Maybe it's you who found me
Ferals born beneath a classroom
Wasn't fast enough to trap you
Actually what I meant to do
was get there before your mom made you
but nature works so quickly
and I was busy, so busy
and before I knew, well it's silly
cute little kittens
and then one injured sitting
at my old apartment
Couldn't let you stay in darkness
You all found me
and together we're a kind of family
Cats and people, similar emotionally
It's been proven scientifically

Creating is part of living and it can't stop even if there is hardship
and that won't help because if there is hardship
the worst thing is to just freeze and hate yourself because you are there
and not here, over somewhere better
so the blood must continue to pump through the veins and your dreams must continue even if they are now more furtive and furious than ever,
that is the life force and there is nothing,
nothing that will stop it
but death

I look for love here
the only place I know to look where
love doesn't exist here
Never existed
but here is where I looked for it when I was so young
and it's the only place to look: the love place
in a man who has better things to do, more important people to see
the love place a little girl looked at for her whole childhood
now in a man who can't deal with her, doesn't want her

It's like waiting at an abandoned train station
where no trains come or go,
and you can hear them at the new station
but you come here
because that's where you've always come
and that's where you grew up
always looking down the track
hoping the train would come in and you'd have that endorphin
rush and every so often it would and for a day or so a train ride
and then back to the empty station, waiting
feeling sad, because you want to ride again

The power, willingness, energy of another train
on a different track you see it
and people get on and off and go on their way
but I stay put, trying to love him who can't love me

Sometimes in my life, I drew a deep breath, and hoped against hope
and closed my eyes, and let go of my fear
and I joined the people at the train station
where trains actually still come and go

But it's always been a round trip ticket
and back I come, and wander off again
to the empty, falling apart, spooky, windswept station
where there is no life, no love
but it feels like home
and it is dead

You won, I lost and then again I lost
and it's not so bad, really.
Isn't that funny?  
Because in the end being in a place
where you are just a loser losing over and over
despite all your efforts to please
in the end this is a nasty situation
and I must be happy that it's over and I don't have to
keep trying to please so hard, be respected, be valued
in a place where my values aren't valued and never will be
unless the whole
plan
changes...which will be a long time from now.

Hurt
But then you are lighter
quicker
Once the bleeding stops
Patched over, you ache
scars over
Only a memory of pain

He had a bright yellow one, as yellow as a highlighter
I see them now and then on the highway and they stand out
like an important concept in a textbook, something to be taken note of
I rode in it once, and it was so clean, I felt like I could eat off the dashboard
and the doors were attached with the regular bolts and backpack shoulder strap material
which I have never figured out
and he looked even shorter, sinking into the seat, his longer legs stretched to the pedals
and his torso foreshortened and far away
and it was bouncy, and I was sure he could see my fat shake but I think that was the last thing on his mind.

We had dinner with another teacher, and his burrito arrived on his plate, and I felt like
I ate the inside of my taco salad and drank my beer and a few seconds passed and his plate
was empty and his eyes never seemed to leave me, not in a pleasant, admiring way
but with concern and fear, and attraction
and he finally burst forth in a flurry of worry about what would happen to the taco shell
would I eat it? take it? I should have offered it to him, but I can honestly say I've
never heard anyone so upset over a taco salad shell, and the waitress took it away
and I looked at him gently through my beer fog and he seemed to be pouting and squirming inside

On the way back he told me we had no future
At forty one the longest relationship he had had lasted three months
and clearly this one wouldn't work and I remember being confused
because I wasn't aware I had ever brought up a lasting bond
but it's true, I wanted his attention, his acceptance,
I felt so down, even losing a job I hated
and besides, he would leave all summer and not talk to anyone except his buddies
and those he met on the road
He was wiping the slate clean

I never liked him, only craved his attention and didn't enjoy it when
I rarely got it, and on my last day, which I worked hard to make happen
a little earlier than normal
I ran to him and hugged him and kissed his cheek
and it was not a high cheek bone and I cold feel five o'clock shadow,
and the wrinkles on his neck, his neck like a turtle's
and I begged him not to forget me, in a strange rush of madness
and he let out a cry of  joy with the kiss
and said he wouldn't forget me, I was in his phone
It was like in Hebrew, where you say someone is "in" the phone, not "on" the phone
and I dreamt about going back to Israel that night, but not of him

