I'm so goddamn sick of being black and blue I'm through it's time to lay down a new coat of paint something the rain won't penetrate I'm no bedroom wall my skin is being berated by hurricanes I am a lighthouse with a fear for waves I am the survivor and I am the storm pick up your feet don't wander you've got to run if you're looking for anything but comfort let's move on let's take another road maybe the one with pot holes so you don't fall asleep maybe the one with gravel so you're numb once we get through let's go let's get there let's leave here I can't breathe beneath the sheets it's suffocating please keep reading have you ever had that feeling like maybe you're making a mistake but you keep right on reeling with someday and too soon and take two

I never wanted to fall apart all I ever wanted to be was art all we ever needed was a brand new start and how can I be proud of these walls when it's coated in chipped paint and water stains from when heartbreak leaked in through the roof it's just proof I'm no longer pure how could you tell me to just keep going when there's no where to get to how could you

here we go and there we went and do you wanna go again we used to be breathless we used to know butterflies but they've flown and we've grown and what's the use of crying over cartons of spilled secrets when everyone could see through me anyways I want to remember what it is to be new what it is to meet you what it is to be blue like the sky like your eyes like everything you never knew

and I might be a mystery but my heart has always been on my sleeve all you've got to do is dig through a few layers of cellophane to touch the rotting remains of feelings I now fake my life is in refrain my mind is down the drain

I buried my blades I flushed the pain that doesn't mean I don't remember how it was to rain saltwater what it means to bleed rivers how it feels to swallow smog and sewage what it is to slip on your own spewage

look away saving face saving grace

I just need a new layer of paint

pale blue like you were under the moon pale blue like I was under you pale blue like we were in the morning dew new fly flew

just let me cover up my bruises

don't give me grief as I touch up my smudges because I never asked to be imperfect all I ever wanted was blending and if you have the beauty to judge me then good for you how about a hand

how about a leg

let's remember we were only ever here to surrender and as I recall you arrived prepared to fail but somewhere you lost your brush lost your touch

grab a roller and let's get going

these walls won't paint themselves

in the early days

of my fourteenth year

it occurred to me

that i had never broken a bone

that i was writing just to fill the page

that i was living just to pass the time

boys were boys

in cotton shorts

and girls were goddesses

i never dared to think about

death was a mile away

even when i played with fire-

sticking my hands in flames just to see

how long i could last

before i burned-

sometimes it disappointed me

but sometimes i was relieved

born and bred

a cradle catholic,

i had always

believed in god-

not enough to want to pray,

but just enough not to

cause a scene

every wednesday

i would go to church

and every wednesday

i would feel nothing at all

as a child

sitting in sunday school,

i learned

it is hard to turn nothing

into something

yet i was told

he built the world

with his own two hands,

crafting the moon and sun

and all the stars

out of his nailbeds

i was told

it took six days

to create the earth,

and the seventh day

was left for us to believe it

but it's hard to believe in god

when you don't even believe in yourself

and it's hard to love a god

that might not love you

for who you are

as i grew

i tried praying

with my clammy hands pressed together

and my sweaty knees on the floor

but i did not get a miracle

nor a saving grace

faith did not clog my pores

my veins did not flood with his mercy

so i assumed

a wreck like me could not be saved

in the early february

of my seventeenth year,

i was patted down

and searched

and stripped of my belongings-

my dignity

my pride

even my goddamn sweatshirt-

as i was entered into the inpatient ward

in the hospital,

the girl hooked on meth and heroin

told me

that life was bullshit-

"there ain't no god,"

she said

through the sores around

her mouth-

i began to believe her

so i stood beside her

and stood for nothing

secretly i spent days concocting "what ifs"

hoping to find the right hypothesis

but i could always disprove them

with this proof-

i had not gotten my miracle-

therefore,

god had not gotten his green card

as spring bloomed into summer

i gave my faith to girls

with red lipstick

and auburn hair

and i experienced heaven

when i kissed them-

it felt so good to sin

and i did not want to be redeemed

it became harder to hide

than be myself

so i crawled out of the rose bushes

and declared my being

while denying god's-

and not a single soul told me to go

in late june

of my seventeenth year,

it occurred to me

that i'd broken my mind

but it was healing

that i was writing

because i was breathing

that i was passing time

because i wanted to

I feel each equinox

and solstice

like a crowbar

to the head.

