one winter I almost did not survive
the infinitely consequential moments, all merged
indeed
into one dimensionless experience
where the pain of my entire life (embraced) was
all around me, all at once, and forever
do you know what I mean?
and I could see it all, even behind me and underneath
and I was crushed beneath it and yet,
*in that endless vast untime
a winter?*
even then
held it upon my palm to look down at
from far far above me
as though it were a tiny diamond
impossibly durable,
sharp,
with all the shining upon all of the surface of the oceans on the earth
and unbearable, I looked down at it,
I held it, unbearable
but it would never fall from me, and it hurt and cheered me to be beneath it
for if God had (known me) long enough
in the untime with no breadth
to lay this curse
the form of grief
down upon my head,
was it not also the most solemn blessing?
*and he is faithful, and the suffering he lays down upon you, he will not allow
to be too much, that you would die while you are alive
one time, but again,
again,
and more after that*
that is the winter of indelible clarity
a hard glass memory
*behind the curtain, the coldness off the window
freeze against the pane*
still I feel it in my hand
heavy (unbearable) and familiar
coming down on me again
what did I do
to turn the eternal gaze
toward my face? I disintegrate in excruciation
but never turn away
Oct 13, 2018
Oct 13, 2018 at 9:18 PM UTC
god
can you hear me?
have my ears turned inside out
did my voice get lost
change into oblivion?
was my whole soul small change
I threw into a perpetually emptying jar?
I wear down each map I'm given
drown in the pulls of eternal tides
to come back to you
and every turn fades into another
until the years are all lost
today I woke to
the north star falling from the sky
so god
I go into the black
bind stones to my body
go down to the river to pray
down to the bottom of the dark
I break the broken pieces
and break again
again
I lay down on the pyre
wood wet with weeping
the whole of me a sacrifice
crying out for the flames
o god
can you hear me
Mar 15, 2016
Mar 15, 2016 at 6:21 PM UTC
wind rushed about to
antagonize the branches and the branches groaned
I am a tree and I am a pacifist and I never
hurt anybody. Quiet now and glass smooth glare in my eyes I’ll step
into the shadow and look out from here.
are these cigarettes a sign that i'm losing?
I stay up because its okay then.
nothing ever happened at 3am.
*go to sleep with the moon with a face dead like
an ocean shore line the morning after a storm*
there I walk like dreams
I took to drink
like I never had
when the old crystal inside of me
cracked
that night you said love
next to "you"
in a past tense
it all comes to some rusted gates
to a road going out
like water over falls
and suddenly my tongues undone
and through my mind flies
there are still things to say!
...
yes! a thousand wretched ****** of prose
and still not enough
I believed it all for rot
this organ's surely stone
Jan 21, 2016
Jan 21, 2016 at 10:26 PM UTC
I've been so close to death
weeped before dancing
in its wailing white glare
now
I don't know why
it makes people cry
Jan 21, 2016
Jan 21, 2016 at 4:49 PM UTC
in the morning
to wake to the dissatisfaction
the kind that only sleep envelops
to stir to stir
and wander into long halls
of a million doorways
in one: a simple smile
another, painted earthenware and a child's laughter
a third: needles before euphoria and neurotransmitters
pouring out into blackness
the next: a single blank page and a sigh echoing out of eternity
the doors stretch farther than I can see
contain more than I can bear
cigarette ashes, beloved footsteps fading away, a thousand different accidents with a thousand different grief-ends, a foreign home, one white bird in a flock of black, tie dyed bed clothes, a foggy road, a scientific discovery, a one-night stand with an unforgettable face, a creaking porch screen door, lost pets, piles of bills, purple lightening, long hair, a fathers tears, a city of bare concrete and rain, a moment beside a wood stove, a lost job, a yellow poppy on a green hill, a bottle of whiskey, a tarantula behind the toilet, a convenience store on a special block's corner, **** last messages, pill boxes, promotion, a long exam, a homeless man,
in one a wedding, in another; divorce papers
hospital rooms, persian rugs, leaking rooftops, eye contact
some doors locked with years lost
some with no turning back
oh
sometimes I can reach the very last **** to touch for a moment
the room with death itself
but I wander still for there are many more
wander whispering prayers
no guide but a burning light, following always
the center of being
Jan 17, 2016
Jan 17, 2016 at 7:59 PM UTC
I walk out to the bottom of the lake
whispers and snaps under my more worn feet
and high over my head huge cumulus creatures
look down on me in their reflections
as they creep by echoing the atmospheric wails
so I smile facing heaven
along the edge the wind blows an impatience into the heads of fall- budding trees
a worried crowd
I am impatient too
to open my lungs in a worldwide gasp
to be then overpowered and brought to meekness neath a wave
of the form
of all things
Aug 29, 2015
Aug 29, 2015 at 9:40 PM UTC
I can't see my limbs
swinging in the muddy water
the grace of god comes in words
you'd never believe
washed out in clod clouds
tuned out in wind chimes
turned on in creek corners
looking out again, sniffing in animal shapes
looking for the power, watching for the billows
like butterfly snow
blowing them into harbor
to be collected into warm arms
put together carefully into maps and images of difficult to speak
exchanged like gold pieces, used not again as knives
or watery tear stained ropes
wonder for a moment
infinitely
am I real
were you?
Aug 20, 2015
Aug 20, 2015 at 1:28 PM UTC
sometimes I know
sometimes
I am only
a tree
with unbreakable heart
moved only by the wind
May 28, 2015
May 28, 2015 at 3:13 PM UTC
a sharp blow
swung out by
you,
who was thought a friend
produced a small hole
at the base of my skull
behind my left ear
ringing echoes inside
and shining sparks down
the splits of the mystical dendrite forest
thicker than thieves,
illuminating
the deep and dark of me
and out of the hole
comes some stuff of wisps,
lavender colored dust
with quiet rays of glimmer flickering all through it
floating and curling in the air thick as smoke
*is that stuff me?*
then it settled in a fine layer on my lashes
and my alveoli
and my eyes were filled with a vision
time slowed as we moved faster
slowly closing my eyes and then
I was in the porch of my infant home
on a late afternoon when there was the first breath of relief from the heat.
but in the familiar air there was a deep stillness
unsettling as I had never known it
and I looked out into the back yard, and over the tree line there
in the distance was a towering wall of dark clouds
and wind whipped through the line of trees
I closed my eyes and when I opened
I was with my little brothers sitting on the cold tile
of the patio of our home in Costa Rica
and rain was pouring down in lines from the sky,
thick sheets running off the slats on all three sides
I got up and stepped into the rain
Mayala reached out for me and said "¡ joelle, NO !"
this time when I closed my eyes,
I opened them but there was no longer anything
and in fact there was no longer vision at all
I tried very hard to remember what vision was.
I suddenly realized
there was not much left of me.
I felt the purple mists of me going out with the wind
to become the nothing
time moved forward with grace
one step, and two
then
it was all done.
Apr 10, 2015
Apr 10, 2015 at 6:55 PM UTC
caged brain
unsteady as
two wheels in a row
"we have deep bonds
ye and me"
please
tell me how to put this all back together
so that they all face forward
and don't cry
shaken awake
by the false soul soul press
of warm dreams
please
give the truth
gently say which way
to go
away
please so
the weight, after your face
won't
anymore
now
I wish I still had that gifted pill
to ease my ache
now
I wish you hadn't crashed your bike
that night
now
you only look at me and say "undo"
well
I wish
that I could
Mar 31, 2015
Mar 31, 2015 at 9:07 PM UTC