Kaleidoscope

the Pied Piper picked a peck of pickled poems

2011-11-17T12:44:00.006-06:00

Go forth yon cosmonauts,
explore the wilds of witty thoughts.
Write at work if you dare,
or on your couch in underwear.
Just be sure that you do and post it on the blog too.

Come Hope

2011-11-15T09:41:00.002-06:00

Oaks clutch falling leaves
Chill winds encircling for months
April cavalry

— a haiku version of a previous poem: Winter Months

haiku

2011-11-11T15:02:00.001-06:00

Question for keren:
I'm the wannabe rockstar?
You're a mind-reader.

Monday

2011-11-08T20:30:00.002-06:00

Two leaves separate
from a familiar branch
the wind howls.

Non-Fiction Musings

2011-07-25T09:12:00.000-05:00

Reflections of the Unseen

Much in this world is a reflection of the unseen, or what lies beneath the surface. Take for instance a barren tree: a mass of trunk, branches and twigs—woven in a complexity that mirrors what is below the surface –the same tangled pattern of the roots. So both that which is collecting life and that which is displaying life are a reflection of each other. Of course as we know, that which is below the surface, the unseen, is much deeper, wider and intricate: especially true of the root system of trees bearing fruit. It is the same with other such reflections in this world. The unseen is more profound. But what is physical and evident to us, leads us to understand the unseen.

I’ve been thinking about this reflective nature in terms of my future lately. My future is unforeseeable. Yet we pretend to see the future. We make all kinds of plans for the future as if we can see it, as if we’re constructing it for ourselves. Let’s transition to the physical reflection of this abstract. I am near-sighted. My eyesight is so bad I can only see with clarity what is right in front of my face. Everything else is a gradient abstraction: a field of colors and shadows with puddles of light.

For a long time, I resented my poor eyesight and would pray to wake up with perfect vision. In the same way, I have tried to see the future, and prayed for “insight.” But these prayers are the same. And the answer to both prayers was given in the summer of 2008 when I stepped into the new international airport in Beijing. For those of you who have not visited this airport—it's a wonder to behold! As you walk in, you are confronted with a colossal cavern ribbed with rafters each bearing what from your vantage point looks like a string of Christmas lights. This legion of lights bounce off the brilliant floors and give a sense of the ethereal. Everyone gasps as they step through the entry. I had a 9 hour layover in this airport. At one point I took my glasses off to clean them and froze. Light stretches with my nearsightedness; what I was beholding with my bad vision was more than incredible: like the light from another universe. And I honestly feel sorry for you if you do visit this airport and don’t have near-sightedness. Again last September, as I took in the Chicago skyline from my 11th floor hotel room, I was impressed. When I took off my glasses, the whole scene transformed into the fantastic. Vision in the form it has been handed to me transforms the world into a stunning scene of twinkling orbs.

The answer to my prayers was: “No.” My eyesight lets me see something more dazzling than precision. The same with the future. It’s good we don’t know. It’s good that tomorrow is hard to see, and years down the road are cloaked in mystery. It’s beautiful this way. A clear vision isn’t always the best view. What God has made a mystery is best kept for…when we walk closer to it, later on. Jesus said, "Don't worry about tomorrow, it'll worry about itself. Today's bad enough" (a loose personal rendering of Matt 6:33,34). Everything will come into its apparentness in time. Meanwhile, I can stop squinting, and enjoy the view from far away. I thank God I’m near-sighted. It reflects perfectly my vantage point in life, and illustrates the beauty of limitations.

Epic

2011-06-15T21:05:00.003-05:00

I thought I'd drop a line to say, we are all currently working on an Epic together. This means...your wildest dreams are pretty much just about to come true, dear reader. We're hard at work on it (I think?), and we'll not only be posting, but also publishing when it comes together.

to tide you over til then, I'll write a spontaneous proverb:

Just as the seed is planted in spring
And the return gathered in autumn
so patience is a virtue you must wait for.

The Galliard

2011-04-16T17:38:00.001-05:00

Never time passed with so little definition. Neither the present nor his memory had its usual edges. His days were as weeks, and his months were sometimes less. In that initial moment in which he was again self-aware, he knew nothing — which is to say, he was uncertain of everything. His mind, or his world (at first he wasn't sure), was all murk and distortion of sight and sound, thought and feeling: as though all were as speech underwater.

As Richard came a little more to himself, he found his body moving with intent in a room of masked dancers, one arm extended toward his partner. The dancers kept, what seemed to him, an unnatural distance from each other. The dance was a galliard, and the song melancholy, with repeated rounds like a chant — a melodious rhythm to which rose and fell the shoulders of the whole party in perfect time. The masks they wore, they wore uniformly: not a face could be seen without. Consistent too was the slight, unnerved feeling Richard had whenever he allowed his attention to remain too long on any mouth or eye in the crowd. Not that anything appeared to be wrong with them — on the contrary, they all looked superficially like happy mouths and merry eyes — but Richard had the peculiar sensation that they were somehow far away, and the longer he tried to focus on any one, the greater the feeling of distance. It was all a trick of lighting, he supposed, or of whatever drug he now began to think he had been given.

But how had he come to this now? He had a thought of taking his leave of the dance to collect himself, but there came to him a strong thought, almost solid, like a sound: “Once one has begun to dance, one ought never to stop before the music ends.” So he continued, but doubted the voice. The voice spoke within him, but didn't sound quite like his own voice, as if his conscience recalled not his own values, but those of another.

