muted

some sort of hidden pathway that might make me remember where i was heading,
the little fragmented documented placement of phrases
that label
the type and place and space of your thoughts
leave me lead around ditty to ditty to mind over mind
and there is no sign of rain.
no answer
nor home or knowing or placement of future or reality or sense,
nor what if i know what i am doing again.

little tracks from your own embedded directions.
i try and get lost, helpless, buried, devoured
in some loamy dense warmth. as i clamor
up
the edges of the wound that's not yet formed.

nature is a bit shit

i climbed a mountain this morning. admittedly, it was not a very big mountain. probably actually a very small mountain by mountain standards. it's been an hour or so since getting off the mountain, and my breathing is almost back to normal. this is indicative of my state of fitness. i am a lazy little shit.

i don't understand the idea of the spiritual connectivity of nature. exercise, yes, because you become intimately aware of your body. but the outside, the roughness, the rocks and the stumbling and the trees and the void, it is divorced from my tedious, urbane existence. god, i've never even been camping. the 'outside natural world' does not make me feel more human, or less human, or different at all. i like looking at trees, and i like finding animals, and i don't like getting covered in dirt. i feel relatively satisfied by how exhausted and slightly ill i feel, as it means i actually exerted myself for once. but i don't feel like the experience of walking up a hill has made me more human in the way that talking to a stranger does, or... many other experiences do... reading a amazing book... meeting someone you admire... connectivity.... good food... good sex... eye contact... all of these touch me more deeply than trees and red dirt and rocks.

aim.

list time. i like lists.

1. finish QUT part of uni. this semester. no dropping out, no excuses. i do it.
2. start on thesis for curtin part of masters.
3. cook more.
4. save more = travel money. pay off credit card, Travel Money
5. clean more. and better.
6. find carpet in room.
7. work out why i sleep so much, and stop sleeping so much.
8. self confidence. get some.
9. what do i want? work it out.
10. create. because that is what keeps me sane.
11. read more. because this is what reminds me why life is wonderful.
12. open up while keeping self contained. because this, human interaction, is what life is about.

Dinosaurs with Feathers

i bought a book on them. Fuck Yes. i have been very inspired by them lately.

i love them a lot. they are dinosaurs! and birds! between. i like spaces between, that's part of the wonderous nature of evolution.

mmm. now i am tired and full. i am pondering writing poems about my teen lesbian novels. i will start with earlier ones.


here is one on 'Annie on my mind' by nancy garden.


ANNIE and LIZA - by Elizabeth.


Annie, sweet artistic soul;
you may be working class, quiet one,
upper New York
trouble, torn between
feminism and your own desires.

but Liza loves you.
and there are few things sweeter than
when your first lover touches you
and you know, oh yes,
something so much more profound about
that space inside
your
soul.

together, annie, liza, you look
at unicorns
that almighty feminine and
you ride across the city
over each other's bodies,
towards a future without
homophobia.

the end.

forgetting

damn it. i was meant to pay some money off my credit card today. i'm an idiot. actually, i have a few hours left. i can fit it in.

saw movie. enjoyed it. cinematic experience indeed. i took my shoes off, even if they did stink, but i like the socks i wore, i'm sort of hungry but lazy in bed, ready for sleep, i wish i could stay awake late and ponder the world and myself and my world, and my uni work, and not just spend half my life asleep. it is less fun.

hung over

too many cocktails.

drunk

tired

stomach cramps. i think this is because i am eating slightly better. this is why eating better is a mixed blessing.

i was going to write about a girl i knew once, but now i am tired, and she'd updated her facebook status, and it seemed a little close to home. or too far away from home. or something, ah distance, yes, we are often in the wrong place right place wrong time wrong space, it's all so arbitrary, this stupid situational timing and placement.
the cathartic act of writing is becoming habit again. this does, admittedly, make for a blog of repetition, but it's a nice way of bleeding without blood.

female writers

i rarely smile in the self portraits i take, i've noticed. let's try and change this.
this is also an excellent way to make me write at least a line or so every day. i wonder why i don't smile. i smile a lot in real life. i guess, i look at the image on the screen, and i dislike how the smile mutates my skin and folds it around my mouth, my nose, and i feel self conscious about it. which is a little silly, because i try not to follow the beauty myth. i am also feeling more and more self conscious about my eyebrows. i've plucked them since i was 12, or so, when my best friend told me i had a monobrow. every so often, even now, a well meaning friend offers to do it, or instructs me on how much nicer my face would look with two slightly more distinct eyebrows, rather than a line of finer hair linking between them, and finer hair below them. the shape of them is still distinct, it's just not defined and preened. it's taken me 14 years to stop the habit of keeping them in the kind, socially confined ideas of how female eyebrows should look, and each time i study one of these pictures, i just want to take to them and make myself look 'better', before i slow down, and remember that this is just our socially conditioned notion of how i, as a woman, am supposed to look. i've come to think of my leg hair as attractive, and i love it, i love the way it feels, and how the air feels against it. i will not remove pubic hair. it's simple. underarm hair was my second most recent concession, but probably the easiest, because i think it's sexy as all hell on women. the warmth of it, the way sweat clings to it, the scent, i find lovely.

