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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in seashelllz's LiveJournal:

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    Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
    12:11 pm
    taut
    feel the blood of
    october, orange veins, trees
    shudder and fear and
    fearlessness battle like
    babies
    for air

    all this premature preening
    like white hearts in snow, invisible avenues the
    dead drew with their empty
    walking souls

    we are masks, skin and bone and muscle
    fleeing blue, too much alike in
    what’s undernearth, too many old things
    in the attic
    now there are songs, you stood for
    sleepwalking summers

    but broke in winter, ruptured your own
    vast and frozen fashions, oars and barges
    that carried what couldn’t be held
    by something as alive as arms

    now lives are listened to carefully, circled
    by stones, funeral families feed each other
    old bread, hiding the crumbs from the
    formation-flying crows

    closed eyes, we feel with our hands, with
    voices that bounce around in the dark
    boomerang back to our own undisciplined
    ears, every edge amplified

    classical music, decisioned destinies blockaded
    protested, all glaring examples of colonial
    backlash corsets pulled tight enough to teach
    ribs to rein in the breath, the breather
    the breathing

    slowed to a standstill.
    Thursday, September 10th, 2009
    12:12 pm
    unlikely divine
    i had a blessing in mind
    when i drank the wine, had
    a fist full of dollars and
    a concept of time made of
    daisies and disasters
    and old friends of mine

    but i slipped, tripped
    unzipped, came unglued
    dress was ripped, was a new year's
    resolution to give up
    the gift

    no more nightlights or
    highlights or films reel
    to reel, no more derisions
    or fleshdreams or skin
    numb to the feel

    just a prayer like practice
    fingers on keys, voice on a tremble
    tree without leaves, in a church yard
    with graves grown over with
    mist and memories

    i had a blessing in mind
    when i dialed your line
    when i wrote you a letter
    and then scratched out each line...
    Tuesday, September 8th, 2009
    12:13 pm
    etymology
    naked as a needle
    need some thunderstorm clothes
    sleeping in the needles
    tattoo’d like a pose

    naked as a robin
    redbreasted from the rain
    rowdy in the branches
    of october’s maple flame

    naked as a jaybird
    jerked from the ground like the morning’s worm
    plastered nests and hollow wings
    a cracking open like being born.
    Friday, September 4th, 2009
    12:14 pm
    mythmaking
    there's power in the wanting,
    the lust of lying naked waiting
    for a breeze

    there's the rough and tumble tease
    of a tuesday afternoon when sleep
    seems a disease we're all running from

    washing washing hands, to keep from
    catching the stillness, the wetness of a
    quiet night alone

    there's power in the wanting, in the old
    and grayed out haunting, in the long ago
    superstitions that stitch themselves to our visions

    alcoholic dreams, cancer coming out the seams,
    brainwaves measured sure and slow, another test
    before you go

    the laundry of a legend, the cleanliness like
    Godliness without the God to scrub to a
    haloed shine, another prayer out of time

    there's power in the wanting, in the desirous
    den of a Delilah, luxurious and empty like
    a vase waiting to break, a flower blooming hard

    amoral amorisms, faulty excuses, i told you the
    story of Aphrodite without words,
    with my skin alone...
    Tuesday, September 1st, 2009
    12:15 pm
    recessing
    not mentioning the empty pockets
    we make extravagant plans
    bags under eyes, late night
    decisions, scarce sounds

    cupboards clanging an echo, the
    hours long like a day on fire
    the old guard's weapons, jittery
    jingles to make you want more

    anti-social bosses' wives
    red walls, too many shoes
    multi-million dollar dinner plate tectonics

    in a new phase moon eclipse, arguing
    over mexican cities, hypochondriac visions
    of children who lose electronic affections

    now the noise will be the wedge, the alcohol
    will lubricate the lesions, as if amputating the
    widening gaps between having and holding

    coins without faces, languishing nations of
    wet rice in bowls, bombed out walls, dust
    and disease photogenically funded

    but who likes politics, war, famine? who wants to
    hear of the murdered precision, the battered lady
    that stands on a lonely island holding a torch

