nothing over again against the side of your brain, saying there is nothing now where there once was something.

i remember sitting on that bus thinking about jeans, and absence ate the year, and i brushed against your shoulder.

today my body trembled a little bit when i thought of you. that's a whole other beat. it's a whole other hole.

abre los ojos/i saw a shooting star in inner mongolia

in the back of a taxi,
my head out the window,
rain on my tongue,
eyes open enough to see gray concrete buildings
and the left side of beijing blurring by.

from above i was staring at the ground,
by the rosebush crying, with bruises on my chin.
just a tree and a concrete wall,
freshly rained upon dirt,
black dirt and choking up my insides.

lying on my right side,
blinking slowly at two seats in front of me,
dirty beige, ripped, and bumping drunk
in the back of a bus somewhere.

“i love you” slides off my tongue
dripping with heavy,
the lingering taste of alcohol,
my stomach empty and filled with sad,
and, i loved you suddenly after i said it.

from the earth i was staring at the sky,
a sudden sobriety, eyes open to
une année sans lumière, pitch black earth,
and blinded, i had been blindsided. then
lying on my back, in inner mongolia
i saw a shooting star.

A Poem I Wrote On The Bus

"Realise tes rèves" the sign says

with a picture of the sky

because dreams are in the sky and the sky's

the limit

but we've been on mars so

that proves that mars exists

or something

or that we exist

are there dreams on mars

dreams people had but then forgot

when they woke up

is there anything else up there

my old schoolbooks

the other half of this pair of socks

my childhood perhaps

which i misplaced once

and never found again

much like

i assume

the people who left

footprints on the moon

and what about the moon-

what about the moon?

st laurent to mont-royal

When we climbed up to the top of the mountain it was like 4am and I was pretty drunk. It was cold it was sometime in November I think. No, it must've been October because Ryan didn't hate me yet. It was just me and him and Karen and I think Ryan liked her at that time. I liked Casey but she kept getting me down. That night I had seen her outside the bar sitting on some other guy's lap and ignoring me, well screw that.Why do girls do that. Let's go to the mountain Ryan said. You'll feel better. So we went up the mountain and I was feeling pretty down and Ryan and Karen were racing each other. Karen was so fast it was like they were so free and I felt heavy 'cause I couldn't run as fast as them. But when we got to the top the air was so fresh and I didn't care about anything anymore. Except maybe I was feeling down that Ryan and Karen were making eyes at each other. We stuck ourselves in a telephone booth to keep warm and wait for the sunrise. We must've listened to Bon Iver because whenever I hear "re:stacks" I think of running up the mountain and the view and the cold air. But later that song would come to mean something else to me and that was alright. The sunrise wasn't even that good I think it was on the other side of the mountain. But after that night I didn't care about Casey anymore. We went down the mountain and I was feeling pretty good about it and I fell asleep on the bus.

That was all before Karen moved to Thailand and I met Lainey who's a good girl. I don't get drunk anymore but sometimes I miss those days when it hurt to breathe. I guess no one's hurt me like that since then so I never needed to go back. Everyone changes I learned so we just grew up like everyone else. And growing up doesn't mean not fitting in telephone boxes anymore it means not wanting to or not even being there to do it. Shouting "fuck you Casey!" into the night doesn't mean anything anymore. When we were young we used to hear our voices ring around the city, now we just hear it in our heads. We don't let people get us down like Casey got me down anymore. But sometimes I miss climbing the mountain thinking that's what love is.

The Best Gifts Are The Simple Pleasures

A box of good tea...

Ankle socks...

A mix tape...

(via autostraddle)

A blanket...

Paper letters in the mail...

And a warm fuzzy hug from someone you love.

absence poems #2&3

absence poem #2 (heavy blanket)

in the morning

in the cracks

between my blinds:

snowflakes.

+

absence poem #3 (surrounded)

snow in the suburbs:

the heavy sound

of silence.

i am all alone.

The Easy Forgetting

"You never could have imagined

back then with the waves crashing

what the body could erase."

- Stephen Dunn "The Vanishings"

I stumbled out of a bar to a street I know too well. My shoes fell in dirt, a block of concrete removed to make room for a tree. I leaned against the tree, my head falling back in laughter. I'm so inebriated that I cannot see three feet in front of me. I want a cigarette to warm the tips of my fingers and in my circle of friends we create clouds that roll up to the sky and disappear. I hope she kisses me tonight.

We hang on to each other for support, because it's so funny I can't stand. I could swear we are moving in slow motion. Each laugh is like a howl, our heads thrown back calling to the moon. The ground doesn't hurt, nor do scrapes on my knee, ripped jeans. Stephen Dunn said too much doesn't hurt anymore.

She kisses me on the cheek, like I once saw her do in a picture with someone else. My stomach aches.

Our foreheads are pressed together. My hair sticks to my forehead. My mouth... The air is warmer between us. I have wanted this for so long.