now it's just the damn eyebrows. i look at them merging between my eyes, and i want to think of it as poetic. i want to focus on the way the hair feels when i touch it, and how different it feels to how it has for the last 14 years. i remind myself that there is no substantial reason that it is less attractive than were i spending an arduous amount of time in front of a mirror, carefully removing each hair to submit my face to a more typical version of attractiveness. and, in the end, i don't tackle it, i leave them messy and merged, but still, i feel that little bit uglier still. i'm looking forward to celebrating them more, the acceptance of, no matter how small, i can play out the politics of identity, and consumption, and gender, with my own body.


while cooking dinner (a delightful pasta 'thing' my New Friend Fiona I Met Off Facebook told me how to make) i pondered something i often do. gender in writing. and how much it shits me when i realise male friends who consider themselves well read have read such a small number of women writers without realising this. i had one debate with a drunk kid (ok, i too was extremely intoxicated, and belligerent, as i tend to get when drunk and debating with people who assume i am stupid) who listed all these male philosophers, but could not name a SINGLE significant female one. i think i was using that as a proof of either his ignorance of feminism, or philosophy, or ... something, i dunno. but it's surprising how common it is - men who read, but only really read male writers. i know teen boys are like this, largely, from when i was working in abookstore - to generalise, they are more comfortable reading about boys, while girls will read about people regardless of gender. perhaps this is why girls tend to be better socialised, their lack of fear of gender transgression?

to be slightly simplistic it comes back to the fact, simple, that i can wear pants, and it's not transgressive. men, however, wearing skirts to work, with a gender identity of male, would have a larger problem. for me to be 'transgressive' through not wearing make-up, or plucking my eyebrows is a far less transgressive act than for a man to wear make-up and tidily, openly, pluck his eyebrows. does this make men freed from these stupid, idiotic beauty rituals that push women into time wasting, consumer, object based activities for hours, or simply deprived of choice? however, as i've mentioned in a blog-entry-long-ago, i don't think that feminism is about choice. that to me is bullshit. and i've explained why before.

i'm starting to readin dworkin's 'intercourse' - this book has particular interest to me for a lot of different reasons. one of which is the fact that i am, to a degree, a masochist, and a sub. and she critiques this solidly, and it makes me question my own desires in a really interesting, focused way. is this a way for me to avoid intimacy, to distance myself from a lover through pain and power play, detaching my own humanity from theirs in a desire to remain as seperate as possible in such intimacy? i tend to think that might have a lot to do with it. and insecurity maybe. it's making me question my own desires to the point of realizing that the desire only seperates me further from the act, and makes me more alone.
this doesn't make clear sense yet. will articulate more after dworkin.

vanitas

i am a compulsive photographer of myself with my webcam. i take them often. i like to document what i look like, and well, i have no articulate reason for doing this. so, as is only sensible, i'm going to call it conceptual art, and make myself take one photo of myself every day for a year.

i finished 'stone gods' by jeanette winterson today, sitting in civic under a tree after work. it's one of my favourite things, i've done it since i moved here; sitting under trees in civic, reading books.
it was an amazing novel.

it's cold

little bunny is snuffling.
in some ways, it comforts me. he's named after lachlan, who i call noog, (for no real reason that i remember... he calls me pickle) and who i have spend many, many evenings sleeping with or next to. his breathing was always heavy, broken with snuffles and snorts and little sounds all night long, and well into the morning, as midday was lachlan-awake time. for a long time after i moved out, and started sleeping without him next to me every night, it was hard without the little sounds. i mean, being the strange people we are, i'd still stay over there usually a few times a week - non sexually... we just loved sleeping next to each other. i find it strange sleeping next to people who are silent, or who snore, or... whatever, because i remember the little soft sounds lachlan makes, and it makes me feel at home, because i love him so much. it's hard to explain, because i don't miss being with him, in a 'girlfriend' sense. he and his partner are happy, and i am not interested in a sexual relationship with him at all. but i miss hearing him sleep and curling up next to him.