    like a beacon, i have witnessed the cracks in her feet
    as i floated in water, my own liberty questioned
    my own riches drowned.
    Monday, August 31st, 2009
    12:16 pm
    the danger in the flavor that your mouth knew
    before mine, the intoxicating nature of the fruit
    fresh from the vine

    the wilting of our garden, as we move on
    down the block, the music of our muscles as
    we sometimes forget to talk

    the senses screaming sensual arguments
    with skin, the sky falling down around the
    stars we thought could spin

    the awful anonymity we relished - while we quieted
    our nighttime selves, kept our vanishing laughter
    in the closet on dusty shelves

    the walks i wanted to take in a darkened slumber
    scene, through the creeksides to the city, down the hill
    of a hazy dream

    the hands that didn’t shake, the limbs
    that didn’t break, the resolution to revolt
    the time it took to make

    entwining of our minds, exhalations, divine spines
    soaked in comfort and kaleidoscope
    bedsheets, as asleep as canaries in mines
    Sunday, August 30th, 2009
    12:22 pm
    weathered wood
    i know you have locked doors
    but i have keys i have found
    in many places
    one i dug up from the sand on
    a distant beach

    one from an old lady
    one in the street
    one in an old car

    one was there in the lock the whole time
    at that yellow house lived in
    near the levy
    flying kites under
    the pecan trees
    waiting for the power
    to go out

    you said you wanted to be a sycamore then
    and i reminded you of an old oak
    spanish moss trailing my twisted arms

    and wind like a linament across my bark
    i knew what you meant, that they bent
    but didn't break, even in a hurricane.
    Friday, August 28th, 2009
    12:18 pm
    something borrowed
    of mine, of windy days
    of november and broken vows
    stolen rings, antique and
    full of stars

    of better or worse to
    have and hold, of ancient trees
    that watch us pull apart
    mysterious skin

    of lost cities underwater
    rooftop sorrow, cigarettes
    one-sided conversations, of
    trumpets and cheap restaurants

    of televised ventures into quarters
    unmentioned, dungeons and dugouts
    vast open spaces, broken down
    cars and injuries

    of yours and hers, worms and
    apples, of course and matter too
    much, sleeping endless months and
    weeds grown taller than windows

    of babies and new beginnings, laughing
    at things not funny, heat lightning and catfish
    and sewing yourself into a sack
    fighting your way out

    of the ways we asked for signs, directions
    and then still got lost in the lines of our
    own unread palms, mistakes that didn’t count
    things we missed about each other

    of circumstance, villainies, forgotten names
    of enveloped faces, beautiful chances we took
    drunk and young enough to believe our feet
    could always keep in step

    of the way i feel knowing these years
    have erased certain shames and scars, some
    hidden in highways, old rain, rescued guitars
    mothers, handmade dresses and sons that remember the swamps…
    Thursday, August 27th, 2009
    12:24 pm
    sideways
    tell me what it's like
    when you're done receiving, the dry
    mouth feeling of forgetting importances
    days that mattered once, years ago
    where you were standing
    what you were wearing

    who was there beside you?

    i have a selective memory
    that loses moments like old notes
    or car keys, stores things i'd rather
    not recall at all
    and plays movies while i sleep
    long drawn out plotless
    clumsy desires i won't admit
    when waking

    there beside you.

    sometimes we just make up things
    to tell each other because life
    seems to have dulled in summer's scorch
    the sand smooths down the edges of
    shocking revelations we once shared
    like sunny spots on the floor
    and i like to collect those
    half-truths, just as telling as
    scar stories, midnight mumbles

    taught tunes in tired tempos
    sang inside you.

    now i craft the callings into something more
    siren than lullaby, cradling my own screeched name
    and molding, clay-culling the curving canteen
    of my own dried mud bowl, my own empty spaces
    upright and rigid, accompanied by numb yet nimble
    fingers, orange peels, blue eyes like rain

    outside the tent i once slept in with you.

    but it can't become a song, can't morph into melody
    can't drum the rhythm, dance the moving mystery of cut lines, broken telephones, deep waves, dormant
    chest cavity calisthenics
    and if it was loud enough to reach
    where you hide out becoming a brick house
    the breath i'm holding could not
    break in

    and win the battle that's still being waged
    inside you.
    Saturday, April 25th, 2009
    2:15 pm
    In this beginning, she called to the sun
    freckled with summer (Blonde
    and beguiling) for more,
    smothered with wax and feathers

    and
    a dream of flying.