He is somewhere with his buddies, in a bright red jeep
and I never really liked him
and can't this be the last time
I pursue and obsess over a man I don't even like

A tender thing
A rare flower, delicate petals quivering in the wind
An unmarked valley in a vast wild plain
Clear teal water filled with bright fish with little fins

Wind whips past my ears
Rain drops in my eyes
Thunder in the distance and
a wave crashes close to the cliff
a thundering sound that frightens
love is a storm

Waves on the bay, too many
So much power
Overwhelming
I am not grounded enough yet
to withstand this and I
turn away, run away

I see them all the time, walking entwined
oh, there are problems i see too but there is this glue
sticking them together a rubber band connected, sometimes snaps
sometimes doesn't last
but for me it is ruined, i still can't answer the question you asked me ten years ago
in Haifa Israel at Ha Bank cafe: what would you do if this ended
your cold hand and heart and I said I would be a nun meaning
deadened feelings and no connection again because I trusted you
and I should never of but I believed in you
and never should of and I can't open up again I am not over it
will never heal this fresh wound from a decade ago
never will the raw bleeding stop and I can't
I can't to that again, that opening and hoping and stupid dreaming
that ends in betrayal and being cast off like garbage
with a wedding dress sold to a filthy store in the armpit of the city by you
and my china, some kind of symbol of hope and love to be
some kind of promise of married happiness and fidelity
you sold that too the day I left
you destroyed me
so love is for other people, not the road **** that is my heart
baking in the sun and unrecognizable flattened into oblivion

"Was that your brother?"
the colorist asked me at Empire Video
a reference to a Christmas Party
where you came, my husband
He was the same guy
who said I could be a hair model
after 16 hours editing a spot for Pantene

Laughing together
how funny, to be in sync
Sync, sync: sound and picture
must be in sync
husband and wife as well

How when I saw you I would relax
and your sense of humor would
deconstruct any trouble
"When he was a child, he could make adults laugh,"
your Aunt said
and I believed it
what a gift

Troubled by my boss, "he looks like a used car salesman"
a smile, it was true, the last thing I'd think
taking him so seriously
So many times, you'd pick me up
your response would puncture
the bubble of fear and angst and heal it with laughter

After parties, our impressions
are the same
this person, that person
Howling in the streets over some dumb movie
or chance encounter
anything upsetting
you can cut to the quick
and pull out the ridiculous

My best friend
I had you
I trusted you completely
If only I could remember just that
There would be no trauma
and I'd go on
without so much fear
If only I'd seen just that side of you
I guess I must pretend

It was a glorious affair in the high school cafeteria  
and my boss said hello to me and I sang along with
the band..."I'm Yours"
And somehow you ended up across from me so here I am
with three men surrounding me when I don't feel that popular
but you have taken a peculiar interest in me like when I can't
count up all the tardies, and you help me out in a meeting
and I fixed the copy machine and you could make a thousand and one
copies of dissections, but there you were again.  
And you found a way to put your dead preserved animal away
because I was upset.  No one would do that for me they just make fun
if I don't like poor dead creatures displayed to children.
The admin supervising over
us like we're a bunch of kids...and there you are with your inquisitive face
and I always thought you were the cutest teacher...but you brushed me off and
brought another woman to my play and I understood except now you
are talking about what I'm doing over break and it's the second time you asked
me and you remember what I said I was doing over the summer, except my
cat died so I didn't finish my script.  And you just have that look.  
When a man is looking into my eyes wondering what it would feel like to
be next to me naked and would I take care of him like his mother did?
And I am wondering if you are a skillful lover and do you snore?
And so maybe we will make plans, or maybe not.  But that was definitely
a love spark, my friend.

come heal me
take me up in your arms and you'll see
how perfect I am to you
and we'll bask in each other's warm glow
no one else to know
or show
our love completes us
never leaves us
and you aren't real
with reality, I must deal

The guy sitting behind me
opened up a tupperware,
brought his own food
to my favorite cafe
and he smacks his lips as he eats it
crunches the world's loudest salad
and burps as a finale

