writing before 7
writing before i’m fully awake
writing before breakfast
before coffee fully takes effect
before i know what my mind is doing this day
but i also know
later today
i’ll have no desire to write
or
the desire will be there
but the motivation
the actually action
will cease
so morning writing it is
with its
imperfections
and sleepy word choices
and distractability
at least i’m sitting here
writing
that’s more than i can say for
the rest of my day
the secrets of the morning
only come out for those who pay
attention
and time
and a little bit of caffeine to the gods of
light birdsong
color-changing skies
a quiet you can’t quite name
and the awareness that
in a world of billions
you can still feel like the only
one
playing with the puppy —
a necessary respite
from morning pages
i feel too tired to write,
and an upcoming day
that i have no idea
how
it’ll play
out
tired
inspired
driven
distracted
saddened
and suddenly
maddened
and then
a little
glad
and
that’s just what i can describe
of my emotions
this morning
no wonder i always come back
to
exhausted
too tired to write anything
of substance
too word-play-y
to not,
stuck in a limbo
of will i won’t i
(a new take on ‘will they won’t they’)
(get it, cuz i’m nonbinary and use they/them pronouns)
listening to music from the
‘Roaring 20’s’
so what are we?
‘The Coughing 20’s’?
‘The Dying 20’s’?
‘The Denying and Closing our Eyes and Covering our Ears and Screaming “[B]LA[B]LA[B]LA”
Over All the Signs
and Words of Learned Folks
and Science
20’s’?
i wish i had the compassion of
Amanda Gorman
the faith in people of
Anne Frank
the calmness and knowledge and belief
of so many
but i am caught between
i want to see the good
and
i can only see the bad
played
over
and
over
and
over
again
behind my eyelids
every time they close
(and most of the time while they’re open,
too)
i know i’m doing little
to halt/hold/stop the division
of one side
‘gainst the other,
but it’s hard to listen to folks
who’d never listen to me
were i to show them my true self,
who argue that folks like me
are a disease unto society
and deserve the worst of death.
if you can’t look at me like a human
then why should i listen to you
like your opinions have any say
in my living my own life
in my own honest way
(maybe this is why
it’s so important
to look inwards
for spirituality
as opposed to outwards)
but this poem
is kind of a mess,
but it is morning
so i can mull through
my thoughts of the day approaching
and get them all out of my fingertips
and onto this blank page/document/screen
for all to see
(or at least the six of you who usually read)
(hi, by the way)
and the poem doesn’t ~need~ to mean anything
it can just be,
a product of my brain,
my overthinking-
obsessive compulsive tendency-
pessimist in the body of an optimist-
-brain,
and leave it
for whomever may need it
(which might just be me
needing to get it out
in order to write
other things)
sometimes you have to eat
and read
before you can write and wake-up
and sometimes you have to just do the things you have to do
before writing that to-do list
and sometimes you need to look at where you’ve been
before going where you’re going
and sometimes you just have to cuddle your cat and dog
before being human.
trying to figure out
what i need
each
and every
morning
to feel fully
me
because i had a great time
these last couple of weeks
having coffee with my Kip
up on the deck
chatting
or planning
or meditating
or bird-watching
or dog-playing
’twas fun and new and exciting
(and the meditation certainly helps most of the time)
but my brain and body
have gotten used to
Morning-Pages
Morning-Poems
Morning-Putting-Thoughts-To-Tomes
that, apparently, without them, i feel
just
a little bit
lost…
i mean, clearly, i catch up,
do an afternoon poem,
or after a few days, back-schedule the words i write at the time
but this
pre-8:00-writing
this Morning-Gathering-My-Thoughts,
this is where my true me shines
(or maybe just the me that is the most
Raw)
this chocolate muffin
is
hitting the spot
just right
tonight
(nah, it’s morning,
just kidding)
and there’s a gorgeous gnome
just beside me
lips painted
a stunning shade of red
to match the hat
and the coffee i’m drinking
may not taste subtly of blueberries
or vanilla from France
(is that what French vanilla actually is?)
but it is coffee,
it is caffeinated,
and apparently
this morning
what i needed more than anything
was hella sugary breakfasts
and hella caffeinated coffee
and a gorgeous gnome beside me.
who cleans the cleaners
and who helps the helpers
who finds the finders
and who paints the painters
this is why community is important,
because if everyone stays in their place
(hah, take that, grammar!)
is the only one of their kind
then when they need
what they provide
instead of turning to someone who doesn’t know
they can turn in to their own community
and say
“i need what i give”
and they know
the next time
the other person needs it
they will provide.
(Jacks and Jills and Jax[es] of all trades are imperative to a functioning society)
thirty days have september,
april,
june,
and november
all the rest have thirty-one
except february which completely fucks us up and every four years gets even a little bit more complicated because time is a mortal construction and probably not as linear as people make it out to be…
i see my friends
open themselves up to the universe
to give and receive and the universe complies
sending platonic connections from years and years past,
sheltering under iridescent wingspans
and holding safe a space for baby queers;
we are the ancestors we wish we’d had
(and we do have those ancestors,
they just may not be blood)
the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb
isn’t it great how the actual saying is saying the opposite of what everyone who says it thinks they are saying?
there are a lot of things like that in this world, aren’t there?
(and do we even need to live our lives by sayings made up by humans long since dead?)
i’m still finding my way
slowly opening myself up to the universe,
trying not to ask it too greedily,
as i’m still scared it’s not real,
i’m too much of an atheist/agnostic to trust in anything outside of myself
(but, one might point out, the universe could simply be a part of ourselves that is unknown,)
and we are far more connected to one another than we think we are,
so maybe those connections are the universe
and each other are the spiritual guides,
but all of these are very ‘what if’
very potential answers
but not definites,
and it is too early for this kind of contemplation to make 100% sense
(and i was definitely up too early to be too comprehensible to others)
so we can just write this
and post it
and throw it out into the universe
and know that our place in it is constantly changing
and at times you need the guidance
and at others you are the guide
and it constantly changes
and change is good
scary
but good.
kipventures 