Disturbed, Richard began to introspect, fearing what he would find within the one dull brown memory of the indefinite, recent past. It was no black spot in his mind, no unconsciousness. It was, rather, a vague, blurry mixture of all the things he had apparently experienced, having taken on the accumulated color of all he had seen and thought and felt into one great intermingled stain. But no sooner had he concentrated his will upon the task than the dull brown thing began to divide itself, as white will divide when applied to a prism and reveal the many colors that coalesce to make it. Images and emotions, all in very strong color pulled away from each other and lined themselves up in a sequence — but whether the correct one, he could never afterwards discern.

The content of the images themselves were mostly rather plain, but his reactions to them were inordinately potent. None of this felt right. The queer idea occurred to him that the things in his mind were not rightfully his own. He did not like this at all. Neither his conscience nor his intuition could be quieted, though his memory and the associated emotions were struggling to muffle their cries. In another man they might have succeeded, but Richard was not unaccustomed to fighting himself and winning. He had been conscientious as a boy and had learned to listen to the voice that told him what was wrong to do or good to do, and thus he knew what it was to discern the tiny whisper of character despite the raucous tantrums of self-preservation, desire, or rage. He had long been consistent in telling the truth, even when it spoiled his plans or negatively affected his reputation. Of course, it is such little deeds of goodness which can alone reliably make one capable of great deeds of goodness. Richard's grandmother had once told him, “A real hero — not a warmonger, mind you — is made when a little boy is honest and peels the potatoes and stands up to a bully for another and sits with the neighbor when her cat dies.” Richard had taken these words to heart and was now was steeled against the battle for his will.

Upon a slight pause in the music, a second before the crescendo of the galliard, Richard perceived a quiet, muffled sob. And suddenly he whirled with a flash of memory and a bite of realization in his clearing mind. He saw at once that he was in the midst of a great, dangerous cult. He saw that some unnamed man had resisted, had taken to the brainwashing imperfectly, and was cursed therefore to endure his half-twisted mind alone in the prison for which the basement below this ballroom served. The only door was in sight and reach, but Richard knew at once that he could not now free the man from the prison, but neither could he put the man from his mind. He could not dance now; he could not laugh now — not while he was here and the outcast man there, apart. So he stopped: a pillar of will in a shifting tide. He stood with the weight of a great burden, but began a stride to the door. With each step his conscience assented its approval and his will grew more resolute. The weight grew lighter until at last the burden became his wings. With each false, grinning dancer he passed, his love for this humanity — his brothers and sisters — grew bolder until it could no longer be contained by decorum and broke its fences into a run. Removing his tie and disregarding all the stares and gasps of disbelief, he pulled open that horrible door before he could be stopped, and bounded down the stairs.

Richard sat on the floor next to the man who had only increased his sobbing since Richard's intrusion, and pulled his trembling brother to his chest, awaiting the man's freedom. Richard was already free.

What I Thought When She Said No

2011-04-16T17:07:00.000-05:00

My love is home for her dear soul.
And if in other homes she lies?
It's hers in truth — no less than whole.
The 'giving to' is most the prize.

Love is innately giving free,
and thus it does not need to take.
I can love her as does he,
and wait for what high loves can make.

Never filled in present time,
future will know truer love.
When in ages hence sublime,
we will know the truth thereof.

But, for now, we must grow hot:
to love, as flame does what is not;
to burn, for that is what it does;
for love consumes what evil was.

Invitation to Sod a Hobbit House

2011-04-10T18:24:00.004-05:00

If I didn't sod
I'd be worse than a cod
I'd be a septically putrefactive dyspeptic
But I shall sod
Till the sun begins to nod
And the bullfrog starts to sing his song eccentric

Luxury

2011-04-06T19:45:00.005-05:00

I am a house divided.

divided time, divided heart, divided mind

I house a hundred potentials

a tug and pull of

left or right

ийшээ тийшээ

여기 거기

this tongue

or that place

that love

or this faith

help myself

or help everyone else?

In the wake of my disunion

lies a morbid trail

of unfinished, unforgotten pursuits:

ghosts in wooden shoes

trod behind me

clambering for resurgence

crying for rebirth.

I'm unable to assemble

all the contradictions

into a Frankenstein
of human ingenuity.

But if I forsake insanity

and toss them all away

there remains one thing:

to know You,

and in it, measureless gain.

make it your every ambition therefore

to live a quiet life before the Lord.

Carnivorous Hippopotamus

2011-03-27T19:15:00.002-05:00

A carnivorous hippopotamus

I hope I never meet one

But if I did

I'd chop off it's head

And I'd be the first to eat one

Ad Pater, 57 Years Old

2011-02-25T13:33:00.002-06:00

You are as young as the morning dew
And more sprightly than a thousand Lady Gagas

Let us rejoice while we are young.

Free Write at the Soviet Glory

2011-02-23T14:19:00.000-06:00

The card we drew this time as the theme of our writing was "opossum"... paired with "burned telephone."

So proceeds our brilliance:

from Jordan:

from L'Abri:

From Gabe:

Mine:

Modern Times

2011-01-11T21:08:00.000-06:00

I see the Moon
and the Moon sees me
God bless the Moon
and God bless me

I pay the man
and the man pays me
God bless the man
and God bless me

writer's block broken

2011-01-05T09:01:00.007-06:00

A thought, fleeting and fine,
can stir the ethos and transform the mind.
There's nothing new under the sun
and you should know straight away
that what you've to say
has already been said.
But brilliant and new that thought is again--
once it's got into your head!

christmas poem (sonnet?)

