New Year's Reflections

The best things about me this year:

My self-sufficiency

My hair

My commitment to what I set out to do

My self-awareness

My willingness to grow and change

My confidence

The fact that I’m a quick learner

My personal growth as a dancer and my willingness to learn all types of dance

My willingness to love, in a general love of humanity way

Things I hope to change next year:

I will solidify my relationship with the truth

I will do more direct activism work

I will continue learning to be comfortable on my own

I will visit another country

I will better learn the line between confidence and arrogance

I will start to learn spanish

I will learn more about my own adulthood and where I think I become an adult

I will figure out more of the next step in my life

I will fight harder to get the jobs I want

People I loved this year:

Keyra

Hallie

Meghan

Deena

My family

Cindy

Hawkins

Rokhl

Rivkie

Alex

Kai

Dylan

Ben

Elizabeth

Narmeen

Felecia

Milea

Really, anyone I hooked up with, but in a temporary way

That boy at the fed-ex shop who printed something for me and then didn’t charge anything

Most of my favorite authors

Most of humanity, really, if I’m being honest

Places I went this year:

On a five day road trip by myself from New York to Arizona

To a weekend long contra dance in Saratoga NY called Dance Flurry

Deep within my own subconscious

Things I did that were good this year:

Decided to take a gap year

Ran a half marathon

Voted for the first time in a presidential election

Went to places where I knew no one, multiple times, and had a blast

Went dancing on my own

Applied to colleges

Started another job

Learned to ask for help

Got an associates degree

Found jobs for myself

Made art

Saw art

Learned it is alright not to always have a good time

Descriptive Writing (Lesbians and Motor cycles!)

She swung her leg over the back of my bike and whispered ‘let’s ride’.

I gunned the throttle and took off down a narrow side street. I could feel her body against mine, through two layers of leather jacket I pretended I could hear her heart beat. Her dark hair whipped around both of our faces my own red hair too short to get in my way. The wind was harsh on my sun worn face and beat against my tinted sunglasses.  

I listened, above the engine, siren sounds but the world was silent outside the bubble of our roaring bike. A Vincent Black Lightning, a limited edition. She leaned with me as we whipped around turns. We went fast, probably too fast, fast enough to draw attention. But our bodies moved together through motions we had done hundreds of times and I couldn’t stop the excitement, opened the throttle wider, moved against my better judgement but in accordance with her.

We took a sharp left onto the interstate ramp and pulled onto the interstate. I opened the throttle fully, finally giving into all the speed the Vincent craved and I felt her shift positions, settle in for the long haul. The sun shone directly into my eyes as it set in front of us and I squinted into a glaring sunset.

*****

When we finally stopped the sun had been well below the horizon for hours. There was no moon, but the stars shone bright. I pulled off the interstate and onto a long stretch of road. She had fallen into half a doze against my back and shoulders and as I slowed the bike and the hum of the bike changed pitch I felt her sit up. We turned left, following the green reflective signs pointing towards a truck stop. Gas and greasy food to fuel us and the bike, after a long time running.

I slowed the bike and brought it to the stop in front of the pump. I slid off the bike and she slid off after me, her leg bumping the heavily laden panniers as she swung off. We filled up the bike and it made a hungry, glugging noise. The smell of gasoline was sharp in my nose. As the pumped worked.

She sauntered ahead of me into the diner. I knew she would save me a seat. While she ordered food I parked the Vincent and paid for the gas. By the time I got inside she was sitting at the booth with two plates heaped with greasy food in front of her. A burger and fries for her and fried fish on a roll and ‘slaw for me. Two huge neon yellow slices of pie in the middle of the table, still steaming.

We both wolfed our food, barely pausing to breathe, let alone talk. When I next looked up at her, her dark eyes glittered in the dingy light of the diner. The table left a layer of grease on my hands as they dragged on the table. They shoveled the food into their mouths with their hands, bypassing the dull silverware.

Finally, I took a breath. All that remained of my fish and slaw was a few slivers of cabbage and crumbs of breading on a plate. I felt the silence on the air, thick and heavy like a blanket. The night itself was warm and humid, we hadn’t gone far enough West to reach the plains yet.

