Greenwitch

I again feel like a dual creature, and this time in a more advanced, whole, and yet confused way. Life has continued to progress, which although obvious, begins to seem shocking.

I was once a human, amazed, terrified, awed and excited at the intrusion of non-ordinary reality into ordinary; feeling frightened & blessed by the ways in which I had been selected to experience non-ordinary powers. I undertook an effort to take on shamanism as my full occupation, to commit all my energy and life to non-ordinary reality, forever.

Now I am still present, still telling myself that I am human in a material framework. Originally, my sorcery was begun as a rebellion and all difference was construed as freedom.

The more I used my strength against the idea of the World, the stronger I became.
Now, I am not like this anymore; there is an amphibiousness to it. An adult-ness?
Where's the center, the heart of iron?

From the book Greenwitch:

"FIRE ON THE MOUNTAIN shall find the harp of gold
Played to wake the Sleepers, oldest of the old;
Power from the green witch, lost beneath the sea;
All shall find the Light at last, silver on the tree."

Implicit Awareness

I am at the unique standpoint of being able to see my disintegration, to view the shards of what I had come to think of as my "being" washed away or pulled apart. I may very well be insane, or I may be a prophet of madness. I am at the point where I look at the illusions I have held before and no longer have to fight their truth as much; I look at them and they are not so true, and therefore are not relevant. Anna says, "..someday Brandon is going to be a great spiritual leader," and my ego somersaults in my stomach, does cartwheels in my ribcage.

I think of all the schizophrenic prophets and I wonder how I could be a great leader. I look at my softness, my worrisome thought processes, my dis-integration. I have hacked my way through a jungle, and I've wrecked a lot of beautiful vines, too. They grew back, though not in the same way.

I've changed in some ways and yet I haven't changed in any. There is a temptation to hold up the statement of not having changed as evidence of transcendence. It doesn't matter. What things I have felt are not personal to 'me'. I bow to them.

I miss Gregory. The secret of life is: "shhh...Listen!" I am an Idiot and a God.

Horseshit On Bridge Back From Terebithia

I told the children's community clinic doctor that I was taking Klonopin and asked if they could refill my script. No! We got into an argument. I was not surprised or angry that she would not refill the script--I think that's actually a sign of integrity, and appreciated it--but that she was insisting I go to a mental health provider. She said (yelled) that I needed to see if I had 'an underlying issue' and that I don't just have panic attacks for no reason. No? Really? But, I argued (yelled), I know why I have them. I get scared about things during the day, but I don't feel it, and then it all comes out at once. She paid no heed to this explanation. I told her that psychiatry and me have some major splits of opinion. I said I'd rather solve my problems with spirituality and my own intelligence than psychiatry. She said that made sense but I should still get help! I said psychiatrists love medications, they give them out like crazy! She said no, they can SHOVEL THEIR WAY INTO MY MIND! I recoiled! I said everybody has some type of anxiety! She said to leave her out of it! She went and got me a list of sliding scale community clinics. Community clinics are full of LCSWs trained to deliver tidbits they learned in two years of college through the haze of their own mental illnesses that inspired them to major in social work! I didn't say that, though.

Ok, lady, so you are right. I am sick. I didn't want to say this for a very long time, but I guess it's true. She said that the fact I've moved twice across the country at 21 is a warning flag to her. I wanted to yell something about traveller kids and not understanding transient youth culture. But I really am lonely. I really am drained by always having my next move on the horizen. Every place is equally cold, dry, disconnected. I am tired. I am willing to become comfortable.

Barack Obama

Reading through Obama and Clinton's respective position descriptions on Wikipedia and VoteSmart, I found myself standing more and more behind Obama. His positions are clear and strongly liberal. Hillary is a moderate and has reversed her positions to make them more palatable over time. I believe she probably has genuinely changed her mind about some things, but for the most part she is a politician. I credit her with an evolving and deep understanding of the war in Iraq and with having an outline of an exit strategy that primarily employs economic means of establishing peace. She's a diplomat and I am guessing she is a very good one. Nonetheless, I hate to see her falter on whether homosexuality is immoral or if prisons are too full or not full enough.

However, reading through Barack's positions, I was disappointed to learn that he is strongly in favor of gun control, so strongly that you get the idea that he'd like to ban them altogether. In fact, he has tried to pass a bill banning the sale and possession of handguns. Not only is this in conflict with my personal beliefs and my rights, but it makes him unelectable.

He's a favorite of the Democrats right now, and in the narrow incubator of the primaries he's coming across wonderfully. But already fringed by his color and relative youth, he will have a tough job convincing Republicans over to his side. He still has a chance, however, if he is very straight-shooting, fiscally conservative, and socially permissive. He could capture both Republicans looking to return to more dignified roots after the embarrassment of G.W. as well as the entire Democratic voting base.

