Writing post...
Sep. 17th, 2006 09:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nebuliaFirst off: A short story I wrote (Previously mentioned as "Enough," now changed to "Innocence Dead")
June 6
He’s the kind of guy mothers warn their children about.
He knows this. Knows this like he knows the sky is blue.
He always packs a switchblade in his belt—and sometimes his boot—a bottle of poison—he always had a flare for the Shakespearean—in his pocket, and a Smith & Wesson 357 Magnum, usually, under his coat. He’s got other weapons, of course, but he only needs them for a job, usually. But that gun is with him always, no matter what.
A man and his gun should not be parted, after all—unlike a fool and his money.
He is dark. He is scary. He is tall, with bushy eyebrows in a permanent glare, a constant five o’clock shadow, hair that doesn’t comb and doesn’t cut, and eyes, plain gray, angry gray. Scary. It is not some manly, rippling, raw sexuality, with tight clothes and a six-pack. That only happens in romance novels, or whatever, not real life. He is scary, plain and simple. Children run from him. Grown men run from him. It’s satisfying, in its own way, but sometimes it is lonely, so lonely—not that he ever thinks about loneliness.
He’s sitting on a park bench after a job when a kid, a girl, maybe seven, maybe, walks up to him.
“Hey, mister.”
“What, kid.” It’s not a question; it’s gruff, rude, meant to terrify, to make her run away.
She doesn’t flinch; doesn’t move; her eyes hopeful, full of an innocence he doesn’t expect from anyone alone in Central Park, even a little kid. Her pink dress and blonde-brown pigtails blow in the wind. She says, “My mom’s staring at you. Will you go and talk to her?”
He meets her eyes. “Kid, are you nuts?” The question is truly incredulous.
She returns his gaze with a blue-eyed innocence. “Mister, my mom thinks you shouldn’t be sittin’ here.”
He raises and eyebrow, coldly. “Oh? So where should I be sitting, then?”
She furrows her brows, confused. “Oh. My mom didn’t say where you should be sitting. Just that you shouldn’t be sitting here.” Her face brightens. “So maybe you can sit with her!”
Her small fingers, slightly sticky, wrap around one of his hands, and she drags him to his feet.
How odd.
Not that she could drag him to his feet. That he let her drag him to his feet.
He follows her.
oooooooooooooooooooo
June 6
Her mother is short and stocky, maybe five feet tall. She has tired brown eyes and light brown hair, up in a tangled ponytail, too-long scraggly bangs around her face.
He tilts his head mockingly. “Can I help you?”
Her face is sardonic, and annoyed. “You’re scaring the children.”
The kid lets go of his hand and flings herself into her mother’s arms. “He doesn’t scare me, Mom!”
She smiles tiredly at the girl. “You’re special, Lissie.”
He would peg her at her mid-twenties, a little young to be having a kid. But, then, in this town, no one’s quite old enough. He’d bet the kid’s dad’s out of the picture, too. Her mother doesn’t have a wedding ring on, at any rate.
“I have a right to be in this park as much as you do.”
She glares at him. “It’s Central Park. There have to be a million benches. Why choose one near a playground when it’s obvious you do dirty work for someone?” She frowns. “I know a lot of parents are lax about it these days, but I, for one, want to raise my girl right, and having hit men sitting across the way is not conducive to that.”
So she wasn’t here forever, then, judging by the way she talks. She sounds like she went to college. Or tried to.
He raises his eyebrows. “It’s a free world, ma’am.” The ma’am is mocking, and the kid pulls herself out of her mother’s arms and grabs his hand.
“C’mon, mister,” she chides. “Sit with us for a while?”
She pulls him over to the bench and shoves him down. He lets her do it, again.
oooooooooooooooooooooo
June 7
They meet the next day, and the next. He never talks, but sits there. The kid chatters about everything and nothing, all at once, or plays. Her mother is as silent as he is, shooting him incriminating glances.
Finally, she says, “All right. Are you going to kill us?”
He sort of wonders how she knows he kills people for a living, but then he guesses that maybe it’s fairly obvious.
He shakes his head.
She nods. “All right, then. You can sit here.”
And then, maybe, a little bit, they are friends.
oooooooooooooooooo
June 19
Every day they meet mid-morning at the same place. Eventually, he lunches with them.
It’s just the kid and her mother. Her mother is reluctant as always, despite that they are sort-of friends, and the kid hooks on to him like a burr, never leaving his side. She even stops playing so she can sit with him. Sometimes when she falls asleep, because inevitably she does, most days, they talk, about little things, like the pointless details of the past that don’t matter or the movie that neither of them will ever see.
It’s never anything important, and both are a little wary.
She has to leave for work, one day, in the late afternoon, and she tries to take the kid home, but the kid refuses.
“I wanna stay with him!” she cries, flinging her arms around his waist.
“No,” her mother snaps. “Come on, Lissie, we’ve got to catch the bus.”
“I won’t go with you,” the kid says firmly.
“You will,” her mother says, angrily.
“No!” the kid snaps. “I’m tired of you not being there at night!”
“Lissie,” she says. Her voice is tired, sad, tears threatening. “I can’t afford anything but this job. You know I—“
“No!”
He decides to step in, a little. “Why don’t you let me talk to her?”
Her mother looks startled, but nods, and walks away to where she can still see them but he can talk quietly to the kid.
And he does.
“Look kid,” he says. “You should be afraid of me.”
“Why?” she asks, full of her usual innocence and confusion. “You haven’t given me no reason to be scared of you.”
“Kid, I’ve killed people,” he snarls. She flinches slightly, but holds her ground, still unafraid, even unsurprised, only startled at his tone of voice.
“You haven’t killed me,” she says, voice calm. “Or my mom.”
“I don’t kill unnecessarily,” he retorts, “but I could, if they ordered me to.”
Those blue eyes blink. “No,” she says. “I don’t think you could.”
oooooooooooooooooooooo
June 19
It doesn’t take long for her mother and him to relent, and he finds himself following her and the kid to their apartment.
