One-A-Day

looking for something outside of myself to make my insides feel fulfilled but as the orchestra swells i still feel empty

it was always your job to be proud of our successes but i can't help but admire you for what you grew within us: four self-sufficient adults (or as much as one can be) thank you with every breath for all your continued blessings. driftwood: weathered and worn but still here and so damn beautiful. there's a fine line between acceptance and resignation, between curiosity and obsession between weakness and silent strength some might say you need a good kick in the ass, a nice punch to the face. but really, you just need a place to find some love a love that defies convention and exceeds all bounds, a passion so bright it burns so fast. but the passion we had and the passion we've lost exceeds my daydreams and paints my memories with such intense colors i haven't met you or even learned your name but you're in my heart even if not my womb, and i'm ready to sacrifice myself for you. i won't rush perfection -- you'll co

a heart may be precious but it's not a diamond and papercuts bleed a heart may be reckless love's wrecked many ships before i became your casual casualty bridges burn, naturally. wood's no more permanent than eroding shores of evaporating seas trust is easily lost but there's no chance to cultivate it if i can't have some faith. so i will stand as the bridges burn and cling to you as we sink from the shore, carried away by the current. we will evaporate one day together.

writing's so much easier alone. without him rustling covers and you in my head. you're there still but without your mortal coil adjacent, there's no resonance to interfere with my thoughts. i love you both in equilibrium. don't make me choose. a system tends toward chaos. i welcome your promise of disorder. uneven roads: a better ride.

so many words. unimpeded by formality and decorum, i write what i want even though it pains me to admit and let loose these truths. to keep the ships in the harbor would deprive them of their purpose. i have feelings, at time inconvenient and untimely, that should not be buried. to love across boundaries is commendable, but to stomp upon tradition, convention... what reward for the stomper? i cannot turn away from a commitment; i cannot burn the bridge i'm standing on; i cannot stop loving him to pursue another. and yet i do, and yet i itch to dive off this bridge and swim after him. what to do with these feelings? they are not going anywhere and i don't know how to make them go away.

hello, animals. i am female and fertile. life is at a high and happiness is too. buttons pressed just hard enough sometimes jam. alphabetize your desires and they will be attended to. patience, dear one. give it time. and when it's time it will come. do you feel the moonlight? can you hear the echo of a day gone by? heed it not; accept today. your magical verisimilitude convinced me that you were real. but i hadn't yet learned to recognize a reproduction. the flesh is weak when prodded by the id. i don't want to be your Aphrodite -- i'm so much more than a pretty doll on a shelf. don't launch a hundred ships, for Helen doesn't share my shoes. today i'll prove i'm your Artemis, fighting for you, setting my aim on your frame. sometimes it takes a little groping to find your footing when you're climbing a cliff. did you take advantage or did i give you the advantage? lacquer on another coat of paint, rearrang

suddenly stepping back from a lover's moment of release and depriving him of completion is either cruel or generous, depending on your next step. begin a dance of whimsical delay: coyly return to a time before attachment, when the currents of the scenario weren't even ripples in the stream. relive the path back to fulfillment

Again, another self-imposed silence. Not out of spite or any misconduct, as everything I've built you up to be is still true, since the virtual artifice is the only forum we have. One day -- nay, two -- we shared a sleeping place. So innocently guised, a brother cradling sis' while she fell into another realm -- but t'was not half so innocent, for we'd enveloped one another in our personas, allowed each other to leap from stranger to lover in a single night -- Nay, a single breath, as pheremones linked our bodies long before slothful minds could catch up. How long can the chains of society and etiquette resist our magnetic pull? 'Tis true, was the same with he before, but time healed wounds and silence passion in those days. Will it again?

