~Love Cats~In Memory of Leif Garneau 1970-2007~

super 8 films

elaine on the plain

now i lie in need of a lonely regression. i can't remember a time without her. her cheek bones high like the humming bird's cry. look! she'd say as she point out the bird. i say, i am glad i stayed home from school today. i liked the birds and the bees like she'd liked the v's and the AMCs. mitchum flaunting in knuckles, she'd chuckle at his good looks. "I've always like him" she'd say, "so take a good look." he doesn't go by the book, just an handsome old-fashioned crush. even if we're all just a lush.

driving around hollywood, the home with the note behind the mirror. a cobb salad rests in peace after a 30's kinda feast. turn me around; look where i've been. oh how the boulevard been abused. golden as she whose seen babies and guns. sometimes we just forget how to run. i love you, you're myself. a goddess to history or all lies and a mystery. i know you as the silver vixen who sparkles with stars as you kick aside another's chides. not the svelt young stunning woman that partied and tried; a glancing back era laden with winks of approachability.

but you were never so innocent were you? purest ideals back to the time when chastity and honor were abused with brash, as you say, class. breathing out your smoke with a doctors note and a nod.  was it all so much better then? when men were men and women were cats. she says, look where sinatra sang, now it's there where the hookers hang. oh, but it was so much better then.

maybe the pain cutting in on the dance, breaks your backwards glance. you tried to run away but it wasn't the right day. away from the home, from the farm, hollywood's alarm. but what did you think you were running to? from the little town where you were so stunning? gracing the stage in a bitty high school choir. a stage play, you take all the suiters' breaths away. were you thinking about stunning in an hollywood picture? he went off to war, but you couldn't wait to be small.

fifty years later you were never small. more like my star. you filled up my eyes with your beauty and poise. filled up my head with the lies and ideals. the more you gave up. the more empty you turned up. empty inside. like an empty barrel that only a sea could sweep away.

a hollywood star to a grandchild. the star who remembered every note. the little girl who needs. needs you on a molecular level. like onions to your enchilada. you just need more. skip over water and bring home the frogs. skipping generations to bring them home to our world. the world of our ingeniousness stupidity. addicted to this or to that. sticking our heads away from the light. croaking as they infest, pumpkin seeds growing in jest. but we drown in the pool. a pool of fresh lies, cries and diet fries. It's ok to remember the picture in pieces. it's ok to remember the picture through any lens that lends. don't call the gardener. let the weeds grow. they're my favorite part.

and later still i don't even know who your are. and later still, you don't know who you are. you're smaller and weaker, trapped in a bed. from super-hip to a broken hip; molecules? where are you? do you betray our connection? do you remember me like i remember you? i can't run to you anymore. i call you when i cry out for help. a soft spoken achille's heal can't even see you anymore. memories have been parceled to tomah, i think. the part of me that hurts is the part of me thats you. the golden era, innocent and ready. the pre-dawn hours before we are enlightened by the tragedy of hours.  the horrors of years. the inevitability of age.

i'm mid-day and your at dusk. we will meet in our dreams and our molecules will be the same again.

evoking Grace

evoking Grace

in the morning love is born
with the sun peeking over the darkness
slowly
the presence of loss sleeps awake at the wheel
by rocky night we fight till
the trite understanding of the end
we have
the loss of those come and gone
forever a mother, a lover, another
light
that dies to be reborn in our hearts.
our dreams are our paintings of
a leaf in a tree
nature shades a Lynn while she watches you
play
so let your balloons float high to the sky
and
on that day
the day that it falls,
a miracle will plant itself in an idea
within the day bad news is passed we're
to desperate to take that flight
alone over rain clouds and into the sky
together forever a flight to the future
to obvious to deny she's going home to the moment
that sinks into itself
evoking Grace with a single trace
of kindness shown to a weeping brook
to March in your movement the second
she shows her face.
in the morning grace is born
you've had it all along
a goodwill ambassador from the country of dreams.



Written between March 2, 2008 and March 4, 2008

I'm Big in Japan

japan, part one.


i can touch the light
i'm not up for the fight
zero in my illusions
already a bleeding contusion

but i'm big in Japan
like i waits, i see a man
awkward here in a cry
a lie for a chance to die
i am tangible, when it's time to come
i feel my animation's flow won
a hint at the lusty devotion
so i cause a big commotion
nothing keeps me from talking
the tonic of my walking
side by side with the dark
is i always leave a mark
i stand at the station
feeling no aggravation
i succumb when i turn
i prefer the blue watery churn
or the fight over the clouds
far away from the crowds
i'll be a devotion or maybe a potion
he's coming out with emotion


japan, part two.

loyalty spills
into into a jar
to be stored for the winter
or a freak stunning blizzard
or
maybe an earth shaking
to free up my
my history coming and going
in a night or a fight
kiss me hard on the mouth
then glue a collage completed by ads
and lulls and the glimmer
intertwined
together
it's glowing and light as a feather

contradiction appeals to me

i draw in a box
to keep quiet my deals
confined within walls the color bleeds into
corners
unfortunate monseigneur
i can't enjoy that again
oh but i will
over and over
take me to your sea.
take meds. take a fee,
take a key i've got three.

