My mouth tastes like mold. Originally mislead, I thought it was the blueberries, but it’s my mouth. White and fuzzy. Squirming with death and a pristine sterile white wooly cleanness.
I can hear the dong dong dong of the grandfather clock pounding in my teeth. I look up at its stale sallow ashen face from the red oriental-ness of the rug to which my check is glued with stalactites of saliva and my skin groans as the sun glares at me through window blind eye slits, full power- ON.
I moan in response. Again. And again. I become a growl and every shimmering faded burnt out cell in my whale heavy harpooned corpse wills it to implode and heave me into blessed pure untainted night once more.
My howling grows fainter. I am moving away from myself. I can sense me in the sphere of hazy distance beyond myself. The magnetism is exceedingly strong and I am collecting the unnecessary into my most immediate planetary rings.
The unnecessary, the undesired, despised. Rejected littered forgotten gunk of the universe. When All I Want is You !
Where is that stupid shadow of a girl who tied the drooping pink ribbon around my lower intestines? My Aurora. OH Why can’t I trap you in my magnetosphere?
And now crying. Crying happens. My face just holds my eyes which are holes; soft holes for water to stream from. Disappointment leaks down into the mushy red oriental-ness underneath me, supporting me. My eyes feel like microscope lenses.
I am protruding into details I never knew existed. Outwards along the tops of the evenly mowed field of carpet. The dirt and dust build up between each tentacle thread secured at the base like underwater seaweed. Grimy and salt encrusted, ancient with the excrement of the world. The cracks. The lines- everywhere.
Oh just dance for me Aurora. With your lights reflecting on the wall, rainbows. I am seeing spots, long oblong spots of yellow everywhere. Like every one has been semi-dipped in it.
I feel exposed being naked here on this rug. I feel like there are people everywhere watching me. I am cold.
I am screaming all my words, my mouth is huge, all red lips and I feel like my eyes will never close. I am looking, I am soaking this flattened world up through my eyes. My tongue juts out like a plank and I trip on my words off the end of it. Lapping, splattering against the bald oriental head, rubbed raw by an allusion of me, stripped, as if by acid. I have burned into this rug. I have skinned it
All I want is to see your breasts, while you brush your teeth, one more time swinging back and forth with each stroke, serene and heavy, clocking time.
I suppose I was human after all.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Writing Sample 11
My distaste for nuts does not come from a dislike of flavor or even texture of nuts themselves, but rather stems from my first experiences with the white chocolate macadamia cookie. The frustration and immense disappointment of biting into a cookie full of creamy sweet smooth white chocolate, prickling with the anticipation of delight, but instead being cruelly fooled by look-alike pieces of white, not soft, or sweet, hard, dry, disgusting, cardboard-like nut- it is the worst feeling in the world. I absolutely could not deal with the shock or disappointment and promptly avoided that specific cookie.
However, as a passionate lover of white chocolate, it was difficult for me to avoid it for long (seeing as it is the only commercially accepted white chocolate cookie) I was hardly ever successful in my avoidance of this, my favorite snack-time dessert. So what did I do? How on earth did I manage? My cravings, desire for, and obsession with white chocolate was stronger than my disappointment in nuts. Thus, I would choose the white chocolate macadamia cookie and proceed to carve out as many of the nuts as I could identify. It was a tedious assignment, with much mess, and often ended in entire cookie crumbling disasters. If I managed to keep the majority of the cookie intact, I immediately knew with the first bite that it was well worth the effort and I would become instantly delighted and satisfied with myself and my technique.
Why did my brain work like this as a child? I have been avoiding nuts, picking out, and eating around nuts for years. It has become natural. "I don’t like nuts." I say it all the time.
But the thing is, I do like nuts: candied nuts, the peanuts bathed in sauce on my Asian food, salted peanut packs on the airplane. I eat them all.
