the artist formerly known as nice

...tater wants to know since when is 'nice' a TRULY bad thing? my roommate told me this, too ('but you're never mean to people')...as if being dismissive / aggressive was the only route to take with humans whose scent doesn't sit well with us...then how do people know if you really like them?! she said...this is where the concern for niceness really lies, i guess...with the ego.

...later, a similar sentiment was expressed - that i am too accommodating with people (my words), at the expense of myself (my words)...this coming in the form of him miming me taking a dagger to the side, slowly...sort of like he knew, actually, how one might deliver that kind of wound - period.

accommodating, kind, open, vulnerable, sensitive, patient, trustworthy, trustING - not all synonyms, by the way...that some who are new to my life choose to see me in this way is of no consequence. the reason people want to be in my life, love me, and respect me, has little to do with 'nice....'

to the kid who told me i was too nice : eat a dick.

<3

ese lunar que tienes / cielito lindo

...man...my girls were cranky this month, myself included...the moon is a crazy thing and we don't pretend that when they wane new or wax full that it doesn't affect us...in december i was riding the train into manhattan and a solo mariachi began playing 'cielito lindo' on his guitar. very simple song. but that is only if you're hard. weather or not the moon had anything to do with the heaviness and quickness with which my salty gotas dripped from my cheeks to chin to floor, i'm not sure...i remember thinking that everything was so heavy...why does everything have to be so heavy? if you have it does it cease to weigh?

Ese lunar que tienes,
Cielito lindo, junto a la boca,
No se lo des a nadie,
Cielito lindo, que a mí me toca.

the fruit whisperer

...we are clamoring for summer, and so are the fruits, sweating through plastic on franklin avenue...as a youngun' in cali wayyy back i was given my own toddler-table, where i was placed, desnudita y gordita, with fat yellow mangoes. i shall tap into that this summer...i know a kid here in new york who hates all fruit...really?! not even a motherfucking seedless green grape you ungrateful ingrate?! a pluot? one framboise? tamarindo juice with ice on 24th street or central valley oranges ripened at 20 degrees, foggy farenheit? just bitter greens, nuts, and grains, no? exactly what a horned goat would eat, i guess...you'd be right to assume that this manifests - can't be bothered for sweetness, for kind slices, for saccharine words and most of all no sugar in your bowl - no way baby. amazing because the mouth is akin / to a thing / dripping off the tree in spring...but whatevs, sweetness gets too sticky sometimes, i understand... i live in honey ; not my problem you can only swim in pools.

this note from my beloved Karlene:

"Spring is a time for new beginnings; start over, tater.  Farewell to last spring and everything that it brought with it, hello to Spring 2010, with new loves and new excitements and new apartments and new jobs and new everything."
 
yes, boo.

fruit punch

DUMPLING HOUSE

you agree, don't you? i tried to crop the photo but the dumpling's hair was too tall, spiky like the grey/black stripes of grampa's shirt...SMUSH face like a bud before sunrise, peonies blooming, and peonies blooming on your stupid dumpling blouse, branches like arms and baby hands, twigs or bushes, petals or fingernails, blossoms like a nose and your nose to the blossom, skin and veins / skin and veins, black or grey or white or grey or black, pink like your peony mouth like your ears like all those flowers like every season...it all blends, it's all your crib, it all echoes echoes (echoes echoes)...flesh and flowers your pillow - from now 'til the end.

TJ - Cerezo

andando bajo las cerezas...

o sea LA FERIA DE...las cerezas.