i am a fish. The air is water-- perfectly adjusted fish tank temperature. I take big gulps as i walk upstream.

Leah Oct 19

We take a moment of silence to all compose text poems at my meeting. The ring tones symphony.

Leah Oct. 19

it all looks faux finished this year. Someone hand dyed paper leaf cutouts and placed them on the sidewalks.

Leah Oct 30 5:29 pm

I've seen his face three times today, but as we walk towards each other, i remember that he is in nebraska.

Leah Oct 30, 5:28 pm

This man fro the army corps of friendly passengers engineered conversation while offering a swollen arm in turbulent heights. He was west coast country, saved his empty coffee cup to refill with moist black tar. Seeing together the world through rounded windows, we traveled beyond the traytables. We were offroading, if you know what I mean.

Sylva Sep 4, 12:41 pm

The tangerine moon swings from the sycamore sky, bobbing behind mountains and dipping low onto the pale salt flats, gliding down as smooth as tequila, until I can see nothing but red tail lights and the dazzling piles of crystal reflecting the Morton salt factory lights. Aspiring mountains, they wait- like me- to be boxed in cardboard and sent out into the world.

Sylva Sep 6, 8:56 pm

Once my teapot grew slime mold. It formed mounds viscous and low, like squid tentacle. Tehy clung to the steel with the force of a swaddling dove.

Sylva Sep 10, 11:25 pm

My neurons tickle and itch at electric rates. If only my hands would too.

Jonathan Sep 11, 2:24 pm

The unrefined spirituality of poetry completes me. It's the answer for which I've been stumbling.

Siena Sep 24, 10:11 pm

we may trade stuffed animals for cell phones, but we still don't like to sleep alone.

Sylva Sep 25th, 1:39 am

Instead of listening to my ipod, i fantasized about shoving him up against a neogothic faux stone wall, licking his face and then walking away.

Siena Sep 27, 9:12 am

exit wound sounds melodramatic but it's honest. I'm talking about towes, not hearts. And I may as well not bring up the herd of buffalo at sunset, if to avoid additional height in your eyebrows.

Sylva Oct 2, 9:41 pm

Proverb

the dreamer awakes three hours after his body.

Jonathan Oct. 4, 10:28 am

I can smell that it's snowing in Boston.

Sylva Oct 16, 9:10 pm

Boars are known to gut their hunters with tusks as long and sharp as the fear of fire.

Lauren Oct 19, 8:58 pm

Plastic bottles leach toxins in the dishwasher. My mind threatens to dissolve in the shower.

written by Lauren Oct 19, 9:02 pm

The sign on the salon said: Be a tree and change your color. That's when I realized: Leah- my daughter, the tree.

written by Glenda Oct 20, 1:14 pm

Brown paper soaked through- the smell of rot reminds me where dirt comes from.

written by Adam Oct 23, 4:34 pm

I could tell she needed a mother right now, but my only maternal instincts involved embarassing comments in front of schoolmates and forcefeeding vegetables.

written by Sylva Oct. 27 10:37 am

Anxiety rises up like a peach regurgitating it's core. I'm made of dry lips and cumbersome goodbyes.

written by Jonathan Aug 26, 6:38 pm

i sit in sunshine with the sounds of church bells and an ice cream truck. Such sweetness.

written by Grace Aug 23, 4:06 pm

Ninja pit
passion hit,
chopchopchop. Beat down and packed up. Heeaay-ah!

written by Jonathan Aug 22, 10:05 am

My stomach rumbles. I walk to the refrigerator. The fridges tummy rumbles back...time to go out and get some food!

written by Bobby Aug 16, 6:55 pm

Today is the last day of my leisure. I promise i will never make art again.

written by: Jonathan Aug 13, 5:25 pm

Radio ads poison my ears as i ride the 640 bus. In my head, a lesson plan reverberates. 8 more days.

Written by Grace July 7th 7:48 am

my backpack has become a mortuary for gum wrappers. I am a teacher with no time to brush my teeth.

written by Grace July 6th, 7:58 pm

not sure what is more purple: the bruise on my right hip or my hair.

-Leah Aug 4, 11:07 am

Watching tv i can't help but want a shamwow. Last night i couldn't move after yoga-my brain disconnected from my body. Are the two event related?

-Leah Jul 29, 11:00 am

Fingering coins looking at years. The phrase Leah Lang Gabriella Nixon was coined the same year this coin was minted. wow that was a while ago.

