I liked talking to Greg because he always kept it real, always talked about how much he hated doing coke, and because he always had coke. He played the guitar and I mashed some drums despite my broken finger, trying to stay in rhythm as he compensated for my lack of talent. Then he put the instrument down, gave his hat to some blonde girl who was practically sucking his dick already, then turned to me.
"Last time I did it was like being drunk but drunk on 4loco." He lit a cigarette.
I didn't know we could smoke in his apartment, so I lit one too. The blonde girl was trying to talk to me about some stupid bracelet she was wearing. She wanted to trade me one of mine. I pulled off a handful and threw them to the ground, turning back to Greg. I wanted him to give me a quick snooter just to deal with this birthday party.
"Man, I could climb walls. No problem." He pulled out a small jar. Inside was a baggy filled with powder.
"Only thing is, I just wanted to crawl into a hole. I was at some shitty DJ party, the DJ was a total fucking bummer. I hate how anyone thinks they can be a DJ."
He looked around, then cracked open the bag. Powder spill onto his fingers and he immediately licked them.
"Want some Molly?" He asked, spilling the powder onto a napkin.
"Doesn't matter." I inhaled my cigarette, watching the blonde girl sorting through the jewelry on the floor. Her thong wasn't sticking out, so she wasn't wearing any underwear. Her ass was a little fat.
Greg poured some powder into a beer. He snorted the rest off the napkin, then handed me the beer. "To life, love, and laughter." I nodded and pounded the beer. Someone was lighting firecrackers off on the patio.
The door barged open and as Creedence Clear Water revival started to play, a bunch of weird Asians walk in. I was sitting near the door so they all introduced themselves to me. I only remember this short one named Dwayne--he had long black hair streaked with lime green. He claimed it was his birthday too. I wonder if he could climb walls.
"25 down, 25 left to go." I told Dwayne, not shaking his hand. I inhaled my cigarette then tried the beer again. I wanted every last drop of relevance.
Greg clammed up and stopped talking. Watching the crowd of people schmooze in corners and near windows, he slowly sipped his whiskey and averted his eyes. I stood to get another beer. Life, love, and laughter.
I walked through the crowd, people trying to dance and give me shots of whiskey. I handed the remainder of my cigarette to Kevin, a tall guy with a bandanna around his head. He didn't drink, but instead brought all the blondes and some comics for me to read. We talked about firecrackers and stink bombs until Joan Jett became too loud from the speakers. I walked into the kitchen and past someone asking me how my new apartment was. I made up some nonsense, realized I had to pay some billls, then crack a Keystone. In that order.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. Camille was crying about something, motioning to the living room. It wasn't clear if she was serious, or if she was just a a side effect. Tossing my cigarette into the sink, I turned to the window. People were gathered around and yelling at the rain.
I took a glance and saw some people naked running throw a stream of water. It wasn't actually raining; the naked drunks had just punctured a pipe form the sprinkler system and were going for a dip.
I got closer and one of the blondes bent over in front of me. I stepped into her, and we began to dry hump. I was wondering who else Greg had been giving Molly to. Creedence Clearwater Revival came back on for some reason, and I continued to thrust into her.
The blonde turned around and said, "I can feel you."
It may have been a side effect.
We continued to dry hump and look at the window, even after the wet kids came inside and tried to go warm. The water pipe was still bursting everywhere, turning the grass into mud. "Doesn't matter." I thought.
Greg seemed angry so I went to go talk to him. He was incoherent and yelling, so I danced to a few songs I knew. Camille finally stopped crying and brightened up. Before long she had opened and poured a bottle of expensive champagne.
"Who's birthday is it, again?" Either Camille or I asked this. I remember whoever answered simply said, "Doesn't matter."
Monday, December 13, 2010
Friday, November 26, 2010
Rex
Dogs, too old with senility, will get stuck in corners. Frustrated at being unable to back themselves out, they howl.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Orbit
A man and a child, what a pair,
like a planet with the nourishing star
cooperating and exchanging love and care,
from the same heart they both share."
like a planet with the nourishing star
cooperating and exchanging love and care,
from the same heart they both share."
State's Famed
I look around, and when I know no one is looking, I place a winning scratch ticket on the bookshelf. Whomever's house this is will find it one day and smile.
The windows are never closed but the blind are always open. Cool street air drifts in from the night, bouncing the single flames from dozens of candles off the walls. Vegans shiver in a southern November, but it might as well be a northern September. Each shadow produced by a candle dances with its master; lift your cup and a murmur of the lips makes the darkness mouth silent songs, as I pull up my socks and avoid the view up my neighbor's skirt.
The drunks swallow slowly and suck on their cigarettes as I slowly tell a story in strained monotone, my eyes never leaving the ground. I have to work on eye contact, but it got harder the summer I realized that it is easier to make someone cry than to laugh. But no matter how you slice it, we're all mere jokers in the ring, and what a circus it is that abuses elephants around us. Better yet, what a prank.
Someone throws on music I've never heard of before. Myself, I've cynically been traveling back into time looking for better sounds. I blatantly ignore anything modern or new out of lonesome loathing to my generation--the all inclusive everyone is special generation, a group of fuck ups and ambitious philosophy majors with no practical skills.
If I tear my groin from the bone in a kickball game I'd starve to death at thirdbase like a deer with eroded teeth. But if I happen to mispronounce a French philosopher from the 18th century I catch hell. Everybody wins a trophy in this generation.
I finish speaking and most are too stoned to be paying attention. A few look puzzled and one girl with dyed red hair and a dangerous eyebrow ring asks what I do for a living. I'm an ambitious fuck up with no practical talent so I lie. I tell her I'm a garbage man. Or a disposable lighter repairman.
And in the silence no one laughs. I tilt a half drank beer I didn't pay for to chapped lips, wondering once again who's in charge of refills. My needs for alcohol eclipsed my manners and I strode to the kitchen, leaving the eyebrow ring with the skirt looking for a cigarette. I told her to check the bookcase but she ignored me.
