Fire Demon's Lament

"The Fire-Demon's Lament"
A short story of righteousness and pyromania in Upper Manhattan

Tell no secrets. Admit no lies. That was the creed Feathol lived by. Or was it admit no lies, tell no secrets? After four thousand centuries, he couldn't quite keep the words straight in his pea-sized brain. No matter. After such a long time, the fire-demon's lifestyle had settled into a comfortable lull and he figured he was doing just fine for himself. Just fine indeed.

His mornings began with a romp through the neighborhood's incinerators. The silly people of Manhattan were always burning something. His afternoons were spent sunning his incorporeal body on a rock in Central Park. Sure, it was a rather reptilian thing to do, but fire was fire – no matter what the source. And the big glowing ball in the sky provided plenty of it.

Nighttime was when Feathol truly shined. He would hop from flaming trash can to flaming trash can. The homeless men and women of the city streets would catch glimpses of him through the corners of their eyes, an occurrence that happened usually by the fire-demon's choice, sometimes by accident.

It was one such accident that landed Feathol in his current predicament. Flames whipped around the central core of his essence. Sparks tapped along brick as his fingertips examined the prison in which he was confined. He could hear voices afar – though in truth they were no more than three feet away.

“How was your day, dear?” The sweet, heady voice of a young woman shimmered through the glass front of Feathol's prison cell. He looked outward, toward the world. The fire-demon saw a playground of flammable material – skin rugs, wooden walls, papers and enough Naugahyde to satisfy his burning for days.

By a stroke of bad luck, Feathol had ended up trapped in the fireplace of one of the wealthiest couples in Manhattan. All he had done was tip the trash can of some poor schmuck trying to get some heat. It was all a bit of fun and all in a day's work for the conflagrant spirit. Feathol hadn't quite caught up with the times. The man stood up, and looked right at the fire-demon.

It hadn't occurred to Feathol that this week might have been the perfect time to lay low in his favorite hideout – the local hibachi restaurant. On Tuesday there had been a mass excommunication of priests, accused of all manner of atrocities. Some of them were innocent. Most were not. With no place to go and no home but their Mother Church, these men had flocked to the streets by the dozens.

Feathol could tell by the light in this man's eyes that he was innocent – guilty of no crime, save perhaps over=zealousness, a crime which Feathol knew God didn't look too kindly on anyway. It was that very same crime that had landed him this combustible gig in the first place.

The aura of righteousness ablaze around him, the priest uncorked a half-empty wine bottle and poured the contents to the ground, a mock libation to whatever deity would listen to the cries of a holy man stripped of name and title. Mutter, mutter, grumble, grumble. That's all these priests and holy men ever did. Most of the time the words meant nothing....few of them spoke the Old Language anymore. Unfortunately for Feathol, this one did.

The world began to whirl on its axis, turning faster and faster. The one solid constant was that damnable priest and his Boone Farm bottle, sticky around the edges from the cheap blue vint. Turning ever faster, swirling and pivoting, the world came alive to the cries of the man's passions. Pirouetting like a toy dancer on a string, the world eddied and gyrated until Feathol couldn't see any longer.

The priest had hurled the bottle at one of the older homes in the city, hitting just right so that it shattered in the chimney. He had a hell of an arm, that priest. Feathol thought he must have coached little league at one point. There was no sport more holy than little league, except maybe hockey. But hockey, by and large, wasn't a sport priests cared to encourage. The holiest things weren't for everyone, you know. It was one of the first things you learned, priest or demon. Hurtling toward the fireplace of the family's abode, Feathol lost consciousness. “GOAL!” His mind screamed. “TWO POINTS!” The man upstairs certainly had a sense of humor, narrating the score of this trivial game.

And he'd woken up here. In hell. Was there such a thing as hell? Feathol didn't rightly know. It should have been something he did know, after all, he was a fire demon, but it hadn't been included in his welcome seminar and it didn't seem appropriate to ask – his trainer, a demon so old he'd walked the earth when the grasses still struggled to bloom, was a right asshole. It just didn't seem worth the torture he'd bear to get an answer.

