Notes to a friend.

It is the light, not the darkness, inside of us that we seem to always be the most afraid of... you're dark yet lovely missy! Embrace the good and the bad, but know that the laughter is ALWAYS inside of you... let it resonate for all the world to see. It's always there, no matter how 'dark' you may feel. The past [and the negative people in it] is just that: the PAST - don't carry it with you, it doesn't define you. If you stop allowing it to have substance, it can no longer tarnish this perfect moment that is right now! & now! & now! Everything you need is always available in the present tense. The past, the darkness, the bullshit will not service you in the present. So let go. 'If you don't reveal the brilliance you are, the world will be less.' You're an amazing person, don't let the narcissistic people in this world ever convince you that you're anything less than A FUCKING BAD ASS!



Wake up tomorrow morning... HELL, wake up every morning and stand in front of that mirror. You know, that mirror that's been following you through this great city adventure... the one that's now unevenly hung above your bedside table. Take the biggest inhale you've ever inhaled. Notice today's scent. Notice the recycling of the early morning air that's been sneaking in through the window you always keep cracked an inch and three-quarters. Inhale the positives and exhale the negatives. Envision them: like black smoke, being stuffed back out that same obsessively measured crack in the structure you call 'home.' Don't be shy, stare at the reflection in that gypsy mirror. Really look at yourself; examine your slowly aging face. Notice what IS, and let go of the assumptions... the 'what could be's.' It's like drawing, see what's in front of you, and let go of the image you've already painted in your head; you'll get a more accurate picture this way. Look deep into those two gapping holes in your face; those huge eyes that always seem to grab the attention of the strangers you keep praying didn't notice your face in the crowd. If the eyes are the window to the soul, then take this opportunity to peek inside. Discover the truth, the lightness, the inter-being-ness connecting you to the present and everyone and everything sharing it with you. Don't be afraid, let the warmth of the moment thaw the pieces of yourself you've been keeping on ice- let them melt away-away-away! SMILE. Smile back at what'ever it is you find in that space, for this is the truth, and truth will always set you free.

We'll catch a plane to Barcelona, cause this city's a drag

While you were sleeping
I kissed you
alllllll over your p.e.r.f.e.c.t face
in a pattern mocking
the f r e c kles on my bare arm.

Nothing worth anything, ever goes down easy.

'Undeniable' use to be their song...
now 'On and On' seems more fitting.
It makes me cry everytime, still.
I wish I could send this song to them.
I wish music could fix things like it does in my head.

I haven't slept in weeks.

I never realize how much I hate being 'alone,' until I crawl in to this empty bed every night.
I hate the new coldness this season has brought.
and I hate the empty left side... the side I now sleep on, just to feel closer to your g h o s t.
I keep trying to remind myself that 'time alone is good...'
but it doesn't make this empty bed feel any warmer.





"If you can't find someone to walk with you, then walk alone for that period in time. It's loving what is. It's being realistic. It's about loving people exactly where they are and letting them be where they are and then when you're guided to say something and do something it'll have some meaning. Then you won't waste your energy in a whole bunch of "hoo-haa"-what'ever, because you think that somebody else is suppose to understand you." - Greg Barette

Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music.

From : March 27, 2006
With one foot in front of the other,
The journey is that of an unsteady pace.
Every missed step is matched by an even greater stride.
You choose the unmarked path and dive in; right side leads.
Emotional stability blocks the blows to your ego.
It’s all a gamble; a simple hit or miss.

I believe in the fever to set the stage afire.
I believe in the inspiration to illuminate the loose leaf.
I believe in the wind to coil the tune of a heavenly voice
towards my appreciative ears and sensitive heart.

It's your gamble; a simple hit or miss.
A downfall is an opportunity in disguise.
Just one more strike, to set the wet match ablaze
You’d of missed the glory days, without granting it that
“One last shot.”

I believe in the fuel that ignites the fatigued muscles
I believe in the strength of a single dream.
I believe in the drive, the ambition, the appetite.
I believe in the passion.

I embrace the mystery of life...

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause and stand wrapped in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed." -Albert Einstein



Ironically I had this quote written amoungst the notes I was using for the paper I was writing tonight on Kuhn's book "The Structure of the Scientific Revolution," and right when I finished my paper I checked my email and the daily meditation email I receive from Renaissance Unity started with this same quote. Ironic, or a sign? Regardless, it's kind of freakin me out!


Dear God,
Whenever I think I have life figured out, something new and exciting
and unexpected happens and I realize that every change I go through
changes everything.
I open myself to the mystery of Your presence.
I offer my heart as a place for Love to live and grow.
I offer my life as a vehicle for Your peace.
So it is!
Amen

The Structure of the Scientific Revolution

"I know it's hard to convince you, but life is too short to be writing conclusions for introductions that shouldn't have been written in the first place."

.. and on that note...
The Lexicon to Understanding Our Lovely Kuhn:
Paradigm: 'to show, an example.'
Definition: 'a term that must be defined by opposing terms.'
For example: In respect to its historicity : internal coherence. Arbitrary : necessary. Ambiguity : modeled or articulated. Structure : revolution. Specification : normal. Past : future.

A paradigm, according to Kuhn, is both precedent and unprecedented. It is open ended and exclusive. The paradigm sets the puzzle, gives the answer and sets the parameters of the answer. The puzzle, the paradigm itself, contains the answers it is set to solve in the first place. Failure within the paradigm brings about a new paradigm. The paradigm, according to our celebrated Kuhn, is self destructive and self solving. The paradigm is the model by which Kuhn views the evolution within normal science. Normal science means research firmly based upon one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice. These achievements can be called paradigms. This movement is not linear or straightforward [like Fleck's structure of self moving history] but revolutionary. The successive transition from one paradigm to another via revolution is the usual developmental pattern of mature science. This revolution starts in what Kuhn calls the 'pre-paradigmatic' period when the facts of the current paradigm begin to be challenged by researches who all confront the same problem in different ways. There can be numerous pre-paradigms existing at the same time independently, eventually a new paradigm emerges from the pre-paradigm competition. To be accepted as a paradigm, a theory must seem better than its competitors, but it need not, and in fact never does, explain all the facts with which it can be confronted. Eventually the other pre-paradigmatic competitors and the previous paradigm will disappear. A paradigm transforms a group into a discipline with it's own facts and books. Paradigms gain their status because they're more successful than their competitors in solving a few problems that the group of researchers recognize as acute. This is when normal science occurs. The paradigm is like a box which researchers try to stuff nature in to. There is no effort to discover anomalies, and even when they occur they're usually ignored or go unnoticed. There is no effort create new theories. Normal scientific research is directed to the articulation of those phenomena and theories that the paradigm already supplies. This tunnel like vision researchers have when in a paradigm is important because it allows for them to investigate some part of nature in a detail and depth that would otherwise be unimaginable. It is not until the paradigm stops functioning that it is possible for researchers to become aware of and recognize anomalies. Anomalies are all known exceptions related to the generally accepted pattern of normal behavior. This period of the revolution can be called crisis science which is when the emergence of a new theory is generated by the persistent failure of the puzzles of normal science to be solved as they should through recognizing and analyzing anomalies. Although anomalies challenge the current paradigm, scientists will not loose faith in the current paradigm without another credible alternative. Often times there will be competing anomalies at the same time, or an anomaly will be discarded after being analyzed but further explored by the community in a later generation that has the proper tools to solve the problem. It is the recognition that the current paradigm is no longer functioning and accepting the emergence of anomalies, even seeking them out that can be called originality. The revolution occurs when the anomaly becomes normal, is eventually expected, and this is the internal momentum that regenerates the revolution. Paradigms seem invisible because the revolutions reflexivity is internally moving as a community and the view of history is nonlinear. The understanding comes at the end, not the beginning. To keep the revolution moving, in all areas of science and art, it is important to have originality. It is important for researchers to see the problem that nobody else sees because that is the internal momentum of Kuhn's model. The community must see paradigm change as progress, as we have seen, this perception is, in important respects, self-fulfilling. An idiot can solve a problem, but to keep the structure intact, it takes 'researchers' to take a new view, and discover the problem nobody else sees and reflexively it can reset the puzzle and provide the parameters and answer itself.

