the hungarian boy

was quiet but not shy. he did not know what to say. he had learned to not trust people, not because he had been betrayed,

but because people often did not understand when he said certain things.

the boy had uncombed hair which uncombed itself under hoods, leaning against walls, backs of busses, and when he was truly happy, the palms of his hands. his eyes were small and hidden, though people would notice him from far away (only when he wanted them to least).

When he was happy, people didn't look so much... it was when he was put in a box that his small hidden eyes glowed with a cynical, discerning roughness that pierced through any flat environment.

the boy was a chess genius, and smiled at his mother, though often had too much energy to handle her. mental restlessness to listen. Occasionally he would walk out of class, blatantly disrespecting authority. he was easily unimpressed and dangerously hard to read. he was sexy, even if he was just eleven or twelve. he felt extra sexy when he stayed still with his shoulders hunched over, when he was angry and tired and his brain was worn down enough to not give a fuck about anything. he loved himself then.

he liked the ties, because he respected feeling sophisticated, but hated the way his pleated pants felt when he sat down.

He wanted to play with the old men in the park, but feared their rotten breath, so he watched them from his window. his favorite was the lively man in mustard wool who would smirk and touch his face when he was frustrated.

he couldn't sleep at night, so would close his eyes and imagine conveyor belts and fresh fruit and making out. when he dreamt, he dreamt of infinity and controlled states of near-doom and vast oceanic halcyon. he was little, but he had a real swagger - yet all of his forcefulness came from his delicate, passionate face.

he was a chess prodigy at ten, playing for the president and hosted on trains all the way to st. petersburg and switzerland. By twelve, he felt useless, lost, full of presence, and smarter than ever.

he wasn't sure if it was the best part of his life or the worst part of his life when he was thirteen, and decided he didn't care to be the best 13-year old chess player in the slavic lands, probably because he wouldn't get it, but mostly because he had given up long before he tried.

my comfort place

i am back

- its been a long time - i forget how beautiful this music is

in my comfort place

a little bit crazy

with the hair on my arms ajar, sweeping, chilling, shaking

soft high harmonic voices, waterdrops and davcy synthesizers - it's a safe spot where my breaths are more meaningful, my energy is thoughtful, where eye contact is charged, where patience is not empty - but rather, Really a virtue because the feelings and the energy is sustainable, without emptying itself

It's being back on the wavelength

it's like crying after a funeral, watching the beauty of the thousands of sun-lit leaves

angles are beautiful, textures are meaningful, and time is presently intense and dashingly destructively celebratory and delicate and rejoiceful

it's good to be back, stroked again by chills, kissed by my own live brain

The Flower

I stopped the man because there was a blue smeary painting with gorgeous layers, a sign that just said "bliss". I wanted to buy it, and I could buy it, because it was small and on the street attached to a woven wire fence.

"It's not my painting... people just leave them here." Oh no, I can't take it then, because other people (I waved my arms) need to have it. I looked at him very seriously. The bliss stays on that fence.

The bearded man had a look - which all San Franciscans recognize - that he was about to say something unexpected. Oh god, what was he about to say. He looked too inspired. He said something about living in the moment, but way more intense. And then he said,

"Thank you for bringing that color into my life." Just, Wow. Thank you.

My flower is fuschia. The mexican lady who sold it to me said it, too - I was called to it by that color. I was called to it. In her yellow and goldenrod walls, by mexcian damsel with a guitar, smiling with us ca. 1940.

"Look, look at these walls I have! Its.... let me find it... the color of this cerulean here." Oh wow. Wow wow wow. She lit up. This is the flower. This is the bruja flower.

A bum pulled out his magnifying glass to take a look. "I love Orchids." This one is so beautiful. This one is really... wow. I'm not going to bother you, but I would climb a tree just to take a little piece of a flower like this. He is talking about for his mojo. He's from the deep south, he said.

What should I name her? I asked Adam. "Darfur," he said. Oh god, what a depressing name for something that is supposed to bring happiness. Really? I was just looking at the map. I looked up, and the only map he could be referring to was of San Francisco. Seriously, Darfur?

Dah-fuuurhh. I let it roll, softly, like french. Dah-fooorhh. Its a a soulful sound. This little flower.

Back in bed, this flower is my valentine. It's the only one I need, seriously. This orchid is so vibrant, so unbelievable fuschia that any other color near it, the more brilliant, the more blindingly passionate and invigorating becomes the combo. This is the flower to eat papaya nearby to. This is the flower for the inside of tomatoes. For deep, black hair, for brilliant green grass, or green parrots, for medium gray wet stones.