*I want to **** him

I asked like I was back in school
I had a headache from the outer limits
and aches to boot
and he came over and gave me that little massage
and I felt those masculine fingers
dig into my shoulders and neck
and give elief, and move my clothes, oh, it was a treat
Not soft, yet pliant and warn, not like mine
but different and seemed born
to give pleasure to the likes of me
I'll call you tonight he said and inside I felt glee
but by the time he called I was only half human
memories of his hands were hazy and far
and he said we'd talk when I'm well
and that all right, don't know him that well,
don't want him to see my plight
a flu shot, hand sanitser and still I just fall
sick

For once I see clearly
Grounded, the anxiety haze
that turns shmucks into great guys has lifted
and I see you with all your flaws
I see you because I am connected to the true me
not the scared little girl who wanted her mother's love
so desperately
and it lasted, and lasted
and last night the haze was there
and all I wanted was you with me
but today, how clearly I could see
how awful, how wrong and bad you are
I pray to stay in that space
of reality

A restaurant is honest about what they have, more or less
Do you have real brewed Ice Tea?  
May I have that table by the sea?
I've never settled into a restaurant, read the menu and run out
Dating is like being blind, maybe like that dark room at the Oakland "Exploratorium"
that I was always too scared to go in as a child
You hear what he has, and you have only your feelings to guide you
Alas, most are not good: man boy, been there, done that:
Exploded spine, dislocated ankle, internal injuries, crashed car or two or three
A feeling inside: no, I don't like this, but the conversation is only just beginning
and another voice says: poor thing, you must stay and help
And besides, it's rude to run out of a restaurant
This ain't no restaurant: psychology has told me
"This is all about your mother"
Poor thing, I had to stay and help, or she would become wickedly
brutally angry, a white rage to burn me to ashes, and I am blind
feeling my way through feelings that have been messed with, lassoed to the ground
hog tied, and somehow set themselves free, then learned to tie themselves down just to please
It's dark in here.  No one can see if I run away.
I look around, see only blackness and no one can see me, not even she
I untie the ropes and walk away.

And that's why, in times of stress, they appear in my life
I'm never picky around this time, whoever smiles first is fine
And as I struggle with my fate, I notice that his calls are late
or maybe they don't come at all
or maybe they are laced with hostility
and then I cultivate a humble humility
for to keep this male in my life, all depends on it, like to cut an apple
you need a knife
no matter what they do, I can't let go
Other women, then we're "just friends" and so,
I wait and hope and try to please
as he give another one a squeeze
And that hurts, but I wasn't patient in my choice
I never gave myself a voice.  
The storm hit, and I just grabbed what was near
and now I cling tight, stuck with it, my fear
of letting go is too strong, even when I know this is wrong
I read in my little black book, from a few years back,
some wisdom I used to know,
and it said, men equal security, so in times of stress,
you'll find one and cling, never rest
And there's been about six since I wrote that
And the latest one, I'd like to throw back
into the river, to swim on and spawn
it's not like he did anything wrong
he never asked to be my security
Why can't I find that in me?

We lived in the 8th eme, near the Canal
A lovely apartment we couldn't afford
our usual lifestyle
I did the shopping at the cheapest store I could find: Ed
Ed-day,  you say, and they sell life's basics
like milk with the date stamped on it
and I'm careful about the date
We were Parisienne
Life abroad isn't real, it doesn't matter
you are not you, known exactly
your mother tongue is the lingua franca of the world
but a gulf separates you from the cares of the real
people there, a gulf of culture, experience, genetics even
I am an odd mixture of religions and regions, strange even for New York
There I am a different species, which is good because it helps my normal
worries stand still, and I am able to be a spectator on life
like a child, I
notice every little nuance of the French day and I am put on hold
I keep to myself, my own thoughts as I can understand
so little of what swirls around me
and that is a burden lifted
I am not homesick and I watch with the same curiosity
Americans on the Champs Elysses,
recognizable by the men in boxy t-shirts
and the women in athletic shoes
I don't speak to them, they are foriegn to me now, too
we walk over centuries of experience, that have given a quiet wisdom
to this place and I learn every day, and the mistakes of the past
are right there under foot or in a museum
the scream and rage of the past has echoed for the last time
long ago, and something has been learned from it
France was right, "we are an old country, and a wise one,"
right before the second Gulf war
we didn't listen
Life has slowed down here,
In America we have that energy, that desire to create and make it
and we run ourselves ragged, into the ground, alone in our independence
no time for strangers but here, our friends take vacations and boldly
make a bridge to form a four day weekend and are proud of it
and invite us along for trips and long meals
and visits to old castles, now over run with "the people"
who enjoy the carved gardens and angular pools as much as
any aristocrat ever did
and I don't want to leave
I'm learning so much
but mostly I don't want to be real again
I don't want to be that American person with problems and no
excuses of distance and language and culture
and no excuses of the need for rest from the rat race
because in America, no one admits to that need
And one day in Ed the expiration date on the milk
is past our flight date
and I freeze in pain
knowing the milk will sit here
long after I am gone

