i'd buy myself flowers.

If I end up alone, I’d buy myself flowers
And make them look like suns and glasses of wine
The little things would hold this great big power
But at the end of the day, they’d surely die.

So I’d dry them all up and hang each flower around
I’d separate the bouquet and keep each one alone
They’d make not a whisper, they’d make not a sound
It’s not their fault, it’s surely my own

That I’d make these flowers strangers
When once they were bounded by the lip of their mother vase
What a stupid little bout of danger
What a surely sorry water case.

Certainly you’d see, if ever my window you walked by,
The vase sitting empty, waiting for the next group of buds to pay their rent
You’d laugh, no, you’d cry
When you knew in an instant, that everyday flowers you surely would have sent


To the girl who couldn’t.




yours,
katie beth

i still have a blog.

Does anyone even read this blog anymore? I often wonder it, question it, and then decide it doesn't really matter. But also, to be fair, I haven’t written anything on here in like, I dunno forever. Anyway, though, I have a question for you, if you write stuff like I do: Do you ever write something and whoever the subject was, it seems like then those words belong to that person? I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. And it’s certainly how I felt about lots of the past posts on here. Somehow, I felt old posts were written with the intent of impressing someone who I didn’t need to impress.

I’ve lately discovered that I don’t have to do that all the time. Sometimes, that’s pretty consuming. We spend a lot of time searching for people to appreciate who we are. There’s nothing wrong with that, either. It’s kind of nice, I suppose.

But sometimes people come along who just like each other, just as they are. No matter what, that’s one of the nicest things around.

On that topic, I wrote a few things that have been replaying in my head for awhile now, from some recent stuff that I’ll spare you the details of. And, I felt almost funny putting them on here, because these belong to a different person than before. Up until now, I still felt like the poems I shared with you before made my blog belong to someone else. And somehow, that’s true of me, too. These certainly belong to me just as much as the person I write them for, and I’m different, too.

I just read that back and it made like, four percent sense. So, sorry for that.

But anyway.

It’s nice to write things again.

::

Lately, certain colors have filled me up.
Flashing orange of talk
Blinking green of talk
Flashing blue of talk

All things decided upon by inventors of things we use to communicate.

I wonder if they ever thought about that? I guess they did. I wonder if they thought about people connecting through the colors they picked.

Do you think they did?
I kind of don’t.

::
Infatuation
Infactuation
Infalluation

Call it anything
Call it yours
Call it mine
Call it ours.

::

Sometimes the world hates closing its eyes
Sometimes it fears what it’ll see when it does that.

It’s scared of its saltoceans coming up and drowning the knots of the wood on a dock
It’s scared of its land having too many feet walking on new concrete and nowhere for the trees
It’s scared of its sun blistering the squishy skinned shoulder-freckles of a little red-haired girl
It’s scared of its moon.
Sometimes the world’s people hate closing their eyes
Sometimes they fear what they’ll see when they do that.

They’re scared of their children growing up and they forget that doesn’t mean they won’t still be around
They’re scared of their parents not trusting them to take and beautifully use what they’ve taught them
They’re scared of the present and what future could come from it and how it will change everything
They’re scared of the past.

Sometimes you hate closing your eyes
Sometimes you fear what you’ll see when you do that.

You’re scared of keeping your love around
You’re scared of letting your love go
You’re scared of your brain telling you the logic of keeping away from her
You’re scared of your heart.
Sometimes I hate closing my eyes
Sometimes I fear what I’ll see when I do that.

I’m scared of my mind flashing through the snapshots I took, a silhouette of him in a rainy doorway
I’m scared of my ears listening to the notes and melodies that were given to me
I’m scared of losing you
I’m scared of a lot.

But did you know that Time isn’t scared of anything?
It might sound silly, but Time has no rush
It has nowhere else to be, but where it’s at.
Time isn’t scared of everyone trusting it.

Time isn’t scared of anything.

