Colorado

(5/?/11 – Trying to maintain without the luxury of closure is making things more and more difficult)

Spending random weekend nights walking around book stores and coming home and coming up with ideas in my head of how things should be – I don’t have to be doing this here – it’s cold and people are colder here – if I put things into action without anyone knowing – I can slip out the back door easy – I can make it by the next sunset  - this place and everything I know about it is tired and hundreds of years old – yet again though – I don’t belong to anything or anyone here – there is no sort of inspiration here – there is nothing but sadness desperation and a longing to just be left alone – I walk around on edge now – snapping at every third person who asks me a stupid question – I think back though – fucking in hotels and relishing in mountains and bright blue oceans – sure it will be different this time

I’m not bitter when they tell me of the restaurants and Radiohead concerts these dudes take them to - I’m not worried about what I need to do - it all sounds like a nightmare - courtships and checking your phone and inbox every fifteen minutes - at this point I’ll never get out of this blue without some sort of permanent damage though - these long days and longer routines I have myself involved in are eternal – I get this fire burning inside me – a hatred – a leave me alone please everything you talk about is incorrect – they try to impress or make a better joke and it falls flat – I try not to worry too much about it – trying to imagine a point in time when I can be covered in sunlight all day and covering pages and pages with words that make sense – this tries to keep me going – it’s the same tired old five hundred words I don’t even need to say though – surrounded by nothing all day – the rope is slowly becoming shorter and shorter – I feel myself ready to jump

(9/15/2000 -You put me here, I swear to fucking god you put me here. Listen, let’s try and start from the beginning. Well, no let’s not, you won’t allow that. In fact you won’t allow a word in edge wise here. You won’t let me get you a drink of water to clean your dirty soul out. You won’t allow me to do anything to you at this point. So long to the days of cheerios and stares out the car window. It’s been turned around now. It’s not the same, it’s never going to be the same. I stop. I stop everything, and now I go from town to town checking the mailboxes of housewives and thieves. These girls come up to me with a little display case that has a bunch of wedding rings in it, they tell me to pick one out for them. I pick out the ring, the best one I can see in that little leather case. I hand it to one of the girls and she says to me “this isn’t good enough for me, neither are you” and walks away. Ha! Sound familiar? Not really true but. I can’t picture what the hell you look like. When I see you from time to time you are someone else, regardless of what’s happened on the street and in the swimming pool, you are someone else. Forget your hair, forget your body, forget your clothes, you look at me differently. You don’t look at anyone like you used to. You certainly won’t give me a dime to call a taxi home that’s for sure. I bet at some point I will kick myself for not being more persistent with you. For not writing a book about you, for not taking drives off of canyons for you. I’ll regret that I didn’t take you to the edge of my head with me. I’ll regret that I ever kissed you. I’ll tell you that. I’ll tell you it was the worst night of my life. I am going to tell you that the next time I see you. I’m going to just tell you straight up that kissing you was not on my agenda. I woke up and next thing I know I’m thrown into this world of parties and bad rockabilly music and dumb drinks and even dumber shoes. I still remember where everything in that room is. I still remember where my feet landed on the floor the first time I got up. I looked at my feet to see if I could stand up. I looked to see if I would fall over. Little boys and cocaine addicts tremble, but you sort of made me tremble. Just a little bit. I get up, I get down and I turn back around again, and poof your gone. Just like that. In a cloud of perfume and menthol cigarette smoke, in a cloud of rum oxygen and conversations I get lifted certain times of the day. This fact makes me not really regret that I ever kissed you, it does however make me want to strangle Mick Jagger some nights. It makes me want to throw ashtrays against the wall. It makes me look at guys with pierced tongues and eyebrows and all of that and want to throw a hammer at them.I put these new girls to sleep at midnight. I put you to sleep when I go to sleep. You stay up with me, you out stay me every night. You don't come up for air. Relentlessly plowing through my dreams at night. Fuck that I can’t listen to your rules anymore. You fill me up from time to time, yeah. Not all the time. It’s a short and sweet time of the year right now. It’s none of what you thought it was. All along I played with that yo-yo, hoping you would follow it with your eyes enough to become a target. A target for me to throw my issues at. Like the paperboy in the morning. I’ll whip something at your screen door baby. I’ll whip my issues at your door, and you can send whoever is your pet dog at the time to go and get it for you)