Suddenly her laugh broke the silence. High and wild. Bright against the quiet clanking and buzzing  of an all night diner. It rang loud and clear and seeing her face folded up in joy, made me laugh too. I felt it rising in my stomach up through my throat and out my lips. They drew up in joy and her skin crinkled around her dark eyes.

“We did it!” She wheezed breathlessly through her laughter. “We got away with it! We did it!”

*Inspired by this song*

Descriptive writing in the key of C

My hands are dirty.

Dirt ground into the creases. Dirt so stained it doesn’t wash out. Stains the skin dark brown and gray. It gets under the nails no matter how short they’re cut. If I was cleverer or more motivated I would make this a poem about race in society. This poem is a description of my hands.

My hands are dry and chapped.

Catch at smooth bedsheets. The skin cracks. Sometimes I can’t tell the difference between a thorn in my living flesh and a simple abrasion of my abused skin. When the thick of the dirt comes off the gray lines criss cross my hands, stretched tight at the knuckles and on the palms and ready to snap. It hurts.

My hands are are calloused.

Can no longer find the threads in a piece of embroidery, raised ink on paper. Can no longer find the cracks in a hose or a stone wall. The calluses go from the base of my palms to the tips of my fingernails. Some are old, thick and numb. Some are newer, still red and raw, growing strong and impartial.

My hands are useful.

Have killed and gutted a chicken. Have fed a baby chick water for the first time in its life. Have planted broccoli seeds, harvested potatoes. These hands write, they hold a pen, or tap dance across the keyboard. Have guided a steering wheel or heft a sand bag. Cut off a flower’s head or pull it out by the roots. Cook, do dishes, vacuum, build a stone karin. The can hold the face, or hands, or ass of a lover, or good fuck. They can be soft are hard but they’re always moving. If I were a better poet, I would end this with the steadiness of my hands, but instead I end with the truth. My hands often tremble.

Myths of Equality

Antagonize Antigone

Dichotomize virginity

Capitalize on vanity

Incentivize mediocrity

Aristotle’s arguments

Bring up fits of discontent

She deconstructs redundant discourse

To synthesize some clarity

The vanity of Oedipus

Seems to her sort of prejudiced

Maybe men are noble martyrs

Hysteria for femininity

Socrates’ sloppy method

Led teenage boys to prove manhood

Antigone is unsurprised

But Oedipus cuts out his eyes.

Adventurer Odysseus

Is accompanied by a full chorus

Penelope sits all alone

Waiting in solidarity

Canonized Academics

A fancy way to name the dicks

Who reward the men of stories

And what of sweet Antigone?

The politics of homelessness

The politics of homelessness

So as you (the possibly existent reader) probably know, I'm taking this year to travel and farm. And one of the things about traveling around is that it means I'm basically homeless. And while I usually have a roof over my head at night, it's not uncommon that I end up in a city, trekking with my life's possessions in hand or on my back while I walk or take public transportation. It happened less after I got my car but now while I'm in search of a replacement car after my car got hit by a deer (see: elegy to a buck) I find myself thinking about homelessness means again.

The first time I was asked whether I was homeless was my spring break of my sophomore year of college. I was in New York city for the whole week so I had packed up all my clothes for dancing and running and walking in central park. And I packed it all up in my backpacking backpack which is huge and blue. So here I am, taking up two seats on the subway from manhattan to brooklyn, where I was staying the night I arrived and this man in a suit looks over at me and asks ‘Are you homeless?’ and I found my first reaction was to be defensive. I was ashamed that someone had mistaken me for homeless, although it was more or less true at the time. I was couch surfing with friends and I didn't have a permanent home base. So why was it so upsetting to me that this stranger had asked, politely, whether I had a permanent place of residence?

My grandmother lives in New York city and my family and I visited her frequently from a young age. And one of the first things I learned was how to ignore the poverty. My grandmother has a large apartment on the upper west side of manhattan and can be considered, by anyone's standards, a wealthy woman. And while occasionally I saw members of my family give food or kind words to people asking, most of the time, when my family, family friends, and other New York natives to whom I was exposed simply ignored these people.

