art – Accepting This

Because of a Mustard Stain

I missed you the most
when I put on your plaid denim shirt
looked in the mirror and saw a mustard stain in the reflection
It made me think of hot summer days and eating hot dogs
Visions of you laughing and stirring potato salad flooded my mind
and I wanted you to be here again
I wanted to run to the freezer in the back room and grab
a popsicle to soothe the flushed feeling that fell on my face
at the thought that you cannot be here again

Your absence brings an ache larger than a missing person
When you left here you took an entire era,
my childhood was wrapped up in your existence
showered with boston cream pies and birthday cakes
I want to give to others the way you gave
I want my home to be like yours

The beginning days with out you were sticky
and frozen together by winter air and an odd adjustment
to a different kind of living where my worries of you would be
extinguished by melancholy peace
The days ahead will be riddled with thoughts of you,
the desire to talk with you

I’ve been dreaming of you nearly every night,
reminded that you are now more than alive
let the reality of heaven steal away the gloom
the empty moments where I miss you
The knowledge of your state produces a
joy greater than pain
a fragrant contentment like the scent of your
leftover laundry detergent

Our apartment is now home to your old
windowsill plants,
They traveled with you from arlington to amissville,
back to arlington with me and soon to amissville
again they will be
Irony is alive in this life,
we go from child to later become childlike,
with the weakening of bones and the
deterioration of strength
You had so much fear but you
held fast to your faith

I believe I learned how to truly pray because of
my prayers with you
kneeling down beside your bedroom chair,
holding your hands in mine
hearing the heaviness of your lungs pulling in
a breath, and the most holy name rolling off of your lips
you would whisper his name “Jesus, Jesus”
you said his name like a friend,
like the comforter he is
and I would pray as your whispers became the chorus,
God let us see beyond circumstance
let us trust beyond capacity
let us be near to You more than anything

I learned that prayers when you are sorrowful,
prayers when you are sick, can be uttered with
desperation and met with surpassing peace
Just say the name, “Jesus, Jesus”

When you were overwhelmed with suffering,
body fighting the pull of death
My mother said that just as entering the earth is painful,
so is leaving it

The difference here is that the life to come after
won’t be one of peaks, highs and lows
No, the life that is to come is incomparable
I think God uses contrasts
He shows us the darkest pit to reveal the truth
of the most glorious heaven

On the night that you left,
my terrified anger mellowed out into a deep trust,
my husband said that we could do one of two things;
question why a good god would allow suffering like this
or thank our good god that it doesn’t end like this

Thank you Lord that this is not the end
Thank you Lord that you said “Come to me
weary and burdened, and I will give you rest”
We are weary and burdened, you will give us rest
She was weary and burdened,
you took her from this life to the next,
The heavens are rejoicing and
every sweet memory declares your sovereignty

Wait no more

I have waited for the day where my words are not of you
where these letters stop outlining your ribcage, your collarbones, your side swept smile, your freckled eye, your calloused finger tips, your curved spine when you lean off of the steps with your head in your hands
I have waited for the time where my identity fills out my own desires
like crisp, smooth imperfect books lined up with their
covers faded but impeccably intact

I have tried to mold myself, make myself into something
amiable and honest
I have attempted to redefine these empty parts
instead of just labeling them dark and leaving them alone

There will never be a day where my words are not of you
where these letters don’t form a silhouette around each memory I have of you

I hate the way this ends
when it ends
when will it end, again

ripple effect

Why do the sounds make their own emotions,
ripple effect and creeping notions?
Who gave them personality, and riddled these notes
with sorrow, sadness, and grieving

Who took the noise and made it into song,
my voice stands unclean in a sea
of salty tears and breaking glass bottles and
brevity never seemed so subtle before

And who made beautiful into bittersweet syllables,
like you know that beauty entails more than sight
it takes a part all of your senses
smell, touch, and hearing

So I ask, why do the sounds make their own emotions,
like there aren’t enough feelings already going around
and who decided that this beauty would
forever be crisply coating my insides
all of my organs are laced with faint sorrow
derived from the beautiful, that is tart on its own now

When will my words ever make sense,
cohesive. together, and lacking mess
I’ve made a mess of all emotion
taking hope and smothering it in reality
taking love and wrapping it in sanity

When I make my love into a monument
will you stand tall to reach the top of it
when I make my heart irrelevant
will you be there to grab a hold of it

