shortest poem/story

black out

mourning follows

i dont think i can actually do this

I would do anything to not have the weight of three writing assignments due tomorrow (says the self-proclaimed writer). Fact of the matter is, I can't write about stuff that I don't want to write about. That isn't true. I am a ruthless procrastinator. Instead of doing anything scholastic, all I could find time to do today was : umm. ok. Yes. Today. I came home and drank some coffee because I almost fell asleep this morning on my way home. And granola, I consumed that a few times. Why not, you know? Ginkgo. Ginky. I had two visitors today. Liz : stopped by for a hot minute to say hi and that was nice. Claudia : figure of my periphery. She floats in and out of my life like some current who is constantly influenced by some other thing. She gave me a CD. We smoked a cigarette out of the back of her van. It was picturesque. I went to class. The sun shined, I swear, solely on me and I was sweating but forgot to put on deodorant this morning so I didn't want to take off my sweater. 

I came home. That was three hours ago. I have about one page of a paper done. I have three papers due tomorrow. FML. Instead of doing anything productive. I feel like I am swimming against will, like someone threw me into a pool when I said "no, I don't want to swim at all" but I have to swim otherwise I'll drown. You know? 

Dear Spring Break,

You are so close to me. Hurry the fuck up. Thanks. 

Signed, 

Susan

fuck tomorrow and fuck my attention span right now. 

OH. The reason why I decided to blog. Two funny dialogues with my parents :

St. Patrick's Day:

"Green is the color of my envy" - Susan to Dad

"Green is the color of my underpants. It's 54 degrees and the earth is greening. I'm going home now" - Dad to Susan

"God you are perfect." - Susan to Dad

About 3 minutes ago: 

[on the subject of the fact that my mom's sister is 6 years older than her and her brother is 12 years younger]

"well, this was back in the days when people wore condoms" - Linda

(knees collapse, heavy laughter) "WHAT?!" - Susan

"careful, don't knock over your glass of wine" - Linda (priorities, you know...)

"As if people don't still use condoms?" - clueless Susan

"well that was when that was the only means of contraception. when we were kids we used to go in daddy's drawer and see 12 boxes--" I cut her off

"Of unopened condom boxes?" -I say for her

"haha. Yeah pretty much" 

"Was grandpa a stallion?"

"yeah I think he was. He revealed this to me later in life" 

"oh god. I can't imagine that Gloria was all that receptive to that lifestyle..."

and so on. The subject turned somehow to douching. Really, a lot of ground was covered tonight. Linda is now baking me cookies downstairs because she feels bad for me and the scholastic landmines that hide in my path to freedom and happiness. The hedonist in me says, "hey! aint it wednesday? aint there, like, dollar drinks tonight?"

shut the fruck up, greve. focus focus focus focus focus. 

ok bye.

There isn't really anything to say today

There is always something to write about, though. Always. For example, this morning, while driving grumpy Julia to hikeschool, I turned left and saw, in my periphery, a white car motioning towards the intersection. I slammed on my breaks. And realized they were turning right. No danger. Just overreaction. Overreacting to things is one of my favorite things that humans do. Like the time that Claire fell into the Christmas tree and exclaimed "SHIT!" as if she was most certainly plummeting towards death. Or once, when I was at work at the old Target, a kid knocked one of the bulk racks containing all kinds of tissues and paper towels and such and all of a sudden boxes of Kleenex were falling one by one and he literally DOVE to catch one. Take it easy, pal...Kleenex is rather resilient towards trauma. 

I suppose its worth mentioning that the air isn't as heinous as it has been in the previous days. They say its going to get up to 35 today and 45 tomorrow. I'm sorry, what? Minnesota is the master of deception. It will be snowing until May. Yesterday I was given the brilliant idea to go and look through old Facebook messages and found some gems. It made me miss certain individuals now bound in relationships which wouldn't allow for mutual nostalgia. To be so sweet. I am seeing how good I am at biting my tongue. So far I haven't said anything all that inappropriate. I haven't even really alluded to things. Progress that came with a cost. Fucking Libra. 

Its clear I am avoiding something. I have night class tonight that I am skipping to go see Anni Rossi with some loved ones. Can't. Wait. Two shows in one week. I feel like a highschooler. I haven't looked at my syllabus for my night class once this semester. We're a month in. I'd say I'm doing pretty well for myself. I also haven't met with Cecelia about my directed study. Seems fine. Neglect is the new proactive. 

This is quite clearly pointless. 

I haven't written anything that excites me in over a week. That makes me feel a bit like a mudpuppy. 

a revision, indeed!

the desperate compromise

two like sides of a magnet

are equally drawn 

as they are repelled

invisibly pushed and pulled into

some mutual neutrality,

they will dance but they will not touch

they can't touch--but oh my god

how they can move eachother!

until one slides slightly to the side: 

the intimacy of fuck.

silhouettes on a piece of paper at a bar in chicago

A silhouette is but an 

abbreviated imitation of

a scene:

Scenery as it appears at dusk,

how trees always look 

black in winter

It isn't offensive

but rather the opposite--

what is left out is

revealed in a composition

lovely to the eye

A contrast is honest--

oxymoronic but descriptive

the way that light makes dark

dark

Only against its opposite

can we know a thing:

a deliberate exchange

Antonyms are born in pairs 

for a reason

an early collaboration (sgg&ets)

there is an overused image in art and literature

inbetween the checks of an unbalanced bank account

lies the beaten accent of an oft-trodded rug

and this image--off white against white

like a slightly told story

from a fistful of fingertips

what falls out is those palms

is not the truth but something like it

Friday + CC Club + $7 pitchers = impromptu salon (sorry liz)

[snippets]

on self-loathing:

months of a hedonistic approach to life--the religion of indulgence has taken its toll on my image, and still I drink and eat in excess. my legs and stomach are obvious scapegoats for my reckless behavior, but there is always someone who will find me beautiful. i am a walking, breathing scrapbook of decisions made. kirsten used to carve into her arms and legs the things that bothered her and i would kiss them then sometimes still bleeding : she was honest. humility is honesty in its purest form. to admit one's weakness or inadequacy in an obvious way takes years of deceit. i will oft find myself in duel between head and heart, all the while searching frantically for forgiveness from myself and others. were i made of glass these tasks would be compulsive and finished like a poem but not as perfect. perfection is the end for which there are no.reasonable.means. 

on heaviness:

so many things to be heavy about! there is the obvious--that longing which keeps the poet up at night. oh cruel love. oh love in wrong places--oh prematurity! sometimes when i am falling asleep at night my body is heavy and light at once. try telling a doctor of this paradox and you are met with looks of crazy. for some it feels like demons--that devilish weight, the angelic lift. there is hope--there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I once watched my cat die of natural causes. I saw that oppressing fear rise to her eyes. i saw the moment she recognized her mortality. but then, too, there is a moment of peace before something ceases to exist. Inbetween two storms there lives a deceptive calm that makes people untuck folded secrets: show yourself. A mistake will lend itself to a learned truth. Let's be real now, in absence of storm. Oh security of destruction! What is done will find itself irresistibly undone.

about a door, sort of

impressionable I have become

like a door that swings

in a subtle breeze

a slave to those invisible hands

those polarities on the street

and those people by chance i have met

it is as if my legs are raised

off the pavement in some

perpetual sort of neutrality

to commit to a direction

is to yield to those 

archaic notions of predestination

well what of free will, then?

it is the gentle click of a clasp locked

or the slam in those desperate times:

all things move if given a push.