Brandelyn: Lyrical Contradiction

I prayed toward the moon
Hoping that the distance would be far enough away
to take this away
and for once leave a hole
instead of trying to find ways to fill this empty space

I'm simply searching for my escape

If I had one wish today
It would be to turn off these emotions that are so vital to my being

The heart and soul of my creativity

Today I want to simply be
Turn off this sensation that keeps my eyes aware of the constant presence of selfish tears
I prayed to leave here
Walk past this portion of my destiny, turn my head and ignore it
like I did that homeless man on the street
To smell chlorine, or maybe even bleach
Any kind of substance that will wipe my essence clean
I'm tired of looking and feeling and being mean
But not as much as I have enjoyed it lately
I wonder when I will stop hearing my Nana's voice every time I get the urge to cuss
Ashes to ashes
Dust to dust
The world I'm in right now is simply too much
I prayed for trust
Prayed for that moment in time when that thing that I've been saving myself for
Working so hard toward
Claiming to have faith for
Searching far and wide through the distance for
Begins to shine
And I'll relax and know that all of this
Wasn't in vain
I want to pray
Release these words to the heavens to the only one who can actually fix things
Kiss the wounds and make it better
The one who was clever enough to think I was strong enough to handle this mess
But I don't think I am
Sometimes I do honestly and sincerely wish all of this would just come to an end
So I could finally look God in the face and ask why
What was the point
And why was everything so hard
Because down here
We are told to keep quiet
Not to get mad
Just be silent, keep smiling, Take it and pray
That's all I was taught to do anyway
But the moon was too far to catch the trails of these fears
And God didn't pick up the phone
So who can I talk to
That will grant me my wishes
And allow me to once again
Appreciate the breeze and look up to send kisses
And not fades wishes
to the moon

© 2010 Brandelyn N. Castine

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6/22/10

I smell sunshine when I think about you
Taste the sweetness of raindrops when you cross my mind
Every day in your thoughts is a summer evening
And time melts into the distance
leaving nothing but all of you
In my space
You are welcome here
I’ve already opened the door
swept off the porch
poured the iced tea
pulled out the good chair
giving you a place to sit and sip on my thoughts
There is no need to knock
Silently ask for permission to enter this space
Come in
Sit down
Allow the vibes to twist us out of our comfort zones
And just be free
I like you
I mean I like having you take over my thinking place
You are welcome to stretch out in between the lines of my poetry
Examine them
Dissect them
Recreate them if you wish
They are technically yours
Because without you
These strings of words would not exist
I like the way you create your image of me
and how it matches my image of me
And the sound of your words etching out that vision of me
Leaves me flustered
Causing me to drop things
Stutter, stumble
Trip over my desire for perfection
Bumble over my words
Quite honestly
All the things I do on a normal day
But with you, these awkward moments are desirable
Maybe because my clumsiness is because of you
And because every time I fumble, stutter, or trip
I think of you
And the power you have to knock me off my axis
Because you see me, as I am
Appreciating
Liking
Desiring
Everything about me
Flaws and all
You stump me
Make words freeze on my tongue
Get caught up in my lips
Create brand new moments
That I can see with you
But can’t say to you
Forcing me to lean down hard on my poetry
And allow it to whisper the words I’m too shy to say
To you
So as your eyes soak in my blushing cheeks
My down turned eyes
Peeking out from underneath the curls of my lashes
I say to you
You are welcome
Please, come, sit down
Sip this glass of of my words
Free yourself of your insecurities
Until you become cool
Refreshed
Ready
You are safe here
Captured only by my words
That want only to melt free and embrace you
You are welcome
Please, Come in
And have a seat

© 2010 Brandelyn N. Castine 

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1. We never know the impact we have on people. I will never fully understand it, but when someone says they need me, I am there. When I don't hear those words, I am there anyway.
   
2. That is something I truly love about myself.
   
3. I am a person who does not respond well to compliments but will soak in harsh words and will wear them like my skin tone
4.  I listen to Jill Scott on repeat because she answers my questions, about life, in general
1. I promise we are related
2. I’m just sayin’
5.  Music is my sanity
   
6. I have accomplished a lot but feel like they are just baby steps on the road to my destiny
1. Hungry to take real strides
7. I love random words like cascade, behoove,  and word
1. And I mean 'word' in the I agree with you sense
2. I like saying it
8. I love the crackling sound a brand new book makes when you open it for the first time
9. I have grown to love hardcover books, but there is something about a nice worn paperback book that you got for a quarter off of the back rack in the used bookstore down the street
10. I carry Tide to go sticks with me everywhere because I am not one of those perfect people who can wear white clothes and ever get anything on it.
    
11. I am not one of those perfect people who can wear any color and not get anything on it
12. And I just really love the concept of tide to go sticks and how well they actually work, but I wonder if it is actually just water...
    
13. I could spend my Saturdays in used bookstores wearing a sundress with my shoulders out, big hair that is untamed, sandals and unpolished toes, and be truly happy
14. I love the light the floats into someone’s eyes when you offer a simple hello, a gentle reminder that I see you and no you are not invisible
1. I need that myself sometimes, which is why I constantly speak to people I see on the street, random strangers who are going through life, trying to keep their head above water, just like me
2. We are all the same. I forget that sometimes. We all breathe, cry, sweat and believe.
3. Or at least try to believe
4. In each other, despite the disappointment, In our dreams, despite the fear, In ourselves, despite ourselves
15. I love cupcakes, any kind really, but my favorite is white cake with white frosting.
1. I wonder if there is some kind of subconscious message in that
16. I'm a big girl, struggling to love herself everyday
17. I have had 350 million conversations about my weight and why having so much of it is bad, and why I should be unhappy, and unsatisfied with my life and how I should go to Ross, stock up on those silky animal print moo-moos and hide my shame behind a mean fried chicken recipe and flat worn down shoes that lean a little to the left, because as a big girl, I don't deserve to be as fly as I am...
    
