1
I know naught for which sin
The clock imposes revenge
Only that with each sterile beat
It draws, closer, my departure
2
Now that my flesh
Has assumed caricature
I have come to know
How infinite and precious
Life is
For I cannot imagine
A moment before my birth
Anymore than I can imagine
Extinction
3
The ego claims athanasia
For it cannot conceive
A more sovereign existence
And indeed how can “I”
Claim to be anything
But alive?
=
I am so exhausted, forgive my mad ramblings lol
“What do you do for a living” There is no question more hurtful, more aggressively intimate, more tedious than this one. Personally, I would rather discuss my bowel movements and have often thought of hitting them off at the pass with some of my own bizarre questions. I do not have job. In Sweden to say you are unemployed is unforgivable. The revulsion is always apparent and it lowers your social standing dramatically.
*
There is no dodging or dropping this question as an answer of unemployed demands a detailed explanation. “Stay at home mom.” Is not a valid answer unless your child is an infant. In any case they would immediately follow it up with “What did you do before?” “What job will you be seeking when you get off your lazy arse and return to work?” Swedish people do not generally work part-time and thus do not regard those with part-time employment in a very favorable light. In the future I hope to get a part-time job. Full-time employment is just not viable unless I can find an effective treatment. This question will no doubt plague me until I am in my 60s.
*
There is really nothing worse than explaining to a complete stranger that you are disabled and how that disability effects every facet of your everyday life. It is much too personal for a first time conversation. I have considered answering I am a writer but I imagine that they will want a recitation of my work, which my horrific memory prevents. Or better still “But what is your real job?” I doubt writer would fly in an extremely efficient, practical country. The only Swedish books I have seen are detective novels (and terrifying children stories) and if you have ever seen Swedish television it is hard to imagine poetry would even be considered a legitimate form of writing.
*
Another question I get asked frequently “Why do you only have one child?” Apparently I am single-handedly responsible for the population. I should answer because my vagina is not a clown car but alas once again I must explain that I have Epilepsy and with each pregnancy my condition worsens. “I do not want another child” is not optional and is considered selfish because any responsible parent should be generating children for the first child’s amusement. Babies are not toys!!! I do not work, how will I afford all these babies if I did have them? How will I care for them properly if in the process of having them I am further disabled?
Photograph By: Stephanie Bracciano
I am the white knight
The only cell
In abandon
On a deconstructed shore
I collect birds and shells
Impossible are the dreams
That melancholy ignites
*
If a monster still
Tell me
What is the price of salt?
To be pure
As before birth
On the cusp
Of a torrential heaven
My eyes
As silk-wrapped wings
Falter
Shadowy legs
Crowding the periphery
A day of dreams
Tended but unmet
*
To sleep
As if empty
Flesh yielding
Bones malleable
As red earth
*
To sleep
As if consumed
Deliquescing
Into docile sheets
There exists
No greater impetus
Than to return
Unfinished
To the night
=
I am exhausted. Isadora had a great time yesterday, the kids were happy. There wasn’t much socializing between the adults, however. Isadora is on fall break now so she is home this week. I wonder if I can convince her to the let me sleep?
Genetic retribution. My mother’s most oft expressed wish was that I would have a child exactly like myself. She was clearly out for revenge. Then as now, I am inexplicable. I am also stubborn and not in the endearing way. I had a daughter and she is a lot like me. Had I a better childhood we might be even more indistinguishable then we are now. Our moods match up. We are always ravenously hungry. She is unbelievably unmanageably stubborn. She is also extraordinarily empathic and social which I might have been had I not been raised by mentally ill parents. Like me she has great balance but horrific coordination (my arms still go up after the ball has been thrown). Like me she can hyper-focus on a task. I have a 5 year old (almost 6) that can sit for four strait hours drawing. It is a little frightening when you see someone that young with that kind of obsessive interest. As a teenager I did not do drugs, have sex (until I was 18 with Sam), drink, sneak out, or any of the standard rebellious behaviors. In that respect I hope to God she is like me. I hope her stubbornness allows her to stand up to peer pressure just as mine did. She is not a perfect mirror as I said she is charismatic and girly. I was a tomboy. There is no way my little princess would stand around holding frogs and snakes as I happily did.
*
Today we celebrate her birthday (which is technically Wednesday). I am hoping that her classmates will show. I haven’t had any social interaction with the other parents in fact I wouldn’t even recognize them if they stood in front of me. I have only interacted with one of the dads. He has already confirmed that his son will be there but the others are a mystery. I grant you that I am anti social but in this case it is a matter of timing. I don’t work so I pick Isadora up early, while the other children stay longer in the after school program. In the mornings I never seem to arrive at the same time as the others except sometimes that one dad. The one parent I do know is sending his son with grandparents so I will be hanging out with strangers. Strangers who quite possibly don’t know English because her classmates are recent immigrants except one. So I imagine everyone is feeling nervous, except Isadora who has been begging me all morning to leave. She is dressed up as Rapunzel, Sam ordered her several princess costumes but this is the only one we’ve given her so far. She has been prancing around all morning, admiring herself in the mirror. Another way in which we are different as I hated were awkward and uncomfortable clothes. I still do which is why I can never seem to get out of my exercise clothes. Which is why I will attend the party in said exercise clothes so I do not focus so much on my clothes that I forget to talk out loud to others.
