sonnet LX

Never enough skin to be touched, or breath

to be shared in those passing moments of

being alive, simply being in love-

it is never enough to wait for death

or waste away tears spent in agony,

when there are far too many joys that could

wake emotions dearer and cries that would

give life and blood to outlast misery.

~

To understand the aches of life gives grief

its greatest share, then indestructible

it only will end comprehensible

that life is not worth living- but I brief

the thought of living without you and see

that without you, there is no life for me.

a confession- inspired by Dean J. Baker…

I told myself I wouldn’t share anything I write for a while.

Well…. this is a little different. This is no poem. Or story. And no source of fiction. This is a confession and a prayer.

~

I often have many times that I doubt myself.

Well, to elaborate, I doubt everything. (Including my writing.)

Recently, in one of my few moments that I talked (more like “wrote”) to God:

I don’t pray often, as you know, and I think that the only real reason why is because I don’t think you hear me. But I feel that you exist. For the thought that you don’t scares me, and it’s the one thing I do NOT doubt. The thought that my mother has simply turned to ash and dust makes my stomach twist and heave. I can’t believe that you do not exist.

But many Christians would find it odd (“old testament” in a way) to hear that I fear you much more than I love you, but it’s true. I fear you because you gave me life. And I’m afraid of life. I’m afraid of the life you gave me. And sometimes, more often than you would like, I don’t want it.

And I ask why?

And then I refrain.

My life isn’t so bad. Not as bad as it used to be, and not as bad as others.

But there’s something inside me that hurts.

And then it attacks me in waves of hate and fear.

And what I doubt more than anything is the answer. Or, I should say, your lack of answer.

And then I closed my “letter” with the same words I always close them with:

God, please grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. You have not given me the spirit of fear but one of power, love and a sound mind.

Amen.

~~ Dean J. Baker, if you read this, and I hope you do, your story reminded me of my step mother, who was sick a long time ago and who I loved more than anyone. Not just you alone, of course, Mother’s Day was just a few days ago, and this prayer was written on that day as well.

Would she be happy with the person I am today?

I have no idea.

stigma journals XIV (the monster)

I could feel it creep-crawling up the bed sheets, the translucent stain reaching for my skin.

It started with the toes. Poor, uncomfortable little bastards that would try to wriggle the essence off of them like it was as easy as wee, wee, weee!… But it’s not, to our great dismay, and let me not digress. It began to spread further.

Up the foot, twisting around the ankle, biting my calf and implanting opaque fingers on my knees.  I could feel its damp hands, the clammy heart that could rip through any mental barricade like it was wet paper.

And then it reached my palms. Oh, the great summit almost reached! it thinks. For I am sure, it has thought. “There could be no better devil in disguise than this,” looking at my hands, I wonder. Displaying pretty patterns and twists of silk, fitting like the perfect glove to a cold and solitary wrist.

But then constricting like an anaconda with steel chains instead of vertebrae and scales, it tightens and binds and bites and instead of lavender satin, there are rough mittens with bones and fangs that have already latched itself to your skin.

Then it swallowed my arm. Whole, unbroken and unmovable. A large, unstoppable mouth opens wide and attacks my back.

No ordinary monster, but a monster it was. What makes a man a monster, is that against his nature, he can do no good.

“What made me a monster?” I cried in my grief. For there was no obstacle left in its course. I could twist and turn my back but its body contorts with me all the same. I could break my bones if it would help, at least, justify my lack of action, scream into the silence to escape the laughing. “But it would all be useless.”

And it was deemed.

And it was happy.

With a thin strip of sandpaper binding my mouth, it prevented the screams I would not make.

And with a venomous bit to my temple, it killed the dreams I would not make.

And I gave in to sleep.

sonnet LVIX

More beautiful in sun, light glossing all

flaws into specks of originality.

Yet women seek the shadow’s falsity

and men wait for the veils of shade to fall.

~

Against my nature I long for sunsets,

for dusk to resist my lesser glories

while gnawing on bitter children stories,

to be held back, languishing in subsets.

~

The pain burst fevers so hot that I cry

from laughter of such a sweeter release

like divulging into absence deceased

in the coming sun and the summer’s rye.

~

But against all the memories I’ve made,

I am a woman; I’m fighting the shade

 

with you, I would be virtuous.

I see the stars now and welcome each and every one. I welcome the knowledge that despite the harsh days that lay before us, there is not one night that I sleep in desertion.

It makes me think of the past. Those many days I sat under the telescope trying to see the future, all lonely without you.

