(Poetry) The corpse of you

I hope one day to come across the corpse of you, while holding the hand of another man's daughter.
There we would drag you down some secluded alleyway, so that I could give her the education it took me years to graduate from:
a Masters in the Art of You.

 First I would run my hands across your body,
 making sure to find the puncture wound, or broken neck,
because if this is anything like our relationship,
 without rigor mortis you are bound to come back to life, and enter back into mine.
And if history is meant to repeat itself,
 then I would rather be the one to drag a knife into your chest
 then let you pin your poisoned accusations into the very core of me,
 only to leave me the one floundering in painful familiarity.

And once I was done, I would pull my daughter's hands into my lecture hall, and recite my dissertation on what it was that made me wish that I could touch you,
kiss you,
let the world that had built itself upon my shoulders
 fall into a cloud of forgetfulness when I had the opportunity to take you in between my fingers,
 lacing your curves,
 your flesh,
 and the very sight of you
 underneath my nails that begged to release the truth of you away from that mask that you had latched onto.

So that if she ever came home with a head filled with questions,
and homework based on that "cute boy in class" lessons
I can remind her of her hands I pressed into your heart,
touching each tendon that was chilled with misuse,
showing her how some men can betray it so young,
using it as an after-thought, that had barely begun.

And if that isn't enough,

I will tell her about the silence that would eat away at our phones
 causing the rift between our bodies to expand,
 collapsing into a million letters that we never sent.
Of how I would type each unsent digit gently,
 like a lover,
 into the frame of our misdemeanors
 and from the release of those thoughts
 I would let the memory of you slip
 like watercolors
 into a muddled patching of what you were,
 to what I wanted you to be.

I'd tell her how I pray that she'll get the answers,
 without having to live the lessons
that she'll never have to play the broken record of a heart,
 that continuously skips over all of the best parts
and that from me, she'll know better,
that when asked,
 she won't make the choices that her momma never taught her.

And I'll pray that she'll forgive me for who I am today,
 remaining in the present here like I have,
 letting the rush of blood pump back and forth between the places where my heart and hands once stood,
 letting me replace the cur of my emotions
 with writings to you about trivial things,
 in hopes that maybe once,
 just once,
 you will understand that all I wish to whisper to you
 is that I hold out my love to you,
still.

(Poetry) Alex Gross. Oil on Canvas. "Product Placement" Inspiration

There we sat
a party for two,
at separate ends of the room.
Starbucks and it's water maiden looming over our heads,
conducting our first encounter.

Transfixed in your eyes,
scanning over some pixilated nonsense,
oh how I longed to be the subject title of your attention.
Oh read the digits of my thesis,
veer your fingers to scroll down my index,
let me be the body paragraph that you sip over.

I long to touch you across the floor,
moving my desires over your unknown trespasses,
let me lose myself in your cashmere decors
so I can replace it with my silk printed interests.

Oh Starbucks maiden,
heed my prayer,
let us finish our overpriced refreshments at coincidental times.
Let us stand beside each other within your blessed,
 and slow-moving lines,
so that the proximity of our bodies will answer for our introductions.
Allowing me to brush my hand against his,
as an ending paragraph seduction.

(Poetry) Butterfly Inspiration

A rhythmic enchantment begins to pulsate beneath the layer of grime
gathered over my cerebral cortex,
where misuse of synapses have died down
 from last I omitted poetry from my fingertips.

Now,
watch as the river of sludge dribbles across the porcelain page,
each word chasing after figments of butterflies,
in attempts to make sense of abused syllables and sentences.

Lacking in structure,
face,
movement,
and time.
I am creating a monster in misconducted monotone.
Grasping onto the fraying corners of overused visuals
as I attempt to stimulate a coal into the uncertainty of its nature.

Oh gleam and reflect my own unsure character,
judged by histories long forgotten ancestors.
Let loose the chiming of laughter
 that remains flapping
 on the tip
 that is my imagined butterfly wing.

(Poetry) Dedicated to December 28th

They tell you not to eat before it happens.
They tell you to hold it in until they can get a sample.
They tell you to wait. To enter. To put this gown on. To lay down.
That this is going to be cold here and there, as they pump you full of drugs.
To count down from a hundred.
If you're ready.
But you're never ready.
Even when they say
"This is going to be uncomfortable just for a second"
and
"This might pinch".

Then after wards,
they hand you a bottle that is supposed to make the pain, go away.
They give you a clean little packet of papers, that is supposed to explain everything you need to do for the next two week,
and if anything should happen that isn't covered on those pages,
to give them a call.

