The Elusive Oft-Promised Silver Lining

My friends, I am a really terrible blogger.

Part of this is because I haven't written anything recently that I'm terribly keen on sharing, but it's mostly because I keep forgetting this thing exists. However, there is a silver lining!

I GOT INTO GRADUATE SCHOOL AND IN THE FALL I WILL BE ATTENDING MILLS COLLEGE IN OAKLAND, CA FOR THE MFA IN CREATIVE WRITING PROGRAM WITH A FOCUS IN POETRY!!!

(For those of you reading this and wondering, "were all-caps really necessary there?" the answer is yes.)

There is also another silver lining, and it is that I'm working, albeit very slowly, on some things that I will eventually post here. It's odd, and slightly worrisome, because here I am accepted into a poetry program and all of the things I've been writing recently have been some form of prose. I think poetry doesn't usually work, at least not for me, if I sit down and say "I'm going to write a poem now!" I just have to let it happen to me. Prose seems to be easier to make happen. I am a little worried that I'm going to get to Mills and not be able to write any decent poetry, but I suppose there'll be plenty of faculty around to force it out of me if need be.

Since my last post (in early February...seriously, I'm terrible), I started co-facilitating a writing workshop for incarcerated women at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation jail. I LOVE it. This work is, without a doubt, what I want to do with my life. I'm interested in editorial work as well, particularly assembling and editing anthologies,* but facilitating? It's my favorite thing ever. Every week I leave the jail and fall in love with these women's voices all over again. Not all of them are great writers, but does it really matter? They're enjoying themselves, getting something out of what they're doing, and letting their voices be heard. What more could I want?

*When I first started working with Voices from Inside, the organization that does these workshops, I began in an editing capacity because I hadn't yet been trained as a facilitator. I compiled, edited, and assembled an anthology of work by women in western Massachusetts jail writing groups from 2005-2010. I also wrote the "from the editor" section, and my name is right there in the front of the book! It's REALLY cool, guys. I am super proud of it - of myself, the other people involved in making it happen, and most of all, of the women whose work is showcased in it. I haven't met them all, but I can assure you they are amazing, incredible, talented, beautiful women whose words are valuable contributions to the world.

If you're interested, the book will soon be available here, and in the meantime, you can email Robin, director of Voices from Inside, at rrglenn@earthlink.net. Books are $17 each. (It's worth it.)

Eyes Closed, Heart Open

I found myself in a strange frame of mind - kind of sad, but also brimming with things to say; effusive but silent. As I sat in my room trying to decide what to do next, I suddenly realized my brain - and my heart - were trying to tell me to write! I have a few ideas for more extensive projects I want to start working on, but at this moment I just wanted to get down on the page what was swirling around in my brain. So I decided to try an experiment. I opened my notebook, positioned my pen at the top of the paper...and closed my eyes. Yes, I wrote with my eyes closed. It's weird, but I find that it really helps eliminate some of that inner critic who cringes when she sees the words I've just written.

I'm not saying that what I wrote with my eyes closed - what I'm about to post here - is good writing. [Requisite apron-wringing ahead] I feel it's kind of melodramatic and, for lack of a better word, emo, dangerously similar to what I was writing in high school. But it's what was in my mind, what was in my heart, and now it's what's on the page. I didn't change anything; nothing got erased or crossed out or edited. My eyes were closed, but my heart was open.

I am someone who feels intensely, and while that's a good thing because it makes me a better friend, it makes me hurt, too. I feel pain for everyone who's hurting, everyone who's aching. I feel the pain of all who are crying, all who are sick and heartbroken. I even feel the pain of those who aren't hurting anymore but once were. I cry their tears as well as my own. Their ruminations become mine and despite how desperately I try to keep them all safe, I can never hold onto them tight enough to make all our pain go away.

I am the color red: intense, fiery, and passionate. I am fire and water mixed into one decanter and swirled until the oceans burn and the beaches turn to ash.

I am everything; I am everyone. And yet inside I am as empty as I am full and brimming.

Inside me is a burning, churning sea of tears, where a thousand souls tread water, clinging to each other with all we are, hoping we'll stay afloat for one more day.

