It's who you know.

I never took the future seriously
Because I don't think
I ever thought
I would live that long
Now here I am
On the cusp of 25
And no closer to
Anything
Than when I was 18
I don't expect anything
And I am my greatest hurdle
And yet
I want more
I want to heal
But wanting something
Is not the same
As going
And getting something
And I have trouble
With the "doing" part
I don't lack ambition
I lack motivation
I don't lack intelligence
Or ideas
I lack resources
Don't tell me
All you need is
A modicum of talent
To make your way
In this world.
What I really need
Is a dish
Of privledge and opportunity
And a cocktail
Of prescription drugs
To take away my greatest hurdle
And to know
Someone who knows
Someone who knows
Someone.

A break up.

If heaven is a real place,

Then it exists behind your eyes.

But when you sit there

And tell me

You want out,

All I can think of

Is I'm living in hell.

I didn't see that coming

But being near sighted

How could I?

You don't even shed a tear

And I feel far away.

My emotions are banging

At the door

But my heart is in my throat

and I can't keep them from coming.

We speak civilly

But I feel like an abandoned fort

In the middle of a violent civil war

I don't want this

But I know if it's is what you really want,

I can't convince you otherwise

And I won't.

I won't.

I have been thinking.

I have been thinking a lot about this blog lately. I still write often. At least a few times a week. But my writing happens primarily in the form of journaling these days. It helps me deal with my depression and anxieties, my queerness and my hatred of this queer body, my relationships and my relationship with conflict. When I was at the bottom of the ocean and thinking I would drown down there, I wrote my way through the entire experience.

Even though it helps me with all of these things, I have been finding it frustrating to write in circles and not really be producing readable work. I feel as though I have lost myself and I have lost my craft.

I thought, when I first really stopped writing a few years ago, that I was growing out of it and I didnt need or want to do it any more. I dropped out of university. I was very focused on my music and then my job and then coming out and exploring that. I watched my life do a complete 180 and I found myself in a codependent and emotionally abusive relationship. It took me a long time to realize that I was isolated from my friends and family, and unfortunately from my hobbies and passions. It took a diagnosis and moving out of that relationship and then months of quiet contemplation to heal and really begin to unpack what happened. I find myself now in a stable place, in a much healthier relationship, and missing my words and my music.

My hands feel numb with disuse. But I am playing guitar again. I am slowly building muscles that I have allowed to atrophy. My prose feels weak. Like a bridge built from popsicle sticks and glue. I want to write again. I want to publish eventually. I find myself now a queer, nonbinary trans feminist with a lot to say, especially about these experiences. It feels appropriate now with NaNoWriMo in full swing that I try and begin that work now.

If this sounds whiny or annoying, it probably is. I haven't written this for anyone but myself. Though this blog is public and on the internet, I find it quiet and private, far away from the bustle and constant circling of vultures on social media.

Someone told me once that I cannot look to find happiness in another person. They told me I have to find it in myself. I was a little younger and a lot more brash and I did not want to hear those words. Even though I am in a relationship that makes me very happy, with a person I will probably marry, I struggle every day now to find that confidence and happiness in me and for me. I wish I had taken that advice seriously, because it is so much harder now than when I was 18,19, or 20. Here I am on the cusp of 25 (ancient, I know, I started this blog when I was like 16), and just beginning to understand happiness beyond the parameters of a romantic partnership.

Hindsight is 20/20 I suppose. I am here now, battered and a little worse for wear, but I'm alive and still sober and queer and hopefully a little smarter and thankfully ready to write again.

Nacreous Bottom

I let them take over
The small machinations
Of a part of my mind
That they said
Was better left unloved.
With every pinnacle
Every peak
Every jagged faced mountain
I've ever scoured,
You will always come down
At some point
And it will be
Ineffable
Inescapable
Unmistakable
A deep blue
a nacreous bottom
In some ways
Those moments
Make me feel
Nascent
Like I have just been born
Like I have yet to live
Like the last 23 years
Are a drop
In a river
And they drift away--
Nothing at all.

A Welcome Distraction.

I catch you
Slipping through
My mind--
Every day
I get distracted
From my thoughts
They feel contracted
Like water receding
From cool blue tide pools.
You are a moon
And your gravitational pull
Has me
So grounded in you
That my head
Sways and crashes
Like waves
On an ocean.

I never ran away but I tried.