    In this swimming of mixed metaphors
    a choice - a door. Galvanized and sore
    hands held up in protest, eyes
    searching for a symbol
    an earth child,
    a center

    and
    a core.

    Some songs pour out
    fully written
    into music, some
    nights the moon glows
    brighter than before.
    Ocean tides and seashells
    are the weapons in a war.
    Far off acenstor calls you home,
    a call you try
    to ignore - trading an old life
    for...mountain peak
    you'll show her travels from shore
    to shore, dances
    you will teach her,
    a sense of adventure

    and
    the curiosity to explore.

    And only a little sad someday
    you'll have to watch her
    walk away
    through the door.
    2:12 pm
    singing down the bones
    the elephant knows
    the boy in the hospital
    spilling out things
    only a mother knows
    singing like reeds
    when the wind blows
    the muscle the skin
    the mouth sways in the
    same slow ways
    the music plays
    the song fades
    the impression stays
    for days
    in ways
    in waves
    an underwater scene
    a dream
    where everything is clean
    and the clear jewel tones
    are stronger than bones
    build homes for hearts
    and put back together what's
    been torn apart
    in each of us
    i know the moans of amputees
    and the cries of hearts
    ravaged with diseas
    and the way it feels to feel
    completely alone
    and the way it feels
    to come back home
    singing a song
    all my own
    down to the bones...
    2:11 pm
    beginning
    there was dark matter - no matter
    genius stored in star parts
    loose change
    bangs big and small
    with no oversize entity to watch over it all
    so then where was i
    i wonder
    what seed am i sprouted from
    what satellite galaxy grew me whole
    imagined into this thin skin
    where i remember
    my turn to begin
    a long swim
    in a her and a him
    a yang and a yin spin
    towards the light of when
    a birth and a cry echoing back through time
    to skim the perception
    of all the other me’s i’d been
    but this new story
    bound in infancy for glory
    was a chapter being written
    as my molecules were splitting
    soon i rolled over, then I was sitting,
    standing, walking on wobbly legs
    talking with words
    unshaped
    and overstretched…
    Tuesday, April 14th, 2009
    11:09 pm
    day 14
    Madcap capers
    Caped crusaders
    All in the alleyways
    Looking for saviors

    small scalpel sleeps
    sleeping like meat
    never pretending
    to do more than weep

    laugh lines
    lined like vines
    smothering skin shadows
    adding up time

    coiled carpets
    braided in markets
    scented with incense
    and colors of sherbet

    disturbing bourbon
    birds through the curtain
    flutter and stutter
    always uncertain

    War-torn waves
    waving like slaves
    sunburnt and salt-stained
    with crime that pays
    Monday, April 13th, 2009
    10:55 pm
    day 13
    in your child
    bed, were easy fables
    fabricated and unraveled?

    someday they sang, a fifty
    gallon bucket outside the window
    to catch the rain, to heat
    on the fire and then
    you were washed with

    with voice hollow and scratched
    like stones on riverbed, bright
    missives collected in crevasses
    canyons of canons delivered
    like a shot of daylight

    straight to the vein, like a
    road through the desert, waiting
    and look now, you might see
    broken guitars and wet honey
    spilled on the floor

