Farther Than I Ever Expected

My grief has taken me

On trips unimaginable

Past the atmosphere

Under the ocean floor

So much farther than I ever would have chosen

If given a choice

I saw things

Felt things

Held things

Smoked things

I remembered so much

Forgot so little

I held on too tightly 

And still the next thing I knew

I was free falling

I always was an extremist 

I always had an overactive imagination 

I always laughed

In fact, I’m still laughing 

All the acceptance in the universe

Won’t take away the missing 

Doesn’t change the permanence 

The I’m here

And you’re not

But I accept myself anyway 

And do whatever I can 

To live the life of my dreams

And I’ll wake up tomorrow

And every day 

Until my last one 

And I’ll breathe

And I’ll smile

Until my grief 

Sets 

Me 

Free 


gluttonous

 

i treat my mind to the smorgasbord of life

my soul feasts, it’s a glutton

it’s engorged, way too full

uncomfortable, i unbutton the pants of my brain


encore

i played time in a play once 

i wore regret's hat 

my justice dialect was flawless

i got great fucking reviews

my subtext was doubt

but my props were belief

i was upstage i was downstage

i was backstage i was frontstage

i took my bow

to an infinite ovation 

ordinary

what was the sizzling 

i cracked, crackled

calmly collected the 

corronary's catastophe 

i began. i begin. 

i'm a tense

no 

i'm tense

my massage got cancelled 

splurging. urging splurging. 

a catalyst, once and for all

wow. who wants to be ordinary? 

make a wish

just real quick

just here to mention

a quick little thing

just a small detail

just need a second of your time

right, yes

no, yes, i see

i understand, yes

just hold on

ok, real quick

are you ready

no, no

ah, look

11:11

a day

there's nothing abstract 

about the wants 

worth wanting

a cavalier catastrophe 

a drag raced calamity

contemplative fuck ups

up for grabs

pardon an accident

a relaxing reverberation 

couldn't calm the nerves

until the truth was admitted

wake up! we screamed

and screeched and cried and sang

and chortled

it was a day much like others, but all it's own 

HIS HERS MINE YOURS

LIGHTS UP ON A SUBWAY CAR. B EAVESDROPS ON T & A. T & A ARE HIPSTERS.

 

T: Like, how are we still arguing about this shit? Equality? Freedom? Pursuit of happiness, am I right?

 

A: I know, man.

 

B: Ugh I know!

 

T & A STARE AT HER.

 

T: And then we pat ourselves on the backs for being so “progressive”, like congrats on recognizing basic human rights.

 

B: I’m always saying the same thing! I just think that-

 

T & A STARE AT HER.

 

B: Oh, uh, sorry?

 

T: But what are supposed to do? What are we supposed to think? When everyone is basically a big stereotype of themselves. How are we supposed to abandon cliches?

 

B: I know, I know! It’s like, I’m a strong, independent, confident woman… but i do suck at driving

 

T & A STARE AT HER.

 

T: it’s crazy, man.

 

A: I know… like, the shit we’re still arguing about is insane.

 

T: I’m just not sure why straight conservative white men want to pee with the transgendered so badly?

 

TRAIN STALL

 

A: woah.

 

T: what the hell?

 

A: shut up. Shut up… I can’t hear him. Thanks. Thanks everyone.

 

T: he just said we’re stuck, asshole.

 

TRAIN MOVES. B ALONE IN SPOTLIGHT (trend continues)

 

B: I’m the girl with the chipped neon nail polish. The one without the umbrella. The one who’ll argue the pass interference call until you hate my guts. The one who buys earrings from the planetarium and has the majority of biggie’s debut album ready to die memorized.

I’m not a victim of circumstance. I’m not a victim of any kind.

I never meant to be white

I never meant to be female

But that’s what I am, right? That’s who I am.

But I mean what I think

And I mean what I say

The spirit in me has nothing and everything to do with me being a woman

I try to start every day with graciousness, humility and fearlessness. I’m not afraid of heights. I’m not afraid of snakes. I’m definitely not afraid of spiders, I fucking love spiders. I’m not afraid of bats or scorpions or sharks or failure or public speaking. I’m not afraid of dying.