Out the window, on the street, men are returning from closing time. It's been windy for weeks, and it won't be stopping soon. That's not what they're talking about, but it'll be on the minds of the people who hose off their vomit from the sidewalks in the morning.
The windows are never closed but the blind are always open. Cool street air drifts in from the night, bouncing the single flames from dozens of candles off the walls. Vegans shiver in a southern November, but it might as well be a northern September. Each shadow produced by a candle dances with its master; lift your cup and a murmur of the lips makes the darkness mouth silent songs, as I pull up my socks and avoid the view up my neighbor's skirt.
The drunks swallow slowly and suck on their cigarettes as I slowly tell a story in strained monotone, my eyes never leaving the ground. I have to work on eye contact, but it got harder the summer I realized that it is easier to make someone cry than to laugh. But no matter how you slice it, we're all mere jokers in the ring, and what a circus it is that abuses elephants around us. Better yet, what a prank.
Someone throws on music I've never heard of before. Myself, I've cynically been traveling back into time looking for better sounds. I blatantly ignore anything modern or new out of lonesome loathing to my generation--the all inclusive everyone is special generation, a group of fuck ups and ambitious philosophy majors with no practical skills.
If I tear my groin from the bone in a kickball game I'd starve to death at thirdbase like a deer with eroded teeth. But if I happen to mispronounce a French philosopher from the 18th century I catch hell. Everybody wins a trophy in this generation.
I finish speaking and most are too stoned to be paying attention. A few look puzzled and one girl with dyed red hair and a dangerous eyebrow ring asks what I do for a living. I'm an ambitious fuck up with no practical talent so I lie. I tell her I'm a garbage man. Or a disposable lighter repairman.
And in the silence no one laughs. I tilt a half drank beer I didn't pay for to chapped lips, wondering once again who's in charge of refills. My needs for alcohol eclipsed my manners and I strode to the kitchen, leaving the eyebrow ring with the skirt looking for a cigarette. I told her to check the bookcase but she ignored me.
Out the window, on the street, men are returning from closing time. It's been windy for weeks, and it won't be stopping soon. That's not what they're talking about, but it'll be on the minds of the people who hose off their vomit from the sidewalks in the morning.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Never Save Your Goodbyes
I had just started smoking again when it was her birthday party and the older people on the road tended to board themselves in for the winter. Like most parties back then, they consisted of petite lesbians juggling fire while we smoked hand rolled cigarettes, passing food around a small, friendly fire. Home made vegan brownies and a single spoon murmur, and almost everything has avocado in it.
Always tattoo your favorite piece of produce on you. Don't cut yourself with the bread knife. Let's give Molly the first piece of everything.
She had made guacamole and a drunk guy with a mustache was bothering me as I tried to eat it. He was dressed in a suit that was soaked with sweat. At the bottom of the stairs, a girl looked horrified that newspapers were being fed into the fire.
I gently point out Mustache's drunkness, and explain why others avoided him. He leaves without saying goodbye, and people try to find him in the streets.
Knowledge of narrow back roads will always reward you. The man who would end his night dead to the world in a lawn chair unbeknownst as girls got Facebook worthy photos with him had made some impressions that night.
Right before he spilled his pink drink all over the kitchen floor he mentions losing luggage coast to coast. He explains it's like losing your sword before crossing the river.
Television shows which feature non-aging characters are inherently creepy. Really, they are an abomination to nature. Some float through the years, maintaining a tenure as a perpetual child.
Always tattoo your favorite piece of produce on you. Don't cut yourself with the bread knife. Let's give Molly the first piece of everything.
She had made guacamole and a drunk guy with a mustache was bothering me as I tried to eat it. He was dressed in a suit that was soaked with sweat. At the bottom of the stairs, a girl looked horrified that newspapers were being fed into the fire.
I gently point out Mustache's drunkness, and explain why others avoided him. He leaves without saying goodbye, and people try to find him in the streets.
Knowledge of narrow back roads will always reward you. The man who would end his night dead to the world in a lawn chair unbeknownst as girls got Facebook worthy photos with him had made some impressions that night.
Right before he spilled his pink drink all over the kitchen floor he mentions losing luggage coast to coast. He explains it's like losing your sword before crossing the river.
Television shows which feature non-aging characters are inherently creepy. Really, they are an abomination to nature. Some float through the years, maintaining a tenure as a perpetual child.
Analytical Analysis
Everyone is afraid of meeting a stranger. I speak to a large man with a beard. He is concerned about his parking, how his car may be a health concern to some one, maybe even himself. It's probably a lot worse when he's driving it.
He shakes his hands as if they're wet and mentions how that is another story. His words are so demanding, they rack his body, sweating alcohol out of his diabetic pores. His thoughts drift to bitter taste of vitamins in the morning, greasy soap cracking the skin on his knuckles. Car rides consisting of impatient cigarette ash on the pant leg.
Why do I think of these important things?
Strangers that approach me at intersections while I'm selling my weeks for hundred dollar lump sums make me accelerate towards curbs. A stranger could embrace you. Or annex the love of your life as she dances uninhibatedly. You can always throw an elbow at him, and deny it later. Maybe picture yourself taking out his legs and getting a few fore arms in.
A lack of socialism is barely an excuse, as trucks eyeball slowly looking for labor.
Their parties always border on Oregon Bad. Some nights there are only neighbors and weird relatives--the step mom's daughter with the nice guitar and good malt liquor. No one notices your port wine, so you can stain your lips red some more. Stranger here wants to know if you like Salvia and an obscure 80's movie.
The sound of silence cuts behind his head. Strange times already with mom sitting there. Get her out of here so I can vomit. She seems to want to touch me when I tell her I've got a job downtown. I don't really know her step daughter at all, or the people that I work with. Sometimes I like being a stranger.
