Enlightenment.

I am washing my hands. Again.

Some of them are beginning to worry, not out loud, not yet, but I can see their eyes flicker to my hands when I enter a room. They don't realize that I notice-that I can see right through their cream caked faces-that I probably see through their eyes more clearly than they ever did. It would make me laugh if I could remember what that meant.

It's amazing the things you forget when the world changes.

Like colours. I think that there used to be more colours. Some were brighter. Some made statements or soothed the people. I think that's how it worked anyway. Trust people to depend on something that doesn't exist to tell them about the world. I don't need them anymore. The colours the smells. The people. I don't need them to tell me about the world.

I already know. 

I think that maybe I always knew. Like one day I woke up (it was such a loud awaking. sounds like metal breaking and the flash of heat all against me) and understood that everything will peel away. I took my hands and pulled. I pulled at the sky and the ground and anything i could reach. I could reach everything. And the world fell to pieces for me. Big coloured chunks that fell like ceiling insulation across the floor and i kicked them aside and kept going. I got to the great grey bones of the earth and knew that this was the end. 

All my life I thought the dark was in my head and the light was outside. Now I know better.

I pulled the whole world to pieces in one day. No one noticed. They kept walking on streets that I had just thrust aside like old building blocks. They spoke about the rolling sky and the chance of flooding when I had peeled the sky back and left the metal framework it was plastered to standing bare. I would have cared except that I knew. 

I can pull the people to pieces too.

They just sort of fall. They lay across the floor casually, clumsily. And then they break apart piece by piece and then there is something small and skittering in the pile of well maintained wax. It is afraid of me. It moves sideways amidst the camouflage it has used for years hoping to avoid my attention. I don't care enough to look anymore.

All this tearing has done something to my hands.

I cannot keep them clean. I used to keep my nails long. they were smooth and well polished and generally genteel. I cannot anymore. The dirt gets under, stays under, won't leave. That's why I wash them. again and again. Its amazing. The filth in this world. Its everywhere under and in everything. I scrub with the filthy soap trying to strip it from my skin. Again and again. 

The cracks are appearing. They are red and swollen but I cannot stop.

My skin peels away in long sticky strips. It litters the floor in piles that coil around each other. I cannot stop pulling, tugging, tearing. I destroyed the whole world in a day. I am the only real thing left. So I continue to scrub. 

She entered the bathroom carelessly. Then she screamed. and screamed.

I skittered across the floor panicked. I ran for cover. I tried to disappear. 

The pressure and the screams melded and melted. The last scrap of sound came from far far away.

"I hate cockroaches."

Glad Tidings!

This is a note to inform the world that Hannah Minick is now a published poet. The Phoenix, Baylor's Literary Magazine, has generously accepted my submitted piece "Call Disconnected" and published it in their Fifty Year edition. I am completely and totally over the moon right now and do not expect to come down for a good three months. Next year I will compete again with my ambition being this: to have my name spelt correctly. Sadly the name Minick is apparently an unreasonably complex one and therefore the "c" was graciously edited and removed, most likely for reader accessibility. I do not, however, intend to continue with this Anglicized version of my illustrious name of German heritage and would contemplate a letter of righteous outrage if i were not so ridiculously happy right now. Thank you to all of you who bullied, browbeat, bothered, bugged, and in other forms, encouraged me to submit because I know that my terribly tremulous heart would never have been able to hit the 'send' button without you.  Especial thanks to my Dad who, for the price of five poems a week, rented me a laptop and instilled in me the discipline that now helps to keep me sane in the midst of life. Another thanks to my Mom who loves me no matter how badly I write, and is also bold enough to tell me that she has no idea what in the world I am trying to say...at which point I get to practice revising. I feel like I can now stand and say "I am a poet." I need not apologize, apostrophize, amend, nor add appendixes to that statement. This is not to make the claim that this contest has in any way defined me but rather that it has validated my position as an artist. 

Currently I am watching the adventures of Brave Princess Amy and Sleepy Ogre Rebecka. Life is good.

