I went to a woman’s house I was seeing. a different one. she asked if I wanted to take a bath with her. we took a bath in chamomile and epsom salt and I began to tell her that I thought my house was haunted. or rather, that I had many astral experiences that I wanted to dissect.  the water was lukewarm and we rubbed each other’s legs. she didn’t shave and that didn’t bother me. she had no hair. I was attracted to her because she looked dainty like a pretty boy. I liked men who were effeminate and manageable. she was shorter than me but always wore heeled boots. last time we met at her house I asked if I could go down on her for practice and she let me. 

I started tonight by telling her the colorado story. we had settled in the bath. she demanded lumination. she had spent hours defending her position as a witch already and she was claiming she had right to the deific heritage. I was sort taken aback by all labels and confused about my own identity beginning to walk the line to use the label “queer” “bisexual” “gay” “splintered.”I ignored some of her incendiary thoughts around the use of such a coveted title and didn’t dare go into any detail about my summoning of Lilith. in fact, I puposely left that out by going very far back to Boulder. I begin by telling her:

“I once took a nap in the middle of the day and woke up to a woman, a white woman, like glowing white. not wearing a gown but I guess you could say it was a gown as well. she had big, bright blue eyes. she was right next to the top of my bed. probably about 2:30 pm and  was bright outside. I tell her that the white woman was saying “it’s ok it’s ok” and then within no change of frame, she’s gone and next to the oven is a green glowing orb. I then feel like I’m being pulled from my body and I hear like a spit sound near my ear. like my spit is sucking back. I feel like I’m floating.  I panic and try to drop down in the bed and then I feel myself realign and settle in. almost as if I have walked back into my spine.  I wake up. I text my ex boyfriend because he was super scared of aliens. he used to get too high and call me at 330 am afraid of his closet. true story. so I told him first. my sponsor at the time told me to get a shaman.”

“yeah,” she interrupts.

I think of the line from my friend’s film. I am the Jinn. but I don’t say it. I tell her the most recent visitor. there was this thing that looked like my brother. but had a stretched face. he was wearing a white tee shirt and, I settle my hand on her shin and lean forward. people have described me as being nearly apathetic to human connection.  he was pointing to a painting on the wall. it was a tree he had painted. and then suddenly I’m  like screaming but in the astral realm and feeling claws on my legs and I tried to climb back in bed. 

“you need a guide.”
“I don’t do well with guides.”
“these entities are pulling you out as  you sleep.”
“mmm.”

that was a troubling thought. she said:

“it sounds like you aren’t astrally traveling but being pulled into the astral realm.”

she let me borrow a book on tethering to Earth during astral travel and some other things about spirit work, lighting candles, what to ask for, etc. and also a book about polyamory. very thick book. I pretended I would read it and nodded a lot. we didn’t have sex. we looked at her crystal collection. she named all of them and where she got them which is cool because I can’t remember what I did with my garnet, let alone, when I got it.  or rather, every few years I throw things away. so whether I have that garnet seems up to God. we hung out on her bed. she was scolding me for deviating from known mechanisms and chants.

“the mantras have existed for thousands of years. we say the mantras because they are being heard over and over and gaining power as they are spoken.”
“I like to make my own mantras and repeat them over and over.

 I was there because she had a special solstice ritual the next day and this was the only night we could hang out.  I watched her cut ginger and make us strong tea. I sat in her kitchen regaling her with all the ways my dreams have been keeping me on edge. she was abrasive because I refused input but seemed palms open. I was also leaving a lot out.  she resented women using the term “witch” unless they were of a witch’s heritage. I learned a few things from her. 

“my mother was a witch,” she said to me matter of factly. “it’s in my blood line.”

use ginger liberally. boil for ten minutes. offer friends tea and baths of chamomile are sweet but roomier with one. you can shave your legs if you want. ideas of polyamory are attractive in theory but you also have to be attracted to the person you are fucking. controlling identities is limiting and bossy people are kind of a mood kill for exploration. it wasn’t her I liked. I am loyal in a very secret way becoming fixated on one person at a time. I left not knowing how I felt at all. about her or her concern that “entities are pulling me out of my body at night.” what mantra would I say?

God.

I walked to my car wanting to walk longer. wanting to skin myself of any fragrance left from her couch. 

12/21/2016

dream I was in my childhood home staring at a clear statue on top of my parent’s old stereo in our living room. it moved its head and pointed up. 

today I sat and stared upwards at a drone for thirty minutes. tt was just a guy flying a drone over the Ben Franklin Parkway, maybe tracking traffic or just testing it out.  but I was unsure. I wanted every shot he downloaded to have me staring intensely right at it. an act of patience and tenacity. 

I don’t like being watched unless it’s pinpoint bulls eye only two eyes on me and I invited them. 

12/20/2016

the rule is dreams. I have to post the dreams as they really were to match the date as well. only filling in details of accuracy. I can’t lie about the dreams.

dreamt I was crying to xxx and telling her I had an attachment disorder that’s why I can’t open up to people. crying next to her. crying in bathroom. helping someone cook in my kitchen but I was embarrassed of my kitchen. was helping to clean up.

at some other part of the dream, I was in some sort of ceremony and was embracing people. I was scared to go into the dark. xxx was with his girlfriend again. I was wandering around losing everything. 

my moods move houses. I made a list of all the things I enjoyed and none of them involved people:

yoga
walking
reading
writing
eating
earl gray tea
art
poetry
nature
animals
herbs
flowers
learning/being studious

my moods move houses. they move them and they jump into them. 