Stupid of him.
oooooooooooooooooooooo
July 12
“Why are you here?” her mother asks, finger-combing the kid’s hair as the child sleeps on the couch between them. The credits of The Little Mermaid are rolling, and they could move, but it’s warm here, safe-feeling. At least, that’s what he thinks. She sits on this couch every day, so he doubts she even notices. And the kid’s asleep.
“I’m here for the kid,” he says, turning back to painting the kid’s toenails, a surprise for the morning.
Ah, how the mighty have fallen.
She protests, her brown eyes curious. “But why? You could have yelled at her, threatened her, hurt her, hell, even—“ here she shudders—“killed her. Why did you not? Why did you stay?”
Sometimes, in these lucid moments, she’s creepily like the kid, only jaded. He doesn’t really want that sadness to come into the kid’s eyes like it’s wormed its way into her mother’s, and the thought that he wants to protect something other than himself is terrifying.
He opens his mouth to speak, but no words come out.
And he realizes he doesn’t know.
Doesn’t know why he’s happier when the kid’s around. Doesn’t know why his pulse quickens—just slightly—when her mother smiles at him.
He turns away, and then his head snaps back when he hears her laugh, almost breathily.
“You love her,” she marvels, her face somehow happy and excited and joyful and then almost jealous all at once. “Don’t you?”
He frowns, about to protest. And then his face softens, traces of a smile crossing his mouth.
He guesses he does.
oooooooooooooooooooo
July 13
He spends the night at her apartment, on the couch. In the morning, she’s up before both the kid and him.
Her hair is down, for once, and it has coarse waves. She’s wearing an apron, bright pink with ruffles and what looks like finger paint stains splattered across it, even on the ties around the waist and neck. And she’s humming along to the radio.
Classical. Something from some Norwegian opera he saw in high school.
She turns, smiles. “You stayed the night.”
He nods once. “Yeah.”
Her grin deepens, uneven dimples showing in her cheeks. “Want a waffle?”
He sits at the table, and she slides him a plate and maple syrup. The fact that she knows him well enough for his silence to be acquiescence doesn’t scare him, surprisingly.
It feels very normal. She joins him a moment later, still humming, even as she eats.
For a moment, he wouldn’t mind being like this forever—with the kid, and, maybe later, a few more kids, sleeping upstairs and just them eating waffles on a Thursday morning—
And then he nearly laughs, because what kind of dad would he be?
The kid wanders in, hair tangled, rubbing her eyes. She kisses her mother’s cheek, gives her a sleepy hug, and then crawls into his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and dozing off again.
Her mother snorts into her milk, trying to hide laughter and failing, miserably. He glares at her, but can feel his lips twitching anyway, and is almost angry at his traitorous body, that wants to laugh and hug the kid back.
When he leaves, five hours later, they both kiss him on the cheek, the kid last. Her soft whisper of “Love ya,” so simple, so easy, makes him stop and stare into space in shock.
But when he gets into his car, finally back to himself, he smiles.
oooooooooooooooooo
July 25
“You kill people?” the kid asks, building on their conversation from—from, well, a long time ago—while they’re at the park.
Her mother’s at work, will be until the wee hours of the morning. Until he came, until a month ago, the kid usually stayed by herself, tucking herself in and huddling under the covers until she fell asleep. Now, unless he has a job, he’s the one who tucks her in. And he doesn’t mind.
He nods. “Yeah.”
“You like it?”
He frowns. No one ever asks him that. “It’s a job, I guess. It pays well.”
She wrinkles her nose in disgust. “That’s the kinda answer I get from Mom.”
He knows her mother’s a waitress. She works until two, though sometimes she gets to run the bar after ten. He also knows she hates it.
And then he knows that she got pregnant with the kid at eighteen, and all her dreams—they’d been promising, but then, churches just don’t give full-ride scholarships to pregnant girls—flew out the window.
He could have found all this out if he’d just asked the Boss for a little information. But, wonder of wonders, she’d told him everything. And had been perfectly willing to talk about it.
He shrugs. “Most people don’t like their job, kid. Fact of life.”
He would have taught Shakespeare somewhere. The kid’s mom wanted to be an archaeologist.
Stupid American dream.
The kid frowns. “That stinks.”
He nods. “Yeah.”
“Hey?”
He looks down at her. She looks suddenly afraid. “What, kid?”
“How do I make sure I like my job when I grow up?”
He gets down to her level, kneeling. She’s so small, and he’s so tall, that he’s still taller than her anyway. “Kid, I’ll do anything I can to make sure you’ll like your job. No matter what.”
“Promise?” she says.
He nods. “Even if you want to go to the moon.”
She looks shocked, and then grins. “How did you know?”
oooooooooooooooooooooo
July 25
Later, when she’s sitting on his shoulders and they’re watching the sunset, she says, “Will you take care of my mom, too?”
It takes a moment to catch her meaning, but when he does, he nods.
“Good,” she says. And then she adds, “Even if I’m gone, will you take care of her?”
(Later, he’ll wonder if she knows. But now, he just thinks,) I’m getting soft. He nods again, with a careful, “I promise,” added at the end.
The kid nods contentedly. “Good.”
He takes her home.
ooooooooooooooooooo
July 26
When he mother comes in at two, looking exhausted, she thanks him sleepily and tries to pay. He refuses the money until he snaps at her, and she glares but acquiesces.
He’s at the door when he turns. “I have a job for the next few days,” he says gruffly. “But when I get back, do you want to go out to dinner?”
He’s a little surprised when she agrees.
oooooooooooooooo
August 2
The job is half-successful, but Joseph Filipelli got away. He’s not in town twenty minutes when he hears news of Filipelli—an information-seller by trade, a killer for fun—in town, allegedly to ‘visit his sister.’
He half-doesn’t care, and he’s got two days off, and he’s got a date, so he doesn’t care.
He picks her up, takes her to a 50’s diner. A fun place. She laughs, and he smiles once or twice—because she’s laughing—and they’re happy.
As they’re walking up to her apartment, he asks, “Where’s the kid?”