Eyes dart around
Shoulder twitches
thoughts dart around like flies
this worry, that
work---will start
what will it be like?
He, I will see again
can I make it normal
Script done in time?
cat, when will he die
can I handle it?
weight, never budged
must live with it
age, goes up
continues
no turning back
he, what will happen?
Script, is it good
Money, can I stretch it?
I'm
just
supposed
to
notice
these
thoughts
and
let
them
go

And I know it's what I must do
Miss you until I'm numb to the bone
Don't run to the phone
Last time I tried this, I had to go off the grid
I went to Yosemite, with no bars, I thought I'd get rid
Of any thoughts of you
So what did I do?
I drove to a pay phone
Broke a ten buying a sticker of a bear and quarters to call "home"
You thought I was calling from Arizona
What a rush to talk to you on that phone
Hating myself, feeling crazy at the same time
Like I was piling dust on a mirror and doing a line
It left me trembling and happy and hating
myself for all the trouble I was taking
It took forever, but somehow I pulled through
And today here I am missing another dude

Hadn't seen you all day
I guess that's normal for May
We used to be connected
But now I've been rejected
And I wonder if you feel it too
This kind of funk, this kind of blue

I know I must forget you
Our spicy little passings
The hope, dancing on the surface with nervous energy
ripples across the water

It must end
A trail that leads nowhere
Off a cliff or into a pile of rocks
It only looks like it will lead you to your destination

The destination, a mirage
you see it, but your hand passes through
Again and again
Excitement leads to dissapointment
an endless circle, rolling across the hot pavement

Here we go again
Back to work and can I make the trouble end?
Now I finally get it
Or at least better, it seems
That my emotions, they come from me

It's not so much what the world gives
It's how you handle it
What you tell yourself inside
All the positive attention in the world
Won't override that inner voice
So inside yourself you must work
You don't have a choice

Creates the economy
Also there comes a heirarchy
It's also something I care very little about
The obsession with it makes me want to scream and shout

I wanted your love so desperately
as children do, thought there was something wrong with me
A child's mind can't handle the thought
that there's something wrong with the parent, so she thinks "not!"
"It really is all up to me,
I'll change and then I'll see
her turn to me and glow with love
and I will feel as beautiful as a dove."
And then everything with be all right
I will no longer hate myself and cry at night
But your love was unobtainable no matter how hard I tried
it was a moving target, I could never get it right

And then I grew beyond the need for mother love
I looked for a man who could make me feel like that dove
But the only ones I can see are the ones like you
The ones who have better things to do
than take a break and pay attention to me
I really must stop this, I must break free

A small two months without your presence
I will miss you,  I am an empty vessel
A garden watering can on a hot day
Metal burning--too hot to touch, dryness and dust

I am not a senseless bucket
waiting to be healed
by love and compassion
like a child unable to understand
the absence of mother's love
sitting in the void of a soundless and empty house
If that silence has a name, it is terror

Outside, a sun drenched day cooled by the ocean's breath
Inside the cave of the house, a profound stillness and foreboding
an emotional vacum without the oxygen of concern
dry, forgotten grass blows softly across the yard
Inside, fear and yearning, like the cold concrete hallway
outside the cell on death row
dead child walking

"But what are their jobs?" she asked
my mother, the only one in the world
who would demand that cats have jobs
or perhaps it is only a requirement from another era
they should catch mice, except there are no mice
they should catch snakes, but  I've never seen a snake in my apartment

My cats keep house
A stack of papers needs to be spread on the floor
This makes it more comfortable to sit on

Small objects must be knocked from raised flat surfaces
Cats like to be up high
and they like to have plenty of room

First, there is the interest of knocking the object,
watching it's movement to the edge
How much effort does it take to move it?
Does it slide?
Or does it lurch and stop.
And how does it land on the floor?
Does it break apart? Splatter? Bounce?
Flat surfaces are for sitting and sleeping on
Small objects get in the way, and should be stored
on the floor

Mostly, my cats jobs are to be cute
And that they are very good at

What is my job?
That could fill a small report
But really, what is it?

