In Memory of Piper Rose and Sean

not an everyday brother
he is a person i spent more time peering at through picture frames
a ghost of a brother
unaging brother


ache for the regret

i sleep through one of the pictures we are together. any proof that we have been in the same room at the same time

but i remember the hug

the hug we hugged because we knew we wanted to even though we knew didnt know eachother. even though the hug was filled with awkward silence. i remember the hug and how you were not tired. how if you were tired you were still ready to go out and play.

oh life. oh brother.

i wish you were more than a photograph brother.
i wish you were more than a lesson brother

but i will jump into 55 degree oceans for you
i will snow board for you
i will take people by the hand and hug them and love them for you
because i can do none of these things with you

i will try to live my life without fear. without regret.

much love Piper Sean and Ro 12-29-2001

Aging and Hoping

New year. New birthday. Hope. These three things are on my mind. I am seated inside my mother's car in her boyfriends house's driveway. Odd place to blog. But this is where I find myself. Darn. the battery is going to die soon.

New Year: So much has happened this year. Jan 1 2008 i had not yet been to guate, not been accepted to grad school, not quit my job, not moved to indiana, never had taught undergraduates, had not written stories and poems. So much has changed and grown this year.

New Birthday: I saw the curious case of Benjamin Button. I enjoyed the freaking long film. It made me think about aging. Something i have thought about already as i approach my 26th birthday in couple weeks. 26 sounds so much older than 25. I am over the hump of the twenties marching down to my 30s. The only reasonable thought I can think, is thank you for my life. Thank you for my life. Thank you for the years, days minutes and seconds, breathes held and breathes released. I used to be very afraid of 26. My oldest brother died when he was 26. I used feel frantic. trying to learn things as quickly as possible as my time was limited. that fear has faded. I am not so much in a rush. but i remember that fear. my brother was so much older than me. he was married and had a 3 year old child. I will not fear wrinkles, grey hair, singleness. I will not fear these things. My mom surfs everyday. She is an example to me of thriving and living at any age. I can only hope to be like her a little more every day.

Hoping. It is odd that sometimes i find myself hoping

battery dying goodnight.

A poem because I just don't blog anymore.

I dont know what has happened. My blogging drive has hit an all time and steady low, so here is a poem I started writing in Indiana and started revising in the Los Angeles Public Library today. This is a third but not necessarily final draft.

A brief history before the poem. Being a poet in poetry school, you learn all kinds of cool things. It turns out there is a whole kind of poem called an aubade. Spellcheck doesn't even know its a word, but the dictionary does.

Aubade: n.

1. A song or instrumental composition concerning, accompanying, or evoking daybreak.
2. A poem or song of or about lovers separating at dawn.


[French, from Old French albade, from Old Provençal albada, from alba, dawn, aubade, from Latin, feminine of albus, white; see albho- in Indo-European roots.]

So I thought I would try to write one.

In Autumn

Only clock hands arc with the sun.
Cereal bowl wind chimes clatter and ask
Climb from bed, climb from warm fist.
Leave behind falling hallways, invented libraries.

Trees gloved in morning observe
the muted shadows. Telephone poles stutter
In rainsaddled streets. Driveways and roads
Unfold. We chose today.

Awake, my love. Awake
Your chapped lipped lung heavy stare.
Breathe us in. Breathe us in
While we are still enough.

Inc.

Inc
Ink
Inc--

Incomplete. This day feels incomplete. So I will make a list of all things accomplished:

-graded 90% of the fiction exams
-made and ate banana pancakes with plain yogurt and thawed out berries.
-rode the bus, waited for the bus.
-worked a bit on my story for class.
-sat at Roots and drank a mango lassi waiting for yoga class.
-surprised by snow, watches snow, contemplated this snowy life I lead.
-looked at maps of bloomington to figure out my way around (bus maps)
-went to yoga (yay) fundraiser for animal shelter
-went to the gospel choir concert "holy ghost takeover" and boy howdy
-went to the tail end of an 80s party and watched the end of goonies.
-ate chocolate cake, burrito. Not together.

So why does my day feel incomplete? Because you were not here with me, I guess.

Sad Stories

I am full of sad stories. that is all i can think of. so i will tell you what i am wearing.

socks: christmas snow men
tights: to keep me warm
pants: american, blue cords
shirt: dbc long sleeve
hair: 1438 directions up down here there

my phone.

jackson in the reflection of my eyes.