(Does this count as poetry?) A loosely associated collection of words.

Sometimes I swear
this sadness just envelops and eats me
the way clouds move in and devour dancing shadows with dark
or a phagocyte engulfs a poor little lost virus.

It gives no warning
It has no cause
It is disobedient to my will,
or I continue to convince myself that it is,
and I resent that, or I resent being lied to.

I think of playing one-on-one with my dad.
Sometimes he would back off, essentially ceasing to defend.

In that moment: There is no obstruction, no reason the well executed jump shot should not arc perfectly and gracefully into the coveted hoop; swish- the peaceful sound of a thing falling into place as a result of a motion well done.
But I hesitate. He looks at me and says, 'C'mon, whaddaya' want?!?'

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay.
My oh my what a wonderful day.
Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.
It's the truth, it's actual, everything is satisfactual!

Wishful thinking, that is.
I feel the inverse. A plain brown sparrow on my shoulder, perhaps.
Probably the left one, the sinistra one
It's the truth, it's actual, everything is just as it is and I need to see more.

Maybe that sparrow will be kind enough to share his wings and help me get somewhere where I can see more clearly.

Three Things

Three things ricocheting around my head:


ONE. (from Adam D., Counting Crows)

All my friends got flowers in their eyes
But I got none this season
All of the last ten years' blooms have gone and died
Time doesn’t give a reason
Hey baby, do you ask yourself sometimes what you need to be forgiven?
Everything that you've ever done wrong
Is the reason that I'm driven
Straight to you.

Waiting here for you
Wanting to tell you
How I get my ends and my beginning mixed up too
Just the way you do
Thought if I told you
You might want to stay for just another day or two

It's just like answers
that come in small packages
that go in the mail

Waiting for the trains that just never come
Beginning to believe in
the disappearing nature of the people we have been
We have begun to change into the worst kind of people
So unkind
Oh apologies, no apologies, this apology
Doesn't describe the way it feels to feel for you.

Waiting here for you
Wanting to tell you
How I find myself slowly disappearing too
Just the way you do
I thought if I told you
You might want to help me to remain with you

I just wanna stay for a little while
I wanna stay for a little while

There's a night life falling down on me
I just feel like a change
Beneath the sun in summer,
a sea of flowers won't bloom without the rain
But oh, this desert life, this high life
Here at the dying of the day
I wasn't made for this scene baby
But I was made in this scene
And baby, it's just my way
I don't want to go home alone, I wanna come on home to you

Waiting here for you
Wanting to tell you
How I line my sky with all the silver I can use
Just the way you do
Thought if I told you
You might want to stay for just another day or two.

Isn't that just like disappearing into the sum of yourself
and the person you are disappearing into
it's like one plus one equals nothing at all
one plus two equals nothing at all
one plus me equals nothing at all
one plus you equals one plus you equals you and you and you and you and
nothing at all
nothing at all

TWO. (from Caitlin Thomas, Leftover Life to Kill)

"You have only to look at my hands; the very reverse of Dylan's' square, gnarled, awkward, unwieldy, chunks of flesh; as though born to the soil, and only fit for planting spuds. And the nails: a shameful reproduction of my mind: torn, bitten, bleeding; the dead skin unfurling in grotesque corrugations. My worst vice at the bottom of all my troubles, and disquietingly part of me. And I fail to stop; and God knows I've tried."

THREE. (from Salman Rushdie, Luka and the Fire of Life)

" 'The better news is that Fire Bugs don't last long,' he consoled the young fellow. 'They blaze brightly, but they burn out young. Also, they blow with the wind. This way, that way; it's in their nature. No constancy of purpose...' "


(If I put them here, out of my head, can I get some sleep?!)

Sleep Tight

I can't sleep, AGAIN. I think I am not trying hard enough. Jumping out of bed to reply to an email from your mother-in-law, then register for a race, then going back to bed, then getting back up to look up lyrics to Collective Soul songs and get on Facebook does not constitute a true effort to sleep. Sometimes, seriously, what is my problem.

How tired I get of myself! If you want more sleep, sleep. Good gracious. GOOD NIGHT.

Somehow I think that I think if I write the words down, it will increase the gravity of my self command, and I'll have to obey it. It's worth a try, yes?!?