Yes, without you. The smallest comfort of knowing that someday would be better, and the struggle of dreams against my will. It brought me restless hope, my only solace lingering in the songs and tears that would rock me to sleep. Living for the days to come, the promises I made that with or without the one I needed, I would prosper. I would be virtuous.  And against my will, I would sink lower into the bonds that held me to it. To the hope that today’s struggle would be tomorrow’s light. Today’s failure would bring the eye closer to the heavens, and I would see all the more clearly and all the more farther.

And the day’s went wrong. So wrong, losing sight of what I needed and who I could trust. Forgiveness could push a person past the earth’s breaking point, where all our thoughts would seem to shrink in the morning’s light. And there was not one night that rocked me closer to tears than without you.

But humbled and falling, the heavens reached closer to the telescope’s edge and I saw all the things that would bring me virtue. I saw all my masters of fear and the laws of science that I followed with such meticulous religion. I had lost sight of the stars.

And reaching with broken limbs for the last minute that could bind me to you, against all fears that had deserted me in the nights before, I escaped the solace without you. With you, I would be virtuous, and with you, virtuous I became.

in the field of dandelion

We left it behind us,

hidden in the field of dandelion

where we found bliss in the grass and

golden vows to promise the sun.

I wanted something to return to,

for when the days have made you

tired and shaken, your body sore

and your feet worn down to softer skin.

 

When I am too tired to care

take me to what was greater,

what was brighter, even in moonlight

and where the vows would make us

whole again, the secrets I’ve waited

to tell you and the promises of earth.

 

When you’re too tired to shut your eyes,

escape the day with me,

in our field of dandelion, and hush

the light to softer rays, where we

will read the vows, ready to face

the sun of an infant day.

dreamscape diary IV

Why is it that

while I sleep, and

torment myself with beauties

I can’t reach, or

otherwise, the terrors

that molest me and rape me

and take me from those beauties

or save me from those beauties,

I am everything but blessed

while I’m wrapped in your arms.

~

Your arms, and

your still heart and bosom

make my bed and skin

for sheets, your silver beard

becoming braided in my hair,

makes me think of

about all the ways

I want to die, and

how I can, and

why I should,

but never when.

~

But then dawn

pulls me away from those thoughts,

I find myself in a different place,

warmer, safer, inconstraint of

myself and in constant notion

that I will return to you,

to those thoughts and those dreams,

your beauty, my tempter,

the fiend I can’t forget

who rescues me from beauty,

for I am not,

who saves me from sleep,

for I never can,

who seduces me in fear,

for it never ends,

and who leaves me in the morning.

 

finding the “what” (stigma journal XIII)

what did I say?

Oh, yes. “What.”

Now I don’t know if this is something between poetry or confession (both, most likely) but I often start with that one word- “what.”

And I never answer it- the question of something that is always “bothering” me. And I am a very “bothered” person. Just ask anyone, if I ever “bother” them. With thoughts or questions, and I myself am always “bothered.” By “what.” Yep, that’s just it! “What!”

It’s almost irritating, in a way. No, it is irritating! For you, for me, for the “what” that I ceaselessly run after like a deranged dog chasing her tail.

Maybe that’s the “what.” Just a very long “tail”, or “tale” or something that my wordplay isn’t clever enough to express.

So “what” is it?

(Can you tell why I get so “bothered” when they ask me these questions?)

Because I don’t know!

Here I am now, for instance! I’m writing! I’m running after some long “tail” (or “tale”) and I won’t get it. I never really do. I get all sorts of other things that “bother” me.

But not this. Not the “what.”

“What” is wrong, you ask. Or I state. Or I ask. Or you state.

Yes, that is it, “what.” That’s why I start with it (with “what” I mean)

the things she says

it cannot be perfect, she says.

it cannot be understood.

but when the sound waves shake this closeness in me

and I am bereft of your voice,

it cannot be perfect.

it will never be perfect.

for without you there is nothing.

the sky has no limits for me,

the oceans no shores.

there is just a bitterness in the wind

and a silence in the trees.

a hunger unfulfilled inside grows stronger

and it is never understood.

it is never complient or eased,

never soothed or comforted.

it ceaselessly grows

a constant desire

for something perfect, something understood,

and for something this is not.

nel songo

Mia sorella,

The distances growing deeper, nel songo

felt like soft waves,

I tapered through the skies,

and swearing to all those

who heard, ma non capisco

for the eyes awakened

suspicion eternally.

In foresight, there were

dreams waiting for you

to exhale beyond relief that I

would run away from

further thoughts, la bugia che

in our deepest faith,

our dreams come true.

Ma, il songo 

keeps me to be unshaken

by any further terrors,

al buio, we cannot escape

what we fear, for then

what we fear is but

an essence, un spirito,

will hold strong to

this prayer, mia sorella,

mio songo is a paradise

for you to fear and dream

and hide from deep

in your thoughts.

Sogni d’oro.