if I had a calendar

without hanging a calendar I diagnose every day a different shade of blue. the colours work for winter and the cold until the rain stops falling. we’ve had a hint of summer before spring. I taste tomorrow on the sip of tea that’s too warm for the temperature that’s too warm for this time of year. I try to see my thoughts as words I’m reading in a book so as to pick apart the lack of logic. if I really want, I can see the case that’s made by people I love out of the love they have for me: that my fear of every summer to come and the spirals they bring is a self fulfilling prophesy. there is logic and love and sometimes a combination of both, each of which can shape the things we say and derail us from the truth. and I can believe what I choose to believe except for when I believe that I can’t.

if I had a calendar on my wall I’d wake and turn the page for spring. if I was consistent I’d live in a mirror or give away everything I have to something more than me. but I am nothing if not on the fence and living in between. I’ll watch another movie til I want to go to sleep.

a good person

I open the screen and work until I close it, at which point tasks and expectations mean nothing until time comes to do it all again. I won’t think about where most of my waking hours go once I log off for the night. in therapy the psychologist says this was a good thing. we did what we all seem to enjoy and gave it a label: balance. she applauded my efforts at setting healthy boundaries. I wanted to talk about something else.

I walk to the store for milk on my break. the air is warmer than it should be. beyond drying laundry the heat does little for me. I worry about the summer that will be, and spare a moment of concern for those still yet to accept the impending destruction of the ecosystem and world as we now know it to the climate catastrophe caused by our collective greed and need for more. the horizon is bleak for everyone that still is and will be. I write about them now to feel better about thinking more of myself and the task of enduring the December soon to come.

I choose unbruised fruit and leave what I wouldn’t eat myself for somebody else. at the checkout I scan the codes and think of my own delusion in the belief that a performance of words and gestures to indicate care can make me a good person. I wonder if it makes me evil or nothing worse than human.

spoiled

sometimes I’m there in my dreams and it’s like I never leave. I catch tasks and pass them off completed at a pace I could never keep with a ball on the field. demands from different directions grow louder and there is hot angry breath down the back of my neck. but I keep up and manage til the running stops and there is thanks for your time and we’ll see you tomorrow. I close my possessions and the thought of the treadmill into a briefcase and wake up to the sound of tomorrow.

on my run I listen to the air that I’ve spoiled leaving my body. I think about where I am and that maybe this is the hardest I’ve made myself work since I broke, although last time it felt as though it was all building up to something big. at the kettle I wait and scroll past footage I don’t want to see of infants and their final breaths. in five minutes I’ll give a stranger a couple hundred dollars to ask me how I’m feeling for an hour. I’ll have leftovers for dinner when I’m done.

packed like sardines

I exit the train and am one cell in the current that passes down the platform from the train doors to the stairs. the procession descends, packed like sardines in a crushed tin box; solemn and mechanical as we move to the gates at which we pay for passing through liminal vessels and spaces to our temples. today we broke bread at the benches on the lawn we can see from the window: an assortment of biscuits and cupcakes wrapped in plastic, products of the devotion of other believers from other churches. nobody had time to bake.

on the bus home last night I told my parents about my new religion. dad said work shouldn’t feel that way if you enjoy it. I thought people were meant to enjoy their religions. on the bus tonight I open my phone to a photo of a monkey dressed like a professor. there’s a chat on my phone that details the 326th day of the genocide: 41 Palestinians killed and 114 injured in the past 24 hours. I tell myself I’ll eat less chocolate tonight.

rhythm

I give my day to a rhythm I spend the night trying to forget. the moon rises and I only remember who am when I leave the building. I exist beyond routine and you the divine demands placed upon me: but where? the contract tells me my joy is important; that I should find time for the things that matter beyond my screen and tasks. with space and time I unravel, without I mean nothing. can I ask someone to fix this?

candles and a table

at my desk I can sit and spend entire days without thinking of the truth that once kept me bound to my bed. the same truth I pass through in dreams or words and scenes on pages and screens. sometimes I manage a whole day of ignorance - uncrippled by the weight that once sunk every morning. I relish the comfort of too much to do and no time to think. I smile when I should without thinking about what I know is and always will be, no matter how much I give to the life I call work. the truth is too big for emails and grocery lists. when I finish the day I close my screen and walk with my book to the park to feel the sun on my face until the shadows stretch to meet me. I read stories I wish I’d written. I’ll see myself in anything but where and who I am. there can be comfort and joy in telling any story but my own.

