poems on video
All poems written by Alaina Latona
All visual/audio content below by Alaina Latona
(unless otherwise noted)
“I CALLED UP THE SUN”
i called up the sun
asked her if she still has time for me
as if day in and day out
she doesn’t show up for us
consistently
even when she hides behind the clouds
she’s looking at you, looking at me
she knows we are still just kids
taking things out of each other’s hands
without asking
because i’ll carry what’s heavy
rip it from your palm,
even when you won’t let me
because you don’t want to share
we bend our bodies into spaces they don’t fit anymore
beams of light sneaking under doors
bare thighs sticking to the booth
in the back of the bar
i’m unable to move
shoes glued to the floor from the night before
nobody cares to clean up a place that isn’t theirs to keep
i want time to stand still instead of me
there’s more than what meets the eye
or the fingers on the screen
i drew a heart in condensation on the window in the taxi
i put my hand in the center
as if i could extend my arm across rivers to reach you
it’s a vibration everyone can feel
except me
i’m listening
pressing my ear against your walls
trying to hear
trying to understand
throwing wishes into the ocean
on a scraps of newspaper
i didn’t mean to make a mess
of the nothing between us
but there you were, a willing participant
so we flooded it,
and it burned
we broke down doors boarded shut
why do people build homes in the path of hurricanes?
because it won’t matter when we’re dead
what we owned or how much we cried
how embarrassing it was
to fall down face first
with your arms tied
as if you should’ve known better
the basements just get deeper
i watched the crowd sway
and in the space between there you were
we didn't sign up for this
we didn’t read the fine print
we just pressed go
the light turned green
and we ran
the sun still shows up every day
whether we ask her to or not
even when she hides behind the clouds
but i swore i watched you
burst through my windows
surrounding with warmth
with light
and life giving persistence
…or maybe it was just you
standing on the sidewalk
“YOU ARE A PRECIOUS MACHINE”
i had a dream last night
i was on a moving train
i wished everything could move together
and i need to hear you say my name
do you trust me?
this is potentially blinding
staring at the sun
i feel warm, i feel at home
giving freely to humiliation
open to misinterpretation
life is a solo invitation
little by little, day by day
i’m waving you forward
begging you to come inside
taking apart the ocean
screaming into a paper bag
grabbing your hand
i’m shattering, exploding
we race into the light
experimenting with emotion
swaying from side to side
shoulder to shoulder
voyagers borrowing time
corrupted bodies
desperately weaving themselves together
we find safety in each other
i have always seen you
burning in the vast expanse
colors melting under your skin
drifting infinitely into space
this can consume, overwhelm
envelop, terrify
and still, we float with ease, every time
we pray for peace
we wish for tomorrow
we call out for a mother
we sing into the universe
i whisper in your ear
you are a precious machine
once drowning in your own refracted light
put your anchor down
we won’t let you sink
“pulling me into you”
something inside of me is magnetized to something inside of you
escaping from both of us
as our faces inch closer and closer
gripping the vast expanse
pulling me into you
bigger than both of us
clawing its way
out of my body
desperately reaching for
a familiar voice
coming from your mouth
"NEVER WERE" film - Eve's monologue
EVE: “The intimate places you never were, the parts of our bodies that never touched, the time between Christmas and New Year’s Day, balanced in a void. Every particle of me feels like it has known you for multiple lifetimes, frequencies vibrating together in space.
Did you know black holes are formed when massive stars collapse under their own gravity? You are a black hole, emitting light yet expanding into the distance, and I watched you swallow stars, trying to repair what is broken in you. I didn’t know the gravitational pull of a black hole distorts space-time around it, so I inched closer, felt the pull and suddenly I was thrown into the unknown. The fabric of reality completely frayed into nothing, stretched and compressed.
I am a blank stare in a crowded room, my head balanced on two shoulders that you cannot touch. I’m just a speck in the cosmos searching for a tether to reality, frantically pulling myself back down to the earth with both hands.”
——
i wrote this monologue while i was making shrimp for dinner and then i chopped up some stock footage, made it b&w for my best attempt at continuity, scored it, and @runswithwolves_ recorded the voiceover. all in the course of like 5 hours. and i eated the shrimp. this is from a movie that doesn’t exist called “Never Were” - i cant decide if it’s the beginning or the end. or some other place in it. the character’s name is Eve because i said so. did you guys know we are allowed to just, do this?
