Lawn Fights and Suicide Pacts

Again tonight that couple next door has decided to vomit their hatred on the lawn,

He is lazy,

But she's a whore so I guess that makes them even.

The size of their hand gestures,

Comical.

The sound of their daughter crying on the porch step,

Typical.

Hands high against a bright purple sky,

Their visceral anger is frozen in its tracks.

The lightning so shamelessly bright,

And thunder so excessively full,

I feared the backfire of a something-caliber.

And yet, maybe it was.

Maybe some winged creatures,

So disgusted with our wasted mortality,

With our hunks of dying flesh and stands of protein hair,

Made a suicide pact.

And then, as this couple so unabashedly bashed,

One decided it was time to end the show.

The backfire bright and the brain spatter loud,

It was only enough to momentarily close a mouth.

This fight, this dirty lawn slander,

Not the last one in Avondale by a very long shot,

So profoundly disturbed those multi-eyed and feathered saints,

And they started up again before any blood could clot.

A Conversation With Myself

I want to be passionately tormented enough to walk into a lake with stones in my pockets. I mean imagine being that passionate about something, so much that you have the force to drown yourself in lake.

Yeah, but Virginia Woolf was mentally ill. She was sick. She heard voices, left a suicide note to her husband, and killed herself. That wasn't passion, that was crazy.

Well, you know what I mean though. I just want to be so consumed with my art that I burst into flames or something.

So you are passionate about passion. Huh.

I know, I know. Clique'. But...what if I lose it? What if I lose this drive? What if it goes away when I start to have a life, a husband, a home?

So you fight for it. Simple as that.

It is not that simple. I have ovaries, which apparently makes it impossible for me to be an author and good wife or mother. If I was a man, I would be applauded for writing into the night alone with a glass of something expensive and sixty-two cigarettes. I would be encouraged to put my art first.


But you are not a man. Nothing short of painful surgery will change that.

You know what I mean. I love having soft curves and long hair and a woman's sensitivity. Not to mention the free stuff and occasional whistle. I just know that as an artist I have a long road of being "neglectful" and "selfish".

Well, I guess being selfish is better than being dead.

Yeah, you are probably right.