I always have.

Sometimes,

the degree to which

the seasons affect me

is a surprise.

I never remember.

Each time my

reactions are new.

Each season,

my brain receives

new orders

from Hell.

I get to be someone new

every four months.

Santa Clause

comes to town

and sucks all the

dopamine

out of my skull.

The Tooth Fairy

arrives

and rips me off.

I become the

Great Pumpkin.

I never show up.

Last Fall I didn't sleep

for eight weeks.

I walked around all day

with a ball of energy

in my torso.

I fed off of the

sleeplessness

like it was a

soft, ripe peach.

It was weird to

get used to

living in a state of

constant anxiety.

I took pride in the fact

that I could put it to good use.

I started writing again

after several years of

nothing.

It was like the leaves fell down

onto my shoulders

and changed who I was.

I was tugged apart

by the motion of the earth

and my brain chemistry.

We are,

after all,

captive riders on a

chunk of

Oxygen.

Iron.

Silicon.

Magnesium.

I became the oranges

and golds.

The leaves and

the hot

spinning core

of the Earth.

A few Winters ago

I was bogged down into

a deep darkness

I couldn't shake.

My brain does this thing

where the world

looks like fog.

My body temperature

dropped.

I couldn't see clearly.

My emotions were dull.

Apathy and a

mild,

blunt,

droning

headache.

The Spring that followed

was a wildfire.

I woke from my hibernation

to find myself burning.

Imagine sitting dead still

with nothing but your heart

running at full speed.

The sun draws me out of myself.

I become wide eyed

and the place

where my thoughts come from

insists on screaming.

My brain questions

all of my actions

and replays each

move I make

on a constant feed.

A grease fire,

and I just kept on

throwing water.

Incessant motion

was the only way to

drown out the din.

Keep

fucking

rolling.

Talk a lot.

Tonight is the

longest day of the year.

My heart is full of

more energy

than the sun.

My head is a swirl

of color and worry.

Teal.

Grey.

Bile yellow.

Tomato.

There is clarity,

but no focus.

There is no peace

for me

to hold.

This Summer will

not be a wildfire,

but a lantern

throwing off sparks

under the dark humid grey

of an incoming July storm.

The kind that turns the sky

funny colors

and knocks down

enough trees

to be a pain in the ass.

The kind that

shorts out electronics

when the lightening

hits your house.

We'll see if it can

blow me into the street,

or make me

overflow my banks.

Shutter your windows.

Lock up

your daughters.

Buy a canoe.

Let the horses

out of the barn.

Insure your shit.

My gut says I am

capable

of inflicting damage.

Thursday morning revved up like any morning. Blue, brown, green, yellow. The color through the window, the color on his plate. Eggs and grass. Coffee and sky. He hardly noticed. Even so, he smirked at his own cleverness. Shoulda been an artist. Throwing the dishes in the sink, he grabbed his keys and shut the door. One more day. Then, the mountain. One more epic climb before the surgery.

He throttled the Alfa Romeo through the corner, then let it cruise as he negotiated traffic with both eyes in the mirror. Distracted, something was different about his reflection. He should know. He spent a lot of time in it. Before he could decide what it was, he saw a truck pull up so fast behind him that he braced himself for the mash to his backside.

But it didn’t. No way the truck stopped in time, but he felt no impact. No mash. Only nauseous. And faint. Out of obsessive habit he looked in the mirror, and saw his skin gone sickly green, his eyes backwards. Left was right, right was left. Grabbing his face with both hands, he rubbed his eyes and forehead as if to undo this grotesque dream. The skin on his hands felt sticky, slick. Tree geckos flooded his mind. Wake up. Wake up.

