Preliminary BS

Hello, Elaeri.

Hey. What's up? Do I know you?

No. But I want to know you.

That's got to be one of the most straight-forward lesbianic pickup lines I've ever heard.

Oh, come on. That's not what I meant.

Sure it's not. What, does the bandanna make me look too dykey? Is it the cutoffs? The ill-fitting sweatshirt? The biker tattoo, chain-greased onto my scabby, too-thick leg?

I've never heard anyone describe their legs as being "too thick."

Well, come on! Look at them. They should be longer. The rest of me is long. It's like during puberty I was growing at a perfectly normal rate above the torso while everything below remained in 4th-grade proportion.

That's not true. Are you always this hard on yourself?

Yeah, I tend to be. Well, if you're a girl that looks and acts like I do, you generally have to be hard on yourself. It's like a defense mechanism against the truly horrible things people decide they just have to fucking say to you. I mean, I've been teased my whole life. Even in college. If it's not the thickness of my legs, then it's the pockmarks on my face, and if it's not those things then it's "oh-she-must-be-a-dyke-because-she-doesn't-act-like-your-traditional-airheaded-broad" and on and on and so forth. I know I'm not good-looking. I know I don't have a whole lot going for me in the whole personality department, either. I'm just a tragic failure at this "human being" thing. I swear, if someone did a DNA diagnostic on me, or whatever the fuck you wanna call it, I'm no science major, they'd find out that I'm not even really a homo sapien. I've never felt like one, that's for damn sure.

The good news is that I never have either. In fact, your general outlook on things - namely yourself - seems to be strikingly similar to my own. I mean, my own about myself. Not about you.

You better not be talking shit about me already. We just started talking.

I know, I know. Look. I need to know who you are, what you look like, what you think about, what you believe in, what keeps you up at night, where you are, where you wish you were...y'know, the whole nine yards and all of that crap.

And why is that?

To put it simply, you're my main character. And I need to know you - like truly, fully, really, in every respect know you - if I'm going to write about you. Or rather write as you, because you're just going to have to be my narrator and all of that. Okay?

Uh...slow down a sec, chief. Why exactly is it that I get stuck being your narrator? I never signed up for this shit. And honestly, being a narrator sounds like it's way more work than I'm willing to do pro bono. Because I'm sure as hell that you aren't going to pay me a red cent to provide my first-personly perspective on everything. Isn't that right?

This isn't about the money, Elaeri! It's about the clarity of the artistic vision and all of that happy altruistic shit. Come on. You're all I've got in a lot of ways, y'know?

Don't dump the Morey shit on me just yet, guv. We've barely even met.

Well, we don't need to really meet, do we? I mean, I know I've been initiating this whole love-in, share-in thing, right, but I think I know the truth about you. As in, the most fundamental, crucial truth. And would you like to know what that is?

Not particularly, but I'm sure you're going to tell me.

You, Elaeri Endwell, are me. You are simply just me. You are Turquoise. I'll just leave it at Turquoise for now because heaven and hell both know we don't need to go broadcasting my real name all over this stupid blog that no one looks at anyway. I mean, we're not going to be like perfect clones of one another or anything like that. Not that there is such a thing as a perfect clone anyway...but yeah, I digress. Um, so, you're me. The writing writer and all of that. And your circumstances are going to be just a little bit weird, and you're going to develop this strange ability that's going to severely fuck up and maybe even marginally improve your life, and --

Whoa. Hold the phone, chica. You're saying that we're basically the same person, and that this literally makes me nothing more than a figment of your fucked-up imagination?!

Uh, yeah. Maybe not in so many words, but...yeah. I invented you. You've been with me for a while. I don't know how long; as long as there's been a first-person narrator in the shit that I write. I don't know when I started doing that. Middle school, maybe.

And this narrator of yours...she's always been me?

In some form or another. I think the whole "Elaeri Endwell" name-change was fairly recent. You were June Lanegan before that for a long while.

So what prompted the change?

Well, your parents were hippie-artists now and all of that, so they had to give you this really creative outlandish name to help carry on their drugged-up legacy. And I think the last name is just that subtle dash of symbolic foreshadowing that will ultimately protect you from being eviscerated at any point in the foreseeable future. So you can thank me for that last bit.

