a city like this

Pinpricks

2006-05-28T23:41:00.000-07:00

I was confused with her narrative of obsession. The disappointment in her face made her usually bright face look ashen and forgotten. “Clara,” I hesitated, and carefully chose my words, “why him? You two barely dated. I know you felt strongly about him, but you were together for two months… You weren’t this upset when you broke up Frank and you were together three years…”

She looked at me silently, I knew there was a lot going on in her head but she wasn’t letting me in to her secrets. My own relationship with Clara was complicated and had changed with time. We had met at a party through my ex-girlfriend Joan. When my relationship ended with Joan, I foolishly thought we could be friends. However, I was still in love with Joan and not ready to watch her flirt with other men. Seeing men touch her was infuriating, but she wasn’t with me anymore, and “friends” don’t care about these things. It was midsummer and I ended up at one of those dull Hollywood parties where people blather on about their last trip to Paris or how they ‘just discovered a delightful petit syrah.’ Joan was across the room looking beautiful in a summer dress. I sidled up to her while she was talking to a couple of her friends. When Joan introduced me to Clara, I spitefully and unabashedly flirted with her. Pretty, with dark brown eyes and a tender frame she responded with a coy smile hidden by the wine glass in her hand. Joan gave me a piercing look, but I smiled casually back. They had been friends in college, though they rarely saw each other now. Clara had no idea that we had been lovers, and she looked at me with fresh eyes. As the night wore on, I kept coming back to Clara. When I saw Joan flirting with host’s brother, I was determined to have Clara leave with me.

After a few more glasses of wine, I told Clara I was tired and I was heading home. “Do you need a ride?” She smiled lightly, and said she was tired too, but she had come with her friends. “Oh, right…” She told me to wait minute. A few minutes later, she was back with her coat and purse: she’d love a ride home. I extended my hand and said, “Perfect, let’s go,” loud enough so Joan would hear. Joan stiffened but didn’t quite look in my direction. Clara gingerly slid her hand into mine as we made our way through house to my car. As we drove through the hills, she rolled down her window and I could hear the crickets chirping. She put her arm out to feel the wind slither through her hand. “You know,” she said “driving in the warm night air like this reminds me of hot summer nights when I was a kid and I couldn’t sleep. I would sneak outside into the garden and lie on the picnic table and look up at the stars. Underneath those pinpricks of light I would always fall asleep.”

When we arrived at her apartment building, she laughed and said “we’re here and I didn’t fall asleep.” I wasn’t sure what she meant, but I put my hand on top of hers and said “I am really glad I met you tonight.” She tossed her brown hair back and with shining eyes said sweetly, “I think I’m the glad one.” We leaned into a kiss and I could feel her tremble beneath me. When she asked me if I wanted to come in I knew I should go home alone but I found a parking space instead. I was running away from demons but I closed my eyes and enjoyed the temporary fix.

Clarity of Thought

2006-05-21T21:20:00.000-07:00

“It’s strange…,” Clara thought, “I usually am not one to quantify things so carefully, but it has been nine months and six days.” The memories filtered with the kindness of a soft blur: The brake of the car as he stopped in front of her apartment was her cue. She turn and faced him squarely as she pressed her left hand firmly on his right forearm and said “good night” in a tone of voice that bookended their relationship. He looked back at her with an expressionless face. As she closed the door to his car, she secretly hoped he would realize how much he valued her and pour out an emotional balm to sooth the lacerations from his tongue. However, as she walked into the light of apartment building entryway and climbed the stairs, she knew he would not. She would be left holding on to leftovers of a failed relationship: parking passes, bottles of wine, photographs, clothing, and old phone messages.

For some reason when he was around she felt like she had been taken out of a fog. Things seemed so much sharper and crisp. The associations she had made with him stuck and would not dissipate. Music, places, food, and clothes all had a scent of him. She wanted to wipe his image off the rear-view mirror and yet she always saw his figure fading in the distance no matter how fast she tried to drive away. She found new lovers to replace his memory, she went new places to forget where they went, she erased his old messages to forget his tender words, and she threw away his photos to forget her attraction. But no one brightened her day like him, no one turned her on like him, no one drugged her senses like him, no one infuriated her like him, no one saddened her like him.

Pressed Tightly

2006-04-04T22:32:00.000-07:00

Getting on the subway was making Darren nervous. Earlier, his co-worker had a heart attack during lunch. He was only a mild acquaintance but they said hello every morning. Today was no different. Today was like any other day.

The heart attack must have been bad, because he died on the way to the hospital. Darren was feeling very introspective and started imagining his own demise.

What does it mean? Does life form its own impression? Do we pile up like sediment, pressed tightly between the weight of so many other lives?

At age forty-four he found himself asking so many questions that he had already asked himself a million times. Iterations upon iterations on the same themes. As he left the station, he looked around at life's glitter of clean barren streets, fast food chains, manicured trees and electricity.

These Things

2006-04-02T18:03:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I search for things
where I know the do not exist
only to hope to that I find them
hidden
by some misplaced chance
or some error of fate
those things ended up where I ended up

Haunted

2006-03-14T22:30:00.000-08:00

"You don't have to be a house to be haunted."

-Emily Dickinson

Reflecting Back

2006-03-13T21:59:00.000-08:00

I stopped writing completely.

I lost the imaginary version of you reading what I wrote.

I was not reborn. I just changed directions.

But you are still here.

Figuratively and literally.

So I started down new paths with strange names and exotic smells.

I went to the Caribbean to find a strand of my history.

I jumped into the winning circle where perfect smiles glittered like the medals that were strewn on their necks.

I elbowed the muscled jocks and forced my way in and then forced my way out.

But I couldn’t write.

None of the stories would stick.

They slip away like trivialities caught between the sheets and made up into a nice bed.

Yet it you that is here, now, reading.

You have come from afar, memories of previous lives I lived within your embrace.

You walk with me though you may barely remember our conversations anymore.

Your friendship has given me strength, courage and faith.

I am humbled.

Thank you.

Still Here

2006-01-22T11:57:00.000-08:00

It was already turning into a hot day and it was only 10 am. We left the harbor toward the gorge, passing London Bridge. “So this was her favorite place,” I thought. I had never been, although she had spoken of it many times. I felt uneasy that this is the reason that I ended up here, but maybe it was what she had intended. Those that were left behind would come here and remember her. And I still do remember her.

She died on my thirty-first birthday. I was not able to say goodbye. I was in southern Africa working hot sweaty days. Even in this technological age, the information came too late. The news finally arrived, it flashed before my eyes and the distance became incredibly real.

Two months had gone by and now we were gathered on a boat to scatter her remains. The water was a blue-green, and I must admit it really was a beautiful setting. I stood amongst distant relatives and eyed them suspiciously because they seemed so foreign. Time had passed and I hardly recognized any of these people. They were aged caricatures of cousins and uncles I had once cataloged as part of my family. Boats sped by intermittently and I could hear laughter from some unseen source in the distance. Her little boy was now a young man and her little baby girl now a young woman. Her devastated husband, turned inward and quiet. Before we threw our flowers, before he cast the ashes into the water, her husband stood up and quietly said “today would have been our thirtieth wedding anniversary, if she had been well, we would have spent it here.”