I’m afraid of being trapped. Small spaces. Not moving. Can’t get out. Can’t escape. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. This isn’t good. Come on. Come on. No, okay, oh there we go.

 

TRAIN STALLS. T & A ARE NOW BROS.

 

T: yo

 

A: yo

 

B: yes?

 

T: you want my seat?

 

A: here, take a seat

 

B: no, that’s alright. I’m fine.

 

T: come on, I’m giving you my seat.

 

A: you’re not gonna take my seat?

 

B: nah, i’d rather stand.

 

T: what a bitch

 

A: that bitch didn’t even say thank you.

 

T: they wonder why chivalry is dead.

 

A: bitch.

 

T: move bitch

 

A: get out the way

 

T: get out the way bitch

 

A: get out the way

 

B: excuse me?

 

A: alright dude, that’s probably enough, she looks a little upset.

 

T: man up

 

A: man up

 

T: stop being a pussy

 

A: stop being a pussy

 

T: act like a lady, think like a man

 

A: think like a man

 

T: she’s not that hot anyway.

 

A: nah.

 

T: i mean, not terrible

 

A: like i’m not gonna complain if she’s standing there

 

T: i mean tits are tits.

 

A: tits are tits.

 

B: awesome. Thanks so much, guys.

 

T: where you going?

 

A: sweetie, hunny, baby

 

B: fuck off, alright

 

T: oh that looks so ugly on you

 

A: you’re much cuter when you smile

 

B: just leave me alone, ok?

 

T: come on

 

A: sit down

 

T: calm down

 

A: just calm down

 

T: relax

 

A: calm down

 

B: TELL ME TO CALM DOWN ONE MORE TIME

 

T: seriously

 

A: you’re not going anywhere

 

T: it doesn’t have to be so bad

 

A: you’re making this pretty difficult

 

T: man up

 

A: man up

 

T: stop being a pussy

 

A: stop being a pussy

 

B: and how exactly would you like me to stop being a pussy? That’s my brand, right? You can see it sticking out of my chest, right? I can’t stop. I can’t. Tell me, if you can, if it’s possible, how i can be both attractive and respected. Tell me why i should “think like a man” when i have a powerful, valuable screaming lady brain inside my head. It’s fucked to think that i have this brain inside me, I know what i’m capable of, I know the poetry i have just fucking brimming and yet I know the intense number of minutes that i’ve spent of my precious life thinking about my calves being too big. That’s what you’ve done to me. So, I can’t man up. No, actually, I won’t.

 

T: wow, I guess I never really thought about it like that.

 

A: and these bitches wonder why they’re still single…

 

T: oh yeah, that’s right, bitch, man up. Stop being a pussy.

 

TRAIN MOVES

 

B: There is a meekness and a quietness and a supposed to that i never learned

I shot a hole through the layers of my asinine confidence

An aim at crashing

At a “bring it on” not to be messed with

How else could i prove our strength

Besides taking on the universe

When you’ve been honored as equal and capable your whole life, it’s pretty ugly to realize the truth of the matter

It’s amazing how many ways you can feel small

But in order to fight oppression, you have to recognize oppression.

So, I wasn’t even sad

I wasn’t

I realized

That my eyes were my brain

And my ears were my brain

And my mouth was my brain

But my heart

Was my heart

Was my heart

I was the sum of my parts

And then some

But, I’m not sure where i’ve been putting my strong emotions. I’m more like a trash compactor than anything else.

 

TRAIN STALLS. T & A ARE NOW WACKY.

 

A: oooooh fresh meat

 

T: you smell that?

 

A: i smell it

 

T: fresh. Like the sadness has barely left the skin.

 

B: are you talking about me?

 

T: welcome, welcome.

 

A: we’re glad you’ve finally made it.

 

T: oooh you are just brimming with it.

