If I Wasn't Me, I'd Want To Have A Baby With Me.

And not just because I read a lot of books, either. Don't you hate when you have a civil war of the mind? Lighting that cigarette while considering its cellular effects? Wanting to trust but fearing betrayal (cherchez la femme and a such a couple more)? Looking forward to writing about three days of anal but feeling compelled to describe the arcane entre nous found between strangers sharing the same deepest darkest? Fuck it; I have to work tomorrow, so I guess I'll sublimate. I meant that to be "sleep."

Anonymity, A Poison Pen, A Heart-Shaped Diary With A Lock

I remember waking up crying, too. Well, not even really waking up, you know, that purposeful insentience, it was a defense mechanism, but not an actual one or a helpful one, like run, bitch, run! would've been, but it was all I could come up with at the time, and given the circumstances, you've gotta believe that it was like being blindfolded in hell and fumbling for the exit. Begging for mercy at the start, but later reduced to only begging for it not happen in front of the girl. Do you understand what I am saying? I'm sure you don't like to think about these things, but they shaped me, irrevocably, and you can't be mad at me for delusional sequels, crying when my mind puts two and two together to get five, because it is as involuntary as a seasonally-induced sneeze or a nerve-induced tic. More like a tic. But short story long, it is all in the past; post-trauma, if you require a doctor's note to excuse me. But it is a very real possibility that I may never not flinch.

I am not sure what is appropriate anymore but these words are just an exercise in compliance, anyway, vis-a-vis me to my inner tourette's, so it might as well be you to whom I defer: strike all paragraphs concerning sex, love, hate, fear, insecurity, and hope.

It's My Job (To Fuck You On Your Birthday)

Recover post? If you say so, but recovery post is more like it. On the TTP, TTC is close to the top, under get divorced but before get a ring, so motherfuck a hater and vilipend a maligner, whichever prophylactic prose best protects your socioeconomic fragility from poetic pratfalls. What I really mean to say is: those cavalier cavilers so don't mean shit to an obstinate moppet like me and neither do their creepy threats of h-e-double hockey sticks nor their obsession with status (quid pro) quo. You can't teach an old god new tricks and I don't take no kind of blood money from no kind of people; and theirs is saturated with mine from the massacres of my youth. But enough of that gimmick. On to more writable, ergo readable, things, like how much I love to suck you when you're still mostly soft and I'm still mostly asleep.

I really feel in love with you when you tell me the truth. I feel like an adult. Like I matter. Like I'm important to you. I feel real.

Speaking of real, I'm rill sorry you can only have my ass for the next few days! I know how much you love pink snapper, so a thousand humble apologies for getting put in time-out. Maybe if you could just make-play like it's a stranger; you love anything that presents a shot at novelty. Come on, now. Tell me I'm lying.

Good god, I love when you're in bed next to me. You're the best kisser. Epic. Epic.

Ochre Scarab (We Wait)

How can you not see? That sometimes I have to. Do that thing. This thing. Check myself. Hold it back. Push it down. Only to pull it out, like teeth with bloody roots yielding to the pressure. No one is more disgusted by me than me. Of that I am sure. Contrition? You're my pet. Violation? Kisses and undying love. And you, Revisionism? Me rencontre dans ma boudoir; fuck slave anyone? The guns of your mind riddle me in a way that I can't help but worship, so hurry up and take my sieved self to the doctor, already. Everyone knows that unhealthy is so unattractive. Now you go'on and cry about that fact. Me? I'll be over here trying to be quiet.

I hate some members of my own family more than I could ever describe using words. Violently fucking volcanic. You have something missing in you. And nothing can take the place of it. Take these tears to your airless coffin.

Self, face the facts: you're in love.

Wish I Was

White trash, and a million other things I'm not; like the one who broke you out of your monastery. But wishing is for children and hoping is for suckers and I don't even need to consult the magic conch to know that this is already going too south. Time to flip a bitch and get all cheerleadery. So, how about middle school sense with upper school sensibilities? I remember back when I was a girl, green and blue plaid hemmed way too short, going commando in that war zone, mostly for my own satisfaction. Sometimes, I would be in the middle of mass (that's right, mass) and think, "No wonder you're cold." St. Michael and All Angels: making bff's with other moneyed wide-eyed coke-and-more addicts, black-tar heroines chewing their daily double brown bagged lunch of 100 mg of the then newly-approved Kadian in the backseat of their pre-pimped rides, pretending to be teenagers but belied by their own abandoned eyes, trying to keep from even thinking about thinking about having to go back to the place they called home; the sad sharp solitude of a Preston Hollow echo chamber: the saddest girls to ever drink straight Grey Goose from an insulated Cooper Institute mug. All of everybody had it all so rough. But me? Not me. I was like a celebrity, popular for being popular, saying all the right things at all of the right times, neither smug nor kind, but ultra fucking private, living mostly in my own head and for the benefit of no one, occasionally deigning to speak to a few tolerable ancillary amis de dejeuner: Royal Palace Chinese, nothing more, at the corner of NW Hwy/Lemmon, third booth, as soon as the lunch bell rings, and yes, bring your roach if you must. Not completely numb, I had a taste for tasting and an eye for an ear, getting down on my knees to beg for absolution. Hike up that skirt a little more. Ha, they call it giving here. I was such an adult as a child and later twisting back backwards, scoliosis maturity; growed up into a child. I got voted multiple Most This and Most That, but I never lived up to any of it.

