....The dead will walk the earth

The aches and pains were always worse with the weather. It didn’t matter if the weather was hot or cold, wet or dry, it always changed and that’s when the pain came on. By now, she’d gotten to be almost an expert in the levels of pain, and the types. If it was cold, the pain was deep inside the bones, almost hot and all encompassing, if it was hot and dry, the pain was a dull ache, almost a memory, a phantom. The house was sinking; she could feel it in her stomach, the way it lurched when she was standing still, the way the doors didn’t quite close properly anymore. When she stood in the front yard and stared at it, studying it, the house sat like a malignant rock, hunchbacked and looming, blocking out the sun, no matter what hour of the day. Spending too much time alone was a recipe for madness, she knew, it hadn’t been just coincidence that Uncle Milton had gone into the woods out the back end of the property and no one had ever seen him again, save for old Widow Harlis, but then the Widow wasn’t the sanest person either. Some of her family had disappeared mysteriously too.
The dirt road that connected her to the Harlis farm, and farther down, the Cripley place, was rutted knee deep, and the dust hung above it like it was afraid to settle. In the winter, it turned into a mud river, slow moving and slovenly, it moved with malignant purpose, carrying away small birds and mice; their wails of doom and terror swiftly swallowed up in the sound of the current. Her great great grandfather had built the house, and it sat on a small hill, surrounded by the moat he’d dug, a primitive levy to keep flood waters at bay, if it flooded at all. He had planted the apple orchard as well, but these days, it was just one more acre for the weeds to infest. The last crop of apples had been hard and sour, even the skins had been bitter, none of them even worth making pies out of.
The house sinking was her first sign that things weren’t the same as they always had been. After that, she noticed that it was dryer than it had been in years past, and there were more crows perched on her barn roof then she had ever seen before. She wasn’t like the Widow Harlis, thinking that crows were the bringers of evil and death, to her corn field perhaps, but oddly enough, they didn’t seem interested in it. They watched her lazily as she moved from the washer to the clothesline and back to the porch, occasionally shuffling their feathers and croaking amongst themselves. At night, she could hear them moving across the roof and pecking at her windows, even though it wasn’t any cooler in the house.
The third sign came when the Widow Harlis promptly dropped dead, not one hour after walking home from church. The crows were ominously silent, heads tilted at matching angles as they stared at the Harlis homestead. It was enough to pull her to the edge of the porch, balancing against the splintering wood railing as she tried to see what they saw. The Harlis place looked the same as it always did, the same clapboard siding bleached white in the sun, the same porch sagging slightly in the middle, the same confederate flag in the window next to the cloth with two faded blue stars; sons that had never come back from war. The more she looked at it, the more that house seemed to sag, as if the supports inside were slowly falling away, leaving it to collapse in on itself. That couldn’t be, the house was the same as it always was, the heat was playing games with her. And the crows were only birds, she didn’t need to go letting her mind run away with silly superstitions and mumbo jumbo.
She went through her Sunday chores, moving with practiced ease through dusty rooms humming to herself for company, after the radio had broken the week before. The Widow would be over shortly, to sit out on the porch with her while they chatted and she worked on finishing a dress that she could wear more easily in the pressing heat. She was startled then, when someone knocked on the screen door, the Widow didn’t bother with niceties, she would sit down then yell through the open door, for lemonade or water. There was a police officer on her front porch. She paused, then wiped her hands on the dishtowel and moved to open the door.

walking down this rocky road....

What would I do for love? Hmm well, a lot probably. I do a lot for so called love already. I'm pretty sure. Can you tell when you fall out of love? Am I in love? Is there an instruction book that I can own to see if I really am? When you say that you love someone, taking for granted gets thrown into the mix, a lot of, 'if you love me, you'll do this (insert request) for me.' I don't want to do things simply because it's what I'm supposed to. I will not be painted into a corner, I need to stand up for myself and the things that I want, the things I need. I've only just begun to peel back my layers, to expose the tender folds to the outside air, to dry out and harden like the fake shell that I've surrounded myself with. I can't go back to doing what I did before, being what I was before. I can see the road stretching out in front of me and all the potholes and sharp stones erupting through the soft dirt. I can see how painful it will be and I have no shoes. Only time will give me toughness. I need to stop thinking. And start walking.