Maybe, it is to enjoy life
like my cats
breath by breath
no matter what happens

I found him on a beach in Haifa
next to a road, covered in tar
Left there to die,
by someone who didn't care
he has brought so much joy, this life with him I share

I stayed home today
to work, when being in a cafe
would be nicer, but there
would be no cats and this ones brother died
and I don't know how much more cat snoring
there will be
my favorite cat
a human snore will send me into a fit
on a French train, a bullet train a man
snored as we passed a nuclear power plant
a big one near a lake with beautiful giant lili pads
floating with flowers in the golden evening sun
and I could have
thrown him out even though he was
in the back far away from me
and I used to kick my husband
when he slept and choked on his own flesh
making that vibration, not a kind
or tolerant wife when it came to snoring
but my cat snores and it's cute and soothing

I said how sorry I was for bothering him so much
and making our relationship awful
he said it wasn't awful,
but I guess to him he'd have to be afraid
I would come at him with an ax
for it to be awful
Awful is all relative, it's still awful to me
I obsess about another who I don' t even like
How can this be?
So easy for me
I think that's how I got married
I apologized to this one and he didn't care either
"No worries," he says, he's a *******, much younger
women, you know, they just can't keep their minds off of me
It's all fodder for his ego, but like a blood drip from my veins
but you don't understand, I want to shout, I don't even like you
I think I'd have a terrible time with you
but I want to call you every day
and you repulse me, I have no respect for you
So there I am, abandoned, alone, in my crazy mind

abandoned again.  maybe its cuz I wouldn't call him.
and now there's no movie, just my life, oh me
but it's good life, not bad
and it's going to take all the strength that I have
to realize he's not all there is for me
just a guy, and probably
one of those dudes I get with before I leave
a bad situation for a better
place
don't know why I do it,
but it's definitely a pattern
and I guess what matters
is I keep my head ******* on straight.
no desperate searches or calls or
staying up late
cuz if rock climbing is more important than
me,
this dude may just be one i toss back to the sea

"You incite it" she said
Me?  The quivering victim
pain radiating out of severed nerve endings
he/she said it, and he/she targets me
"You think it means something"
Of course it does...after all...but wait
"She's not your mother. He's not your mother."
Mother, destroyed me. Can't criticize her.  Hurts her too much.
She lashes out.  I fall.  I must disintegrate into a writhing mass
Crying, water evaporating out of my eyes to drain the life from me
Destroyed, she stands over me, gives me a hand up.  All is good.
It doesn't mean anything.  It's just a crazy person.  I react like
something has been found out
That this craziness has merit to it and should be considered instead of just
let pass like a ball aimed at me that misses it's intended target.
Not worth the effort

Knows what I know
Should be the center
of my thoughts
My feelings

How easily I am pushed away
What do you know in your heart? Trust that.
And I say, why are you giving me so much credit?
How can I trust this--my own, only my own

What pains me is not the situation
The job, the lack of it, the having or having not
of whatever
But when I'm hit with aggression and
how it changes what I think of myself
That sickening feeling when I think I've been found out

To come back to the heart.
To believe what I know
is life itself

Do not cross
the weathered plastic, still yellow, faded blows in the wind
the unsolved, cold case file
there lies, me
"we decided a long time ago," says the detective
"it was pointless to continue.  this will never be solved."
so we put the evidence away in a cardboard box with a label in sharpie and
little plastic bags full of samples of entrails and remnants of a life she once had
and buried the body
but she was still alive
and the box was taken deep down into a sub basement 17 floors from the surface
and filed and there it sits, gathering now a thick layer of dust, unmoved
the cardboard becomes fragile and the evidence dessicates and the body
remains buried, hidden and
yet the victim is still alive and apparently normal
Apparently, but not really, some kind of cold dead inside ***** snatching
a heart stolen and sold on the black market by someone she trusted
but she still moves, walks, lives

Not real
little old man
I want to know you have problems
like me
like we

Now I work it self consciously
let me keep my job, oh please

What I wouldn't do
for the likes of you

I've put it to the test
wore my shortest, lowest, tightest best
that I could get away with at work

and see you come running
see you sit next to me
for lunch I arranged for all of us
and peak at my *******
behind a tangle of hair and behind the keys
around my neck