He shakes his hands as if they're wet and mentions how that is another story. His words are so demanding, they rack his body, sweating alcohol out of his diabetic pores. His thoughts drift to bitter taste of vitamins in the morning, greasy soap cracking the skin on his knuckles. Car rides consisting of impatient cigarette ash on the pant leg.
Why do I think of these important things?
Strangers that approach me at intersections while I'm selling my weeks for hundred dollar lump sums make me accelerate towards curbs. A stranger could embrace you. Or annex the love of your life as she dances uninhibatedly. You can always throw an elbow at him, and deny it later. Maybe picture yourself taking out his legs and getting a few fore arms in.
A lack of socialism is barely an excuse, as trucks eyeball slowly looking for labor.
Their parties always border on Oregon Bad. Some nights there are only neighbors and weird relatives--the step mom's daughter with the nice guitar and good malt liquor. No one notices your port wine, so you can stain your lips red some more. Stranger here wants to know if you like Salvia and an obscure 80's movie.
The sound of silence cuts behind his head. Strange times already with mom sitting there. Get her out of here so I can vomit. She seems to want to touch me when I tell her I've got a job downtown. I don't really know her step daughter at all, or the people that I work with. Sometimes I like being a stranger.
Instead Take You
Internet I
Can't even lick, the test
eclipse reasons and drifts
bending with all the rest
You internet picture
makes my aim miss
emulating emotion
and a cold sense of cyber distraction
but still manges to battle sadness
Can't even lick, the test
eclipse reasons and drifts
bending with all the rest
You internet picture
makes my aim miss
emulating emotion
and a cold sense of cyber distraction
but still manges to battle sadness
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Patience Says it is Past Her Cure
I'm out of patience.
Not even during my immersion into Buddhism was I particularly patient. I blame television, the interwebs, liberalism, pornography. I was raised on electronic boxes. When electronic boxes were the hip, new thing on the block. Technology is so passe these days, anything not an electronic box is hip in certain circles.
But patience has never been an adjective I've worn on my hat. Meditating for hours in rainy Oregon winters, poor, celibate, and uncertain. I look back to those memories as my finger tips brushing the cool glass of self control. I look back and can hardly identify that person, like seeing oneself in a dream. But, I'm the kind of person who will hold a grudge against someone if they upset me in a dream.
One day my boss asked me if I knew that I'd be washing dishes next week. It reminded me of a poor, rain-soaked Bodhisattva on the coast mixing soap in a greasy sink. All that my roommates would eat were bacon, cheese, and beef. Saute'd with vegetable oil. I hated it then, and I was the closest I have ever been to patient in those days.
I told her, "I hate washing dishes. Dishes aren't sexy. There's no sugar in dishes."
Her unilluminating sleeve tattoos wiped non-existent sweat off her brow. She was the opposite of a snake only because she refrained from eye contact. She muttered something about it being good for me, as it was the objects in the world around them that the Dutch painters would turn to. Baroque.
I was out of patience.
"I don't think I'm enjoying this." I said to B. He was a male, but practically female, so our boss liked him. She even made eye contact. I went to the bathroom and punched a few things. Is anything as joyous as the sound of knuckle connecting furiously to an aluminum towel dispenser? Or a cheap boot to the back of a bathroom stall? I don't know what they're constructed of, but I'd love to purchase some scrap just for anger management. I'm sure it'd be cheaper than all that rifle ammunition.
I emerged and my boss asked if I wanted to talk about it. I told her I liked to keep it inside. Let it bottle up. Let it explode violently. Women hate this characteristic. She looked like she wanted a cigarette. Confirming my observation, she told me to meet her outside in a few minutes. I decided they'd be my last minutes here. I Scrounged my fleeting sense of entitlement. It was like the spoons that fall through into the garbage disposal. Clanging against the blades when you flipped the switch, making your fingers tingle.
"B, sorry to do this to you. But I quit." I told him.
"Really? You're quitting?" He asked.
"Yeah, I'm gonna go outside and tell Hairam right now."
"I think you should. Go for it man, you don't need this." B said, always strangely optimistic.
Outside I made her go back in and grab her cigarettes so I could have one.
"I thought you didn't smoke?" She asked. I shrugged and used her lighter. "Smoke 'em if ya got them."
Joining me at the table, she asked if I remembered what we talked about in my 3 month review. I exhaled. I nod.
During my 3 month review, she had taken the liberty to provide a book passage especially for me. It was from some drab paperback about how to run a business. The pages were bent and she had highlighted certain passages. I feel as though she had moved on only very recently from such books as, "Managing for Dummies", or "Money, and Why You Need It!".
The excerpt she had personally selected, and read, to me was essentially a parable. According to the author, I was like an actor. Even if I was having a bad day, I needed to perform, and I must not let outside influences affect my performance. Because people wanted a good show.
I didn't mention that serving deep fried tofu wasn't a performance. Or that professional actors got paid more than professional vegan food spooners. In my mind, I could've made a hell of an actor.
"I'm going to quit." I told her. She rolled down the sleeves of her loose shirt, over her generic colored arms. Koi fish-domesticated common carp. Her skin reminded me of the wallpaper from a room someone would keep fishing trophies in.
"What kind of notice are you going to give me?" She asked.
"This is your notice. When I finish this cigarette, I'm going to go home and rest."
"I'm sorry you're walking out on a shift." She stomped her cigarette out and angrily got up. I didn't turn to watch her walk away, or try to stop her. The actor inside of me didn't want to ruin the scene. It may have been the two beers I drank before work. Or the cigarette. But I felt extremely serene. Patient almost.
I like the feeling that comes with quitting your job. It's really quite liberating. Anything is possible as all those prime 8 hour chunks are no longer spoken for. I've had around 15 jobs in 10 years. I've lost count, and remembering what I did as a 15 year old is like seeing myself in a dream.
