I die a little each day
I breathe in and out even when I cannot
bear
the silence
I think of you often
I think of us sometimes
mostly in the dark
The day feels too delicate
to suffocate beneath the weight
of your going
You’ve gone
I sometimes think
you’ll come back to me
flowers in hand
a smile on your face
and everything will be okay
Until then, I’ll die a little each day
I don’t think any TV sold within the past six years has had any sort of DVD player in it…
Traverwood Library, 6:30PM, 9/11/2024
[an excerpt, or a cry for help]
there is small comfort in the whole truth, but there is no comfort in a half-truth, because your honesty is shielded by your shame. just because you can tell a story doesn’t mean it deserves to be heard. are you not shameful? we are growing old, novelty ripped out and replaced by convenience. perhaps i will write today, because there is also a small comfort in a whole lie, a brazenness mistaken for bravery. an undiagnosed feeling squirms in my stomach. it takes a lot of half-truths, a summation of sins and sorrows, to approach the mirror, speak the words–
You can drive for two or three days in Texas and not leave the state.
Yeah, it’s one of the biggest states.
Alaska is even bigger… look at that. Too big.
Pierpont Commons, 2:00PM, 10/31/2024
—it’s nothing, really, and it’s true, because nothingness–emptiness–inflames the mind and plagues the soul. i lick the envelope; it is empty for now, though it will carry the weight of a novel in its folds. i think of emily dickinson and susan gilbert, tongue and glue, attraction misattributed like an incorrect citation. the quote wasn’t theirs, did you know? it was written by carolyn forché. you are beaming. of course i knew, but i tell you otherwise because this is your moment, your gold nugget that you sifted from the crevices of memory. how would forché put it? tenderness is in the hands? that means–
But that’s just the way that I have to communicate with some of my relatives, just to let them know that hey, I’m still here!
Ann Arbor Thrift Shop, 1:00PM, 11/18/2024
–the heart is the toughest part of the body, though not for good reason. graphite needles puncture skin, drawing blood from vein to inkwell. you’re stationary–letters leaking, fingers bleeding, arms wound like a clock: forever crooked, never on time. the wire, peaked with clothespins, is slack and sagging. to allow for miracles, you say, even though you don’t believe in them. i believe in you, though. what does that make me?
to the right, the maxilla quivers. to the left, the mandible spins, closing the gap. hot breath, pulsing gums, the proof of life staring at you–do we make our own miracles?–as you stare back at the scythe, at the split decision–
midnight strikes. the gator’s mouth snaps shut. the clothesline pulls taut and the pins are falling, falling, gone.
sometimes i wonder & leave the pickle jar unscrewed like the time i stole a hamster from my neighbor & still have but not want & the time i showed my bloody wound knowing that mother would scream i still am wandering to know why i did that & endlessly i still am wondering - sappy
I went to an audition the day I turned 21. The callback involved a series of writing prompts for ultra-short plays lasting around 2 minutes. They could be many things, but they had to be true.
I ended up turning in a couple of plays about how I’d grown up in a strange old house that I’d always thought was haunted. Those callback pieces ended up turning into a series of close to 100 ultra-short plays, mixed and matched in various combinations during performance, where I tried to understand what ghosts were and whether they were real.
From Ghosts: Vol. 8 –
Do you hear the sighs, the groans
The songs
The cries
The footsteps
You can imagine them if you need to
It shouldn’t make a difference
I never did come up with any kind of concrete answer. Instead, I came to a place where I was more comfortable living in the gray. Odds are, no one will ever be able to definitively prove that ghosts exist, but what difference does that really make when we’re experiencing their effects? When something is haunting us, does it really matter whether we can prove to the world that it fits some kind of socially constructed definition of what counts as real, or does it matter that, for one reason or another, something is crying out for us to hear?
Vol. 8 –
You can try ignoring them
Good luck
You can close your ears and your mind
But the voices will shine through
In your empathy
Your convictions
Your hesitations
Looking ahead at what may be a dark, heavy time in my life and in our collective story, I’ve been thinking a lot about what ghosts may be haunting us right now. What unfinished business and half-learned lessons are we being forced to pay attention to? What stories from the past are looping back around with renewed urgency and vitality?
I don’t know the answer yet. We’ll have to wait and see. But whether we’re talking about spirits, stories, or something else difficult to grasp, we’re staring down a very charged, very haunted time. And even more so than listening to the haunting voices already there, I think we need to start figuring out what makes it worth it for us to cry out in the night. I feel this especially keenly as an artist.
From Ghosts: Vol. 4 –
What if the inspiration gnawing at us is really ghosts trying to get us to use their stories—now our stories—to try and fix things. The only problem is, if we fail, their unfinished business becomes ours.
We are entirely made up of stories. Everything up to this point has collided, combined, grown, and evolved to make us, and this is true of everything from our DNA to the life stories that ensured our existence. The ghosts screaming at us in the night are reminding us not to forget that their stories have become our stories, and that these stories are not over. They continue with us. And sometimes we have to change them.
Stories hold immense power. They are not some frivolous thing that we use to entertain kids. They govern our lives. The stories we tell ourselves determine how we live our lives – what roles do I fill? What kind of person am I? Where am I going? Where did I begin? Where do I think I’ll end?