    in that home you smothered
    your best glances in, way before
    the vultures stole the best pieces
    of a history buried shallow
    in a land
    full of dust.
    Sunday, April 12th, 2009
    11:30 pm
    day 12
    salivate for some old bush
    bearing blueberries, the
    fresh cream butter and smell of
    lanolin, i slept in my own bed
    birds broke the silence in
    my head in the mornings
    when the plate glass picture
    window glistened like
    new
    dew
    and i grabbed overalls, ran through
    the dutch doors, down clover patched
    pretend dead-ends
    to find you
    so we could steal cars and
    stash diamonds
    in small pockets, careening
    over cliff-sides, coffee-can
    conversations became our
    twin-salvation, until you
    got a machete and a fishing pole
    and i learned how to discuss
    dinosaurs with the sunday
    school teachers, my dad lived with
    18 different kind of gold-jeweled
    commune preachers
    and i fed baby lambs bottles of milk
    tied my hands to broken stilts
    like a fisherman ties on bait
    and then
    all you can do
    is wait...
    Saturday, April 11th, 2009
    11:57 pm
    day 11
    copy the cats
    with the big black hats
    down on decatur avenue.

    it’s not that scary
    until
    they’re coming after you.

    commit the crime,
    do the time,
    turn into someone new.

    this is why
    we speak the lines,
    rehearse for act one and act two.

    tapdance,
    romance, splitting atoms
    as easily as tying your shoe.

    dancing down the daylight,
    ships sailing off
    into the wild blue.

    if you speak it slowly
    backwards in riddles
    i’ll call it a haiku.

    just don’t say
    i pulled you under the crashing waves that time,
    it’s not something i would ever do.
    12:36 pm
    emerging
    Jeruselum bells, artichokes, circles

    encircled, a nautilus shell keeping

    secrets, honest words, fabricated

    Russian Dolls, hiding ourselves

    inside ourselves

    .

    Kings and candles, lighting up

    nights and windows from far off

    towns, flying over mountains

    glistening white in a dark sky

    from an airplane window I

    searched and saw

    not one light

    .

    A missionary of thresholds, caught

    in a spider’s web, whole bodies birthed

    whole hearts healed by a forgiving wind

    slivers of existence calling us home

    to the doorway we first walked

    .

    so we are called to defend

    that which we love, flowers in gardens we

    left behind, forbidden for being too

    lush to touch with bare fingers

    scent lingers, we remember

    .

    an ocean of hurt happens and

    awakens the fingers of forgiveness

    ignites a small flicker to argue

    with the darkness as if to

    revive all that was broken

    .

    Jeruselum bells, unfurled ferns, circles

    encircled, a seed spilling

    secrets, hard deeds expand to

    encompass these

    Russian Dolls, hiding ourselves

    inside ourselves

    and only now

    emerging…
    Friday, April 10th, 2009
    10:15 pm
    Day 10
    if there were a month
    for speaking fresh
    for cats to rise up on two legs
    and moaning through clenched teeth
    for mothers to glimpse their own
    childhood gathering
    like a tornado whipping
    and chipping away at their
    soft skin
    it might be called March
    Thursday, April 9th, 2009
    11:55 pm
    day 9
    Now we’re
    crossing train tracks
    two at a time, hoping not
    to run out of gas,
    flabbergasted
    at those reckless souls
    that attempt to outrun
    the coming train, swerving
    around the closing barricades,
    ignoring the flashing lights.

    Everyone is a target
    when the hunters stay hidden.
    Now we wonder
    where the tracks lead, how long
    it would take to get there
    walking. We lay
    our pennies
    on the tracks
    for someone else to find.

    Some universal desire
    to follow a straight line
    to its curving
    conclusion.
    To the complexity
    of a trestle
    over the widening
    below.
    Wednesday, April 8th, 2009
    11:23 pm
    Day 8
    so much more and less
    in nothingness
    so much mess in ugliness
    and jest and rising and falling
    of your weakened chest
    this week could be
    our last, this beach
    could be our past
    washing out to sea
    this could be the only
    picture ever taken
    of you and me
    so much falling
    so little care taken
    so many wires cross in
    the calling
    so many beds i've slept in
    in these thirty-five years
    and so many unshed tears
    so much to be amused by, so
    many songs i'd love to sing
    so much losing brings new peace
    so much sorrow brings bridges
    to their knees
    so much damsel distress in
    cleanliness
    so much strength put to the test
    i'm tasting the wasted breath
    and learning to like
    what's left.
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