Follow

Follow

The sons of Mothers do not comprehend,
and so they stray into pale fleshy lips
that pout, preen and argue, while white veneers
climb pious soapboxes, spewing filth,
asking the masses to
follow,
follow,
follow,
where scorpions lurk, and cobwebs bind, antennae
waving, eight legs clapping as one. After all,
what's wrong with wise mature men preaching
the gospel, singing sanctified songs, seducing
young lads, claiming consent?

Sixteen year olds, hormones raging, no taller
than five foot eight, a first opportunity
to uncover forbidden glances in nodding dusky
shadows. Repulsive grins whisper and coo, beckoning:

“Trust me. Trust me. And, we'll fly to Italy in a bat's eye. Board
my personal jet with worn treasure, and copper stains” –
even if there is no truth to speak of.

And the boys craving for attention, love, and contact,
respond naturally to their call. They answer and
follow,
follow,
follow,
into depth's misery, forgetting to anticipate
the enemy. Instead those boys welcome abhorrent villains,
absorbing spiteful venom senselessly. Only those boys
can’t discern a merciless monster from a devoted comrade,
so they seek the sanctity of shore and
follow
follow,
follow,
the wicked pied piper who guides these callow boy-scouts
to that nefarious point just past the tide where
the indifferent undertow pulls fiercely, and folly criticizes
and obliterates naiveté. They
follow,
follow,
follow,
never questioning, just trusting blindly, propelled into futures unknown,
where terror screams, and the cold night scurries
across bewitched skin, astonished that no one heeded them,
warned them to lock their doors fiercely, question
what is not permitted to be discussed.

And so they
follow, once again,
into dusty silhouettes
and ghost worlds gray.

Ebbs and Flows

Ebbs and Flows




Baby’s Girls thoughts turned cobalt, then translucent. As she sits admiring sassafras sand and the cranberry ocean watching balmy waves, something inside shifts, left becomes more center, noises lift and separate like silver apparitions, until she only hears crashing sea tides and her purring heart. Baker Beach was a refuge, no an oasis, a place, a moment where she feels safe, and yet, twenty minutes East, and she was in the thick of concrete jungles merging with a cacophony of others. She called them others in that those people, those aliens, did not inhabit her world and universe. What had happened the night previous? The Tuxedo had delivered her, the rose, to her door, had scotched lips against the nape of her neck, had begged earnestly, like some silly school boy who had pulled her hair, to come up to her quarters, to sweep her to her bed, make love to her harmoniously, tilting the crescent moon on its ear. She acquiesced. The truth – she had wanted his custard love to fill her, like helium in a balloon, to make her walk on air unafraid and unashamed. So “yes” she had said, her rose lipstick caressing his mouth, his cheeks, wherever, he would allow her to roam. And inside, inside where it was hot and sticky, creamy and floating, inside was where he was granted permission, his passion merciless, she gave in, allowing someone else to steer. And so it had been, and so he had slipped out, after cerulean promises and insincere affectations, slipped away while her silken auburn hair enveloped her in her sleep, slipped away into a shadow, into a parallel world, one where she had not been invited, not been included, where she had simply been shut out. The tide ebbs and flows, stealing the sand as it leaves, returning to tumble abandoned sand castles, and depositing fragmented shells, battered and bruised, leaving her right where Tuxedo had left her the night previous, completely, devastatingly alone to sift through amber winds, citrus heat, and granite thoughts, a place she knows better than most, a place that cost her much, a place that failed to leave the most meager of tips, and one that sold her soul to black market thieves.

Why They Call It Falling

Why They Call It Falling

Someone please push me, so I gain momentum. What
has appeared to be so effortless, that “something” that
has developed between you and me, protons reacting
to electrons, that makes the you and me, the we.
It’s magical, fantastical, an elixir for love, filled with
all of love’s complexities and love’s frailties. I watch as we
fall into a feather bed, ether if you will, supporting us
so we become aware of both inner and outer worlds.
I feel both calm and fluttery, living in shades of silver layers
and translucent dreams, a reluctance for being accepted and loved.
Nagging tapes play in the back of my head, the ones
that are no longer pertinent, the ones pushing buttons,
pulling me down just below the surface, the undertow,
lying to the world again, again, again, revealing sordid, rancid
past remembrances, so I think, as to why I will never will be
good enough, so much so, that although my head truth knows
better, my heart truth grows wary.

“You never were good enough, so you will never be good enough.
You’re diseased. Recovery is an impossibility from the trauma
that was chosen for you. Just for you!”

