It's. . . Odd

I want to be Free

I don't know what I'm doing

And I barely know who I am

But I'm tired of being censored

By every woman and man

I'm tired of hearing outcry

And alarm from "my clan"

I want to be praised

Want to be someone worthy.

The chastising scowl

Accompanied by a single oft repeated phrase

"That's no language for a lady".

But really who decided that's the goal?

Or that a "lady" has to speak a certain way?

Why is my voicing my opinions or cutting my hair, or saying damn

An act of rebellion? Of feminism? Of being on the lam?

I'm not running from the law of government but the law of the land

I'm fleeing the fences that surround me

Expectations that choke and bind

I'm running for salvation not knowing what I'll find

Hoping I find redemption and a clue into myself

That someone has a plan to take me off the shelf

I'm no porcelain doll, I'm strong I know at least I could be with time and a gentle hand

But maybe that hand is mine, maybe the plan is mine, maybe the time is mine

I've made a decision

I want to be free

I want to be healthy

I want to be me

It's hot but it's not too hot it's hot in that summer, carnal, sweet sweat and hard work smelling strong of sawdust and body odor way

And you only get it from working in the sun, sweat doesnt smell the same if it's a hike or just sitting outside or a workout indoors in the winter

There's some . . . Visceral about hard work sweat in the summer

It's original sin

A wet hot American summer

Adam eating "the apple" under a blazing sun feeling the sweat bead under his curls at the back of his neck at the same moment that sticky savory juice graced his lips changing forever how he saw the world

It's what the pope fears more than anything

Raw

Humanity

Unfiltered

Un fettered

Animals running flat out across a grassland under golden rays

Laying in the shade of trees older than their speech

All their warts and beauty on display for anyone to see

Drops of it, stories encased in wet salt hit the ground and color it dark in a silent plea for rain

The Soulless

Those who do not see and care even less. 

The soulless aren’t those without an eternal soul but those whose souls are born asleep. 

They annoy me 

I am awake, ALIVE 

I was born that way, I don’t know why 

I’ve been awake since I opened my eyes 

I pity those who never awaken but I weep for those who awaken later in life because then they realize what they have missed. 

You don’t have to be awake to be saved but sometimes that change in your heart can awaken you 

That should shock to your soul acts as a defibrillator 

or you have a choice 

and the Psychosis will Worsen 

Golden Boy and the Black Sheep: Part 1 The Golden Boy

He’s an angel, always has been

The youngest son, the golden boy, the favored child

Shining and resplendent with bright hair long and fair cascading in curls, far more perfect than mine ever were, down his back across wide shoulders to a tapered waist to put models to shame

“Hes too pretty for his own good” “That boy has more charisma in his little finger than anyone else I have ever met” “see how tall and pretty that guy is?” Whispers follow him, praise even in the dark

In my dreams he has wings white and whole, huge things pristine and glistening except for the golden metallic liquid that the tips are dipped in. Blood thick I alone know that its the souls he's been given and the mark of all the hearts he’s unwittingly broken.

In reality he has long thin fingers, piano fingers that are perfect and kept soft and agile for music and grace, in my head those fingers are stained black from manipulating the ink black minds of poets and kings, inspiring them to beauty and malice and greed.

He doesnt have a halo but he might as well, all the compliments heaped upon his lofty brow make him hold his head even higher from the ground

some days I feel like I should hate him, my perfect, favored, oh so loved bouncing baby brother

but how could I hate he who I helped raise? he who I helped create and grow? he whos potential I saw first and gave him love and space and the words so that he could grow

people tell me I should hate him because everyone else loves him so much

but I can’t because he was the first person I loved too

Lately I've been staring myself in the face again

Looking deep into my eyes and coming to terms with who I find

Not a scared girl

Not a strong man

Just me and all my insecurities

I find a kind heart that wants to know

I find a brave soul willing to grow

I find a tender heart willing to show all the love that I possess

I find self expression not in skirts or suits but the marriage of the two

I find happiness in being me without labels, naked and free

Stripped bare of expectations there's a place of exultation where I can be

Simply me

Nightmare Part 1

The most peculiarly specific smell of a hospital in Maine assaults my senses. I hear absolute silence, and then, frantic scratching. I am in a white room, strange stains surround me splattered on every surface, and I sit on a plain white bed, writing furiously in a leather-bound journal with yellowed curling pages, as I write the words disappear just before I can read what I have written. A man walks in, he is tall with darkish curly hair and caramel eyes, clothed in white scrubs with a yellow eye logo above the pocket and covered in the same stains. He takes the journal and leaves me screaming in anger and crying in fear. He deposits the journal outside the door in the visible hands of a man unseen. He trots over to where I lay, picks me up as if I am a rag doll, holds me close, and whispers in my ear It was a strangely familiar voice that brought back memories of days spent playing in the sun and lying in fields of wildflowers. I couldn’t quite make out what he was saying.