However, as a passionate lover of white chocolate, it was difficult for me to avoid it for long (seeing as it is the only commercially accepted white chocolate cookie) I was hardly ever successful in my avoidance of this, my favorite snack-time dessert. So what did I do? How on earth did I manage? My cravings, desire for, and obsession with white chocolate was stronger than my disappointment in nuts. Thus, I would choose the white chocolate macadamia cookie and proceed to carve out as many of the nuts as I could identify. It was a tedious assignment, with much mess, and often ended in entire cookie crumbling disasters. If I managed to keep the majority of the cookie intact, I immediately knew with the first bite that it was well worth the effort and I would become instantly delighted and satisfied with myself and my technique.
Why did my brain work like this as a child? I have been avoiding nuts, picking out, and eating around nuts for years. It has become natural. "I don’t like nuts." I say it all the time.
But the thing is, I do like nuts: candied nuts, the peanuts bathed in sauce on my Asian food, salted peanut packs on the airplane. I eat them all.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Writing Sample 10
And then sometimes I lay on the floor and look at the ceiling and look at myself walking on the ceiling, but that part is too backwards, too up-side-down, too abstract, too outside, and so I just imagine that that ceiling is the floor and I can’t see myself there- I just feel it but I think I might still be up-side-down and it gets really annoying to have to step over all of the door-frame entry-way blockers.
……….
I have decided that swimming and being in love are very much alike. You are completely submerged and everything seems slow, relaxed, laid back, and comfortable. And deafeningly quiet, other than the throbbing pulse of existence, which beats consistently and pleasing. Everything outside of yourself is blurred and distant. And you are utterly calm and content. Maybe I do not mean swimming, I mean holding your breath and lying near the bottom, where there’s a warm pressure that seems to attempt at containing you, but you easily push and glide underneath it, happily sensing its presence and yet gleefully liberated. When you are forced to return to the surface it is entirely devastating. A seal of perfection broken, a euphoric existence lost.
……….
After the last long haul on the bike path, we rolled down to the curb and
pop-ed
a
squat.
There we watched the peak of the road perform. It went wonky, utterly warped. The crest danced underneath the flies, underneath the heat, underneath the tire wheels, and underneath our very roller blades. It cackled and swirled until our eyes began to go sore and out of focus. In an urgent motion, everything stopped.
So we pulled ourselves up and went home.
……….
……….
I have decided that swimming and being in love are very much alike. You are completely submerged and everything seems slow, relaxed, laid back, and comfortable. And deafeningly quiet, other than the throbbing pulse of existence, which beats consistently and pleasing. Everything outside of yourself is blurred and distant. And you are utterly calm and content. Maybe I do not mean swimming, I mean holding your breath and lying near the bottom, where there’s a warm pressure that seems to attempt at containing you, but you easily push and glide underneath it, happily sensing its presence and yet gleefully liberated. When you are forced to return to the surface it is entirely devastating. A seal of perfection broken, a euphoric existence lost.
……….
After the last long haul on the bike path, we rolled down to the curb and
pop-ed
a
squat.
There we watched the peak of the road perform. It went wonky, utterly warped. The crest danced underneath the flies, underneath the heat, underneath the tire wheels, and underneath our very roller blades. It cackled and swirled until our eyes began to go sore and out of focus. In an urgent motion, everything stopped.
So we pulled ourselves up and went home.
……….
Memoir 2
“No! No! The pretzel bag! Someone grab the pretzel bag!” Beth shouted from behind me where she sat in the very back of our tiny wooden canoe as we glided up into the air and bounced down hard over a sudden intense spell of waves.
But it was too late for the pretzels- we had been flushed with sea water seconds before. “Dang it.” I thought to myself. “I didn't even get to have any yet and now the whole bag is soggy and entirely uneatable.” I frowned deeply, but my troubled thoughts were quickly forgotten as we were bombarded with another grouping of even higher and more monstrous waves.
“AHHH” I screamed to the heavens. “What the heck?!”
Then suddenly we knew. As we looked to our left, paddles franticly trying to propel us forward, we could see the mighty Steamship Authority Ferry looming in the distance, gracefully transporting tourists between Hyannis and Martha’s Vineyard.
It was coming straight at us!
