Coloring Book

Poetry Chapbook

Top or Bottom? Choose Your Starting Point.

They scare me.

heights and all.

Yeah, I am terrified of being up here,

Especially when you don’t let anyone join you.

It is cold up here,

and fear sucks. 

Fear is so red, 

like a claustrophobic artery with too many red blood cells to count- 

it’s hard

to live this way.

it’s hard

trying to reach new heights-

It's because we are always climbing...higher...

now we are here.

They all say started from the bottom, 

Yeah, you’re in the right place.

Start here.

Citrus Sting

“there's more beauty in 

 truth, 

 even if it is

dreadful beauty.”

my eyes flood while my mind tries to clean up. 

     “BUT 

SHE 

N E V E R 

LOVED

 H I M.”

these words fall off 

my tongue,

shattering as they drop, 

and each word

breaks boundaries.

they fall like my

book bag did when 

I 

found out 

my grandpa died.

the words 

roll off the

tip of my tongue 

like the oranges did, scattering as they hit the 

chair: 

refusing to sit; 

running.

was I blind? or perhaps

I am blinded- 

by the pierce of her dishonesty? did everyone know? 

my breath felt hard

 to breathe,

and i can’t go on 

imagining

 how he felt lugging around 

that 

 oxygen tank for the last 7 years of his life, almost the whole time 

she knew him, 

she went ahead

 and 

sold the house of my childhood, 

of my moms, 

and got married again

within 3 months of his passing? was she having a party 

while 

I 

cry, while we all cry?

was she patiently awaiting his death? I 

hope 

not.

she can

be that way- i

would not be surprised... could she be?

today as I wake up I wipe the flood from my eyes

And the current grows weaker again, contained. but I

 still feel 

as if the 

Citrus 

pierce my eyes and i'm not even chopping onions. the

Sting

is marinating deep within me

as the pain sits there 

for how 

this women- 

Liz,

she treated my poor grandfather-

yeah. dreadful beauty breaks boundaries, alright. it 

brought 

me pain.

ones that sting more than anything, but the citrus can seep into cracks

that other beauty can’t reach, stinging 

us 

worse than ever- but 

this pain 

will make some damn good orange juice.

In the Dumpster

two bell peppers 

were grown on separate vines, but came 

together

to live in the fruit bowl in my kitchen.

they were passed by, snuggled up

together 

as 

apples

and pears 

and tomatoes 

got chosen over them.

they were brought on a trip, bagged up and shipped out

into the real world

together.

at gas stations and stop lights,

when the bag of foods was open,

they were not chosen.

so these yellow bell peppers

that were so hard and firm as younglings

quickly became old and grey 

together

wearing the fuzz and scars 

of hurt.

They used to be rich and able to transport

Me

and You

on this roller coaster of flavor 

blast,

but now,

they only have each other.

The Wild 

I read the wild

from right to left.

Does that sound right? 

Wild is a mess,

and the word 

mess

has me in it.

The wild is the bitter taste of 

a lions roar, alarming chartreuse through

 my veins, 

or hearing it’s sharp claws 

as I look at a silent forest 

green. 

Wild is awakening in my mind

this morning as I see New York City 

darting and 

frizzy like the bedhead 

mane

that crowds

my forehead, as the kick of lime 

shuts my eyes. 

As I go to 

open my blinds,

the smell of my mother stirring up 

stew

makes me see all 

sorts of shades of green-

busy at work, yet in need of saving 

drowning in each other.

But mess in the wild can
quite often be

stressed trees

that fly in the wind

like a fly stuck in a spider's web.

I will eventually 

fly out, and detach 

myself from the trunk,

and I will not mind, being “free to wander,

[to] collect at will, read the 

words- read

the wild” 

for what it truly is:

a mess of mine.

What is the Definition of the Color Blue?

blue

 means something different to everyone

but especially to me.

most think it's 

                                 deep or

sad like Leann Rimes sings

 i think it's much more than that.

i think blue is joy, and there should be a shade called that.

 midnight, sapphire, aqua, cornflower,

                                                                     bluebell on a hot summer day, turquoise water- baby,

                  none scream joy to me, except a little southern ice cream maybe. who decides on the name of these? you

could do it, you do love the ocean, though not ice cream as much as me. but you are as deep as they get, and you do like the Blues.

perhaps joy needs to hold some depth, some vulnerability-

some way of putting more meaning to the name than just 

                        happiness

        something that doesn't whether during storms

finds the best in the present and is fully in the here and now.

what joy it is to experience you,

Blue, and

the definition of this hue is joy- and 

joy is you.

Zinnias

Artificial? 

I think not- the beautiful pink zinnias that 

smile up at me let me know that they are genuine. 

I excitedly cram this flower up to my nose to get to know it better,

for when we see beauty, don’t we all want to get close up? It is a sensation like no other,

as eating strawberry rhubarb pie on a backyard picnic is what I feel. The taste of reading a good newspaper or poem makes you want to run off the pages to Target and get a new journal, only dedicated to the text you just read. Zinnias have a funny way of getting me like that. 