Almost three years have past and there still are days when I think I should call her. Cancer claimed her life and she is gone, and yet still with me.

Delayed

2006-01-15T01:41:00.000-08:00

These memories came knocking on my door last night.

Congregating in the stairwell and laughing.

Like a surprise birthday party that showed up late.

And yes, I still think of you fondly

Your beauty stills shines

In the small ways that won my affection.

In the days of immersion

The nights intertwined

The hours of quiet as I listened to you sleep.

There is still a sound that still resonates with your name.

I can still feel it deep inside.

Pulling out my best and my worst to the surface

Challenging my faith and confusing the meaning.

Dislocated

2005-12-18T21:36:00.000-08:00

It started at a Christmas party of all places… but then again these things just happen, you don’t plan it. After he explained how difficult the conditions were, I asked Derek, “Why do you live here?” He stopped himself for a moment, looked over at the Christmas tree and said, “because Los Angeles is wild, dirty magic.” For some reason those words struck me and startled me into thinking about the truth of that statement.

I woke up the next morning, with the words in my head, “wild, dirty magic.”

The View

2005-12-04T22:47:00.000-08:00

The view: Cinerama Dome parking lot: December 4, 2005: 2:00 p.m.

Lyrical

2005-11-27T11:54:00.000-08:00

And I am a writer, writer of fictions
I am the heart that you call home
And I've written pages upon pages
Trying to rid you from my bones

And if you don’t love me let me go

-The Decemberists

Fortunate

2005-11-14T17:53:00.000-08:00

It’s remarkable how inside this urban sprawl
you can still find a piece of wilderness hiding.
We went for a hike with sun and the smell chaparral surrounding us.
We talked about politics, work, and incompatible partners.

So many things that go wrong, but it didn’t matter.
So much was still going right.
I wanted to say more.
I wanted to express my gratitude for my good fortune.
I wanted to keep the feeling that this life is an amazing thing.

We looked with admiration at each other.
Once we had shared our lives and traveled on the same paths.
Once we had hoped that our futures would be together.

We looked with admiration at each other...
hugged goodbye and contently went back to our separate lives.

Touched

2005-11-08T22:40:00.000-08:00

Karen didn’t seem particularly well that day. Her eyes lacked their shining alertness. “I felt like I was going insane. On the edge of falling to the other side and I couldn’t see who I was anymore,” she said. We walked together in the park in the coolness of the fall evening. Her brows furrowed and her mouth tightened. I asked her, "what are you thinking? She did not reply. She became dark and cloudy. Words were twisting inside of her. "I am becoming my own person, separate from this madness," she said. "I am going to stop listening to the noise inside me. No longer will it torment me. Yesterday something inside me turned off. The loud confusion suddenly stopped.” She looked scared. “For the first time I feel I am alone.” I wanted to do something ease her pain but I was unsure. I started to give her a hug and she shivered in my arms. She looked up with teary eyes but a smile lightened her face as she said, “I don’t feel so alone anymore.”

Strength

2005-10-29T09:52:00.001-07:00

Sincerely the sky outside is soft
I open the windows and peer out
And I thank you for the moments when we were alive

Those feelings of being so brand new
Closing my eyes and enjoying the warmth
I had the found one I had waited for

She said maybe you went too quickly
He said maybe there was something cruel in there from the start
She said it probably never was really worth it

It ended poorly but I am stronger than I have ever been
Without you there is a hole in my world
Without you I feel strength rebuilding inside of me

Those words that came out of your mouth did not hurt
They made me sad knowing I had misjudged you
I thought you were different

The magic you had cast upon my heart has lost its power
I know the fires have extinguished
And so I rearrange my words, my mind, and reclaim my smile

I detach from past and look to the possibilities
Hit reset, turn over the page,
Put it all behind me and begin again

Respite

2005-10-16T19:53:00.000-07:00

I have to let go.
Stop reopening the wound.
Find respite.
Turn down the volume of these feelings.
Let go of the weight.
Find peace again.

Invisible

2005-10-09T00:34:00.000-07:00

We lay in bed barely touching: our hands slightly grasping each others. I turned to the side and felt her warmth of her back on my chest. My heart was pounding so loudly I thought the room would be swallowed by the sound. I summoned strength to hear her answer the question I had not dare ask directly before.
“Diane… Diane…?”
“Hmm?”
“Do you care about me?”
“What...? Yeah.”
My heart slowed down but the sound still boomed. I took a deep breathe and continued.
“Well it’s hard to see that anymore. You have become so cold, you seem to hardly notice me.”

She let out a long exhale.

“Diane, I really care about you… I feel a bond with you that I rarely feel with anyone. If you tell me that you really care for me I will stand beside you and help you fight these demons… but you have kept me so far a way… if you don’t want me anymore, tell me. “

She didn't move, but responded, “I really don’t know how I feel. All I can see is obstacle in front of me and until I clear that away I can’t see anything else. I have worked so hard to fight this. I never wanted to come back here, I thought I won and was safe. All of sudden the sky has darkened and I it feel all around me. There are moments where I want to cry and moments where I feel I have conquered the world. Yet nothing has changed, I go back to where I started, where I started before it all came back… this is not how I see myself. I believe I am a different person than the one you see before you. I need to change these things and I may have a way, but I am not sure.”

Diane described the machinations that were working against her and pulling her down. How when she is there, she is in another world where I don’t exist. My messages break through randomly and momentarily I exist again. She talked about how this happened before and she had left it all with a golden ticket out. Times had changed and golden tickets were no where to be found.
Then as an afterthought she said, “I have told some of my friends I like you.” That was everything she could give. After all that had happened, she told someone she liked me. The pounding of my heart gave way to a hollow sound that consumed everything in that room.

Diane had pulled away the veil and now I saw what lay underneath. Diane was in pain and I could not reach her nor could I really touch her. She hardly noticed me. This depression was her companion, not me. I was an accessory to distraction. I became silent; I did not know what to do. I wanted to look into her eyes and search the gray for something I could recognize. The room was dark and I wanted to leave, but I didn’t. Hazing morning arrived and I wanted to leave, but I didn’t. I wanted to make sure I heard everything, that there wasn’t something hidden away in her heart. I wanted to hear that although buried, a spark still burned for me. I waited expectantly not knowing how position myself in room where my dimensions had become awkward.

We went out for breakfast and I didn’t know if I wanted to scream at her, shake her or walk away. Instead I pulled into myself, covering my wounds. She looked around me anyway but noticed my quiet demeanor.

“Where are you?” she said.
“I don’t know. Somewhere far away”
She gave a half-hearted smile.

I struggled eating the breakfast I thought I had wanted. My stomach has always been the biggest indicator of my emotions and that day was no different. It turned over on itself, while my lovely companion across the table ate her food in peace. Breakfast came and went. Out of the tunnel Diane said “I’ll call you later” but I felt nothing.

Still a Chance

2005-10-02T17:15:00.000-07:00

I always left the door cracked open
It was enough to give the appearance that the door was closed
There was still a chance you might get lost I find your way to my door
Confused and disoriented you would enter into this strange world
Recognize it as part of your own
Just shuffled and reorganized
But you knew underneath it was the same.