Something was off. Everything was off. The lightheadedness got worse, his tongue felt inside out. He clutched the steering wheel as an anchor but the intensity of sensation of the leather on his fingers caused him to recoil. As if touching fire. He tried to scream. Mottled puffs of air bubbled up through his contracted trachea. Some alien warble squeaked out. Brxhruhhhhh…

He opened his eyes as wide as they could go, sight fading. Everything converting to grey, as if he were in a wet Caravaggio being squeegeed into abstract, all colors mashed together. Within a few minutes, no vision at all. Useless orbs.

On the other side of the world, geologists recorded unconventional seismic activity. Weather centers, geostationary satellites, and space stations flooded with frantic demands. All sensors worldwide registered impossible data. Before anyone could analyze or speculate or respond, all people lost their sight. Something was off. Everything was off.

No one knew. Far off the coast of Finland, a small lighthouse made of crimson bricks shifted. One of the bricks sunk into the Baltic Sea. The cause: Sudden radioactive decay of one atom at its core. This brick was not like the others. This brick was not a brick. It was a slag of squarish residue from Lake Lappajärvi where a meteor mashed the backside of the earth 76 million years before. That time, whoever was driving felt the impact.

This artifact held the slenderest magnetic pulse that kept the earth tilted on its axis at the exact sequence of degree and warp required for human sight. Once it was gone, even though all the rest of the recipes and ingredients of the complex matrix that keeps life intact was unmoved, vision ended. Orientation to reality was unseated. Other senses respond. The plastic brain renegotiates. A new story begins.

What was left of universal blindness was questions. Had we seen all that could be seen? Had we looked at all the hues, shapes, distances, lights and darknesses? Had we noticed the tear on the hair of the pulsing sun? Had we perceived the shaking and shadow of a stranger’s gaze? Had we captured all the fragments of rags of moments forever?

This tiny atom danced in its perfect rhythm all those years, eons, epochs. Now, it was tired. It no longer danced the dance. All the glories and injustices visions witnessed were now dusts of memory. Something. Everything. What if we had known?

She picked up one of the empty bullet cases from the floor, delivered by an M16 assault rifle, and discreetly slipped it in her bag. This was a significant piece of her story, a memory she wanted to keep, despite its tragedy. A memory that would crash into the consciousness of others, in years to come.

-----------------

"Was that at Mum's 40th?!" I asked my Auntie Elle pointing to an old photograph on her mantelpiece. I was briefly visiting my old town to see Nan who had been taken into hospital, and Auntie Elle always provided welcoming accommodation and a home-cooked dinner.

"Yes, that was at Sefton Road, 26 years ago!” she replied.

I sat cross legged on her carpeted floor in front of the electric fire. She'd lived alone for the last 34 years and cherished the company of close family.

"And what's that?!" I asked pointing to a small golden cylinder sat on top of a rock.

"Oh it's from Palestine, dear."

"Is it a bullet?!"

"Well, it's the shell, you know, the casing of a bullet."

My Auntie Elle, a 78 year old woman, an unassuming, kind and gentle soul, then told me her story. I sat and listened. In silence. In shock. In astonishment and in horror. A whole new existence of my Auntie Elle emerged, her energy glowed and her words radiated my core whilst shifting my entire concept of reality all the way back to the day I was born. By the end of her story, I’d evolved, a hundred thousand years. My heart raged, my spirit was ablaze and the indescribable admiration I had for this woman, soared with disorientation.

How had I not known all of this before?

It’s as though every atom that had been me, every electron, nucleus and subatomic particle, had scrambled and dispersed into infinite space; and then, regathered, but with a distinctly noticeable change in formation.

The way I’d see, feel and think would never be the same again.

---------------

She walked through the checkpoint, and through the metal fence saw a bulldozer savagely tearing down an orange farm. She saw a Palestinian lady screaming, begging and crying with despair. The orange farm was her livelihood, her only source of income. Auntie Elle walked towards the fence and held out her hand, and the Palestinian lady responded by reaching back out towards her, their hands connecting. Through unspoken communication Auntie Elle told her she

wasn’t alone, through her eyes she reassured her there were good people around who knew, who saw, and through her touch she promised there was love.

