Sleepless

I cant sleep.
I'm too hyped up on wine, weed, sex and art to calm down.
And I kinda like it.

The Meaning Of My Life:

• Good friends
• Family
• A smell that takes me back
• The light of campfire embers
• That special feeling
• That one night
• The view from the top
• Getting lost
• Getting found

The Meadow

I went to a meadow once
And within it found a fallen tree.
I went to a meadow once
And within it found a fallen me.

Reach

the far reaches are reaching back for you.

It is the internal itch you cannot scratch,
It is the hunger inside you
It is the desire for all your dreams to hatch
It is the restlessness in moments before they do
It is the hope of all return
It is the reason why you are.
It is the place where passion churns
It is the fall before the scar.
It is the reach you extend so far, out of faith, in the dark.
It is for all these reasons
That you only feel,
That you know you have a purpose
That you know God is real.

The moonlit path

When you walk that moonlit path
Will you retreat from the dark?
Or never come back?

Beauty

"Beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is an eternity gazing at itself in the mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror."
-The Prophet

THIS is why I write:

To relive the joy
To ease the pain
To materialize the thought
To find the spark
To light the flame
To fire my heart
To feel alive
To feel at all
To scream my diary
To answer my call
To talk to God
To speak the truth
To capture the moments of my youth
To let it go
To keep hanging on
To find some right in all the wrong
I do NOT write to censor or to please
I write for me and only me, no matter how beautiful or ugly it may be.
Toning it down I will never do, I will lose control today tomorrow and the days after them too.

Refresh, re-energize, re-do. My new beginning documented.

This is not a new years resolution, though a resolution it may be. Lately life has been, dull to say the least. I am no longer connected with myself. Who am I? Who was I born to be? Who do I want to become? I am no longer in tune with God... How did it all happen? Over the course of this year I've focused on lesser things in life, kept myself preoccupied with daily to do's and I am feeling so unbalanced now, my yin is off, my yang is gone. Peace, has not come to comfort me in a while, my happiness, that is so unfailing seems to be less. It's still there yes, but in a duller, more muted form.
So I began a few weeks ago, thinking back to times when I felt balanced... When I was one with God. Yes. When I ate healthier. Yes. When I didn't smoke so much pot. Yes. When I wrote poetry. Yes! When I cared about how I spent my money. Yes. When I did yoga. Yes. When I said yes more than I said no. Yes!!
I'm really tired of the up and down. I want to get back on board with who I am again, an this time not be so easily thrown off. For when the waves of dillision hit me hard, I want to hit them back. I want to ride the tide. I want to be the commander of the sea.
Retrospect. It is a beautiful thing.
So this leaves me here, in the now. The beginning of the road. It's mid august, today is nothing special unless I make it something special. Today I start my journey on The road to spiritual, emotional, physical, financial, and intellectual peace. I am going to focus on regaining my life and happiness back. I am ready to fulfill my mission on this earth, ready to change, and ready to experience life at it's full capacity. I want things to be different from
now on. I dont want to gain everything just to lose it all again... This time i have to move past the bull shit for good, its time to be a woman. I hope I'm strong enough.

More like a woman, less like a child

It was one of those mornings.
The kind that catches you off guard.
The kind that makes you realize that no other morning will ever be the same
After this one.

Because
It was one of those mornings
That you gawked in disbelief at the face in the mirror.
And then realized it was your own.

You are a woman now.

Monday

You woke up late for work,
ran to your car and realized..
Oh no.
You forgot to brush your teeth.
Too bad, the seconds are ticking closer together now.
Shove a piece of gum in your mouth.
You gun it.

The sun glares down and you glare back, and the phone starts ringing.
It keeps on, that incessant tune.
Remember what the chiropractor said about
Clenching the steering wheel not your teeth.
It's that guy your in love with.
Great.
But As round one of the fight commences,
As you press the pad of your foot to that pedal
With more and more violence,
Something makes you stop mid-scream.

There are blue and red lights reflecting in your rear view mirror.
And you know then,
The government is going to screw you too.

