every time i believe myself knowledgable, the universe reminds me that most dynamically I am nothing. humility is my favorite feeling because is a more rare moment can also acknowledge being proud of myself. my favorite questions leave me speechless. i've heard my own inquiries in such a loop they've transcended music back into static. i melt at intentional interrogation. i hate asinine considerations. we HAVE had this conversation several times in a few dimensions.
every day feels here & more every day. when i go to bed at night, i'm gratefully aware of the minor gravities i've traversed. the new rhythm is more ambient. i am less in my own way. here i'll mention i was a repressed child. i'm a more distilled woman. a concentrate of "cool whatever". I eat more. still a chore. I've chosen to not be silent about it.
I almost can't believe people walk around feeling like this. a regular. nothing more human than projecting. i wonder why I haven't been asked which tortilla i prefer. i haven't thought of my preference since naming it, months ago. I forget to inform of its importance. But wasting food is an old trick & I deserve to eat now. there are other shortcomings on my plate but generosity is sazon completa. Mother goose eats a rainbow & these days are soundtracked by Luther Vandross & the best of 2019 lists. my memories tell me butternut squash isn't pumpkin but orange is still one of my favorite colors.
revisiting proto-selves has been sweeping me in sadness. a decade ago, i wanted nothing more than to be legendary & dead. prodigy turned untapped potential. the song still tugs at my heartstrings. the chorus of "at any moment now". now, every moment has a beat & my best friend says i look less wild in the eyes. a decade ago there was nothing behind my eyes. every word i recorded i wanted as evidence i thought for myself. i'm still.
i needed Audacity to get me to this place but i am ecstatic to shed some of my bombastic predisposition. i am still TS Black Romantic, will still venture land, sea & multiverse, to tell you to believe in love. i drama up reasons to dance in the mirrors.
i think i've bullied myself into thinking i needed to write a memoir. I can't sleep with sensationalists. there is no world i live in where my story won't be reduced to shallow talking points. with my poems, i know i place them so high in the stratosphere the average reader can't tell the difference between cumulus clouds or cephalopods.
the other night i ate mussels in front of "a man i love". not to be confused with "the man i love". i've been laughing at the choice of supper. my father & I love mussels. this man is a father. there is a daddy issue somewhere. mostly my consistent inclination to not lie to fathers like some act of confession. I'll omit, singsong, allude, but never do i lie. never had a face i wanted to save. there is something i get by letting men think they are seeing, tasting my brine, shell, & tendon. i needed to eat. i needed to think aloud. he was the first person i told about my latest fear. i love being able to afford company.
the word of the week is performative. one of the more formidable concepts i studied for my "sociology" degree was Goffman's theory of the presentation of self. the theatrically tinged rhetoric includes understandings of "front-stage" & "back-stage" selves. the "front-stage" being an intentionally observable realm, where we produce & reproduce gestures with each other & various facets of society at large. "backstage" than the interior mechanisms at play. where the emotional rigs & movable set pieces reside. some misunderstand the "front-stage" as a mask but actors appear on stage with masks. it is not a question of what is hidden but how the obscured keeps the production going.
in my archival footage, my mask looks like my face, superimposed on a wild clown understudying a trapeze artist with no net. my "front-stage" was filled with set chewing soliloquies all with the subtext of "save me". the only thing that breaks my heart over again is reviving this production to the gain of uncritical praise. the most fantastic thing about my life up to this point is that i haven't squeezed it for all its salacious characterizations. my peers have varying levels of success telling truth vs. living it. least especially there is no safe way to tell you my story.
my poems have been called memoir so often, I feel like my memoir would be an obituary & i don't wanna die like that (anymore). each of my productions used to feature a funeral. now they always include a club night. i haven't been able to write a poem since starting hormones. i have at least [redacted] until i have to worry about that. i even have a plan. projected projects. i have so much more now & future. i decide how to fall out of sync. to be aligned.