I walk through the department store and pass through empty bedrooms. I buy candles and a table for a home that isn’t mine. 

rubble everywhere

in my dream there is rubble everywhere and only the skeletons of buildings still standing. there are mothers wailing as their children dig through the rubble. with them I pull through torn tents stained red. the air is thick and heavy. somebody finds the shoe of someone they knew or loved. a voice over the speaker booms through the shell of the city that was. I follow the crowds that move at this prompt. I don’t understand what was said. we gather around a large tear of fabric, and I know that underneath are the remains of the children they’ve found. parents fall to their knees and look to the heavens for something. an answer maybe? I’m not quite sure. I turn to throw up and wake up instead.

I check my phone and try to think of what I want for dinner. at the rally a pink haired redneck assaults the man with the flag up ahead of me. the organiser in high vis tells the perpetrator it’s a peaceful protest. ‘no it’s not!’ he shouts as he storms away from the cops.

the man who had seen the end of the world

the man on the grass where the park meets the street is haggard and slow. I looked at his beard as he watched me run past. he wore a weathered black coat and long pants without shoes. in a different time and place he might have been dressed for a funeral. I was scared when I saw him in front of the bushes. his eyes were dark and completely unguarded, like he had seen the end of the world and lost any reason or will to play pretend anymore. he stood still and I ran faster to get out of his sight. when it felt safe I looked back. he stood motionless, watching cars pass between his feet and the outlet stores.

when I get home I shower and slip into my clothes and the safe embrace of routine. I write someone else’s dreams in someone else’s diary.

Caligula

I walk to the park to look for something to write. on the grass in the sun I read the book I ordered online. a director I admire said it inspired him to make a movie I can’t stop thinking about. the text reeks of dark humor and a bleak cynicism for the human project and our place between the supermarkets and slaughterhouses we create. I catch somebody waving my way in my periphery. the sun obscures their face and it takes their voice to make them more than a stranger in the park. it’s somebody I met last weekend. I apologise for not realising and blame the sun. they ask what I’m reading and I tell them. we exchange pleasantries and I wish them luck for the gig I was meant to go to tonight. I return to the reading and wish I could sit in the mind of the young man who writes the thoughts I wish I had the words for. what would he have thought of my mind? would his meaning to me mean anything to him? I want to take him to the movies and hold his hand but he died in a car long before I was born.

I walk through bookstores just to be somewhere else. I read spines until it’s dinner time.

keeping up

all of a sudden the air is warmer and I feel the weight of the time that has passed on my shoulders. I wake weary eyed with only myself and screen to blame for the lack of sleep. I change out of pants into something lighter for the heat. the days are already stretching into the evening. when I leave work the sun is still waiting for me. I used to hate the days that would end before dinner. in winter uniform I’d dream of summer holidays and the sun on my back in the shallows. counting the sleeps til my birthday like nothing could ever matter more. I am afraid of the days I used to love.

the calendar runs like the stream now. I watch from the banks and do my best to laugh at the ambition beneath the surface. what and who I thought I could do and be: forgotten trinkets once polished for the mantel collecting algae with the stones below. on the outside I am removed. I shrug at what I see as though it always meant as little as it does now. destined for the liminal. in the mirror I fix my hair despite everything I say and think I know about what matters and doesn’t. nothing means much and I’m still keeping up.

a new religion

every night I stop and think I worked a little more than usual. there is always more tomorrow no matter what I do today. every morning I wake with my head on the pillow and rise to the sound of the chime that I’ve timed to get me working at my desk before I have to. I finish later than I should with less time between dinner and dreaming. before bed I forget to pray. perhaps I’ve found a new religion in the rhythm and demands of the work that keeps me safe.

in my dreams I visit the carcasses of rooms I used to know. sometimes I catch the ghosts I try to shake when I’m awake. at the supermarket I scan my card and the numbers matter less and I’m disgusted by my comfort in the face of knowing that I have whilst others lack. I beg the pixels on my screen to free me from my thoughts and space to breathe. 

isn’t it wonderful?

there’s a plot in the new movie I’ve seen three times that follows a woman who has left her life and family to serve and adhere to the customs and expectations of a cult. I tiptoe down the hall outside the room that I rent with weary eyes in loyalty to the whip of a job and think. am I so different from her? all but our total freedom surrendered to the security and affirmation afforded by belonging to something outside of us, demanding our time and obedience. we have both left our families and serve our roles before ourselves and those we love. I see the life I’ve hoped for only in dreams and fleeting etchings of memories or distracted doodles in the margins. but oh to be protected and to serve the machine. no need to think or justify the fact of being: already tied round the contract like a ribbon or a plastic seal for freshness.