i stare at the men not a green thing in sight.
not one like a leaf.
It's fall don't you see.
no. then they'd all just be dead.

epilogue: past & present, here & there:

i just noticed i grew into the clear

Vice Parade

trying to catch a flea. one of life's great pastimes.
trying to kill a vice. one of life's even greater pastimes:

there it is!
get it off!
it moves to fast.
it lands and it multiplies and it drains you of blood.
you tried.
you missed it.
so you itch it some more.

but i'll make it a circus.
i'll give my vices little pea coats and whips. I'll teach it tricks and to do dances and even some feats for the crowds.

you would have paid for my show. but i don't know who else would agree. they'd say, "Ew, you got lice, I can't stand the sight of vice!"

So, at last I am alone, with my miny entourage of vice. Just me and some worms and hermione and ron. a little magic could go a long way in making visitors stay.

but alone i'd rather be. it's chock full in my head any-way.
even if i got lonely today i'd say the parties pretty full.
How could you compete with a circus of tricks taking my lobes and playing feats that outwit my own hopes!

so thorny it is when i think I'm in love! i crave cavernous inklings of poetic mainstream! I give credit.

even when i talk to people i feel separate.

i feel like an outcast.
i just want to admire butterflies and hold them on my knuckle. i want to be in the rain and look up at the clouds. i want to walk around with music in my head. the singers understand what i feel.

i feel to much sadness, it weighs down their balloons.

i want to discover things.
i want creatures to help me chase this drink, this existence. to understand why its hard for me. don't criticize oddities but enjoy flaunting them like a paint brush to the sky.

there cant be two of you. you should have died so you say?

everyone else has a normal problem. maybe they just don't like fleas....

i feel so blue while seeking for green.
"you'll never it find it like that!"
"no, but maybe my color is black?"
she looks down at me, eyeing my black t-shirt and scoffs.
"for someone so black, you paint a colorful woe."

so poetry I get, as a partying gift of death. poetry and a circus and a bowl full of chuck.
the vacuity without you is daunting. at least before i had my heartstring attached!
i am not sure where you are, but for a while i was. now i'm confused, and the fleas are selling out every night!

now i am alone again. caught up in a nagging addiction that will hurt me to hell. i pray for the strength to make it go away. i can't. it's the only thing that helps.

pills every night and dinner isn't down. my teeth hurt and my brain is confused. it's not really pretty, not even "heroin chic."

it's better in the dark no one likes you with barf.

especially me.

Tomorrow. I Throw my arms around blunders.

Rethink my name.
Reframe my game.
Retrain my brian.

Beginning to remember.
Beginning to feel tender.
Beginning to sleep in a blender.
Just don't be afraid baby.
I just don't like Maybe.
Light now, in a poets corner.
Call the coroner in a horror.
Just another bloomy foreigner.
Just don't be afraid.
He forced you to get Laid.
She didn't want to trade.
Tonight the words are the fire
Don't be afraid I posted my flyer.

Yesterday my heart drank to mend her.
Yesterday I waited for your sick tender,
Yes, Today I cleaned off the blender.

You speak to my number.
all butter and cucumber.
no toast, not a time to slumber.

remember my name or try to
remember my game or try to
rememeber why i came or...try two
cubes of sweetness
they say, hey!
be afraid baby,
it's still only maybe;
just one cube will do.
one drop'll sweet the sting.

Tomorrow. Love in the time of thunder.
I don't worry 'bout blunders.
Look south. Because it's coming from North.
Tomorrow. I Throw my arms around blunders.
I don't worry 'bout Thunders.
Say Cheese! I smile bout my mess!
Tomorrow. I grow hearts around troubles.
I don't worry 'bout the bubbles.
Look west! I like to kiss him with mumbles.

Warning! Please read note!
Note: Sugar made in the shape of yesterday. Mold responsibly!

