59/365 : this morning i'm up before the sun, screen-glow-rise.

i miss the earth so bad it hurts--
and yet.

one of these days i will go home to the
dark, dark wild
crying apologies,
praying for some way
to right my absence,
tenderize the abuse.

58/365 : my favorite flowers grow back east

for alyssa, nawal, jen, adrianna and judy... thank you for being my eastern sunflowers

we are all holy sunflowers turned up toward a magnificent sky
but--
i like most the ones who grow back east
where it's unlikely
and hard
and still somehow they shoot out of slate cement
into smog-filled skies
screaming tantalizing blessings
for all the angry
suffocated
trying
souls
who walk weary
too fast to even
notice

holy is, at first,
the struggle to remember

then eventually,
it is just love

doing that thing it does
drenching everything weary
in it's okay baby
mama's gotcha
mama's gotcha

57/365 : 'revolution' is a highly misused word, but to actually pull this off would be one.

i'm done pining.
i am doggedly planning.
honey bees, sage, beavers, mud huts
three stories high.
homecoming
never felt so honest.

56/365 : the truth is

the truth is i want to love you more
than sudden sun in the dark cloudy winter
i want to love you past
the ways i hate you
and stop only
where that
loving
turns
dark
on
me

55/365 : self-hate selfies

{here: have this instead, this time}

if i hold the camera just like this
you'll get my good side
and i'll avoid what terrorizes me
about the image of my body
for just a few moments longer

look: my face, tilted slightly to the right
down a notch
eyes high
mouth closed
mischievous smile
hair wild
forehead--cropped off

you can have this picture of me
where i'm still
and knowing
and devilish
and just the right kind of crooked
from the shoulders up--
maybe a little bit of cleavage

the bouncing blubber when i dance
or the witchy cackle of my laugh
or my nose that's a tiny bit longer on one side
if you look at it from the other
or my chin skin that's growing deeper
or my arms that are thick as butternut squash
because i eat pastries and drink wine
and don't make the time to exercise
all that much--not really

those things, i don't want you to see
not permanently
on a screen
where you might be able to relate
or worse, abdicate me
from my position of queen
in the kingdom of Perfectly Edited

there: i said it
i'm afraid for you to see me
i'm afraid you won't love me
i'm afraid i won't get my need for love met
if i'm human

i'm afraid because i was a kid once
who had needs, like all kids
and mine weren't met
like all kids
and i was traumatized by that
like all kids are

my story is i was a fat kid--really
and i didn't understand
that Jimmy McQuilkin's reason for not loving me
might not have been because I was fat
it could've been instinct
or other human things
or the fact that he was 10

no matter, because i am an adult now
and i can choose
to hold the camera just like this
until my arms fall off from exhaustion
and my face morphs into the strangest
version of fake

or --i can stop looking at myself
from the outside in
and i can start dancing
like a kid again
you know the ones who always
tilt their heads confused
when you try to capture the truth of their
wild incalculable magic

i can feel the yeses boil to the surface of my skin
until the conditioning of my self-hating
has no room
for stiff arms
or cropped minds
no energy to hide
the joy in me
that wants to shine
without apologizing
or shrinking
or over-saturating
or misconstruing
the real expression
of simply doing
what makes my body
happy

54/365 : i explained it much better when he asked, but inside, it still felt like this

how do you know the
difference between rape and
dominating sex?
i don't know. i don't know. i
don't know. i don't know. i don't.




// this poem is a tanka.

53/365 : easy tail-wag

these romances grab hold of me like
invisible leashes
invisible fences
like i am a dog
suddenly loyal
to some undeserving drunk
who never plays catch with me
like he promised he would
the day he lured me in
to his ownership

so many yards i've sat inside
waiting to be leashed
waiting to be walked

they let me out their back doors
to piss and shit

they don't even clean up
the piles