fern-writes-stuff

[fern-writes-stuff]

beach

beached whales explode after death, eventually.

which sucks for the humans living nearby the beach

but the whale has just exploded,

which probably sucked more for the whale.

climate change,

boat propellers,

fishing nets.

i don’t think it mattered,

the whale’s dead regardless.

bloated on the beach,

skin bleached by the sun

scraped by the sand.

lonely.

not that it probably mattered at that point

to the whale.

---

it was either this or ken's job is beach, so here we are. all caught up on the backlog, now i just need to write today's.

[fern-writes-stuff]

a recurring dream

every night, a different dream with the

same ending.

spoiler, it’s blankness.

you’ll be 

skating down california piers,

   flying over miles of parking lots,

  singing sweet caroline in an opera house

 polling for a politician across the midwest

  ice skating at the olympics

  performing surgery on a pig’s heart

and then nothing.

not a thing.

and it’s scary, but it’s all you’ve got, and 

then you wake up.

---

14/30

[fern-writes-stuff]

purr

personally, i think that it’s unfair that time keeps going.

unfortunately, time doesn’t listen to me.

really, though, it’s the cat on my chest that doesn’t listen to me.

really, though, it’s the cat on my chest that keeps me going.

---

sometimes we've gotta default to silly formats for the sake of sanity. i'm all caught up on escapril now, so those'll be incoming over the course of today.

[fern-writes-stuff]

oh, the light!

oh, the light!

the horrors of the day!

the screaming, the crying!

muffled no longer!

clear as the hurricane’s eve!

oh, the light!

blinding!

brighter than the fireworks of man!

the candles wicked by women!

the sparklers in a child’s fist!

oh, the light!

holier than thou!

halo of blistering rays!

hallowed ground blazed away!

the champagne toast of life!

---

i've had a hell of a weekend, so here's 12/30 only a few days belated. more are incoming!

[fern-writes-stuff]

posture

more specifically, bad posture.

limp shoulders, or hunched,

neck bent over,

slouching to hit the national average height,

the height everyone glances over,

the person they glance over.

there’s an art to being invisible,

and it’s also an innate trait.

i like to think i’ve got both under my belt.

quiet, average looking,

nothing special, and, more importantly,

okay with that.

i genuinely prefer invisibility.

it has its hindrances, of course—

when people don’t see you do things,

you haven’t done them.

when you need someone,

they’ve got someone closer on standby.

it’s safe, though—

safer—

so invisible it is.

---

i’m done with responsibilities for the week!! incredibly relieved.

[fern-writes-stuff]

fog

there’s this fog, right?

looks normal, all gray and misty,

swirls across the fields,

ducks under branches,

rustles the leaves.

this fog ain’t normal, though.

it chills bones through windbreakers,

seeps into your soul,

clawing out those things you’ve been

shoving deep deep down.

fog’s not friendly, either.

it sears and rips,

leaving blood dripping,

turning gray to crimson,

dying faces red with dew.

it’s never just the fog.

the crows follow,

cawing a cacophony,

swooping low over the carcasses,

perching on shoulders gone limp.

i’ve never liked the fog.

---

power’s out, woo! i’ve taken off my old nail polish and written this and now i have to find something else to do, so we’ll see how that goes. 10/30 down!

[fern-writes-stuff]

bad habit

i’ve got a bad habit of thinking you love me.

it sneaks up on me, sometimes—

thinking you love me, that is.

certainly, my brain says,

certainly if you didn’t then

i wouldn’t exist, much less

find myself in such good fortune as this.

but here we are,

and even your stars don’t shine as

bright as the fire, allconsuming,

consuming me as i fight it with

all i have left.

that bad habit,

the one that leaves me thinking you love me,

is all i have left.

i want more than a bad habit.

---

tumblr post formatting is funky, and i sometimes find myself leaning towards taking screenshots of the google doc i type these things up on, but that would mean blasting people on dark mode with brilliant light and another hurdle for screen readers and probably some other miscellaneous problems, so funky formatting it is.

[fern-writes-stuff]

what's the truth?

tell me, ophelia, what’s the truth? were you mad, twisting flower crowns from a rose’s thorns pricking the pads of fingers with print worn away by grief and sorrow and emptiness, wine streaming down from between eyelashes, water choked out in mirth.

or did they shove you in? torment you so much that you just had to, there was never any other chance, no chance but madness, but the death that took your father, the death that you love with your whole heart and can’t bear to glance away from.

did the water go down willingly? when your eyes opened underwater, as they must have, were they panicked or at peace? did the rocks bash you apart or finally make you whole again? did the blood from the split across your brow doom or anoint you?

what’s the truth, ophelia?

---

once upon a time i almost brought home a lovely young cat, a new mother, named ophelia. she was abandoned in a grave yard, so it felt like an apt name. she's doing well, living with a friend, but sometimes i can't quite escape the feeling that i abandoned her myself.

[fern-writes-stuff]

portrait

a picture of you hangs beside my bed.

printed out at cvs for eleven cents and

blu-tacked to a wall painted over at least a dozen times,

you’re the first sight of the morning,

the last sight of the night,

laugh frozen between the sands of time and

smoothed into a smile.

i haven’t seen you in a few weeks,

in person, i mean,

haven’t held your hand or

heard your grin in your singing or

watched you steer us towards the nearest target.

i’m not in love with you,

i don’t think,

but i love you with so much more than i

know what to do with.

anyway.

i love you.