i've never known what kind of person i was meant to be that's truer now today. without you here my voice of reason has lost its voice i don't know up from down i can't stop hating myself for meandering and it's true: i've never been direct but i'm feeling pretty pointless right about now. the point is i need you here and i don't know how to float on my own so i think i'll drown for a while maybe i wasn't meant to lean on you so hard that i couldn't stand on my own. but this must be the cruelest way to learn the lesson how can i fill myself back up when you helped me build the self i was? i don't recognize myself these days and the mirror's a stranger that i want to shatter and build back again.

write write write in hopes that something will flow out other than the sewage that's filling my mind these days winter -- or whatever this in-between time that the calendar doesn't actually allow to be called "winter" because it's not official -- pushes me toward self-criticism and self-loathing and i'm broken more than usual because of this crushing loss so i can't rebound like i should there's no voice of reason telling my inner critic to shut up and i have lost my bearings and i don't know which way is up or if i'm just going to keep drowning here waiting for the sun to return. the only thing i can do to retain some semblance of realism is to distract myself from the heartache and heart break but are these lies keeping me from feeling what i need to feel keeping me from going through this tunnel of darkness i don't know how to grieve because i can't say goodbye and i refuse because he isn't gone but he's g

i look back on this year and i see a big waste of 365 days. what did i do with all this time? what do i have to show? a whole lot of nothing, my pockets emptier than before my heart more broken than before. i have less today to hold close than i had a mere 30 days ago my father doesn't breathe this air anymore dead dead dead and it hurts to think that i spent all those years building nothing and i hurts to think that i ran away from home in a sense that i wasted three years with a guy who didn't give a shit about the family who cares more for me than we ever let on. is there something wrong with me that keeps me from shouting out how much i love these people? i don't know why it's so difficult to speak so difficult to express how much i cherish our moments how little i make of the little time we have together is it a mistake to let things just be should i strive for more purpose or just bask in the joy that is togetherness? why do i always need to m

days pass me by and i don't even feel it will it gallop like this 'til i'm dead? if i enjoy the meaninglessness who's to say i'm wasting my life? we've each got one life to live -- one span of moments -- i have to believe consciousness is eternal otherwise i cannot cope with the mundane. stop judging, start living and accept what is rather than what could be. this isn't to say i should stop moving, because that's impossible until i'm six feet below.

our intertwined fingers strain the sunlight from its glaring spot in the sky. my eyes burn when i look away from your face -- is the sun to blame, or just my heart? i am torn between where i'm supposed to be and where i want to be: in your arms. and yet we remain apart, two bodies aching to join but afraid to challenge the expectations in the air. even today, when we have learned a sort of etiquette, we remain unbalanced. society forces us apart but there's a string drawing us together, some sort of connection that we can't deny. i feel selfish to crave everything i see, but i can't lie to myself anymore. i can't live without reaching for more. i am happy where i am. happy in stability. and most days i can accept that; he's exactly what i need and what i want and yet i always crave more. i want to be off balance. i want to be unfulfilled because it makes me work for more. i am much more productive, much more creative...without something solid to fall back on

there's this happy medium between sober and blitzed where i am creative and productive i ache to be at that point of intersection but fear i've gone past the point of no return. i want to write this masterpiece but if i set out to create something profound all i will find is sludge. so i need to change my mindset and seek the middle ground. why i've made stanzas i've no idea. why i still pursue you with the knowledge that nothing can come of it eludes me still. my teasing hurts me more than you but you'll never believe it.

golden rays of sunlight strained by our intertwined fingers the scuffed plastic of the lounge chairs maybe i'll ponder the source of their ruggedness one day. the surface of the pool aches for something to break its smoothness yet all i can do is trace your lines, looking for something new. the novelty of you attracted me that day, but what is it today that makes me continue my pursuit? there is something within you that makes me question myself. is there something more beyond that hill? i continue to trudge up its incline with no goal in sight. i move to move, numbness encircling me. but i feel when you enter my mind. come back again and set me afire.

graham crackers crumble and s'mores beg for seconds but my heart can only shatter and it's not beat in days. i'm not alive without your sun i cannot die without your touch but still we stand, apart. what do you mean to teach tonight? your silence holds such terrors! but you won't hold me tight so how will i survive? my spine is crooked but whose crook caught and dragged me back to this spot? i am a crook for stealing what i can't possess. go to sleep, my little one -- our little life encapsulated in your eyes. your gaze waters my horses. and we gallop far far away.

my muscles are of ramen my bones are pure saltine but my heart is made of diamond just try and fuck with me. i don't have dollar bills to burn but a fire blazes in my chest i'll take passion over cash ...