But you can't call them after you wake up from another nightmare.
You can't call them when the shock finally catches up to you.
Their papers don't cover how you'll have to stand there with the knowledge that you let that 'thing' go.
That 'thing' you and others told you you'd be better off without.
 That 'thing' that books and movies describes as "the best thing to happen to you".
Clearly making what you did "the worst thing to happen to you",
right?

But that pain doesn't originate in the losing it,
 it's in the wanting to keep it with every fiber of your being
 since the moment you woke up in a half daze to test yourself at five in the morning.
 That moment when you think your mind is playing a cold trick on your heartstrings,
 and yet even after the floor stops spinning,
 you're left facing that it did actually happen to you.
 Even as you're calling the other member to this party,
 long distance,
 at a reasonable hour that is long past the hours you've been living with this realization alone.
 Trying to convince him to fly down to your hometown now,
 no not three weeks from now,
 but now.
 Right here.
 At a distance that his arms will fill the empty space between yours,
close enough so his words can convince you out of your desires.
Where the need to feel his skin is satiated, because it's the only thing that will be like that thing that is growing inside of you.
Whenever you need to feel the brush of his hair against your cheek, because it's the only crown of hair similar to the one inside of your body.
The one you'll never touch.
The one you'll never see.

They never tell you how you have the date burned into your memory,
 like a cattle prod
afterwards.
And that every year you will have to drink yourself into a stupor to celebrate the loss of something that took a part of you with it.
They never tell you that afterwards,
 you feel half the woman you were before.
 Even when they remind you of what you can have again,
 and again,
 and again.
 None of that matters.
 How can it?
 The first one was let go,
no...
ripped out.
Pinched out.
How can you replace that feeling?
That longing?

That's right.
 You replace it with his words,
 when every night you woke up in sweat over another vision of her beautiful face,
 and her precious laugh
 that you have on a tape cassette that repeats itself against your discarded innocence.

His words of "Don't worry baby, we'll have another one"
But you're asking yourself, another what?
Accident?
Isn't that what he called it?
Isn't that what it had always been,
even after he left you shortly after?
After you went insane with the post-traumatic depression,
stress,
anxiety,
tragedy,
 after you swallowed an entire bottle of pills in front of him
not knowing if it was for you, him, or her?

But then I guess,
we really did have 'another', after all.

(Not Quite) The Worst Day of my Life (but Close Enough)...

They tell you not to eat before it happens. They tell you to hold it in until they can get a sample. They tell you to wait. To enter. To put this gown on. To lay down. That this is going to be cold here, and there. What drug they've just given you. To count down from 100 hundred. If you're ready. But you're never ready. Even when they say "This is going to be uncomfortable just for a second" and "This might pinch". Then after wards, they hand you a bottle of more drugs, with longer names than you can pronounce in your current state. They give you a clean little packet of papers, that is supposed to explain everything you need to do for the next week, and if anything should happen that isn't covered in those pages, to give them a call.

But you can't call them after you wake up from another nightmare. You can't call them when you cry every hour because the shock finally hits you days afterwards. They don't mention that in their papers either; how you'll have to stand there with the knowledge that you let something go. That thing you and others told you you'd be better off without. That thing that books and movies describes as "the best thing to happen to you". So that makes what you did "the worst thing to happen to you", right?

But it isn't in the losing it, it's in the wanting to keep it with every fiber of your being since the moment you woke up in a half-daze to test yourself at five in the morning. That moment when you think your mind is playing a cold trick on your heartstrings, and yet after the floor stops spinning, you realize that it actually happened to you. Even as you're calling the other member to this party, long distance, at a reasonable hour that is long past the hours you've been living with this realization alone. Then trying to convince him to fly down to your hometown now, no not three weeks from now, but now. Right here. Because you need his arms right now, and his words to convince you out of your desires. You need to feel his skin, because it's the only thing that will be like that thing that is growing inside of you. You need to feel the brush of his hair against your cheek, because it was going to be similar to the crown of hair inside of your body. The one you'll never touch. Or ever see.

They never tell you how you have the date burned into your memory, like a cattle prod, and that every year afterwards you will have to drink yourself into a stupor to celebrate the loss of something that took a part of you with it. They never tell you that afterwards, you feel half the woman you were before. Even when they remind you of what you can have again, and again, and again. None of it matters. How can it? The first one was let go, no... ripped out. Pinched out. How can you replace that feeling? That longing?

