camille shapiro
sdja, class of 2005


bizarre works


i dreamed a dream last night

and the dream

was reality

beauty and sex

combined in inarticulate

wavelengths

the incoherence;

the water running down her wrist

was poison,

and yet i sipped

thinking of utopia

and receiving only

sickness

the next morning

i woke to find her next to me

in a wide configurement of eyelashes

the piercing of my flesh brought me back

from darkness....

her absence,

like tequila

prescribed

for a hangover


i like the taste of people.
if i could, i would eat them.
piece by piece...mmmmmm...
a little balsamic vinegar, some butter...olives..?


am being exotic

am scaring myself

am delighting in the whole mess of it


i thought of you today. wouldn't it be lovley to wander around europe? to taste the olives, and the wine, and the cheese.

i was thinking how i stray from commitment. how i crave it, and yet run from it. i am my own worst enemy, and my very best friend. i was thinking of how i have a callous on the wrong finger from writing. i was thinking how there could be a wrong finger. i was thinking of where i find happiness...and found it delightfully odd. i was thinking of what scared me..and i found it amusing.

what nourishes me also destroyes me.

avec baisers,


my life explodes onto stage
like pomegranet juice
through white button-holes
owning only myself
and yet being
a puzzle;
all askew

yes, i sing of rain
you, my japanese apple blossom
would hunger in paradise
and yet i would still kneel
for the essence of your fruit
to drip
to my waiting tongue

i never walked into you
i never found you awake
in the middle of the morning..
waiting for night
you caught me by the hair
and stubbed my toe
on the marble pavement
of your white-gloved existance

you; a limber mechanism of questions
with morality sculpted
from the blueprint of God
gave me your suffering
left behind from someone else's
frigid tension
imprinted on your flesh
in painfully beautiful white scars...

i surrendered.


bubble baths

sushi for breakfast

coffee for dinner

cheescake in-between

dreams that never end

kissing...


i smell like vanilla tobacco,

have found that cigars are a great comfort,

am glad i am not obligated to inhale, just to play with the smoke.


My life in five years...don't bother asking

For me, in five years, so much will be different. I will be out of high school. I will drive, and realize that driving wasn't really as big of a deal as I figured. Maybe I'll have an apartment. Maybe I'll share it. Maybe I won't. Will I still use the same shampoo? Will I still smell the same? Like gardenia and musk? Will my toe still turn slightly outwards in those blue funky shoes I wear around the house? If my tastes change, how much will they change? Maybe I'll visit on weekends? Maybe I'll sleep a lot. Maybe I'll walk around like a zombie still marching off of four hours of sleep and a double expresso, made at five that morning. Will my hair be blonde? Probably. The hormones will have settled down by then...won't they? I'll ask the palm reader. She knows what she's talking about, which is more than I can say for me. Don't ask me to think too far into the future. I might just go into overdrive and explode on you.


Plastic tomb
The address is wrong
Sorry, wrong number
Leave a message?
On what answering machine?
Oh, you must mean this confused haven of thoughts,
Well,
It's out of order

String of pearls
Across my forehead
Tomorrow's newspaper
Yesterday's news

Life is purged on the edge of a Kleenex box
And we all wonder where the fairies are hiding


I'm lying in bed
Sunlight seeps through my half opened windows
And my half closed eyes

Can't decide whether to sit up and face the day
Or lie back down
And burn my way
Into a hell,
Into a hole
That I dug myself
It now has a mouth big enough to swallow me whole

Death is at someone's aid
Where is the guilt?


I want to hold the secrets of the universe in my palms,
And crow at the sun as if to say
"I can control you."
Then I would laugh with the moon,
And whisper
"I can kick a hole in the sky, I am the wind."

But Time works different,
Even more than I.
Time and Death work together;
They co-exist quietly;
They are happy.
It's just that their children keep dying...

Death does not need Time to survive;
To exist
Death takes life before Time
Can glimpse the victim.

I cannot glimpse a fragment of the future,
False hope.
I can't stay alive long enough to enjoy,
Or suffer it.

I will return to the space in-between.
I want to see the earth,
The size of a blueberry
And so far away from me.


There's a soul
hidden
in the mirror's false reflection

glass shards
litter the ground

a thousand eyes
look up at me
through the darkness

bloody hands
::smile softly::
candle wax

the eyes
in the jigsaw puzzle of life
have skipped over
one element
a flaw in the transcript

moist lips
::eyelids::
cold fingers

your energy
vibrates
down the vertebrae
of a warm god
that you do not believe in


I stepped out of the way, for a painted lady to blow past
on the east wind
parting my lips for sunshine
I waited until dusk
to see her pass again,
cold, on a cloud of luminescent souls

Even in death, the flower is beautiful

It still holds its vibrant color

Its petals still soft
(fingers through hair) like liquid silk
the world is a parade of many colored scarves
outside my window

Fear is in my bones
the sinew is poisoned
wax tears
are beautiful
red
blue
green
yellow

Fake


Gallery | E-Mail Doug at mrdoug@aznet.net and he will pass your comments on to Camille.