TALKING SHIT ABOUT A PRETTY SUNSET//BLANKETS AND OPINIONS THAT I'LL PROBABLY REGRET SOON

i was lucid dream-thinking this. what i had in my head isnt what i've written down . this is a thought twice removed.

a bad habit. a selfish, painful, mutual love-drugged addiction. it was never enough to save me from feeling lost. the more i gave of myself, the more i missed myself. only believing that it was something more than habitual .

this is the most selfless love. there are no expectations. there is no right or wrong. i don't feel empty. i don't feel obligated.  i haven't lost myself. there is no missing. there is no sadness. there is only this feeling. this innate sense of validation. like i belong in my head. like these outside bits and these inside bits formed something sane and stable. like my thoughts are worthwhile. i will feel this until i don't and i wonder if i'll ever not. 

RED BLOODED, WHITE SKINNED, OH AND THE BLUES

so now i try to keep up
i've been exchanging my currency
while a million object pass through my periphery
now i'm rubbing my eyes cause they're starting to bother me
i've been starring too long at the screen

where was it when i first heard that sweet sound of humility?
it came to my ears in the god damn loveliest melody
how grateful i was then to be part of the mystery
to love and to be loved
let's just hope that is enough.

ANXIETY

i'm focusing on better management of my anxiety. i think here (when i'm in the US) it becomes much more obvious to me. or perhaps it has gotten much more intense in these last months, though when i look back, i'm sure it was always there before, too...... maybe it is because i don't have a close group of friends that i feel comfortable doing anything or nothing at all with. every social interaction seems forced, strained, like i'm overexerting myself, like i'm forcing connection. like the situation revolves around my every action and hangs off each of my words. 

this week i will limit my caffeine and alcohol intake - surely this has some impact, because i've sworn by coffee this entire year - something to make me awake and focused and not irritable. but perhaps it's done more damage than good. i'm going to compliment people who i see on campus. i'm not going to avoid interaction in passing with others.  i'm not going to overcompensate in casual conversation.  i'm not going to plan every interaction i have word-for-word.  i'm not going to toss around a conversation i had for hours, even days, and wonder if i said the wrong thing - because, honestly, who's got time for that? and surely the other person doesn't either.  

i'm going to continue exercising every day - yoga - meditation - clear my head, become my body.  don't skip meals. stop weighing myself. don't focus on what i dislike about my figure. 

i can't keep living in this way - fearing even the most mundane, monotonous exchanges. every day life has become a struggle to breathe with so much pressure. all because of this anxiety that has suddenly crept up. and i know it stems from the stress that school generates, but it is crippling even the slightest chance i had at enjoying these last few months here. in my head, i get this idea that with these looming tasks before the end of the semester, if i don't complete them right now, or perfectly, i absolutely cannot function until they are completed. i keep a tedious list of every moment of every day and something is just sick about that - especially because i feel like i need that to keep me afloat. 

dear my own lifetrinkets & everything 

write letter to 31-year-old self

hug the sunshine 

yoga 

treat body like it's as fragile as a child's: 

feed it well, let it take naps, make it go outside, don't let it stay still for too long

stop obsessing over the small stuff 

stop meticulously planning every moment 

stop living by staring at that clipboarded schedule 

remember to breathe

remember that you are here for you and you are the first priority 

dont be afraid to say no and remember that you cannot do everything 

stop trying

you're killing yourself trying to do everything

AN EMPTY PACK OF CIGARETTES BY THE BED

locked carelessly together in a stranger's bed. with our clothes on the floor i remember crying not quite silently to the room. into the blankets. into the pillow soaking up your drunken head. my arm going dead underneath you. my words like shards of glass in my throat. every slur was an attempt to swallow them, shrink them back down. i pushed you awake with forceful trembles. i couldn't be alone anymore with these drunk and sobbing tangles i kept finding myself in. i'm almost screaming out at you now. surely audibly. it was someone's birthday. stole their bed on their birthday and successfully failed each other for the last time. i couldn't even pry your eyes open. none of my words sunk in at all. that is the most alone i ever felt. you in your blissful stupor, my body sweating into yours. holding on to a person who i couldn't reach, in a body that wasn't familiar, but would never again be as familiar as in that moment. retrospectively, that was the most honest and familiar encounter we had.

