Villanellie

With you lies the green swell of laughter

Tonight the current runs rampant red

Moon-sweat dripping down the leafless avenues

Promise scats across the morning sea

It does not take the living to recognize the dead

With you lies the green swell of laughter

Tulips whisper out coordinates, new seeds

The soil owns its own compass bed

Moon-sweat dripping down the leafless avenues

A cold friend with warm hands aligns me free

Mischief burns the buried dread

With you lies the green swell of laughter

Without you who I wonder what to be

Want of grazing expectation leather lead

Moon-sweat dripping down the leafless avenues

Writhe to recount sand stationary

Slipping through our worn clutched thread

With you lies the green swell of laughter

Moon-sweat dripping down the leafless avenues

- (c) Katya Stepanov

On Transatlantic Relationships

Past-show post-home hum-v
Blues easy to shake as pneumonia
Longing spilling black coffee dregs
Across everyone’s white linen

Tiptoe ‘round babushka’s laundry
Play into marketable type: to beg
For any tune to fill the time
Between sheets I’ve been in

One-step two-step three-step
Whirl round doe-see-doe-see
Gut churnin’ wind rambling
Head banging’ plea spinnin’

Please please come back to me
Freckle eyed white blouse haste legs

-KS

I can’t let go.
and the sting is raw and my wounds they
split, they ache, I am ripping them apart
I am ripping me apart
every day.
“You’ve lost it,” the fucking devil screams
“Useless, stupid, useless, stupid, boringboringboringboring,”
I want to kill him, I want to prove him wrong
But vengeance is against my gut, and
all I see are disconnected thoughts and
failed attempts at mercy.
“I hate you,” I think, I scream, but he won’t leave
he won’t leave me alone, and I
convince myself that I like his company
this self-pitying misery
“Stupid, useless, stupid, useless, boring, boring, boring,”
 AHHHHHHHHH I want to be rid of you!
I need to break this cycle, this circle of burnt plastic,
burnt ego, burnt dreams.
It, she, you, you’ve been here long enough.
Leech, bitch, parasite
You’re eating me alive and I am letting you
I have given you the right.
“Stupid, useless, stupid, useless, boring, boring, boring,”
No. No. No.
Fuck you, your chains, your choking grip, your haunting
shrieks I hear them night and day, you’re holding me
too tightly now, breaking all my ribs and I have locked you in,
locked you deep, deep, deep, no exit, no salvation for my mind.
You are a killer, and I am but a child.
You are splinters in my nightgown and teeth in my side.
You are every breath, every space I’ve spent on a lie
You are dry. And I?
Waiting for a miracle? Some spare change?
I must learn to re-arrange.
Get out, get out, get out.
Yes, you, I’m calling. I’m stalling, I’m crawling and
I will get up.
“Perfect, golden, perfect, sunshine, yes, yes, yes,”
From now on I will wear you, like a stupid dress
and I will rip you open when I feel this mess 
and I will never, ever, ever settle to regress. 

-KS

Ey.

I’ve de-activated my Facebook account for a week. Let’s see how I feel. There are so many things I could be doing, and it’s so strange to have the time to do them. Rarely must you confront your inability to motivate yourself, because you are occupied with “things you have to do but don’t necessarily want to do”. Isn’t it funny how once you have all the time in the world to do the things you thought you wanted to, you feel like you have absolutely nothing to do, no purpose. This week, I’m trying to learn what it really means to be an artist. Or at least, to be someone that’s okay with just doing anything they want.

Unbelievably
Nonsensical
Purposeless
Really fucking bad
Expediently miserable
Poopy
Abominable
Repulsive
Exceptionally wrong
Dining halls.

What about..

little dinosaurs?
couches on rooftops?
blueberry cream cheese?
pop-up textbooks?
color snowflakes?
erasable blankets?
portable bubble-wrap?
adjustable waistlines?
reversible umbrellas?

the time to sleep?