Redington Beach

strange summer sky. long thin pier we trod the planks corridor of pelicans standing on the rails in quiet anticipation. hunger. there's a man calling out got an amber jack on his line. want your picture taken? no thanks. today you travel leaving the storm behind. my soul lives inside a flash. it's a black and white deal.

  #katyamills

Indian Rocks

Her eyes were the blue of the great lakes where she was from. She pulled her shirt down from the neck to show them the tattoo she had drawn and inked herself. She was living on Indian Rocks beach with her mother taking care of her grandfather and already planned to get out of town after he died. It wouldn’t be long. She was waitressing at a local oyster bar and saving up. She wanted nothing to do with her mom who was alcoholic and had started her on the same path early, age twelve, and now she was eighteen and already been burned. She talked to them about her dream of leaving, like her father had before her, and not looking back.


by #katyamills

one can dream

in the eye of a hurricane 

where all is eerily calm and tenuous

all the linens blown off the line

and nothin is the same as was

it is here gazing up at the impossible blue

of the impossible sky

one can dream

#katyamills

JANUARY 9, 1997

thin as a grain of wheat
rarely uprooted from his chair
black cat at his feet
waiting for the next meal
the next dream

traded freedom to his granddaughter
so he wouldn't have to live in a home

eyes red around the rim
voice deep within the throat
bones coated with dust like the painting
of his long since passed wife
hanging on the wall behind him

six foot three he can still
touch the sky
i used to jitterbug he says
and smiles. heart following memory
up the gulf coast
across the panhandle
all the way back to California

when he's upset
sometimes he swears (the gravel
spitting off his thunder)
GIVE ME THE KEYS! i'll drive there my
damn self i will!
alone? she questions, eyes bulging
ALONE!

and i
i believe him
you better hide those keys
tonight


#katyamills
remix 1997

NOVEMBER 22 1997

playing crazy eights listening to music
talking trash fighting getting high
twentysomethings in the late 1900s
spilling drinks spilling consciousness
on the dance floors of YBOR CITY

a blackout drinker in those days i
would lose my credit card and eventually
my wallet my shoes and my keys
my sanity. early hours of the morning
nothing but my clothes and my high on
and a couple phone numbers of friends
in my head.

FEBRUARY 11 1998 (1/2)

 I found a typewritten sheet from the Royal I had in Florida, 1998, tucked into my diary. Here's a remix from the first paragraphs I wrote...


She lay with him she
trusted him she knew him no more than
the shadows the moon cast on the wall
dressed and gone by morning

balancing on the edge of the tub
she shaved her legs with a cheap razor
someone left behind

02.11.98

the blood didn't bother her
there would be no sleep
tonight

he lay awkwardly after
hands in his pockets
she played a palm across his chest
carelessly

to be robbed was something
he imagined he
deserved

taste of her in his mouth feather
pillow imbued with her
perfume



#katyamills. remix'98

Tampa, Florida. 1997

narrow dirt roads for legs
two moons for eyes she
was once that kid on a
milk carton

did not want to be found

twelve years later watching x
files smoking weed helps

the pain she
cares for her grandfather
and her son

they're both handfuls

grandfather drinks and smokes
like he's half his age
boy cries and throws tantrums like
he's half his and he's
ten

she loves them without
conditions

i want to be around people
who give me energy
she shouts (competing with the
swamp cooler) not
take it

thick gravel roads for legs
half moons for eyes she
hasn't changed



#katyamills
remix'97

lightning without thunder

through clouds flashes
through eyelids

blanket over tired feet pillow
under head how long is forever? you
let me sleep

the wind
sands
the dunes

washes the truck
dry my eyes on my
plate you let me
eat let me
sleep

time flashes by on our tv
sets. through eyelids through
clouds

lightning
without thunder

it is past our bedtime past
our pastime before
we even know it
and

we even
know it



Katya Mills
remix from '96

painted fences

i was moody i was ready i was running through a field. i was young i was adventurous i was heading for a fall.

you were walking you were friendly eating raspberries off the bush. you were older and reticent and you wanted to protect me.

we were unlikely bound for friendship in a deep and southern town. we drank orange juice walked the shoreline. painted fences stood us down.

type.writer (archive #K) -iii

the bluefish dissolved when
the devil rays flew in
and the sea disseminated
into sky

a line no
longer

what a solution
now nothing would never
make sense

type.writer (archive #K) -ii

We rented a small house on the Gulf of Mexico
for 800 bucks a month
me and my friend
we got lucky

I must have typed 500 pages that year
on my little drab postbellum s.corona
to the rhythms of tide
and jazz...

Journal # 05.02.15

 Some old paradigm element had us skimming across the Keys all the way to Key West. It was fantasy. You just don't do that. The islands are long and a long ways apart. They may be connected by bridge and culture and climate, yet each is an entity unto itself. If you stand next to someone in line for bread and water, are you family? The journey would be long from one to another. Harleys trailing exhaust for miles, coughing in clear cracks over the aqua blue magnitude. The fantasy might find redemption in a storm. Red sky in morning. The air shifting and accelerating until few birds could fly. Old nests would be blown out like paper. By afternoon, people stop and stare at the amazement of clouds. Hold onto your bloody mary. American flags begin to whip at the whitewash on the poles. The sky turns many colors with the sun reduced to a narrow band of grey-white above horizon. The clouds would compete with the sea. Pull your outdoor furniture inside. Find your pets. Businesses taped the glass. Lizards darted into porous ground. An ocean above and below. The fantasy lived in the storm. The fishermen took in the catch. The boats being secured all evening long, then the rains came. Only then could our splayed Keys reach and touch one another, falling together on the ring as the winds picked up to shore. All became monotone and inaudible. The sky, the sea. The earth. The mind. And from there we might finally, after too many cocktails and smoke and dissension, come together and unlock all the truth. A moment of clarity. In the morning, it was gone. It was fantasy.