'I' before 'E' except after 'C' ?

I always go searching for the things that will hurt me the most. I've spent so much of my life sick and wounded, that I think sometimes this new found 'happiness,' terrifies me. I'm not sure why I felt the need to go searching for the old Ali tonight, but it happened, the stories fell into my lap. The sickness, the disease, the heartache, the lies, the deceit, the darkness, the past. The past that I can never bury deep enough. The past that rises like the bile I coughed up at least a thousand times too much. The old pain that seems to pick away at the scabs of the new wounds, in just the way I like it. I'm addicted to the past that nearly destroyed me, that could still destroy me if I don't just LET GO. I'm letting go. I'm gonna do it. I'm not just gonna walk on the narrow ledge I've been balancing on for the past five years, I'm gonna close my eyes and dive. Dive head first into all the perfect love I keep trying to stifle. I'm gonna fall down to come back up. Back to the now, back to the present tense. The tense I can never seem to write in. I'm gonna let go and let it write itself.

You can't cage a free thing

Baby I could climb down in to your dreams

If a real man like Mat Kearney exists...
I'm gonna find you!

The rhythm of the heart is the birth and death of all that are alive.

As I was getting ready the other morning, I was voicing some frustration to God and asking him for guidance in a certain situation that I am unsure of how to deal with. I have found myself getting angrier and angrier at someone I truly care about in my life and allowing their issues to affect my well being and anxiety. I have been trying to figure out how to help this person but my anger and frustration has gotten in the way of allowing me to find sympathy and compassion towards them any longer. I have been in the same position they are, but I cannot seem to find the strength to put my frustration with them aside to be the true friend I know they need, the support that I knew I needed at that time. As I was praying to God for guidance, to help me find compassion again, I picked up this book 'Heart Steps' that was sitting on my nightstand and randomly flipped to a page unconsciously. I landed on a page with this message on it...

MY SOUL IS A COMPASSIONATE HEART
I am compassionate. I allow my heart and imagination to embrace the difficulties and concerns of others.
While maintaining my own balance, I find it within myself to extend sympathy, attention, and support.
When they are grieved, I listen with openness and gentle strength.
I offer loyalty, friendship, and human understanding.
Without undermining or enabling, I aid and assist other to find their strength.
I allow the healing power of the Universe to flow through me, soothing the hearts and feelings of those I encounter.

It was quite the perfect mantra to open that book too. I have been reading this to myself every day, trying to find strength in these words, and in myself to allow the healing power to flow through me. I will continue to pray that my friend finds strength within their self to feel the healing power of the universe, to choose a healthier quality of life, because they truly deserve it.

Itinerary

2007

I'm so happy I am not 'this' girl anymore.
I am so happy I found peace.
I am so happy I realized I deserved better.
I am so happy I got out of Michigan.
2007, was a BAD year.



'Photographs Don't Lie'
(found on a harddrive from 2007)

He adored her
He doted over her creative imperfections
Always accepting
and challenging her distorted perception of reality
Her actions were even more unclear than her unorganized thoughts
She spoke before thinking
Speaking the truth regardless of how offensive she may be
She lived by one big contradictive policy
Like she was pressing down on the fast-forward button
Skipping over the “unimportant” parts
But still, she was the only one on the opposite side of the lens
The one that he spent years trying to keep in focus
She was always sliding in and out of frame

pretending to not notice his struggle to keep up with her impulsive pace
He took snapshots of her best 
and worst features
each one individually

Telling a story all their own
He took it as his responsibility
trying to convince her of the beauty he worshiped
How could she not see it?

The audience…
they loved her!



Her eyes seemed to reflect the fury of the storm brewing in the gray clouds
and he cleaned up the mess left behind
after the flood gates had been released
Attempting to capture the sympathy of his strong arms
She wanted more than the awkwardness of these situations
Paralyzed by the memories of arms that weren’t as genuine
A distant touch that always seemed to haunt her in the most painful way
She intentionally tried to appear unintentionally needy of compassion
Smearing her vibrant palate of lipstick on the collar of the faces and the places she tried to call home
She was only trying to define the things she would soon suppress to the darkest holes of her consciousness
She wanted to take it all in

and let it slowly seep back out
Conserving the air that would sustain the handful of years she had left in her

Holding her breath in fear of disturbing his peaceful sleep
She wanted to give him everything
Her intentions were true this time
She was scared that everything she had had to give
wasn’t much of anything at all.
He questioned her judgment
Lost sleep over her flirtatious behavior
If her provocatively girlish smile did as much for the other hungry bastards
He knew he was in trouble.
“God damn those bastards!” she silently screamed into the pillow beside him
“
God damn those bastards with their untrue intentions! 
”
God damn those bastards with the untrue intentions who always built up the walls he struggled to destroy
Those bastards never loved her
or even appreciated her
She wasn’t just some body they thought they could abuse
Using for their own goodtime
Always bringing over her favorite wine
in the dark cobalt bottle
With a name they couldn’t pronounce
She sipped on glass after glass
It was the only way she could even tolerate their ignorance
She could never have enough
She was celebrating the pain of their touch
As their hands became more friendly
burning every precious inch of her innocent body
Their dirty hands mutilating her flawless skin
It was like acid 
and every unwelcomed touch scared her deeper
than even her sharpest razor could have cut

