a late harvest in Brigadoon
plucked from good earth
by strong hands
hauling
uphill, until
a gentle
*****
rewards
a stiff
back; easing
a grateful
burden
that levitates
famine

[ bushels ]

now
ziggarats
in a root
cellar

a Sumerian skyline
of parsnips and rhubarb
with fennel minarets

where Gilgamesh slept
in a pantry of pagan loot
underneath a corner room
at the very back
of a round
house.

where four seasons bunk with an almanac

mason jars of pickled beets
breathing their own blood
hanging gardens from the ceiling
of the Underworld
like fliers of missing children
on telephone poles

i go outside and wander off

you stay home

I stood as still as I could.
Trying to hold in my breath, trying to turn invisible, trying to melt into the wall I steadied myself upon. My heartbeat thumped in my ears drowning out all other sounds.

Were my feet nailed to the floor by fascination? or was it disgust? The knot in my stomach laid no reliable argument to these rushing emotions.

My eyes followed his hands; the way he gripped her hips, the way his fingers traced her jaw. My eyes also followed his lips; how he pressed them almost reverently against the base of her clenched neck.
I watched as he inhaled her scent like he was being squeezed out of breath.

She struggled against his grip. Her eyebrows knit together in an unsightly frown. She halfheartedly pushed him off her weak body. It almost looked like she didn't want to resist, but her pride pulled her away from yielding. She was shaking, her form disheveled, yet it wouldn't sway him.

I felt a stinging in my eyes, that all familiar burning I experienced when I felt that twinge of paranoia. That burning paranoia that plagues me now, as my worst fears are embodied.

How could she easily dismiss him like that?
When I lay nights awake craving his skin, his breath, his words.

I have spiraled out of view, just a faceless backdrop in his hopeless love story.

How could a person hate and love so much at the same time?
It just goes to show that the world doesn't work that way, it works to crush you. All these emotions spurt out at once, as a lesson for all the lucky fools watching you.

I'll wait until dark
to buy myself a bottle
please, night, come quickly

It’s dark.
From what you can see through your eyelids,
But there is nothing but the darkness…
Just completely nothing,
Nothing around at all…

Lights low,
Eyes sown shut,
No one can see,
Not even yourself,
The harm and chemicals that race threw your veins,
And even if they could…
No one would know how to help.

Even with your eyes shut it’s unnecessary,
You know the feeling,
The fake darkness,
The sunshine that throws the dust around,
It’s not real.
The sun that moves the dust,
The sun that shines on only the wretched
That sun that shines on your depression,
Making it brighten to full volume…
And then the blinds snap shut,
So fast…
You don’t even know where those thoughts went.

Chemicals that your body is used to,
The chemicals that make your eyes shine,
Make your hands shake,
But nothing that you had to take,
No substance is involved,
Just the feeling of flying then shooting yourself down.

The chemicals course threw your veins,
Making twisting and turning paths
Threw every part of you,
No blood, just this nuclear fission making your eyes roll.
Sleep comes easy,
But it’s not really sleep,
Just enough to regain your strength to peak threw that window shade.
The darkness of the room, the black depth of your curtains,
The mechanical glow given off by the tv,
The news rolling almost as a portal to an outside world,
A world you are not comfortable with.

Your eyes press down the keys,
You take another dose of distain
And flip the power off.

Smoke drifts into the air,
Maybe from an apartment downstairs,
Voices scream at you to move,
But once your eyes open to nothing,
But fire.
Raging in a circle around you.
You have no escape but to hide within yourself…
The outside can not be trusted…
It’s not real…

Instead of giving your heart or part of your soul to a person,
It’s trapped on the other side of that wall,
You’ve been caged with no walls…
The fire isn’t real, and neither are the walls,
There is nothing.
No one
At all…
Just the sliding of your consciousness in and out,
And the draining of your comprehension.

A jump, a start…
Silence,
It’s in your mind,
A blow of wind, a scratch of death,
Inching closer to you….

Frantically searching for yourself…
But just deeper and deeper inside of thoughts you sink,
Drowning, thoughts of reality choke you until there is nothing left…
Just space…
Space that never runs out.