The noise of the firing rifle tore apart the hope. The anger-filled shouts demanded immediate severance, and the momentary relief of understanding and solidarity, was gone.

After a dangerous exchange of unchecked impulsive retort, Auntie Elle was ushered by her friend to silently move on... but not before picking up one of the empty bullet cases from the floor and discreetly slipping it into her bag.

--------------------

When I first heard that dark bass line, I saw the eyes of other people's children staring out into the blackness. When the haunting words began, my skin shivered as I watched my own child crawl into that life. When the tone, laden with warning, penetrated my soul with a terror unknown; and the crash of guitar blasted missiles, rockets and grenades into the desperately helpless hell of despair... well then I knew, that our evolution would have to far surpass any physical progression.

In a time and place that normalises war, slaughter and torture, where children in certain parts of the world are left to die because their country doesn’t contribute any significance to the power and profit of the world’s elite, where the media lies and innocent cries are cast aside... it slowly dawns that this, is not human nature. This is the want of the privileged few, not the compassion of the loving many.

Developed way beyond archaic hatred, Auntie Elle dedicates her life to the cause of peace and justice, despite being shot at, threatened and intimidated, still she continues, unwavering, at 78, to spread love, support and peace.

The origin of consciousness, of universal existence... commencing an evolutionary progression exceeding this primitive bodily existence, heading towards the beginning of time, forwards to the start, where energy is united and we... are all one.

“Mama, look!” She squealed with excitement as she finished filling the hole around the small tree with soil.

Her mother smiled and bent down beside her, patting the soil down smoothly. Her three-year-old daughter giggled excitedly over the small life now growing in their front yard.

“It’s so small, Mama!” she giggled, “It looks like a stick!”

Her mother smiled, “Yes, it does look like a stick right now, but it’s going to grow into a big tree over the years. One day it’ll be as big as all the other trees.”

“Should I name it, Mama?”

Her mother laughed, “If you want to.”

“Okay! I think I’ll name it… Briar!”

Her mother laughed and shook her head, “That’s an… interesting name for a tree.”

“I think it’s fitting.” She looked at the tree and smiled.

Years later, when she was far past being the three-year-old she was when she planted he tree, she went out into the front yard while it snowed, thinking about her years as a mere child when she planted the tree and her progression into the teenage years she’s going through. The tree had grown over the past thirteen years—it was taller than her and its trunk was thicker than her arm.

She touched the trunk with her gloved hand, running her fingers down the trunk. Snow scarcely got in her hair, for the leaves over her head shielded her from the flakes that fell at a steady pace.

She softly whispered to Briar, telling it stories of happy and unhappy times from the past months. Briar had over the years become a sort of place of peace for her—a place where she could unveil her soul and be completely herself. She confided in her tree as if it were a close friend—because Briar was her friend. She could tell anything to Briar—things that other people wouldn’t understand.

She felt safe when it was just her and her tree.

Decades later after her mother passed away due to illness, she visited her father and went out to her tree. She was married now and had two lovely children to take care of.

It was the middle of spring now and she gently touched her tree. Briar had grown significantly since she first planted it. It had grown from being the size of a stick to a full grown tree—the trunk larger around than her hips.

Her mother was right: it did grow to be as big as all the other trees.

She smiled at the memory of her mother.

“I miss her, Briar.” she whispered to the tree as she stood before it, tears welling up in her eyes as memories of her mother flashed in and out of her mind.

Years and years later she fell ill… and so did her tree.

She struggled to get to her feet and go out to see her tree.

She held herself up by leaning with one hand against the tree. She looked up at its drooping branches and fading leaves. She let tears slowly stream down her cheeks as she recalled every moment she spent with her tree. She recalled every story she told her tree and every secret that lay enclosed deep within the layers of bark.

But the moment that stuck out most in her mind was the moment that she planted Briar.

“Look, Mom,” she spoke softly around the tears, “Briar… Briar is dying… and so am I…” She looked down as the tears began to flow out heavier and harder. “I miss you, Mom… and soon I’ll see you again. Soon Briar and I will be back with you—all three of us together again.”