“She’s saying the night with her uncle; he’s in town for a few days.” She smiles fondly, eyes full of love.
Something niggles in the back of his mind, but he ignores it. “Ah.”
They walk silently for a while, and they get to the door to the stairwell. But before he can open it for her—he still has a little bit of respect left—she stops him. “Why did you take me on this date?”
He shrugs, not looking at her. She reaches up and smoothes his coat lapels; he flinches almost unnoticeably.
She continues, not removing her hands. “Is it because Elissa asked you to? Is it because of Elissa?”
No, he wants to say, but that’s far too easy, and far too cruel. Too cruel for her, too cruel for him, and, even more so, and more importantly, too cruel for the kid. Eventually, something would take him away, and then they’d all be alone again. He stays silent, willing himself to say yes.
“It is, isn’t it?” Her voice is oddly sad, and nearly silent.
He’s never been in love before.
He kisses her.
ooooooooooooooooooooo
August 3
The next morning, early, at the door to her brother’s hotel room, he says, “I’m sorry.”
She shakes her head. “Please don’t apologize,” she says, and smiles up at him, uneven dimples showing.
He allows his own lips to turn up in a rare grin. “Then I won’t, I guess.”
He is happy. He is going to see the kid and he’s in love. He is happy. The feeling is so odd and glorious that he actually knocks a pattern on the door without realizing it. Dun dun-duh-dun dun.
No one opens the door.
They pause, and then he knocks again—normally this time, he reminds himself.
No one answers.
She pounds on the door. “Elissa? Elissa!”
She’s about to run her shoulder into the door when he stops her. “Let me.”
The door swings open with a well-placed kick. They rush in, she crying, he scared. The room is empty,
save for blood splattered temptingly across pristine, snowy sheets and tan carpet.
He knew.
Her fisted hand is pressed to her mouth, and when he looks into her wide, horrified brown eyes, he realizes she knows, too. How does she even know?
Filipelli’s in town, to see his sister….
She’s staying the night with her uncle; he’s in town for a few days…
He looks at her. “You’re brother’s Joseph Filipelli.”
Her eyes don’t leave the bloodstains. “Yeah,” she manages, voice broken, small. But what does that I have to do with anything? I mean, I know he’s in with some bad stuff, but—“ she gasps.
“He’s after me,” he says. “’Cause I was after him.”
She looks at him. “But I never told him—“
“He has his own ways,” he said, knowing that Filipelli could get any damned information he wanted. “And she’ll be in the park.”
She grabs his hand and they run.
oooooooooooooooo
A real assassin hates his job. A real assassin doesn’t kill anyone who isn’t his target, and his target must die. A false assassin is nothing but a killer. Real assassins kill killers. Joseph Filipelli was my target. He did not die in our first encounter, consequently this time he must die.
ooooooooooooooooo
August 3
The reach the bench they met on and there’s a man standing there, stocky like his sister, but older, graying, with hard, hating eyes. He’s never seen this hateful, sad man before, but he hates him on the spot.
He pulls out his gun and shoots Joseph Filipelli before the man can say a word. There was nothing for him to tell them; there was too much blood on those white white white sheets for the kid to be alive, and no point for him to take her save revenge.
It’s so anticlimactic. So empty. Filipelli falls to the ground. He ignores the body; it will become one of the many casualties in Central Park, forgotten.
“Lissie!” She’s fallen to her knees, and now is holding the tiny, bloody body.
He kneels next to her, takes the (dead) kid’s hand. Her mother falls against him and he clutches them both in a half-embrace, she still holding the kid’s body, the dead body.
Just another death on his hands…
He holds her and the kid and watches the world blur, the odd, unfamiliar sensation of tears in his eyes.
It wasn’t enough. It was never enough.
So, after that happy little piece, I bring to you--and more for my own piece of mind and remebering, some songs that provied inspiration. At the moment, they're all pretty much romantic. Some of them are choral pieces, and I only have the lyrics in my music, which is why I'm writing them down here, I guess.
So:
Collide
The dawn is breaking
A light shining through
You're barely waking
And I'm tangled up in you
Yeah
But I'm open, you're closed
Where I follow, you'll go
I worry I won't see your face
Light up again
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills my mind
I somehow find, you and I collide
I'm quiet, you know
You make a first impression
I've found I'm scared to know
I'm always on your mind
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the stars refuse to shine
Out of the back you fall in time
You somehow find, you and I collide
Don't stop here
I've lost my place
I'm close behind
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills your mind
You finally find, you and I collide
You finally find
You and I collide
You finally find
You and I collide
So I Thought
All your twisted thoughts free flow To everlasting memories Show soul Kiss the stars with me And dread the wait for Stupid calls returning to us to life We say to those who are in love It can't be true 'cause we're too young I know that's true because so long I was So in love with you So I thought
A year goes by And I can't talk about it
On my knees Dim lighted room Thoughts free flow try to consume myself in this I'm not faithless Just paranoid of getting lost or that I might lose Ignorance is bliss cherish it Pretty neighborhoods you learn to much to hold Believe it not And fight the tears With pretty smiles and lies about the times
A year goes by And I can't talk about it The times weren't right And I couldn't talk about it
Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last between Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last, between
And I'm praying that we will see Something there in between Then and there that exceeds all we can dream So we can talk about it
Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last between Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last healing
And I'm praying that we will see Something there in between Then and there that exceeds all we can dream
And all these twisted thoughts I see Jesus there in between And all these twisted thoughts I see Jesus there in between
transatlanticism
The Atlantic was born today, and I'll tell you how:
The clouds above opened up and let it out.
I was standing on the surface of a perforated sphere
When the water filled every hole.
And thousands upon thousands made an ocean,
Making islands where no island should go.
Oh no.
Most people were overjoyed; they took to their boats.
I thought it less like a lake and more like a moat.
The rhythm of my footsteps crossing floodlands to your door
Have been silenced forever more.
The distance is quite simply much too far for me to row
It seems farther than ever before
Oh no.
