I’m Going To Kill You

Inside I am jagged and sharp.

I’ll cut you in half

 I’ll tear you to shreds.

I’m scared this fear is contagious—

One kiss will infect you,         

And make you as sick as me,

And neither of us will find the cure.

Approach with caution.

Hazardous materials.

Watch your step.

Hard hats only.

Don’t feed the animal.

Looking at Black Hole

Even Lucifer had the face of an angel. 

They called him the Morning Star.

But you're not really a star, are you?

We mistook you for one.

But that light we saw?

That wasn't your light,

but light of all the stars caught in your orbit

as you slowly sucked them dark.

Even now I still feel your pull,

but I won't be caught in your gravity--

not anymore. 

Lately

I've been of two minds,One mind: oil,
the other other: water.

I could absorb you, surround you, bathe you,
baptize you;
I could wash you away.

I could anoint you,
make you my priest, my king;
I could let you slip through my fingers.

I could set you on fire.
Some fires consume.
Some melt.
Some purify.
Some forge two metals together.

What God has joined together,
let no man separate.
What is done,
let it not be undone.
What is formed out of dust and ash,
let it not be burned up,
let it not be washed away.

Dream Diary #7 A gift from Jimmy Fallon

Lately I haven't been remembering my dreams, but this one was weird enough to stick in my mind all day. 

I'm not entirely sure what the occasion was, but I went to the post office to pick up a package. The package itself was the size of a large stack of books, and inside, surrounded by a bunch of multi-colored accordion-cut confetti was a note:

"Enjoy. Hope you like it.

--Jimmy Fallon."

Also, don't worry, the Fallon in my dream was no cheapskate. He sent me a small mirror in an intricately cut black frame, and a bunch of other small items that apparently weren't that memorable. What I do remember was thinking how the heck Fallon knew who I was and why he thought to send me a package.

Dream Diary #6

I had several remarkable and disturbing dreams last night, unfortunately the chief of which involved my personal head canon about my character Striker in Finding Oblivion. Don't get me wrong, it was one of my favorite dreams, but writing about it might spill some potential spoilers about the screen play. With that said, I'm going to write about my other favorite dream from last night.

For whatever reason, my friends and I had decided to cross the Willamette River farther south than the three known bridges in Salem. We'd heard of a recently constructed "living bridge." None of us were sure what that meant.  If the living bridge could handle cars, it would certainly solve a notorious traffic problem Salem has. After all, the city only has two vehicle bridges connecting its east and west sides, with one way traffic on both. They also transformed a railroad bridge into a pedestrian bridge, but my friends and I decided we'd rather try the new living bridge instead.

We also decided to take a canoe downriver instead of trying to find the bridge from the embankment. As my friend rowed for us, we noticed giant cages of animals jutting out over the river from the east side. Apparently Riverfront Park had recently added a zoo to its attractions. Part of me wanted to get out of the canoe and get a closer look, yet at the same time the rest of me knew that those flimsy cages might not hold. And they hadn't keep all of the animals inside.

Something bumped against our canoe, rocking it violently to the left. It rolled over, dumping us in the water. I screamed as I saw a giant green snake wrap itself around one of my friends as its jaws went for his neck. My other friend and I left him to wrestle with the snake, for we saw the vines stretching across the river in a living bridge.

Recently it had fallen into disrepair, so we managed to ascend it in the middle of the river, climbing it to the west bank. It was like one of those rickety bridges you'd find in a jungle movie. At the top of the west bank, we found brush as tall as most one story buildings, and we wondered what we'd find on the other side. My friend pulled out a tourist guide, describing the primal community living within.

On cue, one such person came up the dirt path to greet us at the gate. By greet, I mean he gave me a rather long scrutinizing once over. This was made more awkward by the fact that I recognized him, even in his scanty, plant based clothes. He looked like some replica of Peter Pan, but I could tell this was a former trumpet player from my marching band in high school. I wondered if the other trumpet players would be inside the jungle community, and if they would look as good in nothing but brush and leaves.

Dream Diary #5

Frequently I have dreams about apartments and houses. This is one of those. 

It began as once again, my roommates and I had moved to a new place. This one was shockingly spacious, with rooms as big as some apartments. For whatever reason, my roommate Bree and I were sharing the master bedroom, with two separate futons. Every wall in the house was shockingly white, and the overcast sun poured through the windows during the day. All the windows were on the same side of the house. We had another pair of roommates living in the other wing of the house, one that we rarely stepped inside. Our living room, dining room, and kitchen stretched from our bedrooms to the other end of the house in one cavernous stretch.

However, none of this was on my mind as I attempted, and failed, to unpack my things. I had the worst headache and exhaustion known to man. I tried napping, but the ache in my head failed to go away. It was a heavy, burning, pervasive sort of ache, one that glued me to my mattress. The stress of knowing we had company later that night did not help one bit.