I don't fear being poor and out in the rain. That's the closest I've ever come to gaining patience. And it reminds me of something I once read from a drab paperback with the edges of the pages folded and paragraphs highlighted.
One day I had everything. The next day I had nothing. Except my life.
Not even during my immersion into Buddhism was I particularly patient. I blame television, the interwebs, liberalism, pornography. I was raised on electronic boxes. When electronic boxes were the hip, new thing on the block. Technology is so passe these days, anything not an electronic box is hip in certain circles.
But patience has never been an adjective I've worn on my hat. Meditating for hours in rainy Oregon winters, poor, celibate, and uncertain. I look back to those memories as my finger tips brushing the cool glass of self control. I look back and can hardly identify that person, like seeing oneself in a dream. But, I'm the kind of person who will hold a grudge against someone if they upset me in a dream.
One day my boss asked me if I knew that I'd be washing dishes next week. It reminded me of a poor, rain-soaked Bodhisattva on the coast mixing soap in a greasy sink. All that my roommates would eat were bacon, cheese, and beef. Saute'd with vegetable oil. I hated it then, and I was the closest I have ever been to patient in those days.
I told her, "I hate washing dishes. Dishes aren't sexy. There's no sugar in dishes."
Her unilluminating sleeve tattoos wiped non-existent sweat off her brow. She was the opposite of a snake only because she refrained from eye contact. She muttered something about it being good for me, as it was the objects in the world around them that the Dutch painters would turn to. Baroque.
I was out of patience.
"I don't think I'm enjoying this." I said to B. He was a male, but practically female, so our boss liked him. She even made eye contact. I went to the bathroom and punched a few things. Is anything as joyous as the sound of knuckle connecting furiously to an aluminum towel dispenser? Or a cheap boot to the back of a bathroom stall? I don't know what they're constructed of, but I'd love to purchase some scrap just for anger management. I'm sure it'd be cheaper than all that rifle ammunition.
I emerged and my boss asked if I wanted to talk about it. I told her I liked to keep it inside. Let it bottle up. Let it explode violently. Women hate this characteristic. She looked like she wanted a cigarette. Confirming my observation, she told me to meet her outside in a few minutes. I decided they'd be my last minutes here. I Scrounged my fleeting sense of entitlement. It was like the spoons that fall through into the garbage disposal. Clanging against the blades when you flipped the switch, making your fingers tingle.
"B, sorry to do this to you. But I quit." I told him.
"Really? You're quitting?" He asked.
"Yeah, I'm gonna go outside and tell Hairam right now."
"I think you should. Go for it man, you don't need this." B said, always strangely optimistic.
Outside I made her go back in and grab her cigarettes so I could have one.
"I thought you didn't smoke?" She asked. I shrugged and used her lighter. "Smoke 'em if ya got them."
Joining me at the table, she asked if I remembered what we talked about in my 3 month review. I exhaled. I nod.
During my 3 month review, she had taken the liberty to provide a book passage especially for me. It was from some drab paperback about how to run a business. The pages were bent and she had highlighted certain passages. I feel as though she had moved on only very recently from such books as, "Managing for Dummies", or "Money, and Why You Need It!".
The excerpt she had personally selected, and read, to me was essentially a parable. According to the author, I was like an actor. Even if I was having a bad day, I needed to perform, and I must not let outside influences affect my performance. Because people wanted a good show.
I didn't mention that serving deep fried tofu wasn't a performance. Or that professional actors got paid more than professional vegan food spooners. In my mind, I could've made a hell of an actor.
"I'm going to quit." I told her. She rolled down the sleeves of her loose shirt, over her generic colored arms. Koi fish-domesticated common carp. Her skin reminded me of the wallpaper from a room someone would keep fishing trophies in.
"What kind of notice are you going to give me?" She asked.
"This is your notice. When I finish this cigarette, I'm going to go home and rest."
"I'm sorry you're walking out on a shift." She stomped her cigarette out and angrily got up. I didn't turn to watch her walk away, or try to stop her. The actor inside of me didn't want to ruin the scene. It may have been the two beers I drank before work. Or the cigarette. But I felt extremely serene. Patient almost.
I like the feeling that comes with quitting your job. It's really quite liberating. Anything is possible as all those prime 8 hour chunks are no longer spoken for. I've had around 15 jobs in 10 years. I've lost count, and remembering what I did as a 15 year old is like seeing myself in a dream.
I don't fear being poor and out in the rain. That's the closest I've ever come to gaining patience. And it reminds me of something I once read from a drab paperback with the edges of the pages folded and paragraphs highlighted.
One day I had everything. The next day I had nothing. Except my life.
Aquatic Mammal
thats me
sitting in the back
drinking and thinking away
buried under numb being
the tender smiles drifts for miles
and gives me a free drink
as i fade away
because sooner or later
i'll have to pay
sooner or later i'll pay
sitting in the back
drinking and thinking away
buried under numb being
the tender smiles drifts for miles
and gives me a free drink
as i fade away
because sooner or later
i'll have to pay
sooner or later i'll pay
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Tauroctony
I was scrubbing at dried organic rice when one of the more focused of the new girls at my work mentioned that the rodeo was in town.
"That sure is interesting," I told her, even though it really wasn't.
I didn't like the rodeo, and I knew that our relationship would never blossom the way it could potentially have if she didn't mention her infatuation with the rodeo.
It was like when the Cheesegirl didn't understand my metaphor linking NASCAR to sex. She'll probably become a judge when she's older.
I knew something was up, because when I was downtown 'socializing' in bars the other night, something like my 13th or 14th day straight drinking/drunk, I noticed a large influx of young, drunk people asking me where I'm from. I didn't start in this city, and most likely won't end here unless of course that pain in my side really is my liver, not a bruise from when I crashed my bike a week ago like I've convinced myself. Foreign. But I live here, which set me apart from the drunk married couple that kicked my ass in pool.