PROVE TO ME I'M NOT GOING TO DIE ALONE

today i
drew on seven tattoos with a sharpie
maybe in the summer they are something that i can make permanent

today i
woke up at 7:20 because my body told me to say hello to the morning
hot green tea with honey
didn't inhale
yoga
twice

today i
looked through the books i read as a child
particularly one on unicorns
and another on horses and ponies
and i think that that is why

today i
completed my tie-dyed shirt
hooped to gold panda
got called kath
felt extra alive driving home
made a packing list for my second european summer
of living out of a suitcase

most importantly
today i
took care of myself

4 WEEKS

i can't believe everything.
or
anything.

i dont love you but i live with the idea of you. you're the best idea i've ever had.


(so much is supposed to happen in these next four weeks. and then what? i am stuffing my brain with physics of sound waves & formations. do you prefer vowels or consonants? i can tell you everything about them. SIETE repuestas. y qué?)

the first and final year in this apartment. packing up my things i feel an emotion for the first time in a long time. living and moving with strangers. clean sheets and clean thinks. in the end i can tell myself- i did grow in this apartment. early 2014, language melts in my head. i feel one less heavy. but i cant feel the world vibrate anymore. that's how i exist.

"at each moment we begin again, as ripe for a low blow as we were the moment before."

i wish that timers had camel scandals
candles

sift around as sea pollution. see? pollution.

imagine your kneecap as the great wall of china.
u do u

i don't think about bats enough.
the noun not the verb.


treat everyone like their kneecap is the great wall of china.



treat everyone like a rare sea anemone
spicy meatball sub
bears
ANYTHING that i wasnt expecting



because all the nightthoughts get wasted on endless scrolling

BECAUSE OF THE WONDERFUL THINGS SHE DOES

ool
ovf
peep

and i drink this green tea, which i quietly made, in the corner of this mind.
and i say goodbye to her.
because we have to.
(it's not because of before. not the kissing in 12-story bathrooms with my best friend, asking "where are you" or demanding "let's practice")
no

but because i can't compete.
i cannot stop my feelings. they exist by themselves. a separate being, and i tell them to stop. i tell them all of the time, stop.
so i try to uphold this image,
being different than what my feelings say.
and that's what is so hard.

0:00.

concerned about: how to make self feel better?

being here means feeling quite alone. running from here to there. without time, without anyone.

check out books from the library. monitor the daylight through the window, typical on a sunday. have brunch at blackadder. wash bedding. remember how a shower makes a new start to the day possible. read moon palace again. clean the space im in. donate the clothes i dont wear. grocery shopping. go for a run. small movements in big places. listen to sounds. smoke some, have tea.

dont think about how you prefer the person you were before, at a different time, on a different day, in a different phase. remember how interests and hobbies change. stretches. burn candles. dont look at old photos until they dont hurt anymore. take a warm drive, scream a warm song. write more concisely. dig more music without words, life soundtracks. take out the garbage. literally and figuratively. sit by the water. sit in the sun. sit in the sun by some water. sit in the shade. find out what makes you grow. study language, study literature. cook something healthy.

smell clean air, open the windows, watch the curtains dance. put your hand out, please the neurotic tend\encies, be partially inside and out. stick your feet out. light a spliff. dont focus on the distance. focus on the feeling that is very here and present despite the distance.

listen to the sounds of the outside and wonder who else hears it. feel the smoke enter, exit, filter, fly. think about dying your hair a lot of the time when really you're actually quite satisfied. see the purples, aquas, dark blues of the lights below. fall in love with characters in books. dont wonder about the future. onedayatatime. connect the shapes. sort the copies. cradle the soap box. shuffle the card deck. cut the simpleton. swat the cornfield. clarifying the sunshine. string out the crowd. wondering about vegetable gardening.