Great

I once wanted to be great,
and here I am in this position
to decide for myself and breathe on my own
and pick up my arms like bags of skin and bones

I once wanted to be free
and here I am waiting with the water
up to my knees

And these are the to-do lists that will make up my entirety
oh, I’ve got worries- worried to the brim of my heart and conscience
but I once wanted to be great and to be free

And if this is not free, then what is?
if freedom does not taste like the world on your lips
like travel and new beginnings
if freedom does not smell like summertime and Sundays
then freedom must not be what I wanted to begin with

I won’t always be free- it will go thin and thick but
I will always know joy- sometimes as my heart knows it and others like a distant friend..
but tell me this,
is joy not when you can laugh
deep, unheard of smile
deep, washed to the core I am
joyful

These declarations might seem shallow
but for so long I’ve been bound up by my sorrow
and I am still
sorrowful
but the difference now is joy
there is a difference between sorrow with joy
and sorrow with sadness
sorrowful sadness that tastes bitter and sweet,
falsely identified like sugar in a faded box of candies

And there are a thousand decisions that I have not yet made
and a thousand more that I will hate
but I know now that these things are temporary and for some reason my mind cannot stray
too far from eternity

I once wanted to be great
and the sky that has now been broken by rain
the sun that has furrowed and frowned on its golden face
has brought to me again
this desire to be great
and to be near to Greatness
and to be in love with vitality
to be in love with living
to be in love with words and language
to be in love with company
to be in love with solitude
to be in love with rhythm set to lyrics and altered by voice
to be in love with creating and making
to be in love with freedom

I’ve always wanted to be great
not for heightened pride, not for praise
only to know in my deepest thought
that there is passion and meaningful living
within my feet, bag of bones
stitched together like a puzzle,
and when one has been made for greatness
how could we want anything other than to be
full, and whole, and together

Let my lips speak life,
let my heart know worth
let my desires be pure
let my hope be held together
by this greatness

I once wanted
to be great

should I gather

guess I should gather my thoughts
should I gather up anything at all

we’ve all been told too many things,
that aren’t valid or of meaning

take everything: silk garments and empty cans
leave nothing
canvas striped green and in my head it should have been
different
and you’d think I’d get tired of anxiety
but no my mind keeps telling me-
feed me with your worries
drench me in your shame
lock me up inside your darkest times
inside your fear and wring your damned hands

over and over again

feed my with deceptions
drench me in complaints
lock me up inside your night terrors
inside your black loveliness and wring your damned hands

over and over again

I’ll fight back with what some would say is optimism
but if anything, it is an unavoidable hope
there’s something about knowing truth
there’s something about holding it close

sometimes we’ll gather together
we’ll laugh and grit our teeth-
only when the other is looking away
only when they can’t see me

but sounds carry and visions don’t
your vision escapes me-
why can’t I find some type of balance
why can’t I find a hint of peace

lift your eyes, lift your chin
I’ll take your hands and
chapped lips
lift your eyes, lift your head
it’s not easy for me too, ya know.

unavoidable hope turned into tendency,
a tendency to fall and get back up again
WHY would you attach negative connotations to your hope
only because the truth brings so much contradiction
only because the truth highlights friction
only because the truth means progression
means lighting your own desires and again putting them out
and figuring which way is up and where in this place is down

repeat

only because the truth means this sorrow is real and, correction- IS REALITY
only because the truth means I have lost and wait, AM I LOSING
only because the truth means I might lose you too
only because the truth means
means
means
means
my words are dust but dust can shine beneath the SON

my only vitality is in-
what I have found to be the truth
And in this truth, alone.

and this gathering of thoughts
amounts to nothing at all
because again I am lost
and thrown out of sorts
because we’ve got bombs going off and
then there are the others who are just sad

and before I wrote this, I wasn’t even thinking of that

but if the truth brings all of this, does that mean it’s false too
mixed up by calamity, It’d be easier to deny righteousness
but I can deny nothing that weighs heavy like this on my heart
I can deny nothing that carries my soul out of dark

LEADING back to my initial goal
to let go of these ideas and nothing more
relax and breathe a little
syntax,diction,allusion,creation,
exposure,contrast,hue,debate
whether this life that is coming up is cut out for you
is this life that is coming up allowed to be taken one segment at a time?