Feathol watched the scene through the glass-front cell. Tapping his ethereal fingers against the bricks around him, Feathol saw a family in the room. They weren't looking at him. They didn't even notice he was there. The fire-demon pounded the walls, shook the bars, rattled the glass. And still nothing. After some time, he settled.

“Dear,” that infernally sweet voice spoke again. “Don't you think it's getting to be too warm to keep a fire? It's nearly July.” The woman leaned over the Naugahyde chair and kissed the man sitting there. He nodded his agreement.

“Yes, sweetheart, I do believe you're right. Have Ilsa extinguish the fire for us, would you?” Feathol's flaming eyeballs widened. He pounded the walls, shook the bars and rattled the glass even harder. The woman left the room.

The strange man stared directly at the fire, directly at Feathol. “You know, not every homeless person is homeless by force. Some of the ones you torture do have families, some of them do have recourse. There are some who choose to live as they do. My brother did the right thing sending you here. We're going to get you the help you need.” A demon intervention? Feathol thought it was passing odd. His panic quelled but for a moment before the bucket of water was poured on his essence.

The last thing Feathol remembered was the kindly chimney sweep who pulled his tattered and worn spirit from the fireplace floor. Washed away down a drain, Feathol wondered in passing if there was a job market for slurry demons. Surely there had to be a waste management plant somewhere in need of a resident spirit.

Last Request - Flash Fiction

This was written as an assignment for my creative writing class (Shoutout to my instructor Denise! Thank you for the inspiration!) We were challenged to write a piece of flash fiction, a complete story between 10-1000 words. I took it a step further and used a prompt generator on Seventh Sanctum, the random "Writing Challenge" generator. The original prompt read "The story must involve a quilt in it. A character is thirsty throughout most of the story."

I hope I've managed to catch the gist of flash fiction writing and fulfilled the additional challenge I set for myself. I also hope I've managed to paint a picture in your mind and inspire YOU just a little bit as well, reader.

And without further gilding the lily, I present...

"Last Request"

The penultimate wheeze of death rattled through the sun-melted room, shaking the dust from the peeling wallpaper and disturbing the mice who sought to take refuge within the aging walnut armoire in the corner. Curtains the color of moldy teabags seemed to sigh in resignation as Margie McClellan committed to one last act.

“I am going to die.” Her spittle-thronged words spoke to no one, save the old gray tabby in the corner. That old gray tabby – she, too, wanted to be left in peace. “But first I would like a glass of water.” There was no one around to hear Margie McClellan's words, no one nearby to stroke the beads of sweat that formed on her withered forehead in the scorching summer heat.

Stale air carried the scent of death as she exhaled again. Her wizened fingers touched the quilt that shielded her from the world, despite the stifling heat that blanketed the room. Rheumy eyes could no longer discern the colors and shapes of the quilt, but her fingers knew each square, each stitch. Each block told a story. And why should she not know? Margie McClellan made that quilt herself.

The feel of worn green cotton told Margie the story of the time her boy fell out of a tree, his body twisting to match the branches. They'd had to cut the shirt from his body and he spent the better part of six months in a full-torso cast. Margie smiled at the memory.

Soft grooves of blue corduroy whispered words of Mr. McClellan, passed away some years ago while working in the train yard, killed by a drunk conductor pulling the trolleys in for repair. The plush fabric comforted her, soothed her as she entered her last hours.

The wail of a child rose to old Margie's deaf ears. Coarse, moth-eaten lace over a square of satin recounted the birth of her first grand-child. Her daughter Susie spent three days in labor. Sandra was born with a full head of hair and her grandmother's hazel eyes.

Caressing her death shroud, Margie McClellan wondered if it would one day be part of a quilt. Would anyone care enough about her life to see that her last moments were remembered? No one had shown up for days. And where was that glass of water? She was thirsty. So thirsty. No one would come to cut the muslin shift from her body and make it into something new, something useful. Her body would fertilize the flowers, but her clothing would be left for the rats in the walls. With one last dispirited rale, Margie McClellan gave up and died.

The door to the musty bedroom creaked open. “Mom?” the lilting female voice inquired permission to enter. Permission that would be neither granted nor denied, save for the agitated meowl of the old gray tabby in the corner.

