dream weaver

i am a stranger to my own bones
alien to my own skin
just the outsider looking in always
even in my own family,
and i don’t know how to shatter the glass
to actually participate
before i lose my ability to human
perhaps i already have;
it’s always been so hard for me to fit in
never fit in their cookie cutter molds
even when i was foolish enough
to try to—
i am me
that’s my super power
with my intensity, passion, and ferocity
in love and life and my dreams i just don’t fit in
with these people
who praise the mediocre and hold it close
to their bosom as a lover;
i want more than this provincial life—
watch me jump off the balcony
into the ocean of possibilities because my dreams
won’t work
unless i do.

 

“Gel” © Dr. Regina Valluzzi

 

Linda M. Crate is a Pennsylvanian native born in Pittsburgh yet raised in the rural town of Conneautville. Her poetry, short stories, articles, and reviews have been published in a myriad of magazines both online and in print. Recently her two chapbooks A Mermaid Crashing Into Dawn (Fowlpox Press – June 2013) and Less Than A Man (The Camel Saloon – January 2014) were published. She is the author of the Magic Series. The first of this series Blood & Magic, was published March 2015 and the second of this series Dragons & Magic was published October 2015. Her poetry collection Sing Your Own Song is forthcoming through Barometric Pressures Series.

Art can illuminate even the most elusive and difficult to comprehend ideas. Visual rules and tightly codified visual metaphors help scientists communicate complex ideas mostly amongst themselves, but they can also become barriers to new ideas and insights. Dr. Regina Valluzzi’s images are abstracted and diverged from the typical rules and symbols of scientific illustration and visualization; they provide an accessible window into the world of science for both scientists and non-scientists.