Terrified, we tried digging deeper into the water, putting forth an inhumane amount of force. Our little sister, huddled in the middle of the canoe without paddle or actual seat, began whimpering. Her swimsuit and face were streaked with the seaweed which kept coming over the side of the canoe and suctioning itself onto her like bile colored starfish. She sat in a tide pool of water up to her hipbones and the sea level was terrifyingly close to the top of the side of the canoe, which was at her eye level. I could feel her shaking behind me.
The atmosphere returning to shore was incredibly contrary to the previous trip we had made across the bay earlier that morning. Cheery and excited we had sung 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall twice and made up pirate names to pass the infinite time we had ahead of us. We went slowly and stretched our bodies lazily in the sun, barely paddling as the tide carried us to the deserted stretch of beach that lay ahead.
We had been shocked that morning at the breakfast table when we had confronted Mom with our plans for a day trip and potential picnic on the island across the bay, and she had approved. Completely surprised and bubbling with bliss and expectation we hastily ate and up and began to prepare for the day. Exploration! A land with no legacy of a human past! We had only ever canoed across the smaller bay, over to Gull Island, a stinky mess of muck that only appeared out of the water at low tide. We rippled with new adventure.
I made sure we remembered to grab food and Beth made certain I had smothered myself in sunscreen. Mary Kate, being younger and not fair skinned, was perfectly ready the moment she had put on her swimsuit when she had crawled out of bed with the sun that morning. She stood outside by the canoe which our grandfather had so kindly already heaved up into the bed of the truck, and danced around, waiting excitedly. She would get to ride in the truck, while Beth and I rode bikes, just in case someone needed to get home quickly. We didn’t wait for Mom and the boys, we were just too excited! So we kissed her goodbye and flew out the door down the street to the shore.
By the time Mom; pulling the wagon full of toys, towels, and little brothers made it to the beach, we had already set sail. We could see them on the rock jetty waving to us. Mary Kate smiled blissfully back, she was in heaven. It was not every day she got to hang out with the big girls!
We made it across easily with no troubles at all and pulled the canoe onto shore quite a ways away from the yacht anchored on a sandbar smack in front of the middle of our new beach. No bother, we would just pretend it was ours. As I stared at it, pure white and glimmering in the sun, I imagined sunbathing on the deck in a large straw hat and dark sunglasses, getting up only to dive off the side into the pure Atlantic blue water.
Beth started hollering for me and my day dream was broken. A horseshoe crab had floated right next to her as she stood, knee deep on the sandbar. For being the tough one, she sure was a scaredy-cat! We ran playfully back to shore and helped Mary Kate search for seashells. Though our beach was directly across the bay from where we were and the exact same ecosystem, it had been picked over many, many times by wandering children and romantic young lovers. There was hardly a chance you could find an exciting, different, or even unbroken shell there. This beach, on the other hand, was shell paradise.
By the time we had become aware of the Ferry heading towards us; however, all of the shells we had collected were long gone- dumped mercifully back to the bottom of the ocean where they had come from in a frantic attempt to lighten the canoe. We were definitely overloaded and chanced sinking.
Thankfully, we managed to maneuver our invisible little boat out of the Ferry’s path. Though still panicked, we soon relaxed as we could see Mom sitting on the rocks of the Jetty making a drippy castle. It was comforting to know we were almost there, especially for Mary Kate, who I could tell had stopped her silent crying.
The older younger brother, David, watched us as we pulled our now despised and hated canoe onto shore. He had been waving at us ever since he has noticed us returning on the horizon. We could tell he was bursting to tell us something, but our bodies soaked and exhausted, recently near-death, we were not to be messed with. We ignored him as best we could, until he said “You guys are in soooo much trouble.”
“What?!” We panted at him. “You’re ridiculous. You’re just jealous you didn’t get to come.”
“Nu-uh” He said, as we dragged ourselves over to where Mom sat, watching us. She had a very strange look on her face like she had been crying.
“You are never, NEVER, allowed to canoe across that bay,” was all she said.