Those bastards never caught the moments that defined her elegance
showcasing the compassion she was too afraid to see in herself
These were the moments he fell in love with her again, and again
Despite the demons that sometimes got the best of her
Even years later he couldn’t forget those stormy eyes
and the way they darted about the world she used as her personal canvas
He’d leave parties to recklessly hunt through the libraries of albums he hid in the basement of his subconscious for that one photo
that would nurse all the wounds that never healed

Reminding him how far they had come
and even how much easier it was to loose her
The snapshots he preserved in his personal archives
illustrated the person that he gave up everything for
The person he always wanted her love like he did
In those photos her authentic,
uninhibited innocence was captured
In the candid laughter that still echoed in his not so distant memories
In his photographs her true colors were synthesized
despite the black and white of her scripted persona.
She tried so hard to appear aloof
and untouchable
to even him
But he touched her

and only because she let him
She tried pretending she didn't notice

or even appreciate the prudence that was in his delicately strong hands
Secretly and anxiously she anticipated the next time his welcomed hands would penetrate beneath the layers of her clothes

Muting the burning left behind
With every organic blink
he captured her beauty and rawness in a way he would remember

Everything in life responds to the song of the heart

Mom snuck this book in with the books I asked her to send me, I had read it awhile back and folded the corner on this page...

'MINE IS AN ADVENTUROUS HEART'
-from Julia Cameron's 'Heart Steps'

I choose an expansive life.
I choose adventure, freedom, self-expression.
I choose self-definition, self-love, self-renewal.
Life expands or contracts according to my expectations.
I expect good and that is what I experience.
Viewing the whole, I choose to be interconnected yet dependent.
I allow the force within me to open and enlarge my lens of perception and realm of action.
My horizons stretch ever wider as I define my identity in terms of my divinity.
I am an adventurer, an explorer, a dreamer whose dreams become true.
I embrace the adventure of life.
I have courage.

The girl who's in love with the World

I really love the way the World can make you feel so small sometimes. I really love the people who have come in and out of my life for even the briefest portions of my history; the ones who inspired me to be adventurous, to find the laughter in my heart again, to stop holding back and just open up my wings and fly, to trust in myself and stop being so damn afraid of being hurt or abandoned, to just let loose and dance to the rhythm of LIFE. I really love that I've finally become OKAY with being alone, that I've actually grown to love being a solo act, that I've embraced myself for the loner that I always have and might always be. I really love the way a song can synthesize a specific moment in time, but there's always the opportunity to hear it a different way and it just might make you fall in love with something in a completely original way. I love that at any second of the day I can step out onto my shallow stoop, into this empire of a city, take a walk around the block and discover something or someone uniquely new to inspire me. I love that I can make a person's day with a smile or a corny joke (G.G. always said laughter was the best medicine). I love that my capacity and hunger for knowledge seems infinite. I love that when I feel like I've given my all, I somehow always seem to stifle more energy, to push myself a littler further this time, to blow myself away with my new found potential. I love that I was given a voice, a voice that deserves to be heard, a voice that can speak up for herself, and those who can't fight for themselves sometimes. I love that I was blessed with good fortune, because what a better opportunity to help others less fortunate than I? I really love my family and friends, because without them I just might have given up that one time. I really love the way the World can make me feel so infinite sometimes.

Cold Roses

The clock next to my pillow hasn't worked for weeks
but since when have I been one to be on time?
Days feel like evening and vice versa.
The only proof that time is still ticking away
t i c k t o c k - i n g
in a spiral motion
are those roses.
The roses keep getting colder
hung to dry,
a wreath of my favorite city memories,
on a noose of silk.

Train of thought

"My thing is that I can never write about anything enough. I can never fully explain how much I love stuff. I can’t ever quite get it into the package."

We're gonna float around

Gotta get my space suit dry cleaned.
Andrew said he's gonna take me on a date to visit the moon in December
I'm hoping to catch a star
and if I'm lucky it will let me keep it, as a souvenir to wear on a red string around my wrist.
Btw- I hate the way 'souvenir' is spelled... should be more like souvenier or souvinear. IDK, maybe that's just me.

It's 4:30 in the morning, it's always 4:30 in the morning

The palest of my two palms is sweating...
recollecting
late night fingers
petting
skeleton knuckles

Repeatedly
falling limp

stale
and
clever

beautiful
and
morbid

atop the fleshy spot
your cheek
made home

Sometimes, I wish.
I wish,
I wish,
I wish!
The sky lark
would make it rain...
inside!

Flooding this rejected hideout
Washing away the faintness
of your scent,
disguised as echos
exhaled by sea shells
scattered
on the bed side table.

Episodic visions
of your bare hands
left to loiter
like morning dew
in the six corners
of my freedom

Spiritual Surrender

"How many times have we called on God and then ignored the opportunities he sent? Maybe we didn't recognize them because they didn't take the form we expected. Spiritual surrender requires faith, but it also requires paying attention to opportunities and taking action. We need to look to God for guidance, to keep us on the right course, but we can't expect God to kick-start us every morning and deliver breakfast in bed."
~Kathy Cordova
 
Strengthened by faith, I act upon the opportunities God provides.

Dear Mother/Father/God,
I surrender the pictures I have long held of the way I think things should happen.
I surrender the outcomes I have attached to my goals and plans.
I surrender the problems and challenges I have been holding onto by reliving and retelling them over and over.
I surrender my stubbornness and rigidity.
I surrender the pain from the past and fear of the future.
I surrender any outmoded beliefs I still cling to.
I surrender everything that is not part of Your plan for me.
I accept and act on the guidance You provide when I ask.
I say yes to the new life You are creating in and through me.
I say yes to the rebirth of the Christ in me.
I accept Your will as my own and I let it be.
Amen

