day ninety

INSTALLMENT ONE: HOMO+INTRA

I watch them greedily

Standing still, another day
is going by,
I’m still unsold.
A pink hand grabbing
and picking me up -
could this be it?
yes.
I am making my final journey
over to the cash register
where all wanted bottles
go.
if my lid wasn’t on right my
soul would surely
be pouring out
right now.
The head connected to the hand -
my new master
is scrunching this head
into a hideous grouping
of wrinkles,
to be released by a smile.
I cannot tell if they are
happy or not to see me.
Bagged into darkness
as if going to the chopping
block, I am now bobbing
up and down, in a forward motion
the pink hand, tight around my
neck.
Bobbing, bobbing
until now, light again
but not too much,
we must be underground.
the pink creatures twist off
my lid – ouch. It hurts
but no one ever said
losing your virginity
was easy.
my soul, my spirit,
is being poured into
three separate glasses,
until I am left feeling empty
and unwanted; they no longer
look at me.

take all that I could
give them.
they cackle and unsteadily get up,
pink faces now red
and I am grabbed by the neck
and back to bobbing.
Outside again, it must
be only one full turn of
the clock
since I last saw
this air,
we have bobbed back
to my original home.
my pink friends
do not want me
anymore, but the door
to my previous dwelling is closed-
they do not want me either.
the pink master’s red face
get wrinkled
and ugly again.
now I am going, up, up
about as high as I was on
the shelf in my home,
until I am speeding down fast -
I can’t even see properly
and now pain
temporary,
it’s gone.
I can see again, I
can see my pink (or
red) friends laughing
and bobbing away
and I can see my
soulless shell
in twenty different pieces.

update #5

'underneath it all'
is officially being published in
the poetry institute of canada's
anthology this year.



cool.

i don't need boys.

they consume my mind
and waste my time.





but love can be awful nice.

should have stayed home.

'come over',
you said.
so i came,
on two separate occasions that night.

the colours on your face.

red,
purple,
green;
sparkling lights
leading me to my downfall.


(always temporary).

homeland reunion.

getting back
into the wrong crowd,
getting out
of your comfort zone.
getting up
in the wrong bed,
getting back
to who you were
before.

ocean eyes.

the memories
bring out
the tide,
the messages
bring it back in.
unstable
for a night,
but know
you're in
the right.

goodbye, forever it seems.

breaking up,
breaking out
of that
box and
on my way
to a
breakthrough.

i'm getting better.

it's been 

rough

for five days,

6 days, 

maybe even seven days.

i don't know,

most were spent in 

a drunken haze.

i didn't know

who i was;

am,

or where my 

mind

was taking me.

sorting out

my tangled brain

is almost as hard

as sorting out

my tangled hair.

but you have to

keep sorting,

because it's best

to just break

one thing

at a time.

underneath it all.

under a bridge,
under the influence,
under age.
under the smoke of a campfire
and
under the sky's night light.

under five sweaters but
still
under dressed
and noticibly
under fed,
under close scrutiny.

under the grade average
and under the rent's small radar,
yet
underneath friends arms;
never been happier.

'it's okay' is false cheer.

i said never mind,
for the hundredth time.
never
mind.
it was starting to feel
natural
to make those words
echo
from my mouth.
you don't even have to
think about
what else was going
to come out from
my mouth.
my mind,
my thoughts,
they probably mean
nothing
to you,
or anybody else.
so go on
ignoring
me
like everybody else.

close to done, and yet to begin.

standing
squatting
sitting
staring
stirring
starting
to think
that i can't
write poetry.

work can be impersonal.

the biggest hug
i had today,
was the garbage bag
as i threw it away.

the circle of life.

i've yet
to meet
a soul
who has
claimed
upon deciding
to become
a parent,
that they
'want to have teenagers'.

the first place
statement
is that they
'want to have kids';
babies come
second place.

but no couple
trying to burden
another human
with living,
has stated
to me
that they want
'to have teenagers'.

i find this
curious
as the
young adult phase
in one's life
is also
precisely when
you start getting
kicked out of
the house,
lose your
innocence,
grow your
own
mind
which may
or may not
agree with
the teachings
your parents have
fed you
over the years,
and you are
expected
to move out
within
the next couple.

it's funny how
someone could
bring you
into
the world
only to
kick you out
of theirs
after you
stop
being the 'kid'
they wanted.

which
you
couldn't help happening,
and
they
knew would happen one day.

so stop
eating their food
and
taking up room
in the house
they brought you
into.
go out into the world,
into some cold,
empty apartment building.
spend your time in
the same office
for 40 years,
find someone nice,
have some kids,
then kick out
the teenagers
or the young adults
they turn into.

however,
it's a circle,
a cycle
of sorts.

when your
parents
turn back
into children,
they'll ask you
to take
care
of them;
bring them into
your home,
and once they
stop
being the cute
old
kids
they are when
you let them
in with you,
you kick
them out
like they did
to you;
into the hot,
stuffy
retirement homes.

we learn
through experience
don't we?

find your audience, even if it's just you.

freeverse poetry
can be a bunch of
bullshit,
but if you say it's
poetry,
someone will
listen.

!!!

the enormous amount of
exclamation marks
exclaim
what era she was born in.