You Were Here

9/29/10

More Lateness: Soccer Players of Brooklyn

9/21/10

9/20/10

What of the Ocean?

What of the ocean
were it not for the rocks?

A bunch of salt & fishes?

What of man,
goddamn him?

Fotos found yesterday at La Lagunilla market, Mexico City.

AS My Homeless Puppet Making Friend would say...
..."I Think You Dropped Something".

It Doesn't matter from whence you came,
or how by who for what you're named,
how cool you look, or sharp you dress
in tidy order or uncouth mess.
In the know, without a clue
with hearts in love with what we do,
no wrong is wrought, or life untrue.
dear friends I bid you all adieu.

"Oh yeah, all right
Are you going to be in my dreams
Tonight?

And in the end
The love you take
Is equal to the love you make."-P.M.

Gratitude for Growing Things

Dear Lovers,

The sun is setting here now. I was just hanging out in the garden here at Casa Libre where there is a newly constructed arbor covered in a grape vine. The sky is less pink tonight than it has been in recent weeks, but no less beautiful. I was thinking of how I wanted to end this project for myself and for you.

I am thinking about the cycle of things. I am thinking about the sun rising and setting, the grape vine that grew from a 3 foot seedling into a massive cape of green, about the dark that tuns into light and back into dark. About coming together and pulling apart of people and lives and bodies, of chances, changing seasons, what papa used to say, smooth flights, heartmind music, drifting, gold coins, trains, glove boxes, prisoner of war camps, car wrecks, other selves, lovers, Alchemy, Mexico, birthdays, dancing, elk hyde drums, "beast" pumps, psychography, job hunting, making out in orchards, teeth, hobos, exile, witnesses, daydreams, good news, language, sacrifice, naming animals, bike rides, hot dogs, days, nights, sunsets, memories of house parties, sex, irish whiskey, libraries, poetry, warriors, classes, dancing again, wolves, excess, overflow, promises, bumper stickers, kids, tough girls, apples, houses, parks, music, babies, questions, suffering, burning embers, 20 dollar bills, ice, kitchens, power, the Miss Fantastics, Lacey, black books, wind, wanderlust, cans of fresca, breakfast, dads, godparents, migrations, boardwalks, work, perros, set lists, excerpts, earth, apologies, notes, fiber, fish, birds, pleases and squeezes, death, bedrooms, villages, here, magic stuff, luminous events, haircuts, lottery, motorcycles, bike lanes, Clairvoyance, Logic, summer nights, eavesdropping, rising creeks, truth, mornings, dismemberment, teasing, Alabama, references, hearts, bangs, paint, rabbits, missives...

Beginnings and Endings. All of the things that have made up our last twenty days together. I am grateful to have shared this space with all of you. I appreciate the attempts to push how this shared community exists in space. To seek/destroy definition. To collaborate/communicate/connect. To balance rawness and craft.

Thank you, Bo.
Thank you, Camille.
Thank you, Malcolm.
Thank you, Melissa.
Thank you, Selah.
Thank you, Kristen.
Thank you, Mickey.
Thank you, Thirza.
Thank you, Sharon.
Thank you, Logan.
Thank you, Deborah.
Thank you, Adam.
Thank you, JenMarie.
Thank you, me.
Thank you, Travis.
Thank you, Angela.
Thank you, Kate.
Thank you, Soham.
Thank you, Rick.

"We have come into the presence of the one
who was never apart from us. When someone chews
sugarcane, he is wanting this sweetness.

Inside the globe the sound roars like thunder.
And now silence, my strict tutor." ~Rumi (from Meadowsounds)

With Love in All Directions,

Kristen

Postscript
This space will remain private for a few more weeks. On October 1st, I will send you an email to let you know that it is going public again. Feel free to delete anything you've shared here, that you don't want to go public. Then I hope you visit this space like a photo album. A memory of a shared journey. For me, my people, this has been one fantastic ride.

a chance blindness

just looked the sun right in the sunset and stared until it was gone. I still have spots where my sight should be. Gold and fuchsia ringlets.

We were really here, weren't we?

(gratitude and blessings to Kristen for organizing and contributing and all of you for sharing)

changing seasons

No profound last-day thoughts. Had a random visit from high school friend and her girlfriend on road trip. They cooked and drove me around in their car and I felt young and excited. packet came back from advisor. walked my dog. milked the goats. now, 110 pages of editing for the pitkin review. tori amos, to continue the high school revival.

thanks, everyone, for screaming into the chasm and bridging the divide and having discourse.