(?/?/?? - Funny how time flies and they all fly away from me. They take off like pigeons. Rats with wings. They show up for a minute or two, think they got to know me, and fly away into the wind. No looking back or anything. There are no apologies. They come by the house now and again, and make believe they care, I make believe I care, and we go our separate ways. It bothers me that I put effort into things and they just sort of linger around collecting dust. It bothers me that I am not happy with all of this. There really is no reason to be happy about it. You were had honey bunch. Sipping coffee late at night waiting for the efforts to be rewarded with at least a phone call, or some sort of poem on a napkin. Any sign of anything would help out big time here with me. I don’t want to go backwards. There are people I want to hurt now. There are people from last week I want to hurt. There are people from the movie that I want to hurt. I have a few allies in this war I’m waging right now. We have secret meetings disguised as dinner dates. We look like the couple of the moment, while we plot revenge and fun things like that. She meets me for a drink and we make it back to my house. I lend her books, tell her a quick story about “this one night in Chicago a while back”, give her a peck on the cheek, and the phone doesn’t ring for fifteen weeks. The phone rings with people selling sneakers disguised as literature and shiny photography. We meet again, she never read the books I leant her, and we go our separate ways again. The next meeting of the secret ninja society will be on October 11th 2011, at the parking lot of the restaurant we always meet at. The same parking space and everything. We shall meet there, and there we will finally get to the bottom of this. The plan will be under way, and we can sit back and watch it happen. You and I, we’ll go back to the beach one more time and talk about old families, and sports and cheerleaders, and vegetarians, and Reagan. Why it always bothers me that you come around like Halley’s Comet is beyond me. You rarely have many words to say, and when you do, it’s sugar and fire all wrapped into one big kiss. You bring out the kid in me, I swear to god you do. But you ain’t going to fully understand what I have for a plan. You’re not going to help me whatsoever. It makes it weak when you add your two cents. I’ll do all the work, you watch. I got involved with this girl Diane a long time ago. The most beautiful girl you could ever imagine to see in your whole entire life. We became fast friends, and I eventually developed the biggest crush in the world on her. She was completely crazy. Her mother had died, and she lived in the attic of her aunt's house. No boys allowed. I found letters from her a while back. All sorts of shit about birds flying around her room in the middle of the night, and her mother coming in the room after she had died. I remember every once in a while she would just disappear. Weeks at a time. She would just not answer the phone. I want to see her now. I was so into her. Yikes. I’d pay one hundred dollars just to see her once and hang out. Dreadlocks and babies are all I know about her as of 8 years ago. I would be able to make more apologies if I was given the time. I never have time to apologize though. I have plenty of time to dwell on things though. I have plenty of time to hang out and watch the river flow by me for a few hours. I have no time to sit down over a cup of tea, and discuss wrongdoings. I created a clone recently that I want to show people. I created a secret ninja out of thin air. I wanted him to be just like me. Bored, lonely, misunderstood, and all of that fun stuff. I hang out with the clone all the time and he tells his friends about me, I don’t mention a word of it to anyone though. Nobody believes you when you talk that kind of game. They don’t believe in magic like that. You can make anything. You can do all sorts of things when you keep your mind to it. Pin the mind to the wheel. Pin your tail on the honkey. I enjoy my new friend. If nobody else does, well, fuck them.  There’s no way I can think back to the summer. Nights of high doubt. Nights of guilt. No I just can’t stay here tonight. Nights of feeling like a stranger. Feeling like a loser. A husband and a friend. Honest, and to the point, but a complete liar as well. Drive and use gasoline to get something you think you really need. Try it some time. Know exactly what it is you’re doing without regard to other peoples’ feelings. See how it makes you feel. Be the one who hurts others for self gain and doesn’t think about the consequences, or karma. A fake and a liar for five hours a night. I can’t get on the floor. I need to crawl across the floor. Let’s take a ride to the beach you and I. You never won my attention. But I won your's somehow. I look back and punch myself in the face for all of that. This is really what I look like, but this isn’t what I feel like. I swear to god I didn’t want to get it out of me with you. I miss you now. I kicked myself in the head last week thinking about you. Thanks for sending the karma back to me though. I deserve the games played with me now. I deserve whatever happens now. Do I really deserve this over and over though? I mean it wasn’t that long. You always initiated it. You always started it. Not saying a word to me. I knew the minute I met you that I was going to hell. I knew the minute I met you exactly what you would say to me. I knew all about you and your life. You told me in vague sentences about boys and girls and kisses and roses. I gave you ten minutes, you gave me hours, and what did I do? I took advantage of that, and now look at me. I haven’t had enough yet. I haven’t felt alive like this in a long time. Dear, I will never lie again.)