I need you so much closer [x8]
I need you so much closer [x4]
So come on, come on [x4]
truce
you can have washington i'll take new jersey
you can have london but i want new york city
i should get providence i've got a job now
los angeles - obvious - that's where you belong now
you can have africa asia australia
as long as you keep your hands off cafe pamplona
we can split germany right down the middle
you'd hate it there anyway
take berlin and well call it even
you can take all of the carry-on baggage
i'll trade the saskia jokes for the alphabet language
and if we find out that we have any children
we'll trade them off summers and alternating weekends
you call it over and i call you psycho
significant other?
just say we were lovers and we'll call it even
we'll call it even
i am the ground zero ex-friend you ordered
disgused as a hero to get past your borders
i know when i'm wanted i'll leave when you ask me to
mind my own business and speak when i'm spoken to
i am the tower around which you orbited
i am not proud i am just taking orders
i fall to the groud within moments of impact
i hit back if hit
and attack if attacked
you get route 2 between concord and lexington
i want mass ave from the sqaure to my apartment
and if we should meet through some misunderstanding
ill be very sweet very patient and forgiving
(now get off my side of the state)
and if we should meet one another in passing
despite these techniques there is sometimes no avoiding
(there must be some kind of mistake)
we'll raise high our white flags and say hi and shake hands
declaring the land we're on unamerican
we'll call it even
i am the tower around which you orbited
i am not proud i am just taking orders
i fall to the groud within moments of impact
i hit back if hit
and attack if attacked
i am an accident waiting to happen
i'm laughing like mad while you strangle the captain
my place may be taken, but make no mistake
from a little black black box i can say without shame
that you've lost
do you know what you've lost?
so take whatever you'd like
i'll strike like the States on fire
you won't sleep very tight
no hiding
no safe covers
make your bed and now lie
just like you always do
you can fake it for the papers but i'm on to you....
the sea
I woke up from a dream
A white rose was floating to greet... the sea
Morning light, race me down
The wooden path, can't catch me now... the sea
Will you wade with me? You and me, all alone?
Wadin' on the sea
I grab your toes and now I understand
The symbol of the rose, it floats on my hand
On this great sea strand
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
Will you always float here with me?
I don't wanna send second-hand notes
To you my friend, about the sea
So we jump back into the party
And we wade our way out past the bar
I had not planned on going out this far
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
'Cause the devil has a smile
And the devil has a smile
And it's thorny and it's wild
And it grows from deep inside
And you try to swim away
But the devil calls this play
Deep blue sea deep blue sea deep blue sea
Life Less Ordinary
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me
Live a life less sedentary
Live a life evolutionary with me
Well I hate to be a bother,
But it's you and there's no other, I do believe
You can call me naive but...
I know me very well (at least as far as I can tell)
And I know what I need
The night you came into my life
Well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me
By the way, I do know why you stayed away...
I will keep tongue-tied next time
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me
My face had said too much
Before our hands could even touch
To greet a 'hello'
(So much for going slow...)
A little later on that year
I told you that I loved you dear
What do you know?
This you weren't prepared to hear
I'm a saddened man, I'm a broken boy
I'm a toddler with a complex toy
I've fallen apart, since the ambush of your heart
The night you came into my life
Well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me.
By the way, I do know why you stayed away
I will keep tongue-tied but...
Honey understand, honey understand
I won't make demands
Honey understand, honey understand
We could walk without a plan.
Honey understand (honey), honey understand
I won't rest in stone all alone
Honey understand, honey understand
I'm all ready to go
But you already know...
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me.
If I could name you in this song
Would it make you smile and sing along?
This is the goal: to get into your soul
If I could make you dance for joy
Could that be the second-chance decoy?
The bird-in-hand I would need
To help you understand?
The night you came into my life
well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me
By the way, I do know why you stayed away
I will keep tongue-tied next time
Changeless
Call my friends to share some wine
To share some laughs, and last goodbyes
My photographs of these years
Will make me laugh through the tears
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we don't meet again
What are the odds, What are the odds?
That I will miss your smile
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take care and
Fly away and see the world
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take time and
If you need rest, I'll keep your nest
Changeless
Let fondness be our souvenir
To keep it warm, we'll keep it near
Otherwise with no heart to recall...
A memory's just a memory after all
I will not leave this pulse alone
Though it may take the long way home
I will not wait until the end
For my applause for you my friend
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we don't meet again
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we won't meet again
What are the odds, What are the odds?
That I have missed your smile
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take care and
Fly away and see the world
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take time and
If you need rest, I'll keep your nest
Changeless
Set me as a seal
Set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
Love is as strong as death
jealousy is as cruel as the grave
it's flames are flames of fire
a most vehement flame
Set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
Many waters cannot quench love
nor can the floods ever drown it
if a man would give for love all the wealth of his house
it would be utterly despised
el dia es hoy
(translated from spanish by the poet, gabriel navar)
for many nights
i've been wanting to dance and jump
within the sea light
that licks me this way
all is clear when
hunger evaporates
in long-awaited rain
that fals here
kiss me, i offer you
that sun that illuminates
the sunrise where i am
with you i dance and jump
night after night
your life animates me
yesterday
as today
awaken me...
the day
is today
She Walks in Beauty
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!
*uber KK! Except the first three lines of the last stanza, that's definitely KT.*
in other news, our sunroom ceiling is falling in, so maman and i were unloading the attic today. it was a good bonding time, we actually had fun, oddly enough.
so, 'twas okay. still haven't managed to finish moving all my crap in, though. and I still have homework to do, yay for me! Just wanted to get that out. So I don't forget and turn in my music. Sorry for the big-ass post *hopes all the lj-cuts work all right*
quote of the post: "washington was the first person to defeat a great power and then say, "you know what? i think i'll go home and farm." --teach.
nebulia out.
June 6
He’s the kind of guy mothers warn their children about.
He knows this. Knows this like he knows the sky is blue.
He always packs a switchblade in his belt—and sometimes his boot—a bottle of poison—he always had a flare for the Shakespearean—in his pocket, and a Smith & Wesson 357 Magnum, usually, under his coat. He’s got other weapons, of course, but he only needs them for a job, usually. But that gun is with him always, no matter what.