Visions of the Future

My friends, I am a terrible blogger. Didn't I just promise you all I'd be better about updating? And yet here it is, the end of January and I think I've posted twice this month. Not only that, but I'm bad about reading other people's blogs. It's ridiculous, really. As a writer, I should be jumping on every available opportunity to read others' writing and to share my own. There's probably a deep, significant, all-encompassing Psychological Reason as to why I'm so lax about this - I'm finding more and more recently that there seems to be one for everything - but that's a story for another time. I am, however, in the process of thinking out a piece about one of said Psychological Reasons, so with any luck, that'll be up here soon.


In the meantime, here's the end of my thesis.


Rejected

I don’t know about Kara’s graduation party until two days after it happens when I read about it in Kate’s internet journal.
“I don’t know why I didn’t invite you,” she tells me.
“I meant to. I thought I did.”
I’m glad I’m so memorable.

Really, I should be used to this by now,
but even so, the sting isn’t entirely gone.
I’m tired of always being the one
not invited, the one everyone forgets to call.

 Eventually I just give up.
It’s easier that way, or at least it should be,
but no matter how many times I tell myself
my hopes aren’t up anymore,
they’re still up, just a little bit.

“Hello?” I ask into the phone for the fourth time this afternoon
and try not to sound too disappointed
as I take another message for my mother.

The Two Times I’ve Been Beautiful

The first time, my mother:
“You need to be careful because
you’re a beautiful girl
and there are scary people out there.”

The second time, Steve, my neighbor
who walks his cat on a leash,
drinks beer at ten in the morning,
and is one of the Scary People Out There:
“You’re a very beautiful woman,”
probably looking down my tank top
as I pet his cat.

These are the Lines I Read Between

Everything always starts out innocently,
with the best of intentions, then escalates
into something only vaguely recognizable.

The cat’s face was so sweet, his purr so soft
I had to pet him.
His favorite place to sleep during the day
is the exact middle of my parents’ big bed.

Next to the bed, on both sides, are white nightstands
with drawers. I’ve seen inside them before.
My father’s drawers are boring: an old alarm clock, a pair of socks, extra pens.

I don’t remember what’s in my mother’s drawers
so I open one and find a notebook.
I know I shouldn’t…

Cat long forgotten, I know I shouldn’t
and do anyway.
It’s a rare glimpse into my mother,
a woman I realize I don’t entirely know.

I enjoyed the time Anna was at camp.

Maybe I don’t want to know her.

I could let my days be solely dictated
by what I wanted…

The words on the page before me tremble
and I don’t know if it’s my hands shaking
or my vision tunneling with tears at-the-ready.
Now I’ve started, there’s no going back.

…It was a vacation from the usual routine,
and I liked it a lot. 

I could stop here.
I should stop here.

Now that she is home
it’s hard to watch her old habits…
She looks like she put on weight at camp.

I feel heavy now.
There’s something weighing down my heart
and settling deep, deep inside.

Before she left she was going to the gym
and seeming to moderate her eating.
It took her almost a week
to work out again after her return…

I could stop here.I should. For my own sake I should stop here.

…and she appears to be back
to her old dietary ways.
I had gotten to a point
of being able to dissociate from that
and not be troubled, but right now
I’m back to being made tense and uneasy by it.

All of the words I keep in my head
are gone, replaced by a white hazy heat
that at once numbs and hurts
like no pain I’ve ever known.

Somehow I’m back in my room,
though I have no memory of walking there,
my mother’s notebook tucked safely away
exactly the way I found it.
The cat is on my bed now,
face sweet and purr soft.

My mother is more of a stranger
than she was an hour ago.
I’m not proud. I’m not innocent.
I know I’m not innocent.

Neither is she.

Depression: A Practical Definition

It requires far too much effort
to rise from bed and walk downstairs
to eat. Nothing tastes good anyway.
My whole body protests my existence.
There is an arrhythmic pounding in my head
and bricks tied to every one of my limbs.
My wrist cries out for a blade
as if it’s empty and boneless without it.
Singing, writing, reading…I fail to see a point.
I fail to see anything at all,
blinded to everything the world has to offer.
There isn’t anything to see.
It’s easier this way, lying in bed,
surviving, but failing to live.