Say I Won't

I'm not afraid of indian giving 12 o'clock thoughts nor of 1 AM baths nor of 6 AM sex. Yours may be a catharsis of unbidden words and fine-tuned punctuation but mine is just a long recursive love letter -- shabby and inadequate, I'll admit -- but the pleasure is in the act of trying to please, in the giving and not the reception, eye meet beholden, and no Studio 60 can take that away from me.

Having Hurt: Faith In Fireweeds

It was a thoughtful sickness, near-catastrophic but genuine, short-lived in the long-run, and even though it ended bad, I love what we started. Truth is, I'm twenty six and a half, and I should've outgrown this by now. And as I enter the second childhood of my fourth lifetime, I promise I'll fake being an adult a little bit better. Oh, I just need a vacation, you know, go intubate down the Guadalupe, let the cold soak in my bones and remind me of my skin.

"What is it that you want?"

"For this to be fair and equitable."

"Okay. Good. Now be more broad. More general. Tell me about your goals."

"Um....to...get divorced?"

"No, I mean...like, stop looking at the trees, and start looking at the forest."

"Like, the 'where do you see yourself in ten years' kind of deal?"

"Exactly."

"Um...oh. Okay. Well, not back here, for one."

"Well, I don't think ... I'm not really sure you are ... I mean ..."

"Am I not playing the game the right way?"

I don't mean to be difficult, except when I do, but my mouth never fails, except when it does, like when we're all one big tangled mess of legs and arms and wrists and hips and we're on the bed, and

oh god
I am alive
I just remembered

and we're not speaking, just breathing, and she's laughing and you're watching her and I'm watching you watching her, and are you aware that we are only living for one another? What else do we have? We become something else, like a real honest-to-god family. But something beyond that and less nuclear, too. Then I don't even want to say anything because warmth and syncopated heartbeats say more and words would only serve to insult. If this that we have is ever taken away from me, by you or by the universe, please just take me out back and put me down, like an old sheepdog. It will be a kindness.

Tell me when and I will stop smoking and I will get a new car and I will go see Tommy. I will, I will, I will, I do. I am ready.

Let Me Get Some Action From The Back Section

Is she, curious pause, just a friend? Please say yes, to everything that I ask, except the things I want you to say no to, like, like, like ... because I am just that gullible, always made me think of guillotine, not sure why. Always preferred how come, as far as that goes, never really knew the reason for that, either, but maybe the objective observation that I am the quintessential crackerette upper-middle class child-woman of the 80's goes a long ways towards explaining it. Don't it? Tell it to spellchecker; who don't like nothing none. And where have you got yourself to now, my Plaster Master? Me? I'm supine on an empty beach in Zihuatanejo in June, topless, careless, sunscreenless, gettin real Ra. Drinkless, too, because because because, think of a reason, think of the reason, now smile for me, for the camera in my mind, so I can remember how happy you were when we first found out we were. Now, going, going, gone, aaaand we're back. Today's the big day - you get that a lot, don't you? I wrote more things that you get a lot but not giving a fuck for punctuation or for fact-checking, I canned it, like a cherry, like a red tart cherry, like a sweet cherry, like a maraschino cherry. Like a comment, like a compliment, like a complimentary drink with an umbrella. It's a Top Shelf Half-Life so get used to getting used to things, like tequila barely drank drank drunk before bounce bounce bouncing, etc. etc. et al. Now you listen and you listen real good: no more husband jokes, unless you are the object of them.

Get To The Point: Deny, Deny, Deny.

Quit eating that junk food so nonchalantly and stop taking those pest-ate walls for granted. I do work, too, but it is behind the scenes, making phone calls and taking pictures, pretending not to be wide-eyed about the wall-eyed bait and switcheroo bullshit that is the intangible service that I trade for stores of value; scripophily sacrilege.

From one dipshit heart to another, I'm afraid I've gone and fucked it all up, said too much about not enough and all of the rest of the usual shit I do, to ruin every good thing I ever manage to con my way into. Goddamn, this fear of being left alone to rot is overwhelming. Choke it back, choke it back, choke it the fuck back, watch the Office, eat some pizza, now work, do some work, now smoke a cigarette, smoke a cigarette, smoke a cigarette.

Try again. Talk about cool things. Find your sparkle motion. Be interesting! Don't be karate! What if I am karate? Sounds so appealing but goddamn, it isn't for everyone. Everyone? Anyone? You? Me? I'm an acquired test. I mean taste. And you're excused. I mean acquitted. Miserable fucking coup d'etat, stealing all my candy and cribbing off my tests and stealing my lunch money. Let me tell you what its like for a normal girl, smart and successful, a goddess, to be so profoundly fucked up. Begging? Who's begging? Did you mean groveling? I am not so scared of dying but sometimes I am so scared of living. Of harsh lights and hard words spoke soft, like a bouquet of barbed wire. Good gone like gobbled by a vanishing pool. It isn't your fault that I sound like a good idea. Now there is this distance and I put it there.