::

I think it might be nice to have a little candle around to burn ---

One that smells like tea-d spearmint and peppery tobacco
One that smells like kneading cardamom into playdoh
One that smells like cabins and chocolate
One that smells like tiny wooden ABC tiles
One that smells like ochre blankets
One that smells like barely rain dusted grass
One that smells like little yellow daisies
One that smells like pretending acrylic paint is oil paint
One that smells like lemony icy stuff
One that smells like watching an old movie in a hotel room
One that smells like old books resting in leather chairs
One that smells like the thick tube wall of a lighthouse
One that smells like being happy.

::

I like the electrical sounds you make
With the scratching of things that go round and round
And the beats of drums peppering underneath.
Then I like to think about you making them and picking each one out with a left and right ear and then a thumb keeping rhythm on a steering wheel.

I like the way the sounds opposite who you are
Their mechanical taps like aluminum foil around the last piece of a warm spice cake.
And if they are the foil and you are the cake,
Then I’m the one wrapping it up.

Putting it away for later, but slowly closing and slowly opening the fridge over and over to see whether or not the light stays on.

I like the font Perpetua
If you add an L to it, do you know what it means?
It means continuing or lasting forever.

::

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading.

One more thought: bad things happen to good people, but they don’t forever. I’m sure of it.

Yours again,
katie beth

from probe to purpose.

Good friends of the blog: how’s it going? I’m not going to act like we haven’t spoken in months. I’m not going to catch you up on stuff. Instead, I am going to post something I meant to post a little while back. I rediscovered it the other day, swapped around a few words, remembered some stuff I wanted to forget, changed a few endings, got a little nostalgic, got a little mad, got a little sad and posted it.

I hope all has been going well for you and I hope you know that I have missed you and your awesome way of reading the blog.

I hope you like reading it, I mean, I know the other stuff that I write is probably more fun, but I don’t want you thinking that I’ve only got one dimension. So, I keep-on keeping-on. Here’s some more seemingly futile writings from me, katie beth byerley. Now read on and get pleasantly enlightened, confused, whatever. And know that I’ve missed you.

Anyhow, here goes:

::

probe.

Oh, verses with iambic pentameter…
Oh, poems with images of things…

But the things are images.
And, if that’s the case, the images are things.

And what if that one really did mean “wheelbarrow?”

Really, I think we’re just beating-a-dead-horse.
Those people might have, in fact, said what they meant and meant what they said.

To the similes,
To the metaphors,
To the imagery:

I bid you a line of brightly-colored ink & little plastic tabs stuck-all-at-the-edges-of-my-pages…

And I offer up the 3-D boxes I draw over-and-over-and-over, just to get away for a second…

And I’ll hand you my sanity in replace of your veracity.

[maybe they didn’t want us to know what they really meant]

Well, I no longer want to bear your delegation.
I’ll just pass it, and the ink, and the tabs, and the boxes, and the sanity onto the next, the next, the next, and the next.

And I’ll tell them, “good luck,” but I won’t mean it.

::

S&H well-wishers:

I hold onto certain friendships and I hold on tight,

But it’s not because I like you, because I don’t,
And it’s not because we have anything in common, we never really did,
And it’s not because we’ll ever see each other again, because we won’t,
And it’s not because I think you’re funny, cause you’re not,
And it’s not because you think I’m funny, you probably find me to be completely different from anything you like and know --

[in which case, I thank you]

And it’s not because we haven’t ever fought, although, we never did,
And it’s not because I really miss you, because I don’t,
And it’s not because I wonder how you’re doing, because I really don’t care,
And it’s not because I’m proud of you for joining some False-Greek-Sisterhood, because you have to feel included, and you have to feel accepted with happy smiles and plastic cups as your little veil,
And it’s not because we’re waiting to follow-through with all those plans we made:

No, I certainly don’t hold on for any of those reasons.
I’m holding on for the nostalgia,

Because we used to be friends.
We used to be and I don’t want to get mixed up in your ridiculousness because I’m afraid,
But I’m not afraid of your lifestyle and I sure as hell don’t envy you with your silly-parties-stupid-ideas-false-believings-head-in-your-ass-ways-of-thinking,

No, I just hold on because I don’t want to taint my memories of who I used to be,
Because I was always some version of who I am now, only getting better.
I guess I thought by now, you would have caught up, and I guess I thought you’d be a lot smarter. But, turns out, you’re still an idiot.