push my tongue to the roof of my mouth
grit my teeth and think of the

laugh
the laugh your grandfather yells out at the t.v.
at one in the morning on a saturday evening
the laugh that claims all ideology and future anxieties
throws them to the ground and proclaims
I can have peace.

san francisco: days four and five

wednesday:
(I’d ruined my “secret return” to san francisco)
I don’t have much time so these words will be quick,
a bus ride to broadway street to visit the beat museum
and a thank you to the man there who showed that there can be passion
from bethesda to san francisco,
you can get up and go
find something you love and follow through.
a visit to city lights bookstore
(but instead I bounced drunk into his City Lights bookshop at the height of a saturday night business)
a walk from chinatown (while hiding in the alleys with bums and then marching forth into north beach)
to embarcadero,
shared a chocolate macaroon with myself on
the pier, watching the bay bridge and the water
and i realize again,
that it’s alright to be alone
a muni ride back to soma and a trip to the market
barbeque chicken never tasted so good

thursday:
among many other things,
i happened to eat a chocolate croissant the size of my head

friday:
today,
i write in a panic because of my soon departure to monterey for the night.
big sur tomorrow and here we go,

(One fast move or i’m gone’ so I jump up, do my headstand first to pump blood back into the hairy brain, take a shower in the hall, new T-shirt and socks and underwear, pack vigorously, hoist the rucksack and run out throwing the key on the desk and hit the cold street and walk fast to the nearest little grocery store to buy two days of food, stick it in the rucksack, hike thru lost alleys of Russian sorrow where bums sit head on knees in foggy doorways in the goopy eerie city night I’ve got to escape or die, and into the bus station- in a half hour into a bus seat, the bus says “Monterey” and off we go down the clean neon hiway and I sleep all the way, waking up amazed and well again smelling sea air the bus driver shaking me “End of line, Monterey.” – and by God it is Monterey.)

(Big Sur by Jack Keouac)

projection

image: digital photography with a physical projection on the model, katelyn rebelo.

what’s inside of me?
a whole world to see
and we’ll joke about all of the places, we’d rather be
what’s inside of me?
a student will stand, claim another grievance
why can’t we all be friends?

what’s inside of me?
a whole world to see
and we’ll waste away with images all over us
but never inside of us

take a part your sorrows with your hands,
leave them out for your angels to consume for dinner,
or your demons to say, “i’m here for you, sinner.”

what’s inside of me?
an eager await for the next page
that provides a slow claim over my future
but I don’t want to be corroded by these things
what else could be inside of me?

see, it takes a while to feel again
after you’ve kept yourself from feeling at all
because there’s not much time to settle and really discover
there’s really no time to create anything at all

we’re here one afternoon, and gone away with the night
but there’s something inside of me
that’s fascinated, by vast open spaces
and hearts carried by hollow bones, and long faces

and music, too sweet to be let go of
what’s inside of me
something more than I can feed
something more than words and repeated christenings

this was intended to be about adventure
and things like maps and compasses and the grand canyon
and hiking mountains

like most things, it’s become overwhelming
but i’ve got something inside of me that’s
craving and crying, saying “don’t let go of me”
because it gets boring, being sad
it gets heavy, being mad
it gets me going, this anxiety
it gets me wrong, i’ve had enough of these things

so here is the adventure- i was talking about,
here is the freedom, i can see it,
not for long
but for now

what’s inside me?
project it onto me
what’s beside me?
let me feel everything

lately…

I have found myself in a lot of exciting situations. I normally don’t address an audience in my blog but this time I’d like to document a couple of things I’ve been a part of…

Bittersweet Zine, Winter 2013 Issue!

Last Fall I was given the opportunity to do a photo essay for Bittersweet’s Zine on Defending Human Rights, I was super excited to be asked to do another shoot early January for their next issue focusing on Economic Empowerment. After a few trips to H Street, I ended up with a documentary style shoot that is featured on the cover and page 10 of the Zine that was released last week. See it here: http://btrswtzine.uberflip.com/i/107616/0

Scholastic Art and Writing Competition 2013!

After submitting 2 art portfolios and 4 single photos to the Scholastic Art Competition, I was awarded a Gold Key for my art portfolio, “In The Air”, and a single image, “In the Stacks”. I also received two silver keys for individual photos.