It became a myth, a fantasy, a delusion
I was becoming an adult, and adults let go of childish dreams.
I started closing the door for real
Locking it behind me as I left their world and entered mine.

But at random moments, I would venture out into cool night.
I would smile as I looked laughably for you knowing you would not be found.
The door was open and the breeze blew in as well as creatures that buzz in the night.
I became calm and studied, I knew that dreams were constructions and we made them.
Every single one was part of a remembered past jumbled with desire and regurgitated.

I must have gotten careless with throwing away dreams.
Because you found it on the ground and brought back to me
Yet it isn’t the same anymore
The colors are rich and infused with scent
The sounds are alive in orchestral force

I never knew you had a key
But it was timing that made all the difference
Too early was as bad as too late
The door locks change and the keys melt away

Even in face of such obstacles the impossible happened
And the lines between the dream and you have become vague.
Now that you are here I see that maybe I was wrong
The dream was too small; it did not encompass all that you are
Then, maybe it was not a dream but a premonition.

Change of Heart

2005-09-26T00:27:00.000-07:00

Diane had misjudged. She thought she was falling in love but when she looked closely it was a peccadillo of infatuation. It was a brief exit from sobriety that temporarily filled her with hope again. It had been so long, and her life had become dreary. But with time she came back to the conclusion that someone outside her was not going to solve what was going on inside her.

At dinner she was out of sorts. She felt that familiar feeling of the present becoming part of the past. That this would be the last time she would be with him. She looked over and asked, "what's wrong?" She had inadvertently leaked her emotions without realizing it and he was reading her thoughts. It was clear his spirit was dampening as the night wore on. She tried to give off a positive attitude, but it wasn't working.

She said, "I am really tired, I should go." His solemn face knew what this meant and he did not fight it.

Four days later she received a letter:

"I thought about you today and the crazy things I have done. I put my life on the line for you because it felt right. What if it felt right, but I was wrong?

I thought about your spectacular qualities and how you seem to function right, whereas I am full of circuitry bugs and worn out parts.

I thought about how cool you can be: indifference or annoyance hidden barely below the surface.

I thought about how warm you can be and fill my insides with heat and aspirations. How brightly you shine in my eyes when you are moved to do so. You strip me of my armor and protection and am exposed before you.

I thought about all these things,but I thought about them all alone."

She was moved by this odd love letter. "Maybe", she thought, "he is all I really need."

Waking Hours

2005-09-18T16:20:00.000-07:00

I had to leave for so many reasons. One event followed another and eventually it was clear that there was no reason to stay. The past spoke warmly, but I would not go back to a place where memories were hanging on wall hooks. It was 10:44 in the morning and the dream was still lagging in the back of my mind. The glow of their faces, brimming with possibilities, telling me it was going to work this time. The day had past me by, it was almost 8 p.m. and I had forgotten the dream. These waking hours had painted over that momentary feeling.

It was the end of summer, but so much was beginning.

Unspoken

2005-09-08T23:54:00.000-07:00

The summer flies buzzed with weary speed in the hot afternoon sun. A wind picked up and piled dust against the windows. These visits had become painful, and certain discomfort started in my stomach even before I sat down. I hardly recognized her anymore; she had weathered harshly over the years. In recent memory she was a handsome woman, but after all of this she had been hollowed out.

She confessed to me what had happened. Embarrassed that she could not let go of this hope that he would change his mind, she looked beyond me as she spoke. "I thought he would see how we were really meant to be together." She looked sadly in my eyes and said, “I feel like a fool… but I needed to know for sure. I needed to know that there was never going to be a chance.” After twelve years, she had finally gotten the closure she was looking for but it came as no relief. “After he left, I was crushed. Now I know for sure there is no chance…” She poured me a cup of coffee and wiped the table with a dish towel. “I need a clean break, and I thought that telling how much I hate him would do it. But now that it is done I don’t feel any better.” She stopped moving for a moment. It seemed like an unnaturally long period of time.

“I.. regret it, and I am not sure what to do next.” She lit another cigarette, and sipped on her coffee. “I know that the opposite of love is not hate; it is indifference. The fact I hate him so much only shows how much I still really love him.”

Hidden From View

2005-08-09T22:39:00.000-07:00

It was an unintentional project
An interest in an invisible world
A simple question with a larger impact

So many people have hidden lives.
Things you would never guess by looking at them.

I am sure you have your own secret

And they did
Usually it started with little sins
I listened carefully and validated their perspective
Devastated later, but out of view.

I didn’t know the kind door I was opening.
I didn’t fully understand why they were hiding so much.

She said it wasn’t that hard and she needed the money
“I never told my family and I never will.”
“I guess we had each other for support,”she said
“but I always knew I would leave and find something better.”

He talked about the disease
How his face had changed to foreshadow the future
‘A living skull’ he told me
which means ‘I should already be dead’

He told me about the meds.
The ones that helped him hold onto a piece of reality.
The world was a groggy gray now but better than the alternative

She told me about the drugs
Finally feeling beautiful and wanted.
Even fleeting moments are memories, she said.

She told me about the car accident
On a continuous cycle
The guilt had not diminished after 25 years.

The curtain was pulled away, and in a way, we were all exposed

‘you know’ they said. ‘I don’t know why I am telling you …’

Here All This Time

2005-07-31T23:25:00.000-07:00

To reach out to some soul who would understand
She sent an open message of need.

To let the pain flow forward and leave him
He presented himself in a disguise .

To find validation for a view of the world that was tilted to the side
She wrote about her life.

To immortalize love he felt
He captured that ephemeral feeling into verse.

To vocalize the insecurities that she would challenge and conquer
She presented her path of questioning and resistance.

We came together by accident finding threads of ourselves in the lives of others
A mirror upon which our reflections were distorted and simplified.

Telling our stories... our narratives of a world uniquely ours
In a public place.

This was a new story that flowed from an old one
A instinctive need to connect, to share our world.

And really nothing can describe us all except that
We are here and we didn't know you were hiding there all this time.

The Fire Inside

2005-07-24T19:22:00.000-07:00

He hit me. Not hard enough to really hurt me but deliberately and directly to warn me. He threatened me. Drunken rage over something I didn't do. I would never do. My friend transformed hideously by the spell of fire water. This liquid genie with malicious intent took control. It didn't make sense, this was my dear friend, who I'd protect and shelter from any storm. Yet here in the late of a night out he was ready tear me down. In moments like these I become disoriented and after it happened all I could think of to say was, "goodnight".

Half Life

2005-07-12T22:50:00.000-07:00

Another moment in time to comtemplate bubble gum pop and coy smiles.
I escaped I thought, it was close, but not really.
Distorted memories of fever and dimmed windows, and television buzz.
Return to life, Lazarus, John Travolta, Kenny from South Park.
Work pays, school proceeds, life continues...
Supported by the phone lines like a high wire of communication.
They provide the feelings of hope, love, need, reality, and appreciation.
The ambilical cords that end in phone jacks.

I looked him straight in the eyes and said you are only your relationships.
I think I was misunderstood. I didn't mean he was dependent on them.
I meant that he was constructed.

Birthday cake and ice cream smiles.
Presents of bubbles, Playdough and paint.
Grumbling parents elevated to task of future clean-up.

