"We were married for sixty-two and a half years. Even when she was in the hospital I went and visited her every single day. Every single day. It's so different being alone. It's so different being in our house alone."

Stanley, an old friend of the family whose wife just died this summer, is in our kitchen. My mom made him grilled cheese for lunch because he has trouble cooking for himself. Then he started talking and talking... I had to leave the room and now I can't stop crying. I wish I could describe how empty his voice sounded.

Life is merely a flash.

The pipes leaked
and I learned to live underwater
but I dislike how it makes my
tea weak and my
mascara run.

I suspected the rain
would become eyelet snow
but the culprit would not
reveal itself too soon.

Soaked pages of
a textbook love
were stolen and replaced by
cryptic dreams.

Oh, the espionage
that goes on within my own head
how it makes my
knees weak and my
thoughts undone.

I love people.

"I'm just a kid with a heavy heart these passing sunrises and sunsets."

Sometimes you meet folks that just restore your faith in humanity.
These kinds come and go, of course.
But once you've seen,
you know they exist.
And, as such,
You know there are more to come.

SHE: "If you died today, what would you want your epitaph to be?"
HIM: "When my father & mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up."
[&She still can't believe that he didn't even miss a beat.]

I am going to spend most of next week working on my applications. I think I am going to apply to my grandparents' [very selective] alma mater, just to see what happens. The school is perfect for me, but there is absolutely no guarantee that I would get in and that scares me. I keep reminding myself that by November this will all be over. By May I will have chosen and it will all be taken care of.

Twelve months from now I will be moving out. I am clinging to this last year like no other. Though I have complained about everything here for the last seventeen years, I am just starting to realize how much it means to me...even though I am excited to make a new start somewhere else. I am not scared anymore, just sad to leave friends.

Honestly, this summer has me in the best mood, though. Work is slow, but I savor it. The weather is hot and gives me migraines, but feel glad that I am not confined to my house like in the winter months.

I run, I write, I plan, I laugh too much. There is only one thing missing.

+I had dinner with my favorite teacher tonight. She retired [again] and is very silly, because she is actually still working. She wrote her own job description and everything. "I only have to put in ten hours a week! But I'll probably work more like forty." MAN. She is definitely kind of immortal. She was telling me how she saw the Von Trapps on tour after WWII. It was quite amusing.

+I have two violin students now. They are quite adorable. Maybe it's just the patience of God in me, but I actually kind of like working with kids. Who knew?

+I tallied up what I've made in the past two weeks from violin-related things [weddings, lessons, etc] and it's about $400. Seoul, here I come!

+I am talking to a Pittsburgh friend that I haven't heard much from all summer. It's nice catching up.

+Nine days till Breaking Dawn.

+I keep having dreams about what it would be like to live in Iran. I am just so curious as to what it would be like to live in an Islamic country. It seems like every cultural nuance familiar to me would just be so upside down there...or something.

+Tomorrow I am working, reading, and decorating my school notebooks. :D

"Hello mister. Wanna see my new telephone? 'Cause I'm dying for a proper hello."

A survey for you. :]

( If you ever turn around, you'll see me )

01: Can't Go Back Now by The Weepies
02: Rewind by Paolo Nutini
03: Beautiful Mess [Acoustic] by Jason Mraz
04: Summer in the City by Regina Spektor
05: Lovers in Japan/Reign of Love by Coldplay

I.
There are thunderheads
& thunderbirds
over my house today.
& I cannot tell their sounds apart
but I can tell you they are very loud.
My rain dance in the garden worked.

II.
I don't like getting my hair wet
so I watch the weather from inside
& drink my peach tea
thinking about how you taught me not to cry
by making me cry
& how that is really the only thing
that I am grateful to you for
anymore.

I forgot the color green
in a maze of thirty-degree months
till the exam room closed
till my Korean friend left for home
till humidity aroused my
hip-clinging shorts;
bare toes;
pretty dresses;
naked back;
taste buds [banana-blueberry-strawberry
peach?]
a summer [fruit salad] oddity;

 

 

          I sit upon a stool at the counter in my grandmother's kitchen and watch the door open and close. My Midwestern relatives spill in, some with dogs, others with children, others with boyfriends. Gifts in hand, they smile and embrace one another. 