Consider yourself thanked. Man. This is all kind of heavy.

Yeah, I'd think finding out that you were the figment of someone else's imagination would be a little hard to digest. But look. You have a lot of reality about you, too. I mean, you're almost entirely based on me. I've tweaked a few things to make you more interesting, like the whole parent stuff...and nothing else is really coming to mind at the moment, but I haven't fully drawn you out yet, either.

What's there to draw if I'm essentially just you? Do we have all of the same favorites? Do I have a bizarre preference for the color blue? Am I an even more religious devotee to peanut butter?

Uh...wait a minute. How'd you know that?

I think the whole you-are-me-I-am-you thing works both ways, doc.

Oh, and that's another way in which you're going to be different. You're going to have the ability to be sharp-witted and jivey without making much of an effort. It's going to be natural for you. You're going to have all sorts of cute, clever little dialogic (I don't think that's a word, and Firefox is in agreement with me there, but I'm using it anyway) nuances at your fingertips. Or maybe your tongue-tips, or tip...yeah, that kinda fell through. Whatever. You know what I mean.

Am I a better, faster, stronger version of Turquoise, then?

Not really. I'm going to almost-fatally-but-not-quite flaw you. Can you use "flaw" as a verb? You can now. And of course I have some of my own AFBNQ flaws. And you'll probably wind up exhibiting some of those throughout the duration of your existence, too.

Oh, hurray, flaws! I can never get enough of those. As if my legs and my face don't have enough between them already...

I think you can stop it with the whole "taking it out on yourself for not being a robotically-engineered beauty" shit, too.

Why? You do it all the time, if I'm not mistaken about what it says here.

So? I'm the author. I make the decisions...wait. What do you mean, "what it says here?"

I don't know. It just slipped out. Look, forget it. Um. So what did you want to know about me when you sat down to type all this shit out?

Hm. I guess I really just wanted to know if you'd be okay with developing the ability to kill people by simply speaking to them. Well, after you've distinctly uttered twenty-five words to them, that is.

Oh, wowie! Just what I always wanted! A quick-fix means of eliminating my enemies and people who just generally piss me off! I'd be more than okay with it, actually. No sarcasm. Seriously.

Well...there's a catch.

There's always at least one.

The catch is, you can't control it. Like, you can't decide who dies after you say twenty-five words to them and who doesn't. Everyone you say twenty-five words to will die. It's just that simple. Well, later on in the storyline, I'm planning to have at least one person who's immune to that show up, but for right now, no one has immunity. Everyone you give more than the time of day to shall perish. On the spot. With no traceable cause of death. Au naturale, if you will.

Um, well, jeez. That sounds kind of lame. And burdensome. I think I'll pass after all.

Hm. I guess I shouldn't have made it sound like you have any choice in the matter, huh?

WHAT?! Are you saying that you're just going to do this to me, and there isn't a damn thing I can do to stop you? Well, yeah, dumbass! Why the fuck did you ask me for my opinion in the first place? Do you know how hard it's going to be for me to get a job now?!

Ugh. Look, Elaeri, I'm sorry I momentarily made it sound like you had a choice. But you don't! This is the whole crux of my story, the whole nexus of the damn thing! I need you to do this for me and to be a good narrator and a protagonist that the reader will want to sit down and dine with at least once or twice. I need you to be brain-pickable. And I need you to be able to kill people by just uttering twenty-five words in their general direction! Is that really so much to ask for?

YES! YES IT IS! It's way more than what I signed up for!

Wait...wait. You signed up for something?

Uh, no. I guess I didn't. Well, not literally. But I materialized here when you started typing this all out, and I guess that materialization was like my wordless consent to conversing with you, or something. Whatever! The point is that I didn't think this little chit-chat of ours would devolve into...into this! Into me randomly developing this ability to vanquish people with just...just words! Did it occur to you that speaking is a fundamental part of being human?!

Correct me if I'm wrong, here, El, but I'm pretty sure you said you weren't human anyway.

I did? Oh...yeah, I did. Well...come on, Turquoise. You don't really expect me to do this. You can't. Right? Uh...oh, fuck, man! I don't know! Work with me!