The Great Pretender

Only 47 more days until adulthood. It's looming over me like some huge storm cloud in the distance. June 7th I turn 20, officially ending my "teen" years, and I must say I'm not too happy about this. I never thought I'd actually be TWENTY years old. Just like I don't think I'll ever actually be 30, or 50 or anything else than a kid. Until now I've simply pushed the thought out of my head, pretended it would never come. Time would not catch up to me. Last year I was mad about turning 19 because lets face it, 18 IS the perfect age. Your old enough to do adult things, yet young enough to get away with being a stupid, irresponsible kid. By the time 30 rolls around I will want my birthday to go unnoticed COMPLETELY. But I feel that one thing from my childhood will never change, however old I may be, and that is that I will still pretend. When I was a kid I would pretend to be an adult. When I turned 16 I pretended to be 18. At 18 I pretended to be 16. And now, with 47 days until I turn 20, I am pretending that storm cloud will simply blow away, and cease to rain on my charade.

Celebrating 20 years of life this summer :]

Alright so I usually never just "post" a thought that isn't part of some poem or essay but I figured, hey, I'm bored to tears at work and I have some things I'd like to just merely say, without the worries of rhyme and delicacy.
   So this summer is going to be INSANE. I'll be working two jobs like I am now, taking just one class (thank goodness) and going on vacations!!!  I'm so excited I can hardly stand it. I will be going, on my BIRTHDAY to Bonnaroo, the 4 day music fest in TENNESSEE (My favorite place in the whole wide world :]) with all my closest friends. This is going to be an 8 day adventure, and I MEAN adventure in the foothills of the deep south. I plan on going swimming in a river and dancing to some bluegrass with no shoes on, and we will come back on my besties BIRTHDAY. So pictures and poetry will be coming up soon after this crazy awesome trip that has been conveniently sandwiched between two birthdays.. One month after I get back me and the family are heading to San Antonio for a weekend family get away at a resort and the last one we went on last summer was an experience to remember so I'm really excited to get to spend some good quality time with the ones I love the most. THEN, the day after I get back from that, my best friend is getting married!! OMG she's tyeing the knot. I'm super happy for her and her awesome fiance Tim. They are the best. But damn, life goes by way too fast, I suppose there is a small part of me thats sad...but don't worry it's very very small. Then Tiffany my other good friend is getting married, then my best friend from NM, then my friend Melissa. And I don't even have a shadow of a significant other lol!! Its awesome.
   And there's my summer schedule... can't wait to embark already!!!!

Imagine

Close your eyes.
Pretend your not sitting
Slumped over, eyes glazed and slightly hazed.
Pretend your not doing things you never
Wanted to do.
Stop taking those notes.
Stop listening to her ramble lifelessly.
Tune into yourself...

Ne te quaesiveris extra

Imagine a world...
Where one never does what one does not want to do.
Where every moment lives up to exactly what it's meant to be;
A world where we never leave the Garden.
A world that bows with ecstasy and rejoices in life
And that, in the afterglow of love, never once gives a reason to depart.
Drift to that place, when you can.. when you need to.
You know you've only got a while though
And now you must leave.

Now lust and anger and loss will slip themselves
Into that world, through cracks you'll never see
And you will open your eyes
Not to pillows of lavender but to
Reality.
And you will forget that place until something or someone
Gives you a reason to visit again.

But don't fret over this.
The world you have imagined will remain
That way, still framed and timeless.
And what is real will be felt and not thought
And when you one day go back to that perfection,
And warm thoughts overcome you
You will be awed.
Not because it is beautiful,
But because of all the times you spent in the cold.