A man and his gun should not be parted, after all—unlike a fool and his money.
He is dark. He is scary. He is tall, with bushy eyebrows in a permanent glare, a constant five o’clock shadow, hair that doesn’t comb and doesn’t cut, and eyes, plain gray, angry gray. Scary. It is not some manly, rippling, raw sexuality, with tight clothes and a six-pack. That only happens in romance novels, or whatever, not real life. He is scary, plain and simple. Children run from him. Grown men run from him. It’s satisfying, in its own way, but sometimes it is lonely, so lonely—not that he ever thinks about loneliness.
He’s sitting on a park bench after a job when a kid, a girl, maybe seven, maybe, walks up to him.
“Hey, mister.”
“What, kid.” It’s not a question; it’s gruff, rude, meant to terrify, to make her run away.
She doesn’t flinch; doesn’t move; her eyes hopeful, full of an innocence he doesn’t expect from anyone alone in Central Park, even a little kid. Her pink dress and blonde-brown pigtails blow in the wind. She says, “My mom’s staring at you. Will you go and talk to her?”
He meets her eyes. “Kid, are you nuts?” The question is truly incredulous.
She returns his gaze with a blue-eyed innocence. “Mister, my mom thinks you shouldn’t be sittin’ here.”
He raises and eyebrow, coldly. “Oh? So where should I be sitting, then?”
She furrows her brows, confused. “Oh. My mom didn’t say where you should be sitting. Just that you shouldn’t be sitting here.” Her face brightens. “So maybe you can sit with her!”
Her small fingers, slightly sticky, wrap around one of his hands, and she drags him to his feet.
How odd.
Not that she could drag him to his feet. That he let her drag him to his feet.
He follows her.
oooooooooooooooooooo
June 6
Her mother is short and stocky, maybe five feet tall. She has tired brown eyes and light brown hair, up in a tangled ponytail, too-long scraggly bangs around her face.
He tilts his head mockingly. “Can I help you?”
Her face is sardonic, and annoyed. “You’re scaring the children.”
The kid lets go of his hand and flings herself into her mother’s arms. “He doesn’t scare me, Mom!”
She smiles tiredly at the girl. “You’re special, Lissie.”
He would peg her at her mid-twenties, a little young to be having a kid. But, then, in this town, no one’s quite old enough. He’d bet the kid’s dad’s out of the picture, too. Her mother doesn’t have a wedding ring on, at any rate.
“I have a right to be in this park as much as you do.”
She glares at him. “It’s Central Park. There have to be a million benches. Why choose one near a playground when it’s obvious you do dirty work for someone?” She frowns. “I know a lot of parents are lax about it these days, but I, for one, want to raise my girl right, and having hit men sitting across the way is not conducive to that.”
So she wasn’t here forever, then, judging by the way she talks. She sounds like she went to college. Or tried to.
He raises his eyebrows. “It’s a free world, ma’am.” The ma’am is mocking, and the kid pulls herself out of her mother’s arms and grabs his hand.
“C’mon, mister,” she chides. “Sit with us for a while?”
She pulls him over to the bench and shoves him down. He lets her do it, again.
oooooooooooooooooooooo
June 7
They meet the next day, and the next. He never talks, but sits there. The kid chatters about everything and nothing, all at once, or plays. Her mother is as silent as he is, shooting him incriminating glances.
Finally, she says, “All right. Are you going to kill us?”
He sort of wonders how she knows he kills people for a living, but then he guesses that maybe it’s fairly obvious.
He shakes his head.
She nods. “All right, then. You can sit here.”
And then, maybe, a little bit, they are friends.
oooooooooooooooooo
June 19
Every day they meet mid-morning at the same place. Eventually, he lunches with them.
It’s just the kid and her mother. Her mother is reluctant as always, despite that they are sort-of friends, and the kid hooks on to him like a burr, never leaving his side. She even stops playing so she can sit with him. Sometimes when she falls asleep, because inevitably she does, most days, they talk, about little things, like the pointless details of the past that don’t matter or the movie that neither of them will ever see.
It’s never anything important, and both are a little wary.
She has to leave for work, one day, in the late afternoon, and she tries to take the kid home, but the kid refuses.
“I wanna stay with him!” she cries, flinging her arms around his waist.
“No,” her mother snaps. “Come on, Lissie, we’ve got to catch the bus.”
“I won’t go with you,” the kid says firmly.
“You will,” her mother says, angrily.
“No!” the kid snaps. “I’m tired of you not being there at night!”
“Lissie,” she says. Her voice is tired, sad, tears threatening. “I can’t afford anything but this job. You know I—“
“No!”
He decides to step in, a little. “Why don’t you let me talk to her?”
Her mother looks startled, but nods, and walks away to where she can still see them but he can talk quietly to the kid.
And he does.
“Look kid,” he says. “You should be afraid of me.”
“Why?” she asks, full of her usual innocence and confusion. “You haven’t given me no reason to be scared of you.”
“Kid, I’ve killed people,” he snarls. She flinches slightly, but holds her ground, still unafraid, even unsurprised, only startled at his tone of voice.
“You haven’t killed me,” she says, voice calm. “Or my mom.”
“I don’t kill unnecessarily,” he retorts, “but I could, if they ordered me to.”
Those blue eyes blink. “No,” she says. “I don’t think you could.”
oooooooooooooooooooooo
June 19
It doesn’t take long for her mother and him to relent, and he finds himself following her and the kid to their apartment.
Stupid of him.
oooooooooooooooooooooo
July 12
“Why are you here?” her mother asks, finger-combing the kid’s hair as the child sleeps on the couch between them. The credits of The Little Mermaid are rolling, and they could move, but it’s warm here, safe-feeling. At least, that’s what he thinks. She sits on this couch every day, so he doubts she even notices. And the kid’s asleep.
“I’m here for the kid,” he says, turning back to painting the kid’s toenails, a surprise for the morning.
Ah, how the mighty have fallen.