So it works for me, too
And what I wouldn't do
to keep my job

I told the shrink I wanted to commit suicide
I was so jacked up, filled with self hate
Like a jagged rock slashing
through my veins didn't want to stay
in my skin
but I'm calmer now
And I don't even really know how
things got that bad
I'm not even that mad
at all

My old vacuum lasted over five years
Can't tell you how many times
I unscrewed it and cleared it with
a wire hanger to make it fine
On TV the Olympics roar
people making history
but I'm just happy with my new appliance
in my humble home, making it clean

Oh, it was so romantic
and he put it on his computer
where I have my password taped
that I look at every day and can't remember
and I didn't ask for his, and I left it all up in the air
where it should stay, and at times I can barely remember his name
So the same, stepping lightly out over the abyss
will I float or fall or float for awhile and then careen down to
the ground and smash?  And It was in the teacher's lounge and he still
gave me that look of genuine interest that makes me sure
he wonders what I look like naked, and
I wonder if he's cute enough or if he'll be mean
Because a lot of them are I've found and for some
reason an early memory surfaces from a dinner long past
with my boyfriend who I'd marry,
and we were finding out about a dinner party me and my boyfriend
who became my husband and what
was to be served and the Madame said "Eet will be a fish and
eet will be cold."  And we laughed later and it was a cold fish but not fishy,
and not good, because who wants to eat a cold fish
in December in NewYork?
And now my number is on a Post-it on his computer and I can only
wait and see and I do admit I wonder what he looks like naked.

"...it is our own wish to be soothed that is the root of the attraction."
I read in the yellow pages, the spine of the paperback cracking and that is underlined
for the second time because I bought my first copy of this book in 1988
and I felt behind the times
Still, I am a "woman who loves too much"

My first copy became so thrashed I put duct tape on it from my grip kit
film school and obsessions with unavailable guys, boys, and all kind of things
I did, drugs and two on one *** to try to make him love me back until a social worker asked me to buy the book and read it

I remember going over to University Village and walking to the back of the store
where the self help books were and there was one copy and I paid 4.95 in a kind
of glazed over way like I'd bought photocopied readers for classes.
Dutifully, sure that this in some way would benefit me although
I wouldn't really know how and then I read it and I was never the same.

"This book says it comes from your family" I remember telling my mother
on my land line with the long cord connected to the answering machine...
and I read that book nearly every day and my life got better and I made a film and got accepted to a New York City graduate film school and I threw it away
when my very serious boyfriend made fun of it
which was a mistake, because if I had kept it I never would have married him, I think.
I still remember it sitting there on a pile of newspapers in a milk crate,duct tape on the spine in the basement garbage room that was so cold with winter's air
and I felt like I was abandoning something alive and now I think that something was me

Anxiety goes up, impulse control goes down and here I am again
I went to a store, some store, I don't even remember which one or where but some
book store this time with desperation to find that book again and there was one copy
and I bought it some years ago and every time some nasty thing happens
there appears in my life some dude
who torments me and who I chase
who I try to extract caring from

Because it is the struggle I know so well
And it's 2013 and yes I am reading it again as if for the first time
And I find, it is my own wish to be soothed.
To have someone tell me, everything will be OK
This, too shall pass
And of course I know this, know this, ingrained and wired in my brain is
it has to come from somewhere else
when really, the only one who can truly soothe me, is me

Oh world, sometimes you are too much
People dash their words against me
Like angry, grey waves challenge rocks on the coast  in a storm
Words, spray from the storm, like saliva, floating up and landing
splat next to me
foaming and wet

My eyes are soaked in water from they sky tears
When I braved a walk to the angry coast
Afraid of the power of the Bay
Seemingly endless, overwhelming, unremitting
the loudness of the wave's rants and crashes
ceaseless, overwhelming as I stand near the cliff's edge
Somehow I wanted to know this
to face this

Like your words
I am hit with salt water from below, fresh water from above
how did I get into this storm?
on a hot October day with a fever of 101
You argue with me, accusations fly
Why I want to postpone some crucial work
Until I feel better and the illness that consumes me
subsides

Into my safe space I crawl
The clatter and water outside
If, and only if,  I trust myself
here there is no danger.