oh i feel tired, and .. not confused. just held back held back, my ideas tied down, and what i want is too muffled because well, whatever it might be, it won't, so i can't, and i leave it. but god, i just ... want to lie besides you, warm, breathing, softness, nothing else. my thoughts are there and they are so safe, and sensible, and clear, and you can run your finger down my cheek and i will smile, smile like this, you see.

this is madness.
then there is jule, who is a seperate, past madness.




jule called. ignore him, elizabeth, don't give him any more. he won't love you. he won't respect you. he won't understand why you are hurt. give it up. oh yes, not worth it, with his poetry and wandering and beautiful lies, and divine madness, and god, jule, it's only sense keeping me from calling you back, you mad, hideous arsehole, you'll spit in my eye and i'll thank you for it. and i know he's waiting, one day, to come, implore me, and hold out his hands, and i know by then, the moment will be lost, and i'll have become smart enough to know better.

around and over and under again

circular, elizabeth, circular, that's how you live your life, yes? yes? well, accept it and don't hate yourself, hell, you know it's narcissistic, you're the first to argue it.

my phone rings, and i ignore it, often. i like the silence. i'm nestled in the the nest and it is comfortably warm even if i have an unseasonable number of blankets piled over me. it's time to listen to 'casiotone for the painfully alone' because it makes me warmer, not that it's cold, no, i've said that.
my neck hurts a bit. i'm ignoring people. i'm overtired from sleeping too much. i'm finding things to do. i find conversation that excites me so rare and sweet and delicious and ripe and damp and sucks me right in so deeply and hard and solid and when i've had it, i'm left breathing heavily somewhere deeper, satisfied and yet now more hungry, that sort of paradox of something worthwhile you get every now and then.

the trees here have shifted. one of the few truly entrancing things about canberra is the seasons. the trees go from dead, to flickered with green, to full ripe green blooms so fast that it's hard to remember when it was dead and dry. there are these sudden, heavy storms that come in the morning, evening, night; surprising and gleefully heavy. the air smells sublime right now.

i had two lighters in brisbane, and i would light one with the other, only pressing down the gas and not the spark, moving the flames into each other, separating them, merging them... disasociated fond memories of my grandmother with cigarette burns in everything she owns. i dislike smoking simply because i want to, but feel obliged to resist out of knowing how vile mouth cancer is.

facebook updates from the last hour tell me there is a large storm in brisbane. ten or so friends have stated as much, and this makes me feel strangely delighted, that i see their weather through dinky little status updates. i get this strange communicative fragment through updates, and i have a little bit of sharing, and we have a little bit of touch through the internet, and touching often scares me until i'm breathing comfortably around someone and god, i want to go home.

dialogue with autumn girl

me: so, what are we doing? i'm supposed to be awake. that's part of why i ask you over.
autumn girl: maybe you are just being Boring. i blame the fact you are on the internet, checking your facebook.
me: hey, i watched little britain
autumn girl: doesn't count. hey, if you'd bothered to take advantage of me visiting earlier, in stead of scrubbing the hotplates in the kitchen, and doing the jigsaw, you'd not be pissed off at me.
me: hey, i'm not pissed off at you, or me, really. i like sleeping too. i was just hoping to be productive and focused for a bit longer
autumn girl: you could write an annotated bibliography of all the teen lesbian books you have?
me: i know this, we talked about this in the shower. we also planned an alternative thesis, and four different versions of it, from a web portal, to the viability of creating a series of links with the changing nature of the internet, and the way people use google. that's all good and well, autumn girl, but now i can barely keep my eyes open, and by all logic, i should be dancing with you for another few hours.
autumn girl: i dunno. it's weird eh?
me: why the fuck did i spend last time decorating my wall with fucking fairy lights?
autumn girl: hey, i'm not the brain. i just make things exciting for you, you know. jumping around, pointing, making you focus nice and clearly. it's not MY fault if you focus on decorating your damn wall with fairy lights rather than planning the not-yet-enrolled in masters thesis, or the year or so away PhD.
me: sorry, autumn girl.
autumn girl: that's ok.

little bunny runs around my bed again ...

i have been listening to 'summer rain' a lot lately, and it makes me remember the time jule and i went drinking in paddington. we were, for all intent, going to sound art at the old power station, but were supplementing this with tallies (long necks) and chartreuse on the side of the road.

we drank on the side of the road, him lazy and languid and dripping with sex. i, scattered. it was an embankment sort of space, where we were hidden from the cars. it started to storm in that heavy brisbane way, and we bought more. headed to the main road. stood there, drinking and laughing and dancing out in the rain, the storm, the water drenching us both, running around, floating leaves in the gutter, giggling.

my dress was soaked, shoes useless i stood barefoot, he shirtless, the air hot, humid dark evening storm humid.

re-blogging.

