There is no end of the world.

Only the wind feels like winter.

Foam fizzes and flies, sun breaks against gray clouds and blue crests, I raise my camera, and suddenly this all ceases. This becomes nothing on a tiny digital screen.

My bare hands hold steady against the wind as my hair flies in front of the flash. Flash, flash, do I even need one? The old man in the gray car holds his camera, a real camera, an artistic one. His luck will be the same as mine. The lens mutes and diminishes, except for the very talented or the very lucky.

But I focus and capture anyway. The Sound leaps, shatters, and recedes.

All is as it should be. There is no end of the world.

I step down from the cement to leave. The old man's face is in his hands.

Does he agree?

As she walks across the dark yard

and I turn on the music that reminds me of long drives for one person, I wonder how it is that two people who love each other can hurt one another so deeply.

And, yet, continue to love. Unceasingly.

Will that be me? I wonder now and then.

nervous

And what if my words were to fail me?

Bright nights and quiet noises.

And my goodness, am I really about to be twenty-one tomorrow?!

Sure, she'll tear up, but she's a fighter.

They'll pull you apart and rebuild you. But they will never break you.

I don't always like when my dreams come true.

Matchbox Twenty comes through, again.

I'd forgotten how much I liked this song or how emblematic it was until 105.1 played it today during practice. My head went up. I listened intently, waiting to hear "shit" bleeped out. Nobody else noticed.

It's sitting by the overcoat
the second shelf, the note she wrote
that I can't bring myself to throw away
and my soul reaches out for no one else but you,
cuz you won't turn away
when someone else is gone
I'm sorry 'bout the attitude
I need to give when I'm with you
but no one else would take this shit from me
and I'm so terrified of no one else but me
I'm here all the time
I won't go away
It's me, yeah I can't get myself to go away
Hey, it's me, and I can't get myself to go away
Oh, God, I shouldn't feel this way, no
Reach down your hand in your pocket
Pull out some hope for me
It's been a long day, always ain't that right
And no, Lord, your hand won't stop it
just keep you trembling
It's been a long day, always ain't that right
Well, I'm surprised that you'd believe
in any thing that comes from me
I didn't hear from you or from someone else
and you're so set in life man, a pisser they're waiting
too damn bad you get so far so fast
So what, so long...

And somehow, sexy.

whisper

There's only one question I'd really like to answer.

Eventually. Eventually.

To Build A Fire

Face down. Red burn. Eyes against the cold. Push through. Push through.

Barely an inch of snow on the ground. A ten-minute walk, and I want to run to warmth. After all, nobody is around to stand witness at 7:50am.

But I walk anyway.

How the hell'd you do it, Jack London?

LAST DAY OF CLASSES

No, really, I am that excited.

PRESSURE! ::thinks of Billy Joel::

It seems that my most "productive" writing comes
when I am forced into it, in the style of AP tests and take-home finals.
"Only spend two hours on this!"
My integrity agrees,
and in all honesty, who would want to linger over such "timed" essays?
This is not meant to be a poem. I just don't have to
fill out line after line of revelatory analysis,
or even sit at the computer any longer (and you know I will!)
and I say,
"YAY!"

No quiero Taco Bell!

After perusing the local newspaper online, I decided I wanted to see a more global perspective on the world. In an LA Spanish-language newspaper, I found....THIS.

ESTO!

I think my favorite part might be the fact that Long Island is called an "estado de Nueva York"; a state of New York.

For the record, I have never eaten Taco Bell. Clearly, that's about to change.

Hemingway, more appealing to me at the moment

"It moved up closer to him still and now he could not speak to it, and when it saw he could not speak it came a little closer, and now he tried to send it away without speaking, but it moved in on him so its weight was all upon his chest..."
-"The Snows of Kilimanjaro," Hemingway

What a relief it is to wake up,
feeling nothing but a little tired.
Even the bitter blast is all right, at least from in here.

And:

'"Love is a dunghill,' said Harry. 'And I'm the cock that gets on it to crow.'"

A step up from The Old Man and the Sea, to be sure!

under the radar

I feel less vulnerable this way. For now.

Ahhh, eff it, I've lost my train of thought for the night!

I shall post this compliment, courtesy of Rachel:

"You'll be like Jesus...Only shorter...And more agile."

el primer caido oficial de la nieve

Sometimes, as I walk down the sidewalk, I have the urge to flip.

sincerity

So many eyes, and when it mattered, I didn't let the glow of their gaze melt me.

I thought I would. They would smile at me, for certain. But behind those smiles I sensed the question: Why are you here? The lean forward, eyes narrowed, hand on the chin stance. Hmm.

I am not hmm, the uncertain nonword. I am not yet who I will be, but that day I stretched my arms and let you see the current draft in progress. There are words. There are scribbles, there are scratches, there are stains, and there are words.

And as I moved away, yet ever before your view, I forgot you were watching. You smiled, in the end, sincerely, because I was and few others were.

I land. The affirmative punctuation.

This is only the beginning.

we write when

other stories become too boring.

balmy december first

My umbrella's long since blown inside out, and as I watch other girls hurry past, hoods huddled to their hair, I let the rain hit and slick and frizz my hair as much as it wishes.