17. Dixie Donuts, Cary Street, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

I blame all things on this body,

an increasingly unfamiliar form

disguised by the paint of many wars,

paint effortfully applied to make it my home.

But it's not a place where I'm at ease.

It demands too much from me with its

always overreaching arms

flexed in false confidence

searching for something to embrace.

Fitful fistfuls of fingers

like a herd of unruly children

touching and teaching.

And these damn legs

that have forgotten how to bend in rest

and only know how to run.

This body is a dangerous collection of angles

through which faulty wires run live

triggering a symphony of false alarms.

And in this catastrophic noise and motion

I try to live and find some truth.

But I am just a voiceless passenger

who watches things disassemble 

from the ceaseless vibration of this body.

Your Friend,

A

16. Maymont Park, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

I am bilingual

a cloud of language

a dense collection of words

certain to burst.

I speak in storms

ungovernable rain

falling in audible patterns

filling or flooding.

Some messages unspoken

observable in the shadows

cast by my folded arms

and the electric angles of my eyes.

What's seen and heard

frequently colliding

thunder and lightening

an imperfect storm.

Your Friend,
A

Interlude

I wanted to acknowledge that many of these initial posts have utilized the same pieces of writing. This repetition was intentional. In part, this was an effort to examine how people in different places react to the same piece of writing. There were also instances that I felt like the same piece of writing was well-suited for different environments.

That being said, I will be shifting into new writing in future flags. One of the primary objectives in this experiment is to propel me into frequent writing. It is my hope that by writing on a daily basis I can practice the articulation of my thoughts and purge whatever mental congestion lingers within. 

15. Virginia Commonwealth University English & History Offices, Franklin Street, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

There are 1,013,913 words

moving in a current between my ears.

When I close my eyes to see inside myself

they spill out from my mouth

and are ejected from my fingertips.

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 3

Love

Hate

Fear

and in those times those words 

each grow inside me like a child.  

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 2

You

I

and in those times those words 

seem to be enough.

Your Friend,

A

14. Ellwood Thompson's Local Market, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

Quiet acknowledgement of self

awareness interrupted 

by fevers of stimulation.

I'm riding this cosmic metronome

with unyielding momentum

to and fro between

where I should and shouldn't go.

The place in-between

a mystical middle

with proper allotments of all things.

It's glimpsed in passing

like that highway sign I miss

and huff, "God damn! I'm lost."

But even in fear propelled

to search for signs

as the metronome sounds

increasingly like typewriter chatter.

My story's being written

one letter at a time.

Your Friend,

A

13. Grace Street, Richmond, Virginia

To You:

This year has been an angry fumbling
in the dark
I have torn through pictures of you
muted Polaroid pictures
of our bodies postured.
With water in my mouth
I've shuffled and reshuffled
all the things you showed and said
and suffocated in the humid grief of silence.
My mind has been in tantrum
throwing thoughts like punches
into the wind from your departure.
Your swift flight into the openness startled me
as if you had died unexpectedly
in the birth of our creation.
I, this screaming infant
Wrestled from the womb of words
you spoke
of how each piece of me was yours
and that we were bound in this perfection.
I wrote you off.
Then I wrote you a letter
begging for you hands on me
and you came in hurried aegis
like a parent to a child in nightmare.
A return like a hushed lullaby.
I finally slept.
I finely slept.
And awoke with the taste of honey.
But daybreak brought stillness
and my awakening from a puerile dream.

From,
A

12. Belmont Public Library, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You:

My job is moving boxes.

I lift them.

I carry them. 

I stack them.

It requires no mental acuteness

just force and motion.

I am a workhorse.

Once this was a source of shame.

A downfall.

A disgrace.

A disappointment.

A failure not exclusively my own

passed with bread at the family table.

But I'm not a simple beast.

Untaxed by trade my mind is free.

It's a resourceful explorer

wandering like a wild creature

not a broken brute.

Your Friend,

A

11. Visual Arts Center of Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

There are 1,013,913 words

moving in a current between my ears.

When I close my eyes to see inside myself

they spill out from my mouth

and are ejected from my fingertips.

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 3

Love

Hate

Fear

and in those times those words 

each grow inside me like a child.  

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 2

You

I

and in those times those words 

seem to be enough.

Your Friend,

A

10. Grayland Street Community Garden, Richmond, Virginia

18 July 2014

To You,

There are 1,013,913 words
moving in a current between my ears.
When I close my eyes to see inside myself
they spill out from my mouth
and are ejected from my fingertips.

There are 1,013,913 words
but sometimes there are only 3
Love
Hate
Fear
and in those times those words
each grow inside me like a child.

There are 1,013,913 words
but sometimes there are only 2
You
I
and in those times those words
seem to be enough.

Your Friend,
A

9. Cherry Street, Richmond, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

I'm an alcoholic.
Like any true alcoholic
I accept no absolutes
outside of the bottled variety.
Nothing is true without adequate testing
including the truth that I'm an alcoholic.

Each leaf of truth cast down
by those much taller and sturdier than I
has been crushed into a palatable consistency
to put in my pipe and smoke.

I have ground great piles of wisdom
into a coarse collection of words:
God and Goodness
Motherhood and Moderation
Wife and Work
and burned them.

So long I've sat lost in hazy firelight
exhaling only smoke and hot air
that I've forgotten the shape of my body and
my mind can't assemble all of the real I've dismantled.

