A Necessary Drawer for a Broken Ego.

While the old words of now-broken hearts can be cozy, my intention in keeping a drawer of stale compliments is questionable.

It started as a way of having kindness and comfort and confidence easily accessible. To read reminders of all the ways people have loved me is the easiest route to subside my doubts and grievances.

A necessary drawer for a broken ego.

So why keep this weight among the feathers meant to tickle me? Why hide a sword in the sandbox?

Why do I swallow her long-dead sentiments like a necessary poison?

...

Though most days I am fine, it’s on nights like this that I hurt myself with the pain of having hurt another. 

She’s gone in the wind, thriving where she is, the feelings I clutch to my chest are held only here.

Holding no feelings for her in my heart other than regret, I’m home to a never-ending apology that even if accepted—even if she had forgiven me—would remain eternal.

...

I am incredibly unskilled at letting things go, the good and the bad. I keep these remnants of old friends, old lives, old impressions, because I don’t want to forget my good. But I keep this dagger because it’s the only form of self-harm I could ever bring to myself.

The greatest punishment, the grandest injury I can sustain at my own hand is to remind myself my murders; not of people, but of possibility. I am plagued with a great dread of decision, for fear I’ve made and I make the wrong one. To kill a potential future is to eliminate Schrodinger’s answer. It is both correct and incorrect until proven one way or the other.

Of course, I understand there is no correct or incorrect answer. There is no question. Life is not a series of right choices or wrong ones. It is a series of actions that must be taken as they come, and lived with once they pass.

And maybe once I accept that, I can finally burn this wretched weapon.

...

I am not haunted by spirits, though I have always longed to see one.

I am haunted by the crumbs of my emotional spillings; these half-intentional messes I have left on my path to an allegedly perfect future. They follow at my command, ready to guide me back to my manor of mistakes. And until I forgive myself, I shall always go along.



"My friend, aren't we tired?"

My friend, aren’t we tired?

We were standing in line at seventeen, thinking about when we’re retired.

Like clay we’ve been molded but I’m losing my stick and can no longer stand.

I show up, I rise up, and--



My dear, are you tired?

Are you tired as I am, bound by and wound like and wired?

My head hangs six feet under ground, like a bird with its head in the sand.

I wake up, I sit up, and--


My love, I am tired.

How lucky I’ve been, to have admired you and been desired.

If I take my last breath, I’m grateful to have even just once held your hand.

I give up, I go up, and--

The Midnight Lightrider, Or, 'A Satellite to Your Greatness'.

I didn’t know my best friend until I read her annotations.

To see her thoughts, her feelings, written to herself but read by me…

To read another’s interpretations gives me such an overwhelming energy.

I don’t know what it is.

It feels like a deeper connection—yet—one-sided.

It feels like cheating.

She gave me this book that I might read the novel, but I feel instead that I tried to read her.

I have seen the death in her heart without knowing her pain.

A simple “GO” and I’m with her on the freeway as she drags her dreams to the earth.

I have no place in these moments, and yet I claim to know their place.

I sing of her often, but only once have I writ’n of her. Just once.

“The midnight lightrider who scours the streets for song as she strikes fear and exhilaration into my heart with every glance.”

That’s her.

However, as the true sky also, she has a silver side;

Parallel to the moon, unseen by those who do not fly.

So am I a pilot because of this telescope?

No. 

I do not fly.

God and the World tell me so.

But with her...Perhaps I do.

A Great Perhaps: ‘a Satellite to your Greatness.’

Just Another Rough Draft of Yet Another Love Poem

The command of the universe is that we are where we are.

But--just as all prophecies are susceptible to an eraser--we can change ours.

The mountains which separate those who are meant, 

are nothing in the eyes of those above them.

For when we fall in love, we don’t simply fall--

we fly out of the hands of the world and into each other’s arms.

Like the American Midwest--corny without end-- 

that same human phrase puts it best: love transcends.

The Creek.

Memory lane is not a paved street

It’s a creek. In the nature of night that we claim

Thick, dark, mud lines and makes the bank

Trees on all sides, the creek runs through us all

The fugitive breathes heavy among the salamanders small

The same ancient amphibians watch the kid who cries

Her tears join the waters, running between the toes of the new humans as they cross oceans in their minds

It is the creek which babbles to keep us awake

And the bed which carves our path to away

In the back of every head ever heard there is healing in the stream

The homo sapien memory bank is not for wealth but well-being

The creek begins at midnight and ends when we are better

Listen for the moon and the water when you enter.

I Thought Ghosts Would Be Fun.

It’s like I lead two lives.

The life I live now and the life I’m still living.

I can’t let go.

