i feel like i write differently, depending on whether i'm writing in my notebook or on the computer. i think sometimes when i write on the computer, the tone of my writing tends to be a little more sarcastic, a little more sharp. or some other way that i can't quite put my finger on.

i just know the sensation of the things that i've written digitally or in analog tends to be distinguishable. is this just me, or do other writers have this problem? i asked it on twitter the other day, and my friend Collin confirmed that he too feels that way. anyway, that interests me, and i have been thinking about it this week, as i try to work on a new goal that i've set for myself, to go back to writing right before i fall asleep every night, for at least an hour. with no distractions, not even music. (that's a huge thing.)

i used to do it all the time, from like 2004-2007, and then i just got busy, and i got a computer and well, the internet has killed lots of useful time for lots of people, so i don't really need to justify (because i can't.) but i like knowing that i'm not the only time-wasting writer in the world. (when writers say they have "writer's block," they really mean "the internet" anyway.)

i've been avoiding writing out anything prosey lately, because there have been a lot of emotions that i've been dealing with, personal, secretish type of emotions, which i am comfortable with divulging cryptically and enigmatically into poetry. and with prose, i can't hide. maybe some people can, but i'm not one of them.

so i end up being so straightforward, and blunt. and say things that perhaps you won't be disappointed in, but that i would.

it's easier to explore my emotions in poetry, anyway. or it's tidier. i think them out in my head and try and translate - or abridge - them down into an image or an idea that fits the feeling. like cramming a huge pillow into a tiny box and all anyone can see is the box, but only i know that the pillow is stuffed inside. that's a shitty simile. but it kind of fits. you see the box, and sometimes the pillow, if i've done a good enough job divulging, but mostly you just see the box, but when i read my poetry, i see the box AND the pillow at the same time. so i remember exactly what giant knotted emotional mess was crammed in my head when i wrote it, and you just have a pretty little package to look at. does that makes sense?

do i care if it makes sense? no, not really. i'm writing this for me. explaining things to myself. and there are a few of you who know that this blog is here, who read it on occasion, but mostly i am just keeping a journal here. a journal that gets left on the nightstand and strangers find it and peek through, but only for a few pages, because it was meant for me, not them, and you can tell it was meant for me, and you become uninterested and walk away. because you don't see your name, or you do see it, but you don't want to read it. because what i have to say isn't what you expected. or because it's exactly what you expected, but you don't want to be reminded.

hang on, i'll go find an old poem and tell you what i was thinking when/as i wrote it.

Uncomfortable Isn'ts

I pluck dead words
from the rafters
at night, 
(i'm trying to pull whatever words i can grab
out of my head tonight.)
 
meet each shrunken
arrival with a doubt
and a stutter.
(each small, misfit wrong word that comes,
i second-guess, and can't quite get out. second-guessing myself,
really, not feeling confident enough to write this evening.)

Could I lick
the palms of your sweet
successes?
(i just want a small taste of what it's like to accomplish something,
because it seems like everyone else around me is accomplishing good things
and i want to know what that feels like.)

The honey of your
today stings straight
cinnamon on my lips 
(it hurts to see how sweet the lives of the people i called my peers
have become, while mine feels anything but sweet. i want the things
that you have right now, to be mine right now too, but they're not.)

and my tongue
pretends I know
the taste of tomorrow. 
(so while i watch you have all those things that i wanted/want for myself, 
to deal with it, i just imagine that someday i will have all those things too,
and that's supposed to make it hurt less.)

I have been Widow:
shutter-eyed;
waiting 
(i've been left alone by what i loved the most,
now my eyes and expressions are masked and closed-off
from everything outside, just waiting for something to change.)

for no one
once dinner's gone
cold. 
(...even though i feel like what i want is something that's never 
going to show up. and i'm wasting the time that i have right now.)


see, i don't feel like it's too much of a leap between what i wrote and what i mean, but like i said, i know the pillow's in the box. maybe the reader doesn't. that's what's floating at the top of my mind as i write this, anyway. not a day for digging deeper. no more emotional prose. for the moment.