This is called "Not Rhyming."

Shout out to Gold Lion Arts' Poetry Greenhouse!

So as not to tread on your toes,

So that you cannot tread on mine,

I build a ten foot fence

Around my box,

Where I keep my distractions.

Anything to not feel

Or connect.

Let me be your other

I will make your pancakes

And your decisions.

I want to be needed by the needy unwanted.

Read me the map

And I’ll drive.  

Mimosa Hostilis: Round two.

Body vibrates, curls, uncurls. Mechanical whirring fills the head. Both ears ring.

“You again?”

*sigh*

“It’s okay sweetie, this happens to a lot of people who see the Truth. You come back a few days later, wanting to suckle at the teat of infinity. Well, I can show you again, but you’re not going to like it.”

Streaming: eyes, nose, pores.

Why does it feel different this time?

“You’ve already seen it now. The elation you experienced last time was largely due to receiving new information.”

I knew that. I know that.

I’ll just vibrate here in the puddle of insanity anyway. I’ll just nestle up to the Mother.

Too exhausted and weak to purge, I wearily hold onto the drip[, drip, drip] as it fumigates my brain.

{expelling your waste is key to the trip; if waste is held onto, no movement can be made in any direction. the overflowing energy MUST move, so instead of going forward or backward, it creates a tiny wormhole through which I travel to a new dimension of ego games.}

He reads poetry. Pretty rainbow lights, exploding flower prisms on the cloth walls of the blanket tent: a quiet spectacle surpasses roman candle displays. Ehts szO byoutifulll….He kisses the ripe fruit, drinks her nectar. Legs quake and shake. So much information for this newborn body to download.

He retreats when reality knocks on their door. 

So sensitive.

Tears flow freely here. The tiniest bite of pear is overwhelming to my new tongue.

Heart hardens.

“Shell must harden before you can hatch.”   

Thank you.

Scorpio Moon Ramblings.

This rhyme dictionary,

Collecting dust on the shelf:

I’m gonna use it

To string words together,

To free up my Self.

Without further ado,

Here’s Amira: Act two:

The spinning of our planet is making me seasick

When I lose control, I can be a real prick

When did I lose you?

Why did I chose you?

Your age, your sign, your face

Never mind,

This isn’t the time nor the place.

I can solve all the problems of the human race,

But put me, Like a rat,

Inside your maze,

That hall of dusty mirrors

Has me lost for days,

Months, three years now,

And I can’t get out.

No matter how loud I scream or shout

Nobody can hear me.

Nobody can find me.

I’m looking for the Way, the Tao, the Day

When my mind will be freed from the decay.

I'm looking for freedom 

From this encrypted shit I say,

When all I really want is to dream and play.

When All I Really want is for things to stay

Comfy and cozy, 

Keep my glasses rosy.

I want to build a Self, but not if it takes work.  

I want to build a you who isn't a jerk.

Or maybe a Me who doesn't get hurt. 

I'm not a Duke, I'm a writer.

I looked to the first people I knew to define me. 

She says, “You and David were my most strong-willed children.”

She also says, “David was always ambitious, but John is more intelligent.”

So THIS is what Intelligence looks like?

Will, Intelligence.

“Gifted” meant I (we) needed more homework? “Gifted” meant I suffered from paralyzing social anxiety by the time I was seven, to the point of making me vomit every morning before school in anticipation. I didn’t want to be gifted,  I wanted to be happy.

Ignorance is Bliss.

Stupidity could be ecstasy.  

The best I can do sometimes is feign ignorance.  

An Amira Onion: Where are you, Mircat?

Or, How much of myself is actually other people?

Ballet and drawing belong to my sister, Larissa. Larissa was make-up too.

Anxiety and panic come from my mother.

A need to compose myself, from my father.

Being self-conscious comes from every young woman in my life.

Self-loathing and resistance-to-existence, my brother John.

The tendency to see the world as a stage and every moment as a chance for a new, dazzling performance, from Matthew, the Core-mate.

Then there’s this tiny flame somewhere in my heart: the Constant, my personal Truth.