So my face smacks down hard against harsh pavement, everything
growing grey. It’s almost best to start over than try and fix what is
dilapidated. Damaged goods sear my soul. I try to cascade
upon a safe netting, that soft, secure, that sanctuary. I still cannot
fully accept with an entirely open heart, that appreciation
has been earned. I return to “I’m sorry”, aware that
each time I say it, no matter how many times I mean it,
it lacks the same amount of sincerity, punch, as it did previously.
And I do mean it. Besides, who am I apologizing to anyway? That I can’t
give you more? That I am paralyzed in fear? These shards
undermine what is true.

Time to suck up, return to bat, line up over first plate, and allow that
first pitch to hit in the winning run. For a time that works. That works.
Just fine.

Lydia (Racoon's Mother) From Baby Girl series

Lydia



She just wasn’t cut out to be a Mother. True, she had gotten pregnant by Stan before her nuptials, had told Charles that the unborn child was his, all the while knowing that this was an end of an era, her independence squandered, the dependence of the child growing inside of her, causing her body to change, causing her to feel woozy one minute, ravenous the next, someone she did not even recognize, and then the dependence on Charles, for now she would be limited to bed rest, her doctor had told her. She wasn’t naturally built to carry a child, and the birth would be excruciatingly painful, a laborious process, so much so, that she began to loathe and detest the seed that was spawning. At what point did it actually become a living soul, she often wondered, as if there were any reasonable recourse for her.



There was a point in time, when she was a young girl, fair haired, wearing a yellow cotton sundress, hair pulled back into a ponytail, when she would carry her dolls, her babies she would call them, her babies, babies just like her, when she would fantasize about becoming a Mother, changing diapers, feeding, loving unconditionally these babies, the children she would someday have.



But something somehow had changed her, she had changed, and all she felt was a seething hostility at the boy she would be forced to raise mostly by herself, because Charles was always busy for work. Charles was busy at a rotary meeting, the Boy Scouts Club, or at a fundraiser. And she was left to feed and clothe Wayne, Wayne who also loved to play with his dolls the way she did, that faggot sissy boy. She used to watch him as he would say, “When I have my baby, I will dress you up in pretty dresses and bows,” just like she had done, and she felt repulsed and ashamed of him. It wasn’t as if she was religious and had a problem with whether Wayne would grow to like boys instead of girls. It wasn’t that she had a problem with the boy who would later apply mascara and go to school, the little freak boy who would get teased, pushed, and bullied by the other kids. It was the fact that she would have to come over to the school when they would call. “Please come pick Wayne up. There has been some trouble,” and Lydia would have to stop in the middle of putting groceries away or stopping right in the middle of preparing dinner, which would no doubt be ruined, to clean up his mess, his fucking mess. Always disgraced she was, and Wayne knew that his Mother was angry at him, no not angry, that she hated him, and that somehow made her even angrier. And that is how her life was stolen from her, an indiscretion with a handsome young man before her forthcoming wedding, producing a bastard child whom she despised that looked nothing like Charles. She remembered when she first called him Raccoon, an animal she thought, eyes lined with what appeared to be coal, something that made him appear soft and a target for ridicule, and how he had adopted the name for himself in mockery, humiliating her. All this work, this damned work she was doing for every fucking else, and nothing to show for it.



No, Lydia was not cut out to be a Mom. She knew it, just had she known the moment she had had sex with Stan in the heat of his car, throwing away her future, lying to Charles, telling him lie after lie after lie from that point forward. Like, when she told Wayne that she loved him, she had felt so disconnected and unrelated to this beast, that she actually gasped, this beast that was part of her, born of her, and who might someday grow to be just like her. Lydia, Lydia. How had it all gone so wrong, gotten so fucked up? Lydia, Lydia, Lydia. She lit a cigarette and exhaled slowly, blindly watching the serial on the television.

Lightning

This was a ten minute write in my writer's group and thought I would share it will all of you for good or bad! :)




Lightning


Lightning strikes
Telling me lies
Lies illuminated
Manipulated
As lights go out
Downstairs
A memory flashes
Bright
In the corner room
It was the night you came
To my bedside
Your tears
Flowing like clear streams
Your breathing
Rapid
Increasing
As you profess
To apologize
For what
For what
You can’t say why
Except that you love me
But there has been an indiscretion
An err in judgment
You never meant to hurt
Me
You
Him
Us
Mostly you
It won’t happen again you say
Haley’s comet is only seen
Every seventy-six years
Too long to wait
Lightning flashes
When storms brew
Sometimes when Realization
Blends with the truth
That indicates that it might
Just might happen again
I mean
It did happen
Last night
As you slipped into to door
Tripping over your own shadow
As if I was unaware
Of your absence
But then the phone rang
And I answered
There was a hesitation
A wounded wolf
So I asked
Whom was calling
Knowing full well who it was
And he said
Paul just Paul
Lightening struck for the last time
As the caller confessed
That I was a fool
Made a fool
A fool who trusted
Believed
A liar’s breath
A liar’s tears
A liar’s explanation
Of the distorted truth
A truth of sorts
You can always find where the lie unravels
If you listen carefully enough
It was an indiscretion
Yes it was
And it won’t happen again
He told me
And it won’t of course
Because I will see to it
See to it
Like honey to a bee

