Today is the day I told your father you exist
And the roses he gave me are wilting on the table
We are not ready
We are not ready
We are not ready
The roses are wilting and I am afraid
We will too
Tag: slam
How My Dad Accidentally Raised a Feminist
The day I was born
he gave me the first name Morgan, sturdy and neutral
“fighter of the sea”
he gave me the middle name Freya, norse goddess of
love, beauty, war, and death
a seeker of thrills and pleasure, who carried herself
with strength and passion in plight
he declared to my mother, “honey, she will be a force to be reckoned with.”
I was three
the bathtub was full of bubbles and brothers and me and
they could pee into the toilet from the tubside, which
I couldn’t do
no one had ever told me I was different from them and I became
infuriated
he yelled from outside the door, “honey, don’t let your brothers torment you.”
I was five or six
I stood painting at my easel in the garage where he worked and blurted
“I think blue is my favorite color but blue is for boys and pink is for girls,”
to which he responded, “honey,
colors belong to everybody.”
I was ten
we pulled into the driveway after school and I said I’d get the mail and
I did
he watched me walk down to the mailboxes and back and then
he cried in the drivers seat for an hour and muttered “honey, some men like
little girls with ponytails who walk alone to get the mail
a little too much.”
I was fourteen
my body had become something womanly and unfamiliar and
well-hidden under my brother’s hand-me-downs,
my long hair shoveled into a beanie
I walked down the hallway from my bedroom and
he stopped me to say “honey, I don’t care if you like boys or girls or
purple aliens from Mars, as long as they treat you well and
you are happy.”
I was seventeen
a transgender girl had been allowed to become a girl scout and
it made the evening news
and my mom exclaimed “well. that’s. just. great.”
and he countered “honey, who are you to decide how someone is
connected to this earth?”
I silently cheered from the dinner table.
I was twenty
we were used to everyone else holding their breath when we talked because
when we talked it was fiery altercations
this week’s controversial topic: abortion
and he remarked “honey, I’m pro-life because I would never want you
to go through that”
my retort was “I never would- that’s my personal choice but other women
should be able to make that decision for themselves”
“yes, I think so, too”
“then you’re pro-choice”
“oh”
everyone breathed.
I am twenty-four
my nomex uniform hangs in the open closet,
his name sewn onto my breast pocket
I smell the smoke he used to wear when he got home from work and
we all crawled into his lap
his voice carries over the phone, “honey, I am just
so proud of you.”
my father did not make me from lace and cursive writing and subordination
he made me from untied laces and carving initials into tree trunks and the innate cognizance
that I am anything but collateral
the day I was born
and he said, “honey, you will be a force to be reckoned with”
he was not wrong.
The Kitchen Sink
I left dishes in the kitchen sink the way some people leave Christmas lights up into January
Spent too little time in the kitchen.
He called me messy,
called me inconsistent,
said “you are not enough homemaker to hold me together.”
I left dishes in the kitchen sink the way he left my heart in the doorjamb when he slammed it shut behind him.
Spent too little time chasing after him.
He called me later,
called me every night
said “I only said those things to hurt you, I still want to be together.”
I left dishes in the kitchen sink the way I leave people to play extras in the movie that is my life.
Spent too little time deciding it was over.
He called me monster,
called me psychotic,
said “you will never find someone with enough patience to piece you together.”
I left dishes in the kitchen sink
So he left me.
And I…
I did not stop him.