Rejected: Same Feeling, Different Arena

There is no good reason why
I never made it into my high school’s a cappella group,
and if there is, no one has ever explained it to me.

I deserve it. I’m really good
which I have always known but have never said
because I don’t want to be a snob.

It’s easy to forget that I’m really good
when nobody cares I can sing
or even notices I’m around.
There must be something wrong with me.
I am defective somehow.

When my friend looks me in the eye and says
“Susan is the best singer in the whole school,”
I think maybe being a snob wouldn’t have been so bad.     

Mazel Tov

At seventeen I realize
I am a fraud.
Based on the belief that
Children should celebrate
In the winter,
My family has
Loosely observed Hanukkah
For the past thirteen years.

For the past thirteen years,
I’ve lit candles –
Blessed them in a language
I don’t speak –
Given (but mostly received)
More presents than I can remember,
Eaten so many potato pancakes
I don’t need to look at a recipe
To make them from scratch.

I’ve gotten angry
On someone’s behalf
Because in store windows
There are no blue and white
Pictures of menorahs and dreidels
But we’re blinded
By Christmas lights and
Rudolph’s glowing schnoz.

I’m Jewish by association.
My father had a bar mitzvah,
My mother’s parents were
Raised observant, but in our house
We don’t talk about G-d
Or temple
Or blessings on our heads.

I have been in a synagogue
Exactly four times.
I don’t even know all the holidays –
I just know Hanukkah
Is actually the least important
Because Yom Kippur and
Rosh Hashanah
Are the High Holy Days.
(Someone once wished me
A happy New Year in September.
I smiled and walked away.)

In seventh grade social studies
We learned about
Religions of the world,
Creation stories,
And how maybe
G-d created us all
While in science we learned about
The Big Bang,
The Origin of Species,
And evolution.
Believing in science
Made so much sense
I laughed at how
Clear-headed I’d become.

I believe in science,
But also in the Hebrews
Escaping their slavery,
In the Maccabees
Burning oil for eight whole nights,
In a people’s strength
To triumph over adversity,
In Holocaust survivors,
In love,
In kindness,
In peace.
I don’t need presents to know that.

Mazel Tov.
My mitzvah is now.

How I Spend My Lunch Breaks

I wrote a poem today. On a napkin. I wrote a napkin poem. Didn't I tell you?

In all honesty, I'd been meaning to write this since New Year's Day, and unfortunately, the feelings I was trying to evoke weren't as strong as they were at the time. I don't know quite how I feel about this poem. A problem I've been encountering in my poetry is trying to write not about myself, not from my own point of view, while still keeping the same emotional rawness that's in my "confessional" poetry. What do you think? Did I achieve that?

The poem doesn't have a title yet.

New Year's Day and the puddles on the sidewalks
used to be piles of white snow
that fell last week.

All the stores are closed while their owners
celebrate the new year that settles over them
like a hazy new sun;
doorknobs refuse to turn under my clumsy, gloved hands.
The streets still look the same.

Next to the cardboard box too small
to house the man sitting in front of it
a pile of confetti sports a slushy boot print,
a requiem for a moment of giddy joy
we are too hungover to remember.

Attack of the Vengeful Sinuses!

My sinuses hate me. This is the only logical explanation I can think of as to why I have had this stupid, clingy cold for five days now, complete with a cough and crazy sinus symptoms. It's not even a sinus infection. It's just...Hostile Sinus Syndrome. If that's not a real name for a disease, it totally should be.


Anyway, what better thing to do when I'm sitting here in my sweats surrounded by tissues than post more of my thesis? ...Don't answer that.

My Heart in Armor

The black lipstick was an accident.

It was Chloë’s Halloween costume –

looked better on me –

and I bought my own.

Between baggy black pants and

a black Care Bears shirt

I’d never looked better.

I am a Goth, though shamefully inept.

I prefer Italian arias to Metallica,

chocolate chip cookies to marijuana,

leggy blonde women to grungy heavy-metal men.

The eye shadow takes ten minutes to put on perfectly,

the lipstick another two.