Perfect families are boring

Thanksgiving is next week and everyone is talking about their plans of going home to be with their family. I'm not going home again this year, but that's not bothering me as much as just having to think about 'family,' right now. My parents have been divorced since I was two years old, my childhood was atypical to most, but seemed very normal to me. When my Dad and Step Mom got married, I was pretty excited. I was going to get the opportunity to be apart of a 'typical' family. I moved in with my Dad, Step-Mom, step-sister and little brother my Sophomore year in highschool because I NEEDED to feel like I was apart of my Dad's family, apart of their life. We had a big house in a beautiful neighborhood and our front porch looked on to the golf course, my step sister and I went to the same school, I got to watch my little brother grow up, my Dad came home from work and we'd usually all have dinner together, we vacationed together, we laughed together, we supported each other. We dealt with more shit and problems than most families do, but we were a family who supported and loved each other. It was a special experience for me, I needed it. I admired my Dad and Step-Mom's relationship, more than they will ever know, but I guess sometimes the perfect (but crazy) family isn't enough, maybe sometimes love just isn't enough. It's tearing me into a million little pieces to think that when I come home for Christmas we're not going to be the same family all living in the same house together. My Dad's moved into his house downtown, Lisa is living in the house with the kids... instead of having two houses to visit while I am home, I now I have three. I talked to my Mom (via Facebook chat - how weird! haha) and she reminded me that I still have a family, I have her - 'it only takes two people to make a family.' I love my Mom. For the longest time growing up it was just her and I living together, we've always had each other to lean on. It still hurts to know that my Dad's family is being torn apart, but no matter who is living with who, or no matter where any of us end up - we will always be family, blood or not, we'll always have each other. My little brother and sister mean the world to me, they inspire me to fight for what I believe in, to make a difference in the World around me, to stay strong, to see the World for the messy-beautiful thing it is, and I will continue to be there to support them as they grow up and face the demons of reality. It's so hard living states away, pursuing my dreams, when all I want is to hug them all, be the big sister I know they're going to need. I've laid in bed the past two days trying to get a grip on the reality of what is happening, hugging myself, trying to piece myself back together. I refuse to let this situation turn me cynical, I refuse to stop believing in the power of Love. I have a family who loves me, and who I love more than words could express, and that makes me one of the luckiest young women I know. God is Love, and Love is real... I won't loose faith.

You are my greatest Earthly blessing

Today's been tough. Laying in bed just counting the minutes from one anxiety attack to the next. I've never had so much work to do but been so paralyzed by my anxiety and inability to even start anything, or even concentrate on something for more than 10 minute intervals. I never thought being productive or motivated would be a struggle for me. I chose this crazy lifestyle, but sometimes it's hard to be completely alone. I miss my friends, my family. I'm in this big city, with no one to depend on but myself... sometimes, it gets a little tough. It's days like this were I just need a hug, and there's no one - I called my Dad and he reminded me the power of wrapping your arms around yourself, hugging yourself, hugging your inner child. The next month is really gonna test my mental, and physical, endurance but I'm taking it a day at a time, an hour at a time. Making a list, and checking it off.




'I have heard the crying of your heart.
I have seen the searching of your soul.
I know how deeply you have desired to be loved and accepted as you are.
Know that you are truly beautiful.
Love you always.'
(Thank you Dad, I couldn't be luckier.)

I know you better when I'm sleeping

I wake itching
Monday morning
your scent
permeating from
the pillow
buried in my skin
Your tarnished ring
on the night stand
A glass of midnight water
dully gleams back
reflecting last night
into my opal eyes
Unconscious fingertips
claw away
tearing
little pieces of you
left buried in
my too thin of skin
Cleaning
bloody nails
painting self portraits
on your white sheets
a souvenir,
a memento
to say the least.

-wrote this on 11/20/2008

You were holding me honey, kissin my soul

The only man who's made me cry, laugh, dance, and inspire me - all at the same time - in the past 2 years, and I don't even know him! Now that's talent. That's what music is about, that's what art is about. If you can make your listener, your audience feel like they know you, connect with them in such an intimate way that they can literally almost 'fall in love,' with you, with your art - you're doing something brilliant, something right. Ryan Adams, you are a genius. Thank you.


A few of my all time favs...


'Oh My Sweet Caroline'


'This House is Not For Sale'


The best performance of 'Wonderwall,' Ever


'Crossed out Name' by. Dr. Adams


'Cobwebs' by Dr. Adams


'Two' by. Dr. Adams

The guilt of witchery

Sometimes my potions don't work.
Sometimes your brother's ghost haunts our home.
He's a talkative little bugger.
Just wants to sit and discuss philosophy
over a cup of last weeks coffee.
He's a messy little fool of a ghoul.
Leaves me a puddle of memories
to be mopped from the hardwood floors.
I don't mind his conversation
but his mess is starting to leave a stain,
it's shaped like the birth mark on your neck
the one on the spot I use to kiss.
I'm starting to think I can see your face...
in the floor boards,
smudged into the grain.
He won't stop floating about my hair
going on tangents
about Nietzsche
and tragedy!
He's so rude that brother of yours,
soaring right back through the ceiling
rattling the dishes on his way out,
before I even get a word in!
My lips have started to bleed,
and bruise a mosaic of dull colors.
When he leaves, I get to lay with you.
Sprawled on the wet floor,
pressing my cheek next to yours,
I can hear you singing.
Inviting me to dance
into the darkness with you
Deep into the shadowy basement
you now call home.

When I Have Fears that I May Cease to Be

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,
Before high piled books, in charact’ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen’d grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love!—then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.
-John Keats

This gives me hope, every time.

The Dance by. Oriah Mountain Dreamer

I have sent you my invitation, the note inscribed on the palm of my hand by the fire of living. Don’t jump up and shout, "Yes, this is what I want! Let’s do it!" Just stand up quietly and dance with me.

Show me how you follow your deepest desires, spiralling down into the ache within the ache. And I will show you how I reach inward and open outward to feel the kiss of the Mystery, sweet lips on my own, everyday.

Don’t tell me you want to hold the whole world in your heart. Show me how you turn away from making another wrong without abandoning yourself when you are hurt and afraid of being unloved.

Tell me a story of who you are,
And see who I am in the stories I am living. And together we will remember that each of us always has a choice.

Don’t tell me how wonderful things will be . . . some day. Show me you can risk being completely at peace, truly OK with the way things are right now in this moment, and again in the next and the next and the next. . .

I have heard enough warrior stories of heroic daring. Tell me how you crumble when you hit the wall, the place you cannot go beyond by the strength of your own will. What carries you to the other side of that wall, to the fragile beauty of your own humanness?

And after we have shown each other how we have set and kept the clear, healthy boundaries that help us live side by side with each other, let us risk remembering that we never stop silently loving those we once loved out loud.

Take me to the places on the earth that teach you how to dance, the places where you can risk letting the world break your heart. And I will take you to the places where the earth beneath my feet and the stars overhead make my heart whole again and again.

Show me how you take care of business without letting business determine who you are. When the children are fed but still the voices within and around us shout that soul’s desires have too high a price, let us remind each other that it is never about the money.

Show me how you offer to your people and the world the stories and the songs you want our children’s children to remember, and I will show you how I struggle not to change the world, but to love it.

Sit beside me in long moments of shared solitude, knowing both our absolute aloneness and our undeniable belonging. Dance with me in the silence and in the sound of small daily words, holding neither against me at the end of the day.

And when the sound of all the declarations of our sincerest intentions has died away on the wind, dance with me in the infinite pause before the next great inhale of the breath that is breathing us all into being, not filling the emptiness from the outside or from within.