I figured the commotion must've been over one of the music festivals this city holds each year. But that's a week away. The rodeo was in town.
Watching bulls get individually slaughtered for sport under the Mexican sun is the closest I've ever come to attending a rodeo. That was another lifetime ago. I didn't consume two mamosas made with champagne available on the corner drugstore everytime I left the house. A beer and bourbon before work. 2$ beers across the street during lunch break. Bottle of wine at quitting time. The bulls would get exhausted and collapse before their brains were thrusted with a thin sword. Like a toothpick in the free cheese samples at the new H.E.B. There's a sign out front that says it's the pride of the whole avenue. And it's true.
Another new girl at my work was sitting in a boat and had the chance to save her drowning friend from sea monsters. But her mother wouldn't let her off the boat. She dreamed this last night and woke up crying. She asked me what it meant. Shrugging, I suggested that perhaps her friend was an alcoholic.
She said, "No, he's just European."
"Maybe it was the strange place you were sleeping at." I said. "Before I had a bed, I slept on the floor and it gave me the weirdest dreams of my life."
These days I dream about the first real job I had as a manager of a buzzing capitalism store. They're not nightmares, but they're scary because in the dreams I am relieved. I also drank during that job, because I could. Not because I had to.
I left the bullfight three-quarters of the way through. I assume it was almost over, although they could've continued for hours more, who knows. But I grew tired of the show. And slightly disgusted with myself for paying some pesos to experience it. I'll probably stop drinking for the same reasons, but hopefully not until I get fired from my job because of it.
"That sure is interesting," I told her, even though it really wasn't.
I didn't like the rodeo, and I knew that our relationship would never blossom the way it could potentially have if she didn't mention her infatuation with the rodeo.
It was like when the Cheesegirl didn't understand my metaphor linking NASCAR to sex. She'll probably become a judge when she's older.
I knew something was up, because when I was downtown 'socializing' in bars the other night, something like my 13th or 14th day straight drinking/drunk, I noticed a large influx of young, drunk people asking me where I'm from. I didn't start in this city, and most likely won't end here unless of course that pain in my side really is my liver, not a bruise from when I crashed my bike a week ago like I've convinced myself. Foreign. But I live here, which set me apart from the drunk married couple that kicked my ass in pool.
I figured the commotion must've been over one of the music festivals this city holds each year. But that's a week away. The rodeo was in town.
Watching bulls get individually slaughtered for sport under the Mexican sun is the closest I've ever come to attending a rodeo. That was another lifetime ago. I didn't consume two mamosas made with champagne available on the corner drugstore everytime I left the house. A beer and bourbon before work. 2$ beers across the street during lunch break. Bottle of wine at quitting time. The bulls would get exhausted and collapse before their brains were thrusted with a thin sword. Like a toothpick in the free cheese samples at the new H.E.B. There's a sign out front that says it's the pride of the whole avenue. And it's true.
Another new girl at my work was sitting in a boat and had the chance to save her drowning friend from sea monsters. But her mother wouldn't let her off the boat. She dreamed this last night and woke up crying. She asked me what it meant. Shrugging, I suggested that perhaps her friend was an alcoholic.
She said, "No, he's just European."
"Maybe it was the strange place you were sleeping at." I said. "Before I had a bed, I slept on the floor and it gave me the weirdest dreams of my life."
These days I dream about the first real job I had as a manager of a buzzing capitalism store. They're not nightmares, but they're scary because in the dreams I am relieved. I also drank during that job, because I could. Not because I had to.
I left the bullfight three-quarters of the way through. I assume it was almost over, although they could've continued for hours more, who knows. But I grew tired of the show. And slightly disgusted with myself for paying some pesos to experience it. I'll probably stop drinking for the same reasons, but hopefully not until I get fired from my job because of it.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Four Legs and 2 Voices
Bonx stopped walking. I did the same. She was a few yards ahead of me and turned to face me. “Don’t talk about things like that.” She said to me.
“Besides,” she turned around and started walking again, further into the darkness of the graveyard. She outstretched her arms and spun like a dancer on the path. “It’s not so bad if you do this.” And she spun and walked around with her arms outstretched from her body like a small child would play airplane.
I did the same. And for a bit it did seem to help. Then my foot fell into a hole in the path, and I rolled my ankle. I dropped my arms to my side, and caught myself before I fell, but pain shot up my leg. I hurt. And I knew it had to be a spirit. One had gotten me.
“I’m hit! They’ve got me!” I cried out, but Bonx ignored me. She continued to twirl like a dancing child, light on her feet as she missed every bump and sinkhole in the path. She danced alone while I writhed in pain like the World Cup. I felt sharp knots in my stomach. My guts twisted and groaned. I doubled over from the cramps. I knew a spirit was inside me now. It was trying to take over. I began to sweat even more.
“Come on. We gotta go deeper.” Bonx said. She was drawing me further into the void of death. While a parasitic specter was digging into my guts. I turned around and noticed that I couldn’t see the road anymore. I sped up and caught up with my old girl, and I wanted to wrap my arms around in an embrace like a terrified child.
Once we had walked through the western woods of Massachusetts, years ago, minds wandering as we had hung close to each other, surrendering ourselves to the powers which tugged at our hearts and smiles. We didn’t acknowledge or understand, but didn’t scoff either, because weren’t we eternally happy in memories? Certain ones I could always pull and go back in them, there with her, in the woods smiling until my face hurt and grasping her fingers until our palms began to sweat.
Were we even the same people? I thought. It‘s like watching an old cartoon. Yellow and slow, the voices are unfamiliar and strangely discomforting.
For the last year, I had assumed that I had truly wanted to return to those moments. Had I even acknowledged healing? I wondered. It was beginning to occur to me that we had perhaps been truly different enough the whole time, especially evident when we were sick of pretending.
