Pen and Paper: "-"

I had a great lunch with a friend today and he reminded me that a poet need not be estranged from his pen for too long.  So, here is an older poem that will be accompanied by a new piece in the morning. 

"-"

The clock struck one and woke me up from my daze
I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and looked down at the blank page
Cursor flashing

Life as a hyphen I begin
But get lost in the space on both ends of the dash
Lost in what it means
To be anything
So wrapped up in the delusions of inclusion that lay
In the union of two words
That do not define me but confine me to an identity
Chanting and chanting

They say sticks and stone make break your bones
But words can ever hurt me
When the
Truth be
Words don’t hurt
They kill
With precision and no shame
Hurled by the mouths of the
Idiots and savants
Equally

Sticks stones bones
Breaking under the weight of a well crafted
Line
Or misused verse cast as a curse
Upon the infidel with nerve
To challenge and end the line with a question mark
-ing time with the passing of each life sacrificed
to un balanced conjunctions of
conflicting assumptions of who I am
imposed by  scribbles on a page

words don’t hurt they kill
ideas
and
dreams
slaughter peoples
and nations
when formed in minds warped by false assumptions
and presumptions
of justice and democracy
in le se faire bureaucracy that
that draw lines between
you, me, and the powers that be
that interconnect the three

Echoes: Verse 2, Jorge Luis Borges

Here is one of my favorite poems and a nice preface to my next post.  I will finish it up tonight and post it later.  I am feeling a little melancholy at the moment and don't feel like sharing the thoughts this poem invokes.  Maybe I will sleep it off.

Amorosa anticipación
Jorge Luís Borges

Ni la intimidad de tu frente clara como una fiesta
ni la costumbre de tu cuerpo, aun misterioso y tácito y de niña,
ni la sucesión de tu vida asumiendo palabras o silencios
serán favor tan misterioso
como mirar tu sueno implicado
en la vigilia de mis brazos.
Virgen milagrosamente otra vez por la virtud absolutoria del sueno,
quieta y resplandeciente como una dicha que la memoria elige,
me darás esa orilla de tu vida que tu misma no tienes.
Arrojado a quietud,
divisare esa playa ultima de tu ser
y te veré por vez primera, quizá,
como Dios ha de verte,
desbaratada la ficción del Tiempo,
sin el amor, sin mi.


----------------------------------------------
(for the non-spanish speakers)

Anticipation of Love
Jorge Luís Borges

Neither the intimacy of your look, your brow fair as a feast day,
nor the favor of your body, still mysterious, reserved, and childlike,
nor what comes to me of your life, settling in words or silence,
will be so mysterious a gift
as the sight of your sleep, enfolded
in the vigil of my arms.
Virgin again, miraculously, by the absolving power of sleep,
quiet and luminous like some happy thing recovered by memory,
you will give me that shore of your life that you yourself do not own.
Cast up into silence
I shall discern that ultimate beach of our being
and see you for the first time, perhaps,
as God must see you—
the fiction of Time destroyed,
free from love, from me.

(transl. by Robert Fitzgerald)

Surprises

Last week I went on a short vacation to visit family and old friends on the left coast.  It had been several months since last I'd seen anyone from my old stomping grounds so I was anticipating a trip full of spontaneous gatherings, excessive photos, and generally good vibes.  For the most part that is what I got.  There were a few exceptions including an awkward day with Waru (more on that later), but by my last day in Cali,  I had escaped any large scale drama and thought I was going to be able to leave with a pocket full of joy.  Enter my sister, Pandora. 

Pandora doesn't always intend to cause trouble, but as her name impies, it usually follows her whether she wants it to or not and this vacation (unfortunately) didn't end up being an exception.  BUt, I get ahead of myself.

On my last night I was planning on a nice night with the women in my family; my mom Isis, my youngest sister Confusion, Pandora, and I were all going to be home for dinner.  My brother's Blackbird and Bigger couldn't make it do to some obligations they couldn't get out of, but I'd spoken with both of them earlier that trip and it was all good.  (Look for a future post for explanations to the family's psuedonyms).  All in all, it was shaping up to be a nice farewell dinner until Pandora thought that this would be a perfect to time to invite my father Red.  

