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i'm sick of a lot of things. stretched out pants slipping down my legs. cobblestones. bathrooms. the color pink. the possibility of rain. absence. seat cushions. chairs, for that matter. boundaries. computer screens. distances. remixes. mirrors. having to spell out my name.

stringy.

last night i dreamed about long confusing tours of city streets and alleyways, so many new people i was reluctant to befriend. can i go yet? some girl with long skinny weak blonde dreads was my new fourth roommate. possibly. she was also half that other girl, the one with the chlorine neck.

finding a post office on some floor of a maze of a building, dark and dingy, opening to a wide concrete cube, rows of hanging canvas bags for destination and day - i needed to send a letter to belgrade. rough brown envelope. she was looking for a laundry card and i heard her say my name.

lost the rest. half-hearted fucking. rainy skies. woke up and couldn't remember what was real.

dangling keys.

lately, suddenly, vienna's gotten really fucking cool. or partly that i've just gotten used to the fact that you are an ocean away, and so is the city i know by heart. but there's too much of excitement here to overlook it, too. promising, enticing.

friday was critical mass, only a year old here but still getting big and flanked by cops on motorcycles and full of contagious laughter and yells. slapping hands of bemused motorists, grinning at our own missteps. and it ended on a sloping park by some grandiose old buildings, tables of beer and bikes leaning up on trees and i climbed to sit on the wall with evi and tom and watch the tallbike jousting from above, then back down to shiver in the damp grass and drum along on our knees during the fire show. home alone then out till approaching dawn to fling ourselves into the beats and the lights between pulsing walls. you know.

so many nodding smiles.

the next day i biked to bratislava - 3 hours of farmland and riverbanks and bumpy trails, the border guards laughing and waving me on - for a night of bike tricksters, full houses, wine festivals, underground bars, and six people jampackcrammed into a hatchback. strange rolled pancakes, with poppyseeds. bruised hipbones from sleeping on the floor. sweet eyes and tequila breath (gold, with cinnamon and orange).

we had no words in common so instead we just winked and looked away.

a plaque commemorating the first witch burned at the stake in slovakia. a big wandering tour of the city. vain searches for vegan food on sunday.

i left with a good taste in my mouth.

(something about biking home from class or from shows, tearing up these smooth now-familiar paths, wanting to ride fast and forever. or maybe it's this big beautiful punk houses and the way people here seem actually eager to meet each other, to create things, instead of standing back and apart and making sure to wear the right clothes.)

all i know is, all these invitations have me reeling. this is what i want.

yoot.

you really can get drunk on these cloves --- !

stupid consequences catching up with me.

punkt punkt punkt.

pastries made of sharp secret splinters to claw yr tongue. (i hid them in yr cupboard as a breakfast surprise.)

these things feed on sugar and desperation

but garlic-eaters are always friends.

au naturel.

either is okay. neither is a sign.

a hedgehog smaller than my foot, ancient meditations on behavior, self-control. i'd like to bike in nothing but my swim trunks and matching gloves, feel wind and sun and legs spinning, path spinning out beneath me. i'd like to be weirder, prouder. old-timey knickers and a torn scarf around my hair. shoes that cry for tramping.

(we need some more big laughing empty buildings and shattered glass, more quick-change shoulder blades and ladders to the stars. or the treetops. clamber up quick before the leaves start to fall and give us away.) side-splitting like thieves. whole gangs of them, sooty cheeks and sly fingers. rub-a-dub-dub and chilled to the bone. one day i'll learn to play all these songs i'm keeping hidden somewhere in the sinews of my wrists.

and what could be better than sun and skin and sky when i take all my clothes off and eat fresh figs by the river, fall asleep in the grass?

the night bus.

so when i leave my bike at home it takes hours to get back, striding shivering together down long quiet streets, half-paved, and covered in traffic cones. waiting for buses while drunk boys ask for help in german, in english, in that twinkling eyes sort of way that says a whole lot and a whole little all at once. everything's interchangeable, and maybe that's best after all.

