Lemon_The_Parrotfish's blog

This is an essay on the nonfiction book, Field Notes from a Catastrophe, which I had to read for my freshman seminar. Our professor asked us to write on whether or not we believe we can cope with the challenges of climate change. The essay(s) I reference are from the Kobert Reports, which you can find at http://academics.smcvt.edu/KolbertReports/ Hope you enjoy my essay and feel free to criticize constructively.

I wrote these for my Virtual High School class. We had to submit them to a website so, clearly, I chose YWP!

The air smells like rain
Musty perfume that I breathe
Lay me in the mud

Now things are growing
The green is greener than green
I'm living again

Thunder and lightning
A sonorous symphony
Play their sonata

Leaves begin to fall
Decaying perfume returns
Skeletons make trees

Crows car their warning
Everything's about to die
Make way for the Spring

I can support you
(it doesn't mean
I'm strong)

I can stop myself from crying
(but it doesn't mean
I never fall apart)

I might barely be an adult
(doesn't mean
I'm an inexperienced boy)

I act tough when
I'm not
Sad when I am
Lost
When you don't know
How things will work out

I am serious
through my funny faces
I am happy
through my tears

Young but wise
Smart but foolish
Such a stereotypical
paradox

In the end:
I'm but a figment
of your fragmentation.

A year ago, it had never been my desire to change the world. I never wanted to be different. My hope was to never stand out, never have to speak up. All I wanted was to survive life until it killed me. And then something magical happened: I found myself.

Hi. My name is Lemon_The_Parrotfish* and I'm trans.

My collarbone
is comforting. During class,
my fingers and hands glide
along the shelf, sometimes pushing,
kneading. I like the stone
feeling, a warm rock during the summer.

It feels alive, makes me alive.
I can't be broken. For all
the tearless nights, sonorous,
mournful grunts, I will remain.
I will stand.
Even when I am overflowing, the dam
will hold. It's what I was made
for. The skin
over my collarbone is soft,
almost as soft as the baby blankets
I bought for my cousins when they were born.

My baby blanket saw a decade
of me, held together for ten years

Prompt: What are you waiting for? If not now, when?
Time: 5 minutes]

It was with a time and a pen that I started to write. I had been waiting and waiting for something to just magically pop up and say "Write about me" but nothing was good enough; either that or I didn't have the skill, the capacity to write about it. I ignored every idea I was given based on insecurities of myself or my topic. I didn't write anything.

Hello everybody.
I bought a book at Barnes and Noble this week (The Pocket Muse by Monica Wood) to inspire me to start writing again. It's full of prompts, black and white photos and quotes from other writers to support your writing. Like I did with Levine's book Writing Magic last year, I've started picking prompts, giving myself a time limit, and writing without thinking for the set amount of time. Everything I write for the prompts will be under the keywords "The Pocket Muse". Feel free to use the prompts yourself!

A disconnect
bestween emotions
and ink.
So now
everything
stays bottled up,
always
threatening
to explode and destroy.

It's a sad
state of affairs
to lose a big chunk
of who you've
been,
even though
you're no longer
that
person anymore.

Critical blows
are thrown
by the weakest.

Note: So, I changed my name(s) for privacy purposes but the rest of the letter is legit. This is for Letters About Literature

Dear Julie Anne Peters,

If I were to write for you,
I'd stab the ink into the tree;
If I were to read to you,
I'd allude to songs with "One, Two, Three".

If I were to play for you,
I'd pluck and twang the silent strings;
And if I were to sing to you,
I'd call up just the Nicest Things.

If I were to yell for you,
I'd scream and crash and make a fuss;
If I were to pick for you,
I'd want to start a wild rumpus.

If I were to cry for you,
I'd let tears make a waterfall;
But if I were to swim to you,
I'd drown to let you have it all.

