Things that move and things that are harder to move

Growing up is like a sore thumb, or forgetting, or taking out the trash, or like---
well, I guess it is like all things, like most things, how when things start to change
you are changing, like growing, like how your chest starts hurting and your mom
can't explain why something inside of you is allowed to grow bigger than the thing
holding onto it. My outsides never caught up, like for most people, and my insides
are still big but growing up makes me feel like they are dying, like how the fat in my
cheeks is dying too, like how people move away and it makes you cry even though
it's not the regular kind of sad, like how you can still get sad about somebody you
used to love when you hear a song but how you love somebody else a lot and it doesn't
change it just because you cry from a feeling, like how when you planted the seeds it
took more dirt to fill the pot than you had originally thought it might, like how I cry
regularly in front of people I don't know but how I have a hard time communicating
my actual feelings, like how I remember being in the kitchen with small hands, like
how I remember being great at college and not great at most other things, like how
I forget that I wasn't always good at things, like how people think I'm a writer even
though nobody has ever seen proof in my entire life of that, like how writing almost
always makes me cry but only sometimes I will actually do it, like how I can think
about things and feel sad and hear a sad story and get annoyed, like how my horoscope
makes my heart sound both big and cold and that sounds right and hurts my feelings,
like how people can do things when they have the means, like how I just want to
do things my way. Like how I think I'm the exception to the rule. Like how I am.
Like how I think you are. Like how I think music is. Like how it is reading a book
when you're standing in line for birth control refills and everyone around you is
really, really grumpy even though we're all getting exactly what we want--- and how,
no matter how much things work out, there are so very many things that do not-
and how we hold them next to our big, cold hearts and talk to God and cry about it.
Like how it's okay, but that's just how we feel. Like how making changes doesn't
always make the changes you thought it would. Like how you always ask me how
I feel and lately it's never good like I wish it were. Like how I hate the thought of
giving you my blues. But like how I don't know where to put them anymore.


Like how when I was young and my dad was drunk and talking about music with me,
I understood slurred words and sad smiles and I knew what he meant, even when
he didn't know what he meant, and we both shake our heads now and say "okay."

too truthy

Bringing it back to the way I like it, windows wide open and a kitten running around, making a mess of all material things because this is my room and this is the way I like it, Joni Mitchell calling me home and telling me none of it matters anyway, or maybe that's God filtering down because that's how He's wanting me to hear it, but that's the way I like it. I like it when I am alone. I like it when I am alone. I like it when I am alone. Something like a mantra or maybe it's me trying to convince myself that that's actually how I feel. Something like that is more about right.

I like it warmer with the roses in my way, I like crawling through the darkness to laugh with you in the mornings and I like the way it is when there is a quiet after it all and you are telling me I am pretty even when we both know there is a long way to go before that's true. I like it when I can feel you wanting me forever even though I'm not sure how either of us feel about that on a practical way. I don't want you to feel differently even if I talk that way to myself sometimes because I can't imagine long-term pain and even with all of you surrounding me and all the voices inside of me from love songs I use to navigate the way I feel, I could never know how to hurt you that way and the only thing about you that could make me cry maybe is that--- is fear, is us, is our fear, is our lack of being able to imagine something possible. I'm not asking you for a way in, all I am asking for is a way to settle my stomach when I am in the middle of thinking things big girls might think about (not that I would know even what that resembles). I am not sorry. It's just weird to be honest with yourself. I'm not sure how I feel about honesty because the only policy I have found that ever works is listening and then keeping everything to myself. It's not a good policy but it seems to be working better for me than saying what I mean.

//

Laying naked under a willow tree, I am crying.
Sad things make me cry. Sad people make me
feel at home. Something like forgetting is the way
I feel best. I am glad to be under that tree in 40
years with bare feet, whether I bring someone
along is not up to me--- up to up alone and alone.