I thought of attachment and what does it mean to have someone.
Is someone in your life? Do you have someone special?
The need to affiliate is great among humans, but at what level?
And at what point does attachment become habit and not appreciation?

I've have been thinking of the past,
only to find its manifestations in my dreams.
Friends that weren't worth the effort of phone bills and Christmas cards.
Yet somehow they have made their appearances in the soap opera of my sleep.
Their colors are vibrant and for some odd reason I need them.
At least for now.

An Excuse

2005-07-02T21:29:00.000-07:00

Hello?
Oh… How are you?
Yeah, sorry I haven’t called for a while…
Yeah, well… I umm ran out of things to say… to you
You see, I don’t feel the same, well…
Remember how you said you felt an electrical charge when we met?
No.
Well, I like you… but I…
Ok.
Yeah.
Goodbye.

After that there was time to rewrite it. There was time to reconstruct.

Six o’clock on a Thursday night and I know it’s you. I push myself to tell you directly. Your voice is soft and expecting. Unsure if I’ll pour love or rejection onto your fire. I hear your voice and I stumble unsure of what to say... just hoping the whole thing will just go away and let me off the hook easily. My mouth babbles earnest confessions and all the while I feel terribly guilty for not feeling the same as you. “Goodbye.” It ends. You hang up and the glaring lights shut off. I sit back on my bed and feel relieved in a selfish sort of way. In the background the Bright Eyes sing, “love’s an excuse to get hurt, and to hurt. Do you like to hurt?” I chuckle to myself and forgive everyone.

On The Other Side

2005-06-11T11:40:00.000-07:00

I remember when it all started: I was a determined child at four years-old and I convinced my mother to let me stay up late one night. My mother exhausted from her daily activities reluctantly gave in to my pleas to watch Peter Pan on our green-tinged TV.

She had been in bed for about 40 minutes when I heard a noise outside. The sound of steps on concrete was seemingly getting closer, until I was certain they were coming up the walk-way to the front door. I saw a silhouette of a man pass by the living room window; he kept walking to the door and jiggled the doorknob checking if it was locked. The rattling stopped and he started walking back down the walk way. I started breathing again but I was still paralyzed on the couch. It all of a sudden occurred to me that he might check the kitchen door too. I wanted to run and make sure the kitchen door was locked, I wanted to scream and wake my mother to go do something but my body betrayed me. I could do nothing. I was trapped inside a motionless body with a racing mind. I could hear each step as he casually walked toward the kitchen door. The sound of him jiggling the doorknob was pounding in my head like bombs. Fortunately for me, the door was locked, and he turned around and walked away.

Once I could finally move again, I ran to wake my mother. In her exhaustion she did not believe a word I had said. She told me that I should be in bed already and to turn off the TV. I was devastated. Now I was aware of an eminent danger lurking outside our doors and that no one would listen.

That event sparked a reoccurring nightmare that was to haunt me for many years to come. For some reason which I cannot explain, the dream was always in black and white on a fall day. The light all around was hazy. I was dressed in a gray clothes sitting in front of my house near the sidewalk holding some twigs tied with twine. I could see a figure on the sidewalk a few houses down. He was dressed all in black. It was unmistakably a man, but a large crow mask disguised him so I could not tell who he was. He walked slowly toward me and I could sense something was wrong, something ominous was about to happen. I stood up and started running toward the house and he started running too. I ran toward the car in the driveway but I couldn't get in. I could only run around it to avoid him. The steely black eyes on his mask stared out at me. His black figure clearly defined on the other side of car was trying to harm me, but he would have to catch me first. Slowly his head and body transmogrified into an enormous crow dripping a black oily fluid. He flapped his oily wings, rose high into the air and with loud screech came barreling down at me. I would usually wake up just as I jerked out the way of his fatal beak. It would be many years until I learned how to defeat this demon.

Still Life

2005-06-06T23:26:00.000-07:00

My great-grandmother was a medium. She was said to have visionary powers and could talk to the dead. People would come to her to hear what she could see and they couldn't. While only a thread of her blood resides in me, I believe she passed down a piece of a gift. For I see things all around me. Not the dead or their spirits, but the things that lie in between, these unspoken truths.

The Wrong Way

2005-05-28T15:06:00.000-07:00

We went on a hike together to talk, relax and reconnect. The guide book said it was one of the most beautiful sites in California. We must have gone the wrong way.

Temporary

2005-05-28T14:59:00.000-07:00

I sat at the table but didn’t hear a word she said. She went on from topic to topic. All I could focus on was the moisture spreading from the outside of my water glass forming a ring on the table cloth.

“Are you listening to me? Her hair turned orange!”
“hmmm.”

The spots where the water thoroughly saturated the cloth were darker like ink blots. The tablecloth was a cheery red, but the stain insinuated something sinister. But in the end, this was a temporary stain that would fade away or at worst leave a dim reminder of where it once was.

“Then, he came back! You are not listening!”
“I am. You were talking about her hair”

The waiter came, picked up the bill and the water glasses. I looked across to her side of the table. The water had left a tiny crescent moon and yet on my side there was a dark eclipse spilling into the night of the red table cloth.

“I personally can’t believe it. Don’t you think that’s ridiculous?”
“Absolutely.”

Quiet

2005-05-23T23:51:00.000-07:00

The quiet of the night has settled in and I hear the intermittent sound of cars passing by. The widows are open and yet the air is still. I sit and type these words. Aware that that they leave my fingertips trying to speak softly to you. I was warned. I was told that these words would not fan the flames. These words would not drive you away, bring you close, or change your mind. They were just words and would fall like leaves. Still, I choose not to believe.

Resolve

2005-05-18T00:00:00.000-07:00

It is a surprise to see you here.
I did not think I would see you anymore.
I was moving forward without looking back.
Found all the reasons I needed to leave you there.

Pride fights addiction.
Fear fights desire.
And yet it so good to see you.
I can still feel your smile.
Tender and soft.

You know, I read your letters.
Thought through each word you wrote.
Without the context they implied a thousand different things.
I could put a million meanings behind them.
But in the end, I hadn’t heard from you in so long.

Part me of went underwater and silent,
I swam forward and free,
but still it didn’t change.
I see you and my resolve diminishes
Until it is gone.
I see you and I feel warm,
I smile.

Touched

2005-05-09T22:15:00.000-07:00

Sarah came home with the anticipation of a future with someone new; an opportunity to fix what had gone wrong before and start with a clean slate. She locked the deadbolt. "You know what happened before... now find a happy ending," she thought. But lately, things hadn't turned out the way she had expected. Relationships grew and developed like seedlings and without much warning withered and died.

Sarah looked at herself in the mirror suspiciously and considered whether this would happen with Brad. Did Brad really like her? Would he still be interested once he scratched the surface; when she revealed her true self? Sarah kept asking herself how much she understood of this person-- this Brad. She felt more uncertain about him than with others.

She still felt the sting of Andrew and the fear he had created within her. Sarah was more self-conscious than ever. She was beautiful yet insecure. She ruminated on small things: she calculated the ratio her touching Brad to Brad touching her. She vowed that would not touch him more than he touched her. She would not give too much or too little. She scrutinized the things Brad liked, or at least the things he verbalized that he liked. She would be aware of everything and thus strangle any spontaneity she had left. Part of Sarah was tied in knots, like socks thrown in a corner. She was unsure of getting any closer. Anxious about a repeat of her previous temporary lives.