So if I were to die for you,

It's impossible to not be lonely when you're covered in fading graffiti
but your pen is full of ink for the words your mind can't
find to describe how you think
what you feel because there's all so much that it doesn't fit
in one sentence or one cohesive
thought yet it does and it's one omnipotent
thing and feeling that keeps you up at night
in the always-present but never-existent
lack that only ever comes up in that place we always
talk about where it's awful and depressing
and we never want to go and don't know how
we get there but we do and even after we get back where

The day I was hired for a part-time position as a book-shelver at the ________ Library, I had no idea how much it would change me. I had always alphabetized my own videos and books – the latter, of course, were divided into fiction, non-fiction, and reference – and so the job seemed like a good fit. The first few weeks, I grew extremely familiar with the alphabet and soon, I was able to recall that ‘w’ came after ‘v’, not before it. While I really enjoyed my job, I never spent much time at the library during my free time.

Yeah. It's been a while. What can I say? Life is lively... Warning?

i. An absence of light. Absence of warmth. Of feeling.

Pain. Tears. Torn flesh, bloodied. Soundless shrieks in the night that only your heart can hear.

A presence of air. Presence of neutrality. Of becoming.

Trans.

There's something lonely about cold flannel sheets, like a fire you can't feel though you know it's there. Feeling lost in your own bed creates a depression similar to hearthbreak - something once comfortable that now is confusing - and the pillows you pile up fail at substitution. She is not there and never will be. You tuck yourself in, kiss yourself goodnight and, after turning out the light, you lay with yourself in the darkness, nothing but the sparse moonlight as company. You are lonely and yearning, imagining a body that will not, can not appear.

Another "R.I.P." Facebook group.

Another high school student, dead.

Another piece of writing lamenting the loss of someone I never knew, never had the pleasure of knowing.

I understand that in a group of thousands of human beings, it's possible not to recognixe everyone of them. But when something like this hits a community, you wonder why.

At first, CeCe's name didn't sound familiar; her Facebook picture was foreign. Then, talking to my co-worker who hadn't heard about the stabbing, I connected the pieces together.

I've seen the family before, multiple times.

She fell asleep with four half-moon bruises
on her inner thighs, perfect copies of her lover's
teeth, and her arms wrapped around herself in the absence.
Slow and soft breathing. There had been tears, twice, after 3.5
implosions. Joy; Completion; Love. Of course, there was the small
matter of sharing... Turning over and over, she cringed
and pushed those thoughts away; they would not cease.
Tenderly, she sucked on her fingers, trying to taste the sweetness
that had been there earlier but was undoubtedly gone by now.
Sigh.

This is just a rough cover of "Anyone Else But You" from the movie Juno that I did. I hope you guys enjoy it

Lyrics:
You're a part time lover and a full time friend
The monkey on your back is the latest trend
Don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

Here is the church and here is the steeple
We sure are cute for two ugly people
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

We both have shiny happy fits of rage
You want more fans, I want more stage
I don't see what anyone can see, in anyone else
But you

I have been seated here wondering if putting pen to paper will work for me anymore. I've been thinking about the Fates who sit and play Solitare in the library, about the man who laughs like he's crying, but most of all, about the one with shotgun eyes who makes you want to pull the trigger yourself just so they will pump back their head in glorious laughter and refill the chamber; sight, tigger, pump [[repeat]]. Staying home from school in order to regain health in all areas was a good idea.

Written with whatever magnetics were on my friends' fridge.

question gender; ceremony; identity; stereotype
transform skin, love
change culture; commitment; clothes
happy people never realize, little friend
intimate baby dream trans; union
create some sexual relationship too passionate between women
through style, attract every partner
have them choose: boy; girl

sex.

We had pictures today and I had to go back to school. It was as horrible as I remember it, but worse. Ever since I was young, going back to school was always exciting. Now, I'm a Senior and nothing sucks more.

I'm at the top of the food chain, not to mention I know my way around and can name the teachers people need to know and where to find them. I'm in interesting classes and was actually able to hand-pick what I wanted. No more requirements this year. I got what I wanted.

I started writing poetry on gum wrapper lyrics... I have not capitalized the first words of sentences or proper nouns. THIS IS INTENTIONAL.

gum wrapper lyrics spread themselves width-wise on the inside once inhabited by winter's cool chill, by summer's sultry cinnamon and every penswipe leaves a stick green by the paper's toothed edge.

I have not capitalized the first words of sentences or proper nouns. THIS IS INTENTIONAL.

