10:03 p.m.

he worries about the world like it was his to save. I try to memorize his features and the inconsequential things about him because I know they're bound to change. not because of me, but because that's how people are. like the world. these things are never static. I just pretend they are.
I wait for memories to keep me company through these dark and sleepless nights. I wait for dreams to come and remind me of the things I briefly held. I wait for everything to tell me it's ok, it's alright, nothing lasts, nothing stays; enjoy it while you have it.
how many weeks until I see him again? how crazy will I get? how many more opportunities will I miss (but not really miss, because I don't want them anymore) because I've finally found my faith[fulness]?
I ask questions I can't answer and envelope myself in memories of a summer that will never taste its equal. it's ending, autumn's coming, and with it something else is rolling in. if I play my cards right (he taught me how to do that) then I can have everything that I've said I wanted. oh, I could have everything if I could just learn how to relax and accept people and not just actions.
my chest is with filled helium when I think of him. I can't get enough. I didn't want to let go, but I had to. I had to come back to reality.

Sunday, September 18, 2005

08:32 p.m.

instead of doing what I should
it's difficult to concentrate. I start to type something, something I should have been working on all night, and the image of him shoves itself into my head.
I miss him. I miss him completely, in every sense of the word, in every way imaginable. I just miss being near him, and hearing him breath, and listening to him talk. I miss his hands and his slouch and the movement of his limbs. I miss looking over and seeing him looking at me. I miss his eyes. that is what hurts, the memory of his eyes.
when we held each other for the first time in weeks two days ago I thought I was going to cry from how happy I was to feel him again. how good it felt for him to touch me.
it made me forget how consumed by doubt I tend to become when kept from the source of love. it was a nice thing to forget.
I think one of the best times of the weekend was walking from downtown after lunch and seeing him as close to happy as I've ever seen. everything was perfect and beautiful and I want to freeze that in my head. I want to take that moment and make it stretch until we are together again. I don't want my fear to get the best of me. I don't want to feel like I am losing him. I don't want this doubt. I want to let go of all my negativity and just be.
I want that afternoon. I want his hand in mine. I want his lips on my forehead. I want to hold him and never wonder again when I'll see him again because I'll already know.
it's this uncertainty that kills me.

Sunday, September 18, 2005

02:48 a.m.

another 3 am bramble
he thinks I could use some happiness; he thinks I deserve it. I don't know what that means or if it implies that I am more worthy of happiness than someone else or not. why would I be? all the bad things that have happened to me have been direct results of my actions, haven't they? well, except for maybe last summer. and maybe the past year. a little. I don't know, it's so hard to tell when you're mired in the middle of it.
but more than me, I think he deserves a taste of happiness. or at least contentment. I want to hold him in my arms and feel him relax. and by feel I don't mean muscles and skin, I mean that sensation I get around people, that emotional connection that tends to keep me separate from most of them. I don't mean to be egotistical or presumptuous, but I know things people aren't supposed to know without asking. like I knew about mike, like I knew about chris, like I knew about me. like I know about him and what's going to happen. I hate this knowledge, but I might as well enjoy what I have now. I want to feel him relax in my arms and I want to hear him sigh against me and I want to know that he has that one moment of happiness to carry him through the next month until we see each other again.
I guess that's romantic or idealistic or optimistic or ... hopeless? but it's a dream I have, that things don't have to be the way they seem they'll always be. that we can find our way off the paths we think have been laid for us. that we can change the future we've resigned ourselves to.
maybe we are on the verge of something great, if we can just hold on long enough.
maybe premonitions are sometimes just neuroses. I don't know but I'm willing to at least try.

Saturday, September 10, 2005

02:34 a.m.