War around me, and it's like I've got a ****** at my back
I'm in his gunsights and he follows me around with no
friendliness how I ever could have thought I could be friends
with this person and I need so much the strength within and I
am standing there and there is no me inside and I can't let this happen
because I am in his sightlines and others, too and it's completely different
a battlefield every day and I can't let myself go, the strength has to stay
and he is only my enemy, trying to shoot me down and I can't
I have to stay and fight because there is no choice and this is
so wrong but it doesn't matter things never matter I am a member
of a much maligned group, and it doesn't help but what I can do
is not lose me. I may go down but I will go down with myself intact
my opinions that I know and not believing their lies which come
flying at me every day now a new one.  And I can hear the disrespect
and sarcasm and belittlement and the value on the stupid and I will
stay with my own thoughts this time.  I will not abandon me and what
I know.  I will not let them take over my mind.  What happens on the
outside I can't control.  But my opinion of them, of what they're doing
it will be mine and it will matter to me and I will believe it this time. I swear.

Anxiety is at the heart of all that ails me
like my best friend ever, it has always been with me
So familiar, my anchor in the dark
I return to it endlessly to remind me that this is just like the rest
This new thing, this new test
is just the familiar torture you've known all your life

By my side, it destroys my mind, and I can't stop
this addiction, will always be with me, I think
The lies it tells me, that this turbo spinning depleting energy keeps me safe
That the constant tension that translates into fear and self hate
Is as it should, as it was set up for me
And blocks me, just when I want most to be free and easy

Letting go of my best friend, so scary, and feels so light
and beautiful, like the afternoon sun in a quiet garden
where everything is colorful and peaceful and the air is fresh
and there is the smell of water from a hose...slightly rusty with an aromatic humidity
All is well, and from here I can do anything
but I catch myself: I am not safe without my best friend
and the ax falls down into the scene and it is now night and I am hungry and cold
and unwelcome and stalked and frightened, as it should be.

So anxiety is my enemy
It keeps me from this delight in life from feeling all is right
and I can go on: and when I meet it again
I shouldn't welcome it in like a friend, but finally
be honest about it and say: go away
You have no use anymore in my life
You served me at one time, but that time is over
and you must evaporate
and I must face the fear alone, without you
You stay back, and I go forward, with courage.

You hold the key to my financial future
This job.  You, the boss
and I think you're crazy
In a zone where nothing makes sense
Where the ground is unstable and shifts
And I look around at hollow eyes
moving and very busy
You
and you are simply quite mad

Anxiety is at the heart of all that ails me
like my best friend ever, it has always been with me
So familiar, my anchor in the dark
I return to it endlessly to remind me that this is just like the rest
This new thing, this new test
is just the familiar torture you've known all your life

By my side, it destroys my mind, and I can't stop
this addiction, will always be with me,
The lies it tells me, that this turbo spinning depleting energy keeps me safe
That the constant tension that translates into fear and self hate
Is as it should, as it was set up for me
And blocks me, just when I want most to be free and easy

Letting go of my best friend, so scary, and feels so light
and beautiful, like the afternoon sun in a quiet garden
where everything is colorful and peaceful and the air is fresh and warm
and there is the smell of water from a hose...slightly rusty with an aromatic humidity
and little birds flutter about, and a sound of a buzzing insect appears occasionally
All is well, and from here I can do anything
but I catch myself: I am not safe without my best friend
and the ax falls down into the scene and it is now night and I am hungry and cold
and unwelcome and stalked and frightened, as it should be.

Anxiety is my enemy
It keeps me from this delight in life
and I can go on: and when I meet it again
I shouldn't welcome it in like a friend, but finally
be honest about it and say: go away
You have no use anymore in my life
You served me at one time, but that time is over
and you must evaporate
and I must face the fear alone, without you
You stay back, and I go forward, with courage.