But I’m not going to let go. Because I need my memories, and I’m afraid that if I saw you tomorrow, we’d mess-them-all-up, and we’d go through the motions of a conversation and all-the-while, we’d be saying nothing. And that’s all we’d be able to remember.
I guess it’s pretty selfish of me.

::

I am, in every respect, loyally dedicated to the pursuit of a pragmatically pensive euphoria.

…maybe it was just a nice thought?
But I really thought it.

I mean, I really did.

But I don’t feel silly,
Or ridiculous,
Or like I was living-a-falsity.

No, I just wish it was more than just a nice thought,
More than just some idea.

I guess I’ll see you around. Never mind about what I just said.

::

to the histories of the arts and the arts of the histories:

How we try-and-try-and-try to understand what you meant.
And how we analyze, oh, how we analyze:
your gods, your loves, your lives, your needs, your wants, your jobs, your homes, your children, your truths, your colors, your dress, your minds, your thoughts, your passions, your ardors, your desires…

But we can’t know. At least, not really.

And I wonder what you would think of us, Arts and Artists of the Past.
I wonder what you would think if the time was reversed
And my present was your past, and you were living now and unearthing all that my world had done:

I wonder what you’d say if you unearthed our “Art.”
And you saw our Madame Tussaud’s bizarre and eerie completions of waxed-out-washed-up celebrities, and you pulled them up out of the ground, and their glittery eyes were dulled and their fingers were broken, and their wax had somehow made it through the years and didn’t melt, although, I wish it would have.

And you tried to figure out why we had done it. And you scratched your heads.
Maybe you’d think we worshipped them as our gods and goddesses.
Perhaps some of us did, but just know that most of us didn’t.

Most of us were just as confused as you all were.
And maybe, as your hands sculpted the marble dips and curves into your gods and goddesses,
You felt like a jerk for questioning it all.

But you kept-on. I think that’s what I admire most about you, Arts and Artists of the Past.

::

You will, most likely, spend another second, minute, hour, day, week, month, year…

Doing nothing. Nothing but worrying about yourself,
And your purple glitter for your eyelids,
And your hot pink polish for your hands,

And you’ll worry about where to go drink-and-dance,
And you’ll complain that your boy has broken-your-heart,

But there wasn’t one to break.
Well, there is one, but it already belongs to you and you alone.

It’s not that everyone loves you, it’s just that you only love yourself.
And I’m tired of having to hear about it.

I don’t care.

::

I sat outside a dollar-budget store
in the parking lot.
And the car parked beside me had a woman, her children, and her cigarette
in the parking lot.

And she sucked on the smoke, and she drew it out and blew it back up into the universe.
And her son sat beside her in the front, fumbling with his seat-belt, trying to keep safe.
And her teen-angst daughter sat in the back, sinking her teeth into a candy bar.

The mother had on so much make-up, and her lavender-dewed eyelids looked bright and washed out against the fake orange of her skin.
Like the dressing on a corpse, she was trying to look alive.

And as she pulled out of the parking lot and splashed through the rainbow puddle of an oil spill, she looked right at me and I can’t understand why she hesitated.

I guess it was because I was looking at her, and her children, and her cigarette.
And I saw right through it all. I saw her
in some parking lot.

::

Do you have anything else that you’d like to say?
I wondered it to myself as the girl beside me kept her notebook closed and her pen down.
She was not taking notes and she was doing it as a tiny-baby protest against the teacher in front of us:

The girl sat there, arms folded, breath huffing every-so-often-to-get-her-point-across,
And I knew it was because that Philosophy teacher told us she was nonreligious, ironically enough.
And the girl wasn’t.
And she argued,
And she argued loud,
Over-and-over-and-over,

Of course, she was trying to convince herself and no one else in that room.