Call Disconnected

I'm reaching for you
through these narrow wires
Can't you see me
My fingers squeezed so thin
like shadows on a wall

And you can't hear me
Don't turn around
Walk past this swinging receiver
'cause all that's coming
is the dial tone

and maybe today's the day I realize
we all grow up alone.

the art of being mute

i love the way he talks

the half sentences with verbs missing

his hands that fall half-heartedly

as if to supply them 

and then with a shrug abandon the effort

but I catch it every time

sort through the sentences and shrugs

and emerge with the sense of what he says

clasped tightly in my palm

in exchange i spill a thousand synonyms

a torrent of sounds to balance the silence

that you stretch between your syllables

its funny.....you know....speaks like bending

and even then he leans on me

like the wind pushing itself past his throat

is too much for him to bear

and so he will collapse the words into whispers

and then again into gaps and ellipses

waiting for me to twist these absences into sense

and shape them again into strength

to be his voice i sing

with all the words i've ever known

its no wonder i suppose

that his dreams sounded so much like mine

when it was my tongue

filling in his silences

the cure for heartburn. and returned items.

so carefully i take this pill

that leaves a leprous streak down my tongue

and on the tip of my finger

a pale chalky stain

that clings to my skin 

like the scent from the dirt

crushed beneath my toes and manages

to remind me of death and life

at the same eclipsed moment

like this grey lump that scratches

its way down my throat like fingernails

leaving long red streaks until

like a rock

it hits my stomach and explodes

into a thousand sounds that bounce

bend and break against my hidden flesh

like reflected light dropped suddenly into a cave

and all the world comes alive

this is what i do

mouthful by mouthful swallowing these scraps of verse

hoping at some point they will reverse

the effect of this heartburn

that i've been fighting since your return

you gave it back with a receipt

and no apparent damages

a heart turned back into itself

burns inside this ribcage

the down town.

We are reaching for fresh air, 

outside this hazy bar. 

thrusting our hands in your pockets. 

looking for the thing that makes you free

 and keeps us breathing this smog

something in your skin that looks so clean

pale and sweating in this foreign night

creeps up our fingers and twists

sharply

around our wrists and we are caught again

in these thin gold cords 

that you slide around our slender wrists our slender necks

until we            choke

we have been waiting all our lives

for the chance to drop these breaks and go

but we sit here with the brakes on

under this red light glow

hero's vocation vacation.

and sometimes i wonder what it is that screams of danger. these knife blade glances from that dark eyed stranger. why do i find safety in this game. and the fact that she will forget my name. because there are shadows and then there is dark. there is loneliness and then standing apart. i will be the silhouette on the rooftop tomorrow.and she will walk and not look up. i will take another sip of sorrow. and laugh while i refill my cup. i take my needs with me wherever i go. i plant my fears and watch them grow. i turn them loose and then suck them dry. bleed poetry from each eye. and stain my teeth with this red elixir. the delicious tearing of thought from thought. listening to them stretch and strain further. from where they were meant to be and what they ought. to say to think to sing and i am the master of the dirge. the master of this earth. playing these games with the dark eyed stranger for the taste of danger. stripping these thorny stems. for the colour it brings. those subtle explosions against the sky. that draws the city's eye. up and i'm away. to laugh and live another day. to find another thousand souls to save. and laugh at the irony.

they call me free.

hope of holiness. hope of wholeness.