I was sweating to catch up with her. A strange girl who was somehow skinnier, filled with piercings and hardly interested in the mold of my old self. It was a polite relationship now. Completely formal, one which I did not deserve but was helpless to prevent. And now an ancient spirit had my body in its grasp, prepared to commandeer my vessel, recycle it, and use it at its whim. And this strange woman before me, who ran ahead of me in happiness while I staggered in terror, cared nothing about my plight.
Struggling to catch up with her as she ran further ahead, my tongue recognized the bitter taste of ugly thoughts inside of me. The rage was instantaneous, like a dark ooze of oil contaminating a placid, salty pool.
Who does she think she is? Leaving me behind? I growled to myself.
I began to jog into the warm air like an obese woman through crashing surf. Knees high, I swung for the fence of the graveyard with each step, careful to avoid twisting my throbbing ankle again. I followed her uphill, into a wad of dark trees.
The sun’s light was bleeding everything red and purple as I finally reached her on top of the dense hill. The shadows beneath the summer leaves were morphing darkness. I clutched at my intestines as we stood on top of the little rotating hill, Bonx marveling at the sky. I was losing interest. I had been doing that all summer--spending too much time marveling at the sky while I lost interest in everything beneath it.
Bonx muttered in amazement at everything. I wanted to get back home to die. A spirit had hijacked my vessel. I was going mad, I needed to get home to cleanse myself with water. And probably my Buddha statues. Someone way higher than me once said to picture the Buddha raining light down on to your body to ward off demonic possessions. I assumed those would exorcise the once I had summoned from the Satanic Bible when I was 13. Along with the specter which had forgotten to get off the wheel and hid in divets inside the cemetery. But firstly, I had to convince and ward off Bonx, another ghost from the past, which had forced me to try to stand upon the wheel for far too long.
“This is amazing.” Bonx said, somewhat breathlessly. It pitifully reminded me of having sex with her for the last time. In the city, I awoke one night and we wordlessly humped, under the pretense of being half asleep. By then, we had already known that our union was over. Epilogued.
We were at the crest of a hill in the early summer red. Shadows moved and danced among us like how the stars kaleidoscoped for the Hate Machine and I roughly 300 years ago. I had always pictured the reunion of myself and Bonx/Belle as a divine dissolution. But I am almost certain that it was worse than being lonely. I was tripping next to a skinny, long haired billboard which neonly proclaimed how nothing was the same. For ever from now on.
Bonx starred blankly into the morning sky. The fog was breaking apart. It’d be light soon. My mind began to clear and defend itself. Hours had passed, and it was metabolizing. I felt like I needed a bathroom and a notebook. Impatiently, I grabbed Bonx’s hand. She fought me off, but then I started to pull her away. I was done. In the past 3 months, I had wasted significant amounts of time in this cemetery under the influence of mediocrity. I had seen enough.
And worse of all, I wasn’t enlightened. Or scatter brained. But still frustrated. And hand in hand with a neon proclamation of chaos. Change. Unknown.
The two of us reached a wounded wire fence, rusted and limping along a border. On the other side, there was the church playground I had enjoyed with everyone I loved 300 years ago. That was gone forever now too. Just the fence now.
Bonx threw one sneaker into the fence and swung her thin legs over the top. No going back. She landed on the other side with a touch of grace. She turned and smiled at me through the rusted links. Her energy had always provided clutch athleticism. I thought, thinking of her drunkenly hitting me in the eye with a piece of orange fruit once.
The pressure was on. All living eyes in the cemetery were on me and my fence jumping skills. As a young shithead, having spent many days in Dedham Juvenile Court, I liked to believe that I could still jump fences if I was being chased, or infected with a ghost spirit.
I planted my foot and pulled myself to the top bar, emulating Bonx. I quickly realized I was a lot heavier than Bonx. And slower. Who knew spending hours wandering in an induced psychosis would get you out of shape.
Around the time that I should’ve been landing beside Bonx outside the cemetery, my shin tore through the wire links. Rusted shards of broken metal cut my into my pant legs. Shredding skin froze me, stupidly balanced with one leg on top of the collapsing fence, the other in the rusted bear trap of fence guts. I had enough time up there to see Bonx’s wide eyed amusement, my face probably a mask of horror.
I was perched like an animal on top of the border before I finally succumbed. My trapped leg ripped free with a horrible paper-tearing feeling and I fell over the top. I landed on the playground soil, made for little kids falling on their heads.
I stood, trying to retain some facet of pride. No such thing these days, I thought. Kill the ego, right ol’ boy? I brushed myself off, my hands going to my wounded leg. My hands brought back my wet pant legs torn, but I didn’t seem to be bleeding. I stood up straight to offer an explanation but instead I burped.
The spirit left me.
Shaken with my relief, I smiled in the bloody red of darkness, grateful the girl I once worshipped couldn’t see my dark eyeballs.
“Besides,” she turned around and started walking again, further into the darkness of the graveyard. She outstretched her arms and spun like a dancer on the path. “It’s not so bad if you do this.” And she spun and walked around with her arms outstretched from her body like a small child would play airplane.
I did the same. And for a bit it did seem to help. Then my foot fell into a hole in the path, and I rolled my ankle. I dropped my arms to my side, and caught myself before I fell, but pain shot up my leg. I hurt. And I knew it had to be a spirit. One had gotten me.
“I’m hit! They’ve got me!” I cried out, but Bonx ignored me. She continued to twirl like a dancing child, light on her feet as she missed every bump and sinkhole in the path. She danced alone while I writhed in pain like the World Cup. I felt sharp knots in my stomach. My guts twisted and groaned. I doubled over from the cramps. I knew a spirit was inside me now. It was trying to take over. I began to sweat even more.
“Come on. We gotta go deeper.” Bonx said. She was drawing me further into the void of death. While a parasitic specter was digging into my guts. I turned around and noticed that I couldn’t see the road anymore. I sped up and caught up with my old girl, and I wanted to wrap my arms around in an embrace like a terrified child.
