RAQ15s

I pressed “record” by mistake while I was hanging out with Raquel

The Slam Poets

While you’re watching football, Christina is bored

You are with your girlfriends drinking wine and talking about boys. Lucia has the mic and she tells all of you about the new guy who is a complete gentleman. He invited her home for tea and he is intelligent and beautiful. Everyone is listening to her like she is the season finale of Lost. Eyes are fixed on her until they eventually glaze over as everyone ponders their own situations selfishly and wonder how they compare to Lucia’s Mr. Perfect. Explosions of laughter arise during the telling of the story and nee-slapping that is a little too enthusiastic. But it’s a sugar rush followed by a crash. The smiles around the table are barely being held up by the ’smile muscles’ in everyone’s faces. Your other girfriend’s stories won’t include successful men with perfect abs. The rest of the night will resemble a slam poetry reading full of beginner poets supplying each other with a supportive atmosphere to trade 4s. But your eyes haven’t glazed over. You’re the only girl at the table without a ‘boy story’. You catch me staring and you smile. Fuck. My waitress suddenly blocks our eye contact with her ‘waitress body’ to ask if the food is ok and to ask me if the book I’m reading is any good and to ask me if I’ve seen the new Spike Jones YouTube thing. She is beautiful in that Japanese-French-Canadian sort of way. She tells me that she is taking a trip to the coast of Argentina to snap photos and then she takes out her cute little Leica that is hidden in her money pouch and snaps a photo of me and runs off to her next table. When she leaves I look for your eyes again. I try not to stare, but my eyes keep falling on your face like a Hello Kitty magnet falling on a fridge. When I get the check from the ‘waitress body’ she has put her phone number and a ‘happy face’ and the words ‘call me’ underneath the total. I look for your eyes as I’m walking out but ‘girls night out’ has your full attention. I hesitate before I open the door, but then I come to my senses. The sight of yellow cabs and nightlife overwhelms me and I realize that tonight is going to be amazing.

I Miss Erasable Pens

American Gothics, Kelle and Nevada

She’s kissing you and kissing you and kissing you and you want to kiss her back, not physically, since you’re already doing that, but emotionally… romantically… And all night you’ve been trying to convince yourself that there’s no one else, but you feel bad because you know that actually there sort of is. But this other person doesn’t call you out of the blue the way this girl you’re kissing right now would love to. This other person doesn’t initiate romantic gestures within the storm of everyday living like the girl youre kissing right now would. Someone else only gives you the shallow breaths of oxygen you need instead of the deep gulps of air that you desire, while this girl is only is getting half of you right now. And like a switch… call it the last Patron shot… you’re kissing her back, as if healed. She notices, and she digs in deeper. And even though you’re not in love, your head is spinning and it’s exactly where it should be right now: in the moment.