Seattle Cliches
[written in 2011]
Let’s wish we could find a way to make coffee and fingernails sound poetic. I want to write about the paint on my clothes and the smell of smoke absorbed by my skin. The holes in the soles of my feet and the holes in my mind, but I can’t find a reason to write in the dark. It’s much scarier under beautiful stars when you realize you’re in a city, an alleyway of broken windows and broken hearts laid out neatly in the dust of dirty thoughts and suicides. There will come a day when Starbucks aprons are believed to be a sign that multiple gods exist in our atmosphere when Microsoft stops autocorrecting the I before E rule and “I” no longer needs to be capitalized like God does. I believe dead spirits that walk among us in the bodies of the depressed. Stumbling outside reality in a cloud of unhappy until they master a way to find artsiness in the darkness. They can hear themselves breathing, but can’t decide whether they should hold their breath in to retain life until it evaporates as nothing from their lungs or if it’s better to let white noises crawl under their skin until they’re crazy. The people here are crazy. Driven mad by stop signs and running through red lights until they’ve reached a destination of uneasiness. How he knows he never really loved her because the poetry he wrote when they were together was shit. We’re show-offs to cover insecurity. Cheering hard for losing baseball teams and avoiding ignorance. We never lose hope and that’s where our music comes from. The one thing we deserve to take pride in. That’s soul burning down our esophagus until it warms us in the depths of stomach acid. It took a lot of time on Google Images, searching for pictures of physical deformities to learn that not everyone is born with two eyes, not everyone is everyone else’s idea of human. Where we rip the seams in our rain jackets as an early weather forecast hoping the sun will peak through the clouds we’ve created with wrist pollution. Where we say “fuck” too much and “love” like it’s sacred. Where we believe pop cans and soda bottles and newspapers and microwave dinner boxes deserve a second life through recycling. We’re superstitious. We use eyes to see into souls and window reflections make us nervous with the anticipation of seeing someone we don’t want to look at, we don’t trust, so as a result some of us stop trusting in God. All we’ve known to have grasp of is the sidewalk in which we walk to reach places we’ve never been, but we never venture too far for that would mean chance of facing unacceptance and non-hipsters. We believe that wearing t-shirts with skulls on them makes us brave ‘cause it’s a scary thought that the only place you’ll ever feel safe is in the lap of your mother. So as Seattlites we search for Mother Nature in everything. We just want to be hopeful. We just want to be happy. We’re trying to find the light. Where social status is decided by how many rings are on your fingers and how clean your dreadlocks are. How much makeup can you go without and still be beautiful? Be organic. So we smile crooked-teeth and let our fingernails grow yellow between cigarettes as we say welcome to the city, welcome to Seattle. Here, we do art.
Pool of Flames
[written in 2013]
For anyone that’s ever met someone so handsome, you were too scared to touch him.
For the oil on your skin would surely ruin him. Already ink-stained collarbone to collarbone, bent to let your head rest.
And you touch his chest with the barrier of a sweat-soaked t-shirt: safe.
And you feel his heartbeat like it’s made of puppies: Labradors.
And you think this is wild, breathing like a creature hidden under his diaphragm, spreading his ribcage like open-heart surgeons might.
Like veterinarians might.
They baptized me in a pool of flames, igniting every nerve ending into letting me be my own person. And drowning me in the truth that one will never be as good as two.
While I see his body is a temple, he sees a city recovering from a harsh winter, peeling ice off the telephone wires where talons perch on their way south.
So when my coffee’s gone cold because I hesitated at its taste,
When tears reverberate down my jawline and my hair won’t get out of my eyes
When my toes break from dancing on the feelings of people around me and avoiding his contact
When I’ve sinned beyond all recognition of the little girl they once rocked to sleep
Because I know they baptized him in a pool of tea, too hot to swallow, too sweet to claim
But my fire burns hotter underneath his boiling figure with the fear of losing fuel- I need them to recognize my helper, my accelerant
So I will climb up the walls I was built in, char every room where I froze in bitter air during sleepless nights, wondering about the judgement of god
Craving arms to wrap around me like the ribbon on a gift
Tied to every love I faded out of, every guy that made fun of the way I pointed my hair dryer like pistol, every girl that tried to hang herself with her extensions and choked on acrylics, every daughter and every son that might inconveniently wake us up on a Saturday morning for breakfast.
