Naming the Stars

This present tragedy will eventually
turn into myth, and in the mist
of that later telling the bell tolling
now will be a symbol, or, at least,
a sign of something long since lost.

This will be another one of those
loose changes, the rearrangement of
hearts, just parts of old lives
patched together, gathered into
a dim constellation, small consolation.

Look, we will say, you can almost see
the outline there: her fingertips
touching his, the faint fusion
of two bodies breaking into light.

--Joyce Sutphen

everyday i feel more like shawn

"You guys have been together since before I even knew you. And if you're not, I guess I feel like there's nothing I can depend on. And it really makes me angry that there's nothing I can do to fix that."
Shawn on 'Boy Meets World,' to Cory and Topanga

es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido
--Pablo Neruda

i want my old friends
i want my old face
i want my old mind
fuck this time and place

--ani difranco

i can't tell you what i think
i can't tell you what i do
i can't tell you what i feel like doing with you
--The P.Laquers

now we speak with ruined tongues
and the words we say aren't meant for anyone
just a mumbled sentence to
a passing acquaintance
but there was once you
--bright eyes

i am not a beautiful or unique snowflake.

It's May--soon everyone will be done with their first year of college. They'll come home (or not), I'll give them a big hug and within minutes it will be painfully obvious that the whole world has gone on without me. Everyone has gone off to college, learned new things about themselves, become new people. And then there's me, back here, the same as I always was.
Maybe I should've gone to school far away, declared a more interesting major, gotten drunk, had some sex, travelled, struck up a conversation with more strangers, listened to music I don't like, joined a club, volunteered, gone to a frat party or whatever it is people do to go find themselves in college.
But I have a sneaking suspicion that I don't have another "self" to go discover. I have a feeling that I'm it, plain and vulnerable to be overlooked for the rest of my life.
It's amazing to be able to feel so unoriginal and yet so weird at the same moment.

update

I kind of like this blog. Either way, I win: if you read it, then you get to hear what's going on with me (or at least the songs I post to avoid saying anything explicitly). If you don't, well, at least writing it down is therapeutic.

Most of me is really happy with the way things are now: we're firmly rooted in the "friends who never see each other" communication zone, which is nice, because that is what we are. There is that part that wonders what's going on with you. It's a familiar feeling, one that kept me dreaming for many weeks last fall. It's a feeling that will eventually go away; I know from experience that if you starve it long enough it'll die.

Here's the new dream:

I love this song. If all else fails, I'm going to marry this song.

This is the first day of my life
I swear I was born right in the doorway
I went out in the rain suddenly everything changed
They're spreading blankets on the beach

Yours is the first face that I saw
I think I was blind before I met you
Now I don’t know where I am
I don’t know where I’ve been
But I know where I want to go
And so I thought I’d let you know
That these things take forever
I especially am slow
But I realize that I need you
And I wondered if I could come home

Remember the time you drove all night
Just to meet me in the morning
And I thought it was strange you said everything changed
You felt as if you had just woke up
And you said “this is the first day of my life
I’m glad I didn’t die before I met you
But now I don’t care I could go anywhere with you
And I’d probably be happy”

So if you want to be with me
With these things there’s no telling
We just have to wait and see
But I’d rather be working for a paycheck
Then waiting to win the lottery
Besides maybe this time is different
I mean I really think you like me

--Bright Eyes

Unoriginal

The truth is, I can think of a thousand things I'd like to post here. Things that drift into my head. But none of it is my own words. So I'll just borrow a few from other people:

"But as my friend Claribel once told me, "Daniel, you could have sex if you want. The only difference between you and those guys having sex is that you have morals and values." That makes me feel better to know. Not that I think having sex is a bad, immoral thing. On the contrary, sex is honestly the most beautiful, intimate act that two people can share with one another. But it can also be quite an ugly thing of power and selfishness. I never want to allow myself to be in a situation where sex could become that."
--Daniel, another Middlebrook resident.

"Our problem with sex is that we haven't had time to spend together this year, and when we have that's what we did. Instead of enjoying each other's company in a more pleutonic way, we were physical. We had sex and lost our friendship."
--Meghan, an old friend who just broke up with Joe, another old friend

and yet, at the same time...

"I want so badly to believe that
"there is truth, that love is real"
And i want life in every word
to the extent that it's absurd
I know you're wise beyond your years,
but do you ever get the fear
That your perfect verse is just a lie
you tell yourself to help you get by?"
--The Postal Service

You're in my head, you know.
And it really seemed like
you were never coming back here,
like I'd never see your face again.
When it's true, I can breathe.
Otherwise,
my head swims.

Yeah, we never talk about the future
We never talk about the past anymore
We never ask ourselves the questions
To the answers that nobody even wants to know

Oh well, oh well, oh well
So much for the afterglow

--Everclear

come for the week
you can sleep in my bed
and pass through my life
like a dream through my head
it will be easy
all i have for the moment is
a song to pass the time
a melody to keep me
from worrying

--bright eyes

"Isn't that all any of us really want? Someone to hang out with until we drop dead?"
Gilmore Girls

Tears

I wake up choking on grief that can't be mine
I must have soaked up everyone else's hurt
that must be what's streaming down my face
it can't all be from you

This frozen pain and longing and missing
that still clings to my insides
shivering in my wasted heart
ever since your life wove itself into mine

I first tasted them that morning
when the sky was gray with goodbye
you kissed me until you saw them beading on my eyelids
then patiently held me when you realized
no shoulder, sleeve or Kleenex would make them stop

I blinked them away that afternoon
I swore I'd have to forget you
and went for a walk along the river
throwing into the current
all the things you couldn't possibly have said to me

They blinded me that night I watched you
swallow the castles I'd built in the sky
each time you threw your head back
I could feel that ache that is you
and boy was your face red

I just want to start out this year
with less tears and more laughter
especially when it comes to you
at least you got lost in all this with me
I could see it when I caught your eye
in that look which tells me you do, too