Madeleine - Sarah Slean

Madeleine
Shall her story end?
With this aftermath music,
My broken French?
Heal her, if you can
Pray the lions aren’t waiting
Take her hand
I want to be brave,
I want to be brave
But the night goes up in flames
The courage we need
A fury to tame
This madness, madness, madness
No more,will I count the dead
Bending gathering words
I should have said
When the night falls
It scrapes its knees
We watch the houses on fire
And she says to me
I want to be brave, I want to be brave
But I don’t think I’ll love again
The dark is so deep
I’ve lost my way
In this madness, madness, madness
Over time, luck runs out
And fate is not your friend
Over time, good must go
And are we safe, safe yet?
Madeleine,
Can I escape again?
Out of a dragonfly jar
Am I safe yet?

-Sarah Slean

Bar Song 5

It's a fast world :
"Where you from?"
We speed along.
Make you run so fast you can't focus on-
And the worst is, no one changed my mind.
The best is I still get all your time
So if we're in love, I suppose,
I'm out of here before I get too close

I think we should, we should, we should be together. I try to love you like you've never pushed me around.
I think we should, we should, we should be together.
With you, I could slow dance anywhere I go.

I used to write childrens stories.
I once wrote one about land where you had to purchase your names, letter by letter. And a girl who couldn't afford a name.

On that note, bar song four is here!

Bar Song Five
Decked in his navy pinstripe suit, which he always fancied himself quite dashing in, George drove to pick up Don for car pool to work.
Don, similarly decked, provided as much stimulating converstation as Beth had.
This was fortunate. A good thing about Don has always been his ablility to hold an entire conversation by himself.
Had Don not been so absorbed in his own highly amusing and slightly obscene tale regarding his wife and a hair dryer, he may have actually asked George a question, to which George would have had to answer.
So, as it was, Don prattled on and George drove on, thinking about her, and how he should not be thinking about her.
So absorbed was he, by thoughts of not thinking, that he failed to stop at the stopsign at Maple and Third.
Needless to sat, and with fate being what it is, the one sign he ignores is the one he shouldn't have. Isn't that the way it always is?

The resulting crash would not have been so catastrophic had he hitten, oh say, another car, instead of, once again fate being what it is, of the child on a bike.

The ear tearing scrap of metal on much smaller metal wasn't so bad. George could've handled that.
It was the sickening, solid thump of a body hitting the ground that was the worst.
Don stopped talking. George sat behind the wheel, his eyes hut tight, and fingers gripping the wheel for dear life.

Seconds pass.

George unbuckled his seatbelt and opened the car door. The dinging telling him his door was obviously open (a feature George always noted to be fairly useless) matched his thoughts.

"Damn damn damn damn damn damn damn damn damn damn..."

He looked at the bike first. Blue and yellow and....
small.
Deep breath.
The body.

I know you are but what am I

1. Although you do not approve of my choices, and although I respect that, I appreciate you a) not talking about it in a rude manner and b) respecting me enough to let me make them, and not calling me [dumb bitch] over them. Good? Good.

2. I thought, when i saw you yesterday,






what did i think?
Not what happened, for certain.

As if seeing you wasn't enough of a shock.

Imagine my surprise to find that, like me, you had grown as a person.
I should have realized.
Thank you.
Thank you for giving me space yesterday.
Thank you for, if judging, keeping it to yourself.
Thank you for not condemning me, or joining as others did [dumb bitch]


3. I have a problem with that.
Peoples words.
What people say about me.
It's all very well and good to say
"Oh don't worry about it, they don't know me"
But
it's very well another thing entirely doing so.
[dumb bitch]
People's words hurt me. Way more than I show it.
That's why I'm so loud, so aggresive when it comes to these things.
I may be talked about, I may be watched and whispered about.
But I will not let it go without a fight.
Even when I walk home early
because I can't stand the idea of crying at school,
of breaking down in front of everyone.
[dumb bitch]

Why / Still / You

Why does my heart skip a beat still?
Still.
Still, after so long,
somehow you still
still
take my breathe away.

No.
That's to harsh a way to say it.

You smile.
And I smile.
And everything clinging to my mind
my heart
my soul
my weary body
slides gently away,
leaving me smaller
quieter.

If I was a Buddhist,
you'd be my transcendence.

