blown out candles

i would like to wake up one day and say “today is the day i will not be afraid to start over.” i’m so afraid at being bad at something before i’m good at it. i’m so afraid of embarrassing myself, at not being good at something i love, something that could have made me happy. so many of us choose other roads because the one we had been following was vague and compromising. because it meant we had to make mistakes in front of people. it meant we had to show everyone that we are not intrinsically good at the one thing that makes us happy. it meant we might have to stop and start all over again. it meant we had to be vulnerable. and nobody likes being vulnerable. because it’s so much better to feel safe. but at what cost? there are a lot of mistakes i’m terrified to make, but there are a lot of mistakes i’m terrified are going to cost me more if i never make them. if i never risk it all for something important to me. if i never do the things i wanted to do just because i would be really fucking bad at it for a while. i don’t want to be afraid anymore. i don’t want to be terrified of shame anymore. i don’t want to hold back just because people might not think i’ll make it or because it might not mean anything to them. i don’t want to waste anymore time being afraid of all the things that could have been right for me. the things that could have made me the person that i wanted to be. this is our only shot. don’t you get that? this is our only shot to be happy. we have to make these mistakes. we have to embarrass ourselves sometimes, we have to do what we love even when nobody else loves it back. and sometimes it’s going to be really fucking hard. sometimes it’s going to seem really hopeless. but we have to never be ashamed. we have to never be afraid to start over. we have to, don’t you see that we have to? because if we don’t then all of our dreams mean nothing. this is our only shot.

--Ashli Wood

perfect timing.

one day i will find the right words and they will be simple

It begins and ends with and without it. he wrote that sprawled out on the floor of my room. I convinced myself that new places would stave off old ghosts. I was wrong. I run and they follow. I hide and they find me. I speak slow and carefully hoping they won’t catch me. they can hear me whispering. I leave and a part of you comes after me. chases me. holds me in the palm of the darkest parts of you where i don’t dare try to look. knows me in places where words cannot go. don’t forget this yet. it’s still midnight and the feelings are young, new born and helpless. don’t forget that morning when all our moments snuck between us, found us soft and whole in all the wrong places. found our wide open spaces where nothing else could reach. but i’ll love you until my hands bleed. I will love you in ways that only the crumbling streets of your country would understand. as willing and openly. as brokenly and goddamned hopelessly. i write these poems about abandoned moments we tried our damnedest to share. i write about warm and sad souls that thread together when no one else is looking. I write about things I have known and things I still don’t. I write about people I have burned holes through hoping I’ll always have a place to hide my hands when they start to shake – when I can’t shake this fever, when I can’t shake these ghosts, when I can’t escape these words so I hide them in the notches of your spine. i keep them tucked beneath your voice box so every word you say is said with a piece of me. i keep carrying these secret things we all try to save for someone who’s hands are strong enough. are your hands strong enough for me? sometimes i stay up late at night making knots on strings. i make one knot for you and one knot for me. people do the strangest things when they’re lonely. and i know that these goddamn knots will never reach each other. i know there will always be these great gaps between us, rivers and winds between us, bitter roads and disconnected moments between us. i know. but i like to think that at least we’re both apart of the same string, right? so one knot for you, one knot for me, and i don’t mind if there are other knots between us sometimes. as long as we’re apart of the same string.

--Ashli Wood

Paul Thek's 96 Sacraments

to wake up
to breathe
to touch the earth
to pee
to wash
to prepare breakfast
to eat breakfast
to do the dishes
to clean up
to write a letter
to mail the letter
to go out
to see the sun
to do the shopping
to talk with some people
to buy a paper
to come home
to go to work
to work
to have work
to have lunch
to notice the light changing
to see a cat
to see a dog
to stop for a rest
to go home for dinner
to talk with a neighbor
to talk with a neighbor's child
to kiss someone
to eat dinner
to eat dinner with friends
to eat dinner with children
to eat dinner alone
to have dinner with someone
to think of love
to think of hope
to think
to dream, sing praises!
to plan
to write a poem
to read a poem
to forget bad things
to sing
to sing with someone
to hold hands
to hold anything
to hug
to get on a boat
to go somewhere
to eat a snack
to not eat a snack
to give away some money
to replace some technological education with some spiritual education
to see an island
to go swimming
to see somebody worse off
to see somebody better off
to go swimming nude
to make love in the daytime
to make love in the daytime with someone you love
to eat a peach
to comb your hair
to find a way to grow feathers
to satisfy all hunger in the world
to avoid dominations and dominating
to never stray
to be innocent of corruption
to not think (at least now and then)
to worship in another's church, in another way
to fly away into the air, high as a chicken, come back
to grow
to practice
to be just
to be stronger than you were
to understand a bit more
to like the ups & downs
to feel okay in spite of it all
to feel good knowing all the worst
to avoid being forced into defiance
to avoid emotional escalation
to forget the way
to make the way

--via

p.s. - Happy New Year! xo.