By that night, Bree had been replaced by my friend Sammi. I'm not sure if Sammi had moved in, or if she was just helping me host this strange dinner. Apparently we had invited one of my celebrity crushes to dinner with his father and brother, to discuss some sort of business plan. This actor intended to moonlight as a farmer, or something. I don't really remember, as my headache still hadn't gone away. It took all my energy to pay attention as they quizzed each other about land use in the darkness.

The lights weren't on! None! We might have a candle or two lit, and we could hardly see each other. I scrambled to turn all the lights on, except I couldn't remember where all of them were. Embarrassed, I felt along each wall for every light switch I could find. By the time I was done, I could hardly move, and our house was filled with light. Part of me worried about our upcoming electric bill.

I dragged myself to bed as the sun came up through the windows, overpowering all our lamps. In my minds eye I could see and hear Mr. Actor ask Sammi in his English accent "Is she alright?"

"She has as migraine. She'll be fine." Sammi answered, her ever-present grin on her face.

"Would she mind if I joined her?"

Sammi sniggered. "Not at all."

Freshly Brewed Trouble

First thing in the morning,

Or sometimes well towards the afternoon,

Only the thought of a hot white mocha

Can keep me from falling to the ground.

I live in the brewing pot of the U.S. of A.

The Babylon, if you will, of Coffee,

In all its permutations.

For the uninitiated, the green bean, the freshly pressed

To taste of Portland’s finest blackest nectar,

I give you the following:

Most famous of its caffeinated brethren, Starbucks--

Will likely find you before you find it.

Like the foggy, soggy streets of its Sound origins,

The Bux is bitter, dark, and misted with cinnamon and murky with cream.

Dutch Bros, on the other hand,

Has that southern Jeffersonian warmth,

Whose principal fault is that sweetness

Which goes straight to your head,

And will bite any visitors that stick around.

Another favorite is Ava Rosteria,

Deep and rich with the art

And care of Italy,

And will empty your wallet if you fail to pay attention.

Or perhaps you prefer something a little more quick,

And a little more easy.

In that case, I direct you to K & F on Clinton Street,

Which, like the fast, well-educated literary lovers of Stumptown,

Seems smooth, and light,

But if you’re not careful to catch him early,

Will literally keep you up all night.

Dream Diary Entry #4

Finally! I had a dream on a weekend morning/night! I actually had multiple dreams, but I'm choosing just to write about one. If your curious, the other dream was about me nuzzling and kissing one of my celebrity crushes. That's about all I'll say about that. *Ahem.*

I can't remember the exact reason my roommates and I went back to my old house in Keizer, but there we were, in my old bedroom. Shockingly, the closet was full of old, treasured items of mine, like my childhood teddy bear, beach toys, and a box full of ribbons and beads. My bed, which currently resides in my new apartment, was also there in my room, though it had been stripped down to the sheets.

Taking the items I wanted, I allowed my roommates to go through everything else. That was when I heard my dad from the other room. What in the world is he doing here? I thought as I walked into the master bedroom. There he was, sprawled across his bed, in a fully furnished room, as if he had never moved out.

"Why are you taking all your stuff?" My dad looked up at me from his pillow.

"Just picking up some things left behind from the move." How on earth I managed to leave so much behind the first time, I had no idea.

"Why don't you leave it here?"

"Are you staying?" I blinked. I thought he had moved out when I did.

"Carol's offering to help with rent." For some reason, this referred to a friend of his, and not my aunt.

Suddenly I wondered if they were more than friends. I also remembered that this house was empty the last time I stopped by, and that my old roommate had moved all my things for me when I was out of the country. And then I woke up.

Dream Diary #3

Another speed post. I have a bad habit of forgetting to record my dreams until I only have ten minutes to write them.

I left my job as a hostess at a restaurant a week ago, and so of course, I would start having a new kind of nightmare about them. Before, when I would dream about that job, it was all about the restaurant's layout changing rapidly and swarms of customers at the door. One dream even featured a multi-layered floor plan that changed every few seconds. 


In this dream, however, I opened my eyes and I was walking through the restaurant in mid morning. They were starting to get busy, but that's not what I noticed. It seemed that all the employees had changed in a matter of one week. I only recognized the manager and the owners. The manager guided me to the office, which had somehow shrunk while I was gone. Now, it was even more of an oversize closet.

"I need you to print out some shift sheets and the waiting list." My manager said with her hand on my shoulder, before she walked out.

No problem, I thought as I logged into the computer. Another thing had changed: instead of the computer desk being on my right as I entered the office, it now faced the door. Who knows what happened to the safe that used to be in its place. The operating system had changed too, and it was nothing I recognized. It looked more like a badly designed advertisement game for some fast food company than an OS. More and more of the owners piled into the office to give me advice on how to use the computer, and so did the hosts and servers. By the end of my dream, the office had turned into a clown car.

