Ah Consequences...

Gums bleed.

Fingernails too.

Consequence paid for nights I don't want to look at myself and the thoughts running mad

Lead teeth to pick and bite and tear apart pieces of me

Ah consequences

Self-reflection in a tiny dentist mirror

There is decay and damage here

Each tooth holding a history of food eaten and moments ignored

Each finger, a print, a map with no destination to the chasms in my head

Late arrivals, crashing in front of the TV

Same here under the eyes, the pores open, I pour open

get deeper

get older

Don't want to wash my face, don't want to wash my sins

Leave them on me

Let them sleep in me and me in them

Drunken crashing, colliding with my pillow

Teeth left to rot in the aftermath

of whiskey pools and soda fizz

Like sunburns time again

I left myself out too long

Ah, consequence

What was I avoiding all those nights

eating candy, watching videos, bag after bag of 25 cent deliciousness

long weekends in 7th grade on Grand st. and Bialystoker

By myself when mama went out

Movie after movie, snack after snack

Was I always hiding?

Like each ripple of cellulite

a memory bank of meals

Ah, consequence

What about nights I pretended to brush my teeth

Dad would smell my breath to make sure that I did.

I'd put a hint of toothpaste on my tongue

A small rebellion at a large price

And even still I force myself down the long hallway to face myself

and what I've done to my mouth

8 cavities

3 root canals

4 crowns

one pulled

And a yellow shade of consequence

If God was my homegirl

"Ummm....excuuuuussseee me!

Where have you been?

Oh no, Oh no...I've been waiting mad long fo you!" Said God to her homegirl.

"I've been waiting for you to GET IT TOGETHER! (in rhythm with long fingernail hand claps).

"How many mutha effin' times I gots to tell you, you are the LIGHT OF THE WORLD!!!

And you sure as hell don't need all that bullshit you been carrying around in your head.

Who do you think I am? Bitch please. I'm God. I made the earth, the trees, with birds, awwwwwlllll kinds of animals and shit.

Amazing things I've done. Come on now, gimme some. (An extended pound)

And I made you, girl. So what you think you just apart of the scenery, meant to look cute and shit. I did make you kinda cute, now didn't I, with your little freckle face. Come on now, I squeezed the sun like a grapefruit to sprinkle those love jewels on you. You know how hard that is! Shiiiiiiiiiit

I made you to shine. I made you to live in the glory of the creation that is you. Um Hello?

And you are my child and I'm fly ok...haha She gets it from her mama (with a booty shake song to the left n right) So you best believe you fly too.

I created you, all of you, to love and be loved. But somebody wanted to go out there and get all uppity and start changing shit. Started getting everybody excited and afraid like there's a hell or whatever, when the only hell there is, is the one in that little itty bitty pea brains of yours.

Haha can you imagine, an old horned monster with a pitchfork breathing fire...hahahhahahahah stop it, your hurting me hahahahahhahahaha (holding her bellyfull of laughter).

Then you let that fear shit start to control you and then other people start to use that fear shit on their fellow human beings to control them too. Then there's all this killing and fighting and what not. And I'm sitting up here like, Fool, you better stop hurting each other like that. You think that shit don't hurt me too! Here I am Almighty Mutha effin God and I told you to love each other and here you are doing the exact opposite. It's offensive really.

But you know I love y'all so I'm gonna be there for you (catching feelings, wiping elephant tears away). I'm here to forgive you when your heart is open and ready for me, like BONG, here I am, take me, use me...and I'll be there. But when you living in that fear its harder for me to reach you, you're all clouded and murky in there. No wonder the storms come. No wonder the earth rumbles. People living in fear makes Mama cry, makes Mama's stomach ache.

Aight. Let me bring it back now, back to you.

Girl, it's time to let the past go boo. I got you. Don't let this fear shit drown out your head with all that nonsense. Listen to me. You came from eternity bitch. Now go out there and do what you gots to do, OK! Cus time is money and money is energy and energy is love and love cannot be wasted. ( Snaps, snaps, snaps)

The love you have inside of you is a gift, what you gonna do, play with the wrapping paper, the pretty bow?

Let somebody take your present away from you?

Let somebody tell you it ain't good enough?

Let your gift just sit there collecting dust, next to little cheap animal ornaments?

Or you gonna take that gift I gave you, you know what I'm saying, take that gift and do right by it and give it back to the world.

Give it where its needed. Give it where its wanted. Where it can be received. And in the darkest of corners where love is not wanted, where love is cast out, let your love shine like a streetlight so they can still find their way home.

