not a poem about a rose

the summer had not even begun to speak, and there i was, brimming with every intention to write a poem about the rose you should not have offered me. at once, i knew the notion was self-deprecating, which meant within the hour i was observing how walmart merlot slid through my hourglass throat. "how strange a metaphor for time!" i noted. crushed grapes are minutes. our bodies are the mechanism with which we calculate the hours. i supposed that meant that crushed grape flies and throat enthralls with the sensual curve of a woman. that wine must be fleeting. that there must never be enough merlot. alcohol is money! race the throat as it tick-tocks away to the end of liquid decadence!

clearly, i was not going to be writing a poem about a rose (the one that should not have seduced me).

i quickly thought about all of the not roses i could write about. a giraffe would suffice. or lust. or eternity. or a prayer. or a tastebud. or a lie. and as i wrote about an elegant long necked mammal who worshiped the salty fuck of dishonesty (a metaphor i could not unravel), i thought about what my poem would say if i had been writing a poem about a rose (the one i'm so grateful you painted for me)

i realized that i would have focused on its scent
and how i now noticed that aroma in the grocery aisle
at the movie show
on the bus
(in places where one does not think to stop and smell roses)
and i would have noted how the scent was not of a rose at all
but that of sweat. aftershave. cigarette. night.
and the rose perfumed with not a rose, which i smelled where one does not think to smell roses, was not from your garden at all but from a foreign (and most unexpected) bush that did not speak of roses but of not-a-ones instead.

"the fragrance of not a rose is delicious."- that i, suppose, would have sufficed, had i written a poem about a rose. but i didn't.

home for purim (well, more like hannukah)

With my current roommate studying abroad, I will have this big, charming apartment all to my lonesome in the Spring, and well, my wallet doesn't like the sound of that. So, for the Spring, I'm either looking for another person interested in moving in, or I'm trying to find someone else with an empty room that I can sublease.

While my apartment is anything but "swanky," it's got character and convenience for days (ignore earlier comments on this blog about it being the "dustbunny where dreams go to die"). It has a great location (just off the square, above the Manhattan, across from the Dukum), it's huge!, it has roof access, a washer and dryer, hardwood floors, a fresh coat of perty paint, lots of personality, very affordable (for 2 people, rent would be 200 per person), and it features me!

So if you or someone you know need(s) a place to live next semester, let me know. If you or someone you know has a place for me to live next semester, let me know! I'll live with boys, girls, goats, circus folk- it don't matter.

Thanks!

Adam

P.S. i'm smart and i'm cute and i do dishes; i'm totally worth it. also, pets are allowed. and pet names. i'm flexible.

elsewhere

Last year I took a mythology course. I hated it. The professor, while brilliant, accepted that he had chosen a subject and a class size well beyond his scope, and he allowed Gods to become equations. We analyzed Ragnarok the way you might observe moldy bread, noting it's shape and color, but not eager to put it in any universal context.

There was one day, however, where the discussion struck me as worth my time. We had just read some obtuse analysis of the paths myths seem to take, and we stopped and shared how college was, itself, a liminal experience. We are thrust into a transitional dimension where ideas are radical, experiences are delicious, and the rules of the world don't always apply; at the same time, we are expected to be preparing ourselves to serve reality once we return to it. Jesus want AWOL for 21 years; I'm expecting 4-5 for myself. Still, I can't help but bitch about how ready I am for my life to begin.

It's not Truman that dissatisfies me; it's not the shitstain of a town I grew up in, or the Midwest mindset that will never mesh with me. It's just me, ready to be making changes and terrified it will stay the same. I have an ambitious (albeit, disoriented) heart, and she's ready to start fixing things. But there's always the chance that I won't end up anywhere but here, treading water.

I love so many of the aspects of my life in this moment. I have encountered so many pure ideas and beautiful people and known so much love that to negate it would be as false as it would be cruel. But goodamnit, give me a paintbrush or a pistol or something so I can stop waiting to return to the world; I'm ready, honest, to be a part and be a change.

