Drowning in Cake Batter

I forgot that other people, aside from my mum, may read this blog. One such reader asked why I hadn't updated in a while. The truth is, I've been too busy and in my spare time, I do a lot of thinking...not so much writing. Recently, the business has settled a bit, tho the hiatus shall be brief, and the wallowing in my sorrows has started to come back. And, obvi, whenever that happens, I take to the pen, or the keyboard...So here is something cheery. NOT. Here is some free-form about how situations are always so much bigger and more complex than they seem. About how people we have relationships with often stand in as symbols for something of greater meaning, like our psychological make-up or something in our past, or our "character flaw". If only everyone understood that, and stopped thinking I was a middle school girl who loved talking about boys. It's not that, you dim-witted ninnies. It is so much more.
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I miss something that wasn't there. Someone who wasn't there. He plagues me - Loneliness...and he who shall not be named. Men who have too much power over me, who control me, who lure me with their fingers into a trance. Men who I long to possess and whom I obsess over. Men who were never there and are not there still. Who show their face than remove it. Who taunt me and tease me and then say it was nothing. But to me it was. How silly of me. To think of men when others think of politics or school or interior decorating. I think of men. That is my weakness. I think of how they are not there and how I want them to be. How I want to fix it, change it, scrape it up, ooze it out, melt, cry, be held. Why doesn't anyone love me? "Because you don't love yourself". No. I don't love myself because no one loves me. What is life without love? What is life without being needed, without being wanted? What is life if you just exist for yourself? It is empty. It hurts. It is not enough.

Scrape the remnants of the bowl and lick your fingers. It'll satisfy your taste buds for a minute. And then when it settles, you'll crave more. But the bowl is empty, the ingredients gone. No, this is not souffle, you fool. This is my heart. This is my fucking guts, we are talking about. My bottomless-pit of a stomach that aches and yearns to be full and filled and forever satisfied. Never enough. It's a wonder I am not obese.

Stuffing my face with fruitless attempts at love. At stolen, contrived, pulled, contracted moments of faux emotion to feel a glimpse of reciprocity that isn't even real. So that when I watch two people in front of me, holding hands, touching her knee, rubbing his back - it doesn't hurt as much because...I had that...once.

I can't be alone. It is not boredom. It's the inability to distract. The sounds and thoughts and perspective drown out the world. I can't see or hear reality, just my beating heart and the wind in my ears, whistling, and the obsessive thoughts and the wandering thoughts and the thoughts and the thoughts and the thoughts. STOP.

I can't.

Unless you're here. Whoever you are.

The Clock

I wrote this poem, and for some reason it makes me laugh. I don't usually write in rhyme scheme or write poetry about men wanting to die. The whole concept is just bizarre. Maybe it's the "woh, woh" ending, maybe it's because it reminds me of those chain e-mails from the nineties where if you didn't send it to 10 people something terrible would happen to you, and the poems were always corny and written by a middle schooler. Regardless, I kind of like this piece because I don't typically write like this or about this subject matter, and I think it's important for artists to step outside of what they normally create. So here it is...I'd say enjoy, but that's not really the point. This is about our survival instinct, about fighting to die, and then fighting to live. This is about feeling trapped between life and death - wanting both. Being stuck in daily purgatory. Oh jeez, I'm getting dark. Just read the poem. 

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Tick tock goes the clock

He wonders when this will stop

Bang bang goes the gun

Shoot it now, shoot it son

Bullet penetrates the skin

Piercing, pulsing, blood within

Red runs down his chest and cheek

He stumbles, he slows, he feels weak

Gravel and cement becomes his bed

But now he doesn’t want to end

Frantic, pacing, adrenaline

Grabbing onto life - must win

Someone help me! Someone, please!

Save me, love me, I’m on my knees

It’s too late, the clock’s run out

His cries are unnoticed, no one hears his shout

He is gone now, from this earth

He chose to leave, he had no worth

Now

I haven’t written about you yet. I’m not sure why. I’ve written about many of them, but not you. Did you not inspire dark emotions? I thought you did. Did you not reach my core? I felt it sink. Or is it simply because I feel too much and will not allow myself to delve into the depth, as I usually do?

Let me write about you now. Let me write about your small eyes. They did not peer into my soul, but I think they yearned to. And your thin lips, which at certain angles looked plump and full and I wanted to pounce on them like pillows. I liked the way you moved your hands. Your fingers were long and thin, but strong, and your wrists held them firmly when you waved them around as you spoke. Your body - lean and fresh, tight and tasty. I liked to grab your arms and stroke your smooth skin. Did you like to touch mine? Your teeth were like tablets, straightly aligned, your nose protruding like he wanted to be heard and seen, your hair was slight and wispy, like a warm summer breeze.

Let me write about you and me now. Let me write about us. Did such a thing even exist? It feels so surreal to me. Our first kiss. When you made me laugh. When you saw the freckles in my eyes, as the sun hit them. When I cried in front of you. When you held back your own tears and my heart leapt because your emotions were dancing in front of me. When you first took my hand in yours. When we looked at art, and sat in a movie theatre, and had a picnic on the grass, and you brought me yellow roses, and I beat you in Boggle, and you beat me in cards and we wrestled like siblings. When I borrowed your clothes and wore them to work. When you lit candles. When we danced the tango, naked, in your room. When you stood behind me, your hand wandering up my dress, as I stirred brownie batter in the kitchen. When we joked about gnomes and lumps and other silly things. When we hiked to a waterfall. When you stroked my back early in the morning as I slept in my twin bed. When you forced me to eat tuna fish. When I expressed my fear and you held me. When you didn’t say anything.