i want you to stand like the man

who i drive past every day on my way

to what i want what i need

and he has his arms out

his fingers flared and waiting

for the world to change for him

for me to stop and begin to understand

he stands there every day and his face never changes

watching me and the horizon at the same time

as though i and it were one

that i was simply a momentary personification

of all the infinite possibilities of that blurred line

and as if he saw all of its faraway beauty crammed 

into my pulsing skin and at the corner of my mouth

where waits still that last step towards freedom

he does not want to take it

but stands still with his arms out and his face soft

in the sun which alternately strokes

and then beats against him

much as i do in my mind in my small hungry fury

that curses him as the disease and claims him as the cure

and finally collapses in my stomach weary and worn

from its own fists thrown against the floor

still he stands, so still it seems the wind itself

that sweeps all these things to the sides

the leaves and my hair tie together around me

to blind me and choke me and leave me 

with nothing to say to see

but he is not moved not swept away

still waiting for something to change

one day i will break and press my pale face

against that white shirt and cling to that smooth neck

and cry all the thousand fears that one day he would leave

till at last i am still and feel in him the bending

the impossible coming true and his arms around me

the church folk will gather and speak 

of miracles and vandalism

"look how the arms have moved

how his holy face once watching the sky

bends down now and gazes with a new look

how along the side of his cheek a marble tear lies

see these footprints that come

and none that leave, nothing here but a ring of keys

who can scry this mystery?"

Winston and Julia.

burrow deep beneath my darkened skin

slip past the veins where the blood still runs (don't we all) blue

and then brush through these fibers of muscle

down and down again letting them twang tight again

after you are gone

hit the bone like a fist (knock knock on wood)

and hammer your way into the marrow stream

keep going and soon you'll hear the echoes

i i i

must survive

and it goes and goes again like a thrum

the thousand waves that start

at the plucking of a harp string and strum

through the air to crash against every shore that will receive them

and it will survive the severance of all bonds

anything (snip snip ) as long as it still stands

as long as (say it with me now) i survive. 

forget Romeo and Juliet

this is the world of real

everyone and Big Brother is watching

Winston and Julia.

the anti-romance, the tragedy of self and survival

take her. take her. anyone but me. 

and they all live ever after.

presenting

every day for you is a dance

in which you are a most accomplished

marionette

with your proper strings to be pulled

to lead you gracefully from one end

of this scuffed stage to the other

but you never let the curtain drop

you never let the grimace grin fade

and i am the sillouette

played for laughs behind you

as you move on oblivious

of my darkened being

in your own world of twitch and go

your cleverly disguised dependancy

in this distant dance between you and me

there are days i wonder

if the scissors would bring you freedom

or if you would crumble

a pile of shattered sticks

there are days i wonder

if the light would give me grace

or if i would disappear

a blur of undefined desires

there are days i wonder

who we're dancing for.

artroom.

what is strange to me

is where you exist

i am sure that you

strange being that you are

must reside within these four walls

nourished on the cutting turpentine

that saturates these slow air currents

like blue the sea

you only notice it in its broad expanses

and when scooped close to your hand

it falls as clear as ever

how foolish of me to think that i could carry

you in my spirit away

to this dry arid land that simply reeks

of absolutely nothing at all

except a strange greyness that clings to my fingers

as i hold them to my lips

to blow you a kiss across the miles

across the millions

of wasted feet because they-none of them- know where they are going

and i too am lost letting only

this fragment of soul i stole from you

and hid deep in my memory guide me back

thrusting my eyes into the darkness and out again

through the tunnel time and i'm safe in memory

swinging my legs on that splattered table

waiting for you to stop being art long enough

to still a little more of my heart

that runs too fast with the heat of your skin

i let it run so fast

i let it run away with me

it confused distance with dignity

and hope with impossibilities

you stay for me in that one room

where magic was in the paint

and lessons in the pain

nymph

i know a girl. she is like the sea.

she follows the moon wherever it leads

one day i pray it leads her to me

i knew a girl she was like the sea.

she came down on me like a tidal wave

and swept me away

into her natural element

and then swept away leaving me gasping

for the first thing that felt like air

to me in this long world

i lie upon the sand

waiting for the hated sun to take me

but if i should survive

i shall crawl back towards the sea

and hope to be set free

i knew a girl. she was like the sea.

she followed the moon wherever it led.

i pray that she will come back to me.

she stole my heart and left me for dead.

If it fits. we call it quits.

clap.clap.

blink if you're guilty.

snap. snap.

blink if you're guilty.

hey baby look me in the eye

no i'm not here to cry.

hey baby,

blink if you're guilty.

