furnace

Explosive internal nervousness & anxiety, and a lump of emotion in my throat that feels like jumping out if I start talking about what I want it to be like. If it does I'll melt away in tears, acidic with my ungratefulness.

My slow pace is both keeping it down and helping it swell, absorbing every minute I waste, every calorie I allow myself to swallow. It is not really me feeding it - rather, the often-ignored, home-ridden girl who reaches out desperately for any passing judgments, not-quite-rights, floating fears. Some she uses to kindle the explosive hearth, some she allows to escape, some she feeds to the swollen thing. Process is black-dust and staining, her whole body like a charcoal figure chiaroscuro. She grinds shadows whole for her meals, so her whole self is coated, filled.

No one saw her.
Walking past normally nothing could be seen, darkness
Smoke around, trailing, whispering life, but nothing alive

Until some one saw her

diana

What is happening?

I am in a prophecy, stuck in history,
seeing patterns but
an Oedipus unable to escape them
But are there real signs - real marks?
It could all entirely be in my head, lost in a
dense forest somewhere. The feelings I've found here are about
to cut me to pieces. (Or at least cut all my ties)

Am I a replica? Some say history is meant for
learning from, others try to build a framework that looks
like every era. If I can see a framework, am I in one?
And can I move? My breath doesn't blow anything
away, it only makes me realize how tight my chest feels.

This is the question, which may not even be relevant:
Do my parents maintain an equal relationship?
Is there real love and respect? Is that possible
for anyone?

Otherwise, it's not worth it. Please let me be alone,
a lone Diana, but with arrows pointing to the clouds.

If it is all nothing, and I'm running past trees, then
I'll reach the clearing. I'll be out of breath but, as stated,
that won't mean very much. I'll kill the shadow then run home.

neighborhood breakfast

10 past 8am, the clouds are all furrowed up

as I enter the kitchen to make breakfast

sit with my one-minute oats (eating slower 

to watch the crows)

Two blinds frame 

the neighborhood

It’s just two on set today (they don’t have pupils

yet I’m directing mine back just in case)

My sister sprinkled peanuts on the lawn yesterday

I stepped on the lawn today, under all the furrowing

sounding like nothing ever happens here (not even

mockingbird visits) besides murders

and the handful of peanuts I 

dropped in the grass, which

give me doubts despite

its greenness

sitting upright

in the still shadow

white chevy

I don’t really understand

I’m not sure where I left

I’m in the middle of the street

I don’t talk, no I won’t forget

someone who never existed

is now a neighborhood ghost

the curb is lined with white chevys

an effect that has me almost

at an ending I predicted

but I keep reviewing and rewriting

the crows tell me it’s over

the seagulls just keep flying

the shoreline shivers and changes

Seymour, I won’t follow your pages

the space is positive most days

I tell them I’m a poet who stays

some things last a long time

sometimes I am finally fine

sometimes I feel him wrapped around me some things take a real long time

truth X sorrow

why do I

always pull you so

close till I

can’t breathe

then you say

exactly how it is

how there’s so much space

stare at space

I’ve been circling

with an X

on both sides

sport blue dress

locked arms

why do you

say blue needs some

self control?

you are the same

then I show

how it’s like

forget green

wallow tonight

with an X

on both eyes

unlocked fence

by the sea

dear

 love,

not outwardly aligned.

technically leo, ursa minor

passion. like if just scream

love ! voice

funnels inward,

too much.

pour astersims for ,

instead positioned  into ear.

now,

best effort: want to ****ing love !

just space

empty sky spoon

just keep stars across face arms legs hair

keep staring at .

dipper across arm under sleeve

voice narrows

polaris too pale skin

this month's letter

4/22/19

I would rather have my drowsy eyes fixed onto this lethargic motion of your foot in my direction, south-west, while the other remained under a stair. Standing here, water color orange resting upon our arms, testing temperatures for a warm touch - sudden & small. Yet everything seems expanded when I’m peering a perspective of a single bead eye. 

