#babbletry

[wordrummager]

Beg to differ “…listen to the silence inside the illusion of the world, and you will remember... It is all one vast awakened thing. I call it the golden eternity. It is perfect.” - Jack Kerouac Blurbs tumble out all over social media about the mess of life and creativity… And for some reason, I have little patience with it; I just can’t… The most beautiful words seem to pour out from the most troubled assholes and I wonder as I get better with my writing, is it truly literary growth or am I devolving into more a disaster of a human? I ask because some of my writing lately has been hitting the mark but I am in crisis so I don’t know whether to be glad or worried about my artistic expression. Listen: I am moved by Jack Kerouac, Virginia Wolfe, Sylvia Plath… just a few examples anyway. But why follow advice about life from those who were self-destructive? Does actualization have to be so painful, we cannot abide breathing the air of our own anguish another minute? Can contentment breed beauty or is it one or the other? Is it right to admire a dramatic sense of agony? Why don’t we glamorize persistance? Why is the fall more endearing than the rise? “I have the choice of being constantly active and happy or introspectively passive and sad. Or I can go mad by ricocheting in between.” -Sylvia Plath I guess I wonder if I’m meant to be a good writer or a happy human and is that even a choice or a fated thing? “Death was happy to be alive.” - Tom Robbins

[wordrummager]

Better than Excalibur As I pushed a curl behind my ear, I had a rush of visions- many things I have not said but think regularly. Repeated, like habits, internal babble breeding- like rabbits. The back of the Greyhound bus, non-smoking zones in the early 1980’s, pizza trays are always bent, movies without guidance as a kid, with blood and rape and knights and sharks and ideas in the dark taking root. Picnics in yards without chain link, honeysuckle on the playground as the only friend in sight, shelves of books the first to be arranged in every place we lived. Music always music, sometimes soulful, sometimes too slow, the beat slightly off, waiting for me to join in. A string of years of first kisses, the beach, city streets, clunky bar glasses and a need for eye glasses. Memories of a lake and a perfect A-frame house, not far off from a little house in the country where it’s windy all the time and the sky tells me what I need. The record skips and the gingerbread man has crossed the river but I watch as the fox laughs but my reflection shows my hair has turned white and I am a mother with sage advice I’d never have taken. I long for the forest so I turn and walk until I find trees, then more trees, then than soft dark quiet that tells me I am home. I am wishing you would be with me, better than Excalibur, better than a passing cloud, better than pizza or rain or even a book. The curl slips back askew and I do not push it aside this time, knowing you’d like it there even as I know you wouldn’t mind the stream of memories and nonsense because it would all be quieted with a kiss.

[wordrummager]

Good night (let go)

I don’t want this day to end because I have come to grips with the current pain and if I don’t move too much or think too much or wish too much, it’s almost bearable and the thought of letting go and falling asleep only to wake and find another day full of agony is... too much... it’s like I’m a fish on a wooden plank waiting to be deboned but I’m clenching every fiber within as if I could prevent the inevitable flaying and then I wonder if maybe I’m meant to be good sautéed and roasted slowly or if I’m meant to be seared and quickly devoured and now I realize the pain has taken me deeper into a destructive groove than I meant to travel but maybe that’s a good thing because I’m not afraid of endings because there aren’t solid endings but rather a sort of morphing from one element into another, like clouds turning into rain and I don’t mind the thought of falling to pieces and feeding the flowers. Good night.

[wordrummager]

It’s a Pennsylvania spring

It’s been raining biblical amounts in Pennsylvania for weeks and weeks. Some of my trees are drowning. Dying. My yard feels like a cemetery. We’ve had tornadoes, which are not typical for us. Though I’ve been lucky in my valley, every time I leave the house, I see evidence of damage. There’s an assload of construction across the whole freaking state. Delays are the norm. I feel ill at ease when the workers give me condescending looks from their outposts of bright cones and steaming asphalt. I secretly make fun of people who claim to be affected by barometric pressure but I think the crazy weather is making me more unbalanced than usual. My job doesn’t help. It’s rather dull. My imagination is still going full-bore; the in-between is a cliff of emotions. The rural traffic doesn’t help either. My Amish neighbors are showing another disappointing side of humanity. Once in awhile, someone does surprise me with me goodness but hell, that’s rare. My kids are almost adults and I don’t know how to process that since I’m not much of an adult myself. I enjoy them so much, I can’t be cool about it. I don’t think I’ve ever been cool, though I came close twice. I don’t like many people but I miss the ones that are gone, even when they’re still around. (It makes sense to me.) It’s been stormy and unsettling and I’m restless and tired but today, the sun peeked out. It’s supposed to stay out until the day is done. There’s more rain coming this weekend. I won’t have much of a garden but I guess I can try to grow things that will survive storms.

[wordrummager]

A question or eight

What about the places that get ignored

like the wrists or kneecaps (tricky floaters!)

and why do not enough kisses land

on the neck since it seems an obvious spot

and where can hands rest if they’re always

feeling (that’s why we wear clothes!)

and do you know how to give direction

when needed or do you enjoy the scenery

even when he gets lost amid hips and valleys

and what will happen to our elbows

if they’re not loved enough and can you

hold me until I stop talking and if it doesn’t

seem imminent, can you kiss me quiet?

[wordrummager]

A Handful

For weeks, I have been stuttering alone in my room, cozy and with no focus. A strange lump keeps me from swallowing correctly; I am so hungry for touch, I keep eating despite gagging through stale crumbs. How does one beg in a manner that belies a smoldering desperation? Staring into an enlarged portrait, there are only pixels or brush strokes -none of which can duplicate what I like about skin. How useful is holding onto a strict reality when there is more within grasp?

[wordrummager]

Sometimes it's hard to be a Hitchcock fan

Mondays are weird. They carry the stigma of being at the wrong end of the weekend. Something about the first day of work after a weekend of revelry feels like donning a suit of armor to dance a delicate ballet. Or something.

None of that matters now. The reason I’m writing this is I decided to sit on my porch and have some tea after supper. Unwind. Watch the clouds and the slow summer sunset. And so forth. It was quiet until about five minutes ago. Then one bird landed (alit?) on a wire in front of my house and began chattering. While staring at me. It was an odd squawk for a small bird. And I felt he was trying to tell me something.

There were no other birds around… until he unleashed a long “soliloquy,” apparently calling at least three hundred of his closest friends to join him. In some nefarious scheme to swarm, peck, and eat me no doubt. They are now lined up on the wires in front of my house. I live in the country and have about six neighbors within a half mile radius and the birds are all congregating in front of me. No other people are out this evening. I am alone.

I am typing on my phone carefully, slowly tapping, making no sudden moves. My door is about nine feet away. I’m not sure I’m spry enough.

If this is my last post, know that I enjoyed my time tumbling and wish you all well. Maybe this seems dramatic, but perhaps you haven’t seen “The Birds.” Vicious fuckers, these birds can be.

(Ten minutes later…) It’s been ten minutes (obviously) and more birds have shown up. Several species. The wires are sagging with their weight. I’m going to make a break for it… heading for the door… here I go…

[wordrummager]

office construction recall

he told me my lips were uneven when I wrapped around certain words like “odd” and “angle” he said my eyes were like Irish tea with brown streaking green he would touch my leg under the table while commanding the room with his polished air and wit he walked too fast making me out of breath trying to keep up his focus in a crowd was most often on me which was delicious and somehow dangerous too bad he was an ass he made his mark and it was semi-permanent