Almost There

2005-05-04T23:08:00.000-07:00

I sat down by a group of girls who were probably in their early twenties. They spread themselves out on the chairs and the floor with the casualness of a dorm room that had landed into an airport terminal. Books, magazines, laughter, earphones, journals, and general garrulousness was inconsistently broken by announcements overhead. Eventually a pressing announcement of a flight departure would nudge them to gather their dorm room and head for their plane.

It was another day in an airport with gray light filtering through the tinted windows. This state of limbo-- before arriving to a final destination-- always inspired me to people watch. I sat and I observed. I imagined lives and histories of those in front of me.

Everyone kept looking around. We all did as if we could find something that was here all along. A large man with the crew-cut styled Mohawk squirmed in his seat. A pasty white man on his cell phone banged his head with an empty water bottle. An Asian man wearing a burgundy cable-knit cardigan kept moving his book closer to his face, then realizing his book was too close would push it away and eye it with a certain suspicion. Every so often I had the feeling that I was in an psychiatric ward.

No Further Inquiries

2005-04-20T23:17:00.000-07:00

In the late night hour of my open eyes
I pondered the warm scent of night from outside
The subtle light that entered from the window
Movement in the curtain from the breeze

I stepped away without moving from my bed
Into a bright day where they had come back
Brilliant in the sun
Waving their shiny flags of victory over winter
As they did every year
This year would be no different

I could feel the miracle of new growth
The inspiration of what has never been
and what will only be temporary
New life clean and clear coming from the old.

Time changes everything
And nothing stays good or bad forever

I let go all the expectation, all of the intoxicating hope.
Now I was free again, free from wanting.
The magic faded and he became human, and only human.

I see him as part of a history of miscalculations
A reality that I only felt, only I could see
The bursting flame that was one-sided died down.
The embers fell into a mound that quietly goes away.

Back to the comfort of being outside
Standing separately from those who stop and join in.

The case was closed and the mystery stood suspended
No further inquiries.
I stopped pondering the fragments of evidence and let it go.
I had studied too long.
There was something down in the deep,
but I would go no farther.

Deep breathe and bright lights.
Back to a world where the chaser is the chased
and the anticipator, anticipated.
It is safe here.
There are no wounds in a padded world.

The construct, this façade, covers the exterior
and no one can be touched here.
I am safe.

Around the Corner

2005-04-12T20:32:00.000-07:00

I stood up and looked out the dark window and saw Richard staring back. He opened up briefly; just enough to let me see him smile again. It was that smile that made you feel you feel high too. I hadn't seen him smile like that in long time. Around Christmas maybe? No, definitely before Christmas. Some sort of spirit got into him. His eyes lit up and he tried again. I missed seeing him so happy; I almost forgotten that that was also a part him. There was hope in his words and although he would never tell me, he saw a new future that was pregnant with possibilities.

Infrequent Stops

2005-04-06T22:41:00.000-07:00

This was a story I had already lived
a crowded room of smiling faces
I embraced the familiarity and novelty of people I supposedly knew
a parallel amongst those in a library of friends
Here was the luxury of indifference

I left the door open and never came back
thinking in a way it would close itself
forget that I once lived there
reconstructed with the same materials I surfaced
to a new side of my green leaves

Fade

2005-04-02T08:08:00.000-08:00

She questioned herself if she had a right to be unhappy since after all nothing had happened. It was same as it always was except she had changed. After six years their relationship had been firmly established and was beginning to dry out. What had started as a passionate relationship became a companionate partnership as the years passed. The love was there but the color of that love was muted to a softer tone. Diane looked across her shoulder as Jake passed her a bottle of water. Here was the man with whom she had spent the last six years of her life. While she was grateful, she could not deny she felt discontent. Those years came with a price she wasn’t sure she wanted to pay anymore.

Privilege

2005-03-16T14:45:00.000-08:00

I woke up from a sound that seemed like a prolonged wail. "Paaaaaaaaaayshaaa". Loud and shrill it echoed outside amongst the dust. This was not a wail, but a screech for survival. The parade of women started early in the morning from the harbor and into city announcing "piexe". Elongated wails of which I assumed were religious when I arrived were not religious at all, but an announcement of fresh fish for sale. And indeed, brightly colored fabric formed swirls and knots which covered these stoic women merchants with tubs of fish balanced elegantly on their heads. It was only 8 am but the heat and the sun oppressed. Music from some unknown tinny origin buzzed like the mosquitos that were ever present in any cool spot. The colonial colors were bleached by the sun and tinted by the red dust. This fertile land had betrayed its people. With time my daily shock to the conditions here lessened; however, my sense of injustice grew.
Roosters and hens pecked around the trash and polluted puddles that surrounded the apartment buildings. The war has been officially over for three years, yet the struggle to survive continues daily. It's amazing though how they persist. I don't think I would have the strength as a person to forge through conditions like this and not be embittered by the wealth that is hoarded by a few ignorant greedy people.

It has been over month since I left home and come back to this strange country. This infernal heat and humidity surrounds you, and pulls on you. Each day I work like never before and can’t help but realize that I had the privilege of lower-class American childhood. In a place like this, I feel I lived like a prince. I come with privileges: monetary resources, and the mere fact I can leave and go home, but most of all, my skin color. My skin is the most expensive suit one can have here. This sickens me; something so worthless distinguishes between who is valuable and who is not.

Blue

2005-03-08T15:30:00.000-08:00

Darren scared me last night. I was sound asleep when I heard the pounding on my door. The sound echoed in the fog of sleep, and it took me a moment before my head cleared enough to orient myself to the hotel room. Off to my right I could hear Darren pleading to let him in. I opened the door unsure of what I find waiting. Unsure of what role I was about to play.

Darren looked terrible. His blond hair was matted down and his eyes swollen. “Jay” he said slowly, “Is all right if I come in? I…” He stopped and choked on a few words that seemed to have wandered off on their own. It was awkward. I didn’t want him in my room, but I couldn’t turn him away after what had happened.

He came into the room carrying a large blue towel of unknown origin in his left hand. This hotel only had cream colored linens, and wouldn’t have made sense to have brought a towel from home all this way. Sweat was beading on his forehead and he erratically used to this towel wipe it away.

“So Darren… what is going on?” I asked with honest concern. He looked at me and winced as if I had pulled off a bandage too quickly.“I told her what happened and she hates me now. Doesn’t want me around, says she’ll shoot me if she sees me with him,” he said with pained look.

I hardly knew Darren, we had worked on a few projects together but our conversations were generally work related. I never considered him a friend or someone I would confide in; much less seek at 4 in the morning. I resented his presence and could feel him trying to pull me into his dark corner. I wanted to resist, but I also wanted to free myself and go back to sleep.