I invited
Their estranged silhouettes
Into the innermost chambers
Of my adolescent heart
Blackguards, lunatics, poets
I sought derangement
And in Buddhism
An equivalent peace
*
The more personas
I could endow
The sooner
I believed I’d find
The immutable spirit
Straining underneath
*
The deeper
My compassion
The more potent my words
I gathered stories
In the hopes
That one day
I could interpret
My own
2 interesting TED Talks I watched
and
My mind braves
The consequence
Of a ceaseless appeal
Who am I?
And for what purpose
Do I linger
In this perilous domicile?
My humanity hurts
The media has not
Desensitized me
I still feel
Every moment
As if in a chronic state
Of emergency
Yesterday I had an appointment with my soon-to-be former therapist. I understand completely the rationale behind her decision but I liked her. I find it difficult to open up emotionally in artificial situations. I find it difficult to open up to a person that I will never, in any profound way, know. I find it difficult to open up in general. My emotional experience of the world is tempestuous. My mind is in the process of creating a universe. Formless energy, implosions, explosions, death, rebirth, CHAOS, darkness, illumination. How do you feel? Is a complicated question. Often I have no idea how I feel until I begin to write. Writing is my way of embodying the unseen.
*
Human interactions for me result invariably in a deep unshakeable sense of humiliation. I took a monumental first step in discussing my childhood with her and the thought of repeating the experience is a bitter pill indeed. I dislike speaking of my everyday life as well hence my diary being more an exercise in abstraction. There is not a good deal to be said on the subject as I function via a schedule. If I’ve gone to see a movie I don’t really bother with details or plot lines. Did it make me think? Did it make me feel something? Never ask me what a movie was about you will end up with a very strange and nonsensical response. For me a movie very well could be described as venous or carbonated 😛 I once described a movie by describing a leaf. I can watch the same movie countless times and see each time something entirely different. So I do not mind repetition. That said I have quite a difficult time personifying myself. I perceive mostly everything, myself included, energetically, organically. I am entropy (not in the purely destructive sense of course). I have to have the same conversations with myself over and over again in order to make them cohesive and concrete enough to relate.
In my daughter’s class there are two children (a brother and sister, M and A for the sake of anonymity) who are struggling emotionally with their parent’s divorce. Sometimes they lash out at the other children, not physically but verbally. Isadora has occasionally been on the receiving end. I’ve taught her to stand up for herself. If someone says something hurtful she needs to let them know that it’s not acceptable. I remind her that she is smart, beautiful, and important everyday and that she deserves to be treated with kindness. I’ve taught her not to physically or verbally lash out at others but to express her emotions in her normal speaking voice. So far so good, so far she hasn’t bullied any of her classmates. Fingers crossed that she never does. Both Sam and I have tried to explain the situation of the divorce to her and how the pain of the divorce is effecting M and A’s behavior. A few days ago Isadora overheard A talking to the teacher. Sadly A is blaming herself for the divorce =( Both Sam and I explained that the divorce is in no way the fault of the two children, that it’s a compatibility issue between their parents. At five I don’t think she fully grasps the situation but she has, nevertheless, chosen to follow my advice.
*
I have encouraged Isadora to play with M and A and to treat them kindly. If they call her names then she needs to let them know how she feels about it and that it is not okay. She knows to tell the teacher right away if someone would physically assault her. Isadora’s birthday is this weekend and we’ve invited all of her classmates. She handed out the invitations herself and despite the bullying she gave M and A their invitations as well. Not long ago another kid in her class had a birthday party, which Isadora attended, and his parents did not invite the troubled siblings. I noticed that some of the parents are teaching their kids to avoid the situation entirely. I keep thinking of those poor children being isolated at school and how in time that sense of rejection and the conviction that they are bad could escalate into more serious behavioral problems. I have been teaching Isadora not to exclude. At the birthday party she attended last weekend Isadora chose to play with a little girl who was sad and isolated. The little girl was just over the moon to have made a friend. I was so proud of Isadora for taking the initiative on her own to include everyone. Yesterday Isadora came home and said she played with A and they had a great time together. I’ve chosen a path in direct opposition of all the other parents. If the children were older and dangerous I don’t know how I would respond but they are only in kindergarten! I want school to be a happy and safe place for all children not just my daughter. Is it irresponsible to encourage my five year old to play with bullies?
*
(Encase you are wondering when they do bully her she speaks up about it right away, so she does have the courage to say no)
My heart echoes
The thunder
Of an evanescent parting
The sky
In sympathy weeps
Though I am
Infinitesimal
In Empyreal design
I find my querulous eyes
Cast in every variance
That great psionic mirror
Omniscient
Commiserates mercifully
For I could not
In your absence
Bare the vanity
Of a divergent sun
=
Sam is away on business he will only be a few hours delayed but I miss him just the same lol
Curious Flowers 