Summer Drift

Summer drift

Summer drift to fall leaves

school buses leave trails of children

The marching band plays at the high school nearby

I can hear the grand sound of brass and drums

Here we are on the cusp of pumpkin season

Fall is the weaver of children in costume

Let the leaves fall down to red

                Let the nights get cooler

The crooked tooth of a pumpkin on a curb

is a welcome sign after summer's heat

September sun is easier on the eyes--

on the skin.

We welcome each new season

with wide open eyes

like we've never seen them before

while listening to the stories

of tornadoes, blizzards, heat waves.

The seasons are our friends

they keep life going,

they keep it interesting

continuing that old idea 

that life is a march down lanes 

of grass, fallen leaves, white snow, windswept rain--

tearing down the visions that life is unchanging.

So come on with me through curbside leaves,

hold my hand as we walk under gabled eaves

dripping tired flowers who have seen

their season pass.

While we watch the summer go down to fall

Let us remember there is another summer coming

There is no real end, no real beginning,

only this circle. This never ending circle. 

Heather Lake

Poem: Sub-society

We tear up the streets

tossing coins to the men

and women who sit by the wall--

writing WAR in spray paint

onto the stop signs,

being warriors for change we think.

We sit in at the council meetings

arguing with the ones who want

sameness over innovation-

status quo over new ideas.

We are the loud ones

who build tents in the park,

who challenge the bureaucrats

that want only the things

they can have for themselves

and the people they serve.

We are tattered and torn,

guarded but open,

talkative and secretive--

we need only the things

that change and grow.

A very, very short story

Once,she thought she was a bird. She could fly and sing and live in the trees. She crept down the hall and tried to fly off the second story window. She discovered she was NOT a bird.

Once, she thought she was a shadow. She followed her sisters around all day. They scolded her over and over. She realized she wasn't sneaky enough, nor faithful enough, to be a shadow.

Once, she thought she was a spider. She tried to spin a web across the doorway and failed. She couldn't make a thing. She realized she wasn't a spider.

One time she thought she was a girl. She brushed her hair, wore some nice dresses, walked quietly to the bus stop, kept herself quiet and still. She realized then she wasn't a girl. She was a woman. She walked confidently, she kept herself loud and amazing, she did her hair anyway she liked. She didn't need anyone. She was amazing and brassy and brilliant. Her story doesn't end here but this story does.

Poem: Woven Vines

Woven Vines

Do not look for me when you are sighing yourself to sleep

do not look for me when you feel the bright light of dawn

keep your heart quiet and still

small and hidden

what cannot be found cannot be broken

We joined our hands like plaited braids

counted our blessings with eyes cast down

held onto each sand of the desert,

drank from the stream of our kindred
consciousness where our words found
each other in the night.

You burn with the fire of myriad suns

Your body an instrument I long to play

your eyes are emeralds deep and dark

your teeth like white pearls.

I want to climb into you

and hold your limbs close to mine

we can be a single star

bursting like a seedpod

in the summer night.

Our minds meet--

our hearts beat--

our voices soft--

we lived our lives

like woven vines.

Heather Lake

8/9/2017

What I think of Straight Pride

Straight Pride is something thought up by *some* of the straight population who believe Gay Pride is somehow "locking them out". This is what I think of that:

1. Straight people didn't get their clubs busted in and sent to jail for deciding to have some time to have fun and dance.
2. Straight people have always been able to get married, adopt kids, be on each other's health insurance, collect survivor's benefits, have the children they conceive able to be both of theirs without having to adopt them by one partner, and all the other accoutrements of legality awarded to them without having to fight tooth and nail for them.
3. Straight people have never been killed for being straight.
4. Straight kids have not been bullied by others, tied to fences, beaten up, shamed, cyber-bullied or otherwise had their school experience destroyed for being straight.
5. Straight people have always been celebrated and accepted.
6. Straight people have never been forced against their will to marry outside of their orientation.
7. Straight people have never lost their families, jobs, security, housing and other needed things because they are straight.
8. Straight people have not had to put up with people saying god hates them and had their military funerals picketed for being straight.
9. Straight people in other countries have not been killed for being straight.
10. Straight people were not killed in the Holocaust for being straight.
11. Straight people have never been thrown into mental institutions for being straight.