She protests, her brown eyes curious. “But why? You could have yelled at her, threatened her, hurt her, hell, even—“ here she shudders—“killed her. Why did you not? Why did you stay?”
Sometimes, in these lucid moments, she’s creepily like the kid, only jaded. He doesn’t really want that sadness to come into the kid’s eyes like it’s wormed its way into her mother’s, and the thought that he wants to protect something other than himself is terrifying.
He opens his mouth to speak, but no words come out.
And he realizes he doesn’t know.
Doesn’t know why he’s happier when the kid’s around. Doesn’t know why his pulse quickens—just slightly—when her mother smiles at him.
He turns away, and then his head snaps back when he hears her laugh, almost breathily.
“You love her,” she marvels, her face somehow happy and excited and joyful and then almost jealous all at once. “Don’t you?”
He frowns, about to protest. And then his face softens, traces of a smile crossing his mouth.
He guesses he does.
oooooooooooooooooooo
July 13
He spends the night at her apartment, on the couch. In the morning, she’s up before both the kid and him.
Her hair is down, for once, and it has coarse waves. She’s wearing an apron, bright pink with ruffles and what looks like finger paint stains splattered across it, even on the ties around the waist and neck. And she’s humming along to the radio.
Classical. Something from some Norwegian opera he saw in high school.
She turns, smiles. “You stayed the night.”
He nods once. “Yeah.”
Her grin deepens, uneven dimples showing in her cheeks. “Want a waffle?”
He sits at the table, and she slides him a plate and maple syrup. The fact that she knows him well enough for his silence to be acquiescence doesn’t scare him, surprisingly.
It feels very normal. She joins him a moment later, still humming, even as she eats.
For a moment, he wouldn’t mind being like this forever—with the kid, and, maybe later, a few more kids, sleeping upstairs and just them eating waffles on a Thursday morning—
And then he nearly laughs, because what kind of dad would he be?
The kid wanders in, hair tangled, rubbing her eyes. She kisses her mother’s cheek, gives her a sleepy hug, and then crawls into his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and dozing off again.
Her mother snorts into her milk, trying to hide laughter and failing, miserably. He glares at her, but can feel his lips twitching anyway, and is almost angry at his traitorous body, that wants to laugh and hug the kid back.
When he leaves, five hours later, they both kiss him on the cheek, the kid last. Her soft whisper of “Love ya,” so simple, so easy, makes him stop and stare into space in shock.
But when he gets into his car, finally back to himself, he smiles.
oooooooooooooooooo
July 25
“You kill people?” the kid asks, building on their conversation from—from, well, a long time ago—while they’re at the park.
Her mother’s at work, will be until the wee hours of the morning. Until he came, until a month ago, the kid usually stayed by herself, tucking herself in and huddling under the covers until she fell asleep. Now, unless he has a job, he’s the one who tucks her in. And he doesn’t mind.
He nods. “Yeah.”
“You like it?”
He frowns. No one ever asks him that. “It’s a job, I guess. It pays well.”
She wrinkles her nose in disgust. “That’s the kinda answer I get from Mom.”
He knows her mother’s a waitress. She works until two, though sometimes she gets to run the bar after ten. He also knows she hates it.
And then he knows that she got pregnant with the kid at eighteen, and all her dreams—they’d been promising, but then, churches just don’t give full-ride scholarships to pregnant girls—flew out the window.
He could have found all this out if he’d just asked the Boss for a little information. But, wonder of wonders, she’d told him everything. And had been perfectly willing to talk about it.
He shrugs. “Most people don’t like their job, kid. Fact of life.”
He would have taught Shakespeare somewhere. The kid’s mom wanted to be an archaeologist.
Stupid American dream.
The kid frowns. “That stinks.”
He nods. “Yeah.”
“Hey?”
He looks down at her. She looks suddenly afraid. “What, kid?”
“How do I make sure I like my job when I grow up?”
He gets down to her level, kneeling. She’s so small, and he’s so tall, that he’s still taller than her anyway. “Kid, I’ll do anything I can to make sure you’ll like your job. No matter what.”
“Promise?” she says.
He nods. “Even if you want to go to the moon.”
She looks shocked, and then grins. “How did you know?”
oooooooooooooooooooooo
July 25
Later, when she’s sitting on his shoulders and they’re watching the sunset, she says, “Will you take care of my mom, too?”
It takes a moment to catch her meaning, but when he does, he nods.
“Good,” she says. And then she adds, “Even if I’m gone, will you take care of her?”
(Later, he’ll wonder if she knows. But now, he just thinks,) I’m getting soft. He nods again, with a careful, “I promise,” added at the end.
The kid nods contentedly. “Good.”
He takes her home.
ooooooooooooooooooo
July 26
When he mother comes in at two, looking exhausted, she thanks him sleepily and tries to pay. He refuses the money until he snaps at her, and she glares but acquiesces.
He’s at the door when he turns. “I have a job for the next few days,” he says gruffly. “But when I get back, do you want to go out to dinner?”
He’s a little surprised when she agrees.
oooooooooooooooo
August 2
The job is half-successful, but Joseph Filipelli got away. He’s not in town twenty minutes when he hears news of Filipelli—an information-seller by trade, a killer for fun—in town, allegedly to ‘visit his sister.’
He half-doesn’t care, and he’s got two days off, and he’s got a date, so he doesn’t care.
He picks her up, takes her to a 50’s diner. A fun place. She laughs, and he smiles once or twice—because she’s laughing—and they’re happy.
As they’re walking up to her apartment, he asks, “Where’s the kid?”
“She’s saying the night with her uncle; he’s in town for a few days.” She smiles fondly, eyes full of love.
Something niggles in the back of his mind, but he ignores it. “Ah.”
They walk silently for a while, and they get to the door to the stairwell. But before he can open it for her—he still has a little bit of respect left—she stops him. “Why did you take me on this date?”
He shrugs, not looking at her. She reaches up and smoothes his coat lapels; he flinches almost unnoticeably.
She continues, not removing her hands. “Is it because Elissa asked you to? Is it because of Elissa?”
