so far, not feeling anything
[re: the ill effects of the vaccination,
except for a small soreness in my upper left shoulder meat]
so the things i vowed to do yesterday
in order to prevent them from adding to my plate today
i can actually get done today.
and yet, adding to the pile of things
that i want to do
but have yet to get done,
still
this is a pretty nice feeling:
the concept of being awake
and ready to take on a day
and do the things that need to be done
instead of avoiding them
or fearing them.
[and i know this may not last.
there are many traps i could still fall in to
and so many things on my plate,
things that i *should* do today…
but still
as of right now
everything feels
kind of…
aligned.]
April 8, 2021
Round One
Fauci Ouchie
i wake up coughing, not because i’m sick, but because the air in this house is dry af.
so on the humidifier goes, away it sends my cough, i’m back on track, to get my
Fauci Ouchie
Round One.
i have chores to do today,
as well as assignments from
job
and
class
and any other day i’d divide them up over the whole day,
maybe nap a bit before getting started,
but today
i know there is a
(small but substantial)
possibility that i may be
down for the count
because of my
Fauci Ouchie
Round One
(based entirely on averages
i am likely to not react
at all,
but based on familial anecdotes
that prospect rises
significantly.
i only have one close relative to draw from,
and he reacted very poorly,
so i’m taking that into account;
i see myself as having
basically
a fifty/fifty chance
of having no reaction vs. an incredibly poor one
and i’m trying to plan my day accordingly
around the possible aftereffects
of my
Fauci Ouchie
Round One.)
so there are chores,
things with substantial physical effort
and i’m planning those for the morning
and then
post
Fauci Ouchie
Round One
i have the simpler
less tasking
tasks:
the monologue recording,
the voiceover acting,
the ones that i can do sitting down
in my silly little closet-studio.
but also
i’ve taken the time to
plan for a bit of those pre-
Fauci Ouchie
Round One
just in case i’m so dead to the world
that i just need to sleep.
(hilariously enough
this is why i’m planning on not napping pre-
Fauci Ouchie
Round One
because i would feel silly if i took two naps in one day)
so let’s juts keep the adrenaline up,
the excitement
the prospect
of my getting my
Round One
Fauci Ouchie
out of the way
and go out into the world
(when i can)
and make it be
like
any other
time.
April 4, 2021
my first words i set down
are always the most raw
the most me
the subsequent editing
and overthinking
and deleting
and more
and explaining
and rewriting ten times
that’s where it becomes no longer me
and instead
turns into
a parody of myself
a caricature of the person i think i am
(or at least think i could be)
all the potential falls at my feet
and any genuineness is forgotten
deleted
whisked away by
the persona of hj
when all i’d really like that persona to be
is the real hj
(but the overthinking and editing comes at that cost
and if i know i’m making mistakes
sharing too much or not enough
within the first draft
how do i make the edits more like me
instad of less)
(or is any written thought
always
going to be farther away from me?)
February 5, 2021
running out to the sidewalk
big chunks of snow falling
pockmarking the small white hills,
the yellow of a taxi cab
shining
in the not-quite-twilight of
5:45 pm
on a february friday,
the haze of pink-ish-purple
lighting the sky
in that way that
only an NYC dusk truly can,
my eyes adjusting to clearer vision,
happy
(for once)
to exist.
December 4, 2020
people say that scent
is the strongest sense-memory
but…
…damn
that first chord plays in my ears
from the first song on the Spring Awakening soundtrack
and i’m suddenly 17
trying to find a burger king nearby
(without a smartphone)
so my friends and i can gobble up
fast food veggie burgers
before/while driving
to what we nick-named
“nuclear reactor beach”
or
the first three blasts on the trumpet
on the Star Trek Voyager theme song
and i can feel the early autumn 4 o’clock sun on my face
from our west-facing windows
nestling in for some post-school entertainment
at ages 5, 6, 7, 8…
or
the entire album of Todd Rundgren’s
A Wizard, a True Star
makes me want to clean the whole house
on a Saturday morning
or
any Death Cab for Cutie
song
and i’m driving
late night
to and from Oberlin
keeping up a high school romance
vaguely long distance
independent
thinly masked sadness
and yet infinite possibilities
November 17, 2020
i had a dream last night
that i was at a theme park
all roller coasters and arcade games
and fried food and good friends
and yet, in the air, there was the stench of stress
of disease
and i realized
that i shouldn’t be there.
