this craziness

what is this life?

be true.

think ive realized

a life lived in love is a life in which you can be broken or hurt.
and trying not to be hurt, to be cold feels so good.
but think it's already happened- lots can get to me, and cut.

to be full of You,
your joyful and unceasing love,
to delight in
and to give away, freely.

...i am grateful for late nights, and conversation.

it is yearning that makes the heart deep.
- augustine

figuring out where i'm supposed to be-
my heavenly

i wonder

if we were to take everyone's hearts,
how beautiful or ugly a person's would be.

i wonder what mine really looks like.

tonight

my depravity makes me sad.
really, really sad.

i think God is gracious though.
lets things be better than they ought to be.

but it still makes me sad.
i hate it.
very much.
but most of the time: not enough.

esther's adventures in manhattan

makes a date with someone
is happy
wakes up late
looks at her phone, groans
missed calls
sometimes is ashamed
and tries to go to sleep again
thinks about not calling back/copping out.
i hope this will not happen tomorrow.
i also hope this is not the person i will be.

on another note,
i would like to fill my life with decent people. mm.
good to see a high school friend today, and to talk with an elementary school friend.
they are, decent people. more than that, kind, make me think, people.
i feel rich- very much so.

who'd be your desert island five? woah. hard. maybe not something to think about.
good night,

prolific writing-

i've been looking for this poem all my life.
okay, on and off, for about three years.


this gentleman came to the iowa writing workshop when i was there [junior year of high school], talked about writing and poetry, and read this poem. i remember thinking that he was extremely intelligent, and precise, and softspoken. a bit metaphysical, but very human.
i wish i had written to him and asked him for this, because it hadn't been published yet-
but here. i think i listened to it, and was electrified. it has to be spoken out loud, perhaps only in his timbre- reading it now to myself, i can't quite get the same effect. and this may be hallucination, but i think he said this originated from an image, or another poem, of two men in a holocaust camp, looking up at a wire, a bird dancing upon it.
______

Twittering Machine
by dan beachy-quick

I see I must rewire the Twittering Machine
Whose song was lightning
when lightning-struck—
And then sang singe, sang smoke: elect

-ric elegy, perpetual elegy, the fuse
That fused syllable to
sound is blown, is
Blown, and now the dry-throat on noting

Nothing drowns. The gold-sheathed wire
Soldered to star
sang both the star
’s celestial thread that fretting through

The night kept the night a needle-width
Undone, and sang
yellow the yellow
Thread unmending the sundress wife kept

In closet December-long. And longer:
Through darker months
none could name, none
Name—since, ever since, that star whose light

Powered the Twittering Machine’s ever-song
Died, was always dead,
though nightly seen,
Is still seen, cold but brilliant overhead. The gold

-sheathed wire withered, tangent to the moon.
Now a fungal-wire aches
down cemeteries
To find a decaying song. Earth-battery—

It winds the dynamo by a ceaseless, clock-
Work turn, clock-
wise turn,
But the Twittering Machine refuses song.

No, no—not refuse, not refuse. We’ve rewired
The mechanism. Stars
are silent, trustless:
They lock the dark vault they seem to pierce.

Music of the spheres? buzz, no test-pattern,
Program cancelled, shut.
Now one dark talon
Sheathed in darkness drops unseen from sky

And scratches the earth as the earth turns.
Do you hear that sound
of gravel on gravel
Grinding? That music is our music now.

________

more, i like reading his writing, the way he articulates his thoughts. he loves philosophy, and i think it shows. from an interview:

4. Who are some of your favorite non-Anglo-American writers? Why?

...Another influence, though quite different, was in studying the Blues tradition in America, from slaves’ field hollers to juke joints of the Mississippi Delta to the City Blues of Chicago. I love the way in which one musician would hear another play, take a lyric or a lick from him, and incorporate that into another song. That expanding voice of Anonymity unfolding in each individual mouth moves me greatly, and seems, in my mind, to parallel how tradition functions in poetry. This ties back, actually, to the question about philosophy—for it’s just as Seneca said when writing letters to his young Stoic. He’d often end a letter with a quote from his philosophic nemesis Epicurus, and say something to the effect of: “You ask me why I mention his words? Because what is true is everyone’s.”

HEY,

LIFE. haha.

there is a singular joy in being near one who feels loved, completely and fully, with nothing more to ask. ...that is how i felt last night, watching my grandmother as she drifted off to sleep, coming awake now and then to ask funny, sporadic questions, but finally, sleeping, a smile playing on her lips, and forehead smooth and free from anxiety at last. it was from the deep knowledge and assurance that she was loved by her children and grandchildren, and how rich and lucky she felt because of that. but more than that, like a child, she took with complete and unfailing trust our love and that we would be there when she woke up. ....she was giving herself up to us, asking her to take care of her, with perfect confidence that we wouldn't let her down.

it sounds trite and oversentimental, because i cannot do it justice, but i think it was one of the best moments of my life. sitting there by her side, just taking it in. it was pure feeling. i think i caught a bit of that swelling a parent must feel in his heart when he looks at his child, as he is going to sleep. how big it makes you feel- and how small, at the same time. and perhaps of what God desires us so much to do, in relation to him.

for perfect love casts out fear.

i guess

that post down there would be a lot more normal if it had been about the boy of my dreams.
...yeah, i doubt if i could have had another dream make me so deeply content.

my brain hurts right now, but i want to do something worthy and beautiful. sort of realizing now the ways in which i'm so unequipped, unskilled to do anything, really, or even, what i actually want to do- but...i'll try now.
yup.
20 years. maybe i should start capitalizing. a smattering of interests and experiences, with a lot of undeveloped leads. ...a lot of undeveloped leads. all i can think is, i should have taken more time, and care. but 'tis okay, cause it's never too late.
dude, writing makes me happy.
the minutes and hours after 11 or 12 make me feel like its filler time til reality starts again: hazy, slow time that doesn't actually count as part of my life: so i think i don't really need to be responsible or think about what i'm doing. truth? false.

and, great hair. more importantly, a great person: jay. president of SYG


(he saw the picture: "woah! that's crazier than i thought.")

last night,

i had a beautiful dream about this young boy i met, and was supposed to take care of for some reason. i think, he loved the Lord, even though he was not yet grown, or maybe it was just that when we spoke, we understood each other. and we each listened. he was very good, i think, and sweet, and that made me happy inside. i remember sunlight and yellow school buses, like it was a summer camp. i hope i meet a kid like that in real life one day. and when i do, because i've written it down here, i'll remember and tell him that i've finally met the boy in my dream.