Fifteen minutes devoted to untangling necklaces,

clasping them behind my neck,

fastening safety pins to available surfaces,

picking out the perfect earrings…

I’m late for school most mornings.

This is how I’m beautiful.

The black lipstick was an accident,

but once it was on me

everything fit into place.

Now, without it, I’m naked;

people say I look tired and

ask if I’m feeling all right.

Black is the color of sad hearts.

Without my armor,

my being floats unanchored,

so I hide inside it,

both amused and offended when

my therapist tells me about the woman

who saw me in the waiting room,

convinced I do drugs –

I don’t –

and constantly cut myself –

I wouldn’t call it constant.

I look good in black.

The black lipstick was an accident.

Everything else was on purpose

because

this is how I’m beautiful...

Dear Emily

(Written in a journal on April 17, 2003)

I want you so badly.

If you were mine I’d love you always.

I would never let you down.

I want to feel your warm breath on my face as I fall asleep

I want to come home to you every day and lie in your arms into the late hours of the morning.

Be mine and you will never need to be lonely ever again.

Be mine and I will be yours to love until the day I die.

Love me and I will never need to be sad in the entirety of the remainder of my life.

Love me and our lives will never need another reason.

Decisions

Today, in a moment of clarity so extreme it’s almost blinding, I am absolutely positive I am a lesbian.

It’s barely eight A.M. and I have never been more alert.

I blinked. Then I saw it. Me.

It was that simple.

Sweet Sixteen

Too early on a cold morning we pull into the high school parking lot.

I get out on the passenger’s side because I didn’t get my learner’s permit today like I’m supposed to want to.

EmJay21275: Why has your week been bad? It’s your birthday!

Fourth period looms in the distance – math, and I have a test.

There’s a cement mixer in my head and the concrete has hardened in my nose.

I’ve had a cold for four days now.

EmJay21275: What do you have third period?

CryingFaerie22: Chemistry, why?

EmJay21275: I have to go.

I don’t get to leave school until late tonight.

I have play rehearsal again and it’s parents’ night. Rehearsal ends at nine and I’ll wait in the library with my homework for my parents to finish meeting my teachers because they couldn’t do it another time when I’ll already have been sixteen for a little while.

EmJay21275: Cheer up because it’s your day, not anyone else’s!

Something feels different as I leave chemistry class.

For some reason the air around me tingles with promise even though I have a headache and I can’t breathe through my nose.

I see her feet first and her smile next:

Emily.

My love, my dreams, my undoing.

She leans against the hall of lockers like she’s meant to be there all along, holding a plate of brownies and a homemade card.

“Happy birthday,” she says, and I forget to see anything else as she hands me the plate and hugs me.

I think I turn sixteen today. It’s not really important.

The brownies are sweet, but Emily is sweeter. Our late-night internet conversation replays in my head over and over and I know immediately

I’ll never forget it.

I wonder when the last time was that she made brownies and a card for her boyfriend.

Suddenly I’m twenty feet tall. I could be sixteen. I could be thirty. It doesn’t matter.

On top of the card, on top of the brownies is one candy heart. It’s yellow.

“Smile,” it says.

I think I will.

Bloodletting

Fists clenched, I know there is no other choice

than to drag a thumbtack across my wrist

as hard as I possibly can. There’s no blood,

and I am both disappointed and relieved.

I hide the thumbtack under the table and

try to keep listening to my biology lesson.

That first time I did not learn my lesson

and stop hurting myself. I make a choice

that seems perfect each time, the only answer, and

yet each time I cut my stomach, my wrist,

or my leg, I cry and am never relieved.

Still, I am fascinated as I watch my blood

and my pain surface on my skin. Blood

tastes like pennies and something sweet, a lesson

learned over time. I am always relieved

when the bleeding stops. I make this choice

sometimes, when I’m sad and alone – I cut my wrist

but never want to die. Still, I crave the release, and

one time I scratch kiss marks on my arm – XXX – and

then I get scared and wear long sleeves to hide the blood.

I lie to the school nurse, get caught, and my wrist

heals slowly. Everyone sees. I learn my lesson.

Still, those kiss marks are the only choice.

Overwhelmed by the world, at once I am relieved:

Scissors in hand, terrified and angry give way to relieved.

