I am You being Me

She was a dreamer of many things, but mostly in the day, which of course made the dreams less real than the nighttime kind.The night dreams mainly consisted of flashing glimpses and out-of-context intensity. There was nothing concrete there, but the tone of these stained her waking time.

Perhaps they were more important than she gave them credit for, since the colors they painted influenced her purposeful thoughts, and really where would she be without these slips from reality while going through the motions of her boring existence, the humdrum routines she kept up for lack of something better to do. Tearing papers on perforated lines, stuffing envelopes, hitting F3, enter, enter, enter… And really these low maintenance tasks allowed her mind to wander easily. It was as if fate wanted her to be a dreamer. Or maybe it was a chicken-and-egg kinda thing.

Once upon a time she was waiting for a bus when she left her sentence right in the middle and hit the ground convulsing. Her greatest friend knelt down in a panic and yelled for bystanders to call nine-one-one. They were all so worried for her.

In a room in the night she was alone when she heard a knock on her door. On the other side was her favorite co-worker, the one she drank too much wine with at all the Christmas parties while wondering if her boss was too drunk to notice her flirting. He told her he was passing through, got a flat tire, but his look told her he did something on purpose. She wondered what he told his wife as she invited him inside.

The other day she was remarking on how lucky she was. The weather had been perfect for three weeks, and vacation was coming right up. She wondered what it would be like to be someone else, someone bored or empty, maybe wandering through the days on autopilot, perhaps stuffing envelopes. She was happy to be in in such an exciting place. She decided there was no reason to be any other way, as the spring sun peeked around a corner and blinded her momentarily.

Until the phone rang and she jumped. God, she always startled so easily! Thankfully it was someone she could rush right off the phone without the feeling that she was being a terrible bitch. She wondered if she had any new email, or if she accidentally bounced a check yet.

Once in college she had this super hot adjunct professor in her political science class. He was a New Orleans boy, which was a place she loved, and coincidentally her plan for spring break that year. As fate would have it she just happened to run into him. It was like a dream. In between him taking off and her dropping some X there was a tiny movie with her pressed against his van and his hands, of course, finding their way like only a New Orleans boy’s hands could.

Someday she is going to re-run it all with the people she still has on the perforated lines. The chicken came first, and she had forgotten lunch again. She has left over mail sitting in the corner, but she always keeps it stacked so neatly.

I’d love nothing more
than to be totally carefree
to be light and have laughter
like someone who is authentically charming
I’d like to approach myself
with easy hands
and have discussions about
how amazing it is we live so close to a star
how when you really think about it
space, earth, moon, sun
is all so perfect with possibilities
that the dark matters I allow
don’t really mean a damn thing

I am writing in my blue book for you
secrets I’ve kept all along
terms of negotiable contact
I am a hider, a silent stepper
I spend all the days
knowing the contents of your thoughts
and his and hers, and hers
because it’s easier to blame

just like everybody does

every time I remember your name
I carve it into the wax
but it always melts, you know

what would I talk about
if I didn’t have you to write to?
with all your rules and judgments
and pronouncements on the word

who would I be?

what would I think if
I didn’t have a you in my head
to speak to
each day, each second
you watch over me
and criticize the impulses
you screech nasty when I’m down
you soothe soft when I’m up
but always with your voice
I’m scrambling the scale

who would you be
if there was no traitor at the start?
just some observer
a silent witness noticing
my human-ness
somebody nice
calm, easy
non
conflicted

?

it’s fairly convenient to have an alcoholic as a
father when you don’t get to meet him until you are 21
huh, ironic age too
oh, and I was a bartender at the time
and that is where he came to meet me, at work
funny

lately I am sifting through
my perception of your elements
breathe in
breathe out
have I mentioned that
my memory is uncanny?
deep breath in
out
and in between us
is a perfect piece that expands
made of the dust of you
and me and light and history
I breathe in
breathe out
and trust you
do the same
exactly now
this spark is also
made of the things
we always knew
like the timing
is completely
flawless
now
and I think
again
my breath
in
out
in

and out

back before I understood gratitude

did you know I spent an entire cycle
feigning sleep along the edge of your bed
just willing your body to rest against my shadows?

on the 28th day when you came to me
it was the perfect goodbye
I wonder if you hear me now
after 9 years have grown by
do you hear me?

I am saying hello

is not the right one
for valentines
we’ve learned to lie
with our paper
cut-outs
the even-ing out
of two sides
as if making love
neat and pretty
will help us to catch it
but inside my chest
is a mess of red hiding pink
uneven and bulbous
just waiting for someone
to smooth it over
see it bare
until all the ugly
is only something
we used to be afraid of

you must imagine yourself to be soft
as the butter in its dish
from the counter tops of 1982
and open as the sky
I look up to every fourth of July
or whenever I notice I’ve lost something
but what if I’m like your mirror
and really you are just as tough
and unfraying as the hemp
tying up my wind chimes all these years
and closed up tight, sleeping
like all pretty flowers before their bloom

the times between
i cool myself
and race through
voices from history
the wreckers in
all of my stories
they resound
their cacophony
until i am deaf
to me

i’ve discovered
i am a figment of
who i once
thought i’d be

and you
you are the one
who disregards
the same old person
who has left me
an untapped resource
you are the person
i’ve already known
you are the only
person i’ve ever met

because i said so

i’ve always
said it would be so