And I felt sorry for her.
Because she was missing the point:

If you wear gloves for-forever, you start to forget what your hands looked like.

::

It was pretty magical-enchanted-just-in-time,
The way I met the metaphysical realm of it all

The wonderful-beautiful-possible-here-for-you
World of the Hyperlinks

Leads me to discover things who are still waiting to be discovered.

::

Truth, you sit there in the traveling cart of the Circus,
And we can pay-our-tokens-eat-our-peanuts
And watch…

But we aren’t to touch,
The bars keep you inside,
But we can see just-enough.

Just-enough to keep us coming back-and-back-and-back
And paying-more-tokens, for we can’t think of anything better for which to spend them,
And we do it all
Just to watch some show.

::

Did you both forget?
Did you forget that it was me who brought you together?

You must have.
Surely, that’s the reason,

Because I have forgotten the both of you,
At least for the moment.

And I’ll enjoy every second of that moment,
Because I hate to taint my brains with your memories of Skies Calling and Quitting in the Hills’ Laughing.

::

I hate learning new things about you,
Because I keep waiting to learn something that will make me stop wanting to learn,
But it hasn’t happened.

And it scares me because I know I’d go-back-on-the-things-I-believe,
If it meant I could keep on learning about you and who you were, are, and will be.

I hate reading what you have to say.
Because I keep waiting to read something that will make me hate you,
And what a joke that is.
Nothing could make that happen.

And I hate hearing what comes out of your mouth.
It rattles me, but in the best-sort-of-way.

I know I don’t know you, but I feel like I do.
I feel like it’s the shadows,
The forms,
The things I’ve seen in a past life,
And I just keep on getting reminded.

When I said I hated learning,
I lied.
When I said I hated reading,
I lied again.
And when I said I hated hearing what comes out of your mouth,
I guess I lied a third time.

And I hate lying.
So I’m going to keep-on learning and I’m going to keep-on reading and I’m going to keep-on hearing, at least I hope,
Because the forms won’t fail me,

But then they did.

I hope you like her very much and I hope I never have to hear about any of it.

::

I hope you know that you are things:

You are not defined by-that-one-time
You are not defined by-that-school-you’re-at
You are not defined by-that-shirt-on-your-back
You are not defined by-that-one-story
You are not defined by-that-job-you-have
And you are certainly not defined by-that-job-you-had.

No, no.
You are defined by the seeking of the definition.

And you might get it tomorrow, but you might never get it at all, but
Just know that it’s within. You just have to go seeking it.

Cause that’s really all we do,
We search for something to awake our souls,

But we forget that it starts within ourselves;
And not books.

We are given these bodies,
And this is where we will live
And this is where we will die.

It’s comforting, really. At least we know we have that one constant.

Death is not what we fear,
We fear Death without a purpose.

See to it that you have Purpose,
And I’ll be right there with you,
Searching and seeking for the same.

::

I know you’re busy.
But I don’t know if you’re too busy.
I mean, you make time for things you really want to do,
And it’s okay that my mail isn’t on that list.

It doesn’t hurt my feelings.
Well, maybe a little,
But it really hurts my feelings to know that
You’re too busy doing things,
Trying to make it look like you’re doing something important.
We both know you’re not.

I had hoped for more out of you.

You look real dumb in that one picture.

::

Well, I think that was worth coming back for. I mean, these have been saved on my laptop for a little while, and I thought that I wasn’t going to post them, but then I thought, “yes I am.” And so, I did, after a few swipes and swaps. I hope it wasn’t time wasted.

That was kind of a long little post. Ah, who cares. I didn’t tell you that you had to read it, anyhow.

Did you like it? You know I hope you did, cause I really care about your feelings. Really. They’re super-important to me and all that I am.

Welcome back to the blog.
I missed you like the deserts miss the rains. Yes. I just said that.

