seek

you should not be afraid of my curiosity
you should let me seek you

muse

an ephemeral inspiration
a perrenial flirtation
that ebbs and flows and swells my heart
to sporadic creation

furtive and nimble
he creeps around the corner of the page
ardently i pursue him as
he invokes me to engage

a desire usurping
of this i cannot choose
i follow him desperately
my elusive muse

an ambit of mischeif
that radiates his girth
a pirate smile, wicked yet sincere
seductive wild mirth

surely a stranger
but somehow i know him well
familial yet esoteric
my charming infidel

winter # 5

winter is for temptation

the ocean on my right

I went for a run tonight. I missed the sunset, but there was something so beautiful about the evening. Beautiful evenings just have to be given to someone, don't they....
I looked out to the ocean on my right, into the dark wide expanse of deepest blue, and I thought, I felt, for a glorious suspended 30 seconds, that the ocean would swallow me whole.

(For Gemma)

Sophie's dancing

There's this thing that you do....

You dance with your eyes closed

Not clenched shut in defiance.

Just a .... gentle shutting of the curtains. 

It's a beautiful expression of... Feeling free. I feel like you are in your own world, but still here with us. You don't shut anyone out by closing your eyes. You simply.... Bring something very special, very free into your body. I think maybe your eyes are shut to protect that thing. 

And you dance. Sometimes it's just a little shuffle. You bop your head around 

Sometimes it's an all out jive. 

You get this beat in your whole body. You do this great thing with your hands. 

I love watching people watch you. 

This quizzical expression on their face. I can imagine their thought process: surprise and thrall in equal parts. 

Because its not that usual. To see someone dance freely. 

But it's beautiful. And they understand that. I recognise certainty on people's faces. People know when they are in the presence of something strong. unique. untouchable. 

I wonder if you know the impact you have on people, when you are peacefully, comfortably, insouciantly yourself. 

attenuating future fears

I have had a very definitive and glorious turn around in my thoughts about a certain area of my life. and I have just felt so mired, so dismantled by my fears in this area. So a new perspective is a wonderful, welcome thing.

What scares me is the future. Not generally - mostly I feel very excited about it. I have a beautiful foundation level of confidence in my life. in my soul, in what i seek, what i cultivate. Except for the very specific area of my studies and my future career. Maybe the fact that I usually feel so bold and sure and confident, even in my erratic-ness - maybe thats what makes this fear seem so powerful. Because I am not used to that kind of... lack of self belief.

I remember the moment that I realised that a lack of self belief was bound up in this fear. It's not me, it has no place in my heart. But it has crept in and I dont know how to combat it.

I find the legal field - to get a job - it just seems so unachievable to me. so elusive. so complicated. there is nothing about it that feels simple, or achievable or even understandable.
I like studying law. I am pretty good at it. I enjoy it most of the time, to a reasonable extent. But this next step... it just feels so far away. I dont know how to get there, or to get to a place where getting there seems more achievable, or even the steps involved in getting there....
I feel like I dont even know the little steps involved that would get me there. that would make me less fearful, less intimidated.

But then I am so afraid of anything that represents getting a job, so afraid of being confronted with this reality, that I am too scared to even start looking. To figure out what those steps are, which would probably attenuate my fears.

Fear is so powerful. I dont often feel that afraid. I dont know how to respond to large scale intimidation.
little things that intimidate me... I thrive on that. I love a challenge. it excites me.
But anything beyond that ambit - anything TOO uncertain or TOO intimidating or TOO important ...

it completely dismantles me.

and my mind, it puts up walls. I cant deal with this intimidation so I just shut it out. 
So I have been clinging to the fact that I will finish at the end of next year, a semester after most of my friends. because i feel like i need time. to find out how to not be so afraid. i need to put off facing that fear for as long as i can. facing the fear of finishing a 5-6 year degree without a job. and how demoralising that would be.

But yesterday I realised that I had done more units than I thought, and that I would probably finish midway through the year next year.
and for the first time that did not paralyse me with fear.


I am starting to think about other options. i am starting to wonder about how comitted i really feel to studying and praciticing law. I feel.... like sometimes ive put in a mediocre effort to studying. ive felt ambivalent too often. I have great moments of dedication, passion even,

but now i just feel so sick of it, but i dont feel i even deserve to be sick of it. I know what its like to have a usurping desire, a usurping comitment for something. and ideally, naively, i dont want anything less for my life. but thats not law for me. not right now anyway. i dont know how to reconcile myself to that.

i know that i started law thinking that i would do this for the sensible version of myself. i would do this because i beleived it was my potential. and then if i wasnt happy with it, i could pursue something more reckless and creative.

so maybe i will do that. Maybe I could save up and live somewhere new for a year, and do some study in something that really thrills me like language. or like creative writing.

maybe i will even audition for waapa. which is what i really wanted to do in high school. act.

The most important thing is that I have realised that if I dont get a job in law it is not the be all and end all... its probably not even what i want to do, or will be happy doing - so why let it make me so afraid!? maybe if I feel less intimidated, maybe that will open doors.

sunset

I am sitting at the beach and the evening is gathering around me. The tide is very high tonight. The waves are like heavy hammers against the shore, the sand is sinking under its weight. 

There was this great mass of clouds, like a heaving purple beast. A dark deep purple, almost grey. Splayed across the horizon. And the sun dripped beneath it, like a golden amber liquid. It was like this purple beast was wounded and bleeding across the sky. When all the light had finally gone, the purple clouds dissipated and dispersed. Like the golden liquid was all that was holding the beast together. I felt like I was attending some sort of majestic funeral of the sky. 

And then the clouds regrouped, but darker this time. An angry deep gathering grey of cumulus. 

I love the dimensions of clouds. I feel like I'm looking deep into the horizon.

(For Dylan)