“SPITTING INTO THE WIND”
head in the clouds,
fitting your behavior into the puzzle,
is like spitting into the wind.
i'm indefensible to these unwelcome chemicals,
inaudibly screaming in a crowd,
as you, gripping the silver spoon,
spiral into my atmosphere.
“TEETH INTO MUSCLE”
bending concrete for a penny
just move on and keep walking
why do i feel like i owe you?
i don’t want to be nice anymore
i can’t pin you down
i want to let go, move on and forget
heartbeats in sync, begging to be close
chest to chest so i can abandon you, hurt you
“never apologize to me” but i’ll make you sorry
we ran through the dew covered law
2am on the front porch (i smell roses near the garage)
it’s like falling and skinning your knees
it’s like teeth into muscle
don’t get too close
easing our bodies back into the swing
i’m falling through the floor
i’m barreling to the center of the earth
i’m begging you to touch my hand
i’m right here
concept, music, editing, words by Alaina Latona
animations by @ameetanimates & Alaina Latona
“WE CAN RUN”
following the sound of your voice in the dark
maybe i have a chest full of stones
or the air is just heavier here
chlorine soaked hair tangled on a pillow
suffocating on the smell of freshly cut grass
with unadorned sweetness,
with a welcoming calm and familiarity,
with stillness and with hesitation
every morning a sliver of light shines through the cracks around your door
even though sometimes it feels like
we are shattering from the outside in
before we know it, our bodies cry out to us
pushing past the limit
racing into the cul-de-sac
waving your arms to the sky, at god
we can run
it's complete abandon
brains rattling in our skulls
bone against bone
those little moments hanging on my heart
one million light years away
standing on the sidewalk, hailing a cab
and evaporating into the night
“vacuous, with gravity”
i identified you just before dawn
in between a hundred arms and legs
flipping through the bible
staring at a blade
screaming at the ceiling
hunting, or threatened
you had a box of bullets in your pocket
struggling before sunrise
on your back, over your shoulders
you are pulling up the sun
you are kicking to the surface
a promise you keep
day after day after day
lingering like a shadow
shifting positions
creeping up around the sides
stretching my arms into space
i am so much, i say too much
daredevils exploding into an infinite landscape
sound ripping through our bodies
out here there is no such thing as pain
there is no such thing as sorrow
vacuous, with gravity, seeking resolve
4am on the west side
pulling your feet from the earth
in forward motion
marching step by step by step
into a phantom of who you are
what they think of you, and who you want to be
all of it, all at once
“PEEL YOUR BODY”
twelve trumpets in the distance
sunshine sound
everything feels like a little disaster
your mild joy is
conditional
like religion
like god
a prison of stars
and rumor has it
this is a virus
technology is deadly
but what can we do with the guilt? nothing.
we’re still
pedaling downhill as fast as we can
falling off a bicycle
colliding with the pavement
cracking open your skull at warp speed
and we hope just one person
runs over
to hold you
look into your eyes and
peel your body off the street
“CONTRAST”
a customer drills the professional
resting a chin in the hand
repeat pressure, repeat pressure, repeat
jaw clenched, listening to you speak
sizing each other up
can i talk to you?
it smells like a basement in here
cold damp wet and full of cardboard
boxes and backs of picture frames, games
i swear i’m broadcasting from my chest
assuming substance,
assuming form, something you like
microscopic font on the computer,
i’m coding, the formula
curling my fingers together in my pocket
bouncing up and down on planet earth
a little too far to the left and you lose
contrast
his fall crashes into my autumn,
same meaning different words
gasping and
relaxing into tobacco smoke, we ride
it out
decrescendo and
squashing a chorus of nothing,
silence on the table i’m shuffling a deck of cards
a creature bubbles under my skeleton and dies
again and again
razors in my brain
love arranges herself like a god, spent
she turns into fourteen rainbow
cheap paper chains taped to the ceiling
strategic and loud i’m
bent over a banister screaming into the foyer
(can you hear me from across the street?)