2010-12-20T08:58:00.001-06:00

"Too tall," he skips along the barbed wire fence,
cheerfully falling out of his mud boots,
scanning the field for one that isn't bent,
twisted, bare, brown, withered, hunched, or knotted.
"There it is!" he exclaims, pointing, sprinting
towards the perfect cedar, branches soaring,
6 feet of needles, thick trunk cemented.
Trembling with ardor, he began swinging.
He chopped and sawed and flung his axe,
til Dad stepped in, with one vigorous swoop,
and fell the tree, trunk leaning on the fence.
"Time to drag it back," he said, and grabbed it,
handing off the heavy axe to the boy
who could hardly wait to share the story.

writer's block...obviously

2010-12-16T09:55:00.001-06:00

something beautiful,
something brave,
something handsome in every way,
something to say that hasn't been said,
it's a loaded gun and dead end...
"Don't even think abaaaut it."

The Memory of a Morning

2010-09-10T21:38:00.000-05:00

a memory I lay out before me:

of sunlight slant
and bedroom morning air
accenting the syllables
of manifold beauties pronounced

oh how the delicate turnings
of phrase in a face's form
may suggest, may evince
untellable loveliest things
of the fount of the woman who spoke!

I read her all and studied with care
the execution! the eloquence!
well-said! well-said! I honored her motion
her rhyme
and pleased to so bring in the day

but alas! our days have nights
and our springs their inverdant winters
that we might love the days and springs the more
that by our missing we might gain them
better next we met

thus duty called her forth from our new home
and I sought shortly with intent
with gifts to bid my fluent darling part

but time withheld its favor from my design
and winter's night came harsh and early
to the sound of crashing worlds

and there stood I for a moment
mid-road
slack-jawed and bloodless
with a flower and a banana in my hand

the busy world of r. scary

2010-09-01T10:46:00.008-05:00

heavy heavy heavy, hangs over your head
looms over your bed
enshrouds you with lead

tight tight tight, draws up your heart
pulls on your scarf
and squeezes your arm

round round round, my entangled mind
run shadows of times
love left behind

light light light, enters my eyes
simple words guide
and lay heartache aside:

on a solid rock I stand
all other ground
is sinking sand, sinking sand.
sinking sand that swallows.

Copiapo, Chile

2010-08-30T16:34:00.010-05:00

I think of these men, alone in the dark,
feeling privileged that I can see the stars just by looking up,
that my water pours freely from a pewter faucet,
that my spiritual peace stems from the winner of "Project Runway."

And even unhinged jealousy swells,
that these workers never earned their celebrity;
they earn $1 an hour,
and Anderson Cooper praises them,
simply for living.

love

2010-08-30T14:01:00.000-05:00

As I wander through my life,
I wonder if I'll find a wife!

Thought for Food

2010-08-27T13:58:00.009-05:00

my mind is overpopulated
with thought bubbles which
launch,
stretch,
thin,
and pop
into perfection
into production
or obscurity,
becoming a thin film of
cognitive ability floating
to the floor in a sticky mess.
mopped up and run down the drain,
some become the pipe-dwellers' breakfast

the banana story

2010-07-02T18:10:00.000-05:00

She was rifling through her cabinets while he peeled bananas on the kitchen island. She pulled out the chocolate chips, maraschino cherries, and rainbow sprinkles and set them on the cabinet. Meanwhile he was rifling through the drawers the find a good paring knife to make the ultimate banana split.

"Now Roger, that won't do at all," she said gently as he grabbed a steak knife with a wooden handle. "Why not try this one?" She opened the adjacent drawer and pulled out a huge butcher knife with a rubber sleeve covering the blade. "This is the best knife I have in my kitchen."

She removed the sleeve and closed the drawer, licking her lips and admiring the gleaming blade that was as big as Roger's hand from wrist to fingertips. It was stainless steel, Japanese, and had a few nicks on the tip from frequent sharpening.

"Golly Beverly, isn't that a bit of overkill for a couple of bananas?" he asked.

"Nonsense. This knife always gets the job done. Now have you peeled them?"

He stepped sideways to show her the naked bananas lying on the bamboo cutting board. She set the knife on the countertop and walked across the kitchen to the door leading to the garage. "I'm just going to step outside to the deep freezer and get our ice cream. You go ahead and start slicing." She shut the door behind her.

Roger was in his late seventies, a widower whose wife of thirty years had passed away five years ago. He met Beverly through his deep water exercise class on Thursday mornings at the Y. She was a spirited woman who rarely missed a class, and they were enjoying their first date together after a hearty class. He had told her that he was so hungry after swimming that he could eat a horse, and she laughed and told him that her banana splits made her famous among the other seniors in her neighborhood. They had dried off and headed straight to her house to enjoy them together.

Beverly came back into the kitchen with a gallon-sized pail of vanilla ice cream. She saw him slicing the first banana into tiny chunks, and thrust the pail into the sink, rushing to his side.

"No, no, no! That won't do!" She grabbed his wrist and he dropped the knife onto the countertop, leaving it clanging against the ceramic top. She was glaring at him.

"Did I do something wrong?" he asked, concerned. She had never expressed anger at him before.