Now, one of my New Year's resolutions this year was to reconnect with one person that has drifted out of my life every month.  It could be someone I got into a fight with and never forgave, a friend who moved away that I don't get to see regularly, or that old mentor that used to inspire me that I kept meaning to write.  It seemed like a relatively simple task, but karma consulted with fate and decided to throw me a curve ball.  I didn't anticipate Red making it to this list.

My father and I have neither spoken nor seen each other in 6 years.  Pretty much the entire time I have lived on the east coast he has been nothing more than a ghost.  Ever since he and Isis got divorced when I was a little kid, he has not been actively involved in my life.  Only slipping in and out, sometimes with years in between.  In the last year or two however, he has been trying to reconnect with me and my siblings.

Personally I stopped looking for a father figure a long time ago and came to resent the notion that I should have to make room for him in my life when he felt it was important.   My mom and Pandora have both been advocates of me establishing a relationship with him, but everytime I asked them (and myself) why should I, all I got was blank stares and vague comments that he is my father and that is reason enough.

I am not sorry to say that I harbor a mix of ambivalence and anger.  The man fucked up and instead of being there for me when I really did need him, he disappeared.  I do not feel like I owe him a damn thing.  Some may say this is a selfish stance, but fuck it.  He was pretty damn selfish when he walked away from his family too.  All I am doing is serving as an agent of karma.

I still remember very vividly the last time I saw him before he went on his first hiatus.  Me and Pandora were maybe 10 and 11 years old respectively and we were waiting outside on my front porch for him to pick us up.  In those days I used to worship that man and was a daddy's boy through and through.   Bags packed two nights before, me and Pandora waited on the porch with great anticipation.

We waited all that morning, skipping breakfast because we didn't want to be running late when he showed up.

We waited into the warm afternoon and started to pick through the snacks my mom had packed for us to take over to his house.  Neither of us wanted to leave the porch in case he'd gotten lost and couldn't remember which house was ours.

We waited as the warmth of the day faded into the creeping chill of the evening.   My sister started to shiver a bit, her jacket in the house (why would we need to wear our jackets during the day), so I draped my arm around her to warm her up.  

I could hear my mother at the door looking out on us huddled on the porch steps.  I turned back to face her as she began to speak and the words dried up in her mouth.   She looked at us in silence and turned away, returning a few moments later with a blanket.

We waited until the street lights came on and my sister gave into the rumble in her stomach and went into the house to grab leftovers.

We became I and still I waited.

Little did I know that I would have to wait for years to come.  Wait for the excuse, the apology, the visit, the call, the letter.  Something, anything to explain why.

I waited for years until I forgot why I was waiting.  The image of the man everyone said I resembled began to blur around the edges and I went back into the house, to the people who loved me and didn't make me wait in the dark.

Pandora didn't mean to bring trouble in her wake and perhaps her forced encounter with Red will lead to a reconciliation in the future.  For now, he can take my place on the porch; I am already home and am done waiting for a ride to see the people I love.

Echoes: Verse 1, Rory Buchanan.

So, I have decided to officially launch a new feature on the blog that I am going to call "Echoes".  Echoes will be poetry and short story posting from friends and artist I admire and think that the rest of the world need to encounter.  I have done a few of these in the past but I want to provide the feature with a little more structure.

Here is the plan.  Once a week I am going to feature an artist.  I will give a little biographical information and post one of their works that speaks to me.  Please feel free to send me recommendations of people you think I should add to the list.

Daddy Lied
by Rory Buchanan

my daddy taught me
i must be perfect
i was weak if i cried
i had to know everything
that feelings only get in my way

my daddy told me
whie men don't like me
then he drank until I knew
he didn't like himself eiher

my daddy pushed me
to be better than everyone else
forgetting to tell me
i could set my own standards
instead of working toward theirs

my daddy talked to me
but never told me how he felt
never seemed to care what I felt
he only talked about what interested him
and told me to look the rest up in a book

my daddy showed me
that being a man meant being aloof
catering to white man dreams
raising kids that didn't understand you
until they were thirty
and then didn't want to

m daddy lied to me
but i forgive him
he lied to himself too
his daddy taught him how


Rory Buchanan is thirty-four years old and lives in Brooklyn, New York with his sixteen-year-old son.  His work has appeared in Pyramid Periodical.  He is an AIDS educator with the Minority Task Force on AIDS in New York City.

