Yes, this poem was about her

Monday, September 20, 2010
To exist as if You did not
Danielle D. Billington

To exist as if You did not

I respond to your ghostly controls
Constellated archetypal stellar positions of synchronicity
Ghost owl cat bird eye tree
Steal time waste time
erasing me
Relativization
Dark matter explodes thoughts
The world we made is falling apart bridge by bridge
brick by brick
A strange humidity refuses to dissipate
Falling through sidewalks into nothingness
Make me invisible
Disconnection happens because there is no time
You exist in a black hole that consumes, rips apart
Spits out remnants to float dead and alone
Amongst burnt out stars and cosmic dust waiting for
the hand of God
What’s the use of Sanskrit now?
Your kiss like sulphur
My heart a chemical puddle
So tired my face aches, skin tight around my eyes
Like taut canvas waiting for the application of something grand.

Avant Garde writer with no story, no plot. (Czyzm)

(No, just the real inner world actuality) “In inner plot prose…the critic says, the experiment doesn’t quite succeed. Without characters or something resembling a story, there is nothing for the voice-intriguing as it gets to stick to; it becomes disembodied. Thus Passes Through, is not so much a novel as a 206 page poem. ..the question is, how long can you listen to a mind…I can’t help but feel despite its well wrought prose, Passes Through would have achieved much more if it had engaged the outside world once in awhile…”

That man in a suit is worlds away from. Man, suit, newspaper, laptop, testosterone, social construct, Tell us your dreams sports illustrated swimsuit edition, save the world quantum leap, fingers to forehead a stressful day in the world you created and help maintain. Two splenda in your coffee, got them yourself instead of making the tattooed barista do it for you. Progress, progress. I guess. Take off your glasses, not your eyes. Put your eyes up on your dominance. It establishes the relationship between things. Each of us our own world, our own world. We can take a trip to you, travel, unpack, visit, for awhile, but can never live within you. This is the end, this is what destroyed you most, why you’re so desperate to get inside, but you can never see. As if you or I or anyone needed another reminder of our mortality.

Bits of prose and poem

Liberate art from form. Shifting pronouns existing outside inside of time. there is no narration, no plot, no intention, no memories and poetic phrases bring some semblance of story together. memories exist outside time in shift and rhyme. it is extravagant prose that tries to be pretty. puff of seedling rolls across the table like a spider hiding clues poorly. visceral, like breaking glass pieces scattered, evoke, evocative like the almost silent chimes. Chimes in a song, an assault of images mimicking the internal monologue. loose yourself into the stream, do not demand anything from beauty but to be pretty words in a vortex. contrived is structure structure the plot engine temporal frame narrative drive why, why metafiction. if you have this, you must have that, but why? 6 billion of us to hell, hard to believe. body breaks, velvet underground if sleep ever comes.

In the End

people play games for reassurance
it's easier than asking
10,000 green trees
exhale our sadness
a dragonfly stops for a moment
contemplates me, while I contemplate
him
the trees love in the breeze
I sip my coffee, squint at
the sun and wish someone
understood
sweat trickles down my face
the breeze cools it
birds sing, squirrels chirp, water
flows, wind blows, time passes
I expose my shoulders to the sun
and return to reading
what is left behind and done

love is so much ephemera
a dry cleaning ticket traveling
towards a sewer grate
playing underneath
modern art
cat batting at a curtain cord
you, with my heart
Venus flytrap,
sticky sweet glue
I want to be trapped, consumed
her silver hammered words
like lightening strikes
blinding me, burning me
shocking me
I'll put it inbetween these two books
the beautiful thing
these beautiful things
you made me