There are words I can accept as descriptive of my being. Who or what is this Amira-thing? 

What, in my family of seven children, was always mine? 

What did I do of my own accord? 

To Her Majesty, Arcadia Kalina

Before the doctors had even cleaned you up, they tossed you, writhing and screaming, onto my bare chest and pulled an ugly knit hat over your tiny conical head. You were puffy, red, gooey, and easily the most beautiful creature I'd ever laid eyes on. 

Being accustomed to warm, wet, dark, enclosed spaces, you were generally appalled by the cold, dry, bright, open multiverse. In a sort of silent protest, you refused to open your eyes for a good long while, perhaps hoping that if you couldn't see the world, it would go away.   

Now, about thirty baths later, you're finally getting the hang of this world-thing you were thrust into. Digestion isn't as horrifying, smiles and frowns take turns on your visage, you've discovered some remarkable appendages at the ends of your arms, and you can even tolerate a diaper change for more than a millisecond.

Starry-eyed and full of wonder, you begin to explore the universe. Some things, like stuffed yellow bunnies who light up and sing at you, inspire great pleasure to your senses. Other things, like the sound of velcro or sneezes, offend you entirely. There is much for you to see and experience, little Arcadia. I feel indescribably lucky to have my first front-seat viewing of the human journey. 

Shining, Shimmering, Splendid.

I adore the day after a night of rain. The grass and trees are all well-fed and meet the eyes with a green splendor incomparable to that of a merely sunny day.

The earth is damp, still absorbing.

The moss is bloated like someone after a thanksgiving feast.

The sun hides partially behind clouds, brightening but not blinding.

The air is warm, but with a crispness reminiscent of autumn.

I wish every day could be the day after a night of rain.

Tear Gland Malfunction.

I am suddenly terrified that I will die before I can convince everyone I know how much I love them and how grateful I am to have them in my life. Every blooming moment I spend not showing people that I care for them is a moment (selfishly) wasted.

X_X

Writing and Worrying.

Today I submitted at least five different works to Yahoo Contributor. I just tossed my writing into the ionosphere for review. Furthermore, I whipped up two entire poems especially for assignments. What a hoot! One was a mother’s day poem while the other was a Shakespearean sonnet.

At first, I was intimidated by the sonnet assignment. I mean, iambic pentameter? Fourteen lines consisting of three quatrains and a couplet? Waaayyyy too specific. I don’t love either of the pieces I came up with, but we shall see if the universe does in due time.

Who are these people that read and judge my poetry? What sort of subjects appeal to them? I wish there were a way to know my editors. *BIG SIGH*

A Dream I once had.