Sometimes

Sometimes I just don't have the energy or effort to write. Sometimes I just don't want to write after spending all day writing. i get burnt out, tired and very very sick of looking at strings of characters turned into words.

I've been burnt out for the past two days and I have bills to pay, which means I have to keep writing. I don't want to write. I just don't.

Everything in my soul hurts, my heart aches, my mind is blurring. In no specific order, here is a list of things I would rather be doing than writing:

Cleaning
Playing with the puppies
Tending to the cats (bath, flea spray, wormer routine)
Dealing with a feral cat
Cross stitching
Sewing
Knitting
Crocheting
Bookbinding
Fixing my dollhouse
Fixing my real house
Drinking
Crying
Sleeping
Walking around/hiking
Drawing
Creating
Crocheting
Crafty/artsy anything
Cleaning
Organizing
Shopping
Driving around aimlessly


Here is a list of places I would rather be doing these things than my current location, Ohio:
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
Delaware
New York

Anywhere but here. And anything but this.

Sometimes I wish someone would save me from myself and everything I have to do. That knight in shining armor is NOT going to show up. A poignantly named facebook group proclaims that a knight in shining armor is sometimes actually an idiot in tinfoil.

It's true.

Mother.

I am not a mother. I am not now, nor will I ever BE a mother. Physically, I am capable of producing offspring. But that would not make me a mother. I do not have it in me to love a human being unconditionally. I do not have it in me to take responsibility for the care of a baby. I do not have it in me to be that unselfish. I am not a mother.

Sometimes, when I let my mind wander, I question what it would be like. The ways my life would (or would not) change. The things I would have to give up - the things I would receive in return. I am one of the few people left in my circle of friends who is not a parent. Sometimes I am envious. I am human, after all. Sometimes I wish it didn't make me envious. Sometimes I'm relieved and glad that it isn't me.

I'm asked that, if I can have so much compassion and unconditional love for animals, why wouldn't I feel the same about my own spawn? The answer is not so simple, though at times I wish it were.

An animal does not stop loving you. Even when abused and beaten to an inch of its life, it will not turn so far that it cannot be brought back. A human being has capability for the worst hurt, cruelty and evil possible. There are no unforgivable acts among animals....it may take time to heal the soul, but it isn't impossible. I can't say beyond certainty that I know the same to be true of humans.

I don't want the burden of being responsible for the needs of a human being. Animals are vastly uncomplicated in their needs. Or maybe it's a different type of need. I can understand animals. I am, by and large, able to communicate them. I cannot say the same for people. I don't understand them and I usually can't communicate with them. Which is odd, since that's what I do for a living.

I am selfish. I do not want something growing inside of me. I do not want to deal with more pain, more health problems and the potential of fucking that up. I don't want to lose the precious little time I have for me caring for some squalling infant. I do not want to put those vast needs before my own. I don't want to. Plain and simple. And being a free woman in a (mostly) free country, I'm entitled to that. Plus, this planet will not exactly suffer from the choice of one woman not to add to the already bursting population. Trust me on that one.

I am miserable with the prospect. If I had a child, it would be a source of contention. I dislike my in-laws with an intense passion. I could not knowingly and willingly send a child into that family even for a moment without the desire to slaughter. My husband would want that child to meet its family....whatever my objections. We have a great deal in common on the philosophy of raising a child. And a great deal that is diametrically opposed.

Genetics alone dictate that I probably should not procreate. With the number of issues I have and the number of hereditary health problems lurking around - it just would not be wise. Especially were that child to be my husband's. Were the coupling different, genetics might, might might just be excusable. I wouldn't knowingly subject a child to the shit he and I have to deal with on a regular basis. It's an almost certainty that any spawn of ours would be genetically fucked from the start.

Above all else, is that selfishness. I don't ever forsee room for a child in my life. I have my life and I have my dreams and I have my goals. When I have my goals, I let nothing and no one stand in the way. It may sound ruthless - it probably is - but I would not let some sappy sentimental notion of "bearing a piece of my/your/our love into the world" dissuade me from the life I want to lead. Ambition has been the downfall of many. One day I may fall. But it will be by my own hand.