But it was too late for the pretzels- we had been flushed with sea water seconds before. “Dang it.” I thought to myself. “I didn't even get to have any yet and now the whole bag is soggy and entirely uneatable.” I frowned deeply, but my troubled thoughts were quickly forgotten as we were bombarded with another grouping of even higher and more monstrous waves.
“AHHH” I screamed to the heavens. “What the heck?!”
Then suddenly we knew. As we looked to our left, paddles franticly trying to propel us forward, we could see the mighty Steamship Authority Ferry looming in the distance, gracefully transporting tourists between Hyannis and Martha’s Vineyard.
It was coming straight at us!
Terrified, we tried digging deeper into the water, putting forth an inhumane amount of force. Our little sister, huddled in the middle of the canoe without paddle or actual seat, began whimpering. Her swimsuit and face were streaked with the seaweed which kept coming over the side of the canoe and suctioning itself onto her like bile colored starfish. She sat in a tide pool of water up to her hipbones and the sea level was terrifyingly close to the top of the side of the canoe, which was at her eye level. I could feel her shaking behind me.
The atmosphere returning to shore was incredibly contrary to the previous trip we had made across the bay earlier that morning. Cheery and excited we had sung 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall twice and made up pirate names to pass the infinite time we had ahead of us. We went slowly and stretched our bodies lazily in the sun, barely paddling as the tide carried us to the deserted stretch of beach that lay ahead.
We had been shocked that morning at the breakfast table when we had confronted Mom with our plans for a day trip and potential picnic on the island across the bay, and she had approved. Completely surprised and bubbling with bliss and expectation we hastily ate and up and began to prepare for the day. Exploration! A land with no legacy of a human past! We had only ever canoed across the smaller bay, over to Gull Island, a stinky mess of muck that only appeared out of the water at low tide. We rippled with new adventure.
I made sure we remembered to grab food and Beth made certain I had smothered myself in sunscreen. Mary Kate, being younger and not fair skinned, was perfectly ready the moment she had put on her swimsuit when she had crawled out of bed with the sun that morning. She stood outside by the canoe which our grandfather had so kindly already heaved up into the bed of the truck, and danced around, waiting excitedly. She would get to ride in the truck, while Beth and I rode bikes, just in case someone needed to get home quickly. We didn’t wait for Mom and the boys, we were just too excited! So we kissed her goodbye and flew out the door down the street to the shore.
By the time Mom; pulling the wagon full of toys, towels, and little brothers made it to the beach, we had already set sail. We could see them on the rock jetty waving to us. Mary Kate smiled blissfully back, she was in heaven. It was not every day she got to hang out with the big girls!
We made it across easily with no troubles at all and pulled the canoe onto shore quite a ways away from the yacht anchored on a sandbar smack in front of the middle of our new beach. No bother, we would just pretend it was ours. As I stared at it, pure white and glimmering in the sun, I imagined sunbathing on the deck in a large straw hat and dark sunglasses, getting up only to dive off the side into the pure Atlantic blue water.
Beth started hollering for me and my day dream was broken. A horseshoe crab had floated right next to her as she stood, knee deep on the sandbar. For being the tough one, she sure was a scaredy-cat! We ran playfully back to shore and helped Mary Kate search for seashells. Though our beach was directly across the bay from where we were and the exact same ecosystem, it had been picked over many, many times by wandering children and romantic young lovers. There was hardly a chance you could find an exciting, different, or even unbroken shell there. This beach, on the other hand, was shell paradise.
By the time we had become aware of the Ferry heading towards us; however, all of the shells we had collected were long gone- dumped mercifully back to the bottom of the ocean where they had come from in a frantic attempt to lighten the canoe. We were definitely overloaded and chanced sinking.
Thankfully, we managed to maneuver our invisible little boat out of the Ferry’s path. Though still panicked, we soon relaxed as we could see Mom sitting on the rocks of the Jetty making a drippy castle. It was comforting to know we were almost there, especially for Mary Kate, who I could tell had stopped her silent crying.