Innocene - Raccoon

Innocence (Raccoon)


As he reached down to pick up the jeweled scallop shell, flawless, almost as if from a mold, the symmetry breathtaking in its perfection, I watched his hand, his beautiful hand and wished he was holding mine. His hair, flaxen, bangs almost obscuring one eye: his eyes, like rare jade, piercing. I felt my heart flutter knowing that his man, handsome, unaware that my eyes coveted him, had little idea that I wanted him to hole me close.


I did not know him, but as he stood back up, he saw me out of the corner of his eye, and grinned self consciously, yet slightly flirtatiously, and said “Hey.” Just hey. No introduction, nothing complicated, just hey. And all that was required of me was to say hay back.


“Hey,” I said, as I blinked, then looked down for just a half second before I looked at him again, studying him, his muscular calves, evenly tanned skin, his tight abs, and developed chest, square jaw, that smile, bedeviling, disarming, and his dancing eyes. All of this was captured in a snapshot, so quickly that perhaps he hadn’t noticed my awe. His eyes still held mine as I returned to his face, his face that had gained some intensity, or was it tension. No, it was intensity for he did not look away to even flinch, relaxed.


I felt confused, like my knees were about to cave, buckle, leaving me in a pile of bones, but I tried not to show just how nervous I was, my smile just a little too tight.


“I’m Robert,” he said.


“Wayne,” I uttered in response.


“Where are you visiting from?”


It was summer break and out-of-towners and tourists were en masse.


“Asheville.” And then “North Carolina I mean,” I mustered, as if this was not obvious.


“I know where that is. I go to college at Wake.”


“What are you majoring in?” I inquired clumsily, trying to sound natural, get my bearings, understanding that without the eye liner I felt naked, embarrassed.


“Pharmacology,” he replied, without a hint if feeling flustered.


“Cool,” I summoned. “I might apply to Wake next year. I don’t know. Unless I move to California that is…” trying to show just how brave a move like that could be. Bravado.


He nodded. Something still, yet understood, passed between us, an apparition or a shadow, something unseen, unheard, yet you knew it was present.


“Cool,” he stated matter-of-factly. Just cool. No elaboration. I felt trapped for words in that moment, trying to find anything to say.


“That’s a beautiful shell, “I stammered. I almost picked it up first.”


“Yeah. Take a look.” And as he held it out to me and I reached to grab it, careful not to actually touch him, his fingers lingered just a slight second. I flushed, thankful I had been out in the heat for a few hours.


“Well,” he said, “I am staying at the cottage just up the beach, the blue one on stilts.

“Really?” I replied a beat too soon, my heart pounding like a bass drum, feeling as if I had fallen down a well, or as if the undertow might smother me. “I’m staying just a few houses down – the yellow one.”


He smiled. “Cool.” Yeah, cool I thought. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”


And with that, he turned and walked up the beach, leaving me with that beautiful scallop, a remembrance, and possibly a hint at what a future might be like with someone you adored, who equally adored you. It was the first time I had felt a certain amount of awareness, a certain amount what it might be to be an adult, not quite comprehending that my idealization was still very childlike in general. And it was the first time I felt I knew who I was for just a few moments, moments that would eventually flood me like ocean waves or pockets of rain.

Boy Girl

Boy Girl

Baby Girl was often lonely but seldom alone.
This shallow feeling had persisted for oh what,
some thirty years, back as early as grade school,
as early as when she knew the difference between
boys and girls. The boys teased her endlessly,
as boys will often do, for not being like them,
acting like them, being them. She remembered
letting the captain of the football team cheat off
her exam in Earth Science, an exam about conifers,
tall pines that produced seeds that grew into
cones. In exchange, he agreed to protect her
from those monsters that lurked around the corners
of hallways, a maze she would have to navigate
in order to arrive safely to her next class. Having
a guardian was a lesson she carried with her
even today. Looking back at that boy, she could
still relate to him, the one with the recessive gene,
that freak of nature and science, a mistake,
an aberration, the last to be picked for basketball.
Instead, a new woman had been born on
Her eighteenth birthday, and she never looked back.
These lessons, lessons learned, necessary lessons,
would serve her well, and who she became, the woman
who had arrived, survived, would have knocked
all those childhood bullies down with one punch,
one solid punch. None of her friends, except Raccoon,
knew that Robin was her real name, a name that could
have just as easily been born a girl rather than a boy.
She had been reborn Baby Girl, even if her driver’s
license picture reflected those childhood taunts. But
no one presently knew of this boy, and she kept him
hidden, out of sight, Still reflecting, she sat in the
center of a party in her honor, smiling, feeling completely
and utterly alone.

