so i havent actually... written... anything in god knows how long. theres nothing wrong with that, i mean i wish i did it more but i dont. i always think of things to say just never take the time to sit and work it all out. its sortof a shame, so many beautiful things. in my mind anyway. so i will sit here in the relative darkness, bathing in the glow of the blogger screen with the television blaring in the background. its nowhere i havent been before. everywhere is a place ive been before.

a while back i started getting these paranoid deja vu moments that would about knock me off my feet. suddenly i would see something and it would bring back almost total but vague recognition of something i had felt there before. its hard to explain. dreams i had, i assume, would flood my mind, having dealt with that place. i would see the things i had seen before and feel the way i felt. it was more a flood of emotion than anything else. welling up and overtaking me. i sat in the band room during 20th night a couple weeks back and casually looked the length of the room, up. the light that crept in from the far window bathed the ceiling above all the parents and students' heads. and it took me back to a dream, or, more precisely, brought the dream back to me. and i cant explain the dream but it was sickening. and i stared at that sight of the ceiling and the window and saw other things that id seen before.

there is a time, i think, that this all stems from. in between sleeping and waking up there is a period where i hate my dreams and hate realizing they are slipping away. it is a terrible deep down sickness that makes my eyes squint and me roll over and stuff my face in the pillow. times, i will sit in my living room all alone, or walk through the hallways of my house, or, once, looking through the refrigerator and realize, all of a sudden, that this is everything i have done before. ive been here a thousand times before, done this a million times before, this house, this room, hallway, everything is as concrete and real as i am and i am still here and always was. its a trapped feeling, a sick feeling, that brings me back to that gray area beween dreams and the morning sun that makes me hate everything around me and leaves me no escape. my head aches terribly, stomach rolls into nausea, there is no escape from what is, undeniably, reality. and yet, feels like something i am stuck in, some rut, something else. some bad dream come back to visit me.

other times i will be walking along a dry red muddy sidewalk across the street from my school to my car, some afternoon. i check the tinted windows of all the minivans as i pass to make sure my shirt is straight. sometimes, if its really pretty out, and im thinking of a specific occasion here, i will look up at the sky, at the white clouds that fade to gray before becoming blue. theres no sharp line between the clouds and the atmosphere they float in, no black pencil outline like i used to draw around them in elementary school. they just hang there, in real life, and fate into the horizon. and sometimes i really get the feeling that all this distance is real. i havent flown in an airplane in quite some time but the clouds are more than a painting. and all this distance is real. i remember writing about that this past spring break, driving back home from massachusetts, that all this distance is real. for me, for the longest time, five hundred, six hundred, seven hundred miles... its a long ways certainly. driving a hundred miles an hour, five, six, seven hours to get somewhere like that. but thats all it was, numbers on a page, in my mind. and the concept that those places werent here... but far. well, driving that, it became real to me. those hundreds of miles are so much longer than they are on paper. there is so much physical distance in them, the difference in concept is uncanny. hard to deal with sortof. and everything in between here and there is real. as if for once, or maybe there too, the earth just rotates under me like a tracball, exposing only what it has to for me to stay in a constant reality. i dont know if anything exists that i havent seen, unless i force that ball to take me there. but that feeling tends to leave when you travel, and see that not only is new york city almost six hundred miles away, but that in between there is richmond, and washington, and baltimore and rivers and hills and pastures and people of all shapes and sizes that even though i dont see every day, i have to assume are there because i saw them once. its not that easy.

the hard part, after figuring out that much, is knowing that everyone i dearly care about will be farther away in a couple of months than they are now. i will move to winston-salem to wake forest. and people will go to michigan, and texas, and south carolina, and vermont, and connecticut, and raleigh and chapel hill and greensboro and charlotte and so many places farther and in between. but everyones leaving. i suppose this is all i really need, to get away from a family that is changing and find some way to support myself for once. i look forward to the laptop and free laundry and air conditioning and wireless campus but i look back at my old historical landmark high school and all the people that i wont see every day anymore. most, i will never see again, barring a high school reunion. some i would love to visit but dont know how to ask. its a good thing to make new friends, and there will be plenty. although i hope i have a couple people i already know to join me. it will be good to take a break from everybody but i hate that its a semi-permanent one. this is it, time is running out, and all i can think about is why this room feels so familiar to me. not exams, not picnics or graduations or musical performances. im thinking about the beach, thinking about love, thinking about those wonderful people. how all these relationships will either fall apart or grow some resiliancy in the coming months. its a hard call to make. i tell myself i can let some people go and keep up appearances with others, i want to be friends with everyone but not let that go to my head. i want to find the right words to say and say them, or just the right words to type.