I can see the freckles on her nose. I can see the flecks of green in her eyes. I can see each individual eyelash, closely stuck together, and the delicate skin on her eyelid when she blinks in slow motion. I smile into her mouth.

I can feel her sigh escape into the night.

Each breath is hot and I can see our breath hovering in the cold air. I kiss the edges of her smile and behind us the chaos of kids laughing and falling becomes haze and muffled noise. For one night I am in love and it ends too soon. She escapes into the night.

One day it will vanish, he said, how you felt when you were overwhelmed by her. Hurt, he said, how could you have forgotten? hurts.

i was walking with a ghost

i walked up the mountain because i wanted you to see it. i thought maybe if i were there, you would be there too. i thought maybe i would find you at the top, as if you'd been waiting for me this whole time.

in the middle of the night we can walk in the middle of the road. we can run and jump and skip and it's just us alive. we can be the tallest city mark.

the trees are littered with gold and red and orange. the sunrise is kind of perfect. i know you'd be impressed, i know impressing you would make my heart swell. when i'm with you, i am a balloon on fire. it is the most wonderful feeling. and i think the edge of the world is on fire, which makes your sweater warm enough for the both of us. i'm in love with the way you see the world.

i am so, so, so.

i keep my hands in my pockets, as if i could shrug off the rain. i want to listen to re: stacks because it seems fitting, but i'm not quite sure i could bear it. i meant to leave my heavy heart at the top of the city, to burn with the sun, but it's right there in my pocket and it carries me down the road. you stayed at the top of the mountain to burn with the tops of the trees, and i? i am so. i am so, so, so.

The Supreme Art of Letting Go

The slow change of summer to fall, and we sit in denial. It's not quite happening yet, but you begin to think to yourself that you need a new pair of boots, and your mind briefly passes over that sweater you will wear when the weather changes -- it hasn't changed yet. But you know it will. It's happening right in front of your eyes.

For a while you refuse to shed the light t-shirts and shorts, until, undeniably it is fall and then possibly winter, and your shoes are wet from snow that melts when it touches the ground. But you still don't wear those boots, and your jacket is a sweater inside of which you shiver once or twice. One day you wake up and go outside and your breath catches in your throat and you know it's time to get the heavy-duty stuff; the hats and gloves, longjohns, big sweaters, and the hibernation attitude that allows you to trudge through dirty snow on your way home, where you will wear all these things. The days are short, but you knew this was coming. You saw it happening, it happens every year. But you are just not ready.

++

Slow change is like this. You wake up next to somebody and know that soon your bed will be empty, because summer is leaving and you are hungry. You can see the day when there will be no more hot whispers in your ear, no more christmas lights in August because it is no longer August, no more warm fireplace, no more warm body next to you, no more fingers on green shirts, no more kisses or touches or toothy grins kissing touching toothy grins.

Denial is easy and you hold on to it for as long as possible, but little by little you put the sweaters in the front of your closet, preparation for the coming cold. You don't wear them yet though. Summer is leaving, you know this, but you are just not ready for it to go. Knowledge does not make it easier, in fact, very little makes it easier.

++

You feel, and you let yourself feel it. You let the fall sharpness bite you, just for a second, before you wrap yourself up, and you hold it inside yourself, and then you inhale and exhale and you let it go. You breathe the cold air out and then you breathe in and out some more, because that's what you have to do, breathe the cold air out of your lungs until there is no more, and then you walk. You walk and talk and breathe and move your fingers like a human being with human tendencies. You make sure to wear your thickest coat to soften the blows until it doesn't feel like punching anymore. And that is all you need to do, for now at least. And you will emerge. You will emerge.

Explosions in the Sky - Your Hand in Mine

she made stars out of her hands. i mean, she cut paper into little pieces and used her fingers to bend the paper into star shapes. i thought if i threw them at the sky they would float up there all on their own, but i wanted to keep them for myself. i know it's selfish, but given the chance, wouldn't anyone want to hold a piece of the sky in their hand? maybe the stars in the sky are really burning balls of paper, shared by people less selfish than me. maybe i just wanted to hold a piece of her in my hand.

paper star girl used to walk down the street a lot in the summer. she had jean shorts and converse (who doesn't?) and she jingled when she moved: it was bangles on her wrists and keys in her pocket (house keys, car keys, keys to closets, hearts, hidden places) and noises in her chest. she met people on the street and she liked to talk to them. she talked to the man with dreadlocks and a white t-shirt. she talked to the girl sitting behind a table selling hand made bracelets. paper star girl did not buy a bracelet but she gave the girl a cookie from her lunch (she had leftover pasta for lunch and two cookies). she talked to a boy with sandy brown hair and a pretty smile and he was nice to her. he had a blue t-shirt and she gave him a paper star.

all at once paper star girl gave everything away, yet maintained an air of mystery. it seemed to everyone who met her that there was something even better behind her smile, if only they could get to it. but they couldn't.

