Blog

5/30

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

First Love

You glorious heartfuckerupper,
you manic-depressive 6-year fever,
you tornado trail across my heart –

you fucker –

the thought of you
makes me hiccup with laughter
while I am heaving my grief
over other men.
When I am violently emptying myself
into pages, watching
my brain firings manifest
in desperate crooked scribblings,
I am tickled, elated even,
that your name is not among them.
Years and lovers later,
I am still shocked silly
to feel so deeply about someone
who is not you.

You Heartbreak Original
among very convincing knockoffs –
you existential attachment crisis calibration,
you, the first person
I would never stop loving,

you – the space carved in me
that can hold him now,
the scar who reminds me
of my homemade sutures,

you – the reminder
of what I can heal myself from.

4/30

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

Thank Goodness

For the dark,
for the cold damp breath
when I open the door,
for the heroism I feel
just stepping outside
into the emptied streets;

after months of brazen
light and activity,
finally –
permission to retreat
into myself,
the necessity of becoming
a sanctuary.

3/30

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

I asked a woman tonight about her owl tattoo. She told me of being in prison, of seeing the ground owls outside and caring for one who was wounded. She was the only one they allowed to approach.

Letter from a Ground Owl

I watched you wander
from wall to wall
as I lay in the dust –
I could not figure out
why so many humans
were gathered together
in one place,
no cars, phones,
nowhere they were
preparing to go.

I could not say why
I trusted you. Something
about how your eyes
peered out at me,
a child emerging
from the rubble. Your hands
were soft. They did not
hold me like a prize,
or a conquest. They knew
better, had learned ownership
from the government (addiction)
(government). They did not
trust humans either.

It was strange, leaving you,
once my strength returned.
I could feel you watching me
as I took shaky flight,
your hands at your sides
as the walls hugged you close.
I will always carry the tender sounds
that bubbled out of you
when I was weak and shivering –
I do not wonder what they mean.

2/30

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

Singing for the Patient with a Head Trauma Who Says “I Love You A Lot” Every Few Seconds

1. You think it is meant for someone else, even though you are alone with him. You must have misunderstood.

2. You meet his eyes and laugh, nervously, when he repeats himself. You are embarrassed, though no one is around to see you fumble through this conversation with a 5-year-old with a brain injury. He looks at you from his bed, a tent of mesh hanging around him, his face peering out beneath a green helmet. He smiles and says it again. He is not embarrassed.

3. You begin to let the words flutter around your head, getting tangled in your hair like moths. You smile at their gentle tickle. He has not stopped smiling.

4. You wonder when it will stop.

5. You chide yourself for wondering.

6. The minutes and words spill on, hypnotic as running water. You start to believe, all you are is this moment with him, your eyes and your smiles and the song you are singing, and he knows you, and he loves you, a LOT, he loves you A LOT he LOVES you, a lot, you begin to believe him, you begin to love him even though you do not say it, you keep singing, you keep this moment alive and he loves you a lot.

7. You know you will leave him when the song is over. You have warned him it is the last one, you know he will attach his attention to the nurse when she comes in, but you will leave him alone and your heart winces. You wish he would stop.

8. One more, and you leave. The room is quiet behind you, stagnant with meaningless TV conversation.

9. Later, you remember. The moment is frozen over. You tell yourself, he does not remember your name. He never knew what he was saying.

10. You listen to the recording you took before you go to sleep. His small, earnest voice. He is alone in a room and so are you. You wonder if he has stopped smiling.

11. You listen again and smile, just in case.

1/30

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

November 1st

The sun was swallowed
hours ago, but the streets
are safe now –
the world isn’t scary anymore.
I walk by the suburban-forest
palaces, orange and purple
lights hanging groggy welcomes
from last night. A few drops
land on my jacket
every few seconds, clinging
uselessly for blocks.