that should be all, it feels like i have other things to attend to. sometime i will post some pictures i have been meaning to for the longest time or write about something i have forgotten tonight. for now, though, im just happy i wrote something. it feels good, i wish i could every night but i dont think there are quite that many words to say.

peace and love

what do you do, God, up in your Heaven,
while all of us sinners below
look up with pale eyes at your quiet disguise
and struggle in life's ebb and flow?

behind great cloud curtains, do you lay down with Venus
or father us all from afar?
when prayers dont get answered, are we asking the wrong questions
or speaking to the wrong twinkling star?

when unquestioned faith slips, it becomes a construction
to silence the critics of sin
unanswereable questions deferred to beliefs
that only blind faith lets you in

it is difficult, to encrypt everything i say. everything i write is the truth, and i like it that way, but there are times when i realize that certain people read what i wrote and it kills me. i want to share with all the earth, not those in my own backyard. and its too damn difficult to encrypt everything so maybe no one will understand. but those not involved might.

seated where i didnt want to be... why? because you can see me. i never wanted to come anyway. the corner would have been appropriate, the balcony, alone. where i can see you but you wouldnt think of seeing me. but out of courtesy (and no offense...). it lasts forever and number two is the hardest. so many people involved! my heart beat faster, painfully, and when the curtain rose i wanted to sink back into my chair and somehow paint the yellow hat black. once i thought we made eye contact and i didnt want to wave. all in a moment of your passion, all my love turns to hate. and it was good but so typical, depression. and you looked happy and oblivious. i clapped too, even that, though slouched in my chair.

and you beamed, it was sunshine. but just for an instant, just for a flicker, i saw it fade. that smile melted, those eyes searched, but no one was standing.

i feel so cruel writing these words. i thought that as i walked across the dripping concrete courtyard alone that i would be the perfect bastard. just that... nothing works. my bitterness would take away so much more than whatever it was reacting against. the perfect bastard, and that didnt bother me. because thinking about that, walking huddled in the drizzle, was more comfortable than sitting there burning.

and the rest wasnt any better. i noticed though, how you had matured. how you were so included and advanced and a leader. it was obvious. youre still a liar. still, i cant talk to you because i cant help liking it. i make myself sick. you make me sick. and its not like i can even have my last hurrah, my closure... because theres always tomorrow. we even have plans... oh jesus. something else to look forward to. if i could just end things on a low note, just once... leaving wouldnt be so bad. and if i ever thought about it later on, at least i would have reason to hate this part. but every single day, sunshine, brings me back years.

and that, as im learning, i cant let go.

scribbles

found in my homework notebook... i write these in between classes. heh, so if they suck... who cares?

---

seems to me you always go
riding in your undertow
never fighting where it leads
waving bye to mourning beach
swim on back to some new land
rest a while on different sand
but always called by some heartstring
back into your boiling sea

and never by me
i wont shy
your way but please
dont leave me dry

---

late night, lonely
with a homespun dish
receiving calls from the moon's dark side

the pretty face always speaks to me
but the sun's bright rays dont expose
what only the stars beyond know

late night, lovely
on the grass, lying still
illuminated blue through my radio silence
(broadcast blue through my silent radio)

---

its not a poem if you dont want to write it
just bullshit on a page
its all the rage
to plot and cry on a page

---

making my way out of town
driving too fast, much faster than usual
at such a late hour
i can smell the flowers
of the trees that i remember
freshly green, spring blooms
lining the main drag of that
in-between black neighborhood
where the children play in the streets
the young men amble across the street
staring at me and every other
white kid in a black car
(it only looks that way in the dark)
clean looking guys in white smocks chat
every afternoon at the barbershop
my ears ring for them

it is a place
beautiful in the haze
fresh in the morning dew
that im glad my car never breaks down in

---

the first poem is for a girl. the second poem is for a different one. the third one was when i was angry. the last is a mellow one. its not that hard to figure me out.

happy april 3, everyone!