The older younger brother, David, watched us as we pulled our now despised and hated canoe onto shore. He had been waving at us ever since he has noticed us returning on the horizon. We could tell he was bursting to tell us something, but our bodies soaked and exhausted, recently near-death, we were not to be messed with. We ignored him as best we could, until he said “You guys are in soooo much trouble.”
“What?!” We panted at him. “You’re ridiculous. You’re just jealous you didn’t get to come.”
“Nu-uh” He said, as we dragged ourselves over to where Mom sat, watching us. She had a very strange look on her face like she had been crying.
“You are never, NEVER, allowed to canoe across that bay,” was all she said.
Writing Sample 9
I’m a plant. I am a pretty little colorful flower and I will only grow- I will only exist and survive and be- if you sprinkle me with salt water. If you drizzle the ocean onto my head and bless me with throbbing whispers of creaky ship-prayers and gasps for oxygen. How am I going to make it if I am not pushing myself up out of sand-soil? Seriously, I don’t think this all-natural process of photosynthesis, of self-feeding and fueling, is going to take place if I do not have these additional, necessary, life-supplying elements.
……….
It exfoliates my heart
and puckers me into an eternal kiss
You are my only true love(r).
……….
In my special secret spot behind the love-seat I am swaddled with printed fabrics that I never got around to making into anything and I think inside of my head of the ocean and the sky and the flowers, and the mountains when I open my eyes are right there past the window but I am still sitting right here in my very small very sun light bright spot.
[out out damn spot!]
……….
Just think of it- all the starfish spilt in two and instead of growing back in normality to have five limbs they have four and the fifth becomes a nub of a head and they trek up the shore up the beach and across the parking lot exponentially expanding in size and paling in color until they become almost-people except their stomach is still on the outside in the middle not the inside and they still aren’t wearing any clothes, which is what is the weird part, but shouldn’t be. Do you know how many starfish there are down there underneath in the water? And how many more briefcases there would have to be to accommodate? (les serviettes) Because of course they would want to get straight to business, wouldn’t they?
……….
It exfoliates my heart
and puckers me into an eternal kiss
You are my only true love(r).
……….
In my special secret spot behind the love-seat I am swaddled with printed fabrics that I never got around to making into anything and I think inside of my head of the ocean and the sky and the flowers, and the mountains when I open my eyes are right there past the window but I am still sitting right here in my very small very sun light bright spot.
[out out damn spot!]
……….
Just think of it- all the starfish spilt in two and instead of growing back in normality to have five limbs they have four and the fifth becomes a nub of a head and they trek up the shore up the beach and across the parking lot exponentially expanding in size and paling in color until they become almost-people except their stomach is still on the outside in the middle not the inside and they still aren’t wearing any clothes, which is what is the weird part, but shouldn’t be. Do you know how many starfish there are down there underneath in the water? And how many more briefcases there would have to be to accommodate? (les serviettes) Because of course they would want to get straight to business, wouldn’t they?
100 Lines of Poetry
Laying in the bath
she is
pink and puckered
like a strawberry
rinsed under the faucet of the kitchen sink.
Supple, still, and silent
Her breasts her thighs her eyelids
speak for themselves
Half-submerged
as the final air-bubble-messenger-of-life
makes its way to disappear at the surface.
[11 lines]
Brick upon brick of book
I have stacked, walled, fortressed myself in.
Drawing. Jarring. You carve,
pen in their spines.
Bolting upright,
bringing to life, like Zeus, out of clouds
a man of imagination.
At night I can’t sleep,
it sounds like a pendulum- caught-
going too fast,
against my ear.
[11 lines]
It’s been a shoebox full of days since the last time I thought.
And longer since I’ve thought of you.
I’m not the only one who’d rather be cold and outside.
No, apparently I am.
I like what the goose bumps do to the feeling of my body.
And what the air paints with the colors on my skin.
It makes me feel tangible.
I become more of a reality.
[8 lines]
There’s a conspiracy on the airplane.
I knew it!
The pilot had to pee.
That was a pretty dang cool switch-a-roozy.
The stewardess,
who was chatting all cozy with that old man
-instead of getting me cranberry juice-
is standing guard.
This is hard core.
Why am I so aware?
