*no one can make you inferior without your consent*

I'm a Sunday Scavenger
picking at pieces of yesterday's mental meal
I wish I would stop, fly off and nest down
and rest for a god damned hour or so
just to clear my head, make some room for
more emotional messes.
If only the realization that god is dead
didn't leave so much up to me
I've adopted the LIES of adulthood;
I'll never be good enough, or have enough money
I've made myself sick with envy and grief
how could my mother leave me with so many unanswered questions
how could life be so  u n f a i r ,
how could i possibly forget her?
I am responsible for my life and
finding food to eat, cover for sleep,
and am at an utter loss on this
scavenging
sunless
Sunday

written on an asked-for scrap of maybe a paycheck envelope from a mexican security guard at the Santa Monica (jewelry) tradeshow.

want to leave but can't stand to say goodbye
here i am a year deep and im ready to run again
maybe its just a stage, maybe it'll pass
but shit baby everyday it seems
i'm wondering if it's still worth it to me
my fear is making a rash decision
living in regret
i've had enough of regretting and losing
but theres a voice in my head
the volume louder and louder
asking me if i my love for you still grows
or if i have become fat and comfortable
and stagnant
and it's not you, my love, it couldn't be you
you've been sweeter than i could have asked for
but it is the insecurities in me that as i
sluff off more and more of my rough exterior
i see that i have no more energy to believe that
you love me more than you have loved your past girls
that i have anything to offer that you haven't found before
and that you would make any sacrifice for me
that, i guess, i would think was big enough.

and thats just too damn bad, now istn't it
because we've had such a good time
but i can't be honest enough with you
i can't get what i want
whatever that is
so like the children of egypt, i will flee
and your next girlfriend will have as much disdain for me

i want to breath deep; release
but the air around is toxic to me
all those unattended emotions linger in a cloud of humidity
and my insecurity soaks my skin and hair with sweat
the sunshine burning on my shoulders helps, but doesn't
today was yesterday's tomorrow, and we're still in tact
but slippery in all the worst ways
checking my life's rear view mirror, considering which exit
while you talk to me about staying the course
can't we make plans i cancel? can't i take control from me?
you don't want to make those decisions; i will
you don't want to see where we're walking to; i will
god i'm just so tired, i don't want to
    any more
please can i breathe, at ease, without feeling like i'm falling up the street
and regain some personal focus
and not feel so damn bad
about everything i do
and for once   just   breathe

this love is exhausting
lately          but perhaps it will pass, i think it will
I don't think i'm done here yet
i'm not ready to leave my love
behind

today today i want to pack a bag and go  h o m e
where you are so afraid to visit
where i am so wanting to run away back from to
but today today
i will choose to stick it out and allow myself to  feel afraid if afraid is what i feel
and tomorrow or the next day, i'll feel better,
and i will stay, in love

I don't really know whats up with me lately. Have I gotten so good at lying to myself that I can't even recognize when I'm unhappy? Or is my body the problem?
I am exhibiting the signs of depression; I want to eat nothing but bagels, I get lost in internet TV, and though this shouldn't be a bad thing I'm thinking about mom, Paige, and death again, which I know goes in cycles for me.
Also the headaches. I never get headaches, but I've had one everyday for a week. And yesterday, or was it the day before? I wanted to go home for the first time in a long long while. But I know "home" doesn't really have anything to offer me right now, at least nothing that is better than what I have here. And I truly am falling love with R, so far beyond what I've experienced before. I think. Why do I doubt myself so much?
I want every day I live to be a testimony that a life lived in fear is a life half-lived. I know this, and am consciously trying to conquer my fear, anxiety, and anger. But I have so much that has been mashed down repeatedly for two decades. And so much self-judgment! Where is the love I harbor for myself? Why have I no Reverence for my body and mind? Why don't I believe in me?

If a young lady in 2010 who is smart, confident, and energetic cannot find a job where she is treated with respect, what is she to do? I've grown so much since I left New Hampshire. I am able more and more each time someone criticizes me to separate the wheat from the chaff; the true from the false.  And even stupid miserable Lynette can teach me, though I receive her fat words begrudgingly and I do think she's wrong in some ways about me, and reads into my tone instead of listening to my words.

I've got cabin fever, caught in a shitty job, and maybe terrified of success.

i wonder what i could have done
would have done
if she had lived
would i be in college
yeah sure i could be like this girl, that girl
i could make myself beautiful
i could find myself in store windows
or on the cover of a book
i would have made amazing works of art
to change our lives
i'd run farther and harder, i'd have been better
i see that girl, this girl here
i have nothing they have,
all of the women he's loved seem superior
more talented and concerned with being gorgeous(and succeeding)
having traveled the world i would be larger, better

i wonder where i could have been, would have been
if my mother had survived
i want her to be the reason i am not
the model of perfection
but maybe i would be smaller and less beautiful
maybe i would be lost, so much more lost than i am now
damned if i know, i just got what i got
and the rest of what i have
i EARNED, worked for
you dig, bitches?
so, no, my daddy couldn't send me to college
he couldn't give me a dime
but he gave me my mind!
i hope eventually
i won't envy the girl in the picture
who once held his hand
i won't see what sets us apart, and what i want from her world
i'll only see
a girl
who is just
a girl
like any other
jealous girl

i am wealthy with what i have