The Good, the Bad and Enjoying the in Between

It’s amazing to me how many people call to check on you when you behead your ex-boyfriend in one of your poems (like you’ve never done that?)

As a writer, you draw on the sadness or the discontent because for many of us, writing is a way to get those negative emotions out of you.  No one wants that festering inside of them.  It’s important to remember that hurt, sadness and anger are all nothing more than a moment in time.  Once I put things down on paper I feel lighter.  It’s a meditative exercise in letting things go (even if you behead people in the process).  J 

We are all just moments in time and moments shift.  Each one is different and as such, we are different.  I am not my past; I’m far too present for that. 

I was watching a Louis C.K.  stand-up bit how we constantly expect good things to happen to us.  He jokes around about some guy who spills coffee on himself and how the guy’s reaction to this extreme anger and then this victimization like  "how could this have happened to me?!”  He goes on to discuss how it's absolutely ridiculous that we expect ONLY good things to happen and then freak out when the bad happens.

As a society, we have a tendency to EXPECT that only good things happen to us.  It’s natural of course, no one says, “I hope that I fall off my bike today.”  No one wakes up one morning thinking: “I hope I get into a shitty relationship.”  No one says, “I hope my friends all abandon me and I lose my youth and beauty and end up living alone with 20 cats.”

Instead we say, “It's going to be a gorgeous day and I'm going to bike along the lake to enjoy it."  We say, “I’m going to find the one and we’re going to be in love forever and it’s going to be amazing.” We toast to all of our fine friends, “To our splendid future!  Friends forever!”

When things don’t go our way it’s devastating for many of us.  Yet, I wager we wouldn’t be half as happy with the good times without the bad.  How would we even recognize the difference?   Would we be as strong as we are without having to struggle?  Would we appreciate the times when we are able to relax and let it all go if there weren’t points where our muscles were tense and sore from carrying too much on our shoulders?

All moments should be taken in stride from the joyfulness to love to heartbreak to depression because for better or for worse, it’s a moment and it will be over before you know it.

<3 

Ashes of an Ex-Boyfriend

My face is emotionless

Staring at yours

In the guillotine of my mind

It wasn’t a long sentence

But your actions so horrendous

That the executioner now beckons

I have no interest in memories

The good times; the bad times

Any time involving you, really

Furthermore, I don't appreciate

Your guest appearances

in my dreams

The blade has been sharpened

And I feel nothing

I do not forgive you

Forgiveness implies an

Understanding I do not possess

I won’t mourn your death

In fact, after this I plan to wear 

The most colorful things I own

My last and final gift to you:

This poem

Rest in peace

Prickly

I’m a slow healer still

Hugging my chest tight

I know nothing of love

Other than it always leaves

I don’t want to pretend

“I’ve never done this before”

I just don’t want to do it again

A heart’s got that muscle memory

Breeding new instincts; new reasons to run

And the love-jaded women, hard on the street

Well, that’s just hyper evolution, baby

I’d invite you to take a look inside

If it weren’t for all this scar tissue

That envelops my heart 

A diamond scalpel couldn't cut through

I know my own loneliness

like cacti know the desert

I don't need the promise of rain to fill me

then leave me...slow to drain..

[insert happy ending here]

The Chicago Project: Bridgeport

I love going to places alone. 

It’s an odd hobby that I must have picked up when I was 18 years old and had just moved to the city for the first time.  I remember how I was then – so young and fresh and wanting to experience everything – the people; the places; the day; the night…

I’ve come back to that girl it seems; the one that goes out on her bicycle late at night alone to check out the open mic night and perform for people that won’t ever know her name.  The comfort about strangers is that you don’t ever have to live up to anything.  You just share in a moment without clinging to identity…

This is one of the many reasons I love to travel alone.  I love traveling because of the complete uncertainty of where the journey will take you or who you will meet along the way; the exoticism of new places and the seduction of a moment in different vegetation and landscape.

So Chicago: how do I experience you as a tourist instead of a resident?

Let’s start in Bridgeport, a southside neighborhood not too far from Pilsen.  I walked into Bernice’s Tavern’s open mic night because I wrote a poem I was dying to read to a room full of strangers.  I was disappointed to find that it was only music.  I then scanned the room thinking about how poetry would probably not fly well here as I eyed the décor.  Signs that read: “work is the curse of the drinking class,” and “never trust a man that doesn’t drink,” permeated the walls.  I could hear thick Chicago accents over the Neil Young cover songs.  The Sox game was on in a tiny t.v. in the corner of the room.  Bridgeport is Sox country, make no mistake about it.

I knew immediately that there were two things I would not do here today:

1. Tell anyone I’m vegan 
2. Read my intense feminist poetry

Instead I noticed the little things one tends to when in a new place.

As a writer, it’s the external stimulation that drives you inward to put it all into words. It’s overhearing a conversation that inspires a poem or noticing the way the light dances on foreign walls over music. It’s reading the silence between the words; it’s contemplating life’s riddles as you watch the man and the woman in the corner whispering into each other’s ear…

Or, if you’re Bridgeport, it’s scanning the bar full of burly men in Bears and Blackhawks jerseys and baseball hats wondering if anyone is a secret Cubs fan. 

Deep thoughts.

More Chicago adventures to come throughout the summer!

Goddess File #34

I recently saw a film on Maria Luisa Bombal, the Chilean author who was never fully accepted in Chile for her provocative writings. This poem is dedicated to her.  It's not for the faint of heart.  You've been warned.

The boys come so easy

The men come so hard

And I’m your mother

Your sister

Your daughter

Your wife

Your lover

Past in present

Future tense

Sex

I’m a phone call

A voice

I am my body

My legs

Fishnets

I am a fantasy

Baby bottles

Breast feeding

What is it that you need?

