From My First Day at My First Full Time Desk Job

Remember that time I threw up on the pavement,
Outside of your car door--
dizzy from the clouds?

I am not pregnant

I am not drunk.

I am fucking purging my past.

First day on the job,
full-time, whatever.
Stuck at a desk maybe
and a rumbling in my tummy.
I spent my 1st hour of my new job
in cold sweats--
trying to smile but then shitting rivers
in the only bathroom
Almost naked on the tile floor asking,

"please stop."

Then in the office I could barely
stand up straight,
my voice no longer works and
they still filling in numbers,
"We are not doctors here."

I am purging my past of free schedule,
no commitments,
unlimited time off and
no benefits.
I am purging myself as an artist
pressing forward to make a name for myself.
I was asking God, whoever,
for some stability.
Some responsibility that I could grow from.

Given a chance to learn new things
and am now learning how to shit a storm
and feel wholly embarassed.

The "I can" is the challenge
and the
"why can't I?" I am challenging.

The second I arrive home in my bed,
what is done is done---
Potential falling through and
maybe no turning back
because I have already said goodbye.

My bed in covers
shivers
cold and warm

Just let me sleep as if it didn't happen.
Remember that time
I was on the computer and my entire
body went fucking balistic?

forget it already. 

A list of things to do from last year, I am approaching 30 now

-drop business class
-look into grad school/apply for grad school
-mail items
-get in studio next week
-organize details for design work
-get health insurance
-pay student loan
-pay off credit card
-do time card for ____
-send pay stubs to Sally Mae

Look up
there is stillness all around you
if you just open your eyes

What is there
has been there

People are not enemies
We are each encompassed and held
so tightly by ourselves

our laughter and sadness
This world sucks us up
We get lost

But we are becoming more aware
In the blossoming fruit of the tree
are we
ready and bound to be ripe.

What life is this if we have
not learned to enjoy
all that we have
created?

In complete amazement
and action,
the will to grow deeper

in this stillness.

[relax here]

When you go to a place you take on part of the consciousness of that place. The language, the dress, the style, the mannerisms.

 Speak to me but only in whispers late at night
and please try to remember what is said because
i don't want to explain myself again come morning.

please disregard my love letters because they don't
make sense to you, and they probably wouldn't
to me either.

Last night I went through photos of 5 years
I am now clay, bitter reds
hands dry and you're down the avenue
drinking sorts of whiskey and wine

i am just trying to be
as cute as i can be
all huddled up in fetal position
poison/sorrows and listening
to nothingness nothing
conversations of
if I were stranded on a desert island.

Let's think, let's not think
such questions and bare ourselves
with facts and feelings no matter
how fiction

in fetal position
beating myself up for
social time wasted.

I am not short term committed to you
for life.

She didn't know you and therefore
did not mistake you for
versions of strength
working man, not sad at all and so not
broken winged.
(we are fooling each other)
we are doing it ourselves.

(Please) let's mistake this for sometime longer
because the cold is letting itself in through
the cracks in my window, and being close
 and being imperfect

is (was)

City Dreams
city scapes
city streets
grown up
grown life
you want a baby one day
one day you want plans
Running from a volcano erruption
Volcano cliffs
jumping out into shallow water.
Just jump
(I am afraid)
Pretend you jumped
(I want that falling feeling)
Have gravity plummet me
bruised and feeling something
better than nothing.

This is my cubby room with a view
This is what my hands feel and smell like.
These are the things that I hold-sift through,
mold into pieces.

Every night I want to curl up with a feeling
of accomplishment.

Every morning I wake-up to traffic.

Not sleepy in the slightest (at first).
I have to get things and places out of my system-
so that I can be closer to not moving.
Be closer to staying still even though there is no
stillness in sight.

If tomorrow will be productive
and if I will connect with and be close to
everyone that I love, here.
All spread out across the city
and it becomes weeks/months before
we're able to see each other and when
we do
I will surely show resonance of that beat-up
alone feeling that I am met with
when I sit solitary on that step
nightly.

Stairs to the doorway.

what thing I can do
before I go to sleep,
before it's too late
and can't get
enough sleep to be productive
in the morning.
Do. Make. Be. Do more. Get better.
(my mantra, my thoughts)
get better so that you can do more-
so that you can develop close relationships
and finally feel at peace.

First Lesson
that I have learned
is that I must take care
of myself
more
give myself my art
my time
my energy to feel
stop being angry at other
people
stop relying on them, too
be here/there for myself.

At least a letter from me

NOT yours/done

From my last week in Europe, over a year ago

(I still vividly remember the color of the sky that night)

Regardless of whether or not I got on the night train
it's fucking beautiful outside.

My last day in Castellammare,
I walked down the dock,
in the harbor of the Mediterranean. the bay.
And I stood
up and down I went with the wind blowing my hair
in each direction on that dock
waves like I might have been eaten,
had I feared them.

The water, aqua marine.
Italians have more than one word for blue.
We have adjectives,
light blue, navy blue, dark blue, electric blue.

Madonna De la Aqua.
Spouts of mineral water,
coming from the Madonna herself-
Italians come here to the spout and fill jugs, wash their
faces, pray.
Put together with mosaics made by locals.
Good for digestion.