I’M HERE RIGHT NOW, THIS IS A PARADE
made for you
“exonerated”
screaming in unison, drowning in sound
out of control and empty-handed
there was nothing to salvage,
i was the one who dissolved
and i was the collateral damage
obedient and intimidated,
folding for the thousandth time
didn’t you love to see me come undone?
everything discredited in a day
i held out my hands, asking for answers,
a holy communion
didn’t you love to see the world burn?
this is a formality,
because i know you miss me where you are
now, i am disarmed and earnest
an architect with a white flag
parachuting from heaven, a god on standby
no longer begging for validation
i am scared of your reality
but i open my eyes when i see the sun
running from the past, chasing the future
i am at peace with the things i’ve done
marching forward day after day
exonerated
“callmecallmecallme”
there was a time before all of this
before the comfort, before the hiding
i was straightforward and proud
you were a fence around me
cross my heart, hope to die
call me, i'm so embarrassed
swallow me, accuse me
i recovered and i am unrecognizable
missing the target over and over again
the white hot taste of this extraordinary pain
i was disposable and choking on it
you exploited the best things about me
compliments like little drops of poison
i scattered my body throughout your world
the inertia kept me unaware of the damage done
but i can still trace the places your hands met mine
isn't it strange how the mind draws a blank?
i am a paper doll sitting on a shelf
i am barreling forward
i am floating into heaven
i am pleasant, i am kind, i am numb
i intend for this to reach you
wherever you are
“trejure trejure”
tie a string around your finger to remember
i am on another planet
everything tastes like gold
i promise to keep breathing
i treasure this moment
i look to the past to make peace with myself
teach me about the future
is there love where you are?
i live inside a dream
i am wishing into outer space
what if time is my only enemy?
do you ever fight back?
i forgive myself.
i treasure you
“this is ephemeral”
we are born cascading down a mountain
fast learners, somersaulting in sync
put on a brave face;
this is ephemeral
it's a single ticket
for each of us
bespoken for the garden
or backstage for the rock show
(it doesn't ask, it only tells)
i see you in fuchsia
running down the sidewalk
standing sunflowers tall
we are given the gift of light
may it blind,
may it bore
we must sprout and grow
yet for some of us
we find flight but too soon
we watched icarus melt
and still hand in hand
we race towards the sea for what?
because despite our fight to heal,
in futility we share
our dancing joy
our wealth
our destiny
our failure
our fallout
we are all ships in the night
we idle
and we pass
cartographers shouting into the void
in unison
wandering the only map we know
back to the garden
from whence we came
“fallingdownscared”
two chains coiled around each other
to create all we have ever known,
but now we are long gone.
goners from birth,
goners til dawn,
chasing a fabricated effervescence,
missing the target over and over.
yet despite the insidious anchorman,
despite the acceptance of losing
everything we will ever love,
there is still a deep hope
and it bellows from the core of humanity
at a frequency tailor made for you.
hands over eyes, hands over ears,
eyes on the floor,
ears deafened to nuance,
hands over hearts
versus knees on the ground,
and vicious 2cycle4
overtaking common sense.
we are all scared.
we are all scary.
there is a truth to every crush.
i feel nothing and i try to feel everything.
i am still
fallingdownscared
of you.
it was debilitating
to witness the narcissist spiral into oblivion
but i was glued to the tragedy,
my reality manicured to take the blame,
and i wouldn’t dare change i thing.
i learned to shotgun lemonade in a dream.
i smelled a garden rotting in my heart.
i watched a monarch fly down the storm drain
in your neighborhood.
i ripped out my tongue and
i left it on your driveway.
i watched wet footprints evaporate on the back porch.
tune out the changing tides of memory.
keep jumping harder into the things
that make you feel the most,
and become a vagrant in your mind.
“cathexis" REIMAGINED
have you ever loved someone
when no one was looking
have you ever made yourself whole again
with your eyes closed
did you find what you were looking for?
i just can't look
i hope you find this stupid and uncomfortable
i dare you
you will keep reading
go ahead
and read this out loud to your friends
pretend it is a joke
pretend you don't remember
pretend you are fine
pretend i deserve it
pretend everything was my fault
keep one hand on your heart
and the other over your eye
skew your vision
throw off your perception
and find love
this is not what i had planned
it's killing me
i kept all of your plants alive
as long as i could
i made jokes about forgetting to water them
but i always did i always did i always did
i always did
meanwhile i dreamed it was pretend
and woke up next to myself
lying to myself
i won't water them today
but the soil was always wet
when the door shut behind me
everyone knows this is about you
it's always about you
if i gave a shit i would align with you
on the comet coattails you ride
through outer space
instead i will rocket past them
the only propulsion being me being me
being me being me
“I TALK 2 U IN DISCO BALLS”
i talk 2 u in disco balls
i'm choking on my own words
i meditate, mediate, medicate,
do not resuscitate
but maybe
i can't carry this forever but i will try
forcing myself up another flight of stairs
forcing myself
with all of this
like sisyphus
will you marry us
what a grand gesture!