she turned dresses into skirts and she stitched holes together. i wanted to crawl into her bed, into pink and colours, and swamps and swallowed by blankets like oceans and silly putty. she was smarter than me, already i could tell by the way she moved her wrists and shoulders, the way she bounced on all the edges of her feet. i could tell by the way the ink came out of her pen when she carved letters onto paper: "i just want to reach over..."

the books i read made it sound easy, but my hands seemed to weigh more than all those pages i'd ever read put together. i couldn't lift a needle.

at night paper star girl spoke alone in her room.

i wanted paper star girl to make me stars out of paper. i wanted paper star girl to take care of me. i wanted paper star girl to stitch me together. i wanted paper star girl to wrap me up inside of her. i wanted to cry on paper star girl. was i afraid my tears would ruin paper star girl? see, did paper star girl make paper stars or was paper star girl herself a star made out of paper? and what if i ripped paper star girl, or if i cried and my tears touched her and she didn't rip but merely came apart in a mushy lump like kleenex under water?

i was paper and we set ourselves on fire and burned up on the way to the atmosphere, and fell right down again, and lay there in the gutter, ashy, burned up stars; me with my heavy hands, and the real paper star girl, with the jingles from her bracelets and keys and noises in her heart, with a love for people and cookies and making things with her hands. she had a knack for turning lives around.

This is One of Those Posts Where I Write a Random Poem About My Day

I can't stop thinking of you,

and my stomach,

which hungers for love more than my heart,

which seems full,

already,

full of bits of stuff and bits of fluff,

little pieces of misplaced

I-don't-know-whats.

++

I love you more than birds, which are free
and love is free and boundary-less.
I like you more than that.
Birds are tangible,
three-dimensional,
edible.
Love is quick to catch fire,
sparks,
embers burn long into the night.
I love you longer than night,
longer than the spread of eagle's wings,
the length of light from the sun on water.
Love is not so measurable as the sky,
which has limits,
but not the mind, which is so easily interrupted
but steady in its perseverance.

++

"I'm over him," she said,

but something about her tone

and the way she flipped her hair

made me think,

No you're not.

It occurred to me,

hours later,

that I couldn't remember her name.

Then,

more hours later,

I wondered if I ever

knew it in the first place.

"This is where I used to live," she said,

"and this is the high school I went to."

I said something,

but she didn't hear.

She was lost in a memory,

and I wondered

if she was even talking to me.

Later,

I laughed about it

but it wasn't funny.

The realness,

the closeness,

the tangibility of it all.

It confirmed my suspicion

that nothing,

if anything,

lasts.

It was three-dimensional

and edible,

so they ate it,

and it was gone.

i'll only ever be a middle distance runner

cold air makes your lungs expand. cold air clears your nose. running in the cold is easier because your lungs are open. i ran home one day in the middle of winter from the bus stop. it was a 45 minute - 1hr run and i didn't stop once. i was surprised at my endurance. i felt like i hadn't moved in months but magically i could still run for an hour. it was probably because it was freezing outside and if i stopped i would die. my ankles were blue when i got home. i crawled into bed and wore 3 sweaters and under armour and a hat and a jacket. it was a stupid idea, running home. i just didn't want to wake up my dad.

it's easier to run in the cold. the cold invites me to run. i ran home tonight, but only a short distance. i took a short cut through a patch of grass and it reminded me of the summer, when i walked that short cut to work every day. contrast night and day. day night. night. a part of me wanted to stand there and look at the stars. i took a picture of the moon with a disposable camera. i don't think the picture will turn out as anything.

i would post a map of the distance i originally ran, but i don't want people to know where i live.

as if i am addressing a large crowd of people. show your teeth.

i didn't prepare a speech for this

because i didn't think i would win

because i look funny

and my shoes are too big for my feet.

++

i hate those 'before' and 'after' pictures.

it's probably not even the same person.

people don't look like that.

people have real waists

and hands

and stomachs.

++

this morning i woke up and my hair looked funny in the mirror.

oh god, i love it when you laugh.

++

i want suspenders and pants with pockets

and red, red, red, lips.

i want longer legs

and blue, blue, blue skies.

++

invisible; modest mouse // does this mean you're moving on; the airborne toxic event // girls in their summer dresses; the airborne toxic event // all we want, baby, is everything; the handsome furs // piazza, new york catcher; belle & sebastian // blindsided; bon iver // first day of my life; bright eyes // camp out; an horse // little lungs; an horse // lion's mane; iron & wine // clean getaway; maria taylor // north; phoenix // aside; the weakerthans // pictures of success; rilo kiley // so come back, i am waiting; okkervil river // re:stacks; bon iver

Open Letter to Santa Claus

Dear Santa,

for Christmas I'd like Bill Watterson to make more comics.

Thank you,

Love,

Emily