Bliss

Perhaps

it's nice to be unaware

Worth the Choosing

I am tempted to chase you
recklessly
 - romantically - 
with emotion and with everything
to lose involving you,
while somehow keeping
my power and my wise pride.

But I don't
because 
I'm here
between
what we were
and what we could have been.

It doesn't mean 
I've stopped
laughing out loud,
or stretching,
or going to the sticky dance bar 
on the corner.

But it does mean 
that I'm not 
playing a cruel game of tag...
I'm not that fast of a runner,
and it might look a bit desperate or creepy.
And tag isn't actually fun.
And only one person wins.

It's not because you're not worth the chasing,
but because we are all worth 
the honour of being free,
and the blessing of being chosen.
And if there has to be a choice,
I'd rather
you choose me,
than I chase you.

So
I choose 
me.

Tag -
I'm it, and
I'm getting outta the game, and 
I'm going dancing.

Dancing is inclusive,
and every body wins...
You're all invited.

So
I'm here
between
what we were
and what we could have been,
dancing,
and having fun...
I win.

Qualifier

My umbrella still up,

didn't realize it stopped raining...

blue skies above,
laughing out loud
and drinking in soft 
purple beauty of the streets 
awakening - doesn't disqualify
this pain,
doesn't do it a disfavor.

Umbrella down,
shake it out,
haha.

Do it Again

your easy smile
and I saw it
react to something I said

it really happened

Something to do with Fireflies

Christmas slow

Christmas what

words

prolific poetry

but what about the story dragged out?

Who is around me this Christmas

little Christmas.

Don't rush away,

where I am now.

What are you pregnant with she asked?

It's Christmas,

and what comes next?

Not just five meanings for love,

- seems like a lot

but it's not - 

as many as my moments.

A word I know 

every instant

use all the time

and always feel new to,

define it for me again.

I'm sick of talking I want to be

I'm sick of writing I want to do

I'm sick of loving I want to love

I'm not sick of loving,

I love it,

whatever it means.

The natural sparkles in the snow

makes our hearts all a glitter.

Welcome Christmas tingles,

we're glad you're here,

even when you're bitter.

Afraid of Falling

The wiser man
with his shoes untied
because he looks pretty cool
and the fear of trippin'
keeps him light
on his toes

Sacred Us

This morn 
a sacred fire burned, invited me into it.

This land
I grew up on, told to thank the creator for it.

But now my heart  burns
warm by the fire
with thanks for those
who never knew me, or I them,
who never consented to the land they had to hand over
to me,
and now instead of palm closed
they open hand draw me
into the fire,
onto the land,
our sacred home.

What do I have to give back?

Only me
it seems,
and my fuel for our fire.

Train Transitions, My Octagon Mug, Fancy Cocktails, and Stable Fluidity.

I like my octagon mug

and my stomach feels queasy

as I eat my eggs

and process you.

Digesting the news,

it's not me,

it's true.

We talk like women,

pissed at the system.

Strong in our sadness

we laugh about the naked chicken

in the window across from Hello Darling!

and talk loud about the lack of female orgasm - 

an epidemic

not aired on the news,

in case you haven't heard of it.

I feel the city come into me

as I leave it.

I had once breathed it in

as portals of streetcars rocked me.

Now trains swaying my aching a little more gently

and Sufjan reminding me "we're all gonna die."

I drink coffee in Riverdale,

the place that conceived 

a quarter of me.

It's all news to me, this family history.

These streets of memory,

our mysteries humming as ghosts and power lines.

Fuck you and your feelings for me.

Fuck my grace and understanding.

You tell me you liked the memories 

we made the same sentence you said we had to stop making them.

Why should a filmmaker stop filming or a poet stop poeting?

We're good at it - memory making - so why should we stop

and start remembering?

I am a woman who is a bit bitter,

and I know I'm not the first.

You sang me goodbye

while I kissed your ear softly (in my head)

and took in the moment while I was there on the couch 

beside you, knees touching, hands resisting.

Her painting of the rocks

was about stability and fluidity.

Funny, I thought in the church pews,

that's what I had already written

about me and you when we watched the waves over the stone

from a cliff on our stomachs, 

living on the edge.

We took pictures,

like her.

We were her painting in the present - 

you are rock,

I am water,

and Grandma Gray painted it on paper 

before I was born and I never knew her.

Life's a game of chance

and timing.

She was probably beautiful

but maybe annoying or stuck up or

maybe she snored too loudly,

and she'd have been concerned by my tattoo.

But I'll never know,

and now I'm moving to her home,

where she learned love.

Love in my stomach,

might puke it up.

Gin in my veins,

dreams on my sleeve,

ideas unborn on pages

with lavender tea,

home somewhere else.

But I feel it growing -

these hospitable humans making me swoon.

We are good.

Present/past/fluid/stable,

I'm ready for mine - 

in the city of trees,

in the wild,

with the lights.

And I miss you.

Mom passed me Aunt Olive's inheritance

tears in her eyes,

another stranger's kindness.

I pass out my Body of Work in secret,

relieved to be rid of him and by the kindness in your lens,

even though

you have a woman in each eye

and when you blink

I am gone - 

but don't you worry I'll take care of my own.

And you know, I'd still paddle the river with you

if you were alone,

and wanted my company - 

if I'm not off and hitched by then.

We could spoon and wish on stars,

play would you rather

and have serious conversations.

I was gonna buy you a record,

but I didn't.

I bought myself fancy cocktails with

the ladies instead, with colouring pages and names of dishes we had to Google.

cuz we're adults and that's what women do.

You didn't choose me and my laughter,

and I buy myself fancy cocktails with the ladies instead.

Purpose

if for no other reasons

but to float

and to fly

Dissipate

where

i

dissipate

and

am

reformed

...the moon and the mist...

It Comes to Me When

Sometimes it comes to me,
my chest expanding
like I can't breathe enough..
It doesn't hurt though -
it's just like a bunch of extra air
that wakes me up with a gentle punch and
opens my eyes a bit wide.
It catches me off guard as I realize I'm alive,
and that is extraordinary.

Sometimes it comes to me
on the metro line,
headphone soundtrack snythesizes
my heart strings in time:
this body imagines it's dancing right there
to the beat in it's seat, or skipping along the street,
like Beyonce whenever she feels like kicking it
flash-mob style wherever she damn well pleases.
That's me,
when it comes to me.

Sometimes it comes to me
as a fluttering thought of the butterfly friend of
my youth who was crushed too soon,
her wings take flight in
my memory of her and the
adventures I take on her behalf, we fly.
When it comes to me,
it is perfectly ordinary that
we fly.

Sometimes it comes to me
when I hear the words "peanut butter" and
sometimes
when you're sitting next to me on the couch and lean in close to talk,
wine and electricity pulling us in,
it comes to me.

When the words of a friend's song become a soundwave
that courses through my body like a tidal wave
washing over me, it comes to me.
Like when in silence,
it comes to me.

Pang of love, for the smile in the mirror.
Paddle through the blue, still like glass but gliding.
Photo of mystery captured.
Tears of laughter.
High of the mountain top.
Sigh after making love...
it comes to me.

Sometimes it comes to me,
a poem wrapped up with twine in a bow,
complete,
before like a gift it's set free through
shivers and goosebumps while the lightened soul passes to the world
as I realize I'm alive,
and like when it comes to me
when death is sitting in the living room,
the most ordinary thing in the universe...
I realize I'm alive,
and that is perfectly extraordinary.

It comes to me,
I'm alive.

Sneak Peak

what we saw

in the clouds