Wednesday night, at the Brownell Library, there was a poetry writing workshop. One exercise was to pull out some words from an envelope and write a poem with them. I didn't actually write POEMS but... I'll underline the words I pulled out.

Education santizer.
Also known as:
liberty.

Eco-friendly
lawn mowers:
green sheep.

Chronic zest
spells "lemon"
with yellow peels.

Steady left hand raised above your face, ready to strike, ready to claim your bruised skin, bruised soul and dig that flagpole into your mind. dark side of the moon, of your heart and every crater is full of bllod, waiting to burst. Stop salting your soda, stop putting ice on your meat; it's not going to help the swelling go down.

Original poem by William Carlos Williams

I have forgotten
to write
secret messages in
my blog

and poems
about that
which does
not exist.

I'm sorry
but you seem
to have stolen
my words.

I started writing poetry on gum wrapper lyrics... I have not capitalized the first words of sentences or proper nouns. THIS IS INTENTIONAL.

gum wrapper lyrics painted on your kitchen walls in the blue that ends each day. we stay alone, crying sky blood tears and screaming sonorous thunder claps.

i. I have splintered the board
that once splintered me,
using the roughed foot
riddled with "I can't" and "No way",
screaming YEAHHH from my heart.

ii. Fuck you.

i. "Did you hear me?"
"Yes, sir!" I shout and kick,
hard.

iii. You trace the smooth of my collarbone
with one of those three fingers
and my feet cha-cha downwind
of our breath, callused by the shoes
that look so good.

ii. I release the confusion
at the silver end of tweezers
and examine the empty space
left by the flick of a wrist,
a silent nod,
a dismissive wave.

i. I can't hear you as your knee leads
into me and your force
is but a yawn of uninterest.

iii. Soft skin kisses my lips
under the pretense of a whisper
and I hold you close to my chest
like I held those children so long ago.

ii. Vampires sometimes hold their breaths
as blood pools in the vacancy.

iii. I've drunk your soul
and thirst for more.

i. Yeahhh!

I am a lack-luster teenager
sitting on the porch
where nothing exciting
ever happens.

We've called the cops
and seen the fights
and I've written
songs out here
with my guitar.

This porch bores me.

I yearn to go back
to the conference;
I yearn to feel understood
and accepted by peers
again and I want, I need
to hang around
people like me again:
writers, gender-frees,
people who don't give a shit
as long as no one's getting hurt.

"Fun Home",
"Dykes and Sundry Other Carbon-Based Life-Forms to Watch Out For",
"The Vagina Monologues",
Kushner's "Angels in America"
and Ani DiFranco are keeping
me steady but I want to feel
alive again.

Let's fauxhawk ourselves,
roll down the grassy hill
and give haircuts to random kids.

Let's stay out late,
judging poetry slams,
salivating over Harry Potter
and fantasizing about peaches,
walking around as barefooted hobos,
smelling grinders on the porch swing
and randomly picking up friends.

Ripped apart and lonely,
I stood below you last night.
You were, understandably,
oddly poised in full lotus
atop a stone pillar
at the foot of the stairway,
eyes closed, searching.

I felt lost and you used
to be my best friend
so I sought you out,
hoping you could see me,
really me, and ask what was wrong.
Yearning for some comfort,
we said "hey" and I almost,
almost told you I was miserable.

You did not see so I left,
holding my pizza plate,
and went to sit by myself.
I finished and wound up
awkwardly telling a girl
of similar personality
to you, I was missing someone.

I don't understand
why I needed to tell you,
why I looked for that
from you when we still
don't really talk, meet eyes.
I suppose I miss the honest
comfort we used to share,
the needle and thread you've used.

They stuck a straw in me
to suck out my life.
It did not hurt
and I did not mind.
Part of my soul
would be recycled
by another human
so they might remain.

I will run through another
and keep them strong, warm
but I will not know
who they are, where they've been.
Our paths won't have crossed;
their happiness or pain
will be a result of the vampires
ironically dressed in white.

Humanity is strange;
it's where I am responsible
for whoever gets that part
of me but I cannot
take care of them.
They are anonymous:
we are anonymous
to each other, to the world.

Two unknown beings entwined
in a way that should be revered.
No attention is payed;
we are indifferent.