Don’t say, "Yes!"
Just take my hand and dance with me.

Sunday morning omens

I saw a deer crossing the road for the first time ever this morning in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. It's image was the forefront in my thoughts all day long. I fell asleep on the bus and the deer came back to me. It led me in a maze-like-path; deep into the forest it called home. I gratefully laid with it in a blanket of colorful autumn foliage. I felt protected and loved. I felt one with The Source, held like a sweet-sweet child of Mother Earth. I didn't want to wake up and to leave the embrace of my morning dream world. Supposedly a deer can be an omen from the God's, a symbol of peace. Deer's are in tune with nature and all it holds. They are sacred carriers of peace and show others how to open their hearts and love unconditionally. I'm thankful for crossing paths with this beautiful beast this morning.

Il n'est rien de réel que le rêve et l'amour

I want to remember what 'it' feels like
to have your dreams realized by someone else's imagination
and to know that time does not limit the road this love can travel
because in this moment, with you, forever is the only answer.

Some say I'm a dreamer, but I know I'm not the only one

"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
~Albert Einstein

I am creative, imaginative and inspired.


Mother/Father/Everything God,
In sweet stillness we imagine soaring with You.
Beyond the flood of information that our senses gather and report,
beyond the facts and fears that prance in our minds, is a deeper knowing.
We have always sensed that there is more to our lives than what we see or hear.
We have dared to dream that we are capable of living at a much higher level.
Inspire our dreams and infuse our imaginations with power.
Prepare our hearts and minds for the journey You are calling us to live.
As You will!
Amen
 

I've figured it out... breaking is what your heart is for

I've given up all belief in 'forever.' The two people I believed in, sometimes more than I believed in myself have deleted this term from their lexicon, and I seem to be following suit. My limbs are numb and I feel like this thing I've called a heart - might just have disappeared from my bodily cavity. If you find its bloody mess, please return it to '126 Divorce is Not an Option Dr. Apt 7B4' Sincerely, Another broken heart.

In the face of Zeus, I confessed my immortality

If it wasn't considered plagiarism
I'd be rewriting your song
for tonight, tonight.
Conversing with the sky in tongues
never satisfies my perpetual itch
to paint your mouth with mine.

You're not the things you tell yourself you are, opinions of others, or old scars.

Dear Sweet-sweet God,

Establish the priorities for me today.
So many messages and thoughts compete for my attention.
In the midst of this cacophony, may I resonate with Your voice alone.
Help me to not be distracted by insignificant things,
or waste time by majoring in the minors.
Illumine the path that You have for me.
Speak to me Lord, I am listening.
And so it is.

Amen

The sweetness of this World, and what we have made.

I wish drugs didn't exist.
I wish people understood that there are consequences to their actions -
that you could sacrifice a momentary high for the rest of your life.
I wish people thought about the ones they could be leaving behind.
I wish the ones I loved weren't selfish enough to sacrifice their brilliance just to 'feel good.'
I wish they could be high on life -
and feel all the goodness life offers us every day, and that, THAT was enough.
I wish I never had to experience the pain of loosing someone too young,
someone who was just as brilliant and special as all the hearts they left behind.
I wish in the moments before shooting up, or smoking it, or snorting it, or tipping that bottle [again] or what'ever your drug of choice may be that you saw the faces of the ones you loved - hurting - because you are destroying the person they know and love.
I wish love and life were enough to destroy all the pain and ego that made us all make bad decisions and reach for substances.
I just wish we could all 'play it safe' and respect this gift of life.
I wish my love was enough to save them all.

Blood bath

Just keep holding on
to your plastic eyes.
I'm painting your face
with the words under my breath.
Hidden behind the bar lights
you'll look fine.

Burned by your eye contact

-Shallow embraces fogging picture frames
-Glasses 3/4 full, taken from the last days at the seaside
-Day dreams lounging in your living room
-Burnt sienna with a touch of alizarin crimson speckling the bathroom tile
-Bedroom masterpieces
-Leftover footsteps still echoing out the back door
-Little girls hearts left to break.break.break.

Coming home

I've mentioned it before, but I recieve daily meditations from my old church back in Detroit, and today's meditation really 'hit home' for me. It talks about goals - and we all know I've been quite the goal oriented over achiever throughout my life. However, have I allowed my path towards achieving these physical gains to get in the way of my path towards my spiritual self? The meditation reminds me that I have been blessed with the freedom to CHOOSE my path towards happiness and choose the goals I see most rewarding in my life, but more importantly reminds me that it is not the DOING or the monetary/status gain I will obtain from achieving these goals that will feed my soul like my awareness and presence with my own Beingness and oneness with the universe can. Freedom comes from enlightenment, from freeing myself of the physical 'things' that only temporarily fill the voids in my life, and becoming more peaceful; more aware of my present moment - not just from achieving one unsatisfying goal after another, because that will never feed my soul like being aware of Your presence can.

In this bizarre land swarmed a host of colorful artists

Where all time stands still
and the stars seem to fall just to frolic the streets during the day.
I am in need of the romance of theses streets.

I just want to disappear

Daily affirmation

Dear God,
I appreciate Your constant presence.
Thank You for holding my dreams safe and sacred.
Even when I had given up on my dreams, you never wavered.
Thank You for always believing in me.
Thank You for calling forth the very best in me.
Everything I need flows easily to me from Your limitless supply.
I share generously and lavishly as I am directed,
knowing that there is enough of everything for everyone.
I open my heart and mind to the Truth: Everything that the Father has is mine.
I accept with a glad and grateful heart.
Thank-You God.
Amen

Love like the disco

You gave her tulips,
I got daffodils.
You took me to San Fran
just to dance
in the fire.
Watching
my sweaty palms
loose grip.

Dark, yet lovely.

A couple of years back, a mentor of mine told me that I was "dark yet lovely." Over the years I have thought deeply about this idea. Knowing that I carried baggage and pain - the dark cloud - but also knowing that there was light and love inside of me. At the time I could not recognize my loveliness, but knowing that someone I admired could see it, inspired my curiousity to explore the possibility. As I've confronted my pain and darkness, and become more aware of my ego - I have also become more aware of the light inside of me, inside of us all. I am no longer affraid of my infinite potential, of my loveliness. I have become more full of light and love than darkness. I have become more aware of the love in others and my ability to bring out their inner light by sharing mine with them. In Your eyes, I'm perfect. I'm golden. I am light. I am love.