 

B: with what?

 

A: you smell that?

 

T: i smell it

 

B: smell what? Brimming with what?

 

T: you’ve made it to the right car.

 

T & A: that is clear

 

B: what are you talking about? Wait, aren’t you the bros who were just-

 

T: Welcome, welcome. You’ve made it. To the train of unused love.

 

B: The train of-

 

T & A: Unused Love.

 

T: Used-up sadness and unused love.

 

B: those go to the same place? That’s so depressing.

 

T: things aren’t depressing here. Not unless you let them be.

 

B: well i don’t belong here anyway.

 

A: you don’t think so?

 

T: Why can’t you make them care? How come no one wants to care?

A preoccupation operation where you realized you changed much more than you meant to

 

A: There’s power in understanding you don’t actually want what you thought you wanted

 

T: Believing in something is different than having something to believe in.

 

A: Connection through obligation isn’t really much of a connection, is it?

 

B: I… I… I feel something in my gut that simply won’t become words

 

T: Did you ever have one of those jaw breakers as a kid, the ones the size of a fucking baseball, the kind you lick and lick and lick for real like seriously your tongue starts bleeding like you couldn’t stop and the layers wouldn’t stop and your jaw wasn’t broken yet even if your tongue was fucking bleeding so all the colors are tinged with a faint pink. You remember those?

 

B: yeah?

 

T: so, I dunno, it’s something like that.

 

B: I don’t get it

 

A: you’re the jawbreaker

 

T: no, you’re the blood.

 

B: what?

 

A: Imagine standing on top of a huge hill. Everything has gone to shit, there’s nothing but dried up moss and dried up grass and dried up trees. It’s desolate, it’s desperate. It looks just about hopeless but then you spot this patch of amazingly green grass. You run to it. The grass is the softest and greenest and most glorious grass you’ve ever seen. It’s like a bed. You could just sleep there for the rest of your life in the amazingly bright grass bed in the middle of the drought.

 

T: You’re the bedspread.

 

A: no, you’re the drought.

 

B: ok, ok. Um, so let’s say there’s a trash compactor.  And I’m completely aware of everything that’s going in there, right? The peach pits and the coffee grounds and the cheez-it boxes and the q-tips and the banana peels and the ziplock bags and the credit card statements and the rotten avocados. I can feel them compressing right, getting packed tighter and tighter, I can feel them. So… I’m the trash compactor, right?

 

T & A: No, you’re the coffee grounds!

 

B: WHAT? I gotta get out of here.

 

T: So, all that wasted love, where have you been putting it? Huh? We’ve never seen you before.

 

B: I don’t think I have any.

 

T: oh come on

 

B: what? I’m not that old. I’m not!

 

T: Uh-huh

 

B: And I give tons of love anyway! I don’t have any unused, I swear! I don’t belong here!

 

T: But I’m sure some of your sadness has to be here, you can’t deny that.

 

B: But I shouldn’t have to face that! That’s not right! I don’t belong here!

 

T: You don’t need to get defensive. Everyone belongs here.

 

B: Not me. I have a handle on my sadness, on my love. I’m in charge. I’m in control. You don’t know me. I don’t belong here.

 

A: Then why are you here?

 

TRAIN MOVES

 

B: Their charts weren’t my charts

And their graphs weren’t my graphs

And i think either way

Their numbers were way off

I couldn’t decide if it was more important

To like something or to love something

I couldn’t decide

Why all of a sudden those seemed like such different things

Sometimes i want to be sad

And i just end up neutral

I didn’t want to want anymore

And i didn’t want to have

And i certainly did not want to be neutral.

 

TRAIN STALLS. T & A ARE NOW AN OLD COUPLE.

 

T: oh dear, you scared me. Oh hun, wasn’t that so scary?

 

A: (grunts, mumbles)

 

B: ok, guys, what the hell is this?

 

T: excuse me, dear?

 

B: I said what the hell is this?

 

T: oh my, I don’t think there’s any need for that kind of language. Don’t you agree, hun?