Foundations

A few months ago I was informed by my mother of a mission trip that my family was planning to Tennessee, and a few months ago I was unaware of the wonders I have come to know so well since my arrival. This story, like any other is filled with a sense of inspiration and childlike happiness, a struggle and then an acceptance of the ending reward...but if you are reading my letters, know that this particular story is in fact not a story at all, and it is quite possibly the most moving. It is the real accountance of the two most beautiful and perhaps most important fibers in the human soul; meliority and christianity. Right now you may be asking 'what exactly is the meaning of meliority and where did it come from?' Meliority is stemmed from the Latin word [melior] which is understood in English as "better". Meliorism is the most unselfish belief that I have come across, aside from the belief in God, and what is more interesting is how I found it. It is "the belief that the world can be made better by human effort," and it is that fine doctrine that holds the utmost amount of faith in the human race, even when the world is cruel. The heart and soul of optimism and love are dependent upon it and faith in God, and these two notions are more real than the keys beneath my finger tips.
      Through the course of my 18 years on this earth, I have seen through the eyes of others what a wonderful place the world can be if God is only accepted into our hearts. I have watched on tv peoples lives succome to the great and almighty God just by the touch of their pastors hand on their persperating forehead. I have heard their stories, and watched their eyes drip like faucets onto empty floors because they have finally found whatever it is that makes them whole. Yet I never really understood. To me, these people weren't real, they were figments of some far away place that didn't exist outside my sphere of reality... maybe it was because I couldn't connect their new found wholeness to my broken pieces, my hollowed heart. I thought they were just pretending, and who knows maybe some were, but little did I know I would come to learn that it was I who had been pretending all along.
     We arrived in Tennessee on a Sunday and the humidity nearly knocked me off my feet a few steps outside the airport; I, living most of my life in west Texas was used to the dry, windy climate. Nonetheless, me, my family, and the rest of the Betenbough housing crew packed like sardines into a small white bus and drove to Williamsport, which is conveniently located about an hour outside of Nashville and headed to Narrow Gate Foundation. This particular stretch of land truly is a little piece of heaven carved into the foot hills of Tennessee; it is a glass of water in the dessert to which I can now happily say I have had the priviledge of drinking from. A few days after our arrival myself, my little brother and a few of the Narrow Gate members went on a hike to the 'High Point', a spectacle of a hill which overlooks the entire property just so I could really take in the beauty of the land, but as it turns out... as many things in life turn out... what I found was much more than just a beautiful view. I found on top of that hill, as so many young men at Narrow Gate do, a compassion and a respect for God like I have never known before. As Ken, Frank, Clayton, John Rae and myself shared our life stories, each more compelling than the last, a spark was lighted within me, and as seconds go by writing this letter, it grows bigger and brighter than the moment before. We were strangers walking up the hill, but I can say that without a doubt we were friends coming down. I have never in my life been so moved by the emotion's of others, but what I could see when I looked into their eyes, as if I peered through a window into thier souls, was love. A true, and pure, and personal, and passionate love for God. I left wishing that somehow I too could see this warm, radiating passion for the greater force in my own eyes. There was my first sip of living water, and to my surprise, I was thirstier than ever.
      Tuesday night, after the 'High Point' I lay in bed and continued to ask, when would I get what these four young men had? When would I get another taste of God? Then Wednesday came, and with it, a revelation.
      At around 11:00 p.m. I was walked into the countryside by a now good friend and vessel of the Lord named Adam, to which I am extremely thankful, and at 12:00 p.m. I came back alive. To be completely honest, it was like I was on drugs... you know, the kind that make you feel invincible and happy and energetic and free. And that is the best feeling in the world, the feeling of total and complete liberation, the knowing that the world is in reach, the beauty and awe that brings one to tears. It is wonderful, lasting and real. The best part is that it is real. A mere breeze had caressed my skin and I knew he was with me, and I think that he knew I wanted him to be. Under the stars and amidst the hundreds of fireflies, I felt the hand of God, and I am thinking now how badly, I cannot wait to touch it again.
     This trip was a mission, I was suppose to be just a helping hand that cleaned up some gardens and made the place a little prettier, yet I  leave living and renewed. I was suppose to change the "Narrow gators" lives, and now I am certain, that they have changed mine. I have watched through my own eyes how people like Bill and Stacy Spencer ( the founders of Narrow Gate) have made this world a better place to be in, how people like Ken, Frank, John Rae, Clayton, and Adam have been changed by faith and are reaching out to do the same for those around them. God has changed the outcome of so many lives through those people and words cannot begin to explain how grateful I, and so many others are, that they have chosen His path. In short, these people have made me realize that mankind is a wonderful, brilliant, and life changing species when coupled with God. At Narrow Gate, with the help of many, I started the life long journey of self discovery; I found that I am a meliorist, and a christian; I have faith in mankind and more importantly in God...and those two things are a wonderful foundation to any structure.