Dancing with cadavers

I'm writing your name on loose sheets of notebook paper and they're burning in to the night sky
Crimson, white, black
The patterns of the velvety stars are all that align my nerves with realty
While the swines are the only ones to ever understand your filthy hands more than I did
I'm washing my mouth in the river
And making music with the currents
Asking mother earth to forsake your soul

Tea time

-Big hat
-Thrift store prom dress [probably from the 50's]
-"Wild 'Bout You" pink lips
-Strand of pearls, from the garage sale in Port Huron

I'm coasting on your rays

Once again
I feel the p e r p e t u a l need
aching in my wrists
to push away anything "good"
sneaking in to my heart.
I complain about being l o n e l y ,
but I have knit my own blanket of loneliness
and I am smothering myself in it.
My head is in the c l o u d s ,
but my heart is in my hands
I am pulling on the strings
watching it s t r u g g l e
I can't stop myself
I love to HATE this game.

Freak show!

Ohhhhhh - I am obsessed!
Good luck to my girl Mags who just got an interview with these talented ladies!





Cushnie et Ochs F/W 2009

I do it every day

Love sets us free.

You're perfect, as it turned out

And if we had brought our passports
I would have
made synchronization notes for the sounds,
which were taking the northern route
to the mainland.
And when we would open our eyes
the artists would've been seen -
seen as threats
to society.
Held accountable
for creating the chemistry
of the real world.

In a black hole

And if I had good balance, I would've protected you from the sun

Led by the Wompanoag tribe
raging on
for over a year
3000 indians
600 colonists
DEAD.

Eventually he too was killed
and the victorious colonist sold his wife
and children
into
slavery.

She was a minister's wife
kidnapped by an english man
held captive for 11 weeks

And like the Greek Fates
She knit the fabric of individual destiny
of a classic American text.

Steal my records

I'm in love with a man I don't even know.
I'm in love with his words, his voice, his energy.
We dance in my empty room every night.
His soul and I, and a bottle of red.

You're such a gentleman like that

Yeah, I miss you...
more today than yesterday,
but less than I will tomorrow.
So once again,
we'll sit in our corners,
picking our scabs,
waiting for the pain to numb the nostalgia.

In some fantasy of mine

I'm just one of those girls
who never got over
her first love
and I can't stop
writing poems
for your bloody palms
laying limp
on the mattress
in the spare bedroom.
I guess I'll always
love you...

Religiously unreligious

Allison: "I'm a Christian"

Some kid: "Do you eat meat on Fridays?"

Allison: "I try not to eat at all."

You'll never understand

Remember that one night I stayed at your place, because I had no where else to go and I needed somewhere that felt "safe?"
I tried falling asleep while you were out, but your bed felt so empty without you.
I don't really remember how I fell asleep, but I eventually did.
We always use to "fight" over who had a more comfortable bed... I never wanted to admit it, but I think I liked yours better than mine.
I felt you come home that night, and you tried to be quiet getting in to bed with me.
It always felt safer when you were next to me, it always felt like home in your arms.
Still, today, when I think about you... about us - I don't even realize it, but I still smile.
I'm smiling right now.

Nouvelle addiction

Post Secret France!






Aussi, sil vous plait ecoutez: "Ryan Adams -"Blossom"
C'est la chanson du jour!

Bonne nuit. xo

Purification

All the evil karma, ever created by me since of old;
on account of my beginningless greed, hatred and ignorance;
born of my conduct, speech and thought;
I now confess openly and fully.




Believe nothing, no matter where you read it,
or who said it, no matter if I have said it,
unless it agrees with your own reason
and your own common sense.

70

My teachings are easy to understand
and easy to put into practice.
Yet your intellect will never grasp them,
and if you try to practice them, you'll fail.

My teachings are older than the world.
How can you grasp their meaning?

If you want to know me,
look inside your heart.
-The Tao Te Ching

The road of adventure.

We do not go round a circle (of existence).
That is an illusion, just as the cycling of the planets and
the stars is an illusion. We move along a spiral track.

We're off to Vienna

Just a typical walk home from class with Mags...

Mags: "So I want Billy Joel to put on lipstick and kiss me somewhere so I can have his lip print tattooed on me."

Me: "I just want to see Billy Joel with lipstick on."

We've got a job to do, and this is it

Today I realized, most people - even when they've seemed to hit rock bottom - continue to spend more time trying to solve everyone else's problems than really taking a minute to realize what a huge mess they're sitting in. Why do we all try to run away from the problems we can solve for ourselves and try to play heroin to someone else's story? Because the truth is, the only mess we can clean is our own.

Voyage Insondable

Sailing away,
deserting our dwellings
Our friends
Our family
Our enemies
Our lovers, too
Entrons ici en territoire inconnu

Plummeting
towards the abyss
Discouraged
Abandoned
Nostalgic for comforts,
for stable ground.

Winds propel
Waters agitate
Dampening our spirits
Hardening pieces
of our souls

Falling
Tumbling
Plummeting
An insignificant spec
on the horizon

Paralyzed beneath veils
A silent cry
like a darkening crescendo
Locked on the line
time draws neatly for us
Entrons ici en territoire inconnu

Fred Baby

Sometimes, I just miss having a best friend...
someone to laugh with,
someone to dance with.







"I'm like cat here, a no-name slob. We belong to nobody, and nobody belongs to us. We don't even belong to each other. "



Where's my "Fred Baby?"

And I'm dancing as if I were in the woods with you

I'm back to reading "The New Earth" [by. Eckhartt Tolle]. I had to take a little break from it and start living in my state of awareness, Here's a little juicy morsel to kick your morning off that I found pretty powerful...

"The ego doesn't know that your only opportunity for being at peace IS now. Or maybe it does know, and it is afraid that you may find this out. Peace, after all, is the end of the ego. How to be at peace now? By making peace with the present moment. The present moment is the field on which the game of life happens. It cannot happen anywhere else. Once you have made peace with the present moment, see what happens, what you can do or choose to do, or rather what life does through you. There are three words that convey the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and happiness: One With Life. Being one with life is being one with Now. You then realize that you don't live your life but life lives you. LIFE IS THE DANCE, AND YOU ARE THE DANCER."

You hold me without touch

I forgot how much I loved this song/video concept.
Ya dig?

High, neighbor!

Dom: "I'm so proud of you Ali!"

Phil: "Why are you proud of Ali?"

Dom: "Well look at her!"

Phil stops and looks me up and down with his stoned eyes...
"Why because she's sober?"

"Well aren't you cute!"

The next month is going to be such a wonderful learning experience for me.
I can't wait to take it all in, and be working on something that I'm truly passionate about again.
I'm already getting so inspired and motivated to work my ass off.
I feel so grateful and blessed for this opportunity, I don't even know how to express it.
I just really appreciate someone so talented, and someone who I admire and respect as an artist, giving me the opportunity to work with and learn from them.
I'm probably going to say "Thank you" way too many times, but I don't even care!