There Was Always One Night

There Was Always One Night

There was always one evening a week, her evening,
where Baby Girl would dress up in a smart purple suit,
popping it with some green pumps and a yellow clutch,
her hair twisted into a chignon, appearing like a lady of leisure.
It was just another cornflower day. There was always
one evening a week, where Baby Girl would take a seat
at Frenchy’s, while Max poured liberal potencies of Bombay gin,
extra dry, dry as a bone, dry like her humor, two olives please,
one onion, and usually, the lounge was deader than the
fogged over moon, with the exception of a few stray cats,
hissing and meowing to each other as if in heat, unembarrassed
and unaware of being watched, scrutinized, usually no one
that interested her. While the jukebox wailed “I Fall To Pieces,”
she would sit distantly, observing the frail man tearing up,
liquid salt pouring into his chardonnay. There was always
one evening a week, where Baby Girl would sit distantly,
apart from the jarring action, the jarring emotions of others,
owning these moments, some of the few that she allowed
to be present with herself by herself. Max, was great company.
He made her laugh, and she needed to laugh more at life’s
fickleness, and she even wondered if Max liked women like her.
No matter. Max held coveted secrets, as she did his, allies
against the sycophants that usually surrounded her, whom she
dismissed with a smile or bat of an eye. Four martinis,
three cigarettes, and then onward home to her small, bright,
quiet apartment, the silence palpable, nearly unbearably so,
alone with her cat, Sam, and the crazy neighbor across the hall,
a place she had consciously chosen for herself. There was always
one evening a week when she acquiesced to routine, without
giving it another thought.

Carrie Prejean -- Fraud

Carrie Prejean -- Who's the Boob Now?
Posted May 11th 2009 3:00AM by TMZ Staff

Those topless photos of Miss USA California Carrie Prejean were taken after she turned 18, according to one of her former pageant sponsors. This contradicts Carrie's position that she posed for the pics when she was only 17.We obtained an email sent by the sponsor (we were asked not to use his name) and he says Carrie sent him one of the topless photos after January 6, 2009, asking "if she was in good enough shape for the Miss USA Pageant." The date is significant, because that's the day Carrie got a boob job. The former sponsor says the pic was post boob job and she was well over 18.TMZ obtained 4 topless photos a week ago. Her rep contacted us and said Carrie's position was that she was naive at the time she posed. Then we got a second email stating she was only 17. As a result we did not publish the photos. But the sponsor says he's positive they were taken when Carrie was a full-grown adult.

Carrie Prejean -- Phone Whore
Posted May 11th 2009 2:24AM by TMZ Staff

If your phone rings and there's a voice recording asking you to donate money and sign a petition against gay marriage, you can draw comfort from the fact that the person who recorded the message is really hot.We found out Miss California USA Carrie Prejean recorded that message for the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) during a recent trip to Washington D.C. She's certainly accessible to NOM, but she's been like the topless version of Phantom of the Opera for the folks at Miss California... she will only communicate with pageant officials through her publicist -- the same dude who was the publicist for Billy Graham.By the way, the pictures that we did not post showing a topless Carrie... even though her lawyer says she was 17 when the photos were taken, we obtained an email from a former pageant sponsor of hers, who says on or after January 6, 2009, Carrie sent him the photo (posted on thedirty.com) asking if she was in good enough shape for the Miss USA Pageant. The upshot -- the sponsor says he knows "for a fact" she was not 17 in that picture.

Miss California Carrie Prejean -- Take it Down!
Posted May 10th 2009 12:07PM by TMZ Staff

Miss California Carrie Prejean wants to put a lid on those nude photos that have been posted on the Internet -- stat.We've obtained a cease and desist letter fired off from Carrie's lawyer to thedirty.com, demanding that the site take down two photos, showing a topless Carrie posing for the cam.In the letter, her lawyer says, "One of the displayed images of Ms. Prejean was illegally taken under false pretenses when she was a 17-year-old minor and unable to consent to its creation." The letter goes on: "The other image depicts Ms. Prejean's likeness but is not an actual photograph. It is an electronic manipulation ["photoshopped'] of her image created without her consent."The response from thedirty.com: "Your client's publicity rights are substantially inferior to the right of the public to consider, discuss, agree and/or disagree with Ms. Prejean's actions and views. This is not conduct for which your client's consent is required." Translation -- go pound sand.