He doesn't owe me anything other than himself
as he is, as is, and if I don't like what I see
that's me
to deal with.
So what if it will be Valentine's day and I have no Valentine
I never try to get one--why would one just fall from the sky?
I guess I believe in magic, and misery
want someone to commiserate with and soothe me
but  a bad match won't do,
It's worth about as much to me as an old shoe, nothing new

How I wish I could believe that this time the ******
of innocents will result in real, substantive change
to prevent this from ever happening again

he or she will do this: the child meltdown crazy act
in an adult
and I will blanche into an affectless emotionless marble slab
deflector shields up, they can't hurt me
the dysfunction energy will well up surround me
rush over me like a tornado flows over a house
as I hide in the basement

"The population is expected to level off at around nine billion," says my father
A nearly full plate of Thanksgiving feast food in front of him
but he has been asked to pontificate which is what he does best
and I hear a tremor in his voice like I have when I teach
I know he is in the throws of excitement about what he's saying
planning for his keynote in Brazil, and what plant scientists can do
to help save us from global warming and the lack of water since there isn't
even two liters of fresh water for every person on the planet for use every day at seven billion
I gesture as to what two liters looks like  and my mother snaps "I know what two liters is!"

It's cold in here, in this large Oakland short sale house that fits my cousin's family
and my Aunt downstairs, where I like it better because the children aren't there
Like two houses put together and there are no carpets just hard wood floors and
open windows that make it cold and it is anything but warm and fuzzy
My Aunt is angry with me that I shop at Walmart but that's what I can afford
Tomorrow she's holding a strike at a Walmart with her daughter which makes them superior to me
She's also mad because I don't like my "Union" which does nothing for me since I'm not tenured
"You have to organize" she condescends, like that is a reasonable thing with my one and two year stints at schools but she is the big Union Head for CSU so she should know
She was on TV with Jerry Brown after all, so what do I know
The kids are noisy since they all have their own phone and can play anything they
want at any time in addition to turning on the myriad of TVs and radios and stereos in the house
and the noise ricochets off he hard cold floors and walls that have pictures on them
of people from the family, but they don't look quite like they belong
and they hang there uncomfortably and self consciously
There is every skin tone except deep black at the table
My family--all that is left

Childhood: I loved going to my mother's family in Idaho
It was hot in summer or cozy warm inside in winter and
a wonder land outside for snow shoeing and skiing
It was quiet and they always had wall to wall carpet
I rolled from one end of the room to another in it the first time I felt it
It was warm and fuzzy.  
People listened and there were breaks from noise and chaos

Here, every conversation is disjointed like we are going
in and out of different time periods and different petty rivalries and
fierce competitions under it all and families are blending and being
torn apart and the latest one has formed from "OK Cupid" online
and my Aunt has to be right, the smart one, the good one, the one of the people
and it is so cold, so very cold, and the windows are opened to let in more
cold Oakland air as if there isn't enough of it and all the sounds of
kids and electronics are driving me slowly insane

What can plant scientists do to help nine billion people
without water?  Not a whole lot, except invent crops that
survive like camels, or can live underwater like fish
since everything will be either dry or deluged with water
and I wish there was carpeting, warm carpeting and less
noise and more harmony
and this is the family I have now
the old one is gone, like the glaciers that will melt all at last
and the rivers that will run dry forever.
And I think: what we need to do is invent a way to make water
Make enough water for everyone, maybe from recycled bags or used Nike shoes
and if we can do that, maybe the air in this house will warm
and it will become quieter and the hard wood floors will become soft and warm and fuzzy
and I will feel at home here, with my family

My last boss, the last chain of command
complains and brags about his daughter to others now
not me,
because Friday they will hire my replacement

And he has stopped making eye contact with me, like the other one did a year ago
because why do they treat me so badly and
I'm still a person
And I'd like to walk right up to him and shout in his face that
if he were my father I'd have a lot of problems, too!

And I'd like to tell him as I've been told,
when you've thought of yourself as very intelligent for a very long time
it's hard to let go of it
and he met me, and well, I do not lack in that category
in sanity, perhaps

I want to scream and tell them all my most honest thoughts and have them listen
especially him, my last boss
But he will never listen to me, I'm told
My thoughts infuriate him
They run around his thoughts and lap them
and that is unacceptable

So every day I notice, every day, is a fresh form of torture
and appreciation
and no eye contact from your enemies,
things could be worse.

He knows, though I do not
he cannot articulate it why
he pushes me away
and I return
like an annoying dog at the dinner table,
my nose driving me

He knows, and I do,
though I cannot admit it
though it seems so compelling
and so healing
that for him to like me
would so seem to heal me, cure me
but it is not what I really want

Because, I do not
have not
never have
liked him
Why don't I know that?