Here's to a month of hard work!
Ciao. xo

It's a brushfire spreading, feeding as it moves

Tomorrow is a big day for me.
[I'm crossing my fingers & toes!]
Time to prove something to myself
and gain some confidence once again.

Meet me at the North Shore

Get in my pocket
and fly away with me,
little dove.
The sky is so blue today
and the winds tastes so sweet.
Get in my pocket,
we will travel these cerulean seas.

207

I found a short story that I wrote for my creative writing class my sophomore year in high school. I re-read it for the first time since I wrote it and turned it in, and it definitely brought a few tears to my eyes. I have come so far from the naive and scared little girl I was, but I am glad I have put so much faith in the universe around me, because in fact, as I predicted - the journey has been epic, and I hope it continues to be filled with surprises. I feel so infinitely blessed.




The first time Cat walked through that musty low-income apartment hallway to number 207 she knew she’d be coming back again, and again. Even the chipping paint of the once white walls, that now seemed to be a slight shade of yellow, seemed more exciting than the varsity football game the rest of her so called “friends” were at. They would be drinking their cheap vodka out of water bottles, praying to not get expelled from school, while she drank her just-as-cheap vodka out of a red plastic cup wishing the night would never end.

She felt safe in that crowded little apartment not even a mile from her own home. It sort of excited her to think what her parents would do if they found out that their fourteen-year-old daughter wasn’t sleeping safely at her best friend’s house, like she told them earlier, but at an apartment owned by four guys over the age of eighteen. Not to mention how would they react to see her playing beer pong with the skill of a college frat boy? Or to see her flirting with guys who should see her as nothing more than “jail bait?” And that’s why her parents thought she was sleeping at Allison’s house for the night, and not her eighteen-year old friend Greg’s newly rented apartment.

At some point in the night, after being greeted with an anonymous “Heyyyy!” from the already budding group, she found herself the center of everyone’s attention. The mixture of liquor and heavy beats from the live DJ broadcasting on the radio always seemed to summon her hips to some sort of modern tribal ritual. Even if there wasn’t music playing Cat would have still kept her hips moving to some deep rhythm inside her soul. A few random bodies slid up to her and swayed with the habitual movement of her dance, always making sure her free hand had a filled drink in it. She knew the power her still slim hips had over those older boys’ straying minds but it didn’t really matter to her. She had one guy in mind, and he was the only one whose straying mind she cared to seduce.

Mark made the pit of her stomach turn over, and under, and inside out. He was in a band and didn’t even start becoming attractive until after the fourth or fifth shot. In this case, his looks weren’t her concern, it was his skills that kept him on her mind. She always felt like she was the one in control, that she was the one using him to get what she wanted, or at least he let her believe that. In her mind “a girl has needs too,” and he definitely knew how to get the job done. Their relationship, if you could call it that, was nothing more than in-the-moment drunken hook-ups. They seldom even talked outside of their intoxicated lip locked moments.

As much as she told herself she didn’t care about him, it still bothered her when the music stopped and she saw that scenester girl, with her stupid black studded belt and pink Converses, sitting on his lap in the corner of the room like she was something special. She was holding Mark’s drink and whispering something into his ear, and he had a smile on his face that she’d never seen before. The music was still playing, but she couldn’t really hear it anymore as she walked from the center of the room and sat down squeezing her way between two unfamiliar bodies on the couch. She could feel the color quickly fading from her face. She tipped her head back and let the last swig of cherry vodka slide slowly down the back of her throat, numbing the anxiety on its way down.

“Cat, what’s wrong?” screamed her best friend, and “homeowner,” Greg from mid-conversation across the room.

“Oh nothing! I’m just a little nauseous. I need some fresh air, that’s all,” she said trying to cover up her look of disappointment in the girl on Mark’s lap, that she was positive he had picked up on.

She pushed her way through the obnoxious unknown array of bodies, which seemed to have flooded into the apartment uninvited, to the sliding glass door of the balcony. As she stepped outside she caught a glimpse of her disheveled reflection in the glass door and concluded why it wasn’t her sitting on Mark’s lap. She looked like hell! As she stood on the frozen porch, watching the winter blow, with only the glass door separating her from the party, the cold seemed to sober some inner riot inside of her. Cat lit the palmed cigarette she bummed on her way out and balanced herself on a single chair. She sat beside the fake Christmas tree, which awkwardly sat outside over a month after this year’s snowless holiday, and questioned what she was even doing here.

She looked down through the cracks of the four-by-fours of the two-story balcony to the first floor patio below her. Her view was distorted through the small cracks, but she could still tell a small child must live there. The sprawled collection of brightly colored plastic toys seemed to be forcing her to recollect a childhood of riding with training wheels, shiny pink ribbons and a basket for her “big girl makeup” through the neighborhood while chasing boys with Barbie dolls and threatening to apply lipstick to their faces if they put snakes in her sandbox again. Cat tried to remember the last time her parents doted over her like they did during those years of pigtails and sent-home tests with the letter “A” written brilliantly across the top. Her short-term memory couldn’t seem to recall the last time her parents said anything along the lines of “Good job,” let alone suggest that they were proud of her.

She ashed her cigarette over the ledge of the balcony and leaned a little too far forward on the chair, losing her balance just enough to remind her of the amount of alcohol she had consumed in the past five hours. The ash floated two stories down turning a brilliant orange to a pale yellow until it burned lifeless into the darkness of the quiet winter night. As Cat went to take another calming drag of nicotine, she noticed not only that her hands were now cold, but they were wet. Minuscule molecules of water had formed into what would become the first snowfall of the season. Closing her eyes she not so secretly wished for a morning worthy of the title “Winter Wonderland,” and all the excitement it brought during those same years of pigtails and sent-home tests ornamented with that prized “A.” What did that “A” stand for anyways? Amazing? Astonishing? Astounding? Admirable? Advanced? What did it matter now as she sat isolated from her friends, who didn’t even seem to notice her prolonged absence, nothing seemed to matter now besides the cold wet dampness accumulating on her hands.

Cat closed her eyes because she didn’t need to look at what was happening at her fingertips anymore, the sensation was becoming even more vivid and stimulating. It was like her skin was falling off like clothing. The small droplets of water were accumulating into snowflakes and melting leisurely in her palms. Her pores seemed to be drinking the water and transferring a wave of alertness through her intoxicated limbs. Cat opened her mouth and stuck out her tongue, like her five-year-old self would do, until her tongue felt stiffened by the below-zero temperature. The wind was whispering forgotten memories through her hair as the snow melted the comfort of years long forgotten like awkward moments through her dampened clothing. A distant voice breezily echoed, “Cat, we know,” over and over as her hair got tangled with the force of the blizzard wind. All she wanted were the answers and the security she heard in that distant voice that grew closer with confidence in each passing second.

