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Wednesday, February 28, 2007

five things people have said that were meant to be heartfelt and compassionate but sadly missed the mark. 

1) "the lord works in mysterious ways." (it's not so much the religion in this that offends me, it's the cliche. it's like comforting someone with a marketing slogan or a really shitty proverb. we are so sorry for your loss, dear. good good whole wheat shreddies are worth two in the bush.)

2) "well, i guess you're not looking forward to christmas this year." (well not now you tactless, blathering fool. i was almost kinda flirting with the idea of christmas spirit, but i guess christmas spirits will have to do.)

3) "hey! it wasn't your boyfriend who died was it?!" (this was asked of me while i was in the middle of serving a line-up twenty people deep. this is what happens when grown men spend their entire lives communicating with machines and not people. this man now gets decaf coffee no matter what he asks for.)

4) "it's hard being alone, isn't it? you were so needed for so long and now you're not and you're all by yourself." (i have no idea how this could ever be conceived as a sensitive or compassionate thing to say to anyone at any time. the great part is that this one came from my grandmother.)

5) "well kathryn, let's hope 2007 is a little better for you than 2006." (what the fuck? gee, you think?! this was said within the first hour of my first shift back full-time, by the same gentleman who gave us number two. his social skills are a black hole that normal thoughts get sucked into. yipes. just yipes.)

Sunday, February 25, 2007

love letters, lost nights. 

dear halifax,

what happened to us?

we used to be lovers and now i don't know your face. i drag my feet across your frozen skin and feel nothing from you. nothing in me. we had secrets pockets of space and time. we had frantic laughs and dreamy east coast eyes. all the lights have gone out between us. my hands curl into claws when we touch.

remember when we were rockstars? you would fill my head with noise and i'd scramble over your hills and pathways, my breath swimming in front of my face like a ghost. you spread yourself lovingly like a sheet, with a million pin pricks for the light to shine through, and never minding the tatters that come with serious committment. you weren't like the others. you weren't shy when we met that first night (you saw me from across the room at the party, you stalked me like a hunter, you grabbed hold of my face and burned me with one look, you spun me around, screaming with laughter and i was done. i was yours). after that night i was invited to explore every inch of your body. the tickle trunk. the marquee. the khyber. stage nine. i came to all your parties. you had so many friends that i felt insecure at first, but you always had ways of letting me know that i was the one. i was childish and introspective, but none of these petty nuances mattered when the music played. you would let music fill every breath, every pore, rolling over waves of ecstasy as you swallowed the notes. and when you could no longer be filled, when you could endure no more pleasure, you would burst, spilling out melodies in torrents. i remember how the guitars cried and how the drums shook the floor and how i would clutch my own face for fear that your sweet symphonic eruptions would split me down the middle. when it was all over you would collapse with the sound of a redwood falling and i would carry you home. the cool night air would dance along the curve of your mouth.

now our nights are empty. you've shut your doors, one by one, and packed your masks away in great dusty boxes. your music is dying. all the notes turn sour in the air and then are silenced. i look at you and i see you look away. i touch you and it makes me feel ashamed. there are novels of words that we aren't saying to one another. is this a desperate cry for attention? is this a game to you? is it really over? maybe we drank too much that summer. we spent hours on the waterfront, our legs swinging over the pier, our heads full of drugs, lolling on our necks like sleepy-eyed infants. maybe we said too much too soon. all the words start like snowflakes but become honed projectiles that whittle us away, one letter at a time.

we tore each other apart and we can't fix it.

most nights i find myself alone, scraping together my last ragged notes to make a song that plays like a patchwork quilt. i've stopped wondering where you are and i don't expect you to come home to me. i've heard the whispers from your battered battalion of ex-lovers. they speak of you in a dead language, sentences like dried mud crumbling. birdland. misty moon. the green bean. there were so many before me whose existence i watered down with pretense and debauchery. i was supposed to be different but now i find myself among their loathesome ranks, haggard and wheezing, fingering ticket stubs and stolen trinkets, wondering what i'd say if you called. i did this to myself. i willed myself into believing that we had something honest.

Sunday, February 11, 2007

these landmarks that don't exist 

the calander tells me that it has been four months today. four months, which is how many weeks, which is how many days, which really boils down to moments. these measurements are nothing when all you feel is now now now now. you're not here now. you're not here now and i still can't fathom how this tricky beast called time will change anything in me.

(again, that pregnant pause in which i don't know whether i can still call you my boyfriend in casual conversation. there are no qualifiers that come easily and these semantics leave a bitter taste in my mouth.)

you and i are scared children pretending to be adults. such a precious pantomime. we talk about the importance of good food and the necessary forms and what i will do when you are gone. we talk about healing and breaking down. we talk about time even though we don't understand it. even though it rapes us. we talk about god.

(the day you died, i told your mother that you believed in everything because i heard such fear behind the question. i told her you were in heaven. i lied because she loves you in ways that are impossible.)

yesterday i listened to your voice on the answering machine for the first time and it sounded different than i remembered. your sentences are tired and stripped away. were your words always so ragged, or do i filter the past through the shock and suffering that comes with knowledge? I left you a whispered i love you and imagined that we could have secret channels of communication untouched by the unbearable sickness.

(and it occurs to me, from time to time, that we said everything except goodbye.)

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