That's right. You replace it with his words, when every night you woke up in sweat over another dream of her beautiful face, and her precious laugh that you have on a tape in the cassette player that is your innocence. His words "Don't worry baby, we'll have another one" another what? Accident? Isn't that what you called it? Isn't that what it had always been, even after you left me shortly after? After I went insane with the post-traumatic depression, after I swallowed an entire bottle of pills in front of you?

I guess we really did have 'another', after all.



Dedicated to December 28th

Food Food Food...

Often times, families have a traditional recipe that they pass down from generation to generation, and yet there are some who simply take from someone else's, "The recipe for this delicious family cooky [sic] came to us from Mrs. Ronald Anfinson, Benson, Minnesota." as stated in the cookbook "Cooky Primer."

Though told to heat the oven to 400 degrees, which is considered "moderately hot" in cooking lingo, my preference drops to 350-375. Perhaps the 6000-7500 feet in elevation of New Mexico makes that more of a necessity, either way, it has been suggested to keep the temperature lower than advised for baking goods- especially with the delicate nature of cookies.

Washed hands, prepped workspace, every item pulled from the shelves and wooden cabinet spaces in pantries, and besides left-over cups and bowls, all that is left is referring to the recipe. With bare hands, crush between your fingers a cup of shortening with a part of Imperial margarine, a cup and a half of sugar, and two eggs, thoroughly within a large bowl- glass works best.

In a second bowl, medium sized, in any material, measure two and three-fourth cups flour said by "dipping method or by sifting", which dumping it into the bowl works just as well. Next include two teaspoons of cream of tartar, a teaspoon of baking soda, and a fourth of salt that will all be combined and stirred into that larger bowl. From here, you can mix all of the ingredients by hand, by wooden spoon, or if you are so lucky, by a self-mixing kitchen-aid.

Afterwards, simply shape the dough into one inch “balls“, or lumpy mounds as I call them. Roll them in a mixture of two teaspoons of sugar and cinnamon, to the point that you are left with stains of brown and grainy white, over each finger and in between every wrinkly crevice. Finally, place them apart on an ungreased baking sheet, to bake for eight to ten minutes. These cookies will puff up at first, but then flatten out into cinnamon laced disks of soft, and subtle gooiness.

The recipes say that this will make six dozen cookies, but who knows- it is the only mystery, but everything needs a touch of mystery every once in awhile.

They have called me “snicker doodler” since 2005, and with the years this spread from friends to family, binding me to them all, with the simple touch of sugar and cinnamon.
_______________________________________________

Snickerdoodles

1 cup shortening (part butter or margarine)
1 1/2 Cups sugar
2 eggs

2 3/4 cups Gold Medal Flour
2 tsp. cream of tartar
1 tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt

2 tbsp. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon

The Day it Happened...

Layout/ Notes

911.2011 > 12 years old > Home (watching news on TV) > Didn't go to school, because parents felt it best that I stay there > Remember the "Jumpers" by the anchor woman's voice, which cracked in shock > Repetition of first video, of footage on the ground > Footage/security tapes recovered by nearby building which caught the first plane crashing into the first tower > Switch of language from first tower crash "being an accident", to the second plane collision being "an attack/ terrorism" > No commercials were playing throughout the event > Frantic anchors trying to explain what was happening > The giant plume of smoke that escaped once the towers fell, chasing the bystanders away from the site in a thick veil of gray > Father was in the police force at that time, so was called in early > Mother had to go to work, and continued to watch the event on a minature television that the bank tellers kept, repeatedly stopping to watch, because spending a few minutes working, only to return to the television when they got a chance > Amber, my sister, was stationted in San Diego in the Navy, at this time, and we couldn't get ahold of her for she was driving to the base for training, but all of the bases were on emergency shutdown, and she was caught in traffic so didn't have any idea what was happening, and we were frantic because we couldn't get ahold of her through any means > throughout the day they continued showing the same footage, and the same reports went out on the radios > Afterwards, all the media began to change- people were on high alert, but lost in where to go or who to blame > chaos came and went, and throughout the week more cases and more theories sprouted as to why, who, and if it would happen again.

My Diva/ My Hero...

"I understood that what I needed, to become the first poet of this century, was to experience everything in my body. It's no longer enough for me to be one person. I decided to be everyone. I decided to be a genius. I decided to originate the future."