(i can't hear the ringing through the music, the ringing in my ears or the ringing on my phone; the music so loud it batters our eardrums and the confetti explodes from yr back and they all strike a pose so we all cheer and laugh and jump into frenzied joyful dances.)

something about riding home past these ferris wheels every day, one two three or is it only two? something about searching desperately for glances just so i can ignore them. i wake up at night startled, singing aloud, fingers digging deep. i wake up in the morning with turquoise patches on my elbows, with smudged ink on the insides of my thighs.

last night we went past the limits of our broken phrases; we ate cold vague delicacies from dirty plates, with squiggly forks, while canadians played reptitive droning songs in the basement below and dogs trotted around bored and happy and the nets hanging from the ceiling could've pulled me in for good, so inviting. maybe that was her, maybe not.

(but saying hello is the hardest part of all.)

numb-dumb drums.

in this city i have no tongue, only meek eyes that trot the sidewalk as if some asphalt answer will come surging up to meet me.

all my syntax coming fumblingly apart, my reluctant stumbling attempts to reach you. (all the things we don't say.)

my tongue exploring my own mouth for lack of yours. the dead air that stretches between us, humming.

i'm not poetic when all i am is fist-gnawingly missing you.

when all i can remember is skin.

pass auf!

things are starting, as usual, to fall into place.

yesterday i biked down the Donauinsel, the island in the middle of the Danube, for miles and miles of rolling hills and sweet Austrians walking their dogs and boys riding their bikes through the water and wildflowers everywhere for me to gather in bunches to stick in my hair, to stick in a jar in my room.

today i bought the best hummus in the world from the Naschmarkt, and then sat in a cafe sipping espresso and writing a short story auf Deutsch about a melancholy baker who comes home one day to find her forgotten bread dough risen to fill her entire house. when i left, i stepped over a lonely yellow rose on the sidewalk, turned back, balanced it on the seat of a bicycle by the wall, and walked off just as a girl came around the corner and found it, quick bright smile on her face.

a blissfully unaware jogger with his ears plugged into an ipod jumped in front of me to cross the bike path, and without thinking i yelled "Pass auf!" - watch out! i'm not sure if the shriek that followed those words out of my mouth was in german or in english, but at least there's something sticking to my tongue the way i want it to.



best of all was when i made it home without taking out my map even once.

wolkig

the clouds outside are flying by faster than i can stand, and the sun flickering through the curtain is off on off on off on again every time i look up. i'd like to go plunge my fingers into some soft dirt, pull gentle weeds up by the roots, watch seeds turn into something real. i'm too far away from everything around me here; i'm too close, too. i'd just like some sort of definition, a map tattooed into my skin so that i can be sure just how far my limbs will stretch.

my feet hurt from late nights of dancing in empty shoes, my eyes from smoke and lights. that street yesterday felt so good, so fast, the momentum carrying me downhill and around pedestrians and cars and pushing my body into relaxation in the familiarity of cyclicity.

maybe it is starting to make sense after all. farmers' markets and chinese groceries where we nod mutely at one another across the counter. cozy vegan restaurants with cheap beer and grinning regulars, board games lining the walls. i miss you all the way down to my toes, but at least there's enough directions for me to point them in to try and forget.

(you should have seen my turkish roommate's face when i told her i don't eat meat, and then, cautiously, keine Tierprodukte, no animal products, also.

uncomfortable silence.)

bored hookers and warmer nights

scrape the last desperate remnants of peanut butter from the jar - they only have one variety here so we shouldn't waste a smidge. chug half a bottle of wine apiece and then attempt to decipher maps in search of more ways to squander money on some brief intoxication. i smell like a little bit of smoke and a little bit of brakeless meandering. i live in the middle of a red light district across the street from a ferris wheel, but don't let that fool you. die strassen sind glitschig. ich bin nicht die beste. alles wird okay.

(scrape the last desperate remnants of peanut butter from the jar; long for an all-night grocery and some non-dairy desserts; schreiben sie bitte ein aufsatz auf deutsch von wistful anarchy und unsere müde zerstörungen.)

my skin is dry without yours nearby.





ja, ich wohne jetzt im Wien.

yes, i live in vienna now.