February 29, 2008

Dear baby Kamila,

Welcome to life! We've waited for 7 months for you to come. We thought we were going to wait for 2 more. However, it seems that you were tired of waiting to meet us! You may be small and younger than we'd imagined, but you are more beautiful and precious than we could have dreamed. By the time you read this, your real name should fit you comfortably and you won't believe that your Aunt Kamlah really thought she could pass you off as "Kamila." That's okay. When I left the hospital today your name hadn't fallen from the lips or poured from the heart yet. I know it will. We'll all look at you and say, "She is beautiful, masha'Allah," and the name will be there, right where it was all along: on your lovely face. Despite your nameless state tonight, I love you. And even though you'll always be young with a birthday every four years, I love you. Not just because you're my best friend's first born love, I love you. I love you and I can't believe I'm an "Aunt."

Sincerely,
Aunt Kamlah

I watched you
hold it in your hands

I watched you
look at it with mild amusement

I watched you
caress it and smile

I watched you
kindly adore it

I watched you
play with it in enjoyment

And then I watched you stop

I watched you
crumple it and
toss it away
like a sheet of paper

I saw you
toss it over your
shoulder as you
walked away
with a five o'clock shadow
and a smile on
your stubbly face

However, I still feel it beating.

February 10, 2008
10:50 a.m.

Watch a movie
and see the characters
live and die
as we want inside
we wish to be
the way we hope
this ride

Let's listen to music
and hear the desires
of one man's hearts
and listen to the
dreams of one woman's tears
and float into the realm
of happiness's lies

Let's read the words
in a book of rhymes
describing my wishes
as a set of dishes unwashed
and lace uncut as
wild dreams deferred and
leaves of the green, green grass

But I'd rather
just lay here in the dark
with my thoughts
chasing the demons from
the darkest spots

I'd rather just
lay here and become
the bed and the
wall and the room
and me and you

I'd rather be just
left alone with
the thoughts inside
my feeling head
the thoughs inside
me, feeling dead
the thoughts inside
me light as lead
the thoughts inside
me, thin as thread
the thoughts inside
me dripping red
the thoughts inside
me wishing wed

February 9, 2008
2:48 a.m.

the problem is that
i have fallen
i've skinned my
knees and
twisted my ankle
i've broken my
wrist and scraped
my elbos
i've dislocated a
shoulder and stubbed
a toe
the problem is
i've fallen and
he won't
help me up.

Oh, really?

Excuse me, I must go back to my room now, where I'll attempt to kill myself with words.

Why can I not remember?

Chinese food=bad

i will not eat fast chinese food again
i will not eat fast chinese food again
i will not eat fast chinese food again
i will not leave campus to eat at that chinese fast food drive thru restaurant again...

...at least not until i have forgotten again.

I never noticed.

In "The Overcoat" by Nikolai Gogol, the protagonist dies a horrible death.

In "A Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift, the narrator proposes eating babies (well, sarcastically anyway).

In "Two Friends" by Guy de Maupassant, the two friends are killed after a fishing trip.

In Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom, Morrie dies of ALS.

In my class today, the kids remarked on the dark nature of my reading choices.

"Miss M, can we EVER read something that doesn't have a sad ending? Maybe one where the main character DOESN'T die?"

:~)

Cricket Song

Ripples move in circles
away from the edge
of humanity's home.
Dark and light, LED, make
the shadow of the
human form I inhabit.
Children, mufflers disturb
the silence of an evening's
delightful solitude.
Chains on the pet limit
its freedom and
pollute the aura.
All this and yet he sings.

The cricket song
fills the spaces
all else tried to
fill. It fills the
air with a reminder
of their existence.
"Hey, I am here! You
will listen! I exist,
I'm smaller than you,
but oh so more tender
and true! I sing my
lover a lullaby. I treat
the world to a tune.
I fill your evenings
with music."

I hear it.
I hear the cricket song.
I dance to it.
I enjoy it.
I embrace it.

There's something about it.
Something morally wrong with it.
Something reprehensible and treacherous about it.
Something that makes me want to scream out loud.
Why burn daylight?
Hang the notion
burn it at the stake
Beat it senseless.
Just don't burn daylight.
Don't you dare.

******

I bet the grass is warm now.
I bet if I lie down on
on the grass by the river I
could feel the Earth's warmth
and hear the
lull of its beating waves.

******

7:32
The River really
was what I needed.

The goosebumps all
over my body tell me so.

The breeze,
the smell
the music
the crickets
the hush of cars
the fish leaping
the water lapping
they all tell me so.

***