bruised

I can't sleep. I've tried so many times and I realize I have to change that statement. I can't sleep at night. I sleep at inappropriate times for inappropriate lengths. I can't sleep, but I'm more afraid that I won't wake up. Not never wake up, but not wake up in the morning or in the afternoon or whenever I've decided I should wake up. I've slept through concerts and parties and meetings and papers and

My head is too full right now. I tried to empty it today, organize it. But it's like organizing my house--I pull everything out, but never manage to put everything in its place. Right now it's all Morri Creech and statement of purpose and this poem I really want to write because I'm pretty sure it will be good but I'm missing the vocabulary because I'm missing the experience. Does that make sense? I became obsessed with pale Regina Spektor and her red red red lips singing. I like lips. I've liked lips ever since a boy told me I had lips that were perfect for kissing. He was my first kiss. Appropriate. Anyway, this poem is--I think--centered on kissing and speaking and the difference in the expressions. But that boy kissed me and then another boy kissed me and then the first boy came back to kiss me again. My last kiss was a long time ago and it was a goodbye kiss.

Ben Lee writes genius lyrics--not complicated, but genius. His lyrics are all messed up with these other words I'm trying to sort out. His words are relaxed, they don't resist the rhythm they've created. Every word I own is tense, is clenched teeth. No red lips, but not brown and quiet and relaxed either. I want the word "bruised" for my poem, but I feel bruised, I don't own bruised right now. Right now it doesn't belong. But then I wonder if I belong. Maybe I'm not the one who's supposed to write this poem. Did I spell write r-i-g-h-t earlier? I do that sometimes. Please forgive.