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AM flight tomorrow morning

It's no coincidence that in no known language does the phrase "As pretty as an airport" appear - Douglas Adams

Why have I always loved airports?

Hundreds of thousands of people congregate in one spot before departing for hundreds of thousands of places.

We join one another in line, on escalators, in the high speed trams zipping from terminal to terminal– We eat $20 burgers and sip $5 Starbucks, click clack our laptops, wearily scan crowds for that maybe-terrorist.

A fusion occurs. You become one with the crowd - you are a worker among workers, a patron among patrons.

I find this comforting.

I am watching a young Mom try to control three kids under the age of four. Deep circles sit like dark puddles below her eyes. Hairline cracks crease the thin skin around her mouth. She orders “Sandra” to pull up her pants and “Ian” to sit down, all the while bouncing a red-faced baby on her knee. I think, where is her husband? Where is the father?

So I repeat: why do I love airports, this den of germs, confusion and chaos?

Transit. Mass transit. The crowd is constantly changing, never static – only the airport employees stay put, those shadowy figures ringing up our magazines, our trailmix, our cashew shaped pillows.

Airports contain the best and the worst of humanity. Nothing beats it. Except maybe the gym.

I arrived in Miami safely, and have been hanging out with Omar's family the entire night... we watched the show "Wipeout," has anyone seen it? It is HILARIOUS, but prepared to feel seriously guilty.

more later. sweet dreams, mundobello.

tonight,

I am watching Sex and the City with Jackie and Max, making s'mores, drinking La Croix.

Tomorrow I'm headed to Miami!! And then sunny Curacao : ) 

things are looking up.

today I got my nails did at a grungy frisco salon. bright "big apple" red in honor of my sister's new residence. then mums and I went shopping at Wallmart like true americanas, went a bit nuts and bought our two "kids" (dogs) matching bandanas. oh and i had a diet coke/rootbeer combo from mickey d's. finished off the evening eating at a five star restaurant and playing nintendo wii.

sian tipped me off to a great site called "wordle" - my wordle shows the words I use most on this blog... interesting, eh? 

going, going, gone.

steady posting on this blog restores my sense of routine and stability. so blog on, little bird, blog on! 

i have yet another poem to share with you all, one i hold close to my heart. this recent death has resurrected my feelings of love and adoration for a certain man in my life and despite efforts to keep my heart silent, the love is loud. 

and with this? i am spent. 


I Have Five Things To Say

The wakened lover speaks directly to the beloved,
"You are the sky my spirit circles in,
the love inside of love, the resurrection-place.

Let this window be your ear.
I have lost consciousness many times
with longing for your listening silence,
and your life-quickening smile.

You give attention to the smallest matters,
my suspicious doubts, and to the greatest.

You know my coins are counterfeit,
but you accept them anyway,
my impudence and my pretending!

I have five things to say,
five fingers to give
into your grace.

First, 

when I was apart from you,
this world did not exist,
nor any other.

Second, 

whatever I was looking for
was always you.

Third, 

why did I ever learn to count to three?

Fourth, 

my cornfield is burning!

Fifth, this finger stands for Rabia,
and this is for someone else.

Is there a difference?

Are these words or tears?
Is weeping speech?
What shall I do, my love?

So he speaks, and everyone around
begins to cry with him, laughing crazily,
moaning in the spreading union
of lover and beloved.

This is the true religion. All others
are thrown-away bandages beside it.

This is the sema of slavery and mastery
dancing together. This is not-being.

Neither words, nor any natural fact
can express this.

I know these dancers.
Day and night I sing their songs
in this phenomenal cage.

My soul, don't try to answer now!
Find a friend, and hide.

But what can stay hidden?


Love's secret is always lifting its head
out from under the covers,


"Here I am!"

Rumi 

hope you all are taking care of yourselves and your loved ones <3 

There is no pain so great as the memory of joy in present grief.

Dad's Mum, my grandmother, died this morning. She was a beautiful woman who exuded strength, humor, and quiet grace. She will be missed by the entire family and many, many more. I know she is in a better place, a more peaceful place. Other than that, I am stunned silent. 

Death XXVII

Then Almitra spoke, saying, "We would ask now of Death."

And he said:

You would know the secret of death.

But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heart of life?

The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot unveil the mystery of light.

If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide unto the body of life.

For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.

In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond;

And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.

Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.

Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

Khalil Gibran

We see things not as they are, but as we are.

What is the recipe for a perfect day?

A hike through the mountains - romping above the tree line with my Pops, Jackie, Sampson and Sophie... waiting for Jack’s adrenalized boyfriend to get in from Conneticut. No makeup, no nice clothing, my Dad's old socks. Reading and writing in the evening. Then a burger joint with the fam, my Mum included, laughing over french fries and sparkling water.

I feel at peace with my family, and I am lucky, because it wasn’t always that way. The recipe for a perfect family? Beyond me. But for a day, for a day, maybe.

a hike and franz wright.

Admission
by Franz Wright


Like much-loved music things
(when I am at my gladdest)
physical objects themselves
appear to represent
something I can't see
(not yet)—
something
I cannot recall or imagine
yet whose presence I clearly perceive
the way perhaps the born blind do
the sun.
Like words
most masterfully uttered
these concrete things stand for
invisible things, while
remaining themselves,
their dear selves, without which
I just can't imagine my life;
I believe in a higher unseeable
life, inconceivable
light
of which light is mere shadow, and yet
already, at times, and with desolation
with bereftness no words can express, miss this light
of the earth, this bright life
I yesterday only began to love, to understand.

definitions.

my last summer as an unemployed, college student bum.