Medicine For a Nightmare

Without the aid of drugs or making the eyes tired I’m kept awake by constant noise in my brain - like an echo chamber – voices of a million ideas and people from throughout the day still talking to me – memories from six years ago – conversations from last week – lines from movies I hated – women from thirty-six years ago complaining about how cold it is – standing around outside waiting to see something more exciting on the dry pavement – flat worn down cigarette butts – pebbles – plastic bottle caps – pebbles – sand – footprints – everything a cold grey color – they all stare at their feet when they talk to me – warm green eyes – warm hazel eyes – warm blue eyes – dark brown eyes that are truly the only ones I want staring at me – I can’t even look her in the eye without trembling – she is the one I would stop listening to music for – she can crush me in a second with her smile – I can’t ever – I will never know what this is about – drifting further away is going to make it all better maybe – I can make them all laugh – I can piss them off to no end – wide awake late into the night though – wondering who even gives a shit – wondering if any of them ever think of me anymore – I think of them all now – this last time though – I never felt stronger – left to feel weak and guilty like I did wrong – the echoes as I try to sleep – I wonder how drugs might help again – I hear voices and laughter – voices of people I haven’t met yet – voices of the last thirty women I wanted to fuck the shit out of – voices of the ones who are of no consequence anymore – when I am far away from here – sitting on a bench looking over the night peppered with orange freckles – a valley of dreams and where I always wanted to die – long boulevards of strangers and friends and hey look it’s open all night – like a grid – I stood up there in September one night – the beginning of what I thought was the best story I could ever write – medicine for a nightmare – a cure for an ailment that never existed in the first place – back and forth and back and forth and back and forth – whatever the case – anyone who tries to judge me now – the fire and energy from a trillion suns on everyone they’ve ever loved – I spend nights listening to nobody – an empty head full of ideas I can’t hear because of all this other static – when I get to an nice open space though – when high above me a black ceiling with billions of stars confusing me and my eyes – relaxing my eyes and pointing me in the desired direction – when I am there I’ll know I’m finally on my way home – these days silence only happens for five minutes at a time – I can’t spend another grey season in this echo chamber – the sound of a distant signal high upon a mountain lulling me to sleep – remember that?