So flash forward to the present. Here I am, sitting by myself in the back of an IHOP. To my left are two bags: one filled with the clothes I need this weekend. The other bag has a water bottle, a bunch of important papers for my car, my computer, my chargers, a broken pair of earphones, and a dilapidated deck of tarot cards. Are there people looking at me? Not really, I'm all the way at the back of the restaurant. Can I ever detach myself from the classism that makes me think being homeless is shameful? Am I as liberated as I think if I still experience this extreme, subconscious bias against homelessness? How do I combat this as an individual? How do I combat the systemic classism that leads to this shame? Ultimately, I am homeless right now, although I had preferred to describe myself with words like nomad and vagabond, probably because they carry a different class connotation. So for now, I will carry homeless as a title with pride, in defiance of the classism of society.

Butterfly Poem

You told me that when I kissed you in the street you felt butterflies and I laughed. Not because I was delighted I could give you butterflies, although I was, but because at 19, everything is made of butterflies. It's like that one episode of steven universe where Ruby and Sapphire chase so many butterflies that it looks like the sky is going to explode. I don't have the language to describe the beauty of Aravipa Orchard but that doesn't mean I didn't know I felt something. The closest I can find to to words is the feeling of all my insides being torn apart as gently as a bow string caressing a violin. I can't hit a note for my life but I know a symphony when I hear one. And no, I don't think when I see the sunset I'm in love and yes, to flatten all you are down into a splash of colors spilled across the sky reduces you to a silly two dimensional decoration. You are beautiful because you are real. Maybe you're not quite whole but our broken pieces together let enough light through to watch the sunset. If you only knew how many sunsets you look like maybe you would understand how measly a few butterflies seem. You are thunder and it's not true what they say about lighting because it just keeps string me. Everything is butterflies because I can't even feel the solid ground beneath me and if I'm not afraid of falling it's only because I'm already in mid air with the wind streaming across my face. I am a butterfly in a hurricane. I'm the clouds chasing the sun in the sunset, desperate to feel it's sliver lining again. I'm the hot, still, throbbing air before the thunderstorm, desperate for the storm to come and release the tension with explosions of air and light. And yes, I mean sex, but I mean more than sex. I mean butterflies and sunsets and feelings I'll never, never have the words for.

Elegy to a buck

Here are things I know to be true:

I was thinking about getting oreos at the gas station in town

The road was entirely unlit by streetlights or other cars

My car hit the buck

I screamed

My car was not that much bigger than the buck

The buck was dead on the side of the road

Here are things I think are true:

The buck felt pain

I was lucky not to be injured

I was seriously shaken by the accident

I could not have avoided the buck

The buck was beautiful in an instant

Here are things I know to be hyperbole:

The buck felt air against his face

The buck’s legs lifted him into the air effortlessly

The buck’s heart beat louder and faster like a drum in a crescendo--

The drum beat stopped

The windshield shattered like ice and the car’s engine died suddenly and hopelessly

The car rolled to the side of the road

My heart beat to the same rhythm the buck set with its own heart before it died

My car mourned by rolling to a stop

The dead buck remembered the tragedy from the side of the road

A letter to a friend

Hallie,

I’m currently working at Sleeping Frog Farms which is in Cascabel, Arizona. If you don’t feel like plugging that into google maps it’s a little over an hour drive east of Tucson, Arizona. I’m three hours from Phoenix, six from Albuquerque, New Mexico, five to El Paso, Texas. Also, it’s half an hour to the nearest phone reception, gas, or NPR station, what with being in the middle of a desert and all.

The desert is beautiful, Hallie. I’m still running every day that I can and for my run I go uphill for anywhere between one and a half and two miles and then when I turn around and go downhill and when I go downhill I’m running straight into the sunset. Like, a stupid pretty, I-don’t-believe-this-shit is real pretty. When I run, I leave my hair down and the wind whips through my hair and I feel like a fucking dessert princess. But picture mountains in the dessert you’re imagining. And a huge sky. And the stars, when the night comes. The stars are everything you’ve ever read about stars, They’re everything you read stars should be. 

I’ve been working my ass off In the daytime, running, cooking and cleaning for myself and climbing into bed exhausted every night. I love farming and my coworkers are all really cool (side note: I’ve yet to meet anyone who chooses to give their lives to the sustainable one åresponsible creation of food who is an asshole. but it’s an exhaustion job. I barely even make enough money and have barely enough energy to go dancing in Tucson on the weekends. I’ve been leaning swing and blues dancing—both are so much fun. Both have a lot of attractive, hippie queer young people. I wish I lived closer to Tucson because there’s dancing every single night of the week. Cascabel is too far away from Tucson to justify going in on a week day but I’m dancing on the weekends every chance I get.