Time to Recognize

,There are systems in place for essentially every single living thing that graces the earth. For every leaf there is an intricate highway of vessels, each one pumping life to and fro, birthing and dying all at once, organized and objectively. And inside every vessel, are more intricate processes, doing the same thing on a smaller scale. For every vessel there are cells, each one flowing along in perfect harmony, providing means for life and caring not that their work is a part of a much bigger, grander, beautiful picture. The same truth is relevant even so for the contents that lie inside each cell, of every vessel, of every leaf. The nucleus, the ribosomes, the vacuole ect. all tick and tock for the purpose of the life of a single leaf, absolutely everything else in this world, and perhaps the universe. As one finds himself in nature, (everyone should at some point in their lives find themselves in nature) intaking the subjects of the earth, whatever they may be, will he recognize the importance of it all? Will he see not just the colors of the element, but the infinite parts that make up the whole? Will he appreciate what he cannot see, as it is capable of being beautiful just the same as what he can? perhaps it is too much to ask, too heavy a concept for a simple mind, but if everyone could see the beauty I see... if everyone could lose but just one breath in awe of the details of the world one time, they would understand. They would believe in the things they cannot see, and feel the things they cannot touch. They would know there is a God, and account for the wonders he created if only it be a blade of grass. Life of the universe is full of detail, fleeting but ceaseless, wonderful, and dependent on every single speck.

Bend in The Road

    A few days in and here I am again, sitting in front of the same computer, typing on the same keys, breathing the same air. But this time the words that appear on this otherwise empty space hold some light behind them. As if before they did not, as if before this letter they were hollow and dark and ending.
This is the end of that depressing, sad, life ending, soul dying world that I have walked around in for the past months; this is the bend in the road. Things do get better, we have to believe that when the world has turned its back on us and the colors fade to gray, things will get better. Life is merely a cycle. We are essentially surrounded by endless amounts of circles with time being the catalyst of it all. The cycle of life and death, of good and bad, of summer and winter, of love and hate. The patterns that are repeated in nature are the same as those repeated in our lives, our bodies, and everything in between. Circles.
    Life, in every sense of the word is just a cycle, and when we get through those moments of despair still alive and breathing, the reward is promising, beautiful and untouched.  The end of one chapter is only the beginning of the next because really, there is no end, because every end is a new beginning and the cycles go on forever.- ( read Self Reliance, Emerson) I am a believer in infinity and I am a believer in love, does this make me an idealist? Maybe. Does this mean ever-lasting love is fathomable? Maybe. But for the past few days my life really has been 'ideal' and for some reason I cannot and will not accept an end to this journey, so what can I do but believe in the moments that make it wonderful? Each day of happiness was worth a year of pain, and in this second I am lucky to have experienced them both, and wise enough to appreciate the events that led up to this profound joy.
    So this is the part where I tell you what exactly it is that has brought a smile to my face, what has changed everything so suddenly...well, it's simple. It's pure. And it's lasting... its love. And for the first time, its real.

365 Days

A year ago, I was different.
365 days later, things have changed; things have grown, things have died... people have grown, people have died.
I have watched a part of myself deteriorate into nothingness.. and that is what we are really afraid of isn't it? The nothing[ness]? The worst pain in the world, that parasite of being numb; that of feeling nothing, that horrible day when you realize that you are not happy, you are not sad, you are not filled with rage but you are numb, comfortably numb.