Are your seasons changing, too?

papa used to say "dream i love you princess"

kristen, what a wonderful gathering you arranged. thank you, everyone.

thanks

It's been lovely to share this space with you.

so many, so long

so many trees.

so much light.

so many long shadows

to go.

FIN

9/19/10

Drift

I drift I drift I drift

I center

   I lift
I drift

I
   drip I drift

I drift in
   dripping

I wander I stray

I drift

I dare I stare

I need

I want to drift

I admit I

(need) want to drift to

drip

I scare

I dare you

I
l
e
a
v
e
a
s
t
r
i
n
g

Wishing you all smooth flights, clearly illuminated pathways, and signs facing the right way.

gold coins

Digital Drugs

yo! where can I score some I-Dose?
You have to download that shit!
How do I take it?
Put it in your ear!
crazy....

....Just rocked I-doser "hand of God" and um.... well... I took some aspirin. and I feel numb to the world.
hmmmm. ..kids getting high on music...hmmm...what a novel idea...
WTF---- the new gateway drug! "How my second life high became a real world drug problem"
That's right folks!..DIGITAL DRUGS!!!!!!
SOMEBODY CALL HUEY LEWIS!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZcgUEkBIX0&feature=player_embedded

He imagines or remembers the train.

ballad

In the tiny upstate city where we lived, no businesses were shuttered, including her and I’s. The war-boom left no empty windows. His house situated at the back of the thriving shoe shop we ran when he was away. The store front near brand new. Still some broken glass. Through the angled windows, coming back from the market, I saw them reunited. First dusk, he came to me on the couch. He held one arm around me, the other across the front of me. This hand innocently tucked in skirt’s waistband. We slept like siblings, sitting up. In his sleep, he moaned in what seemed another language. We never asked what he saw from the sea. I slipped back into dreams. Just above my knee, a worm the color of my skin, mouth like a lamprey. Or was the worm simply my skin? Mouth a quarter inch wide. I was afraid but started to pull. Round balls of skin, connected like little sausages, one after another after another after another. The strand seemed endless. Finally what I pulled out was a string of beads on fishing line. I woke again, they stood at the bedroom door. Her blue dress with wide skirt, a pinafore, covered in white polka dots. Why was she dressed like this in the middle of the night? Call me The Sailor, he said. Do you know how many times I got on that ship?

Note: point of departure: http://flashfiction.net/2010/09/friday-flash-prompt-carol-guess.php.

This type of chorus is called a burden.

Most ballads can be sung to the tune of a hundred other ballads.

particle or wave, sangres?

9/18/10

We have lift off

So, having now completed her 2nd round trip flight, CV has flown more than probably 85% of the world. And, also, she has her own wings...

I wish you were here, even more

I'm sad that our experiment is almost over. Thanks, folks, for all your great posts. It's been quite a joy to wander through your worlds.

Found

Found in bed today: lizard tail, crystal earring, Scarlet O'Hara pin

Found in mail today: a gift from the sea fairy (oh oh oh! thank you, Poe!)

Found in class today: Kate's poem "2 of Swords" brings tears to eyes (not just mine) and promotes sincerity in the classroom:

----------------------
2 of Swords

~ Kate Greenstreet

There's always that moment

with people, right?

You look back...

you can't believe

how they just

don't love you.

And how,

in the minute before that,

you didn't know.

There was a place, near water.

The people had come

from somewhere else, and settled.

How we came to exist.

How we came to be here, everywhere

at once.

How could I say nothing?

Well, it's a long walk ahead.

For a long time,

I didn't know.

And it's all just another

story about how life could be.

A psychic told me once I had the mind of a nun.

As if there would be only one kind, for nuns.

The offices of seers we consulted in the South

sometimes had chickens. The vestibules

were swimming with the poor--

bobbing, drowning, in our lake

of dreams and wishes.

Tell me everything

you want to do while there's still time.

Keep in touch.

Think about the leaves

and the birds

in branches.

Think about the words

Big Picture.

The Big Picture.

For a long time,

I didn't know what to say.

And of course I didn't want to say it.

When everything depends--has always

depended on acting like nothing is wrong.