I feel as though it was all taken from me by my own hand.

A one man stick-up; both the robber and the robbed.

And yet...I lost nothing.

I guess you can burn the bakery and still manage to bake some bread.

But where are the nights?

. . .

Of them all, the night I turned eighteen was my greatest steal.

Driving alone in the moonlight, the stars fell from their thrones and flooded out my eyes.

Why was I alone--I was never alone--how was I alone the entire time?

That builder’s brown room with the color-coded closet...the memories are there!

Good memories; but they rest not in peace.

Possessed.

Possessed by what could have been.

Pour après.

“The date is February 27th, 2020.

The world seems dangerous, desperate, and deceived. We’re moving; towards what, I am kept blinded. The recent turn of events has drawn my mind to the darker outcomes.

My mind rushes to paranoias like a hand to a gun; it puts fatality in the chamber then shoots from the hip.

Despite my mind’s best efforts, I do not fear death. Death has been at my side since I was born; I do not see it as a predator but as a patient observer. Put more simply: I recognize It is there, yet I feel no threat.

This is not to say I align myself with the Reaper. On the contrary, if my demise should come prematurely the only thing I will feel is regret.

Regret that I didn’t do more in my time before returning to my Father; Regret that I wanted that which I did not go for; Regret that I had not lived how I wished to live. This regret is not self-blame nor is it self-inflicted (I suppose it is self-inflicted in some parts), but a lingering spirit aimed at the Mortal Companion which took me.

In my absence, I know I shall only wish I could comfort you. Thus, I have felt a burden on my conscience that this document be crafted with even the utmost sincerity and love. I lived a blessed life. My survival of coming, alone, was a blessing but I recognize my loved ones as a greater one.”

Dear Cecelia.

Dear Cecelia,

Things are rough right now.

Everyday, it seems like the world is...worse off than it was the day before.

One look outside the ego, and everything looks a mess.

Everything’s harder. I don’t remember things taking this much of a fight before now.

And, obviously, I’ve got it really easy.

I mean, comparatively, everything’s totally fine. But it doesn’t always feel that way, if that makes sense?

I dunno.

I’m 20 years old and I’m afraid to write a letter to my future self because who even knows if I’ll have the chance to read it. Who knows if I’ll make it to 30? If any of us will last another ten years?

No one really knows, of course.

That’s the point of human mortal blindness: to know one’s death is to give definition to the deadline, and take away from the beauty of the experience.

What I’m trying to say is it’s easier to write to you than it is to write to anyone else.

Because you are hope personified.

The future’s face.

And if we mess this up? If I mess this up?

...can’t dwell.

I look around and I wish I could stand to be more ignorant because I would LOVE a little bliss. But we cannot afford to ignore any of this, if change is happening, it has to come from us.

So much is wrong. So much.

A lot of folks ignore it. They find solace in just the knowledge that they want to know, disregarding the truth because it hurts to be wrong.

If there’s anything I believe in, it’s all of us.

But belief has a sister and her name is doubt.

Anyways.

Best wishes and a blast from the past.

Let’s get this right.

Dread.

Dread is

a hungry predator.

It hides just out of sight yet it is

all-seeing.

It waits on its prey like war

of attrition.

When I grow weak, it summons

the pack.

Howling at fear and anxiety, I don’t know

how much time I have.

All I know is that dread is

there.

Its next move I do not

know.

Then again,

I don’t know mine either.

Spinning

For an eternity, it’s you and I and no one else

This endless dance until our death

Our celestial bodies spinning in tandem, this is our destiny in a universe of random

Our future uneasy, our achievements watch proudly

What I have now is yours just the same, and some far away place thinks they know our name.

This energy between us: forever shared

No matter what happens to me, I’ll know you always cared

I’m getting older now, smaller and cold

With my every new pain, your heart grows more bold

“I’d give my life for you,” and that’s what you intend

Our love, our life, a partnership never to end.

We’re there for each other through thick and thin,

Binary forever;

Forever we spin.

The Station, Part One.

There exists a room. At one end, a door; at the other end, a window which leads into a much smaller room. This room, the larger of the two, is a station. You cannot reach this station like you’d reach any other; it only appears to those who have nowhere else to turn.

Do not be fooled, however. This station is not a force of good in the universe nor is it a force of evil. It is instead a force of consequence, and not one to be reckoned with.

Unfortunately for today’s soul, Abraham was not one to have such knowledge; nonetheless, he entered the station with overwhelming hesitation. The heat of the surface world was awful, yet something about the station’s grey, carpeted walls and dirty, white tile floor was much, much, worse. He desired to leave. He wanted so strongly to run home, and yet he no longer had a home to run to.