My mother adds
A shade to my dark
When she asks me
If I remember the time
I tried to run away.
I wouldn't have
Gotten far
I had less gas
Than a parked car
Three packs of instant noodles
A fresh faced scar
And my favorite blanket.
She thought it was funny
But it also broke her heart
To know
The turmoil I was facing
Was not something
She could control
Or handle
Or fix
Or do anything about.
Our life was just a bunch
Of crappy circumstances
Exacerbated
By a fist's
Unruly advances.
It made me sad
To know that I hurt her so
Much.
I never wanted to.
I never thought of her.
I was just tired and scared.
And that's why I'm crying
At the dinner table
As she tells this story:
Because I forgot
How she was always there
And I wasn't alone.
Even if I felt it right
In the core of my soul.
I was never alone.

Hearts.

She could break my heart
into 1000 pieces
and I would pick
them all up,
number them 0 to 999
press them back together
with superglue
and bent up euphemisms
and drop my heart
right back in her hands.
She said
"I could never do that to you."
But you did.
Over and over.
Every day.
Until I couldn't find all the pieces
anymore.
And it wouldn't matter anyways
cause you can only fix
a broken thing
so many times before
it becomes unrecognizable.

Erode.

Why do you hold this power over me?
I am leaves ripped from branches
I am trees torn from the earth
I am erosion
Of soil and stone.
I hate that I let you do this
I hate that I can’t control it
I hate that my fate
Is to continue
To let you wear me away
Until I am
Nothing but
A never ending canyon
A winding river
The deep crevice
Of an underground cavern.

What You Do.

Her eyes cut through me.
A hot blade through cold butter.
Her eyes gut punch me.
A hammer to the head of a nail.
Her hands still hold me.
An anchor clinched around coral.
Her hands move through me.
An automatic rifle kicking out after firing.

I don't know if she knows.
I want her to want me.
I see that she sees
her special effect is affecting me.

After A Breakup.

I'm afraid to admit
I feel sort of out of it.
I'm just too tired I think
To invest the time
To step off the brink
I can't continue to lie
And say I'm fine
And turn around
And die every night.
Every night
A little bit of me dies.
Hi,
Do you care at all?
Hi,
Did you ever?
Hi,
It's been a while,
Want to catch up over coffee?
Hi,
Did you know you've damaged me?
Hi.
How are you?
I miss you.
I wish I could kiss you.
I wish I could forget you.
I wish I could relive you.
I wish I could be without you.
I wish I was whole without you.
I want to be whole again.

Seven Minutes in Heaven.

She said,
"Lay down and
let's look at the stars and
wonder
about all the places
there are,"
I almost told her,
"I'd rather look at you
because
I wonder where you are and
where you've been and
what's under your skin and
how can I get there--
Those deep blue
tide pools
where crustaceans
find heaven
where doe eyed teens
count to seven:
The number of minutes
I want to spend in
space with you."

What it's like.

My heart sings poetry,
but my brain can't motivate me
to get dressed
hand and pen pressed
to paper fated
to wait with bated
breath.
I'm so tired
of all the liars
singing in my head.
If I could be free of them--
these ravenous thoughts--
I count to ten,
look again,
I see them still:
Those dark sentient
beasts
that only I can
kill.

The First Time.

I fill my time with people
In part
Because I'm scared
To admit defeat
To go home
And face this disease.
I'm afraid to be alone
With these thoughts--
They pinch each
Fibre of me
So much pressure
Behind my eyes
That it's all I feel--
This pain.
It feels good to hit something
Tear it down
And hate it,
Even if its me.
Skin flushed
Under fist.
Tomorrow it will blossom
And remind me
Of those thoughts,
And I'll ache
At the next dreaded night
Of trying to battle
With the inevitable:
Swollen eyes
Stinging cheeks
Singing limbs
Splintered teeth.
I hope one day
I'm strong enough
To face this.

The Priest's Grotto - Mundare, AB.

Something about that small town--that grotto that we walked through, I keep thinking back to it. My memory is an old sepia photograph that I squint at. I keep trying o pick out the details, but time proves as persistent as it always is, and the jagged edges of hewn stone and wild hedges fade even as I recall them:

The place is old: you can feel it in the grass and see it in the stone, but it feels ageless too. It's like it will remain for a thousand more years, even when there are no more priests left to tend it. It is such a strange juxtaposition of stone and cement, a hard precise human hand and the wild ravages of nature. It is almost a paradox. It is almost perfect harmony.

