http://clearsoclear.tumblr.com/
July 12, 2008
June 17, 2008
April 8, 2008
today
a girl from school died today.
today.
and all i can think of is if when i die, will there be as many people at the vigil down in south quad, and how many of those people do i care for, and how many of those actually cares for me, and how many will cry, and how many will cry because everybody else is crying.
we were on the third floor fellows, the boy who uses “concrete jungle” to describe an adventure to Columbus, OH, talking of death and humanity in low tones and poetic healings.
today.
and all i can think of is if when you die, i’m strong enough to go on, move on, trudge on, fade on.
i think of their car at the intersection, plowed by the on coming truck, 70 miles an hour and no moment of mercy. i think of her severed limbs and body, the blood rushing from lips that once smiled, cried, kissed.
today.
we wondered what her story was. we wondered if paris hilton died, how US weekly will run chronicles on little paris’s life, and here we stand mourning a stranger who’s closer than little paris will ever ever ever be. we wondered what her story was, and whether it mattered, and whether we mattered, and whether i mattered.
today.
i know i don’t matter as much to you than ephemeral pauses in your eyes. i know it by the words repeated and the feelings reiterated. at the same time, i know i matter to you as much as i could this moment of suspension. i know your words are truer and your feelings are freer. i know i am bound by words that make shackles of my being. i know i’ve written too many love letters and meant every one of them brutally, honestly, faithfully. i know the sadness curling in my toes reflects the stillness in my eyes.
today.
someday i want to take the girl by her hand, i want to feel her feelings and know her possessions. i’m crude and rude to her. does she hate me and want to break me. that’s okay. that’s okay. i’m waiting for some resolution in this fictional moment. rising. falling. denouement. diamonds and ambers and kisses galore.
today.
somebody in france protested china about tibet. they think and therefore they are french. i read letters from frenchmen who trick wide-eyed girls with expletive-compliment after expletive-compliment. break down the fucking-gorgeous, fucking-hot, and fucking-good-fuck and see myself for who i am.
today there’s much left to do, best to system shut down and stand by, best to live and breathe fully and appreciates what’s precious.
fragile, i say.
fragile and therefore precious, he says.
today.
April 3, 2008
let’s go to yunnan
“Let’s go to Yunnan.”
Her cursor beamed and blinked at her rhythmically, aligning universes to the same beat. “Let’s go to Yunnan and get a plot of land. We can grow tomatoes and basil under the sun. We can have animals two of each: sheep, monkeys, rabbits, horses, snakes, an elephant to carry us through the contours of the land. Let’s get a plot on top of a mountain, and every time we go into town to buy rice and grain, we’d take our shoulder poles and bamboo hats. You could grow your hair long and roam with a red-tail hawk, and when my knees get cold, we’d know the rain was coming, and we can do the rain dance around our tomatoes and basil. We’ll make millions with our tomato and basil brand. In Italy, they will worship us. Michelangelo will retire from death and erect a statue of us holding a jar of tomato sauce and a leaf of basil. It will be his magnum opus.”
February 24, 2008
blur
Listening to: Lupe Fiasco – Superstar
if you are what you say you are, a superstar, have no fear, the crowd is here, and the lights are on.
what a show.
time: 6:36pm. check. six minutes into a brand new born day. check. just got up.
“you read me like a picture book.”
four hours from whiskeybourbontequillasheerybrandyvodka, we cooking a meal that smells inflammable, and infallible we are. check. ARE.
(the entire house is out or sleeping)
here’s my stomach made of antioxidants. we rolled through the day like a dream, a segue within the dream of sleep, and between sleep and waking up is letting go, baober it’s hard to let go.
“drifting into the sea, eating passion fruits.”
or
“floating into the sea, eating a passion fruit?”
always write now what you meant to say.
Next time, I’ll write down what I meant.
They say limerance lasts three months.
Here’s to three months of no return.
And I’m buggin’ trippin’ living for the stars.
Remember the days before, and remember me.
Reunion on Union Square.
February 22, 2008
The most romantic song you ever heard…
Listening to: Henri Salvador – Chambre avec vue
You know it’s not your school anymore when 3/4 of the faces are of strangers picked up from random truck stops. It’s as if the whole world is trying to excise you the moment you finally find a ball of yarn to grasp on. Here in Ohio the snow looks metallic under the orange glow of lamps that imitate Sherlock’s London street accessories. It’s pristine white snow against green pine trees, and the ground never turns slushy brown because it’s earth as it is meant to be. I guess this will be my last winter in Ohio. I guess when next year comes, wherever I will be, the snow willbe less idyllic, the sky less clear, the love more complicated.