 

A: (grunts, mumbles)

 

B: ok, I’m sorry. Um, what are you making?

 

T: Oh, nothing. Just passing the time. Why do you have that look in your eyes?

 

B: What look?

 

T: My, my, my. Do you see that, hun?

 

A: (grunts, mumbles)

 

B: What look?

 

T: It’s like you lost something. Do you have everything?

 

B: Everything but my mind.

 

T: Oh would you like me to knit one up for you?

 

B: Well that’s very sweet but, um… I just wanna figure out the point of this one and move on.

 

T: The point of this one?

 

B: Yeah, I just figured you’d have some sort of convoluted lesson or moral or some shit.

 

T: Well, dear, that’s not a very nice way to spend a conversation.

 

B: I just… I guess I’m not all that concerned with being nice anymore.

 

T: Wow. Did you hear that, hun?

 

A: (grunts, mumbles)

 

T: Ok, you want a lesson?

 

B: Sure.

 

T: First of all, don’t underestimate nice. Don’t underestimate time. Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to. And don’t do anything that makes you want something in return. Growing up is a lot like paying taxes.  It’s going to feel like you’re constantly giving, giving, giving… and at the end of the year, you have to give even more. But sometimes, you’ll get a big return on everything you’ve been giving. But don’t count on it.

 

B: That’s bleak.

 

T: But it’s not. We don’t do things to get something back… that’s the burden we share. But just know, that in the end, it’s about teamwork. Money, children, simply living year after year… it doesn’t matter who’s on your team. But you’ve got to have one.

 

B: Ok.

 

T: There are million ways to feel powerful, my dear. Never forget that.

 

TRAIN MOVES

 

B: I feel roots when I stand

Well, mobile roots

Along for the ride

Like the forest I missed so badly, left behind

It’s still there, making noise, theologically speaking

Bracing myself for broken daydreams

Inevitable but temporary

Another chapter, come and gone

But I would stay the main character, just watch

 

TRAIN STALLS. T & A ARE NOW MUSICAL AND JOVIAL.

 

B: Alright, guys, what now?

 

T & A: Yeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh

 

A TURNS ON BOOMBOX. NOTHING.

 

T & A: Yeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

 

NOTHING.

 

T: (sings) how bout some music

Yeah, How bout a song

With one little diddy

We’ll all get along

Hey! How bout some music

to fill up the brain

We wouldn’t want our precious girl

Going insane

 

B: come on

 

T: You’re more than an object

You’re more than a toy

I’m sure he didn’t mean it

Right? Boys will be boys

So smile, sit back

Relax with a song

We get it. We get it.

You’re independent

You’re strong

You’re lucky, your freedom

Is yours for the taking

It’s only been 6,000 years

In the making

 

T & A: Sh! Don’t let them know

You were right all along

It’s easier to swallow

Don’t you think? With a song

Shhh! Don’t let them know

You were right all along

It’s easier to swallow

Don’t you think? With a song

 

B: I don’t wanna sing

I don’t wanna rhyme

Hey anyone! Hey anything!

I need more air! I need more time!

With the walls closing in

And a stall on the track

My brain’s panicking

My heart’s under attack

Listen

I’m the kind of girl who rarely gets scared

Seeming on top of it

Always unprepared

A backdrop on purpose

Cuz too much too soon

I begin to surface

BAM i’m on the moon

 

B: I don’t wanna sing                        T & A: Shh! Don’t let them know

I don’t wanna rhyme                                           you were right all along

Hey anyone! Hey anything!                                 It’s easier to swallow

I need more air, I need more time                      don’t you think, with a song

I don’t wanna sing                                               Shh! Don’t let them know

I don’t wanna rhyme                                           you were right all along

Hey anyone! Hey anything!                                It’s easier to swallow

I need more air, I need more time                     don’t you think, with a song

 

B: STOP! STOP! This is getting out of control!

 

TRAIN STALLS.