bitter and unsure
there are certain people that have left in their wake huge holes inside of me. I've never been able to fully deal with the loss or come to terms with it. but this one can be seen physically in the gaps in my movie, comic, and book collections. his presence is physically absent in more than just form. I understand mistakes, but I don't understand doing the same thing over again when it already fucked everything once.
twice.
at least four times, but possibly more.
and I can't believe that a four year relationship has been reduced to a comparison of missing forms of entertainment. I can't believe this has really happened. the times when I let the knowledge filter through I end up just sobbing to myself and wondering if I'll ever be able to trust anyone the way I used to trust him.
"used to" is the imperative phrase.
I've tried to keep the bitterness away, but these late nights bring it to the surface. I am recounting the destruction of the things I took for granted and meditating on his own loss. all this shit we brought on ourselves. he is coming to terms with it but I still want him to suffer. that is so fucked up.
I hurt, I hurt and it goes on and on and on. I've become adept at blocking away the painful feelings that so many men have caused me, but how long can I do that before it eats me entirely from the inside out? I feel the gnawing already. I have been feeling it for years. this just magnifies it. how can I deal with it? how can he ever say he's sorry so that I believe him and just let it go? I miss him so much. I miss what we had. I miss how good it used to be. how it used to be the best thing that had ever happened to me. I can't ever get that back. there was a time when he was all I needed, when it didn't matter what was going on around us as long as I could go to sleep beside him at night and wake up to his kiss. there was a time when I thought we were forever. when I could taste it and know it and be content.
I thought it would work because everything about the relationship was absolutely and positively different from every other experience I'd had. my superstitions failed me. I didn't write about him, didn't take lots of pictures, didn't draw him all the time, didn't talk about him a lot, didn't get all wrapped up ... and I still got hurt.
people on the outside say it was sudden but he and I saw the decline. I miss him so much. it's nearly unbearable. but it doesn't matter, because he isn't what I miss; I miss who he used to be and who we were together and what we had. I want to leave my life behind and rush headlong into something else entirely. but I can't. I am left with this mess all shattered at my feet and mocking me. I guess there's such a thing as perfection. I'll never see that again. not the way he defined it for me. and maybe that's what made the fall hurt even more. he had it so right for a while, then we just lost it all.
not sudden. just viewed from start to finish. I miss him so goddamn much. I don't think I'll ever come to terms with this. I don't even know where to start.

Friday, September 9, 2005

01:21 p.m.

incomplete rambling
the first time I told him I loved him, he was laying on top of me, his stomach on my back and his arms on either side of me. I can't remember how we ended up in that position, but it's something he used to do when we were first together. it made it difficult to breathe but was comforting at the same time. I put my fear of being held down aside, I put away the memories of panic attacks when I used to be forcefully restrained. I felt him, everywhere, and I talked about serious things.
I said "I love you" and I am not sure if I imagined his shock and fear or if it was actually there. maybe the contact of our skin directly transmitted it from him to me or maybe it just dripped down from his body. or perhaps there really was a catch in his breathing and a slight rigidity to his muscles the second after my confession. I have always preferred talking about these things in person, but it's so hard to face someone when you're pouring out your heart -- especially when it's something I didn't think was reciprocated.
so the darkness helped, being pinned face-down helped, being held in that submissive pose helped because it made me want to take control of the situation. I took my terror and transmuted it into action and then I took that action and transformed it into patience.
this is what I contemplate, months later. the darkness and the feeling of his body pressed against mine, words I wasn't sure he could hear because we weren't face to face, and the analogy that carries through it all. there are images every where to tell stories of our romance. I carry them with me like a card in my wallet, ready to pull it out at any time. memories comfort me like his voice in my ear, his heartbeat under my hand, his arms around me making sure nothing ever touches me the way he does.

Tuesday, September 6, 2005

02:50 a.m.

I was feeling ok about things. actually, tonight I was feeling empty and a little dead.
then I was struck by a memory, I started feeling him on me again and all these emotions poured into me and over me and suddenly I was submerged and drowning.
and I wondered what I had done.
I wonder what I'm doing. how could I even think about letting him go? how could I say "if you don't call me tomorrow then I'm writing you off?" that isn't fair. that doesn't make sense. that isn't love, it's control. this is fucking ridiculous and if I could, I would take back the entire night and fucking scrap it and just hold him close to me so I could feel his heartbeat and revel in the sensation of his breath on my throat. I would take it all back for his tears on my shirt, I would admit fault if it meant I could say I'm sorry. I forgot myself for a couple hours. this distance is so damn hard. I forgot that I'm ridiculously in love. I forgot that I'm happy with him.
but if he doesn't call ...
well ...
I guess I'll take things as they come. that's the path I've carved out for myself and this relationship. I'll see how true the things he's said before are. things like "I can't imagine my life without you."

