mourning shadows

I don’t reside here. I’m just preparing. Where is my voice? Why can’t I speak? Why can’t I just be ok living this way? Empty. Despite how I try to fill my space with a positive state of mind, I feel like I’m here just to watch until I die.

I refuse that fucking life. I sware I’ll keep practicing and getting stronger and one day I’ll do it. I’ll stand up for myself and find the voice of my authentic self.

Until then…I’ll just keep incessantly cleaning, my only form of control in my upside-down world.

Eyes Don’t Lie

This struck my chord as I sniff sweet coffee steam, the storm beating down on me and the roof over my head, lightning behind my eyes, shocking my brain to the truth of why I can’t help but feel insane.

But, I’m a woman, and I will survive.

I’m a Woman (Koko Taylor)

Unexpected

As I drove to help at my daughter’s work again, I realized I was singing, not staring absent or crying over a complex situation, no I felt like singing!

In an instant, fully cognizant of the difference in my temperament, I asked myself, Why? What’s different this morning from yesterday’s?

And I remembered how I fell asleep last night, relishing every frame of him singing until my eyes fell into my brain’s serenity (held within my phone’s screen).

Every day is the same for me.

I cherish his face, the way he moves his mouth…funniest thing ever is since I can remember, I had dreams of teeth, so not kidding, and the most hilarious part of yearning for this particular man is that I have literally had dreams about his mouth since childhood, lol!

How silly right!?! No one knows, it’s just a secret hidden deep in my heart without any point or purpose except to me. I swear, I couldn’t make this shit up.

I’m starting to have nightly panic attacks unfortunately. No one knows that either. I wonder why I cry, like letting out the pain of my hub killing hope will help me cope. What a joke.

I sware that other of mine is going to ruin G Love’s show for me (tried the first time I saw him in the Rockies, tried to ruin Billy Strings, and was a dick before (and I slept alone in the hotel room after) ALO too).

He makes the great in life taste…less sweet. 

Tonight, right now, with love guiding my sail, I will eat another man’s sweet, and I do not feel guilty. I’ll protect my heart, keep doing it alone, talking to myself, touching myself with images of us that pop up hot…

A clandestine transgression of fulfillment, wishes washing my soul into an awakening, my wish every evening.

My days with him helping me through each end, then, begin like this…

Baroque and Blue

Present

There’s a line that repeats in my head every time I get super frustrated at my life:

“the medicine of speaking and listening”

Remember back to when smoking pot was new and exciting. A person would puff ‘n’ give while talking, smoke pouring out of their mouth because they’re laughing…I can’t even speak while passing a peace pipe, NO ONE is listening, let alone hearing anything from my lips. A wife is said to become annoying, but NO ONE realizes I’m gone. It’s sad, but not for me.

I have that line.

“the medicine of speaking and listening”

I thought it was me. I’m just not worth listening to, I have no job, I have nothing important to say, so why should anyone listen to me? Fuck that. Sorry to be crass. I’m done being the blame for his wrongs. I’m done feeling like an ass.

I’m yearning for growth through connection, conversation like I used to feel when I got out of my head.

I wish I could give you a present for all the ways you help me in a day. Fun images when snide comments are thrown my way. Lovely lines that encourage my strength, advice in a way to not lose my shit when repeatedly I’m made to feel like a dick. It didn’t matter how often he tried to ruin my day, he couldn’t. Instead of crying and hiding, I climbed a hill and took a cool picture like I used to do when I was by myself. Progress I feel.

Nature giving you a hug 🫂

it’s in me

It’s in me. I know it is because my subconscious keeps showing me. The sizzle of the chicken on the stove, open eyes wake-dream your eyes guiding your lips to land on the skin just below my ear, with a kiss grazing my neck, you whisper, “I’m here…” And while savoring that sizzle, oil pops out to smear my glasses, you know, fate reminding me of my reality with a fizzle.

I don’t write sex anymore because obviously I won’t ever get what I wish. Recently, he killed my artist endeavors on Instagram too (made fun of me for a few too many things).

Despite all that baggage bullshit, sexy images popping up in me tickled me pink all day long…

It’s the most wonderful thing! It’s in me! Passion, lust, desire, wild-fun love are in me still!

Seduced

I want to be seduced and seduce my muse!

I now know what I’ve spent my life looking for: someone who inspires me.

I also know what I cannot abide: being belittled and sexless for the rest of my short life.

(I started volunteering at a summer camp for kids with disabilities where my daughter is teaching art and STEM. Good distraction:)

unacceptable

It’s unacceptable. I know. Silly, for sure. I have to purge before midnight, or sleepless I’ll be. So, here’s my unbelievable moment of honesty, with which I show the fool hidden deep.

I miss a video, well not exactly…how can I explain???

Funny how a song can not only bring back things unsettling, but also give a new beginning with a joyful memory.

His video, his voice, his smile, each creative choice did that for me.

No one knows that when I was about ten, I performed a dance routine during a basketball game half time show to “Dancing in the Streets.”