Yours with one of those knowing nods-and-a-smirk to a person that you haven’t seen in a while,
katie beth

working title.

Well, it’s time for the second installment into the works of verse. So, let’s just get right to it. It’s my hope that you find them pretty-alright:

::

Sugar Tongues.

If it does not happen now, it is not going to.
If you do not get up now, you are not going to.
Well, I don’t want to.
I do not want to promise myself away to the
years-years-years-years
Of meaninglessness.

“What are you going to be? What are you going to be? What are you going to be?”

I want and need nothing of your counterfeit inquiries. You don’t care and it’s too much to believe that you ever really will. And it’s painfully obvious. So, spare me of them. Spare me of them and pull them out of your mouth and off of your tongue and teeth and throw them in the garbage with the rest of the peels of the things you’ve cut on.

I only wish to worry the “who.”

Now leave me the hell alone.

::

The Verse.

Quote The Verse. Over-and-over-and-over-and-over.
Pretend like you know what you’re saying. Say it again-and-again-and-again.
Promise to believe it. Promise to believe it. Promise to believe it.
I can’t.
But it will set you free! The Gospel will hang! It will love! It will endure!
I can’t.
He knows you! He knows me!
I can’t.
You must. You must. You must.
I should.
You should. You should. You should.
I did.
Why ever would you now denounce the He?
I didn’t. You did.
Damn you for such falsity! You heathen, you child, you fool! Believe it now!
I used to. I want to again. In fact, I do. Yes, I do, but what we believe, it is not the same. My He is a Love. It is a version of the He that you cannot possibly understand. I wish you could roll away your stone. I wish you could come out of your Cave. I wish you could lay down that leather-bound weapon you keep in your back-pocket.
I have no weapon! (he thuds on the Gospel)
That is your weapon. That Book is nothing more than a means for you to fight. It is not your Faith. It is not your Love. It is your firearm, and it tickles and delights you inside to pull the trigger. Does it make you feel important? Does it make you feel Nearer-My-God-To-Thee?
You denounce in this House-Of-The-Lord!
I have not denounced. We both know I am speaking The Truth. The Love. The Love. The Love. That is all there is. That is all He would have wanted.
(he nods his head)
So, tell me, Brother, does it make you feel safe?
Yes.
Me, too.

::

Rime.

Cold was the War. And your heart was already frozen-like-ice.
Yes, the ice already hung in your chamber and turned itself into a winding shaft and stabbed you.
And it stabbed you over-and-over.
Every time you took a deep breath.
Every time you bent over to tie-your-laces.
Every time you rolled over in your sleep.
It stabbed you.
And you knew it.

And you asked for someone to melt it.
Yes, we tried to melt the icicle, born of your youth, born of the War, born of the time.
We were too late.
The Sun was going down and the Winter was coming up around The Bend.

But why did you go so long?
Why didn’t you try and melt it sooner?

We would never know, but we asked it over and over as we laid down our shovels,
And the rain dripped itself into the fresh soil over his grave.
And we stood there, staring, asking, wondering.

And the children in the field, somewhere over The Bend,
Started laughing and dancing as the rain turned to snow.

We gathered them, took them into the houses and watched through the thick glass of our windows as the snow turned into ice.

The ground froze that night. And we couldn’t plant a crop. We couldn’t get our shovels to do their work.

And the icicles hung around our awnings. And they threatened to stab as the sun rose again and melted them like honey dripping through the curves of the comb. And they dropped. And they dropped loud. And they shattered.

We had never seen a Winter so cold.

::

Flora’s Wind-Up.

The Wind started whipping, whooping, hurling itself into the moon.
The Sirens started blaring, blurring our judgement.

They grabbed their bags and ran into the ground.
But we weren’t prepared,
So we blocked-it-all-out.
And we started to dance.
And we held each other,
The night the world was coming to an end.

And they shouted at us from their burrows,
But we weren’t listening,
So we kept-on holding one another.
And we talked about the first time we met, and how it rained.
And we talked about the Summer,
The night the world was coming to an end.