At once I stand up, toss my homework aside, and

make what seems to be the only logical choice.

I press hard on my arm and draw blood

the smell of metal. I forget the lesson

I’m supposed to read for homework. My wrist

is more important. I stare at my wrist

scared, nauseated, excited, and relieved.

I promise myself this time I’ll learn my lesson

because I can’t keep doing this. It’s wrong and

I’ll just keep hurting no matter how much blood

I draw. Deep down I always know it’s the wrong choice.

I put antiseptic on my wrist and

am relieved to see that some blood

remains: a harsh reminder; my lesson...my choice.

Reading Between the Lines

From the back seat of the car:

“Dad, can you hand me the flashlight

from the glove compartment?

I can’t see the mirror to fix my makeup.”

Before he can, my mother:

“You had time in the house to fix your makeup.”

I just thought of it now.

I wonder:

“What difference does it make?”

(“Thanks, Dad.”)

He gives me the flashlight; my mother is not pleased:

“Now, it’s an inconvenience.”

My hand still on my eyelid, thinking:

Mom…am I an inconvenience?

Disappearing Act

Many, many apologies for taking nearly a month to update. I know I shouldn't care about how many followers I have, but I do, for entirely selfish reasons. I'm going to try to stop caring and post more often regardless of who follows this thing!


Also, I've been a bum about writing new stuff, which has made me less enthusiastic about updating the blog. I generally make it a rule not to make New Year's resolutions (why does New Year's have to be capitalized? I think that's silly), but if I did, one of them would be to be more disciplined about my writing. So I basically just made two promises to you, and I have, at this moment, every intention of keeping them.


One thing I recently discovered is that if I make a concerted effort to get into the "writing zone," whether by sitting down at my computer or with my notebook in my lap or going to some kind of "inspirational" location, I veer in the opposite direction of the zone. I do my best writing-thinking in the shower, walking down the street on my way to work, or in one of the many coffee shops I frequent. I think I write better material on paper napkins than I do on the computer or in a notebook. Maybe I'll staple a bunch of napkins together and patent it as a notebook. If the rest of the writing population is anything like me, I'd be a millionaire.


In the meantime, though, here are the next six poems of my thesis.

Axis III: Neurology

His office smells like antiseptic and gauze,
the doctor who looks and talks like my uncle J.
He’s a neurologist I have to meet because
my new psychiatrist thinks it’s possible I may
have subclinical seizure disorder or some such
problem with my brain. I’m just another sight
for this man. He’s nice but I’m not comforted much.

The visit lasts three long hours, and driving home that night

I’m glad he said I’m “normal.” At least this part is done…
until my psychiatrist says she wants my blood, my piss
analyzed in a lab. Pin pricks and a cup: more fun
to make sure nothing in my body is amiss.

She tests my reflexes before she finally decides
I’m not completely normal, and gives me the pills she prescribes.


Axis IV: Structure

Rose and I do our work in the library
because it’s quiet there and we can concentrate
without anyone telling us we’re weird
or that we read too much.
We only get to stay for a half-hour or so
each day, but our teacher’s only redeeming quality
is that she lets us come here at all.

We spend the rest of the day in her class
listening to her talk about history – she calls it “social studies” –
and she would go on all day
if she didn’t also have to teach us English (I know it all already),
math (she tries, but I have no idea what she’s saying),
science (she turns us loose and makes us make bridges
out of toothpicks and glue with no instruction at all),
and whatever else she thinks she’s teaching us
but isn’t because Rose taught me everything I know.
Together we’re smarter than our teacher.

My fifth-grade teacher hates me.
She’d never say so, but she cuts me off
when I try to talk, gets frustrated
when I want to work harder than the rest of the class,
brushes me aside when I ask questions,
and writes comments on my homework
that I can’t even read. I’ve never seen worse handwriting.

Anna has moderate stress
including her present relatively unstructured classroom.

The only thing I know to expect in school
is some form of humiliation
(between the teacher, the other kids, and gym class,
the world is a supremely cold and cruel place)
and a lecture on “social studies” that I won’t understand.