Just realized there is an "email" button that pops up when I post to these blogs. So not only am I strongly encouraged to share my posts on friends' feeds, but I get a suggestion to go one step further* and email you as well. (Hope you like spam.) If you're in Hawaii, aloha. (If you're not, aloha.) I love layers of meaning like onions love nothing because they're inanimate. So basically nothing. I don't know why I'm posting my thoughts rather than keeping them bottled inside. Maybe I'm finally realizing that bottling these words up just clogs up my head which just spews out ideas. I should purge my head of concepts even though the vast majority will be a waste of time and cyberspace. (Though that seems to be growing in the same way the universe is.) But the problem tonight is that I'm getting tired. *I say "further" because this is a metaphorical distance, though I suppose you could also use "farther" since I

Framing a story. Or continuing an old? Vampire / body snatcher / wizard saga. Two friends preoccupied with death coping with life in different ways. Twenty-something still living with parents, unemployed and unmotivated, finds an impetus through graffiti art.  Novelty is scary but appealing all the same. . . . 

So I'm gaining weight and getting dumber So it's about damn time That I come back and type words on a screen. I should probably compose with pen and pad Since the feel of the pen between my fingertips Is so sensual I just. cannot. even. Superb, how swell the awesome greatness is! There are no vegetables in my garden But I wish there were a bun in the oven. Sometimes When I  stop thinking about myself for a change I want more. Being me is so unsatisfying sometimes Because I find new things about myself everyday And novelty is dangerous. But give me a novel any day. But will I write one? If I live in the today.

I promised myself I would complete these tasks on my day off: Write 3 blog posts. Do 2 loads of laundry. Watch 1 episode of Mad Men .  Now, the third may seem a bit strange, as Netflix, more often than not, ends up on my "completed" list without any conscious effort. The idea was not to exceed that one episode before the other two tasks had been completed. So I did the first load of laundry and have been dragging my feet about the posts...and staring longingly at the TV. So it's time to sit down and write. I decided to begin with the least labor-intensive blog I have. Hmm, that's not right. I guess this blog format seems easiest because the word-of-the-day posts have a rigid format and I need a little structure right now. My OCD tells me to look back at old posts to see what format I used for these kind of things, but that is the first of many tangents I will forgo as I pursue my goal. Today's word is equanimity , which according to Dictionary.com , m

i don't have anything planned but who among us ever does even if we plan our plans step aside when something else trumps the original offer. or maybe it's a boulder but over eras, it too erodes so live hard love long while you can and life might be justified.

fire burns. ice melts. which is my heart with you?  i want both but fantasy fades and you are not who i see when i turn out the lights.

where there is substance without import i am there. i feel useful but utility next to artistry cannot compare. i have so much inside but have shifted my focus to my output instead of what i am. can i become what i hold can i ever grasp my potential will i ever try? if i died in five minutes how useless would my end become? i sit here, fingers afire but mind only just beginning to awaken again. where did i go? i used to think my individualism was a strength i sometimes feel my cooperation is strength what is stronger: the chain or my link? i cannot focus on one without  weakening the other. who are you, girl? why should we waste a breath on you? show us your brilliance or we will always turn away.

what am i feeling other than emptiness i'm a mason jar fresh off the shelf before the food to fill me before the wax to close me i am empty. where is the canner to make me whole?

