Sunday, September 25, 2011




I had a math test on Friday. I considered running away with the circus and traveling the world, all unkempt hair and acrobatics and striped performing tents. I would be math and Ms Partridge* free. I was cheered a bit by the pretty little idea and off I went to school.



I think I failed the test.



Addy Baird: Oh, Hayley. I bombed a math test today. Like, really god awful. 68 percent. Say something that will make me feel better.



Me: Addy, I lie not: on my math test last week I got a 67 percent. Us English kids just don't work well with trite numbers, but at least we can commiserate eloquently.



Addy Baird: Hey, that made me smile. Thank you, baby.



Me: Keep your head up, pretty thing. Math is for squares.



Math is my antagonist. I beat petty numbers into submission with utter lack of charm, and usually end up with the wrong answer. With negatives and positives and sin and cosine, I find myself hopelessly uninterested. Un-passionate may more accurately define. Lead Einstein and his E= MC^2 far away from me.



*Ms Partridge: pre-calculus teacher and bane of my existence, bears striking resemblance to Mrs Tweedy from Chicken Run, often tells me to quit talking or put away my book, finds a grotesque happiness in watching highschooler's sweat and squirm under a burdensome math load, glares at me as if she would like to chop of my head and bake me into a pot pie.





Busy, busy, busy.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Automatic stop




Grandma: Hi, pretty girl. How are you?


Me: I'm good, how are you?


Grandma: I don't know. ...Old.








Anxiety killed the cat.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011



I came home from school one Thursday afternoon, and found a cream envelope from the Brigham Young University Department of English sitting on the counter. My name and address were typed in courier new. I love mail. I ripped it open.

Inside was one sheet of paper, and typed on it was this:


The Meaning of Life


I listen late into the night
for the music of the spheres.
I look religiously at faroff stars
trying to see what matters.
Stars seldom look back.

Last night I saw granddaughters
dancing, all giggle and wiggle,
hips and hair everywhere,
wild as seeding dandelions.
When I came in


Hayley stumbled toward me
arms opening, smile widening,
tongue tripping over "Grampa,"
"Grampa" -- liking me this moment
more than lively music.

Searching for my soul as far as Orion,
Trying to distill happiness from starshine,
hungry for the life in constellated light,

I find myself sometimes illuminated
in the stars in Hayley's eyes.

And then, hand-written:

This is from when you were three or four- inspiring even then.
-Grandpa

I'm the luckiest, with a grandpa like that.

Stop, drop, and roll.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011



And Blue


I was good at questions
which
filled up space and softened
the angles of our elbows and
twisted us by tangled spines
while my cherry lips were scalded by
those angry little vowels
that banged and bruised my tired mouth
until you strung them out like beads.

And I wrote your words in the margins
of my cracking family bible
they made a mess of Psalms
as the wet ink dripped and danced,
black and white and blue.

For we always knew it was much more crime scene than mystery

and much less mystery
than
the thriller novels we browsed in the closing bookstore
and the romance novels

we laughed at.

Sunday, September 11, 2011


The unfortunate side of having an angel for an English teacher is that I've got a higher standard. I'm having writer's block of the worst kind. My recounting of Yellowstone as a child is falling flat, the first five sentences are at least. When every word is supposed to be put there to serve a specific purpose, the choosing becomes tricky.

So I gave up and I've been watching September 11 picture montage's and crying in bed. But I can't think of anything good to write about that either.


Gold teeth and a curse for this town.

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

x's and o's











We browse romance novels while we should be in school and I wanted our fortune told for 50 cents . But our pockets were empty and I thought to myself, I guess we'll just wait and see.


I think I'm an optimist and...








Stripes are our specialty.