shapeshifter.

sometimes i see myself and think, wow that looks nothing like me.

potluck.

last night, i caught a glimpse of family.

our words were gusts of wind, pushing each other back up and blasting away the grime of worry we had all collected.

we danced in the living room. our limbs moved like the spirit within them.

there was no space left in my chest for love, so it exploded. they picked up every piece and placed it back in me.

i love them. i love them all.

snow trails.

when i was little you used to put me on the back of your snowmobile and ryan on the back of mom's and we would ride the trails around mattawan. we rode mostly under the power lines behind our neighborhood because it's a straight-away laced with small hills. we felt as though we were flying every few seconds. i used to sing school songs to myself while we were flying. i didn't think you could hear me at the time. but i could make out your mumbling over the zinging motor, so maybe you were listening to my songs. maybe you heard me as i recycled the phrase: i love my dad, i love my dad, i love my dad.

motor home.

it's my dream, i say.

my friend says, all we need is a nice camera and about twenty-eight thousand dollars.

but how will we get the money? i ask. we'll both be in debt up to our ears.

they won't be able to find us if we're one the road all the time, she says.

i say, they definitely won't be able to find us if we're dead. let's get some death certificates and release our student loans, hang low for ten years then smack, break out our footage of traveling all over north america. and to make money we'll take odd jobs like drifters do. you know, washing dishes for a meal or helping an elderly coupld move firewood for a hot shower.

who does that? asks my friend.

american nomads, i say. i think they exist. or maybe they're just called homeless people. i saw it on mtv once. but, when will we be able to visit our families?

whenever we want, she says. we will be lawless.

i don't think i could ever be that free, i say. lawlessness scares me.

me too. i want kids and a house and a dog, she says.

i know, me too, i say. but i would do it, though.

i know, she says.

that would be amazing, though.

i know.

click click.

i imagined today that people are like gears.

aristophanes tells a story of the original three sexes: male, female, and androgynous-each with four arms, four legs, and spherical. every person was cut in half to restrain us. so, he suggests that this is the reason we spend our entire lives looking for our soul mates, looking for another person to complete us and make us whole again.

all of that jerry macguire shit about one person completing another is bull. i am a whole person on my own.

maybe it's not about finding a person who "completes" me. maybe it's just about finding another gear, slightly rusted and imperfect in places that mirror my own broken pieces. and together we will fit in our brokenness.

and we will click click click.

the be in.

i don't know how to write about losing.

i can write all of the letters i want.
sing all of the hymns and folk songs i know.
i could build an army of pissed off people.
teach them to fight, hit a target three countries away.
i could starve myself, kill myself.
i could be ghandi.
i could use faith books as weapons.
and cut off their heads with my tongue.

or, i could love them.

gaga.

one day lady gaga will rule the world.

i will have to learn to walk in stilettos. and the propaganda of the media will surround the latest brand of bubble wrap.

i'm not coordinated enough to be a background dancer.

oh, shit.

blarg.

endings suck.

few loose ends are ever tied.

they blow in the wind and
smack
my face.

and endings travel in packs.

like a group of girls
who can't handle the mystery
of the bathroom
alone.

she called me today and told me she did it, too.

but the truth of mass is constant.
when i am squeezed from one place,
i must go somewhere else.

seattle.
holland's ends are slappin'
and i am out of here.

rosette nebula.

he says, we need to find the distance between our eyes and the angle to this object to find out how far away it is.

i nod.

he says, otherwise we're just looking at pretty pictures.

what's wrong with that? i say.

he says, we're scientists.

why can't i be the kind of scientist who just appreciates the beauty for what it is? i say.

i think you're in the wrong place, he says.

why no I.

i don't use capital i's.

english is one of the few languages that teaches the capitalization of i.

german ich
spanish yo
dutch ik
polish ja
and it's no secret we're one of the most self-serving, materialistic cultures in the world. these two things must be abstractly correlated.

how can i serve others when my i capitalize "i" and not "you" or "us?"

one thing is certain.
i will spend the rest of my life fighting the urge to press the shift key.

tree people.

dear everyone reading,
(which is probably no one.)

i have just decided i am moving into the woods and never coming back.

i will meet some nice tree people. learn their ways.
we will solve all of the problems in the world.
we will cure cancer with our hands.
we will learn solutions to world peace that satisfy every person.
we will know the truth from the stories.
we will understand the presence of all things.

now, you might think i would come back eventually. share the cures and truth and peace with the world i knew before.
but by this time, i've forgotten about that world.
or i am too scared to return,
knowing full well they would hang me.