I'm sorry, Elaeri. But this is how it is. You're my protag. My narrator. And you need to kill people with the power of speech.

So "Enjoy the Silence" by Depeche Mode must be my new personal theme song, right?

It must be. I'm afraid it can be no other way.

...Alright. Fine. I guess you have to come to terms with the shit you can't change, or whatever that Irish prayer thing is that you see on old ladies' doormats. That serenity B.S. You know.

Yes. I know.

Could you at least explain to me why I developed this new ability of mine? Is there some kind of freaky accident? Do I get struck by alien lightning? I mean, I need an origin story and all of that happy-crappy, don't I?

Quite frankly, Elaeri, I don't know why you can do it. I'm hoping I'll figure this out at some point. But of course I don't even really need a reason as to why you'll be able to take people out with nothing more than your words. You know why?

Why?

Because I'm the author.

You're the decider.

Right. I decide what's right for this book.

Good Dubya impression there.

Thanks.

Um, look. Can I go now? I mean, I need to acclimate to this whole new "superpower" shit and all of that. Maybe I'll meditate or start getting into hard drugs or blow my fucking brains out or something.

I'd prefer it if you went with the "or something." Well, meditation would be fine, I s'pose. Just don't get too blissed out 'cause I'm gonna come a-knockin' again pretty soon.

Great. That's really encouraging. Well, uh, I look forward to, um, seeing you again and all that.

Right. Smashing. So are we all set then?

Yeah. We're on the same fucking page, man.

Groovy. Later days.

Mm. Bye.

Headache

I can feel the low pressure system
sitting on my heavy head
like a leaden weight thrown down
from the no-fly zone sky
out of some spy plane passing by,
undetected by everyone
but unfortunately prone little me.
I can feel my skull throb,
feel something like my very brain
shoving against the walls
of its lacquered white skull-prison -
that damn tooth-clenched
migraine smash has slipped a hand
down past my medulla and
pinched pain into my nervy neck;
it takes control of incisors
and drives them deep into tongue,
pumps paralysis to limbs
too tired and unguided to move...
I can feel myself giving in,
caving in to that quarter-desire,
seventy-five percent need
to bury myself in the warm dark
found face-down in pillows,
to cover my quivering sore self
with sheet after sheet until
that lancing flame cut thru brain
is smothered and forgotten;
until that weight is gone, thrown
back up to from wherever it came.

Brought to you by the LiveJournal Haiku Meme

unknown body of
water. we talked about
things this semester.

have to get my hopes
up. nothing like that, but i'm
still going to write.

he gets home after
i get into bed. i have
my evenings back.

what i ate at lunch -
i'm yet to figure that out,
before or after.

stolen expensive
hotel breakfast. let me tell
you in next week's...

Unsequined

Now that my floor is nearly clean
of all its filth-fuzz imperfections,
I feel like I should be dancing on it -
it's almost bowling alley-smooth;
it's so utterly without grain or grime
that every time I put my feet down,
I have the urge to pirhouette,
to triple-lutz like my quasi-famous
former figure skater of a third cousin,
but I squelch it.

I bottle up the need
because I'm not at all sequined; no,
instead I'm wrapped up in a hoodie
adorned with hot chocolate stains,
characterized by seven months
of constant daily over-wearing,
and if I started sliding around here
like the fucking Sugarplum Fairy,
I'd no doubt instantly trip over
the stretched-out cuffs of my pajamas
and hit the cool, fine-textured tiles
as hard as I just scrubbed them,
and what would be the fun in that?
Someone would find me in the morning,
languishing in a sticky pool of my blood,
and all my hard housekeeping work
would be for absolutely NAUGHT! -
and we can't be having that, can we?

No, we can't,
and that means I'll settle
for sitting rigid and squished at this desk
and ever so often running a tentative toe
across the unblemished dancing-ground
that now exists in here, all around me.

Leavings (hyper-draft)

So he fucking left this morning. It's OK. Really. I'm not too upset.
It's not like we're breaking up. It's not like he's being sent half a world away
to some underdeveloped oil-rich country to fight for a cause he doesn't believe in.
No, he's only going to the mountains, to this state's unbridled, lush forests,
to a land still so barely tainted by pavements and roads and homes and infrastructure,
so he can learn how to "range." Yeah, right, whatever the hell that means...

