I seem calm to others but often feel feral

and school is picking up, slowly hitting a pace where I feel urgent, and urgent means I achieve. Which is okay, so far it's okay. Because urgent and achieving means I feel like I'm in school again for the first time since I started school again. And that is good, mostly good, maybe entirely good. It is at least good enough to keep me moving forward.

It is about to be Halloween weekend, one of my favorite holidays probably simply because it requires so little preparation and is generally nothing but fun. Plus I get to dress up and drink and laugh a lot, and what possible way to waste a weekend is better then that.

There is still confusion, there is still hecticness, but really, if I settle into school for two years very little else will matter. And anyways, I can only be self indulgent for so long.

Notes to remember: just because you support gay marriage, doesn't mean you need to be gay. jen bervin - post-modern poet, whatever that means. Part wind and part wolf. and maybe a text tattoo will be necessary before I stop getting them all together. Maybe.

storage space again

frida kahlo to marty mcconnell |
by marty mcconnell


leaving is not enough; you must
stay gone. train your heart
like a dog. change the locks
even on the house he’s never
visited. you lucky, lucky girl.
you have an apartment
just your size. a bathtub
full of tea. a heart the size
of Arizona, but not nearly
so arid. don’t wish away
your cracked past, your
crooked toes, your problems
are papier mache puppets
you made or bought because the vendor
at the market was so compelling you just
had to have them. you had to have him.
and you did. and now you pull down
the bridge between your houses,
you make him call before
he visits, you take a lover
for granted, you take
a lover who looks at you
like maybe you are magic. make
the first bottle you consume
in this place a relic. place it
on whatever altar you fashion
with a knife and five cranberries.
don’t lose too much weight.
stupid girls are always trying
to disappear as revenge. and you
are not stupid. you loved a man
with more hands than a parade
of beggars, and here you stand. heart
like a four-poster bed. heart like a canvas.
heart leaking something so strong
they can smell it in the street.

sometimes I think sitting on trains

I had a good weekend. It was a little blurry and a little crazy, but really quite excellent. Friday I spent all day at home nursing a cold and watching bad tv online. And Saturday I achieved things for the afternoon and then went over to a friends house for dinner. Before, during, and after which we proceeded to drink large amounts of whiskey and rum. Then a group of us moved on to a party partially put on by idce and danced for a couple of hours. After that we went on a slightly awkward bar crawl. Post bar crawl we wandered around worcester, looked at lots of photos and climbed buildings (or I watched, others climbed). Got in a debate about development, the borders of which are slightly unclear to me today, and after partially falling asleep on a kitchen table got to have a sleep over. Woke up almost painfully hungover this morning and got to go lie in the yard and sun bask for awhile.

Sadly my hangover prevented me from achieving much over the course of today, which I will have to make up for tomorrow, but all in all a weekend that made me feel slightly like I was 19 and fucking crazy again (except in a more stable, I'm older now kinda way). And now I'm talking to an old friend from home and he's making me happy, as always.

storage space

http://www.sweetlit.com/poem_joe_wilkins_spiritual.html

because sometimes I find random things I want to keep

Daughter, by Nicole Blackman
One day I'll give birth to a tiny baby girl
and when she's born she'll scream and I'll make sure
she never stops.

I will kiss her before I lay her down
and will tell her a story so she knows
how it is and how it must be for her to survive.

I'll tell her about the power of water
the seduction of paper
the promise of gasoline
and the hope of blood.

I'll teach her to shave her eyebrows and
mark her skin.
I'll teach her that her body is her greatest work of art.

I'll tell her to light things on fire
and keep them burning.
I'll teach her that the fire will not consume her,
that she must take it and use it.

I'll tell her to be tri-sexual to try anything,
to sleep with, fight with, pray with anyone,
just as long as she feels something.

I'll help her to do her best work when it rains.
I'll tell her to reinvent herself every 28 days.

I'll teach her to develop all of her selves,
the courageous ones,
the smart ones,
the dreaming ones,
the fast ones.
I'll teach her that she has an army inside her
that can save her life.

I'll tell her to say Fuck like other people say the word The
and when people are shocked
to ask them why they so fear a small quartet
of letters.

I'll make sure she always carries a pen
so she can take down the evidence.
If she has no paper, I'll teach her to
write everything down on her tongue,
write it on her thighs.

I'll help her to see that she will not find God
or salvation in a dark-brick building
built by dead men.