Empty Rooms

Some time ago a friend of mine wrote a short vignette and sent it my way. This is my response to it. I haven't seen her in a while, but thought I would post the vignette I wrote in response to her. It's been too long since we traded words.

Empty Rooms

I come with the night, and sow doubt in your dreams, seeds pregnant with need and desire. Buried beneath the frost bitten grave that stands in memorial of our tryst, I summon cold winds to drape your unclothed feet so they can do not but trot the numbness that engulfs me.

You are the eyes that bare witness to my folly, doomed to hold within your vision alone that which can never be graced by the hands of man or fate—the honeyed fig that holds within it the Friar’s last gift to stars that remain crossed even as they fall from Grace. The taste of temptation lingers in the vibrations of my voice even as it rings in your ear, echoing the sound born as I crash upon the shores of truth. The fine grains there to slick to retain my essence, I fall victim time and time again to the whims of Artemis as she flees the footsteps of her brother, falling into a steady rhythm poised to swallow you in my wake.

Your eyes stand closed in anticipation of half wished release, poised between hope and fear, held taunt till muscles knot and skin quivers. From the depths of the sea I call you, igniting the wicker at your core and spreading heat that makes flesh melt like the wax of a thousand candles. No longer a steady pulse of unrealized want, now the steady sizzle of hot oils licking the surface of cold steel.
I step from your shadow swabbed in crimson and spice, yet your eyes see nothing but a ghost reflected in the polished surface of the oak.

Shade I have become in the days since the stars left their home and settled in the earth wrapped in cellophane. I stood to catch them but instead was caught and bound to this state of stasis perpetuated by cold indifference. Bile settles on my tongue as I turn to you and cry but find my voice stolen, my tongue turned to stone and settled on my shoulder to torment me for my crimes. My tears in turn rusting the twisted barrier that marks the boundaries of my prison. I once slick smile following my mind out of reality into madness.

The night has become my home. The rains are my only companion in this dark dwelling between your door and your light switch. Dark laughter cascades amongst the broken remains of our once treasured heirlooms, stars that have all but lost their light. Sickly light surrounded by dark and uncertain waters that I now call home. I come to you begging for light and the keys to my prison, for all I am able to offer is soggy match and keys corroded by the passage of time. I whisper to you in the dark, but you are afraid to traverse what was once familiar territory, but has now become a death trap of broken glass, broken furniture, and the scent of stale smoke which has become the essence of my being.

With the coming dawn I settle back into the deep, slipping back beneath the waves and into the steady rhythm that marks my battle with the shore that cannot contain my essence. I bow my head in silent prayer, hoping my seeds take root like vines in the stonewalls of your heart and spread through the delicate byways of your blood, giving life to succulent roses, that will cushion your feet from the broken glass left behind from my hasty retreat, and wipe the blood from your still lips.

I loved you.

Re-dedication

Well it has been some time since last I even looked at this page. I started it after graduating college with the hopes of using it to chronicle my thoughts during the first year of me being a “real adult”. From the sporadic writing and long absence, I think it is easy to see that I wasn’t the most successful at it. But another year has come and gone and like most I have laid a laundry list of goals and self imposed trials to help me start the new decade off right. One of those resolutions was to do a better job about writing every day. Whether it be a short poem, an article, or just random rambling. I have let the job I took to pay the bills and support my artistic endeavors supercede my creative output and damn it if it isn’t about time I found a little more balance.

Now, I won’t lie and say that I will write everyday, but I am going to try and take the time to share a little more regularly. (Even if all I am doing is talking to myself).

So for now, I leave you with a poem that I think should be at the forefront of folks minds this year.

“Brothers loving brothers”
by Vega

Respect yourself, my brother,
for we are so many wondrous things.

Like a black rose,
you are a rarity to be found.
Our leaves intertwine as I reach out to you
after the release of a gentle rain.

You precious gem,
black pearl that warms the heart,
symbol of ageless wisdom,
I derive strength
from the touch of your hand.

Our lives blend together
like rays of light;
we are men of color
adorned in shades of tan, red,
beige, black, brown.

Brothers born from the same earth womb.
Brothers reaching for the same star.

Love me as your equal.
Love me, brother to brother.