circa feelings make bright my readings

this is heavenly

Poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay


Renascence

All I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked another way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I'd started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see;
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.
And all at once things seemed so small
My breath came short, and scarce at all.
But, sure, the sky is big, I said;
Miles and miles above my head;
So here upon my back I'll lie
And look my fill into the sky.
And so I looked, and, after all,
The sky was not so very tall.
The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,
And -- sure enough! -- I see the top!
The sky, I thought, is not so grand;
I 'most could touch it with my hand!
And reaching up my hand to try,
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.
I screamed, and -- lo! -- Infinity
Came down and settled over me;
Forced back my scream into my chest,
Bent back my arm upon my breast,
And, pressing of the Undefined
The definition on my mind,
Held up before my eyes a glass
Through which my shrinking sight did pass
Until it seemed I must behold
Immensity made manifold;
Whispered to me a word whose sound
Deafened the air for worlds around,
And brought unmuffled to my ears
The gossiping of friendly spheres,
The creaking of the tented sky,
The ticking of Eternity.
I saw and heard, and knew at last
The How and Why of all things, past,
And present, and forevermore.
The Universe, cleft to the core,
Lay open to my probing sense
That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence
But could not, -- nay! But needs must suck
At the great wound, and could not pluck
My lips away till I had drawn
All venom out. -- Ah, fearful pawn!
For my omniscience paid I toll
In infinite remorse of soul.
All sin was of my sinning, all
Atoning mine, and mine the gall
Of all regret. Mine was the weight
Of every brooded wrong, the hate
That stood behind each envious thrust,
Mine every greed, mine every lust.
And all the while for every grief,
Each suffering, I craved relief
With individual desire, --
Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire
About a thousand people crawl;
Perished with each, -- then mourned for all!
A man was starving in Capri;
He moved his eyes and looked at me;
I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,
And knew his hunger as my own.
I saw at sea a great fog bank
Between two ships that struck and sank;
A thousand screams the heavens smote;
And every scream tore through my throat.
No hurt I did not feel, no death
That was not mine; mine each last breath
That, crying, met an answering cry
From the compassion that was I.
All suffering mine, and mine its rod;
Mine, pity like the pity of God.
Ah, awful weight! Infinity
Pressed down upon the finite Me!
My anguished spirit, like a bird,
Beating against my lips I heard;
Yet lay the weight so close about
There was no room for it without.
And so beneath the weight lay I
And suffered death, but could not die.

Long had I lain thus, craving death,
When quietly the earth beneath
Gave way, and inch by inch, so great
At last had grown the crushing weight,
Into the earth I sank till I
Full six feet under ground did lie,
And sank no more, -- there is no weight
Can follow here, however great.
From off my breast I felt it roll,
And as it went my tortured soul
Burst forth and fled in such a gust
That all about me swirled the dust.

Deep in the earth I rested now;
Cool is its hand upon the brow
And soft its breast beneath the head
Of one who is so gladly dead.
And all at once, and over all
The pitying rain began to fall;
I lay and heard each pattering hoof
Upon my lowly, thatched roof,
And seemed to love the sound far more
Than ever I had done before.
For rain it hath a friendly sound
To one who's six feet underground;
And scarce the friendly voice or face:
A grave is such a quiet place.

The rain, I said, is kind to come
And speak to me in my new home.
I would I were alive again
To kiss the fingers of the rain,
To drink into my eyes the shine
Of every slanting silver line,
To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze
From drenched and dripping apple-trees.
For soon the shower will be done,
And then the broad face of the sun
Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth
Until the world with answering mirth
Shakes joyously, and each round drop
Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.
How can I bear it; buried here,
While overhead the sky grows clear
And blue again after the storm?
O, multi-colored, multiform,
Beloved beauty over me,
That I shall never, never see
Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold,
That I shall never more behold!
Sleeping your myriad magics through,
Close-sepulchred away from you!
O God, I cried, give me new birth,
And put me back upon the earth!
Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd
And let the heavy rain, down-poured
In one big torrent, set me free,
Washing my grave away from me!

I ceased; and through the breathless hush
That answered me, the far-off rush
Of herald wings came whispering
Like music down the vibrant string
Of my ascending prayer, and -- crash!
Before the wild wind's whistling lash
The startled storm-clouds reared on high
And plunged in terror down the sky,
And the big rain in one black wave
Fell from the sky and struck my grave.
I know not how such things can be;
I only know there came to me
A fragrance such as never clings
To aught save happy living things;
A sound as of some joyous elf
Singing sweet songs to please himself,
And, through and over everything,
A sense of glad awakening.
The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,
Whispering to me I could hear;
I felt the rain's cool finger-tips
Brushed tenderly across my lips,
Laid gently on my sealed sight,
And all at once the heavy night
Fell from my eyes and I could see, --
A drenched and dripping apple-tree,
A last long line of silver rain,
A sky grown clear and blue again.
And as I looked a quickening gust
Of wind blew up to me and thrust
Into my face a miracle
Of orchard-breath, and with the smell, --
I know not how such things can be! --
I breathed my soul back into me.
Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I
And hailed the earth with such a cry
As is not heard save from a man
Who has been dead, and lives again.
About the trees my arms I wound;
Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;
I raised my quivering arms on high;
I laughed and laughed into the sky,
Till at my throat a strangling sob
Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb
Sent instant tears into my eyes;
O God, I cried, no dark disguise
Can e'er hereafter hide from me
Thy radiant identity!
Thou canst not move across the grass
But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,
Nor speak, however silently,
But my hushed voice will answer Thee.
I know the path that tells Thy way
Through the cool eve of every day;
God, I can push the grass apart
And lay my finger on Thy heart!

The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky, --
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.
But East and West will pinch the heart
That can not keep them pushed apart;
And he whose soul is flat -- the sky
Will cave in on him by and by.