How I can hear a song
still
still, and think of you
and those many nights
of gibberish
and sentiment
Of stolen moments, and the "ohhh" feeling, when somehow,
still,
you take me by surprise
and all my air just seems to hitch, then start again,
a little different from before.

You're a medical disaster waiting to happen.
You're the phone as it vibrates in time to the music
late at night
when my eyes are glued shut
and my heart is in my lower intestines.
You're the sunlight that pokes it way through my
dark brown curtains in the morning.
You're a shower after a long walk.
You're the song that hushes me, when little else does.
You are that moment when
one sentences
one stray thought
makes everything fall into place.

You're the reason for my grumbles and my inexplicable love poetry.

Good grief

STRESS

Math pilot exam today, part one of two, did not go well.
How was I supposed to know I needed both days cheat sheet on the one day?

Bio test tomorrow.

English test Thursday.

Tomorrow is choir/chamber choir concert.

Thursday Friday is Arts in the Park.
(The weather is to be warm and sunny at least!)

I have essays to write
and assignments to catch up on.
People to deal with and console.

I just don't want to deal with anything

ESPECIALLY
because friday I got sucker punched with the stomach flu.
Beautiful right?

This weekend I work friday 11pm-7am and saturday 11pm-7am

...joy.

New layout btw. I can't stand when things stay the same for too long.

Have a great week guys =)

"Wake up Sleepy Jean, oh what can it mean, to a
day dream believer"

Aint it the truth

Never let go of that idea, that ideal

Maybe mornings there are more bareable

Easy to take apart, hard to put back together.

Never lose the key

♥

When will you come home
and hold me close again;
Tell me that it's going to be alright after all.
When will we fall back together,

with the ease that we fell apart

Not even sure, what that is, what that will be

You make it feel okay to be how I am;
to be who I am

Who would you call, dear readers?

Part II

all pictures by me

May 15th, and May16th are oddly absent.
I failed to write that day

May 17th

Sing me/ Sometimes brave from your mouth

Maybe I didn't belong there fully
[don't]
but a piece of my aches for it.
Calls for it in loud brave tones.

I am not a deb.

I am me.

A writer. A storyteller?

I did learn about myself there. I did.
About family.
About being alone.
About storytelling.
About words and stories in general.

I learned it's okay to be alone, if you're okay with yourself.

from the first day on the beach, to my final lonely walk
i learnedsometimes, it's okay to be what other people want
-- as long as you remain yourself.

I scrubbed with pink fragrant soap.

The kind he hates.

AND I LIKED THE SMELL. I ALWAYS HAVE.

and i like the Dixie Chicks sometimes too.

I'm sorry you made me forget that.

Present day


As some of you know, I am one fourth Arabic.
I read a book recently.
In Arabian Nights, A caravan of Moroccan dreams.
This book changed my life. I want everyone to buy it, borrow it, get it, READ IT.

It talks about finding the story of your heart.

And it tells in it, wrapped around a central plot of humor and self discovery, a true story following a man in Casablanca.
And in it, are many stories I've heard or faintly recall from my grandfather.

I'll relate one for you.

There were once three men, all of whom wanted fruit though none of them had ever seen any, since it was very rare in their country.
It so happened that they all traveled in search of this almost unknown thing called fruit. And it also happened that, at about the same time, each one found his way to a fruit tree.
The first man was heedless. He got to a fruit tree, but had spent so much time thinking about the directions that he failed to recognize the fruit.
His journey was wasted.
The second man was a fool, who took things very literally. When he saw that all the fruit on the tree was past it's best, he said: "Well, I've seen fruit, and I don't like rotten things, so that is the end of the fruit as far as I am concerned."
He went on his way, and his journey was wasted.
The third man was wise. He picked up some of the fruit and examined it. After some thought, and racking his brains to remember all the possibilities about this uneatable delicacy, he found that inside each fruit there was stone.
Once he knew that this stone was seed, all he had to do was to plant and tend the growth, and wait for -- fruit.

Janina Ballerina - I am not your rolling wheels, I am the highway

I'm home.

BOOKS I BOUGHT ON MY TRAVELS:
Animal Farm - George Orwell
Lady Oracle - Margaret Atwood (novel)
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie - Alan Bradley
The Gargoyle - Andrew Davidson

May 10th

I'm high above the world, or part of it at least.
Below, someone has mowed
HARPER
in large clumsy capitals in a field.

