Spring in California
feels like the dream;
meadows high with sunshine
brushing hips

Oxalic sour grass on your lips
sweet sweet berry

Painted clouds, straight
from your breath

It is falling in love
only,
if you see it

These sad eyes and tired shoulders have make me weak with the promise of someday. The weight of the world is pressing down so tightly on my vision that I can’t see anything but the sun’s glare. And I am waiting so anxiously for the days to break and the river to warm so I can try to wash my dusty eyes and smooth my crumpled up soul so I never have to come back to four white walls and a picket fence.

I am reminded of California when I hear the birds call to each other in the afternoon
I used to spend hours being as still as possible, so they’d trust me
or forget about me, I’ll never know

I am reminded of Maine when humidity hits
the smell of salt and wind cracking through my skin
I used to spend hours searching for sea glass on their tiny beaches
until my hands grew numb,
until my pockets were full

I am reminded of Italy when the Verbena bloom
a country full of colour, is somehow still one palette
from azure lakes to olive hills, and the small islands full of lemon trees and melon gelato
I used to spend hours in il giardino
thumbing through botanical encyclopedias
digging into latin, trying find meaning for my solitude
antirrhinum, basilico, mentha, zucca, cortarderia, pioppi, *vitis

It is all too loud
and I am crawling into myself
and I am bowing my head
and I am leaving now

The light, two redbuds, and your moss covered roof
take me home
take me to the light
where the grasses hug your toes and the flowers glow like sunshine
Pieces of canyon, ivy, the woodpecker’s holes
It is soft there, I am no longer afraid

A tear you forgot was there  
Like a rock stuck in your shoe,
Like the polaroids in your garage,
Like the old letters stuffed in your desk drawers,
Like me every week night,
with boundless questions to answer.
Crumpled naked over too many bedsheets
Before I fell asleep,
to the end of a record,
Before I fell asleep,
after a day spent feeling like the flower that grew in the back of the bush,
Before I fell asleep,
and wake to a day of regretting yesterday.
All day I stood out in the rain clutching this book and hoping that I would see someone walk around the corner.
I hope it's her
and she sees me
and she tells me that I've left a mark she can't ignore.
I'm hoping on the final word I'm clinging to,
because this is my last chance
to prove I'm not just ripped tights and forgotten promises,
rather morning tea and the way a clothesline sways.

You are part lightbeam
You are soft as tulip petals
I have so much tenderness for you and
I am so scared

You have such lovely people and I am not here to ruin that
I only want to be here for you
and to share life

I am not unaware that
I have not always been here
I don’t know what to say,
but that I am here now and I am here to love

If you wanted to take the blue from my eyes you could’ve just asked,
I probably would’ve given it to you
A year takes a lot of energy to light
Are you happy now that the fire’s gone out?

You tried to buy my meals
I think I’d rather starve
It’s not you...
(I hope you know I'm a liar)
it’s just that my exit feels eminent
like burning at the ends
to get smaller and smaller

Give me your love, and give me your life*

Lie next to me, soak in my heart.
Gaze past the stardust,
and experience the world's
oldest mystery.

I'll tear you apart, but
only with my soul.
You'll stay gracefully
spill your tongue through my heart.

On our evening together,
we'll dine in tension.
You'll have catharsis,
I'll have regret.

The thunder rumbles in sore throats

and rivers of yellow speak of high hopes

for the people who plant flowers and complain to pollen

the earth will give you too many chances to worry about sunflowers

because drizzles help

until there you are,

achey muscles and grey face ******* on Ricola

crossing a street to go to work

and how does it happen to be that the first day of rain in a month comes on the day you lose your sunshine

Well today the sun came in a bottle of Tropicana

and tomorrow I will count the losses of those who just can’t take one rainy day

I missed you today,
I missed you yesterday.
I’ll miss you until our hearts open with morning glories
in soft sheets above ground.
High above the sights of reality where our voices can turn to robin songs
and your hands intertwined in mine are the sugar pine roots.