Anyway, he left me here at school with a broad bubble of silence
that burst as soon as he shut the door and snuck off down the hall -
and it unfurled a foul fume that filled this room the fuck up,
and it's choking me now, eighteen hours later - it's just as lethal, just as lingering,
and the crazy-ass assortment of songs my computer's been shuffling through
are helping to abate it, but not much. The off-handed comments I'm saying to no one,
yeah, they clear the smog for seconds at a time, sure. Never for too long, though.

Shit. You know what? You never notice the little things when the person you love
is around to distract you from them. You never notice how much shit is stuck,
deeply tucked beneath your fingernails, which you wish would stop growing.
You never realize that your bed has stayed unmade for at least a month
and that those sheets have been on there for way longer than Oprah recommends.
You never really think about the need to sweep or to scrub the sink or clear the floor;
you never give a second thought to any part of the room you wake up in every day
because none of that stuff is even remotely detectable when you're not alone.

So all of this - the drab dirtiness of this sad little dormitory, the smothering silence -
it's not making this any easier, but it's not awful. Solitude can suffocate you,
but it can also help you see clearly; it can help you define certain things,
like what needs to be done tomorrow, or what can or won't be done today;
it can make you appreciate that mystifying, blind-siding togetherness for what it is,
or what I make of it: a damn good distraction from the horrors of housekeeping.

The Law of the Bald Villain

According to the comic books,
sinister thoughts thrive inside
the hairless heads, but why?
Because of the brunette cowlick
that dangles in the blue eyes
of our airborne all-American hero?
Because we'd have it no other way?
Because shaved scalp = skinhead?
Because it reminds us of braves
who brought their broad knees down
on the backs of blameless pilgrims
and cut long forehead-arcs
and pulled back on the hair
to pry away a grisly prize?
Is it unpatriotic to be bald?
Does it make men evil?
And what about women?
If I took a razor to my locks
and lopped every last one off,
would my head quickly fill up
with mad plots and schemes
to crush this city or country
or even the entire planet?
Are my follicles the one thing
keeping me from kidnapping
the mayor's obnoxious child
or from wiring City Hall
with complex explosives?
Do they stop me from aiming
a custom death-ray at the Sun?
So, if that's true, tell me
why I should stay my hand.
Why not cut my hair off
and lay waste to this land?

I'm back?

Wow. So I haven't posted anything on here since December. Well, that's OK. I've been spending most of my time over at LiveJournal, but as of late, I've sort of lost the will to post anything there. Therefore, I'm re-reverting to the Bloggerland. And I've got a whole new intention for this thing.

Well, in retrospect, it's actually not new at all. I think it was my original intent for this...but it never came to fruition. Maybe this time it will. After all, I am closing in on the end of this damnable academic year, and that may mean I'll actually have the time and the intellectual capital to make something out of this. (I hope that's the right "capital." I always forget which one is which.)

Anyway, lately I've been trying to de-conventionalize, if you will, the way that I write. I feel that my journalism classes have made me much more rule-savvy and syntax-compliant than I'd like to be, and it's having the result of squashing some of my best ideas before they can even truly emerge from the depths of my mental primordial soup. Therefore, I want to practice knocking those conventional walls down and capitalize on my desire to do so. And that is what I fully intend to do here.

I'll probably primarily stick to poetry, as that particular mode of expression has suited me best throughout the past month and a half or so. When paging through some of the stuff I've written lately, I tend to get perplexed by my own lack of definite voice or style - and I've noticed that it seems to be because I'm too concerned with making things prosaic. Which is, of course, ridiculous, because I'm supposed to be writing poems! AAH. I wonder if anyone is following this. I barely am myself.

Whatever. To make a long story short, this blog is going to be a sketchbook of sorts. I'm just trying to see if it's possible for me to drop the unnecessary conventions and fly free of the "journalistic" trappings that prevent me from engaging in a FULL-ON ARTISTIC REVOLUTION! So, without further ado, I close this post so that I may start another one, one which will consist of my first attempt at this bulldozing, as it were.

Woosh!