She'll Laugh

It’s perfectly okay to forget about places and people and things you did

I could worry myself to sleep like the best of them

Nowadays I just fall asleep empty with not a care in the world

No wondering if I pissed one or five people off

No wondering when I might get the courage up to leave everything and everyone alone

I really want to do it all again, try it again

Sooner than I think I will

This place

This area of the country

This state

This life right now

There are no rewards

There is contentment

I never “can’t wait to get up tomorrow” anymore

Like a machine here though

I do it every day

Everything I thought was back here isn’t here at all

Everything and everyone is the same

Cold, selfish, uninterested in anything I am interested in

It’s like everything here moved ahead (backwards?) while I was gone

I have no desire to catch up really

This New England place, it’s incorrect

I have nothing in common with it

Lying and saying “I’m a New England person” sounds good

Looks okay on paper I guess

When I think of steel, sunlight and blank skies though

I feel like myself all over again

I guess you can be wrong a few times in a row before you get it right

-------------------

She comes to me every few weeks - I remember how in love with her I can get - I remember how in love with her deep eyes I can be - Her laugh and hands and smile - I can never have that ever really - every few weeks though I return

15 Lies I've Told

1.       

               a) Discordant guitars in place of women complaining in my ear every twelve minutes

2.           

          b) Going to sleep never – remembering winding through the whatever valley heading west towards the ocean – this keeps me awake still

3.            

          c) A series of empty sexual experiences in your 20’s, 30’s and 40’s

4.           

          d ) I’ll only smash them inside my head

5.            

          e) He carries weapons around with him. In his jacket, in his car, in his closet

6.        

                f)  Pussies and chicks liked The Beatles, dudes who loved eating pussy and knew all women were evil and lied liked the Rolling Stones. I liked both, and The Who.

7.        

               g) Communication

8.         

          h) Some nights it’s hard not to walk off into the woods.

9.         

          i) I secretly hate living in New England and can’t wait to leave again in a couple of years or one

10.      

          j) ?

11.     

               k) I think I may be

12.      

          l) Nobody has ever cared what you ate

13.     

               m) All the Van Halen albums with David Lee Roth

                   

          n) That dude's wife Stacie

          

          o) "I love you"

n)

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog

This years long feeling of dread that was always in my brain and when I looked out the window at the end of the day, out into the woods, into the eyes of unsuspecting weak women who had no idea who I was. “they’re all weak” I’ll tell myself forever and for the most part I'm correct. I can barely look in mirrors nowadays. That years long feeling of dread. For the most part caused by polluting my body with all types of poisons. It’s gone now. Now I am still just as paranoid and dread it all. I still feel them all behind me ready to take me somewhere I don’t want to go. Listening to them complain, echoes of the same complaints over and over for years now, the same people complaining about the same thing. Weekend nights are hopeless now. Remember a weekend evening was cause for much needed sleep the next day? A quiet night with one or three people works now. A nice night out with a friend, walking around book stores and gossip halls. Most of the week, a ghost in the forest lurking around, attempting to make women all over the world laugh when I can. I have no connections, deep connections with other men nowadays. Maybe for a long time now? In Los Angeles I certainly did not. This afternoon I missed the coast out there. The Pacific ocean, how we drove it up and down, well a couple of trips one ending almost bad and one beginning amazing. Who is the guy two years ago thinking eternity is an actual idea? Whoever I thought I was, I wasn’t even close. Under a spell of bright blue water and deeper eyes, sugar kisses and hair that flowed down like all night long. I miss it and her constantly but never think about it all too much. I hate ever saying “I’ve moved on” as that is such an empty and final thing to say for such a big piece of me in the last decade. Hmm, this blanket of white ice that seems to cover us once a week now is holding something down. Is it holding down my thoughts so they don’t float away into the sky like before and end up all over the clouds? My own thoughts spent months and months turning the clouds and sky dark gray. My own ideas for how to make things better was to move further and further away from the “nice guy” I always am. Yeah, that guy. Bitter and shot down for the last time ever I am a completely different person now and I imagine some other completely different guy out there I’ll never know in my place doing everything right I could never get down. Still not 100% comfortable with this place and this person. As much as I am obviously going to stay here for a long time, my head is always going to be scatterbrain and never be able to sit still. Sometimes I fuck things up for a reason. Sometimes other people fuck things up for a reason. It all happens so slow when you are older that you have the time to fix it, but you get so comfortable you have no idea how to do any repairs. I wonder if I’ll laugh about all this in three years time of if I’ll still be kicking myself in the teeth for it.