Be soft and evoke those who are
Let your eyes wander

Open yourself to this world despite its sharp edges
You will bleed, but you will heal
Some of us bleed with the moon anyway

do not feel the need to fill silence, it exists to bring peace and truth
but you must also speak your truth
You are blessed, glory
the light

Twine our hearts together

Melt into your eyes

Rejoice for small seconds
in rhythm to the pulse
of your blood
Your breath
flows straight into my lungs
That voice of yours cascades like a river
rushing toward the boulder of my heart
I've been cracked by other stones
worn by time
and weather
I have stayed
for your cool waves
to fill my cracks
Wash away worries
Stay on course, love

Water wades high and low
I'll stay right here if you stay flowing

Everything is damp
and I can't escape how my eyes drip black
They won't stop

I try to turn my back
but all I see are ruins for miles
And this broken house I built

A road that I paved
That I destroyed out of somewhat necessity
With broken nails and a weak heart
This whole town was mine

I destroyed it all for you
and the promise you never kept
You said I'd have hope here
You said this was right and warm
You said I'd be safe here
You ******* liar

I started purging your name to the rocks
and the river
the current answered, “I’ll love you forever”
That echo rang in the caves of my heart.
Filled them up and my heart is gay with
“I love you“‘s forever.

The thought of you away
is driving me insane
Weeks without you
my heart burns like a furnace
like December 14th near a wood stove
catching glances, biting lips
sneak out the door

Up against pine, my hands in your hair
don’t ever leave
don’t ever take your perfect hands off me
the kind of passion that starts wars
heat, from your breath slipping out like smoke
and the air is so cold but you are
searing a brand on my lips that says “stay”
I am lost in your energy and I won’t find my way out
until my heart finds a way in
It's trying to burn its way out of my chest
to be closer to you.

Yes, but I want her back
I want her to tell me
how she sees none of this pain
That she only cares for sheep,
her small box of love letters,
and the radishes on her windowsill

That she saw brightness in herself
and for her future
That there was hope
hanging onto her curls,
in the muddy light
of her fire escape at sundown

And even though she cried
and often called him
to resuscitate her
that she still knew
she was strong
That she would live
to fight for her own
broken mind

All these soft people are hurricanes
Have you ever seen a storm from space?

I remember when we would both rest our star-crossed tresses on that mattress
When you were asleep I could never stay under long. There was something about rain on the windows and how I looked up to see water on the windowpanes, but mostly saw little plants and knick knacks you had collected, all lined up on your windowsill.
Mornings like those, you'd wake up and smoke sitting there in your underwear. And you never wore a bra. It's like they didn't exist when we were out there.
It was calming just to know that the house was filled with magic, with tea, with art and nature.
That Isabelle was always there, speaking rapid french outside your door.


I remember laying there in the middle of the night just looking at you fast asleep and thinking "I must be the luckiest girl in the world to be laying next to this gorgeous person right now. You are so remarkable." There's a lot about your mom's house that will always tug at my heartstrings, but it never would have meant anything if it weren't where I could find you.

Am I supposed to write about  
How I feel you biting at my ankles while I sleep
How I’m having dreams again
but my cynicism is tearing them to shreds
How I spent all day labouring over
my own softness
and tying each strand of my hair to
lace curtains

Am I supposed to feel like blossoming?

Oh bring her back
Oh dew and robins
Early morn, tasting wild lettuce
dreaming of sweet lips
dreaming of wholeness

Oh she’s coming back
Oh open eyes
Afternoon, crying youth
dreaming of right here

Almost entirely,
we smell like lavender
and brush our teeth with honey-baked laughter

I found two magical things this morning, even before breakfast
but this life is not just fire, it’s burning
And my romanticised campground does litter itself with children and lemon balm

With this stress, it's all pulled apart
and the bits forgotten
but it’s okay; I’ll put the pieces into your food
and make sure it’s tasty

For now it’s better to have dreams about rats in the flour
than the nightmares that we used to have

Yet I give my parts to these men
boys rather

Somewhere in Washington,
my tailbone

In Maine,
ten inches of my hair
taken out of desperation

In Wisconsin,
my fragile wrists

Italy,
my stomach
pulled straight from my throat
under cover of expensive wine
and exotic gardens

but here in California lies
the soft skin of my thighs
a collarbone, broken and replaced
several times
my *****, given willingly
and the dead cells
of my young heart

That these images have been part of my life is too surreal
I walked through Italian cobbles
Rested my head over canals
Bought a pastry each from the Lidl
With the same pack on my back then
That's hanging on my bedpost now

Fields in Maine
I never knew blueberries looked like fire in October
or that wine and cheap chocolate
are best at the boat dock in a thunderstorm
I soon discovered
three feet of snow is the same as six
and sea glass calls to everyone