---

7/30 :)

[fern-writes-stuff]

rejects from childhood memories

the day i went to ukulele club and they started teaching us the song to play at my teacher’s funeral, when i had to go to the coat room to lean against the shelves and struggle to breathe in the smell of a dozen households.

saying goodbye to the cat that was deemed too rowdy for the house and returned, the one that scratched up the furniture and scared the other cat, the one that shared a name with the best friend i’d meet three years later.

my mother accidentally pulling me over a fire long-ago put out, branches scraping up my legs and ashes turning my soles to soot, on festival grounds with family friends who watched me scream and cry.

that time, or however many times, i went to the back of the playground where no one could see me and gingerly sat on wooden structures that i was sure hid spiders and i was alone.

crunching over wood chips while barefoot from a fire drill, stunned awake from my vigil sitting at the classroom’s only computer and typing the next great american novel (it flopped before hitting the shelves).

---

felt mildly uninspired today (the original prompt is a childhood memory), so here we are. as always, these are first drafts scribbled out before midnight, so spare me the harshest judgement. hope your days are well <3

[fern-writes-stuff]

spiral

staircase

1. the lighthouse on the first trip to the seaside of middle school, the one that first felt my knees ache. concrete, the old, better kind with shells mixed in and sticking out to catch on shoelaces. steep.

2. the attic in a museum of witchery, prague. old, wooden. creaky, and missing half a slat. velvet ropes as handholds, dingy with grime. lit by slits in the walls.

3. the library at college, down to my usual level. wide, stable, plain gray with a metal railing. echoes fiercely.

4. backstage. metal, probably, under layers of black paint. rusty, probably, under light. treacherous, yet never for me.

---

done with event planning for the foreseeable future! today’s went well but i am Worn Out so a short one again for day five.

[fern-writes-stuff]

trip

going up and down the stairwell to the

laundry room in the basement,

basket of clothes balanced against my

hip knocking into the door handle,

i’m always worried to stub my toe and go

tumbling down those metal stairs

painting red over white over steel

spilling my stained tshirts and ratty underwear over

each step.

---

short but sweet for today! went to two poetry/memoir readings at a writer’s festival & met a lovely guy named david who’s been going to the same festival for 45 (!!!) years! got to chat a bunch with him while navigating his driver through the dizzying maze of a college campus, and signed up to go to another reading nearby next week. good day to be a writer :)

[fern-writes-stuff]

eye contact

i’m staring down the screen and staring into

you, bright young thing that’s been breathing for

nine months of filming and another six of

editing laughs and curses out and

adding dingy color grading and music just on this side of

far too ominous to not be cheesy.

you, bright young thing, haven’t been

hit by the eighteen-wheeler of life and death, the

depth of the story penned into your bloodline or the

sear of the hand pressed into your bicep or the

other life lived hidden in your body’s crinkled eyes.

you, bright young thing, love your brother despite him

leaving, your father despite him

staying.

you, bright young thing, are who i see tonight.

---

this is inspired by a certain man with the pseudonym of jack allen in another reality, and i like it a little bit. 3/30 down, wahoo.

[fern-writes-stuff]

the internet

scroll. 

scroll. 

scroll, then scroll back and like it because it’s your future sister-in-law’s post about her spring break. 

scroll. 

watch half a video about donating to save the world, click on the link, and when it asks for your credit card number decide they won’t really save the world anyhow. 

scroll.

scroll.

scroll.

admire art of that one character from that one show. decide you should rewatch that sometime.

scroll.

wince at that friend from college’s new haircut, or new boyfriend. like the post.

scroll.

scroll.

scroll.

pause at a video of a twenty-something sternly telling you it’s time to go to sleep. 

scoff.

scroll again.

---

in my mental state right now (of exhaustion) the internet and poetry are mutually exclusive. i probably could've written a poem about this blog, and it would've been better. one of my old professors would've pointed out that poets love meta. maybe i'll come back for a revision.

[fern-writes-stuff]

change of state

i always thought georgia florida line was a silly name for a band.

i mean, i toed that line all the time. there was nothing special about it.

the highways looked the same, were the same, the only difference

was what side of the welcome sign we hit.

the dented guardrails were the same,

but it was orange trees, not peach trees.

tourism, not cinema—though i didn’t know that as a kid, somehow.

speckled spanish moss gave way to full on everglades and

going to the okefenokee had less meaning in a land of

gators and beaches.

there was something. i couldn’t tell what, but there

was something about that line, when i started toeing it myself with my

right foot on the brake and left hand out the window dangling

a ring and a dream.

i don’t know their songs—the band, that is.

just know i thought their name was silly and i

know their name is something.

---

back at it again! this time for thirty days only, folks! participating in escapril this year, as i do most year, but i figured i'd revive this old blog for it. as always, i don't claim to be a poet, just a writer with some down time. have a lovely day/night/nonlinear timescape!

[fern-writes-stuff]

hi! it’s been a while, and my 2000 poem project has long been abandoned (though i might pick it back up eventually). i’d just like to put it out into the world, where nobody knows me, that i’m now not only the person to write love letters, i’m the person who receives them. i’ve not yet figured out what all that means to me, but i know it means a lot, and i hope it’ll make some of your days brighter. love ya, whoever stumbles upon this.

-fern

[fern-writes-stuff]

This is the lucky clover cat. reblog this in 30 seconds & he will bring u good luck and fortune.