You Can't Stay Here

A friend sent me a poem recently:


Keeping Things Whole

In a field
I am the absence
of field
This is
always the case.
Wherever I am
I am what is missing.

When I walk
I part the air
and always
the air moves in
to fill the spaces
where my body's been.

We all have reasons
for moving.
I move
to keep things whole.

Mark Strand


I'm moving. Out of my Toronto apartment, leaving my stuff in storage at my cousin's and will be back here at the end of August to move into a new apartment I don't have yet. I'm a little anxious, less about the packing and more about the fact that I don't really have any idea how this year is going to go. My partner has to be in Vancouver for the year for work and I'll be back in school in Toronto. And there's the rest of this crazy summer to get through. Which has actually possibly been the best summer ever so far, but it's also filled with a lot of moving around.

Which I'm kind of getting used to. I'm enjoying this strange part of my adult life where I don't really have a 'home' exactly, and I now have stuff in storage in three different provinces. For years I was stuck in this emotional state where I was afraid to leave my city. Afraid that I would just feel isolated and alone and never be able to build the kind of close community I've had. What I didn't expect was to love the sense of coming and going, leaving and arriving.


Which is probably why I love this scene. This is so me two years ago:

Do the Work, Stay Out of the Results

I just did a little review of my latest posts and I was amused to discover that almost every post begins with some version of 'I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted on this thing...'.

I am clearly never going to be the weekly blog poster (secretly I hope this is a reverse psychology method being used on myself right now), but I try, right? The main problem with being a poet (with being any genre specific artist, really) is that whenever you are doing something not directly related to the craft, you feel like you're wasting your time.

Isn't that slightly sick (and kind of melodramatic)?

In season 4, episode 2, Claire meets Edie. A spoken word artist who breaks Claire's eye open just a little bit. Who shows Claire not to be afraid of her own work. Not to worry about how it sounds/looks/is. And more importantly, not to be afraid of what others think about it. This is her first appearance on the show:



Honestly, I have always loved this. Not because I think it's necessarily that great of a piece of work (though I think it's kind of cool, and I have to admit I kind of get chills when I watch this scene, probably because I can see a spark returning in Claire), but because it holds a certain kind of fearlessness and honesty, and it refuses to apologize for what it is. Yeah, it's self-indulgent (which Edie admits to herself) and it's melodramatic and probably not for everyone, but she sums it up in a later conversation with Claire and Anita, when she remarks matter-of-factly, 'I say do the work, stay out of the results'. That might sound dismissive and not to say that I don't think revising is absolutely crucial, but I think we do interfere in our own work half the time. And the better we get at our craft (I find) the more likely it is that the pressure builds to produce something of a certain standard and value. Edie's casual response when Claire mentions that she hasn't picked up her camera in months because she was experiencing a rough time, is 'That's the best time to work. When your guts are all raw and you don't have to spend too much time thinking about it."

I feel a panic inside me every single day that I'm not writing poetry. Even if I don't want to write poetry. Ever. Again. And it's been coming to that. Like, obviously that'll never happen. Certainly sheer stubbornness pertaining to the idea that I Am A Poet will take over. Because, really, who am I without that identity? It's a scary thought. I find so much assurance and confidence wrapped up in that silly little title. I feel boring without it.

But honestly, these days I can't seem to write anything I like. I feel tired of it all. I was working on a fiction project for awhile, just to do something different, but even that has come grinding to a halt. I told a friend this morning that I had finished with the majority of my residency/grant applications and my second collection is back circling again and now I can relax and just write. I can work on the raw stuff. Isn't that great? To be free of such obligations like the 'business side of writing'.

It's not great. It's hard. It's upsetting. It's like pulling teeth. Every twenty minutes I'm on Facebook, praying that someone's written me a message so I can tell myself that I should really reply to that. Every hour I decide it's time for a washroom break. Every ten minutes I try to read even one line from one of the twelve books of poetry I brought along for inspiration. I can't even be bothered to read poetry. It's just so dense and condensed and I don't even know why I want to write in such a constricted form.

