Irene

Mommy woke me up in the middle of the night

terrified the roof might blow away and carry us into the sea

The wind hit everything hard, punching the guts out

slapping and screaming a high pitched note

We took our pillows down the stairs and hid away

watching the ceiling for signs of trauma

and the power was out, everything looked blacker

outside was a shimmering dancer

The whole house shook with the world

We held tight to our pillows, clung to what we could

And soon the storm seemed rhythmic and soothing

and we fell into a deep and calming sleep

In the morning, the sky was a vibrant blue

and though the wind was still angry

it blew only hard enough to shake branches, not roots

But signs of the night before were clear and saddening

The water grew dark  and bashed the shore

in white foaming waves

and the fallen trees looked as if they were born there

born upon the ground, laying over the garden

We called the storm by name

and we did not curse her, it was too soon for that

so we begged her to go far away and she answered in daytime lightning

and far off thunder

She swept away, giddy with our crying

taking mental pictures of her power and her quality

and we took in her destruction and felt cold

felt as if we wanted her to come home

So we sang her a song of pity and begging and got to work on the cleansing of the land

and prayed for the people whom she would take next

that their rooves would stay on, and their trees rooted

and that they to would see her absract beauty

I'm dreaming

I'm dreaming.

I'm underneath truth or maybe inside

I'm trapped in a seperate thought

where I feel more than anything possible

Sharp and vibrant and painful

Everything is clearer, more real and yet I know

I'm dreaming.

I'm biting my knuckles and squeezing skin

and pulling hair and trying desperately to scream

but I'm so real here that escaping is impossible

I climb into the bed to fall asleep, to wake up and my eyes are clamped shut

and my nails are in my skin and my voice is nothing

My voice is air and my heart is whistling

I am dreaming.

I climb out of the bed, out of my skin like a snake

realizing this is half memory, half fantasy

each feeling is pure and stabbing

and all the blood is redder than possible

and hotter than the sun

and I am squeezing these eyes completely shut but I still see everything

I am dreaming

I can tell myself the whole truth here

that I am a sinner and I will never not be

but the truth is killing me

it's too real

I'm screaming nothing

A skinned body

bones in a trash can

Cans on a string

sounding the alarm

I am dreaming

They are all chasing me and I know they will hurt me

and now the pain scares me so I'm running

eternally, I run

I see them, what are they?

A father, a nun, a small boy with no eyes, and a naked old woman

A wrinkled prostitute calling me over, telling me I'm a sinner

They are all raping me, violating every part of my skinless body

I am dreaming

I know it's real because I can't wake up

and they are watching me

down the wooden hallway to the right, past the doorway

and again down this wooded hallway, to the right, past the steep black doorway and now backwards again, to find the bed, to fall asleep, to wake up, to sooth my bleeding feet, to sit and not be chased

To find the rest of the memory

I am dreaming

I remember it like it was yesterday or a past life memory

I remember it's clarity which makes this place foggy

Which makes these feeling half of what they could be

I am a shell, a sliver of a woman

10% of what could be and so I'm pinching myself and biting my tongue

to wake up into a dream, to feel, to bleed red blood

but I am dreaming

and I can not wake up

Hidden Agenda

For three and a half years my insides dwelled inside themselves

attempting to dig through all the thousand layers

And on the thirty seventh of the thirty cycle

my one inside broke a pinhole through

and led you by a miniscule light into a light filled bedroom

And for a minute my skin turned transparent

and you saw all the fighting turmoil within the grounds

of a land of many tunnels

of blood filled tunnels and breathing heaps

of purple masses

And when you blew into the lips of pink on ivory

the messy turned to water and you scrubbed away the muck

and you saw the cage of twinkles

who had lived in me for four years and who beckoned for your fingers

to unlock and find the key

And so we met inside the blue moonbeam with all the other hidden campaigners

and we were sucked into the holes in the sky

and within them no one saw us

yet we saw eachother fully

each vitamin, each scar, each neon bleeping lie

And our bodies moved together

unison swimmers

naked as newly rained air

And my insides, inside, inside myself exploded

and all the twinkles burst into stars

And we cherished the sight

like a blind man would

till the green mirrored sea swallowed the night

and my twinkles moped their way back to the cage

and sealed over with golden glue

And we flew from our moonbeam and we ballooned down

to our lifeless reality

captured by our landlords, our gold turned brassy, our bones roughened

and our rooves shaggy

back onto our hooks for another hundred years