In 2005, at the age of sixteen, this became the catalyst to cementing my future as an artist. Not because it lead me to the desire to draw, I had been playing with that “hobby” since I was capable of holding a pencil, nor did the quote open up some ideals that I could be a genius myself. It helped instead explain, and encourage, the emotional stampede that was running through my body every minute of the day. As a teenager, I refused to demand the attention my emotions needed, locking them up internally and letting them spillover ivory sheets of paper instead. Before I had begun to study the lifestyle of an artist, I had continuously restrained that very part of myself which would later enforce my voice as one. A naïve discovery, that would have remained unchecked, had it not been for an Arthur Rimbaud.

Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a 19^th-century French poet. Born in Charleville, Ardennes, he produced his best-known works while still in his late teens, which I related to at that time, feeling a sense of awe that one at his age could have such an impact in his field. Rimbaud influenced modern literature, music and art through both his writings and life, as he was known to have been a libertine and a restless soul, travelling extensively on three continents before his death from cancer just after his 37th birthday.

A decade before I would be introduced to his works, the 1995 film, Total Eclipse by Agnieszka Holland, documents Rimbaud’s most influential, though self-destructive, relationship in 1871 with his older mentor, Paul Verlaine.

The story follows their encounter together, stewed with absinthe and resentment, which begins with Verlaine abusing and later abandoning Mathiltde, his wife that ends with the two writers becoming lovers. Rimbaud's uncouth behavior disrupted the insular society of French poets, during that period, which Verlaine found youthfully invigorating, leeching onto it as a means to add excitement to his life and creativity with his works. There were reconciliations and partings with Mathiltde and partings and reconciliations with Rimbaud for Verlaine, until an 1873 incident with a pistol, sends Verlaine to prison, and Rimbaud to the hospital and an early retirement out of poetry.

Before I was hitting every bookstore for his writings, looking up countless articles, threads, and forums about his life and endeavors; attempting to suck up his life as a means to inherit his uncanny faith in his abilities, and dedication to his craft, I was introduced to his lifestyle through this movie. Though it highlighted his love affair, I found his countless internal struggles between his humanity, sanity, and inspiration comforting. With every slash of his childish misdemeanors, with each tantrum and outlandish remark, I felt a kinship rising within me and connecting me to the pursuit of his aspirations. I wanted to be a revolutionary artist, an independent thought stream, a unified experience to be rendered in art, and with Rimbaud as my guide, I felt for the first time that I could have my insanity and make something out of it.

“The first study for the man who wants to be a poet is knowledge of himself, complete: he searches for his soul, he inspects it, he puts it to the test, he learns it. As soon as he has learned it, he must cultivate it! I say that one must be a seer, make oneself a seer. The poet becomes a seer through a long, immense, and reasoned derangement of all the senses. All shapes of love, suffering, and madness. He searches himself; he exhausts all poisons in himself, to keep only the quintessence. Ineffable torture where he needs all his faith, all his superhuman strength, where he becomes among all men the great patient, the great criminal, the great accursed one--and the supreme Scholar! For he reaches the unknown… So what if he is destroyed in his ecstatic flight through things unheard of, un-nameable: other horrible workers will come; they will begin at the horizons where the first one has fallen!”

I began with my journey of self-awareness. From Rimbaud’s cues, I began to analyze each experience through my body, and documenting it; storing it into a section of my brain that I mentally configured as a “material’s” storage center. Every moment, spent alone or through interacting with others, became another piece of material that I could later develop in my work. No longer was I simply allowing time to pass by, unnoticed, having no more disregard for it’s existence than any moment that came before it or would follow it. With Rimbaud, I wanted to be a scholar on life, and so studied myself in ways that I couldn’t learn in a classroom textbook. Like Rimbaud, I reveled in my “flaws” as much as I did in my “perfections”, finding my self-worth lost in every area but through my work, and so I knew that to perfect my work, I needed to begin to perfect myself.

Now with five years of art classes under my belt, countless emotions drawn out on paper, and numerous experiences stored up in my head, I have learned to accept my artistic insanities as a means to achieve my own sense of “Rimbaudian Genius”

My love life is... (Love is...)

I.

"So tell me why you're here." 

It always began that way; the cities, names, and buildings may change but never their questions. I recall hating their introductory assessments, wondering why they never looked at the previous files to get these immediate answers, so we could get to the actual root of the problem instead. Perhaps it was a way to make sure my story was straight, that I hadn't left some important detail out with the others, the one detail that would "solve" all of my problems. Or at least, explain them. 