I have wished and pleaded
for every gift, but
all I'm gaining is... questions

Like what place can hold me up
And who will not hold me down

I tried too hard not to need people
now I only love myself

I need the peace you have

I see you find it in your morning tea
and the kids you love
every day

Who believe in magic and gnomes
they have fairytales
of acorns and moss gardens

and it is the only thing I want

My voice leaves me
in no manner of conviction
as my pulse warms me
with minor habit-I'm drifting


Lately I’ve been dreaming about Berkeley  
and how the streets there are covered in fruit trees
I dream about New York and the separate life I lived two years ago
Speaking Mandarin in Boston
and English in Bologna
It seems more like a film reel than my life


I used to dream of what my heart looked like on the inside

I thought it was important

And when I was 16 I was convinced it was a mountain range

Now I worry mostly about my lungs quivering
and when my dreams will tell me what it means

Doesn't summer feel hostile?

Your hot skin drips honey
that wastes into the pavement

It feels raw

Naked bodies
bathing sweetly in a sensuous river
Tired books in the hands
of holy women

Thinking all morning
about sweet peaches
And all night
about salvation

In the gullet of September you feel a strange constriction
A rust colored hand around your throat
digging into the memory of what you never were
Its nails scraping up dead things
of skin,
of uncertainty from a teenage year
A bellowing illness
once forgotten from walking so far
left to waste under bare feet
until the weather came round
and the conditions laid,
for an autumn gross with the pain of knowing
Wishing you didn’t know
Wishing so hard it accidentally comes true
and haltingly,
sorely,
life is no longer of the present

While you were here
you gripped my spine
and I still feel it
every month
when I lose more blood
to cleanse myself of the men
who have been inside of me

I am clean and still
full of holy light
but they linger in the places
on my body I do not see
but that they have
and I am desperately
forcing them out of me

It was an early summer morning. The fog set in overnight as it often did on the island. We were a pastoral painting; buckets, rows of crops, and all five of us hunched over picking the morning harvest. Only visible as curves among the eden that swallowed our bodies.
The things that I remember from that summer are not what was painful then, but what is painful now.
I was crying. I cried because of her yelling, but my tears were more than self-pity and frustration.
There is no rest in this life that I've chosen, yet who I am inexorably needs to be rich in soil. And is it any way to live? In constant fear that the world around you can swallow your livelihood with their greed and destruction?
The farm is a living being. She will hold you tighter than any lover. She will take your hand and lead you to riches and paths of contentment
But just like falling in love, you never realize how deep you're in until you look up and your underwater.
In those rows, amongst the spinach and morning mosquitoes, I cried for everything I have chosen. I wept for that farm, myself, and the weight of my life as the solution to a problem.

Touch crisp and break heavy

falling pieces that will never shatter

but hang heavy

todo esto de espera

I am the lady grey
torn from a tattered box
and hung up on your wall
I am the bracelet engraved with the exact place of your youth
and I carry it with me
I am the letter you wrote me in the hospital
I’ll only look at it when I need you
These are not things to take lightly
I am not a thing to take lightly

I’ll pour this vial of pills
to fall through my neck
to push out my navel
so I can grow up and out

I’ll watch it all dissolve in my hands
watch my world dissolve in my hands
so it can finally be mine
something entirely mine

And as I’m standing on the big blue planet
eyes tunnelling into the moon
I will drape the reticulum
over some other creature
and no more burden shall I be
lying deep in the milky sea

My heart hasn’t stopped
fluttering since you left
Your fingerprints still
like flowers grazing my neck
Take everything in my skin,
take it to place aside the
winding coil
that your heart wrapped me in
I know you keep it close

Honey Bee,
I fought the day by
singing your name
into clouds of autumn air
Shaped the word into
a tender hearted sword
That I’ll save here
until you come back

I was once a little girl
with ringlet curls and grass-stained knees
I was scared of the ocean
and soft for my mother’s tomato vines
but I was not pure with youth
because I did not feel clean then,
no white satin or freedom
I was not full of love

I feel pure now, softer
I know my whole, my skin, the corners of my mind
I know the flowers I have planted outgrow the ones I will pick
That lambs come in twos and ewes make me cry
I know how much one honeybee is worth and why I had to let you go
It is all bringing tenderness
It is all tenfold my young freckled face and sleeping heart

When I need to be held
I cannot ask this of anyone
So I fall into my mother
the river
And she catches me
in her current
strong arms
strong waves
of reassurance
I ask her
“Is it right to love like this?”
She presses into me harder
“of course,
my child”
I cry to her,
“I love her, mother”
She floats me downstream
wrapped in her whirling hymns
past the falls
past the sharp rocks
and unkind matters
There’s no one else to be found but us
And she showed me this time
Her miracles are my answer
“Will I be okay?"