Once we had walked through the western woods of Massachusetts, years ago, minds wandering as we had hung close to each other, surrendering ourselves to the powers which tugged at our hearts and smiles. We didn’t acknowledge or understand, but didn’t scoff either, because weren’t we eternally happy in memories? Certain ones I could always pull and go back in them, there with her, in the woods smiling until my face hurt and grasping her fingers until our palms began to sweat.
Were we even the same people? I thought. It‘s like watching an old cartoon. Yellow and slow, the voices are unfamiliar and strangely discomforting.
For the last year, I had assumed that I had truly wanted to return to those moments. Had I even acknowledged healing? I wondered. It was beginning to occur to me that we had perhaps been truly different enough the whole time, especially evident when we were sick of pretending.
I was sweating to catch up with her. A strange girl who was somehow skinnier, filled with piercings and hardly interested in the mold of my old self. It was a polite relationship now. Completely formal, one which I did not deserve but was helpless to prevent. And now an ancient spirit had my body in its grasp, prepared to commandeer my vessel, recycle it, and use it at its whim. And this strange woman before me, who ran ahead of me in happiness while I staggered in terror, cared nothing about my plight.
Struggling to catch up with her as she ran further ahead, my tongue recognized the bitter taste of ugly thoughts inside of me. The rage was instantaneous, like a dark ooze of oil contaminating a placid, salty pool.
Who does she think she is? Leaving me behind? I growled to myself.
I began to jog into the warm air like an obese woman through crashing surf. Knees high, I swung for the fence of the graveyard with each step, careful to avoid twisting my throbbing ankle again. I followed her uphill, into a wad of dark trees.
The sun’s light was bleeding everything red and purple as I finally reached her on top of the dense hill. The shadows beneath the summer leaves were morphing darkness. I clutched at my intestines as we stood on top of the little rotating hill, Bonx marveling at the sky. I was losing interest. I had been doing that all summer--spending too much time marveling at the sky while I lost interest in everything beneath it.
Bonx muttered in amazement at everything. I wanted to get back home to die. A spirit had hijacked my vessel. I was going mad, I needed to get home to cleanse myself with water. And probably my Buddha statues. Someone way higher than me once said to picture the Buddha raining light down on to your body to ward off demonic possessions. I assumed those would exorcise the once I had summoned from the Satanic Bible when I was 13. Along with the specter which had forgotten to get off the wheel and hid in divets inside the cemetery. But firstly, I had to convince and ward off Bonx, another ghost from the past, which had forced me to try to stand upon the wheel for far too long.
“This is amazing.” Bonx said, somewhat breathlessly. It pitifully reminded me of having sex with her for the last time. In the city, I awoke one night and we wordlessly humped, under the pretense of being half asleep. By then, we had already known that our union was over. Epilogued.
We were at the crest of a hill in the early summer red. Shadows moved and danced among us like how the stars kaleidoscoped for the Hate Machine and I roughly 300 years ago. I had always pictured the reunion of myself and Bonx/Belle as a divine dissolution. But I am almost certain that it was worse than being lonely. I was tripping next to a skinny, long haired billboard which neonly proclaimed how nothing was the same. For ever from now on.
Bonx starred blankly into the morning sky. The fog was breaking apart. It’d be light soon. My mind began to clear and defend itself. Hours had passed, and it was metabolizing. I felt like I needed a bathroom and a notebook. Impatiently, I grabbed Bonx’s hand. She fought me off, but then I started to pull her away. I was done. In the past 3 months, I had wasted significant amounts of time in this cemetery under the influence of mediocrity. I had seen enough.
And worse of all, I wasn’t enlightened. Or scatter brained. But still frustrated. And hand in hand with a neon proclamation of chaos. Change. Unknown.
The two of us reached a wounded wire fence, rusted and limping along a border. On the other side, there was the church playground I had enjoyed with everyone I loved 300 years ago. That was gone forever now too. Just the fence now.
Bonx threw one sneaker into the fence and swung her thin legs over the top. No going back. She landed on the other side with a touch of grace. She turned and smiled at me through the rusted links. Her energy had always provided clutch athleticism. I thought, thinking of her drunkenly hitting me in the eye with a piece of orange fruit once.
The pressure was on. All living eyes in the cemetery were on me and my fence jumping skills. As a young shithead, having spent many days in Dedham Juvenile Court, I liked to believe that I could still jump fences if I was being chased, or infected with a ghost spirit.
I planted my foot and pulled myself to the top bar, emulating Bonx. I quickly realized I was a lot heavier than Bonx. And slower. Who knew spending hours wandering in an induced psychosis would get you out of shape.
Around the time that I should’ve been landing beside Bonx outside the cemetery, my shin tore through the wire links. Rusted shards of broken metal cut my into my pant legs. Shredding skin froze me, stupidly balanced with one leg on top of the collapsing fence, the other in the rusted bear trap of fence guts. I had enough time up there to see Bonx’s wide eyed amusement, my face probably a mask of horror.
I was perched like an animal on top of the border before I finally succumbed. My trapped leg ripped free with a horrible paper-tearing feeling and I fell over the top. I landed on the playground soil, made for little kids falling on their heads.
I stood, trying to retain some facet of pride. No such thing these days, I thought. Kill the ego, right ol’ boy? I brushed myself off, my hands going to my wounded leg. My hands brought back my wet pant legs torn, but I didn’t seem to be bleeding. I stood up straight to offer an explanation but instead I burped.
The spirit left me.
Shaken with my relief, I smiled in the bloody red of darkness, grateful the girl I once worshipped couldn’t see my dark eyeballs.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Anyone a Fan of...Satan?