One day the curtains could be thrown open,
The blinding light,
Maybe a comfort for one not ready to see,
But at least it’s an inch closer to life.

more than the water,
she ripples concentric.
alone.
but who isn't?
it needs to be written.
she needs to relive it.
again.  
it's her prison.
now the world and her daughter
decide how far she'll go
amen.  
heaven's risen.

you chew on coffee beans to cleanse your mouth of this
one long silence
it is open like a wound
it festers

when your breath condenses in the cold air you feel its presence
with icy hands it holds yours
it is patient
it is strict

chewing gum is not sufficient; it is sweet, it makes you wonder
about sugar crystals
they grow like bones
they are brittle

but the taste of blood, of coffee, of chocolate with no milk is good
you can remember without remorse
you can sit and think about dreams
without letting them in

and all your pain can stay subcutaneous
as long as you don’t speak

the thunder talks to me
and tells me to be afraid
of it's glory
and power
and boom.
it tells me that if I don't want to see the lightning,
then I must close the windows and draw the shades
and turn my back.
The thunder sounds
even when there is no storm.
the thunder is always there within my heart,
warning me of the lightning,
telling me
to close my eyes
cover my ears
stay inside
and stay afraid.
always.

I awaken to find my mind either a complete blur, a fuzzy, foggy place, or a place of a maelstrom of thoughts, ideas, and emotions, some from the previous day, some from even before that. Electrifying anxiety, paralyzing fear, crippling doubt and depression are the orders of the day, when I fully awaken. I eat, then take my pills, to get my thoughts in some semblence of order. I go through the day, feeling trapped by problems my medications cannot control. I find myself either blaming everything and everyone else for said problems, or ripping out my own entrails as I blame myself - one extreme or another. I have visions, dreams, hopes of success, but then my depression, or whatever it is, kicks in, and wipes out those dreams, reducing me to a mess of shattered hopes and dreams. This is why I spend most of my days on tumblr, where people see me for who I am, but even there, people judge and discriminate against me, for whatever I have. On tumblr, I have friends that I roleplay out various characters with, different personalities, sometimes variations of myself take shape. Tumblr is the only place where I can seemingly have a reality in which I have control. The Internet is my portal to reality, my line of defense against what could be described as agoraphobia. But I still desire the company of people my own age, physically, rather than electronically, but I do not have the same interests of most of them, and am scared to death of doing so. The very thought of meeting a large group, or even an individual, sends me into a panic attack-like state, then I fall quickly into a state of depression because of that. I hate myself for that anxiety, the awkwardness I have. Loathe is the correct word. This is why I hide behind a computer screen. It may not be perfect, but I find it easier to interact online. I do not know how to translate how my characters act to my own actions, as some have suggested for me to do. I have been told that I need to choose to get out of this hole in which I am trapped. It is a struggle every day to even get enough energy to care, much less try to get out of the hole. The only way out is by climbing a steep cliff, covered by snow and ice, cut by the howling, bone-chilling wind, with only two hooks, in my hands, to claw my way out, fighting the falling snow and ice, occasional rock and hail, sleet too. There seems to be no place to make a camp, where I may rest, only the long, arduous, grueling climb, my vertical trek, my seemingly Sisyphean task that awaits me. A choice that may seemingly **** me. People have suggested that I turn to the supernatural, but that is a fool’s bet, a folly of hope, a wish of the people who build their castles in the sky.

i. arachnophobia; fear of spiders. more common in females than males, why at night you choke on the idea of her fingers on him, long and thin.

ii. ophidiophobia; fear of snakes, fear of being crushed alive by commitment, why in the mornings you never left your number, why you don’t call her back, why you regretted it later.

iii. acrophobia; fear of heights. why she stays out of circuses and away from people like you who would make her fall in love.

iv. agoraphobia; fear of situations where escape is difficult, fear of the plane that takes her away, fear of the open crowded space of your ribcage where paintings of her still constantly hang.

v. cynophobia; fear of dogs, fear of the graves where good noses could dig up the mistakes you have made, fear of a girl who made you want to get a puppy and settle down somewhere finally.

