write what you know
and then write it a little farther away
using metaphor
or simile
or narrative tactics
that make it seem
like it may not be about your life
at least not completely
but we all know
we all know
every writer carries hundreds
if not thousands
if not millions or billions or trillions of
selves
with them at all times
[or is that just every human
as we live and grow and change and morph
into each of our
many
many
many
final forms]
so interesting how
being in one’s 30’s feels
like settling into the person you
were before testing out all the other life things
i’m hungry for experiences
but i need only try something
once
and then i’m happy to go back
and just cuddle my kip and my cat and my dog
and organize books alphabetically
and wake up each morning
to write poetry
[i do wonder if this is the true 9-year-old me, but i also have to admit,
i still have that 9-year-old inside me, plus the 16-year-old who couldn’t
help but immediately drive to see friends the moment they got their
license, and the 22-year-old who just really wanted connection with
whomever would connect with me. i think it’s always been, not about
partying, but about connection. and i also think 9-year-old me
would agree.]
how can there be
so much horror in the world
alongside such beauty?
how can death happen one day
and the next, the miracle of a whole new life?
how can those celebrating a graduation/
a union/
pure friendship
be next door to
domestic violent terror
in one’s own home?
i haven’t figured out yet
how to be a happy person
while also knowing
so much that happens behind
tightly closed doors
in front of
tightly shut eyes
because, from my position here,
it feels counterintuitive —
i’m trapped in feeling like
one thing cannot be acknowledged
if the other isn’t also
but perhaps that’s my own black and white
fault
thinking
because there’s also
often
mundane day happening
alongside mundane day
and it’s the grey that
somehow
sometimes
keeps us going
hiding
or fighting
a fascist dictatorship
a takeover of/from
what once called itself
the paradigm of democracy
and we the people
somehow
voted this power-monger in
[though, with wealth, it’s easy enough
to turn the tides of an election
with tactics on either side
of the line of
voter fraud]
but what do we do
when our numbers mean so little
against media takeovers and social distractions
and virtue signaling and in-fighting?
a revolution is at hand
but the powerful seem to have control
over literally everything
[we’ve been here before —
we, as a species —
perhaps the technology is new,
but i’m certain
i’m certain
the despair and feeling of powerlessness
has all happened
and will all happen
again
and again
and again and again and again
because humans hunger for power
almost as much as they hunger for community
it’s just
will we learn
from our past
or not?]
creation mixes magic
with science
and i think you’ll find
we’re all adept
at both
[if we just believe]
create
creativity
or you’ll die from
lacking
a human need
maybe
someday
i’ll feel like
a human
i am a smattering of choices
in an aging human body
decorated so i feel more real
and interacting with the world
even though sometimes
i wish i
wouldn’t
i’m ecstatic
i’m scared
i’m electrified
i’m anxious
i’m invigorated
i’m apprehensive
i’m defensive
i’m meditative
i’m happy?
[maybe?]
i’m existential
i’m whatever
i’m apoplectic
i’m in shock
i’m winding down
i’m revving up
i’m lost
i’m found
i’m starting now
i’ve gone through so much
i want
i want
i need
i yearn
i spin yarn after yarn after yarn
but i never seem to learn
that it’s all part of the human condition —
there isn’t one affliction or emotion
better or worse than the others
when you look at one whole life lived
[and you’re not even near the end
as far as makes sense — why are you always
wrapping up your life in your head
to make the ending
an end
rather than a beginning
of a new era]
[you do you,
but also,
there’s more left of you
than you seem to act like
you
have
left]
i know the steps i’d take
and the things i’d say
to be mean
but i never say or do them
they remain inside my mouth/my throat/buried deep inside my mind
and though those actions i’ve never taken
and i know i never will,
how come having those thoughts alone makes me feel like
the worst person who has ever lived?
[i know i know the point is
we cannot control our immediate reactions/thoughts/feelings,
but what we can control —
and what shows the merit of a person —
is how we act on them, but i guess i just want to be so good of a human
that i never have human feelings
ever]
kipventures 