i was there with a friend
i haven’t seen in ages
and we were enjoying our time
(it seemed the park had just opened up
and we were some of the first to ride its rides
again
after shut-down)
but the shut-down wasn’t done yet,
they just decided to open
they said they had precautions in place
but all i saw was slightly less people
and no way of stemming that flow
once the gates were truly open
(indeed, it wasn’t really much less than on a rainy summer day.)
and though my friend and i enjoyed our time
and i said hi to her family
and we replayed our crazy youth
(of rehearsals and post-show chi-chi’s gatherings
getting ‘drunk’ on sprite
and ‘high’ on pixy stix)
there was still a reminder
in the back of my head
“we are in a pandemic
we should still be in lock-down
what are you doing?
what are you doing?
what are you doing???”
but i couldn’t seem to leave.
maybe it was the social obligation;
i had arrived here with my friend
(i think we’d driven together)
i couldn’t just abandon her.
or maybe it was a selfish decision;
i hadn’t had this much fun
in over 8 months,
i hadn’t even been to a theme park
in years
i’d get cravings
(though i’ve never craved the crowds)
and there was still one more ride i wanted to ride
one more game i wanted to try
one more food i wanted to partake in
(plust the park wasn’t closing for hours and hours)
so my insides struggled
with the guilt of knowing i shouldn’t be there
and the knowledge that i could just leave
but the compulsivity to stay.
would i have not entered the park, had my dream started earlier?
given me an out of not feeling like i’d ‘already gotten this far’?
or would i have convinced myself there was some reason
saying ‘we’d already driven this far’
or ‘well they invited me’
or ‘i mean, the pandemic is lessening, right?’
but it’s not, it’s getting worse and worse, but half of the united states decided they were
‘bored of the pandemic’
‘bored of the lockdown’
‘bored of taking precautions for themselves and[especially] for others’
and i want to be bored of it all
but frankly, i enjoy the solitude
however
i miss my friends and my family
i miss having a place to go to every day
i miss exploring
i miss feeling like i could spend hours in one public place
i miss classes and hugs and working towards feeling strong
i miss feeling like i could one day make this city my own.
but mostly, i miss the souls i never met.
what if that first statistic was meant to be my new best friend
what if that person who had an ongoing condition
won’t be able to dance again
because their breath was taken away
by a disease traveling the globe
and they won’t go back to a class ever again
because they feel too embarrassed by their loss.
what if there was a chance encounter
a silly thing
mixed-up drinks at a coffee shop
or a jovial ‘yes and’ at a subway platform
just the little things that you hold in your heart
and maybe tell your spouse at the end of the day
that make the city feel like the most welcoming place
in the world
and now we can’t
because people think that roller coasters
and their own enjoyment
are more important
than other people’s
lives.
please stay inside.
November 7, 2020
7pm
every weekday
New Yorkers
cheer
through open windows
banging pots and pans
screaming our thanks
outwards
upwards
towards the front line workers
[trying to] control this pandemic
helping people
keeping folks
alive
[it felt like our only way to actively
give thanks
and feel relatively
in control]
November 7, 2020
11:27am
cheers echo in our neighborhood
as my spouse refreshes their page
“yep, the New York Times just called it”
and here we are again
regaining some control
screaming our relief
through open windows
outwards
upwards
towards whatever higher deities
[or Pennsylvanians]
we believe in
giving thanks for knowing
we should have a leader
who can be held accountable.
[now let’s hold him
accountable.]