This is, of course, related to another anxiety- that I am somehow incompatible with what I want. There is a part of me that clings to films, literature, theater, ideas, and all things delicious. There is a part of me that dares to notice what has been written off as the dirt beneath the fingernails of society, and I long to know it, love it, work with it, help it... to make justice out of randomness. Can I be both people? If I fulfill one desire, do I destroy another? And if I don't answer that question, will I, just as a fear, stay this way forever?

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On a completely unrelated note, I love the rush of finding your power chord when your laptop battery is on the verge of death. Grey's Anatomy ain't got nothin' on this shit. Solid gold drama.

P.S. I have called/texted a few of you this afternoon/evening for perspective; thank you all for your help. It meant a lot!

lies your teacher told you

In 5th Century B.C. Athens, they hypothesized the atom, birthed democracy, got shwasted on Dionysus's birthday, had oracles who habitually downed hallucinogens, and accepted and expected homosexuality.

And here I was, thinking we'd come so far. Sounds to me like it's time to return to a little thing I like to call civilization.

Apparently Ancient Greece was the birth place of rock and roll; who knew?

undressed to impress

this week, i was naked for the first time.

sure, i've found myself unclad before, for, ya know, amusement. hygiene. voracity.

but i think i might have finally stripped off every last article. and it felt like october evenings and fresh socks and the truth.

in short, expect to see a lot more of me from now on, especially when he's around, the warm embrace of over-priced cotton that i'll never need to wear again.

calendar boys

i composed this stream rather quickly, foolishy, and tiredly. i'll improve and update later.

Lustra (and that which makes the world go 'round)

i had never watched another man cry before.

i thought myself quite the voyeur as he stripped off the spotty veneer he called armor, revealing a boy who dreamed small, was small, and loved without hesitation. he was a memory i could carry (could crush) in my hand, in my pocket, with my eyes.

the sirens' cry is a melody. a cadence to seek and expect and grow lost in. his tears, however, were the sound of your knees buckling on stage, your milk spilling at lunch. an amateur's tragedy that was so plain and pitiful that it shook you. his was not the wail of a fresh widow, the unassuming gaze of a starving child refugee. i knew his pain because i'd felt it before, 15 years ago, when i stubbed my toe, scraped my knee. those naive moments where your nerves are set aflame because a bandaid level scrape masquerades as the deepest pain you might ever subject yourself to.

i thought, for a second, this must be some larger issue: stress. his friends. me. all the years of his life.
i asked.
he replied.
"no, it's nothing else. i'm just so embarrassed that i had to ask you."
and he was.
i believed him.
and i broke at the simplicity with which he wept, desired him more than ever for his purity, but couldn't help but wonder if such a white light could ever penetrate the likes of me.

"it's okay, baby. you work on it... we work on it... and it will better in time."
*sigh* "i don't know that i can afford time."

me neither, dear. me neither.
i suppose i keep my head afloat and you do the same. you survive the rat race. i'll run the prelim. and please, love, please, let our paths keep crossing.

How to Peel Labels

it would be hypocritical of me to not consider my own tears, the pioneers of my morning. they were, i think, more the product of shock than pain, but i mustn't ignore the fact that a boy made me cry for the first time in recent memory. no doubt in my memoirs i will claim his words were the ink of my own blood, that he laced his lines with arsenic. in truth, i imagine that letter was more akin to a frustrated, incredulous glare or a judgmental "hmph." but when i read those words the way i'd read so many of his before, my eyes flared, and my tastebuds noted that sadness is less salty than books lead you to expect.

and i did question, for a while, if two boys who love to shine could be friends without blinding each other. and the answer that half-satisfies me is "i don't care." piss me off. make me cry. ignore me. make me jealous. because i find myself captivated (i find myself trapped) by you and the possibility of you knowing me. so i mean to keep trying until you run out of tolerance or i run out of sanity.

of course, i did leave you with all my ammunition, and you have still resolved, mostly, to leave all quiet on the western front. which is fine. no rush. no necessity. but i encourage you to cross the netherworldiness of no man's land, cause i'll still be here, shining, ready to be your friend.