26 is the new 14

happy-angsty. except attitude adjustments are less corporeally challenging.

instead of your whole body trembling with tense, shameful dread and self-rejection,
its now more of a sneaky, manipulative trick we play on ourselves

in order to think positively about change as it shakes up our world.

We have mastered the game of the worst of 14 year old rivals.. those who drove you to develop through fear of perception: a sneaky undercurrent of influence based on survivalist values: self pity and contempt is much more satisfying, though cleansing positivity is far healthier, we are convinced of an attitude change only when considering how we will be perceived.

Its the new 14!

my jaw problems suck

because they induce headaches when I'm coziest.
face mashed into the pillowtop, cheeks dislodged for dreaming. ouch, ouch,

however may I burrow?
I prop my face up, hand down, knuckles at my temples.

my new straight life

Ok ok ok ok ok not so bad. Blackbird "with the lesbian bartenders" has 2 straight guys, and they're already my favorites. "I was thinking about the mezcal." "do you like spicy? bitter?" "Yeah." "I know just the drink. I can make you something wonderful."

And I trust him, the bearded jack, and the tiny, engaging argentine with the papyrus scrolls listing drinks in proper german prose and caps with curved Ls - agave, cardamom, bell pepper, rhubarb. cinnamon and plum wine. rosemary and maple. mist of scotch. amaro nonino.

It's all sparkle, and no glow. Thank god!

Doodles, tamales, and hand-carved cherry bar-heads, save my soul.

its ok

because comfort comes at both
the most waken and sleepyest moments
because wherever you are you will find your way to one.

a baby in cascais

the man who lay on the beach

dreaming, and analyzing the flowers - with the authentic words, and the glow, like liquid sunmelt all over my body and soul, launching an entire language into

my spirit for the first time

is having a baby.

at 26, my last guarded youthful fantasy

launching into tropical fruits, art in cobblestone streets, villas with linens, turquoise seas, and 100% natural attitude within it,

has been struck with life.

The kind that kicks you and tells you, "wake up! go to work." when your throat hurts.

Ay, the language of twisted trees with blossoms in the moon that smell amazing

and make your skin shake;

and the home I found on a greek island which I turned into

my room in a hole, in chinatown, to recreate every night in the same pajamas -

our youthful fantasy lives on and shakes its head at time.

dust; windex; clutter; sore throats, and babies.

18-22. 18-22. All of my fantasies, 18-22. cuban rooftops, dawn in Mycenaean territory, overlooking the goats; sunset with papaya and hawaiian gypsy music; the company is never so fresh.

22-26, 22-26. Same four years, and I've built a stale patience

of a woman.

I can swingdance for goofs and sautee artichokes and eating one in my cramped hallway floor straddling the heater, resenting a stale white striking some untuned chord in my heart.

I have to choose in the meaning of life to have meaning.

I have to choose in love, to wake up.

If I am not present, I am not. Why is life cold, if I have life. What use is a foggy city, with no angst. My skin needs some whisper, without bashfulness. A deep kiss, without self-consciousness. My curiosities have dwindled to shadows of themselves, like schoolnights in elementary school. Somewhere in there there was a fire, somewhere I was weary, somewhere I sang.

My guitars are all over my house, one in each room, each missing strings.

My orchid refuses to die, unwatered on my mantle, reaching up like a ballerina.

A tissue paper I destroyed in careful shapes damaged by the wind of opening and closing my door guards the exit of my room, with a drawing of my orchid etched into the tissue the color of the thin, south atlantic sea.

My computer shouts, "IT's Twelve O'Clock". My clay animals which are whisles, from Latvia and Panama and India and Mexico all look at me patiently. "This isn't over yet, Alice, this isn't over yet," and forgive me for not closing my drawers, or buying a new lamp in years.

May the bursts flow through me! Please, extend your half-life, push me to care about the corners of the good things, bear me again, I am not burrowing, I am here, help me present.

The Tall Redheaded Woman

She has appeared twice already before me. This woman is like a ghost. She is powerful, and she is silent. Her pants are dry cleaned, and she is not stiff.

my new gay life

why does this place make me eat everything with my fingers?
the french fries are so tiny and curried I have to reach down and grab six shreds to get a bite.
Why so sugar,
why so icy.
why am I the only woman here on women's night, elbows on the cold marble -reeking of straight, or old, or happily invisible, while I lean on the cold clean marble, as the green lights fade to purple, and he disappears.

