other shores.

On the coast
of some different shore
ages and ages ago
we shoved our feet in the hot sand,
and drowned ourselves in the cool waves,
and let the seaweed tangle us up,
like a mother’s blankets.
We’d watch the boats go in and out
and wade and waste away afternoons, child-like.

The blackberry trees were always ripe and full,
sweet and tart,
staining our hands, faces and feet.
And sun would set, 
tired and hungry,
with our pores full of that fishy smell,
we two together, with him in tow,
would climb the hill for our cake.

Days have gotten shorter and cooler.
Nights have gotten longer and darker.
There has been warm wind and stiff breeze
and sun
and sand
and seaweed
and blackberries.

The boats have come and gone,
and their passengers have long departed
and returned,
standing on that bow,
watching the sun go down,
thinking, “my, what a lovely beach”.

Until one day when way made way
amidst the whistle and hum
of a crowded city street.
And eye met eye, and gaze met gaze,
but nothing was spoken between.

You just sat suspended there,
shining orb-like,
red and gold and bright,
like tiny beads of fat in the cans of clams.

You’ve found your way to this day,
and on the journey, other shores,
as delightful, as carefree.

But ne’er to that different shore,
of years of yore,

that belonged to you and me.

maybe…

you sit there with your green eyes.
all I can really think of is that coldplay song.
“honey, you are a rock, upon which I stand…I come here to talk I hope you understand…green eyes, the spotlight shines upon you…and how could anyone deny you…I came here with a load, and it feels so much lighter that I met you…”

but you are none of those things.
if anything, you are the absolute opposite.
you aren’t the rock, you are the sea.
you are the load, not the burden lifter.

there is really nothing new to say. there are no unexpressed sentiments left.
there is the same discontent, and disappointment, and confusion, and what the fucks rolling off my tongue at the end of the night.

I think I just need to run away from it like I always do. not in a bad way. just in a way that provides some perspective.  the last time I felt like this I flew to Vegas, drank what seemed like an olympic sized swimming pool of vodka, didn’t sleep, made a best friend who a year later is still like aloe for my soul, and met a man that did more than an adaquate job of diverting my attention from the pain in my chest that I have been  told was heartache.  I just let it roll me up in it’s whirlwind, until everything else was just a blur passing by so quickly.  

it was reminiscent of playground days…spinning a swing all the way to the top and then just letting go and allowing natural forces to unwind you. all the while you are watching the same scenery spin quicker and quicker to the point where it is unrecognizable. and you know it’s fun, but you’re not entirely sure why. 

in any case, I am back to that mindset. that one that is continually searching for a new place.  that one that puts so much faith in places unseen to help me sort myself out. like these cities are my soulmates, my revealers, my friends, my rocks, my burden lifters. really, they are so much more dependable than people.

I hope that somewhere on those cobblestone streets of Rome, in the mortar, and the cracks, I find a foundation. maybe some pieces of ancient wisdom could have slipped below and are now waiting for me to catch them in my shoe soles and take them home with me.

or maybe I can just get lost in those beautiful blue humming waves of Marbella, and lose all of my bitterness in them.  just sweep them out with the tide, like a message in a bottle for someone else, some other day. 

or maybe the City of Lights will just make my soul incandescent. Maybe my eyes will hold the reflections of all those tiny shimmering lights on the Seine, and they will just stay there.

and then maybe, I will just forget all about you.

maybe…

god, God.

I suppose I don’t know much about religion. which I suppose is pretty ironic considering I’m a minister’s daughter, and I went to church 3 times a week for the first 20 years of my life. I think I’ve been three times total since then. and since I’ve left, religion and God, not that the two are synonomous, but that I’ve left them both, I really don’t know how to feel about either.

I don’t think religion is necessarily evil. I don’t necessarily think it is great either. I think it is whatever you make it. if it helps you to be a better person, then so be it.  but like anything with influence and power, paticularly of an emotional nature,  it can corrupt and destroy, under the guise of something moral and noble.

and from what I know about God, he’s a pretty good guy. I know he created us, and gave us life, and all that jazz. I think I could tell you what I was told I’m supposed to believe, and maybe what you were told you were supposed to believe. I could recite a hundred passages about his  goodness, and his loving-kindess, and his magnanimity, but to be honest, the only time I think I’ve ever really felt it, known it, was in solitude, a long, long time ago.

there is a just big empty void in my heart, where there used to be something. and that something, I don’t know whether it was real or imagined, the cure or just a placebo, my savior or just a crux…but I do know that whatever it was, it’s gone. and I do know that I hardly notice it, unless I’m forced to.

I do know that there is something in words that makes me forget.

there is this moment when I crack a spine, and they roll off my tongue, and I feel… holy. like psalms on the lips of apostles.  like many books could be my bible. there is this feeling, when the red wine hits my palate, and the pen touches the paper, and I feel…more.  more human.  more vulnerable. more desperate. more beautiful.

and maybe putting faith in words is like cheating. because they can always be exactly as you’d like them to be…and at the same time, sometimes you can’t make them exactly what you’d like them to be, and you can’t be exactly as you’d like to be. but, they don’t fail you. you fail them.

they keep you reaching for that one perfect stanza. that one that you want to shout from mountain tops. that one you want to whisper in the ear of your one true love. that one you want to impart to your first born. that one that you want for your stone when you are gone. 

words can be tangible. but that doesn’t mean they aren’t spiritual. that doesn’t mean they aren’t sacred.
words can be intangible. but that doesn’t mean they aren’t real.

they are real.

poems are my prayers and all the forewords are genesis, and all the epilogues are revelations. and they are my saints, and my demons.
my accusors and my witnesses.
my salvation and my damnation.