The Siren

More things I've been doing lately. 

The Yeti

Things I've been doing lately. 

Better get out the deep-fryer.

Vacation from the Internet

My computer committed suicide yesterday, and it's going to take a week to fix. Since I hate using my phone, it appears that I'll be taking a brief vacation from the Internet. 

I'm like 90% sure that the novella that I've been working on hasn't survived, so it looks like I'll be rewriting that. =\ Oh well, I still have my notes on it, and it could probably use the revision anyway. Maybe from now on I should use Blogger or Google Docs for my novella writing so that they'll be safe from kamikaze computers. 

The Liar

She was an artist.
Picasso had painting.
Poe had his writing.
Dickinson had poetry.
She had lying,
and her masterpiece
was a love story.
It was the story of us.

It went like this:
Once upon a time,
(This is how the best
lies always begin.)
there was a lovely girl
without a name, and
one day she met another
lovely girl without a name.

And together they were
lovely—no, they were more
than lovely, they were
happy. They were in
love. Everything was
absolutely magical.
And the frogs got along
with the toads. And the
witches stayed in their
fortresses. And the princes
stayed in their castles.
And the nameless girls
lived happily ever after.

The end.

Leanan Sidhe

And I've tried to put off writing about Mag because she's a cliché—a real life cliché. She's been written ten thousand times over by writers ten thousand times more talented. She is Holiday Golightly, Miss Daisy Buchanan, Beatrice Portinari, that stereotypical kind of extraordinary that permeates pages of classic literature. It's true—she is my muse, but she is also part demon. She is a spider whose bite I invited. The venom dripping from her fangs is inspiration. She pumped me full of it, and now I dance like mad for her amusement, scribbling away at sonnets in her likeness as her poison courses through me and rots my insides. I can feel her sauntering through my blood stream, her laugh echoing in my brain, her scent causing my lungs to swell. My greatest works are merely seizures brought on by her bite.

3 more weeks...

My Juli Blue moves in in less than a month. :) :) :)

The best kind touches the soul, she said.

After Mag, I stopped touching people. I stopped letting people touch me. It wasn't something that I thought about so much as it was a chronic symptom of knowing her.

I remember the first time I zipped up her dress, the first time I braided her hair, the first time she silently grabbed my face just to scrutinize my every pore. I remember our first meeting, how she snuck up behind me and placed her hand on my back, as if this was the customary way to greet strangers. I remember our feet and knees nervously touching under restaurant tables and in movie theaters. I remember her arm casually brushing against mine when we stood in line together. I remember each strand of hair, each tear, each eyelash, each bit of mascara or eyeliner, each smear of lipstick, each trace of paint or pen or frosting or foam, each miscellaneous smudge we wiped from each other's face. I remember my palms sweating when she took my hand in hers. I remember her collapsing onto the floor, sobbing at the thought of being apart, and I remember lifting her up into my lap, holding onto her and truly wishing that I never had to let go. I remember smoothing back her long, blonde hair with one hand, squeezing her cool, dry palm with the other. I remember how her skin was always just a little bit colder than mine, how on a cold day she'd pull my hands to her face or her neck or wrap them around her own to warm herself up. I remember the bruises, the bite marks, the scars—hers and mine. Mine: wine-colored, some shaped like words, some shaped like stars, precise. Hers: little gray-pink crescents, a galaxy of quarter moons in a milky white sky. I remember the first time she sunk her teeth into my shoulder, purring, "I hope you don't mind pain." I remember the first time she peeled off her jeans and t-shirt, straddled me in star-patterned underwear, told me to relax. I remember tracing her ribs with my index finger and her calling herself a "starving artist." I remember waking up in a cold sweat over reoccurring nightmares and how she'd pull me in close to her, breathing warmly into my ear. "Shhh, it's okay. You're okay. I've got you." I remember her standing in my doorway, screaming at me over things I'll never understand and how much I wanted to grab her and shake her and yell, "It's me! Don't you remember me?" I remember letting her go, letting her slam the door behind her, after she looked at me like a stranger and didn't kiss me goodbye. 

The Scar

"It's like this," Mag said, lifting up her shirt to expose a jagged, moon-shaped slash across her ribcage. 