100 Best White People I've Ever Met

A mans best friend is not a man or a dog.

Telling me that you care is just one of a million things.

She tells me stories that Mother Goose would kill for.

We speed down the highway, and I still can’t get a commitment.

Wish I was taking a vacation in a month. Don’t ask don’t tell.

We spent weeks at a time together.

Will it stop being the latest issue of the newspaper?

My favorite night this year was in May.

I expected to forget what I went for, and then I found her.

The reasoning behind all of this is grounded in bad punk records.

She is short.  She just waves at me.

Her favorite song was my favorite song 10 years ago.

I hate to think that I am not clear all the time 24 hours a day.

We smoke heroin because we don’t talk to each other anymore.

She is short as well. Real smart. I can’t believe I was in awe of her at one point. “She’s one of us” we say.

There was a small pile of dirt left at my door, methodically placed there to get to me. I hear them out there.

She made me think back to six years ago and go over all sorts of letters and notes.

I have a series of things I need to always do. Never walk down stairs in front of anyone.

My guitar sits there now rusty and out of tune, waiting to be completely retired at any minute.

She sends me messages I never delete

We talk and talk and when it gets down to waking up in the morning, I still have the book open.

I lose touch with people for a day and I feel like an exhaust pipe.

The best thing I remember was looking over and realizing the mountain would not tell me I had a call.

She looked best in the morning. Once a girl can look that good, that early, an inch away, she has me.

We make out and never talk about anything. Nobody knows, and nobody ever will.

She is on my mind more than she’s in my mind.

The other thing I need to do is always flush the toilet when I leave a bathroom, no matter what I did.

Long letters from her are rare but truthful.

It always feels like this when I get around to talking about it. Clear and concise.

I watch them smoke many attractive cigarettes in fifteen minutes.

I acted like I was one of them. I acted like I meant it. I asked for paper.

They complain and complain, wonder if they’ve ever smiled

Once they break in though, they have me. I never let them break in.

I swear I never want anyone to get hurt. I’m always good hearted in the long run.

She wears this shirt that makes me just want to watch television with her.

We had a good time, and then I went on my way. Two more tornadoes, and a brush with the police.

Every morning I need to look out the window for two minutes before shower.

The key is to flip it when you can see that it’s not stuck to the pan.

They are out there, arranging more piles of sand to fuck with me. I hear them.

Disgusting dudes with no cocks.

I take these days in stride now, you can tell me if I am “too much for your mirror”.

I was almost attacked by Stevie Nicks riding a Unicorn last night.

Blues music is my only outlet now. It sucks when you’re not allowed to spit in private.

The night he died.

I wonder how many have tried to forget they even met me

She was scared as a bunny rabbit on crystal meth.

Phil Collins.

Right now, I feel like I could jump out this window and fly.

She, the song by Kiss.

I wish I could run on back to Virginia Beach right now. The only place I’ve ever felt so shitty and so good.

I’m perplexed at how they operate. It’s almost like trying to teach a duck to write poetry.

I never got to cook tons of meals like I wanted to.

There are more than one ways over the moat.

I would piss people off at work, and then ignore them until I face them at the copy machine. Three nails at a time.

I opened up my eyes today. More than they’ve ever been open before.

She made her way in, and looked around, and realized she couldn’t redecorate.

I only lied seventeen times today

The last time I was at an amusement park I fell of the merry-go-round. Now I see stars over everyone.

I knew it was wrong.

We talk about what it will be like to walk around Heaven on Quaaludes.

She has a funny way about her. Even when she is angry with me.

Some day I will stop looking at the hand obsessively.

We walk and argue about who fucked less people.

I knew she was bad news when she asked me if I liked “The Fucking Doors”

Massachusetts has a funny way about making you feel like a goddamn loser.