They gave up on us. They called us fools.
So, we called out to the Wind and we told him to give up.
And we called out to the Sirens and we told all of them to shut-the-hell-up.

And they both listened.
The wind died down.
The sirens stopped.

They came out of their burrows and joined in the dance,
The night the world was coming to an end.

And we all met up around the fire the next night and we danced again.
And that’s all we did for the rest of our nights and we-tried-our-best to forget

The night the world was coming to an end.

::

Lunar + Solar.

Night pushes up Day.
He lifts Her into our reality and He shrouds Her from the darkness on the other-side-of-the-world.

Day pulls down Night.
And She tells Him to wait for Her on the other-side-of-the-world.

And that’s all they do. They push-and-pull-and-push-and-pull.
Sweetly dancing up-and-down.

And they go on-and-on playing hide-and-seek with each other from the other-side-of-the-world.

::

Veracity: DCT.

If the Forms are God,
And the Concepts are Wisdom,
And the Things are Knowledge,
And the Images are Sensation,

And if I exist only because my parents existed,
And back-back-back into the eons,
They all existed,

And if Anselm says, “That Than Which Nothing Greater Can Be Thought,”
Well, I can define things, too.
Is that The Proof?

And if Aquinas says, “MOTION!”
And if I have The Potential to Move,
Well, who will start The Movement?

And whose digit was it that first flicked that first domino with great fervor and hope...

And that effect led it down-down-down and we all fell,

Well, was it The-Hand-of-God?
Was there only Void before?

And if I am a Necessary Being,

But there was a time when I was not necessary, and there will come a time when I will no longer be necessary to anyone or to anyone’s memory.

Oh, I do need Order. I need a More-Intelligent-Being to give me direction to move me towards My End.

Yes, I need it like the way the archer needs to direct his arrow to the bull’s-eye.

And if He only requires, or, rather, commands the Morally Right Actions, then I suppose I’ll just sit-and-wait.

I hate to question The Verse. I hate it. And I hate to question The Minds. I hate it.

Lead me to The Truth and I will follow you with my whole life,
Because it all makes me pretty tired.

::

I sure do hope that you liked this post and my second attempt at saying something important through literary works of verse. Because, it is important for you to remember that this is important stuff we’re doing here.

Yours,
katie beth

doors.

hey, friends, thanks for bumping it on over to the blog. go ahead and settle in, cause this is an awfully long post, but I sure do hope that you like it. this post is called “doors,” because I wrote some “poems” (I’m finding that I kind of hate that word) involving those things that open and shut.


The Umbrella - at his left

He still holds his umbrella slightly to the left,
As if she’s still there.
He’s still trying to keep her from getting wet.

He looks to the skies and sees the grey
And heads out with a skip.
It’s raining today and she’ll need someone to keep her from getting wet.

He pops it open, barely wetting his shoes.
The thunder claps, the drops fall heavy,
And today’s the day, he’ll be the “who” that she’ll need to keep her from getting wet.

She wasn’t there when he arrived at her door.
Oh, what a painful thing to forget.
That’s she dead and gone, and he yells it more, “I should have kept her from getting wet!”

One thing he promises, like he does everyday; it‘s so easy to forget,
That when he dies, he will surely keep that umbrella to his left,
Even if it is all soggy and wet.

He’ll hold it there, all wrapped up beside him,
As people go by, they’ll stop and stare.
They’ll stare at him and his umbrella in the coffin and wonder why it‘s there.

He won’t care if they make a joke or stop and ask out “Why?”
Cause that’s the thing he used to keep her from getting wet
and that’s the reason why.


Notes on Doors

You’ve really got something,
Something right there in your eyes.
The cobblestone roads, the snow-ridden roads I’d go
To be something they’d fix upon, for only a spell in time.

And if you’d let them,
If you’d let them hold their gaze,
You’d see that I’m “her,”
The one you’re meant to see for the rest of your days.