For LGBTQ youth:

• Nearly a fifth of students are physically assaulted because of their sexual orientation and over a tenth because of their gender expression.
• About two-thirds of LGBT students reported having ever been sexually harassed (e.g., sexual remarks made, being touched inappropriately) in school in the past year.
• The average GPA for students who were frequently physically harassed because of their sexual orientation was half a grade lower than that of other students.

On the subject of sexual assault and rape:

 1 in 8 lesbian women and nearly half of bisexual women experience rape in their lifetime, and statistics likely increase when a broader definition of sexual assault is used. Nearly half of bisexual men and four in ten gay men have experienced sexual violence other than rape in their lifetime, and though statistics regarding rape vary, it is likely that the rate is higher or comparable to heterosexual men. As with most hate-based violence, transgender individuals are the most likely to be affected in the LGBT community. A staggering 64% of transgender people have experienced sexual assault in their lifetime.

So by these facts and statistics and many, many more there is no reason for straight pride. The straight people have always had the sway of community recognition, rights of marriage and the backing of their families. The only way this is different for straight people is if racial, ethnic or religious conflicts arise.


So to those who want straight pride---get over yourselves.

Because the above picture...is ridiculous.

Poem: Grand plans/Great Plains

Grand plans/Great Plains

Grand plans and great plains

Running away never looked so good.

Taking the road by the throat

choking every last mile out of it

and eating up the scenery---

a vapid, hungry hunt for the

very best place to be.

I find myself lost in myself--

twisting stairs like an Escher print

winding down.

Crowded buses with loud voices

drag me down

and I beg for quiet spaces.

Lost here—with my thoughts--

heart beating pure like water.

Little pictures-like fish-darting

here and there within the

confines of my internal vision.

Here are my arms raised.

Here are my hands open.

Here are my eyes closed.

There is no more of me

than what I can see.

Heather Lake

Great rumble of trains passing
        somber home in the darkness
grandpa snoring--
   little quilt with knobs of fabric

The trains ran by
  their whistles blowing
while i sat and held the little drops of fabric in my hands

The fire was stoked in the little woodstove
   and grandpa got up at 4am to feed it wood
to warm up the children and grandchildren in the house

Balogna sandwiches and ice tea
  My father's little brass piano player in a corner
of the sparse living room
  Grandma's quilts and yarn rugs all around.


I treasured those times--those nights.
Nothing could take their place in my little world.

Diary of a running break: Knees and hips and muscles Oh My

A runner who can't run. It's the definition of frustration.

My knees and hips have been bothering me more than ever lately. I hate it. It upsets me.

But it also changes my definition of myself. My identity as a runner was all tied up to my self-esteem. It was tied up to my friendships and relationships. It was tied up to my image of myself. But the hardest thing to let go of is my idea of how to stay fit. I have had to change that. My hips are not allowing me to run right now. My muscles feel sore for far longer than I want them to. My knees hurt a lot more now no matter how much I rest and what else I do.

But here lies the trick: It's not what you DO for fitness. It's just that you stay as fit as possible while nursing your body back to health. It is the idea of NOT pushing yourself that can sometimes be the most difficult and yet the most important thing you will ever accomplish. Keeping myself healthy for life is more important than pushing something to achieve a lifestyle I am not able to continue for long. I am in this body for life. I need to treat it with more respect than I previously have by pushing the running when I am not fit for it at the time.

I must be smart.

Smart sucks sometimes. It feels depressing to not be able to achieve a runner's high when i need it. It feels frustrating to see everyone doing their great runs and races and knowing that at this time I am unable to do that. Not that i am not happy for my friends---and extremely proud of them. I just want to join them--for runs, races, events, exciting moments in their lives.

I want that identity back. I want that feeling of accomplishment back.

How will I get those things back? Weightlifting, swimming, biking, walking alone or with friends, taking care of myself, getting enough sleep, de-stressing and remembering that my setback can lead to my comeback--a stronger and better person than before.

That is worth waiting for. I can get into other things and my identity can change from "runner" to whatever I choose to become. It can be good enough to be "heather" and realize that just because I cannot run isn't the end of my self-esteem, my good feelings about myself, my fitness and my ability to spend time with friends. It's different but not bad.

So...as I spend time with my doctors getting the hips and knees working better again I can find some ways to spend my time constructively and appreciating my runs later on in my life as a great gift--something to be treasuring. And if I not ever able to really run again?


That can be okay too.