We play phone tag, and I play connect the dots.

Wait, I think we just killed each other.

I hate them, and when they look at you like they do.

I need to open doors at the bottom of staircases after they have been properly closed.

Wait until I show them all

He comes home, checks his messages, and checks his arms. Everything is there, he sleeps.

That faggot Mark

We drink and I make pretend I’m interested. This is how we get along.

She takes her pretty time while I look at old scratch marks on my left arm.

Finally I find her, and she ignores my eye contact.

Once you have them down, you need to start again. It’s so tedious now.

In your spare time, you should not do what you do in your spare time. You are losing.

Married and never happier, yeah okay.

It’s funny how many times I doubted what was happening to me. Now I write instructions.

The way it goes is this: you work for me, I work for you, and the money goes to the house.

I should probably be worried about this.

Gifts I never gave or received, how sad it that?

He tells me I should go for it. I ask him what he has invested in this. “----- -- ----- --- --------“.

Rain came and I shit my pants.

Not sure if I want to die on cement, or a bed.

I met her and immediately made phone calls the next morning.

My one and only way to catch on is to just move on. Look, I know what you’re doing.

We spent time on the rocks, frozen.

We pretend we don’t see each other, and then I fuck it up.

So exhausted I have to be awake when I sleep.

My one last hope for survival, hmm

We walk on red bricks.

Taking time off from time.

She looked at me once.

It’s lonely out here.

Massachusetts.

Evenings.

Lonely.

Never.

Done.

Out.

Estimated Prophet pt II

At the same time my ears ring, my eyes burn and my sixth sense is heightened to where an alarm will probably go off fifteen minutes from now. There has to be an alarm going off somewhere fifteen minutes from right now anyway, I’m sure of it. I can’t imagine why, but then I realized as much as I am into letting you know how much I like you or don’t like you via secretly recorded conversations about my third cousin I’ve never met anyway, I still notice this shit. I notice it all though and it’s why I can’t even relate to here anymore.



Sometimes you can have a memory of a scent from when you were a child ,someone’s house, a food you used to eat, whatever. The other night I randomly remembered the scent, and then the lighting and whole atmosphere of where I went to what we called “CCD”. I have no idea what this even stood for, but it had to do with preparing kids for confirmation in the Catholic church. The only thing I really remember about these classes is, they were maybe in the early evening once or twice a week, they were boring as hell and you basically just spent your time memorizing these stupid prayers....Our Father, The Lord’s Prayer and maybe Hail Mary. I couldn’t recite a single word from any of these at this point in my life as I guess because of the timing of it was during a formative time in my life when it was kind of hard to trick me. I was being taught to talk to someone I never met, someone I couldn’t see and someone who lived in “the sky”.

I never received my Communion or Confirmation as a Catholic as at one point or another I complained so much to my parents that I hated it they took me out of it...I went to Penance once to tell a priest of my recent sins which in retrospect seems just wrong to do to a ten year old kid. How many of the Ten Commandments can you even break that young? My parents weren’t church people, and with my dad in the music industry in the 70’s and the nature of what I was involved in during the early and mid-eighties, worshipping someone I could never see or touch seemed more absurd by the second.

With my dad in the industry, we were able to go to quite a few big concerts, often going backstage to meet these rockstars like Styx, Supertramp and later on in life New Order, Robert Plant, and then countless musicians in the punk rock scene. With the ability to meet and see these people as real humans my idea of idol worship and that kind of think was more dull than most people I know. The fact that I spent so many hours with records by bands and musicians that I could someday meet made the notion of worshipping anybody or any entity a ridiculous thing. This isn’t to say I still don’t do this to this day though.