From Ghosts: Vol. 9 –
I am truly starting to wonder if I don’t exist and I’m just a bunch of ghosts trying to coexist in one broken body.
And the thing is, no one person owns these stories. We are all keepers, and there’s a constant push and pull of narratives happening. Stories are shared. The collective narratives a society has exerts more control over it than any government or police state. And because we are born into stories that have lived much longer than we have, there are plot points present that may not serve us. So how can we harness the power of the stories that govern our lives?
How will the story change with us?
Vol. 8 –
The odds are high
That your job will also be unfinished
It is likely that you will be
The creak, the groan, the hum, the sigh, the cry, the singer
The maker of footsteps in the night
You will be the noise
That jolts children out of their bed saying
“Something is not right”
If the story we tell ourselves is that everything is fine, everything will stay exactly as it is. For better or worse. Nothing will be rectified. But if we tell ourselves that the current story is an injustice, that it’s harmful, that it’s wrong, there’s at least a chance that it will change. Changing the story is step one for justice.
And this is the reason they’re so afraid of artists. We challenge stories. We take them, embody them, make things beautiful that were not meant to be so that they can’t look away. We can look on a stage, or in a book, or see a movie, or take in a painting, and we see ourselves. We see what we do and don’t want to be and the kind of life we want to have. And divinity is having the power to change your path. That’s the power we have.
From Ghosts: Vol. 9 –
The purpose of light is not to banish and conquer demons, to burn them with holy water, to send them to a place of eternal torture… Light walks face first into literal hell holes and tears open portals to the other side so that no one is silenced. Light sets fires in the middle of the night to make absolutely fucking sure that nobody misses the dangerous, spectacular burning flames…Light is fucking pissed right now.
So as we step into what may well be a dark, heavy, and uncertain time, how do we honor the ghosts that keep us up at night? How do we hear the beauty in their howls and take on their unfinished business as our own? There is power here. How do we claim it?
Vol. 9 –
We are creatures of light. But that doesn’t mean we live in the light.
If we are headed for a revolution, it will start and end with us. No one will fight a war they don’t believe in, but they’ll risk it all if they think it’s worth it. People are powerful like that. And wars start and end with stories.
Artists were not put on this Earth as a fun addendum to the important stuff. We were put here to ensure that everyone stands a chance. It is our job to make sure that every screaming ghost is heard.
From Ghosts: The Final Volume –
I am sending you forth into the darkness. To be witnesses, to be storytellers, be burning flames in the pitch black. Walk in darkness always.
So no matter what happens next, we haunt. And we will not be silenced.
From Vol. 8 and Vol. 9 –
Are you angry yet?
the Forest
there are whispers in these woods
they call
to me Breathing
sweet nothings
born from blackberries
and figs The promise of purpose
pomegranate seeds
mashed by molars
mystifying It’s alive
and breathing
though the exhale doesn’t
stop
and the air has runs
and the lungs don’t
e x p a n d
between trees
the metallic clicking
a painful
gurgling The mouth of the forest
opens wide
stealing air
blood
body
from my soul
o u t s t r e t c h e d am I
doomed to the final moment
a death rattle
[pointing to a bag of psychedelics] You laugh at me but you support it. Look what happens when you support it!
UniQue T-Shirts, 1:30PM, 10/16/2024
your face turns, a sunflower in september. a starburst of seven streams, blending together, repelling, intertwining. you grab my hand but i am already gone, a trip distilled into its core emotions. a fairytale nightmare, a frontal lobe stunned, or stunted, only time will tell. an infection, a parasite, a host and a contestant–the grand prize a great flood, for better or for worse? the earth swirls and sloshes. mud becomes bronze becomes clay becomes tar. i am trapped, anchored to a moment, watching the world spin forward without me, the present freezing into the past. i watch the drops of sanity peel from my skin, feel the beads of blood coalesce beneath my tongue–a ribbon, a pulse, a dream.
Like, I get it! Harassing me is only gonna make me want to vote less, you know…
East Quad, 6:30PM, 11/5/2024
we are always running to a graveyard or an office or a sunset that we will never reach. why would you take a golden ticket for granted? keep duties away from indifference. your voice, silenced, cut like a stem, put on display–oral histories drying up in your parched throat–and for that i mourn your loss, your vowels sharp as the glass that imprisons it, the enamel behind your teeth ground away like whetstone. this is your fault, your victimhood, your desire. we have split the atom and put it back together, you and i. it hurts to breathe, but we breathe anyway.
I need to lock in but the minute I get home… the minute I see my bed…
Chem Building, 9:00AM, 11/6/2024
wake up, you’re going to be late. now is your chance to tell your story. see the camera? smile and wave. your achievements are not interchangeable; your memories are not replaceable. you’re scared? i don’t care. everything that can go wrong might go wrong. life is full of might-go-wrongs, it’s how we built the pyramids, planned the skyscrapers, chipped rock from the moon. might is a powerful word, it indicates strength, it predicates possibility–trust me, there’s nothing stronger than a word that tumbles around your head. internalize your worth and wear it like an accessory. scratch that itch, spit it out, shed your skin and leave no trace behind.
wake up, you’re going to be late.