More Lies From Miss California Carrie Prejean And Her Camp
Access Hollywood: TheDirty.com, which posted the first racy photo of the beauty queen on Monday, has posted another shot of a woman posing in just her underwear covering her chest with her arm, which they claim is Prejean.
But a rep for Prejean told Access Hollywood the photo is not her. The rep acknowledged that photo shows Prejean’s head, but that “it appears to have been Photoshopped.”
The rep went on to say that Prejean maintains that one photo was taken during that session, “as far as she can remember.” Her rep noted that the photo was taken four years ago and “her memory might be faulty.”
Prejean’s rep also told Access the photo was taken by a friend of Prejean’s, who sent it to an agent, but that she “can’t remember his name.” The rep said they believe the agent might be responsible for releasing the photo to TheDirty.com.
According to her rep, Prejean has contacted the Web site and asked them to stop using her photo.

Click Here To Read Full Article
Carrie, your lips are flapping and all you keep doing is lying and making everything worse! You and your “rep”? Isn’t it stated in your agreement with the pageant that you are not allowed to even have your own PR rep.? You have not tried once to get in touch with me or anyone here at TheDirty.com. The image is NOT photoshopped and an agent did not release these images to me. As for your statement, “can’t remember his name” that is the funniest thing I have ever heard. Carrie, TheDirty Army and I will pray for you.
Exodis 20:16
Ephhesians 4:24-25
Carrie, I am sure you skipped over those passages. I decided.- nik

Visitation

Visitation


Every time I approach that hill, the one that leads to that monstrous fortress, the cold institution where those intakes caused my heart to pound, my palms to sweat in dread, the panic rises and I hold my breath. I hold my breath forgetting to breathe deeply. But, I had already reconciled myself to the fact that it was important to give feedback about the intake process, how everyone did their part, that the clinicians were excellent and caring, but that the communication on the team failed, and as a result, I was forced to retell and relive the trauma again and again without the tools necessary to do a little harm reduction as far as symptoms are concerned. I had to give the feedback because, like most of us, we believe that we are not allowed to actually participate in our own healthcare, whether it is physical or emotional. Doctors cure. I also know that doctors are constantly learning, and though their intentions are honorable, they are human. Researchers especially are cogs in the machine, so the fact that reports are produced, does not necessarily mean that they actually talk to each other about the patients, or treat each individual case uniquely.


I had already decided that I would probably drop out of this study after I had delivered my feedback to Dr. Marmar. For those who are not familiar with Dr. Marmar he is Vice Chair and Professor of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco. He is also Associate Chief of Staff for Mental Health, San Francisco VA Medical Center. Dr. Marmar’s current studies include a five-year prospective study of posttraumatic stress. His research has been supported by the NIMH, Veterans Administration, and Upjohn, Solvay and Forest Pharmaceuticals. With the use of Cognitive Behavior Therapy, Dr. Marmar has had a high success rate in treating PTSD survivors since the mid seventies.


So, this man, this doctor, this amazing opportunity – was I going to give the feedback and just leave, knowing I had a great therapist who supports me, who thinks I am doing FABULOUSLY anyway? Or was I going to be open to the possibility. It is interesting how you think you have a plan, and yet you know you will try and be open for anything that might give you a way to get in or out. And that is what happened. Dr. Marmar told me that the intake process should have never occurred in the manner it did. There should have never been a seven hour intake. There was no reason to relive trauma three separate occasions, followed by a startle study that would produce said symptoms, before the actual treatment had even began. The feedback he said was useful, and I was assured that if I was willing to trust him, trust the process, to make associations that did to create pain and anxiety, with the help of tools, and techniques which would be given to me, and that if I did the homework each week, I would benefit from the treatment. If I received the medication or if I received the placebo, we would not know as it would be randomly assigned. But regardless, he would help. And so, I took a leap of faith, and decided to not give up just yet, and to do the best I could, and if it did not work, then I could make an informed decision. He also gave me the much needed self-esteem boost by telling me that he could tell I had already done my research that I was already working hard, and that I was well along my way as it was. So, I feel grateful, and I am shedding skin, and I am happier, because I am open. Being open. That is what it is about. And now I do not have to look up that hill and see the facility as something to be feared. I can look at it has a refuge, each time I visit.