I feel good and I look good (I’m tanned and ripped) and I think I could be happy for a while here. And of course I miss you. When do you leave for Taipei (is it Taipei?)? You must be excited! I’d love to call/skype before you leave. Weekends are the best time for me, Sunday of this weekend is preferable to Saturday. Happy december and good luck on whatever round of tests happen in your life next,

So much love,

Monya

Farm Noises as Erotica: A poem

The morning silence.

Stop. Lean into it.

Do you hear the birds?

Sparrows and doves and wrens crooning

Into the crisp sunrise.

The noise of wind chimes hanging off the frame of the hoop house.

The breeze caresses the cool metal, wrapping around it

Swirling through the most intimate spaces between perfectly tuned chimes.

Try feeding the animals: 

Pigs squeal, cats meow, dogs bark, cattle moo

Onamonapias don’t begin to cut it.

The noise crowds every part of your brain.

Overwhelms the senses.

Loud and immediate and enveloping and sensational.

Listen to the wheelbarrow rolling down a hill.

The constancy of the bumping of the wheel against the dirt

Rubber giving to hard earth on one side and rough rusty steel on the other.

Again and again they clash down the hill and collide into each other.

Drip lines leaking,

Hissing water into deep puddles

So the earth is rich around the leak

The water arcs powerfully away from the drip tape.

A continuous shaking, hissing noise.

The air and water and friction and continuous strength and pressure

To make ess sounds.

Grass rubbing against itsself:

The correct verb is to rustle

Or perhaps the noun susurrus.

So many thin fingertip touches

Mounting into a great whisper.

Tragedy revisited

*A re-imagination of an old poem a poetry teacher once ruined.*

*Content warning for dysphoria related to bad sexual experiences*

Before:

I only wanted him for his body

That was the bitter irony of it.

That his feet danced with the grace of gazelles

And I could not move my own leaden feet

Stuck in the muck to reap what I had sewn.

Durring:

It did feel good, there’s no reason to lie

About that. In the shower, on the bed.

Before:

I was a good dancer, but not as good

as I thought. I was so sure on my own 

Two feet and my own lips fit on my face

Exquisitely. I owned the dance floor with

A single twitch of my infallible feet.

After:

Well, wouldn’t he like to know what it was like?

Durring:

He pulled out and immediately I knew

Something was wrong. 

After:

He looked worried, so of course I comforted him.

Because I was so used to being strong I couldn’t imagine it any

Other fucking way.

He never gave me the money for the

Plan B he oh-so-kindly offered.

Durring:

The thing that really gets me is 

I didn’t do anything

Wrong. We used a condom.

Put it on right and everything.

Before:

I decided I didn’t want to be on birth control any more.

My reasons went thusly: I mostly had

Gay sex, and if I was going to have

Penis in vagina sex I would just

Use a condom. I just felt so crumby

On the birth control pills I had been taking.

After:

I was fine for the day and then the next day I got miserably sick.

Threw up

In the morning. Left 

Two of my classes early. Didn’t show up entirely to another.

Cried. And 

cried. Contemplated calling my mom. Calling my best friend. Calling anyone.

Drank a lot of tea and didn’t

Eat anything

At all.

After:

The nurse said it was just a stomach bug. 

My blood-work, weeks later said I was std free.

The pregnancy test that I took in the 

Bathroom at the public library read 

With a minus sign. I never told my mother.

After:

Months later, I skip my period because of the new birth control I’m on.

In a way, it’s a relief

Because every time I see blood stain my underwear

I still think of him.

I remember how I felt so empty and so full

At the same time.

Durring:

I felt so empty and so full at the same time.

Before:

I knew exactly where I was putting my feet.

After:

It takes almost half a year before I can keep my balance when I see him.

After:

My next sexual partner is slow and gentle and checks in constantly.

As are the next two after that. 

It feels good to have hands on me again.

After:

I go back to dancing quickly.

He couldn’t take that away from me.

Eight months of dancing around the country later, 

I am a better dancer than him.

After:

Ten moths later I learn to blues swing.

It is like dancing and sex all at once and standing up.

Ten months later I move on my feet like they are mine again.