I feel stronger than I ever have.
Like a horse, an elephant, a whale.
Just because I left my hoodie with a skull
doesn't mean that I have abandoned plans
to play cello in a metal band.

I have become rather accustomed to being alone,
without foreign English speakers nearby,
I think this is as long as I could have taken it.

what should I pray for and how to begin

Step 1: Get out of Bed.

Step 2: Go do something.

Be thankful for all that you have.

Resolve. Patience. Love. Trust. Service to others. Service to self. Remembering without regretting. Letting go and accepting new things as they come. Being ok. Being thankful. Inviting success. Be an artist. I am an artist.

I ate it.

That big black ball hanging onto my esophagus.

It went down my throat and

through my digestive tract

and then it circulated through my veins,

Around in my body, emptying out

until it eventually evaporated through

my sweat

as it dried.

Oh how long,

since I have felt this falling feeling.

At one point, you realize that everything has changed.

And that you made it this way.

You ricochet pavement upturned

unnegotiable frienships,

jumped-up-and-left

and thought, for a second,

that maybe you could just say

yes-and-continue-as-usual.

But then you realized there

was nothing to go back to, or be usual with.

You can come back to that place

that you've called home,

and you can sift through the belongings

of

the-girl-who-was-once-me.

You used to paint your hair and talk to animals.

You used to have people, old friends,

at your fingertips.

You used to sneak out of your window to put

poetry on the windshields of the cars

of the boys that you liked.

And even when you see those old things and

remember those old people, not

one part of it is the same,

nor could it be if you tried.

And you've tried

you've tried really hard.

You've tried hard to set free

and go back all those

times that you tried,

tried to forget them, tried so hard to forget them while in

them, cold and dusty train wrecks in the middle

of the desert trying to catch sunset on a camera

before dinner is served.

And you can thank yourself-or-god-or yourself-as-god.

That you can move away from all of those

teenage big dreams

of making it

and you still wonder if you

can.

Until 5-10 years have gone by

and you're completely satisfied

with the every-perfect-little life and

death that is happening/has happened

quite constantly,

all around you.

From last night

I kept on waking up from dreams, not sure if at this point I remember all of them but

The first one I woke up from. I went to bed around 10:30 and woke up at midnight. I was squatting in this house, there was gang violence going on. Someone shot me but I lived and I was still hiding in the house. I remember people looking in through the windows, shots happening. I woke up after this, crept down into the kitchen and ate bread and butter until I felt better.

The next one I was with my mom, we drove to Portland for Shine a Light, the reason why were were able to was because we were stuck playing this giant video game together, and we got someone to fill our spot. We got there early, and I remembered thinking that I looked kind of crazy from the trip. The art museum was so beautiful and fun and no one had shown up yet, I remember thinking that I would soon see Justin there, but never did.

The last one:

I was at a Whole Foods, and I was buying all kinds of beautiful vegetables. I couldn't afford all of them and checked out through this woman who was flirting with me. Since I didn't have enough money for everything I had to take some items back. As I was leaving she gave me her number on a 3X5 card and had drawn little animals on it. When I got to my car a window had been wiped out, everything in the backseat was gone, and the trunk was wide open, with my pottery wheel gone.

I still feel tired. Too much battling in waking and sleeping life.

Time to Get Better

I dream, I succeed, I grow, I learn.

Katherine's P.S.U.

Artist K.B. curated her own Public Social University on an island and artist residency near Indianapolis. She asked Ro and I to write a letter that she could read at her event on the topic of WATER and here it is:

Dear K. and Public Social University Attendees,

K., congratulations on curating your very own Public Social University! It was always our intention that others would create their own events, and Public Social University would soon spread like a wild-fire throughout the city, or in this case the country. I am currently in Oakland, working on new projects, and getting used to the rhythm of the bay area.

A beautiful part about putting on Public Social University events, among many, was that the more we explored different themes and topics, the more we learned about our community and the wonderful things that people where doing in it. It was also enlightening, that when picking a theme like Oral History, people from all over the city would come out to show and share with us their similar vision. So many people donated their time to learn and teach!

When Ro and I first got together we would go on long walks and talk about what our school would be like as well as what we would like to learn. It was important to me that our events be multi-sensory, as I have been a kinesthetic learner all of my life, I wanted people to be able to come and learn about a topic from many different modalities. As Ro and I were dreaming, everything was falling into place, like being able to use SEA Change Gallery for example, or randomly meeting that new person who just happened to be the missing link to one of our events.

I did my last event on the topic of LOVE. It was a special and important topic for me because I was about to leave on an international journey. I also dreamt of talking about love in a public and open space with strangers. That night, we had lectures, a performance, a conversation share, and food all based on love. It was a perfect prelude to my adventure, and made for a bittersweet goodbye.

It is extremely difficult for me to compartmentalize all of the feelings that I felt during and after Public Social University. I held onto it so tight, I started to become acquainted with how to organize community events, and I felt, and still feel, so blessed to have met all of insightful people that I have throughout that time. If we join together like we know we can, we can create amazing things! We have each other, which is truly something powerful.

I often think of moving back home and continuing the project, I leave myself open for such opportunities to arise.