So I wake up and I’m in a really blank apartment. Bare white walls, the sofa I’m laying on is white, the carpet is white- when I say it the apartment sounds sort of sterile in a heavenly way but that’s not what it’s like. This isn’t a pristine, holy white- it’s a dead white. Like if all the lifeblood could be drained from an apartment, this is what it would look like.
Anyway, I’m on the sofa and I look round for the source of my consciousness- and it’s my younger brother, Truth. He looks really eager and nervous. And there’s something else, something off. I ask him what’s wrong and he does his signature “uncomfortable” face and takes me to look out the window.
We’re maybe fifty stories up and my belly squirms with vertigo. Outside has the same deadness as the apartment only there’s an enormous commotion. People rioting- and not in a rebellious way. They all just look confused. It’s not like they’re trying to destroy the world, it’s like they’re trying to destroy themselves because they don’t know what else to do. I go to exchange a concerned look with Truth but he smirks at me and says, “We won’t die.”
I don’t know what he means by this so I ignore it but then he jumps out the window. Fifty stories up and he just jumps right out like it’s nothing. I feel like I’m the one plummeting. When he hits the pavement with a wrenching crunch of broken bones, he gets right back up and looks up at me and waves. Sigh, okay- it’s okay- he’s okay. But I’m not about to follow suit so I take the elevator.
There’s two men in the elevator: Man number one keeps shooting himself in the head, he raises the gun to his crown, pulls the trigger, the bullet rushed through his head, but there’s no blood: no blood, no brain particles, no chunks of skull, nothing. His head jerks back and before he can hit the ground he pops back into the starting position, gun in hand, ready to repeat the process over again, and he does. The other is repeatedly walking into the walls. There’s no talking to these people- they’re completely useless in this state.
Truth runs up to me when I come outside. I can tell that he’s scared but amused. Hundreds of people are in the street, and they’re all trying to kill themselves. They’re running in front of cars, slitting their wrists, nooses hang from every branch of every tree- but nobody is dying.
“What happened to everyone?” I ask Truth, my gaze fixed on a man in a jeep who keeps driving into the same brick building. Truth bites his lip and follows my gaze- the jeep hits the building and the man sort of bounces off the airbag, reverses, then starts it over.
“I think we’re already dead,” Truth answers. I nod distractedly and scan the rest of the crowd but my eyes snap back to Truth. I notice he has a slitting scar across his throat and I see that everyone- every person in the crowd has the same scar. I feel my neck and I’ve got it too.
A blonde guy with a kitchen knife stumbles up to me. I realize that he’s wearing the same expression as everyone else: it’s like a bewildered stupidity. I get the impression that everyone woke up like I did but over the course of the day they lost their minds. It looks like they’re all stuck in a loop. At any rate, the blonde guy’s loop is stabbing himself in the abdomen. He falls into me and I catch him at first but the sight of his idiot face is disgusting so I let him drop.
Truth and I wordlessly agree that we should keep moving so we start walking down the street, dodging the suicidal lunatics. We reach a point where the road veers right and Truth jumps out of the way to not be run over by a Buick Le Sabre- but I’m not so quick as that. I use a tree branch to pull myself up onto the hood and there’s a balding man and his family inside, looking truly horrified. I lunge off the hood into the grass- which is green but with a loss of saturation, like sun damage on an old photo.
There’s a creek past the trees where people are attempting to drown themselves- I shake my head bemusedly. We trudge on without a destination in mind and we see two people we definitely recognize.
Mum and dad with the same scars and expressions as the rest of these maniacs. They look like they’re caught in a loop of killing each other, which is refreshing. Truth throws me an exasperated glance and I know what he’s saying: “Everyone else is killing themselves but mum and dad are at each other. Typical.”
And I’ve lost it. And I wake up and the Fords are eating waffles.

The Instruction Permit.

I am twenty-one years old and unlicensed.

The story goes a little something like this:

I dropped out of high school in the middle of my freshman year. I’d been having seizures and anxiety issues that combined and combusted, causing a total intolerance for the high school atmosphere as well as my peers. There was this intense point in the cafeteria when I felt like I was hearing every single stupid little melodramatic and arrogant conversation being held as if it were right inside my head. They were all so loud, obnoxious and unnecessary. I had a flash of the big picture and realized I did not, for a twinkling, want to spend four years getting caught up in teenage culture.

So, in short, driver’s ed was out of the picture unless I felt like paying the 500 clams.

The years rolled by and my desire to drive decreased to the point of nonexistence. Frankly, cars are a waste of money and driving is a waste of time. Do you people have any idea how much of your lives you spend in the car doing nothing? As a passenger, I can do all sorts of things. As a driver, I have to drive. The end.

Also, cars seem like they are never a good investment. There are always going to be problems and constant upkeep. The fuel is too expensive and the automobile is murdering our planet. Can anyone, with good conscience, support this foolish industry? The driving culture became on par with the once-loathed teenage culture.

So then why did I, a day ago, pass a ridiculously simple driving permit test (I swear there were ten questions- this permits me to drive somehow)?

One possible answer: I’m caving. I’m giving into societal norms.

Another possibility: I’m tired of being dependant on everyone to get places. SO much in my life has been the way it is because I can’t drive myself and have never wanted to. Now that I’m going to be a mama, I don’t want to need the world to drive me around. Very simply, this is freedom.

Scary, I-have-no-idea-how-much-room-the-car-takes-up-on-the-road freedom.