However, if he maintains his position on gun control, he will lose virtually every Republican voter, left-voting libertarian, plenty of moderates and a small number of Democrats. He will capture perhaps 35-40% of the vote, and 15% of those will only be voting for him out of fear of all things red.

Be Out

"BE OUT. Someone, somewhere, will refrain from putting a bullet through their head because they see you living a reasonably happy life with the kink that they think makes them worthless."

-Raven Kaldera

Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree

He and I are curled up like a double spiral, our faces almost touching but upside down to each other. We're on an unused wooden stage tucked away at the back of the Dragon's Den courtyard. We're breathing in concert, my breath in and his out, and I know that our breath is the same force, being pulled back and forth between our lungs in perfect harmony. Together, the curl of our bodies forms a great seashell. He exclaims, "I understand you, I understand you!" I giggle with relief, noticing for the first time that I have never really wanted to be loved. I have only wanted to be understood.

David lopes over to the door of my truck. He arrived yesterday from Atlanta. He looked cleaner, better dressed and clean-shaven, more aloof than before. I had missed him and now he is here, but he isn't part of me anymore. I ache for the emptiness he has left. I know he's leaving again tonight, after only a day in town. "I can't be here. My life is going nowhere," he tells me as we drove over the Claiborne bridge, past the perverse cityscape of neon pink boxes littering the lower ninth. I am silent and dry inside, but back at the house, I weep over the balcony, but he doesn't hear that I'm crying. He walks away.

I slide over and David gets into the truck with Charles and I. "I'm leaving tonight for Atlanta and I'm joining the Air Force," he tells us. His voice has a distant, grating, medicinal quality.

"That's fucked up." I tell him. I'm looking at distant building, not at him. I feel very tiny and far away.

"I know." he says.

We talk for a while, and for a minute, he almost changes his mind when Charles tells him about Greenpeace and their boot camp. "You could be traveling all over the world and fighting the real war, Yo."

He almost jumps on it, but he's off it just as quickly.

"This is just something I need to do for myself. To better myself. There are opportunities I can't get anywhere else but in the military." He sounds like he's reciting something he doesn't particularly like.

I give him every bitter, pointed response I can. I try to counter his argument at every turn, to convey the deep disgust I feel.

"I don't want you to think less of me, Brandon, because of this choice. Do you?"

I don't answer that question. "I'm going to love you for the rest of my life, just because that's the way it works."

He's quiet. "I still think you're cool, David." says Charles.

We are in the warm pitch dark of a hotel bathroom in the early morning, hot water splashing on us in the jacuzzi tub. It's just the sound of his breath, this memory, the feel of his foot on the edge of the tub. I pull myself out of the bath when my phone rings, and the ceiling light makes everything deeply white. He looks at me from behind the parted curtain, hair plastered to his forehead and his eyes wet, desirous. My mouth tastes like the center of him and my blood feels like it's running with grated metal, that stabbed feeling I always have when I touch him, mixed with the dizziness of arousal and hunger. I dress and leave, the early morning light on me on the balcony, a coworker's truck, a meeting.

You shift in the driver's seat of my truck and tell us you'll be back to say goodbye, and unceremoniously get out and shut the door. I sob against the steering wheel with no attempt to hide my face. "Go ahead, and cry, Yo. This is worth crying for." Charles says.

The army general in charge of procurement is preparing for at least fifteen more years of protracted struggle on multiple fronts.

"Wanna get in the back?"

Charles and I get in the back of the truck, under the camper-top. We curl up under his sleeping bags and I lean back on him, tired.

"I remember you told me that you used to cry and your parents would cover you up with blankets," he says.

I giggle, and then giggle more. I've thought of something.

"What?" he says.

I try to refrain from telling him, but eventually I do.

"Imagine that it's summer now, and not winter, and Murphy and David are driving away with their windows down, and I'm never going to see him again. I'll poke my head out of the back of the truck and yell, 'HEY DAVID! Remember that time I ate your ass out in the jacuzzi at that hotel? That was fucking awwwesome!"

Ginger Sunset Expired

Sometimes I don't want sex and violence together. Sometimes I just want violence.

A psychological need? A sexual one?

I can only laugh with myself about the straight men who crush on me, thinking I don't want them, that I'm withholding sex from them. If they only knew the type of ache I feel. If their desire stretches over rivers, mine stretches oceans. The sharp and unbearable beauty of their skin, their faces, the pale and twisted roads I could wander over their bodies. Sometimes I feel like an enormous wave, held in place and shivering.

I, asexual white girl. I, delirious boy, who could worship your feet for hours. Would suck your cock, tongue your nipples, anything for the pleasure of feeling your hands defining my body, for the feel of the spread of my wings.