isn’t it wonderful?

sponge

my ears are open and I’m awake: make me your sponge and I will absorb anything you ask. run me over every surface. let me grow heavy with your burden. you will wring me dry over the sink and I will sit and wait for more. I’d be a brush if I could face the empty canvas. to listen is much easier than it is to think.

from my phone

I don’t think about work when I’m not there. at the moment I’m struggling to figure out if this is because I am somehow capable of respecting my time and space in this sole domain of my being and doing or, rather, if I am closer to what I think than I am the way that others see me. I am rational enough to recognise that the reflection I cast is not the same I see in the mirror. but I don’t think about work once I’ve closed the lid and maybe it’s because I still feel short term. the future is always tomorrow and though I know I’ll be there I am ashamed to confess I still hold out for something else, despite the love and luck in which I’m spoiled. on the horizon clouds might part but it’s still the same telescope and half the world is still engulfed in flames as their inferno fuels the sunshine and the shopping malls for the rest of us.

I watch the funeral pyre grow from my phone.

when you were giant

I can see poetry in today’s darkness and nothing in the stars tomorrow. my own inconsistency: a rare constant upon which I can count, anchored to the ocean floor as every tide turns.

the other night I dreamt I climbed a mountain amidst a crowd of strangers. the steps led up into the clouds and I was nervous, because I knew I’d see you at the top. you were the main attraction, sitting in a pen like an exotic animal at the zoo. you towered over the crowd without even standing, your head alone bigger than any statue I’d ever seen. I hid behind strangers and wished they would leave us alone together. but I was scared to see you and something woke me up. I didn’t get to hear your voice or know if you remembered me. but it was a dream and I woke to another day of how things are.

I continue. every night I drink tea and find a little comfort in this ritual through which I am not alone but one of many seeking warmth from the cup in my hands. I wash and dry and wonder if you miss me too.

Alexandria

when I first found out some children go without food or somewhere safe to sleep I refused to believe what I was hearing. it didn’t make sense to me that adults would carry on with their business as though everything was normal. how could we possibly go about our days whilst children die without the food and shelter they need to live? two decades on I sit on the savings I earn with my time at the desk. what would that child think of the man that shares his name?

long term

today I spoke with people I trust about the future. I mentioned I had been considering finding ways to study again. in doing so I would be making a choice to commit to plans beyond a week or a month away. if I think of going back to school I think of the future beyond the end of a calendar year. the lens widens in ways I never let it. the long term feels insurmountable and impossible. I have spent so long running from the thought and refusing to see potential in my reflection. the long term project is still frightening. everything is precarious and nothing can ever be certain at the best of times. but I thought about the future today, and that’s something more than nothing.

always more

at the end of the day I think and realise I don’t know if I believe anything I say. words are fickle but such malleable armour. I hide behind them without realising until I’ve forgotten what it was that moved me to open my mouth. there will always be something to say about anything. we make meaning out of nothing as long as there’s somebody listening. I listen to my friend play trumpet in the jazz bar and try to understand the language she shares with anyone who’ll listen. what’s foreign to me is second nature to her. there’s meaning I can’t sense or see beyond how I see the music sway her. meaning in sound and movement unrestrained by the confines of words. meaning in the notes and the melting ice in the glass and the mic that won’t work. meaning everywhere. and there’s always more.

in circles

there is always someone to call. this isn’t the case for everyone and sometimes I forget that I’m lucky. I fill empty time with other people where I can, and more often than not it doesn’t take much. if nobody picks up I remember that there are pens and paper. I drew today for the first time in a long while. when I get sick of disappointing myself in ink I can try the phone again. running in circles.

they bombed another school. a hundred displaced people massacred in an instant as I try to decide what to wear to the theatre. when I stop to try and comprehend the gap I see the dystopia clearly and wonder how long we plan to keep this up. they’ll remember the martyrs and curse their deaths outside town hall and that will be it. nobody moves anymore. I care until I lose focus until I’m forced to stop and listen again. running in circles.

clay

I think with the language I have been taught and believe within the spectrum of what I’ve learnt is possible. we are brought into being as clay to be shaped and weathered as those already shaped by others before them deem fit. my sense of extraordinary and mundane is not my own but a response to the days I have lived through the lens forged for me before I could talk. no one view is perfect but I think I’ve been lucky. things could have played out much worse. had it been my decision I would still choose my parents to hold my hand in the dark. I love them more as time passes and they love me too and that’s more than enough luck for one mound of clay.