From but only a thought and a single-cell

I burst through: welcomed but expelled

I came from blank thoughts and repetitive motions

To engaging in conversation developing ideas and notions

I rolled on rugs from end to end with no pace or strategy

To capturing accolades in my athletic pursuits, as if casually

I once found the notion of my demise one frightening

Now every day I'm alive, seems like it might be far more enlightening

I've come across a share of others I thought I loved and befriended

I've seen some grow, some make family, and some have time ended

Mine eyes started with great clarity : Crisp, clean, and constant

Evolved or devolved with astigmatism If I must be honest

In that regard I once believed I could be punished for telling lies

Now I know that you can earn your weight in gold for it, in employer's eyes

I once believed in the American dream : Be all you can be, live, do, and be free

Now I'm aware that even with your greatest strengths- Corporate chains are some of the most restraining

I once was blessed with a child's sense of happiness and go go go

I grew into a sense of disappointment answering many wrongs with "no, no, no"

My spirituality began boxed and confined to pews of churches brick and pine

Now I know that those thoughts are shared between the creator and simply I

I once thought you started at the beginning and that there was a definitive finish

It's more and more evident, that this is less true as things are less systemic

I watched a world grow from one norm to the next, claiming one time was best

I laughed, I cried, I forgot, I remembered, I digress

The Earth filled with more and more bodies no longer running

The heaven's and hell's agents always getting more cunning

I saw ignorance grow into a new found passion in knowledge

I watched knowledge turn one to sloth passion left looking rotten

The words from me may sound sad, truth is they aren't oversold

You'll get what you see and not simply what you're told

I once slept normally and awoke naturally

now I am restless and awake with device's aid erratically

I once started as a babe writing the letter's shapes on a paper

Hoping that somehow I made words that were valid , no danger

Looks like I tread a thin-line stringing ideas and thoughts together in type

Hoping that it makes sense, that there's more substance than just self-hype

I grew from a school of thought that I could be great in any way I wanted to be

I never grew out of that, I applied the idea that I must always be improving

From the moment I show up to the moment I roll out

Working on my weaknesses, driving away others' doubt

I was but babe

now I'm a mind:

I now see all

where once was blind

It's weird

Change

Part of me really grieves over change

I've lamented talking about it because it something I had to do a lot of this year...

The beginning of 8th grade

I've made it but only partly

The other half is waiting for me at the end

But it's a difficult half

And it's making fun of me right now

But we do that, so I guess that's alright

I quickly step through the first months, I am already taken by how easy I have had it

But then again I stitched up my heart at the end of summer, so I keep my emotions fairly hidden, unless I feel the need to talk about them which never happens

It's hard being on the outside, I have realized that in many ways I have changed my approach to talking to people after feedback

I never changed the way I dressed but this year was the first year I was okay showing my arms in public

I used to never think of wearing short sleeve shirts

Now I do

I swim through the muddy water of the next months

Knowing it was a good thing not to let my gut drop at certain social stuff like I did last year, because I wouldn't have my gut anymore

I stayed quiet when I felt it necessary, I let people swim over me

And that's why I was last to get to shore

The last months I crawled through

Knowing my stitches had become worn, and I didn't want them to tear

So I came up with lists of all the changes I had made over the past months, thinking that it had been a successful year

And then one of my stitches ripped

Realizing that I could still make it to the finish line I tried

But the weight started to pull me in

But I wouldn't just stop at nothing anymore

Like I used to

And still do, but not today

I would cry and scream

And try every way to dig myself out of the hole I had created

With my stitches lose my tears started to fill the bottom of the hole

And slowly they started to lift me up to the top of the hole

So I didn't need my stitches

I started to carefully walk to the end

I was soaked but I was drying

Slowly but surely I knew I would get there

If my emotions can help me so can I

Through painful hardships and constant fear of messing up and being alone, I some how saved myself from falling through

The cracks I had made myself, without even knowing it

So I guess I changed, wasn't that my goal?

