Hesitation

It feels different this time.

Last year, I felt like I was going into something unknown and strange, but something that I wholeheartedly wanted. I was going to be with one of ny best friends, and everything was going to be perfect.

Then she hated the life I felt like I decided for both of us. And I looked at the year through her eyes and blanched. It was not just her, either. Many left. Many friends.

Now I am heading into this upcoming year hesitantly. I know what to expect. I understand what is going to happen. I will be mostly alone. Nobody is going to be thrilled to see me. I will be a freshman in high school again. Alone, but desperate for friendship. Desperate for a connection to somebody at a level deeper than just friendship. I want someone to desperately want to see me. Someone who doesn't share my blood.

Tomorrow morning is coming. I can feel the earth turning underneath me. I can feel the stillness of night collapsing upon me. I look forward to the classes that will bring me some sort of peace. But I am not at peace. I am broken. I am alone. They forsake me and the system I try to uphold.

The Lack of and Presence of Imminence in the World

So few people in this world get to choose the way that they die. Yet it is inevitable; each person will grow older- for some not perhaps old...but older- and then pass into the next level of human existence. We try to flair this up with speeches of the afterlife, heaven, hell, what have you. I can almost see teenage girls decorating their ideas of death with flashy tassels and stickers, just to make this universal ideal palatable. Something that every person who ever will exist will experience, and yet we shy from it like it is something untouchable and foreign. Everyone will touch it. The only true question in life is when?

But, back to my original thought: few people get to choose the manner in which they lose themselves to the openness (or closedness) of the infinite future. Only those who seek it, who take their bodies made of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and push it past the barriers of life. Suicide. What a word. Apparently sues means oneself in Latin. I know that -cide indicates the ending, or murder of an individual. But is suicide really the ending of your life? Or is it just the (forgive my gaming reference) forced respawn of yourself, your identity, your thoughts and dreams into a new form? If death is a new beginning, is suicide just a jump start into a new life, new everything?

And the infinite future. It sounds daunting. A professor once said that when he was in Catholic school, nuns would try to scare him by holding his finger over a candle and asking if it burned. When he finally relented and said that it hurt, they would say that the fires of hell would be a million times hotter, all over his body, forever. It would never end, never get better, and never ever change. Forever. The timeline of forever will surpass the amount of time it took for the planet to form, life to begin changing, dinosaurs walking, butterflies breaking free from the darkness of their chrysalis. Millions of billions of years. Quadrillions, trillions of quadrillions of years. And death is something you reach after approximately a century.


Before I stray too much, I want you to try to grasp this. Feel each second draining past you, falling, sliding, groaning all around you. Feel yourself trapped in the amount of time it takes for your heart to beat again. Infinity. Something that so many people ink their bodies with. A sideways figure 8 that manages to encompass the idea of a never ending thought, or feeling. A sentience. A thought, an ideal. Much like "0", infinity is not a thing we can touch. But 0 is not as scary. I have one cat. Six months ago, I had no cats. I will never have infinitely many cats, however. (Not that I think that owning infinitely  many cats is a good, viable idea.) Infinity is something nobody can wrap their mind around. It is something that does not physically exist. Everything comes to an end, and everything has it's number. Yet, after a measly handful of years, days, hours...we expect a vast nothingness of everything?

 

I saw a movie where the main characters face death prematurely. Fatal diseases. They both face their impending upheaval with dignity and regret; they do not want to leave each other behind, their families behind, or the life that they shared. They believed (as much as one could tell) that they would meet again, but they wrote one another's eulogies, a promise that this would only be a bookmark in a chapter of a long story, a slip of paper folded in half, untouched by the years and yet old beyond measure. It was beautiful and profoundly wrong at the same time. They knew that they were not long for this world, and did not waste time in expressing their feelings for each other. But by the same token, no teenagers should look on their death with such inevitable certainty. They did.

 

My best friend's grandfather died a year or two ago. He was told he had months to live over twenty years ago. He set his affairs somewhat in order, choosing to rearrange things as necessary. He had leukemia. After all of this, he died of brain cancer. He was a resilient man, a man who kept his ideals and beliefs until his mind wandered to where nobody could follow. But, nobody told his granddaughter that he had died. She missed his funeral, his memorial, and her inheritance was swept under the rug. His house was cleaned out by a child he had not been on the best terms with, and family possessions were thrown out. Who knows what happened to his precious cats and dogs?