I soon realized I no longer worked at this restaurant, and then I woke up.

Dream Diary #2

Of course, once I start this exercise, my internet vanished for two weeks and I switched day jobs so that I'm working literally every morning. As I type this, I'm eyeing the clock and I have to leave in 6 minutes. Let's see if I can remember everything. Aaaaand: GO!

In this dream, I was at a screening for the film A Tale of Delight. Instead of regular theater seating, our hosts decided to set up lounge-style couches, so that all of us could sleep comfortably during the film. The irony here, of course, is that sleeping through A Tale of Delight would probably give us nightmares.

There were four screens set up, instead of one, and they were about a quarter of the size of normal theater screens. Three were stationed up front, and one was in back, and I remember seeing the beams of light cross each other. How this failed to mess with the look of the film, I have no idea. Also, the projectors were skinny, probably no larger than camcorders. In the middle of the screening, there were some technical difficulties, and most of the audience was unhappy to be disturbed from their naps.

Afterwards, when the sun was coming up, Edd Blott's wife invited me and another gal to go the laundromat with her. I went reluctantly, because I had realized that I had forgotten to do my statistics homework again, and I was scared I wouldn't catch up by the end of the semester. Nevermind that I graduated from college a couple years ago, or that I never had problems with staying on top of my homework in that class. I have dreams about this quite often.

Dream Diary #1

Apologies for not updating much. I've been focusing my efforts on my two unpublished novels. Speaking of which, one has a plot revolving around dreams. In an effort to write believable dreams, I am going to start recording the ones I remember here. Although my dreams often contain real life people, I'll refrain from mentioning their names, in case they do something rather embarrassing. Here begins my dream diary.

I woke up to a flurry of noise, of doors being slammed and boxes bumping into walls. Ah, yes. Today was moving day. Heading into the hall, I saw not just one, but two roommates moving in. One was a colleague, one with an ever present smile and springy golden curls. Together we watched the third roommate, who we had not expected til April, with straight dark hair, moving her things quietly into the bedroom between mine and my colleague's. 


"She's our third roommate?" Her smile turned into a puzzled look. "I thought you picked that red-headed girl."

"I did, too." The dark haired girl was one I hadn't seen since college. Or was it that day as extras on television? It was hard to say. But apparently we were going to live together now.

We watched as the dark haired girl opened a closet next to my room, one I'd forgotten I had, and started nonperishable food items in it. Shrugging it off, I passed by my room, to a room I also forgot I had, complete with windows on either side and a desk I thought I had given away. It was covered in papers and dust.

"As you can see, I hardly use this room." There might have been a flat screen television one side of the room.

Then we went out to the deck. Rather than be a patio deck on the side of my bedroom, this was a huge area, on the third floor, surrounded by rooftops, and metal railing.

"Look at how much skyline there is!" I pulled out my camera. Though the sun had been up previously, it was dark now.

"It's perfect for taking sunrise pictures." She watched me as I started snapping away.

Two hot, white-gold orbs rose from nebulas of clouds in the west. Maybe they were moons? As if remembering that I was taking pictures of a sunrise, I turned to the east, and snapped even more photos. My camera was slow, and for some reason kept switching to video mode against my will. The clouds in front of me were larger than thunderclouds, and spiked in all directions as if made from a galactic gas. Behind them, the sun lit there edges in red and gold as it rose into the sky.

I was walking, and walking fast, and at one point I was riding in the back of a friends truck, snapping as many pictures as I could. Then I was surrounded by warehouses, enraptured by the sky. Again, the sun rose, only to disappear. It was late, and I was standing at a busstop where the bus wouldn't arrive for half an hour. A taxi-cab arrived to pick up customers, and there wasn't enough room for me. One college-age girl sat in the shot gun seat, and three football-player sized guys piled in the backseat. The cab driver, a middle-aged woman, fiddled with her meter.

Next I was sitting in a small, local diner, and the day finally showed it's full brightness outside. I was reading through a menu, wondering if I should order chicken strips or something that would take less time and money. My family had at least three tables put together, and I wondered if my dad or my sister would try to pay for me. The menu had fried pickles as one of their appetizers.

The Cliff (for a friend)

Of all the times we danced near the edge,
I never thought we'd end up here.

Funny how we're holding hands,
but we're not thinking about how this feels,
only how we'll keep from falling.

I can tell you looked down,
but please don't let go.

Hold on to my hand,
and I'll pray I'm strong enough
to hold you up.

Love Errant

This could be our fairy tale--
with you my prince, and I your princess,
But our kingdoms sit
on either side
of these mountains,
with only these tunnels,
and the film running between them and
music: the rails, connecting the two of us,
and God, the train that carries us forward.