Monday, September 5, 2005

09:30 a.m.

the tide is coming in
the first time he initiated "I love you" left me giddy and light-chested. it's been months but I still remember the feeling, I still relive it every day when he reminds me how he feels.
when I respond in kind, he says "awesome" and he means it. this isn't something that just happens to him. this isn't something that's ever happened to him.
I don't think I've been someone's first reciprocated love since I was 15, if ever.
like freeing someone of their virginity, it carries with it some responsibility. I've never been good at responsible love or taking things slow or doing anything the right way. this has all been a learning experience for me. for both of us. for us to let go and trust in our own ways.
my superstitions still pop up. I hope that in time they'll be eradicated. I hope I can be honest with him and myself and stop pretending to be things that I am not. even now I walk down the street and I don't want anyone else. I don't know if I've ever felt that way about anyone before.
I don't want to feel this way about anyone else. I want to hold onto it and rest my head against it and let it comfort me while we're apart.
I want this to always be different from everything I've ever felt and done.

Friday, September 2, 2005

05:18 p.m.

I know exactly what to say to hurt him. I know what to do to make him cry. I know the words, I know the movements, I know the verses, I know the songs and memories that get under his skin. I could do it, I could destroy him, I could make him collapse into nothing and want to die.
I'm not doing it. I'm not, but I want to. I want to hurt him because he swore he would never hurt me. but he did anyway. I am trying so hard not to dwell on this. I wanted this to be amiable and drama-free. I thought we could do that.
but now I am hurting and when I hurt all I want to do is make others feel my pain. specifically those that caused it. I don't know how to reconcile this.
I don't know what to do.

Thursday, August 25, 2005

09:10 p.m.

this morning
I woke to him slowly stroking my lower back and I wondered what it was that drew his hand to that spot. I stretched, getting used to the morning, and felt his hand move with me. it was so comfortable. it felt so good to wake up with him beside me, with him caressing me awake. I almost wished I'd pretended to be asleep, just to feel him touch me as gently as he had been.
the sunlight through the curtains and the fan on my face and his hand on my back and stretching awake at exactly the time I most like to wake up. all good things. all memories to keep me company until the next time.

Sunday, August 14, 2005

07:00 p.m.

poems that I found

12nov04
I took two lovers to a bridge
rusted and useless
leading nowhere.
one would only stand at the shore
scared of reprisal.
watched me wander
unworried by the daylight.
the other went all the way
despite his fear
and we stayed for hours
kissing in the dark.
if you flip these connotations
there is something ironic
almost honest.
I ache to realize
every bridge will hold their names,
disappointment and fulfillment
pointed endlessly at the sky.
waiting for the day
it can finally fall into the river
and find purpose once more.

Sunday, August 14, 2005

12:16 p.m.

let's find an analogy that doesn't sound trite, please?
I feel like I'm holding my arms up against the ocean, trying to keep it from the shore. Trying to block it from breaking into waves and swirling all around me. I am valiantly fighting this battle that I not only won't win, I can't. I can't win this but I am trying so hard to hold it all back. I am trying so hard to keep it where it is.
but I can't.
there will come a time when I realize this and I will drop my arms and let the water overwhelm me. it will cover me and encompass me and cradle me in its arms. it will toss me and scrape me and pummel me. and I will be better for it.
because as much as I write, there's so much more I want to say. that is my ocean, that is what I am holding back. it frightens me because of the hundreds of poems I wrote years ago that ended in the worst heart ache I've ever had. I am holding back (I know it's hard to believe). I am posturing (and he loves it).
when we are together I can forget everything. the world is beautiful and I feel like me again. right now there is nothing that I want here. right now I am waiting to see him again. right now I am fighting a losing battle against the ocean. the water is seeping through my fingers and the shells are swirling around my feet and any minute now, any minute now I am going to crack and get lost in the swirling of all the words I haven't been letting myself say.
I am so in love.

Monday, August 8, 2005

01:15 a.m.

strange adorations part 2
he has freckles underneath his eyes. every time I notice them I fall in love all over again.
it really is that simple. it's like that with the veins in his arms and the strength he hides and the moles scattered across his body and his crooked teeth and sensitive ears. it is so many small things. so many things that I randomly forget about but when I notice...
when I remember...
part of me is stolen away. I am gone. I am completely his, and he has no idea.

Friday, August 5, 2005

09:27 a.m.

my strange adorations
I keep thinking about your knees.
I think about body parts the way other people devour memories. I have your knees locked into my mind and now I keep remembering them: my hand on them, the feeling of them against my legs when we spoon in bed, the way they look, just everything about them.
I guess that's a weird thing to get stuck in my head. I've never gone all gooey about someone's knees before. thinking about anything on you would possibly make me loopy, just because it's you. because you have become part of this package that cannot be separated into pieces that are adored and are not adored. all of you is beautiful. there are things that caught me first (your eyes, your lips, your goddamn perfect hands) but now clearly everything is catching up.
you are so fucking beautiful. I can't wait to see you again.