This is all i want to know

my last question before i go

one thing left to see

hey baby-

blink if you're guilty.

snap. snap.

this is the end of my rope

here is where you choke.

clap. clap.

you put on such a show.

but i have what i need to know.

hey baby,

blink if you're guilty.

blink if you love me.

Warning. No diving.

they say no

don't do it

not headfirst

and when i failed

they shook their old heads

you are so headstrong

and in my heart i know i always will

thats the way they carry you away

when i am at last still at last broken

they will put me on that hard board

(because who will feel it and why waste

what little life has of this soft touch

on one whose skin is shining)

and they'll push me through the doors

feet first feet first

my bare feet bare and blistered

from the thousand streets i've run

to get away from you to know what i am

through and through

so through with you 

and i talked my way free

tore my skin from your cold skin

and let the scraps to scar

to scare away the others if they dared

i'll always dive in headfirst

they said i was headstrong

turns out you were shallow

which makes it so much worse

they pulled me out feet first.

reject.

my future grows tired of you

grows sick of your figure

wreathed in the old fogs

the old befuddling fear and love

it wishes to throw you off 

to send you spiraling down where you demand to be

to, in damning you, set itself free

you must stop it says

reaching with your skeletal hands

to grasp at me

unclean unclean

stay where you belong

and i would take you further

it would throw you into the past

i would cast you farther

back and back again

till you fall beyond my wavering timeline

teetering on the dot that marks

my beginning, my grand entrance

and are lost forever in the sporadic numbers

that blur into the unknowable infinite

and i would never see you again.

My future wishes to restrain you to the past.

My present wishes you never were.

Let him Live.

broken child in my broken arms

i cannot carry you for crying

you, the one i might have known

if God had granted me that boon

and now you are so far away

in your broken world

he is young, he is afraid

let him rest, let him be blessed

take from him these keys

he uses to lock himself in

take from him the eyes

that weigh him down with their heavy gaze

take me instead

but take this from him

dear its turned so cold

dear its past your time

the night has gone away 

the dawn rises to meet you 

no longer lie here against my shoulder

rise to take your day

throw away these old lies

and claim these names that you deserve

leave the bitter root away

and let this light echo ring in your ear

loved and loving

grown and growing

the hope is at hand 

and in these hands are hope

dare to dream.

dear one.

the answers i don't want. the questions i won't ask.

i'll fold up this photograph

into sharp creases with wide space

disconnect the scrawls on the back

that tell you when and where

but not why

never why

i'll never know why you took

this photograph

what you were thinking with your eyes so far away

and with your hand so close to mine

and i with my head against your shoulder

my eyes closed in the shadow of your arm

and my feet still for once

against the leaf strewn sidewalk

i wasn't going anywhere

your eyes though

looking for the horizon saw things

dreams in which you breathed

and blew out like smoke in the morning

while i ran my finger through the fog

you made on the glass

and erased it till we saw the world 

through my elementary heart shapes

and you laughed

with the sound of leaves falling

or rather how they look falling

your laugh like small streaks of colour

rising and falling in the wind

and then skidding along my skin 

and i keep my feet still

because i never want to leave this moment

i'm folding this photo

giving it creases and wings

and when fall comes i'll send it in the storm

to follow the leaves

i never thought that you would leave

i know the when and where

but not the why, never the why

of where you went to follow your eyes.

Vive la Heroine

i'm so familiar with these streets

with these roads of revolution

and they say that if you love

do it the french way

with all your heart and none of your soul

use your face 

as both shield and sword

flash those burning eyes

and conceal the embers of what

that wound left behind

so i'll throw myself in this ring

and i'm too wise to hope

for that golden ring

but i'm hungry enough for your whole heart

for your whole  soul

i'm starving for a slice of life

and i want it from no hand but yours

so i'll be your feet

i'll be your mouth

carrying words that cut like poison

carefully for you to her

because it draws me for a second to your side

and now i'll steal this moment

sing this show down and they'll remember me

crying out "oh, vive la heroine Eponine"