Part of the problem is that I just don't have any new ideas right now. That never stopped me before, I was always one to write my way into the poem, so to speak. Believe you me (if I could throw this phrase into every post, I would, I love it), I was damn prolific. But I've been making the realization that about half the poems I write never make it above ground. They never surface and find their way to the published page. Simply put, they just don't make the cut. And I find it painful to know that probably all of the poems I might write today will get scrapped in another six months or a year or two years. But you have to write those underdeveloped poems in order to get to the goods. That's the rule. I mean, it's not a hard and fast rule. Maybe some people can polish every poem they've ever written to be immediately worthy of publication, but I can't. I guess because I'm still evolving as a writer.

So, maybe I secretly (or not so secretly) hope I never evolve to the point where I write the perfect poem in one sitting. I don't even know how that could be possible.

At one point in their conversation about producing work, Edie says to Claire, 'What's the worst that can happen, some asshole will make fun of you?...There are probably a ton of people here making fun of me" I LOVE this. What IS the worst that can happen? There will always be someone who doesn't like, connect or respect your work. There will always be someone who said what you wanted to say better than you can. Or so you think. There will always be nasty critics, yourself being among the harshest. There will always be a reason NOT to work.

So what, besides ourselves, is truly stopping us?

Circling the Drain

I'm in Saskatoon now.

So much can happen in just a couple of weeks. Including coming home to Saskatoon for the summer. Including hearing six gunshots right outside my window, and watching as (within minutes) 15 police cars and dozens of cops flooded my block, crime scene tape is criss-crossed along the street, and my neighborhood turns into an episode of CSI Toronto.


Including spending five days completely sick and feeling VERY sorry for myself, so sorry in fact, that I decided to google all my ex's at once to see how much better their lives are without me.

Really, it's the best thing to do when you want to continue circling the drain.

I also re-watched both seasons of True Blood in preparation for season three's series premiere, which starts on June 13th. How am I going to get anything done this summer?

I'm meeting some wonderful friends for drinks tonight on a patio. Patios really are the best part of summer. I've been wanting to put this clip up for awhile, so here it is. Sometimes we cry for no reason, and sometimes we have to laugh at ourselves for it. And it usually feels strangely good.

Rocket Man

Last night I went to see my friend perform in the queer choir Singing Out. It was super fun, and the perfect evening for a concert, though the church was a little on the warm side. They did a couple of hilarious numbers (the ladies performed a song called Big Butch Woman and the guys did a little soft shoe, jazz hands action with a song called The Fundamental) and the rest were more traditional chorus type songs. They did do a lovely rendition of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, which, as it always does, broke my heart.

Anyway, it was a lovely evening and to top it all off, the night was so beautiful and all the Toronto flowers were so fragrant that I went for a nice long walk in a t-shirt and jeans. I love this city. I really do.

An added bonus was the fabulous queenie David look alike who made me think of David's venture into the gay chorus in 6FU. Here are some little clips for your viewing pleasure:





I love this one, mainly because I love Elton. He featured prominently in my childhood, on road trips with my family.



Today it's a grey, grainy day and I'm looking forward to reading and relaxing and perhaps drinking some hot chocolate.

Breaking Your Eye Open

It has been a month since I've posted. Over a month.

No specific reason, except that I've been cocooning a bit. Which is fine, I guess, but I really need to get back into things. I'm pretty sure I only have about two readers, but I like those two readers. Two readers, you are both super awesome. And I really really don't want to disappoint.

A friend of mine sent me a 6FU quote a few weeks ago that I wanted to include in the blog. It's a quote I sort of agree with, but am also kind of unsure if I totally believe it. It's a quote by Nate Fisher.

"Love isn't something you feel, it's something you do. And if the person you're with doesn't want it, do yourself a favour and save it for someone who does"

I originally thought this was when Nate was with Lisa, but I mixed up episodes and this is actually from the fifth season, when Nate is with Brenda and Claire has just ended things with Billy and he's totally obsessing over getting her back. I suppose context really is everything.

I've been wondering about this statement, 'Love isn't something you feel, it's something you do.' I don't know what to make of it. A big part of me agrees with it, that love must be followed with action, and how you behave around your lover/partner, how you treat them really does make a difference. If love is something we do than we must focus on doing 'right' by the people we love, putting their needs above our own, not in a way that totally compromises our own being, and yes, we should also be prioritizing our own needs, but we must concentrate on what we can control in a relationship.

I suppose my hesitation to fully ingest this definition is that it seems to discount the mystical understanding of love, which is important. But perhaps in our society we put this up on a pedestal far too often, when we should be focusing on how our actions can portray the love that we do feel.

