Sid Branca Dot Com

Continuing my project of burrowing through old boxes of paper and things, of trying to leave behind as many objects as possible before I move West, some moments from a notebook from Spring 2008.

An exercise: Write one sentence, the cause of a feeling, and describe that cause’s result. Subjective abstraction. Use an object, the object must in some way be transformed.

In a class, asked to describe some version of myself several years into the future: I am 28 years old. I live in Berlin with my husband, my girlfriend, and my dog, Charlie. Most of my time is spent with a clown-theatre ensemble and working on my fourth book of poetry. I make a lot of music, and my house is always full of visitors.

A horoscope: All day you may hear certain influences– a clanging, punctuated with a slow hiss– interrupting your meals. Your ability to handle small islands, personal and institutional bankruptcy, may be hindered, or improved. Watch for inaccurate diagrams. Those you will offend will deserve it. Lie about your age and childhood.

The memory of a girl pulling dental floss between her two front teeth, little knots in the floss every few inches, the spiral held in her mouth. Watching a man lick his fingers for minutes after eating a bag of chips. Matthew drinking from a large bowl of cold soup, causing a man in the audience to run to a garbage can and vomit.

When I realised you never have me
I boarded a sinking ship, I wrecked a few good men
I sang siren to some sailors
to cease the aching in my bed
but all those living in the ocean cried out,
“no beast so fierce!”

If the devil will not be my plaything
then I’m turning to the sea
I’ll burn the whole thing down
for the sake of one sweet hour

“The romance of sex distances us from the materiality of sex. Ritual works at creating space between ourselves and something far too big.”

Thoughts from a stupid affair that ended poorly:
The first time I met you, I smoked too many cigarettes so I wouldn’t have to go inside. The first time I kissed you, I was blacked out and bruised. I’ve been trying for six or seven years to write my very first love song. I will count the days until I will no longer pretend that no one knows. I will hold my breath until I confess all the songs I write are about you. and my hands will stay awkward at each of my sides until I know that I can hold you when we walk along the rocks. I want your leather jacket on my bedroom floor. Give your hand a place on my arm, let stretches of air get smaller, try to avoid my bruises but do not succeed. Let me learn the movement of your bad leg down the hallway of my house, let me hear your family when they’ve been drinking, teach my back the walls of alleyways and give me all your private wishes. Writing my name a thousand times made your hands ache so I tied them– I could love you well.

I am more compelled watching the tightrope walker who nearly falls, who catches himself by his fingertips, than the man whose performance is flawless.

and I’m worried that you’ll notice that I’m clumsy and devoted, you’ll see that I’m a plagiarist and a second cycle masochist, but I’d do a lot of things for you, maybe anything you tell me to, except to keep my big mouth shut.

Some nights I imagine a tidal wave made of all the change fallen from the pockets of men in my bedroom, a huge metallic sea come pelting down in the dark.

I had a dream in which Martian chocolates were named after American musicians. Woody Guthrie and Willie Nelson were fruit-filled, Neil Simon and Neil Young had mint.