Her expression softened. "Dear, you have to flay them. Like this." She picked up the knife with authority and positioned it long-ways across the banana. She sliced it in one fell swoop with a soft thwack.

"There. Now isn't that pretty," she cooed, "Now I'm going to get the good china bowls, they belonged to my daughter. You can start scooping the ice cream." She wiped her hands on her apron and headed into the foyer to search for the china.

Roger looked around the kitchen for the ice cream scoop, but he decided not to serve anything without the bowls on hand. Aha, we need whipped cream, he thought to himself. Now where would she keep it?

He opened the refrigerator door and didn't see any. Then it occurred to him that she had a huge deep freezer in the garage. Perhaps she would have some whipped cream there. He dodged the kitchen island and opened the door to the garage to go outside, leaving it slightly ajar.

The garage was hot and muggy from the summer heat, and it smelled a bit like rotten vegetables. He grimaced at the sudden rankness and swiftly opened the lid to the freezer. There were bags of frozen meat layered at the top, and he had to move several of them out of the way to pour through the freezer's contents. Suddenly he stopped. His hand had fallen onto something sticky, with crystallized black hair on top of it. It was heavy and solid, and unlike everything else in the freezer, it wasn't wrapped in paper or in a prepackaged box. It was raw.

He dug his nails into the hair, trying to pry it loose from the ice crystals surrounding it. Curiosity was killing him. He finally got a good enough grip to roll it over and get a good look at the object. It was round and rolled over easily once he was able to loosen it from the ice.

"What the hell?" he said out loud.

His eyes widened. At first he wasn't sure what he was looking at, and he blinked twice. His tongue went dry. It was a human head, severed at the neck, with blank, open eyes and and expressionless face. She looked about thirty years old, and her hair was matted with frozen blood around her chin. He felt nauseous and doubled over the open freezer, bending at the hip to stare at the floor to quell his stomach.

He saw a shadow at his feet behind him.

"I see you've found Rosemary," Beverly said, gripping the knife in her right hand.

Thwack.

office noir by crystal

2010-06-17T15:33:00.002-05:00

silence
is not as disconcerting as contemporary soft rock playing
through the speaker above my cubicle.

humidity
is not as uncomfortable as frigid A/C blasting
on the top of my head and messing up my hair.

my futon,
old and creaky as it may be, does not promote poor posture
as badly as this dated desk-chair

sports injuries
are less painful than papercuts.

garbage
is less stinky than moldy carpets.

rats
are less likely to induce carpal tunnel.

work
is less likely to not completely suck.

office noir

2010-05-25T11:07:00.004-05:00

murmuring opens the scene
a dull white light flickers
above a cubicle on the corner.
the view is
pixilated
digitized
beige and grey.
a solitary figure
hunches over a cup
of day-old joe.
geometrics strewn in black
and white,
low and high--
it's the 21st c. landscape
the 9-5 skyline of
inbox and outbox
and everywhere in between.
our protagonist sits between bars
of light cast by venetian blinds,
punctuating ripples of burgeoning cellulite
and wafts of smoke
from the fax machine.
Femme fatale isn't sexy any more
she's cancer
and carpal tunnel,
and back pain--
it's lame
it's lame
it's lame--
and all the action is going down
the monetized
prosperized
sold-out
drain.

why i love my husband

2010-05-10T10:10:00.000-05:00

true love is sitting on the couch for six hours and complaining about each others' movie choices.
true love is laughing loudly and comparing us to slugs, sliming on the pavement, wallowing.
true love is cooking kettle corn, and painting with watercolors, and drinking beer.
true love is doing your laundry.
true love is badmouthing coworkers in the basement, door shut tightly, whispering to avoid outsiders.
true love is whining when you play the guitar too loudly.
true love is smelling feet.
true love is when you steal my car and secretly fill it up with gas.
true love is recycling.
true love is simultaneous exercising, painfully, so that no one feels like mowing the lawn.
true love is sweet tea, a jammed disposal, and moldy bath-tiles.

dictionary/chronology of jessee family pets

2010-04-22T10:30:00.004-05:00

angel (gender unknown) - transparent angel fish. survived life outside the tank for 30 minutes once. died of old age.
bonnie (f) - first family animal in memory. black cat. wife of clyde (see below)
blackie (m) - outdoor cat. neighbor labelled him as the reason for her cat scratch fever.
chip (m) - albino hamster, adopted from classroom in 5th grade, died of cotton overdose
clyde (m) - husband of bonnie. calico.
duncan (m) - italian greyhound. excellent sprinter. sprinted into a cadillac.
edward cullen (m) - hamster that step-brother inherited from guidance counselor. mysteriously disappeared.
fanny (f) - pregnant hamster purchased to replace chip (see above). died during childbirth one day after adoption.
goldie (gender unknown) - goldfish
hawn (gender unknown) - goldfish
hercules (m) - red beta fish, trained to kill with the mighty skills of a samurai warrier
max (m) - neglected golden retriever
mr. tweet (m) - yellow parakeet. died of asphyxiation when brother smuggled him into school in his backpack.
mya (f) - indoor longhair cat. once locked in pantry for 8 hours, ate the cinnamon. died of feline leukemia.
starlight (f) - blue parakeet. died of cat attack (see also: zeus)
sugar (f) - white miniature pomeranian. purchased because she is easier to walk than max.
zeus (m) - white siamese. absolute very best cat ever.