It Starts Today

I am still editing myself! After having an enlightening conversation with one of my friends earlier today. (She doesn't live in the same state, but she can call me on my self editing crutches, she pulls no punches.) I came to realize that I am still editing myself and making excuses. When I should really be saying, I feel sad, I feel sucked dry, I am angry, I am frustrated, I don't know how to make it better, I know how to make some things better, but I'm scared. I even catch myself doing it, why do I feel the need to complain about something, but quickly follow it up with some kind of ridiculous disclaimer like "oh but at least I have a job, it's really not that bad" when really I want to say that today I really hate my job, and I wish I didn't have it, and everyone can take a flying leap because I'm tired. It's because it's easier to let things go, cave into things, less confrontation, and I don't want to bring anyone down. What I need to realize is that when my friends and family ask me how things are, they have enough insight and brains to see under my shallow words, to the deeper and more ugly ones. They can see the truth that I try to sugarcoat. I am not in this alone, I have spare sets of backbones and hands to hold, and shoulders to cry on, and smiles to return and laughter to share to the point of pants wetting. Why am I even doing it anymore? No one in real life is actually like this. Well, this Stepford train has come to the end of it's track, no more Miss. Shallow, no more worrying about if it might bring someone down, no more thinking I have to be the easy one. It starts today.

Popsicle Cannibal, I'm never gonna grow up.....

whoever said that it's good to be alive.... sneaky sneaky, bouncing down dark hallways, waiting to be discovered... everyone clap your hands to the beat, the beat in your head, the beat in your heart. my thoughts are like bubbles, soap bubbles that rise higher and higher before they burst in the wind like chicken grease on a stove top. music makes me strangely nostalgic, i remember things i would rather not....love is all you need, doesn't anyone tell you this? and panda's don't wear purple bathrobes, ice cream has no bones and you can't drive a canoe down the freeway....it's all very obvious if you just know what you're looking for. and who you travel with.

C'mon skinny love...

Sometimes it takes me a while to see that I slip down a hill just the same as everyone I see around me. what I mean is, I was having a conversation about how new age people kind of creep me out, in that some of them grasp on to healing Chrystal's and herbs like it'll suddenly cure their whole lives, like suddenly everything will be alright because they have their necklaces and powders. And it only occurs to me at this exact moment that I opened my mouth and said the things that people do when they're pointing fingers because they are scared of the very thing they talk about. I said that those people need to realize that it's not just about having stones and incense, if you want things to change in your life for real, you have to believe in it, you have to get off your ass and change your life so it moves in a more positive direction, you can't just clutch a stone and hope that it gets you were you want to go. That's just lazy. How true. Too bad that I'm cowering in my tower, my fortress, hoping that it'll turn out just exactly that way. At twenty-six I'm just now not wanting to be invisible, I want to do things, I want people to notice that I'm in the room.....I still don't want to speak up but I want to be noticed. It's a nice little corner I've painted myself into. Hand to mouth, I've left nothing extra to show me how I can be less invisible, to show me how to show myself. And now I stay invisible. such a vicious circle, till I blast into the sky like some kind of superhero, out of the darkness and into the light. I will not be invisible forever.

An amalgam of sorrows and the wisdom they give

Lately I find myself trying to change how I view the world and people around me. I try to put myself in their shoes when I smile at them and they don’t smile back, maybe they are the same as I am, and are nervous about someone trying to reach out and form a connection with them. Much the same as I am. It’s hard to change when I’m always so afraid, trying to move forward when I feel like I’m going crazy in my head seems like an exercise in futility. As if I’m running in quicksand with concrete shoes.
Talking to my friends, I’ve realized that I attempt to make things work until I have a breakdown, I force myself to do things that I hate, and to be in situations that make me unduly nervous, as if I’m testing myself, and somehow magically this time will turn out better than in the past. I force myself till there’s nothing left, no way for me to fake my brain out any longer and then I collapse.
More and more now, I find myself thinking about when I was young. I try to pinpoint where things took a turn from endless possibilities, to the same path stretching on into eternity. The exact moment when I started to live in fear of everything, the exact moment when I told myself that this was how it is, this is what everything is, nothing more, nothing less. The farther those early memories slip into the past as I age; it’s harder to recall if I was happy more than I was sad, comforted more than I was scared.
People are fond of ridiculous sayings. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, view the world through rose-colored glasses; two in the hand one in the bush, people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. Do people say these things because they lack the courage to voice their feelings and have to rely on puritanical proverbs? I cannot point even one finger, as I have been lying to myself all my life, never mind anyone else.
Now I’m caught in the middle, in a sea with no land in sight, velvety bitter regrets swirl around my body, they weigh me down and drag me just under the surface, convincing me that this is the end. The end is near, and I feel it, but I am not afraid. Funny that, how I’m terrified of everything in life but now I’m no longer afraid of dying or death. Not so unafraid that I’d actually willingly seek it out, but when it comes I won’t be afraid of it.
My brain feels like the ever-changing house, in House of Leaves. Hanging tape measures and lighting flares and using fishing line to mine the dark depths of things I’ve long forgotten will do absolutely no good. In the next instant, they will be gone, replaced by a door far too narrow to slip through, a flat gray wall that stretches in both directions forever. My brain is not a peaceful place, it feels like it changes on a whim, and I’m only along for the ride. Well I want off this ride, I get motion sickness, and I want to be the captain of this crazy train, this runaway cruise ship. Maybe I will be one day, maybe never. Maybe I should just not think about it anymore. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