I'll explain to her it's better to regret the things
she has done than the things she hasn't.

I'll teach her to write her manifestos
on cocktail napkins.

I'll say she should make men lick her enterprise.
I'll teach her to talk hard.
I'll tell her that her skin is the
most beautiful dress she will ever wear.

I'll tell her that people must earn the right
to use her nickname,
that forced intimacy is an ugly thing.

I'll make her understand that she is worth more
with her clothes on.

I'll tell her that when the words finally flow too fast
and she has no use for a pen
that she must quit her job
run out of the house in her bathrobe,
heaving the door open.
I'll teach her to follow the words.

I'll tell her to stand up
and head for the door
after she makes love.
When he asks her
to stay she'll say
she's got to
go.

I'll tell her that when she firsts bleeds
when she is a woman,
to go up to the roof at midnight,
reach her hands up to the sky and, scream.

I'll teach her to be whole, to be holy,
to be so much that she doesn't even
need me anymore.

I'll tell her to go quickly and never come back
I will make her stronger than me.

I'll say to her never forget what they did to you
and never let them know you remember

never forget what they did to you
and never let them know you remember

never forget what they did to you
and never let them know you remember.

nothing clever today

It snowed. Yesterday, most of the day. Nothing stuck to the ground, so at least that is okay, but every time I looked out the window from my warm spot curled up on the couch and reading about the World Bank, it was snowing these giant, fluffy flakes, and it was too much. I would have stayed in all day, but I had reading group, which was fine but not horribly exciting. After reading group I went to a friends house for some food and talking, it was nice also, he'd been out of town for a week so we got to catch up, but I ended up not getting home until 12:30 and still having to write a short paper for today.

And today is turning out to be terrifying, because we are getting grades back for our first (and only so far) paper in our theory class. I haven't gotten my grade yet, but of the two people I know who have one got 6/10 and one got 7/10. Those are not great odds, which makes me very very nervous. So now I am impatiently waiting to hear how I did, and am rather scared it is badly.

We are getting into mid-terms, which makes me nervous, and means I will be overwhelmingly busy for a while. Soon. But then it is Halloween, which is nothing but fun, no matter what state I'm in. And I'm going to be a pirate!

I had six too many drinks last night,

I got back home again, after a long weekend in Disney with the family. I forget sometimes that despite the fact that I love my family and get along with them well we have moments where I don't remember why. My mom and my sister are getting along less well, I think it's only been accented by me moving. I'm normally there for my mother to get mad at, frustrated with, annoyed by. And now that I am gone she only has my sister to interact with. I worry about her sometimes, I hope she figures out something that makes her happy soon, because I'm wowrried that if she doesn't she will just become more and more dissatisfied and combative.

And then my sister got sick. And grumpy. So I had a grumpy mother and a grumpy sister and I just wanted to run around disney and enjoy every minute of the too hot to think amazing weather. I just wanted to soak it all in. And that becomes harder to do with a sick and grumpy family. Two more months of here before I need to see them again, hopefully everyone is in a better mood next time.

I have been listening to this album on repeat, but mostly this song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4v8FJhQ-teE

once you caused my cells to shimmer

The city seen from the Queensboro Bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and the beauty in the world. -F. Scott Fitzgerald

I am aching to sort my life out well enough that I am content with it. Aching to solidify my plans, find a place for next summer, or spend it walking if I get my way. I am content with certain aspects of my life, but feel like I am not achieving what I should be. I am still allowing myself to take a weekend off. I don't feel that I have necessarily earned it, so much as I feel that I need it in order to reapply myself to my life here.

I want a city to love, a city I can drown it. I do not dislike here, so much as it does not inspire the wanderer in me, it doesn't inspire tracing my life out across the streets like lines on a paper, like writing. I miss walking, I miss the ability to walk aimlessly, and I may start again anyway, I may start because it feels wrong not doing so. I may start because I feel that I will soon question my sanity anyway, am already questioning my desires, and I feel like I need something to ground me to here. My feet on the pavement have always been relatively good at doing that.

So a weekend away, wandering around the happiest place on earth, around a place that makes me happy, with family that I love and miss. And then home again home again, to an apartment I love in a city that may never feel like home. Two years is not so long though, and time always passes quickly these days. I will get a job, I will do more work, I will go out less, I will care less what people think of me, I will try to recreate the feeling I had at the end of the camino. I will try to recreate the feeling of patience, of knowing what I want.