Sophie Lee

End of January 2021: Bracing

I don’t know about about you, but the month felt long and full of endurance. I have been looking out for the small things. Now is when we brace ourselves.

I have been thinking so much about how important a feeling of “home” is. When that feeling gets destabilized, it’s easy to become insecure and anxious and lost. That label doesn’t have to be a physical place, nor is it even always the same thing. I’m no expert, but it must be different for everyone. And it must be destabilized at some point because those negative feelings are how we gauge what eventually feels right. Hm.

Also, recipes are so important. I like to think that I can trust my senses, but sometimes it is crucial to use a recipe. Take that as literally or as figuratively as you’d like.

Questions for the next month: How do you cope with longing? What brings you comfort? What feels sustainable for you? Do you feel ready to begin, again?

Untitled (In Winter)

 Last year around this time it was blueish and wet,
 the same forks in the same rough road. The sun 
 is soft now, frugal with light. If I could jar it I might
 grow whole, more humming, more snap! But no,
 the walk home is like crying on a train: all for show.
 All now thinking about suffocating in a cave,
 a drawer, a warm car… must be so miserable
 to seize your own breath, how the tongue can find
 nothing to draw on, nothing moving and supple
 like memory. These leaps are no accident, there are 
 bright months, faint months, lovely months, months pulled taut.
 There are weeds on every corner and flowers
 on every other. Is there a right time to make a friend?
 Some new destination to move slowly toward?
 We watch deciduous trees then become them,
 mistaking empty with sleep and briefly with red.

New Year

 I am seeing you in the broth again: 
 the best days are rising to the top 
 like good fats and clear onions.
 I almost bring down my tongue
  
 to taste, but I know it will only burn
 and take a week to heal, feeling numb 
 like static when I count the backs of my teeth 
 walking outside, brisk and alone
  
 this month, staying present but losing
 myself to sleep at night listing 
 those things you might have
 given me— red stones, the number three,
  
 steering— and I feel like a tourist 
 in my own strange city, leaning over
 a handrail and falling into the tigers
 to take a photo. I'll risk it to feel
  
 a rush of something, but I am not waiting for fruition
 unless it proves that time is a chord across
 a circle, or that the half-life of missing you
 is tonight's long dinner, where I lift the bowl
  
 again to my mouth and drink half, then half,
 then half, so as not to run it dry but instead
 to forget hunger. I don't always remember. 
 Your house was full of those summer drafts.

start-of-the-year

“I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)”
-Sylvia Plath, “Mad Girl’s Love Song”

I definitely feel some kind of relief, but I’m trying not to put too much pressure on 2021. Years are just numbers anyways. Who even says time has any authority? (Or is even real?) All I know is that something has shifted. It might not be what we think, but I’m glad for it.

So… what’s next? I think the past summer has trained me to go with the flow, which is a good thing overall. It was really great to not feel like I had to be or do anything in particular. But at the same time, I learned to expect less and feel less. I kinda miss manifesting and feeling those steep ups and downs. Though this past summer was not lacking in steep downs.

How are you? I’ve been eating a lot of sweets and I definitely feel the repercussions. I guess that’s what getting older is… which is more repercussions. More of your body reacting to things.

I’m excited to move to the city and relearn how to be myself. I miss being alone. It’s weird how cities make you feel more alone. And that feeling is so great sometimes.

things i’ve eaten recently

no one asked for this 😀

pizza crust from Costco pepperoni pizza but only the crust
chocolate sediment at the bottom of hot chocolate
one and a half Beyond Sausages
couscous (pearl variety)
assorted 반찬 aka banchan
Clear Mind kombucha
white rice
Planet Oat Original
small butter cookies from Anne
a snickerdoodle that I made but the family discarded the batch because I’ll admit it… they tasted bad.
fried egg x 3
my feelings ❤
so many clementine oranges
what I thought was a delicious rice cake but it wasn’t
eggplant
mushroom pasta
various takeout that is always delicious
marshmallow(s)
the beautiful clean yummy pacific northwest air
unripe mango

Self-portrait From Inside

 I am more confident. I guess 
 I decided two days ago  
  
 when I woke up with the feeling 
 that I was sweating sesame seeds.
  
 I heard a siren in the distance 
 and did not think it unusual  
  
 for this forested street. Before that, 
 a family member gifted me seaweed body oil 
  
 but I could not imagine putting on 
 more oil. All of it, like the past months, wrings 
  
 out of my bleach-sick hair and I would
 pluck it all out if I was not afraid. 
  
 There is pencil lead living in my left thumb
 (which makes me a compass, or android, 
  
 or rough draft) and in the back of my left eye  
 there is something foreign. I couldn't tell you.
  
 I imagine an oddity caused by blue light
 and google "blue light glasses" or "am I sick with:"
  
 autofill. Do you ever check the time and look
 at everything but the time? No use lying 
  
 unless it is down to sleep, of course
 it's all rain: how the words leave our mouths
  
 and cling to another, waiting for once
 to be drunk back hungry.