Peeking through the shell – i

I feel cold. The sense of warmth leeching from me is frightening… shifting, I discover the nature of confinement and for the first time, discontent. Craning my head about, I nestle into the lingering, wet warmth of myself and attempt to sleep… impossible… the fleeing heat reveals a stickiness that annoys even as it spikes my sense of fear… I twitch, aware of my own form for the first time… feeling somehow cramped, somehow deprived. As my mind registers myself, the reality of form and structure, my eyes open… slowly… to nothingness, blackness, and instinctively I realize there is something […]

05-16-2003, untitled

Sitting in the darkness as it feels I have all my life I whisper, quietly, fearfully, not expecting reply, ‘Are you there?’ My breath, frozen on lips that would be warm My heart, still halfway into my throat My whole being focused on the reply I must have, I won’t get, I can’t live without It echoes in my own head Reassuring me that I asked In case I forget in my panicked state Ask again, look foolish or desparate or clingy I find I chant it softly I can’t ask again Instead, my mantra Of hope of reassurance, but […]

stuttering biography, abandoned for now

I’ve stopped and started this ‘book’ about a dozen times. The temptation to write it won’t let me push it out of my mind. I’ve tried making it ‘like a novel’, I’ve tried making it like the things I read, I’ve tried loading it up with emotion. But it all reads fake to me. This time, I’m just going to write it like I remember it. I can’t even say it is the truth, I can only say it is what I recall. Maybe that will be enough. My first memory is my grandmother, bathing me in the kitchen sink. […]

windows

We bumped into one another outside the café in the center of town. Her eyes go wide as she recognizes me, and I can see the quickly hidden shock… time has changed me in ways unexpected, though I suppose the eyes always remain the same… windows of the soul, why would they change? I grin wryly to myself as I approach the table and we have the obligatory welcome hug, ‘So good to see you!!’, she gushes to me… and for a moment, I believe it… the warmth of it rushes over me like arousal, a feeling clean and pure […]

Freedom is a state of mind (2003)

From the archives: Someone said elsewhere: Quote: ——————————————————————————–  Freedom comes from within – it’s not fought for, or granted. ——————————————————————————– And of course, many took umbrage. I happen to agree with the poster who said this, and for the same reasons. Freedom is not a state of being, it is a state of mind. People often confuse the two and it seems most propaganda is designed to support that confusion. Freedom is not a state of collective mind, a collective mind does not exist. Freedom is a state of individual mind. Such a state, by definition, cannot be ‘given’ to […]

letter to the monster

Recently, I have thought about the idea of my writing a letter to you. It struck me as unusual for several reasons, not the least of which being that although I have every right to write you the ferociously angry letter I immediately thought of, I never considered doing so as a legitimate way to release the anger I have toward you. Even as I sit here and type, I do not feel that warm flush of anger rising to push the words out of my brain. Very strange, since it is a rare thing indeed to find myself without […]

daddy’s girl

daddy’s girl loving eyes, happy smile ruling from the protective shadow of the first knight his armor how it shines in the sun as only a child can see the hands strong, sweaty moving slowly as a spider across young skin confusion, shame, uncertainty as frenzied workings become obvious the hands squeezing tender limbs lashes tremble, a little mouth works to voice the newness of pain the armor darkens cruelly as the knight falls in earnest to the sound of a little girl’s sobs which echo now in an older mind bitter anger, shame, pain collide with cynical laughter following […]

clown

the face of the clown painted before the world with the colors of happiness people look and smile never seeing the reality behind the mask the shadows of pain just beneath the facade so carefully erected so fragile the illusion but it matters not the strength for the clown is all too aware no one has the time or even the inclination to look beyond the carefree smile they so desparately need to see for to admit it exists is to admit they too, have pain and that is much more involved than they care to be

she ii

i am two and yet, one, my history splicing us together, we hobble all my life, i have known her presence…different and yet, same debates not quite conscious, vaguely aware of she who dwells within this body, this mind, this spirit – a house divided i am afraid, but not of myself, of my other she who watches, who waits, who hides i know she awaits my weakness in its moment, she will spring to what action, i do not know companion through horror, through fear she is also my power and my strength wonder if she knows how much […]