I who made me feel

the way you
made me feel
i could not stick
around


i could not
whiskey rocks
i bought
and downed
til I was numb and dumb
like the wake of a
sunset


on the periphery i
discovered it was i
who made me feel
that way

#katyamills

what we had

it wasn't romantic
what we had
didn't catch fire like
some fad
couldn't make millions
off a silver screen
wouldn't walk a runway
just to be seen
faded discolored was
what we had
blown in the glare
of a weary lag
we quietly held hands
in the alley

#katyamills

anchor a bridge in a sea

we wanted it to be something it was not. we so badly wanted it. the distance between us made for sadness. for confusion. for anger you had to push aside again and again. and again. the distance grew. it would take years to anchor a bridge in this sea. it's no use being angry i'd rather be sad. it's no good being sad and alone. not having it the way you want it. the way you believe it could be. but it's not.   #katyamills

bloom

get up and say a prayer. drag these 50 year bones to the kitchen. pull the bag of beans out of the freezer and and grind them by hand while the tea kettle fires water to a boil. memories begin to percolate in my styled bed head. the whistle. the first splash into the ceramic cone lined with filter is to let her bloom over the mason jar. the thoughts are beginning to breathe. images of new england and chicago and the road between them. clockwise over the grounds and feelings are bubbling up now. long slow exhalations. it's between four thirty and five. the frothy brown liquid is ready. deep blue yosemite mug. pull my hood over my head, open the sliding glass door and walk out into the dawn. i have to leave the past behind or it will kill me. just listen to the morning birds. just watch the sky fill with light. #katyamills

any verse

out on the stones

a friday eve with any verse

tremulous voice

tied back sleeves lips 

pursed. all the world let

down her locks 

in the arms of her bonny

brakeman

#katyamills

urban verses

faith in one

another we
take cover

hitting the bricks
early hour of the

day we
trick the tricks
what they gonna

say

no nine to five we
make our own
time i feel so alive
in your arms then
spent

steam rises
through grates in
the streets we rent

hydrants let loose
like my spirit
summer days
catches fire scaling
fences

beneath
your loving gaze


#katyamills
2020

suck free

on the street the other day
a kid told me

people suck

i wanted to yet i

could not deny that they do

 

what if we all sucked up to 50% of the time 

on average? could we still have faith? 

 

we could dream of being 

suck free some 

day

Reading (ATE87)

yankee

dawn has struck
the sky is turning colors
the last bit of dynamite
blown. shredded paper
tumbles aimless on the breath
of passing cars

what will we
do now

any one of us is so much more

The multiverse has shaped me and so I run in colors, and when we meet we bond by the imprint left upon our personalities, the texturing of all the forces that contour us into recognitions. You are so much more than you. I can hardly stand not to love you not to know you. Come with me.

five

i found my peace in silence

i found my peace in a cup of coffee

i found peace in an early morning run

i found peace in devotion. working.

i found my peace in you

when pennies were copper

mag wheels for eyes
roll out in silent film
silver screen dyes

down walkways
floorlit and salted
and buttered with
scenes

of someone else's storied
childhood

long legs falling in love
with strapping lads on streets
paved flat by
pennies

land without
cell phones

a sunday. 1955
a city. 1959

when churches were
sanctuaries

mark the time
by the bells and
the sun

we rest on
bloody knees

the automobile
extinct

home. 1936
the sky. 1910

the pool
1920 and two metres
deep

the denim
1969. when pennies
were copper

the board
she saw better
days

cut elbows
in ink

porcelain cheap
for the poor

inscripted
the names
in powder blue
soap

sliding down rails
to the subway

we saw better
days

laughter echoes

a certain
despair



- KatYa, July'17

early morning americans

struck a balance with all, in the city in the summer after dawn, when the morning bird was heard and the sun at eye level, playin hide and seek behind deciduous trees, while the cat trailed you partways to the cafés, and the barista knew your name without asking, and the statesman laughed and folded his newspaper and nary a phone was ringing, the time was reserved for a church bell and silence. americas were thick with technology, in the cables in the air, and you wouldn't need to care in the early, early mornings. in the city on the streets, face values appreciated and if you looked past the wheels and the burden of homes that were carried, you were sure to find an honesty and goodness that survived any standing recession, knew more than money and politics combined, and had a penchant for pastimes of early morning. as deep as any faith, the devotion. rise and shine, america!

