paint a beige wall red

Take the plates from the box
move the table to the left
find new homes for old things
paint a beige wall red
and build a new life
upon discarded remnants
past life possessions
well worn, loved, previously used
made useful once more

Did you know that the M-space of a teenager or an adult is only 20 minutes at most?

Dear ___________,

I read something today that I would have loved to share with you, if I could ever stand to speak to you again. I always respected you as a professor and an educator. Listening to you teach, whether it was that time I stood in the hall without your knowledge or the time I sat by invitation in your class, always brought a smile to my face. So when I find myself learning something really valuable about teaching, something I know you could benefit from as an instructor, well it makes me want to call you or at the very least write you. But I can't do that. We aren't lovers anymore and we certainly aren't friends. You are someone I used to know. I don't really miss you anymore. Not since I realized that underneath that feminist visage beat the red and bleeding heart of secret misogynist. You are a man more concerned with his ego, his fear of being a cuckold (which is in my opinion the roots of misogyny), and his pride than with anything else you profess to hold dear. There is a reason you are unmarried at forty. Yes, you can form longstanding relationships with friends, even female friends, and family. But you will never be a true partner to a woman until you can let go of your fear that she may take her pussy elsewhere with or without your permission. I could have ridden through the streets like lady Godiva but I would have never strayed. You were to fear filled to respect me as a woman. And while you would have never used the word out loud, I know you called me slut in your heart. So I cannot call you to tell you that while your lectures are funny, oh yes you had a gift for humor, they are too long. If you want to get better results with the students in your class you should vary your activities every twenty minutes. Provide more opportunities for group work and meaningful expression. You should give your students a variety of ways to connect to the material. After all if the goal of teaching is to help student's learn than you can't afford to take the easy way out and simply lecture. No matter how entertaining and funny your lectures may be. Yes, its sad that we can't talk anymore as friends. I would have liked to be friends with you. But how can I ever be friends with someone who doesn't respect me? Especially, as I love and respect myself enough to know that I deserve better than a short blonde misogynist, no matter how smart or how good in bed he happens to be.

Best regards,
The Goose Girl

Reaching hell

There's got to be bottom
to this endless darkened well
because how long can I keep falling?
without ever reaching hell.

a little after four in the afternoon

smoking
I catch my father in the glass
staring back at me
with half lidded eyes

but the curls give it away
his hair is too long
cheeks too soft
I look left
and his gaze follows me

looking straight ahead
we engage in that classic contest of wills
staring each other down
we crack simultaneously blinking and looking away

Me, looking for my mother.
him, looking for I know not what.
I see her soft cheeks
and round eyes
as I lift my lids up
to greet my own

The perils of swimming

His body upon me
weight on my back
shadows in the dark.
suddenly,
the tide has me
I've swum beyond my depth.
I'm dragged out to sea
drowning
in my memory of pain.

His body upon me

I transcend time and space.

 fourteen  and tipsy on wine

impressed by a senior letterman jacket,

I don't notice the change in tide

until the water's to deep to swim.

His body upon me
my cries are swallowed by the waves.
my insides burn
I float face down
like driftwood
tossed about by the tide
discarded by the sea.

late at night

                                                                                                                    Late at night

                                                                                      you sneak into my thoughts

                                                                                like the early morning sun

                                                                              streams into my room

                                                        through the cracks in the curtains

                                                                              so carefully hung

                                                                  tucked behind the books

                                                    and that camera I never returned

                                                             I cannot shake loose the dust

                                                                                      of your memory

                                                                                          no, I am pinned

                                                                                                  like my curtains

                                                                                              shut tight against the sun

                                                                                                that creeps into my thoughts

                                                                                                                                  late at night.

Light

We appear briefly in history
if we show at all
just one brief shining moment
our light barely has time
to travel the length of our most distant star
before it has gone
extinguished
with all our hopes and dreams.
In light of this short window
I choose to shine brightly
so that my glow
will last the length of the universe
and back again.