Whiteout

The snow sheets down,
Blanketing the world in pristine white,
Harsh in its purity.
People enter bathed in it,
Baptized by the cold and the snow, melting in their hair.

In nomine patris et filii et spiritus sancti.

Objects disappear, devolve
Into piles of pure white,
One lump
Indistininguishable
From another. The snow
Penetrates, it
Procreates,
Multiplying in nooks and crannies,
Covering all the hidden secrets of the world
In mute acceptance.
Turn your back for a moment and what you seek is
Gone,
Has vanished into a sea
Of white that numbs your hands as you dig,
Dig,
Dig, searching for your buried treasure.

And yet
In the cold
There is warmth,
There is a core of heat as old as the earth;
A cold heat that soaks into your bones,
That saps the strength and energizes,
That rebuilds and remakes you
In its own image
As it destroys what you once were.
And it is white

(so white)

All around, pressing down,
Penetrating
And pure, filling your vision and mind with
Ancient vistas,
Snowswept plains from the dawn of time
When gods were dreams.

It is a white of corrections, of
Failed impulses, of
Restarts and rewinds and redos,
Echoes of memories painted over and written over,
Forgotten
But still there,
Underneath it all.

Snow

Snow is falling all around him, like fairies floating earthward in the service of some ancient god of rime and frost. "Hello," he says, as one settles on his nose, but she does not respond, she melts in silence. He takes a drag and hears the fluttering of wings in his chest, in time with the fluttering all around him. In the snowdrifts he sees her face, in the snow-heightened silence he hears her voice, and he smiles as fairies drift towards him, bestowing gentle kisses that he saves for her.

Old Town

We walked that day,
Past cathedral bells and cobbled streets,
Down by the river of dreams.

We sat on a stone bench
In a pool of yellow light,
And in between our hands
I could feel our dreams
Coming through,
Coming real.

We were dancing,
Though we never left that bench,
In glances and smiles,
To that ancient reel
That every lover hears
Anew.

Milkshakes and cotton candy
Leaving sugary trails on our faces;
Wispy clouds,
The lightest touch,
A whisper of skin on skin.

I still taste
Your kisses.

A Snowy Day at the Bus Stop

Perfume on the breeze
Sweet and cloying
Kills the senses,
Overpowering.

Butterflies flutter by,
Frozen in a moment
Behind a thin membrane,
Glittering with the light of dewdrops and coffee cups.
Doors open and shut
As the snow falls
And buses go by;
A neverending story
Of arrivals and departures,
Orpheus forever leading Eurydice,
Afraid to look behind him
But unable to stop himself.

Silent stops,
Empty receptacles
Where neighbors stand alone,
Refusing to acknowledge each other's presences
For fear or connecting,
Of being sent
Back to Tartarus,
Swept away on Lethe's currents,
A forgotten shade.
"Know me," they say,
"Remember me."
These ghosts,
These echoes,
Forever peering from glassed-in shelters,
Waiting for their buses to arrive,
Marking their lives by the 5:02.

Notebook

Creamy paper under my hands;
An empty slate,
Waiting to be filled,
Waiting for me to cover you with my spidery script.

A blank page,
A challenge.
Satisfying warmth
In my hands;
Her hair,
Pressed against my cheek.

The pages start to fill,
And I run my hands over the bumps
Left behind by my pen:
A hungry braille
Defining her
Yet leaving her as strange to me
As she ever was.
This mystery.
This love?

Writings from the past
Leave their marks on the pages to come;
A forewarning,
A premonition
Waiting to be raised
By a rubbing.
The future,
In ridges and canyons,
Waiting for us to discover them
Together.

Crosswords

Diamonds glitter in the light
As her hand moves across the page
Filling in the blanks of her life:
One across,
Five down.
Chin in hand, the clues fly by,
Answering themselves,
Ticked off the list,
One
By one
As the world passes her by.

She pauses,
At a loss,
Frozen in a moment;
Searching for the right word,
The one that will fit
And solve the puzzle before her.

Scenes From a Cafe

On the table, a chessboard
Empty of pieces,
Cold and barren.
Glossy pages reflect my life,
The tale written on my face.
Hissing steam keeps time
As it slips through my fingers.
Notice me,
Oh,
Notice me,
My hands beg
As they turn the page.