I am afraid of my own body's limitations. I have several issues that would make it potentially life threatening to have a child. I have the fear of failure due to past problems. I don't want to deal with that can of worms and that mess and that potential to send me to the edge of insanity. Selfish fear, sure, but I don't care. It's MY selfish fear.

I dislike the intense pressure there is to have a child, from family members, friends, society as a whole. If you're married, or otherwise attached, you're expected to have a child. Be the good wife, squeeze out a few pups and call it a day, resigning yourself to a life of sheparding a brat to and fro from soccer practice and ballet lessons and school and social functions. I could not trade a sword for a sippy cup. Sorry. And that IS my choice. I hate when people say "Oh you'll change your mind when you're older. Or when you're ready. You'll know. You have no clue. It's different when its your own."

No, I will not be changing my mind. And yes, i do have an inkling. And yes, you're right, it is different when it's my own. Make no mistake, I love children. I love babies. I especially love when I can GIVE THEM BACK to mom and dad. I dislike being told that someone else knows what is best for me - and I know, that in any foreseeable future, having a child is NOT what is best for me. I dislike being pressured to pop out a kid because society sees it as the RIGHT thing to do. Sorry, but that's not sitting well with me. If anything, the chiding remarks and the pressure make me rally more to the cause of not having a child.

I have my moments of longing. I see my friends and their children. I watch them grow, and smile, and laugh. And I feel a pang of longing. But it's temporary insanity. It isn't the thought of them being parents that makes me feel a twinge of jealousy. It's the happiness they have that makes me jealous, I think. And there are many roads to happiness and fulfillment. And I know within my heart that their path is not my path.

I am the type of mother who would eat her young because they got on her nerves. That's why I send my mother a card every year on a certain day in May - thanking her for not doing the same. A peace offering, of sorts. A "Thank You For Not Eating Me" card.

There is the maiden, there is the mother, there is the crone. Even my spirituality subtly pushes me toward that path. And yet there is another archetype in the space of "mother". That is the warrior. It is the courage of a mother without the compassion. Mothers are some of the bravest, strongest people I know. I was the maiden. I am the warrior. And if I live to old age without managing to get myself killed, I will be the crone. I am content with this role. It's one I've cast for myself.

I'm going to spend my days in the line of fire, taking heat to protect small, furry, fourlegged babes. I'm going to put myself into danger time and time again, because I know in my heart it is right. I will help, I will heal. At times I will hurt, if necessary. This is the path that feels right.

And I wouldn't have it any other way.

I Am Not a Victim

Today I will ruminate on a prompt from "The Pocket Muse" by Monica Wood. The prompt states "Write about an ordinary ritual that goes horribly wrong." This is a statement of my life.

I am not a victim. I was raped on the night before my wedding. I had everything I knew and thought I was stripped from my essence. I lost my voice. I lost my sight. I lost my footing. Only now, does the world even begin to make sense again. I have known one thing, even since that night: I am not a victim.

As a recipient of sexual violence, you are told by your family, your peers, your counselors, your loved ones, figures of authority that it WAS NOT YOUR FAULT. And you might know that in your head. But you cease to believe it. You are told you didn't do anything wrong - and you don't believe it. You let it happen, the voice in your head screams. You did it. You could have avoided it. You should have fought back.

I did fight back. I fought back against that stupid little voice in my head that nagged me about everything I did wrong. There isn't exactly a handbook on life, and there isn't exactly an instructional booklet entitled "So You've Been Raped" or "Handling Sexual Assault for Dummies." There are a thousand and one self-help books, designed to step in after the fact. There's nothing, save cheesy drama television, to help you recognize what steps to take BEFOREHAND.

Watch any episode of Law and Order. You go to the police. You scream. You make a scene until someone sees you, believes you. You talk to the nice understanding policemen and you suffer the ministrations of the kindly hospital workers, poking around at what's already been poked.

It doesn't happen like that in real life. Then again, nothing happens in real life like it does on television. I went back to the dorms. I talked to my would-be husband. He was afraid of being caught with me in the room because I had been drinking....it's an offense you could be expelled for. He sends me to the showers. I cry. I jump at every noise. I can't get the sounds out of my head, the smell out of my nostrils, the feeling off of my skin. I'm pretty sure he cries, too, while I'm gone.