If only I could see through
these dim windows,
to see what you think of me from
that platform,
if you think of me at all.

Caught

You said my name first,
but like so many times before,
my name was someone else's name,
my skin, someone else's skin,
my eyes, certainly my eyes,
belonged to someone else.

You said my name again,
and here I noticed my failure
to move your name from my brain,
yes, my brain to my mouth, and then my lips.

Perhaps you said my name a third time,
and I could only call you--well--you,
but it wasn't you then either.

Even now I can't help but imagine
it was you,
and it was me,
and it was my hand on your shoulder,
and it was we who walked out of the room
together.

The Undelivered Love Poem

You probably never knew that I fell for you,
or that you cost me that A in geometry,
or that a touch from your unconscious hand
could melt all the snow outside.

Before my path went near,
and yours
far.
Before I knew your secret.

This is the love serenade,
caught in the throat.
This is the bouquet
left standing behind the counter.
This is the last petal:
the one that says:
He loves me not.

An Appointment with a New Patient

I'm usually the last person people want to see. Granted, I'm not pleasant to look at. My pale skin would blind most people in direct sunlight. Honestly, I don't wear a lot of black to scare people, but to protect their eyes. It's pretty uncomfortable on hot days and nights, especially in summer when people are dying of heatstroke. I find it more bearable in winter, to keep out the cold. After all, I'm not a very warm person to begin with.

I wouldn't say most people like me, though I've had my share of stalkers. I guess I understand. I'm not the most pleasant person. I kill a room when I enter it. Most children cry when they see me, but the elderly seem to like me well enough. They smile at me like I'm a familiar friend. Sometimes we talk for hours, sometimes they have nothing to say, but the old always take my hand.

It's hard to get a date when you're like me. My hands are ice cold, so no girl wants to hold them. I have a morbid sense of humor that girls don't appreciate. Goth girls seem to like it, but it's been my experience that they prefer to talk about me behind my back than see me face to face. At least we both tend to like dark, cozy restaurants.

I may show up unannounced, but at least I'm a gentleman. No matter who the person is, I don't discriminate.  I think I'm a basically good person, though you might disagree.

Thanks for listening to me, Doctor. I think you're a great therapist. Unfortunately, I have to admit that I came here to this appointment, for more than one reason. You see, today is your deathday, and it's time to take you. I promise this scythe may come as a shock, but it won't hurt you. It will kill you, but it won't hurt you.

Changling

You left as a man,
and returned as a beast.
Sometimes your fur's soft;
sometimes your claws come out.
I don't recognize your pupils,
as they've transformed from orbs
to slits.


You left your soul in the desert,
and brought back a dead man.
He does not see,
but he consumes.
He does not hear,
but he spits out acid.
He does not feel,
except for a bloody, explosive rage.

I can't rely on my mine-detector,
and I fear losing limbs.
So save me the trouble of asking,
and tell me:
Are you back?

Preservation

Oh to be a myriad of brush strokes,
A spectrum of color!
Oh to be the sparkle in her eye,
the blush upon her lips,
the corner of her smile.
I would be forever in love,
never hurt, always hugged by a golden frame,
surrounded by a cloudless sky,
with fresh grass blades tickling my feet.

But ah, never to be painted,
trapped with only a sight of my lover,
never any closer to him than the day he painted me,
never hugged by his arms,
never spoken to by his lips,
never kissed.

Through Rose Stained Glass Chapter I Scene IV

The door closed with a bang behind him, but he walked forward without jumping. His eyes narrowed as he turned down a hallway, unfazed by the buzz of the fluorescent lights. Brown bulletin boards slipped behind him along with the brick walls they hung on. Even his feet barely touched the brown carpet. He passed doors with windows, already knowing what he would see through them. Finally, he reached the end of the hall. Both of his eyes scanned the papers hanging on the bulletin board, darting each way like a hoard of bees. Then they stopped, focusing on a prize sweeter than honey.

A grin swept his face as he ripped a small stub off the flyer and stuffed it in his pocket. He marched back down the hall, only to jump when someone tapped his shoulder.

"You looking for something, son?"

"I'm not sure."

"Well, you're looking at the community board. Do you need some community service hours?"

The stub in his pocket chaffed against his fingers. "Not really."

"Well, in case you change your mind." The man opened the young man's hand, and closed it over a business card.

"Thanks." The young man muttered, as he opened his hand to look at the card. Save for a hand-written phone number, the card was blank on both sides.  He glanced up to ask the man about his card, but the hallway behind him lay empty.

Gifts

Why do we give flowers to those we love?

When those flowers were once
lovers scorned, or lovers killed.

What are flowers but lives cut off,
dead things we call beautiful.

They have but one purpose:
to distract the eyes and the nose,
from a less beautiful, a less innocent
purpose.

Why say "I'm covering you in pollen"
When you can say "I love you"