Tag: poem

Coffee Log, Year 2, Day 29

garethlivesayLeave a comment

Hi.

Coffee: Maxwell House Drip, Office Coffee

I’m sneaking in this coffee log right at the tail end of the day. It’s 11:20pm. It’s a blue-purple kind of dark. That tells you it’s Spring, because only Spring has nights like this.

I spent most of my day working. I spent the rest resting. I didn’t go out for dinner, I didn’t much leave my room once I got home. That’s how I wanted it – what a week… Because of that, though, I don’t have much to say tonight.

Here’s a poem:

It’s like a pearl necklace
And you wear it
Only in your hair instead of around your neck
And nothing had to die to give it to you
Well, maybe some old, rotting dinosaurs
And maybe the planet, if you look hard enough
Rough cracked road asphalt
Looks a lot darker
More appealing
When you’re wearing that pearl necklace
Of streetlights.

Novel Count: 31,808

Currently Reading: The Sense of an Ending, Julian Barnes

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Marco Polo had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-colored pearls in the mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been enamoured of the pearl that the diver brought to King Perozes, and had slain the thief, and mourned for seven moons over its loss.

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray


Coffee Log, Day 199

garethlivesayLeave a comment

Hi.

CoffeeTea: Bigelow’s Earl Grey, pre-packed (New pot is purchased; will use tomorrow)

I was lying down in a hot shower thinking about your cats. You had two. I assume you still have them. In my head, I wrote this poem:

***

Two lump sums
Additive of: day-naps; kitchen scurries; fur balls.
One of you is a great gray fumble, kept to profound lounging, nighttime meowing
At your own shadow, his/her shadow
You chase your tail sometimes, but mostly you’re chasing sleep.
One of you is a slim speckled princess, white gloves on all your hands hiding paws that got declawed.
A safe tragedy
You’d surely use them.

I reckon I’m stuck with
The tick-bite memory
Of lounging in your daytimes
Or napping through our bedtimes
And that one hot day in summer
Where we sat on bathroom floors picking at each other’s
Family fleas.

***

I toweled off. I looked in the mirror. I’m getting older. Cats age faster. A long, lazy day dreaming of things I won’t see again.

Currently Reading: Autumn, Ali Smith

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“Holding this soft, small living creature in my lap this way, though, and seeing how it slept with complete trust in me, I felt a warm rush in my chest. I put my hand on the cat’s chest and felt his heart beating. The pulse was faint and fast, but his heart, like mine, was ticking off the time allotted to his small body with all the restless earnestness of my own.” – Haruki Murakami, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

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Coffee Log, Day 149

garethlivesay1 Comment

Hi.

Coffee: India Extra Bold Roast, Cafe Crema

I fished this DVD out of our dry creekbed, ‘8 count abs.’ I threw it in the trash because a fish with a six-pack just ain’t right.

The things we throw away… I’ve wasted lots of things. Some of it was junk, some precious. I’ve got this vivid memory of a high school romance who used to fall asleep on my leg. The show would end, sun came down, she’d still be sleeping and I’d get so antsy – like, if I didn’t move, I’d be watching roots grow out of me – that I’d squirm until she woke up. What a simple moment. The older I get, the more I miss the clean, simple moments.

I met a guy today I’ve heard bad stories about. They call him rough, loud, arrogant, mean, difficult. He was all those things but I think he was mostly trying hard to make up for something. He drove a brand new Acura and was trying to buy a house. He told me his parents had only ever rented.

I had a list of discounts when I got hired that I could opt in to. One was a sizeable credit off my insurance if I declared I wouldn’t be smoking. I didn’t check the box. I’ve only smoked four things in my life, all one-dollar cigarillos, and haven’t had one since winter. I don’t have any plans to smoke again. Still, checking away the freedom to burn something up inside me wasn’t worth the money. I need my lungs to remember what it’s like to tingle.

That last time I smoked, I’d just broken the handle off my favorite blue mug. We sat in the cold, arms on legs on arms, passing the cigarillo, dipping pink ash into the empty, broken blue.

Currently Reading: LaRose, Louise Erdrich

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“we
sat there
smoking
cigarettes
at
5
in the morning.” – Charles Bukowski, from when you wait for the dawn to crawl through the screen like a burglar to take your life away

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