Ana.

Please,

let me be

simply

Ana.

Let me live

as an essay without abstract,

pirate’s trunk without treasure map,

and undocumented comet.

Define me, if you must,

as an improvised patchwork being,

ephemeral mirage,

and gypsy collage.

Don’t make me claim

a country of ancestral descent,

language of origin,

or family tree.

I will not pronounce

a bulleted outline of my life’s agenda,

exegesis of past occurrences,

or report of my present sentiments.

I do not fit into

a personality test result,

list of implied obligations,

or eternal legacy of inborn traits.

Save your myopic documentary of this soul’s aura

for my epitaph

floating from a nomadic breath of wind

down to the rise and fall of the restless Pacific.

Cows

The faded sky cries.

These eyes can’t.

I’m over it all though,

Of course.

Wind flies between my fingers.

Take me away.

Fast.

Please!

Cows feed their babies.

Where’s mine?

Can I be a cow?

That would be more funner.

I wish I were a poet.

That would be romantic.

And dramatic.

But I’m too tired tonight.

Let’s go to Cuba.

Forget school.

I can be a maid!

Can I be yours?

So, I think we should get married.

Cuz I like you

And today you said my ears look good.

I think that’s a pretty good reason.

I’m not high,

FYI, Mr. Polo-and-Sperry’s!

I’m going to be a real counselor when I grow up.

Since I guess I can’t really be a cow.

Cramps

Quiet cramps kill ambition

Invisibly eating strength

Diluting muscle

Inside

Slouching sloth seeking relief

Horizontally active attempt

Ease pain

Bedridden

Medicine meanders millimetrically slow

Finally settles sedatively

Deep drowsiness

Erases

Hi

I waited

For the sky blue box

To pop up in the corner of my screen

Saying “hi”

From you

One syllable

To free my heart

And tell me you care

At least

That’s how I read it

Or would read it

If only you

Wrote to me

Right now

Wherever you are

But you aren’t

And I don’t understand

What goes on in your thoughts

Or

What doesn’t

I skipped dinner

I skipped dinner

again

to avoid you.

Your shape,

my eyes dodge it

instinctively.

Those eyes

soft

menacing.

Is it me

who makes them spear my lungs?

Am I irrational?

Really,

what is your face?

Your eyes?

What are you,

but a feeling,

but pain?

Why should it hurt?

Happy memories

that are no more,

…that are no more.

I killed

them

mostly

didn’t I?

I did.

Emphasis on the “I”

I killed them.

I ended it

us being Taco Bell hobos,

homework parties past dawn,

memories on The Couch,

tickle fights.

It was my choice.

My decision.

I also put an end to the other fights though.

Those with tears.

Arguments

that demanded Excedrin.

Too much.

That left me alone

when I shouldn’t have been.

I ended it.

Yet I fear you.

What is it

that makes me seem an ant

soon to be squished

in a boy’s fist?

Being replaced

so easily

and seeing you happy

now with her?

Wondering if she’s just as “amazing”?
Sitting

watching you do with her

what you once did with me?

Probably d.)

All of the above.

It hurts.

A lot.

Still.

So I skipped dinner

again.

London

I got lost in London

To find myself,

I thought.

To figure out who this person I call me

Might be.

I looked for traces of me

In the slim blonde businessman

Chuckling with old friends at a pub

Over a chilled Guinness.

I looked in a fishnet-clad girl

Searching vacantly for a customer

On a lonely street corner.

In a blue-eyed boy

Staring at me

As he clings to his mother’s skirt.

I even looked in a mob of hungry grey pigeons

And a bottle of Spanish wine

For something that was me.

I found London has a culture

And I want to belong to it.

I want to have old friends

To drink a Guinness with

I need a street corner

That feels mine.

Even pigeons belong to a park.

No.

I didn’t find me.

I spied on a city full of people

With their lives rooted in London.

I didn’t find me.

I found people

With roots I’ve never had.

So I drank

The bottle of Spanish wine that is not me.

But it only made me more blurry.

Vodka

Vodka would be good.

White amnesia. Sleeping freefall.

From abrasive, toxic, agony… reality.

Glaring scrutiny of my naked, broken soul.

Strength pleads fiercely for recess.

Inhaling deep, under a crushing, acrid ocean.

From plastic smiling cold, lonely frown.

For an inviting audience of his mocking fools.

Writer's block

16 minute minutes remain

empty ideas doused

brain soaked thoughtless swamp

roll, sit up, stretch

stumble to sink

ponder mirror

splash water to face

inhale

receive inspiration

Seaweed

local foreigner of everywhere
with a rootless seaweed soul
floating forever ahead
leaving forever behind
fragments of nothing concrete
as today’s currents drift
to the next atlas page

Nonexistent

sworn to abstain

from mentioning

callous infidelity

against the soul

who cherished him

until he extinguished

that capability in her

and morphed love

into a taboo enigma

We breathe

We most often play

we are happy

and full

though in the bathroom

or in bed

at night

we really get naked

and maybe cry

or not

but we let ourselves,

the real us,

out to

breathe

Bees

She murdered some bees

with a towel and a beach.

Squish squash went each

to their finish so… final.

She shadowed them

smothered them

smashed them

til they reached their end

under her strong hand

striking the sand

as her friends looked on quizzically.

Powerful, she towered

victorious, she loomed

triumphant, she billowed

as she stood so victorious

among corpses of the notorious

who had lived as laborious

as stinging insects generally do.

Alas, her big toe

was poked

pricked

pierced

for despite their disastrous defeat

they took their revenge on her feet.

Now forever she’ll quietly retreat

when she sees a bee on a beach... and has a towel handy.