Innocence of a child

With a seductive grin

Come one

Come all

Playground style

Do I scare you now?

I gave birth

To dead crows

And the levity

Of my laughter

makes you forget

That I am your sister

Your wife

Your lover

Strapped to a bed

Pushing baby stroller

Down dead ends

I am the whore

Blowing you in your car

I am the angel

Spiritually speaking

Spitting image

Virgin Mary

Can you handle me?

The boys always come so easy

The men come hard

Hot Button Issue: Unbottoning Down

My yoga teacher that evening was a thin muscular guy with grayish black hair and this fierce vitality that is both incredibly compelling and abrasive all at once. He’s the type of guy that swears in the middle of class so that all the serious yogis can let go of their “good/evil” references.  He can be really annoying when he’s telling you to get into these impossible contortions while maintaining complete awareness of your breath, tailbone, toes and fingertips all at once.  He goes out of his way to mimic the chatter in your mind during your practice, if only to point it out to you.

I had heard of those tricksters that come into your life to test you; the ones that will bring out your demons and push all of your buttons so that you recognize the buttons you have. 

“We cannot always control what happens to us, but we CAN control how we react.  That’s yoga; understanding your reactions and learning to control them.  It’s a discipline.”

I wasn’t controlling it. I was angry.  Didn’t he understand how impossible his commands were?  We were in yoga class, not some sort of military drill.  How do you remember to track your breath, toes, bhandas and alignment in four breaths?  Who does he think we are? 

“Now you’re going to shift all of your weight onto your left foot.  Keep those toes lifted! Push your right leg up towards the sky behind you and stack your hips.”  I struggled to find my balance and he came up behind me to pull my right leg back into alignment – at his touch I collapsed.  We tried again, and once again I collapsed. 

“Trust me; you’ve got to trust me!” he said in a not so gentle tone.   “One more time; you can do this.”  I did it for a few seconds before he walked away and said “just do your best.”

Button #1: Trust.  That’s a loaded word right there.  I’m barely learning to trust my own body to get into these poses, much less some guy adjusting me in yoga class. 

You’d be amazed at the things that run past your mind when you’re trying your hardest not to hold onto anything that comes into your mind.  Here I am in a balance pose remembering the day my body betrayed me.

I was in the fourth grade and had quite the audience awaiting my performance in my front yard.  The audience included my family and some of the older neighborhood boys.  I needed to prove myself.  I got into position: front foot perpendicular to my back foot; arms raised as I wind-milled my arms to the ground into a cartwheel.  The next thing I know, I’m in the car with my parents on the way to the hospital.

“I want the hot pink one,” I said to the nurse. There’s nothing like rocking a hot pink cast with all your boring outfits.  My right arm had suffered a sprain as I had put too much weight on it.

Back on the mat: I remember this now – the feeling of my body betraying me.  I was supposed to impress all of my friends with my amazing cartwheel and instead I collected signatures on my arm for six weeks.  Oh the humiliation!

My friend had a pin the other night that said “button free.”  I asked her what it meant.  She said that when she works with youth teaching them yoga or breath-work she teaches them to be “button free;” meaning having an awareness of their buttons so not to allow anyone else to push them.  

Damn good class (the swearing is to throw off all of the yogis).

Serpents, Men and our Dying Roles

My favorite topic came up on my date the other night.

“It’s just in this culture we’re socialized from a very early age to have a one-sided view of women.  Women are constantly oversexualized and then pinned against each other on the basis of physical beauty or other petty materialistic and superficial concerns.  Women do other things in the real world but the majority of our representation in the media is not representative of that.” I said.

“You know, Jen, it’s really hard for men too.  We used to be the providers, the protectors and the breadwinners.  Our roles were clearly defined, but what is the definition now?  Women can do everything by themselves.  Even in dating, men don’t know what women want anymore.  What can a man do for you that you can’t do for yourself?  Men are in a state of crisis right now,” he said.

I sat staring at my Malbec and thinking about all the one-sided dialogues I’ve had with myself all these years about the topic.  I hadn’t thought about how difficult it must be to be man.  When I was confronted with the question: why do women need men anymore? My mind went straight to: why does the moon need the sun?  Why does the ying need its yang?  Why does the soil need its seeds?

I did a walking meditation years ago.  I asked for God/The Spirit/ Pachamama to teach me about the masculine and the feminine energies.  My senses sharpened; the sounds became crisper and the forest was ALIVE.  I saw a serpent: phallic and long, slithering in front of the hallow crevice of a tree and immediately I understood.  In nature, the serpents protect the feminine: the caves, the crevices and the shallow earth.  Males are built externally and women internally.  The internal: those caves that encompass you and provide shelter through the storms or the great wombspace we all used to inhabit.

In today’s world of challenging social dynamics between the sexes we need our men to understand and protect the sacred.  We need them to plant seeds and watch how they grow.  We need them to bear witness to our differences with respect while women learn to see them with awe and wonder.  Today, we need them to listen and support our new roles.  In turn, we will love and respect theirs.

The masculine and feminine isn’t just a matter of men and women.  All men carry feminine energy and all women carry masculine energy.  As a society we must learn to live with our constant duality.  A man can enter that intuitive introspective space in his mind and a woman can assert her strength sprung into constant activity.

The revolution is barely starting and our liberation exists in limbo ebbing and flowing from one day to the next.  Men don’t have to ONLY be the providers anymore.  Instead they can choose to be much more than the typical male script and fully come into their own as whole and complete human beings.

Feminism never was just something for women.  It is for everyone that wants true freedom from oppression.

I myself am grateful for all men: the one who raised me gently; the ones who I call when my intuition failed me and I’m in a bind; the ones I don’t need to explain myself to and the ones that show up in front of my house for a late night bike ride to get me out of my head just when I need it.