Like all souls who’d entered before Abraham, though unbeknownst to him, he was lost. Lost in the world. Lost in life. Lost to himself.

But the station had found him.

He walked slowly between the crowd of plastic, folding chairs which filled the chapel-size room. At one spot, the tile was peculiarly sticky. The bright, beaming LED lights hummed above, relentless in their sterilization of the shadows. Abraham reached the window.

On the opposite side sat the Interface, a gaunt portrait of humanity crammed inside a dark, rubbery box. Its pale latex features stared vacantly. Abraham cleared his throat, and it came to something close enough to life. Its words more or less oozed out of its thin lips, asking its customer for a directive.


“I--I’d like to purchase a ticket please...” Abraham said, looking anywhere that wasn’t the Interface’s excuse for a pair of eyes.

It wasn’t enough. More words spilled clumsily into the air, looking for elaboration.

“A ticket to yesterday...please--please,” he stuttered. The sooner this interaction was over, the better Abraham hoped he would feel.

The false human repeated his words, thick like molasses and just as slow. Several servos began operation, and the Interface’s mechanical arm slithered out of the dark; gripped in its digits was a black rectangle, only slightly bigger than a face card. Abraham plucked the ticket free with his first two fingers and thumb. The card was barely tangible and cold to the touch like the fog of dry ice when placed in hot water. As the ticket entered Abraham’s possession, he noticed a second door had appeared in the station a mere five inches from the Interface’s window. Turning to thank the face, he found the window was gone. Looking back, the seating was gone as well. Even the entrance had vanished. Abraham had made the decision and now, with ticket in hand, the only way back was to go forward.

He stared into the door in front of him and he felt the door stare back. Drawn to the silky black void ahead, Abraham was barely conscious of his actions as his feet took him closer. The door vanished behind him, and Abraham was suspended in a space outside of spacetime. For what could have been an eternity or a mere three seconds, he waited. And then? The colors.

Bright flashes of red and orange, green and lavender. Blue, violet, chartreuse and sarcoline moving before his eyes like watercolors made of light. The visible spectrum rained down before him like a waterfall of energy. Sounds like laughter, thunder, the crackling of the ocean. All of it beautiful music rushing to his ears; an orchestra on fire.

Then, all at once, it was over.

Painted before him was not an image, not a memory, but a moment in time.

The day before.







The Old Clothes.

I put on the old clothes today...

I hadn’t thought to check for any lingering emotions before putting them on.

What a surprise it was when I slipped the shoes on and felt every step we took together.

In the pocket of my jeans I found our favorite places; they’d been through the wash, and were a little worse for wear. Bricks in the cupboard, water as windows. Still recognizable, just...confused.

I buttoned up my once-favorite shirt to find joy folded up in the breast pocket. Faded, creased, torn in a few places. But hey, what would joy be if we had not worn it well?

The jacket was the last piece I put on. Dark as the day we departed; but something was different this time. The pain was gone. The frustration, the rage, the smoke...gone. I guess it got bored. Perhaps all it needed was some time. Maybe that’s what we needed, too.

Couldn’t wear the hat anymore, though. That’s what happens when you grow up. You change your mind.

I wore the old clothes today...but today they felt new.

Thoughts on Doubt.

To be human is to doubt. 

We doubt “their words” and we doubt “ours”. We doubt fire and we doubt flowers. 

We doubt kings and we doubt cowards. We doubt peace and we doubt power.

Doubt is the basis of the scientific method, our criminal justice system, agnosticism, and also a major turning point in a child’s life: the moment one learns to doubt.

That which we have a harder time doubting tends to be the more negative things: fear and his monger, hate and hers.

It’s the better things in human life that we have an easier time doubting: love, bliss, truth.

We are a naturally loving species who has learned that love can hurt, that things change, that people lie, and that good is something fought for rather than something picked up. 

It’s important to note that when good is fought for, it sticks around; when good is picked up with no struggle, it can just as easily be put back down. But I digress.


So, is doubt humanity at its purest?

Is doubting the self and doubting each other the natural order?

That’s down to your worldview...but I choose to believe no. That’s not . 

While yes, it is completely natural, it’s not the only way to be human.

To be human is to take risks. To be human is to learn from mistakes. To be human is to fall so in love with someone or something, that we conquer self-doubt because that someone or something believes in us and we believe in that someone or something, too.

This is of course a topic that has been touched upon a billion times, but to be human is to doubt until given definite reason to believe. To trust. To love again.

I often find myself so often doubting my actions before I make them, that I have found myself to not be living life to its full potential. We are all capable of incredible things. We just have to use our doubt properly.