I go to the police. They tell me to write out a statement. I wait for months. They tell me there's nothing they can do because everyone else was drunk and high and no one was willing to stand up to Mr. Charismatic Who Said He Was Gay.

And that's that. No hospital visit. The police never suggested it. Not even so much as a kindly counselor provided by the school. Sexual violence doesn't exist here in Southeastern Ohio. And when it does, it's a lie. It's the girl's fault. Just ask that poor woman who had her mattress taken into custody as evidence. Ask her what happened when the defense attorney made her re-create her position on that very same bed she was violated in. Go ahead and ask anyone around here who isn't a "radical" of some sort whether or not sexual violence is an issue. How many rapes are prosecuted? How many end in sentencing?

The day of my wedding I was in shambles. My husband was lectured because he was an attendant at the dorms. He was told to control me, not let me go out drinking, my behavior reflects on him, I'm too wild. I'm on the verge of getting kicked out.

If you only knew. I wanted to SCREAM. If you ONLY KNEW what happened. Of course I have more sense than to come back to a dry campus drunk. Of course I knew what that meant. I was crying in my head that night, begging for someone, ANYONE to confront me, catch me. But there was not a soul in sight. No one to stop me from self-destructing. No one to lend an ear. If you only knew. I pray you never do. Reprimand me for being hurt. Real sympathetic.

I watched it tear apart my life.I watched it tear apart my family. I watched it glaze over my husband, ineffectual and seemingly untouched. I was sad. I was hurting. I was not heard. I was ANGRY. I was MAD AS HELL.

And now, almost four years later, I am still all of those things. But mostly I'm just angry. My family and i got into an arguement over it. I know it wasn't meant to hurt, they didn't know how to cope either. But now it's brushed under the table as if nothing ever happened. I never got to talk to my mother about it - when I needed her most. I never got to talk to my husband about it - when I needed him most.

No matter what anyone tries to say - sexual assault is something you go through completely and utterly alone. And it's maddening. Like trying to put together the pieces of a broken mirror. You might not ever get all of the shards back in place. And if you do, everything melts back into place like liquid quicksilver. And you're stronger because of it. I don't know if I've put the mirror back together yet. I'm too afraid to look. I'm not afraid of my shadow - I'm afraid of my reflection.

Even so, for all the anger and hurt in my heart, I am not a victim. I was violated. But I was not destroyed. I was hurt, but I am alive. I was knocked down, but I'm mostly standing up. I was kicked back, but I am still fighting. There was nothing I could have done to change the course of events, though gods I wish there were.

I am not a victim. And the next person who tells me I am gets a boot to the skull. Because I won't tolerate being made the victim. And I won't tolerate anyone viewing me as such. It's another piece of my mirror, another part of my story. But it isn't WHO I am and it doesn't define ME.

I was raped. I am not my rape. And if you ever found yourself in the same situation, you would understand too.

But I hope you don't. Because you're not a victim either.

In Reply To The Nature of Love

Everyone has different definitions of that ephemeral concept of love. What is it to you? What is it to me? A member of my tribe, that is to say, my extended family of choice, recently made an eloquent post reflecting her purview on love. And while I agree with many things, I feel that for me, they need further understanding. As I've been charged with the challenge of writing in my journal every day, I will attempt to answer that (quite appropriately) mercurial question: What is love?

I love without thinking. I do not love without feeling. My heart sings a song to those I love, in echo of a song heard in their heart. We, as a society, do not love enough: not anymore, and not as we should. We are afraid, I think, of trusting ourselves to one another. We are afraid of being hurt.

I am not afraid of the hurt that comes with love: all great things come attached with a price, and often that price is not realized until much later. Is the cost of loving someone far too great? For me, the answer is no. I've almost been destroyed by the darker edge of love. But I've been nurtured to life by it far more. It's a simple cost-benefit analysis: Is the cost far more than I am willing to pay? It has never been so for me, but even I have my limits at time.

For those just joining -- perhaps new readers, perhaps classmates, perhaps long lost friends, hopefully a literary agent or two -- I feel there are certain details of my life that bear mentioning in order for me to fully speak out on this topic. Some of you might prickle at the thought, but I am polyamorous. I believe it is fully possible for some people to love more than one person in a romantic manner without harming any involved. I love my husband. I love my boyfriend. My husband loves me. He loves his girlfriend. They all weave the rich tapestry that is my life - and for each of their roles in my life, I could not be more grateful.