12/7/2016

I had begun to rearrange my house and make use of the chest that came with the side room. this gaudy yellow carnival looking piece, all wood. the people that helped me to move asked if I wanted it removed. but I loved the mirror. the case itself  was weird. I found it tacky.  it looks like it was made for an arcade fortune teller that you stick coins inside. I began to decorate it now. having not known what to do with it. first the urn. then black tourmaline and driftwood from oceanview. then a picture of us: my brother and I as children and the brass piece he made in high school. an old art project. 

I also began to cry in my bathtub. it felt good. I rearranged the chest and then took a long bath. I lined the tub with crystals and about three candles. I let the music drift in. it was all ambient. all I could take. I would let minutes tick by as I watched  the candles make shapes in their little glass containers. and I don’t know if I made meaning of it. it seems like I did inquire things and then wait for pictures. I sat back more in the bath then I did on any couch. my tub was chipping away slowly. the paint coming off. the thing repainted over and over and so poorly at that. I had given up asking for help with it shortly after I moved. I soaked in that tub many nights beginnign that fall. it always smelled like lavender. 

I was laid out in the tub like that night after night, stoned, watching candles project shadows on my wall.sometimes I would see the centipede on the ceiling the day before knowing it had been in here having seen it here before. in the tub as my cat watched it. I thought of it like a friendly wraith. here to deliver something to me. a symbol of luck. others detest insects but I make vows to protect them. 

 if anyone asked how I was doing, I said fine.

12/5/2016

I told my therapist my journaling was unreliable and I showed her the last few pages were just black thick lines I drew.  I call them “borders,” I tell her. I don’t like writing every day. I don’t like the minutae.that’s not it either. I walk a lot. she knows that. I spend one to two hours walking around the city aimlessly. it feels like nurturing a need. I do like my apartment and the stained glass windows. I have been rearranging that side room again. I have begun to use the mirror chest as a holder for my brother’s ashes. 

12/3/2016

dreamt someone was singing “God wants you to enjoy outside pleasures”

it’s Friday night and I am going on a date with a woman. I have only been smoking weed again for two weeks but this feels like a good choice to get high before. two hours before so I can cool off and then walk there. I need the relaxation and something about it really opens me up to channel whatever I find most encompassing about my environment. I feel it like pinpricks everywhere. whatever the mood is. whatever my mood is and then how the environment responds. 

when I show up, the first thing she tells me is my sweater is inside out. I told her I was wearing a dress but got nervous and changed into pants. so I could feel like myself, I added. she asked me how I got here and I said I walked. it takes me about forty five minutes. I loved walking west philly and the river trail equally.  I waited before telling her I was high to gauge if this would offend her. I didn’t have to tell her but I confess. almost on instinct. anything at all. not even pressured.  

we were meeting for ethiopian. I love eating with my hands. I love sharing dishes. there was a coziness to it. and I can eat a lot. it comforts me if we are both really enjoying the meal. I  waited until I sat down to pull off my sweater feeling more comfortable seated and hidden. I was very attracted to her and it’s not that I don’t want to be desired but I am  cloaked. the act of arching my back to pull the sleeve out made me self conscious. I was wearing a black tight undershirt; a low cut long sleeved tee. I sat perfect posture once I got it off. I had combed my hair but worn a hat so I had to keep it on. my boots were also black like my jeans and five inches tall. when I am anxious, I like to intimidate my environment to back up.

 people have revealed to me that the first impression they have of me is that I’m completely unaffected by anything that’s happening.  I am cool in my distance and bulls eyed on something. staid. targeted and without emotion. I can be very engaged and I love laughing, chit chat, being in on it but I am devoid in some other sense.within moments of sitting, I had explained to her that my sweater was inside out because I was nervous and changed and now I’m more nervous because it was inside out and I’m a little high.  I told her I didn’t drink and that I smoked weed before I got here and that I’d only been smoking weed for two weeks since I got sober in AA. I was wearing makeup but I did show a lot of teeth. just laughing at the situation and smiling. also engaged with her process as she began to reveal her history. when I smile in front of someone in a bare face, that means something.  if we were measuring vulnerabilities, some things have more weight then what you say.

I am not armed but just steel.
like I am a steel gate.

I dreamt I slept with xxx again. he told me he didn’t like the way I talked about someone I dated. I told him that wasn’t true. we slept together and tried to start over.

(the rest of the page is just dark lines intersecting everywhere like tree branches or a grid. it takes up two pages. they are fat and thick and black)

11/17/2016

dream I was trying to rescue a child and thought the child was me. kept thinking I’m going into the darkside. my dark side. there was also me confronting a woman rapist who had raped a child. I was crying and telling her I got raped. 

time moves slowly. I have almost no motivation to leave my bed. I am amazed that I am combing my hair. if I do, it is a cause for applause. mostly I am wearing the same black pants and some sweater and the same gray hat. I have not worn makeup in weeks. almost nothing gets done except basic hydration and that is questionable given my like for coffee. I don’t remember eating and hours go by. I usually have a handful of almonds. maybe a clementine. every time I looked at the clock it was 12:12 or 2:12 or someone other derivative. i’m not hungry. i am vapid like a hole in space. 

to do: get toothpaste. 

11/16/2016

“I am a boundary to something else but I don’t know what.”

I dreamt I was assisting with stealing cars. I wanted a green balloon black. a man was holding it. it had the number “8” all over it. I said it was my lucky balloon. my friends were showing me how to steal cars.

sometimes I just flit about  inside in agony like I’m a bunch of tiny bugs trapped inside a skin suit. 

11/14/2016