Liver and Ambrosia

2010-04-22T07:27:00.000-05:00

Orange pools of liver-flavored grease floated in warm, just-boiled milk among dry cereal Os. Wonderful woman! She worked so hard to satisfy the tastes of her American guest! For breakfast, dry cereal with milk had been the plan. But she had only one pot, and I assume there was some restriction on the quantity of water she and her son could consume because of the presence of the aforementioned floats and that she had used this pot the night before to prepare her special dish: a cringingly delicious and plentiful combination of pig livers and pig-liver gravy. My tears well at the thought! It was so much an honor for me to stay under her roof that she insisted I refrain, during the meal, from drinking anything in her home, until she had retrieved from the piaţa a soda by her own hand. Have I told you how great a beverage a soda can be? A few times in my life I have supped a soda that became on my tongue Ambrosia. I believe the myth — it has prolonged my life. Bread too becomes the Bread of Life when you have it with Romanian liver gravy. After my second-birth by soda, the boy — the only one in the flat who spoke English — hurried me out to the piaţa to see if I could find any food to rival his mother's in flavor. I did not.

I'll forever remember the family that took me in,
Brought me closer to heaven than I've ever been,
Fed me pig livers and warm liver milk,
Made me wait for the soda that swallowed like silk!

Dictionary of Things that Can Kill You

2010-04-21T08:46:00.006-05:00

Aluminum Foil... no wait, Alzheimer's isn't death

Bread with that one stuff in it.

Chinese toys (but only if you lick them)

Computers

Death

Disappearing honey bees

Fluoride toothpaste

The Government

Inescapable Pits (this one is relative to the skills set of the person in the pit)

Isopropyl alcohol

Life (eventual conclusions count)

Meth labs

Microwaves

Modern medicine

Murder (for both parties)

Neal's ideas

Non-paper-filtered coffee: french press, gold filter, etc...

Non-stick pans ... what does that cause? death?

Oil Companies

Oxygen (unless you eat exactly the same amount of 100% dark chocolate as oxygen breathed--I've done the math. Then you'll live forever.. unless something else kills you.. like Death.)

Paper-filtered coffee (probably)

Public gyms --- wait, Mersa isn't death either...

Plastic wrap, plastic Tupperware, plastic disposable anythings

Reading this blog

Refined sugar doused in gasoline...so like, all refined sugar

A sense of euphoria

Sleeping on ledges

Smelling concrete--and liking it.

Smelling gasoline--and liking it.

Ultrasounds (actually.. this should be in the sequel : Dictionary of Things that Can Kill Your Baby)

X-rays (after your 3rd)

Sticky Note Soap... in Antarctica

2010-04-07T08:06:00.006-05:00

Spring Comes

2010-04-05T20:26:00.002-05:00

But spring does not abruptly come.
It waffles with the winter some.
Like an epiphany slow-dawning,
It wakens with a stuttered yawning.
Do not expect a sudden pop
Of color green, or leafy top,
Or meadow bloomed, or forest groomed,
Or winter doomed, or cold entombed,
But gradual return from grey.
So listen closely what I say,
And to my former promise cling:
There will be, oh tree, a spring!

The problem of existing

2010-04-02T08:37:00.003-05:00

Just because I have a body,
doesn't mean I'm fat.
Just because my hips exist,
doesn't mean they're fat.
Bumping into that trash can shouldn't elicit
the awareness of cellulite
but rather
the cellular eureka
of existing matter in collision
with every other weight-bearing atom.
My body
gets to take up space.
I have the privilege
of pressing against
bumping into
trampling on
the material world.
I weigh. Therefore I am.
So why would I
ever despise
any inch of my existence!
Unless that is
I had a problem with existing.

Salis

2010-03-22T15:30:00.005-05:00

Salis continued on her southward course, dodging thistle and briar, cobweb and lowing-hanging limb, but eventually found herself precisely where she had intended to be: lost. It was one of those sorts of arguments of which you can never afterwards remember the cause that had sparked her juvenile fury and burned a path through the woods. She had sharply pronounced her intention of running away, and, in step with her under-breath cadence and the slam of the screendoor, marched headlong into those solemn deciduous boughs with every intention of getting lost — of making them sorry.

But now this spiteful victor was losing her resolution. She was lost. They weren't lost. She knew where they were. But she had no bearing on her own relation to them. So it wasn't long — no, far less than long — before Salis gave up her frantic attempts at discovering some landmark or memorable trail and sat herself upon a fallen ash and wept.

After no more than the customary time of sobs and whimpers had past, she looked around to associate herself more closely with her situation: she was truly without even intuition to guide her home.

There is a childish innocence that brings not exactly courage, but suspension of fear. Courage knows what it faces, fears it, and triumphs over the fear. Innocence stands before certain peril and does not know what it faces, so cannot fear when fear would do it good. Innocence is composed of many good things, but it does have its troubles.

Now, there is an animal fear that instinctually reacts to a plain and immediate threat, like a growl or bared teeth, or to the absence of something to which it is used, like a mother or light — when I say fear, I don't mean that. There is a higher fear and it is more able — this is the kind I mean and it cannot be the property of innocence.

Young Salis had been trying to grow out of her innocence for some time (though she did not know it), and so she feared. This fear might have given way to courage, but as she looked around through ebbing crests of tears, the fear she ought to have felt much longer, and rightly so, unnaturally withdrew and vanished. Whatever chance at courage she might have had receded along with the fear, and she stood in an artifical and ignorant innocence quite below her years, with no care for the future.

