Travel Haiku
Miles of memories
Kaleidoscope gems tumbling
Heart incarnation
it’s almost 7pm
and it’s going to get dark soon
and it looks like it’s going to rain
and my brother sent me money for ice cream
because he loves me and,
i guess, because he feels a little bit sorry for me,
so damn it,
i’m gonna get ice cream.
as soon as i walk in,
i’m overwhelmed.
i can buy anything i want.
anything?
i’m not thinking of buying for two people,
not thinking if you’ll like this
or if you’ll eat that,
i can just buy
whatever i want.
as it turns out,
that’s too many options.
before i panic, i find myself practically sprinting,
subconsciously,
to the pasta aisle,
obviously.
they start playing some
stupid Michael Bublé cover
of fucking Home or whatever
and it makes me cry.
jesus.
i feel like a middle aged mom in a movie
going through a divorce,
crying at a fucking grocery store.
i make my way to the frozen aisle,
for the ice cream,
obviously,
and i finally find my favorite ice cream
but they don’t have have it in a pint size
and the quart is EIGHTEEN FUCKING DOLLARS
which is a ROBBERY
and i will NOT be paying that much for ICED GODDAMN CREAM,
but i swallow my pride
and i buy it anyway since my brother sent money for
specifically
this purpose, and i feel silly and guilty and
good.
the rest of my cart consists of
frozen pizza,
mozzarella sticks,
soups,
granola bars,
blueberry eggo waffles,
and peanut butter.
when i put it all on display on the conveyor belt
it looks like a six year old stole their mom’s credit card and went wild.
the total is eighty dollars.
jesus.
as soon as i get back in the car
my phone blares with a
tornado warning.
i can never remember which is which,
but i think this is the bad one.
i’m only five minutes from home
so i don’t worry,
but i do think about the last time
when i got caught in the tornado warning
and i came home crying
and you held me
and i said i was so scared of dying
and you said
“you’re safe now.”
i miss feeling safe.
i think about the fear i felt,
of dying,
except it wasn’t that, really,
it was the fear of dying
and leaving you alone to grieve.
it was the devastating heartbreak
that i would give anything
to make sure you didn’t feel.
now that you’re gone,
no one would miss me the way that
i was so afraid of.
the thought is fleeting.
though it fights to come back.
of course,
i think,
everyone would miss you,
think about your friends,
your mom,
your sister.
but losing the love of your life?
your best friend?
your home?
that’s the thing i was most afraid of.
funny.
here we are,
doing it to ourselves.
now that it’s already happened,
what else do i have to fear?
i know it’s not true.
i know i just need to eat
or sleep
or maybe have a damn drink,
but,
jesus.
it’s my birthday.
and i miss you so bad.
ash that was so volcanic
say it’s not the money
your heavy hand, barbaric
dripping in guilded honey
children in a puppy-mill
family portrait septic gash
and the scar burns even still
sewn together with the cash
Today I’m a new kind of tired
A tired that seeps into my marrow
That fuses to my cells
That with each breath
I hear a secret plea for rest
A whisper from my lungs
My heart skips beats
Tries to spell out its need for repose
In frantic Morse code
An SOS lost in translation
The ship must sail on
No savior on the horizon
Ritalin starvation: my current baseline.
I don’t get “hangry”, I get “miserably depressed”.
The water taps the windshield I’m hiding behind,
like it knows I’m in here.
Twelve hours, fourteen, who cares?
Can’t bite the hand that feeds.
Probably not worth my own idea of my worth.
Sadness follows me everywhere
in a pair of work boots.
The only shoes Sadness owns.
This is hunger.
It’s just a restaurant,
The chefs are being paid,
Big vats of rice
And bowls of soy sauce,
They can’t see me,
The excitement on my face,
They don’t know how much I love this,
How I’ll stuff my face with leftovers,
It’s just work,
But it still tastes
Like it was made with love.
It is summer so every event is typed bold. The heat itches us with temptation.
If we breach this line we tow, from the dead she will scold.
Our childhood church draped in black, a scan of the room reveals silent grins and enough
tears to heal heart attack.
Last week you skimmed a book on grief. The sun seeps into the stained glass first and my
skin second, but you loom over me so it is brief. It is more than warm, this building lacks ac. I could drip, but I am impatient. I need her to breathe.
I await a dropped glance so my hands can lace through your hair. You soothe like running cold water on a needle shaped burn, but you scar just as easily. I am always spared. You underscore sentences with falsities about the human condition, as if you understand, as if your mother has died. Although,
your lips. I struggle to refuse your spit. Today, I don’t feel like being delicious.
Perhaps desire is nothing more than self-obsession.
I caused it. The day it happened,
we let boredom fester. Skin to skin in fetal position, bodies depressing.
Collapse drowned by records she collected.
through the wall lays my mother, halted.
My head between your legs, feigning connection
Bliss rejected, on the precipe of stolen kisses
stolen breath.
My mother showed me early and often,
making for making’s sake
is a worthwhile way to spend a life,
Build the sandcastle, celebrate it
until high tide, no need to photograph it;
Waves doing what waves will do
is no reason to grieve
what is erased in their wakes.
Even when your canvas turns out like crap,
the act of painting is never wasted,
you can hate it, start something else tomorrow,
Fallen logs are made glorious vignettes
of tender plantings and moss,
all in a clearing no one will see but us,
where we can enjoy it
without accolade or compliment,
My father showed me today as we walked,
a new forested area she is making into art,
he said it used to be she would find open areas
to make lovely but she can’t help herself,
now she must infiltrate this thicket.
She will always grow to the size of her container,
never bend to its shape-
always the tree, never the water.