Papers, papers
Bulging from a file.
Tapping fingers:
A life line
Sending messages
In morse code.
File it away;
This day was brought to you by the letter, "P"!
This is how I spend my days.
...
This is important.
---
This is the truth.
...

Remember

There once was a boy who loved a girl very much, and she in turn loved him. They were young, and they were happy, because they did not know any different.

The boy grew older, as boys do, and decided to follow his dreams to the city, where he could hear them calling. He promised the girl he would not forget her, and she likewise.

He went to the city, and every evening he looked to the north, imagining that the girl was looking south, that somehow, some way, across the miles between them, their eyes were meeting, that she had not forgotten him. And, indeed, there were many nights when she was looking south, towards the city, at that very time, and thinking of the boy, whom she loved so much. "Remember," the sun whispered to them as it set, and they did.

Time passed, as it does, and the boy stayed in the city. The boy and girl did not forget each other, but distance has a way with memory, not to weaken but to strengthen, to calcify it, set it in stone, cold and unliving. And love cannot be blamed for weakening in those circumstances, for love requires heat, is nothing if not the distillation of life. The girl did not stop loving the boy, but her love for him stayed still, like her memory of him, and other loves went rushing by. One day, one of these loves asked her to be his wife, and she said yes, for she loved him. But she had not forgotten the boy. She looked south, hoping he would hear and forgive her, that he had not forgotten her.

And he had not.

The boy looked up and to the north, with that feeling we all have at times, of unexplainable unsettlement. Things were changing, he knew, they were always changing; such was their way. But memory is constant, memory does not change, memory is all the little details of people set in stone, waiting just a step behind for us to turn and see them once more. He still remembered the girl, as he had promised he would, and he closed his eyes and smiled as the sun sank below the horizon.

Boxes

Boxes, boxes, boxes. Isn't it funny how we pack up our lives in boxes; a year here, a year there, and at the end of your life you find yourself packed up, packed away, tucked in between the blankets and bicycles. He lifts the cover and runs his hands over the paper within, its yellowing smoothness slipping through his hands, like the past he is trying to hold onto, to remember. Faces with no names, names with no faces, people he can't even remember forgetting.

And then, her.

It isn't a good picture of her; she always hated her hair that day. But it's the only picture of her he has, the only one she ever let him take. In all the other pictures he has of her she is on the periphery, half seen and half invisible; a pair of eyes in the background; a ghost; a cipher. Perhaps that is why he still remembers her; how can you forget someone you never knew?

It's the look in her eyes that draws him to this picture, a look that has said everything and nothing to him at different times in his life. He remembers a time when he pulled it out and was filled with rage, with the urge to burn it, to wipe her out of his life as surely as she wiped him out of hers. But today he looks and sees only sadness. "Take my hand," she was saying, but he could not hear her then and can hardly hear her now, her voice echoing thin and tinny from a faded yellow photograph.

Ume

Information found here and here.

------------------

Once upon a time there was a maiden who had a beautiful garden. People came from miles around to walk its curving paths, sit on its stone benches and admire its pretty flowers. Men came from even further away, for the maiden was fair; fairer than the fairest flower in her garden. They brought her exotic gifts, wrote her songs and poetry and waited on her hand and foot, yet all were turned away, for there was no room within her heart for any but her garden. The men despaired, but what were they to do? She had made up her mind that none would possess her.

One day a strange boy came to the garden. He did not glance at the girl, did not speak to her, did not bring her gifts. He walked in, sat down on a bench and began to read. The girl thought this very strange, indeed, but as he was quiet and did not disturb her, she let him be.

The next day a new suitor came, and the boy closed his book to watch. The suitor brought the maiden a present, which she took, but when he tried to approach her, she turned him away, as she always did. Despondent, the suitor left, like countless men before him.

The boy watched in silence.

"Do not judge me so," the maiden said to him.

In response, the boy picked up his book and began to read once more.

The girl was irritated by this strange boy. He did not glance at her, did not speak to her, did not bring her gifts, did not do anything. He simply sat and read. She wanted him to go away, to leave her and her pretty garden in peace, and so she devised a plan to chase him away.

The next day, the maiden walked over to the boy's bench. The boy looked up and closed his book as she approached.