it's not that the tree people don't care about you.

we just know you will never understand
until you go into the woods and never come back.

old old song.

i cannot sit down.
i cannot breathe. they won't let me live
in my own body.
sit down, they say.
sit down and listen to what we know.
breathe deep our words,
our hate.
i cannot sit down.
my legs will not fold that way.

mental block.

what is it about her? this mental block that she has no fucking clue how wrong she is? i don't know.

my mother.
oh, my mother.

she's been brainwashed.

i have no idea how it happened either because i've known her since she birthed me. does she just want to feel as though she always has the answer? every answer in one book? imagine that. every question you have ever had is clear cut and dry and in a portable book. i imagine that would feel nice. comforting. i can see why she holds onto it so tightly.

but to her, people fighting for their rights is the same thing as infringing upon hers.

seems to be there is a whole lot of "othering" going on here. the majority pushing a minority group away, saying “those people over there who do these things that I would never do,” instead of embracing the differences and focusing on the things that connect us each as humans.

i don't know much of anything, but i do know this: physical, verbal, emotional, and spiritual violence against another person silences them. i also know that sometimes people are silenced just because the person in charge of the microphone never hands it over. they filibuster the shit out of their privilege.

what causes one person to silence another? the privileged person in me says the fear of losing something, the fear of my privileges leaving because the status of owning the upper hand disappears if everyone has it. the minority in me says the same thing in a defeatist voice.

i guess it must be true if my white/middle class and queer/woman insides are in agreement.

theme: silencing comes from the majority's fear of losing control or bringing themselves “down” a level if they choose to treat others as they would like to be treated.

wait.
that last part sounds familiar.

ten commandments, anyone?
bueller?
bueller?

i wonder if she knows that moving past ignorance and towards tolerance is a christian mandate. i also wonder if it would make any bit of difference to her.

it's scary when people can't see outside of themselves. it's some scary shit, man.

restless.

my stomach has been hurting for two days. that sort of dull ache that feels like i either need to eat or yak, but i'm never sure which. ew. gross.

i just feel so damn restless.

i don't know how everything is going to turn out this semester. the concert. the be in. the board meeting.

it's 4:50 am and i still haven't gone to bed. my mind won't stop about all of this. what if this happens? what if this really happens? what if the policy is lifted? i wouldn't know what to do with myself.

god.

i need to meditate for an hour each morning. i need to fast. i need to be in the moment.

but my head is already in seattle. the semester is over for me and we have three weeks to go. but i want to be here. my mind already got on that plane, though. it's probably sitting with Bo in the backyard, barking at all of the fuckers walking by.

my heart isn't here. it hasn't been for a long time. i'm not sure where it went. maybe i left it in philadelphia. maybe it, too, is waiting for me in seattle. god only knows where it is now.

i want to be in a place with its arms out, ready to embrace. or even with hands on hips. heck, i'd take dangling arms at this point. just anything but crossed arms or limbs shoving away. that's all we get here. that's all we get.

basically, i need to dance.

grab the portable pole. i'm gone.

child.

it's 1:06 am and i am sitting in a large circular room by myself. a rotunda. oh, so rotund.

i am going through my facebook notes.
and i wish right now more than ever that i could go back and meet my former self, little freshman lindsay, and just hug her. i would hug her and hold her and tell her that pain is on the way. but so is unbelievable joy. and accomplishment. i would tell her that she is capable of anything. she is capable of pushing away the ones she loves the most. she is capable of healing. she is capable of things people will tell her over and over she cannot do.

more than all of that, i would tell her that she's beautiful and loved. i would tell her that it's not her, it's the world. the culture is to blame. it's nothing you did wrong, child. none of this is your fault. smile. please, smile. it will all get better soon.

it comes off in patches. (2.15.09)

it's the worst pain i've known
growing into myself.
so many bones broken
from word boulders
shot with hate catapults.
arms tired, muscles aching
trembling from peeling away
layers of expectation
and normal.
it comes off in patches
closer than my skin.
it rips, i bleed
and know that i will heal
in rough patches of scars.
the tissue will trail out
and remind me of the way stars
glittered the night
i asked God to break me--
the darkness where i said:
i don't need you to build me a path,
only let your light guide me
through dense fields of
honesty and invention,
veracity and falsehood
to touch the core of you.
to see the face of God.

those people.

i don't have a problem with those people as long as they aren't kissing and groping each other in public, my mother says.

i say, do you feel that way about everyone?

yes, says my mother.

why don't you say that about straight couples?

my mother says, we're not talking about them.

we're talking about people, i say.