Knowing neither how to be brave, nor how not to be, Salis swiftly forgot her present jeopardy and occupied herself with admiration for the tiny multitude of variegated forest flowers around her feet. This flower of lavender hue and crimson veins; that flower of brilliant red, seared on the edges by yellow; another in seeming indecision between orange and mauve — not two were alike in kind or color, excepting the pure white prospers, demure among the rest but gifted with the most extravagant and pleasing forms.

One bud alone, no bigger than a thumbnail and cast in sunny gold, drew her fancy from the jolly forum — it being set a little way off from the others like a naughty child or a sacred station. Being that much more beautiful to her — I can't say if it would have been quite so attractive to other little girls — she stepped carelessly forward to more closely appreciate its lines; and, with her third step, Salis' attention caught on a very unexpected sound from underfoot: a hollow wooden clump!

end of the world

2010-03-17T09:48:00.003-05:00

I lifted my parcel to the top of my shoulders, grunting as the weight shifted and I nearly toppled over. The person in line behind me coughed as if to warn me against clumsiness; it would throw off the entire assembly’s production for the day.

“Sorry, Smith,” I murmured under my breath, digging my feet into the earth beneath me to steady myself.

“Stop talking. You know it’s not allowed on the line,” he grunted from behind. His breath was hot on my back; he was practically on top of me. I marched in silence, legs burning, arms numb, thinking only of the possibility that I was the slowest one in the line, my weak legs causing the line to lose precious daylight.

We reached the base of the mound. I shrugged my shoulders and used my forearms to nudge the parcel to the ground in front of me, panting to catch my breath. The bigger men filed in behind me, nudging me to get out of their way. One of them grabbed my parcel and pinched it with his teeth, clawing his way backwards up the enormous hill, stacked sky-high with rations, to drop off my hard day's work and tout it as his own.

"Hey! That's mine!" I shouted to him as he scurried away. He didn't answer, knocking over packages and stumbling past the others as he escaped.

I noticed a parcel sitting on the ground at my feet, untouched, and nearly identical to the one I'd lost a few moments ago. I looked to my left, to my right, and stealthily kicked it to the other side of the hill away from the main entrance. When no one noticed the kick, I steadied my nerves and picked it up. I strapped it to my back and crept up the stairs to the entrance of the depository. This poor fool. Now I'll get my rations after all.

I'd almost reached the depository via my detour when I noticed a dark shadow pour over the hill. I looked up to find the source of the shadow with my eyes but I couldn't see anything - it was as if the sun was being blocked by something huge, something dark and sinister. I heard rumbling, and then I felt the ground below me erupt with the stampeding sound of hundreds of factory workers, screaming and running from the entrance to the depository. Arms outstretched, looks of sheer panic on their faces, they sprinted towards me with no regard to their parcels or mine.

"Smith, run, get out of here! It's going to kill us!" screamed a familiar voice, rushing past me before I could see who it was.

"What's going to kill us?" I yelled, starting to panic.

"It burns! It burns so badly!" Someone was whimpering as they limped from the doors and down the hill. I didn't recognize his face because it was soaked in a brown, slimy liquid. It looked like his mouth was melting. "Acid, it's acid!" he moaned, grasping at his face as he pushed me aside, running into the endless grassy field at the base of the hill. I was still standing near the entrance as more and more people poured out, screaming in terror as I stood, awestruck.

Suddenly I saw it. The brown liquid was bubbling up from the entryway, spewing from the mouth of a red cylinder that was held, floating mid-air by the massive shadow. The stream gurgled and erupted as the acid exploded from the doors, washing away the wirey bodies of my former coworkers, forming volcanic streams of murky runoff down the hill. It washed away the ground beneath our feet, our hill, our depository, our rations, our livelihood. It disintigrated lives.

I stood without moving, clutching the unsteady ground below me as I watched the liquid wash over my feet, up to my abdomen, pulling loose the grains of dirt that were piled so meticulously to build our home. I closed my eyes and tried not to feel the bubbles swell over my head, fizzing and popping as I lost my breath, body swept to the bottom of the hill among countless others, hearing echoes of laughter from the great mass hovering over our colony.

"You stupid bugs, why would you build a house out of dirt?" he cackled as my vision faded for the last time.

Free-Write from the Chow Bar

2010-03-11T13:50:00.001-06:00

the card we drew said "the Hollow Sound"... This is what came of it:

Via Patrick.

And mine:

more farming memories (probably because i am aching to go outside and enjoy the weather)

2010-03-09T10:43:00.001-06:00

The Bull

Brett put on his boots to drive the four-wheeler;
I put my retainer in my pocket.
My cousins were still cleaning the sheep shearing,
chasing tufts of wool lilting on the breeze,
settling on the surface of the cow pond.
When he started the engine, my heart jumped -
Clutched the vinyl seat with my fingernails,
all the while hollering with Brett at the men
in the mud, rakes in hand, toiling while we rode.

Soon we were on the dark side of the hill,
couldn't see the sun past shadows of grass,
and there was The Bull -
grazing, staring, tail whisking flies with fury.
and then The Engine Died -
coughing, sputtering its last dying breath
spitting just enough exhaust to catch His eye;
We froze in our seats, reluctant to breathe
or talk. He snorted fire. He blinked slowly.
We jumped at the same time when he charged us,
leaping into certain manure (or mud),
scrambling like june-bugs flying to the porchlight.
His horns ripped through aluminum siding,
splintering the ATV down the hill.
We saw it land in the ditch, glancing back
as we sprinted, screaming, with arms flailing.