I can have my mood and attitude completely changed within minutes if I hear certain musicians. If I need advice on something I can consult a musician or an author for advice or inspiration. Where I live right now, there are quite a few “Jesus people” as I like to call them. They are some of the most unfriendly, close minded people I have had the pleasure of being surrounded by. Sitting in this coffee shop playing music loud into my ears and watching them is like watching a movie. Starring all white people, they’ve all stepped out of a white picket fenced world of backstabbing and weird ideas of how things should be and well “leave us alone anyway”. Every one of them probably own a Golden Retriever and a minivan, watch Everybody Loves Raymond on a nightly basis and have about two orgasms a presidency.



I have this plan of slipping out the back door without anyone seeing. Without leaving a note, without slamming the door shut. A quiet sneak out the back door with one knapsack full of ironic t-shirts, sneakers and books about dead people with hard to pronounce names. I have the ability to drive a whole day without feeling guilt. I can leave blank pages on the ground, a trail of crumbs that leads nowhere but to me sitting in a hotel room waiting for the sun to come up so I can bore myself to death for nine hours again with deserts and forests and hills and white people with ridiculous accents. Not a single drop of poison needed, not a single piece of anything. If they need to wonder where I am they can, but at the end of the day I don’t owe anyone anything. It’s sunny enough here that people can figure everything out on their own. I don’t think anyone would even want my advice. I hate giving advice, nobody takes it, I never take it either so. Mostly though, if I can never hear another person complain for as long as I live, if I can never read another person complain again as long as I live, and I can slip away to some small place on the Pacific Ocean I’ll be done. Nothing here but noise and noise and that kind of thing, well it’s easy to slip away without anyone even noticing. I hate cakes anyway.

F

Last night I never went to sleep at all. Woke up 9:00 AM the previous day (Thursday) after going to bed at 8:00 AM. So aside from that brief hour or so of sleep Thursday morning, I haven’t slept at all. It’s boring and nothing happens, who wants to sleep? Truly though, I did eventually go to sleep this morning, and slept for a bit. Before that however I decided to pour some Robitussin in a shotglass and take two shots of that, two shots of rum and smoked half a joint and wrote this:


In the hills of whereversville California
Far above gross strips of orange and grey
Hollywood on one side and an area I should never call home on the other
Trying to locate the first second
The best way to my heart
Looks of frustration
Contentment
And just that look

“every single one down there is a liar”
“stay away from me I’ll only hurt you”
“”these sunglasses and hat will make it easier to deal with”

My first, but really second moment like this
Interrupted over and over
Spilled directly into awkwardsville
“oh well then”
Months from now in the middle of the night
Months from now in the early hours of dawn
Months from now we’ll remember this time and laugh
We’ll look back fondly
Speak of fucking and taking things fast
Speak of how better everything gets
Months after things get worse
Weeks after things get worse
Even days after things get worse
They seem to get better

Her gaze even better in real life
Better than hours of phone calls and letters
letters on a screen that have something
“nothing will ever stand in the way”
Not women you’d never meet
Not men I’ll never meet

Eight months later
Almost to the day though
Light in my eyes that makes it hard to even sleep
Darkness that makes it easy to sleep
Why is it when I feel I’ve done wrong
I can sleep better at night?
I always have more light in my head
The way I pull information though
This gigantic flashlight
A flashlight made of fire, frustration and sixteen other words that begin with the letter F

Master of Puppets

I can push and be pushed into any situation. I try to make my own decisions here and there and really, I never do. I let situations dictate them. I don’t think I’ve put more than a few minutes into a choice in a long time. I have no fucking patience for sitting around thinking if it involves other people. I can just as easily ignore people forever. I can leave them alone and never pick up the phone again if I need to. Most people can’t do this, they are weak and always cave in. I think because everyone ever has failed me I don’t put any kind of stock into people at this point. Everyone is selfish at the end of the day including me. If I had it my way right now I would disappear into the middle of the country somewhere. Miles away from the ocean and the internet and coffee and listening to people ramble on about things I have no interest in, listening to the same questions over and over. Miles away from every single person invading my privacy, family, friends, strangers, I volunteer information all the time so the invasion doesn’t really exist, but really. Someone thinks I have something interesting to say. They must be blind, or have some other motives. Hmm.