I guess I’m saying goodbye before it ends. I wanted to escape the moment I got here, and here I am reminiscing before I even leave. Irony? I’m sorry I lose. I’m sorry I’m a fighter with a forked tongue, biting, flinching and running out. I’m glad you smile like there’s no reason not to, like mouths were made to smile, to carouse, to sing, to kiss. A mouth is a thousand vitriolic verbs burning spades on my skin, and it’s a thousand words unspoken in fear of fear. But you my little love, you. are. great., greater than all the adjectives men have mused on me, suckle on carbonated French water, Sushi and snails of worldly cuisine, New York fashion and Japanese soirée.
I’m still ready to get out of here, but, it’s good better to frolic away than flee. Don’t you think?
February 21, 2008
Paul Beatty
Psychedelic
When you’re young, psychedelic is a primary color and a most mesmerizing high. Santa Monica was full of free multihued trips. The color-burst free-love murals on Main Street seemed to come to vibrant cartoon life when I passed them. The whales and dolphins frolicked in the clouds and the sea lions and merry-go-round horsies turned cartwheels in the street. The spray-any-color-paint-on-the-spin-art creations at the pier were fifty-cent Jackson Pollock rainbow heroin hits that made your skin tingle and the grains of sand swell up and rise to the sky like helium balloons. Looking into the kaleidoscopic eyes of a scruffy Bukowski barfly sitting in the lotus position along the bike trails fractured your soul into hundreds of disconnected psychedelic shards. Each sharp piece of your mind begging for sobriety.
PAUL BEATTY is SO sick. If I ever get a tattoo. It’s gonna be on my right arm/hand and it’s gonna say “Two Hours A Day.” I need a fucking regimented writing schedule. In other news. Brooklyn College is official choice #1 for MFAs next next year because he went there.
!
February 20, 2008
stream of syllables
A confession. It is hard to be unhappy these days. Even looking at photographs with artistic poses make me a bit wary. Well, Kafka wasn’t raised on happiness. As for me, I guess I’m just waiting for the bungalow shack to be swept by the sea. So this is how you lose your girl best friends. I’m working (still working dammit) on a story right now and I wish it could be a tighter narrative. I just need to pick it up period. Tomorrowwww…! O god it’s 2.20 already.
February 19, 2008
rebel ravage
Listening to: Manu Chao – Mama Call
scene i: dippin’ dots (four) were falling from the sky today! i was going to go out with a cup to catch some ice cream from the sky, but then the sun came out… but then the sun came in. that’s ohio weather for ya. hohoho.
{Today, from 12am to a solid 11:05am of heavy sleep, I dreamed a dream. A most uncompromising, vivid, and narrative-driven dream that probably had me blacklisted by the Chinese government. It started with a park. Sunny day. Green grass. Sasha and I were moving about, moving across the lawn, and there were six, six kids our age, six against the world. Li Hui was one of them on the swings, the charismatic leader of the pack whose name conjures a mix of fear and awe. I knew nothing about him until days after his death (uh, I’ll get to that). I knew nothing of his terrorism, his martyrdom, nor do I remember exactly what he was fighting for. All I remember was six kids talking with two in a park. I remember him swinging on the monkey bars, a mass of tousled black/gray hair and startling smile. He had chiseled features, small falcon eyes and lips perpetually fixed in a lopsided smirk like he knew exactly what you’re worth. He was criminal and dangerous and exactly the bad boy all the good girls fall for, and really now, he was the leader of a rebel group (again, the cause of which I don’t recall, but I believe falls somewhere in the blurry lines of liberty, justice, and the pursuit of happiness through destructive, flashy means. If I were an artist I’d draw out exactly what he looks like before I forget, but as it is, I can only fumble with falcon eyes and descriptions in vain. Li Hui. Li Hui. Li Hui. This is what you looked like, and tomorrow I’ll forget.
The rest of the dream sort of went by in a flurry of motion, with gun shots and mug shots. There was like a swat team that surrounded us on the lawn, cameras flashing, accusations of us being involved with terrorists. Then we all escaped somehow, and did I mention all of this took place in a New York-esque setting with a Chinese mindset?
Then came the fateful day when the six kids were somehow found. At the cataclysmic junction that looked like 34th street, they were shoved into the part of a bus where luggage is usually thrown in, and I remember a pair of legs sticking out as waves of screams tempered the crowds. I remember their mug shots stuck to every surface, the face of Li Hui, and a girl with really sweet hair that parted and stuck out three ways, and I remember hiding because I thought I too was going to be executed due to being a co-conspirator.
Yeah I think that’s all I remember. Wait, then I saw my boss at a cafe. She had a daughter with her instead of a son though, and seemed more demure than usual. In fact, the world became rather muted yellow after the six kids were captured and executed. I wasn’t at their execution (I believe I was hiding), but that stuff is of legends. Apparently they all gave speeches on runways, and Li Hui was riding a bike???}
yeeeeep. 