Have you ever learned to go fishing, reader? Perhaps a kindly figure in your life - a grandfather, as was the case with me - sat you down and told you to be patient. To wait until that fish came to you. And to slowly, patiently crank the reel until the fish was in your hands. You will hit snags along the way, you will catch your line on a million things. Unlike so many tired analogies, I do not liken lovers to fish (although some have, to be sure, been pretty fishy). Rather, love is the elusive fish we're seeking to catch. My grandfather always told me to fish out of need, never for sport, and to honor the gift that the world was giving me, the continued gift of life. Love is not sport, and love fills a very real need in our lives as humans. Love sustains us. Before this turns into a Beatles song, I must also add that love can destroy us also. There are fish in the world that can kill you with a mere bite. There are loves that will do the same.

Like the scales on that self-same fish, there are many who would liken love to a multi-faceted jewel. Many who would seek to put love on a pedestal. But I speak most assuredly when I say that love is not some grand thing to be admired from afar: It is real, it is earthy, it is not always pretty and sometimes it is practical. Love has caring, adoration, passion, lust, desire, pleasure, enjoyment. It also has jealousy, possession, pain, heartache, hatred, disgust and hurt. Love is these things, and love is more. There is an abundance of literature on love and its many facets. I'd be hard pressed to write about love and speak all of these things in earnest. For some, as it is for me, love isn't so easy to speak about, but it is easy to show.

One of the questions asked the most of me about my relationships is how I deal with jealousy. The simple thing is: I am aware of myself and I strive to be aware of my partners. I seek to keep the feelings of hurt from happening before those feelings rise to the surface. I try to smooth out conflict before it begins. By and large, I am not jealous. Love multiplies. I cannot say the same for the money in my bank, perhaps this is why I am a writer by trade. Love sings out to love, and it begins and begats more love. I enjoy seeing the look in my husband's eyes when he hears from his girlfriend. My tears well up - not with anger, but with pride - to see them together, because I truly find love and beauty there. I do not have a problem with physical affection between them while I am present - simply because it is one aspect to the love they share. And why should something so esteemed, so beautiful, so transient in nature - why should that be wrong? Why should I begrudge that? Who *AM* I to begrudge that? It is not my place - because love, in its many forms, is always beautiful. And one small act of love can, and often does, change the world. Even in small ways.

This is not to say that I am never jealous of anything or anyone - I am not a saint. But I recognize where my jealousy stems from, and I am proactive in my attempts to soothe the ruffled feathers of that prickly bird. My own jealousy often stems from seeing real or perceived inadequacies in my own relationships. A covetousness that I cannot control because perhaps I see something I once had, something I lost, or something I crave and may have never had to begin with. This is something I, and I alone, have control over. If I feel I have lost something, I take steps to find it. I would do no less for a tangible thing in my life, why sit and stare helpless like a dopey damsel? If I've lost it, I'll get it back.

If it's something I never had to begin with, I'll turn those bristled feelings of hurt into thanks - if I never had it to begin with, and I am jealous to see it manifest, then it was something I never knew I needed. And if I did not know I needed it, how could I have expected my partner to know it was needed? By and large, with few exceptions, my lovers are not psychic. My relationships aren't some mystical thing, existing in a wholly perfect bubble - they come with lots of time, patience and COMMUNICATION. It can get ugly. It is NEVER pretty and it is usually boring or mundane. But it is necessary.

I love without question and without apology. I strive to love in the light of day, and not hide things about in the twilight hours. Why should I? It's not conducive to anything and I've burned and been burned by more than one clandestine relationship. I'd rather be exposed and laid bare for the world, and my partners, to see. Part of that, perhaps, comes from being a submissive, masochistic exhibitionist - it's as much a part of my nature as anything else - perhaps it is just my understanding of the world. But the core parts of my being shape my understanding of the world, and those two things are so inextricably linked, it doesn't much matter where it comes from - so long as my heart agrees. And it does.