He softly brushed my forehead with his lips, set me down on the bed and left. As he closed the door I heard screaming, muffled gunshots then silence. Utter and complete silence, I called to him with my voice till all my voice was gone; and shaking I called to him with my mind. When there was no answer I accepted what had happened for he had not answered the call that only death can silence. As I left the door the tears would not fall, the tears would not come and the only escape I had was in sleep.

Sad in the Desert

Its harder being sad in the desert

The wind bites instead of hugs

The voices of people who shouldn’t have been there in the first place, dug their heels in and decided to die just to spite the people who told them to leave

My ancestors don’t whisper in the long pull of an American Spirit, not out here

My grandfathers voice doesn’t sit at the bottom of that bottle of Jack saying “girl if you don’t straighten up”

Its harder to be sad in the sands and scrub

Its barren and cold

You cant get away from your emotions by walking through the trees and just crying out to the leaves, telling the wind to take your sorrow

Theres just sand, sand and dry

I guess that’s one thing about being sad in the desert,

The tears evaporate right off your face like the desert is taking everything from you, even the salt and water from your tears, even the salt in your blood you give to the desert it takes and takes

Doesn’t think about what to leave so you can keep on surviving so it can take again tomorrow

Its harder to be sad in the desert

Strands of Existence

Recently one of my favorite pieces of media featured a character brought back to life with the exclamation of EMPTY! empty empty empty EMPTY!

It resonated harder than it should’ve to be honest

because I feel like that

I feel like I’ve been killed by life

by friends who should've been

family that wasn't

lovers who refused to be

My soul, exsanguinated by those who said they would cherish it

My dreams scooped out of my skull by harsh words and harsher realities of funding and conditional love and security

My wonder pulled from my chest by the same hands I once placed my stained glass heart into

My skin sensitive not from angry and rash touches but from the lack of any love at all

And its left me Empty

Left me feeling like the only things left are the strands of the person I once was and tried so hard to be tying me to a life that I don’t really want.

I tried to cut those strings

those delicate blue strings running the lengths of my arms and legs and release the hot red magic held within them

tried to free myself

tried to leave on gossamer wings

but it didn’t work

it failed

i failed.

So I stopped trying, I now bleed on pages instead of pillows and try to find those wings within me and let them free without letting them see the light. I try to leave those strings be and let them puppet me towards a life I want to lead instead of one I want to leave.

I still feel like there’s only strings within me, but at least I stopped trying to cut them 

Now I pick up the pieces of my shattered stained glass heart and use yet more silver to weld it back together and try to believe what they say, that broken things fixed are just as beautiful if not more for the proof of recovery

And if I can do it

Maybe you can too

Maybe we both can one day look up and realize that those strings weren’t trapping us, but leading us to our destinies like red strings of fate tying us to happiness and a future that we can’t yet see

we invented and perfected the idiosyncrasies of the odd art, we are odd and we are not 

but are the vibrant dread, a constant antithesis of all we should be, we are alive truly yet floaters in a world we did not design and we deign to love 

the universe of our creation we are forced out of by the necessities of those who have and always will persecute that which they know not of and all are naught to understand 

Where I am From (again)

I am from warm hugs

From sweet child O` mine lullabies and a star wars bedtime story

I am from rowdy boys crowded around a bridge ready to jump

I am from puppies in a bin baying and crowding around a mother basset

I am from apple pie dreams and hands older than me and stories spoken over

Laughter and the smell of food cooking in the oven

I am from the morning

Warm sunshine smiles and daisy chain afternoons

Brothers with too tall bodies and too small sensibilities

Confused and wonderful

I am from a garage

Alternative rock, the smell of grease and men and fixing the problem

Pieces clicking together like a puzzle

I am from a field

Scratches bug bites and high grass

Scrapes and bruises falling out of trees and into fun

I am from costuming

Bright sequin, improbable characters, and laudable performances

Lines not quite memorized but somehow funnier that way

I am from competition

Racing past a sibling or cousin to get through the kitchen first without being scolded by that one aunt

To

Racing through the air trying to get to a ball just beyond my fingertips so I can pound it into the ground before it’s blocked

I am from a kitchen

Smells that evoke nostalgia in every southern heart

All the sisters, cousins, aunts and grandmother gathered in the kitchen with bustling mouths laughing as they cook turkey, potatoes and cranberry jam and the menfolk watch football and the kids play a façade of the game of the day

I am from elegance

Being taught table manners, learning how to walk in 6"s and how to do my makeup from a favored aunt for the prom

Learning how to be a lady

I am from vibrancy

Spinning sepia-tinged memories filled with stars dreams and sadness

I am from a field lying between my parents learning Draco, the dippers, mars, and planets chasing the sisters and running from Orion’s bow

I am from the stars

A new adult wandering the earth

My head in the clouds with lofty ideas, hopes, and longing to be the cause of change

I am from a promise

A promise to learn

A promise to live

A promise to laugh

A promise to cry

A promise to succeed

A promise to fail

A promise to be me