 

Before you start to look at this as a rant, take a moment and think. This is not a rant, but an outcry to the masses to think! If life shortchanges you as it has so many times before, will you be prepared for it? I am not proposing looking to every shadow in fear of the Reaper, but only that one takes the joys of human existence seriously and carefully. Live your life like it is your last day, but prepare for many ahead; and know that the end may just be the beginning to a future physically unimaginable. π

empty

Within my open casket

we speak of times long past

we dwelt in the highest tower

and fell to death in turn

speak of these times, and see what has been devastated

 

innate brokenness draped around frail shoulders,  a grove

where Juliet and Romeo laughed and died

walking alone in empty corridors

hallways with doors closed and locked

and no chance of survival

 

untold stories of innocence lost

like a paradoxical twist

for my story is known and told

deep in the shadows of the haunted forests

amongst the shattered hermits of the past and the ghost stories of tomorrow

 

Thus my life is wrought like impure iron

molding beautifully

looking strong and whole, hiding weak fragility

of an imperfect breed

unworthy of the charitable euthanasia

 

boxed like an orphaned litter

and left to die like a stray

concrete pillars of society falling like burning candles

laugh at the dictatorship they created

where the outcasts are removed like hemorrhaging cancer

 

balanced on the tip of denial  

sweeping towards the end of the earth

all knobby groves and screeching forest

encased in broken iron

held together with pyrite and geode

 

together we find a stolid night to share

Those Better Left to Wonder -by me

I feel indebted to your secret softness
The side of you never shared
I saw it first, loved it first,
Yet you never told me why
You kept it hidden
From all of the world
But held me close through it all

You told me I was special, once,
And I told you that you outshone me.
Even though I was destined for greatness,
You would be strong,
Strong enough to change your fate

I knew that you would eventually leave me
The pain you left me with shattered me completely
Moving on is just another challenge for me
You claim it was for me, yet you are the only one to benefit
My loss made you better, you broke me

I thought that you would bring me the moon
You promised me everyday
Any star was in reach, Polaris at your fingertips
But all I wanted was the moon.
And you never gave me the moon.
You left me to die like a forgotten philosopher;
A life meaninglessly dreaming for redemption
For those better left to wonder.

So look at the blood moon and ask me a question.
Laugh at the jokes I wrote but another lover tells
And dream of the forsaken life of another broken soul,
The ideal of forever lost in the ocean of promises
Underneath the stormy seas of forgetfulness

And look at the raven, each feather plucked and pruned
And remember how the ink on my skin tells by each feather
How I aspire to live. Alone. Forgotten. Wholly shattered.

I think that this is me finally coming out and deciding that I need to find someone who is who I want out of a partner instead of me just being who they want. I need to stand up for who I am as an individual, and not let my boyfriend walk all over me. I've had terrible writer's block lately, but ironically, I have been my own inspiration these last few days. It was pretty hard for me to write this; it came out rather disjointed and not as put together as I usually am. Stylistically, this is borderline ridiculous. I prefer four line stanzas because of their general stability and structure. My earliest work sometimes has six line stanzas, but I broke down into four liners as I grew.
It reminisces my past relationship and looks at how it broke down; he gave me everything but what I actually wanted, and left me for someone who is just a little further along in the grand scheme of things than me. He is going to be great-I will never doubt that. But he did not think that I would become as great as other people believe, and that hurt. I still feel rather disjointed and broken, but this is quite like what I just wrote. Writing something like this can take me hours or days to write; this took probably about fifteen minutes and a quick read through afterwards to double check that it retained the way that I felt- I don't want everything to be about me, but I need to address my own needs and wants at some point in time. This is raw and wholehearted, more than many of my past work...

Alone

Throughout everything that I have done, I have always had someone with me. I love being far away, separate from the people who I care about. But this is different. I am about to be purely isolated from all of the people who I have built relationships with or made friends with. I am going to have to start over from scratch.

My roommate/best friend doesn't like people very much. She can deal with groups for a few months, but then finds enough wrong with them to not like them anymore. Some of these people really are assholes. But she is leaving next year, and I need the friends that I have made in order to have a good support system in my life later. She has come to dislike literally all of the people that I want to be friends with.

I want a boyfriend again. Not the last one, but a guy who is actually committed to me and wants to be around me. I want someone to talk to other than Faith. Its not that I don't like talking to her, but there is so much that she cant understand because of her past and personality. I want to connect with someone, but I know that I wont find that someone here or soon. It's just my life, that I realize something about myself and what I want for myself, and it is just out of reach.

The Overrated Truth

So, if you didn't know, I read a lot. A trend in the books I'm reading is boyfriend keeps a secret, and the entire relationship disintegrates as a result.

Honesty is something that this generation seems to completely lack. White lies and small fibs aren't discouraged (in fact, they are pretty much deemed necessary for courtesy and politeness), and the truth is something hard to come by. Honesty is something that I have always striven for, from finding simple beauty in everyday life, to representing myself in ways that can be respected by others.