(wish me luck)

Some kind of hobby.

Hey y'all!

I recently joined Yahoo! Contributor!

CHECK ME OUT!!!

Shortly after which, I was published:

POEM!!!

Gimme some internet traffic, and I will <3 you forevermore.

A Seven Card Progression.

I did this spread on the ninth of this month using my niece's deck: The Golden Tarot of Klimt. It was a general "What forces are at work in my life right now?" sort of inquiry.

1. The Past: The Lovers- sensuality, love, passion, profound tie, intimacy.

2. How You Saw Yourself at the Time: 8 Swords Reversed- family impediments, hidden dangers, inability to escape a situation, psychological or emotional dependency.

3. What You Learned: Temperance- moderation, ability to analyze, wisdom, serenity, purity.

4. Your Present Circumstances: Justice- harmony, order, equilibrium, severity.

5. New Circumstance About to enter Your Life: The Hanged Man Reversed- sacrifice, punishment, reconsideration, humiliation.

6. How They Will Affect You: 4 Wands- agreement, prosperity, successful opportunities, sharing of happiness.

7. The Outcome: Knight of Chalices Reversed- short lived love affairs, escape from reality, useless undertakings, dissatisfaction.

SoOo that made me justly nervous about my THEN upcoming visit to Minnesota. >.<

Ready, Set, Go.

I am 27 weeks pregnant with the above-pictured little lady. She spends her days dancing and wiggling in a warm dark pool, unaware that her every movement makes me smile. I like to entertain the idea that, at one point, I could bring such unadulterated joy to someone without trying.

In under ten weeks she'll be thrust into the world, screaming her head off in reaction to the blindingly bright and comparatively cool hospital room. As it is, she cannot possibly fathom what lies before her.

Is it naive to imagine that my concept of reality is any better informed than hers? I've been residing in this comfortable little reality womb my whole life, more or less. At the least, this reality is a little bigger than what she's accustomed to. >.<

Some Poems.

Inspired by our first few lines:

Balancing eternal harmony with the one of twoness is my goal.

Blazing passions gnashing and combusting the sterile icecaps of my soul,

Beating and burning, my fiery heart will disobey and melt the glaciers in my mind.

What could be the purpose of always making two of every kind?

The pairing of the genders, yin and yang, ourselves defined:

The only way to trump this is to unite and let our whole bodies unwind

The only way is to unite- let’s make our flaming hearts collide.

What it actually turned into:

With raging rapids of raw vigor, your cycling soul is now complete.

A melting molecule escaped to nurture your defeat.

The solitary syllable poured forth without a notion of deceit.

Within that soft lick, my purs'd lips could not taste so fast, so bitter, or so sweet.

Blazing passions gnashing and combusting, the sterile icecaps start to wane,

Breathing and churning, my fiery heart ceases listening to my cooled brain.

This Time No, this time no.

"Love that will not betray you,

dismay or enslave you,

It will set you free."

PAINTING!

From:

Star, Emperor, 3Cups- as drawn for mon frere, David.

I grow weary of

Everything in moderation,
Incarcerating obligations,
Meeting expectations,
Knowing limitations.
So
Hurl me into the ocean
Watch my half-felt emotions
Writhe in realization
My destruction, earth’s creation.
My damnation, liberation.
As
The body finds totality
In the crushing pain of reality
By overcoming its duality,
And accepting immortality.
Then
A hydrating assassination
Ceases respiration.

Discordian Graves?

Dead Cow Farm
"An ancient saga tells us how
In the beginning the First Cow
(For nothing living yet had birth
But Elemental Cow on earth)
Began to lick cold stones and mud:
Under her warm tongue flesh and blood
Blossomed, a miracle to believe:
And so was Adam born, and Eve.
Here now is chaos once again,
Primeval mud, cold stones and rain.
Here flesh decays and blood drips red,
And the Cow’s dead, the old Cow’s dead."
-Robert Graves

"To diverse gods

Do mortals bow;

Holy Cow, and

Wholly Chao."

The Telepathic Monkey