The Best Is Right Behind You

Leigh crashed the Gaga afterparty

You’re the type of girl whos whole body shakes when you laugh. Even when you’re sitting alone in a restaurant reading your book. I’m with my friends and I’m having a really thick milkshake and I can’t even keep my attention on the grilled cheese sandwich I’m eating because you’re so pretty. I doubt I’ll ever see someone as beautiful as you again so I really want to say something to you before you leave. I can see you mouthing the lyrics to the Bob Dylan song that’s playing. I don’t really know his music but I know his voice and he’s the kind of artist that I’m happy to know that you appreciate even if I only listen to MF Doom and Arcade Fire. My friends keep trying to reel me back into the conversation but I can see you fidgeting as if you’re gonna leave. I panic because I don’t know what I’m gonna say and I’m sitting in the inside seat beside the girl that really wants to be my girlfriend. You’re at the cash register paying, so I tell my friends I need to use the bathroom. I go in there and I speak to myself in the mirror like John Travolta in Pulp Fiction when he’s in Mia’s apartment giving himself the pep talk. I’m saying things to myself like “Just go out there, say hi, it doesn’t matter what anyone says…” I finally get the courage to go talk to you at the cash register and I open the bathroom door and you are standing right there. You smile. Excuse me, you say as you go past me into the bathroom. The door closes and I feel like an idiot. The girl who really wants to be my girlfriend yells my name. She is laughing. She’s telling me that she drank the rest of my milkshake but that she saved me some fries. She’s telling me that we’re all going back to Ryan’s apartment and that her girlfriends are meeting us there and they really want to take some pictures. She says all of this giving me an under-look and the smile of a lawyer that’s presented her final arguments and knows she’s won the case. She says she has money for a cab and then she kisses me and feels up my leg. I’ve lost track of what everyone at my table is laughing about but I’m laughing too like a ventriloquist puppet following the flow. I look at your table and it’s empty. The cash register is vacant. The bathroom door is open. You’re gone. Fuck. I hate myself. The older I get, the fewer happy endings there are to my going-out stories and the weaker I get to make something amazing happen with my life. I go with the flow more and more each day. I let the dust accumulate and I’ve lost the desire to make things shine. There was probably nothing there, I rationalize, and I know I’m rationalizing. The grass is always… Is this yours? I look up and you’re standing at our table holding my extra camera battery. I found it in the bathroom, you say. I stare. Before I know it, my friends love you and they’ve invited you to Ryan’s. There’s 6 of us and the cab will only take four and since I know the address, you take the next cab with me. My phone keeps buzzing against my leg and I know who it is and there’s no way I’m picking up. You’re laughing. That’s all that matters to me right now. We get to Ryan’s and you pay for the cab because I have no money and before I can think, you kiss me and then you apologize and tell me my mouth is beautiful. My phone is buzzing again so I answer it this time and I can hear the party in the background and there are people screaming my name and yelling something about turning the ‘Best of David Chappelle’ DVD on louder.

I Just Found $20 In An Old Pair Of Jeans

Self-Censorship

You dance and dance and dance because you remember that you are alive. It wasn’t so long ago that you danced to forget but whatever it was you wanted to forget is underneath your feet right now. You are young, and sometimes you feel like you have nothing. But the music is loud and everything that matters is already yours, and anything else is attainable if you should ever seek it. It’s crowded and you are sweating and you close your eyes and you realize that you’ve never heard this song before, and you’re thinking “who are these people?”, but you act like you’re Alanis in the “Thank You” video where she’s hugging everybody. You’re even hugging the boy you had a crush on last week (but you’re immune to his stuff, oh yeah). You feel like you’ve just come out of heated yoga or like you’ve just received communion. That’s not vodka in your flask tonight. The photo-bloggers are tired and they keep coming back to you so that you can make them look good. Even blurry, you give good face. Even over-exposed. Even when their lenses are misty from the condensation. You are Crystal Castles’ Alice if she was Michael Jackson in ‘Billie Jean’. The girlfriends aren’t even jealous of their boyfriends staring at you because they don’t even notice. They’re staring too. Like the “I want what she’s having” lady in ‘When Harry Met Sally’. They’re dreaming about their single selves and wondering if they’re still being 100%. That DJ! He is choosing songs as if he’s flirting with you, and at this rate he may just end up proposing marriage by the end of the night. You’re dancing like there is no tomorrow as it becomes… tomorrow. The owner walks up to you while you’re drinking from your flask and catching your breath, and he asks you if you want to promote a night at his club but you just laugh and take the drink ticket and his card. Tonight you really heard those Arcade Fire lyrics in a completely new way and that’s the melody you’re still humming as you get your jacket from coat-check and as you get into the cab totally in love with no one or anything but yourself.

