Capturing

To labor is to pray

2011-08-17T19:10:00.001-07:00

Would I feel closer to life, to death, to earth, to my soul

if I had a trade

To create beauty where there was none before

To use strength and human spirit as the tools of my success

And to measure that success, not with dollar bills, but with nods of admiration and awe

Threading the very loom of my existence with pure joy

To collapse into deep slumber after working

Rough calloused hands until they bled satisfaction

Bring me back to that place of sweat, sunshine and peace

2011-08-16T20:48:00.000-07:00

Meditation Dome

2011-08-16T20:42:00.001-07:00

2011-08-16T20:41:00.000-07:00

The Winner

2011-03-22T20:00:00.001-07:00

I am the lucky winner, customer # 1,111.

I am accosted upon entry, showered with gawdy confetti and

congratulations for my luck at being the one to wander in at just the right moment.

I don’t want your crappy prize; the prize that’s just been sitting in the store room collecting dust anyway.

Customer 1112, you’re the lucky bastard

The Game

2011-03-22T19:57:00.001-07:00

Outside the peripheral scope and beyond the horizon
You linger
I want to say I want you
But the borders between us are too wide and treacherous
Scattered with sharp remnants of the past
Clutching to our tenderness
We exchange love like hostages
A crack in your flawless shell, I search for
I will not tell you these things out of fear
And the hesitation I feel from you
We will continue to play hide and seek until
Exhausted after a long game on unforgiving terrain
We fall into each other, for
Only together can we explore the flowering softness beneath

Thief in the Night

2011-03-22T19:55:00.001-07:00

He whispered in my ear the first time, breath laced with intoxication,

I love you

Not knowing where it came from or where it was going.

Spinning together in solitary wonder

We peer into one another other as into a well

What do you see between my black drawn on lines and smokey illusions?

Your love is that of a protector and villainous thief

You’ve stolen my icy heart

Now melting against my will, exposing every delicacy

Under your glowing sun

Life and I Having a Chat

2010-11-16T20:23:00.000-08:00

Life: Wake up. There is something I want you to learn.

Me: Yaaaaawn, I’m tired.

Life: Wake up. I’m talking to you.

Me: Jesus Christ, I’m trying to sleep. What do you want?

Life: I want you to listen to what I have to say. I need to teach you something.

Me: I already have a degree, now go away.

Life: This is a lesson that can only be learned out there in the world and within yourself. Not on the pages of a book.

Me: I like books.

Life: I don’t care what you like. LISTEN.

Me: Fine. You woke me up. You’ve got my attention, so this better be good. I get cranky at work if I don’t get enough sleep.

Life: Good. Are your eyes open?

Me: Yes.

Life: No, they’re not liar. Open your eyes.

Me: Fiiiiine.

Life: Good work, now don’t close them. Ever. No matter how much you want to or how much life exhausts you, keep them open.

Me: You’re kinda pushy.

Life: When you feel pushed around that’s just me nudging you; reminding you to keep your eyes open, because you’ve started nodding off again.

Me: Can I go back to sleep now?

Life: Yes. When you wake up and open your eyes you will see the first day of the rest of your life.

Me: Cool. Nighty night.

Life: Good night Meryl. Sweet dreams.

Rushing Air

2010-11-16T19:46:00.000-08:00

Serrated bluffs afar,

Self perpetually cascades toward an unknown,

As fate would have it.

Rushing air whirls upwards

Glides past skin, moist

attached.

Shroud of warm dew over

Sun-touched membrane

seperates

Air from flesh.

Transmuted pale blue overhead,

Receding cloudscape.

Peircing sky evanesces to euphoric rememberance.

Rushing air floods in a stream around this body
   de
   tached
   f
   a
   l
   l
   i
   n
   g

~I wrote this several years ago, but it rings true again.

Song of the day (well, song of every day)

2010-11-11T08:08:00.000-08:00

Poem (I Can’t Speak for the Wind)

2010-11-10T20:39:00.000-08:00

I don’t know about the cold.

I am sad without hands.

I can’t speak for the wind

Which chips away at me.

When pulling a potato, I see only the blue haze.

When riding an escalator, I expect something orthopedic to happen.

Sinking in quicksand, I’m a wild appaloosa.

I fly into a rage at the sight of a double-decker bus,

I want to eat my way through the congo,

I’m a double agent who tortures himself

and still will not speak.

I don’t know about the cold,

But I know what I like I like tropical madness,

I like to shake the coconuts

And fingerprint the pythons,-

Fevers which make the children dance.

I am sad without hands,

I’m very sad without sleeves or pockets.

Winter is coming to this city,

I can’t speak for the wind

which chips away at me.

~James Tate

Sulphur and Iron

2010-10-30T15:10:00.000-07:00

Click here for video: Strindberg And Helium With Sulphur And Iron

Sometimes in our despair we forget that happiness is only a small, pink, adorable bubble away. Now I just need Helium to bring me a cupcake. WHERE'S MY CUPCAKE!!!