I'm suffering here to interrupt him adjusting the tv. "Excuse me? So realistically how long do I have to wait to not be the only one at the bar?"
"the girls are waiting to come out."
He looked at me like an alien.

Well, at least they closed the door. The marble is freezing, and I am no longer sad I wore my merino, and big black pants, and frumpy ballet flats. My eyes and my new deep gray nails will be it for me tonight, if I last. 30 minutes, 3 hours later, It's still daytime and dark and cold.

The big, dark, metal lounge facing the street echoes in its aluminum weeknight abandonment. The castle door up front trembles on its drafty edge.

top reasons why my hip may have been rotated causing my spine to be shaped like a Z

1. scrunching to lie down on the work shuttle between silicon valley and home
it's cold in here
laptops make terrible pillows
where o where do my feet go?

2. too much salsa dancing, too little sex

3. I only tend to eat things which require citrus-thinned sauces which, in turn, require dipping with other pieces of food. examples from the past 24 hours
ceviche
hearts of pine salad
artichoke hearts
or maybe it's just food-on-food lunge-overs
mussels in beer sauce
hommos and pita

4. I broke my big toe in September
I may subconsciously
Limp

5. I can only dream with my face out the window, stomach down, knee twisted up

6. broken tailbone at ten left me left-cheek chair sitting for over a decade of right-handed school desks

The female engineer probably studied something else

i.

thank

Navigation

that we are explorers underneath it all.

Among us who have known

since six, since dreaming of quasars and strings and acceleration - - (wondering if it all has to be centripetal)

that there is no edge - - (it just goes on around to where we started)

we do not wander - - (with celestial eyes we sail).

ii.

Yes, yes.... the staircase is full of fog, but we're used to that in california up on the cliffs- -

we know the steps, we know them so well,

we made ourselves

the waxy warp molds on each stair

where to place your foot! each stair slightly like a cushion,

tempur-pedic stair.

iii.

Sailing to borneo

because why else would we be in the cold ass water off the california cliffs? to surf?

we bring our skilled tools to predict the storm, find cures for parasites and sea fungi,

track whale migrations, demystify their strange underwater language,

and measure the most visible stars - - (we do this to let men define empires).

How do I navigate off the edge? she asks. what is the map, the map, she asks. how do I come home?

we navigate by the invisible ones. the ones "too" far away.

the ones just past the edge.

how is that.

See we are quite excellent at triangulation, us navigational women.

the invisible stars push us like gigantic magnets.

they twist our hair when we sleep and cause ankle blisters.

they refresh us with strong silver mist-gusts right before dawn, when we are half awake and reorganizing where we're even going today. what the hell home means.

the invisible stars say "shh, you are moving, shh, you are moving."

we can feel everything all along, including the dark matter (the stuff men find out with math).

The dark matter we know is just like balance, like sea legs.

i.

Dr. King said - faith is the first step when you don't see the whole staircase.

but what if we made the staircase.

we don't see it but we know it.

Women have been taught that, for us,

the earth is flat, and if we venture out, we will fall off the edge.

Among us who have known,

since six - -

we do not wander.

if you are what you eat

choose

- spicy and fresh but likely to give gas

- rich fat and so sweet you make the people lie down afterwards

- multigrained but very bland

- questionable and expiring

i'm rich, fat, and very fresh

i'm spicy and crunchy and won't sit still...in your belly

i'm crisp and clean and help wash you like kombucha or a good shower which you needed

i'm fibrous and I will fight

but you will reap the benefits

i'm tangy and creamy and overwhelming and go well with madeira, aged, and smooth like pubescent skin.

modernity on feb. 11th

M: have you found it already?

me: part of it

a tasty appetizer!!

and i am growing more ingredients

for my next few bites
M: Hmmmm.....lol, don't know if I understand that one? lol

I was asking if you have found it already 'cuz on your status update it says, "you don't have to wait for love"...

me: i know!

im becoming a hippie

M: lol.

me: i have a little vegetable garden

to grow things myself! and to share

more proactive

though i am also into gourmet bits of love...

from fancy places

you seem to also like both

thats good news..

M: indeed.

Actually, i'd rather breathe it right off the sides of buildings, insides of lit windows, hilltops and sunrises. some sort of anaerobic trick one can only dream about..

career frustration at 24

I am not suited for an average life. My days are like rows of teeth, ready for decay. I need to eat stronger, healthier, more vivaciously flavorful foods.

I am terrified that I have wings but am evolving into an emu. Soon I will be selling my eggs in a pen with nectarine trees. sounds pretty, but at moments of colorful drive my instincts surface: to migrate with the seasons and build nests all over and sleep in close memory with vibrant, swooping escapades.