I always struggle over which pictures to pair together. I feel like finding that thread that ties the pictures together is necessary to make a coherent post. Still, requiring myself to seek this connection is a big reason why I don't post as often as we'd like. Maybe I should lower my own expectations and just throw my miscellany together, theme be damned. Let's explore that avenue together: here's a few unrelated pictures. If their only commonality is that they were discovered during the same thrifting outing, so be it. First up: INFANTRY. Not exactly the battle formation I would have chosen The battlefield looks like total chaos; no phalanxes or defensive lines. What could these men be possibly hoping to accomplish with this seeming lack of strategy? Why, hello, madam! It's been a long time since we've opted for a full-scale war for one woman. (Helen, I'm looking at you.) Goodwill might as well be the battlefield. I hoped to move o

Listening to some pretty bomb tracks by Daniel Merriweather, who really never got any time on the radio except for his cover of "Stop Me" produced by Mark Ronson (who also produced another dope track by Lily Allen). That's the answer to your unasked question of "What are you up to tonight, Emily?" * I am unclear on the specific parameters of this exercise. Please input additional instruction here: * In fact, I am purging all the bullshit nothingness that is at the surface of my mind so that we can get to something halfway decent or worthwhile. What will I discover when the hard candy shell is broken to reveal the caramely center? And yet -- I would so like to watch a moving picture instead of forcing myself to have something to say. * Tomorrow, I will awaken around 9:17. Jason and I will go to Café 33 for breakfast, where I plan to have a caramel toffee iced coffee, a delicious omelette full of delicious vegetables, and cheddar stone ground gri

ardor \ AHR-der \  , noun; 1. great warmth of feeling; fervor; passion: She spoke persuasively and with ardor . 2. intense devotion, eagerness, or enthusiasm; zeal: his well-known ardor for Chinese art . 3. burning heat. Her silence reached for him in the way an echo initiates a call-and-response. The ardor in her eyes had been there but yesterday. And now what? -- He was in exile.  *     disproportionate levels of ardor between love and work but is it possible  one has supplanted the other  or should i have more to drink  to clear my head? 

i scoff at silence and the inner workings of my mind sometimes. when there's nothing outside it to slow the motion, i think past reality and consider possibility. i'm winded, chasing the hypotheticals that run too far, too fast. i scare myself with thoughts that i'm inadequate that i'm wrong. who's got it right in this world? can we ever truly be certain that our way is the right one? we've got to have faith in something: can it be me this time?

I was looking back through some old posts on this page and realized very quickly that my material is better when I'm not being led by somebody else's prompt. By "prompt" I strictly mean the search results to the phrase "writing prompt". I definitely can see the value of them; they have worked to dislodge any blockage I may have. After staying silent for months, I turn to them sometimes just to make my mind move again. But the crap they push out is just terrible sometimes. So I'm going do this stream-of-consciousness shit until I clear the blockage myself. Prose seems to be a bit more forgiving on the crap than verse is. Of course, it helps that I'm naturally self-deprecating in my prose. So I'm not afraid to poke fun at myself. Not to mention I'm a bit of a magician. I turned myself into THIS guy. Pretty cool trick, eh? Alright. That picture is enough for me to try something a little more introspective now.

it's time to stop interpreting silence. magnifying nothingness  to find imagined significance gets us nowhere. it's time to stop chasing every echo. what lived here yesterday left a residue to scrub away. i must let go. every smile, every blink what do you reveal without a word? motion says more than we admit but my observation in this stillness here goes against the fiber of kinetics potential energy is just an empty threat if i don't start to move.  

tangents lead nowhere and soak up so many tocks of the clock that one cannot ever get again. i ache for you, tangential love. only a theory whose probability is more than "never" but still questionable. why is tomorrow such a duplication? i must change today to prevent the future from living in my reflection. She'd built up this idealized expectation, this idea that dramatic moments in life grew into the same opuses that they did in films. So it is regrettable, then, that her attempt to create a poignant visual "moment" fell flat without the requisite filmmaker's entourage. Sally's scene, as it were (within her head), saw her taking up scissors in a shaky hand and taking bold strokes with the least possible boldness. Her hand wavered and carefully cut her hair -- its color unimportant -- at the same length, best she could tell. I want you. Not just in spite of, but because of the chaos you promise. you're a hurricane i follow for

i pursue you with the single-mindedness that fills a solitary creature driven by such a deep hunger that necessity propels it forward. no need to consider collateral damage, no time. no consideration for a simple thing like future and consequence. (Write a fictional biography about a protagonist whose descendent authored it. As the story advances, the account is more colored by personal bias.)