For the writing division, I received two silver keys for my poetry and was chosen to be published, along with 54 other writers, in this years issue of DC’s Best Teen Writing. I spent yesterday in DC with a group of students editing and creating the book itself. It will be released on March 19th and available for sale on Amazon and a few bookstores!

Bittersweet Photos:

Scholastic Photos:

Published Poem:

Raw Feet

oddly numb behind my aspirations tonight
oddly terrified of the upcoming weeks
of christmas time and lights and these things that used
to be so sweet

greatly involved in my own mind
in my heart I can see your smile
and in my bones I can feel the way
our raw feet used to slap the cold concrete
on grandmother’s front porch
imagining they were all
out to get us
and now we don’t have to pretend
now we choose not to hide
but only indulge ourselves in this place
much similar to a beehive.
(say it like this: bee h-ive)

and I can taste in my mouth the tart reminder
of loss and what else can I say
of it

my legs covered in black cloth and my chest soaked in an ocean blue,
everything only lasts for a moment
the moment is present and soon far away
but my existence is a gathering of these segments
mixed up and bound by yarn, clothes-pins, and photographs
with rounded edges

my reflection becomes unreal, forming a two dimensional excuse
to move and watch the shadows change the pigment of my face
and I feel my bones again,
raw feet slapping the cold concrete.

raw feet

oddly numb behind my aspirations tonight
oddly terrified of the upcoming weeks
of christmas time and lights and these things that used
to be so sweet
greatly involved in my own mind
in my heart i can see your smile
and in my bones i can feel the way
our raw feet used to slap the cold concrete
on grandmother’s front porch
imagining they were all
out to get us
and now we don’t have to pretend
now we choose not to hide
but only indulge ourselves in this place
much similar to a beehive.
(say it like this- bee high-ve)

and i can taste in my mouth the tart reminder
of loss and what else can i say
of it

my reflection becomes unreal, forming a two dimensional excuse
to move and watch the shadows change the pigment of my face
and i feel my bones again,
raw feet slapping the cold concrete.

LOUD

this is loud,meant to be spoken, like this: SHOUT
this is a to do list, written in ambiguous form
centered by my obsessive
passionate, altogether
lunatic
desires!
SHOUT
this is to be crafted by my own
hands and lips and heart
caved in and carved out by my own
fingernails, and to be left tart
like unripened blackberries off of the bush
mind says: it’s winter time!
and there are only glass bulbs in the trees,
no fruit, no life, no nourishment
but here i am, i come LOUDLY
SHOUTING
because of the plastic chair i have sat in,
and the tile hallways i have walked in
reciting poetry in my head
like the lunatic
like the obsessive, disabled, sorrowful, corroded, alive,
and insightful
full of Camus’ stranger
full of heartfelt characters
that i daydream of
why are the lights blinking, who ever thought of this mode “twinkling”
white lights, white lies
and late night
rampage of my
incessant, obnoxious, surrendering, and altogether
anxious mind

SHOUT
label me lonely,
label me wholly! involved in persecuting ideals
cross my heart with craning necks of bitterness
but i will not stay here, i will only sleep here for the night

the walk that i take from the swinging, thick doors
to my car, red box, littered with ants on my thrown away yogurt can
lasts a life time, lined with desperate steps
held in breaths
what is a day that goes by
with thoughts that make real life
a false reality within
seeping, and soaked up stems

SHOUT

a thousand times

a short stop motion with a spontaneous recording layered onto it. consists of about 98 frames repeated 5 times to enhance the meaning of the song, “say I love you a thousand times.”

falling people

unintentionally adjourned my own sorrow,
dove into a tragedy that could never be forgotten, not today nor tomorrow
and it was covered in smoke and billowing clouds
dressed up in people, the colors of ours

i did not mean to open this door,
would have closed it but now i know more
this is where god becomes real to me
in the falling people and catastrophe

i play mind games all day long
my heart tugs at these filtering thoughts
fall into obsession with image and possession
of a history so plastered with loss

and this is when god becomes real to me
in the echoes of despair and despondency
in the trapped mysteries and wanderings
how can He not be true,
what else would there be
keeping me a part from death and the dark
from spilling out of my own skin

it takes heaviness to feel a difference,
and this difference I am desperate to know
i travel through numbness and awe,
passion and i am stripped now, i am raw

but this is where my god becomes true to me,
inescapable and unfaltering
stack me up against falling buildings and ideology
my god has never been so real to me

tangible and whole,
i am incomplete and alone
merciful and strong,
i am bitter and wrong

stack me up against falling buildings and falling people
up against stealing sadness and sores
up against ache and mystery
His love is enough for me

i can no longer hold,
all of these weights in my hands
dragging around me, are my burning stars and
bottled up sand
can no longer break,
or become more broken
stack me up against heat and rising trials
cut off relationships and empty miles
nothing will cause me to believe
that my god is inadequate,
that He is not enough for me.