Progress

2010-03-06T22:45:00.002-06:00

He did not know how to love well,
but he loved as well as he knew.
And now not one can love so well,
Than he who did what he knew.

And plodding on to do, not think,
he learned a good deal more
Than he who plopping down to think
forgot to do any more.

I'd only one thing have you learn:
to do what you know to do.
Oh, my friend! the things you'd learn
if you'd do what you know to do!

choose your own adventure

2010-02-25T20:10:00.004-06:00

Feedback time. I'll give you some bits of somethings, and you say which bit you want to hear more from:

Bit Number One

As a general rule, the Smiggleworths are regular people. Not a one of them wears a wristwatch as a subconsciously inherited rule. A Smiggleworth stomach is a better timepiece than what the Swiss used to produce. At three evenly divided intervals, precisely the same intervals, each Smiggleworth stomach grumbles unhappily. Likewise, sleepiness seems to run contagiously and regularly. A typical Wednesday night: the Smiggleworths are all reading their favorite books, and little Juniper Smiggleworth is beggining to nod off at precisely 9:30 PM. Now see the yawns quickly traveling across the room. Each one is placing his bookmark---be it a piece of pant, dental floss, or pressed flower--in its place, and they're tiptoeing off to bed.
The only downside to their marvelously coordinated internal clocks is that the Smiggleworth household has 9 occupants and one bathroom. So, unbeknownst to them, at precisely the same time: 7am, 12pm, 5pm, and 9 the Smiggleworths and their tortured bladders all line up outside the bathroom to take their turn.

Do you want to know more about them? Do you want to know what happens to them? It might be dark and lonesome. It may be outta this world. I may be, well, just another story we may as well have read fifty times.

Bit Number Two

I grab the doorknob--a snippet from my dream last night pops into my head--I hate that. I pull on the knob and the door peels back like a sheet of rubber. I shudder. That's disgusting, wood is not supposed to behave like rubber. What is the world coming to?

What even is this nonsense? Do you want to know?

Bit Number Three

There once was an unfortunate man with the last name 'Winner.' Or rather I should say: There once was a man with the unforuntate last name 'Winner.' But I don't know which statement is more true because a man is so adhered to his name that the two can't seem to do anything really apart; the one is always getting ascribed to the other.
This unfortunate Mr. Winner married the unfortunate Liza Hamm, who really didn't like being a Hamm and thought the new name a great improvement. But she was unfortunately wrong, as she never would have been driven to such cruelty against her son, as she was, the day he was born.

"Unfortunate" is repeated a lot in this one...but it may not be an unfortunate story at all. It may be a tale of triumph and great happiness! ?

The End of the World

2010-02-25T14:39:00.004-06:00

The world has come to an end—at least as far as I am concerned. —I say "as far as I am concerned" because the subject to which I refer is "humanity" and I seem to be the only existing specimen. Today, I am Humanity.

I have seen not a dieing human soul in eleven years. Neither have I seen a living one.

I sit now on a stool at the kitchen counter of some random house in a suburb of what was once known as Chicago when there was a need in the world to call places by names. I don't suppose I need to call it "Chicago" for my own benefit. Humanity has moved beyond the need for proper nouns. But I'd like to hear, just once, someone say my name.

God, this place is void! All places are void! I find some comfort in little things, like beds-still-made I can crawl into and pretend was made for me, and, for some strange, great reason, trees give me comfort, are my haven and rest.

But most things now are merely reminders of what I lost, I think I lost—I sometimes wonder if not the world before was the dream and not this—that I have awakened from a prenatal subconscious into a world that is as much about me as is the world inside my mind—that the world I see began when my mind awoke—that the dream I had about "others," filling the world, driving the world, controlling the world, merely means to express a subconscious conviction that I, Humanity, am all there is to the story worth mentioning. I must be the main character. Right?

Certain things remind me more soberly of my loss (if it is a loss), my dream (if it is a dream): odd things like gardens that have forgotten that they need people in order to thrive. I know its silly. Shouldn't I rejoice that they live? But I don't think I would bear it worse if the gardens could not survive. It would mean that we mattered.

I have spoken to no one but the murmurs of the wind through vacant cities. I have seen no one but the phantoms plating billboards on I-69.

I sit—I'm shaking again—in a house in a suburb full of the absence of people. And I wonder to what end I am living. Am I still looking for "others"? Could I handle the existence of another "I," another ego, in this world? A world, once all your own, can it be shared? This would, I expect, sound like nonsense to someone who knows nothing but "others."

But, I look outside at the dark traffic lights and the wild gardens and the still swingsets and I... I so want to be held!

I can't get out of my mind a sentence I suppose I said as a child, or if not, then a sentence from my subconscious dream, or if not, then a sentence that has been imprinted upon the human racial memory clinging yet to secrets in my blood, for I can scarcely imagine what a child's lips would be like had they not once pursed to form these words—and I cannot shake the words. They are my source of greatest sorrow and soberest sanity. They haunt me deeply and touch me deeply. And I can hope—oh! can I hope?—that I may one day know the meaning: "Will you stay with me until I fall asleep?"