I am in Colorado, and I am T I R E D. But happy to be with my parents and my sister. The drive was strange - to be alone for 16 hours on the road. Finally I am working on my relationship with myself. It took getting out of a relationship to learn how to be in one.

an evening with Muriel Rukeyser

I listened to this beautiful poem as I traversed the jade and purple mountains of Utah. Along the way I kept my eye out for polygamists and child brides, but I didn't see any... damn.

I am staying in a quaint inn on the side of I-70. The halls are littered with signs warning, "NO PETS" and "$250 FINE FOR PETS AND CIGARETTES." Thank God for boho purses! I stuffed poor Sampson in my oversized bag, and made sure to pocket my ciggs.

They're gonna run me out of town! but hopefully not before I steal a few rolls at tomorrow's complimentary breakfast : )

The Speed Of Darkness

1

Whoever despises the clitoris despises the penis
Whoever despises the penis despises the cunt
Whoever despises the cunt despises the life of the child.

Resurrection music, silence, and surf.

2

No longer skeaking
Listening with the whole body
And with every drop of blood
Overtaken by silence
But this same silence is become speech
With the speed of darkness.

3

Stillness during war, the lake.
The unmoving spruces.
Glints over the water.
Faces, voices. You are far away.
A tree that trembles and trembles.

4

After the lifting of the mist
after the heavy rains
the sky stands clear
and the cries of the city risen in day
I remember the buildings are space
walled, to let space be used for living
I mind this room is space
whose boundary of glass
lets me give you drink and space to drink
your hand, my hand being space
containing skies and constellations
your face carries the reaches of air
I know I am space
my words are the air.

5

Between between
the man : act exact
woman : in curve senses in their maze
frail orbits, green tries, games of stars
shar of the body speaking its evidence

6

I look across at the real
vulnerable involved naked
devoted to the present of all I care for
the world of history leading to this moment.

7

Life is the announcer.
I assure you
there are many ways to have a child.
I bastard mother
promise you
there are many ways to be born.
They all come forth
in their own grace.

8

Ends of the earth join tonight
with blazing stars upon thier meeting.

These sons, these sons
fall burning into Asia.

9

Time comes into it.
Say it. Say it.
The universe is made of stories,
not of atoms.


10

Lying
blazing beside me
you rear beautifully up—
your thinking face—
erotic body reaching
in all its colors and lights—
your erotic face
colored and lit—
not colored body-and-face
but now entire,
colors lights the world of thinking and reaching.


11

The river flows past the city.

Water goes down to tomorrow
making its children I hear their unborn voices
I am working out the vocabulary of my silence.


12

Big-boned man young and of my dream
Struggles to get the live brid out of his throat.
I am he am I? Dreaming?
I am the bird am I? I am the throat?

A brid with a curved beak.
It could slit anything, the throat-bird.

Drawn up slowly. The curved blades, not large.
Bird emerges wet being born
Begins to sing.


13

My night awake
staring at the broad rough jewel
the copper roof across the way
thinking of the poet
yet unborn in this dark
who will be the throat of these hours.
No. Of those hours.
Who will speak these days,
if not I,
if not you?

last night at S-307.

I once asked my Pops, What quality do you most admire in a woman? He replied: passion. I persisted, What quality do you most admire in a man? He replied: strength.

I was ten years old, and he had enough sense not to return the question.

So at age 23 I am going to ask myself, What qualities do I most admire in a man?

I admire men who are like woman. Not girly boys or effeminate males. I most admire men who contain characteristics typically attributed to females. Unconditional love. Affectionate. Caring. Considerate. Maternal.

In a woman? I admire women who take on the best qualities of a "real man": strength, honesty, morality, prudence.

... tonight is my last night in this apartment. I am sitting on my floor, Sampson at my feet, and I have no certainty or stability, no employment or residence. I have nothing and yet I have everything. lucky.

So Goodbye, apartment! May your next tenants have the same luck as I! And keep you a little bit neater : )

Farewell.

News: Valentina, one of my best friends and favorite authors, has officially caught the blogging bug. Read her paz-ful words here: http://pazispeace.blogspot.com/.

On another note, during meditation this morning I stumbled upon this:

I will be more afraid of spirit-unrest, of
soul-disturbance, of any ruffling of the mind, than of earthquake or fire. When I feel the calm of my spirit has been broken by emotional upset, then I must steal away alone with God, until my heart sings and all is strong and calm again. Uncalm times are the only times when evil can find an entrance. I will beware of unguarded spots of unrest. I will try to keep calm, no matter what turmoil surrounds me.

Lately my life is blessed with pillars and lighthouses. A pillar is someone I lean on in times of unrest and upheaval. A lighthouse is someone I trust for guidance and new perspective. Dad is a pillar, Mom is a lighthouse.

Last night I made my first eighty-plus year old friend.

June (lady): Hello, is this your first meeting?

Me: Oh, no, but my first time in this one.

June: Welcome! Here is my phone number.

she grabs my hand and scrawls her phone number across my palm.

Just press that to your forehead, missy, and you'll be fine.

June has thirty seven years of sobriety and ends every share by saying: "And I'm standing on the f-ing mountain, listening to the wind." She is the most joyful, serene person with the worst potty mouth I have ever had the sweet pleasure of meeting.

Definitely a lighthouse.

Cindy Sherman's work.

She reminds me that we are all victims of masquerading. We role play, we are actors, we are authentic copies. I am a work in progress, a lifelong project.

From Cindy Sherman:

The work is what it is and hopefully it’s seen as feminist work, or feminist-advised work, but I’m not going to go around espousing theoretical bullshit about feminist stuff.

The still must tease with the promise of a story the viewer of it itches to be told.