Ojaanimi Gaawiin Awiya

I Don't Relate to Love Songs

2010-12-01T13:15:00.000-06:00

It's occcured to me that love songs are unrelateable to me. Perhaps when I listen to one, I do imagine that perfect individual, but it ends there. I do not yearn for love. This seems significant, but I'm not exactly sure why. It's possible that I'm avoiding a relationship for a specific purpose. This thought only perpetuates my confusion about what I need to do with my life; in my lifetime--however you want to put it.

An Audience of One

2010-10-27T17:07:00.003-05:00

I'm going to make a list of titles
of books, songs, and whatever else I like.
And since my blog is censored with boringness,
I won't worry 'bout theives and such.

Adding more as they come,
these treasures of spontaneous thought
Will enlighten ideas and stories beneath them.

It's worked for previous creative blocks.
I'm hoping it works now.

If you've seen any of these before; it's not my fault. No idea's original. Real talk.

"Finger Puppet"
"Just Out of Reach"
"Shadows at Noon"
"Abandoned Girl Scout" (a friend's hilarious idea)
"I Told You; Don't Ask!"
"As Sweet as Grapefruit"
"The Boy Soprano"
"Makeshift Dildo"
"Insert Obscenity Here"
"The Introverted Extrovert"
"Miserable Planet"
"A Humanoid's Expectations"
"Projectile Vomit"
"Death of a Smile"

Loner

2010-04-05T23:39:00.000-05:00

Words carry on in the loner’s mind—
of places to be other than here,
of spaces only curiosity can find.

To pass by, crowds of three or four
soaking in small talk and chatter,
sacrifice no exchange,
offer no friendly laughter.

An exile of one’s own liability—
harassing each isolated instant
pending it surrender its anonymity.

Words and places, the loner’s consorts,
manage to say things and be things
that, to a loner, periodically comforts.

A white bucket
near a small fire, lit
mainly for the sound of it,
along with the cordless radio,
playing Freebird,
“and this bird you can not change.”
The loner’s wordless,
quieter.

"Prose of a Painter"

2010-02-17T00:09:00.005-06:00

Jeanette peeked out of the curtainless window from her canvas, so quick that her pupils hadn’t time to constrict from the lucid sun. She was in a zone. Nothing felt more natural to her than painting, not even mothering her own child. Though, she never regretted her offspring. That was natural too; she knew. Still, she didn’t wake each day eager to give birth again. When she first began philosophizing about who she really was, she felt guilty, guilty of the fact that she was an artist. Her parents were working-class, and expected their children to work. Doing art of any sort wasn’t work to them. And she spent a portion of her young life hanging onto that expectation. She put long hours in at a factory while going to school for nursing. But her guilt expired the day she saw her own child awaken to art. He was only two: two and already an artist, a sculptor of yellowish play-doh. He had many a time refused his supper to religiously build colorful blobs that he brought proudly to her for approval. At least he’d never have to be a guilt-stricken mother, she thought, with parents who didn’t appreciate him unless he came home annoyed and fatigued each day. That conclusion alone lifted a majority of the burden.

Jeanette was still young, only thirty-two. She worked part-time as an in-home nurse, because any more would dispirit her. The father of her son had died in a car accident, which wasn’t really an accident, it was suicide and she knew it. Even though the investigation didn’t lead them to believe he killed himself. But that day was cruel to him. He lost his job; he was from a working class family himself, so it meant everything to him. It had been three years since his death. Her son, Jamie, was four now. And it had been a year since she began using the spare room as a studio. Barry, her husband, would’ve been just as opposed as her parents, that she devoted so much time to painting.

So now she painted. Her hands took long strides across the canvas, sometimes with a jerk, sometimes with a sweep, alternating between crimson and orange. Right now, she focused on a portion of sky that had remained white for so long. It’s been six months since she’s worked on this particular painting. She de-prioritized it because her commissions had been coming in so regularly. About a month ago, a man compensated her one hundred bucks for three paintings. They required a hue similar to a paper bag, with graduating values, which she thought had no business being so important. That happened often, actually. She’d get paid to do seemingly pointless tasks. But perhaps they weren’t pointless. Perhaps a person would feel more at home, or more warm, or maybe even more content thanks to her paintings; or was that wishful thinking. She lived in Chicago, where one doesn’t usually question the significance of art. She and Jamie relocated there a month after Barry died.

Her crimson exhausted. Luckily, she adopted the good habit of improvising, sort of like when one is low on gas, taking shortcuts and driving less, stretching it to its end. She used violet instead, wishing somehow she could remove the blue from the violet and get crimson. Her supplies came to her door, and she placed an order a week ago. She didn’t mind using violet, but she preferred to call it purple. The word ‘violet’ sounded too much like ‘violent.’ Because of this, she used the color less frequently, which is why she was using it now--when her supplies were low. But her supplies were low because she was working so much. At any given time Jeanette would have at least six paintings started.

While her son spent the morning in preschool, she worked. Sometimes she’d open the window, invite the winter in. She kept music playing in her studio, even if she wasn’t there: Chopin, Muddy Waters, or Led Zeppelin. Somehow, to her, the paintings breathed; they marinated in the acoustic vibrations of the room, waiting patiently for her return, which she would. The studio smelled of a gentle cinnamon. She lit candles and at times used only the candles as a light source. Other times she’d lift the opaque blinds because the sun was natural. Eventually, her supplies would arrive and she’d work that violet sky with crimson overtones, just as she planned.

100 - word Sentence

2010-01-31T20:17:00.003-06:00

This was an assignment for my creative writing class in Jan 2010: It proved difficult; but soon he instructed us to take this sentence and compress it down to 15 words--that I haven't tackled yet. Plus, I'm not sure that this sentence is exactly 100 words--close enough.

He kept burying me under the soil, which fell on me pound by pound, dirt by dirt, worm by worm (wiggling around my face as they ate the shit off my collar bone, jaw bone, and my cheek bones; they went up my nose too; I had my mouth closed the whole time, but they still found a way in), rock by rock (like hail on my forehead, eye sockets, and upper lip); he poured and poured until the mud made a dam between my mouth and the earth; eyelashes quit, cold turkey.

Rhythmic Fluid of a Final Lament

2009-09-27T17:36:00.008-05:00

My nerves spontaneously combust. I make music with equipment any musician would lust.
My extremities become cold while the blood in my brain expands the only cranium I've known.
My breath is shallow and I whisper goodbye. I drift off to sleep and a crowd of --now, strangers--cry.
But the music still pulses at a beat consistent, with the universal expansive dream land we all dwell in.
Like my left dimple, I sits alone. The blue undertones that once dramatized my aura, fades to a dim yellow-ish coral.
A shrink made fact I'm a bit depressed, never mentioned "insane", then wished me the best. Id rather watch me bleed for a hellacious eternity, than proudly accumulate, the same fame that dents our expectations of music today. Thus, I drained my soul....onto the cement. Hear it muffled in the lyrics and rhythmic fluid of a final lament.

Makes Life Exciting

2008-08-09T17:34:00.006-05:00

I have spent years trying to interpret my inner self, my core being, my essence...without much conclusion. And I'm totally happy with that. I don't feel the need to rush (or even associate myself) with any set of beliefs/philosophies just because that's what everyone else tends to do. I like the freedom. I like the structure of unstructure. My beliefs are like my thoughts--all over and changing.... I must say there are some things that I feel strongly about, but in my world there are always a lot of gray areas. It is this contentment with constantly learning and observing the world, and my reluctance to conform, that makes life exciting.