I need to be enveloped in exotic, thrilling, challenging experiences that make me cry in frustration and scream for the unknown.

I have to live like Picasso, always doing things he cannot do, because that is how he gets to do them.

In the name of vivacity and artistic vitality, please let me navigate my reality towards a breeding ground for dreams, risks, ambitions and strategies : I want to build tools that allow my spirit to pump faster, further, marathons on its own! Where are the ergonomic running shoes for my spirit? Where can I buy clothes that breathe, for when I am sweating and need to expand? How can I sign up for the race that is no longer defined, and how can I start up that beautiful hill?

I'm stuck at the start-off drinking station and the water tastes soft.

I love

Yo soy como el chile verde, Llorona, picante pero sabroso.

what turquoise means to me, lately

my favorite spots on my favorite color I took two pints of, on the wall
the color that migrated to boots, headband, 2 pairs of glasses, leather wallet,
the color i already had in a diary, three scarves, an enormous beaded necklace from my sister, a dress from a beach in panama, the cover of my akropolis book, my very favorite sexy shirt, my previous room's largest wall, watered down and intense, senior, expressive, "me" defined year, in durham, my old eyeliner from 1999, and my favorite lost vintage stone swirl earrings

are the watered-down patches that make the wall look translucent, birthmarked, and illustrative
that highlight the expanse
where I had to press extra hard with new paint makes the watered down parts glow even more luminously, birthmarked, and illustrative

not unlike acrylic when you wash it on and rub it off dry ceramic, let it dry and wash it off, wash it on and drip it off, rub it on and wash it off (I did that with a jail cell sculpture once, a tiny diorama)

the only time I have seen this color alive in nature is on the surface of the deepest part of lake tahoe at 6pm in early september from five blocks through the woods, out in the middle of the lake, deeper and brighter and richer than any airy cerulean could support in the sky.

dogs i don't like, even though i like dogs

Inga just walks around... Like she's blackout all the time

message to M never sent

What dream began Nailed beneath the
floorboards of vesuvio with excel
became a half-empty sparkling dry
Italian. Raincheck.

non-codes for where

there's a firefly preaching and searching up against my window
the fire detector says okay and watches
my butt is smooth
over the air mattress that feels like water where it ends at my ankles.
Just as I have grown up
I have grown up! I have not grown up. I don't listen unless it sounds like a foreign language,
or if I want to kiss it.

The warning neighbor with the broken lamp of four fruit-colored heads dangling by popscicle wires
read my palms and said he had never been so off before
but how can you be a libra? but your career line is so broken; but your lines are still forming
in one year, they will look completely different - even the left hand of your birth destiny!
I paced because I wanted his desk for seventy dollars
I paced because I saw the porn on his laptop, and told him it was okay
I paced because his lamp was broken, and because he was fat.
"Be careful around here," the warning neighbor said, because he is leaving: "there is a secret knock, for neighbors here."
Seven bits, the smoke and the half pipe.

The driver from Sudan has a friend who was shot by drug criminals in Durham.
The singer from Miami knew it was Leonard Cohen and not Songs by Ohia
The singer with the long mustache sang, just right, more than full-souled in the Carolina corner
The man who made my pita said AIDS must be bad in Thailand
"I'm not having sex there, ever."
The man who sells plants at Home Depot wrapped carts of deck supplies in enormous sheets of plastic wrap as the store closed
as I picked off the dead leaves from my new baby

Over cold bruchetta bearing goat cheese from a plastic tub, and water smoothies,
the wind knocked over a potted tree, but the pot did not crack
the waitor said duke students are not nice and he offered me a job.

Ally was in Monaco, Andy was in China, Alyssa was in Costa Rica, Annie was in Austria, Chris was in Russia, Carson was in Cambodia, Jon was in Brazil, Collin was in Spain, Will was in the Czech Republic, Katie was in India, Joan was in Italy, Eric was in Korea.

I was in heat, in need of little, in Panama, insecure, inside myself, in denial, in a while, inland, before the islands, when I sailed away sailless on a motorboat to paradise. This summer I stopped biting my fingernails, plucking my eyebrows, shaving my legs, and ripping at my feet.

Both Madelines looked at me with open, painted eyes. Where do you go? They ask.
Pedro appeared for the first time from behind, not from the cigarette porch.
Nick's hair is shorter. Pedro's hair is longer. Katie's hair is shorter. My hair is longer.

I wonder how many larvaes fall asleep at five in the morning and have forgotten when they wake up.