Curlyqued Tongue
April 29th, 2008
Suwadeekaaaa..
the bell clanged against spotless glass door
before the eye reached the salad bar
The girl at the registered sung hello
I had nothing but sandwiches for the week
her really brown skin, wide native cheekbones
Mongolian thick lips that no matter what she wore
she always had gold crown and silk trail–
princess and history keeper of a land I visited.
Energy
Sounds are like songs when spoken
a guiding set chosen by a community
signature accents, drags and intonations
chisels a country’s id
Pride
Say nothing and listen for abnormalities:
the hesitating “yes, but…so, ummmm”
is a stumbling Jesus walking out the door
every culture has a mid-thought meaningless word
Discipline
Listen again, this time to inner reaction
What’s consider beautiful or a gray line taboo?
Are you walking into line or waltzing hello?
When do shoulders catch the sun or hide in orange pashas?
Conservation
After hello, please and thank you,
the first word you learn to say is shaped by geography
the first sound is always ‘ma’
Imagine if water was your first word…
Language,
little mirrors of perfect imperfection
sound bites of who we are
and who we want to be
a sea we perpetually sail,
on turbulent tides and glassy white beaches
we’ll never reach.
One of my favorite photos from the Thailand set. Yes, I did take this photo! Yes, it has been months since my Thailand trip, but I was really missing having an elephant as a mode of transportation and having fresh coconut, papaya, pineapple and mango for breakfast.
add to del.icio.usPleated Geography
April 13th, 2008
I love the way the elders walk,
telling you their story
this one with a concave arch
bowing back
arms like a ballerina’s balanced en pointe
carrying baby,
or satchel filled of harvest fruit,
or just hands cupping air…pondering–
chastising running youth–
holding up community.
That one,
moves hips and shoulders parallelly
chest plate up and forward
hip bones make a figure eight walking
climbing stairs slowly, upright tension
little puffing sounds
with no barriers to explain
days before roads or osteoporotic pains
The last is spit fire:
tan brazen wrinkles matching yellow acid-eaten teeth,
pristine visor, gloves and climbing gear,
looking onto streets and garden rows
as his pick stabs trash and aerates cabbages
that the school buys.
He’s fire that opens pollen pods,
fire that burns excess,
nurturing seeds to grow.
Like geographical transformations,
skin wraps political and natural history:
this joint was the famine
that one was the flood
these were from migration, one mountain to the next,
They tell the story of the place they watch over
walk, clean and nurture,
living the word…community.
add to del.icio.us Rotten Meat
January 7th, 2008
She wanted so very much to please me, to show me she loved me. The food was hot on the table. The smell of garlic, onion and cumin was like incense. The fried dough was fresh, yellow with white speckles, sweet, and soft with lard. The smells were like a court of people twirling silk petty coats of laughter lingering in each centimeter of the room. Nothing could be wrong with the moment and I ate heartedly.
2 hours later I’m looking at the back-side of a hedge
bathing roots in a metallic bitter green substance
I’m trying hard not to let it trickle through my nose
a massive wave is kicking it’s way out
My head hurts
Chunks on the floor
Skin wanting to jump out of my body
A fever with icy hands and a burning esophagus
–It was green, how did you not know?–
Rotten meat,
trying so hard to please me
when the truth would have been easier
I’m sitting in the car,
Eleven o’clock end to a nice date
he tells me he’s married
–I thought you knew when I told you I had children–
Rotten meat smells so good when all the right things are added
–It’s complicated.–
Rotten meat lies so well when under duress
Rotten meat still makes me hurl.
The Pyramids at Midnight
January 1st, 2008
In transit, on the mid night train
with all the derelicts sober enough to beat last call.
The cars are full of soju induced erythemic faces
taunting the -10 winter malady
I’m looking around smiling–
at the polka dot brown socks with hot pink tennis lace
making eye contact with the only Asian who traded his long slick hair
for frizzy short spurs of electricity painfully hot ironed into style,
the arguing old folks with Cuban hats and gold watches
sucking his front teeth back in through a heated debate,
ignored by the open mouth drooling college guy
passed out and clutching on to his Gucci purse
while the 50 year old lady laughs at 18 year old drunk intrepidity
wrapping arm and professing, “I love you!”