 

B: space was suffocating me

as level as scripted conversation

i backed out on my star contract

i reneged that meteor deal

black holes kept calling...i didn’t pick up

 

breathing became my boyfriend

i was queen of affection

i was queen of attention

i was queen, oh i was queen

femininity was mine for the taking

so fuck all you suckaaaaaaaas

 

i knew all about magic

cuz i believed in magic

i knew all about style

cuz i believed in style

i knew all about words

cuz i believed in words

 

what i knew and what i believed

started fucking, couldn’t stay friends

oh it was all messed up

 

i thought, by the time I grew up

There’d be more words

thought light would be liquid

thought money’d be morbid

thought people would be free

 

i write poems so i can become them

not like a weirdo

more like a transcendentalist

 

sometimes i become convinced my leg muscles

are too long for my legs

sometimes i become convinced

of a lot of things

 

i was rather misconstrued about how i would feel in the world on my own

but i’m not mad

i used to think it’d make me mad

and i’m not even sad

i thought for a while, i’d get real sad

but, i guess,

when i’m all of it

and when i’m none of it

when i’m a midwest winter

when i’m a brooklyn ice cream truck

when i’m roots, trunks, branches

when i’m leaves only leaves

if if then then

i’ll get less scared

and i’ll see it all decorated

in the way i imagined

 

TRAIN IS FIXED. B FINDS HERSELF ALONE ON STAGE.

 

B: Yes! Guys, it’s fixed! It’s fixed! We’re gonna be ok! Guys, guys… oh. Um. ok. Guys?

 

B SITS, PUTS ON HEADPHONES.












 

start (just) stop (watch)

we still don't know how

to be what we are

the consciousness that

cursed us

the books they made up

to make sure we'd keep

killing each other

the clock calendar carousel

wracking guilt, disappointment

lottery lucky time travel fantasies

not a step up

no stepping up

a reckless beginning

with a crossbow counterpoint

gotta hell of a kickback

braised bravery

for the good of it all

all of the good

pressed convulsions, backtracking

i wasn't sure what my mind

was appraised at anymore

fuck it i was out of the game anyhow

*****

who were the poets

i was supposed to find out

who were the comedians

who were the prophets

who were the dream dreamers

who had guts after all

who had em

who 

*****

practicality like a headache

with that holding gripping clenching kind of charm

who i couldn't be

was getting pretty chummy with everybody

piece by piece by piece by piece

that's all i got, no?

*****

i would make me 

and take the time it takes

and the ups and downs

of my bank account 

and brain

i would create me

in that time and place

hovering just over reality 

and just under eternity

like the space between magnets fighting

but with a good ending

i would derail me

if need be

just to be clear... i am NOT afraid

i feel roots when i stand

mobile roots

along for the ride

like the forest i missed, left behind

it's still there, making noise

theologically speaking

bracing for broken daydreams

inevitable but temporary

another chapter, come and gone

like they say sometimes

but i would stay the main character

just watch 

 

neutral

it's abandonment

cuz there weren't enough words

or, well, enough right words

displacement and a means to an end

a countdown to eternity

i couldn't decide if it was more important

to like something or to love something 

i couldn't decide

why all of a sudden those seemed like such different things

sometimes i wanna be sad

and i just end up neutral

i didn't want to want anymore

and i didn't want to have

and i certainly did not want to be neutral 

an illusion

memory discography

rental tape typography

i discovered slavery 

of the human spirit 

 

repetition robbery 

coughing up my energy

depleting the destiny

too loud to even hear it

 

i scoured all the savagery

i prayed for eternity

i displayed the effigy

to loathe it and to fear it

 

abandoning geography

sacrificed complacency

for the sake of normalcy

just as far as near it 

the beginning of the end

compatibility ricocheted off her compassion

it had to make sense

it would all make sense

pestering her privilege

and working towards some unnamed goal

time would pass her

time would take her

she wasn't repeating herself

she wasn't repeating herself

she wouldn't repeat herself

she wouldn't repeat herself

 

she was thirsty

she was begging

she was beginning

she was over