Young Writers Society

i wonder, sometimes, if ritual magic - real magic - would feel like the wind on a perfect breezy spring day or the sun in the middle of winter, or if it’s fire like midday in summer when you can’t even look at the asphalt for the illusion of water

or if it’s all mirage - smoke and tricks and all the slight of hand and none of the ethereal we chase but never quite capture

lines drawn in dirt, compass points to legend, not reality.

it’s always fire season when it never rains and the brush piles up and the sun beats down and the cleansing goes up in flame that scorches, not rivulets that sink into the ground halfway to the sea. we pretend there’s a season to destruction that’s as predictable as earthquakes and spreads out in a pattern reminiscent of rouge twisters dancing in unholy glee (firestorms have many forms, but they all burn in the end)

my dad likes to tell stories about the crazy things his coworkers do while on conference calls - tornadoes and hurricanes everyone can hear on the line being favorites of disbelief. me? i don’t notice the earthquake at 5am, too busy stumbling after the cat who refuses to stop - though suddenly his unsettled whining makes sense, rather than the usual dance of wanting attention when i only want my bed.

i am of the land of fire and being ready to run at a moments notice (at least with storms you have some warning, right?) and live in fear of summer thunderstorms because they never bring rain, only lightning

i am of the land of earthquakes (you can only define earthquake weather if you’ve lived through it) and view everything through the lens of will-it-hold-up-if-the-ground-erupts and put books on high shelves and cringe to myself and try not to think about the things not nailed to the wall.

desert climate means 40 degree swings between boiling and not-quite-hot, and the difference between 60 in the winter and 60 in the summer is how many layers you need to compensate for the highs and lows (only in california can i wear the same jacker year round, because a lack of snow does not equate to a lack of temperature variation - only a lack of water).

west wind brings with it the ocean and cooling
but never fast enough on warm dry nights
when all you want is water.

sometimes i think my life started and ended in a small cafe in brooklyn twelve years ago:
(coming full circle from when my grandfather traded coasts -
brooklyn for la and san francisco):
late nights and toolate coffee
traded with friends
barely seen since.

i wonder, sometimes, if it’s only nostalgia that keeps me holding on to memories,
or if it’s a misplaced sense of self (and people) i’ve almost lost.

cold in april chills differently than cold in december -
one goes down your bones, the other dances over skin:
both make you shake and numb fingers
(and mittens are only good as insulation
for the former)

spring is when we start to wonder
if the sirens we hear on the road
are only from the onslaught of traffic
(the cities are fleeing and the town
i grew up in only resembles
itself in name)
or if the hills are burning
as a precursor to hell

you know you’re from california
when you can’t look at a bridge
without wondering when it was last retrofitted
and how much of a jolt it would take
to crush you and your car under the interchange
or if you’d be the last one out before the collapse*

*true story, dad knew the last person to get across the bay bridge when loma prieta hit in ‘89.

Uh, i can't quite figure out how i want this one to go:

cities at night are pictures in motion
blurred lines of light
[never stopping barely slowing]
and artificial illumination
that throws shadows where they shouldn’t be
transitional liminal spaces

barely shielding magic from sight?

magic interspersed with light

magic running between lamposts
barely out of sight

#25
front’s changing
head hurts
spring sucks

#26
the plague years:
we’re almost done
but this plague left
a new one in its place

sometimes i’m not sure what language i think in, until i mash three together to properly express my ire - because sometimes the only way to curse is to string together spanglish with yiddish and take joy in the knowledge that it will take them long enough to work out they were insulted that it really sinks in they were also out maneuvered.

would take most long enough to work out they were insulted for it to really sink in that they were out maneuvered.

Roll with it

I rolled a die to decide what dye to use for my dehydrated hair
It came up four but before I was sure there was for sure an awareness
that the ink that I think was ink might just sink straight into my veins
(a color not blue or purple or a hue that I knew running under skin
and the rose that arose from within might have been a single
shade too much so I rolled a two, yes I knew it was a two
that settled deep in the depth and see it seep dyed over-saturated strains
tarnished skin, take a breath, unnatural hues over due with a dew like fluid or a stain
or maybe just again it was the light, much too bright to show what might have been alright.

i like to pretend the world isn’t flat
and we don’t all have our parts to play
(strings held by mad-men, dancing
wildly to serve themselves)
and freedom isn’t an illusion we crave
to play at controlling our own destinies.