ap lit assignment but make it sapphic
and so the leaves have turned to gold today
yet their beauty cannot match your two eyes
so i'll stand here, asking you to please, stay-
and we'll gaze together at the cold skies
under the passing clouds and the sun's sway
i am on my way to you yet again
imagining you on the seat across
from me, smiling at strangers on the train
the one that goes to the upper west side
the one i know you will never see
this room is too warm for the two of us
the walls are closing in on me and you
you pull me closer, closer, and closer
it's too much and not enough- our hands touch
we swing together like no one's watching
this is me trying to make you fall in love
it doesn't matter if you are or not-
you'll never say it- at least not to me
so we'll keep dancing, but only for now
it's not fair, but i'm sorry anyway
for what? for falling half in love with you
he is like a god, who sits next to you
and makes you laugh, while i can only stare
johnny finds oblivion, and goes back home
it’s all an act.
our hair, i mean. the way it falls, i mean.
nobody knows it better than God, except
maybe his lonely neighbor who watches
every morning as he pulls it from his scalp.
there’s an old country song i made up just now,
where a lonely warbling woman rasps on
about the end of the world.
there is a great deal of loneliness in this poem.
it has already been mentioned two times. this poem
has holes and so all the loneliness of the world
has unfortunately began to leak in. (that’s three)
in this song about the end of the world
we were still fixing our hair. you see,
everything is already ending all the time.
we just go on wading through it,
knee deep in the muck and not a bit hopeless.
in this song there were birds, and nobody
understood this bit, why the birds were there,
living their bird lives while the rest of us
were handed an ending, and too soon.
we held it in our hands, like a corpse.
we could not fly, and this is why the birds.
someone wanted to remind us
our hope is a home-grown thing
unfeathered and without a loud call
sung into the morning.
at the end of the street the world could end.
where the road gets uneven and the fence
bears its chain-link teeth the world will end.
or he will fall in love.
or nothing will happen at all,
even with him standing there,
and nobody will build a monument
to this unmonumental moment,
and the old country song on the radio
will go on singing about the birds.
perhaps all of this at once.
perhaps the world will end
and we will just be making do.
the loneliest thing
is watching the birds from the window
(four times) and wondering how they met.
how they all decided they were meant to be.
that they would dance and sing in unison.
i found out the world was ending
when i was only thirteen.
so of course, i fixed my hair.
i went to the park,
i fed the pigeons. i placed kindness
gently in the mouth of my demise.
all this is to say,
today the end and tomorrow the end.
and tomorrow the birds.
close your eyes. it’s all happening already.
i’m semi-automatic, my prayer is schizophrenic, but i’ll live on
i started calling myself a poet my sophomore year
of high school, when the lines and stanzas became as real
as the blue veins in my wrists
even still, even still
it was all for aesthetics
though i longed for it to be real
it was colour-graded insanity,
a shell of an identity
poetry, once a hobby, became a sort of anesthetic
tied a ribbon 'round my pain for the beauty of it
let's make panic attacks more poetic
sorry, lost myself to the numbered hearts for a minute
i even found that i'd avoid some things
that maybe didn't look as pretty in ink
sifting through the twisted thoughts that i think
but you don't want to read
about what's really underneath
the metaphors and similes
i know you like to believe
are all there is to the girl with the pen
there's more to see
you see
this writer is an ugly crier
hates the world but burns with desire
to see it all, take it in,
live forever but meanwhile
she's suicidal
without the action
loves her life but worships distraction
in lesser things
computer screens
loathes herself most days
a self-taught expert in acting
like she cares, even though she doesn't
there are no feelings even if she wanted
to feel something for you
some sympathy, "poor you"
a chronic romantic scribbling haikus
from friends to strangers in one afternoon
she bears the weight of her own unbelief
it gets heavy, all the prayers and white teeth
knowing mom can't sleep
because of me?
is it because of me?
Be realistic, is this even possible?
Why not, you can do it.