monkey head in a jar
cigarettes on the lawn
listen to all people
you can't choke your way through this one
sibling of a plaything
i'm gagging
“untitled, nowhere”
"untitled, nowhere"
building up the courage
do you "see me" now?
i know what you like
you are comfortable
when i'm nowhere and nothing
impeding my deliverance
"target audience"
i am 1000000 little machines
this is mine
"no offense"
thanks
“overcompensating”
i wrote the poem in 2020, created the video + the song in 2021, i realized / finished it in 2022. a love letter from me at 31 years old to my past self at 24 years old:
overcompensating
collecting broken glass in two bleeding hands
scared to speak and yet
i scare you
do you have even the slightest concern
you should
if you don’t you should
give me the worst advice
because i can be a tidal wave
and this is
primitive
i know, but what have i done?
i didn’t go to prom didn’t get married didn’t buy a house
you would use it all as a weapon
and now i am
sorry
for something that hasn’t happened
you are savoring it
i am collecting
everything that makes me feel guilty
spit it out
screaming “thanks!” as i chew and swallow my own teeth
you are bothering me
i am bothering me
i am capable, safe, useful, suspended
override
suited and dressed
zombies in an elevator
dripping with sweat
sliding out of a vending machine
push
don’t fucking tell me what to do
sad clowns
proud clones with singed throats
sink your teeth into the soft parts
release
don’t let the useless evil
distort, disorient, distract
because you are strange, sweet
and free
“challenges”
i don’t know what i am scared of
but i keep holding back
protecting nothing from nothing
i used to chase you
to the bottom of the ocean
and you’d let me
i was chained to the boat and
i dragged it down with me
even though it was our only escape
the mind is a muscle.
"the mind is not a vessel to be filled
but a fire to be kindled."
the challenge isn’t to move on and get over it
it is allowing myself to exhale
and trusting i can kick to the surface
“EXTRACURRICULARSSS (NICE GIRLS)”
i loved believing in you.
it was one of the only things i remembered how to do.
i had my faith shaken,
i had been given every reason to leave, but i stayed.
days went by and i waited for something to happen,
for anything to change.
always looking for signs of life
in places i shouldn’t.
“am i not a nice girl?
...this doesn’t happen to nice girls.”
some would say, “that’s the devil”,
taking over different bodies to test me;
a manifestation of the
biggest hill i’ll ever climb:
learning the value of life
over society’s “self”
“you think you’re something special,
way above it all.
you had a handful of silver
when you told me you were falling in love.
i know you just love how
i make you feel.”
there is no balance when one side of two lives
is hanging on by a thread.
i don’t know how to hold on to someone so selfish,
when i live in a world where attention is currency.
the only magic we have left
is to believe in ourselves,
and the bravest choice on earth
is accepting yourself.
“i have helped
too many hearts through this.
i can’t do it anymore.”
and in the fleeting moments
where i feel like the luckiest person alive,
i pray that bliss will find me when i die;
unaware of what i have to lose,
totally submitting to the ephemerality of life.
“sugar”
i'm a statue leaning against a wall
i am the confluence of everywhere and nowhere
my vision is a lottery
while i daydream of being a kid again
there are no leaders
we are all just living with a fever
he is a fraud, no one is listening
nothing has changed,
it’s not different, just separate
this is an illness
am i okay? does it scare you?
i am exploring the abyss of my mind
only to find myself 3 or 4 times a day
every time
i am turbulent, i am fire
and it is hard to maintain
the emotional solidarity between
what i want and what i need
wanting 2 be loved
and needing to disappear completely
the discovery of what i am to be
puts want and need
at a stalemate
one to be the penultimate choice
in a long list of celestial ideas
i cannot decode
i have already decided
my soul is a mouth
“i owe you sleep”
i would have savored it
if i knew that was it
i would have chewed every bite
32 times
but maybe we chewed too much
tore tough flesh down to the bone
we chewed and chewed
until it became textureless, unrecognizable
waterlogged
tasteless
digesting in our mouths
i want to hear the room ring
i want to feel the earth shake
i want to climb inside myself and back out again
i want to see the world through the eyes of desire
it is a privilege to know the pain of needing someone;
a lesson in the fear of being forgotten and
the joy of being remembered
bare feet in wet grass
ripped clothes and broken glass
if i knew hours could be lost
if i knew time could be a debt
if i knew something blunt could cut so deep
if i knew i could owe you sleep…
i wouldn’t change a thing
“Undress”
“The devil is not a warden”
I'm going to fuck this up
I'm going to fuck it all up
Don't worry
Don't watch too closely
But wait and see
:)
I am going to fuck this up
Do you ever wonder if there is magic?
there is.