The need to posses someone is not my nature - love is shown through actions, freely given. People ask how it is possible that I can love my husband - people whose sole exposure to love is via monogamy. People speculate how I could "let him do this" to me, as if I were unaware and uninvolved in the prospect of him dating other women - they are often quite unaware that the change in our relationship style was MY idea, and both of our choices. They ask, quite rudely, if I would like to strangle whoever he is involved with. I'm ever sorry to disappoint the bloodthirsty masses, but I've met his girlfriend. She's an absolute pleasure to be around and a delight to spend time with. He worries about me absconding with her, not the other way around. And why not? She's a delightful woman and what's not to love? But to hurt and possess, to conquest for sport, is not my "thing."

Case in point: I know my husband loves me. People place too much on the legal aspect of our marriage. Whatever perceived legal obligation aside, he is not chained to me, unable to ever live a life of his own. There are times when the life you lead with a partner outweighs the ties that bind: that's why there's such a thing as divorce. When we attended our first party, he challenged me to finish a very acidic, fruity alcoholic drink. I have an ulcer and I've had stomach problems since childhood. The night ended with fecal matter and vomit. Barely knowing me and out of NO obligation whatsoever, he tended to me like a family member would. He didn't blink (he may have wretched himself, from the smell of it, but who can blame him?) and he handled it with a love and grace I don't know that I would have been able to pull off. Our relationship has been filled with ugly moments - physical ailments, emotional illnesses, problems and more problems. The fact that he is still here of his own accord is proof enough for me, and should be proof enough for those self-same bloodthirsty masses who have no greater past-time than to wish my love life to go down in flames. And I don't foresee this changing.

Who do I love? Some days, everyone. Some days, no one. But who I love and how I love are not inextricably linked - I love you, unless you prove a reason I should not. And like as not, this has led to me hurting more than once. Like as not, it will happen again. But to say I regret how I love and any result of that would be a falsehood that I am not willing to swallow.

It could be summed up in five little, insignificant words: It is what it is. For anything more than that, go listen to the Beatles.

You Can't Take it With You (Hello from Jersey,Wish I Were There.)

A poem written while traversing the great and much missed state of New Jersey. I miss it already.
I.
I grew up
with the dust of the Northeast Corridor
reflecting grandeur of a thousand untold locations in my eyes.
Rocked to sleep by the rhythms of the rails and
the voice of John Francis Scotti mumbling the eternal grace of a God he knew so well last night.
Words like Secacus, Piscataway, Metuchen
lilting like a lullaby from the voice
of a conductor who can otherwise only say "Yo-
How youse guys doin?"
I can barely hear the distant whistle
of the 10:19 to Jersey City
over the hum of my friend's first Fender strat,
shaking the garage with a fury and a fire
that we'd never know again in the years to come.
And we swore, taking a drag from a stolen cigarette,
we promised over a sip of forbidden, forgotten whiskey
We swore one day we'd get out.

II.
My heart soars over the Meadowlands,
turning wasteland into wonder,
Springsteen was my neighbor, when I was just a girl,
singing songs about the places I knew, the places I'd been
and Jungle Land and Thunder Road weren't just names on a sign.
They were real, and so were we, and unlike Bon Jovi's hair,
we swore we'd never stick around.
And I grew up, and washed the dust of the Northeast Corridor from my hands.
Rumbling once again,
by the Raritan river and the Atlantic Ocean stretching out,
the squish of oil-slicked sand
and the random smell of family vacations fresh on my mind,
looking out over the places I once knew,
and the world that once was mine,
the infinite world within a world of the Pine Barrens,
and the lore of the Jersey Devil hot on my tails,
worse than my conscience, nattling around in my skull.

III.
The sounds have changed - ain't no more Springsteen at the Stone Pony,
ain't no more rumble of the 10:19 to Trenton.
And with the Gaslight humming, singing songs of loss and heartache,
I can't believe I'm standing here again, in all the places I knew and loved,
all the places I shunned and scorned in favor of a "better life."
I was one of the few who got out, for every one like me, more and more still try.
It hurts to say it now, I couldn't feel it anywhere else,
and I'm homesick before the Silverliner ever pulls out of the station.
It kills me to admit it -
I'm home.