i may or may not throw up.

real life: i turn on music and lay down for a 10 minute nap. while i'm asleep the song "bye bye butterfly" by pauline oliveros comes on.

(this song:
(only seven minutes long)

in my dream. i am in a chalky white auditorium. we are sitting on a podium listening to sound pieces. alex is behind me. my performance professor is to my right. the song is piercing, haunting. i tilt the podium forward and we all fall, synchronized, like this was planned or expected, our hands catch us in front of our chests. i rise back up. everyone follows my lead. the lights are dim and we begin to dance. the song progresses slowly, or movements follow. lauren is to my right.

i am literally weightless on my feet. i hover. levitate above the ground. i cannot feel the ground when my feet touch it but it's there, shining chalky white. our reflections are vague in the window. we are wearing black cat suits. lauren begins to levitate as well. we all do, higher and higher. a few girls touch the ceiling with their heads. when they do the room is flooded with bright warm light. our energy is booming. our focus unparalleled. i float to touch the cieling with my head. i can't get quite high enough. i push off the floor, which i can't feel below my feet and finally make it. the dance crescendos and on lookers are pleased. there is a great finale.

we are finished and breathless. the room again dark. in the front row we are laying on our bellies. i look behind me to two kneeling girls talking behind me. there is something that resembles nailpolish on my back. i identify it as drying blood, but have no idea where it came from. the girls are as confused as me. where did this come from. i thought, maybe i cut myself. i see blood streaks on the arm of another girl. we were really into it. i see random drips of blood on the floor. this is not our blood. there is too much. the drips increase to converge at puddle where the floor meets the wall. i follow it up. on a metal wall fixture a lifeless body is draped. dressed in a black catsuit like me. dressed in a black catsuit like everyone else with her body draped dead and wet and bleeding. her head dangling. the song pierces haunting operasings and my heart stops working. the lights are still off and no one sees.


what monsters am i with? how could i have led this dance
i turn away horrified (which is not the correct word).
the lights turn on and i hear the horrible screams of revelation with my eyes shut.

i am awake and i am crying and i may or may not throw up.

everything in this store comes from the family

ghosts paint themselves to avenge love unrequited

metal shop, glowing lockers, wood and steel. trace the tracks.

i sleep on the sidewalk of thompson square, though i know what has happened here, i am not scared. it is a different time.

you are the sugar and i am the spoon. you mumble in your sleep, i clog your inbox with exhalations of the fall. i am the sugar and you are the spoon. you mumble in your sleep. "I could get ice cream and wouldn't even have to have ice cream because i would be there with you" you said. "lauren?" i asked. "yes" and the sugar falls from the spoon.

a cross in a gallery glows. an aura pulses at the word hope. the artists name it the second coming cross. the cynics say nothing.

you said i was in your nightmare with saint maria and the church. i am really very sorry, because i know how this can be...and i know what it may seem. and i hope at least i helped you.

sol said she threw away 21 gallons of latex paint over mold discontentment.


i wake up dry heaving.

and i feel better off

monks in red robes come out the wooden door. they throw yellow butterflies into the air. several stay on my eyelashes and in my hair.

you come back smiling and cut a square out of one of their wings. i cry. a monk consoles me and says,'but that's what men do.'

the monks continue on in a line. there are yellow butterflies everywhere.

and i start this dream with a bj....(i'm sad i said i loved you, but i don't regret it.)

we are filling up a bath and getting sexy. we stop for a while for me to take my clothes off you say something along the lines of 'it's going to be overwhelming.' sitting back in a blue button-up shirt i say, 'it's okay, i can handle it' and roll over onto my belly. i look back at you and say 'because you know i'm in love with you right?'
you don't respond.
i didn't expect you to, that's not why i said it.
you leave because you remembered something.

i'm sitting in the quarter-filled bath. she comes in and says she needs to take a shower now; sorry, get out: she has a baby shower to go to.. he is going to the same one. 'he's going to come back and he is not going to fuck you' she implies. she says something about having sex in the tub. i said we didn't have sex in the tub. she says i should get him to bring me to the baby shower. i say nah, that i would if he wanted me to, that it would be weird to ask. that i have plenty of things i should be doing. a baby shower is a pretty awkward thing to go to. we're not even dating.

we are standing in the hallway talking. she says 'of course a man would never miss you. men don't miss anything' i say, 'i don't know, i hope that's not true. i mean i've really missed him.' (i don't say who him is.) (i mean i hope he misses me too.)