I don't doubt.
Be realistic, is this even possible?
Why not, you can do it.
I don't doubt.
.5%
acceptance rate of .5%
email titles thanking me
for my application
they didn’t say
my poetry is Sanskrit
or just the dirt
under which they burn
my manuscript
my poems are the gasoline
and the acceptance committee
lights a match over every single
one of my dreams
-.5%
The Sisters
This tale is based on a song by The Police called ‘Tea In The Sahara’ that I’ve always found sad, strange and especially cruel. Long before I began writing these stories I always suspected the young man in the song was a time traveler for who else could do such a terrible thing..?
A young time traveler, as of yet unused to and therefore unable to fully comprehend the complexity of unrestrained movement in the fourth dimension, once visited a planet.
It is a strange and isolating thing to exist outside of time and can lead to a certain hubris that far exceeds normal human capacity.
The planet had kind, gorgeous skies in shades of green and sparkling desert dunes of diamonds dust. Upon it, he met two sisters.
Similar in age and lonely and bored he was novel, new, exciting and fun. He would occasionally appear at times in their life when they needed him most or when it was nice.
He made some of their birthdays and when one of them had kids but he never looked older he just knew more clever tricks.
On one of his visits he appeared in a machine the likes of which the sisters never had seen.
It could fly in the air and this delighted them so, they developed a desire, knowing he’d say yes, came to him with their bizarre request.
What they wanted to do was go out to the dunes and have a picnic of sorts on the shining diamond sands by the light of their world’s two moons.
So one night they flew out together in his plane and picnicked and danced, had tea and played games.
Since his travels began he never had so much fun so he made a promise to them when their party was done that he would return once every year and they go back to the dunes to celebrate.
On the first anniversary of their night on the sand they went out to await his approach over the land with such anticipation and anxious glee they felt as young as they were when they had first been seen by their, wonderous, unusual friend.
After some time when he had not yet arrived they went further out to find him at the place they had dined that singular, amazing night.
They waited until the sun became high in the beautiful green of their world’s friendly sky. But as it grew dark and he had not yet appeared the sisters grew worried and began to fear. Where was the man and why hadn’t he come? He had promised he would but he’d never return and that was not good.
The traveler’s mind was not yet adept at keeping track of all the people he’d met. Traveling through time was like reading many books at once.
Returning to chapters and picking up where one left off was all well and good for the reader but for the others involved time still goes on and this is where the young time traveler had gone horribly wrong.
For he never again picked up this particular book and on the dunes of their world left the sisters to die. Crying, wondering and asking him why...
zero unread messages
red
circles
burned
into my
peripheral
kindle
into
migraines
and yet
i still
stare,
waiting
for
words
that will
never
come
On This Day: December 6th … Strange Holidays
Put On Your Own Shoes Day
Bartender Appreciation Day
Mitten Tree Day
St. Nicholas Day
Microwave Oven Day
National Pawnbroker’s Day
Miner’s Day
National Gazpacho Day
Alrighty, we had a day wear we only wear brown shoes, and it looks like a video needs to be made to teach people how to put on their own shoes. I would really not want to see a size 9 struggling to get into a size 6 or a man with a triple=wide foot trying to put on a pair of stiletto heels (unless that’s his fetish). The video would be short, simply saying, “You put each foot into a shoe and ties the laces. After you do that, go to the bar, have a drink, and tell the bartender he/she is a great person. After which, on the way home, stop at a store and buy a Hungry Man dinner, put it in the microwave and call it a day.”
With that out of the way, I shall move on.
National Gazpacho Day
If you like your soup chilled then Gazpacho is for you. It’s a flavorful soup that cooks serve cold. Gazpacho is typically a tomato-based vegetable soup. Originating in the southern Spanish region of Andalucía, Gazpacho is widely consumed in Spanish cuisine, usually during the summer months.
The original Spanish recipe includes stale bread, tomato, cucumber, bell pepper, onion, and garlic. Other ingredients include olive oil, wine, vinegar, water, and salt.