They pretend that everything is okay, and, I suppose, it is…for right now. Though, I have been hearing about my aunt's brain cancer all year, and she has lost all her hair since the last time I saw her. I don't like to gawk, so instead I watch my little cousin, who has just lost his first tooth, chase his tiny dog around the living room.

Dinner is set out and I make conversation with my other cousins, who seem somewhat distant to me. One of them will be graduating from high school this spring. The other will be a freshman next year and has still not mastered his table manners quite yet. He picks at his food worriedly because he is allergic to everything.

After we finish eating, one of my aunts brings out Swedish food she has made for my grandpa, who was born there. She is Italian. Then we go into the living room to open presents. My grandparents don't have a tree, so they just pile the gifts by the back door. My cousins and I have to pass them all out to the adults. None of us get anything good, and then we go back into the kitchen to have pie. Pumpkin or pecan.

We sit around talking for hours, and then it is time to leave. I fall asleep listening to Christmas music in the car, because I have been wanting to listen to some all day. Unfortunately, my grandparents do not own any sort of musical device (except for their old piano, which has been in my house since I was eight). All in all, it has been a good day. In time the snow will deepen, and I will forget all of my family's quirks. And I will learn to love. And I will apologize.

 

Golden rod and the 4-H stone
The things I brought you
When I found out you had cancer of the bone

Your father cried on the telephone
And he drove his car to the Navy yard
Just to prove that he was sorry

In the morning through the window shade
When the light pressed up against your shoulder blade
I could see what you were reading

Oh the glory that the Lord has made
And the complications you could do without
When I kissed you on the mouth

Tuesday night at the bible study
We lift our hands and pray over your body
But nothing ever happens

I remember at Michael's house
In the living room when you kissed my neck
And I almost touched your blouse

In the morning at the top of the stairs
When your father found out what we did that night
And you told me you were scared

Oh the glory when you ran outside
With your shirt tucked in and your shoes untied
And you told me not to follow you

Sunday night when I cleaned the house
I find the card where you wrote it out
With the pictures of your mother

On the floor at the great divide
With my shirt tucked in and my shoes untied
I am crying in the bathroom

In the morning when you finally go
And the nurse runs in with her head hung low
And the cardinal hits the window

In the morning in the winter shade
On the first of March on the holiday
I thought I saw you breathing

Oh the glory that the Lord has made
And the complications when I see his face
In the morning in the window

Oh the glory when He took our place
But He took my shoulders and he shook my face
And He takes and He takes and He takes

 

 

 

“No, I’m here talking to you, remember?”

 

         

 

 

In the light of the sun, is there anyone? Oh, it has begun...
Oh dear you look so lost, eyes are red and tears are shed,
This world you must've crossed, you said…

You don't know me, you don't even care,
You don't know me, you don't wear my chains...

Essential and appealed, carry all your thoughts across
an open field,
When flowers gaze at you...they're not the only ones who cry
when they see you
You said...

You don't know me, you don't even care,
You don't know me, you don't wear my chains...

She said I think I'll go to Boston...
I think I'll start a new life,
I think I'll start it over, where no one knows my name,
I'll get out of California, I'm tired of the weather,
I think I'll get a lover and fly ‘em out to Spain...

Yeah, I think I'll go to Boston,
I think that I'm just tired
I think I need a new town, to leave this all behind
I think I need a sunrise, I'm tired of the sunset,
I hear it's nice in the Summer, some snow would be nice
Boston...where no one knows my name...

 

 

 

 

The hum of the cicadas makes me feel alive. The last time they were here, seventeen years ago, I was unborn. Maybe that's why I feel so connected to the sound. It was one of the first I ever heard. My window is constantly cracked open to hear them. It's kind of funny to think about all the things that happened in the time since they were here last. I like to imagine what their next seventeen years of hibernation will bring, too.

 Cicadas are one of those off-color things that I will miss if I ever move away from this part of the country, I think. Even if they are kind of disgusting up close, they look like little golden bats when they fly, and I kind of like that. Did you know that only the males make the humming sound? Or that only one in a hundred thousand cicadas has blue eyes?

I don't know if they will still be here when you get back, but I hope so, because when I thought about my next seventeen years, all I thought about was you. 

         

 

Fall 2007 Poem Collection