i ask her what you are doing. she says you're looking for something. i ask her if she wants to see a trick. she says sure. i tell her to name something in this house she wants. she says cigarettes. i try to get the cigarettes. obviously there were none in the house. so i say, "okay i'll try my purse." i attract my purse. you come back upstairs. my purse slams into the door and gets stuck. i tell you if you ever can't find anything, that i can do this trick and then you don't have to look. you don't seem disinterested. i just can't read you.

we leave. i attract everything in the house that is mine. i realize i wasn't wearing shoes. all i have are muddy flipflops. you want me to go to the baby shower or maybe you feel obligated to invite me. i look like a sexed wreck and all i have are muddy flip-flops. i'm sad i said i loved you, but i don't regret it.

heroin takes up a lot of time

david's band is playing a show at something is very much like a high school, if not actually a high school. i watch them play from the second row with about fifteen friends. some kid who is there new manager hits on me. he must not know who i am... so after the show i go to the bathroom. well i go and look at myself and i look a mess. i shaved a triangle into the side of my head. i guess it would cool if i didn't look so tired. i considered trying to go see david, but decided i looked too haggered. in the snack line is chris calzone and bryan miller and all those boys. they are all punked out like MAD. i ask them if they remember me and they all say OF COURSE and shower me with knuggies and hugs and cuddles and squeezes and it is great and i feel so safe. they are playing a show in the lobby. i see joey harmon in the snack line. i say hi. he ignores me, chris is holding me around the waist from behind with his chin on my head. i say whatever. i tell chris i dated a guy in that band for two years. and he said oh you should introduce me they weren't bad. i tell him i can't. i know david is successfully hiding out from me somewhere, and i don't want to be disrespectful. I want to ask chris about eric, but i decide it would be inappropriate...
so the boys start playing their show and they are really good. eric is there! and he looks alright..in between songs and during songs they slip in my name and tell me how much they miss me. i try to make eye contact with eric, but he pretends he doesn't see me. i walk outside to see if i can catch david because i know they have to load up their stuff eventually. i didn't want to be confrontational, i just wanted to see him. this kid says he'll come with me for moral support. he gives me a leather jacket and puts his arm around me. we walk down the side walk. i see david he comes out and is like "HEY i was gonna come see if i could find you but i decided i better not!!!" which is rude, but i was like "ohhh SAME!!!!" mimicking his enthusiasm. he takes me in for a hug and i hold my left wrist behind his back with my right hand. a hand grabs tight around my arm above the elbow. it's the guy that came with me. i break up the hug. i introduce him to david then realize i don't know his name. he extends the hand not holding my arm and says "hey man, i'm pete.' then turns and pulls me away. i fall. david says "oh!" pete keeps walking, dragging me behind him like a rag doll. i look at david and try to explain he doesn't mean it, that i don't even know him. he just says "oh!!" again and stares at us wide eyed. pete pulls me up on my feet, but continues to pull me by my arm, right above the elbow. i wonder, scared, if david will come send people to come beat him up. i decide he won't. i walk back to the show alone. this weird boogery punkrocker kid comes up to me and wants me to come into this weird room with him. I keep walking and refuse him. he follows me. I get back to the show and everyone is gone. the mics are still up, but some of the equipment is missing. I look at the boogery kid and ask where they went. He walks away and i follow him. he takes me to the room he was trying to take me into earlier. Conner and some other kid whose name i forgot enter through the door the kid tried to take me in earlier. they have hoods up over their heads. they are paranoid. i tell them it's just me. and they say oh. i pull the hood off one of their faces (conor's). his eyes were huge and black and his skin was pale and sweaty. i said oh sorry! and put it back over his face. then eric showed up and was like "not danielle, ah man" i felt bad. i said "eric it's okay, i don't care what you do. i love you no matter what bra'. you're doing your own thing i totally respect that." so he came in and talked to me for a two seconds. mentioned some chick named veronica. mumbled nonsense. i didn't want to ruin his high anymore than i already had, so i let them all go. i thought for two seconds about following them. but decided starting to do heroin would be a pretty big commitment. i walked home.

you are a sleep, i am too sleep

your brother wrote that song? i bought an inch worm at the store that plays the very same tune. i loved it so much, i bought two. one fell behind the radiator. first half price, second one free. this one is falling apart, but you get the point. does he know about this?