Ashen

The sadness doesn't really pass because the storm has gone.
Now the sun shines brightly and burns its mark onto my pale skin
I am still afraid to walk into the light, to be among others.

The scars on the outside are long gone though it itches,
beneath the skin, beneath the China wall of protection;
the organs on the inside, once reliable turns to liquid.

The pillars are no more yet they believe in sodden limestone;
the chalk of my heart now can only draw crooked lines.
The protective circles, the ghost's mandala has lost all magic.

When she holds my hand; the suffering old woman,
there is a bit of me who wants to hang on, to try and heal;
and then the moon falls and sun rises and I turn to ash.

(November 4, 2006)

once upon a thursday

i hung out with my friend jeremy in the city on thursday evening and friday evening because he will be leaving california to go back to michigan soon so we were all over the place getting him prepared for his drive home and having fun while at it...

you can see the rest of the photos from this adventure here!

Jeudi Matin

Thursday comes
with the influence
of grey clouds
and heaven's tears.

It is autumn
so the slow
dallying drizzle
completes a picture

and settles
my expectations
to the mood
of an earthy Autumn.

(November, 2006)

from my "yet to be lost writings"

"24 Feb, 2006. 21:06h

Sometimes I miss her.

I miss the conversations we used to have. Sometimes I hear music and the universe we shared comes back into my mind the way air fills empty space. Sometimes the melodies are footsteps that I hear in the core of my being. When I turn my eyes to see the person they belong to all I can find are whispers of the dust that has been disturbed. There was no one in physical form. There are the ghost reflections of my mind. There are reflections in space of the person who once stood right where my mind imagined her to be.

I close my eyes, take a deep breath and bring her scent, her ethereal presence into my lungs and for a moment, breathe the air of paradise lost."

in the genes

so i had the bright idea to send my aunt in france a message yesterday asking if my father wrote much, especially poetry when he was alive and if she might have any of his notebooks or journals.

she replied to me that if he did, she never received any of it. however, she said he did have a gift with language – something that i have seemed to inherited. i didn't have any expectations but was a little saddened. how great it would be if any of his notebooks survived and i could read them.

alors, at least i got some of the good genes...

Prospecting

The machine pulls at the earth
the way my tie pulls at my neck.

Both want something but can’t agree
on what is more valuable,

the blood of the living
or the fossil of the dead.

Kitchen Knives

Eight of Swords

5" x 7" watercolor and graphite on paper, 2006.

Kitchen Knives
by Christine Boyka Kluge

On the counter,
a forest of knives quivers,
vertical trunks burnished
and joined with brass.
They keep their dangerous mirrors
hidden.
Twisting pointed blades
in the butcher block stand,
they anticipate the grip
of your unwary hand
as you lift
your silver face
from the dark narrow slot.
You glimpse your own pale eye—
glimmering,
looking up like a lost blue star
from the sharp edge
of your tiny universe.

--

about the eight of swords: A woman is tied and blindfolded within a cage of swords. This is the "damned if you do, damned if you don't," card. The Querent is in a situation where they're afraid to move. If they move, they'll get cut. However, the ropes that bind them, the blindfold over their eyes, are their own fears, keeping them still, immobile. And so the longer they stay, the more they constrain and entrap themselves. Ever been in a situation where you're afraid to say anything, so afraid that you second guess yourself, end up saying nothing, tying yourself in knots? But speaking up is going to get you cut to ribbons? That's this card. The Querent must have the strength to endure the cuts, else they'll stay trapped. They must move, for the longer they let the situation continue, the worse it will get.
(source: aeclectic tarot)

Birthday

Morning's arrival was accompanied by cold.
The first dawn of the season when my bones
hummed the density of chilled violet air.

Apropos it was, it caused wonder in my head;
what events and intersections would reveal in this day?
I started a painting of a dying girl just in case.

Watching the transparent pigment lose themselves
in the field of scratchy divots had a certain comfort;
viridian green, cadmium yellow and always ochre.

Watching the pools dry, not unlike dewed grass
receiving the life of sky's golden orb; the warmth,
what looks so rough wet finishes like molten dunes.