It’s 13 till 12, on new years 2007
and somehow I’m expecting a streaker or an accidental Led Zep cut
blared on public speakers at the end of the line
List of my new year’s eve:
nails are done, hair is straightened
first time I fit into single digit sizes
cracking my neck into action,
plans for Angkor Wat are becoming a back room brawl
contest of wills and stare downs
back at home at the stroke of midnight
…it doesn’t match my necklace,
hmm, nice to hear my words,
contemplating diamonds and stories,
Waiting for “Ken” in a big white horse
is like an atheist telling the story of Jesus,
so now I logically weigh the Great Barrier Reef
against my girly whims:
The worst thing about writing your own story,
is that the only point of reference is you.
The best thing about writing your own story,
is that the possibilities endless,
the world boundless,
and your audience infinitely unique
Replacing Mantras
December 28th, 2007
The sign reads out to lunch, but there’s an x on lunch,
dinner on top of the word, but there’s a x on top of that,
breakkk… trails down and off,
finally, on whatever space it can steal and cozy up,
it reads: “Be back when I’m back.”
The concave tint of the taxi window doubles neon city lights
in 35 degree angles with a point of intersection somewhere in space
following the side door parallelly with an arc cosine equation
Intersections aren’t always clear, static, or rhythmically predictable,
mine keeps moving forward like the roll of a black and white film,
goofy little kiss made with mathematical intentions.
Logos was duct taped and thrown in the back trunk,
so nothing speaks–there’s no point to speech
Following hundreds of details in the duplex horizon with eyes wide open
where pictures are hieroglyphs slurped into interpretation:
I had forgotten what it was like to be an immigrant.
Predictability is easily translated:
where are you from and how long you been here?
Four months…four months and a world has changed
I know that I haven’t written but in my mind
the richness of the scene feels like my play:
i’m a writer, writing the script of my life,
while all the characters dance in their own free will
like the kiss’ complicated foundation following swiftly right beside me
Tonight the scene is New Years,
the phone is off, the email is shut, I’m where I’ve always been
and never realized how much I enjoyed it
When they ask my grandma where am at and what I’m doing,
She says, “It’s Claudia, she’s doing what she’s always done best:
working and studying…(stops)
you are planning to settle down sometime in the future, right?” (chuckles)
Every dating profile has been shut off
And today God sounds like the air paragliding down,
The skeletal of my year is planned,
The goals are posted and hashed,
Midnight is a three mile run and train, prayer and writing,
Time for really great beginnings.
Hospitalization
December 13th, 2007
She’s never quiet when anything is terrible but she takes true sadness when she can’t comfort pain. Going from EM nurse to project manager and hacker around the world, she’s lived her life to the fullest. Her bright green eyes, she says are German, against her African brown hair, look so beautiful. Today, she is dictating my exercise routine and I sit quietly and listen. Tomorrow, she will have 7 pound tumor taken from inside her viscera in a 5 hour surgery. One of many in the year to come. Sometimes, I feel like I came half way across the world to hold this woman’s hand. She reads my thoughts and says, “Because you needed a mother. No one knows what life has in stored for us.” Today is the celebration of La Virgen de Guadalupe and I miss hearing the taclas of the dried calabashes in church halls. The entry in my diary is short:
I’m wrapping my words around a wound that hasn’t bled yet
Dripping the rags like prayers to reach you
Hoping to be like marmalade yellow on lemon:
there even when you can’t see me
Far from here, my two friends have/are visited/visiting the operating table. I rely on textbook knowledge to ease popping static emotions on telephone –It’s just a body. It can heal. We’re just Lego parts on operating table. I just want you to think about how happy you’ll be afterwards.
Sometimes, living far away feels like wrapping a tree
Each revolution an onhmed color
and the smell of burnt camphor that I lay on the Virgin’s feet
Exhaled in each breath
fractally sculpting this pacific blue that will
travel the world and darkness to be there,
hoping so very much to be there,
like the single tree wrapped in rags in this sunset room…
Breathing and glorifying God,
Saying, “Everything will be okay,” in the mantra of your name.
“If there’s trouble, sometimes all us freaks have is each other.” –Abe, Hellboy add to del.icio.us