18. <_<
    
19. I have always wondered why I should be ashamed of myself, why I should hide, cry, feel unsatisfied
20. I justify these conversations by saying that this person loves me, they care, so I nod, with my head cocked slightly to the left because I am listening, but it is rare that someone listens to me
21. If they did listen, they would hear me say that I have tried every diet under the sun, binged, exercised, girdled, hidden and tortured my temple for the sake of pleasing others until I realized that it just wasn't going to happen, I was not going to get down to the perfect size 6
1. I need to find the person who determined 6 to be the perfect size so I can slap them
2. I need to find the person who invented the word perfect so I can slap them too
3. I am deleting perfect from my vocabulary…
4. Done
22. If anyone would listen to what I had to say, I would say that at my last doctors appointment I was called a miracle because my blood pressure , cholesterol, sugar levels and whatever else they test came back better than a patient who runs marathons for living
23. I would say that I have bad knees because it is hereditary, and not because of my weight
24. I would say that I don't eat fast food, but drink wheat grass every morning, only started eating meat again after 3 years because my nutritionist said I wasn't getting all the vitamins and nutrients I need to maintain my energy and I drink enough water every day to drown a fish, and yes sometimes that is to mask the random coffee binges I go on, but I drink a lot of water none the less
25. Yes I love sweets and coffee, sue me
26. I am the picture of perfect health in a big girls frame because guess what, God made me this way
27. My size has opened my eyes to more than I can articulate and I'm destined to teach people how to love themselves as they are and to block out these conversations
28. But people don't listen, they are concerned, so they talk, and I listen, fighting with everything I have to block out the negative and let it float past me and not let it wrap itself around me and cover me like a shroud
29. I guess that's why I started talking to myself, justifying my crazy with the fact that I am an artist and this is exactly what I am supposed to do, internalize the ugly, swallow it whole, suck it out of the world so that it can't hurt someone who isn't strong enough to take it and regurgitate all of it back out in the form of something beautiful and let them know, its okay
30. Yeah, I am learning and most of all I am accepting who I am and really learning to like this chick who cuts her own hair, wears the busted pair of ugg boots to work just because she likes the way she walks in them
31. I go off on tangents that have nothing to do with the original conversation and blame it on my A.D.D.
32. When I say something, I mean it because to me, saying something out loud makes it real and is one of the most important acts of faith
33. I like to sit in silence sometimes and just clear my head, allow my thoughts to float free and travel until they settle down
34. I heard a poem last night that reminded me of how much I miss the 80’s. The days when people actually talked to each other and didn’t rely on text messages or emails to relay life changing messages. When kids had to go outside and play because watching that bouncing ball on Atari was only fun for so long. I miss the days of me being the family’s personal answering machine because we didn’t have an electronic one. When we would eat dinner together and sit down together to watch the Cosby show and a different world, when kids read actually books instead of electronic copies on little devices. When earphones were not worn as frequently as earrings. I miss those days, when people came together and face to face conversations weren’t a rarity that was to be treasured.
35. Blast technology. BLAST I say!
36. I am adding Blast to my list of words I like
    
37. I prefer to start writing my novels by hand before I start typing
1. That is how Maya Angelou wrote all of her books, every last one of them, and then she hands her handwritten pages over to someone to type them up for her
2. If we don’t leave a paper trail, our history would be lost. In a few years, everything will be electronic and we won’t even need museums and libraries any more because we will just be able to see what we need from the comforts of our own living rooms…
3. We are becoming hermits and don’t even realize it
4. There is a reason it feels so good to be outside and laughing and joking with real life human beings
5. Think about it.
38. I love God, like with an intensity that I can feel, physically, that makes me always want to be around Him and hide when I don’t act right.
1. I’ve been hiding a lot lately
2. Except, He can totally see me, so its not really hiding at all
3. Come back to me…
   
4. I hear you Jesus
39. I can’t stand it when people try to act a certain way in front of me because they know how much I love God, or that I am a published author, or a Delta, or whatever other things people want to attach to me that they feel should make me behave differently than I actually do.
    
1. If you knew me...
   
2. Just be yourself, and stop placing me in boxes.
40. A lot of times I feel invisible. But it is in those moments that I do my best work, so I have learned to embrace it
41. I love that art has no rules…
42. I saw a 17 year old girl last night who’s poetry nearly knocked me over…the fact that art was pouring out of her life was my motivation to shake off this self pity and get back to me. God is giving me a gift of life, time and freedom. I am at a fork in the road and I chose to go left, yield to the destiny God has designed and embrace that I am an artist and it is the gifts and talents and artistry that establish my place in the world. It will be my livelihood, enable me to send my brothers and kids to college, it will allow me to travel and inspire and smile because yes, I am actually satisfied with my life and fully acknowledge what a blessing it is to be able to do what you love, I am ready… and speaking these words because like I said, this is my act of faith.
43. It shall come to pass
44. This is just me…
45. “Love it, or leave it alone.” Alicia Keys

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