vi. astraphobia; fear of thunder and lightning, fear of being alone in a house that always sounded like both, the stormclouds of your histories always brewing behind flimsy doors. fear of finding her there and having her kiss you in the rain. fear she’d never come back to you again.

vii. trypanophobia; fear of injections, fear of drugs, fear of the doctor who looked into your heart and told you that your shaky hands and bad dreams were a sign that she’s crept into your sleep.

viii. social phobias; fear of social situations, fear of your father’s white knuckles on the wheel while he says, “no son of mine is a ***** like this,” fear of her mother’s judgement, fear of not being enough.

ix. pteromerhanophobia; fear of flying, fear of remembering how long it’s been since you actually felt alive, why you trembled whenever you held her tight, why one day she frightened you so bad that you left in the middle of the lonely night.

x. mysophobia; fear of germs. why you knew you’d only get her covered in dirt. why looking at yourself in the mirror always seems to hurt. why you will never be happy without being hers. out of this whole messed up world, she was the only thing pure.

The hardest thing about closing the door is
watching the silver lining drift to the floor,
ground to dust and swept under the rug,
floors are much quicker to let bygones be.

The hardest thing about closing the door is
the screech of hinges boring through skull
like worried whispers heard before that
made the iron oxidize.

The hardest thing is clicking the lock
and seeing both keys on the table top,

then clicking your heels
but you're already home,
just seeing how empty
it is on your own.

I can’t look myself in the eye
I can’t gaze upon my face
Reflections are my enemy
Pictures are my fear
Poisoned by standards
Intoxicated by privacy

I stand here wondering
I stand here asking
Will I ever be unmasked?

Mask my face
Mask my name
Mask my home
Mask up
Don’t forget it
Don’t let them see
Don’t let them know

Break a mirror
Punch a wall
I don’t want to see
I don’t want to know

Red wine
Rainy day
Stay inside
Stay away

Don’t leave and you’ll be okay

Five hundred and fifty...
that's how many square feet I have,
all to myself, the kitty,
and the dog, but there's no bath.

Yet, there's plenty of room for solitude.
It seems to be the easiest thing to resume.
Not saying hello is socially rude,
but what they don't know, is that it feels like doom.

It takes one to know one swift fell swoop
like a bat out of hell and certainly the belfry.
If you've something to prove to the birds and the bees,
I won't bat an eye at your rhinoplasty.

I'll take two hoots, 'cause I sure won't give them.
Find somebody else to get up and go;
I cry like I fly like a carrion crow
and I've two left feet and no time to tango.

It takes three strikes 'til it's not just company
any more — it's a crowd and my agoraphobia
is making this worse, so I might disperse.

If you don't quite care, let's put two and two together;
playing pretend we're birds of a feather.
I could commend, but that's such a no-no;
you're more like a doornail to me, less like a dodo.

And if you don't much mind, I might just take five.
I'm chicken-livered, but at least alive
though I feel like a dead duck, dusted and done.
I won't be there, I'll stay fair and square,
right back at square one.

Now can you see how this is cyclic?
Makes me feel one sandwich short of a picnic,
up the wall, and driving me sick.
Apologies, I don't mean to nitpick,
and I know I've a number of bees in my bonnet,
but I've zero interest in your haiku and sonnets.

So here's one for the road,
turn by the way the devil drives you home,
and one good turn deserves
another.

Alone in despair,
Awake but don't care,
Sense of agoraphobia,
I would show ya,
But the circumlocution,
Made us lose communications,
From the overtired notion,
Of who is right and who is wrong,
In a neolithic view of strong,
Indignation is the result,
Of why we're dumb not stupid .