My steps are machinery.
Moving feels safer –
my surroundings rearrange,
the people walk by
and forget the girl
in green pants
with a fleeting smile.
A small fire is stoked
at the base of my throat,
making me mumble,
with the pious
urgency of a monk,
the reasons I should let you go.
I map escape routes
into the moving streets,
my heart one giant goodbye.
I think I have always
been reluctant to let
the world touch me.

I see handprints all over you.
I cannot fathom
the volumes held by your heart.
When you pull me in like smoke,
sometimes your tired lungs
cough me out again.
When you touch me,
it is with the weight of a world
that can be tender
or terror. When I step back,
I do not recognize myself
in daylight.

On Resonating

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

I can’t think of where to start so I am starting in the middle and working out from there. Sometimes writing is throwing a pot.

I have never cried in a patient’s room but my eyes were precariously close to spilling today. A 2-year-old girl with Down’s, her hair thinned and almost all gone, has been in the hospital for weeks now, has stared at my hands playing guitar and lit up when I place a ukulele in her lap, her fingers scuttling over the strings and skins of the drums. I go in alone and sing to her, grinning when she whisks an eggshaker back and forth. Today I invited my partner in to play with me, and something happened when she heard us singing together, saw the guitar and my hands next to hers playing the bongos. She smiled up at him, sighed and cooed, nodded her head up and down as she played with such focused intensity, in between just sitting and staring at me, him, me, her mouth hanging open. I met her mother’s eyes and we smiled back and forth, back and forth the singing and sounds and joy.

We are born from this. We do the work alone, the hours training our fingers to move, the time spent writing down the sounds in our heads, but who we are is created in these moments. The songs we write and the way we sound together and the looking into each other’s eyes. Light infinitely reflecting, resonances and overtones vibrating between us, opening upon opening upon opening. Fear makes us resist it, but we need each other so.

Some of the best songs I’ve written evolved in an ever-fluctuating community of musicians, poets, dropouts, hipsters, hippies, nomads, healers, gathering every Thursday night on beer-soaked couches to get crunk and make and experience art. I sing them and hear the voices of people who are all over the country now. I remember that feeling of being held in every step I took, the harmonies and riffs we wrapped each others’ words in, the love and support for the tender selves we revealed. All of us perfect in our unfinished glory.

There are certain things I believe we are meant to do and this will always be one of mine. Making this space for people to be human and share their voice and feel things. The rest of this life, the grocery shopping and the bill paying and the work schedules and the TV shows, the small shocks of normal, are just the motions we go through. This is where we are born. This is where we live with each other, with our own hearts.

I am starting – well, continuing – this trajectory with a small monthly show every third Tuesday, a tremendous gift to me in these past couple years, and a space that I want to welcome more people into. Poets, performers, storytellers, music-makers, anyone and everyone I know who makes things that are real and true – we have so much to offer each other and we so rarely have the space to share freely. It is a small start. It is a push in the direction that has been calling to me forever.

I put myself into this blog as a way of putting my voice out there and inviting yours to resonate. Another small start. But please let the world hear you. Let others feel your breath when you speak. Open your mouth and resonate with the voices around you. Let the world touch you. This is where we are born.

Heart speaks.

Published on by annaspackman17@gmail.com

There are so many things I could write about. Watching her brave face crumple as soon as she collapsed against her physical therapist, legs frail and body exhausted after walking 45 steps down the hall. Singing Alicia Keys as she walked, as she sobbed in her bed for ten minutes after. I could linger in the playroom with three little ones, erupting in giggles and songs, handing out our tenderness and hand drums, eyes sharing it all every so often. I could write about all the songs stuck in my head by the end of the day, the people who have followed me home. My heart is a pulled muscle I cannot stop using. Not enough songs, poems, conversations pour out of me to catch it all. I run to the people I trust to hold it all, amazed and grateful that they accept me as constantly spilling. I have cried so much the past couple of weeks just out of love for someone. I don’t know the perimeter of my heart. I don’t know how it all comes and goes. But I know that I am here to catch it, that I am made an open-faced bowl facing up, and my light is strong enough to be constantly reflecting. I am still learning the art of it, still sinking into its weight.