Why I Am Not A Painter

the comet you are burns
or seems to burn, streaks across
the sky. is big and cold

at the core, ice like diamonds
and dust like skin
married like the beginning

of text
which burns but rises.
dust made of stars burns

both of your eyes. if you could
see each other your retinas might
malfunction, bright bright bright

things which are burning
or seem to burn. there is
dust which is solid and unlike ash

posted by Emilie  # 11:19 PM 0 comments

your most beautiful
voice in somber
tone a piercing
crack in eggshell

fingers across
the fine grain surface
naturally structurally
perfect. and

when feeling
fracture, wanting you
safe within, it breaks
my heart to hear

my voice or lack of
voice can have hurt,
but we will
hold

posted by Emilie  # 2:02 AM 0 comments

what is it that drives you, azula? when even the mother knows
there is something wrong with that little girl.
we think the way into it is in the ember; force
can't be your only attractive quality.

what makes for perfection? cold core electricity
shoots from your fingertips and cannot go
through your heart. what's left here dying? your friends

are fearful or unfeeling, bodies
you want to imagine are more than bodies. striking
is a form of touch. pressure
is a form of touch

which can be too much. did you choose a parent
loyalty and was it wrong
and did you really need
to choose?

posted by Emilie  # 1:38 PM 0 comments

i hear it hurts, how
adamantium pierces you

but it is hard to see
in your face. how

is it that you heal? is it
easier when your mind is

missing to know
what you are

or want? the past is bonded
to your bones, like

a fingerprint someone
who is not god

pressed into the clay
of your brain. memory

i hear it hurts, how
it can pass through

like a bullet
ripping

carving a hole
your body will fill.

you're heavier
now that this cold

hardness is part
of your core--

Labels: marvel

posted by Emilie  # 11:49 PM 1 comments

now we exist
like the earth and a rubber ball
most of the time
the air between us
and the force of touching
each other sharing
precious surface area
you are
larger, actually moving
faster but there is vibrance
in my unsteady trajectory
i could roll onto you
forever if ignoring
any friction between us

posted by Emilie  # 11:38 PM 0 comments

possibly i will be writing on
the voice you have, as though i can
use this language to document music
although that is alchemy. it is tempting
to turn things into gold.

it is hopeless to describe
the looks you give, as though anyone
other than me could see them. even photographs
don't document emotion so
exactly. are emotion, are the look.

why try to recreate the art
which lives in you? something so beautiful
needs to transcend. the way i love you
is so great it should move
every person i write to

posted by Emilie  # 12:30 AM 0 comments

it is not often but immediate, like a gale
ripping clothes from the line, my need

to tin can and string be able to speak
into your ear and have you hear me. if only

we did live a few feet away, my flashlight
lightning morse code shining in your window

your non-reply echoing like thunder inside
my inside. i could do something about this

need, go into the rain and find you in
person when the string has been snapped

i only have this cell phone, it is
inadequate if you don't answer and i want

immediately to touch you, to tell you
i love you, this moment

posted by Emilie  # 11:07 PM 0 comments

this the second day i do not
leave supine posture, the ceiling
is not as interesting as i might
have imagined and breathing

is not part of automated systems.
i'm thinking quietly about it all day.
how surprising, how easy it is to feel
without understanding the source.

the part of me which loves you most
instinctually wants to find inner caverns
so my darkness will not eclipse the sun
which comes up each day just for you

posted by Emilie  # 1:23 PM 0 comments

physical presence means something
and so do doors and windows,
no one asks 'are these opening or closing'
for each of us they are opened or closed, our minds
are not wide enough to see two sides
of a three-dimensional object or how

you can be here without
your breath, without
your eyes and skin. your smell
can linger on fabric and you can
settle into me as though my heart
were made of blankets

yet physical presence means something
and when your body is not in the room
doors and windows close, my mind
wants for air and everything.

these are the feelings i am afraid of.
it is good to shut my eyes and breathe.

breathing is like taking these blankets
and tossing them into the air to land
softly on this bed, waiting for us

posted by Emilie  # 9:32 PM 0 comments

want to reach the space where words
are unnecessary. the cadence of inhaling and exhaling
paired with eye contact, the distance

between your lips, between your lips
and my lips is the home of tone, where
small sighs move whole bodies

and bodies move the earth. we think
gravity holds us down but it is the gravity
of our thoughts doing it. if we weren't

rolled up in each others' limbs, we might
float into the ether, know respect
for physics but more for magic. math

has always been simple: many are one.
your hands and my hands, your feet and my feet
connect and make infinity.

posted by Emilie  # 5:46 PM 0 comments

naked is naked, the heart
beats like a hummingbird,
it appears still

and the ribcage resembles
half of its name. is the heart
so great it presses

against its prison bars? naked
is close to naked, chest to chest:
if we are quiet, the hearts can

shout through these skins
and talk to each other. to us it sounds
like whispers, but knowing better

we feel it in our movement, in
the insides of our eyes. the heart
grows, escapes, and we see it there

posted by Emilie  # 11:13 AM 0 comments

it's possible i'll run out
of ways to say i love you
worn like cloth
washed for years, softened

and sun-bleached. it would be a mistake
to think of damage as damage, these
holes are bites we've taken
of each other, colors

are colors not to be compared,
"faded" is what others make
when unhappy. shades and tone
are lighter the longer i know you.

these shifts in fabric are not
imperfections but marks of quality.

posted by Emilie  # 12:08 PM 0 comments

we don't understand how the pipes work. 
we know pressing this key makes this sound. 

***

when you touch me in this manner, 
the bellows activates; the tone is deep.