It’s so romantic. But at times romanticism makes me feel like a cat stuffed into a hamster wheel. He’s like an eagle resting on a robin’s nest praying God bless you, undressed with the crest of a beating scarlet chest, pounding through every bound breast compressed to express that eagle confessed ownership of the beating scarlet chest of a robin. And you never woulda guessed by the way he speaks to me. So until I sprout wings, I’m wondering how far my feet can take me before I finally meet my soul mate.
And if he’s not comfortable with snuggling tonight, I’ll understand and then he’ll lend me an arm so I can rest my softened jawline against his bicep and watch him breathe. Staring at his mouth, soaked in his smirks, until I come to the conclusion that those are the curves that matter and he is the reason they call it a cupids bow. And the crease that parts his lips is shaped like wings. And I believe they’re gonna take me to heaven. They’ll save me. And I wonder if he’s thinking the same thing about me and I wonder if I have enough in me to save him and I wonder if he even needs saving.
So for anyone who’s ever questioned whether they start too many sentences with I. Or anyone who’s ever questioned if their pen ran out of ink or if the paper just stopped listening. Or anyone who’s ever questioned if they should go unspoken when they saw feathers poking through ace bandages yearning to stretch a beaten down wing. And every handhold with palm lines pressing until the creases all fit neatly together. For anyone who started believing that if god made anyone in his image- it’s this guy. Then maybe you’ve taken a risk. A chance. A flight… and found out it was worth it.
Jump
My heart stands outside the rails of a bridge
Love her like a call for help
She has been known to jump
Wanderlust
[written in 2011]
I suffer from wanderlust. I want to see the same constellation during a cloudless night in at least two hundred different locations. I want to have a sleeping bag and a thermos of coffee and a package of Oreos wherever I go for the rest of my life. I want to see a comet, I want to believe in fortune cookies, I want to close my eyes at 11:11, and wish on shooting stars. I want a hard-cover notebook filled with quotes and poems and anything else I find inspirational. I want thick-rimmed glasses, a warm beanie with earflaps, and as if it couldn’t get any better, I want to ask you to join me.
I suffer from non-denomination. I don’t believe in soulmates and I don’t believe people can be possessions, but I think if anyone gave me you, it was probably Orion- that’s who I pray to on nights when I can’t find God in the sky. I think Orion is more disciplined, he’s got a bigger belt and if there’s anything I learned growing up, it’s that you don’t mess with someone who’s got a big belt.
I suffer from stimulation. I don’t know what to do with myself when I’m handed a hand and lips press against my ear. I keep your secrets whispering in my subconscious. They speak in my dreams alongside my own secrets which I cautiously share with you from time to time. I’ve never been comfortable holding someone’s hand or sitting in the front seat. I’ve never been easy to trust someone. I won’t say that it’s different… I won’t say it.
I suffer from friendship. After spending months being that wrong person everyone sends text messages to, I’ve learned to write your name in pen instead of pencil with intentions of keeping you permanent. I feel like you are me in a different costume. Even white out would only cover you up until someone scratches it off to reveal what I’ve been looking for, what I am, and what I have been for a long time. In fear, I can paint over you all I want, but you will still be there.
I suffer from you. I’ve found ways to find who you are in extreme detail dancing in my tired mind. Engraved in my sore heart that beats to push blood through the veins only you see. Filling my right lung with warmth and my left lung with happiness. Bringing thickness to my skin and helping me feel invincible. This reflects in my eyes, reflects in my aura.
I suffer from wanderlust. But with you, staring up at the sky, I don’t suffer at all.
History Class
[written in 2009]
I am gonna scream loud enough to scare you. To make you cry, losing your breath, so maybe you’ll be in half the pain you put me through. And during that scream? You’ll listen. Tears bleeding from your widened eyes. You’re going to hear me.
I want to grab your frizzy burnt hair and use your face to flatten out the sand on the beaches along all of the Pacific Northwest where my ancestors fished before your people showed up. I want to take the knowledge you’ve tried to shove down my throat and pound it into my fist and use it to punch you in your throat. I want to build a fire. A giant bonfire. And dance around it like a savage shouting indistinguishables from the depths of my diaphragm.