I've become an edge-less form
unable to outline myself.

I want to be a woman
with soft curves and a sweet mouth.
I want to be a woman
with pillow-tipped fingers.
But first I must be a human
that doesn't always bind myself
into the saddle of discomfort
and ride off in search of things to set ablaze.

This is a truth that I hold a match to
this night and every night
as I consider whether or not to fill my glass.

Your Friend,
A

8. Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, Virginia Beach, Virginia

18 July 2014

To You,

There are 1,013,913 words

moving in a current between my ears.

When I close my eyes to see inside myself

they spill out from my mouth

and are ejected from my fingertips.

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 3

Love

Hate

Fear

and in those times those words 

each grow inside me like a child.  

There are 1,013,913 words

but sometimes there are only 2

You

I

and in those times those words 

seem to be enough.

Your Friend,

A

7. 47 1/2th Street & Atlantic Avenue, Virginia Beach, Virginia

July 2014

To You,

Quiet acknowledgement of self

awareness interrupted 

by fevers of stimulation.

I'm riding this cosmic metronome

with unyielding momentum

to and fro between

where I should and shouldn't go.

The place in-between

a mystical middle

with proper allotments of all things.

It's glimpsed in passing

like that highway sign I miss

and huff, "God damn! I'm lost."

But even in fear propelled

to search for signs

as the metronome sounds

increasingly like typewriter chatter.

My story's being written

one letter at a time.

Your Friend,

A

6. Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, Virginia

5 July 2014

To You:

Art is heightened humanism.

The uncommon communion of the brain's many corners.

This stimulated muscle unfurling

a woven wonder if harmonious thought.

Stripped like lovers

tangents of the mind unite.

Your Friend,

A

5. Fountain Lake, Richmond, VIrginia

9 July 2014

To You:

My job is moving boxes.
I lift them.
I carry them.
I stack them.
It requires no mental acuteness
just force and motion.

I am a workhorse.

Once this was a source of shame.
A downfall.
A disgrace.
A disappointment.
A failure not exclusively my own
passed with bread at the family table.

But I'm not a simple beast.

Untaxed by trade my mind is free.
It's a resourceful explorer
wandering like a wild creature
not a broken brute.

This flag is a wish to communicate with anyone it reaches. It's an invitation for you to share your thoughts about this place or this letter or anything really...

Your Friend,
A

4. Northbank Trail, Richmond, VIrginia

13 July 2014

To You:

This year has been an angry fumbling
in the dark
I have torn through pictures of you
muted Polaroid pictures
of our bodies postured.
With water in my mouth
I've shuffled and reshuffled
all the things you showed and said
and suffocated in the humid grief of silence.
My mind has been in tantrum
throwing thoughts like punches
into the wind from your departure.
Your swift flight into the openness startled me
as if you had died unexpectedly
in the birth of our creation.
I, this screaming infant
Wrestled from the womb of words
you spoke
of how each piece of me was yours
and that we were bound in this perfection.
I wrote you off.
Then I wrote you a letter
begging for you hands on me
and you came in hurried aegis
like a parent to a child in nightmare.
A return like a hushed lullaby.
I finally slept.
I finely slept.
And awoke with the taste of honey.
But daybreak brought stillness
and my awakening from a puerile dream.

From,
A

3. Juneau Arts & Culture Center, Juneau, Alaska

5 July 2014

To You:

Art is heightened humanism.

The uncommon communion of the brain's many corners.

This stimulated muscle unfurling

a woven wonder if harmonious thought.

Stripped like lovers

tangents of the mind unite.

This flag is a wish to communicate with anyone it reaches. It's an invitation for you to share your thoughts about this place or this letter or anything really...

Your Friend,

A

wordsinwait.blogspot.com 

2. Montana Creek Trail, Juneau, Alaska

                                                                                                                                        1 July 2014

To You:

In all the other places that I've been, thin fingers of nature cling desperately to the ground, crushed under the footfalls of progress. Not so in Alaska. Here the early world wraps its giant arm protectively around the land. It raises its hand demanding to be acknowledged and obeyed. It hovers above all things and with splayed fingers warns---STOP!

Here in Alaska civilization is outnumbered by trees, so many trees that you can see their collective breath rising from the mountains. The trees are the lungs of this landscape creating clouds with a mythic force not unlike the Creator Raven. Mountains disappear into these clouds in a willful reminder to all of us far below that they belong only to themselves, that we voyage up them at our own risk, that we too can disappear into their mysterious greatness.


This flag is the first of many to be scattered across the country. It's a wish to communicate with anyone it reaches. It's an invitation for you to share your thoughts about this place or this letter or anything really...

Your Friend,
A

wordsinwait.blogspot.com

1. The Herbert Glacier Trail, Juneau, Alaska

To You:

We touch with electronic appendages
not feeling what has the potential to be there
or what once existed
when people were more than typeset timelines
    when words were propelled by air
    not by the compression of keys
    when conversations were subtle songs the ear collected
    not dangling threads pressed in glass.

   We have become isolated observers
   wandering a digital landscape.


On Independence Day it seems appropriate to wish for escape from our self-imposed isolation. This flag is just that--It's a wish to communicate with anyone it reaches. It's an invitation for you to share your thoughts about this place or this letter or anything really...

Your Friend,
A

wordsinwait.blogspot.com