The front of the grotto is a lush grass field lined with ancient trees. They grow beards of moss and whisper old secrets when the wind kisses them and command a respect that is unmatched by any sprig you will see in the city. Their branches reach over the field for each other, shield us from the sun with a canopy of new budding leaves. There is a cement walkway that leads up to the front of a massive stone structure in the centre of the grotto. It guides us onto a stone pavilion that is old and cracked and has seen the pounding of hundreds of feet. The centre is a sheltered area for prayers or ceremony, and on both sides are wide stone basins that once held fountains. They are deep and empty now, save for rusty bronze piping.

Next to each basin is a set of crooked stairs and a statue that offers us a story. One is the virgin Mary. The other is indiscernible. The fountain piping is bent crudely to follow the stairs. They creep past the statues and up to a cement reservoir at the peak of the structure. When you climb past the statues you find paths that wind around and lead you up to the top. You can run your hand along stone walls that line the path up. They are cobbled piles of rock and poured concrete. Everything is overgrown-- covered in moss and weeds and forget me nots  and other wild flowers. The priests have begun to groom the hedges and lilac bushes that line the pathways opposite to the wall. Though they still carry the posture of something that never stops resisting. They continue to grow and always the threat of them conquering the path lingers.

When you reach the top there stands at its very peak a rusting metal cross at least 12 feet high. It is covered head to toe in creeping vines dried and cracking from last year's winter. Tiny buds have begun to appear as the vine prepares for another summer of creeping.

I remember standing at the top of that place and being struck with the dedication of the faithful, and all that is needed to create and nourish a place like this. It has a sense of calm and serenity and age, but also the unnerving edge of the human hand and mind.

Time 1.

You told me today
that the only thing we can ever
truly give
is time.
It is so limited
and so precious
that my heart sinks
whenever I remember
every time I gave my time
to someone
who threw it all away.
I could have been giving it to you--
Or better yet--
I could have given it to myself.
So often we forget
that time is the only true thing
with transactional value.
Sometimes it's better to invest in
ourselves
rather than live a life
of timeless poverty.

A Thought.

I take another hit through water.

The audiophile ignites in me.

Suddenly I hear such a range of sound. I hear the set back beating of drums, and the trumpet supporting the vocal harmonies. I hear variance, depth, and width.

The music feels full. It makes me tingle behind my eyes and see stars. I feel it in my mind and throat and heart. I feel a rhythmic sway in my bones--it's easy but unsettling--different from my daily stiff back and lead limbs.

This feels right--just right now. I know when I wake up, I will salivate at the thought of being back here: the feeling of being surrounded by music, feeling surrounded by inspiration, surrounded by love. I forget these-- what does it feel like to not be inherently alone?

That might be what I like about writing--all this fullness. My mind is fighting against this all the time. I think I am in some way afraid of this power and freedom.

How can I fear something that frees me so much?

I am tilting and the music is tilting with me.

I Felt Like Icarus.

There's fire in her eyes,
and it comes out in her words--
I sit back and listen
because I'm in awe
of her passions
and her scope
of life.
There's fire in her hair
and when I lean in to hug her
in a friendly manner,
I feel smoke and heat
and it leaves me
tingling
finger tips singed
and feeling so afraid
of being burned--
And yet I'm forgetting
that I wear wings
Of wax.

The High Level Bridge.

I may fall into deeper waters still.
150 feet up it looks soft and inviting,
even during a murky December night.
I've heard whispers of what happens
to the high level bridgers:
They say inertia stops your outside body on impact,
but your organs keep moving,
thrashing around and tearing
themselves apart.
It's blunt trauma.
It's ribcages busting.
It's aorta and lungs and veins and arteries all ripping under too much pressure.
Still,
the high level bridgers must have felt
that there would be some relief in that;
the few seconds of debilitating
pain
would be worth not having to spend another moment
in this fucked up world.

- - -

It's been almost a year since my friend passed away. I've been missing him more than usual. I wish that I had been a better friend to him, that I could have helped him in some way. I wish he was still around so that I could talk to him now, I need his guidance.

Bioluminous.

I have never felt heartache
As deep and vast
As the ocean.
Dark and
Blue and
Sometimes
It seems
Like bottomless
Despair
Though
There's life
Down deep
And they don't need
To worry about when
They will see light at the end
Of a darkening void--
They make their own.

Dear dad.

When I'm far away from you
It's easy to forget your
Shortcomings                    
Negligence                  
On an emotional level      
It's hard to accept          
That you're the father I have  
But never the one I needed.
I miss you                  
I don't
I hate that
I love you.