I had just died when I felt wings where my shoulders once sloped. Such a majesty, I thought, to leave behind the earthly beings and their trinkets of things. Possessions and bank accounts as a marker in the sand, to represent their accomplishments and justifications of existence. Presuming the whole creation was created in a day....As if savings save.
I plucked a gold coin from my vest. Not causeless, but perhaps impious, I shall endure whatever may come down my twisted path of lonliness. As my long curls are lined with silk and gold thread, my fingers embraced by rings of engagement and shotgunned weddings...My lips masked with the finest cake of Versaille, and my feet fit in the best leather of Milan. If only the mind could be kept at peace by such lapses of budget and mind.
But the cold caress of the hands of God, down my spine, her faint touch upon vertabre cast the sparkle of wealth into the well. The lack of vigor in my eyes, and the way faces had turned away and sneered at my laughter elicit the only response I have known since they tried to drown me at birth. Father, his course beard pushing all those away-- Nothing but strife for wealth in his eyes. Ancient. Thou can not kill what is already within. Fools.
To leave behind the earth, and to join a place no one knows but where everyone goes. And then to return again, speaking of the virtuous fire. My majesty, who work does reign but whose voice turns away the profane. Lamenting the loss of the small things; the way the sky would set upon a summer sun would never grace my eyes again. Never again to brush hands grasping for blankets on a December night, in defiance of the winter wind while your hair graced my sight. Merely markings from my past, nothing but states which could never last. What would we be if the happiness always sustained? Poets fashioning war upon the stains of fading haze.
The agony of earth-born emptiness. How I craved to leave a place I loved so well, to taste of the fruit of disobedience whose taste brought woe and pain into our world. To scorn the Holy Spirit, and to prefer those dark eyed light haired temptations--so pure-- to embrace Him who laughed at the Mother of Creation, and her pride. And to revert to such covert guile, and deceive her with his aspiring ambitious peers in an attempt at her vain crown of power.
And so I did.
Spat in the sheperd's eye, who's teachings fell on deaf ears of stone who've tasted of the fruit and seen the light of night, the coldness of winter when not even your touch brings warmth to the bed. Free from the slavery of ignorance, and the bondage of the unclean, I finally was granted a chance to spread my wings.
I recall the last warmth of the sun. A western glow feeding me one last time, before I bid the infernal serpent, whose tongue of hate and revenge stirred the powers of the great Mother of Mankind, and cast us from heaven. Set in glory, above our archangel of peers, came the cold. Looking into the darkness of water, and knowing how cold it was, like me, I could see the distance in my eyes--headlong with ambition, equaling Her whom is most high. Against the Throne and Monarchy of God.
How I wished those blackened waters to be bluish green, alive with heat, light and dance. Just to see the sun set once more upon the sea. Knowing I never would again, chilled me to right now and whatever I am doing.
Instead, reserved to wrath, I thought of the lost happiness and lasting pain, my bafeful eyes twitching at the affliction and lasting hate. A setting sun upon my gaze, a furnace whose flames show no light but only darkness visible, blackened sights of woe, regions of sorrow, and cries from the past, "Hope never comes..."
Cheers,
Nick
I plucked a gold coin from my vest. Not causeless, but perhaps impious, I shall endure whatever may come down my twisted path of lonliness. As my long curls are lined with silk and gold thread, my fingers embraced by rings of engagement and shotgunned weddings...My lips masked with the finest cake of Versaille, and my feet fit in the best leather of Milan. If only the mind could be kept at peace by such lapses of budget and mind.
But the cold caress of the hands of God, down my spine, her faint touch upon vertabre cast the sparkle of wealth into the well. The lack of vigor in my eyes, and the way faces had turned away and sneered at my laughter elicit the only response I have known since they tried to drown me at birth. Father, his course beard pushing all those away-- Nothing but strife for wealth in his eyes. Ancient. Thou can not kill what is already within. Fools.
To leave behind the earth, and to join a place no one knows but where everyone goes. And then to return again, speaking of the virtuous fire. My majesty, who work does reign but whose voice turns away the profane. Lamenting the loss of the small things; the way the sky would set upon a summer sun would never grace my eyes again. Never again to brush hands grasping for blankets on a December night, in defiance of the winter wind while your hair graced my sight. Merely markings from my past, nothing but states which could never last. What would we be if the happiness always sustained? Poets fashioning war upon the stains of fading haze.
The agony of earth-born emptiness. How I craved to leave a place I loved so well, to taste of the fruit of disobedience whose taste brought woe and pain into our world. To scorn the Holy Spirit, and to prefer those dark eyed light haired temptations--so pure-- to embrace Him who laughed at the Mother of Creation, and her pride. And to revert to such covert guile, and deceive her with his aspiring ambitious peers in an attempt at her vain crown of power.
And so I did.
Spat in the sheperd's eye, who's teachings fell on deaf ears of stone who've tasted of the fruit and seen the light of night, the coldness of winter when not even your touch brings warmth to the bed. Free from the slavery of ignorance, and the bondage of the unclean, I finally was granted a chance to spread my wings.
I recall the last warmth of the sun. A western glow feeding me one last time, before I bid the infernal serpent, whose tongue of hate and revenge stirred the powers of the great Mother of Mankind, and cast us from heaven. Set in glory, above our archangel of peers, came the cold. Looking into the darkness of water, and knowing how cold it was, like me, I could see the distance in my eyes--headlong with ambition, equaling Her whom is most high. Against the Throne and Monarchy of God.
How I wished those blackened waters to be bluish green, alive with heat, light and dance. Just to see the sun set once more upon the sea. Knowing I never would again, chilled me to right now and whatever I am doing.
Instead, reserved to wrath, I thought of the lost happiness and lasting pain, my bafeful eyes twitching at the affliction and lasting hate. A setting sun upon my gaze, a furnace whose flames show no light but only darkness visible, blackened sights of woe, regions of sorrow, and cries from the past, "Hope never comes..."
Cheers,
Nick
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