'Souvenir' comes from the french word meaning remembrance. It is an almost universal behavior to collect tiny mementos while traveling, some tangible object that holds all of the intangible memories and joy that came with the moment. Souvenirs are a quite lovely sentiment when you really think about it - before the plastic and mass-production and tourism industry come into the picture. In Japan, souvenirs are called omiyage, which travelers bring back home to loved ones and friends as a sort of apology for their absence, a way of saying "sorry you couldn't make it" or "wish you were here."
Today, the top ten most popular souvenirs are ornaments, t-shirts, postcards, shot glasses, tattoos, sand in a bottle, fridge magnets, tea towels, key rings, and random gifts. My mother has chosen to cherish the seventh most popular form of souvenir: fridge magnets. Manmade refrigerator magnets were popularized in the 1960's for educational and functional purposes but very quickly evolved into fun and inexpensive decor. She has so many state shaped magnets from all around the US, and a few from outside of it.
The thing with my mother though, is that she has always been a self-proclaimed homebody. I sometimes worry that she has agoraphobia but I think most of it is just that she never really had the opportunity to explore the world outside of the dead end street she grew up on (and still lives on to this day). She was raised by her grandfather who was a merchant marine and traveled often during her childhood, but she married and had kids at a young age and never really had the time or money to go on her own adventures. She was a stay-at-home mom to my four siblings and I, as well as to all of the neighborhood kids. Her door and arms and ears were always open for them. Now those neighborhood kids are all grown and so am I and they're off having their own kids and I'm off having my own adventures, but we all make a point to bring her back a magnet from the places we visit.

The wide variety of magnets you can find in a single gift shop in every city surprised me at first. There is now an art to choosing the perfect one for my mom - I went to four different shops in Portland, Oregon trying to find the perfect one. I never found the perfect one but still, that's dedication. I stray away from the boring traditional ones with the state name and shape (although this type is one of the less creative neighborhood kids go-to) and try to find ones that will make her laugh or show her some of the culture or sights from the city instead.
A green-eyed squirrel from North Carolina, a candy skull from Cancun, the mysterious Bigfoot from Washington, a sailboat from Maryland, a front porch with a lamppost from Puerto Rico, manatees from Central Florida, and entirely too many Los Angeles cityscapes and Smoky Mountain bottle openers adorn the kitchen. So many, in fact, that she ran out of room on the refrigerator and had my dad mount a magnetic board in the kitchen hallway to fit them all.

I know it makes her happy to see all of her children having these experiences and seeing the world but most of the time it just makes me sad that she couldn't be there with me. I hate to think that she ever looks at them and feels like she's missed out on too much or that we held her back in any way, though I know she would never admit that. We bring her souvenirs so she can live vicariously through us, so that she can cherish our memories in place of her own. Even now that I've moved away, I mail her magnets from Florida as an apology for my absence.  
I rate them three out of five stars.

Old telephone lines like fossils prehistoric, outdated
So many cOnversations by glowing screen
I could have been something you were really good at
Rhymes and rhythms shared over many mediums
Canvas, air, virtual, paper stain love
It's always the words that stick around
A mind can change anything into what it wants it to be
These pages turn yet still they remain unchanged
Tattooed, scarred into lyrics and get away car(d)s
I miss you
Whispered a mantra across the thin skin of your spine
Tingling the hemispherical split of right and left
Blind on one side, defective
The vision of freedom all at once clear then blurry
Catorax agoraphobia with a hint of I-will-not-open-for-anyone
Wish I could get the taste of unrequited desire out of my mouth
Burn clean the haunting of murky waters
Your sharp incisors still emerge from those depths to keep festering the wound

After last week
I think I fell ill
with agoraphobia
Or perhaps my mind
retreated
turning hermit
and hidden
Maybe my thoughts
were trying to convince
my mouth to become
mute
My heart could have
tempted my limbs
to refrain from making
my routine tired
sloppy movements
out of bed
It could have been your
words
They could have gotten through the cracks
of my protective skull
and paralyzed
my inner spirit
to connect and inspire
and fly
Or maybe I was turned into a vampire
over the course
of the dreary long
tar night
Count must have snuck in
under the tiny slit of my door
and drained the life within me
forcing me to refrain
from light and the beauty
of a newborn day

Whatever it is...

I don't want to hear a single
syllable uttered
in my presence
Not a single w-o-r-d
hurled into my environment
like a sneaky soapy "I" or "me" or...
Today all I want is to
barricade myself in this
gorgeously empty room
and believe that I am the only person
on this planet
and that I don't owe a
a ******* thing
to anyone
especially

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