woke up
in a mood
in a mood-y mcmood-mood
such a mood.
will blue raspberry waffles help disentangle me
from this darn
mood ™
?
~
waffles helped
as did a nap
and coffee
but mostly
doing
rather than sitting
and writing
(unlike most days)
how about that?
stress and
apprehension and
a desire to make these poems
go somewhere.
i’m constantly plagued
haunted by
itching with the possibility
of a full story
expanding
under a reader’s nose
(what was that one book?
Green Angel?
something like that?
where it was poetry
that unfolded
into a complete story?)
and i want these Morning Poems
to tell my story,
but how can they
when my story isn’t done yet?
i may be right at the beginning
i might be hella in the middle
but one thing’s for certain:
life is messy
and stories are good or bad in how they’re told,
not the stories themselves,
especially when they’re true
honest
nonfiction.
it’s the fiction that gets the nice, neat bow at the end;
life blurs around the edges
try hard as you might
to color inside the lines
so embrace the chaos
cacophony
quandary
(and, of course, let your imagination ride out
the potential
of telling a portion of this story
your story
in this form you’ve happened upon…
maybe there is a way to tie up
the loose ends
of a fraction
of your tale.
in fiction,
of course)
mantras and manifestations are weird:
to fully believe them
isn’t necessarily to
fully believe them;
it’s to throw them out into the universe
and trust
trust
trust
that they will come back
(and to trust
trust
trust
that you’ll be there,
fully,
to catch what returns)
how am i supposed to write the most beautiful
heart-wrenching
new-fangled
captivating
epic
poetry
if i can’t even bring my eyes
to focus in enough
to read my own words
for longer than ten lines?
twenty years
it feels like less than ten
i’m still a mid-western teen at heart
trying to figure out how to live life
after witnessing that kind of trauma on live television
in my own school,
barely a month after cancer took my mom
man, that year was fucked.
~~~
the response
to 9/11
was nearly as traumatic
as the tragedy itself
instead of finding solace
and comfort
within community
we (the usa) blew it out of proportion.
we became the poster child for
acting out
(starting wars)
tantrum-throwing
(testosterone-fueled über patriotism)
and general bad blood in the world-relations stage
and the problem with the way our patriotism showed itself
(by literally shoving our ideals down other cultures’ throats)
is that it made youth like myself
not feel safe in our own country,
not feel like our representatives to the world community
truly
represented our best interests
(and yes,
with many fundamentalist factions of many other countries,
that is the same,
whether it’s oppressing lgbtq voices
or women’s voices
or a religion other than the majority…)
i simply feel a sense of
terrible
irony
that the usa invaded multiple countries
(but not the country that was actually responsible for the attack)
as a way to “loosen the oppression” on those oppressed,
but back home
the oppression
of queer,
of female-bodied,
of Black and brown and everyone of color
was growing
day
by day
by day by day by day
and the hypocrisy
of all that
feels so egregious
(but, i suppose, it always does, doesn’t it?)
(only those with the power to oppress others
will feel like theirs is the only power
to un-oppress
everyone)
~~~
it is important
to remember and honor
those who died,
but in doing so
we must also remember and honor
those who died in the endless wars
(american/soldier/and otherwise)
and those who died due to any sort of oppressive regime,
including, but certainly not limited to:
slavery,
ISIS,
AIDS,
Taliban,
Holocaust,
war on drugs,
general hate/white supremacy…
so now you see what it’s like in my brain
all the time
trying to honor and speak out against
all unnecessary deaths
and hurts
and oppression
and not entirely knowing how…
[i suppose that’s why i write poetry]
the potential
to see
so many people
that i love
a visit
and to perform
(but i don’t want to get my hopes too far up
because anything could happen
between then
and now)
so much
to do
so much
to pack
so much
to accomplish
morning
nighttime
it’s the daylight
that holds the time
for dizzyingly good naps.
insomnia
falling asleep
panic
insomnia
staying asleep
i got this.
is nighttime liminal space?
so to wake up in it, is fine,
eerie, but fine.
but to see it change over
from normal to liminal
is to see the working gears of the universe
so one must be driven at least a little bit mad if they see it…?
find things to write
in the mundane
it’s in the big ideas
that get you overwhelmed,
you question word-choice
you panic about phrasing
your anxiety gets entirely in your way
to convey
the fullness of the subject matter
with delicate balance
between
accuracy
and
kind capacity
no matter the big subject
but you thrive in the little things
a whole sonnet about a cup of coffee
an ode to names and nicknames
silly little poems
ones that your spouse enjoys the most
ones that get the most “likes”
but i know you
(i mean, technically, i am you,
that is the whole point of this silly little poem,
i’m talking to myself
simply using the tactic of calling me ‘you’
so maybe, when i re-read it, it’ll feel like someone else is talking to me)
but, i know you,
i know that you contemplate the big subjects
you’re drawn to them
you can’t help but think of them
in fits and starts poetically
but also
the more i learn about mortality
the more i realize
there will never be a “perfect opportunity”
a day when all the stars align
and you’ll be able to churn out that “big poem”
in all the right words
and all the right phrasings,
but also,
there is something to say for practice
and following the dopamine
and writing what feels right in that moment,
so maybe that’s why
instead of writing about a big thing
or writing of the mundane
again today,
i’ve thought to write a letter
in poem form
to let you know
it’s ok
to write
what you’re feeling
in the moment…
(isn’t that the goal,
the whole ‘in the moment’ living?
right?)
when
will we close on the house?
when
will i feel like i’ve started my acting career?
when
will i feel like i’m actually doing morning pages right?
when
will the inevitability of time stop crushing me
and instead harbor in a newfound sense
of comfort with my own mortality?
kipventures 