August 31st (9 years)

nine years. today's our anniversary and after work it's haircuts and dinner. Chevy's on the river. no big deal just to be together. no one else can so we fit the fragments what our combined memory remembers. no one else can. they don't sell this puzzle at hobby lobby but if they did we would make a hot item for sure. a top seller. what i love about you is how you can turn a trip to walmart into a show. someone's jaw drops and i walk out smiling.  #katyamills

romance

you deserved more than romance more than some worn out saying so we gave you a rubber knife fake blood torn stockings lace up boots a hideous face and called it love. You gave us all the candy you had and asked us please. go away  #katyamills

essential color blue

under sky blue

they irrigated the fields

green the corn and tomatoes grew

the trucks piled high crawled out on the highway

the day was done 

they went home and drank and danced 

slow with their wives and the kids

quietly laughing got up 

and slow danced essentially

too

#katyamills

Don Pedro

a drought fell over the land. 5 years & the beds completely dried up. they discovered her bottom of don pedro lake. determined she was over 900 years old. touching into her bones the mage deciphered her life and winsome spirit... golden eyes. she was unknown otherwise 

   #katyamills

blood

The first draft had to be almost effortless or else you would get caught up in editing too soon and lose the story.  The final copy would have to come off as almost effortless. The difference between the first draft and the final copy was blood sweat and tears. Okay, blood is an exaggeration. Usually.   #katyamills

dear enemy

thank you

for without you 

playing with my emotions

taunting me with unapologetic sarcasm and cruelty

i might not have broken free 

from the impenetrable

chrysalis

#katyamills

smoke break

i wanted to get to know you 

the bosses drove us hard 

leaving us depleted... 

you spoke. they caught us 

it's not a crime 

we needed the money 

they hid behind a story 

an don't care about ours 

i wanted to get to know you 

maybe on break

i don't smoke but 

i will

#katyamills

checkout girl

you fold my dress you turn

a phrase

unearth a deeper calm 

behind a morose 

gaze

#katyamills

strike!

she chose one the color of her desolate heart. on the shiny parquet she stared down the lane. deep breath. her father whispered an atta girl from the scoring table. muscles bulging, pencil behind his ear. she took a tentative step, pulled back, danced forward and sent it flying. deep rolling thunder until the crash.

#katyamills

fact #22

the meds. without them survival was unlikely. instead of going to work to make money to buy food they would stay at home immobile and brood

#katyamills

weather pattern #2

inspiration arrives 

with hurricane 

beleaguered by insecurity 

churning morning 

moods

#katyamills

dead!

got into a fight over nothing

we yelled it out scathing and then it was gone

i watched your eyes blink in slow succession like subway car doors when they're jammed

wanna go for coffee? you asked

that make up smile

i'm dead

 

#katyamills

beater

I am like a car that's been beat to shit and still runs. my upholstery pulling apart. glasses cracked. my engine speaking out its gruff noise. with a world-weary look my paint is faded and i settle remarkably into the scenery. the untold miles visible in my lines of cracked leather. I am small and passed by on the highway by fresh and sparkling machines who know little of life and what it's made of. I push on through any inclement anything, wind, rain, snow. It won't be pretty but we will get you where you need to go.  #katyamills

sour blueberry

to live with those who cannot in mind and heart, not needing some soundtrack behind you. to not give credence to all the random thoughts popping off. like blueberries on the bush some are sour. you don't have to care for them.

#katyamills

belly #8

on location

the belly of life

sink teeth in

#katyamills

like space like opera

i am yelling

but only to mask my fear

you are pacing you are tight
i see you in an hour's time

saying your sorries

they mean nothing
they mean nothing

i am fine

a railroad tie
buried in the ground

telling myself
not to cry

you are history
you are gone

i am deep in the past
wanting to forget

you are reading
i am writing we are
dreamy we are
one

#katyamills

shell blue

upon waking
to remember you
i draw my nails the sea

shell blue

#katyamills

am stillness

the morning stillness feels like wholeness 

on days that spin so fast they 

almost blur out

 #katyamills

live and dream

life will tell you straight up

I am what I am

so direct and yet we go on dreaming up something different

like true love and world fucking peace

in my many years i discovered

you can live in reality 

and dream

 

#katyamills

Bernal Heights

we descended from Twin Peaks

to sun touched warmth on Cortland Avenue

i waited for you by the liquor store

on a steep deep hill in headphones

sketching an armada of

clouds

#katyamills

Green Apple

San Francisco

foraging for books with my best friend

and boba

they do not barter with local authors so

i paid cash for Terminal Boredom by Suzuki 

left a signed copy of my latest on a bus stop bench 

Clement Street

#katyamills

bad bxs

turning from the bar 

he looked her up and down 

purposefully collided with her 

what a dish

wanting witnesses
she splashed the manhattan
into his face

#katyamills

mos.quit.o

mosquito

got so dizzy off my blood crazy flying circles thunderclap !

it's over ... I got you

#katyamills

eight eight unitive

no longer themselves

condition quite grave

they held it together

until something gave

turned from a particle

into a wave

#katyamills

splash!

the emotional impact 

came to being 

on the comet tail of a spectacular 

dream

splashed out corners of eyes 

while foaming morning 

teeth

 #katyamills

California

formless in her ex boyfriend's sweatshirt she walked to the end of this dreary American town. no one could tell how fast her heart was beating. formless before the heat of a dull summer day. how very long she had dreamt of this moment. this highway. California. 

#katyamills

50% sweet

standing on a city street. all the chores done. mild bitterness. head full from books. surrounded by plastic. fifty percent sweet. dreaming. 

 #katyamills

eight 18

friday. the big feelings. cannot get around them. the thoughts walk silently into court. powerful strides. my body fills with tension. these tendons when plucked make fine music. I place a palm over my heart and breathe. hopefulness, seated there, uprises!

#katyamills

hell and back

she had been to hell and back

worked with animals for several years trying to restore her credit and sanity 

there were tons of new friends to make over mocha

in her heart lived the ones she loved the most

the ones in hell

  #katyamills 

fight for it!

He served in the Navy and had been a pilot. They thumbed through scrapbooks together and he showed her. There were photos of him arm to arm with his brother and father, both who were aviators before him. It was an intergenerational thing, a legacy. She didn't have to act impressed. When she fell on hard times he volunteered to cover her lodging and food until she could get herself situated. He would not take no for an answer. She said she could handle it but he read between the lines. He would have kept her safe to perpetuity. She loved him a little before all this. They were both fighters. She would love him a little more for loving her, afterward, by heading out into the world with renewed strength to fight for her life. 

 #katyamills

take it or leave it

like the super moon

we cannot be dissuaded we

give ourselves to the world 

as we are

#katyamills