I'm not exactly sure where I stand. I get very caught up in the romanticization of love and sometimes I want to just focus on feeling good. I don't want my actions to have such weighted consequences. I don't want my love to be measured by my behavior. But that's just plain selfishness, on my part. Because isn't that what we should be striving for? To simply just be good to others? To act with integrity, which doesn't always mean 'getting it right', but it means that we try our very best to treat others respectfully and if we make a mistake we are willing to own it?

In theory, it seems quite simple, actually. In practice...well, anything in practice can and probably should feel like work at times. I mean, why else are we here except to improve ourselves as humans?

I've been thinking a lot about a specific scene in Season 4, Episode 1. This is one of my favourite episodes because the grief and pain is so intense that everyone is walking around all emotionally bloody and with big gaping slimy wounds that won't close. And those are always my favourite episodes because they are the most real and the most honest. In this episode, Lisa is dead and Nate and Lisa's family are trying to come together for the funeral. Of course, no one can agree on how best to honour Lisa's memory and everyone is in too much pain to compromise. At one point, David escapes to Claire's room, who is dealing with her own heartbreak over Russel, the abortion and Olivier's messy interference in her life. She is studying the work of Nan Goldin, one of my favourite photographers.



She tells David she's trying to 'break her eye open' like Olivier taught them in class, to see the world in a fresh way, 'without all the same tired associations we've had'. She refers to it as 'the hardest fucking thing in the world'.

So here we all are. Trying to break our eye open. Trying to see everything without painful memories, without past heartbreaks or trauma or irritation. Without baggage. To see for the first time, or perhaps to see in spite of knowing what we know.

Ripening

Oh my god, why do I suck?

I've had a REALLY difficult time blogging lately and I don't know if I have any real excuses/reasons, except for the fact that even though I still only teach once a week, I've been mad busy lately. I'm working on a couple of important (to me) writing projects and I have to say that it's crucial for me to put that energy into those projects when I have it. I've also had some company lately (my mum) and will have more company soon (my sister and squishy nephew) and have been going to the gym a lot and trying to clean the bathroom and dropping my phone one too many times and just generally being awesome.

I think it's the curse of the To Do List. I've started putting down things like, Get Up and Shower and Feed The Cat, because it's just oh so satisfying to check things off a To Do List. I've also been reading a lot lately and have been going back and forth between three novels, (Holding Still For as Long as Possible by Zoe Whittall, The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb and February by Lisa Moore) each of which are satisfying for different reasons.

So, anyway, yeah. I have about 10 6FU related blog posts that I've started but can't seem to get the inspiration to finish. I also really need to get back to the major job hunt. You know, the one where I go from business to business and try to look desperately pathetic enough so that someone will hire me for $10 an hour.

This is the tricky part about being mostly unemployed for several months. You get used to it. You learn to enjoy and the panic slowly seeps away. You forget that jobs equal respect and dignity and you ignore the fact that you ever thought you needed those things from society anyway. And if you're an artist of some sort, you spend time working on your craft and suddenly you realize that you can easily fill up the days and feel completely satisfied with your life. Possibly for the first time ever.

I sort of feel like Claire in this really ridiculous scene with Ruth. She's being such a little spoiled brat right here, but I kinda feel it. All she wants to do is go to Spain with Billy and 'ripen' (most hilarious bullshit phrase ever), and all I really want to do is stay in Toronto and work on my writing projects and never ever EVER have to work for a mere $10 an hour at some shit service or retail job again. So I'm feeling kind of like a spoiled baby these days.

Every Day Above Ground Is A Good One

I've been sick this week....

Why am I always getting sick? It feels like this happens every month these days. I also had a few frustrating rejections in my writing world, though I was pretty out of it with my neo-citran high, so I don't really even remember much of the pain of that.

This is going to be a bit of a gummy post. I feel strange every day. There seems to be a lot of huge, potentially life-altering decisions that I need to make soon and I'd rather just cocoon up and dig a little hole inside my head to climb into. Or out of. Or something.

It's been raining in Toronto. A good time to snuggle in bed with loved ones. If you aren't too irritated with your loved ones, that is. Or if you aren't so frustrated with yourself that your loved ones seem particularly out of reach.

There is something about isolation that both feeds me and makes me a bit mad. Crazy mad.