k. early morning devotée

promise

once there was a boy named bee 

upon my knee

softly telling me how rivers

did not reach the sea in the year 

twenty twenty three

some were black others blue

in twenty twenty two

and none could you wash your

self in

his eyelashes fluttered 

feeling me shudder

i could tell 

he honestly knew 

he unbuttoned my collar 

i cried and hollered and then he promised 

just breathe

then rolled up our sleeves so carefully

we could see those cuts on

our arms

with one finger 

he crossed my lips

tenderly looking into my eyes

and

we existed quietly there

until about quarter past one

bee upon my knee

and me

i wondered if all of the darkness

 he shared

could 

     ever

         be

          undone

yet i knew our

                 pain

             was

         the

same

- KatYa, 2017

GO north and run away from everything
Live off of lizards tails and country music
Sit in a mobile home with no heat
Half-freeze to death
Awaken with a shiver


Come south for your life in the sun
Refuse to grow up
Grow down. Find your roots

I think they are
over there

Date someone you met at Starbux
Who got the same drink as you

Cause you have one thing
in common

depression weighs a ton

women marching and i was walking
the opposite direction and saw a man
who got an erection and everyone
stood tall

but just for a second

 dollar sign stores and lots of whores
boosting from the system
if you had a lot of change and it stayed
the same

got rolled when you swung
and missed them

waking up with a dream in yer head
and you don't know where you are
dizziness come from a
spinning earth

by the minute on an out of tune
secondhand
guitar

bosses looking at their wives
wonderin' who they are

before midnight come
take a stab at the sun
tear ducts gutter and the gentlemen
 shudder

the depression weighs a ton

wattpad story - part 2

I have a Bible. I like to run my fingers up and down the pages cut so thin -- I think only God could have cut those pages so thin. Maybe there is a God after all, wouldn't that be nice for us all? Sometimes out on the streets someone will offer up a name and a verse, Corinthians so and so, or shout out mad props to one of the apostles. If I happen to have my backpack on, and if I happen to have a pen in there, I might go ahead and mark what they said on the back of my hand. So long as they aren't all preachy about it, and only if I got nothin' better to do. When I get home I might actually pick up the Bible (if I can find the Bible) and look up chapter and verse, and read. Only if I have nothing better going on. I confess I would have to be quite bored out of my mind to actually go and look up a verse in the Bible. Hey! This is the twenty-first century! Life is just that way. That book was written so long ago no one can even say for sure who wrote it. Coulda been someone in their own world, for all anybody knows. Whomever it was sure wrote their heart out. God had to cut those pages pretty carefully, miraculously thin even, just to make it small enough to fit into our hands. Good for them and good for us. They got God for a publisher, and we got something we can look at and touch and admire. Or excuse all of our misdeeds behind, too. All I know is once I take a shower, those books, chapter and verse, wash off of me forever. And it's not a big loss. Not like when I can no longer make out the phone number of that sweet guy who was talking to me at the cafe just the other day, whom I may never see again. This is a big city. In an even bigger world. Some people get lost never to be found. Like my cousin. I miss her. We had hella good times growin' up. -KatYa @ Wattpad

On 'flash' or 'sudden' form -i)

 I wrote the freeverse piece below,
 in a 4-4-4-6-6 form.
The form felt really nice for my style,
and I may begin to use the form regularly...

http://kissilent.wordpress.com/2013/10/11/drafting-the-steam/


I am more and more confident in my ability
to write flash or sudden pieces. I still prefer writing
prose to poetry, though often I find myself whiddling a
flash piece I wrote, down into a freeverse poem.
The process is often very natural and leads me there.
Still I prefer the flash or sudden  form.

Flash and sudden are two names for basically
the same form. Usually prose, usually under 500 words.
The Chinese have been know to call it smoke-long. 
Meaning you can read the piece in the time
it takes to smoke a cig.