If I could commit to anything
I’d get an anchor tattoo on my forearm,
because I have never quite felt stable, or hopeful. I have never been tethered,
and some part of me has always wanted to be.
Solid.
I would like them to carve deep into my arm and delicate black anchor, on the right arm, because the left has that birthmark that I could never bear to cover.
An anchor to say,
You’ll stay and be happy where you’re planted, restless child. Where the captain sets you, where you finally fall,
you’ll sleep.
I’m going to keep counting.
Smoke makes you lose your
way to the pharmacy
when you’re trying to cure
life.
And drive three miles out of
the way
just to avoid paranoia.
Casablanca and bad takeout
plate after plate,
I ate,
you said you’d never seen me
do more than pick,
bird like.
I’m going to keep counting
the days until I’m safe
my drinks
my promises.
Smoke makes you lay in bed
and we forgot everything
I don’t even remember
what I wanted to find.
(Source: beatnik-in-blue)
A Poem for Maurice Sendak
Thank you,
for the wild things, for the fresh honesty of childhood,
I ate it up.
You crafted the Nutcracker
And I covered my mouth at the site
of The Rat King
but giggled,
and then played the role of
The Chinese dance monster.
Alone in a theater,
I cried over the abandonment of siblings,
The cold innocence
of childhood,
and our dysfunctional imaginary friends.
I’ll remember story time,
at the library with the sticky pleather beanbag chairs
and how Max made me want to be wild, too
and I’ll silently thank you
from my imaginary woods.
(Source: beatnik-in-blue)
Waking up to your skin
lessens the blow of morning,
because your backbone helps me
stand the endless strain of world and class and city street,
When I wake up next to your skin
I want to leave as much as I want to stay,
I want to hold, and be held,
And it’s all right there for me.
May I be the bed?
Absorb your shape
& memorize your curvature?
Then you would keep returning to me,
sleep, for sleep, for sleep.
When I wake up next to your skin
I melt
into you.
(Source: beatnik-in-blue)
Things I like:
Coffee or tea in the morning
Oxfords
Public Radio
Blazers
Things that make me feel like a stuffy old man:
See above.
One More Day Until You Get Home: A Letter to Myself
Cigarettes, you know, taste like loneliness. The light crackle and the brisk insecurity of your walk.
You’re lonely, you know.
You’re asking for things that aren’t on the menu, feeling the weight of a full red bottle in your bag.
I’ve caught onto you, you’re striving to grow into too big of shoes. You buy lipstick and nail polish in wine shades only,
because you’ll stain your lips and fingers later.
You’re giving glances again. Are you getting restless, little heart? Little minx, little feeble ghost of an older woman. You’re sad because you feel younger than ever, sitting at a bar you’re too young for. But you order coffee like a good girl. You’re a good girl.
Remember the man that held that once? He kept repeating, “You’re young, you’re so young,” refreshed by your excitement over voting and sex shops. He even asked if he could bring you home.
Younger girl,
trapped in a chattery time warp, in between ten separate people groups, none of which make perfect sense to you. You drink because you’re shy.
Because you want to talk and be understood.
Because you want to tell everyone all the things that you’re
afraid of.
Self explore a little more before you choose to be. You’re stuck on the same old sadness still, and if you don’t shake it you’ll surely shrivel up and never accomplish anything.
But you reach for the forbiddeness of sad fruit, for the plaintive string, for the sorry tone. You are unable to grow up because you’re unable to move on. Like the drunk girl told you on your way in to this bar, that no one has reminded you you’re not supposed to be in: It’s never never land here.
You’ll never grow up.
Love Letter:
Dearest:
If I could, I wouldn’t keep you in my bed. Even if you were in it all night, kissing, holding, fucking. No, I wouldn’t keep you in all morning to be close and soft and whisper sweet. I’d want you to go out and do interesting things, things I want to tell other people about, things I want to join you in doing. Good things. Nice things.
I hope (like hellishly.) that I’ll see you today. That I’ll get to roll you up in all my arms, am I an octopus? My tentacles all around you? If I had more limbs I’d use them all to hold you.
When you’re antique, I’ll collect you. Take in your fades bit by bit and remember you, memorize you until I have no memory or the banks overflow.
Why are you so good? Do I deserve it? I can’t say for myself, don’t care either way, I’m all yours. Every bit of me, even the sad parts, things you might not want, they’re all yours. The things I haven’t told anyone else, the broken baby fingers and frostbitten toes, the memories and terrible empty longings, the endless streams of words and words and thoughts, you can see them all if you’d like. You said the other day, just the other day, ‘so glad you’re all mine,’ and I agreed.
I get out of touch sometimes, I think. And, I would apologize if I thought you liked that, but I guess you understand. I worry, you’ll never worry like me, and I can’t remember why I started or why I do, but I’m twisted up all the time every time. Sometimes, though, when I’m with you I stop the worrying and I can just exist. I don’t have to grapple with it, I just am. You put me at ease.
Make me feel sweet and sleepy, like a little wine or warm milk, and like I could climb your ribcage and kiss your spine. You’re like the first breath after you come out of the water, thankful.
And, of course, I hope that in some, small way, you need me. that I’m a vital part of your life, that I make you feel like breathing easy and doing good things, that, I, in some small way inspire you.
that is all I want.
Let’s talk late. Ramble on about God and knot tying and sex and things we like, about novels and line breaks and people we’ve known, about relatives and metaphysics and wild future plans. Let’s get out of town, sleep in a moderately priced hotel, smoke on the balcony and drink in the bed, lots of wine.
See, sleep and things of bed nature are on my mind but I can’t find them in my room. But I can imagine, you and me in a moderately sized bed, at a normal time of night to be sleeping, curled up with our sleep schedules synced, a tabby cat half on my arm and a terrier burrowed under the blankets with us.
Sometimes I’m terrified that I’ll never be able to sleep again. I’m plagued by wake, awake. A wake. A mourning period. Morning.
Hope to God, or whoever, that I see you. We’ll even do art. I’ll make you food and ask you if you’re comfortable, see how I’ll wide eye at you, I’m machine washable, comfortable familiar cotton.
And I love you with every bit of my fibrous being.
©opyright HMVD 2012
(Source: beatnik-in-blue)
Direct quote from drunk text I sent to my boyfriend: “Come kiss me sweet in my bedroom, sleep nicely with me, I will be nectar. Read Poe all night. Coffee haven in headroom bedroom. We can watch a Wes Anderson movie and touch softly?”
