suddenly, the stars, the stars, they shoot but i can't see them shooting the moon, because the moon blocks them, she's like a half face, full but melting in between sheets of cloud that make me feel sad for her because she looks like she's surrounded when it's obvious she really just wants to be left alone. suddenly, the stars say it's time now to be stable and enjoy the fruits of the something something, after a month of heavy romance, new love, but i must have slept through that part, because i didn't see it, and honestly, i didn't really look when i was living through it. there were too many boxes to fill, empty, move, and empty again, and now my hands are broken, and i don't know who i am supposed to be. suddenly, the stars shoot through my head when the honey bee flies into my stable world, and suddenly, there is another full moon with a bee sting, and it should mean something. and it certainly does.
this is the most important part:
now that there's new songs from a brother i forgot to unbury, i get these notes in my sleep, and if i sleep long enough, i can keep them when i'm awake. when i rode back through the desert, instead of pressing on at every potential stop, i stopped and drank and drank, it was a lesson from yemaya, whose songs i'm too dry to hear when i hurry, and if i stop to rest, i'm better in the morning, and better because i learned how to take care of this thing i carry in my head. it's terribly personal, and i take it personally, that whatever human needs have to be seen to, it's up to me to see to them, enough so that i'm starting to wonder whether riding motorcycles is the smartest way to carry this around. but that's too far away from the most important thing. the important thing, my brother from the other side told me that this is the trouble:
i'm in a coffee shop with an old friend, and we're catching up, and she says something about, oh what happened to that girl you were seeing? and i'll say, oh it didn't work out because of x and x and x. and she says, oh that figures i went through the same thing, it's terrible how people can be, you're so right you're so right. and we leave the cafes thinking about how right we are and how lost this whole game is, and how our lives are better because of all the heartbreaks, and we're all perfect lovers and just haven't met the right one, blablabla...
but if i know who i am, and sometimes i do, then there's nothing to protect, and nothing to salvage in all these stories, and maybe i'm just not as insecure any more now that there is a ghost of a brother behind my head telling me things that an older brother should. and he tells me that these things i think i've lost are things that i still have, that the dead see things from a longer distance, and the only loss is ego, and that sting goes away very quickly if we pay enough attention to what's happening in the moment.
and maybe it's not a big shift in any direction, but yesterday when the same cafe scene played out, i found myself not saying things like, oh she did this and then she did that and what was i to do i am so innocent blablabla, but instead said, i don't know really it's very sad really she is an amazing and interesting person and i miss her.
and that's enough to say. and it's true. and it's more true than anything else i could have said, and it rings so true that i see that i can live with it, and it can be true for as long as it needs to be true, until it becomes something else, but for now, i can leave it there for now.
the sting becomes something else, the sting becomes the kind of sting that can come back, somewhere in the middle of a still afternoon when the only thing that is moving is me (and a bee apparently). this is what stings. i'm not going to fight it. i'm not going to play with it until it becomes something else in the narrative in my head, that's already colorful enough, and on some days, it's beautiful, and when the story continues, it's beautiful, even when, especially when, all my dead ones tell me that what happens next is better understood through the body moving through time and space, rather than finding the link between this sign and the next one in order to predict what happens next, because no one really knows, it's not up to them, it's up to the human bodies to decide when it's time to decide.
but a message from me to the ashes that hold the heart of a new bird:
if you could, if you could return...you know i'm such a fool for you...let it linger just a little longer before i open the trunk that's at the bottom of the sea, to see the jewels that lie hidden there, my heart is like a hungry ghost that's been unstuck in time for too long, let it linger just long enough so that these last conversations between me and the moon can resolve, so that the small things that i need to say to her can be said, so that i can close up these last fissures between the rocks, the ones where i whispered to the sea that at the bottom of my heart, i never did want to get over you, and i don't know if i really need to. she says don't worry, do your work, and don't worry, and just in case you think we don't hear you, there's a bee with your name all over it, and it's the same one that came around last time, and if you get to dance that dance again, just don't fuck it up, and don't tell the world anything that's not true. representations in art and poetry don't mean what they used to mean, metaphors of skin between folds of cloth are only good for a few things, what happens when the metaphors are removed is more erotic than ice and strawberries.
this is the most important part:
now that there's new songs from a brother i forgot to unbury, i get these notes in my sleep, and if i sleep long enough, i can keep them when i'm awake. when i rode back through the desert, instead of pressing on at every potential stop, i stopped and drank and drank, it was a lesson from yemaya, whose songs i'm too dry to hear when i hurry, and if i stop to rest, i'm better in the morning, and better because i learned how to take care of this thing i carry in my head. it's terribly personal, and i take it personally, that whatever human needs have to be seen to, it's up to me to see to them, enough so that i'm starting to wonder whether riding motorcycles is the smartest way to carry this around. but that's too far away from the most important thing. the important thing, my brother from the other side told me that this is the trouble:
i'm in a coffee shop with an old friend, and we're catching up, and she says something about, oh what happened to that girl you were seeing? and i'll say, oh it didn't work out because of x and x and x. and she says, oh that figures i went through the same thing, it's terrible how people can be, you're so right you're so right. and we leave the cafes thinking about how right we are and how lost this whole game is, and how our lives are better because of all the heartbreaks, and we're all perfect lovers and just haven't met the right one, blablabla...
but if i know who i am, and sometimes i do, then there's nothing to protect, and nothing to salvage in all these stories, and maybe i'm just not as insecure any more now that there is a ghost of a brother behind my head telling me things that an older brother should. and he tells me that these things i think i've lost are things that i still have, that the dead see things from a longer distance, and the only loss is ego, and that sting goes away very quickly if we pay enough attention to what's happening in the moment.
and maybe it's not a big shift in any direction, but yesterday when the same cafe scene played out, i found myself not saying things like, oh she did this and then she did that and what was i to do i am so innocent blablabla, but instead said, i don't know really it's very sad really she is an amazing and interesting person and i miss her.
and that's enough to say. and it's true. and it's more true than anything else i could have said, and it rings so true that i see that i can live with it, and it can be true for as long as it needs to be true, until it becomes something else, but for now, i can leave it there for now.
the sting becomes something else, the sting becomes the kind of sting that can come back, somewhere in the middle of a still afternoon when the only thing that is moving is me (and a bee apparently). this is what stings. i'm not going to fight it. i'm not going to play with it until it becomes something else in the narrative in my head, that's already colorful enough, and on some days, it's beautiful, and when the story continues, it's beautiful, even when, especially when, all my dead ones tell me that what happens next is better understood through the body moving through time and space, rather than finding the link between this sign and the next one in order to predict what happens next, because no one really knows, it's not up to them, it's up to the human bodies to decide when it's time to decide.
but a message from me to the ashes that hold the heart of a new bird:
if you could, if you could return...you know i'm such a fool for you...let it linger just a little longer before i open the trunk that's at the bottom of the sea, to see the jewels that lie hidden there, my heart is like a hungry ghost that's been unstuck in time for too long, let it linger just long enough so that these last conversations between me and the moon can resolve, so that the small things that i need to say to her can be said, so that i can close up these last fissures between the rocks, the ones where i whispered to the sea that at the bottom of my heart, i never did want to get over you, and i don't know if i really need to. she says don't worry, do your work, and don't worry, and just in case you think we don't hear you, there's a bee with your name all over it, and it's the same one that came around last time, and if you get to dance that dance again, just don't fuck it up, and don't tell the world anything that's not true. representations in art and poetry don't mean what they used to mean, metaphors of skin between folds of cloth are only good for a few things, what happens when the metaphors are removed is more erotic than ice and strawberries.
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