January 22, 2024

i feel like this new day of a new week
is a whole new moment of a brand new life
i don’t know what it is —
maybe it’s the lack of upcoming stressors,
maybe it’s getting used to this
twenty-twenty-four
as we have it,
maybe it’s feeling confident in friendships,
maybe it’s feeling confident in circus,
maybe it’s because
kip
is no longer feeling
vertigo-y
or migraine-y
and i feel like we might be
past
the worst of whatever this is,

but
so

this feels so new/
so fresh/
so daylight/daybreak/break me out of my rut

even with the cold
even with the chill
even with the snow and ice still there on the ground…

maybe it’s artistic inspiration
flowing all over me,
maybe it’s puppies and cats
and 8 hours of sleep
[even interrupted
i’m pretty sure it counts up to that],

maybe i just forgot
all the reasons i have
to be sad —

whatever it is

i’m feeling
almost
glad

November 14,2022

how do you
become at peace
with the fact
that you will never be doing enough?

i don’t know
but i think
that’s how to approach
anti-racism
anti-white-supremacy
anti-any-hate
in a sustainable way

(because otherwise
the sides of the coin
are performative
or overwhelmed catatonia
and neither
actually provide
results
or action)

~~~

there really is a comfort
to having a canine
use your leg
as a pillow
to prop up
their heavy heavy chin

~~~

when i pet my pets
the studies run through my head
of how this act helps the serotonin levels
in humans’ (and dogs’) brains

but i know my serotonin
or the transmitters that run it along
aren’t working at their full strength
so i often think to myself
“ok, here we go, serotonin, you can do it!!!”
just to help it
a bit

sometimes we need
store-bought chemicals
and sometimes we need
our own cheering squad
and sometimes we need
both
and that shouldn’t be looked down upon

September 16, 2021

normally, i don’t mind
the kind of worship-full relationship
we have with our animals,
our pets,
(nos animaux de compagnie),
but when it comes time
to pack and organize and box and move…
i do feel a tiny bit resentful
that half of the beings in this home,
that two of the four of us,
don’t contribute at all
(and, in fact, often make things a million times harder)

July 13, 2021

i have been filled
recently
with inspiration
true inspiration
flowing inspiration
from all over
and this morning
i had
*something*
i wanted to write about
to explore in words
to contemplate out loud
[on doc]
but it’s left me
dry
and i’ve hated everything i’ve started so far
so maybe a prompt is the way to go???

~~~

are poems of dreams
really more interesting
than a telling of that same
dream?

a prompt told me to write
out
a dream i remember
in as much detail
as i can remember

but here’s the catch:
my dreams
(like my thoughts)
are conceptual,
abstract
(at least in what i remember,
retain;
the dreams themselves are pretty mundane)

i remember
[maybe]
[possibly]
dreaming of the pants
i decided to wear today
deep pockets
large legs
flowing around
but still split
my nicknamed ‘gender euphoria pants’
because they are technically genderless
and anyone can wear them
it’s just a lot of people don’t
and i think my gender is not aligned
with the male or the female
the man or the woman
but instead
i’d call my gender
Cryptid.
(so anything that sets me
ever so slightly apart,
that makes you go “i think that was a human,
but i’m not entirely sure”
that’s me
that’s my gender
that’s my euphoria)
but i think i dreamed of these pants
reaching into the pocket
not finding the bottom exactly where i expected
and maybe there was something important there
and maybe i did eventually find it
and maybe there were other people/places/things inside this dream
but what i remember
are the pants
and the reach
and that’s it.

was that actually interesting content???

~~~

(i wonder if there are any of our animals
who are trans
and would rather be
“misgendered” by strangers
than have us
continually
“correct” them.
i think this might be why
i so rarely actually correct the stranger.
i’ll use the pronoun i know them as,
but not make a big deal out of it
(unless we’re at the vet
and it might affect the type of care)
but just in case
the animal gets some gender euphoria
every time a stranger
refers to them
by the “opposite gender”
than i know them as
i don’t want to come barreling in
with a correction
that is not
actually
correct.)

May 8, 2021

An Ode To The Nicknames We Give Our Animals.

A toast to Louka
The Goodest of Dogs
(The Stinkiest of Dogs)
The Silliest and Smartest
And Goofiest
Our Little Louka
Our LoukaLou
Our Loukaloukaloukalou-kah
Kalouah
Good Dog
Booboosousa
HassleDog
Louka

A toast to this Cat
Mowgli
The Mowgs of us all,
The Actual, OG, HassleAnimal
HassleCat
TrashCat
The Fluffiest
The Shed-iest
The Tubby Tum Tum
Mo-go-go-gali
mmmmmOOOWGLI
Stinkiest
Too Smart For Her Own Good
Mowgli