Academia and Experimental Writing

I'm terrible at formal writing, so forgive me. This will be very casual. For my senior seminar, I applied with manuscript, to the creative writing section here at the U. I was accepted, by Julie Schumacher, who
is now the head of the creative writing program. She contantly commented on how wonderful my work was. The other students in class scoffed at my work, not considering it fiction because it did not follow the norm. Plot, character etc... No one wanted to be challenged, or discuss alternatives to traditional writing. The class was beneficial because I wrote, and received postive feedback & encouragement from the Professor, enough that I thought I might be able to get into the MFA program here, as she really seemed to like my work. She told me I should be very proud of what I had accomplished (perhaps I will post that short story here) etc...etc...I applied to the U, with her letter of recommendation, and did not get in. Did not even receive a private note. I submitted a manuscript to a Grad level fiction class, following my rejection and was chosen out of numerous applicants. Again, my work is very experimental, non-traditional, it's not as if these Prof's received standard work and were surprised once class started. I called this class the stab myself in the eye class, because that is what I wanted to do to
myself every class period. I thought MFA students would be excited about writing, want to discuss and exchange ideas, but instead they talked about their personal lives and how my work was nothing... maybe it was pretty words, but that was all (to this day I would like to see them come up with words as pretty as mine). I became silent, tired of trying to explain the validity of what I was doing, tired of being attacked, instead of having my work and viewpoint explored. And I am not just saying this, the majority of work in that class was mediocre at best. Things I was writing years ago, things people have written a hundred times before. I went to the Professor's office one day, and without uttering a word, he said, I know, I know, the class is disorganized, unfocused, out of control. He asked ME to help him get it back on track! I was the undergrad...he was the Prof. He wasn't defending me, I sure as hell was not going to do his job for him. He gave me a B+, claimed I had not turned in all my work (which I had and could prove) and told me I didn't participate in discussion enough. I stopped writing for 2 years. I questioned my desire to ever apply to another MFA program. If this was what it was going to be like, I wanted no part of it. The 'workshopping' of my pieces by other students was half hearted and completely unhelpful, as they had no desire to expand their horizons and understand what I was doing. There is no room for anything, other than the norm. I did not hold a high opinion of the loft, but knew I never wanted to take another writing course at the U of MN. I reviewed their offerings and noticed a class called Intuitive Writing. I was skeptical, but have been very pleased so far. The environment is welcoming to all styles of writing. People are there because they want to write, not because they need to feel superior to others, or be unquestioning. It is a supportive environment. I understand not everyone is a 'good' writer, but if you want to, need to write, this class is just the ticket. The teacher opens with physical exercises, making noises, stretching, word generation, etc...then she gives us an exercise. Pick one of these words and start writing without thinking or stopping. Perfect! I understand the need to craft sometimes, but I don't believe it is always required. Though I feel what I am doing is over most of their heads, I do not feel judged. This class has me writing and thinking and talking about my viewpoint on writing. Granted, most people are beginners and don't have much to say, but I still feel supported.
After this class finished, the teacher asked if I had thought about applying to the U's MFA program? Ironic? I'm sorry this is such a mess. I don't really have time to pause and craft at work.
I hope to post something about what my writing is about (though I don't
even understand it fully).

Covered

Silently softly flakes fell below light while
Alone the moon emptied nothing sudden
Beside the silence
When disturbed I felt cold
Upon the new ground

Excerpt from a new piece

There were messages in the morphine, lethargy at the edge. The pleasure of doing math escapes me and I’m not a sensitive am I? Eternal intellectual pitfalls, what madness is this? No logic or material evidence, love transparent, ephemeral, translucent like a spirit mist. I caught a glimpse of it once and like a ghost hunter I keep trying to capture proof. And what I want is to not have to return to work, to make God’s acquaintance, to be what you thought I was, to disappear. This is a specific neurophysiological state, connections. Writing a complicated infection and the only treatment is persistence. You talk about characters but there is no such thing. What will come of this, when things go too fast. You need time to make time. More likely to forget dreams, hallucinate, limited precise time, maybe around…happiness and glory awaits you. Subconscious communication someone will appoint your thoughts. Practice sitting. Massive steady small perspiring spirit power light and dark knowledge of immortality, unclear end of time, no neat and orderly tight red fleshy drawers. The details are already there. Your world is so small and specific. Shadows everywhere, the intent to murder is there, from the moment everything diverges. A curiosity. I suppose you would say I was dark. Unkind molecules congeal, tick tock, tick tock. The climate of my mind, drastic overcast and stormy. I never really lived in the world. It was always in my mind, the life I created out of difference. The world I created to be allowed to exist, or did I? The assignment is to be what you are not. Wind fire time and place, exit and no exit. I leave no memories. I am not finished. I was always trying to impress the girls. People want what they know. I am nothing like that. Can there be no knowledge without proof? Beyond physical reality outside of time and I like it that way. A little off, just like everything else. I remember when the world ended, I let out a pained howl and closed the door…then it kept happening over and over. The day I realized that people and love was nothing but lies. I know I keep mentioning it, but it’s the truth that everyone is afraid of. Everyone has their obsessions, this is mine. One more thing to tell you. Despite my best efforts (and I am still trying), despite time and distance, most days I still wish you unhappiness. I hope I gnaw at the part of you that knows what you did. Bricks and electric turn cold in an instant for no apparent reason. Yet somehow I can still sometimes make it sound so beautiful I even fool myself. And just like always when I show, no one understands and the inevitable, I become silent.
Sitting on the fence. I am a vague landscape formed out of the silence and so I sit and observe the crows in repose. This is my undoing. Sitting in silence relating to birds more than to people. Participating in melodies and realizing the barrenness. Stark, sparse, the exact exchange unknown. A burrowing slow aimless river through my mind. Brooding and angry. Esoteric cool. Full of wonder and fear. She possesses secret talents.
My only assignment is love.