Time to Travel

As I sit here, at this oak table that smell drifts to my nose, a trail of mystical blues twisted with a red wrath leaks out. I feel like a stump, because I am in a slump in this chair, shoulders curved in- dented, and broken like a pipe. It doesn’t work anymore- the leaves are dead, therefore there is no fruit this season. The harvest did not happen. The water wasn’t able to flow since this metal pipe was damaged, there was a dam

created by the absence of a steady flow.

Maybe if she ate more fruit she wouldn’t be so absent of it,

they say. Right now, my arms feel snapped down by the vines and leaves of the season before- they’re dead now

so I can’t wake them and tell them to fuck off.

Would that have even prevented the horrible storms that blew this brown trunk out of the ground?

The trunk used to be filled inside with a nest and beautiful little birds inside, beating, yet now, it remains hollow.

Hollow is normal though, right?

The trunk is packed and ready to flow-

“the time is now,” they say, time to go

somewhere else, I guess they decided for me it was time to travel...a change of location.

Monkey in the Middle 

Ending 

by beginning on quite an important discussion. We often go back-and-forth on this, tossing the ball over to the reds and oranges and yellows as we experience the fullness of life in the vibrance that it brings, like the car that sits outside, rumbling as it’s engine starts, excited to explore the wonder that weighs just down the street. Or we toss it over to the other side of these blues and greens and purples where we are exploring in a very different way, who we are and who we want to become, and should we keep exploring. There’s so many questions to answer. But then in the middle is where I sit, just getting passed by by everyone, bullied by the other colors and not wanted. I am white, the color that everyone else wants. Or so I think. Once I was on top of the house, standing triumphantly as a weathervane, but then they thought I was too bland. How could I be so bland when I am the middleman of everyone and everything? I taste like vanilla, or piña colada‘s on a hot day. I can also be serene and form one's solitude through a snowy day, as I cover the Swiss Alps, blanketing over them so that skiers can enjoy their sport. I deserve more respect than I get, but instead I sit here in the middle, well the ball gets tossed back-and-forth by all of the bright colors that are apparently way more fun than me, as a monkey in the middle….

I’m starting to feel left out.

Waiting for the Rain to Pause

Is this even a color, or an emotion, when the clouds crowd the sky and everything feels grey?

Sometimes I think it is. I like the rain, and that makes me think of grey. Sitting on a bench overlooking the base at the lighthouse, an umbrella shielding me in my own little world. I can let it down, and enjoy the storm, dancing and living in it, or I can sit here, patiently, peacefully, waiting for the rain to pause.

Sigh[t]

My eyes are pierced by the sounds of the stormy swaying of wind

as the deep blue moves into frame like a storm passing over an ocean's surface.

It floats over like clouds thundering as lighter hues ooze from its base and trickle out into the water below, dying the surface into an eerie fog.

As the fog floods into my eyes, my vision is clouded and I can’t take it anymore.

I burst open.

My imagination is introduced to the real world as I lay here, recently awake from my slumber.

“Greetings of green,” says the real world as the palms sway while rain trickles down on the tips of their leaves like wearing a glove over bare skin.

“The lighting in here is like lightning filling my sky” says my dreamland.

I like to think that my eyes aren’t playing tricks on me- that they just

 were mechanically designed a little differently.

Yet as I look outside to explore the Balinese landscape

 from an observer's point of view,

I can’t help but wonder,

what do they get to

see

that I don’t?

The Hermit

I am a 

Hermit in a rainbow pinata. 

You may sea my shell,

swirled with colorful

jewels and clothing

that makeup

my appearance- 

but do not let the dazzles 

daze you, darling.

That is certainly 

not what lies within

this hard outer shell I wear.

For the inside is much more fragile,

filled with the waves and layers

that lie beneath the surface. 

If you happened to be 

one

who gets me to climb 

out 

of my shell,

cracks me open where I am

stripped of my pride

and smiles,

wearing nothing but myself-

be careful.

For just as a canon can be set off,

E                       o        d

           X    p                      i      

                             L              n     g

into millions of pieces,

I too can be blown to smithereens.

Then, you will sea

me rush to pick up

what remains of me,

just to pack it

in order to put it all together for 

whoever

I let in next.

And then I will swim back

into my shell, once again

a hermit, disguised in a rainbow pinata.

My Mental Grocery List 

             Apples,

                                                                                                       Bread,

                                          Oh but put bananas ahead.

       Spinach,

Kale,

                        And yes the                                        rest will prevail.

Spices like cumin, ginger,                         thyme

                    Oh look at the clock!                                                                                          I better 

run.

                        But                                        just one

                           more.                                 or-                                                                                                                                                          

                                 Un                            less

                                      It’s                     in

                                         This         bowl.

                                                A  ha!

                                                                                 Thank goodness,

                                                                                                                                   An onion!

Now I don’t have to go to the store because I got all the layers of sour and sweet ready for me to take apart in this one here 

                                                     onion.