Sentience

It’s honey flavored and summer inspired. I’m in love like young kids fall in love: hard, fast, stupid. Pour another drink. Mark it on the calendar. I swear the change in seasons will bring me out and about and my freckles will darken and give birth to little freckle babies, and my hair will get back its golden touch and I will laugh, laugh, laugh for days without pause, (except to say, “oh, it hurts to laugh, its starting to hurt!”)
And that is how it will go, trapped up here in the mountains. Or near the mountains, by the mountains, a short drive from the mountains. Where the snow is stubborn and melts slowly, drizzling down hills, puddling in holes. The sun is the biggest tease in my life and I sleep with the fan on because the sound is soothing. Year round its gentle hum is heard, and in the dead of winter, it makes me creep extra deep under the blanket, fighting goose bumps, while rhythmic fingers search for warmth, until success, success, success! It is found.

These are the common things in my life: a jar full of orange and yellow shells, an open box of sewing pins, a hamper of unfolded clothes, the desire for call and reply. Where are the stars tonight, and what of theories and dreams? What are your common things and when you dream, what dreams are messing up your hair?

I drew my lips red and then left them open to possibilities.

Bloody Nose

I had a dream last night in which I considered the morning, afternoon and night of a bullet as it traveled on the way to its destination.

And it felt as if something small, aquatic was swimming in my eye. My left eye to be exact and no rubbing or blinking of it would exhaust or stop it.

I have this image of you. In it you are outside smoking. Your brow is furrowed from the light and the angle of the sun causes the veins in your forearms to seem mountainous, significant. You speak between the motions of smoking. A few measured words then a drag and hold, smoke circling within your lungs; followed by the exhale and a few more words rise up with the smoke, just as winding, they meander up and away. The cigarette is flicked and you study your fingers’ movement as the ashes fall. The red burn left is a sign.
And I am thinking of the shadowed veins, wondering if they lead to treasure or if they are hard to the touch. Tiny mountains, swollen rivers, risen paths. And there is no cigarette in my hand to buy me time. The only smoke that circles in my lungs has circled within your body first. And as you flick the cigarette I study your fingers’ movement and I am aware, the red burn remaining, is a sign.

I had a dream last night that butterflies started to stream into the room and land in my hair. They covered my head and shoulders, all shapes, colors and sizes, and began to mate. “Stay still,” others informed me, “be careful and let them do what they are doing.” And I could barely feel their flutter against my forehead, on my neck. Some couples landed on my forearms, tiny and connected they made their butterfly love and I watched, and I sat still and let them.

Bullfrogs

My growling aching limbs remind me of the days of crouching in the duck weed and muck searching for the biggest bullfrog in the pond. Careful footsteps through the water so the horrific squeak of a squished frog would never creep out, or the snapping turtle wouldn't catch our toes in her jaws and eat them like saltines.
I never knew how important a mosquito was or when the wrong time was to squish it. She is just feeding a family, just trying to survive. She's trying to feed the frogs, feed the ducks and the lily pads. And I thought it was funny to mush her on my arm.
And I'm trying to survive, but dinner tonight was air and Sunny D mixed with mythical animals who make their homes in little red and white spheres of light. Goldfish danced in my hair and flopped back into the tiny pool of sheets nearby.
Something inside is breaking like eggs cracked on heads, dripping through tresses of hair and down my neck. Taking a shower means letting it win. Letting go of the largest bullfrog in the pond, now in the bucket, looking at me with the wide eyes I adorn every day.

Tip #3 - 50 words

If you're having trouble coming up with something, or you just want to try to challenge yourself, here's something you can do: Write a narrative in exactly 50 words. It must have a beginning, middle and end (whatever that means to you). It must be EXACTLY fifty words.

Of course, you can feel free to fool around with this, but the challenge is in the specifics above.

(Recommended by MaKeR)

Boon Epilogue

Dragged down by my personal puma
By the scar I received from no one.

Leaving the murk, let the mud cake and crack in the sun.
Welcome returns make ears ring with the bells.

ugh

remember the ocean where there are waves and seasalts crusty under your skin - if you float long enough you'll feel the barnacles grow and soon you'll become gray and white and maybe baleen. shrimp dance. cuttlefish dance.

remember the ocean: overwhelming enormity - like the sky but deeper.

response to kenneth anger

they've got masks on, you know. painted like little china dolls dancing around like we care. they've got guns and flowers, kind of like guns n' roses but not the same at all. they were there before guns n' roses, if you want to play the originality game.

there's a little person in a blue forest walking through a fountain and her dress gets wet and the critics say gee, doesn't that fountain look big compared to that little person? and we say, gee, what a beautiful fountain.

warhol was a star-struck little boy but we're supposed to worship him. blasphemy to the art world, maybe, but god we have too many warhols around here. i want to see edie's art, see past the glossy edgy and understand what it is to be the face of a movement. andy's got the name, she's got the face, now all we need is authenticity.

you think you know what's coming but you never do. it's that sweet taste of a reward taken away, the last drop at the bottom of a honey stick. you're supposed to ooh and ahh and appreciate. if it evokes emotion it's working, right? that's what they say at least.