As the sun rose above the neighbor's eaves,
I pulled myself away from the desk to make tea.
Walking downstairs into the empty great room

I found a metaphor of my entrance into my next chapter.
These new pages aren't acid balanced; have no guarantee,
but patiently i wait while tea brews, inhaling the fragrance.

October 28, 2006

dream journal: oct 29

last night i had a dream that i was watching an old man in prison.

it was of another time perhaps. he was old. he sat on the floor of his cell atop the strewn straw. he made little trinkets to be sold, perhaps to repay a debt for why he was in prison. i could not tell if i was in the same cell or in another one or just invisible. it was like being in some other place as an observer where no one could see me and i could not affect the situation.

it saddened me.

the trinkets seemed to be maltese crosses cut of tin or aluminum. the edges were rough, burn. they had wires that could stand themselves up or be hung. before waking, i felt very upset because he was gone. perhaps taken away.

i felt a strong sense of injustice. i remember muttering in my waking side that he would be lost among a thousand unknown faces and be forgotten.

i woke up with tears in my eyes.

En Prête? (2006)

There was a time when things felt different.
The oddity of light coming through
curtains disturbing silent fibers

brought about a sense of wonderment.
My eyes morphed into a child’s;
my knowledge replaced by curiosity.

It was a glow that comes faster
than Gabriel’s note, Hermes’s letter.
Now, glories of annunciation have gone,

replaced with “Is it time to go?”
I’m ready in this flesh and liquid of crimson;
only my mind is hesitant, like a loon in circles.

Then the writing on my palms say,
“Are you ready? The boatman awaits.
You must leave regrets here, your sadness too.”

It is time to go, I hear Rachmaninoff.
The piece found in a Scottish winter;
let it come, replace this earth bound vessel.

Mirage (2006)

It is another cold moment in the autumn night.
There are nightbirds and moths flickering outside

the dark window trying to get in.
(Why would creatures that could fly even

choose incandescent light over
phosphorus points on this earth’s ceiling?)

He stares at the semi-reflections on the window
trying to see past the double panes of memory.

Images present aren’t discernable between
objects in the distance or reflections behind him.

Behind him in his mind is not a physical distance
but frayed remnants of emotional wakes.

Traces (2006)

There are melodies deep in my heart
Somewhere in the past, she put them there.

There are memories in my vision
Of southern France, she placed them there.

There are verses in my book,
She put them there in Alexandria.

She keeps for me lines
In red silk.

She holds for me
faces of a past I have forgotten.

She shapes for me faces
In a future that has yet to come.

Réveiller

Since I saw a certain picture an idea that has been stumbling around in my head...


Reveiller (Octover 29, 2006)

Early in the cool autumn morning
my senses not yet functioning,
she brings me a platter of fruit

with a cup of jasmine tea.
The white blossom's aroma
assault the lingering sleep in me.

Her gentle hand on the back of my neck
stirs something deep inside,
taking me back to an undiscovered country.

The mind's eye tries to trip the shutter
like a camera needing a tripod.
The skin's raw nerves try to grip

the sensation like a mantis holding prey.
a streak of light from the vertical blinds
find a spot on my face, crossing my pupils.

Morning's luminosity push me from the fake death,
stirs my reality, forces focus and I find
myself alone clutching an unfamiliar silken scarf.

Ophelia

click on image to see it larger

watercolor and graphite on watercolor paper. 5" x7". 2006.

she came into my mind this morning. i don't know where from...

this is what 40 looks like

i woke up actually feeling refreshed from the best sleep i've had in weeks.

had strange dreams last night. the last one before i woke up involved me going to las vegas on a triste with someone else's wife (it seemed like an ex-girlfriend perhaps) while she was on a business trip and i was tagging along, as it were. i remember limousines, a very nice hotel room, her conference guide (it had something to do with graphic design) and me shedding my suit and tie for a t-shirt, jeans, expensive shoes and an extraordinarily heavy jacket after we had sex and were headed down to the conference floor.

strange huh?

the rest of the day was pretty low key. i got out of bed early and started a painting of a maiden. the maiden started in a standing position but ended lying on her back and eventually turned into hamlet's ophelia.

grandma brought by brunch as she headed to the senior center and said she'd come back to pick me up to go hang out. there was a pyrex of pepper roasted chicken drumsticks and a fresh loaf of sourdough baguette. it was a wonderful feast, something so simple yet dear from the hands that made them.


at 13h45 she and lien picked me up and we headed to stanford. she was determined that i get a haircut and was willing to take me all the way to palo alto to the person i prefer. so we spent the afternoon hanging out in stanford and then i got a haircut and then came home.

quiet. oddly quiet day.

now it is late and as i try to distill the day i am finding it a much easier task than i could have imagined. i can't say why. i just know that i didn't make it anymore difficult on myself as i needed to.

perhaps i have learned some things...