STILL

lonely for accepting the broken bits
lonely for being too drunk to finish a lucky strike
lonely for complimentary breakfast
lonely for strange beds
lonely for forks and knives

lonely for holding
lonely for broken shoes
lonely for ripped tights and painted faces
lonely for the morning

lonely for southern kindness
lonely for castillo de gredos, boxed, warm
lonely for sunless months
lonely for closed aquariums

lonely for västerbron
lonely for anything gentle
lonely for streets filled with people
lonely for wondering if we've lost it

lonely for eating the flowers
lonely for naps in cafe string
lonely for nights spent on public transport
lonely for marshmallow battles

lonely for a genuine connections
lonely for the car ride to colonia jardín
lonely for tapas and mahou
lonely for overpriced clubs and taking the first train home

lonely for reading and iced coffee
lonely for las resacas en el retiro a la sombra
lonely for unpredictability
lonely for björnkulla
lonely for the people who i found a home in


lonely for closure.

IT'S GOOD TO SIT WITH PEOPLE

It's good to sit with people
who are up so late
your other homes wash away
and other meals you left
unfinished on the plate
it's just coffee
and a piano player's cigarette
and Tim Hardin's song
and the song in your head
that always makes you wait
I'm thinking of you
little Frederique
with your white white ski
and your stories of wealth
in Normandy
I don't think I ever told you
that I wanted to save the world
watching television
while we made love
ordering Greek wine and olives for you
while my friend scattered
dollar bills over the head
of the belly dancer
under the clarinettes of Eigth Avenue
listening to your plans
for an exclusive pet shop in Paris
Your mother telephoned me
She said I was too old for you
and I agreed
but you came to my room
one morning after a long time
because you said you loved me
From time to time I meet men
who said they gave you money
and some girls have said
that you weren't really a model
Don't they know what it means
to be lonely
lonely for boiled eggs in silver cups
lonely for a large dog
who obeys your voice
lonely for rain in Normandy
seen through leaded windows
lonely for a fast car
lonely for restaurant asparagus
lonely for a simple prince
and an explorer
I'm sure they know
but we are all creatures of envy
we need our stone fingernails
on anothers beauty
we demand the hidden love
of everyone we meet
the hidden love not the daily love
Your breasts are beautiful
warm porcelain taste
or worship and greed
Your eyes come to me
under the perfect spikes
of imperishable eye-lashes
Your mouth living
on French words
and the soft ashes of your make-up
Only with you
I did not imitate myself
Only with you
I asked for nothing
your long long fingers
deciphering your hair
your lace blouse
borrowed from a photographer
the bathroom light
flashing on your new red fingernails
your tall legs at attention
as I watched you from my bed
while you brush dew
from the mirror
to work behind the enemy lines
of your masterpiece
Come to me if you grow old
Come to me if you need coffee.

- LEONARD COHEN 

I FEEL ONE LESS HEAVY

"My french was neither good nor bad. I had enough to understand what people said to me, but speaking was difficult, and there were times when no words came to my lips, when I struggled to say even the simplest things.  There was a certain pleasure in this, I believe--to experience language as a collection of sounds, to be forced to the surface of words where meanings vanish--but it was also quite wearing, and it had the effect of shutting my up in my thoughts.  In order to understand what people were saying, I had to translate everything silently into English, which meant that even when I understood, I was understanding at one remove--doing twice the work and getting half the result. Nuances, subliminal associations, undercurrents--all these things were lost on me.  In the end, it would probably not be wrong to say that everything was lost on me."

The New York Trilogy, Paul Auster pg 338

VOID OF ALL WORTHWHILE

somehow well, even after all this time
goodbye from the steady, slow phase
the cause of nystagmus symptoms lurching about within my heart
i find it hard to swallow the never knowing, the undone, the unkempt affection
and wondering, just how deeply did i become a part of you? because i can't feel your bones anymore
"nobody ever takes my eyes off of you. entranced, i make myself look away."
can we schwabach a portrait of our feelings because i can't feel the world vibrate anymore.
my blood requires some tactile responses and once i've placed you on a pedestal, you are too far out of reach. i am afraid i am not growing by masking my emotions. get out of me, please.

glasskath

inaglasshouse
withaglassblouse