i need to go back to victoria

because my first thought when i realized my house was getting cold was
oh, i should turn up the heat
and not
oh, i should put on my cardigan and my product of pakistan socks
and eat a nice hot bowl of stew.
and even though of course i did the latter,
the stew had steak in it.

old note

my body feels like a lawrence ferlinghetti poem right now
like
all of these completely random phrases
semantics
images
thought processes
physically manifested as the human
anatomy strung together

what do i say?
read me like a fucking concrete poem
my body weighs
down the page

the page
i'm supposed to be there
yes
bronwyn's page

immaculate voyeur
i love you

ou ou ou ou ou
-où?
-there
-here?
-no
-where then?
-here

take me to that other place.

chelsea says: jessica, why are we stopping at a pawn shop?
jessica says: oh, we're trading you two in for a couple of loonies.
lindsay says: you have the U2 cd??

sit there until you swear
you can see the moon
swivel on its axis

you've always got those dark sunglasses covering half your face.

there is one month left.
a lot of shit went down after i said this last time
and my headvoice is saying hang onto your hat, lassie.
ok, man.
ok.

i even drew a sketch of it and put it on my refrigerator.

roberta finally died. i buried her in my back yard.
this is a sad day for a sad sad cat.

had a dream last night that both my arms were broken

i always feel really dumb when i cry over stupid things
like how impossible my father's sixty year-old sewing machine is being,
but i always cry anyway.

thirds

five divided by three is one point six repeating.
by all accounts, according to the rule, this should have been written
off as a non-issue by june.
i feel like this whole summer has been an uninterrupted series
of compromising circumstances and all of these stupid acrobatics.
defense mechanisms.
my ability to transcend dimensions is astounding.
i'm operating on seven planes simultaneously
and i've regressed in all but this one.

primality

the human body has two of almost everything.
this is not a novel concept, but
you ponder this:
balance and minimalism;
nature's love of symmetry. of prime numbers.
two is the lowest prime number.
two is the only even prime number.
you like the number two
because you are only one
in a pair; because two is the only bed
on which logic and intimacy
lay coupling:

divide your legs
by two more legs
and the answer is one.

stay awake and watch for the data

it's almost too hot to be alive.
i, apparently, am almost too hot to be alive.
i've spent so much time trying
to get this city to do what i want and now that it is
i'm not cooperating.

on the balcony i tried to remember
the exact wording of some dumb
aphorism about leading a horse to water
and when he said, what is it?
all i could do was stare at the skyline.

i'd spend all night losing sleep.

yesterday evening i stepped on a monarch butterfly by accident.
this morning a woman was stabbed to death a block away from my shop.
the calcite crack of its exoskeleton sounded like eggs breaking

on the hardwood floor and when i started crying they said
chelsea, it's just a butterfly.
and i said no it's not. i just killed someone.

i don't know. it's friday the thirteenth week.
i'm sort of fearing for my life. i'm listening to living room
and it feels like the apocalypse.

when it's too far to walk, we just hitch a ride.

the summer is getting long and redundant.
i am bored.
i've made my peace with this city, and now i want to go home.
i want to fucking live alone.
this is making me bananas.

it went like this.

jenn's dad says: actually, i like poetry a lot.
chelsea says: oh yeah, who's your favourite poet?
jenn says: jesus.