Tuesday, August 2, 2005

12:27 p.m.

babbling on an old theme
I always wanted to be with artists so I could inspire them. but the artists I dated always focused on other things. my musician boyfriend never finished the song he started for me, all the writers wouldn't write, the photographer rarely used me in his pictures, if I was ever drawn I never saw it, and there is certainly no painting that exists with my face and frame. there might be a few poems around about my strawberry kisses, but they are nothing compared to the hundreds I wrote about their arms, lips, and actions.
when I was away for two months, three years ago, tophe wrote a program for me in visual basic. a few people have made me dinner, which is like art, but I can't hold that and say "that was inspired by me."
I know I'm too demanding. I know I pour all of me into someone and it ends up with this overflow of art and words and music in my head. I don't know why I forget that everyone else isn't like that too. but when I'm happy, I want everyone to know. when I'm anything, I want everyone to know. I want to describe it and show it and not let anyone forget. I want to be adored. and that's all my baggage, that is my issue. that is what I have to work out with myself. maybe that's why I did self-portraits for so many years -- if there was no one else to pay attention to me, at least I could. but in every art-form there is a piece of the artist and I wanted to see how my view compared to someone else's.
I want to be hard to forget.

Monday, August 1, 2005

07:22 p.m.

almost but not quite stream of consciousness
drunk on the floor, playing nintendo and lamenting about love and what the fuck am I doing again? oh, these friends I have that say "don't make decisions about your life when you've been drinking" and they aer the ones that used to hide their real lives from me because of my masked disapproval. I have become so many things I thought I would never be, either because I thought I wasn't able or because it went against beliefs at the time. so I was drunk, sitting on the floor, playing dr. mario and going through my options for the future trying to memorize what we were saying and the feelings it brought up. the dirt on the floor sticking to my legs, the sensation of just us together with the party in the kitchen, the sensation of just us together emotionally too because I could have been close to perfect for him if only he had been close to perfect for me. but he never has been and I would be too crazy and oh, I am in love with someone that I thought I'd never touch. I spoke his name all weekend to anyone who would listen, I explained away my fears and my reservations and I'm trying so hard to do what's best for me instead of what I want to do. I am trying so hard to do what my head and heart agree on instead of following one or the other. this is so hard, I need someone to hold me and say I am doing it all the right way but I don't know if I am.
I miss two years ago when I knew where I was, even if I didn't like it. but I've never let my life be easy. it just isn't my style. I love this love, and I love whom I love, but what if it isn't really as different as it feels? what if? why am I worrying? I should just go, I should just throw away the things I've been collecting in my life and my head, I should just go go go.
but not too far, oh no, not yet. I will take steps, not leaps, not yet. not yet.

Sunday, July 31, 2005

11:23 p.m.

one thing into another then back again
occasionally I try to write a poem. it usually doesn't go too well and my latest endeavor was no different. I used a metaphor that sang in my head but looked terrible as a poem.
like those lines that stand alone so well, but when combined with other words suddenly sound trite and dull.
it was about missing him. it was something like "I miss your car in my parking lot, your body in my bed" and then I faltered. in my head it had a rhythm and a beauty that was totally lost when applied to any other form. if I could open up my skull and let all the creativity take the shape it makes in my mind then maybe I would be seen for the genius I'm sure I must be.
but something garbles it on the way to the paper. every poem, story, prose, essay, drawing, painting, and song just gets fucked up. nothing is ever as beautiful as it is in my head. nothing comes out clear.
that is part of art.
that is part of creation.
sometimes, though, I just wish other people could see the way I do. see the things I want to, but am unable to, make. maybe someday I'll find a way; the right form of expression.
for now clumsy words will have to suffice.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

11:25 a.m.

I have realized the value of editing
he used to just breathe and I found it unnerving. he'd make no other noise but his heart rate increased, and the only way I knew I was doing anything right was the fact that we finished. I never wanted theatrics or huge pornographic moans, I just wanted to know I was having some effect. but I couldn't bring it up. people say, "you're too loud," I couldn't say, "you're too quiet."
something gradually started to change. maybe his silence had been a trust issue, maybe it was a comfort thing. but the last time we were together, in public, in a park, he pulled me to him and made a noise I'd never heard him make before and I wanted him so badly it hurt. it wasn't that I'd never wanted him that much, because I have. it was just the unexpectedness of his desire and the taboo of a public area and his hands on me and ... and everything. I have been watching him change. I am feeling myself change. this morning I woke up and I smiled. and I thought about his voice. I thought about his breathing. I thought about his heartbeat.
I thought about him.