Twitter-in-the-head Challenge

2010-02-17T12:09:00.002-06:00

Pop Song Sonnet

2010-02-04T15:42:00.009-06:00

This post deserves an explanation. The challenge this week was to write an 80s pop song----in the format of a Shakespearan or Spencerian Sonnet.

Stay True to Your Fool

I've got your number and I've got your song
I'll sing it out until you hit the wall
oh every single second you were wrong
and every single lie was ten feet tall

[robots dancing]

But if you try to break my heart I'll call
and break you in a thousand pieces too
so rip my heart and watch the tear drops fall
and pray that there's some tape lyin' next to you

[skinned chickens flying]

so if you want the maddness see it through
just love yourself enough to be so cruel
I'm hanging up the line and towel too
cause baby I've found out that you're a fool

[chorus]
Just try to run and try to hide your heart
but baby this ain't it, it's just the start.

Pop Song Sonnet

2010-02-04T10:16:00.001-06:00

Synthesizers, trumpets, keyboards, drums
Bring life to Blondie's rhythmic overture.
...
Keren, can you finish this?

Interrupted

2010-01-26T12:16:00.008-06:00

Blue fire sparks in the light
as you rise in flight:
a current of black feathers
washing the Western sky.
A call, and a call back,
barks the way,
and a cacophony of wings and consenting calls lands
on branches just beyond my window sill
where I
lie in wait with a gun,
hungry for some crow meat,
and some fun.
"No offense, but you drive me crazy, and I can't sleep."

snow day in bloomington

2010-01-26T09:27:00.002-06:00

Ravens gather in stark branches,
black ornaments adorning ashy trees
against white grey clouds.

Wind moves the snow from roof to roof,
revealing glittery patches of red clay,
water droplets shiver with each sudden gust.

The bell tower erupts with a chiming shout;
the ravens scatter, the bright sky obscured
by thick vibrating bodies.

stopping by woods on a snowy evening

2010-01-26T08:30:00.001-06:00

forget about this poem, what a lame title!

meat poem

2010-01-21T10:54:00.002-06:00

Dry smoke floats over the wilting orchard,
coating swollen apples with heavy musk,
masking red cranberries, streaked rhubarb,
fat dimpled gourds in a hazy ash.
The henhouse, since '98, has had a chimney
stacked with clay and brick above the chicken-wire windows.
There is no hay or feathers, but billows, string, and salt.
The meat spirals on a slow spit, brimming in a feedsack
stuffed with fennel and rosemary.

Spices mashed under my fingernails, thick lard coating my palms,
I sit on the porch steps and smell my hands.

Suburban Skyscapes

2010-01-14T17:29:00.008-06:00

1:
This morning the yawning sky was witnessed,
a puddle of orange juice seeping upward
into the fabric of frigid black night,
through a dirt-seamed windshield.

11 am's dusty blue sky is blind
to the building slicing
Glory with a rust red razor edge,
to the puncture
of a cell phone tower,
radiating the scene.

3:
Our smoldering star ticks
off celestial bliss,
with a long low sigh
that steams each window sill
and fries the laundry hanging to dry.

4:
Tonight the crooning sky will be haled--
a Hallelujah chorus of lights
hung on a deep blue scale --
through the crooked bars of plastic blinds.

The Tweet Life

2010-01-12T20:55:00.003-06:00

1:49pm my lunch isn't settling good.
Neither is mine. That's why I'm sitting at this coffee shop sipping chai tea. I've been reading his tweets, watching him pace on the sidewalk outside with his hands in his pockets. His page refreshed.
1:50pm where is she?
I was so close I could see him blink. I realized I was staring at him. How did he update his page? I didn't see him pull out a phone or laptop. His face was crumpled in an awkward snarl. He walked to the snowflake decal on the window and picked at it with a fingernail.
1:51pm it's frickin freezing out here. if she forgot me i'll be pissed. maybe i should go inside.
I exhaled over my warm cup. He was inches away from me on the other side of the window. I focused on my computer screen and furrowed my brow intently. I picked up my purse and rifled through it, sneaking a peek at him while he read the posted hours on the storefront.
1:52pm yeah, i'll just step in for a second.
The door opened with a gust of cold air. His wool coat swirled around his waist with the incoming breeze and he raked his hands through his hair. I could smell his shampoo, almonds.
1:53pm hello there!
We made eye contact. Was he talking to me? Hi. I'd buy you a cup if you'd just sit next to me. He walked past my table and approached the cashier to order.
1:54pm coffee or dessert? i only have six bucks on me. maybe a milkshake.
I heard him order a frozen mocha, even though I knew he was cold. He should have ordered something warmer.
1:54pm wait, i should have gotten something warm. maybe i can change my order. mocha, hot.
The cashier gave him a rude look when he asked to change his drink. I smiled. She isn't really upset. Just smile at her, you'll win her over.
I studied him as he waited for his drink, glancing over his shoulder at the rest of the shop. Do you want to sit down?
1:55pm there aren't any open seats. would she let me sit at her table?
I moved my purse out of the open chair and picked up my coat, putting it in my lap. Maybe he'd come over if he saw there was room.
1:55pm i could just ask. do you have room for someone else? she looks busy on that computer.
No! I'm not busy.

Public Restroom

2010-01-12T14:28:00.004-06:00

Defiant interjections tumble
across a desert of thought.
one syllable
HA! -- bursts out
a sonic dart that hits
the steel wall of solitude
and plummets
into unheard and maybe
unspoken oblivion