Never Sleep

Have you ever kept your eyes closed and allowed the sensation of a quite room fill your heart?

Breathe in the air, a mixed fragrance of stale body and fresh water flowing in through the cracked window. The blankets making it a bit claustrophobic and yet your feet sticking out of the bottom of your covers just enough to get to breathe and for your mind to be at ease. I could feel the bed head catching drafts of fresh air as it circled my room, and with my eyes closed I can almost see the swirling of air, that had been around me all night long as I slept, or at least for the few hours I actually was able to. The warm air rising and the cool air falling to the ground, fighting dancing overhead.

I opened my eye and could see the gray dull light illuminating almost from the walls, but originating from the dull light outside passing through the white blinds. But as each little breeze caught the shades, the orange of a rising sun sprinkled into the room it seemed like magic, that we get to experience the color, that we get to see those hues.

I went to bed anxious and I woke up anxious, my heart beating fast, or at least it felt like it. As I took my pulse I couldn’t even tell if it was beating at all. I threw off the blankets and sitting on the bed placed my feet on the ground. I could hear the cars passing by a few floors below my apartment; puddles splashing, sand and pebbles crunching. Maybe too some voices off in the distance, or maybe just distant TVs. I kept waking up to that gray light that bleeds in through the drapes. With the orange lines of light stretched across my floor and the sticky gross hot feeling from an anxious sleep. The feeling came from somewhere in my chest. I knew the fuel that feed it was in between my ears, but nothing could stop the flow you’d need to put the fire out. Both working in a synergy I could not control. I took a deep breathe and closed my eyes trying to remember to relax my shoulders and concentrate on the breathing maybe I could just calm myself down with the old tricks my mom taught me, but they hadn’t worked in years and I knew it would be temporary.

I rose and walked to my door, the head ache was horrible, and the pounding of my heart increased, somewhat arrhythmic, but after a few beats back to normal, though the pressure in my head did not subside. I opened the door. The blue light shown from above the sink, forcing me to squint. I stubbed my pinky toe on the door frame and swore under my breathe. As I walked to the bathroom, I couldn’t decide, do I pee with the light on or off, was I awake enough to not pee on the floor, or did I need the light? One of the toughest questions that early in the morning.

As I turned on the water and pulled the metal thing to start the shower, my eyes fell back to the mirror. I had one of those moments, where I could not tell if I looked my age or not, if I thought anything was looking back, or if I thought reflections in mirrors were of any reality at all or just mere color I was able to experience. And then I remembered...

Today was the day. “Oh Crap!” I thought the air missing from my lungs, my eyes bounced around the bathroom. I had totally forgotten, that this was the first day of the biggest adventure I would ever take. The beginning of foreign travels, of mistakes and successes and the making of some of the best friends I would have, yet I didn’t know that yet, and the “Oh crap!” that was from the realization that I hadn’t packed yet. But first I have to back up, first you have to understand how I got there, standing in front of that mirror a bit dehydrated, engulfed in that feeling of great expectation and utter fear.

* * *

skin

Skin, a thought.

you are altogether other,
you will not do, but to be you

i've tried on another skin
too slippery, oily, to be in
it slithered, it slack, it slumped
and i gave it back and humped on after another
i found it chaffed
i licked, it molted
but i kept it,
it sprouted
i wrapt it as one does
it grew cankerous and then some fuzz

a stray dog
with too many teeth
and not enough ribs
slobbered and chomped my chaffing skin
and ripped me clean

naked i protested
i set up a committee
and i, er, WE agreed
there must be a skin that could not be knocked or bleed
could be slick and sweet,
with large feet and probing eyes,
made for probing and batting lies
with lips to lock
and chest of barrels
and fists for querrils
and a set jaw for Gerils...

but the Dog came back
and broke up our agenda
bloodied our ears
embodied our fears
till we saw the mutt
drew us in and out
not willing to sit past

boney and bloodied
we walked on owned toes
wiping owned nose
dressing wounds with reality
holding bruises with clarity
(and by we, i mean me)

and we found, feckless and fearful
the sun did not burn us
the gazers did not haunt us
our own, did not roll us out with the empty bottles
we walked in skin
and owned the ones
we found ourselves in

A Bit of Good News

Things are right, especially when they're not, and that's a bit of good news, isn't it? That I can wash my hands in the river of peace, resting on bended knee, even in the depths of August drought?

That I can embrace my jealous lover and be embraced with unmistakable passion in return, even as I hear the echo of the only two feet in the room reaching the only two ears.

That the very same mouth which only yesterday spoke fallacies as fact and fictions as Truth can today produce words as True and bold as the red on a fallen soldier's pierced lapel.