Cannot change the setting now - it’s all committed like a platonic idea, bonded with reciprocality. A - (place poetic interpretation for idealizing human beings, for sacrifice of desire) - common alter, where we stare at each other awkwardly, then I back up into your chin. All my ideas are probably my own (touching but never completely true). 

Please visit me though, flying like a joanna newsom verse, singing from a coast. Hours before you’re late for the store, if you don’t call I’ll never pull my weight to open this (please text me) Funny though - words shuffle together and stick but are never fully alive - only frankenstein personalities. (or documentary bores)

(please bore me without interpretation)

sincerely,

taylor pannell

driving sonnet

thank you, I’m so quiet but sure I’m a-

live or I sense you have seen me holding

my eyes you are pale with stage presence un-

der contrast, you know? (arms out) no feeling?

passion is like a yellow road sign in

the night. too drunk with all prolific-ness

It wasn’t about you couldn’t have been 

all distraction, I’m sorry to just sit

thank you for being here. lip-syncing go

ahead, broken traffic light, I know this

street or stanza full with blackout windows

look around (try to) outside the present

you’re welcome, connecting the white lines

car headlights face me, fix this old lie

for yeyo, after a long philosophical discussion

I think you are standing there drowning in the sink
not waiting to shut off the faucet
filling up all the cups I’m holding
you are overwhelming, no wonder
you were comparing Yeyo and Yaya
(yourself and your desire)
your desire makes you forget water
let me extend over folding couch/bed
Why would I allow the flow of your speech attempting to indoctrinate me against my own mind, against my imagination, which already has indoctrinated all my emotions to write this for you.
Maybe it’s all natter
but you make it clear it’s not you
no matter, I keep lists
I take recommendations,
I’m honest to imagined representations
Don Yeyo, you quit poetry, rejected meaning. I said there’s only spirituality left, realistically you agreed, remained unrealistic while loving your poetry.
In my half-judgement I keep a half-full
idea of you, I keep it till
you forget you recommended anything,
I forget your hair
your name for a nickname
leaning over a coffee table
spilling out something

song, of the lonely watching girl

 I don’t wanna read right now

why not write this is in a book?

are you trying to copy their hands again

and everyone’s heads again

why not hold onto your own

But I want you

and you’re getting up to leave

heading the wrong

way first, only passed me by

please feel free to spend my time

it’s not like it’s mine to give

I had a point

that I wanted to leave you with

Impressions are just that and likely

to lead me on so wait

I replayed the part about 

leaving, now I’m worried for you

and a book can’t 

sing, sing, scream

I write about

how I’m still a child

amassing lantana camara bouquets

on windowsills as a toddler

metaphoring words for flowers today

as a legal adult. I watch them wilt.

I press my thumbs until 

they are red no. 40

as a loss of social responsibility

I water my carcinogens

while I stare at flowers

mostly but these hands 

are getting tired. I’m normal and small.

only old enough for short

allelopathic parties these days

maybe a loss of anything 

might do nothing extreme 

in this contained chemical competition

I’m a loss of 

A Nice Memory and a Self-realization

It’s back in your yard

when we were the same height,

balanced across the wall.

watched the pepper flowers fall

you fall, rebound

I stared at you, spring around

energetic as your hand

flexible as your smile.

my knees are locked

statements stretch inside

my stomach, a low trampoline.

I stared at the answers

sticky flowers, the ground

is covered with their bed

you swallowed them!

red like artificial flavor

a known taste of medicine

Now, the view has known us

uneven and tall

I know, yet still stay

I stay away from the ground

and those dangerous flowers, but 

soon they will be all.

dad & bread

easier, elastic nerves

relax me with

the hum of yeast

my dad is baking today

fresh loaf for

homemade beef stew

a damp cloth hugs

the stretching surface

calloused hands resting

he makes up a song

or sings to a video

one with dough as money

final timer cracks

the auburn crust, we

slice two pieces and smile.