Monday, July 25, 2005

11:17 a.m.

old topic re-re-revisited
he used to draw out the syllables of my name, like a moan or a murmur. he made me feel like someone else, as though I could escape myself. he put inside of me a flame that didn't die, even after he had killed me. a burning desire to get out of my hometown. the realization that I could, that it didn't have to be unmet plans or broken promises (despite all those he made with me; all those he made to me). he planted in my heart the love of cities (even though they scare me) and the need for the urban (though it disgusts me).
he added that extra syllable to my name and I could feel his arms around me. I could see his eyes half-closed as he made my name into a sigh. he sent me photographs of his smile so I would know what to look forward to. so I could see a side of him that no one else could hold.
after six years, I still remember. I remember the ember that set me aflame. even after hating him, and then finding peace, this is the relationship that each new love reopens. it is the wound whose scar I must re-examine each time I meet someone new. it is how I know I am in love.
by memories.

Tuesday, July 19, 2005

10:34 a.m.

this may or may not be true
I wish on dandelions for things that have already happened and for things I don't really want to occur. I wish because I rely on my jinxed personality to not supply it either by not happening or by it already being true. it's how I get by, it's how I survive.
it's the same with dreams. nothing is ever one hundred percent. I rarely dream about the past in flashback format. everything is tinted by my perception. the past is not the past in my dreams; it is a possible future that I missed out on. sometimes it is regret.
at some point I told myself to stop regretting. years ago? to live my life with no regrets. it is a struggle to rise against my defense mechanisms; a battle I don't always win. sometimes I just have to accept that. then I just have to move on.
I make wishes for a future I don't want but think I deserve. I make wishes in light of a past I could have avoided but didn't. all in the name of knowledge. all for the experience. to not regret.

Monday, July 18, 2005

01:03 p.m.

my secrets
I have learned that opportunity does not knock twice and it is best to grab things when they come around, because there's a good chance you'll never see them again; nothing is forever, no matter how it feels and how it is built up, change is inevitable; love is a source as powerful as the goddamn hippies say and it is something worth sacrificing much to feel if for no other reason than to feel; anxiety is easier for me to deal with than depression because I can do more with anxiety and escape it easier than depression; there is always balance for better or worse but knowing that is a weapon in itself; people are worth fighting for, not over; family is forever whether you like it or not; it's best to just say things as they come to you, otherwise they fester and can make a simple matter into something much more complex than it needs to be; to do lists are the key to my sanity.

Wednesday, July 13, 2005

12:09 p.m.

I am not confused
there are so many things I would say if I could find the words. meaning I would like to express; I have conditioned myself to expect nothing from the people I love because I have been let down so frequently. when I meet someone who wants me to have expectations it takes me by surprise. expectations isn't the right word though -- I always have expectations. maybe it's that I don't think they will fulfill them, so I start out in the red and it only compounds as the relationship progresses.
but he asks me to hold him accountable. he remembers things and notices. there are subtleties at work that I'm not entirely willing to acknowledge because it is actually approaching what I have wanted in a persyn. he didn't even know.
I could go on but I'm frightened that if I give these feelings a name then they will cease to be. or the opposite may happen and I will hold myself to them. words give power. power gives responsibility which in turn gives accountability. do I want to be held accountable?
I might, I might. soon.
just give it a little more time.

Monday, July 11, 2005

11:32 a.m.

snapshot
a photograph could have been taken of me in my robe, head under the table between two speakers, singing along to something that reminds me of us. I saw my reflection and I froze it in my mind so I could remember how I look when I'm happy; so I can drag that memory up for the future (because this is how I work -- with the constant knowledge of destruction but the total willingness to engage in that which precedes it because I know it will be worth it in the long run; I know that these things even out and there will be a balance and I would rather have the beauty and the pain than just the monotony of nothing and the realization that I never tried).
the only thing that could have been better is if you'd been there beside me, holding my hand, looking at our reflection in the bottom of a glass tabletop.
I make plans in my head for an uncertain future. but that's me, it's how I work, with uncertainties. I believe so strongly in order and in balance to the point that I must balance my beliefs so I end up in places I never thought I'd be (physically and emotionally). I already see us balancing each other. I'm already having dreams. trying not to get ahead of myself. trying, just trying, to make it work. it's all that I can ask for.

Friday, July 8, 2005