How did I catch the secret sign?
Why isn’t the back-up coming out?
Look at her eyes, how creepy.
She is watching everything at the same time.
Planes are skinny so that they don’t need too much peripheral vision.
[15 lines]
We sneak into the theatre on 4th with a full jar of Nutella plus two spoons and stare up at the stars painted on the ceiling and pretend we’re at Hogwarts.
I want to suck your tongue like a dried mango strip.
When you run into the woods later to throw up
I wait for you.
Sitting on the curb I pretend I’m being sucked into the gutter during a rainstorm.
[6 lines]
You are my Space-Age dream
I want to experiment with the anti-gravity of your breath
Whisper into my skin so that I may float upward
I’ve been feeling heavy lately
My head is not even underwater
There is moldy dirt dripping out my ears
Soil moist in the corners of my mouth
and under my tongue
Scrub me clean with your sterile heartbeat
Probe me
I am following the fish with my eyes but when they turn they evaporate into the air
The red one is my favorite
When are we going to leave for Mars?
I’ve been saving up my oxygen.
[14 lines]
At the bonfire
Teresa went down to the river
Where we pretended to skip rocks.
We only ever got one skip-
from our hands
into the water
But we didn’t care.
The atmosphere was cooler,
not just the temperature.
And that boy wasn’t even tree-dancing.
His name was Sam-
and he was breaking off a branch
to hold into the fire
while everyone else roasted
and toasted.
[15 lines]
Sometimes
my heart
feels like
it has been taken
out
and
disassembled.
That there is just a place-holder
in the wrong shape
a star
or a downward spelled word from a crossword puzzle
maybe just the boxes
blank and
inexplicable
impossible to fill in
they belong to a really difficult word
and the clue is too cryptic for me-
or anyone.
And so it just sits there and stays like that-
empty
and contained.
[21 lines]
Ice cream
Pink, sweet
Melting, oozing, running
It’s all down the length of my arm!
Heaven.
[5 lines] Cinquain
Inside the bookstore
they lock up my medicine
Am I making meth?
[3 lines] Haiku
TOTAL LINES OF POETRY: 109
TOTAL FORMS: 2
she is
pink and puckered
like a strawberry
rinsed under the faucet of the kitchen sink.
Supple, still, and silent
Her breasts her thighs her eyelids
speak for themselves
Half-submerged
as the final air-bubble-messenger-of-life
makes its way to disappear at the surface.
[11 lines]
Brick upon brick of book
I have stacked, walled, fortressed myself in.
Drawing. Jarring. You carve,
pen in their spines.
Bolting upright,
bringing to life, like Zeus, out of clouds
a man of imagination.
At night I can’t sleep,
it sounds like a pendulum- caught-
going too fast,
against my ear.
[11 lines]
It’s been a shoebox full of days since the last time I thought.
And longer since I’ve thought of you.
I’m not the only one who’d rather be cold and outside.
No, apparently I am.
I like what the goose bumps do to the feeling of my body.
And what the air paints with the colors on my skin.
It makes me feel tangible.
I become more of a reality.
[8 lines]
There’s a conspiracy on the airplane.
I knew it!
The pilot had to pee.
That was a pretty dang cool switch-a-roozy.
The stewardess,
who was chatting all cozy with that old man
-instead of getting me cranberry juice-
is standing guard.
This is hard core.
Why am I so aware?
How did I catch the secret sign?
Why isn’t the back-up coming out?
Look at her eyes, how creepy.
She is watching everything at the same time.
Planes are skinny so that they don’t need too much peripheral vision.
[15 lines]
We sneak into the theatre on 4th with a full jar of Nutella plus two spoons and stare up at the stars painted on the ceiling and pretend we’re at Hogwarts.
I want to suck your tongue like a dried mango strip.
When you run into the woods later to throw up
I wait for you.
Sitting on the curb I pretend I’m being sucked into the gutter during a rainstorm.