“Darren… who are you talking about?” He stared back at me and exhaled hard. He pulled out a photograph from his pocket as if he had been waiting for the right moment to show me. It was a snapshot of what looked to be a family standing in front of bungalow styled house. The man and woman in the photograph had blank smiles, while the boy and the girl had the unsure expression of concern. The photograph had been taken in the seventies by the look of the clothing, but I had no idea who these people were. Then he pulled out a second snapshot and handed it to me. This was of a man wearing a blue shirt and strange shadowy expression. Upon close inspection, it appeared that the boy had grown up from the first photograph into the man in the second. Yet something was wrong, in the transition from boy to manhood some aspect of character had changed. I turned to Darren’s searching eyes sure he could tell I was confused by these strange revelations. Gradually I began to understand that the accident today wasn’t just “an accident”.

Departure

2005-03-01T00:02:00.000-08:00

The days passed slowly after Diane left. My life was in a state of disrepair prior to her departure and when she left I lost any direction I may have had. I drove alone but the ritual lost its sense of hope that things would get better. I kept driving through the dark nights thinking that I might alleviate this pain, but I was just an engine running oblivious to where I was going.

After months of despair, I decided I would leave too. I would let go of this life that once included Diane and now had me as its sole protagonist. I would go somewhere else and begin again. I would start by vacating this shabby apartment and discarding this sorrow. I opened a drawer in my desk to get an envelope for the notice letter I was planning to send to the landlord and there it was. The stained yellow slip of paper sat plainly in the back of the drawer. The pain ripped through me again as if I was reliving her last steps out of the apartment and into a world that did not include me. That sheet was evidence that she once truly loved me. In this time of uncertainty about any love, I needed something to remind me that these feelings were real and that they weren’t just mine. There were hundreds of them once, now the last remaining one lay in this lonely desk. They were yellow petals to remind me of our love. In sunnier days she would make little drawings on a little yellow note pad and stick them throughout the apartment. Places she knew I would go in the morning… the bathroom mirror, the kitchen cabinets, the refrigerator and the table. The most elaborate drawings were always left on the door to remind of how much she loved me in that brief moment before I stepped outside. Here lay those memories crackling and old like dried out leaves.

From a Window

2005-02-13T21:17:00.000-08:00

Diane and I drove at night. The light from the shop windows and lit signs illuminated the interior and let me see her reflection, her glow. I didn’t know what to say anymore, we had lost so much and the drive seemed to be the last thing that held us together.

I couldn’t say when, but Diane had left me. Her world slipped away and she went with it. She began driving at night. As if to escape our domesticity by driving through the illusion buried in the urban sprawl of Los Angeles. Our apartment grayed, and she maintained her ritual. I continually failed to reach her, neither my words nor my touch opened her to me again. Her vacancy was pulling me down, and I could not undo its curse. If I had done this, I did not know how.

The apartment became a reminder of this ailing relationship. I began following her to the car, getting in the passenger seat silently. This continued for days, until she would finally have to break away from me. We turned down 2nd street and went through a tiled tunnel. The taillights of the cars in front of us stained the tiles to a flickering red. Her eyes were heavy as she said, “I have to leave, and you can’t come with me…” We had grown so far apart and yet I needed her. Her presence meant that everything would be all right. But it wasn’t all right, and as much as I tried to fight it found myself thinking of the possibilities with Diane. She was all I had now. Since the day I saw her, I felt foolish and I felt love.

Diane drove home slowly. We were silent the whole way. When she took the keys out of the ignition and creaked her door open, I broke down and cried.

Outside

2005-02-09T22:51:00.000-08:00

Elena’s sense of pride was linked to her stature. Her walk drained many of their securities and left them feeling uneasy. Her smile would curl slightly upward and her stare was aimed at the infinite distance outside of herself. She knew her tall straight body was bold and graceful as passed through gaze of others.

But all of this was acquired. Carefully chosen movements working tightly like a clock would appear to fall away from her blossoming beauty. Yet I questioned her innocence by her calculated presence. A smile so perfected and a sexual taunt so developed that it was hard to believe she created it for a world that she would never join.

Many that saw her envied her youth and her apparent carefree beauty. Others tried to trap her and hold her with their sweaty palms, hoping to keep pieces her for themselves.

She was sitting alone in a café when I saw her. I caught the corner of her eye and for a very brief moment she smiled lightly. Her lips so tender that each movement, each exhalation made them quiver. Still, she was aware and she was in control. Although she hardly moved, she monitored the distance between me and her carefully. I found myself transfixed and feeling foolish in my obviousness.

I sat across from her and watched as she read. Each word in the text dropping from her lips. I could only stare with intent as she continued to control this situation. My fear of losing her interest was overwhelming. She would move slightly and look up slowly with a small curious smile. A raised eyebrow, or a furtive glance gave rise to flames. This restrained striptease was too slow. I needed more, and in a grave move I stood up and walked around her. I wanted to open her up, to pry my way in. Somehow I had to break her balance, her beauty to find resolution. Her beauty pained me and not having her pained me more.

I had gotten too close to her and she shut down. I felt cold as I stopped existing in her world. The more deliberate I attempted to get her attention the less it affected her. She had cleansed herself of my presence and was completely free of any interest in me. She withdrew further into her private clocklike world. Leaving the external world and escaping back to scraping around her insides on a path I could not follow.

Closed

2005-01-31T22:48:00.000-08:00

Elaine sat down in the café and started writing a letter that she knew she would never send. It would come out of her like some unwanted creature of its own. She would describe the moments in which she could trace the rise and fall of her faith in him. She relived the moments of elation that would crest and crash like green waves to his cold indifference. It became a spiraling story she would relate to no one except to the pages in her weathered journal. Her fascination with vocabulary provided a distance which helped cushion her from the pain. It was as if describing the emotions with impenetrable accuracy she would be beyond the experience. These emotions would no longer belong to her but to a literary exercise. The combination of eloquent phrases tied together with punctuation would help her ignore the fact she was crumbling inside for a man who would never be hers.

Her coffee had become cold and undesirable. She realized that she had spent too much time festering over this passioned ambivalence. There were too many pages in this notebook to one man who refused to reciprocate her love. The intoxication of his presence kept coming back; and even though she wanted to reject these feelings his presence awoke a sleeping animal inside of her. He was an enigma of a man, who would not open up to anyone, including himself. His twists and turns were his personal flurries and she was not privy to enter into his frozen world. Yet, she kept coming back to stare into his brown eyes, his crooked smile, his handsome face, and relish in his mild lisp. Somehow, it was all very endearing on him, until he would gently lash out at her. It was his warning to not get too close, and she learned to take heed.

Heavy Steps

2005-01-25T22:54:00.000-08:00

William walked into his apartment with heavy steps. The sparse clean surfaces reflected the home of a determined man. He lived alone, and had learned to count on the quiet respite of his late night hours. In each room, the placement of each element was calculated with artistic precision. Clutter was confined to pre-designated locations which did not detract from the deliberate lines that encompassed each room.

Friendships had the easy distance of never revealing too much. His unconscious strategy was to find people who were so self-centered he didn’t have to reveal himself. It worked well, and over the years he let others create a persona for him that was completely false but comfortable. He found his attempts of intimate relationships were unsuccessful. This rejection led him to think of women as a means to an end. He continually decreased his effort he put into seeking a romantic relationships until he gave into purchasing the company of a willing party.