It’s silly, I know.
All-ridiculous-and-such,
But I really mean it and I’d do
A-whole-hell-of-a-lot
To be right there at the-end-of-your-touch.

I know you’ve got places to be
And girls to pick from;
They’re all lining up in flimsy dresses,
But don’t ever forget:

That’d I’d crawl up the miles,
For my knees won’t work,
Just to arrive
And knock on your front door.

And on that door, I know I’ll be proud to see
A note that’s there, that you have
Written for me.

I’ll grab and squint at the blurred ink as I read;
“I need you in here, the only one I’ll see.”

I’ll know it’s me you’ve wanted for;
The only one you’ll see.
Cause I’m the one who’s at your door,
For all the pretty snowflakes to see.


Knocking

If you knocked on my door, I’d let you in without even a blink.

And I’d let you fix yourself a drink.
And I’d pull out my trundle bed,
And I’d let you fall asleep.
And I’d line up the stars and tell them to get-in-order!
And I’d let you pick one from the sky
And I’d wrap it up in mortar,
And you could take it home, as a memory from that one time:

That you knocked on my door, and I let you in without so much as a blink.
And I’d do it again tomorrow, because now, I wouldn’t even have to think.


Whiskey Cure

She had never been drunk before, until she looked in this mirror.
Her cheeks were blushed, her lips, they shone
As if to say, “come hither.”

That’s not at all how she wanted it to go,
But here she was standing,
With this shot-glass-of-whiskey and her heart started panting.

Another walked in ready to cure her of her sin.
He gave her an apothecary’s look.
He took her home, laid her up, and off-the-whiskey he shook.

He told her that “she was just-alright,”
And that “she’d feel better in the morning,
But she’d have to stay for the night.”

(that he didn’t have to say; that she liked just fine.)

And as he shut the door, fluffed his pillow,
And decided to stay for a spell;
He blew out the light and thought of the night, and the whiskey on her breath.

He’d been an alright one to take care of the girl right next to him
And he knew that he didn’t mind the scent she left on his sheets and the hair she left on his pillow case, that would reveal themselves in morning’s light.

(that he didn’t have to say; that he liked just fine.)



2:03

I found out who I want to be;
Last night, somewhere around 2:03.

It ain’t no doctor,
It ain’t no poet,
It ain’t no King-of-Philosophy

It’s just a life spent rocking in a chair, with you right next to me.

I thought about that life
And who I want to be
And how I want to wear your flannel shirt and open our cabin door,
And here is what we’ll see:

A tree, some grass, a snowfall or two,
A lake in the view, a swing swinging, too,
A circle of smoke hangin’ round about our chimney top,
A barn with a bed with a quilt lying on top,

And a dog who comes running when we call her name,
and we’ll make sure to call it a lot.

I think you know what you want
And oh, how I hope it is the same.
Because right at 2:08, a cabin I went out and bought
And a dog I went out and named.

Yes, that’s exactly what I want, and it took me five minutes to know
That it‘s nothing but:
Our love in the fire that heats our cabin up,
Our love in the grain of the wood that builds the fire up,
Our love in the wind that fans up the flames;
It sounds real-super-special, but it’s just our love, all the same.

I sure did find out who I want to be, right there at the stroke of 2:03.
I hope you read this, and I hope you know, that there’s something pretty great about hyphenating

“you-and-me.”


Reconfirmation

I’d love you, I’m almost certain.
I’d love you, and you’d love me just as sure as the dust hangin’ in that curtain.

When you have my love, know that there won’t be anything better than this
Cause my love is loyal and like a good-pup it’ll sit.

Boy-oh-boy, if we could just get it together,
I know we’d be getting it right.
Cause I’d tell you things like this, morning, noon, and night:

I’d love you the way that strawberries love summer,
I’d love you the way that you should really love a lover.
I’d love you the way that grapes in jelly love peanut-butter
I’d love you the way that the cold wind loves to see us shudder.
I’d love you the way that the barkeep loves his shiny bourbon bottle,
I’d love you the way that the wisteria loves to coddle.
I’d love you the way that the icicle loves to drip,
I’d love you the way that the gun loves a grip.