I need to know why I matter and to whom and I really really need held so bad because I am so afraid that I am incidental. Don't sigh and tell me to buck up and stop feeling sorry for myself, please. Please come hold me and don't make me play second fiddle to something else. I need your attention and I am begging. Please come hold me. Please don't walk away. God, please come take care of me. Please don't be afraid. I am; I am so disconnected. I need you right now.

This is so unattractive. I am. The fear of being alienated is alienating.

Congress of the Crow

Yeah, go get high, that's the ticket. I'll be over here, unwrapping my phoenixy gauze, smoking a cigarette, looking for my The Ring (clue: it don't involve rocks or metals and hint: it don't go on a finger) and pretending to read that copy of "Deepthroating For Dummies" (its been concatenated into a verb these days) that's been collecting dust on my nightstand since the first time I gave cabeza, not that I can remember when that was nor upon whom I bestowed it. Poor bastard, anyway, with the sloppy unknowing, not that he knew any better and not that I'm a black belt now, just saying. Just saying that: I don't know what the fuck is wrong with me, except being scared, scarred, jaded and tired, and I know, I know: congrats, I'm human, but you should know, you should know, it is no consolation. I love you, I love you, I love you. P.S. thank you for caring about me.

What I Did Today (Corrosion)

It tastes like violence and burns like triflic acid so please don't tell me no more because I liked it better when I didn't know no six words back, back when I was just your little dumb pet. Now I'm just your big stupid pet and I think you had better explain yourself because I hate finding things out the hard way. Things things. You know, tell the truth for once in your life and not color lies with the prettier shades of reality. Besides, its for posterity and I will always adore you. Farm's wagered, heart is beating bleeding waiting on the butcher block, and I will never throw in the towel, unless you tell me, in very specific language, that you are done with me. So you go'on ahead and lay your mind's dick into whatever digital delight works best for you because I am too sad to give a fuck. I did notice that the worse you act up/out the more I get accused which is somewhere beyond ridiculous because I could not be more devoted or honest or faithful. But don't think I don't know from French platitudes nor that about which you were speaking, so long ago. Wife? Babies? (high-pitched Dixie) I bet you say that to all the girls. And I bet you find "inspiration" in more than just one place.

Hey, World! Here's some reasons you will ultimately find me not worth the effort of caring about (this is just a representative sample):

Today, I

Be'd loud when people were trying to sleep
Called too much when people were trying to sleep
Be'd too dirty
Be'd too messy
Spilled shit I was trying to eat (with chopsticks) while I was driving (in bad traffic)
Procrastinated
Not tooked care of the car like I should've
Had too yellow of teeth
Told too vacuous of stories
Still didn't pay the gottdam water bill
Not got the right amount of paper towels
Asked too many insipid questions
Breathed in a scurrilous manner
Not shutted the fuck up

Openly Maintaining Secret Lives

Coughing coughing clicking cracking winking cringing oops relaxing, but said like a prayer, by slipping spouses everywhere. Does "irrational" mean "unjustified" and if, so, will you grant me just this one fear? Circle one and if you circle yes, I'll bounce my tits for you every time I find myself alone in a room with you. Sound like a deal? Like a best laid plan? Poor old Tommy's gonna be seeing red and I could never get used to that like a man can. "Blood splatter," she sputtered to her Rorshocked sneezes; too squalid not to shower and too scared not to starve. Sounds worse than it is but it does taste like Egypt in my mouth and just because I still have to carry on without carrying on doesn't mean that I won the immunity idol. She don't got what you got but you're trying to say that I don't got what you got? Tell it to Chico and explain that I didn't come simply because I am the consummate slacker and, hey, I need those calves, even if I spend most of my best hours splayed out supine; supple, stained, sated. Time to shout out!

Listen up, Pioneer: I am the best in the tri-county area and my grasp on value theory is as strong as your grasp on reality is weak.

Pay close attention, Cash Buyer: Even when I'm nursing a panic attack in its infancy, I will continue to let my brains go to my head, but, don't give me a hard time about it because, either way, you're getting what you want.

Lookey here, Tamiflu Cowboy: I am not a physician so get your own fucking prescription, but I will suggest that you get rested up for the showdown at the D.C.A.P Corral because I may have more to lose than you do but that, maybe by definition, means I have more to fight for.

Hear this, my Medicated Co-Pilot On Auto-Pilot: I had one for you, too, but it all came out wrong, like whispering "I love you," when you really feel like screaming it and how will I ever know you are speaking to me if you don't address me directly?

I do not assume that I am loved.

--------

It goes like this:

"What does that mean?"

"What does what mean?"

"Your title - 'Openly Maintaining Secret Lives'."

"What do half of your titles mean?"