It's a very very mad world....

The landscape doesn't change all that much, the same dried out shrubbery, the damaged earth, the way the sun scorches everything. The difference is, through fogged over windows, or clear, tinted, or cracked; everyone looks desperate here.



Desperation has a certain look.



Everyone drives quickly, like they are constantly late for an important meeting, hurtling toward the horizon at breakneck speed, the freeways are ten lanes wide and still not big enough.



Everything here is super sized and too small.



Here is the land of anorexic tan skeletons. It's only acceptable when you can see your spine from the front, and lead with your hips in a way that screams sex and not, hideous bone malformation!

This is the epicenter of superficiality.

The whole state lives in a constant vortex of self centeredness. There are standards that everyone here has to live up to. Not very many of said standards make any sense at all to anyone but everyone blindly follows them.

Lemmings.

Traffic signs mean nothing. Red and green arrows mean nothing. U turns are so normal they are almost expected at every light and stop sign that no one pays attention to. Honking is another language, and one that people use often and without any kind of sense.

As if this will solve any problems.

This place is like a mirage, a facade for something unholy. Behind the mask of ocean, beach, tans, and perfectly white teeth; lurks something dark and foul. The kind of filthy horror that some obsess is in their closets or in dreams, the kind that force insomnia and make a person glance over their shoulder in the middle of the day, in a crowd of people.

The lid has to come off sometime.

With so much repression the dark filthy shit builds up, with no outlet it searches out the cracks where the light seeps in, it looks for a way to get to the surface. Why should it explode out with wild fury, when it can creep out languorously. Picking and choosing who it wants to torment and infect.

In time it all falls down anyway.

Your Throat Is In My Grip

You want to be somebody, you want to be somebody. You aren't anybody, not anybody. I have your throat in my grip, I've made a list, a list of declarations. I want what I want, your throat is in my grip and you will do what I want, now. I want my money back from this show, this show that you think is so great. My list is written out on my arm, the ink is leeching into my blood, the words are like acid, ammonia. You want to be somebody, I want to be somebody, we both won't get what we want. Bring in the riot squad, let them try and free somebody, put me out of my misery! Militia cold, bred for battle, your throat is in my grip, see the world through my eyes. bloodshot and insomnia wired, crucify my nervous body. Machine gun roar, feedback from speakers that tower to the sky, if you aren't dead yet, then sing along, sing along, fists to teeth, fingers in flesh. Your throat is in my grip. You want to be somebody, you want to be somebody. You aren't anybody, no you aren't anybody!

This Ship Is Built For One

When I close my eyes, on my back, on my bed. I imagine that I am on a ship. The three narrow windows are the prow, cutting waves into the weed choked dirt, plowing steadily through our friends real boat, and then into the neighbors house. With my eyes closed, I am the captain and the conductor of this ship that sails through my veins. With my eyes closed there is only sky above me, and only sea below me, sharks and wales, lobsters and clown fish. I wind into marinas and slip through inlets, easing into the water with my scuba gear, sinking into the cool depths. When I spread my arms and reach with my fingers, I am an albatross. I sweep over highways and bridges, the wind current pulling my flight in new and interesting directions, the rain is like mist on my feathers and the sun is pleasantly warm. Lighthouses show my progress away from the land, the smell of salt beckoning me like an old familiar friend, the air pushing damply against my face. When I open my eyes, on my back, on my bed, the canopy dances above me in the air from the cooler, whispering secrets of next time. Next time.