A gasp fought it's way out of my mouth, though I tried to keep it in. "How did you get that? It looks awful."

"No, it doesn't." She sounded frustrated. This was clearly something that she had expected me to understand. "It's my scar. It's beautiful. It's me."

I found myself staring at her and felt my cheeks start burning when she suddenly grabbed my hand. With her thumb pressed against my palm and her slender fingers wrapped around mine, Mag traced the length of the scar, coaxing me into touching it. She gingerly uncurled her fingers from mine, and my hand was left pressed against her cool skin. She had goosebumps. My whole body felt hot. I became very aware of the sweat forming on my palm and wanted to jerk my hand away, but as long as I was touching her I could not seem to connect my thoughts with my actions. 

She searched my face for some sign that I understood, but all that I offered was a look of terrified confusion. 

She didn't seem upset. "Think about it, what is a scar? How does it happen?" She paused, perhaps expecting me to answer, perhaps for dramatic effect. "Pain. Something wicked, unimaginably horrible happens to you. It slices through you, opens you up, makes you vulnerable, and it hurts you, but then, naturally, you sew yourself back up. And this time you've changed. You're made of stronger stuff. You look different, you feel different, and that's how you keep going."

Mag's eyes burned through mine. She let go of her shirt, smoothing it back down and pushing my hand away.

"I am this scar," she said. "You got it?"

Adventure Time Me

So, my friend Richard drew and Adventure Time version of me, and I love it so much that I'm posting it all over the place. :)

Sir

rescue that

laissez-faire made in

America god

damn sellin' distress

and go around

robbin' the hood

to give to the upper

middle-class white

collar knights in

shining three-piece

none-the-richer suits

The moon is a banana

This is the age when nothing fits.

Smoke all the cigarettes you want

out of my heart-shaped box,

And we glittering monsters

will grab the town by our teeth,

chew it up, and spit it out

because nothing looks good

from where we sit.

When it's over and done,

we cavalier creatures toss

our heads back and laugh

a great loud HA for our loss.

This is the fishnet age

where I fucked up

and felt a prickle in my spine

that never quite went away.

Day Terrors

a breathing pack of lies, 

i've watched them

eat their young

while sleepwalking;

they spit up bones

when they think 

no one is looking

(i'm looking).

a breathing pack of lies,
i've seen them do it;
they go down grinning
and come up again
covered in crimson,
still smiling,
a chemical white half-moon
against a red night sky
(they don't see me).

a breathing pack of lies, 

i watch them 

whether my eyes 

are closed or opened;

and when I hide

under the covers 

they believe

that i want to be found

(i just want to dream).

Sweet tooth

You're clinging to me, hanging on by a tiny thread of festering flesh, and instead of yanking you out, I just keep touching you with the tips of my fingers, gingerly running my tongue over you, tasting your warm, salty rot, and letting you stay. I'm hoping that someday you'll just fall out on your own, and I won't have to feel that godawful rip—the one where my skin snaps and you take a little piece of me with you when you go. I don't want any get-it-over-with tricks, no slammed doors, no swift jerk to get you out quick and leave me with a mouthful of blood. I don't want a professional poking at me, pumping me full of godknows, and putting me under; I don't want to wake up hours later, swollen and stinging with a bill to pay. I don't want my friends trying to help, telling me to tear at you like you were a band-aid, trying to take the matters of my mouth into their hands. I don't want them icing my wound. I don't want there to be a wound. I just want to lose you as gently as possible. I just want to wake up one morning to find that you've packed up your decay and gone. I don't care if I swallow you, so long as I can't feel it. It doesn't matter how long it takes, just don't let it hurt.

Pichouette

I've never been
more sure of anything:
Her heart tastes
just like blackberry crépes
from a dilapidated diner at 3 AM
after sneaking out
through the basement window.
Her heart tastes
just like black coffee
with a menthol cigarette
bummed
from the boy one table over
who must be
at least 2 years your senior
but who is still
just a boy.
Her heart tastes
just like chocolate milk
in a cold glass
which makes you feel
just a bit too full
but which you do not regret
at the moment.