Following is the typical method of preparing gazpacho:
Washing vegetables
Peeling tomatoes, garlic, and onions.
Chop all vegetables (traditionally pounded with mortar) and process in a food processor.
Add the soaked bread.
Blend part of the processed contents until liquid, depending on desired consistency.
Blend in chilled water, olive oil, vinegar, and salt to taste.
Add remaining processed ingredients.
Garnish as desired.
Mitten Tree Day
First things first—no, you do not decorate your tree with mittens. If you do, see a doctor to get whatever is wrong with you—fixed. This is geared to the young kids.
Mittens, we have all used them in our lives, some of us probably still do. They are our favorite things to use when making snowballs or making a snowman. They keep our hands warm from the cold and crunchy snow that we pick up and throw at each other, and are a good way to make sure our hands are colorful against the bright whiteness of the snowy ground.
Created by school teachers as a way to have a fun Christmastime activity for the children to make while they were in school. Others would claim that the holiday was created because of a book with the title “The Mitten Tree” which was written by author Candace Christiansen, in the book the main character Sarah is bundling up to walk through the cold winter weather, and on her trek she sees a group of children placing their mittens on a small dead tree.
No matter where the origin for the holiday came from, children will always enjoy making little mitten trees. But what about mittens? Where do they come from?
Mitten is derived from the Old French word mitaines; which was an old pet name for a cat, because back then mittens were made of animal fur.
The earliest mittens known to man date back to around the year 1000 A.D. and originally were used as sheaths for gloves since mittens did not have any separate finger openings to allow finger mobility. They were believed to have been made out of wool due to the discovery of a woolen mitten found in the harbor area of Dorestad in the Netherlands, determined to be from the 8th or 9th century AD based on surrounding archaeological evidence.
St. Nicholas Day
There really was a Christian Saint Nicholas. He lived in the country of Greece, just a couple hundred years after the birth of Christ. This day is in honor of Saint Nicholas and his life.
Saint Nicholas became a priest, and later, a Bishop of the early Catholic Church. True to the Christian concept of giving up belongings and following Christ, St. Nicholas gave up all of his belongings. He was well known for giving to needy people, especially children.
There are many stories and tales of him helping out children in need.
The practice of hanging up stockings originated with Saint Nicholas. As the ancient legend goes, Saint Nicholas was known to throw small bags of gold coins into the open windows of poor homes. After one bag of gold fell into the stocking of a child, news got around. Children soon began hanging their stocking by their chimneys "in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there."
It wasn't until the 1800's that the spirit of St. Nicholas' life evolved into the creation of Santa Claus. This happened in America. Santa Claus emerged (or evolved) from the stories and legends of St. Nicholas. Santa Claus was kind and generous to children. Unlike "St. Nick", Santa Claus is largely a non-religious character.
But you know something? If dear old Santa would lay off the pork rinds and greasy food, and start doing the Jenny Craig diet, he wouldn’t complain so much about getting stuck when going down or up the chimney.
More strange holidays are coming!
you were
dancing with summer and her heat-wave knees.
you were trying to wear down asphalt
with butterfly kisses. you were
licking every goddamn window in the house
in case of condensation when bodily fluids
were not enough. you were using the 2 a.m. refrigerator hum
for music while the
ice-dispenser’s lighthouse
moonlit each night away
as the sun. then
sweat held her small memory of ocean
salt-duned across the skin & you lay, cool, against the linoleum.
you thought maybe heaven
was a flight of ash. or that maybe we only have
teratoma dreams
in this day & age. you burnt your knuckles on heat lightning,
closed your eyes & became leaves
winging from a tree.
the next hungover morning had legs
longer than requiems. you made pictures
using only the trembling motion
of your hands. something scarlet was left behind in your cheeks, a kiss
from your grandfather. there you lay,
bare spine pressed against
yesterday’s crumbs/ contemporary
of the ice-dispenser.