40

i turn 40 on saturday...

it's now eight minutes before midnight. you would figure that for someone who loves words as i do that i would have something significant to say about turning 40, huh?

no. i've nothing to say. at least not now. perhaps i'll do it in hindsight and by then i'll have the advantage of being a tad older. maybe that will be enough for me to impart some shred of wisdom.

maybe. you can hold your breath.

i am not going to...

the history of light

watercolor and pencil on watercolor paper. 5" x 7", 2006.

for anesh

the poem below is something that i've found to think about on the day before my birthday...

Field Guide to the Night Sky
by Jennifer Chang

No one witnesses
the history of light.
The sky litters itself
with dust and I’m unsettled
by the steadfast burn
of thinking.
The night sky reaches
inside me,
I am sleepless
waiting for each star
to cross
into its corner, flower
then dim.
I do not believe
in paradise:
to flower, then dim.

Hi Miss...

ok, so i go out this morning for brunch and shopping with my grandma looking just like this which is nothing out of the ordinary. but obviously something has changed because today i got an unprecdented numbers of "hi, miss" than ever before. i mean ever before.

now, i'm used to getting mistaken for a girl when i have long hair (which it is not even long right now) a lot and it doesn't bother me. but usually it is once maybe twice a day, today for three hours in a mall everyone i came into contact with except for two (male salespeople in the calvin klein and some other store figured i had to be a guy as i was looking at men's clothing) stared me right in the eye, smiled then said, "hi miss!" they even said goodbye, "have a great day miss!" what the???

when i lived in the deep south, the girls i hung out with laughed caused i got more cat calls than they did. that was understandable cause my hair was really long and i'm little. of course then there was that time jamie's grandmother thought i was his wife's girlfriend but anyway i've never gone out for a whole morning in a crowded public place and have everyone think i was a girl.

perhaps it's because i lost some weight from being sick and my face is a little different? i don't know what to think. i don't think i'm getting a complex about it. all of you readers say yes please!

i just don't know!!! ;p

end of life

i could not sleep so i picked up the pad and a pencil and she revealed herself from the depths of my fatigue and insomnia.

this is the poem i wrote after i finished the sketch. i edited it this morning and thought they should go together:

END OF LIFE (oct. 26, 2006)

it comes not with surprise
nor with fanfares of brass.
it is more like a season;

the centered calmness of autumn.
quiet gentle slopes sheathed in leaves;
sheathed in quieting noises
that wrap like a gentle repose
descending over the detritus of
summer's extravagance;
summer's vibrant spectra.

it comes not in malice raucous
but in a rustle of twigs, leaves and feathers.
it is an awaited sensation;

the shy touch of intimacy,
silky stretches beneath terminal sheets
undulating like a sleepy caterpillar
anticipating the chrysalis,
expecting the drunkenness of
autumn's frugality;
autumn's monochromatic tones.

end of life does not argue,
does not try to make explanations.
end of life seeps like soothing cold
finding no resistance in tired tissues.

lying on toadstools

the quilted pillow i'm laying on was made and given to me by the woman who was my nanny when i was a little kid. she lives in vietnam.

Terminal
by Sylvia Plath

Riding home from credulous blue domes,
the dreamer reins his waking appetite
in panic at the crop of catacombs
sprung up like plague of toadstools overnight:
refectories where he reveled have become
the holstery of worms, rapacious blades
who weave within the skeleton's white womb
a caviare decay of rich brocades.

Turning the tables of this grave gourmet,
the fiendish butler saunters in and serves
for feast the sweetest meat of hell's chef d' uvres:
his own pale bride upon a flaming tray:
parsleyed with elegies, she lies in state
waiting for his grace to consecrate.