Doubt is just another tool in the sapien arsenal.

Don’t defeat it. Just learn to use it.

The Natural and Necessary Open-Mindedness of Human Life in America and the World.

(Originally written on August 9, 2019.)

When the American people are raised...they are taught that America is the greatest nation in the world. That it is a place of freedom, a place of justice, and a place to be proud of if you are lucky enough to hail from its purple mountains majesty.

This nation was built upon the idea of escape from a tyrannical government treating its people unfairly. This nation was born out of a desire for freedom from a government that didn’t care whether you lived or died, so long as it turned a profit. This nation has become the very thing it ran away from.

Written at the base of the Statue of Liberty are the words “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.”

How very noble, don’t you think? And how very depressing that our leaders and our people have become so caught up in our own interests, our own biases, and our own grudges that we have forgotten what Liberty means. 

A motorcycle backfires in Times Square, and everyone runs because they think it’s another mass shooting. That’s not freedom, that’s living under the threat of domestic terrorism, and the thumb of the NRA.

Refugees and immigrants come to our country because their homes are being ravaged by war and chaos, and we lock them away in cages and internment camps and airport hangers, tearing apart families and breaking hearts along the way. That’s not justice, that’s cruelty for the sake of cruelty.

This is nothing to be proud of.

Some try to move America forward, to better the world and its people, but they get shot down. Politics has become a game; the parties, sports teams. It doesn’t matter what someone’s policies are or what their plan is, just as long as they’re wearing the right color and as long as they hate the other side as much as you do.

Many politicians are not making choices based on what their voters want, instead choosing to take an extremist route so that they’ll get re-elected by those who want “their side” to win.

We should not be two sides on every issue. Our sides should change depending on the issue. In a perfect world, there are no two sides. The only side is ‘Let’s make the lives of Americans as good as they can be, and let’s make becoming an American as easy as possible.’

I want you to do something for me. 

Get somewhere high up; if not high up, at least somewhere you can see the freeway.

Once you’re there, look at the lights. Each of those lights is a pair of headlights on the front of a car that is owned by someone. A person, just like you or me. They have fears, anxieties, loves, dislikes, and if they have a family in the car? Each of those people is the same. In today’s world filled with black mirrors and social screens, it’s easy to live in a bubble; to live a life and think yourself independent, to think of yourself just a busy little bipedal making its way in the universe. This couldn’t be farther from the truth.

This world is not made up of 75 billion living organisms.

It’s made of one living organism: life itself.

These aren’t separate lives, we’re all living the same life.

If a car crash happens on the freeway, it doesn’t just affect the drivers of each car, does it? No, no, no, it impacts the lives of each driver, their families, their friends. More than that, the paramedics, the officers, and every single driver on the road who is about to get stuck in traffic.

Your world is bigger than yourself, and it’s bigger than your bubble. Once you realize that, once you’ve seen every light on the freeway and recognized the vastness of the life we lead, and once you understand that every person on earth wants love and safety, THEN try and tell me the actions at the border are just and right. Tell me that guns are more important than that. Tell me love is wrong.

Thank you.


Morning!

It’s high moon as I enter the world, standing at the bottom of a Laniakea Sea.

Stars like holes in the lid so I can breathe, yet they always leave me breathless.

I go a little bit faster to get there a little bit early.

The horizon erupts as I stand at the station and the sky is filled with light.

The train tracks are whispering, alive with an exit.

And so I wait.

On God's Porch

The moon has risen to my left as I lie on a patchwork of time.

Foamy puzzle pieces rest elegantly on the glass sky; beyond it all, celestial bodies loom, gazing down at me.

Challenging me.

I’ve a self-important soul and a self-conscious spirit. I’m both eager to perform, and dreading of their expectations.

I think of the girl who took a ring as a ticket, and how easy optimism was before this all-new same-old.

I exit the memory and wander the desert in search of my purpose, too stubborn to follow the map laid out for me. I find myself on God’s porch in hope of an answer. It’s the first time in a while that I’ve been here before sundown.

I should know by now to never ask a gift horse for the same gift twice, but when the King tells you your dreams are misplaced where else does one look?

I don’t leave my box. I stare up at the motion-sensor light, unmoving out of fear I’ll learn something I’m not ready to hear.

I fell out of love in June; turns out a three-year-battery just isn’t enough anymore.

Now I need someone to show me I still have a future.

“Who am I supposed to be?” I ask, now that the old guard’s gone.

The glow from within doesn’t just look warm, it sounds loving. It calls to me. It shows me the future I could have if I only come inside.

I grow tired and slither back to familiarity, but being familiar and being comfortable are no longer the same thing.