"Boy," she said, "Since you have decided to stay, you must earn your keep."

The boy stared back at her.

The maiden hesitated. She was not a cruel person, and what she was about to say was unnatural to her.

"Fetch me a bag of manure from the shed."

The boy held her gaze for a moment longer, just long enough to unsettle her, then placed his book on the bench, stood and brought her a bag of manure from the shed. The maiden was unsure if her plan was working as intended, so she continued to make demands of the boy, hoping that one day he would have had enough, and she would wake to an empty garden once more. But every morning she awoke to find him on his bench, reading his book. The maiden's irritation came to be replaced with something new, something she had never felt towards anyone, man or boy before, and she became afraid. She did not know what to do with this strange new seed within her, which grew with every passing day, and she was afraid of what it meant for her beautiful garden. So, one summer day, she decided she had no choice: she packed herself a small bundle and left in the night, planning never to return.

The boy awoke. The maiden was gone, and he missed her; he, in turn, had come to love her, for in her demands he had felt the first stirrings of her feelings. But she was gone, and did not return the next day, nor the day after that, nor the week after that. The boy grew sad, for he felt in his heart that her fear had won, that she would not, could not return to him. So he closed his book and stood, turning his face towards the sun with a silent wish. His whole body began to lengthen and grow; he put down roots and his fingers stretched towards the sky, as if it were his pretty maiden's face. And he was content.

Summer turned to autumn. Autumn turned to winter. And as winter turned to spring, the young tree hoped the maiden would return to her garden. He shot out blossoms just before spring, five petaled blossoms which showed how he had kept track of the passing days: five fingers at a time. Visitors marveled at this new tree, and praised the maiden for making her garden even more beautiful.

But the maiden did not return.

In time the tree bore fruit, round plums filled with all his unshed tears and unsaid words. People picked them, but they were so sour that they could not be eaten. The people shrugged; "Nothing is perfect," they reminded each other with lemon-faced chuckles. The strange tree was certainly beautiful, even if its fruit was inedible.

The seasons marched on; spring turned to summer, summer to fall, fall to winter and winter approached spring once more.

And then, one day, the maiden returned.

She had travelled far, only to find that she could not, did not want to forget the strange boy and his even stranger silences. She loved him, and came back to find him and tell him so. But the boy was gone; his book lay on his bench, but it was cold and empty. Beside his bench was a tree, a tree she knew she had not planted and had never seen before. She ran her hands over its young bark, marveling at this strange miracle, and as she did so its blossoms burst into bloom: red, white and pink, with five petals and a strong fragrance that brought tears to her eyes. And she knew that the strange tree was her strange boy.

The maiden wished he could be her strange boy once more; but some choices, once made, can not be unmade. So she cared for the tree, picking his fruit and pickling it so she could taste his strange flavors, taste his tears and feel his love, even when snows covered the land. People came, and she allowed them to take cuttings from her beloved tree, spreading the strange boy's love for her, and his tears, all over the world. As the years passed by, the people who returned noticed that the maiden had ceased aging; like a tree, her growth was undetectable to the human eye. Seas rose and fell; the land around her changed, but the maiden's garden and her strange tree remained untouched. And there, high in some forgotten mountain range, they remain, and will remain until the end of time: a beautiful maiden, her pretty garden and her strange plum tree.

Tomorrow

Another day, another cigarette. He inhales and holds his breath, feeling the smoke wash through him, displacing him. He looks down at his hands, half expecting them to turn insubstantial before his eyes, to see the smoke issuing from under his fingernails, to see himself bleeding away before his eyes. He watches the people pass by, alone and isolated in their hopes and fears, and wishes he could be like them, wishes he could help them all. The wind blows, ice blowing over him, blowing through him, making him numb, a blessed numbness that he welcomes, that he surrenders to and is carried along by. The hand holding the cigarette lost all feeling long ago; he glances down at the foreign claw at the end of his arm and smiles, swept away by a memory of storm-filled eyes and an irresistable smile. "The hand that holds the cigarette always gets colder." So it does. So it does.