I think that I am truthful to others about myself, but I want to stop with the subtle, exaggerating lies and become more honest. I can only hope that the people I surround myself with can see what I am trying to do and attempt to emanate me.

If that isn't self centered of me...

Bitter and Alone- By me

I'm watching and waiting
for your one decision
that decides my fate
my love and my choice

I yearned and pleaded
for your love and affection
I knew you had promised
your soul to the others

You told me you loved me
that I was just perfect
And I never had felt that
I trusted your words

Now I am alone
Without your affection
Without your love
Bitter and alone

Ships and Bottles-by me

Her shadowed face spoke legions,
And I knew that her fate wrote much deeper
This sheltered child
Unknown eyes
Her skin's lace had been thrown

Understatement was her travesty
And nobody could fathom it's depth
Her broken home
And wild soul
The iron chest holding her tome

History marred by her experience
And I see her ship is sinking
Screaming rage
Untold pain
The foundation of life has been shaken

Quick breakdown of "A Dreamcatcher for Seth"

This is my favorite poem that I have written. I used to coach this kid Seth, who I had coached since he was about 4, but had known since he was about 3. I seriously adore this kid. Now he is eleven (maybe ten), and still the sweetest, most hardworking kid I have met in a really long time.

Now, the feathers. He asked me what my deal was once. I was really upset, and he had no clue why I wasn't acting like myself. I had just bought a new dream catcher, and a few other large feathers. My goal was to find a type of feather that I wanted for a tattoo. That day I had also found out that one of my biggest nightmares had been caught and put in prison. It was bittersweet.
When I was younger, I heard this Native American legend. The short version is this: A young girl was begged by Earth to pick up the feathers that the Great Eagle had left each time he took off for flight. They were his promise to Earth that he would return, but they were piling up. Each feather symbolized a promise, a lie, a secret, or a dream. The little girl wove them into dream catchers to protect people from broken promises, festering lies, told secrets, or lost dreams. Over time, she became very sad and passed the job down to a little girl in the tribe. And the story goes on.

When I was eleven, one of my teammates beat me up regularly. He made me scared to play the game that I loved more than anything. He made me hate myself for things I couldn't help. He made me hate myself for things I could help, and so I changed those things. I cut off my hair, wore only boy's clothes, and deepened my voice as much as I could. I lost most of the range of my voice. I stopped being the sweet little girl that I was and became a haunted monster. Seth was just a little bit younger than what I was when he hurt me. I was lucky to meet my coach that year, and he really did save me from myself. He didn't let that kid bully me.

I told Seth that I had gotten a new dream catcher. He asked me how many I had. I had ten. He thought I was stupid. I told him I liked feathers, and that dream catchers were beautiful. He asked me why I loved dream catchers in particular. And instead of telling him about being hurt, having nightmares, or the abuse I endured for a year, I lied. I tried to break the cycle of shattered naivety and told him that they were awe inspiringly beautiful. He rolled his eyes and then asked me what we were doing.

The coach who had saved me was there. I still go to skate for him when I can. I don't think he has any idea what he saved me from. I don't think he knows how close I came to quitting hockey. He never saw the bruises or the cuts. He never heard the name calling or the saw the hair pulling. I would like to think that I can save other kids from that too by helping him. He is one of the biggest inspirations in my life. He and Seth. I hope one day I have the nerve to tell him to his face.

A Dreamcatcher for Seth-By me

When he asked me why I loved feathers,
I told him my life was poetic,
Like the unwavering sweep of wings
Across the arctic winter sky

For every ounce of freedom gained,
A bird sheds a feather, in penance-
an emotion, a choice, a promise, a curse-
And I wander this earth collecting them

Gifted, they say I am gifted
With the promises of lies and lost dreams
These feathers I weave
Into shrouds, tokens of protection

They save me from waking horrors
And vivid night tremors, choices of dying men
Voicing lullabies of orphaned children,
Morbid cries of wounded wolves waiting for the vultures' descent

Stories of legends where the heroes die
Are the epic of my own finale
The bright passage of a life
Gone all to quickly, too soon

I burned at the stake for wearing them proudly,
The agonized choice of death over life,
The tears shed into the ocean
A ring that melted gold richly into bone

The wisps of smoke along the freckles
The spots of purity, little hooks
That can bite into skin, or the next tendril
That which allows flight, and the fall

He was nine when he asked, I was seventeen
I had felt the hot whip and cold steel
I wore my scars painfully, unhealed wounds
And he was the age I began collecting

The choice I made broke the curse of pain
And my feather, my Pinion, was white as snow

My classes have never taken up so much of my time. I am exhausted. I haven't been writing. My IPod is broken; the menu, play, and next buttons don't work. Only back. What a symbol of my life.

