hurricanes

hailed by two string guitars 

evocative. we touched our scars we 

looked to the stars what 

when you hit shore? we prayed

we prayed 

into the grid you tore and 

the children swore god

damn they 

swore   #katyamills  

rockstar #1201

the city outside

restless

yearning

they make

windmill inflections
metal-dipped harp strings 

a door off its hinges they

lean off the wall 

listening to it all
talking to self ina 

wistful way like a 

lost son’s 

mother’s 

prayer

#katyamills

telekat #2017 songs

the resolute kindness

Readers
Friends
Family
Comrades

I wish you all a bright season, and thank you for camaraderie and for showing interest in my work. For the first time in many years, since 2005 to be exact, I will be spending this holiday with family. I am excited. It was a long and painful separation, yet in that empty space my family once filled,  I developed a lot --what Jung would call individuation -- and, up against the painful silence of a careless world, I drew close to the warmth of the fire in my heart, and somewhere there located the elements of my survival. You may have noticed my tools. Writing. Running. Counseling. Reading. Mindfulness and meditation. Guitar. Your life can be what you make of it. Isn't that freedom? I feel fortunate for my small freedoms in our world of power struggles and abuses. Yet the resolute kindness had to be gifted to myself, and still does. There was a time when I was a child then an adolescent and a teenager, and the many kindnesses were insinuated toward me. I believe the most kind among them, lovers and family and lifetime friends, were the ones who knew me best. And I felt insulted. For I knew they knew I was some walking contradiction, that somehow I was an act, and could betray myself in an instant! The ones who knew me, knew I was not kind to myself at all. I treated them poorly and almost as poorly as I experienced myself. I was a classless example on a long and endless tour. I was Keith Richards meets Brian Jones for a swim. I was a party of one, divisible by all. I had to be alone, in order to patiently await the resolute kindness within me. Otherwise, I risked the endless incinerations, and being reduced to a fraction of myself.

2016 K 

This is my confession to you. I know my writings tend to give only a glimpse of who I am and what I have been through. It is only through the greater whole of this website, and through the books that I write (yes, I am a novelist), you may know me more intimately. And you may also see my play and foreplay with the resolute kindness, within and without. I am the filter, and I attempt to surface and demystify the demons, to spin them around like a top and turn them. Turn them into friends and allies, within and without. I consider it some kinda alchemical process going on. I don't create it, I just reflect it. When I am lucky, coal turns to silver and wine, into water. But I want to be honest with the process, and if all that turns up out the topsoil is a demon, well, there you have it, I will share a demon with the world and let the world handle it... I love it more when I can grow the kindness and press it out to you like a flower! This is (and was) my dream in twenty sixteen. And I will exercise a lien on twenty seventeen, and release more of this lovely, tangy stuff to you when i can, so we can share the resolute kindness.

possibly a song

Here are the lyrics to a song I am workin on (to be accompanied by my acoustic guitar which I have been neglecting terribly, poor thang)...

"Remember when you thought everything was going well and then it was not, when winter was too cold and summer too hot, another cup of coffee would pull ya through and it did, raised you up like a pup by the lids... some day you gonna be a railroad tie, no one gonna fuck with this guy, some day you can be railroad grade, swimming ona sea of marmalade... some day you gonna be a railroad tie, no one gonna fuck with this guy... some day you can be railroad grade, swimming ona sea of marmalade..."

so i saw somethin last night, like a vision, right
 i had to let go of the past and move on. now.
so i am

have a wonderful fabulous fantastic effortless lighthearted brilliant day everyone
love and light

KatYa

Cat Sleepin On A Surge Protector

edge of seventeen cover

song frag friday

Sunday Journal (06.14)

Locke, California. Sweet delta breeze and a friend of a friend of friends. We piled in the GTI all four of us for breakfast on the banks of the river just shy of Freeport and just shy of Sacramento, east of the cold rails on a mosaic of a table a cut above the painted toenails. Three coffees and a water from the laughter to the lips. Just shy of a ghost train, midday, and just in time. Delta Breeze rustles through the trees and blinds made of bamboo framing the windows of you know who. A friend of a friend of friends. The sun came up like usual this morning, and lit up the sky different than ever before. I turned and thanked the door for the score. Skipped the stairs in pairs, and got airborne over the orange fat cat -whiskers like fish- rolling belly up, white, like the opposite of last night.