But tonight none of that mattered. He was tired and wanted to forget all of it. He would forget that he once dreamed of being in love. He would shut out the feelings and resolve to enjoy his favorite TV show. This was a simple pleasure with constrained consequences that couldn’t affect his life. His mental state would slow down from the frenetic daily schedule and he would finally let go of the reigns.

Spotlight

2005-01-17T11:43:00.000-08:00

Sarah tried to take the spotlight away from her dissimilarities and guide him back to her warmth. It wasn’t working, and even she doubted her smile reflected in Paulo’s face. She wanted to tell him she loved him, but now it seemed like dim possibility. How could she pull him away from a crowd of disapproval and show him the beauty she kept inside for him. She might not ever be his lover, but it didn’t matter, she wanted him to know, she wanted his understanding more than anything. But how do you ask for that, she pondered. How do you ask someone to have faith in you when they are puzzled by you?

The Party

2005-01-13T22:47:00.000-08:00

He was out of his element. Life had swiftly moved forward and he wanted to reclaim some of it, but wasn't sure how. When had things gone wrong, he kept asking himself. He couldn't let go of the feeling that somehow he was to blame. The tables had turned in his life and he was feeling empty handed. His bed was empty and the very things that once brought him joy seemed lackluster and passed their expiration date. Yet here he was sitting at this party with friends that were not his own. He had been unwittingly been ripped from his comfort zone and wedged in some calibrated celebration which he could not endorse.

Burn

2005-01-13T22:24:00.000-08:00

Richard sat on the concrete stool by the beach and focused on the discrepancy formed by the sunlit sand and shadows cast by palm trees and people trudging by. Why should this fascinate him? He had no reason to care about the impact of light rays on the grains of sand in front of him. A girl of indeterminable age ran past and grabbed a cup filled with toxic colored liquid and gulped hungrily. Her brown skin and dark curly hair defied the sun's bleaching of her gentle features.

The Trip

2004-12-21T19:18:00.000-08:00

The trip refreshed his hope for something he had almost forgotten he had at one point. They met almost by accident and yet her appearance meant so much. He knew then as he knows now that Sara is not for him, but she showed him that he was not alone. That maybe he could fall in love again. Really fall in love again. Someone he could read to late at night in bed. She would listen attentively as they stepped into the looking glass of someone else's world. Their hands together as they gazed upon the scenery through eyes of someone else. There would be someone who would value what he had to offer, even after he, as a physical being had faded. To her, he would be similar, not brainy, not strange, but a recognizable part of her life - like he had always been there.

Some Things Don't Change

2004-12-12T20:49:00.000-08:00

I remember the first day I met her. I was impressed by the force of her clear sense of self. I would not have thought then this was the beginning of a friendship that would continue to grow over the years. I must admit, rarely have the moments of meeting the people who would form the cast of my life been obviously pivotal. Instead, they were caught within the casual experiences of mundane activities of daily life. However, these people –those I consider true friends- have eased some of the pains of life when it was anything but mundane.

Now that our worlds are a thousand of miles away, we have a brief revival. One evening in week of hectic schedules we meet and things seem so familiar… Eight years ago I bought sofa, with a criteria of it being large enough to fit her sleeping body when she came to visit. Those days of late night inebriation and marathon discussions ended with a pillow and blankets on the couch. Now, several years later, our topics have changed, and the drinks are bit more refined but the evening still ends the same.

Exodus

2004-12-05T10:31:00.000-08:00

Tom left Hollywood and started a life in Silver Lake. This would be a turning point in his life, but he didn't know it at the time. In this small move he would leave behind so many of the trappings of a life that didn't fit him. Unwittingly, this is where he would flourish and ultimately come to the conclusion that he needed more. No matter where he looked in the city, the one thing he wanted most seemed to elude him. Each puddle reflected a solitary figure and every wall had a single shadow.

This Hollywood Life

2004-12-02T23:39:00.000-08:00

I moved to Hollywood when I was 23. I had grown up in L.A., but after leaving for a few years I thought I never come back. Still, there was something special about moving to Hollywood. Happy childhood memories were of sunny days of driving in the Hollywood Hills or down Hollywood Blvd. Somehow, despite the miserable state of Hollywood Blvd. during the seventies and the eighties, I had been entranced. In particular, I was in awe of the Hollywood sign. It had taken on welcoming aura for me and whenever I see it now I know I am near home. Even when I travel, there is a certain comfort in seeing the sign on television or in a movie. My father is a landscaper, and when I was a child he would sometimes take me with him while he was giving estimates. These were some of the few times we spent time alone . When my father was going to give estimates in Hollywood he would ask me if I wanted to come along and see the Hollywood sign. I lived in Norwalk, which although only twenty miles from Hollywood, it seemed like a distant land. I felt special and privileged over other children in my neighborhood by going to the real thing, not just seeing it from afar or on TV, but actually going to the hillside where the letters were bolted in. Back then the sign wasn't gated to the public, and as a result it was heavily coated in graffiti. But even still, I remember those days with fond memories. At the time, money was tight and usually all we did was see the sign and leave for home. But every so often my dad would offer a special treat and take me to the Cinerama Dome. Standing on Sunset near Vine in its huge parking lot you could still see the sign in the distance and being at that huge white dome was surreal. I might as well have landed on the moon -it seemed so futuristic to me at the time. The fact the building was in a state of disrepair was of no concern to me. It was just me and my father spending the day together somewhere magical.

Sao Paulo

2004-11-29T22:47:00.000-08:00

Te Sepulté.

Me dijeron que nunca creyera en leyendas,
pero yo soy muy supersticioso,
y de vez en cuando leo las cartas
y hago pactos con uno que otro fantasma.

...de ahí que te volví a conocer
retornaste en forma silenciosa.

-Raul Gomez, 25 de Noviembre, 1993

Drive

2004-11-28T18:19:00.000-08:00

I walked out of the dark room in the brilliance of sunny day in Los Angeles. Although it was fall the sunlight betrayed the expectation of grey gloom. Immediately my eyes closed up with only a slight perceptible break between the lids. I wanted to turn around and go back inside and forget the whole idea, but guilt kicked in and I continued.

I turned the ignition and before the car sputtered into life Elliott Smith sang of 'Memory Lane'. For some reason that still baffled me slightly, the radio was always more anxious to wake than the rest of the car. As I drove off the lyrics of the song filtered off and on into my head, and if recorded music didn't have quality of a specter in its disembodied self, a posthumous release of an album only added to the effect.

Clothed

2004-11-26T11:37:00.000-08:00

There was a tragic woman on the train today. She was filthy and her clothes were tattered. Her presence alone scared away the women in the vicinity. Crazy they would say. One screwed up bitch. Talking to herself and scratching herself all over with the hand that did not have a ski glove on. How did she end up looking like that? Half dead, but still alive enough to roam the metro stations.

At that moment I wanted to be in a warm place, some place of comfort. But instead I was sitting in the harsh fluorescent light with swarms of unwelcomed smells, opinions and germs. I counted down the stations until I could escape from the exposure.

I was lost in my thoughts until the tragic woman started to scream out words from a foreign tongue that sounded from an eastern European country. As if making a point at the end of her outburst she bit down hard on her McDonald's hamburger. Unfazed by her presence was the Mayan-looking man sitting next to her. He would keep his sad lonely expression throughout the entire trip.