I recently got a new ear piercing. A low outer cartilage one. I want to put a hoop in it when it healed up some.

Good stuff.

The Raven. If you dont know who wrote this, then I dont know what to tell you.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

     As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

“’Tis some visiter,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—

            Only this and nothing more.”

    Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;

And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.

    Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow

    From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—

            Nameless here for evermore.

    And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

    So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating

    “’Tis some visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door—

Some late visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door;—

            This it is and nothing more.”

    Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;

    But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,

    And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;—

            Darkness there and nothing more.

    Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;

    But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,

    And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?”

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”—

            Merely this and nothing more.

    Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.

    “Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;

      Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—

Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—

            ’Tis the wind and nothing more!”

    Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,

In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;

    Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;

    But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—

Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—

            Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,

By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,

“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,

Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—

Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;

    For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being

    Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—

Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,

            With such name as “Nevermore.”

    But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only

That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.

    Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—

    Till I scarcely more than muttered “Other friends have flown before—

On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.”

            Then the bird said “Nevermore.”

    Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store

    Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster

    Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—

Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore

            Of ‘Never—nevermore’.”

    But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door;

    Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking

    Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—

What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore

            Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”

    This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core;

    This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining

    On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er,

But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er,

            She shall press, ah, nevermore!

    Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer

Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.

    “Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee

    Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;

Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

    Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—

    On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—

Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—

    Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,

    It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—

“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!

    Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!

    Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

    And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,

    And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

            Shall be lifted—nevermore!

Missing You- by me

I missed you today.
 
Your smiling face,
The way you press your lips to my hair
The way your chest tightens
As we breathe as one
 
I missed you yesterday.
 
The first time I saw you,
Your face obscured, how you played
The way you smiled behind your mask
And how you said I was beautiful
 
I never knew you would think me pretty
I always hoped you could
You looked at me with a distinct interest
And I never doubted you
 
I missed you the first time he hit me.
 
I hoped for someone like you.
I dreamed for the desire to interact
What you gave me was priceless
And forever, I will never regret
 
 
I miss you like falling snowflakes
 
Each drop of sorrow is unique.
However far away you are,
Your promise is the moon
And I am the stars far outside the galaxy

 

I missed you today.
I will miss you tomorrow
Until you come back to me.

Indifference. Except not really

I am not a very patient person. Patience is just one of those lovely virtues that I sorely lack. I have always been slightly more patient than the rest of my family, which leads them to believe that I am more patient. Let me tell you, I am definitely not.

So, as I wait in the Detroit airport for my rescheduled flight, I wonder how I would respond if I was a patient person. Would I just sit and wait like there was nothing wrong? Or would I internally pout at the thought of sitting in this hellhole for ten hours. Because I am already at six. Damn. At least my carry on bag is full of food, like this awesome Irish soda bread and organic grapes and dark chocolate (and milk chocolate...I like them both). My mom made me a ton of gingersnaps, walnut toffee, and gingerbread for me. I recently bought some super fresh and organic cayenne pepper, and some dehydrated mangoes. And some fresh mangoes for good measure.

Where I live in New York, there is little to no fresh food. Comparatively, back home is an organic dump. Everything is either processed into oblivion or right off the fresh, clean tree/vine/branch. That's just my life. My grandmother fed me lots of fruits and vegetables when I was younger. Now I love fresh food, and live really far away from all of it. My mom is looking into getting me a farm share.

To the best of my knowledge, a farm share is where a person buys the yield of a farm, and the owner delivers or has you pick up whatever they harvested that particular week. Sounds good right? Almost too good to be true.

Anyways, here I am ranting like someone is ever going to read this. I wish I could advertise for this without my direct family or immediate friends seeing it. And I know my sister would read this just to keep tabs on me. Ah well. If a real person not a computer stat machine actually reads this, then it will be a good day.

It's 2 AM. Here's an Elizabeth Bishop poem called "Insomnia"

I read this in high school, and my recent stint with severe insomnia (or inability to sleep to the layperson) inspired my posting of this poem, Insomnia, by Elizabeth Bishop.

Insomnia

The moon in the bureau mirror
looks out a million miles
(and perhaps with pride, at herself,
but she never, never smiles)
far and away beyond sleep, or
perhaps she's a daytime sleeper.

By the Universe deserted,
she'd tell it to go to hell,
and she'd find a body of water,
or a mirror, on which to dwell.
So wrap up care in a cobweb
and drop it down the well

into that world inverted
where left is always right,
where the shadows are really the body,
where we stay awake all night,
where the heavens are shallow as the sea
is now deep, and you love me.