Honey, love is a cycle, love is a river, love flows baby. Love gives and gives back.

You gotta love you boo, like I do.

So what you waiting on? Get to stepping mama...I gotta do my hair before I set the sun.

in the green room...behind these 4 walls

4 Walls

Behind these four walls

You are an angel

And I am a goddess and nothing can stop us

I never want to leave

Stay here in this garden

Innocent and true

With nothing to question

But out there in the world

We hit the ceiling

And I am a junkie

And you’ve been dealing

I could be high, get a good sleep tonight

But I’d rather be free

Behind these four walls

I am an orphan, suffering alone

Trying to turn stones into gold

The cage isn’t locked, I can leave whenever I want

Only I hold the key, turn the lights on so I can see

Before I face the world

This I must conquer

I am the victim of my own monster

I could hide under my bed and all my excuses

But I’d rather be free

Behind these four walls

We are sleeping

Safe in our little boxes

While others are forgotten

Out there in the world

Can you feel the riot

I am not an island

I won’t just stay quiet

I could pull the wool over my eyes,

But these voices are mine

And they’re crying outside

Id rather be free

 

in the green room...with the truth

"in your face!" spoke the lesson of the moment, bellowing and bitching in my psyche. 

"do you see it? do you get it now?"

"time to figure this shit out girl," it continued on like it was trying to be my friend, knowing all along it was hurting me something awful. but i can't be mad, no, just doing her job, teaching a lesson. 

sometimes the truth just ain't nice, just ain't your friend and you wish you never met her, ever. 

honestly, i'm angry with her, which may seem pointless, emotional and childish. but it feels like a valid little girl anger inside who was disappointed to discover mermaids don't exist to our knowledge and that all people pass away some day or that the universe is never ending. 

1. was it all fantasy? could u be real?

2. damn, EVERYTHING is temporary, every ending is a little death

3. and shit, what do i know about anything? nothing, not a damn thing. 

stuck in non-communication and limbo aftermath 

voicemail and memory

mirrored journey and pattern exposed in a blazing debacle of the heart

i try to stay assured in this

that i can

1. believe in fairy tales and hope one day to see a magnificent creature 

2. cherish everything in my life to the fullest, knowing everything will fall away someday but that it passed through me, that is the blessing

3. find the excitement in the infinite possibilities and surprises of life 

In the green room...of songs and stories

Oh hello again. I'm back sooner than I thought. I just got to get this all out. 

Watched "Evan Almighty" today. A silly comedy about a Congressman that gets visited by God aka Morgan Freeman. 

The best God ever, although Alanis Morrissete fulfilled my teenage angst dreams of God. 

God visits dude and says he's got a make an Ark to save the town from a flood. The wife thinks he's nuts and leaves. But God visits her at a diner and encourages her to see the bigger picture of her prayers. That if you ask for patience, God doesn't just hand it to you, he gives situations that offer the opportunity to learn patience. If you ask for courage, he gives you situations to learn courage. If you want to be closer to your family, he will provide a way for YOU to make that happen. Though I battle with the idea and philosophy of God as maybe a magic entity, the great mystery, a higher version of ourself, alien king, or a figment of our imagination. I resonated strongly with this. It hit me like a shock wave and really incited deep thought about recent experiences and what I've prayed for and what I've been given. I think it's a great way to look at the struggles we face. Finding the way through them and seeing what we can gain. How obstacles can be these amazing blessings in disguise. 

I feel sometimes like everything I do in life is for a song and everything that happens to me, everything I feel needs to become a song so that it can live forever, so it can be released, so it can be a journey for someone else to find release too. Sometimes it feels like just writing a song about something that hurts will make it go away or something I want will make it alive, whatever I am asking of the song to do. The song is almost like a God itself.

 

The song below is one I started writing 3 years ago.  I was sitting inside my little tiny room in Park Slope, huddled underneath my twin loft bed, guitar in hand and a heavy heart in my chest. I wanted to write a happy song, I wanted to write a love song. But I had nothing to go off of. I called on The Beatles  "All you need is love" for a chord progression and meaningful inspiration. But nothing. "Damnit! I can never write a love song!" I said. And so this is what became of that moment, that realization that I wrote for the broken hearted, the confused, the lonely that my song is Never a Love Song. I took the idea with me out into the world and began documenting the moments I saw love around me and how I longed for that feeling. All my wonderment and longing poured into this song. I hope you can find something within it that resonates with you. But stay hopeful in more than that. I know our love song will be sung and we will be heard.