"I fell in love with a boy..." I could never keep myself from laughing at this point; playing off the cruel reality of my history became second nature to me. A part of me knew my situation wasn't genuine, nor as serious as I had allowed it to inflict my life as it had, but I also knew it wasn't something I could handle on my own, nor run and hide from. I had attempted that by running out of the state twice already. 

At this time, I am twenty-one years old, sitting in a plush white love seat, in a plush white room. The Savannah humidity has already begun to penetrate the brick walls surrounding the two-story house, causing perspiration to drip down my arms only to bead and gather at my wrists. I had been living on this side of the country for over six months, but I still wasn't used to the effect it had on my body. Having lived in Seattle, Washington before this, I believe my body simply missed the rain and so decided to drench me one way or another. 

"Is that why you tried to kill yourself?" It slipped out of her lips like it was old news, or as if it didn't have an effect on her, which it probably didn't. It didn't really faze me either, not as much as it had the week before when I had taken the bottle of extra strength Tylenol. The entire bottle.

"Yes and no. I mean, what triggered it was the baby. But, it was his lying to me, and then leaving me that really pushed me towards attempting."

"Do you still feel that way?"

"God no, after spending three days at the mental asylum, I knew that wasn't where I wanted to be."

"At the asylum, or dead?" I could see where I may have slipped up. I felt that suicide was never going to fully leave my life, I had been caught in the idea since I was twelve, but I wasn't ready to trust this person in understanding that I wasn't serious about killing myself then, however "not ever" was the different story. So I lied. Which you shouldn't do with your new psychiatrist, but I did anyway, because at the time I wasn't trying to get help, just trying to prove I could still attend school.

"I don't want to go back to the asylum, nor be dead. After I took those pills, and failed at attempting to throw them back up, I knew what a mistake I had made." She seemed to be satisfied, so I continued with my original explanation.

"You see, when I was in high school, I was in love with this guy. He was my fiancé."

II.

His name was Damien. That wasn't his real name, but he preferred it to the real one. In my opinion, it always suited him better; it brought to mind someone rougher and somewhat romantic, like Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice, or El Wray from Quentin Tarantino's Planet Terror, not like his real name. His real name was cold, almost unemotional, more your average-Joe than the passionate scorpion Damien was. 

There are people in your life that teach you how to be a better person, who you admire for the things that they did, or are. Damien taught me about love, not by his actions, but by the actions he didn't take. He was my anti-hero, my hard lesson in life, the biggest regret you can't stop thinking about, nor stop wanting. To this day, I can only shamefully accept that I am still as enthralled as the day I took notice of him. The real him.

Our beginning played out like most teen-romance films; we were classmates who barely spoke to one another because we hung out in "different crowds", a situation brought us together, and we clicked. The beginnings are usually the easiest, perhaps because neither of you really expect much to come from the encounter, especially during the years when your hormones are doing most of the driving and physical urges overpower logical reasoning. 

The twist was, I had been living with undiagnosed depression, which was exacerbated by my previous abusive relationship, for years. I had no aspirations, no real individual interests, I followed anyone willing to lead me, and I continuously held myself back so as not to disappoint anyone. I was driven by this unexplainable level of guilt, that the people in my life at the time played on, thus leading me to believe that my self-worth could only be found in the eyes of another. 

(Don't get me wrong, I had a loving family, they did the best that they could with the chaos that always surrounds three daughters, but sometimes, as the youngest, it wasn't enough to give me a backbone in the ego department. I don't blame them for this; I don’t blame them for anything. )

Damien was what I needed back then, he took my own crutches away, and even when I fell and begged for them back, he would just sit there patiently until I understood the importance of what he was doing. At first, every lesson felt like a punishment that I deserved for some wrongdoing, especially when he showed me compassion and admitted he loved me. The biggest lesson was when I finally believed that he actually did. But he didn't stay as what I needed. But I didn't know that back then, or at least wouldn't admit it.

I used to believe he was my Noah from The Notebook, devoted even with the limitation of the time we had together, believing we would make it through no matter where our lives led us. I still believe it; even after all of those years of losing that part of him, there is still that lie of his that I refuse to let go of. After his interests strayed the dozen or so times, after his words lost their sweetness, even after I fell into the pattern like Sandra Cisneros' Woman Hollering Creek with him, I held a delusional loyalty that I admit had become an obsession. I was Jean Baptiste Racine's tragic heroine, fastened onto an idea of love more than the admittance of reality. But it was that idea that pushed me forward in life.