who has time to consider      collateral damage when   the catastrophe's already              unfolding? ... Who has time to think on    future & consequence when present circumstance is so much more compelling.

a fast Audi runs with the fervor of an antelope, but not as the one chased (the prey). nay, this one runs TOWARD inevitable death, a sure catastrophe at the end of the long, dark tunnel.

excuses pile upon e x c u s e s as the days fly by, as i fritter the moments away. the garbage man comes but i'm not ready to part with all my excuses -- come back another day! these walls i build make me feel safe and secure. a delusion, i know, but i can't accept myself for who i am so i lean on the external world to define my self-worth. why can't i bring myself to remove this mask of weakness when i see its outline clearly in the mirror? why am i content to settle for easy when a little work would change my world?

i want to reach out but can't if i plan to make the point i set out to make. i can't let you control me by growing dependent on your approval but my thoughts prove i already am. one day, too soon, i will cave and invite you back into my caverns. spelunking is a funny word but magnetism is only science and physics are only funny if your glasses are thicker than mine. who is this girl trying to explain chemicals, trying to deny pheremones' pull trying to be something other than the positive to your negative? why deny the undeniable? pushing what pulls you only keeps you still pull me close and push against my walls until they tumble down.

sometimes you get me. you get me like nobody else. ferreting out secrets and impulses i've hidden even from myself. you'll dig up a skeleton one of these days something i buried lifetimes ago before i'd learned just how long the dead go on living. but how long will it take you to recognize those bones as your own? will tomorrow be our last day of lies or our first day of truth? life or death: you decide.

falling asleep as i sit my body hasn't exerted itself today not much, anyhow. but my eyes burn and itch to close again. what's on the other side of those eyelids tonight? nonsense or something easier to interpret? do you wait for me there, being the person i imagine you to be, doing the things i imagine you to? i hope so because it's been a boring day and i could use some intrigue.

I have a mere fifteen minutes to post before the clock turns tomorrow into today, so haiku seems manageable. I was a bit sad to learn that my go-to site for haiku inspiration, Haiku Heights, no longer exists; however, I learned of another forum for haiku lovers called  Carpe Diem . The topic wasn't explicit today, but the originating post involved the theme of emptiness in Buddhism. A few syllables, then. half empty, half full drink it down to fill it up life's propelled by change -- [Are you sure  about that last line?] I imagine I could go deeper (why yes, I do  believe she said that) with the topic but my heart is set on a YouTube karaoke playlist rather than typing away right now so I'll leave things there for now. I may very well be back after I've sung a few tunes... (Or I may just sing myself to sleep.)

You have a memoir site to look at called Footsteps in the Hourglass .

3148666666688986669 That was a little poem my dog Kara wrote, slamming her paw on the keyboard to try to get my attention. I obliged, giving her a little scratch under the chin. She's dozing off now. I need a little inspiration to jump start my brain today. (It seems that as my mood swings from melancholia to joy, my creative well dries up a bit.) I turn today to  The One-Minute Writer , who challenges writers to consider weird and awkward dates . I can think of two such dates, though I'm unsure one minute will be enough time to discuss ONE. Oh well; here goes. ... my parents didn't trust him because i met him online and perhaps i shouldn't have either but that is looking back and looking forward to our potential future there was no room for fear no time to hold back so he took me from the safety of my home to a pool hall of all places a / dark haven for dark things. the setting should have been my first clue -- but i was seventeen and hadn't ta

