napowrimo 2017: #10 & 11

i am done apologizing
for my massive
boundless
enveloping
sticky
desire

and what i do with it.

love me,
love my gravitational pull;
fight me
and get pulled apart.

napowrimo 2017: #8

it's been
4 months
and 19 days
since...

venus rollin' backwards
mercury 'bout to act a fool,
but even when they're in my favor,
my bed stays cold
'cause old flames won't do.

still, i declare:
every day
is one day closer
to finding
you.

napowrimo 2017: #3

i may be writing
love letters to ghosts; complex
imagined fragments.

love, z.s.

{reference points}

there never would have been enough strength. what you needed me to do, be, threatened to break my back.

so i walked.
walked fast, far and long.

i found a place for myself.
a small, simple, pretty place i love.

i had no choice but to make it home.

i found other ways to love.  but none that awakened. none that stayed weekends, cooked breakfast, or drew baths.  none that fed me soup or wrapped me in blankets when the chill came.  none that laughed, cried or moaned with me.  none that kissed me in the rain.

i loved in cool, collected ways.  ways that earned gratitude, friendships and laughter.  ways that danced, sung, prayed sometimes.  it was not passion, but it was often joy.  most of the time, this was enough, this open, public love.

most.

i manage.
i survive.

my heart is a kind of desert, one that remembers itself as rainforest: lush and fertile, plush with brilliant flowers and technicolor birds.

yes, there is beauty in the desert: a stark palette of necessity, utility.  the sky is still its blue; some cacti flower.

life just under the surface...love buried in sand full of dormant seeds and preserved pollen.  the arid blessing that maintained the bodies of ancestors for thousands of years.  a whispering love, praying the wind will serve as audience.  the occasional, elusive oasis fed by hidden waters.

it is there.

it is still deciding what to be.

brash as an explorer, excavating buried realms?
skittish as a lizard?

it survives, though.

like so many things that shouldn't, but do...it survives.

because it is, i am.

and i go on.

in my little home
in the desert

with
a love
that
awaits
a monsoon.

seeking:

the man
that looks past
my medicine;

the one
strong enough
to be the fire
in my hearth.

void 2

every day
without touch
i feel the vault door
creak closer to closing...

{part 1}

a love to last...

working my way up to openly admitting {again} that i long to be loved--not just liked--has been an interesting journey.

even more interesting is that the letter was written almost two years ago to the day...the postscript almost a year ago.

i didn't know it'd been that long.

but, in the interest of continuing to acknowledge and manifest my desires...




I want a Sunday kind of love
A love to last past Saturday night
And I’d like to know it’s more than love at first sight
And I want a Sunday kind of love

I want a a love that’s on the square
Can’t seem to find somebody
Someone to care
And I’m on a lonely road that leads to nowhere
I need a Sunday kind of love

I do my Sunday dreaming,
And all my Sunday scheming
Every minute, every hour, every day

Oh I’m hoping to discover
A certain kind of lover
Who will show me the way

And my arms need someone
Someone to enfold
To keep me warm when Mondays and Tuesdays grow cold
Love for all my life to have and to hold
Oh and I want a Sunday kind of love

I don’t want a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday, or Thursday, Friday or Saturday
Oh nothing but Sunday oh yea
I want a Sunday Sunday
I want a Sunday kind of love
Sunday, Sunday, Sunday kind of love

return

this has been waiting
patiently
for me to sit still
and let it go...

to acknowledge
and name it
although
it defies description.

i could be staring down
the answers of a thousand prayers;

witnessing the drying
of an ocean's worth of tears...

it wants to be claimed.

i want to be sure.

need
to be sure.

grateful in the meantime,
fearful in the knowing:

love
might live here
again.

reaching for the sun

words can't do this.

everything i could say about you feels cliche and tired. empty descriptions that can't possibly express the warmth of your arms or the sugar in your smile.