But I suppose that in this very moment I do see something.. I do feel something.
I feel the vast empty slip itself into my pores and settle like its gonna be there for a while.
I know the name of my invader, I know all too well its agenda, all its plans to hurt and steal what is mine, what I have loved for so long.
365 days later, the last morsels of my childhood dissapate, and here I am, babbling on and on, mourning the loss.
I used to feel like I had it all, and one year ago I did..I think. One year ago I was a senior in highschool, I poured my efforts into the yearbook publication of which I was extremely proud. I had a wonderful boyfriend and we were in love.
Thank God for that.. thank God for love.
I made the grades, the nightlife was my life and the world was a white pearl, mine for the taking.
But somewhere in that year long abyss, on that road that I have traveled stretching the miles between who I was and who I am, I shed that innocent skin.
I guess it's not so bad, I guess everyone goes through it at some point or another right?
So where does this leave me? Who am I now?
This is my problem to figure out. This is my disease to cure.
I know this, but I can't help but reach out for answers.
Maybe its not answers I am looking for at all though. Maybe I am just reaching out to see if anyone will take my hands.

So losing love and childhood and innocence and trying to cope with it all, and learning from mistakes, and finding God, and trying to discover who I am inside are all things I am doing... which is making me who I am today I suppose. Right?
Because what are we without these experiences?
Nothing. We base our steps forward on the steps we have already taken; experiences and memories prove we exist. They are the metaphysical link between being nothing and existing.
And "nothing" is an awful thing to be.

As for the drug induced revelations... I can not tell whether they have helped or hindered the process. Ignorance is bliss but God knows I don't want to be ignorant. Since traveling... my emotions are heightened and my outlook on life enlightened.
My mind was closed until I forced it open.
Have you ever cried in the name of beauty?
Have you ever felt such a deep connection with nature and people that you realize you are all one in the same?
There is nothing like that moment friends... when you are in tune with, and truly feel every living thing around you.
But now that I have seen all that I have wanted to see, am I more lost than when I began?
I can not go back home, that house where love resides is but a memory lost in time.
I fear I have strayed too far.
I fear I have lost myself to the oblivion.
365 days later, and I am slowly fading away...

Trippy

There is an entire population of free living strands covering the surface of my head
They whip and snap and curl and fly away like I wish I could do
January 7th I abruptly left the plains of routine and the taste of the open air hasnt left my tongue
Wild air has not yet left my hair, and I covet the freedom of open roads ever more
The hands of the clock ran its fingers through my brunette feathers ;
Kept me sort of level so I would not catch flight
Kept me somewhat responsible so I could not fail my lovers
Kept me slightly sane for societies sake.

Nonetheless, I plucked the sun from its resting place
Squeezed the colors from it and let them trickle down my arm like concentrated river beds
I smeared my stained hands across the canvas in the sky
Then I lit a match; the colors caught aflame and I cried saying its name... beautiful.
Hot magenta soared downward, punching holes in the purpleish blue undertones
The source of life is not one shade of yellow, but many shades of the creative mind
After the ashes fell just beyond the earths face, I drove farther west into spontaneity.

I left some behind, holding question marks in their hands like torches and pitchforks
I cannot give them the answers they want, why I left that Wednesday so abruptly, so senselessly
What I know is there is adventure that lies awake inside me, waiting...
I cannot tame it, I cannot suppress it
But when it whispers my name I find myself answering, again and again.

World of a Writer

Of all the endevours my will be done the most important of all is the act of fun
I have watched shooting stars on many grass plains
I have ruined white shirts with chocolate stains
I have fallen in love and ignored warning signs
all this I have done for the sake of good times
But it is in the sound of music, and the rhythm of words, that I truly come alive
to no one but the paper I find myself obliged
The creation of a writer knows no boundaries , restrictions or holds

I have experienced freedom in its finest hour and it is here that I lose control
letting loose the restrictions of my hair and the entrapments of my feet
I fly across the sea of words and possibilities with nothing but an imagination and a heartbeat
There is power in composition, a beautiful oblivion it can be
with flames behind these eyes, an iris made by God for creativity
It is this silent expression that moves me more than any contender
A passion for rendition calls upon me now and to this I smile in surrender
To me this is bliss, to me this is life's complications coming undone
A thousand excerpts from this human soul and every time I search for them, I find a world of fun.