swifts  &  s l o w s · a quarterly of crisscrossings

witnessing of chaos in motion
maija mist

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driving on 9

past the point of intake
though i am listening to the new lana
& i did watch a few movies recently

the same character shows up elsewhere
talking about their projection screen
which i’ve always idealized

the father of your child said
they just watch things on their phone
but i know for a fact they
were invited to the screening

if ever there was a time to be convinced of the unreality of reality it was yesterday
driving down ainaloa blvd stopped behind a blazing blue cop car stopping traffick
to draw lines on the road, not to denote any crime scene but to manage the
linearity of cars. from a few cars back i heard some campy disco blaring & realized
by the time i appeared to be funneled around the scene that it was coming from
the cop car. upon making it to the bottleneck, it seemed i had arrived back in
some story that had been routinely told & acted upon – the cop seeming
aggressively oriented in a present with no regard for life itself & i exited the scene
back on the street, averting my attention to the greens lining the road, back into
my wishful views where the leaves sparkle & fade, trying not to give too much
attention to the confusion that could be tirelessly perpetrated by the witnessing of
chaos in motion.

at times i write of memory to loose myself within it : deep in the cadence of how
i’d like for it to be, how i fear it has been engraved in my hip bones, how i follow
the inkling to a place where you can meet me if you’d like …
follow the thread to a place i could not possibly have fixed together on my own
// so i’d like to imagine // comfort in falling out of oh what’s that movie, you
know
then tumble out of thinking altogether ,, not by choice but by necessity
nothing comes but now & so
i find other ways to take time
i go back to the farm
i write of feeling & form & forget the past
i fall in love again with the patterns of plants , myself , my child
i wish for prudence ,,, i return to prayer
i remember the histories of which i have no memory of a hand in making &nd i fall
back into the implications of how she came to be ,, what it means to be placed
within all of this &nd i feel power of creation, of choice, of returning to intent ,, to
no knowledge, to cheap facilitation &nd plummeting through the places you
desire , to return to the place you’re meant to be which is here, nevertheless

the bird you like is sitting on the fence

is it the incognito verbatim vibe or
i learned the limit
or
trying to take on just what is
conducive to

in the limelite sprung forth like

spring
rituals
left undone
or
untended to
so as to
dissolve

halfhearted
happenstance

clear water
prudence
focused intent

muddy mystics clear the pathways where
anything is

5 time sin a day
abundance of capability
doesn’t mean you should
abundance of capability
does not negate time
desire does not negate time
capability doesn’t neither

what is held
what we hold

one misstep for the ages
&nd i’ll write still of what could have been

you in another story

say

dematerialize
the real world
still i live here

with you

basic bitch

sunday mourning / praise the dawning
praise the slo rise // praise the houseplants & the dew
the parking lots filled w hot pants & day glo

praise be to that one time.

heavenly host got the bag in their backpack
heavenly host goes by they // them

// find the resonance /// paints arrive eod
clear spray
r the spray paints still at caden’s ?

the way we cvr the mess w chaos to take away from the
mental energy that goes twds reminding you that a deep clean is
usually necessary

i thought your car had heated seats but it turned out it was mine

:::

who plays in the field of no karma
?

define the relation

or create your own inference
or rewrite the assumption
squeeze the narrative of choice
or delineate the implication
circumvent onlookers masqueraded as
what

not your own
but something
else                     & so

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maija mist is a writer & artist with roots in Baltimore, New York, & Hawai’i. Her work considers notions of space, transparency, time, & the limitations of the language. She weaves non-linear narratives that allow her audience to float through visions & worlds while considering multi-dimensional realities. She has published work with Metatron Press, Spectra Poets, Perennial Press, & Women.Weed.WiFi. Her visual work has been exhibited globally.  A collection of her poetry on (3) time is out on Arteidolia Press.