Let me write about what’s left of me now. We are no longer. Just me. And you. I feel broken. I do. I feel abandoned. I feel…unhappy. Why didn’t you want to jump for me? Why did you lay in the lawn chair, sunbathing, as I was drowning in the pool? You watched my body slowly sink. You didn’t care to save me. All I wanted was to save you.

You still exist. But now you live somewhere far away. Somewhere I am not allowed to go. I have been banished, exiled from the place I called home. I don’t know if I want to go back. An evil ogre lives in that land. An ogre who told me things I didn’t want to hear, who hurt me, who didn’t listen to me, who didn’t want me. A gentle lion lives there too, one whose purr comforted me in times of sadness, whose strength made me feel safe, and who gave me great joy.

I tried to sneak back once, back into this forbidden forest. They kicked me out – the guards. They grabbed me by my frail wrists, tied them together with twine, and shipped me back to my jail cell. So here I am. Sitting, wondering – do I rot behind these bars, within these four walls? Do I try to escape once again and return home? No. I will look beyond the barriers and find myself again. 

Teddy Bear

I have a teddy bear that my mother gave me before entering college. He has scruffy golden fur, a red knitted sweater to keep him warm, a loving, moldable body, and innocent eyes. I feel very close to this teddy bear, whose name shall not be revealed for anonymity purposes (he is quite skeptical about blogs, and is in fear of attracting stalkers). Anyway, as you can tell, this teddy bear has quite the personality. Sometimes, when I make my bed, I tuck him in with the comforter and he waits patiently, alert and ready for my return. Other times, when I am in a rush, he lies, contorted and hurled across the room, sometimes on the floor, sometimes hidden under crumpled sheets. But nonetheless, he is always there. My teddy bear meets my friends, especially the special ones...you know, the ones who sleep over. He tells me which he likes the most. It is a kind of a ritual, with my special friends, to make my teddy bear dance before bed time, move his limbs around whilst listening to a random shuffle of music. It is a fun game I like to play with my pals. I like to observe how they treat my teddy bear. It says a lot about their character. Some friends are crude with teddy. They sexualize him and force him into uncomfortable and inappropriate positions, for a laugh. We don't think it's funny. Teddy and I. Well...sometimes I do. Other friends go more along with Teddy's persona, making him dance awkwardly and out of sync with the music. This is how I think my teddy bear would dance. He doesn't really have a good sense of rhythm. Sorry, Teds. But, it's true. My teddy bear is an extremely good nuzzler. NOT cuddler, but nuzzler. He fits perfectly into the neck/shoulder crevice. I like to put him there. I like to force other people to put my teddy bear into their neck/shoulder crevice and see how they respond. If they think I'm strange and refuse, that is a check minus in my book. If they oblige and find my attachment to my stuffed animal endearing, we have a winner! Once, I was lying in bed with someone, and we were playing with my teddy bear and he told me that it smelled like me. It doesn't sound romantic, but to this day, I find it one of the sweetest things anyone has ever said. Up to that point, I didn't even know I had a "smell". I do not wear perfume, nor do I shower with any fragranced body wash or shampoo. For him to recognize my smell, and then to notice it on my teddy bear was something so intimate. It meant he cared. It meant he felt close to me. Whenever I nuzzle with my teddy bear, I think about that moment. I put my nose up to his soft fur, sniffing intently, hoping to get a whiff of my "smell". But to no avail. I smell nothing. Well, not nothing, per se. But I don't smell anything distinct. I wish I could speak to that friend again, ask him what my smell reminds him of, so I would at least have some vague idea. Teddy misses him more than I do, actually. He told me so. My teddy bear has favorites, just like you and I do. That boy was his favorite. He hasn't really liked the others.

how do i feel?

a little poem from a little person on a little day...
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i feel random
i feel rickety
repugnant
resounding
resolving
resolved
grounded
disgruntled
disintegrating
denegrated
violated
vulnerable
viable
affable
laughable
lightable
lickable
loveable
listen
to
me
it's
hard
.

Words Forgotten

Words Forgotten

This poem was written using excerpts from an ongoing, organic conversation I had with a friend. I did not change much - except for the order and some pronouns. I guess we see life poetically, when we speak with one another. I find it quite beautiful. I hope you do too. The sad, or silly, thing is, if it were not for technology we might not remember the sweet words we have said to each other. So I suppose, for once, I thank my cell phone and my computer for saving my messages.

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Think

           About the ocean

                        The undulating waves

                                  It will make your heart smile

You are at the beach

            With the girl

                        She has almond eyes

                                    And an upper lip shaped like cupid's bow

You lie on your bed

            Playing with your toes

                       Watching the fan make shadows

                                   Across the ceiling

I would have enjoyed the daylight with you

            But instead I am excited

                        Excited for our friendship

                                    Maybe it will fulfill me

Our conversation was comforting and warm

            You played with my hair

                        I touched your face

                                 It was wonderful

I have the urge to say I love you

            Even though we are so far from that

                        I have so much love

                                    For you

I thought you loved me

           In our mesh, mushy bubble world

                        Of no memory

                                 You do love me

           

I have so much to say and yet

           I’m speechless

                      Let’s adventure

                                Was this morning even real?