And this not of my own strength or wisdom, this not borne of my own devices or desires, but given unmerited and received ungracefully from a source whose reserves supply races, nations, kings, and beggars alike.

Not an ounce of good am I capable of producing on command, yet fruit grown out of the dead and buried seed presses through my branches and grows too large for my arms to support, for it is meant to fall.

Flattery will get you anything. That's what my friend, Ellen, told me in high school. She had red hair and pouty lips. And she always got her way.

I can't really say we were friends. It was something more than that, and yet, in a lot of ways, something far less.

We started spending time together after my sister moved away for college. That's really what I was looking for. For her to be my sister, a replacement sister. To step into the gap that had been created with Anna living four hours away and no longer in the bedroom next to mine. Someone who gave advice on everything from what sweater I should wear to how to swim in the social waters of high school, who helped me see things from the female perspective, and was just comfortable and safe to be around. She was happy to do these things, but it didn't equate to a sisterly relationship for her. Rather it was the road to intense emotional bonding that would eventually lead to something more. And in truth, that is exactly what it ended up being, not my naive expectation of something neutral.

Soon we were writing each other these intense poetry-laden (often lyrics stolen from angst-y 90's alternative rock) notes. If I read them now I'm sure I would find them laughable, but at the time they ignited a fire in my belly. They brought up these emotions somewhere between lust, curiosity, and fear. I was never quite sure if I should run towards her or get the hell out of there. And that was torment to her, me never committing to anything solid, staying in that ambiguous state.

That was all more then ten years ago now. And yet I still find myself doing the same thing.

Trying to manipulate my friendships and relationships into something that will meet my needs, and be exactly what I think it should be. Trying to suck life, comfort, love from those around me. And Ellen was trying to do the same to me, using flattery to lead me towards a deeper surrender, asking me to give things that weren't mine to give. For a while we used each other, but it was never enough, and it imploded, leaving us bitter and angry. Which lead to more angst-y notes passed in hallways en route to math class.

I take comfort in the words below. Nothing else has ever proven to be true. I know these words to be life giving as I've experienced the slow change of self-pleasing sin habits being burned up, and God breathed truth embedding itself in me.

1 John 3:18-24
My dear children, let's not just talk about love; let's practice real love. This is the only way we'll know we're living truly, living in God's reality. It's also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it. For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.

And friends, once that's taken care of and we're no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we're bold and free before God! We're able to stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we're doing what he said, doing what pleases him. Again, this is God's command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.

We live on street corners and back alleys
pressing our faces against pastry laden store front windows.
We hear hawkers and hot doggers calling in the street,
but all we can do is stare and wonder.

I can't pretend very well, and
turning my eyes away when I think something that I shouldn't say
I disconnect from honesty for your sake, and
shuffle back.

Before and behind trailing blood, and
following a bloody trail I feel again a warm hand upon my shoulder.
Strangers give me drink and call it life's blood, and bread
body.

Now I see your face for the first time
although I've long known you by reputation.
Ragged, wretched, beaten, beautiful. My eyes
fill up with tears.

We Hoist Bottles to Harness the Wind

Slightly alive in this world of furled sails
We nail plastic and glass to the mast.
No friend is the wind who comes now and again
Just to jest at our stagnant distress.

That cursed captain, he said "Listen well, all ye dead,
Land's a treasure, and I am the Key.
Hoist yer sails in wind gales that could empty the sea
But you'll ne'er budge an inch without me."

Childish riddles as these to my ears spoke disease;
Such a sailor as I earns his keep,
Yet he spoke as though toils would earn me no spoils
So I slit his damned throat in his sleep.

"Call me dead man again. You can die in my stead."
Snickered I as his pillow turned red.

Yet it seems he spoke truth, for now nothing we do
Moves our bow any nearer to home.
We've done all that we could to bring land to this wood,
Not a hint of slight progress we've known.

I've lost all hope in sails, they've failed time and again;
We hoist bottles to harness the wind.

The Germans Call It Fruehling

The world smells like dog poop these days.

Thawing preserves from Labrador walks and Terrier runs, creating obstacle courses for melting streams of snow and strollers. Mutt Mitts are shockingly neglected in the months around the winter solstice. Probably secretly. And bitterly.

The earth squishes. As if it's given up its grudge, finally caved in on that thing it said it wouldn't do. Like the time Jennifer Zawislak did invite Karly Kaneski to the birthday party, even though the fight happened on the bus and there hadn't been much talking or notes or phone calls since. And like Jennifer, the ground is breathing is easier for it. Things seem to fizz and pop, as the juices exchange.

Alarm clocks seem too slow, as we lean into the sunshine instead and swap out dark stumbles to sinks and toilets for liftings of window panes and bypasses of wool ensembles.

The melt ensues and the Germans call it Fruehling.