Fruit trees blooming in the blood drenched ground,

a ringing phone--

it's what we're in the middle of.

If we realized the extent to which no one understands

what anybody else really means

by anything they say, well,

you say we'd all go crazy.

But aren't we crazy already?

With trying and pretending

and being mad about it--I mean angry.

There was a place, near water.

How we all came to be,

everywhere

at once.

My prayer is changing.

----------------------

Found in class today: when you offer a student permission to break free, they take it

a stray walk-in/terloper standing stranger

I heard breathing and a sniff. T. had left and E. was outside. I walked from room to room, but there was no one I could see.

when the clairvoyant pauses, one buys a glove box

who she sung herself to be

True Story

This is the first of many weekends to be spent cleaning out this God forsaken house. Today, I gave up pulling weeds outside because of the largest impregnated spider I have ever seen. That was just the last straw. I am preparing to leave and that's what makes it all worth it. It might just be 3 months of doing things like pulling up tree-sized weeds from the corners of my fence (as seen here), or raking up a 2-year-old plastic bag of cat shit and liter left outside the bedroom window of an old (disgusting, WoW addict) roommate.

This is the first of many weekends where my boyfriend and I will have to give up any daytime enjoyment for practically's sake, as well as empty the garage for the umpteenth time, have a yard sale, have tile put in the bathrooms and laundry room, and repaint the interior. We are not selling it, mind you. Or should I say, my father is not selling it. Not in this market; there is no way. (There are 3 houses in foreclosure on my block alone.) When my boyfriend and I are gone, the house will be rented. And best of all: out of my hands.

This could be the first of many weekends where my father comes into town, means to do good, but ends up stirring up all this unsettled bullshit inside me in the process. We've already argued about this house recently. And, we are still both a little sore from it. It just so happened to follow a therapy session in which I admitted to Anna, my doctor, that I felt as if all the grimy corners of this house represent all the parts of my unexamined self; as if the corners of that self are left unclean because I am too lazy to clean them out. How it's a terrible trait, that I can't keep a house, but then my intellectual self speaks up and says I've had other priorities, that I'm young and haven't yet figured out all the details of taking care of myself while expecting nothing but achievements in art, relationships, school, work, friendships, etc. Then I step away from both selves and tell myself none of this is real.

I know I connect those objects with people and events so the thoughts ticker passed my mind's eye something like this house unclean corners father failures. Since when am I a little girl? Sometimes I wish he had never been in a financial position to buy this house five years ago, when the market was high, because now the market is low, and so are wages, and so is job availability. My father is a baby boomer, one of a generation familiar with recessions. He is also an Italian immigrant of the post WWII kind--Ellis Island, the whole nine, the third of 8 children, 16 years old when he came to America with his mother and siblings. The oldest men had to quit school and work. I know he is proud that I am about to receive a master's degree while he never had the chance to finish high school. I am sure it is part of fulfilling his American Dream; that, and being a successful, self-actualized beach dwelling business man. It actually worked for him.

Because he still owns this house he can still tell me what to do. I hate being told what to do. I realize I am childlike this way, but I don't think anyone really likes it. I think most just tolerate it because of some false belief that it is necessary to tolerate such treatment, like say, from a boss, in the adult world. Who made up these rules? Probably the same people who made up the rule that I can't throw the weeds into the retention pound behind my house. A. It's just where the neighborhood shit goes. B. Earth is earth. People like my father who want you to bag the weeds you just pulled up and place them on the curb so the garbage man can take them to the part of the earth that is government designated for bulk trash.

Sometimes I can't handle the modern formalities of owning anything. I would make an exception for my car, and at this point, just live it in. After taking care of a house for the last five years I want to own as little as possible for the next five years. I am grateful I have had this house for the last five years (although it may not sound like it, the way this is going). Just, have you ever felt like your things own you? It's never as overwhelming as when that thing is a house. I dream only in houses. About the dogs of old boyfriends. And escaping.

Escape is coming, but in the form of more commitment. More commitment for just 3 more months. And then? And then we leave. I quit my job. Sell nearly everything I own. Gather the cats. Go towards the beach. For six months or so. Relax. Work to live. Cut expenses. Lack possessions. Make some music. Eat. Love. Sleep.

drought

soil dried to cracking.

there was no rain.

there was no rain

to fill the broken

grackle egg.

Who was she, while she was traveling?

A ballad tells a story.