With any luck I will by this time tomorrow,
In a new sage green lace dress,
Survive this sticky sensation
A while longer.
I know I have been liberal
With new found excess caution.
But it will not last long.
Sometimes you seem to me
The same as the city we live in
And I can't tell
Is from isn't or couldn't.
Maybe the right move is to feed us
One more canned line about
The same frequented bars and the same problems that
Plague our same friends, while -
The third cup of coffee catches
In the throat,
No longer smooth but scratches
An itch down the lining of my insides.
Maybe if I recite the line
One more time.
I would outrun
This stirring that plagues me.
**
Friday, February 22, 2013
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
breather
I ran into the middle of February
Even tempered and light
Strode past premature rain
Breathed in a new scent of the city
Full of clean and nothingness
Full -- though not of promises.
And I sensed,
That we are equals
You and I.
Workers walked past
In hard hats and dazed with Monday
On their minds
In the absoluteness of the street quiet
And the air
I breathed one more time
And gave back
Exactly what I took from you.
That moment,
Invisible and loud
Sealed you in me.
After that I was alone,
A woman in her red scarf,
Hurtling to the underground.
**
Even tempered and light
Strode past premature rain
Breathed in a new scent of the city
Full of clean and nothingness
Full -- though not of promises.
And I sensed,
That we are equals
You and I.
Workers walked past
In hard hats and dazed with Monday
On their minds
In the absoluteness of the street quiet
And the air
I breathed one more time
And gave back
Exactly what I took from you.
That moment,
Invisible and loud
Sealed you in me.
After that I was alone,
A woman in her red scarf,
Hurtling to the underground.
**
Saturday, February 9, 2013
tumbleweed
There was ice on the ground
When we gathered around ourselves
Sam Adams in hand
I watched your palm cup her cheek
First one side, then the other
The smell of something so pungent, like onions and vinegar
Lingered on my mint green sweater.
And I didn't think,
I'd be this bitter
Like a strong drink gone wrong
Like wrinkled ginger peels
I didn't think
The first time you met
That the inevitable magnetism would manifest
So strongly, so late
It fills the muddied water between you and me and
My nose accidentally inhales
And now
All I can smell
Is that stupid pungent odor filling
My eye sockets.
I didn't think I'd see
But I could still see
The tumbleweed rolling in.
**
When we gathered around ourselves
Sam Adams in hand
I watched your palm cup her cheek
First one side, then the other
The smell of something so pungent, like onions and vinegar
Lingered on my mint green sweater.
And I didn't think,
I'd be this bitter
Like a strong drink gone wrong
Like wrinkled ginger peels
I didn't think
The first time you met
That the inevitable magnetism would manifest
So strongly, so late
It fills the muddied water between you and me and
My nose accidentally inhales
And now
All I can smell
Is that stupid pungent odor filling
My eye sockets.
I didn't think I'd see
But I could still see
The tumbleweed rolling in.
**
Thursday, February 7, 2013
before winter
When the arc of the night wanes
You descended with it
Came down with a generic name
That tells of you or anyone
It was as though
You were the sweet dusk of fall
Saturated browns and faded greens
With a piercing cold here
Or there
Your leaves whipped upwards
To a lukewarm sun
Scratched skins and tree trunks
And I couldn't tell if I
Welcomed you or not
Or anyone
The crumpled and second-hand colors
And the lonely curbsides
Could not deter your coming
Nor skip you altogether
To hibernation, to snow blankets
And wintry silence.
You, who carry a punishing presence
With the chill of the season and
The sickle and
The last of the wilting fruits,
Were inescapable.
**
You descended with it
Came down with a generic name
That tells of you or anyone
It was as though
You were the sweet dusk of fall
Saturated browns and faded greens
With a piercing cold here
Or there
Your leaves whipped upwards
To a lukewarm sun
Scratched skins and tree trunks
And I couldn't tell if I
Welcomed you or not
Or anyone
The crumpled and second-hand colors
And the lonely curbsides
Could not deter your coming
Nor skip you altogether
To hibernation, to snow blankets
And wintry silence.
You, who carry a punishing presence
With the chill of the season and
The sickle and
The last of the wilting fruits,
Were inescapable.
**
Saturday, February 2, 2013
monotonous firsts
I had my first kiss at a college party. And 24 hours after that, I was in bed with a different boy. So it goes in college.
In Greek myths, Cupid shot arrows into the hearts of young lovers. Today, we take Tequila shots instead. And believe me, the patrons of Patron got a lot further than those of Cupid. Emboldened by jello shots, readings of de Beauvoir, and the pure invincibility of youth, I dove into the age of non-definitions with an abandon that bordered on cliché.
I remember experiencing something like a minor existential crisis after my first kiss. It was with a boy I didn’t know terribly well. Swaying under the doorway, we did the deed under the careful watch of a cohort from the living room. He used too much tongue, I used too little discretion. The best part was only the denouement. No awkward goodbye, just a laugh with the head thrown back, and a skip down the stairs. Whatever my inexperience, I had gotten one thing right. The pretense of ‘casual’. Of ‘whatever’.
A trail of escapades later, I now come face to face with a new kind of peers—those for whom happily-ever-afters exist after all. Tiffany rings and family planning, they threaten to burst into my life. Spearheaded by the annoying tendency of human nature to compare one’s life with others.
The ‘whatever’ I had nailed so perfectly a few years ago, swaying under that doorway, I don't know if I can ever replicate it without pretense. Unlike written drafts, sex, and most other things in life, 'whatever' is best achieved the first time around. After that, the Patron, the swaying under strange roofs, they look hopelessly the same. Fuzzy on the cure, I wake up hungover from the last few years, and find myself yearning not for de Beauvoir, but Greek myths instead.
**
In Greek myths, Cupid shot arrows into the hearts of young lovers. Today, we take Tequila shots instead. And believe me, the patrons of Patron got a lot further than those of Cupid. Emboldened by jello shots, readings of de Beauvoir, and the pure invincibility of youth, I dove into the age of non-definitions with an abandon that bordered on cliché.
I remember experiencing something like a minor existential crisis after my first kiss. It was with a boy I didn’t know terribly well. Swaying under the doorway, we did the deed under the careful watch of a cohort from the living room. He used too much tongue, I used too little discretion. The best part was only the denouement. No awkward goodbye, just a laugh with the head thrown back, and a skip down the stairs. Whatever my inexperience, I had gotten one thing right. The pretense of ‘casual’. Of ‘whatever’.
A trail of escapades later, I now come face to face with a new kind of peers—those for whom happily-ever-afters exist after all. Tiffany rings and family planning, they threaten to burst into my life. Spearheaded by the annoying tendency of human nature to compare one’s life with others.
The ‘whatever’ I had nailed so perfectly a few years ago, swaying under that doorway, I don't know if I can ever replicate it without pretense. Unlike written drafts, sex, and most other things in life, 'whatever' is best achieved the first time around. After that, the Patron, the swaying under strange roofs, they look hopelessly the same. Fuzzy on the cure, I wake up hungover from the last few years, and find myself yearning not for de Beauvoir, but Greek myths instead.
**