No, he wants to say, but that’s far too easy, and far too cruel. Too cruel for her, too cruel for him, and, even more so, and more importantly, too cruel for the kid. Eventually, something would take him away, and then they’d all be alone again. He stays silent, willing himself to say yes.
“It is, isn’t it?” Her voice is oddly sad, and nearly silent.
He’s never been in love before.
He kisses her.
ooooooooooooooooooooo
August 3
The next morning, early, at the door to her brother’s hotel room, he says, “I’m sorry.”
She shakes her head. “Please don’t apologize,” she says, and smiles up at him, uneven dimples showing.
He allows his own lips to turn up in a rare grin. “Then I won’t, I guess.”
He is happy. He is going to see the kid and he’s in love. He is happy. The feeling is so odd and glorious that he actually knocks a pattern on the door without realizing it. Dun dun-duh-dun dun.
No one opens the door.
They pause, and then he knocks again—normally this time, he reminds himself.
No one answers.
She pounds on the door. “Elissa? Elissa!”
She’s about to run her shoulder into the door when he stops her. “Let me.”
The door swings open with a well-placed kick. They rush in, she crying, he scared. The room is empty,
save for blood splattered temptingly across pristine, snowy sheets and tan carpet.
He knew.
Her fisted hand is pressed to her mouth, and when he looks into her wide, horrified brown eyes, he realizes she knows, too. How does she even know?
Filipelli’s in town, to see his sister….
She’s staying the night with her uncle; he’s in town for a few days…
He looks at her. “You’re brother’s Joseph Filipelli.”
Her eyes don’t leave the bloodstains. “Yeah,” she manages, voice broken, small. But what does that I have to do with anything? I mean, I know he’s in with some bad stuff, but—“ she gasps.
“He’s after me,” he says. “’Cause I was after him.”
She looks at him. “But I never told him—“
“He has his own ways,” he said, knowing that Filipelli could get any damned information he wanted. “And she’ll be in the park.”
She grabs his hand and they run.
oooooooooooooooo
A real assassin hates his job. A real assassin doesn’t kill anyone who isn’t his target, and his target must die. A false assassin is nothing but a killer. Real assassins kill killers. Joseph Filipelli was my target. He did not die in our first encounter, consequently this time he must die.
ooooooooooooooooo
August 3
The reach the bench they met on and there’s a man standing there, stocky like his sister, but older, graying, with hard, hating eyes. He’s never seen this hateful, sad man before, but he hates him on the spot.
He pulls out his gun and shoots Joseph Filipelli before the man can say a word. There was nothing for him to tell them; there was too much blood on those white white white sheets for the kid to be alive, and no point for him to take her save revenge.
It’s so anticlimactic. So empty. Filipelli falls to the ground. He ignores the body; it will become one of the many casualties in Central Park, forgotten.
“Lissie!” She’s fallen to her knees, and now is holding the tiny, bloody body.
He kneels next to her, takes the (dead) kid’s hand. Her mother falls against him and he clutches them both in a half-embrace, she still holding the kid’s body, the dead body.
Just another death on his hands…
He holds her and the kid and watches the world blur, the odd, unfamiliar sensation of tears in his eyes.
It wasn’t enough. It was never enough.
So, after that happy little piece, I bring to you--and more for my own piece of mind and remebering, some songs that provied inspiration. At the moment, they're all pretty much romantic. Some of them are choral pieces, and I only have the lyrics in my music, which is why I'm writing them down here, I guess.
So:
Collide
The dawn is breaking
A light shining through
You're barely waking
And I'm tangled up in you
Yeah
But I'm open, you're closed
Where I follow, you'll go
I worry I won't see your face
Light up again
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills my mind
I somehow find, you and I collide
I'm quiet, you know
You make a first impression
I've found I'm scared to know
I'm always on your mind
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the stars refuse to shine
Out of the back you fall in time
You somehow find, you and I collide
Don't stop here
I've lost my place
I'm close behind
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the wrong words seem to rhyme
Out of the doubt that fills your mind
You finally find, you and I collide
You finally find
You and I collide
You finally find
You and I collide
So I Thought
All your twisted thoughts free flow To everlasting memories Show soul Kiss the stars with me And dread the wait for Stupid calls returning to us to life We say to those who are in love It can't be true 'cause we're too young I know that's true because so long I was So in love with you So I thought
A year goes by And I can't talk about it
On my knees Dim lighted room Thoughts free flow try to consume myself in this I'm not faithless Just paranoid of getting lost or that I might lose Ignorance is bliss cherish it Pretty neighborhoods you learn to much to hold Believe it not And fight the tears With pretty smiles and lies about the times
A year goes by And I can't talk about it The times weren't right And I couldn't talk about it
Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last between Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last, between
And I'm praying that we will see Something there in between Then and there that exceeds all we can dream So we can talk about it
Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last between Chorus Romance says goodnight Close your eyes and I'll close mine Remember you, remember me Hurt the first, the last healing
And I'm praying that we will see Something there in between Then and there that exceeds all we can dream
And all these twisted thoughts I see Jesus there in between And all these twisted thoughts I see Jesus there in between
transatlanticism
The Atlantic was born today, and I'll tell you how:
The clouds above opened up and let it out.
I was standing on the surface of a perforated sphere
When the water filled every hole.
And thousands upon thousands made an ocean,
Making islands where no island should go.
Oh no.
Most people were overjoyed; they took to their boats.
I thought it less like a lake and more like a moat.
The rhythm of my footsteps crossing floodlands to your door
Have been silenced forever more.
The distance is quite simply much too far for me to row
It seems farther than ever before
Oh no.