I want you to call me uncivilized so I can snatch that word and throw it into your broken home with pictures of children who never come home where you do absolutely no work for no love and no life. I want your fake tan to turn to cancer while mine stays intact for years after one summer of sunlight without having to listen to you.
I want you to continue with your monthly hair dyes and thick black eyeliner- trying to mask yourself with something you ridicule. Something you will never be and only secretly wish you could be. Something I am. I want to rip out your tongue and dip it in a simmering pan of frybread oil so you can taste the sweet outcome of your people only giving my people four elements of corn, yeast, flour, and powdered milk. I want you to drown in the bottle of whiskey my people put in your hand every Friday night. I want you to choke the evaporations from the cigar you bought from my smoke shop.
I want to take a needle to your inflatable nose, since you say you can see Injun in mine. I want my blood to spill on your Abercrombie shirt and jeans and flip flops because you’ll never like me if part of me isn’t a stereotypical white girl.
I want your Marine husband to meet a beautiful Indian woman and not rape her for your satisfaction, but leave you for her Pocahontas lifestyle- but she’s not a real Disney Princess, according to you.
I want all of your freshmen students to see right through you. I want their hearts slashed alongside mine. I want the past to start all over and I want to be there to rob your great great grandfather of his pistol and use it to shoot him so you never existed. Actually, I want to use a bow and arrow.
I want there to be a reason for you to call me hostile, so let me give you one. And I want one more reason not to show up to history class today.
Bullet
[written in 2009]
Bang bang. He’s a bullet. Sharp and smart, not like a lot of guys you’ll find these days. He tries to keep the lies loaded and tell only truths to your face, but it’d be a lie if he thought he could do it. The kind of guy that ends only the dirtiest of fights and kisses only vulnerable girls. But what a sweet kiss it can be. Then he walks away smiling the fakest of smiles just to help pass the day while no one visible sticks a foot out to break a common ritual. Telling jokes to get laughs that proves he hasn’t lost it yet- and it hasn’t lost him, while the most important people in his life might have.
Bang bang. He’s a bullet and he doesn’t know it. He plays the big shot, pushing everyone aside. Never settling to ride shotgun. He’s got a grin like a Cheshire cat when he’s feeling devious right before he jumps the gun, going off half-cocked and trying to keep a stiff upper lip as she attempts to bite down on his shell. Holding it in her teeth like a trophy. She spits him out on the pavement like a bitter aftertaste while a scared little one pulls the wool over his eyes in a game of war.
Bang bang. He’s a bullet and he loves it. He can’t break your heart but he’ll run right through it. Make you lose your breath. And when he’s gone all you have left is a hole where he cut for a split second. The worst part is, there’s no retrieval policy to get him back. She had to learn the hard way that it’s a one-shot kind of deal, so maybe she should stop yelling at him and step off ‘cause anywhere he goes is a hazard and he knows it. She can only bring him closer just to send him off again.
Bang bang. He’s a bullet and he’ll wipe the smile off your face just as quickly as he put it there. But he’s intoxicating and addicting and he’s absolutely beautiful. And that may be the one thing about himself that he’s still not so sure of. And he’s always there to catch you when you trip and fall. He’s got your back so well he’s almost in your back even when you don’t have his nearly as well. And he’s always got a word to speak to make you think when the tears are falling and there’s nothing to say. He’ll put you in the situation where you can’t feel as guilty as you want to for having him when he can’t even find himself. But you know you’d jump in front of him to save him from himself when his mind is racing and out of control. He says it’s always an accident.
Bang bang. He’s a bullet and nothing more than a bullet in a world of loaded guns.
Someday
Someday you will wake up to the light peaking through your blinds
striping the walls and her face golden, cradled on your chest
and you will kiss her
and you will feel it
and she won’t tell you that you are the only person who has ever kissed her first thing in the morning
and she will feel it, too.
They call me Spitfire. 