She stood up on her chair, trying to pinpoint where the voice was coming from. It seemed nearly feet away from the balcony, as if the wind was breathing passionate answers on billows of currents towards her perched figure. It continued to grow closer and closer, “Cat we can tell you,” and so did her desire to reach out and grab the voice, to shake from it what answers she could. Putting all of her weight on her left foot, she strategically placed her right foot on the balcony’s railing while steadying herself with her hands. Making sure she was stable enough, she lifted her left foot from the chair and placed it softly on the railing, pairing it with her right. Slowing lifting herself from a stooped position she deliberately stood up, raising her arms to the snow-weeping sky with a growing smile of satisfaction spreading across her once apathetic face.

Now this was the experience she had come for, this freedom. She was on the edge of finding answers to so many questions that kept her awake night after night. She forgot about the booze, the “friends,” Mark, her disappointment, and everything in that dingy apartment behind her. Cat stood on the balcony looking up into the night sky and imagined what life would be like months from now, a year from now, ten years from now. “Cat, have faith in me,” and Cat reached out to the voice that was nearly two feet from the balcony railing, and fell into the swirl of the season’s first snow not caring where it took her but trusting it would be epic.

Waging wars to shake the poet & the beat

Kings of Leon - Use Somebody

I love everything about you that hurts

I want my picture taken.
I want someone to take an honest portrait of me.
Something real.
Something tangible.



"It's a lie. It's a bunch of sad strangers photographed beautifully, and... all the glittering assholes who appreciate art say it's beautiful 'cause that's what they wanna see. But the people in the photos are sad, and alone... But the pictures make the world seem beautiful, so... the exhibition is reassuring which makes it a lie, and everyone loves a big fat lie."

Voyagez la monde!

Another reason why Maggie is [one of] the best roommate, ever...
she's always making me laugh!

M: Who's passport is this?

A: Mine.

M: Where's it for?

A: Uhhh... the World.

When I fall asleep it is your eyes that close

His absence stabbed like a knife,
leaving trenches too deep to fill.
He was always hours late,
finding her on the clammy tiled floor
preparing for her finale.
Gazing down at a porceline face,
starry eyed, and forgetful of what took place
before the gentile warmth began pooling onto her boney thigh.

Dipping a pointy fingertip into her own paint
and smudging onto the Listerine green tile,
what she imagined a heart would look like,
[if she were to ever meet anyone who had one.]
Her hands were of an artist, aged beyond their years
fortifying a brush for a taste-test of love.

Reaching out, only for him to pull back in shock
Letting that crimson hand fall limp
echoing in her heartache.
He use to love holding those hands
and how they were always cold from her poor circulation.
Today he turned away in disgust.
Disgusted with himself for falling short
for letting her hate defeat his love for her.

Kissing her soft bitter lips
and laying his head aside hers just as the heater turned on
blowing on his face from the vent beneath her vanity
He fogged the mirror with his stale breath
Just to remember he was alive.

Missed connections

I love this song.


If you see her, say hello, she might be in Tangier
She left here last early spring, is livin' there, I hear
Say for me that I'm all right though things get kind of slow
She might think that I've forgotten her, don't tell her it isn't so.

We had a falling-out, like lovers often will
And to think of how she left that night, it still brings me a chill
And though our separation, it pierced me to the heart
She still lives inside of me, we've never been apart.

If you get close to her, kiss her once for me
I always have respected her for busting out and gettin' free
Oh, whatever makes her happy, I won't stand in the way
Though the bitter taste still lingers on from the night I tried to make her stay.

I see a lot of people as I make the rounds
And I hear her name here and there as I go from town to town
And I've never gotten used to it, I've just learned to turn it off
Either I'm too sensitive or else I'm gettin' soft.

Sundown, yellow moon, I replay the past
I know every scene by heart, they all went by so fast
If she's passin' back this way, I'm not that hard to find
Tell her she can look me up if she's got the time.
-Bob Dylan

Looking at art

If you're wondering why her placid fingers are gripping your waist so tightly...
it's because she needs you
or wants you.
Or maybe a combination of both.
Consider it a privilege
that she's reaching for you.

Goddamn you.

Another bag of bones

It’s a brushfire spreading, feeding as it moves. It’s a disappeared glacier, it’s an airborne flu. It's your disbelieving eyes locked in concrete miles. It’s your yawning conscious and your lawyer’s smile. It’s an occupied country, foaming at the mouth. No smoking gun, no mushroom cloud. It’s a military mother with a boy in hell. And it’s a flag draped casket down an oil well. It’s an Argentina school girl, gagged and bound. It’s a torture camp, it’s a long way down. It’s the constant brace and shock of now. It’s the whole damn world turned inside out, all right. It’s a march to extinction with your god in step. It’s his name in your mouth, it’s his cross on your neck. It’s a farm boy sprinting over desert dirt. And he’s panting the ‘Our Father’ in staccato spurts. Now that's his automatic rifle and it tells no lies. That’s his truth in your stomach, it’s no alibi. But the trouble lies on the other side. With an equal truth prepping for his holy night. He sees his crescent and the star in the virgin sky. He hears the call of milk and honey from the afterlife. And as he eases to the check point, he is calm and sure. It’s collateral damage, it’s the cost of war. It’s another bag of bones for the gods to sort. It’s just another bag of bones for the gods to sort. It’s the species disappearing, all the birds fly south. In a January heat wave and a pulsing crowd. It’s an African militia, kids with sub machines. It’s a conflict diamond on your bride to be. It’s the dispossessed lining up every gate. It’s the facts worth facing, faced way too late. It’s the mission of modernity, go get what’s yours’. ’Til there’s nothing leftover to get no more. And it’s not what were owed but it’s what we’ve earned. And it’s closer than we realized that it's time now, to burn. It’s time now to burn. Oh, it’s time now to burn.
-K.Devine

I'm leaving my peace with you

"God is always on time, he's never late, but he's rarely early."
- Greg Barette


In the spiritual life, we need to pray for our faith to hold out before we pray for the material things. Hold in your faith. You're getting through every time. It may not be according to your timing, but your prayers will be answered. Isn't that wait faith is? Establish your faith in peace. It happens from the inside out. Build consciousness first and it will show up in your outer world.


"People are moving, and learning, and loving... and all the bad news is not the final say. YOU are going to determine your experience, and your experience won't be conditional or determined by what you see... your experience will be determined by what's in your mind and in your consciousness."
- Greg

God Save, McQueen!

Alexander McQueen Spring '09

Coloring

A: "I love Samantha"
H: "That's because you are Samantha"

I've got a crush on you

Christian Siriano





Spring 2009