Bippety Boppety Boop

Oh Cinderella is so cliche', but I would probably give a half a million to have a fairy godmother right now. I would ask for some new shoes (preferably flat soled and as cute as my kinzies) and then for some guidance. I do not think that I deserve to be in the position that I am in, and sure, I think that it all really just sucks. But am I doing the right thing? Fairy godmother??

Ick, I am so stupidly unstable right now.

I am going to try to start over. Friend L. said that I need to discipline my mind for the time being. I need to stop doing the things that enevitably wind up hurting me and then get on with life, as L. says, "doing the things you loved to do before this all started/ended/started again." She's right. What were those things?

park
friends
books
coffee shops
work
writing
poetry

I think I live somewhat too simply. I really miss the bustle of the city, the heighten sense of always having company even when you were lonely. When I felt alone I would just go to the park and sit under a tree with about a hundred other people around me. But yet, I was comforted there. I was still alone but still surrounded. I loved walking down my street, in my neighborhood, winding up in the busiest center of the world. I miss that. Then, I think, oh but I miss the lovlieness of home, the country, the solitude of the stars and the middle of the road.

Where is the middle? Where is happiness? Is it here or there?

I am a rambling mess and it is at times like this that I am truly fearful of the life I am living. Where will I be in two years and who will I be with?

Time moves too quickly.

Today's Lesson

to forgive, to move on, to push forward, to stop and listen, and to be aware of everything. to spend time away, to spend time here, to show love, show friendship, and show the ugly, to conceal the crazy, to let the air come in, and to give affection when affection is worthy.

i love yet i have lost. isn't that always true?

Today I wept. I rarely weep with such force but today I did. For the first time in my life I know what it means to have fallen into a miraculous spell, to finally have the feeling (for the first time) that my whole life means this person, the next moments, until our moments are gone. Today I felt a loss greater than any in my life and everyone I love is still here. I just sensed the lonliness I may eventually feel.


In Blackwater Woods by Mary Oliver

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.









I am in love.

top ten things to do with autumn approaching

1. Read in the park with a thermos of tea

2. work on drafts of poems on a picnic table somewhere

3. dance and play leaves that someone has raked up in their yard

4. go on long hikes

5. play on empty playgrounds

6. watch a movie on cloudy afternoons with bunches of blankets and pillows

7. go for a drive to somewhere new

8. pick out pumpkins

9. have a bonfire party

10. take sunset strolls, enjoying the sun on the dying leaves

Crab Apples

I hate not knowing.


Some days it is easier just to just wish you had never been there at that moment...



i just wish things were always easier.

I keep thinking about Merle

The ambiguity of the last post has been bothering me. I probably am not going to make it less so but by writing a new post hopefully I will draw my audience away from the last one.

Someone related to me recently that they felt good about the new relationship that they were in. I asked how that she knew for certain that she was doing the right thing and she replied, rather simply, "I just can't seem to stop thinking about him." Maybe it's the old romantic heart that rests inside of me but I found her words to be truthful and touching and achingly similiar to the same feelings I have right now. I won't divludge anymore on this issue except that I am suddenly happy and am finding myself (in CS Lewis' words) surprised by joy.

In other news:

These rainy Seattle days are rather alluring. I might be idealizing but I think that these misty mornings and cool damp evenings are the poets choice of day. We cannot help but write in weather like this. Unfortunately we cannot be certain that what we write is going to be good.

I researched more literary mags last night. Must must must get published this semester. That would be a good goal to set for myself.

apprehension, i won the spelling bee

i remember vaguely receiving the word: apprehension at a spelling bee. i was correct, i was the champion. funny how life likes to repeat itself. i have just been asked to spell apprehension but despite the fact that i know how to spell the word- i can't seem to get the letters straight... do you know what i mean?

i am apprehensive. maybe b/c i already have the knowledge that i claim i need. maybe this intense and ugly feeling is not because i don't know how to spell the word, but that i know exactly how the word is to be spelled. (are you keeping up with the ambiguity?)

what if... what if i know all about spelling bees and words and at this point, right now, i feel as though i am supposed to play dumb? what if... i think that i should be where i am now...for the rest of my life. . . . will we always be this unhappy? or am i the only one that is unhappy here? what if i am meant to be unhappy so that happiness may exist for the other?

i... well, i don't know the answer. i should mention that i lied anyway. i wasn't the champion- but apprehension kept me in the race to the finals. i was a little let down but the experience was good, i remember that. i also remember knowing that i really didn't lose anything at all except for a little pride and that fact alone is why this analogy could never work. in the end i would lose a whole book of things.

it's just so sweet.