Author: HJ

August 18, 2021

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it is approximately
one month shy
of the one and a half year mark
of Kip
going into work
physically.

and i’m getting all nervous
about them going into work
physically today,
though their work is vaccine only,
and mask encouraged,
and Kip told me they’d probably keep their mask on all day long,
but i’m still all nervous

maybe it’s because i’ve been the one to actually go outside
in this Global Patrick Stewart;
i’ve gone grocery shopping
and picked up prescriptions
and had doctors’ appointments
and circus classes
and marches
and protests
and Kip has accompanied me on a couple adventures,
a protest here,
a vacation there
(a vacation where
we still only stayed inside our airbnb the whole time)
so i’ve been out on my own
and Kip has not
and they are a grown adult
and used to make this trip
into physical work
every
work
day
arriving between 8 and 9
leaving between 5 and 9 (depending on after-work activities)
and they learned the streets of manhattan
around their work
and maybe i’m just nervous
that they will once again
have a life apart from our tiny Brooklyn living box
but i also want them to have their own experiences
so we can come together at the end of the day
and share our stories
together.

i have no need for them to only have a life as i can see it,
similarly, i enjoy their encouragement of my
circus classes
and acting classes
and film projects
and artistic endeavors,
but i’m still all nervous…

(i wonder if this is how they’ve felt every time i went in
physically
to an aerial space
over this last year or so…)

~~~

i know
it’s possible
to hold in one’s heart
the gratitude
that one has personally
dodged a bullet
as well as the support
and solidarity
of those who experienced it entirely

but i can’t seem to convince my physical form
that this is, indeed, a thing that can happen.

~~~

my creativity
is still part of me
even when i’m not actively
making up worlds
and writing new words
and surpassing my own expectations.

my creativity
never leaves
just sometimes
it might need
a bit of a
nap.

August 17, 2021

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if i’m
contemplative
too much
i get
existential
and that often leads to
a
crisis
but without
contemplation
i’m left with
mundanity
which therein leads to
boredom
which in turn becomes
agitation
which stems from
anxiety
and
depression
which, while indulging in those
can become
too much
contemplation

[or at least i think those are the appropriate words for all that emotional muck i feel]

August 16, 2021

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construction
on the road
right out our window
and the dog is so scared
but so brave
and the cat couldn’t find half a fuck to give
and for me it just reminds me how lucky we are
to be able to afford a garage
inside which we stash our car
and to Kip
it just reminds them
about the last time there was construction
on the road
right out our window
and how they had to carry the dog
a block up and down
in order to get her to our car
in order to get her to the emergency vet
in order for her to act completely fine in front of the vet
and then have her come back again the following day
to be told exactly what Kip expected to be told.

but as for today
i think about tow trucks,
and reversing down roads,
and loud buzzing instead of beeping,
and jackhammers and how the dog will act at lunch when i have to take her out by myself,
and whether or not i’ll be able to/want to nap later today
and when i’ll feel fully rested again
(and how the last time i said that, i feel like i didn’t know what actual, persistent exhaustion was)
and how exhaustion in itself is probably very subjective

and at least we have this playlist
of loud horns
and louder drums
and apparently spotify calls it Nu Funk
but we usually just label it after our favorite bands of the genre
(perhaps the originators of the genre?)
Moon Hooch
and
Too Many Zooz

and i know Too Many Zooz used to perform in subway stations
in NYC
before we lived here
before there was a global pandemic
before
before before
before before before
(is the new labeling of time
going to include BC
Before Covid?
that would make sense
if we did anything to change
the capitalist hellscape
that preceded this global panini
but instead,
we just continued more of the same)

but we are in late-stage capitalism
so maybe we can actualize industrial collapse
and rebuild something kind and caring
from the ashes
of this atrocity
that is the American experiment
that i’d say worked really well for those it was intended for
(white upper/middle class, cis, straight, able-bodied men,
particularly those of monotheistic religious extremes)
and not at all
for literally everyone else.

ah, so this is what it’s like
to contemplate the morning
in Morning Pages Poetry
to follow each thread of thought
until it lets out into a new concept
a new process
a new subject matter to contemplate,
and
i suppose
this *might* be what they mean
when they say
follow the dopamine
?

August 15, 2021

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i keep getting flashbacks
to times on vacation
and driving in a car
and i wonder if that’s when i’m most living in the moment?
do i, [as a sagittarius?] need more variety in order to feel present in the present?
is that why morning poems are starting to feel stale?
is that why i can’t seem to accomplish new things in my little acting closet?
do i just need to add a new element every time?
the stool helped, definitely…
would a visual *something* help too?
would my writing poems to different music
or after food
or on the couch
or something something something else
be *good* for me?
for my constant need for adventure
[in these days, still, of a global phenomenon]

August 14, 2021

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ever get lost in a dream
so much so
that when you wake up
you’re only half aware of the world around you
and half trying to remember what in the world your subconscious did to you the night before?

no reason,
just asking…

August 13, 2021

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i wish i could find a *thing*
that helped me all the damn time

i have writing
until my mind is too scattered to make any sense of
the thoughts flickering in and out of my brain

i have embroidery and sewing
the fiber arts
until my hand is shaking so much
through an excess of energy
that it seems unintelligent
to have me anywhere near needles

painting could be my
saving grace
calming state
area of expression
but the minute i pick up a brush
i remember how bad i [think i] am at art
and the frustration comes back
ten fold

and i’m still at odds with myself.