...No Hell Below Us

I always thought that when you became an adult, that that was when you were grown up. Once you got there you didn’t keep going, didn’t keep learning things that should’ve already been learned. Lately I’ve been finding that it isn’t remotely close to the truth. For as long as I can remember I’ve had preconceived notions of how my life is going to go. I was the one who played house and just knew I was going to grow up and have a husband that loved me, and kids and everything was going to be perfect. I grew up enough to get married and then I realized that things weren’t perfect but definitely not boring. People I know are getting married and having babies, ones who I always thought I’d be ahead of when it came to certain things. Shows you how much I know, now doesn’t it? Learning more than I thought I would at this stage of the game, might be more, or maybe less, jarring if I could just figure out how I want my life to move on from this point. So many things seem to be half-finished and discarded that I don’t even know what some of them are any more. Sometimes I think I’m losing my mind, I long to be on medication, but don’t want to be handicapped by some synthetic drug that’ll tell me that I’m happy now. I don’t want to have panic attacks that make me feel like I’m preparing to go on an epic roller coaster ride. I don’t want to disappoint anyone and I need to get help but I’m scared that I won’t know what to do, I won’t know how to be, without my fake self wrapped around my real self. I’ve been this way for so long that I’m not sure what I’m really like. I’m scared that I’m not like anything, that I’m really a blank canvas, that all I am is a reflection of everyone around me, secretly I am nothing at all. Nothing worth anything at all. I worry that I am secretly a shadow, that if everyone I know were to stand in a room together and say things about me, on the same subject; that everyone would be different and none of them would be true. I worry that the real me was the child in high school, the one who was alone for the most part, living life through books and music and collages. What if that was the real me? I don’t even remember what that person was like. Just that they were lonely, and possibly creative. How does one find their real self after it’s been lost? Is it lost forever and instead one has to be picked out like a secondhand dress? If you lose the self you had when you were born, does it mean that you’re just out of luck now? Maybe I never had a self at all and was just lucky enough to fake my way all the way here. But what now? What now. Maybe nothing now, maybe I’m doomed to be a secret shadow, a blank canvas, stuck waiting.

when you called I couldnt answer, my mouth was full of sand

when i opened my mouth to speak, the words got stuck at the intersection between my heart and spleen. i could feel their hard edges caught in the soft ridges of my throat, each one a painful pinprick.
the dirt on the edge of the road somewhere between Idaho and hell raised clouds of dust around my bare feet like wayward clouds of powdered sugar, the heat danced off the cracked asphalt, jagged and buckled at the edges like a giant hacksaw. when the cars passed by, the smell of hot oil swept over me like a wave with an undertow. your shoes never touched the dirt, like a toddler who only dips the tips of their toes into the shallow end of a pool.
the lamp on the bedside table cast light over the bedspread in muted bands of yellow like butter in grits, one side conspicuously empty and uninterrupted, no dips and valleys to cast a contrast. there was more room now for all the books yet to be read, all the journals waiting to be filled. all the time in the world now, there was no rush.
the sand on the beach was cold and gritty, it matched the sky, and the ocean. on days like this it was a treat, the weather drove people inside, like blind and terrified moles. lying on my back i dig my body deeper into the sand and open my eyes to the gray rain, coming down to contort everything and paint everything one color.

burn up in the blue black night

The phantom ache in wrists is like a song, the rope is the melody and the bones are the beat.
When the rope is gone the blood hums copper bright and scalding hot just under skin thinned by too much sensation.
How strange this song is, equal parts pain and misunderstanding, pleasure and comfort. A most unusual dance, all bated breath and sweat streaked skin.
Oh, no, yes, maybe? knife-blade thin teeth raking over hot flesh, the blood is so close, swimming like a slow river, pooling like a lake.
Muscles burning like the pistons of a car, coiling and sliding. the song never seems to go anywhere, no slow build to the bridge, no chorus to the verse, just the rhythm of the rope and the beat of the bones.
The rope bites tighter, the melody changing now, sliding higher and less controlled there isn't another place to be, unsung bruises are slinking low along the bottom, the bass to the rope soprano. the sheets moan along the backs of feet and legs, the forgotten strings section, just a filler.
Now the melody and beat changes, higher and higher till the sound is a single scream that fades into nothingness as if it was never there in the first place.
if the rope is the melody then the bones are the beat and no telling when the two will meet again.

while the chorus screams 'unity!'