Overcast

Grey, grey, as far as the eye can see; the sun a pinprick of light, straining through the curtain of clouds. He takes a drag, feeling lightheaded; as if he is floating just above the pavement, as if the steady rhythm of inhale and exhale is the only thing keeping him together, as if the second he stops he will burst out of his skin, scatter into the wind and disperse. He has always felt this way, felt as if there was a secret he wasn't quite aware of, as if he was never meant to be here, as if it is all a surprise to him. He closes his eyes and feels the light on his eyelids; light without heat, without source, pressing down on him, giving him shape. Her face, unbidden, floats out of his memory, and it is a dam bursting. Her in the night, in the predawn, in the day, in the evening, washing over him, the memories pummeling him with their vividness and detail. He stubs out the cigarette and lifts his fingers to his face, smelling that ancient smell of earth and sweet; of her and him in a creaky apartment while the world passed by.

Stretching Toward Oblivion

Had been meaning to write something based around this for quite some time. Not 100% sure how I feel about this; I suppose I'll take another look at it sometime in the future and decide.

He sits in the water and feels it bubbling up from the depths of the earth; hot and salty, the tears of some unknown, ancient god. It washes over him, erasing and rewriting everything it comes into contact with, leaving him blank and whole once more. In his hands he holds two jagged chunks of ice, the pleasant pain his only tether to the world around him. For a moment he watches them crying their slow tears of death that pool in the hidden wells of his hands, which he closes and plunges into the water. It is as if the heat can feel its antithesis, can feel the ice within his hands as it probes, searching for a way to become one with the cold, to slake its neverending thirst; and the cold on the inside of his hands is opening itself, stretching forward for that happy oblivion as a woman welcomes her lover. He grants her wish, a little at a time, feeling the heat seep inside and the chill dissipate, until all that is left is water and the memory of numb hands which gradually return to life.

Newsprint

A continuation/flip side of this piece.

The slow and steady hiss of dripping coffee wakes him, his dream already disappearing from his mind. Something about a woman on the other side of an ocean, and he was afraid; so afraid.
He feels her absence; he has become so used to the sensation that it is comforting, that he would feel lost without it. Even when she is next to him he feels it, a weight dragging him down, making him solid, making him more real. He remembers how giddy she made him feel when he first met her; as if a strong wind could lift him up and carry him down the street like the front page of a newspaper, the headline of his love written across his forehead. He never feels like that anymore. Every day the emptiness fills him. Grounds him. He puts down roots, roots that clutch and grab at everything within reach and fight the wind with insubstantial mutterings.
He remembers, too, how touching her used to make him feel, how he would press his face into her back, feeling her on his face; wanting more, somehow, some way - even if it meant destroying her to ease his own worries. But even in that he failed, too afraid of the necessary steps and consequences.
He hears the sounds of turning newspaper pages from the other room. This used to be their time, the quiet minutes before the day began when they sat and felt each other's solemn silence, let it cradle and sustain them. But things changed. The silence became strained. Forced. Awkward. He tried to fill it up but that only made it worse, made it more painful, made it more obvious that their perfect silence had been lost, that they had lost it somewhere. He raged; he begged; he pleaded. In the end it was simply another failure to add to his list. Now he lies in bed listening to her in the other room and is afraid to join her.
The scuffle of chair on tile. Coffee being poured. He can feel her approaching, feel the pull getting stronger and stronger.
"Brad?"
Silence. But not a strained one; this one is calm, like the old silence but different in some ancient way, some way he can't quite grasp. He almost cries aloud at having found it again, but is trying so hard to hang onto it that he can't waste a single bit of effort on verbalization.
"Brad, honey?"
Nononopleaseno, IamcloseIswearitIamsofuckingclose.
"Mmmmmm?"
"...coffee..."
Gone.
He looks up at her, holding his cup, and realizes she is trembling in the minutest of ways, vibrating in time with some ancient melody whose strains are only audible when two people make love. Do not be afraid, he wants to tell her, There is no reason to be. We will not be afraid anymore, I will hold your hand and we will laugh, laugh till the seas rise and the land sinks and nothing remains on this earth but the sound of waves and the echoes of our carefree laughter. Keep your secrets, only give me this, this moment, these silences, and I will not ask you for more. And we will be beautiful and terrible, broken and whole, silently screaming for all who care to listen.

Stone Woman

Silent pleas
running down her cheeks
this stranger
this woman I have never known
whom I can never escape.

