story telling

my mom is telling me stories, like before, like when i was 10 and she would sleep in my bed and tell me stories from her memory like cinderella, and jack and the bean stalk and rumplestilskin until her voice would get drowsy and shed start mumbling, mixing endings and names of fairy tales until trinity and i couldnt hold it anymore and would wake her up, giggling, mama, mama, thats not how the story goes. last night we lay on air mattresses in her studio and im covered up in quilts up to my chin, shes got fifteen stuffed animals and im clutching my skull pillow and were laughing at each other over flashlights through slight oakland friday night clatter, streetlight buzz and girls voices rise and fade down the street, towards the freeway, towards their night. shes telling me stories about my baptism day, there was a party she said, noah wouldnt leave you alone and trinity was just happy to have a party and entertain, and i, well i had just bought this brand new blue dress...she trails off and her eyes go glassy and i cant look at her because im afraid she or i will cry and i am not sure why. i ask about daddy. and she smiles. she says, your daddy, i found your daddy in the bedroom at grammeres house on santa rosa holding you up in the sun and singing to you, your daddy lived for his children's special days. my mother is telling me stories, i am smelling the air in calistoga when i come home from a boyfriends house and im 16 and my father is barbequeing in the back yard, it smells damp, and mossy and like charcol and dirt, like the sheets always smell at that house, like the cedar tea setter in the dining room that holds all the linen, and my boyfriend and i would sneak to my room and make out while my dad watered the garden just a few feet from where we lay. my mother is telling stories and i remember her hair, thick and black, a wide braid, waking me up in the mornings after shed gone running and coffee on her breath, gently coaxing me into the day, sweat smelling and mama, flat hands careful, careful, careful. i remember winters in that house, rain rot and weeds growing up through the floor boards, all the pans in the kitchen slept with me in my room and i learned to fall asleep to a symphony of metal pangs, plastic tupperware and when youd open up the cabinets in the kitchen, theyd be empty, pots spread all over the house to catch the water, pouring in through miniature holes. my mother is telling me stories and all i hear are smells of 18, vanilla and oil perfume, suntan lotion and skin trip, damp carpet and mold, moldy walls because the house never dried under all those trees, the feel of cement underneath bare feet, leaves sticky after spray and my mother could never keep shoes on me, my mother is telling me stories and all i hear is the loudspeaker at football games, the buzzer in the gym at calistoga high, the gravel on my driveway and the exact place my front door groans open, how you have to open it quick to sneak in after my dad has fallen asleep and the way my door sounded as it slammed, which was infuriating, because it never was really a slam, but more of a sad pathetic shut, swollen wood and rusty hinges.
my mother is telling stories, things i cant remember i ask her to tell me, i strain myself to think of my first memory, how much i piece together as real, as what i know to be true, or what i heard from stories. the first memory i have of my brother is him in the backyard, picking onions... i cant get this out of my head and i collect these fragments, a mustache, a man in tight jeans and greasy hair, brown dresses and sand, salami sandwiches and coca-cola, my brothers voice, his slight lisp, my sisters fingers and big eyes, i feel like i remember being held by her, i want to remember being small enough to be held.

fever breaks

the last three days are hallucinations. flash lights and pink spoons, bowls full of feathers, towering light houses, lions with baby chicks in their mouth and im driving a jeep through rough terrain, tan, messy wild hair flying behind me, running, running, running. wooden staircases and board games made of marble, gold chandeliers, my father, wearing a suit, an eye patch, bright red shoes, smiles at me and does a waltz with a monkey. in my dream i am bold and fierce and opening doors others were too scared to, i vaguely remember seeing my mother, smooth back my hair, and it could have been a memory from ten years ago. and so im running, running, running.
this morning my fever breaks and i think a little bit more clearly, wake up sweating, i have soaked my entire room so that im drowning, paint peeling off the walls, paintings you made me, drawings, float to the top and i look at them from underneath. delicate strips of night and places i loved you flash movie scene terrific, your face is the last thing i think of, close my eyes and wish it all away. black lettering and pencil scrawls, my name looped by your fingers, connected with hearts and magic words, magic i wanted to feel, that you promised and gave on summer nights, daring and brave, light this city on fire, hands a blaze, over shoulder smiles and i cant sleep at night because of you, frayed ends and this fever has to break, has to turn salt to sea, so that when i open my eyes theyre back to blue. this was all a dream. the only thing left is a dampness on my brow, coolness on my neck and a feeling i cant shake the rest of the day. as if something huge has happened, but i cant put my finger on what exactly it was.
its always sunny when you dont want it to be, when your hallucinating and everythings too bright, you put ice on your eye balls through the night, trying to cool yourself from the inside out. everything hurts in the morning, when he still hasnt called, your ribs are bruised and black, red marks under your arms and your neck is swollen from swallowing, from breathing, you just keep laying in bed saying, i cant breathe, i cant breathe, i cant breathe. youre making yourself sick, you know it, its all in your head. dream of sea kittens and apple juice, youve been reduced to a child and your mother says every things going to be all right because she is your mother, and that is her job.