In dance and gymnastics from four to fourteen (when I had a car accident spinal cord injury), nostalgia when I hear certain songs can be unexpected. Well, every part of him singing was touching, and welling emotions made my skin prickly hot when he smiled, especially as he belted a beautiful “Chicago”.

A yearn began to dance about, urging my lungs to expell a belly laugh, honestly, like nothing I’ve ever felt, for tears too dripped onto my phone.

My brain wouldn’t let it go, so I had to figure out if I could find it again. Then, I searched…results:

Gone.

That was last night. All day, knowing it doesn’t matter that it matters to me, knowing it’s something I’ll never again see, breaks my heart repeatedly.

Lost, my confidence whipped raw, I think I’ll take a break from social media. I didn’t used to be so emotional!

I think it’s true…you stay the same age as your greatest traumatic event. For me that makes sense, I still act like a horny teenager, head up my ass.

My excuse is so simple: I want to feel good.

In my life, I’m only misunderstood.

(I put back up a bunch of old stuff, why not, right? If only I didn’t try to hide parts of my writing…)

Illusions

Oh, what a dump: two dogs puking, cat gets out, replacing water softener and water heater which flooded the laundry room floor, van door dumps a pile of rust on the ground, fridge doesn’t come round til next week, barely have enough healthy food to eat…after this morning, I wonder, How much more?

My brain’s swollen so big, my skull is sore.

Eventually, I’ll calm the storm, but for now, I have a hurricane going on.

Illusions

I have no illusions. I can’t change my fate. I make my bed as best I can and…wait.

What if my ability to love were how I was judged? I’d be a super-star!

Ha! Just call my dreams marred. I’m too scared, too scarred, loving me is too hard. Despite PTSD producing acid in my veins, I know I’m not insane…I guess that’s something.

I don’t know how NOT to use this space to “trauma dump” because no one knows or cares if I’m here.

And I mean that as a good thing, everyone has their secrets, you’re mine, and I shit you not, that keeps me going, searching for the light:)

Silly that a bad day can seem so dark and daunting even when the sky is blue and birds sing a lovely little tune.

(Memorized the first listen, no joke, undiscovered country’s words and rhythm, beat like my heart in my head, and times like this, I use it…

“Magic happens when it’s practiced.” I’m a witch, but I have no spells to fix anything.

Just wish I could travel in a wizard’s sleeve…Oh, Love, wish I were a wizard’s dream.)

Oddest Flowers

Even the oddest

flowers can flourish.

No sowing.

At first, just a seed

blowing when it falls

into a driveway crack,

and dormant instinct

roots foundation through

the black tar and gravel

until the magic of a spring

environment rains

light-food and nutrient-water

to seep deep then

an unlikely flower pushes

with burgeoning strength

through paved black-top.

Resiliency from infancy.

That’s me.

brain game

It won’t shut up! Ideas just bubbling, could say percolating, but that’s too focused. Adult ADHD? Yes, got worse with age, now struggling to read, like all those past students who couldn’t do it for me as a teacher. Never had tv as a kid, not through college, nor alone in Arizona as an adult, not until marriage was I forced to give in.

In every room screen-walls, nearly like in Bradbury’s Illustrated Man, that at anytime can show you anything in a flash.

Fast-forward a few decades–

Creativity stagnant, passion dead, every night the light in bed is a documentary about something that doesn’t help. But recently, a change I didn’t expect, I’m writing and reading literature again.

My brain doesn’t shut off, but it’s not really bad. I just keep searching a purpose. Distracted, my brain and heart beat each other to the punch, where I get myself in trouble, thinking too much, wearing truth, as if it’s ok.

I know the truth. Birds don’t talk to me, yet I sware they try. By giving them words, I’m trying to fly, trying to get the fuck out of Dodge, trying to talk to my SELF because (though people surround me nearly all the time) no one else will.

But, I think this is my beginning.

I know the truth. I have to be strong. Life sans passion is typical, right? Why fight. My strength will be finding a way to help others outside of the house. I used to volunteer, may need an old bird there. I’ll read books to escape the mundane, you know, the way I used to stay sane.

Oh, what I’d do to feel wanted and skillful!

I know the truth. My chores depict my servicable skill, no one notices but they demand. Ss a mother, I adore my role with my whole soul. But, I wish a little lust would sprinkle in through my open doors.

How to break free? That’s the brain candy.

Hope

the color of hope

I want to be part of the colorful tree, the crown, a leaf, a limb, the bark, a tap root, even a root hair.

I think about it and stare at what’s in front of me, walls, a roof, windows, a front and back door.

I go nowhere, but here.

Maybe, if I had the money, motivation would follow, but unfortunately, people scare me, I say too much, and mortified, I leave saying, “Sorry…”

Gregarious and fun, I love to be, so maybe, if I keep practicing, when I’m comfortable, maybe just maybe, I’ll find a way to fit into society. 

A monkey doing tricks to keep my spirit high, maybe if I again use Emerson’s tree metaphor of society and turn it into a lovely image…Yes, a visual of magic working:

“Nature always wears the color of the spirit.”

From blue to red and back again, I am everything between.

Alone or not, I can be my own fucking party!