In the green room...kissing Liza

Hey you. Welcome back. I know it's been a while since I have written and there is so much to catch up on. But I thought I'd go backwards in time a little, expose some real truths and nasty confessions of my sometimes insane perspective that leads to insane actions. These experiences directly influence my music. I destroy and then create. I get fucked up then I fuck it up on the mic. I take these real life moments and turn it into art. This is a story, an actual journal entry rant that I turned into a song after being up for more than 24 hours. As it is with artistry, I started to rework some of the craziness so you could understand what I'm talking about. But the guts and glory of it stayed the same. Kissing liza was written like a thousand times in my notebook. Over and over again, the image, blasting my brain, burning it like a cigarette on my thigh.

I actually did that once. I was high on mushrooms sitting on the toilet, felt like I was in an elevator going down, down, down. I wanted to see how long I could take the pain, the burn of the ash going into my flesh. It lasted for what seemed like an eternity. Left me with a little button sized scar.

Summer 2007. I was having my quarter life crisis and partying a lot. House parties at Shelter. Coney island with dope DJs like Kamala Jefferson and great dancers like Sybarite crew and my boy Ant, and artists like Concept and dear friends like Jess and Hosanna. Wasn't a very productive summer on the career front. I guess I've always battled between the life of an artist, just living art, everyday in freedom and adventure, creating but not headed towards a goal, just BEING and then there's the life of the business of art which brings the art to a larger scale but can drain the expression. Finding a balance is what I'm looking for. 

So one crazy summer night I link with, hmmm well, what should I call him, Prospect, I will call hin Prospect, hah, we used that term in college. I link with Prospect on his birthday. We had been spending time together. A borderline, are we friends just kicking it or is there some real chemistry popping off here?

So I meet him for his bday, we go to a spot, which will remain nameless cus it could get me into trouble. There we meet a bunch of his friends, some of them mutual. The liquor is flowing, I've already had at least 4 and I'm on my 5th. Hoping the drunker we get, the closer we get to each other, in more ways than 1.

Which is so retarded, actually reminds me of like a sleazy guy trying to push up on a girl, get her drunk and vulnerable and take advantage of her. I do sometimes feel like a man's sex drive and mating techniques are trapped inside my psyche. Like I'm the one on the pursuit, I'm the one who makes the move. Maybe cus most of the guys are pussy footing round the pussy. HA

This is definitely a naughty blog today.

SO all seems fair in love and whiskey. Until Liza walks in the door. And their chemistry and eye contact is obvious and annoying as hell. He then becomes the sleazy guy encouraging her to drink more and more champagne. She fights him, then succumbs to his sweet face but silly accent. And soon enough they are slow dancing on the dance floor and KISSING!!!

And me being the slightly, not matured emotionally in intimate relationships since I was 12, rushes off to the bathroom in a huff and puff. Thinking back now, I wish I could've shook myself in the mirror and made me look at how beautiful and sexy and amazing I am and that it was all good and that Prospect wasn't right for me ANYWAY. HA

But the higher voice wasn't there in that moment. Only the rageful jealous maniac who had too much to drink. 

I rushed out of the bathroom with intentions of just leaving the bar and not looking back. But instead the whiskey and emotion dragged my hands to both their heads and knocked them so aggressively they might've come off if I had one more shot. And THEN I walked out and proceeded to act like nothing had happened.  Eventually I made peace with them both and even remained good friends with the Prospect. Below is the song I wrote after that crazy night. Enjoy and if there is any lesson learned from this. I'd say its what they told you when you were a kid, 

"Keep your hands to yourself."

Kissing Liza by the dj booth
Kissing Liza in the middle of the room
Kissing Liza under the full moon
When you you shoulda been kissing me

Kissing Liza on a Friday night
Kissing Liza all up in my light
Kissing Liza got me ready to fight
Cus you, you shoulda been kissing me
Yeah you, you shoulda been kissing me

And I’m in the bathroom crying my eyes out
Broke the garbage can and a glass or two
Almost broke the mirror but not with my hand
But with the look of a woman that no one understands no

Kissing Liza up against the wall
Kissing Liza now I’m two foot small
Kissing Liza and I’m going AWOL
Cus you, you should’ve been kissing me
Yea you, you should’ve been kissing me

Whispering in her ear and pouring champagne down her lips
Makes me sick watching you caress her fake tits
Its sweet now, but 6th sense predicts
You’re gonna realize that Liza ain’t shit
No I’m gonna realize that you ain’t shit
No I'm gonna realize this was all one of my stupid tricks