I imagine telling you about it.

I drink my third cup of coffee.
It's eight am. I've been up since 330am

My eyes are sandy, and "Blaziflor Et Helena" switches to "Gives You Hell."

She loves this song.

And I'm flying towards her.
Though, I won't see her.
The idea, the nearness is a comfort though.
And him?

"& truth be told, I miss you. & truth be told, I'm lying"

"Better luck tomorrow."
I whisper
as I shoo his ghost away.

May 11th

"looks like we're heading for a crash landing, like songs that say goodbye"

This place reflects me.
And today,
it's less lonely than I thought it would be.

At Night I was no less
[no more]
fitfull than usual.
But I didn't reach out for you, or your voice.
I reached within.
And I would drift off again,
knowing better than to reach out again for you.

I awoke as if hungover,
with a blistering bursting headache,
and my tongue felt furry.

Damn jetlag.

I showered.
I threw up.
I slept again.
I woke up
and you were barely there.

I saw you once today,
while in a book shop.
While in peace
but right now, perched on a quilt, in socks too big,
the sun finally appearing,
I'm good thanks.
You've been so quick to leave my system:
Are you just weak?
or am I stronger this time 'round?

*

Near the ocean
but not quite there yet.
24+hours here.
Why do I feel such trepidation?
It's water.
It doesn't know me.
Cannot judge me.
I think.
God, it's green here.
This place is so small town.
I feel the people my age looking at me.
What an oddity I must be.
They don't know me either.
I'm small town too.
I think.
I guess here
I'm a big city girl
impressed with the "novelties"
that make up their everyday.
I don't belong here with the locals.
I should be with the tourists.
I don't belong here
[not alone]

*

No one's love comes close to yours
Nothings what it was before.
My eyes are heavy
and my heart is sore.

*

I found a coffee shop, on a lonely walk with no purpose.
It's called the "Cha C'ha Java"

It's quiet. It's fun. It reminds me of Winnipeg.
I had a coffee.
I resolved to take a book with me next time I come.





May 13th
Raining.
I've learned something --
just because you love a place,
doesn't mean you belong there.
For that matter,
just because you love someone,
doesn't mean you belong together.
Or, even,
you don't always love what you need or belong to (belong with)
Sometimes it takes time, patience.
You just need to acknowledge that feeling, that voice that says:
ahhhhhhh
Need to know what it sounds like, that this feels different, because it is different




May 14th
Sunday Morning by Maroon 5 was the first song to play when I put my iPod on random.

"Back and forth/ we sway/ like branches in a storm."

I can still smell the ocean on me.
In my hair? No.
Feet? Hands? No.
It shall remain a mystery.
[in my heart?]

*

I am not a doll.
Nor am I a lady
British
Dainty
Proper
Quiet demur ivory fine chine
I am not a painting.

I never did much like playing tea party when I was little.
Maybe on occasion.
But not often. Not really.

Now, playing debutant or,
Proper Victorian British Lady
[ i think this the most fitting analogy]
i am smothered.

I've drunk countless and endless cups of tea
[only two sugars allowed]
ankles crossed, both feet on the ground [!!!!!!!!!!!!]

If I hear once more
"how pretty she is!"
"oh she looks so much like her mother!"
"oh Anna, you must be so proud of have such a lovely granddaughter!"
I will chuck this hand painted fine china at the wall
and grind my scone into the carpet.
As it is,
I smile charmingly, demure.
Lay my spoon on the saucer the way I've been taught
[Perpendicular to my body, behind the tea cup]
I endure my grandmother, whom I love dearly
adjusting my shirt
wiping my face
always being at my elbow.

I love her and spending time with her
but this is too much too many days in a row.

And now,
there is nothing I value more then my hour or two at night,
when I go for my walks alone.
In which I am,
as best I can,
young flirtatious and above all,
free.




That's all for now, I'll post more later!
(I took 1000+ pictures. I'm still sorting though them all. But all the pictures today are mine, from this past week)

Last post for a week

The Jar - Susan Minot (From "Poems; 4am)
I took the man out of my jar
I thought, That's no place for him to be.
That's no man to be in my jar.
I took him out
and the song went out of me.
And the tree trunks, hit by the rising sun
and the shape of his teeth
left.
It was for my own good that I took him out, you see
[After a looting, after a theft]
He was an insult to my affections.
I took him out and
his voice was gone,
and every sound changed but one-
the beating sound kept beating on

At first I was relieved.
I took him out and took out pain.
I thought, My jar will be ready for
a new set of teeth.
The slowly that drained out, too:
the relief.