And so went the day, and so went the day. Kind smiles of distant friends growing close like the cabbage in the garden, and my faith in love is still devout *. The girl with the bleach blonde hair, sweet Joanna of the wild blue eyes and the deep blue seas, asks for an avocado omelette, could you, please? I shake the salt and pepper over my eggs and the slash and burn of hash and browns. I could see the whole clearly now, bird's eye view. I lost and found my glasses somewhere along the way, by the garden. A man who makes cutting boards by hand, of the most riveting natural grains of wood, helped me retrace my steps one by one. We found them on the tortoise. He was reading Ulysses and rather slowly, a symphony of hens behind him.

Joanna says no, hold the toast. Hold the rye, hold the sourdough, hold the wheat, and your hand over your heart for the Canadian national anthem. This lovely man before me, the one with the twin daughters who are having too much fun to settle down, has embroidered quite a morning for us all. Hospitality doesn't come overnight. Sometimes it takes almost six months to make.  Ramon spontaneously grabs the 12-string and sings us a song, the beaten strength carries long. I remember how music once saved me.

Confucious in cobwebbs says it won't be long. Echoes of the Peking Opera in the theater long-since closed, and soon to be refurbished to keep all of Locke upon its toes. A friend of a friend of friends now a friend of a friend... now a friend.

-KatYa

* Rusholme Ruffians, The Smiths

fishing . indoors

A season

A reason
to get out of bed

a number
an order
a substitute
preacher

tossing
the thoughts
in my head

i’m hungry
i’m thirsty
predestined at last

i turn off the radio
deadbolt the doors
up on my toes…





my spirit likes soft light
and shadows
to play

even better if
it rains today

with knees to my chest
i sit barefoot
facing north

and wait for her
before

the sun up
lifts all life

i set the trap
in silence

EFFING EFFED (PERFORMANCE)

Yes I am on guitar on this clip, but for those who like my spoken word this one should appeal to you because the lyrics are very clearly spoken, not sung. The lyrics are located on this post...

LINK 2 LYRICS:  EFFING EFFED

HOLY DAYS, UNHOLY NIGHTS

(original poem & song)

She had just finished her coffee

she had just finished super-gluing 

the iron-on patches to 

her black jeans

Shamelessly

when the BBC 

reported her city 

the night before

The scandalous 

yet predictable situations

played out on the streets when

certain dice were cast 

Rolled and bounced into

a combination of numbers

when added 

together spelled trouble

She could coherently 

put herself together for you 

on a gray cloud 

with a silver-stained lining 

Halloween behind the ears 

like a cool whip of 

winter winds on 

the nape of your neck

When someone in any given room

in any given west-side victorian 

half-rehabbed three story apartment 

had mind to meet 

The fullness of her face

the fullness of her hot stare

the depth of her purpose 

you can believe 

Just like you buy 

the street talk on the east side

in a slurpee swishersweet rhetoric

ghetto to the bone

Descended from

the self-made madness

of your home

M PATH

(original poem / love song)

i took the m-path

out of the city, today

i took the blue line

just to see you, okay



i took the m-path

i had to see you, okay

abandoned buildings

electric lights, and rain



i came through tunnels

i surfed the channels

to see, your face



i came through rainbows

out of the city

to find, my place



just to be

by you, so true



chorus:

just 2 see you

just 2 be with you

it’s true



because i love you

i really love you

i do

K Covers the EAGLES

Just a little fun for your Friday...

K cover song:  EAGLES
'Best of My Love'

"tomato blossoms"

A Ramon / Mills creation
an eFFin K produxion...

this take is dedicated to the loving memory
of Robin Williams

INSTRUMENTAL # 1

F & K original
Acoustic Guitar 
Instrumentals

Music Composed and Performed by K Mills
Inspired by F Ramon's poem: 'in the time of tomato blossoms'
dedicated to the memory of his mother

'in the time of tomato blossoms'
by Frank Ramon

this old heart is missing you
last saw you in the Fall
those times lie down
like leaves in winter
whose rains have watered
seeds of Spring

lay me down now
the fires growin dim
daylight approachin
darkness fades again
each tear i shed
what seeds will water

i look North 
to where i lost ya

are you still there?

K original MUSIC... 'memory.untitled'

An original song
written and performed 
by Katya! 

lyrics located here:
http://www.katyamills.com/2014/07/memory-untitled.html

many thanks to my good friend Frank Ramon 
for guidance and coaching!!

attempted music by K

first take. 'let me warm your heart some'
part #1

original music and lyrics
written and performed by Katya Mills

the first intərˌlo͞od

I got a Recording King Guitar
yesterday, at a local mom & pop shop called 'The Fifth String'

So on days like today, when I got nothing to say,
I may offer you some freestyle
six string
steely

 intərˌlo͞od

~ enjoy ~