Tag: bamboo pen drawing

honey bee

he woke up suddenly. wondering. trying to remember
the last time he had seen a honey bee.
he can remember summers as a boy when it seemed
every clover crawled with them & running barefoot
would surely result in a stinger in the arch…
between the toes.
calling out in pain to bring mother running so she
could soothe you with an ice cube and soft whispers
of how you got hurt…but the bee died.
he wanted to be a farmer all his life. he lived
for tractor rides. hide & seek in the cornfields.
the smell of fresh cut hay.

lately my stories begin with scribbled thoughts inked over with drawings. i am not sure ever if i will continue the story or if it will live out it’s life as a post on my blog…. maybe one day i will come back through my journals & collect them all.

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divine comedy

it’s all fun & games
until someone starts
a zombie apocalypse

i have been looking at other people’s art for inspiration. here’s one inspired by gustave dore. maybe i’m missing moses jones more than i realize….

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mommy & me

she feels them cold & wiggly under her warm blanket.
she feels them cold & wiggly under her warm sweater.
she feels them cold & wiggly against her warm belly…
her worn belly…
her stretched & saggy belly.
“stop or i will bite you.
“stop or i will break your little bones with my teeth.
“i will eat your fingers. snap & crackle.
“yum. yum. yum.
“stop it or i will tear them from you.
“i will devour you.”
comes the dark growl from the half asleep mama.
they just scamper
giggling
they are not afraid.

just another day in my house. for some reason i often threaten to eat my children. maybe i was the witch from hansel & gretel in a past life…. i do often threaten to leave them in the woods as well.

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now i get it

when i was a girl, i could not get enough of horse stories. i picked up john steinbeck’s the red pony
expecting just another heartwarming story of a boy & his horse…by the end of the book, i was
pissed off & utterly confused. i remember the book from time to time, with bitterness. however,
while proofing my upcoming collection of short stories, i found myself remembering the story
with a different reaction. my own abrupt and morose storytelling reminded me of john steinbeck &
that fucking pony. then i began to wonder how much i had internalized in those precocious early
years, reading books beyond my understanding, stephan king & edgar allan poe…now building blocks
to my own stories. men i have never met, corrupting & molding that little writer inside me….

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poop!

transformation is not a beautiful unfolding
it is not a gentle opening
transformation is violent & ugly & overwhelming
i feel like i am going to explode
am i going to explode?
i want to scream & bit & thrash & kick it all down.
i want to eat the world & make it my poop.

yup. that about sums it up. i am going through so much right now. so much. my brain is a bee hive that has been knocked over by a sleuth of bears. i am trying to survive being knocked over as well as trying to scare away those bears. and save my honey. rebuild my hive. protect my queen. so much to do just to survive the right now!
yup, that is the metaphor i am going with.

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ninja entourage

a ninja
doesn’t want
an entourage

i thought this when i was walking somewhere with my minions. sometimes it is very difficult for me to go anywhere knowing i will have an entourage if i try to leave the house.
so this made sense to me.
i am totally a ninja.
after i had this epiphany, i arrived where my entourage & i were headed and announced that a ninja doesn’t want an entourage. the millennial man with long hair & talk of veganism at this get-together turned to my 12 year old (who is SO NOT A NINJA) and asked him, “are you the ninja?”
like, what the fuck, a chubby fifty year old woman can’t self-identify as a ninja?
ack.
this contributed to my current state of no longer socializing.
(i am a ninja)

on a completely different train of thought, as i drew the seal in this inking, i realized that my cattle dog looks just like a seal (you know, with pointy ears & four legs.)

3

circles

going in circles…
am i
a flushed tank of
toilet water
swirling
am i
a tornado
tall as a mountain
& filled with rage
& frustration
am i
a quiet dust devil
on a summer evening
appearing
as if by magic
& disappearing again
into the dusk?

that’s the question.
though i am probably all three of those things. it just depends on when you catch me.
but reading through journals trying to find fodder for my the invisible exhibitionist book version, i notice that i am definitely not a linear person. yup, i’m the moon…though i guess the moon doesn’t really turn? but it does go circles around the earth, so, yeah! i’m the moon.
moody moody moon.

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happy valentine’s day from an ice monkey

confusion is nothing new

teeth & gums & nakedness
nothing new
a series of dreams
that never come true
but can i really say
i never get what
i want
when wants change
& needs are undecipherable?
needs
i would like to get
what i need
teeth & gums & nakedness
men following men
through my room
moonlight
sunlight
lamplight
condom wrappers
& nothing fulfilled
but i got
what i wanted
for 30 seconds
teeth & gums & nakedness

yes. my name is “mary jo” & yes. i was a pretty promiscuous 24 year old once.
this is my favorite poem that i have ever written.
it was written after a busy summer in ’94 that began with my breaking up with the love of my life and ended with my reuniting with the love of my life after a bunch of indiscretions.
then i went away (with him) to an all girl school in roanoke, va (hollins university) where i workshopped my poem as well as classics such as “bukowski’s undertow” & “tiny tortures in this hyperactive ghost town” which can be seen in comic form in my newly published book confusion perfume & other neurotic comics.

in other news–i made so many valentine’s this year, y’all! i like to reclaim valentine’s day as a day of love & not necessarily romance. and i am so full of love. ink covered love.

ps. happy year of the (big blue) ox!

pps. my scanner finally gave up it’s ghost, hence the buttload of blurry photos. i did invest in a new scanner that should be here soon. buy a copy of my book to help me pay for that!!

2

pariah

one nice thing
about a lifetime
as a social
pariah
not much
time
nor
energy
is spent trying
to
fit in
with the
conventional…
indeed
you are able
to see
the
whole
picture
because your place
in the nosebleed section
allows
for a
panoramic
view.

i really don’t mind being a pariah. every once in awhile it gets lonely…but i like not having to worry about what people think of me.

another ardhaanarishvara…then it turned into an airship.
sometimes that happens
androgeny & airships…another one of my bands.

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