So there it sat, my jar on a sill
with nothing to sing about. Quiet, still.
A jar on a blank page, a jar on a roof
with nothing inside it and nothing to prove.

So I launched it. Out to sea.
A jar set adrifting, a jar on a wave.
A jar on the ocean, far from the shore.
Miraculous. Buoyant. Able to float.
but useless and empty and floating by rote.

No sound but the little tin pecks
of the waves on the glass.
My jar bobbed further and further
out to sea
till the water grew so large
and silent around it
that it was lost to me.

Hey bright eyes.
If I could have your heart,
[as you so suggest]
I would;
but for now, I'll settle for your head on a platter.
You're my paper weight.
You make me want to write
You make me feel unnervingly safe.
And now I fear I've ruined everything.
When I act on impulse,
when my temper gets the worst of me.
When I open my mouth
or close my phone.

[Sometimes I wish I could read your mind - what an unfair advantage that would be.]
And if you fly away, never to come back again, I wonder if you'll think of me.
Will you see my face in coffee shop windows,
on the bus, in the park;
my hair my nose my arms my inkstainedfingers
will you catch glimpses?
Seeing a young women writing on a notepad,
or bending down to pick dandelions?
A curly haired lady striking a match? An I♥NY shirt?
A book of poetry, a cherry stem;
will you think of me?

Will you think of me
even half as much
as I'll think of you?

Absence leads a heart to wander.
And though I, which withstand the
change of days, stay,
you shift and break and scatter.
What shall I do my dear?
Chase and gather the fragments of you,
as I know that is what you wish.
I suppose I'm to put those pieces back together too?
I suppose too, that I shall do so without complain.
It's who I am.
And it's not who you want.

May 9th, o9

Packing light.
I want to leave everything behind me.
Can't let you slip into my suitcase somehow, can't let you follow me out
Toss a shirt in- I remember how you liked it, fingering the fabric - toss it back out.
[I've spent all my years in believin' you, but I just can't get no relief]
I can't even decide if I should put my own broken pieces in.

I lost the rhythm of this place.
It's continuing, I feel the pulse,
but I can't seem to keep up myself,
I can't find the beat.
[Should I change lotions I wonder? I recall who you would smile when you caught the scent of this one]
I look forward to seeing and being with the ocean salt, once again.
Maybe if I sleep with my window open, I won't think of you
or dream of him.

Do you even like the sea? The island? The markets, the trees, the way the sun and rain are one?
Did you even know it's a piece of me, or that the air lets me sleep easier than here?

My Travel Books:
Poems; 4am - Susan Minot
Selected Poems - Margaret Atwood
Anne of Green Gables - L.M.Montgomery
In Arabian Nights, A Caravan of Moroccan Dreams - Tahir Shah
Inkheart - Cornelia Funke

Take me down to Paradise City, where the grass is green and the girls are pretty

Bc, here i come!

I'm off to the island, where the salt can be smelled from my bedroom window.

Where every morning my grandmother and I have a cuppa, before going for a short walk to the beach to discuss the days plans.
Where the trees are green and flowers already exist

I really need this trip.
Really.
I need to just get away from here.
From school, from home, from winnipeg, the endless prarie sky, the dead air, from him.

I'm bringing two cameras.

I leave sunday, return the following.
Ergo, I shant be posting after sunday.
I'm bringing a notebook or five with me, so you'll have dated "journal" entries once i return.

All the pictures here were taken by me, on location

It's not about what you did
it's about what I did
and what I allowed
"make myself translusant, to let you in"
so now,
the one who swore
to always love me for me
to never judge me,
has decided,
he doesn't like what he sees.
"they will lay you out in the moonlight, and reinvent your name"
how could I?
how could I have allowed you to convince me
that I can trust you,
that I can let you in.

Awake soon
The mindstorm
I feel
I feel
the stars out.
The fear goes,
I soar now
As far as I can carry you
as deep
as deep.
No theif can take away from you
the way you have taken from me.
His mouth
full of loose teeth
I see
I see
The liar is weeping
and down on his knees.
The light no longer terrifies
the grief goes to sleep.
So
beauty came with agony.
But sweet
oh every love
is sweet

Goodnight dear readers. Look forward to the morning.
It's 11:11 as I post this. I transfer a wish to all of you.