Rose and I might get library time if we’re lucky,
but until then I pass her notes
about how I feel like crying
because the teacher hates me
and I’d much rather structure my own classroom
somewhere else.


Axis V: Irony

Current Global Assessment of Functioning
is approximately 75 (high functioning).

Things I’m not afraid of:

Eating
Television
The cat
Talking to my friends

Anna has been coping fairly well.

Curve Breaker

I do not understand the concept of grading on a curve
until it is too late.
I don’t know what I had imagined, exactly –
maybe the teacher simply drawing a curve-shape in her grade book
or plotting the points of everyone’s test scores on a bell-curved graph –
but I had not expected my entire English class to hate me
because I got an A on my vocabulary test.

I stop and think about it after my pride wears off and
confusion, loneliness, anger, bitterness, and shame take turns setting in.
If I had known from the beginning that my teacher graded on a curve
and if I had known from the beginning what that meant,
would I really have done anything differently?
Would I have foregone studying and failed on purpose?
Would I have answered some questions wrong and hoped for a B?

If I had done poorly, someone would have given me that look I hate,
that look of disappointment mixed with muted anger and frustration,
and said, “What’s wrong with you? You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
Instead I’ve succeeded; surpassed even my own expectations for myself
and am allowed thirty seconds to revel in it and smile
before someone else gives me that other look –
anger and frustration mixed with muted disappointment and something new – contempt, I think –
and says, “I only got a C. It’s your fault!”

At that moment I understand what a curve is.
It’s the shape my mouth takes right before I start to cry.
It’s the wavering line of my handwriting as I start a new page of notes.
It’s the cylinder my test makes, rolled up in my backpack.
It’s the dejected lilt in my voice as I describe to anyone who will listen
that I really didn’t understand. I thought a curve was something else,
and in that moment I’ve broken all the curves I know.

Now I understand
and it’s just me, clutching my crumpled vocabulary test,
walking home alone from the bus stop.


The Closet, Part 2: One Foot Out

Have I told you about Emily yet?
There’s a girl in my theater workshop named Emily
which by the way I think is a gorgeous name.
It sounds like a song. I think it’s my favorite.

You might know her. She has blonde hair
that falls down past her shoulders.
It’s the softest hair I’ve ever felt –
she brushed past me once and her hair
touched my arm. Right here, see?

She takes the third bus home after school.
I have to catch her before she gets on
because I have something to give her:
last week at rehearsal someone spilled water
on this sheet music – she plays the piano –
and she threw it in the trash because she was upset.
Anyway, I took it home and fixed it.

You must know her. She’s an amazing singer.
She had a solo in the chorus concert last night.
She was wearing a blue dress and black shoes, remember?

…I remember what everyone was wearing.


All the World’s a Stage

Emily – that’s my girlfriend, I wish –
is the lead in the school musical
and I am in it too.
I don’t have a very big part
but I like rehearsals because I get to watch her.
She never misses a line,
and even during Hell Week when she has a cold and says
she can’t sing,
her voice is smooth and crisp like fresh-fallen snow.
I imagine that’s what her skin must feel like.

(During costume changes, all the girls change in one room and I think I might actually die.)

I get to watch her.
She’s thin and elegant,
hair downy and really, honestly, perfectly blonde.
I can see her lips from my seat
in the audience,
wrapping around her words, and I imagine how
they’d feel wrapped around my lips.
I try not to look too long or
I’ll never look away.

(Every curve on her body must have been sculpted by God himself. Maybe I’m not an atheist after all.)

I have a scene with her.
It isn’t very long
and there are other people in it,
but we talk to each other andI get to touch her –
the director tells me not to look so nervous –
one hand on her shoulder and the other in her hair
which is softer than I ever could have imagined.
I look in her eyes,
get lost for a minute (or maybe five),
and say: “I know that you will soon unfold
a forgiving heart of purest gold!”
I wonder what would happen if I kissed her.

(I rehearse what to say if she catches me looking. Is it really weird to say, “Oh, I like your bra!”?)

At the end of rehearsal, Emily – that’s the love of my life –
leaves with her boyfriend –
her real boyfriend; she’s not acting anymore –
and I try not to watch,
but I get to watch her anyway
because my ride is late.