Or was it other people's

Am I not fit to stand my ground in front of them?

Most of me is myself

But sometimes I wonder if I wouldn't really have done what I did

In any scenario

Sometimes I wonder if the change that I really wanted

Wasn't coming from me

Parents have lots of endearing nicknames for their kids: Budgie, Smoojie, Jellybean… For occasions when their children are being needy, I’ve heard parents call them Velcro, The Warden, The Cling-On… and during those especially trying times: The Barnacle or The Hemorrhoid (always said with love, of course). In our house, you would be known as Whiny Clingman or Grumpus Minutus.

As a tyke, whenever my Sonny Boy was feeling codependent, he’d stand in front of me with his arms raised, saying, “I hold you, Mommy?” This meant, “Pick me up.” I know what you’re thinking: how cute! Yes. It was cute…for the first seven thousand times. After that, as I’d try to cook the food, launder the laundry, or tend to our younger child, it would become a tad less darling.

If I couldn’t pick him up right away, he would swiftly transform from Whiny Clingman to Grumpus Minutus – turning me into Grumpus Minimus or Grumpus Maximus, depending on my hormone levels.

Sonny Boy would often wait for the most inopportune time to require cuddling – usually when I’d have his little sister, Peaches, on the changing table. I would have to bend down, raise my ointment-covered hands like a surgeon, press my head against Peaches to keep her from rolling off the table and hug Sonny Boy with my knees and elbows. Try it sometime. It’s a herniated disk waiting to happen. He would come from out of nowhere, like a toddler ninja, and insist on human contact. So stealth. One time, I didn’t even know he was standing right behind me until he squeaked, “I hold you, Mommy!” Nearly jumping out of my skin, I jerked, flinging diaper rash goop onto the ceiling and alarming the daylights out of poor Peaches. The result? Two disgruntled customers.

Now before you judge my Sonny Boy as demanding, let me tell you, he was the ideal child. A delight! Cheerful and sweet 99% of the time! He loved to sit quietly and look through his books or play with his toys for hours on end. That’s why I’d feel especially guilty if I couldn’t hold him at the precise instant he needed some extra attention.

Whenever I could, I’d scoop him into my arms, and squeeze him with just the right amount of squish. I’d nuzzle his sweet ample cheeks, and whisper, “Sometimes you love too much, my little man.” And then we would laugh and he’d kiss me. It was our little joke.

This all happened nearly two decades ago which, in parent years, was yesterday. It’s an age-old cliché, but truer than true: time passes faster than you ever thought possible. While you're filling our camp forms and sharing pick-up and drop-off with the other parents, the kids are evolving behind your back. They develop sweat glands. They grow hair on their legs. They changed into people who tolerate you as long as you don't speak in front of their sweaty, hairy friends.

These days, Sonny Boy is nearly a foot taller than I, so I’m grateful he hasn’t asked me to pick him up recently. But he hasn’t asked for hugs either. If only.

Very soon, we will drop Sonny Boy off at college for the first time. We live in New York. His college is deep within Pennsylvania, so it’s practically Kentucky. Being a six-hour car ride away, it may as well be in another galaxy.

I have already warned him that I might be embarrassing on move-in day. I’m pretty sure there will be tears. I already wept at orientation, and I wasn’t alone. It happened when the bursar spoke to all of us parents about college loans and financing. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

But move-in day is sure to be worse. I will hide behind my huge Jackie O sunglasses. I’ll probably tear up on the ride there, but as soon as our wheels hit the campus, I will begin the “ugly cry.” I will try to be brave while meeting his RA and put on a jolly façade as I’m being introduced to his roommate. By then, however, my nose will be red, my eyes will be puffy and I will be fooling no one.

When it’s time to say good-bye, he will walk us to our car. He will hug me and, if I’m lucky, he’ll kiss my cheek. Hubby and I will drive away, leaving him behind. In that twinkling of an eye, I will have to let him go, for real. And this will cause me considerable pain because, my name is Whiny Clingman, and sometimes I love too much.