Some days you were shy, hiding behind a veil of gray.
You must have thought I wouldn't see you, but I always did. The way the water formed borders ever shimmering, teeming with fish. The pointed hats of saleswomen and their golden loaves of bread slicing through the horizon. Soup steam rising from every corner stall, calling me to sit and eat. Dusty feet, bike tires, motorbikes in constant motion, streets turned rivers, turned streams. Buildings, tall and thin, adorned with carvings and colors that could have been from anywhere, except they weren't. They were yours.
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Joy peered through the crimson panes of her blessed sanctuary, body outstretched across the silken petals of blossoming love. Each exhale escaped her lips a hum, an ode to the ecstasy of Being, breaking the silence that embraced her, faithful, like a lover. She rose and fell as an ocean, birthed again with every heartbeat. She bathed in peace, in light, in stillness, peering as she always did --.
Outside, the crimson tide gave way to rough sea, a tangled mass of sharp blue lines bending like steel in every direction. An indistinguishable prison. Trapped inside, the wild eyes of the one she knew as Sorrow. Wet with wanting, they watched her, as they always did, steady like serpents poised to strike in desperation. Heavy breaths raged like storm clouds, fog on the glass, transient blindness. Joy did not avert her eyes, and neither did Sorrow. She knew without seeing. He was always there, as long as she was. His piercing eyes crying of the misery of Being. She raised her hand to the glass, fingers trickling condensation into dancing streams. Up and down in sporadic loops, hands wiped the surface clean - Joy's on one side and on the other, Sorrow's, moving in perfect synchronicity. Palm to palm, locked in gaze, Joy and Sorrow sat in stillness. Joy smiled and somewhere behind the prison lines, she sensed that Sorrow did too. It was in that moment that she realized her unshakable truth - that the pane through which she peered was not a window but a mirror. Sorrow not an other, but a droplet in the same cup of wine, Joy not absolute, but Sorrow set free. No house, I'm home -
blood, flesh, bone. Knock down the walls, there's plenty of room. Stay the night, stay forever; Everybody lingers, in hair and nails on fingers, exterior decorating. Unlock eyes, ears, valves of the heart. Get comfortable, don't mind the mess, always under construction. Home's a work in progress. DOOMED is a choice. Broken before we're buried, eyes on fire with anger, it's a choice. Blinded, silenced, dosed and left on the sidelines - choice. Cowering, life a night-lined alley, only fear says we're alive, we're making a choice. Powerless is a choice. They don't give us power, they don't take it away, we make a choice. Homeless, penniless, forgotten - you have a choice. Sitting in a classroom, daddy paid the tuition - you have a choice. Stuck on the train, back and forth to work again - you have a choice. Old man, death in the eyes, grandchildren whispering goodbye - you have a choice. Dark skin, light skin, skin covered in blood, thin skin, bruised skin, old and loose skin - you have a choice. It may feel like you don't, but every brick in the foundation of existence is choice. Between every breath is choice; underneath the fingernails, choice; mucus lining the eyes, wet with choice. Let their dark and dirty dungeon be your castle. Let the pain be life. Know that every day the sun shines, sheathed or not in storm clouds. Every day it shines its light. Right now, this time, is your time - make a choice. Be a flashlight. Sticky, oozing, gooey, evil casts shadows - they don't make us hide, it's a choice. Seven billion flashlights don't allow for darkness, flashlights don't hide. Even masked in thunder, even with the night on one side, every day the sun shines. Choose to be an ally. Shine just as bright. You will not be alone, and together we cannot be defeated. Doomed is a choice. I say, "Fuck darkness." I will shine like a light, every second of my blessed life. This is my choice.
Decorate, form a border
Live outside the boundary Unorthodox, innovative, avant garde Marginal, maybe, now Hair that frames the face, covers the eyes, Sweep it back. Lose your balance hovering on the line. Re-bend the wires to make and shape your own life Disrupt the p a t t e r n Disconnect, let the battery die Explode - acid everywhere Find, redefine, limits Question your own authority Silence for days at a time Lost in the universe of your mind Find abundance in poverty In faith that you are safe Untied, not understood We need not comply with context Unbind from the spine and rewrite Manifestation of pure potentiality Threads left loose, twisted Shake with the hips To the deep beating Of truth in your heart. I feel it all the
Time slips through my Fingers strumming a broken String tangled up in Knots bulging out of her Back in the day when life was Easy does it, sweetheart, just Relax the curls by applying Heat rises up in waves from the Pavement imprinted by tiny Feet buried deep in the Sand bags holding back Water falling from the Sky-colored dresses on Bodies in a single-file Line their pockets with Money isn't everything. She pressed 'play,' and the world went around and around - it was a dancer; an astronaut in her inner space; a creature of the sea, tentacles outstretched for a strange embrace.
She moved her legs, and she jumped up and down, up and down - she was a surfer on the moon's face; skipping along the squares of a checkerboard, all gray; twirling up soppy, green strands of overcooked spaghetti. She made paint, splattered color on the walls and the sky and the ground - nothing sat in boxes anymore; all the walls transformed to doors; she dove into tunnels where there used to be hardwood floors. She stretched her limbs out in a million new directions, tied them loop-de-loop, like twine - she shot herself like a bungee ball, watched her body unwind; fell to rainbows in the kitchen sink; swung down the drain on a jungle vine. She washed away, candy crusted solid on the horses nose - she fed the leprechauns lemon-flavored holly-pops; danced in the Christpatrick's Day alien parade; a universe of colors inversed, bleeding down the staircase of her mind. She pressed 'play,' and the rubber-boned queen erased the outlines. I could be anywhere, this
reflection of me staring back from the blacks of your eyes, same gray sky, fuzzy against the edges of your new life. Street sounds fading in the background of that face -- eyes closed, sleeping on a mountainside single bed, dripping sweat, middle of the night twenty-hour bus ride, chair reclined. We've been everywhere, incidentally, accidentally, by chance: that thing that we had, before it slipped through our hands. The way you held mine, I remember the first time on the dark blue streets of somewhere with blurred lines -- we could be anywhere. But we stand, incidentally, accidentally, by chance on the street right here staring at the fragments of a phantom romance. Sweet Release
Finger by Finger by Fist -- Let it go. White knuckles Flushed with blood. Bit by Bit by All of it -- Release. Constricted being Set free. Beat by Beat by Symphony -- Let it sing. Deaf ears Open to music beneath. Drip by Drop by Deluge -- Let it flow. Desert soul Swells to an ocean. Wave by Wave by Rising tide -- Ride, child, ride. Silent stillness Gives way to life. |
AuthorChicago-born citizen of the globe, rich in the things that really matter. Let's get weird. Categories
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