(written in the bathroom after puking from dehydration at the Semi-Precious Weapons video shoot)

Amanhecer

Love In Brazil

It’s raining and you’re home early because you know the night is over. But the phone keeps ringing. They want you to come back out. You’re still half dressed and the alcohol is still running through your veins, but you know that the night is done. You’re sure of it. It’ll only be cocaine and someone’s weird iPod mix if you go now. Yeah, it’ll only be empty introductions and people hanging out in their precious little cliques. Out of boredom you’ll hook up with someone pretty that you’ve never met before. Someone witty that you started a conversation with in the kitchen. You always do. You guys will be in the roomate-that’s-gone-for-the-weekend’s room and you guys will be kissing and you’ll notice that her makeup, her foundation, will have mostly come off and you’ll see the bumps of her acne in the light and she’ll start to look her age. But by then she’ll have already taken off her top and she’ll be trying to be a “woman” and trying to “take control”. She’ll be doing things that she learned from her long-term relationship ex-boyfriend who had it all wrong. You’ll tune out. You’ll be thinking “Is that the sun coming up?” and feel the sudden crash from all that redbull sugar. The cab driver will have just started his shift when you get in, and you’ll be rationalizing quietly in the backseat that all this is really “living” and that the whole world probably wishes it was in your shoes. And when you get home your bed will feel so good. It will literally hug you into your passageway to sleep, and you’ll still have all your clothes on. Yes, but thank God it’s still raining and you’re home early, because the night is over. Your phone keeps ringing. They want you to come back out. You are half dressed and the alcohol is still running through your veins. Then you hear the “tocking” sound of Facebook chat. It’s that cool girl Isabella (with the “Made In Brazil” tattoo) that Josh introduced you to last week. She can’t sleep and she tells you how she’s watching Vice’s Guide to Liberia. She says it’s obviously a rip-off of the movie “Swimming To Cambodia” by Jonathan Demme. She’s overwhelming you so you agree to meet her tomorrow at American Apparel in Chelsea and go to that Greek place across the street for drinks. Now you’re just lying there and your eyes are heavy and the alcohol has worn off so you put on “Midnight Souls Still Remain” and fall asleep before the song is even halfway.

(written at 6 a.m., listening to Ice T’s song ‘6 in the morning’ at Ibis Paulista)

Here I Am Now, Entertain You

Snail mail

That’s when she sat next to me. She started talking about things I couldn’t even hang my hat on. How the wine in the VIP lounge wasn’t dry enough. How the business she conducted in the cab on the way to the airport would change my future. How she had made friends with the guys at security checkpoint. She was talking and I was hanging on every word. And my phone was vibrating and vibrating and I ignored it and ignored it. She twirled her hair and she showed me things in her bag. Everything had a story. She gave me an apple just before her flight’s final call. I stood up to hug her good-bye and she thought I was standing up to kiss her good-bye, so she went for it. Now we were both embarrassed. Then she left and I was standing there like the guys in those movies that just stand there at the end, and I wanted to chase her, because I wanted to know more about the book she had been reading and why she was going to London. But I just stood there like these guys in the movies that just stand there, and listened to the mix of flight announcements, 80s elevator music and people panicking around me and I just wondered if I’d ever see her again. My phone started vibrating and it woke me up out of my stupor. It was a text from you and it said something about how you were listening to early Kings of Leon and how you finally realized what the song meant, and how it reminded you of “the last time”, and how food didn’t taste as good tonight. That’s the text message I was reading when the stewardess asked me to turn my phone off for the 4th time. When I opened my bag to get the Dazed magazine (with Bjork on the cover) and my Cool Ranch Doritos, I saw the apple that the “London girl” had given me. I gave it to a little boy who was fighting with his sister and he calmed down. The lights went off, and the plane went into night-flight mode, with only a few overhead lights on. By the time the plane was halfway there, I had already started forgetting about what I’ve come to describe to my friends as a “lack of poetry”. A lack of poetry that could have come between me and this excitement I felt when I got off the plane. The girl picking me up already had crazy ideas. A lack of poetry that could have made me miss the realization that I could thrive just about anywhere if I was inspired by love. All I felt was unmanufactured passion from the people I was hanging out with. I know poetry when I see it. It forces it’s way into the forefront of our consciousness, making us short of breath with it’s beauty. When I get back, maybe you’ll show me yours. But for now, Good Morning Brazil.