The Distance

2004-11-24T11:29:00.000-08:00

Sometimes you are given a gift into seeing what your life could have been.

You are provided the perspective to see course of life that would have been if you had taken that job, stayed with that boyfriend/girlfriend, or never left your home town. Many times these glimpses of unchosen futures give you the assurance that you have taken the right path.

Then, there those moments where you realize that if you had not pursued some tangential aspiration or had circumstance led you to an opportunity before the door had closed, something wonderful could had happened. One may be dislillusioned by this, or see this as a source of hope: evidence that these opportunities exist and it still could happen.

Luanda, Angola

2004-11-24T01:24:00.000-08:00

An ordinary morning opened as I focused my eyes on the room around me. The sun beaming in through the blinds reminding me I needed to lift my body from the warm nest within my bed and trod to the bathroom and start the ritualized preparations of the day. I passed Tom’s room and saw Pokey curled on top of the bed peeking out from half-opened eyes as a stumbled toward the bathroom. Each morning a familiar surprise to see myself reflected back in mirrors. It was as if an actor lived on the other side, that cold glass world, and we were both startled to see each other on the same schedule. Something inside me, reminded me of the decadent surroundings. These feelings would follow me through the day. Now that I had seen life on the other side there was a nagging question as to what was fair and who deserved what. The room was filled with brilliant white, flowing from the shower curtain to the towels to the tile. A hygienic hue to remind one of the miracles of modern day cleanliness.

I left all of this and stepped on plane and stepped off again onto the tarmac. Jostled from left and to right as I pushed without concern toward the customs counter. The sickly sweet smell of sweat and old fruit permeated everything. Why does it always smells the same? As I left the baggage claim area I saw the flashes of eyes searching for an opportunity to help, to drive, to earn my money.

I turned the page and like reading a blank book I found it necessary to fill the space with my own projections. I could find divine meaning in the happenings and events or leave it all to entropy. I chose to create a narrative heedless to the possibility that there is no meaning but chance: A twist of statistical probability that allows my mind to invoke meaning on the meaningless. Looking down I read the familiar words. I put my ear against myself. Like listening to a conch to hear the ocean, I want to hear what is inside of me. If the sea is the origin of the conch, what sound should be the origin of me? I slept restlessly and looked out like a ghost in a shell. For surely I am not that different from all of them yet I feel so far apart. I walked on the broken sidewalk amidst the broken spirits, as Land Rovers and Mercedes sped by. I purchased my water and my sandwich. Retreated to my hotel, my room, my bed. These days are for others, I told myself. That is why I came. To change the situation for someone else I cannot see. To give hope to someone who doesn’t know the blindness that is waiting for them. If Derek Jarman spoke of blue blindness and Jose Saramago spoke of white blindness, what is the blindness of not knowing your enemy?

Nora

2004-11-20T15:05:00.000-08:00

She kept walking, but he was still on the back of her mind. Trapped like a bird with a broken wing. This constant fluttering in her head would not let her forget.

Jeffrey

2004-11-20T15:00:00.000-08:00

It was very strange in a synchronistic way. As Richard spoke to David he was coinciding with his life. Not only was he talking to him, thus in a parallel existence, but topics were somehow not linked only by chance. The music, the place, and echoes of a story that came before reverberated with Richard. There was something here that went beyond the visible or audible. As David talked clues of sameness opened up. There was a message behind these shared experiences. David and Richard were in each other’s life for a reason of which they were not yet aware.

And as if this conversation were a key to the door of paranormal, the one person Richard wanted to see more than anything landed at Richard’s feet completely unaware of Richard’s beckoning call. Coincidence? Maybe, but fortunate none the less. Here was a chance to step in the dark door way of impossible and cruel love. Richard narrowed his eyes and smiled at the vision that walked near. He treaded with fear lest he be too bold in his desire. He hesitated but moved forward to say his name. He let the word roll off his tongue like he was seeing a friend at a tennis club, “Randy.” The smile from Randy lead him further into a temporary intimacy with his prey. It flowed lightly, and yet there was awareness of attraction on both sides. After a prolonged interaction it was clear it couldn’t continue like this. They looked at each with a slight awkwardness, making it clear it was time to go back to their lives.

Sophia

2004-11-20T14:57:00.000-08:00

If these were superpowers, she might as well find out now. She considered the options in front of her: turning the coffee table into ice cream or turning the sofa into a giant Care Bear. After multiple disappointing attempts her faith in superpowers quickly diminished.

Los Angeles River

2004-11-20T14:29:00.000-08:00

When Richard was alone he became aware what made up his insides. Much like a spiritual retreat of silence and meditation, he found himself detached from everything. The clarity of distance only made the barnacles of his regular iterations and preoccupations more obvious.

Look out

2004-11-18T22:14:00.000-08:00

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it transcends time and space.
--Anonymous, Deserata

Table Mountain

2004-11-17T22:09:00.000-08:00

Richard accepted the fact that he could not go back in time. Emotions change like currents, and he was now in different waters. His smile still held charm but did not cast a spell. He let go of his grasp, and slipped away.

Buddy L

2004-11-16T22:28:00.000-08:00

He looked in the rearview mirror and saw headlights that seemingly appeared like phantoms and faded like wisps as they made their way down different paths. The solitary road allowed him to clear his thoughts as the wipers beat at a rhythm not unlike the melancholic songs he had heard in somewhere in South America.

Water poured all around saturating the ground, cleansing the dirt off the vehicle in a superficial manner. The gleam and glint was back, but the grime held the stain of history. Yes, the dirt was still there, just not as obvious. His vision impaired but his determination to continue was unabated by the water's resistance. He knew he had to follow what he believed to be true and find distance from the veneer that coated so many recent encounters. The water coated the highway creating a strip of sea that carried him farther from the city and deeper into the desert. Its barren space enveloped this vector.

Blue Leaves

2004-11-14T18:26:00.000-08:00

I found history by gardening. My father was always gardening. My grandmother was an avid gardener. Along with me passes an acknowledged tradition.

The styles of lives are played out in our gardens. While I never really got to know my grandmother, I saw her garden twice. It was practical. She had almost everything in pots and long hose that allowed her complete control. I wish I could have spoken to her. Maybe I would have learned her history. Her story of unnoticed life, and buried triumphs.

Frank

2004-11-13T13:43:00.000-08:00

BUZZ

why I ask myself, a mantra in a monastery of addictive iterations
silver purse, red hair and Jesus in pastel and ready for sale
I looked out the glass half expecting the familiar and friendly
half expecting a face chiseled into a possibility
blue peaked and in summer plumage with sari in tow
energy coming through the door
claimed locations in a miniature world of caffeine, tattoos, and shuffled newspapers
The momentum changes as the day progresses
the chatter and sly glances of the caffeine-tenders
early morning crowd and the proud stature of employment and conformity
the disinterested regular inhabitants with their scripts, theses, grading, poetry, artwork and mental disorders.

Masked

2004-11-11T23:09:00.000-08:00

what doesn't kill you will make you a stranger
and outside I look out and step into the street
reflective from rain and electric lights crackling above
I live here in this drifting city
not knowing with whom you sleep