Atlas Shrugged

i've been reading a lot about the final years of FDR. it's tragic, really. a diplomat to a point of reckless inactivity with a messianic complex to keep the world afloat. "just give it time; i can hold it together; i got this, guys. i got this. no seriously, i don't need your help." and he waited. and he held. and he died. leaving Truman to take over with his acerbic personality and cluelessness as to how to balance the world.

i guess i can't save everyone, either. i can't count on my own personableness, my own genius, my own heart, to fix people. sometimes war happens, but if you're willing to shoulder the quest for peace with others, your world need not need slip from your grasp.

Why Things Fall Apart

it wasn't supposed to be like this.

it was just dinner, true, but I could see it was also the drawing of lines, the restructuring of alliances. we were never going to be as we were before. we were not inseparable. we did not "just click." we were growing up, apart, across, and alone. and while we will still have each other, we will never again have each other the way friends do.

it was sad, at first.

then i drank.
and i thought
about what i wanted
about how it would be
about growing up.

and in the haze on a boy who is 21 and green, I dreamed on weeds, dandelions, loosing themselves in the wind only to become more and more and more. and i thought i'd hop on with a few rogue seeds and we could go spread ourselves across new fields until it was time to divide and move on.


Bedside Manner

the more and more flaws he found in the boy's face, the more endearing he became to him.
no more embellishments.
no more touch-ups.
a patch of dry skin on his forehead.
a mouth that was constantly perched, pouty or questioning.
how refreshing it was to find he was no longer an ideal, but a person.
with scars and rough patches and truths to hide.

and from that moment, that epiphany, he could not help but approach the boy from every angle.

as a boy who could love.
as a boy who could not.
as desire.
as fear.
as a sexual dilettante.
as the air.

he could no longer remember what it was like to not envelop the boy, and he hoped he would keep on forgetting.

The I of the Beholder

it was never your job to make me feel beautiful.

besides, i'm sure i never told you how i have, for as long as i can remember, been obsessed with being smaller. how my mom would find me curled up in closets, sitting under chairs, refusing to sleep in a bed as i thought lying on the floor would make me shorter.

when you're big as i am, it's so easy for someone to see you that they never really have to look at you. i just thought if i could be 10 pounds skinnier, 2 inches shorter, you might have to look at me to see me and that you might like the view.

the truth is i want to lose more weight, but i don't think i can handle the damning looks people give me when they see i've grown smaller. i guess i've forgotten the standard for beauty. i don't know how to look like you need to look at me. but i DO know it's not you're problem, so stop trying to ease me of my burdens, and please, please, please don't cry.

The Seven-Week Itch

i've been itching all over for the past couple months. i can't help but think that God is one of those screenwriters who would sneak in such an itch for the illusion of a deeper meaning. Perhaps it embodies my discontentedness. or perhaps i'm being punished for less than God-fearing appetites. either way, it amuses me just about as much as it annoys the shit out of my skin.

A Touch of Class

The optimist in me dubs this semester rewarding.
The pessimist, hell.
The realist, survivable.

Span 201- I have a great teacher, but I'm the only upperclassmen, I find the work tedious, and I wholeheartedly believe that all foreign language courses should land you 5 credit hours.

Hist 365 (The Hellenistic Age)- No evaluation yet as this course doesn't start til next week.

Post World War II America- I am one of 4 people in this course, so skipping it really isn't an option. We plow through 300-350 pages a week and have 6 essays to write, but this is definitely my subject, and I can tell I'm going to learn a lot with Zoumaras.

JINS- Public Issues and Political Rhetoric- The text, thus far, has been a little sophomoric, but the class discussion is great, the writing assignments appear fun and easy, and my professor is fabulous.

Social Stratification- As always, sociology courses are rewarding if you ignore the professor and read between the lines of the text. Lots of service opportunities for this class though, lots of class discussion, and some good friends of mine are in this one with me.

Other than that, I'm working for Dr. Ling, working for the International Student Office, attempting to keep a boyfriend, volunteering for United Way by interviewing, evaluating, and assessing community needs, looking for time to read for pleasure, half-heartedly looking for time to exercise, getting involved in Half-Full Players, College Democrats, Amnesty International, Prism, and Safe Zone. I plan to stay busy this semester!

the realm of (im)possibility

"I fancied in a moment I would be standing on nothing at all, and for the first time in my life, i needed the wings none of us has."

I would love to write more. loads more. but probably won't have the time until the late hours of Wednesday.