1. random decision. all good librarians should blog.

2. my small bunny scrambles around my bed right now, his little feet all fluffy and soft.

3. exhibition areas of libraries, and public programs, are my current Library-interest.

4. life in general is being terribly flummoxing at the moment, so much so that i feel the need to blog because it calms me. it reminds me of being 16 and suicidal, and the only place i had anywhere to express what was going on, was in my blog. however, i'm not in a position to actually go into things that are flummoxing me, so that, i think, might defeat the purpose.

5. damn.

settling in canberra of sorts

not settled, no, but i am here. i take a lot of photos of the streets. i want to find this cemetary that someone i knew in another life sent me, with a beautiful angel looking over the ground.

the churches here are small and beautiful and there are trees on every corner, starting to turn auburn already. it's almost autumn and i am far from home, and trying to make a new home here, in streets that are oddly familiar, and completely alien, looking at books in stores i've heard of but never seen, living out what was a dream of 7 years ago, only vastly completely different. a totally incomprehensible distortion of where i thought i would be, i ended up in canberra anyway, wandering the streets alone, and feeling almost happy to be here, and very happy to be alone, but tired of the lonely. i look in electric shadows, this beautiful indie bookstore which is two streets over from my apartment, and i try to learn to cook, stutteringly, with vegetables and peanut sauce from a jar. i have a bunny, named by my ex boyfriend, and best friend in the world, my soulmate in a friendship sense, while walking home, after midnight, dreamily through new farm. i miss him, i miss my streets, my new farm, my valley, my city, and i am in this alien place that smells strange, and is filled with memories that aren't mine.


i am starting to find a way around this city, in this new skin, in my new job, the Dream Job. i am knitting more again, thinking about drawing, perching around markets, learning to blow glass soon, writing emails to my friends and missing them with every night i don't want to go out because it feels forced and i listen to friend's music, i listen to steel guitar and i think of my henry, and the magical few months we had when the world iced over with our love that melted horribly fast... and i think of jule in ever footstep around, missing him, missing his world and seeing the perfection and beauty that he glosses the universe with. i miss lachlan like air, gasping him in with daily phone calls, poking on facebook, he sends me receipes. i miss my beautiful eliza and her smile that glows, glows glows out of her heart across the state, sometimes i almost feel it here this far away, and my katy, i want to do jigsaws, and snuggle her and write little poems to each other. my joe and my tani, my beautiful friends who most people would never be comfortable with what we all shared together, but they, they wouldn't understand how beautiful it really was, and how sacred, and trusting, and sharing, and understood it was. how natural. and that, that is a fragment of who i miss and how i miss them. i miss anita, my special, special sister and housemate, my jordie and his wide green consumptive eyes and that hair that slings into them, the way he'd drag a strand across his cheek and chew on it absently...

i find pieces of the past i never lived in my workplace, in pancakes, in a large reflective lake but it's all so distant that i feel wry, slow, behind, about the shadows. i grasp for poetry, and i remember things, and i fall back into other words with my henry, and our own shadow that swallowed us. remembering to take it out of words and look at people before i lose my heart in language ever again, knowing it's hard to learn, it's hard hard hard to learn. it makes me feel young, and old, at the same time, smelling this air that tastes like trees and green and the verge of raining, and the dryness, the lack of sweat, the promise of coats and velvet, and of those parks that lead me dreaming, of holding hands through them, interlaced, with someone i love. i can place so many people i miss there, but i feel.. slowly excited that there are new people, new people whose hands can lace with mine as we wander the parks. i miss my friends no less because of this. and the shadows don't haunt me at all, they just deepen the view.

re-blogging

i am starting this up again, in preparation for The Move to Canberra.

it's scary, and the old familiar comfort of Bloggity Blog might help.

eep.
i got a start date. the 18th. the 18th of feb. my plan is to move down in the first week of feb, and Settle in, and then start.

ug.

so forth and etc

uni blah

been sick last few weeks.

knitting vest.

i like my vest.

took a week off, that was Good, relax relax relax.

am slightly hungry.

need to quit a job, scary.

gettting scholarship money number two any day now.

cure = amazing.

sleepy.

should be actually working here, not just sitting here updating blog.

hm.

re-blogging for....

THE CURE!

TONIGHT.

yes. that is the most exciting thing. ever.

the end.