[6 lines]
You are my Space-Age dream
I want to experiment with the anti-gravity of your breath
Whisper into my skin so that I may float upward
I’ve been feeling heavy lately
My head is not even underwater
There is moldy dirt dripping out my ears
Soil moist in the corners of my mouth
and under my tongue
Scrub me clean with your sterile heartbeat
Probe me
I am following the fish with my eyes but when they turn they evaporate into the air
The red one is my favorite
When are we going to leave for Mars?
I’ve been saving up my oxygen.
[14 lines]
At the bonfire
Teresa went down to the river
Where we pretended to skip rocks.
We only ever got one skip-
from our hands
into the water
But we didn’t care.
The atmosphere was cooler,
not just the temperature.
And that boy wasn’t even tree-dancing.
His name was Sam-
and he was breaking off a branch
to hold into the fire
while everyone else roasted
and toasted.
[15 lines]
Sometimes
my heart
feels like
it has been taken
out
and
disassembled.
That there is just a place-holder
in the wrong shape
a star
or a downward spelled word from a crossword puzzle
maybe just the boxes
blank and
inexplicable
impossible to fill in
they belong to a really difficult word
and the clue is too cryptic for me-
or anyone.
And so it just sits there and stays like that-
empty
and contained.
[21 lines]
Ice cream
Pink, sweet
Melting, oozing, running
It’s all down the length of my arm!
Heaven.
[5 lines] Cinquain
Inside the bookstore
they lock up my medicine
Am I making meth?
[3 lines] Haiku
TOTAL LINES OF POETRY: 109
TOTAL FORMS: 2
Writing Sample 8
Holding her arms strangely parallel, yet intersecting, up against the top right corner of her face. The fleshy, bulging under section of her wrists pressing together as if bound. Grotesquely mushy. She looks down and imagines. Vomits on her lilac toenails embedded in the bleached coral of her toes, elevated off the real earth by three leaf clovers, grassy weeds. A freckle of an ant runs across a larger toe and she curls a ramp into the forest. It launches off. Swimming in a flood of milk chocolate bile. Vile. English Breakfast tea with too much sugar, separated into another larger cup. Suffocated with too much milk. She wishes it would hurry up and rain. She doesn't really. Two times she rips a leaflette and it hurts her, on the inside. Almost physically. She wants to purge it all. The caffeine swirling a headache. Failure in the bathroom poking at a space lacking of tonsils, lacking of anything. She bends the grass and clover stems with a pencil. They are bowing away from her. She can't rip them. She slides her hand down down and forces between, without strength. Its like swimming and she is underneath for a time.She looks up and hears a bird land on the wire diagonally, directly in front. A heavy, god awful thump. This girl sees and senses shapes out of the corners of her eyes.They move and loom and dart. They also disappear. This girl is afraid of being alone. An entire empty house grows up directly behind her and it leans over her. She has goosebumps on her entire body. Bubble wrap. Un-pop-able. She is still alone and she still does not want to go inside.She goes inside and daydreams more of future llives and future houses that wont happen until she makes some sort of movement. She eats some nuts and stares at all the orange and red fish in the fish tank. She recalls her dream from the past night. The little girl and her mother, father, sister. Taking her house in the woods, on her cushions, and shoving her fish into a plastic bag without enough water. Its tail and body growing and growing and growing. Launching and flinging it. Trying to make someone put more water in the bag. Terrified and repulsed. But desperate. The waterfall outside of her glass wall, with certain panels open for air, overflowing,and pouring inside. She is sad. Only, thats not quite right. Upset that no one cares as deeply as she. That no one feels as swirlying and dizzyingly and intensely as she. Her attachments. Her desires, her true loves. Emotions she feels physically.Startled by a moving black blob on the right she jerks to look at a stationary piece of trash. She eats more nuts and is unhappy and her head still hurts. She quickly walks around the house closing scary doors and turning on all the lights. She is prepared for the night. She sits back on the couch. Then moves to the other end. Up against the wall. The salt from the nuts stings her canquer sores. She has 3. It is not her record. Unconsciously she decides to only eat with the right side of her mouth. She is a tense girl and the pounding of chewing lulls her into her head. She hypnotizes herself into that place. And she stays there.
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