Journal entry, April 13, 2004

I remember this feeling.  It’s the feeling I have before/during a flashback—like I want to crawl out of my skin.  I just have to keep it at bay until Thursday.  I don’t want to do this while I'm alone.  And god knows Ryan doesn't need to deal with it.  Thursday.  I just have to wait until Thursday.

The Beginning, Tomorrow is Crying for You

I woke up as a fairy in the empty restaurant next to the woods.  I suppose I always knew when I wanted to live in the doll house in the attic that my hopes and dreams beat inside of a tiny heart.  But not until I opened my eyes and found myself crouching in the furthest corner of the kitchen pantry did I know for certain.

            I had been gone for a year—where, I couldn't say.  But I did know I’d been very ill, and that during this illness some industrious housekeeper within had thrown huge dust covers over much of my memory.  I wasn't sure I minded.  Something about the twilight endlessly falling over the woods told me that the last good day had been long ago.

            The restaurant, however, I remembered.  Quietly elegant, its white tablecloths, spotless place settings, and crystal water glasses spoke of another time.  Windows ran the length of the entire outside wall:  restless trees and half-lit sky filled the view as far as the eye could see.  In the cramped kitchen, steel grey units and panelled cabinets housed the pots, pans, and other cooking items.  And then there was the pantry, nearly empty, where I now found myself.  I had never seen anyone cooking in that kitchen.  Save one, I had never seen another soul in the restaurant at all.

The Dragon

There is a dragon in the elevator

He will not tell me his name but

I know it

I’ve heard it in my sleep

He says, stay asleep, little girl

I will not harm you

but I only pretend

I am here and I am alive

They say riddles are clues

but clues in a fortress

If only the dragon would let me pass

Ah, little girl, he says

you must solve the first riddle

to prove you are ready

I ask him what the first riddle is

and he laughs

He says that is why I am not ready

I cannot even hear the riddle

He says I know the words

He says no one stops my ears

but me

He says the riddle is my first clue

That I will hear it when I am ready

I say this is another trick

another stall

But he says no

he is the master of ceremonies only

I am in charge

I will know the riddle when I say it out loud

Forsaken

I nail my hair to the floor

whisper through the strands

                Oh my Hosanna

                do you hear me tonight?

                oh my Hosanna

                shoot me a sign because

                I lift you up

                               I lift you up

                until you are the

highest  

                               

                                                I cast you               you take flight

                                                into this deconstructing night

                                                rain shining hammers

                     down

                                                                upon my head

                                                upon the dead memories I

                                                scatter on your altar

                             like lilies

                                                                                   resurrected

               

For you I know of fires

                                around my eyes they burn

                                they bring me here with

                                crooked fingers

                I shoot you higher

                count the nails tumbling from my hands

                                you forgot me       left me here

                a thousand angels with tar-pitched wings

                                they drag me to this precipice

                they drag me here

                                life is for the jumping

               

oh my Hosanna Hosanna in the highest

               

                                   you bury me like a stick

                                   after you have broken off the buds

                to cast you             to take flight

                                they drag me here

                                call me fool to my face

                                show me my swelling toes underneath

                                your heels

                                                and these nails

              tumble

upon my head

                                Yes, for you I have known of fires

                                with crooked fingers I

                                pray to you

                                through the ravaged ends of
                                my hair

the floorboards hear me

pity me

Dream Journal, 2005

Had a dream last night with Erica in it.  Yesterday (in real life) I replied to her email.  It was probably a nicer email than I should have sent, but I didn't know what else to do--too chicken to do otherwise, I guess.  

In the dream Erica was incredibly needy/demanding, and didn't want me to have any other friends.   Every time I tried to play with other kids, Erica would get jealous and interfere.  The other kids were afraid of her and I was too but I tried to be nice to her to keep the peace; so I mostly just played with the other kids when she wasn't around.  

However, I had to stay in a room with her—she had this big bed, and I slept in a tiny futon bed shoved in a narrow little spot.  She'd decorated the room with loads of fake stupid stuff about how much we loved each other and how close we were.  It was all very artificial and stifling and annoying and freaky in a stalker-ish sort of way.  She only backed off once when my mom's husband told her that I had a right to play with other kids.  But once he was gone she started following me everywhere again.  The last thing I remember is running down some stairs, trying to get away from her.  It’s like she was obsessed.  Very creepy.

Journal, May 29, 2000

A car length away from entering my zone
until I fell through the open door

Journal, January 31, 2006

My memory is a song I tried to forget.

But the words haunted me, the melody always on my lips.  I tried to learn a new song to block out the old but the noise in my head became cacophonous. Slowly I had to let each false note drop - until all that was left was the same sad song I could not erase.

It was a song I could not sing but needed to whisper instead.  A song that would not let me sleep but invaded my dreams.  A song I could not change but needed to hear in all of its tragic wistfulness.

My memory is a song I wanted to forget.  Except for the part of me that refused to believe in the forced, out of tune harmonies that passed for beauty.  Theirs was a song full of violent ugliness, tears I had promised myself never to shed.

This is my song, and I refuse to forget.