A crumpled napkin filled
with all the words left unsaid
and all the dreams
I couldn't fulfill.

I am sorry
I was not all you hoped I would be.

You never asked
so I never knew.
I still don't, you know.

Why are we stuck here
and where do we go?
They never gave me a manual
and I sometimes forget
you never got one either.

Sometimes I wish you could hold me
like you probably did
but I can't remember you ever doing.
Sometimes it's you who need to be held
but I can't remember how to do something
I've never done before.

I'm sorry,
I didn't mean to disappoint you.

Sentinel

Cold and silent, she stands at the window
pregnant with hope,
an empty vessel
waiting to be filled.

Snow falling on faces
silent whispers on eyelashes
munchings and crunchings of footsteps
warm burrows; safe and secure.

Quiet sentinel
here at the beginning of days
where stories begin
and lives entwine.

This was ours
is ours
will always be ours
if we want it so

and I do
I do
God help me,
I do.

God is a gambling trickster
a bored housewife
feeding the penny slots
waiting for her payoff

she pulls the lever
and watches our spinning dials
waiting to see if they line up
whirr whirr whirr

click
click
click
Jackpot?

The Altar

I usually try to avoid shit like this. Consider it a bit of an experiment, I suppose.

whispering sheets
lamplight gleaming
hot breath
steaming windows
fumbling towards
ragged gasps
interlocking fingers
pleading cries
slippery center

hold me down
take me in
lift me up
make me yours
is it me?
or is it you?

moons exploding
suns imploding
vessels dilating
insistent brushes
pain blossoms
pleasure buds
future harvest
flowering spring
reap and sow

hold me down
take me in
lift me up
make me yours
is it me?
or is it you?

glassy eyed
glottal stop
air deprived
empty mind
swallow spit
claw at walls
surround me
pull me in

hold you down
take you in
lift you up
make you mine
is it you?
or is it me?

The Farewell

the closer we get to our destination
the further away from you I am
slip sliding away
is that what the song means?
I always wondered.
wheels humming on pavement
the staccato rhythms of dotted lines
fading into the distance
like you, fading behind me
fading beside me
hand in hand
together at last
the only way we can be
the only way we know how.
Words lie heavy on my tongue
I will not cheapen them
I will not cheapen you.
But,
oh,
how I long to say them
how easy it would be
and how hard it would make things.
You never asked me for anything
you never gave me anything
but your truth
and this is how I repay you.
I do bite my thumb, sir,
but I do not bite my thumb at you, sir.
We hold hands
but not too tight;
we both know the end of this dream is near.

The Nightingale and the Caterpillar

Interesting, the ideas that pop into your head while on long road trips. Actually, the first sentence came yesterday, but the real meat of this piece and then tying it to that little blurb I'd jotted down yesterday came today, in the car. I have another little idea but I'm not quite sure if I can do it justice. I also hope the space editing comes out ok; there isn't much of it, but what with different browser resolutions, I'm sure there's a chance it'll look screwy to somebody.

Secrets secrets don't make friends
but sometimes
secrets secrets keep friends
and promises break them.

Once upon a time
there was a boy
who had a secret
he didn't want anyone to find out.
So he turned himself into a nightingale
and flew away
over hill
and dale.

One day he heard a song
and alighted to find a young maiden.
"I am so sad," she told the nightingale.
"My father is mean, and will not give me any baubles
to play with."
So the nightingale flew to the nearby town
and stole a bauble from the butcher's wife
to bring back to the girl.

"Oh," she said,
"How happy you make me,
pretty nightingale!"
And she danced all the way home.
But the next day
she was sad again;
her father had taken her pretty, she said.
So the nightingale flew to the nearby town
and stole a bauble from the tailor's wife
to bring back to the girl.

The weeks went by;
every day she was sad,
and every day a glimmer of happiness -
or so the nightingale thought -
for the maiden was cunning and shy
(as maidens are)
and was fashioning a cage for the nightingale:
a cage of pretties
lashed together with ivy
to hold her pretty.
Then came the fateful day
when it was complete,
and the nightingale was trapped
in the cage of his labors.
How he struggled against the walls of his glittering prison!
But it was too late,
and the maiden was too crafty.
She tied a leash around the nightingale's leg,
so he couldn't break free,
even after beating his wings all day.