And I know you think you can feel things
that are thousands of miles away from you,
A connection, a spiritual awareness
to something that is not you
I can see the strings pulling you
to believe in thoughts that aren't yours,
But it is just the magic.
You're not the mindreader,
and I'm gonna fuck it all up.
If not today, tomorrow. Or, maybe I did it yesterday.
Most of the time, I am being backhanded by reality.
Dulling it gently with nicotine and gin.
I put the sand in your ice cream
and then I scratched up my knees.
The devil is not a warden
and your mind is not a prison.
(I am so sick of this shit.)
Everyone says they feel empty
when there is a loss,
Like they feel a space,
some kind of gap, a hole
where something used to be.
I can't find that openness.
There is nothing vast or expansive about this.
No part of this feels like I am lacking
or missing something.
Everything is still here.
This space is so full, it's "packed-to-the-ceiling"-full. It is "I-can't-move-or-it-might-spill-out- of-my-mouth-at-any-second"- FULL.
I wish it was a void,
This should be something completely empty
That I can fill up again.
It's more like a closet
I keep packing full of shit I can't get rid of
but don't need either:
12 old t-shirts,
an oversized winter coat,
A printer,
pantings I never hung,
Christmas decorations.
All of it stacked up
next to that time we drove south to visit a friend,
And every New Year's Eve together
This is not a void.
This is not an empty space.
This is everything, all at once,
all the time.
//
“insulated”
I am insulated.
I see no hate; I see no violence.
I live on an immovable plane,
disinfected and trampled into hell
Are you, too, drugged into submission?
Bullied into silence?
They don’t want us to be spiteful as we decay.
And now there is no you, there is only me.
Don’t you get it?
There is blood rushing to my head,
I smile because I know I have handfuls
of broken pearls in my pocket.
Vague like cinnamon, parched like a fish.
I know it’s too late, we’re shipwrecked
and going down, But I hollow out my eyes
so I can see more of who you really are,
more of who I really am.I am infrared,
I am sore. This is my recital
and I have forgotten the words.
Do you keep your honor in your soul?
Do you falter when faced with the truth?
Do you cry as you’re force-fed the future?
Do you digest the same noise as me?
I will affix this heart to your chest.
Bossy, crooked and demure.
I am insulated
“cathexis”
heavy breathing terrestrial beings,
childlike intuition.
running, screaming
with megaphones
glued to our hands.
put on a helmet and watch out for the
spectacular, clandestine eruption
spilling from your mouth, gossamer threads
hissing at me, fizzing
oozing sugary nonsense
fermented.
i'm choking
on the noise.
it's poison and it cuts deep and it never leaves
and it takes more than it gives
forever and ever and ever
it is a cardinal sin,
to roll your eyes.
blaming me.
shameless.
idolized,
spellbound,
bloodshot,
demolished
and suddenly,
in the middle of it all
i inhale.
i've never seen a starrier sky
i fly my rocket all the way up,
exploding into a million pieces.
i sink my submarine,
in the center of your ocean.
this is heaven;
needy and met.
just wait.
i have an announcement to make!
at the lowest lows and highest highs
harmonizing, we bloom
surrounded in love,
cathexis:
crystallized.
“major 4”
innocence
i am far away from home.
i watch the world turn from somewhere high above.
i am an astronaut that got cut.
it’s time to relearn what matters to me.
i don’t know if life is going to start again.
i don’t know when life is going to end.
vanity
is someone supposed to save me?
(god, i hope not.)
how boring to rely on someone other than yourself.
but how am i supposed to tolerate this mess?
inhale, exhale.
i don’t know what is right or wrong.
i can’t believe i let it get this far.
identity
i am excited for the opportunity to live again.
i don’t think i need to be rescued.
it is a privilege to feel alone.
i feel like a child.
and i’m learning who i can be in this body as i float away.
we are experiencing everything that will ever happen to us
all together, all at the same time.
validation
i am building a castle in this moment.
once in a lifetime, one in a million.
this is special to me, make it last forever,
and just for right now.
maybe we are meant for nothing
riding bicycles downhill to nowhere.
i will share my questions with you
and i pray we never find the answers.
i feel everything, all the time, every day.
restart