I met other people, forced myself out there, whilst still continuing to strive for self-preservation and self-reliance above the honest pursuit for someone to "love" me. Through the years, after falling for the extreme opposite of what Damien was, and still ending up in a similar if not worse predicament that led to meeting the aforementioned psychiatrist, I began to pick through what was "my" reality. Discarding my inserted nuances, and forcing myself to reflect on where my actions had begun to lead me, I slowly began to discover my own definition of love, outside of what I had been spoon-fed by modern media, family, friends, and old experiences. 

Love is acceptance. You accept the people you love for who they are, for who you are to them, for who you are when you are with them. You also accept when they hurt you, when you hurt them, and when it inevitably ends. The truth is you have no power over your emotions; they can be either hindered, or shadowed over, even ignored. But they don't die out, or fade away with time, nothing does. But you also need to accept that lack of control, as well, because love is nothing more than living. It's just another experience presented to us, another choice that is either taking us down one road or another. 

Damien made the best choices he could, because they were just part of who he was then. If I didn't accept him for that, then I couldn't accept the truth of anything. He will continue to affect my life, because I let him be part of my life from the get go. Just like everyone I have ever met who is part of my life, will have some effect on me, there is no way of undoing that. If it weren’t for the actions he didn't take, however, I would never have reached this level of "loving", "living", or whatever you wish to call it. 

III.

I continued to see that psychiatrist for the few months I remained in Georgia afterwards, and even though we met every week, twice a week, there wasn't a moment that her words triggered something in me until the end.

"You know, Cory, you went through all of this and you've never once been angry. If I were you, I would have yelled at the top of my lungs. Kept that anger inside of me until I never wanted to speak to them again. Why didn't you just do that? Then you never would have gone back to any of them."

"Because I was never angry at them, I was only angry at myself."

She, of course, didn't understand. But I knew better, because no one can make your choices for you. They can influence you, tempt you, seduce, or charm you, but in the end you can still decide which road to go down. As Jean Paul Sartre stated, “For human reality, to be is to choose oneself; nothing comes to it either from the outside or from within which it can receive or accept…. it is entirely abandoned to the intolerable necessity of making itself be, down to the slightest details.”

My favorite color...

I.

Cornflower Blue. Such a complex combination of a savory, fragrant, sight rarely seen and rarely used. You won't find it on parking signs, or in the morning sky. It isn't a shade often used in clotheslines, or found in the iris of someone's eye. It can be briefly captured when night begins to devour day; when the two halves meet, and in their mingling tinge an arc of gray cupped across the sky. It's deep, beyond the basic lip of an island beach; found in the watery depths that only mechanics can allow man to experience. Even its name feigns in describing its hue accurately. Instead, imagine it wet, mushed together in your mouth, filling it with its thickness, and graininess. That is Cornflower Blue. That is the fullness that I experience when this rare gem catches my eye. 

II.

She, for I often imagine this color as feminine, catches the corner of my eye quite frequently. Not because she is laced abundantly in natures color palate, for sadly she is not, but because as an artist I seek her out: In paint swatches, in interior decor, down fashion runways, on every shelf in bookstores. Any tint, shade, tone, purity or dreariness she wears, I am entranced. Only man has captured her so frequently, though she is left unnoticed by the 'common man'; those who bustle to and fro, trapped in their unimportant desires and unimportant fears, too busy to give her a piece of their mind. But I do. 

III.

In my mind, she touches a sadness that is held deep within me, and places a veil of melancholy over my days, and yet I crave her presence. To me, she is my reality, my muse, my shade of rose-colored glasses. With her I am lost in foggy streets, and hidden passageways, drowning in seas of silence, and the absence of doubt. Wrapped within her beguilement, whisked into slumber, or shielded in her confidence stretched out over my fragility, I am in adoration to her ever-giving nature.

_____________________________________________________________________________

Cornflowers (Centaurea cyanus) are among the few "blue flowers” that are truly blue, as most lean towards a shade of blue-purple, with the slight tinge of green that offsets this color in it’s rarity, there were very few artists that first developed a style of using this pigment when it was first discovered. Only recently seen as a flower, it was originally considered a weed growing in crop fields, hence its name, considering that fields that grew grains such as wheat, barley, rye, or oats were formerly known as "corn fields" in England. In folklore during those times, men wore cornflowers when they were in love, believing that if their flowers faded too quickly, their love would not be returned.