***

most of the time, we can't hear 
the hum of the electric impulses of our hearts.

***

this key makes another. 
the pitch is sharper. we call it sharp. 

***

the way we sound in our heads is different
from the way others hear us. it's the open space

posted by Emilie  # 9:52 AM 0 comments

he and i don't yet know how to look
at art. these silhouettes are
real, more than him and more than me.

these silhouettes gaze at frames
made of pencils just like us and
just like them. i expose an

emptiness, a dent in the shoulder
of a man i place in my jacket pocket.
take a photograph: here is

where something once was. he
is in the frame, overexposed
in the light of a fervent flash

posted by Emilie  # 5:48 PM 0 comments

hello, future, have we met
before? yes i think so and
i suppose you would know 

i share bones with a woman
who has spent time
with you and your bones.

hello, time, can you 
calcify? i feel many moments
with you when he and i meet

for the first time. yes i know it 
forms a proof. it is 
because we are. these bones are

evidence. these are the same
bones. his body has always felt
this way

posted by Emilie  # 1:54 AM 0 comments

if the girl with the red hood
sits still

if the girl in the phallic structure allows her "mother"
to own any sharp object

if the girl is beautiful and kills
her mother with childbirth

if the girls go out at night
and wear out their soles

posted by Emilie  # 5:14 PM 0 comments

it's time for a topic or a challenge. the past few days have been a bit fruitless from the self. i need to do some more thinking outside of Emilie. this is exciting and makes me wish it were spring, so i could go to the woods all day.

posted by Emilie  # 1:44 PM 0 comments

i think sometimes there must be
something lodged in me, a gum-
ball or an eye. i

have this trouble
breathing. it's all shallow,
hard to swallow, even the air

feels like spring is inside
the melting and the spray, yet
if i stop i'll see my lungs

burning. has no one told you
that life is a fixed-speed bicycle
in san francisco? it's you

and your legs, your lungs
which matter. i think sometimes
my brakes are stuck and

that noise in my head is rubbing
rubber against a rim. yesterday
a woman told me i'm not

my thoughts, and i agreed
with everything else she said.
if it is an eye, i

need to know what it's looking
for. is it hypnotizing me? it is
the cause of this paralysis?

it is not coasting down
these inclines. without
an illusion of control

it's a crash in process. without
knowing how to get up,
valleys are ditches.

it's my legs, my lungs which
pump. it's you who sees
the panicked look in

me and instructs my breath
to deepen. it's as though you've
removed an obstruction

posted by Emilie  # 1:19 PM 0 comments

the clay inside
me, you shape it
into bricks and lay them.

the brickwork is grounding.
even if we are still, it is
like walking.

like walking into
snow. like sitting calmly
and i have never felt calm.

your hands, covered in red
clay dust, move towards the mouth
of my cavernous mouth, make

impressions on me. it is possible
we are kissing.
the building inside my chest

is as warm as your skin. we are
kissing. it is possible we feel
inside our chests. don't stop.

posted by Emilie  # 11:34 PM 0 comments

my skin feels temporal
shifts. now you're shifting
in your sleep, breathing
on my eyelids. zones are

ideas we are having,
which we will stop having
soon. time will be the space

between my toes
and your toes, your hair
and my breath

moving it. a small thing
which stretches. my skin
feels the inside of my skin
as though you have touched me;

you are touching me, or
you will be touching me
soon. covalent bonds will form
between our bodies

our bodies are just
where we are
which feels absolute

posted by Emilie  # 1:15 AM 0 comments

it is fullness / the future / your knowing
separate / the same / as my knowing
information is not / the same / as knowledge
it is interesting to us / that
one does not / always / derive from the other.

it is time that you realized / we hail
from / the same / place / all places
are / the same / place. it is time

to heed these whisperings / knowings
the world is / speaking / in a very loud
voice which is / the same / as refrigerator
hum and cricket chirps / as whistles
of air / through your nose / as you are

sleeping. it is true you are more conscious
when / you are un-self / conscious

we are part / knowing / the world and
also all / all / all / the whole of it
this breathing is breathing / in stars
the future / your knowing is / the same

as my knowing / inside and outside
our bodies are / tree limbs
and skyscrapers / organic and made
by man / our ambitions / do not all derive

from each other / but
there is rustling / in / our leaves
and our bloodstream / it is you and i
who are making / the world / shake

posted by Emilie  # 10:45 PM 0 comments

behind a picture, i run
up stairs. each frame is
a window:
                a friend sees through
and into you. the fire inside
the screen
                is an image of fire. it warms
but does not smoke. we burn,
do not combust. everyone we know
makes: art
                from material we have
touched. cardstock
                moved by hands in
the background
                connects us

/* original post title: untitled. if this poem were to speak it would say, "please don't be mean to me! emilie constructed me with a shit TON of care and if i were written in Word with track changes on, you'd see i already have so many scars! also, i need a title for grounding purposes. It's just that Emilie has been working on me for about an hour now and she needs to stop looking" */

posted by Emilie  # 10:24 PM 0 comments

in the other version of the game, when you get that card
you are called the fortune teller, not
the seer. the rules are identical.

you're only allowed to discover a person's true nature
once each evening. i don't understand how knowing
a person's true nature is the same as knowing

fortunes, knowing what to tell. when it's early
it's not a good idea to show yourself. someone might kill you.
don't make the reveal. seeing what they don't know

you see -- the people you want to believe you
will not believe you and the people who believe you
will want to hurt you. it is night. close your eyes.

posted by Emilie  # 2:33 AM 0 comments