This is what I've done in writer's club lately!

Knock on the Table
February 24th, 2005

I have a soul-swept body
That wants to take things for granted
But can’t.
There’s always a rock in my shoe
And a bee in my ear
And a backpack pulling the pain
That screams down my neck.
I wish that a painless day
Was something I could take for granted.

When I’m not hurting myself
Somebody’s hurting me
And when it’s all finally gone away
There’s something still hurting.
I want to fly again
Without my arms getting sore.

You can’t knock wood to change the past
Assume the unassumable.
What if this was my circumstance?

I want my body to be mine again
Not yanked and tugged
By memories of a heartless devil
Or by people who help
By pulling and pulling
Until I’m stretched thin
And there’s nothing left to pull.

I wish there was a theft protection program
For my virginity:
Pay ten dollars each month
And if somebody steals it
A company in Never-Never land
Will get it back
No memories attached.

Knock on the table
But the past’s still the past,
Engrained deep into the wood.
Knock, knock, knock.
***


Virginity Freefall
February 10th, 2005

Jump face-first into a vacuum
Of a virginity freefall
So maybe you won’t remember
Where you could have spun after all.

If you had a smooth, unshattered
Memory of how it begun
Would it matter where the slide slid
Or how your trust was snatched or won?

But just a little pale-faced girl
Is staring backward at the world
She leaped, declawed, into the void
And swings there, tied, her body curled.

Gravity works in negative,
The “normal” desires pushed away
And she hangs there, naked, dangling.
***

Malleable
February 10th, 2005

It’s much more than nature – not malleable.
I’m not just hiding from the real world.
It’s not the prelude to falling in love.
Puzzle over my possibility – it’s not malleable.
The birds and the bees are myopic to a fault
And frozen fingers that are no longer mine
Resembled an apparition.
Coming out of its small closet, hiding from the real world,
And if I don’t see it as a problem,
Why do you?
That’s a bit of a sticky question.
It’s a permanent state:
Just sleep when you’re hungry
Eat when you’re tired
And be malleable.
The darkness, smoke, and cold had conspired
To form an ashen form.
It’s not malleable.
I lingered a little, halfway hiding from the world.
Am I radical, out there, over-the-top?
More people are choosing to just say no:
You don’t have to have sex to be human.
I’m not malleable.
***


A Mad Girl’s Midnight Ponderings
January 31st, 2005

I kick the world; it shatters in a dream.
I wonder what I could have broke instead.
(I wish I’d made this up inside my head).

I am a party in your glass of wine,
A hint of high and sleeping powers too.
I breathe the stains that torture you in bed.
(I wish I’d made this up inside my head).

There is a grain that fades to crystal clear.
I watch a woman dancing, all in red.
(I wish I’d made this up inside my head).

A little bird is climbing up the wall
And when he flies, his wings will be my hell.
My kettle boils, bubbling with dread.
(I wish I’d made this up inside my head).

(Inspired by “A Mad Girl’s Love Song” by Sylvia Plath)
***

I Do Not Understand
January 27th, 2005

Sand, slipping through my fingers
Mirrors tears that run down my face.
I do not understand.
A fire flicked your smile off
Burnt it into ashes and charcoal
Swirling down the drain.
I do not understand.
I’ve never seen you cry before;
I can strain my memory, but not remember
Ever seeing you cry.
I do not understand
This sudden explosion
Shrapnel whistling to the ground.
I’m shivering.
Somewhere out in this cold night
Something has changed
And I do not understand.