reminders.

 

“breathe.”
My father reminds me to remain. When his mileage grows further than my eyes can reach, I press yellow post-it notes to borrowed walls to remind myself what to do.

Exist. Write. Nourish. Be kind. Be patient. Be present. BE.

When I ask my students why they write, a list of words unravel off their tongues reminding me how necessary it is to even question this process of documentation.

I write because it keeps me here.

My father is a novelist. I can say this now because he spent many years curving his back toward various computers, writing words down. Amidst the stress(es) of life, he found time to accumulate over 70,000 words into organized chapters and plot twists. A writer writes.

Each time we speak, he asks me how my writing is going. Am I sending work out? Am I broadening my audience? This check-in reminds me my purpose.

I remind my father that he keeps me here too. As a writer, I have grown accustomed to being so enclosed within my thoughts, it has created a distance inside me. I can reveal all my secrets on stage, but that is because they have already been written down. In person, I am zipped-up; this can be a lonely existence.

My father reminds me how I used to be. Before ______. And before _______.

When I was younger and my hair was yellow and soft, we used to listen to old radio shows, barter at garage sales and hoard other people’s junk. My body was less creased, less angry; there were far less stockpiles of scars on my skin. It’s difficult for me to recall that human that once was me.

My father reminds me that there is still happy in me; I just need to be open to rummaging a little.

I remind my father that there is still peace in him; he just needs to be open to some rummaging as well.

day 20: alphabet

The Greeks called trees alphabets. Each one was a step closer toward a meaning. They scraped and dug toward the many layers of flesh behind the wood and sap.

A  is for axis. How the tree is identified.

T  is for the thickness of each trunk, which alerts the one who views it how long it has been around.

S  is for sunburn; trees are sensitive too.

“Of all the tree letters, the palm is loveliest. And of writing, profuse and distinct as the burst of its fronds, it possesses the major effect: falling down.”    –Roland Barthes (“Barthes by Barthes”)

Even in its massive sturdiness. Even when a tree is accompanied by hundreds just like it in a place called forest or preserved park. Even when the strongest of humans tries to chop it down, the tree remains….even when it falls.

How? 

Listen to the alphabet of the trees; they are the best teachers out there. They are the ones who remain even when hunted or burnt.

If you lose your speech, go follow the trail of roots. They will guide you toward remaining.

which way is *here

“All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. All artists, if they are to survive, are forced, at last, to tell the whole story; to vomit the anguish up.”–James Baldwin

The reason this all feels like sick exiting body is how it feels when it comes out. Feeling is such pain. Feeling is realness. I forgot I was alive until I carved out all the salt preserving my letters. These words became my lunch and its leftovers, supper. These stories are meals. These stories keep me awake, alive and remaining.

continue on.

“Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.”
― Eleanor Roosevelt

So, you wake and want to wring your fists against door handles…find a way out through rust and bone.

So, you think you’ve reached your point as all the callouses on your skin call out stop signs and search out potholes to slither toward.

So, your tongue has numbed and your teeth have lost their ability to forgive you and who ever thinks about aging when skin still appears tight enough to trampoline on.

So, you found a grey hair in an area of your body no one was ever meant to see anyway.

So, you leave it there.

So, it reminds you you’re still around.

So, it represents the worries–the kind that no longer get you.

So, sometimes the ash between black and white or fade of color that used to be bright only means that you’ve remained one more morning.

So, you might as well continue on. This curious pattern of aging can be worn in more ways than just sad.

 

the time breath forgot itself

“If there is something to desire,
there will be something to regret.
If there is something to regret,
there will be something to recall.
If there is something to recall,
there was nothing to regret.
If there was nothing to regret,
there was nothing to desire.” 
……………………………………….Vera Pavlova.

Dear Rebel,

So much of this is about persistence. Did I tell you about the time I forgot how to breathe. I awoke on a Saturday and my chest was sore like April in mourning. I googled: steps to take when breath is forgotten. Videos and imagery emerged. Yoga poses. Lots and lots of kundalini. Some recipes for tinctures and toxin-reducers. Am I housing foreclosed energies that are tying up my lungs into suffocated pauses?

Name one thing I regret: letting that ring rust away from  my finger. Call out the first sounds I heard this morning: steam and persistence of cold. What happens when we recall: lost time. You called yourself pregnant and I told you about the time(s) I thought I was too. Last year, I miscarried my mind. This year, I may find myself giving birth to a mountain; how many stretchmarks will add themselves to my body from that push.

Rebel, in a room full of poets, I was reduced to a stereotype. In a room full of metaphors and freestyle’d verse, I was called dirty and abused. Sometimes we have no idea who sits beside us and the routes of survival.

I used to desire the wrap-a-round of somebody’s fingers into mine. I used to desire monogamy and breakfast. I used to regret my inability to close doors and keep them locked. Now I desire music and tuned colors. Now I regret not wearing sturdier boots.

Rebel, I still think about that yurt and the ways in which bodies can resemble this portable dwelling. We can airlift our bones anywhere. We can escape this cold and travel toward the moon or dig our way around it. I’ll bring the paper, percussion and manuals on how to breathe. I’m still gathering.

tell me how to live (part 2)

then, believe

notice that stains exist on coffee mugs like blots of art created from your lips and sips that never quite made it in

notice that the moon is resilient–an animal in the sky, curled up creature snoring out a radiant satellite

notice the way she carries your tears like Atlas and the whole world / your salt in her palms / an entire existence on his shoulders

notice the arrangement of scars on freckled body resembling the cuts in sky from airplane soar

notice the way your teeth bite into human interactions and the slow digestion of new friendships

notice how others smile once you do and how magnificent it feels to be noticed