lesson one

just listen to Au Revoir Simone on repeat (especially Stay Golden and The Lucky One) and make paper snow flakes out of pictures pre schoolers draw for you, their little dirty hands grabbing at your face and all you want to do is keep hugging them, their small arms and legs and hopeful smiles, soft cheeks and when they love you they LOVE you and so you have hundreds of pictures drawn for you, thousands of snowflakes, make your room winter again and hibernate away, put your brothers sweatshirt on and imagine what hes doing, that smell still resting in there, around the armpits and collar, from the time you stole it from his truck and feel embarrassed because youre not seven anymore and wanting to do all the cool things your big brother does, your 23 and still vying for his attention, for their attention, any way that you can.
listen to these songs on repeat, make rain with forefinger and middle finger, quieter now, just mouth the words, silently and slowly, make hand motions against sky, youll feel better after a story, an ice pack, a cup of juice, an accidental mommy, your fitting together pieces of jean and fabric, what a delightful girl you are, what a lovely woman you have become, slit slip snake bite. snakes are reptiles, not amphibians, you know.

Read

Stay Golden Lyrics

here.

21 14 34 28 23 79 1

un winter
stucco beside stucco
flung open garage doors
pool tables and channel 15
sweltering monday
with wool sweaters like
ambush
pretentious and full of mustache glam
ride the 9 to sunnyvale
keep my eyes closed
let the insides of my eyelids
turn red and orange
shutter flash and camera flash
first memories
open
peel
back
adjust
my brothers blue turtleneck
my sister smells like soft warm blankets
and peanut butter and honey
flash
this city is sirens
the corner store
on potrero and 20 something
across from general
where the lotto tickets plaster the walls and
girls with lip liner
buy sodas and snap their gum
wear their boyfriends hats
and brown eyes to blue
through bus windows
this city is an angry old asian women
eating crusty doughnuts
flaky pastries
in white waxy pastry napkins
on the bus
holding turnips
green onions
thousands of plastic bags
watching me over slight lids
i just cant get myself to smile
the stores on haight street
are all empty
and shop owners
girls with tattoos
thrift clad boys with hair
sit behind cash registers
and display cases full of china made
tibetan treasures
amber
and sterling
and jade
all white plastic
made somewhere else stickers
and everyones faces are stoney and solem
and uninspired
this city is a sinking ship
park benches
tagged doorways
shot out windows
busted hearts
bum spit and fish guts
lets go to china town and get drunk
cigarettes and whiskey shots
sheet marks
cleft notes love notes
notebooks piled high
bus stop waiting and calculating
he looks like someone who spends time figuring out
his odds

fast bike rides
and boys hands up your dress
balconies and blow
mandolins
and
its a fine day for the lute

its 2009, do you know where you are?

14th and broadway kids are lighting dumpsters on fire and im at home in front of my heater eating lentils, making thank you notes, looking up casio watches and thinking about my boy. i feel so utterly disconnected and so i put my hair up in braids and a handkerchief and dark lipstick, make myself completely unrecognizable, think about smoking a cigarette but dont. its been four days and im stronger than that.
14th and broadway, people are fighting against police brutality and im at home watching the devil wears prada and listening to my boy talk about killer fish and laughing with my roommate about the outfits we wear to keep warm. im counting bank statements and throwing away bills and eating muffins i made to go with the soup i made because he was sick. i feel so completely alive throughout all of this and it makes me anxious and nervous, feet prickly and skin tight.
i can go on youtube and watch a boy get shot on bart, on new years eve, i watch his girlfriend, the mother of his children, speak at his public funeral and she is all smiles. 22 and all smiles. and i cry thinking she is so brave, because she had to start new years without him and i got to spend it with you, wake up and look at your face, and even when i am afraid you will leave its not forever, its not gone like her man is gone. it just doesnt seem fair.
i remember when driving you home was just to another neighborhood, when i could hop in a cab and come over at 1030 in my pajamas. and now you are a bridge away, hovering between islands and traffic, over sharks and jellyfish, through cold waters and grey mornings that are hard to pull out of. you are just close enough and far enough so that every time i see you is a treat, every time is like vacation and maybe next that is what it will mean for me to get to you. a trip in some summer, i'll fly virgin of course, ive heard great things about virgin.
i cant stop listening to led zepplin (going to california) and cat power (jukebox) and depeche mode, while also trying to find the cover of dramarama's "anything, anything" that i know is floating around out there. its supposed to be 70 degrees this weekend and i cant wait. i'll wear a onesie and eat a popsicle, maybe have a sunsale and not smoke cigarettes, ill call all my friends in cold places and tell them, earnestly, "wish you were here."






and ive been spending a lot of time with lol cats (thats el oh el cats, not Lull cats, dummies) and heres one for my friend jose, cause hes the best and im sorry. they make me so happy, srsly.