where i live

I live in a place where the train comes through on the hour, rattling on its tracks and shaking the mirror on my bedroom wall. Sometimes Marc’s car alarm goes off when the freight train passes at nine, and he has to run to his keys to press the stop button. Last night was one of those nights.
Anyway, I live in a place where the sunlight hit’s the leaves of the eucalyptus trees and bounces into our window, giving our apartment a green tinge, like an aquarium. But the light is rich and golden, and smells like the eucalyptus it reflects. I am in love with that smell. It smells like oil and deserts and wind. It makes me think of Santa Cruz, and where my step-dad lived. I cant think of a better smell. Maybe the smell of wet skin after a shower.
There are other trees outside. A pine, go figure. And a tree that my grandma thinks is a banyan tree, even though it almost certainly is not. That tree, the not-banyan tree, is Nani to me, and she is an old wise tree that pricks your palm before she lets you sit in her branches.
I live in a place where the pears are allowed to ripen all the way before you eat them, and where pasta is both lunch and dinner. A place where mold grows in the tub like paint, and the parking lot floods when it rains. I live in a paradise, an inspiring place. I cross the street and walk miles until I see the ocean, and then the walk is worth it.
I live in a place where there is always music playing, something soft and nostalgic, or hard and reviving. Sometimes it is played over speakers, sometimes in earphones, sometimes its Marc playing his guitar for no reason but the joy of creating sound. It is a place that hugs you with its plush furniture and rich colors, a place that points its finger at you when you have left the dishes undone. Again.
I live in a place where dreamcatchers hang over the bed, where pillows are numerous and highly sought-after. It is a place that longs for peace, where the couch is just as comfortable as the bed and slept on just as often. It's a place where books are treated like gold and paper like silver, and the tv is never on because there is no tv.
I live in a place where I cut my fingernails to the skin, where make-up is optional and rarely worn, where silence is held as precious and broken like your grandmother's china as the train rolls by, on the hour, rattling it its tracks...

new music

I am not sure I am the person I was yesterday. I have changed, something in me has been replaced by a ... by something new. I cannot yet grasp what it is that has changed in me, but I am different.
Things are richer. Life is better. Friends are more dear. I am cherishing every breath. There is music in this world that can only be heard by those who know how to listen for it. I feel like I have only just begun to hear this music, the dancing notes of a heart, the spiraling melodies of time.
Thank God for this life, and for the lives before, and the lives after. I want nothing more than to open my dancing heart and reveal it to my God.

this chance for beauty

abstract
ab-stract
adj.
1. Considered apart from concrete existence: an abstract concept.
2. Not applied or practical; theoretical. See Synonyms at theoretical.
3. Difficult to understand; abstruse: abstract philosophical problems.
4. Thought of or stated without reference to a specific instance: abstract words like truth and justice.
5. Impersonal, as in attitude or views.
6. Having an intellectual and affective artistic content that depends solely on intrinsic form rather than on narrative content or pictorial representation:

beauty
beau-ty
n.
1. The quality that gives pleasure to the mind or senses and is associated with such properties as harmony of form or color, excellence of artistry, truthfulness, and originality.
2. One that is beautiful, especially a beautiful woman.
3. The combination of all the qualities of a person or thing that delight the senses and please the mind

I believe, by this definition, that all beauty (the combination of all the qualities of a person or thing that delight the senses and please the mind) is actually abstract ( considered apart from concrete existance; difficult to understand)
Yet beauty is there, you can feel it in your spirit, in your heart. I believe it is God's way of enlightening the world (bringing light in). But I read somewhere that it is a gift of the higher aspects of one's being when one can see beauty in all things. In even the grotesque, or mundane. It is easy to see the beauty in a sunset, or a flower, or a star. How many of us can find the beauty in human tragedy, in the suffering of souls? Who among us can look at the image above and think "That is truly beautiful"?

spring: an ode to newness

A thousand pieces of a thousand petals, 

drifting on the breeze 

like ashes from the fires. 

As if it were summer, 

those hot days at the river, 

and I can press the petals on my skin 

like pages of my favorite novel. 

Instead it is nearly spring, 

the winter dewing and wetting the tall grasses. 

I can feel the maiden season dripping over my roof, 

her blushing cheeks the pink new sky. 

Brave blossoms are budding, 

daring the bitter winter wind still blowing. 

The sun only now peeks its sheepish face 

around the corners of the clouds. 

It is time for newness,

for change and rebirth,

for the old to feel young again.

It is time for the sweetness of life to return, 

for the warmth to kiss away the cold.

It is a new season for lovers,

for those flushed winter faces to be replaced

by freckles and drops of sunlight.

I sweep the front step,

climb the nearest tree to sing,

gather up all those past transgressions and offer them up 

like flowers 

to a God that smiles.

I sew new buttons on my old good shirt,

pressing the simple cotton to my lips.

In short, 

these are the days of life. 

These are the hours of life.

These are the minutes and moments of life.

I shall take them and say Good Morning.

an opening

It happens when you least expect it, a grand opening of spirit. Your heart flutters like a bird in a cage, wings beating against the bars. And then suddenly the whole world is new. Everything is brighter, everything is clearer. You can see the dew on a spiderweb and it nearly makes you cry. 

I turned to my left, and there was his face, his eyes alight with love. I saw God there, or an echo of God within him, and he pulled me in and I was flying. No more bars, the wings of my heart pumped expertly and I was up in the air, attached to nothing, riding the sky on great white wings.

there's no place like home

There was a rainbow yesterday, two of them right next to each other, glowing with ethereal light. One was so bright it was almost solid, and every color was vivid and blended into the other. The other was faded, distant, like it was a vision into the other side of the universe, like there was an infinite distance between the two rainbows and you could see the whole way.

I wanted to stand in that infinite space, and hold out my arms, and sing.

chasing smoke

It is strange to know that there is so much inside you, so much to say, but there is nothing important that comes out of you, no secrets of the universe or even whispers of greatness. I write meaningless giberish in hopes of making sense to someone, somewhere, or at least to myself.

I have an aunt, and she is magnificent. She blogs here, writes down her joys and sorrows, her everydays. She changes the world with her thoughts, and I can't even blow out my birthday candles right.

There is just so much beauty in the world, and all I want to do is show it to the people around me, the blind souls who linger in the greyness and reject the silver lining. I am sensing it may be a lost cause.