Swine Flu

Alright, so maybe I'm just crazy, but,

WHAT THE HELL SWINE FLU! WHAT THE HELL!

I don't get what everyone is getting so worked up about.

Yes, it's a flu.
Yes, it's a new strain of it.

And yes, there is no CURE for it yet.

But the panic we see, I think, is totally uncalled for.

People have gotten flus before.
People have died from flus before.

The only reason we're paying so much attention THIS time around is because it's new.
Its the fad. The newest latest greatest coolest disease, if you will.

The people dying from it are the people who would probably die from any form of the flu:
The young

The old
The weak
The poor in bad and dirty conditions.

That it has taken one or two people outside that spectrum is tragic, as are all deaths, but nothing to be so terrified over.

I'm going across this big ol' country of ours come Sunday.
I shall not wear a mask.
I've gotten approving nods, and wide eyed gasps and stares at this comment.

I will wash my hands often, as I always do when I am flying.
I'll bring disinfectant wipes, as I always do.

Other than that,
I think I shall be safe.

Any one else have something to say about this flu? I'd love to hear it :)

It was the first really honestly truely warm day of the season/year.
Unfortunate that it should land on a school day, but I have no complaints, I enjoyed it as best I could.

On a related note, I have bought recently a few sun dresses.
Let's see if I can be brave enough to WEAR them!

Nothing feels the way
your cheek does, against mine,
as you make the world spin for me;

just for me.

There are lots of things I wish I was, could be, could have, could do.

I wish I was smarter,
More dedicated,
More driven,
Level Headed;

I wish I could sew
and cook better;

I wish I knew where I was going in life;

I wish I was neater;

I wish I knew what to do with my hands

that I had a better memory
that I could paint.

I wish I could stand nailpolish on my fingers
and make daisy chains
[anyone care to teach me?]

I wish I could love you the way you deserve
because really,
I don't know what to do with myself or you today.
All I know is that the days I go without you,
I can't think straight,
I can't shake the edgy restless feeling.
I can't stop remembering
who your hands moved so much
your cigarette went out
or how your eyes sparkle those few minutes I allow you to search mine.
I can't help but remember how your eyes widen when I say something funny that takes you by surprise.

I wish I could stay on topic.

No one's love comes close to yours, nothing's what it was before. My eyes are heavy, and my heart is sore.

I went to the carnival saturday night. I went on a ride. It was round like a ferris wheel, but the cars were a cage, and as I rode in a circle, my car spun in its own little circle.
I screamed, loud.
I laughed, hard.
I rose above the ground, towards the sky.
I couldn't see the stars, but I could see the moon in the black, light polluted sky. It was a half moon, a little rounded though. 5 days 'til the full moon.
I saw the moon right side up the first time.
On my second time around, I saw it upside down.
I hurtled head first towards the ground, feet up to the sky.
The world was bright, and loud and out of order.
I was in a state of anti gravity.
When I got back on the ground, I collapsed with laughter.
Nothing like being weightless, to make you feel so grounded later on.

I don't think I realized how much I need you until suddenly
you just weren't here.
And I looked around and said to myself.
Huh. Something is missing, isn't it?

Idunno, this weekend I'm just falling apart, and falling back together so swiftly I've lost count of the rotations.
[head first, feet up; feet first, eyes searching]

I know it's stupid for me to miss him, of all people. But tell me, how do you dislodge the bullet that's keeping your blood in?
How do you dig it out?
How do you have the faith that you won't die from the pain
or the blood loss,
or even the small bits of it you accidently left behind, which then traveled into your blood streams, into your heart/brain/lungs and kill you?
[that's the one that concerns me most]

This town doesn't feel the same
without my best friend at my side.
I go to the park or make a cup of coffee.
I think of how my other half would be
climbing the treesor making fun of how much sugar I use
[i use a significantly less amount now. I'm sorry to think that you missed the transition]
I wander about and sometimes turn to tell you abouthow the red door is beautiful in the sunlight.
I reach for my phone and start to dial your number
"793-..."It's like phantom limb syndrom
like when people go to war and lose an arm,
but they think that they can still feel it;
but they can still feel it.