November 2, 2020
at four,
at five, at seven, at eleven,
i could always see myself
a few years into the future.
i don’t remember how many years, exactly,
nor do i remember if i was ever exactly right,
but i could always feel
my future
was solid
and that gave me
solace.
at 16, the images started to fade
my future seemed to stop after 18
everything felt unknown;
i had no visual to work toward,
no solid internal knowledge
that i’d even be present.
i spent the years leading up to 18 in an
anxiety-ridden daze
and my 18th, 19th, 20th years
in a kind of confused fog
another kind of daze
things were happening
but i hadn’t predicted them
i hadn’t had the insight
i was no longer one with myself
and unknowns are scary
(but somehow, i made it here)
i had a similar feeling about the direction of our country.
i wouldn’t say i predicted the presidential elections
(i still watched the results with baited breath,
and cheered as if i couldn’t believe it
when this white supremacist nation
somehow decided, in a landslide, that this half-black man from Hawaii
was “eloquent” enough to merit their time
and votes)
but i always had those “feelings.”
and even in 2016,
though i didn’t want it to be true,
i felt that we were getting complacent,
i felt that we were setting ourselves up for failure,
i felt that, somehow, this country thought it had done its “good deed” for the century
and now would show its true, horrid orange colors.
and i fell asleep that night knowing what other people didn’t want to admit
and i stopped reading the news
and i stopped listening to NPR
and i re-read Harry Potter throughout that first year,
imagining that we’d defeat the toupee’d Voldemort
through the sheer power of love.
but as this election approaches
i’m back to being 16, 17, 18
the future seemingly unwritten
and that unknown blankness
isn’t just scary because it’s unknown,
it’s scary because it’s either a future of
a political wave we may be able to hold accountable,
or a continuation of this fascist roller coaster
that half the country seems to be enjoying.
and i am struck to near inactivity
(that has nothing to do with my recent sprained ankle)
cuddled under blankets
my heart pounding louder and louder in my ears
as each hour ticks by
closer to the election
closer to the answer
that i still can’t foresee.
so, for the love of everything, vote.
vote like the color of your skin
increases the likelihood of traffic stops
and therein those traffic stops
increase in likelihood of fatality.
vote like your body is rejecting the fetus
you wanted so badly
and somehow your miscarriage
is now legally an illegal abortion.
vote like you’re me, ten years ago
health-insurance-less
because your depression isn’t quantifiable enough
to warrant a medical leave of absence from college.
vote as if you are looking directly into the eyes
of a child
inside a locked cage.
vote as if facts mattered.
vote as if you know the definition of
Separation of Church and State.
vote as if you still had some love in your heart.
[my heart is pounding
so hard
it’s loud
so loud
please let this be the pounding
of some remaining
love]
contemplating 2005
i owned a pair of sneakers
inside which i hiked all around
the Australian outback.
i don’t remember if i bought them white on purpose
or not
but they eventually became shaded
rust
from the red dirt
of the outback
and my friends and i laughed
at the customs forms
asking if we were bringing back
any flora/fauna/soil,
because that red dust was embedded
into every article of clothing
and down to our very souls
by that point.
it eventually washed out of fabric,
but every time i wore those shoes
the red just seemed to embed itself
deeper
and my style changed
as the years went by,
and i didn’t wear anything on my feet
except my [off-brand] converse low-tops,
and later my vegan leather boots,
but i vowed to keep those formerly white tennis shoes
so i could always have the reminder of
how i felt in the outback.
i have no idea where those sneakers are today.
they might still be in my childhood closet,
sitting there, keeping my dad company
(solely by proximity),
or we might have packed them in a plastic bag,
and dropped them off at a Goodwill,
and someone might have gotten them,
and the shoes might be walking around right now,
or they might have already been tossed out…
and i think about how many times i looked at those shoes,
contemplating giving them up,
and i thought the point of the memories
was to keep the physical reminder of them
but i think
that if you have the memories strong enough
the reminders
aren’t always completely necessary…
…maybe?
October 14, 2020
as scary as this pandemic was
at the beginning
in this city of millions
i am far more scared
for my friends
in Wisconsin
than i ever was
for me
in NYC.
kipventures 