Lost at Sea

2010-10-28T21:43:00.000-07:00

And we pass like two lost ships in the night

No navigation to guide us,

blindly adrift in complete darkness

Each hoping we choose our course wisely

Each hoping the stars will guide us to harbor

as soon as the cloud cover disintegrates

The only sound; dark as oil tide rhythmically lapping against the hull

And the stark sea splitting with each movement forward

To never know where shore is

Nor the sharp rocks that mean our demise

To never know where the sparkling blue of home waters lie
leaves one bereft

Each captain praying to their respective gods

That a trusting crew has not been led to a cold and listless grave,

never to be found

Deck hand's names carved into the limestone on the shores of a foreign land

The stuff of legends

What now?

2010-10-26T19:45:00.001-07:00

Dexter; a Tree

2010-10-04T20:57:00.000-07:00

The Fifth Season or Thoughts on Being Alone

2010-09-07T21:42:00.000-07:00

On warm nights such as this, I remember that two can be better than one

For hugs, expectations, fights, and twilight bike rides.

This night brings a tender moment and the realization that a white sheet floating down like summery petals on the body/clouds/softness can’t exist with only one.

This soft summer fades to a different season, a fifth season.

A time with no death, no renewal, no hurricanes nor morning breeze.

A season of regret and doubt. Of uncertainty and longing. Of rememberance.

The void in me now stands shivering and bare;
as an empty well, fraught by the drought of this season, waits to be filled

Seattle Subway

2010-09-07T16:50:00.001-07:00

somewhere

2010-08-16T17:20:00.000-07:00

strange jane

strange costume, wearing a strange face

white dress, red shoes

black hair, black eyes, black heart

poor elijah

drawn on lines to disguise trembling eyes.

under a stark, black t-shirt,

lies a pink, naked heart

somewhere is a strange place

a place where the sun glares through dark gray

a place where the costume decays

and all that remains is raw gospel

Black is the Color

2010-07-22T21:06:00.000-07:00

A Trying Day

2010-07-04T09:57:00.001-07:00

Daybreak and already the onslaught knocks on my headboard

To sleep is to ignore. I hit the snooze button.

Before long Michelle Norris reminds me of all that transpired while

I was dreaming about rubber duckies floating on tiny marshmallow waves.

Car bombs, personal trangressions of prominent world leaders,

The Englishman who ate a thousand nettles to prove he was a man

Remind me my dreaming self is gone.

Good morning world!

I brush my teeth in the utility sink and and have a nagging feeling I’m a failure.

Shit. The rest I do on automatic.

I put on the face expected and the attitude expected like a well worn mask.

Normalcy takes the reins…10am coffee break…taco truck lunch…back to the grind.

Michael Jackson died today and I feel sadder than expected, but tell no one.

Listened to Dirty Diana 4 times in a row on the train.

Looking out over the water as I cross the bridge

I consider Alfonsina Storni and that last fatal slow stroll into the sea

And wonder if I will ever want anything with that much conviction.

Then the sun hitting the water blinds me suddenly.

Sunshine is overrated, who wants to see this mess lit up anyway?

Pike Place Creamery

2010-06-06T19:47:00.000-07:00

Rummage Hall, Pike Place Market

2010-06-06T19:40:00.001-07:00

2010-06-06T19:23:00.001-07:00

2010-06-06T19:16:00.001-07:00

Rummaging for Self Worth

2010-06-06T19:06:00.000-07:00

Maggie, wearing baggy dollar bin sweatpants, stringy blond pony tail and sticky palms Her junkie boyfriend swaying in the wind like a used car dealership windsock man,

Stops at bank of newspaper stands and thinks

Maybe this is where I left it

Buried in the nickel want ads and escort service flyers

Her ragged hands, a finger wrapped in a cigar ring (a sign of Junkie’s affection),

Search through stacks of papers and words for that moment when she went from

Waitress to Junkie’s girlfriend, street rat

She meticulously collects each free weekly in her shaking arms

So she can peruse them later,

When alone,

She can get down to the business of finding what she lost

Moon and Calacas

2010-06-02T22:28:00.001-07:00

2010-02-28T20:27:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T20:24:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T20:20:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T20:17:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T20:13:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T20:05:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T19:41:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T19:33:00.000-08:00

2010-02-28T19:30:00.000-08:00

I'm Wondering What's Over There

2010-02-21T15:29:00.000-08:00

2010-01-24T17:44:00.000-08:00

2010-01-24T17:42:00.000-08:00

2010-01-20T21:53:00.002-08:00

2010-01-16T21:02:00.000-08:00

2010-01-16T20:33:00.000-08:00

2010-01-16T20:24:00.001-08:00

To blog or not to blog? I felt a need to share...stuff, so here you go world.

2010-01-16T20:19:00.000-08:00

2010-01-16T20:13:00.000-08:00

2010-01-16T20:11:00.000-08:00

2010-01-16T20:07:00.000-08:00