The sea was a static backdrop, cool and a sickly greenish-gray; the wind was like an invisible brick wall, biting into flesh with the grit of sand and mortar. The clouds slid along the horizon, stretched thin and torn, like a crow’s wing, and the beginnings of rain pitted the soft sand, buckshot from the sky. The sand was deceptively soft looking, like velvet or cotton fluff, but when laid upon, it became cement, hard and unforgiving. And the rain, gently hush-hushing against the waves became like needles against exposed flesh, chilling it and sinking in to the bone, in the weird gray twilight, flesh became corpse white and sharp as knives. Behind closed eyelids it was easier to remember the good times, the times when the sun shone high overhead and gulls called and clucked to each other about breadcrumbs and fish. Now it was only soft grays and greens, like a bruise on the inside of a forearm, fingerprints fading with time. Sometimes there were other people on the beach, running on the hard packed sand at the edge of the water, flirting with the tattered lips of the waves, almost being pulled in but veering off in the other direction at the last second. How then could some outwit mother nature, while others fell into her traps, never knowing that they could’ve had a different outcome, if only they’d done something, changed something about their lives.
Behind closed eyelids, a different universe played out. The slice of a smile, all slightly crooked teeth and sunburned cheeks, the feeling of cotton against naked arms and legs, while the curtains, half pulled across large windows, filled like bellows with summer warmed air, only to shift side to side and huff gently, exhaling the air across the room like a sigh. That time meant that the sky through the window was neon blue, like a robin’s egg or that cup from second grade that had long since been lost but not the memory of its color. That time meant, long trips in an old car that stank of oil and old cigarettes, sand on feet and the seats, and a beat up hula dancer wiggling on the dash, a loop of bright plastic beads swinging from the rear view mirror. That time meant laughter and silly inside jokes. ‘yea-uh’ ‘yee-he-he-ugh!’ ‘Such a good little wifey!’ ‘I wish I had an evil twin…’ Those days meant not thinking about muscle aches, how tendons pulled and stretched, and pain from things not altogether age related, swam to the surface like oil in water.
If this were a movie, this would be the moment when the music would swell, something laced with violins and cellos, something dark but vaguely uplifting, so you would know that things were bad now, but they’d get better soon, back to days of sun and smiles. The rain picked up the pace, no longer needles now, closer to daggers, baseball bats. The waves were stronger now too, they rose up, higher and higher, like some Halloween monster, before slumping onto the sand with a defeated roar. Each one was just a little closer on the sand, gaining slow inches up the dry, papery dunes. The wet sand was cold, cold in the way that it felt hot, almost scorching to the touch. Much the same way that touching hot metal could feel cold. Numb feet made it hard to walk but it made the pain recede, like an hourglass tipped the other way around.
Behind closed eyelids, the rain sounded like a freight train rumbling down the tracks, solid and inevitable, like death and taxes. Slow and steady but it would make it to wherever it was going, like some dumb beast. Blue sky and gulls singing. Blue-black water. Smiles that curled at the edges like a water damaged photograph. Chemical salty rain and dagger cold sand. Naked limbs tangled in cotton sheets. Seashells sharp and needle bright. Sticky-soft Naugahyde seat covers. Black ragged clouds. Hula dancer tangled with bright plastic beads. The two realities swam over each other, like negatives of the same thing but at two different times. Past and present. They settled onto the beach like tattered pages, sifting into the sand, almost forgotten.

‘Precious and fragile things, need special handling’

