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Friday, June 21, 2013

as I watch you growing up


Perhaps there should be less stress on kids to become what they (will be told to) want
and more on hoping them to stay who they already are.

Not as much Forced Grown Up in your mix
and what the Bigs think you should be when you're six,
sixteen, or twenty six,
but more of the littles, the joys,
un self conscious slips, absent body image.

You're all bravery and spit, sweet eyes and innocence,
teetering on the edge of the haunt;
words that will creep into you,
changing mind and mirror.

I wish I could freeze you like this,
but I am much too curious to see if you will become what you are:
open hearted and unafraid, wholly confident and born-with-it social grace,
imagination and fire;

flames that burn me because I will love you
past six, sixteen, twenty six.

So it lands here, I make my vow
and ask you not become what I want,
but stay who you already are.

©afterthoughtcomposer


allthebeautifulthings by loreta







































Monday, June 17, 2013

the thing about storms

Here is the thing about storms:
they devastate,
they come on uninvited,
they break our rooves and our foundations;
they make wasteland of harvest.

But the thing is
they are
still
beautiful,
and they end
(so don't be too afraid of yours).



Volume up, HD, Fullscreen.
A supercell near Booker, Texas from

Friday, June 14, 2013

holy in the quiet

Early morning, sleeping child; her head upon my shoulder, her arm around my arm and her other arm around my neck. The dog warms my feet. In the trees outside, the birds sing, marking their aired territory with notes like candy: sweet, tiny, varied. The sun's rays remind me I have work to do, show me another day's arrival, warm my soul.

Days later life starts out as rain and washes t'ward grace. Suprise comes in; music made to heal. Quiet kisses, those lyrics, that melody. Funny how a song can be anxiety's undoing.

Dinner at home, evening with my other; sighs in arms as the records play on.

Sometimes the holy moments are the quiet ones.


found on weheartit





































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go to: grooveshark, Matt Corby, Resolution.

Thursday, June 13, 2013

the Egos of men: a confession. (unfiltered)

A few years ago, I wrote this poem:


I admit it.
I enjoy dissuading
the egos of men
who think
I should be so happy

to do otherwise.


...and it's true. Combine that with my quick defense mechanisms and my absolute inability to tolerate being sexualized without my consent and you get a very non-Christian me. So men who leer, or lean out car windows or grab my ass because we're in a crowd and think it's somehow ok, or take liberties when they should keep quiet - mouths and hands to themselves! - get my worst (or perhaps, to some feminist-types, my best). I'm not proud of what Jesus might call my lower moments. Even when I do what the situation begs for, the guttoral response evokes shame in me.

So, I tell you this story with that shame and self loathing attached to it; in full force, softened only by Boyfriend's healthful love and reasoning.


Pre IGA: I am feeling rested. It's been a wonderfully lazy morning, the sun is out, the day is calendarically clear. I decide I need groceries. I drive though I would normally walk, because the list has grown and I'd rather steer than carry. I am moving slow because the fog in my brain is still heavy, still lovely. I arrive, turn off the car, get out and close my car door and I get that feeling, a little creeping in the pit of my stomach; a twisted breeze that moves the clouds away. Then I see the man driving less than 2k through the lot, elbow out the window, staring, staring, staring -- at my hips, my torso, my head to my feet and I think MY GOD, AM I STILL WEARING CLOTHES?? It doesn't feel like it. Every curve has been analyzed, smurked at, assessed with pleasure. This lasts for maybe 60 seconds but feels like a year and the vomit comes out, in the form of my middle finger, aimed at his side mirror as he drives away.

Immediately, I am ashamed and I feel it heavily. I have been made to believe, if I believe my culture, that leering is complimentary. Thoughts bombard me as I cross the doors into a rush of much needed cold air. I'm not even pretty. Okay I'm sort of pretty, should I have done that? Wasn't that nice? It's terrible to be stared at, to be taken in so brazenly and without my consent. I'm overreacting. I'm a product of the overly-feminist movement. He was just looking.

Post IGA: I've settled, somewhat. It's been at least a half hour since I lost my cool and I've let the fog return, sure that the day's interruptions have presented themselves in full. I make it to my car and juggle the groceries in to my passenger seat. As I put down the last bag I am aware of something, it sounds like yelling, it's leaning over the car beside me; it's the man I gave my last angered thought to. I turn and tune in at about this point:

What the fuck is wrong with you? Are you stupid? You are a terrible person. You may be pretty on the outside but your insides are horrible. Your insides need work. You ugly bitch. What the fuck? You're so...


...and on it goes, ad nauseum. Like a record badly broken, pointing loudly at every insecurity I hold; like he knew exactly what to say to get me. For minutes.  I, baffled and sideswept, can only say things like "um, uhm. Sorry. uhm..." in a voice so quiet it doesn't register and it muffles; lost in the freight train of the man one car over. I make it home through tears and the absolute loss of my footing. I can't even pretend I don't want to cry. I can only think: My god, is he right? He is right. He must be right. I forget what I am.

I remember only as time passes (time is good for that).
I remember when my love reminds me (my love is good for that, too).