[this would be the perfect time
to try to find
a meditation that works for me
but something about my agitation
makes remembering meditation
a near-impossible cogitation

but maybe
today
i will]

August 12, 2021

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i’d like to turn the difficult times
into beautiful poetry,
paint prose with words,
tie them up in rhythm, rhyme, and scansion.

i’d like to take the lovely times
and create gorgeous works
from them too,
burst forth with novel metaphors,
capture the moments,
the meadows,
with similes and allegories and alliteration

but instead
i feel
stuck
i feel
restless
i feel like i’m best
at
turning the mundanity
into humorous
but still mundane
poetry

and i suppose i should be okay with that

but i just kind of want

more

August 11, 2021

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a few years ago
during a holiday visit with Kip’s aunt and grandmother
i offhandedly stated (while looking at the various projects and things around the room)
that, as a person who sews, i should have probably gotten into embroidery and cross-stitching
a long long time ago,
but i’d never even tried.
and there was a flurry of limbs, fabrics, and plastic bags
and out popped a cute little cross-stitch kit,
complete with thread, tiny beads, directions, and two extra pairs of small scissors, just in case.

and that started me on a new fabric arts journey
cross-stitch gave way to small embroidery projects,
which gave way to large embroidery projects,
still within kits
(bought by my gifts-as-love-language spouse for nearly every gift-giving occasion)
and i started to memorize the stitch names
experiment a little bit with colors and paths and techniques

and then there was a global pandemic
and everyone needed to stay at home
and everyone needed to find something to do while they were staying at home
and a ton of people got into the fiber arts

and i got…
contrary.

i knew it would happen.
i could feel it in my bones.
as more and more people started falling in love with this art i’d been falling for,
i could feel myself protective of it,
i could feel myself resistant to posting about it,
for fear folks might think i just got into it for lack of something better to do.
rather than be joyous about more and more people seeing the benefit of this older art,
i just got petty

and i tried and tried and tried to tell myself not to,
and i tried and tried and tried to enjoy folks who found it as a life-saver during this global trauma,
but i just
couldn’t.

but i also knew i’d come back
i knew it wouldn’t last
(my distain for newbies,
my silly gatekeeping),
so i simply stopped my project
and began to enjoy different arts,
i poem-ed
and painted
and film-edited,
and i did not share any opinions online
because there’s enough negativity on there [here] to last several billion lifetimes,
and because i knew it would fade
and i would be left with an even stronger community,
or simply with even more people’s projects to look at
while bored online

and of course, i did
(and with an even freer sense to experiment a little
when following the directions felt stale)
and i love looking at people’s projects from the depths of the pandemic,
and i now know this fact about myself even better:
i will be contrary at first,
but i won’t try to keep that gate closed
for very long.

August 10, 2021

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with Louka
all ‘old dog’ ill
we’ve been sleeping on the couch(es) downstairs
to make sure she’s alright
through the night,
and also to be close by
to sense
if she might need
to go outside at 12, 1, 2, 3 in the morning
(which has happens more times than we’d like)
and i feel like our low-key exhaustion,
the whole not actually sleeping through the entire night,
the aches and pains from couch-sleeping,
this whole ordeal
is mimic-ing
infant child-care
not to the point where i believe it 100% is exactly the same,
but to the point where, in the past, i’ve listened to stories
of tired parents
discuss how they’re just always tired,
it’s a fact of life that they never sleep through the night,
and i’ve thought to myself, “i don’t know if i could do that…
i’ve suffered from such insomnia in the past
my sleep is sacred now,
and on the off-chance i’m actually in a bout of semi-good sleep,
to have the cause of an un-restful night be not my own brain,
i’m unsure if i could stop myself from being resentful,
and i know i’m my best when i get 7-8 hours of sleep,
or a night or two of less than four,
but these parents are talking about a near year of 3-5 hour nights
and i just don’t think
i can.”
but this experience,
this mimic-ing,
it’s taught me
that when one is the caretaker
of a being they love without conditions
lack of sleep isn’t really that big of a deal,
and (similar to how i survived high school)
there’s a certain point where exhaustion
just becomes your daily natural state
and you just
kind of
deal.

August 9, 2021

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every time i type the word August
i read it in my head as august
like the adjective
like distinguished and respected,
impressive and esteemed;
contemplating the connection
between the month and the prestigiousity
[and i know full well
that the month comes from the person,
the Augustus of it all,
but, i mean, another few synonyms
for the adjective
are distinguished, high ranking, exalted, noble,
imperial,
and i think, though they may [or may not] have been connected
linguistically
in the past,
they just might be connected again
now…]