it's difficult to write poems for you.  i'd rather be a poem for you: something uplifting or pretty to hear; something to memorize and carry with you.

would you mind?

the audacity of hope

i.

after taking
the first step
(dreaming together in
wide arcs and
fanciful possibilities),
we crafted a brief reality
filled with long kisses and
sweet smiles.

ii.

i'm at a loss
to describe what i felt
and what i'm feeling.

but i know the words
i long to hear you say
and what i'd do
to be worthy of them.

goodbye, again

i dreamt they all came back to me: a beautiful, shining composite of the best of each of them...

we glanced, flirted, then entered into a deep kiss, overjoyed to love without the harsh details. the vision faded without a clear end or resolution.

whether or not we meet again, i'm grateful to have known you...

i have been a rover
i have walked alone
hiked a hundred highways
never found a home
still in all i'm happy
the reason is, you see
once in a while along the way
love's been good to me...
~nina simone (via rod mckuen)

a prayer to the saint of the brokenhearted...

saint mary magdalene...you heard from the loving lips of your beloved that your many challenges were forgiven because you loved much...

pour out your love on my behalf...your cleansing tears won for you the pardon of lessons learned and the vision of your risen beloved on the horizon.

surely, dear saint, whose love was refused nothing on earth, will graciously replenish us with those blessings, for which i implore your prayers.

ase.

this thing

{soundtrack}

i want
to love
again

so wide,
deep,
and massive that
i flow through the streets
not as a woman,
but as a wave.

P.S.

{addendum to the letter}

it's been well over a year, and in the midst of all the other learning and growing i've been doing, my heart's nagging for more has resurfaced.

i am getting closer and closer to fully calling you, drawing you to me. soon, i'll be singing your name to breezes and ocean waves, looking for visits in my dreams.

this spring, i began growing plants. the process has shown me that i need a love like a seed; a partnership between forces of nature, sprouted and nurtured in love, trust and acceptance.

after making due with men tangled up in obligations, i've also realized i need someone who mirrors my freedom, a man able to exert comparable energy in the creation and maintenance of our love.

i know i've hesitated to ask for that in the past, but i think i've earned the right to it now.  

i am sassafrass rehabilitated, growing into my indigo self.

i hope you don't mind the moon falling from my mouth.

in loving anticipation,

o.

lament letter

there is nothing like the feeling of being separated from you. nothing.

it begins with mental images. then slowly, deliberately, the sensation moves into my heart, where it causes a very specific ache.

the dull throb of a cut with just a bit of dirt rubbed in.

and while i ache, the memories come...

i recently spent the better part of a day feeling like my face was buried in your chest--you know that spot my forehead touches if i'm hugging you with no shoes on? there. i was right there. your arms lingered on my waist, resting on my hips.

there is no rhyme or reason to these flashbacks. they simply visit, merciless, immune to repeated choruses of "we're not speaking anymore".

we're not speaking
any
more...
again.

so i'm left here, alone. trying to scribble and type the ache away, praying for dreams and asking them not to actually come...because i'll only miss you more if i see you there.

i can't help wanting to see you.

i know. this is messy. it's been messy between us for a long time.

what i know:

1. we are mirror images of each other, reflecting negative and positive polarities depending on varied situations and life stages.

2. we will always love each other.

3. we will seek each other out.

some days the knowing is enough.

the days i write / cry / scream / sulk are the days it isn't.

i miss you. so much.

overdrawn {napowrimo '11, #5}

i go insane / crazy sometimes / tryin to keep you from losin your mind...

my love
has never saved you
from yourself.

i gave up the saving
but never the loving.

open your eyes / see what's in front of your face / save me my...

save me...
just save...me.
forget about the tears.

i've already shed
an ocean's worth,
and i'm not done.

i shoulda
been bought stock
in kleenex
foolin wit yo ass...

was i a fool?

will we ever
get this right,
or are we destined
to silently scream
into magic mirrors,
praying one day
we won't hear each other

...knowing
we always will?

save me my...