Kissing Liza now the parties begun
Kissing Liza well isn’t this fun
Kissing Liza if I only had a gun
Then you, you woulda been kissing me
Yea, you you woulda been kissing me
Hitting Liza in the back of the head
Don’t do nobody good
But I hit Liza in the back of the head
Cus you you shoulda been kissing me

in the green room...with my lonely earring

(an excerpt from Girl out of Water poetry files 2002)

The Missing Earring

Lost another earring tonight at the movie theatre; my beaded silver dangling spiral ones that everybody comments on. One earring probably swept into a trash heap, the other, abandoned. I return home to add her to the box with all the other lonely earrings. There was the pair of earrings my mother gave me in junior high school when I went through my Rastafarian phase and wore shells all the time. Then there are my jade Buddha’s,I inherited, but that one, almost makes sense to wear alone. These silver hoops I got in Canada for 2 bucks. The copper mermaid, the stars and moon collage, the music note,the golden heart. All loners now, left to rot in the bottom of my jewelry box, only to be worn as an 80’s fashion statement, like Madonna in Desperately Seeking Susan.
Sometimes I fantasize that somewhere out there, someone has found the other earring, like a lost umbrella, or a glove or sock that got mixed up in your wash at the laundry mat. Somewhere out there someone’s saying a prayer for the earring without a match. They sit imagining who the earring could belong to and wondering, maybe even praying the earring belongs their soul mate.
Walking down the street they have forgotten all about looking at tits and ass, now they are checking out the ears, hoping to find the other half to the puzzle that magically found it’s way to them. Desperately seeking to fit together with someone. They play the whole scenario in their heads. A summer day, a warm breeze, their favorite shirt on, chai tea latte in hand crossing from the west village to the east through Washington Square Park. Not much on the brain. Unusually, he’s not looking for her today, the owner of the missing earring. Suddenly in his awkward flair he bumps into a girl. She’s pissed but he likes feisty ladies so this doesn’t deter him. He’s not interested in her at first, more concerned that he didn’t get any on his favorite shirt or on her or if he has enough left to drink, since Starbucks is way too expensive. Phew! No damage done, then he notices her eyes, that unexplainable something creeping behind them. He can see them laughing together, movies and museums, cooking and sleeping in, nightclubs and getting bored and going home. Making love over and over again. He can see fall, winter and spring. Everyday looking into those eyes. Because somewhere in there, he feels like everything he’s ever done makes sense, that everything had lead him up to this moment and she sees it too, or at least he believes she does, because if she didn’t see it, how could he? When it’s love it is one vision, one truth and both people know it.

He says something funny which is something he does well and she laughs which is something she enjoys and then, they say goodbye and keeping on walking. From west to east, east to west, but they both want to turn around, they can feel the energy like a magnet, but she’s late for rehearsal and he’s just shy and they both say to themselves, “If it was meant to be, I’ll see him, I’ll see her again.”
At least he hopes, maybe she was thinking the same thing.

He goes home and writes all about this brief encounter with a Goddess.
She goes to rehearsal and sings like never before and every time they both walk by that first place where they met, they look around for those eyes, that moment, see if they can catch each other again. Weeks pass and they forget all about each other mostly and they’re both out with their friends in a bar that’s too smoky and loud and they don’t feel like drinking or talking, maybe just reading or dancing. But the music’s not that great and if they read they’d just fall asleep, which actually doesn’t sound like a bad idea. Suddenly a friend of a friend knows one of each other’s friends and soon they’re all sitting together.
He notices her eyes, plays it off like he doesn’t know where he’s met her before. She doesn’t play dumb… “You bumped into me on the street…I smelled like chai all day!”
They talk and feel and listen to the silent wanting of their bodies with promise of another meeting, some place quiet so they can concentrate.
He calls the next day, she’s happy and they meet for dinner, Thai.
Conversation flows like water and the food is good. They split the check and go for a walk. The wind drawing them closer and closer. He takes her hand; Velvet. They don’t feel like their rushing…Mmm mm just right…they share a kiss under a tree. One soft, simple kiss. Mmm mm, just right…sweet dreams.
Tomorrow and the next and the next day after that. Love is growing, unknown, yet knowing. No fear, just yes, Mmm mm, just right.

One night he comes over to her house to watch a movie and he’s in her room when he notices her jewelry box sitting on her make shift dresser.
He is tempted just to look and see if she could be the owner of this missing earring, and yes, there it is, the dangling beaded lonesome spiral earring. The match to the one he had found at the movie theatre.