I need you so much closer [x8]
I need you so much closer [x4]
So come on, come on [x4]
truce
you can have washington i'll take new jersey
you can have london but i want new york city
i should get providence i've got a job now
los angeles - obvious - that's where you belong now
you can have africa asia australia
as long as you keep your hands off cafe pamplona
we can split germany right down the middle
you'd hate it there anyway
take berlin and well call it even
you can take all of the carry-on baggage
i'll trade the saskia jokes for the alphabet language
and if we find out that we have any children
we'll trade them off summers and alternating weekends
you call it over and i call you psycho
significant other?
just say we were lovers and we'll call it even
we'll call it even
i am the ground zero ex-friend you ordered
disgused as a hero to get past your borders
i know when i'm wanted i'll leave when you ask me to
mind my own business and speak when i'm spoken to
i am the tower around which you orbited
i am not proud i am just taking orders
i fall to the groud within moments of impact
i hit back if hit
and attack if attacked
you get route 2 between concord and lexington
i want mass ave from the sqaure to my apartment
and if we should meet through some misunderstanding
ill be very sweet very patient and forgiving
(now get off my side of the state)
and if we should meet one another in passing
despite these techniques there is sometimes no avoiding
(there must be some kind of mistake)
we'll raise high our white flags and say hi and shake hands
declaring the land we're on unamerican
we'll call it even
i am the tower around which you orbited
i am not proud i am just taking orders
i fall to the groud within moments of impact
i hit back if hit
and attack if attacked
i am an accident waiting to happen
i'm laughing like mad while you strangle the captain
my place may be taken, but make no mistake
from a little black black box i can say without shame
that you've lost
do you know what you've lost?
so take whatever you'd like
i'll strike like the States on fire
you won't sleep very tight
no hiding
no safe covers
make your bed and now lie
just like you always do
you can fake it for the papers but i'm on to you....
the sea
I woke up from a dream
A white rose was floating to greet... the sea
Morning light, race me down
The wooden path, can't catch me now... the sea
Will you wade with me? You and me, all alone?
Wadin' on the sea
I grab your toes and now I understand
The symbol of the rose, it floats on my hand
On this great sea strand
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
Will you always float here with me?
I don't wanna send second-hand notes
To you my friend, about the sea
So we jump back into the party
And we wade our way out past the bar
I had not planned on going out this far
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
Hang on to me and I'll hang on to you
Until the end, or until the day is through
And as we float, I'll wash away that part of me
That lures the devil in the deep blue sea
'Cause the devil has a smile
And the devil has a smile
And it's thorny and it's wild
And it grows from deep inside
And you try to swim away
But the devil calls this play
Deep blue sea deep blue sea deep blue sea
Life Less Ordinary
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me
Live a life less sedentary
Live a life evolutionary with me
Well I hate to be a bother,
But it's you and there's no other, I do believe
You can call me naive but...
I know me very well (at least as far as I can tell)
And I know what I need
The night you came into my life
Well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me
By the way, I do know why you stayed away...
I will keep tongue-tied next time
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me
My face had said too much
Before our hands could even touch
To greet a 'hello'
(So much for going slow...)
A little later on that year
I told you that I loved you dear
What do you know?
This you weren't prepared to hear
I'm a saddened man, I'm a broken boy
I'm a toddler with a complex toy
I've fallen apart, since the ambush of your heart
The night you came into my life
Well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me.
By the way, I do know why you stayed away
I will keep tongue-tied but...
Honey understand, honey understand
I won't make demands
Honey understand, honey understand
We could walk without a plan.
Honey understand (honey), honey understand
I won't rest in stone all alone
Honey understand, honey understand
I'm all ready to go
But you already know...
Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me.
If I could name you in this song
Would it make you smile and sing along?
This is the goal: to get into your soul
If I could make you dance for joy
Could that be the second-chance decoy?
The bird-in-hand I would need
To help you understand?
The night you came into my life
well it took the bones of me, took the bones of me
You blew away my storm and strife
And shook the bones of me, shook the bones of me
By the way, I do know why you stayed away
I will keep tongue-tied next time
Changeless
Call my friends to share some wine
To share some laughs, and last goodbyes
My photographs of these years
Will make me laugh through the tears
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we don't meet again
What are the odds, What are the odds?
That I will miss your smile
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take care and
Fly away and see the world
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take time and
If you need rest, I'll keep your nest
Changeless
Let fondness be our souvenir
To keep it warm, we'll keep it near
Otherwise with no heart to recall...
A memory's just a memory after all
I will not leave this pulse alone
Though it may take the long way home
I will not wait until the end
For my applause for you my friend
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we don't meet again
What are the odds, what are the odds?
This ends and we won't meet again
What are the odds, What are the odds?
That I have missed your smile
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take care and
Fly away and see the world
Take awhile! Take awhile! Take time and
If you need rest, I'll keep your nest
Changeless
Set me as a seal
Set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
Love is as strong as death
jealousy is as cruel as the grave
it's flames are flames of fire
a most vehement flame
Set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
set me as a seal upon your heart
set me as a seal upon your arm
Many waters cannot quench love
nor can the floods ever drown it
if a man would give for love all the wealth of his house
it would be utterly despised
el dia es hoy
(translated from spanish by the poet, gabriel navar)
for many nights
i've been wanting to dance and jump
within the sea light
that licks me this way
all is clear when
hunger evaporates
in long-awaited rain
that fals here
kiss me, i offer you
that sun that illuminates
the sunrise where i am
with you i dance and jump
night after night
your life animates me
yesterday
as today
awaken me...
the day
is today
She Walks in Beauty
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!
*uber KK! Except the first three lines of the last stanza, that's definitely KT.*
in other news, our sunroom ceiling is falling in, so maman and i were unloading the attic today. it was a good bonding time, we actually had fun, oddly enough.
so, 'twas okay. still haven't managed to finish moving all my crap in, though. and I still have homework to do, yay for me! Just wanted to get that out. So I don't forget and turn in my music. Sorry for the big-ass post *hopes all the lj-cuts work all right*
quote of the post: "washington was the first person to defeat a great power and then say, "you know what? i think i'll go home and farm." --teach.
nebulia out.
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Date: 2008-03-16 12:01 am (UTC)Oh, and I loved the way it's "the kid" and "the mother" and "he." Even when we pick up names, it's through dialogue, and it's just-- pretty. I love your style to death. Would you mind if I friended this journal?
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