And you’d know it, when our love was revealed,
When we say it, and we know it’s really real.

But let me tell you something, sweet love of mine,
That my love will whip like a turpentine.

Cause, you see, as good as I can list,
My love will be better, and you’ll open the door and out it you’ll shout,
into that cold morning mist:

“There is nothing! no strawberries in summer, no lovers loving lovers, no grape jelly loving peanut-butter, no cold wind loving a shudder, no barkeep loving his bourbon bottle, no wisteria loving to coddle, no icicle loving his drip, no gun loving the hand that grips, that could ever compare to the way that I love the love that I am in.”

And when the townspeople look around in confusion,
Wondering how love could be better than those in that list,
You’ll reconfirm what you said, as you holler out:
“There ain’t nothin’ better than this.”


Special-sort-of

It’s an ordinary day, in an ordinary place, but let me tell you something;
I see a special-sort-of-look in your face.

It’s somewhere right there in your eyes, both left and right.
It’s a special-sort-of-twinkle, it bounces round about as your head tilts toward the light.

I don’t know if it means anything, I’m probably just lookin’ for clues,
And here’s the thing, I don’t really know you, no matter how much I want to.

But I can tell you that on my list, getting to know you -
well, it’s the number one thing that I’d like to do, in fact, that’s my number one wish.


Summer Whispered, She Whispered to Me

Yesterday, I thought I heard Summer whisper.
I thought I heard her say that she was whipping her currents, ready to blow-on-in.
She told me she was ready-and-waitin’ and that she’d be here soon, hugging me like my next-of-kin.

So I’m going to wait up, with my ear on the door, cause I don’t want to miss her.

Last night, I know I heard Summer whisper.
She said:

“Gather your skin, all pale and gaunt, and let me kiss it with my warmth. Gather your hats and suits made for swimming cause I’m coming real soon, but then I will be leaving. So gather your sweaters and don’t let ‘em get too far, because I’ll be gone, like the whisper of me that you first heard. I know it breaks your heart, to see my green grass fade to brown, but don’t worry too long, cause just like history, I’ll be coming back around.”


Antiqued Lines

Don’t come to my door, bringing me roses.
No, that’s the last thing that I want,
But if you did bring me roses, they’d be the best I’d ever got.

Don’t buy me some shining diamond
That’s all brand-new.
The one that I want will be an heirloom.

Because it’d mean the world,
That sign hanging in our minds,
That my hand fits the simple ring that rested on your grandmother’s hand for all-of-this-time.

And how incredible to know,
That when our life is drawing to a close,
That the simple ring will fit the hand of the one that our progeny chose.

And there it will be, that simple ring;
Living on and carrying through the next-in-line
Those sweet and simple memories
Of you-and-me curving around the antiqued lines.


Your Door

I can’t. I can’t shake you.
You’re there when I close my eyes
You’re there when I open them back up.
Oh, what a pity.
Cause you’re so damn close, but I can’t just show up.

But what if I did?
What if I used my key to get into your door.
And I didn’t announce myself, like I had been there before.
And I acted all normal, like it was completely such;

That I was meant to be there and we sat down and ate lunch.

But what if you had someone else?
Oh, what a pity.
That I couldn’t take.

No, that I won’t be able to take.
If you have someone else in mind, don’t tell me. Think of my sake.
Let’s just pretend like it’s all normal-and-such
And we’ll sit down in the kitchen and have lemonade with our lunch.

Cause that’s all I want.
I just want to be the one that gets to walk through your door.
I hope it’s me, and I hope it’s not too much to ask for.


Well, if you’re reading this, you’ve made it to the end of an obnoxiously long post. but it means the world that you did it, and, really, I should give you some sort of a gift for doing so. feel free to head back on over to Facebook and let me know how it made you feel. thanks for taking the time.

Yours,
katie beth