pleasant

at the very least routine proves it is possible to live sustainably at a distance from the heart. sweeping the surface is more than enough to get by. I pass as pleasant and out of the shadows I entertain their belief that I am more than the unopened parcel of disappointments and vital organs that keep me moving. the parasite tells stories and they never miss the mark. 

diving

I dreamt I was one jump away from achieving my dreams. atop a diving podium I looked down. the pool was so far I could hardly see it. I was worried that if I jumped I might miss the pool altogether. down below, the future I wanted waited for me. but I couldn’t see and the height was too great so I ran and left without explaining myself.

in another dream I remember my cousin and his friend hiding from me at the reception of the wedding of someone we knew. I wanted to be close to his friend but couldn’t keep up with them. at some point Dad was patting the cat we used to feed the waxy rind of parmesan after lunch at our family’s house in Northern Italy. someone took interest in what I wore as I crossed the dance floor, though I remember wishing they wouldn’t. my drama teacher took me for a walk but I don’t remember where.

after work I walked to the park to see the sun before it disappeared. I tried four bookshops for a text that inspired a film I want to understand. no luck yet. Mum called and I remembered it was her father’s anniversary. she told me she loved me and I love her too.

still again

I run the risk of repeating myself every year. we reach a point at which I am functioning fine, to the extent that I can be relied upon to show up on time and complete tasks with a smile. I wake every morning and tend to the routine to which I’ve signed away my freedom. at the end of the day I am too tired to water the plants I’ve dreamt of growing since forever but haven’t made the time to nurture. I eat leftovers and resign to thoughtless time-passing on a screen on my pillow or the wall. tonight I want to draw but it’s been a few too many weeks and I’m convinced I’ve forgotten how. I’ll boil the kettle and open the fridge and not think of what I lack until I’m still again.

dvd towers

I dreamt the pope died and the son of my cousin couldn’t stop crying. I couldn’t find the words to comfort him because I didn’t understand why he was so sad. at some point I was searching for a film for dozens of children unwilling to go to bed. I knew the perfect film and had spotted a copy on the counter just moments before, but I couldn’t find it and the impatience of too many children in such a small room felt like the weight of the world as I panicked my way through dvd towers of films I’ve seen too many times. I woke in the bed of someone I miss and knew when I saw them that I was still dreaming.

when I woke to this plane it was on the couch in the lounge room. the morning sky was blue and I decided to do my laundry before the rally. I walked behind a lady with a handmade sign giving Israel gold in the genocide medal tally. before bed I listened to the voices of people I love on the phone. they tell me about their days and current chapters. I am lucky to know and be known by people so easy to love. against the pillow on the bottom bunk I am alone and still in what feels like the first time in a while. I feel the weight of my eyelids and listen to my body and the thoughts in the stream. 

control

my time is not my own. I surrender any control I could hold to the expectations of others. I hide behind them and wash my hands of responsibility for the disappointment I hold for my reflection and inability to grow into someone I want to be. the reigns are out of reach and I never stood a chance. there is always someone else to blame. I find comfort in my helplessness and ignore what I know I need to change. for every hurt and reminder of what I lack I collect excuses and build my case of victimhood. I know I’ll find my feet again sometime. maybe I’ll claim myself someday. for now I sit and watch time take. I smile because it doesn’t matter and control means nothing now.

doghole

I spoke with a friend tonight about people disappearing. we had been to a show and bought hot drinks in a cafe that stays open late. at some point we started talking about the stories we tell and believe about ourselves. whenever we are let down by somebody we love, the negative narrative is reinforced and the reflection in the mirror is uglier and more frail than before. my friend reflected that my response to being abandoned is to take responsibility for the avoidance of the ghosts. when people run away without explanation, I question what it was I did. in the story I tell myself, my behaviour or character or very being is reason enough to leave. maybe if I was less they might have stayed. maybe if I had done things differently. maybe if I was somebody else.

it’s hopeless to acknowledge that I have no control over somebody else’s actions or decisions to stay or go. if I feel so hopeless about the state of everything else, why can’t I accept this? 

easy

my housemates are both leaving for Europe soon. I knew about one but the other decided this week. the house will be empty, just me and the ghost. I’ll not know what to do with all the space and silence. my impulse reaction to the news was to find a flight for tomorrow evening.

the work day runs like water down the drain. I am productive and this means more tasks. I forget the world beyond my desk and the sun sets behind my neighbours house. another one. I’ll leave the house for dinner and come back to sleep and do it all over again.

in the Middle East my taxes are still being used to bomb children, though in more places now. I try to make time to read the facts and figures at the very least. the comfortable monotony numbs my response. I am scared of the apathy that is so easy to wear.