-Leah Aug 9, 5:20 pm

It was a summer of hibernation, pulling covers tight around hallucinatory dreams. And I, I was the rocking chair in the forest; moving rhythmically toward existence, pressing soap into my hair.

-Sylva Aug 11, 5:41 am

Sea planes drift in and out of the lake. Guttural rumblings bounce against the hillside. Departures are imminent.

-Jonathan Aug 9, 7:51 pm

I am leaves shining silver blown backwards by the sheer anticipation of rain.

-Sylva Aug 9, 12:33 pm

car

After 23 years i finally know how to jump a car. Red to the red black on black. The teacher being taught. New skills in new orleans.

-Grace Aug 9, 10:32 am

Response:

I've never jumped a car either. Jumped a creek. Jumped a trampoline. Jumped started a heart. never jumped a car.

-Leah Aug 9, 5:35 pm

dwell

chigar, chigar, bite now bright; to seal you in was my delight. Oh, what color! And what swell! Now mark the place you chose to dwell.

Written by Sylva Aug 7, 9:57 am

I'm waiting to mail things at the post office. On the tv it tells me that 700 post offices are being selected for closure. Bases on this line that i am in, this will not be one of them.

Written by Grace Aug 3, 2:12 pm

Pricey

The most expensive real estate of them all is held within the mind. Unplotted endless terrain. Thus it is more practical to sell ideas than objects.

written by Danny Greenberg Jul 30, 3:21 pm

He woke to knocking at his door. No wait. There was no door. But the children's choir singing a Danny Elfman score...hadn't that been real?

Written by Jonathan Jul 30, 10:36 am

Hard-boiled, double-yolked. What other surprises might i find here?

Written by Jonathan Aug 3, 5:07 am

a stomach filled with pasta and a heart heavy after seeing m parallel parking instructor pull away for north carolina, i am going to sleep in this new town in this new bed in this new orleans.

written by Grace Aug 2, 11:54 pm

Breathing like salmon with asthma, I lie in bed freshly baked from a nap. My eyes have miraculously not been whited out. I see my world lick its lips.

written by Leah Aug 1, 8:22 pm

I want to snuggle like fabric softener.

Written by Leah Aug 1, 8:20 am

Dear mother,

Rinsing out my soy milk recycling, I gag three times. Is the earth worth it?


written by Leah Jul, 27 10:24 am

grace

How goes the salvation of your soul?

Written by Leah Jul 25, 3:38 pm

lines

Last night i dreamt I was an actor with pink dreads. I couldn't remember my lines. Each dread was a line, forgotten in disuse. They weighed heavy on my head.

written by Jonathan Jul 22, 9:03 am.

wrist

he is on my wrist in the form of a handkerchief, rose embroidered, cologne scented.

written by Leah sent Jul 24, 11:20 am

think time

i teach first graders. I teach them skills for life like how to be nice and zesty vocabulary like "snarl." my co lab partner also teaches them. She does not know how to be nice. But she definitely knows how to snarl. Maybe [she] needs some think time.


Written by Grace Jul 8, 6:58 pm

thread count

College girl turned teacher i finally have sheets with a good thread count. I guess this is what it means to have a job.

Written by Grace

ready to hit the Big Easy

the eager young missionary gladly helped clean the filthy Passat wiping down windows. shining the dash. ready to hit the road for the Big Easy. keen to first see the girl in St. Louis.

Written by Glenda Jul 21, 9:58 am

the dance

did i tell you the other day that when he and i interpretive danced we were caught and captivating? We were the moths circling the porch light, we were the porch light enthralling the moths.

Written by Leah; Jul 21, 9:54 am

metro poem 3:

I only just noticed that the woman in a chef uniform sitting the seat ahead of me doesn't have her right ear. Grease fires flash through my mind. Her life story must be thick as stew.

Written by Leah

Metro poem 2

I'm waiting for the metro that will take me to the closest stop to the wholefoods where I bought charcoal last week and didn't use and lost the receipt for. My thumbs finding keys is like digging in to a box of kleenex when a runny nose brings you two inches from despair.

Written by Leah

12:28 am

I will not force you to go to sleep nor can i order sleep to come and steal you. What I will do is wave good night and whisper my prayer: good night sweet dreams which really means, I love you.

Written by Leah

sea shell up to my ear

His North Carolina "you know's" are rising in my ear. Pushing drift wood on to the shore and dragging loneliness out.

thanks to raisetsu on flickr.com for this image

Written by Leah

fresh fish

Her eyes glittered like a freshly caught fish, and from the moment I saw her, I was hooked.

thanks to Mike Hartz on flickr.com for this image

Written by Leah