worn out places going nowhere

look right through me, look right through me.... the words curled themselves into circles, round and round with the wheels on the wet pavement. she wondered how long she had been driving. the clock on the dash told her that it was now 2:43 but it didn't help when she didn't know when she had started. the rain came down in sheets, like laundry on a line, as soon as she passed through one another was just on the other side of it.the empty fatigue pulled at the back of her neck, twisting down her arms and numbing her finger tips, at least now all she smelled was the cheap truck stop bathroom soap and the pine freshener from the triangle hanging from the rear view mirror. the inside of the car smelled damp and forgotten, musty like a house that had been shut up for too long and suddenly opened up when newlyweds moved into the neighborhood, thinking that they would fix it up to have their little family in.It was an unassuming car, something from the late 80's, much like hundreds of other cars on the road, a nondescript color, neither tan nor brown, somewhere in the middle. The wipers scraped over the glass, whining slightly and smearing water in uneven stripes. whine sigh, whine sigh. the rhythm was almost soothing, gentle enough that it wasn't grating, too quiet to be unnerving. the radio hissed and buzzed, stations coming and going like people in an airport, here and there. always on the go to somewhere.
she lit a cigarette and cracked the window, letting in the smell of wet pavement, and oily chemicals come in, to mix with the artificial pine. the smell reminded her of a hospital, toxic and breath stealing in its sudden acidity. she scrubbed one hand over her face and flicked ash, heedless of where it dropped, no one was around to complain anyway. she inhaled deeply to see if there was any other smells on the air but there wasn't. the plastic bags and drop clothes were doing their job. she contemplated writing to the company but knew that it would never come to fruition, she wasn't the kind of client they wanted.
the road signs slid by, green and white, yellow, orange, some with blinking lights. take next left, detour 1/2 mile ahead, road closed, they meant nothing to her, she knew her destination, she'd get there right on time, it was just one of those kinds of nights.

somewhere far from home

driving late at night, in the rain, the road turns black and slick. the lines blur and slip slide, in and out of focus, the street lights streak and run, candy bright and rainbow. almost like driving on water. the easy music winding out of the speakers, licks the edges of my ears, the sleepiness pulls on my limbs and eyes, cotton soft and gentle, my thoughts are rounded and unstrung, spilling along my arms and passing through the windows to streak the pavement with the lights. oil smooth but nowhere as slick. the dash lights are military generals, stout and uncompromising, chests puffed out and backs straight with ingrained training, the fog is a siren luring my head lights off their chosen path, and the rain is a cushion from the inevitable blow. the drops tac tac tac against metal and glass and the puddles shush shush, like the ocean lapping against the hull of a boat. my thoughts spin, deep in my chest, when i look up through the rain i can almost see the moon, or so i imagine, phantom light, shining to guide me back home. my fingers itch for a pen and paper, to capture this moment, so i can remember it later, feel it all over again, like a false sense of nostalgia. i see my house and the porch light reaches out, home, and the sirens song is broken. and i am left feeling sleepy and slow. molasses in the winter, sugar in cold water.

How Does It Feel....

When the road stretches out in front of me, wide open and welcoming, I feel no fear. When the wind whips through the open windows and brings a curl of dust across my face, I want to breathe it in, so deeply I cough, till I feel it in my bones and the way my skin prickles, pulling tight over my scull. Strangely, the weird half light and under lit clouds, seem friendlier than the open black sky. Close like a blanket and almost as warm. The parching smoulder of a cigarette and the bite of coke left in the cup holder for a day, brings memories swimming to the surface, road trips of another time, another place and another person. the aches and pains are forgotten in the moment of the wind and sand across my face. the horizon races up to meet me, like the edge of a photo curling at the edges and I open my eyes widely, to see it like I should.

Befor the sadness kills us both....

It is so easy to see the cracks in the sidewalk, the way the tree roots come up into the sun like blind moles. but it is nearly impossible to see the darkness underneath, the way the dirt cowers damp and rotting below, like a secret, a foul truth. Nothing lasts forever but the distance makes it hard to stay, the wall around my heart grows higher than Rapunzel's hair can reach. Falling as the ground comes up to meet my body like a bed, the green of the field like a set of cotton sheets. If I were to be honest, I would have no words to speak. My mouth should be as empty as a tomb, company to only dusty bones, spiders in the shadows. If i have a disease, it must be the disease of over exposure, the poets of yesteryear would turn in their graves to hear the angst that completes our "greatest poets of our day!" nominations. My emotions bubble up through the cracks like a tar pit too long ignored, creeping and gliding across worn concrete and dirt. My mouth moves and yet, I have nothing of worth to say, the words crowding my tongue and slicing up my throat, razorblades and muck. I imagine it much like India ink, coating my chin and staining my shirt as i struggle to make art. The razors cut my throat ever deeper.

So Easy

Being the easy one is actually a lot of hard work. Even the word easy sounds like it doesn't require any effort, eeee-zzzzzeeeee. It sounds like a breath or maybe like wind through trees. So, I'm the easy one and it feels like a cross that weighs me down. The absolute worst part about it is how its me, me saying that I'm the easy one, me saying how I have a cross to bear. And now it's been so long that I don't even know who I am without this self constructed iron maiden around me. Brain, my hat is off to you.