Exhausted,
the nightingale sank to the floor of his prison,
and cried himself to sleep.
But in the night
he heard a small voice above him,
and looked up
to find a caterpillar peeping into his cell.
"Little nightingale, why were you crying?"
she said.
"I am stuck,"
he said,
"And do not know if I will ever be free again."
"Do not fear,"
she said,
"I will help you, if you will but promise me one thing."
"Anything,"
he said.
She told him
and he promised.
So the caterpillar slipped between the bars
chewed through the leash
and then the ropes of that hateful cage
and the nightingale flew free
with the caterpillar on his shoulder -
for that was part of his promise.

Many miles they flew,
to a land where the strangers spoke in tongues
and the water stood still in Winter's grasp.
And here the nightingale landed,
for that was also part of his promise.
Since there was no-one around to find out his secret anymore,
the nightingale turned back into a boy
and built himself a cottage
while the caterpillar built herself a cocoon.

In the spring she emerged,
a pretty butterfly,
and the boy and the butterfly spent every perfect day together,
until the boy began to feel something new,
something he had never felt before.
So one day he turned to the butterfly
and whispered
his secret
in her ear.
In a flash,
she turned into a beautiful maiden,
who thanked him for breaking the spell placed on her
by an angry witch
who had entrusted her with a secret
that the maiden did not keep.

Did they live happily ever after?
Oh, my dearest.
That is a secret
for another time.

Edit: Nevermind, the spacing I was hoping for didn't even come out. Looks like it's time to search the internets for html.

Can't Sleep

...so of course, when I can't sleep, I type something up of dubious quality and post it here. Hurrah!

This is actually the continuation of a story which I had started some time ago - I think I posted the first half of it on here but I can't be bothered to go dig it up.

She wakes to a brand new day, the horizon pregnant with the sun.
This is the day.
This is her day.
She goes about her daily tasks, hoping to calm her nerves. Starts the coffee machine. Steps outside, grabs her paper. Pulls her favorite mug off the dish rack. Sugar, one flattened teaspoon. No milk, no cream. Pours, thrusting her face into the rising aroma, losing herself in the moment, in the sheer joy of sensation, of stimulation, of feeling alive.
And yet she cannot escape the feeling, that feeling, the gnawing in her stomach and in her mind that will not stop, that cannot stop, that is slowly devouring her piece by piece and second by second.
This is the day she says goodbye.
This is the day she says hello.
Calm. Calm. Must stay calm. She flicks through the paper, not really reading any of the stories, and pauses on the horoscope page, something she never pays attention to, seeking - what? Guidance? Advice? Justification? She is the scorpion, the eagle, the phoenix; destined to be reborn time and time again, a destiny which she feels looming once more.
But. But. But.
Always buts. No ifs ands or buts, says the cliche, but no-one ever really brings up ifs or ands. Only buts. She knows what is right to do, what she has wanted to do, what he has been daring him to do.
But.
Isn't it funny how the mind works against us in so many ways; knows our fears, our weaknesses, the things that send us to sleep exhausted from tears.
You'll never meet another.
He can change.
You love him.
Life is rarely neat and tidy; it is a neverending mess that stains your mind and body. Here is where your father spilled. There is where your mother dripped. And there he is; splashed on the walls, on the furniture, on the ceilings - a childish scrawl, a ramble of spent passion. If only he could be scraped away. If only it were so easy. She closes her eyes and replays the conversation in her head, the conversation she has had dreams and nightmares about for weeks.
I don't know what I want.
You don't know what you want.
We don't have anything in common.
They never had anything in common, she remembers. It was convenient, he was nice, she was nice, everything was nice. Days became weeks, weeks became months, months became years and neither of them knew exactly how it happened but it did.
She pours another coffee, as she has every morning for as far back as she can remember. Brings it back to the bedroom, to the waiting shadowy lump.
"Brad?"
Now.
"Brad, honey?"
Nownownow.
"Mmmmm?"
"...coffee..."
She's glad he's still asleep; it keeps him from seeing her screaming, begging, pleading. But then, he hasn't noticed it all year; why would today be any different?

I think when I had originally started this I had actually intended for her to go through with it. Oh well.