You know, there’s a name for people who taxidermy fictional animals – Capricorns assembled from bits of goat and whale meat; the medieval Orphan Bird made of eagle and peacock and swan; Centaurs. Imagine the dead horse that wakes up to find its throat stuffed full of a man’s torso or the man who discovers that his hips are now a clydesdale. Have some perspective; to remake what has been unmade is really not so clever. You are really not so clever.
Just now, at 2:36 in the morning, I reached one of those mental crossroads where the people that I care about are in direct conflict with the things that I care about.
The hard thing, of course, is not coming to that realization. It’s the one that comes directly after: now that I’ve noticed, I have to choose.
that moment had nothing to do with you.
I would like to thank the amazing people who put on & attended the 2012 Women of the World Poetry Slam. I had an amazing time, and I am so thankful
& congratulations to the wonderful, beautiful & brilliant Dominique Ashaheed
the 2012 Women of the World Poetry Slam Champion!
This woman deserves everything she has claimed for herself.
Survival is a privilege you earn by not dying.
Poetry Observed: Lewis Mundt // Father Benjamin
Pardon the momentary social media overload, but the folks at Poetry Observed are doing some wonderful, wonderful things, and it’s probably a total technical oversight that they let me be part of it. Still, I’ll take it with a giant thanks to the PO folks for giving this piece some love, some light, and a lot of fresh air. And hey, spread it around if you dig it; what d’you say?
2. The world I was born into has never
not contained my mother. The world
my baby sister was born into has never
not contained her either. If this world
were a kinder place, the youngest among us
would die first. My sister would vanish
in the night like a baby tooth. My father
would exchange her for a trinket,
a thin coin on the night stand to remember her.
On his way out, he would put her in his pocket
to conceal her from me. He would wrap her
in Kleenex and bury her in the garden
and it would be no different from the morning
before the morning twenty years ago
when they dangled her in front of my cradle
to tell me of her arrival. The room that sleeps
next to mine would be quiet and empty
but only as quiet and empty as it was
before she came. Resolutely, its contents
would turn back into boxes. The coin, too,
spent. This is not to say
that I wish my sister dead. Only that I wish upon her
a world in which her mother never dies.
Hey all!
I’m on the University of Minnesota Slam Team this year and we’re trying to raise money to get to CUPSI (The College Nationals of Slam Poetry)! We’ve been having a ton of trouble raising money, and are asking people to donate anything they can to help us get there.
Check out the link - there are perks for you too!
Please, if you can, check it out and pass it around. I appreciate it immensely.
Love,
Miles
(via hieuminhbeing)
My sister is always my sister but sometimes she is also a swarm of fish. Sometimes she is fistfuls of meat draped in shiny green armor. Sometimes she has three hundred mouths with needle teeth and no lips. Sometimes my sister can breathe underwater.
Sometimes I am a that stretches for miles and it’s all around her and she can’t see the end of it. Sometimes the hum of the motor is so thick it’s barely a sound. My sister is always my sister, but sometimes I do not know how to love her.