I haven't written today Which seems a failure If you look at it In the span of days, This one being empty. But it's so full Of joy Of socialization Of life. Ill let this one go without a composition Because it's composed of life Which keeps me from decomposing

i volunteered for three things two days ago, joined five or six new meetup groups about writing, and used seventeen number-six decals on the posters i made for my last satanist worship service. i also learned how to fix a faucet. But that was a few months ago, and then , only after attempting and failing to complete the job myself. (So much torque that I just don't have in me.) when i was fourteen, i was younger. when i was seventy-three, i didn't. this has become quite freeform, and i don't know what to do with that. i feel as if i might, in the near future, mine this post for some interesting bits that could grow into something but really don't believe in the post as a whole. it was very good. it was good. that was good as well. um, definitely helped out. you're my favorite. f-a-v-o-u-r-i-t-e origami where's my mommy please don't call me it's so balmy and it's calm. she thought that a paper crane would probably be a nice gift, if just

lying alone in the hallway as amber light floats from a single dirty bulb (but the fixture isn't terrible) there's a reason to go and a place to be but i can't move... tomorrow is crawling ever closer but i shouldn't let it drift away. i had the urge to get loftier and parade around some morals meant to keep the emotional wellness high but i'm not done soul-searching and i have fewer answers than before. so exit stage right, trumpets: there'll be no fanfare tonight. no, tonight i hear a distant trumpet and a bongo once and again and again once and again. and the moon shines high above the world and it's cold and inviting all at the same time a lover who turns her cheek but turns her cheek, her body curving into you but her beautiful face, lips, eyes, BRAIN pull away. she's not here: in this world of stability and predictability. there's no space for different in a world of same. and maybe she needs excitement. yes. she d

pleasure trumps pain but pain lets me know i'm still alive. dulling a blade only makes it harder to use. twenty smiles blend into one over time but i still feel every stab. Slice me open and let me live again.

i did a whole lot of nothing yesterday cleaned my face and teeth put on pajamas set my mind to no uncompleted goals so we sat devoid of pretense (aside from whatever we bring to the table naturally) the morning and early afternoon passed without incident but the air we exhaled was rich with meaning what does it mean that there's an invisible string and it feels so natural to behave unnaturally who are you to me i haven't decided

the chill outside pales, comparing itself to the chilly interior. the vacuum pulls you to me but it's not gravity; you won't stay forever. but will you stay tonight? will you stay tonight? there's heat enough between us two to become arsonists -- just just how prolific's up to you. ashes, ashes we all fall down. but will we die tonight? will we die tonight? the silence stretches 'cross yawning crevices how is it nothingness can echo so loud? your matter-of-fact demeanor cuts me deeper than we'd ever dreamed. but will we speak again tonight? will we speak again tonight? [double-time percussion propelling ballad forward -- perhaps delay this effect until first chorus]

the sun one day will fade away the moon's already on its way but i have got you here with me so that's okay as darkness spreads across the sky and living things lie down to die i'll keep you here right by my side so that's okay the tears in my eyes carry us away the blood in my heart will feed us for days i'll hold you so tight while evil things play and that's okay that's okay [soaring violin solo] the tears in my eyes carry us away the blood in my heart will feed us for days i'll hold you so tight while evil things play and that's okay that's okay

duplicated self: we do not share the same improprieties. to ignore and set aside darker desires, to bury discordant feelings to disobey urges of the id: these are my duties. but these sanctions and prohibitions  are not your own. pursue your urgent urges chase him down dark alleys and bring him the light your light. sate unsanctioned appetites because no duties and responsibilities hold you down. darker, ever darker. yes, i know this is no way to live but i only want you to live vicariously and let you fade away. because not even the worst version of myself could survive on darkness alone. who's the darker one of us if i'm content to let you kill yourself off? but the truth is... without the sanctions without the broken commitments you would be happy and free to pursue your acceptable urges and make him your own. and i would be forever barred from breaking and disobeying and pursuing my own darkness. you w