honest

I have let myself become consumed by this bed
swallowed whole and looking at photographs
honest, I wish I had taken them myself
I crave images and noise like a hunger
five years ago from today,
I fell into a trap, unknowingly

blanketed in sorrow that has left me
with anxious reactions and a capacity
I am unable to handle
weight
honest, I never seem to know where I am going,
I wonder if I would not be here if you still were.

these past few days I have stayed in one place
even when I no longer held a purpose-
looking around myself, I have become aware
growing out of this town and becoming scared

I am exhausted of this cycle,
of doing and doing and never being
of writing and writing and never seeing
of loving and loving and never finding
of breathing and breathing and never feeling
whole or pure or perfected

I am not hopeless, but I know fear
honest, I am not doubting greater belief
but I am surrounded by small things
and grand thoughts
that I am unable to express
in this orange box

my bedroom walls know me well,
read me like a magazine
they know every page, every fold of my body
they know every thought and desire inside of me
honest, they’ve got me all worked up
mocking my insanity, testing me with irony.
coward and corroding

my bedroom walls play show and tell,
reveal my emotions like a favorite toy
first comes loneliness, then abundant passion
to do more than type up my identity
to become more than a simple entity

honest, I don’t know where I am going with this
I hold no grand scheme or hypothesis
I began looking at photographs,
I ended up here in this mess
leaving these passages open ended-
falling asleep to silence and the eyes of my bedroom walls
I will only be alone when I feel nothing at all

Middleburg

<p><a href=”http://vimeo.com/50799935″>middleburg</a> from <a href=”http://vimeo.com/user12739646″>lissy tropea</a> on <a href=”http://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>

a quick stop-motion film I made. Layered one of my poems “Confinement” onto it, along with Karen O & The Kid’s “The Food is Still Hot”.

child

in the face of a child
i find myself helpless
confronted by innocence, and she shows me how tainted
i have let me life become
tainted by selfishness and anxiety
by heartbreak and relationship,
i find myself complex and irritated
but in the face of a child
i am shown that this life still has something to offer
and by the grace of god that all of the grown have somehow forgotten
we are free.
i am hurt by disbelief
i am broken by sorrow
i am twisted by change,
she tells me a secret
and i will never forget it,
knowing that every whisper holds a truth,
and that in the face of a child
i can find purpose,
confronted by innocence
i will shake this stain and bitterness

BITTERSWEET BENEFIT

Come out to Chez Billy (3815 Georgia Ave. NW. Washington, DC. 20011) this friday, October 12th, to take a stand against child-sex trafficking in DC! From 7:30-10 we will gather to support organizations working against sex trafficking. Get a free issue of Bittersweet’s Fall Zine, listen to a spoken word piece, and view local art for sale! All proceeds benefit the organizations, check out http://www.bittersweetzine.com/2012/10/oct-12-bittersweet-benefit/ for more information!

I will be selling cyanotypes of the images I contributed to this issue of the Zine. Hope you all are able to make it out!

confinement

everything within me wants to claim its independence
independent guilt, independent belief, independent love and anger
everything within me wants to spill out onto this carpeted floor
wants to let go of hope and faith and all things good
everything within me wants to crawl up from the bottom of my spine,
make you change your mind,
so exhausted from these tragic feelings, gathering up in spite of my will to be joyous
everything within me wants to spend, spend all time all effort
I cannot continue to live like this
cannot continue to watch my life drown like this
for weeks now I have felt that same thing lingering,
like a scar I cannot shake
I stumble over these thoughts like pages in a book needed to be read, but never understood
can you understand me now?
can you see my estranged hands pulling and pulling on the outskirts of
these hopeful encounters and inspiring images
trying to squeeze the life out of them,
swallow the last drops of redemption and
soak up any goodness left

pressed by time and duty
i can handle no responsibility
again and again i have met myself here,
this place lacking cooperation and
everything within me wants to pour into a glass
gathered and together, finally.. at last.