{*italicized lyrics from maxwell's "fistful of tears"}

forever & always...

you know who you are...



Lying in my bed I hear the clock tick,
and think of you
caught up in circles
confusion is nothing new
Flashback--warm nights--
almost left behind
suitcases of memories,
time after--

sometimes you picture me--
I'm walking too far ahead
you're calling to me, I can't hear
what you've said--
Then you say--go slow--
I fall behind--
the second hand unwinds

chorus:
if you're lost you can look--and you will find me
time after time
if you fall I will catch you--I'll be waiting
time after time

after my picture fades and darkness has
turned to gray
watching through windows--you're wondering
if I'm OK
secrets stolen from deep inside
the drum beats out of time--

chorus:
if you're lost...

you said go slow--
I fall behind
the second hand unwinds--

chorus:
if you're lost...
...time after time
time after time
time after time
time after time

forge

for dae

within the pain is a small pearl of pleasure.

the defiant measure of, "you will not kill me."

the sweet, salty ache
of lemon on a paper cut;
a stinging, biting healing.

the ability to laugh.
deep, belly laughs.

the smug chuckle of the harlot after a lashing from the wife.
the snicker of the Goddess before she moved underground.
the maniacal cackle in the midst of a gut wrenching cry.

that is the jewel i am creating
deep down in the center of myself.

idea #24 - explore relationships

step outside the box...learn something new...

beyond marriage

infinite relationships {adult language}

sacred sex

the rainbow is enuf.

there's pain on all sides.
there's drama on all sides.

we've hurt, maimed, and damaged one another in many ways.

still, we retain the power to heal, dream, love, and uplift ourselves and each other.

i am afraid we are allowing the pain to cloud true wisdom and deeper guidance.

the hoopla over for colored girls seems to be unearthing a lot of old feelings and illuminating the still-open wounds and still-wide chasms that separate us.

there is wisdom in saying we must protect our hearts,
but protection is not the same as closure.

i feel like we're swinging to extremes, aching for balance.

maybe the pendulum just has to do what it does and settle into a softer rhythm over time, finally settling into center.

if so, is patience the lesson we need to learn?

are we trying to rush a process that cannot be rushed?

we need to talk about the ugly.
but we should not turn each other into stereotypes and monoliths.
we have to resist its tendency to dominate our minds and spirits.

we need to take responsibility for our own, personal wounds.
know ourselves, deeply, halting the wheels of futile, painful cycles.

there should be no unearned, blanket support without proof of progress and growth. we cannot allow romantic, unrealistic notions to erase or underestimate the challenges that exist.

still, we can learn how to deeply support one another as we tend to our collective wounds.

it is complex.
we cannot make it simple.

there is beauty in that complexity, if we can open ourselves to it.

there is not one way to love, to be loving, to receive love, to be loved.
the ways are so plentiful we cannot count them.

who taught us there was only one way to be satisfied? to be whole?

art, analysis, psychology...these are conversation starters. light-shiners that give us frames, language, concrete foundations to build on.

a means to an end.
a way to name.

but what's your soul saying?

mine:
now that we've unearthed the pain
we have to go deeper
unearth the healing
roll in the dark, fragrant, fertile soil that feeds the world
study star-shine.

all of that is part of us.
we are part of it all.

don't let the fear win.
or the shame.

cry the tears...just don't drown in them.

i love my brothas.
but i need you to learn how to love yourselves
so you can love me back.

can you do that for me?


~~

{note: this is a pre-screening stream of consciousness. i'm sure there will be more once i've actually seen the film...but these are the vibes i'm picking up as i'm hearing/seeing folks react. i worry that there are countless, unexamined opportunities for growth, beauty, and strength beneath the surface. all my life i have heard the whisper, go deeper...i suppose i'm praying that everyone - in their way - gets that same message and gains the courage to do so.}