The void said I own nothing but chrysanthemums
while they tore roses through open air
(the earth angels are coming)

"I hope nothing but holiness touches you
and that the blessed is not of man. Not of his rib"

*"—no helper to mankind"

the light
the light
the light
and Her
and Her
and Her
and this place, these soft people
please heal me
please let me be strong
but only for myself

Here I am in almost twilight
all day this hot sun through
soft curtains
and my own skin
Picking this mind for mindfulness
and my own tangled art
my own tangled heart

We reach for the same sky

I’m in the strawberry’s secret seeds
hiding from blue in the red
before my pink becomes entirely grey
and muted
and suddenly everything stopped
and the lights went dark
no, the sun went down
but I’m still hiding while the others
crawl out of their caves
to sing praises to our moon
and kiss each other in whole holy love

well what if I see her and she pulls me under?
I wanted to stay golden with another
cause (my one) she’s all heavy and precious inside
but this other girl is enchanting
I wanna choke on her somehow
wanna find where that labyrinth in her lips goes
and I know it ain’t righteous
but i’d sin before a goddess Herself
and fall willing into black water
for a taste of her while living

do me raw fleece
under the full moon

touch me soft light
toes curl
jaw drop

**** flower petal
don’t look
come strawberry stem
arch
under this skin

taste me like lemon
taste me in heaven’s gate
a backwoods trail

do me sacred
I’ll see you poppy field
too far to run

I wore black and rested in poetry
I was lonely without her but her nape
and her name as Grace
spoke to me heavy
like the silence of our big valley in its misty grandness

I wore black in mourning
of myself and a facade
and in mornings of our love
she kept me small and shrunken as I was
in that tattered linen
I loved her nonetheless

I’m wearing black in practice
and I will continue to betray
my softness
until she finds me underneath
our marriage bed

In California the sun is just a part of your skin
Melts your layers
Filling you captive
pushing you complacent

You’ll wake in September with a sunburn and gold glossy eyes
And when autumn's near, you realize
You got caught up in her like leaves in a gutter
Let her deal every poison you named
let her feed you, full bellied
But baby,
you’re no better than me

I lost my breath
somewhere between the peaches and the hair on my arms
blonde, and bleached by the sun
Seems I've been reaching up to God to often

In case you were wondering (which i know you weren’t)
I'm burying myself again
In a cold, in a tropical winter
To avoid watching others die
avoid watching my own irresolution
To avoid the the heat of summer I feel playing fast forward on my muscles
We’re tired
We’re all so tired

I saw her swing from 22 stars
she drank moon blood and whispered,
“the body burns in suffering,
but you are a ghost”

in love she boasts four crystals
plain face

a thieving crawl,
loneliness her wicked coat

*my honey drank poison
drank sleep and wickedness
and wed in sickness

I am both cold and warm in heart
So it feels balanced and peaceful
The world sings sin and you can hear it or love it
Don't last this way, but notice when it appears for you  
Feel heavy and clean after rain but know you will feel this way again
for that to happen it must be ***** and free
We should be ***** and free

The days fall through me bruised and orange
and my feet touch nothing but Nevada red dirt
does summer come with brakes
or must I shade it all myself?

Yeah, I feel like ****
And I’m walking with her and
she is so pure
in love and beauty
and yeah she’s talking
and I should be listening
but this park has flowers
and now all I’m thinking is
Nigella
Nigella
Nigella, where did I ever learn that?

I tell her things she says she doesn’t want to hear
She just doesn’t want to show her face

I told her she spent too much time making decisions
She spent two hours painting herself red

I told her she was too cruel to her family
She drowned herself in a bathtub,
called it an accident

I told her she wasn’t pretty like the other girls
She stopped being a girl

I told her she was too removed
She didn't cry for months

I told her she didn’t play well with others
She left for Alaska to hibernate

I told her she didn’t need to stop feeling, just stop being scared
So she broke open her head, found every last fear,
And swallowed each one with blind determination

I’ll whisper flowers in your ear
leaves to your palm and petaled pockets
latin and ancient
and walk away when you look back
you need not know more than what speaks to my heart

Wake up to the birds chirp
and truck engines rev
Despite all, I am still peaceful here
I still want melody and affection
but I do not need it to bloom