(written jet-lag over a delicious freshly squeezed mango frappe)

Death Cab, You Get It Now

Veronica takes over my hotel room better than other girls do

Everybody’s standing up or dancing at your table. You’re the only one slouching in the leather seat, holding a vodka tonic that you’ve topped off with alcohol three times already. If mother could see you now she would chastise you for “bad posture”. You’ve been poisoned. Where is the excitement you used to manufacture, no matter what the circumstances? You are in undeniable pain. Everyone around you is having the time of their lives and you are here thinking about someone far away. You haven’t heard from them all day. You called. Twice. Did you do something wrong? You often wondered how it would feel to be here, totally out of control. Answer: It sucks. Your heart aches. Death Cab, you get it now. You saw them live when you were on top of the world. Back then, you were happily texting on your Blackberry and flirting in the beer tent. But now that you’re, you don’t know… Now that you’re fucked, you get it… You totally get it.

(written while Nicole was tricking her rival into drinking from the pee-filled Heineken can)

The Champagne Is Getting Warm

Jenna, all your LA charm won’t get me to believe you’re a tomboy

There was a time when you were totally in love with him and you couldn’t think of anything else. A time when it was cute that he was always on his phone, texting and being important. A time when nothing could go back to UJI. It would have taken a fire extinguisher to put out that spark, but now, all it took was the first round of Patron shots at The Hard Rock in Vegas. You tried to bring the feeling back, but it was on permanent vacation with an email auto-reply. It had gotten to a point where “inside jokes” were substituting for real conversation. And that was the point when you opened the door and the sun came in. Even your black jeans, your black shirt and your black nails looked grey underneath that powerful light. A light that made you fall in love with everything you came into contact with. It was ironic, you thought, how well you could “see” this “illusion”. It had been like a disease. A mirror game. His only thoughts and actions were reciprocations, if that’s even a word, but you know what I mean. But now, you realize now that you want someone that will drunk dial you out of the blue when you’re fast asleep in a hotel room in Hawaii and recite a poem into your voice-mail. Sorry though, there’s no time for reflection now: you have to pick up Kendra who is having drinks with her co-workers at Bronson Bar. You’re already starting to forget what it was about him that you used to be so excited about. All that PDA had been as fruitful as “chasing the dragon” at 5 a.m., and just as embarrassing the next day. Yes, it was a long, long night. And when you woke up on the Greyhound bus, ‘Motorcycle Drive-By’ was playing in your headphones and everyone was in their own little world, and just a few lights were still on. You closed your eyes again and realized that you still missed him, but that you were also still gladly letting him go. You were lightening your load in preparation for the next big adventure. You can’t stand by anymore while he figures out how to express himself. Sorry, the champagne is getting warm. And besides, there’s a little afterparty that you have to get to that you’re late for. You won’t have to flirt with anyone, or fuck anyone there to feel good about anything because you’re already on top of the world basking in this newfound clarity. You are relieved that you didn’t get sucked into something inferior, and looking forward to something awesome. Cue that Rachid song “Pride”, as the “door whore” gives you a double-kiss and lifts the velvet rope.

(written while I was on hold with my ISP)

Southside

Where the glory days are always just last week

She wanted me to leave Southside at 1 am to go to her place. Leave? Right when the party was about to peak? She doesn’t know. She doesn’t do this like us. I gave her my “bottle” and she just sat there (people-watching through her bangs like Kendra does) with her Burberry trench still on. Occasionally, she would give me that “I’m having fun” smile, and I would stop and introduce her to more of my friends, but every time I walked away the conversation would fizzle. Yes, I know everyone there. She could too, eventually. It only takes 3 weeks to become a scene star (or to instill any habit for that matter). Remember Iris? But the only person she knew here right now was that Somalian guy that wanted to fuck her. Even he was leaving. He had band practice early next morning. But I convinced her to stay. I always want people to stay out, don’t I? Staying out is like a badge we wear. It’s like an underground society and I guess I was hoping that she wanted to be a part of this club. No, she was miserable and she was standing at the exit putting lipstick on. That’s when she delivered the famous ultimatum, the one I’ve heard a thousand times. It was “her” or “nightlife”. Choose. To know what I responded, you only have to look at my necklace, the one I never take off, and the most recent mp3s on my IPOD playlist.