1988

I am not in this picture.

That girl is not me.

I've met her, but she never likes me, at
first. 

Sometimes, I grow on her.
Sometimes, not. 

I am probably still at home,
obligated. Eternally third place.

I still look for signs that you miss me.
Find none.   
Why did I never notice, before?

Music of my wayward youth: AKA What About Prom Blaine?!

There is this radio station on the XM satellite that plays "First Wave" music, which is essentially the stuff we listened to if we were slightly "alternative" back in the 80s.  I didn't LOOK it, but I so felt it.  I was listening to a song that they were playing this morning and it made me think of the soundtrack of that time period. 
Back then, I was prone to heart wrenching crushes on people that I would never tell them about.  I wrote poems and secretly sent them to the crushes and was really kind of shy.  I stayed that way for so long and I think it's kind of funny now, but there were guys who probably had crushes on me and why didn't they ever approach?  I don't know but it was kind of lonely.

I was in drama, and French club, and never had money to do fun things even though I had a serious job, too.  School was way too easy, and yet, I still made Cs sometimes because I didn't bother doing the work.  I loved being in band but it didn't exactly make me the coolest kid, and I never got invited to the fun parties for some reason (I so would have gone, by the way).

I think I identified most with the Molly Ringwald character in Pretty in Pink, and yet I would have dated Duckie instead of the rich guy. 

Songs by Psychedelic Furs, http://youtu.be/S2R3FJyT1rc or Simple Minds, http://youtu.be/CdqoNKCCt7A   (there's a reason this is my phone ring tone) or the Cult http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I8mWG6HlmU  throw me right into a nostalgic tailspin.  Sigh.  It makes me want to write bad Emo poetry right. this. second. 

Also, Charlie Sexton.  Oy, oy oy!!  http://youtu.be/uCRtHVEroQ0   I'm all verklempt.  And for some reason, speaking Yiddish. 

But the point here is that for some reason, this tone, this sound, these bands and songs are how I hear my high school years, my young adulthood.  Yes, somewhere in there is Bon Jovi & Duran Duran and even Janet Jackson (one of the first albums I ever listened to nonstop was her Control album.)   Also, Prince plays very heavily on rotation, but somehow in a different way. 

Anyway.  I kind of feel like putting on some Esprit clothes and wandering around a mall listening to my Walkman playing cassettes now.  Or maybe just remembering a time when that's what we did.

Hating Poetry: An Emo Tale

This is dedicated to someone I am really learning to hate. My mom will say "You don't hate anyone" but that's something moms have to say. I probably will say it someday, myself. But I know the truth, the real, horrible kernel of the truth is that sometimes, you just can't like someone. And there's even something satisfying (and terrible) about the fact that they probably don't even know you are hating them. Like love, unrequited hate is powerful.

One Art by Elizabeth Bishop

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

---Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

I hate this poem. It keeps following me around, and it just keeps getting truer. Dammit.

True story: when I was in Graduate School (ah that place of much losing) I had a disastrous paper about it. People who just didn't get my point, nor my sarcastic tone (I was doing it for a point, dammit, which was lost to the graders of my exam. And thus, failure.). I still shake my fist at those exam graders. Oh to be so misunderstood!

(But I really actually love the poem,) and I hate that a moment of breaking down, of crying like a complete idiot in a complete stranger's office as she told me "the bad news" (which wasn't ultimately that bad. I got over it. No one died). All because of this poem. (Well, that one and some other things, but I really, irrationally, blame this poem.)

I hate this poem the way you hate the truth that hurts you.

I think that poetry is one of those places that can truly grab those places in our souls where we are not always cheerful, where we don't respond to the Starbuck's clerk "Fine" but rather tell them how we really are today.

And yes, I agree that Shakespeare Hates Your Emo Poetry. So do I. But I even hate my OWN

Emo poetry. All emos hate their own poetry-- it's part of their very core.

Tell me why I tried.
I'm filled with disillusion
I am you are me
--Emo Haiku courtesy the Emo Haiku generator.

Hate is a good, strong emotion for poetry. It's almost as good as getting drunk. But the headache of hate is less physical.

Anyway. The point is this: I have no point which I can actually blog. But here is a blank space within the blog where I am focusing the energy of the point I would make if I could blog it:

See. There. Try to come back from THAT you person-who-I-was-thinking-of.