Until I get back to reality and living some sort of new routine, this routine is the one. Staring at a ceiling fan, listening to animals in the back yard, watching people read their bibles, fat housewives sucking on milkshakes disguised as coffee drinks, all whites all the time. I sleep three hours a night, the rest of the time I am waiting for some sort of alarm to go off. The rest of the time its all noise all the time. Nowhere to go to avoid their deafening voices and taunts and uninteresting feelings about life.



Early morning dream 06/02/10:
Was in some sort of pantry area trying to run some sort of device that needed to be hooked up to a tank of gas and it was not working. Tank eventually came disconnected from hose and flew around small area before crashing into a wall.



Looking back now on trips I have taken, people I’ve taken them with, certain areas of the country and which were the best. I’ve never done extensive traveling with another person really. When I did it had a specific function, moving. The whole trips were complete stressful times for the majority, and there was nothing really relaxing about those trips. Trips I’ve taken in New England have been okay. Some have been hard to deal with because of whatever weather we were having, and usually the trips were too short. I know everything that’s here at this point for the most part. I’ve been to the top of Maine and looked across a river at Canada, and to the bottom of my least favorite state, Connecticut. So I feel like I’ve seen almost every inch of New England that I need to see. It’s impossible for me to get lost in Massachusetts.

Maybe because they are more recent, or because of the company I was with, or because I am better at traveling than I was say ten years ago. My trip to Disneyland for my birthday last November with G was great. Great that it was early in our relationship and although still didn’t know each other as well as we do now, it was great to spend my birthday at that place I loved as a kid with someone I love. Our trip to Morro Bay/San Luis Obispo this past March was also great. I didn’t know if it would be the last time I saw her or not since I was moving back to Boston a couple of weeks later. That is a great area of the state and I think I really fell for her there so it was particularly bittersweet to leave that day. I couldn’t write enough shitty songs and poems about that smile and well, other things.

Now that I have been back here, and have listened to all of these songs that remind me of here and then remind me of there, I feel like I really want to go back there. I know what is here and I know what is there. I put these things on a scale the other night. Ups, downs. Pros, cons, you know...It’s noisy and crowded here. If I get to the ocean here, it is rocky and cold and I feel like I am pushed against the sea.



"Hey Charlie"
I landed on the ice with a giant “thud”, and got up immediately. I think I had been running but I’m not sure when I think back to that night. Charlie wanted to catch up with me this night, but I wouldn’t let him. I ran, and ran, and ran. Charlie always had a slew of questions to ask me. Charlie always wanted me to tell him a story “from the old days”. I liked Charlie, but he was just too much sometimes. Charlie always wanted me to lend him a cigarette, although he never gave back the “lent” cigarettes I gave him. Charlie was never in love from what I can tell. He was always telling me of some girl he was with the night before, but I was never interested. In retrospect I guess I should have been a bit nicer to Charlie. Charlie pushed. Charlie outright bugged me most of the time.

I don’t think many people knew of Charlie. I never told my friends about Charlie, or the day I met him in the coffee shop. Charlie was sitting at the stool two over from me, and when the large construction man left, Charlie introduced himself. I had seen Charlie around my building, but had no clue he lived in it. In fact, he lived right below me. I didn’t really pay attention to anyone there, except for the couple next to me, whom I HAD to pay attention to because they were so loud. Arnold and Louise, what a fucking couple they were. So anyway, this particular night, it was raining, which made the ice on the ground even more slick than it was. I was coming home from my friends’ place where we had just watched television for five hours straight. Charlie saw me turn our corner, and started in with the questions. What's up? You staying up? Every once and a while I would let Charlie in and we would hang out and get high. Tonight I wanted to go to bed right away. I’m going to bed Charlie. I’m not doing anything tonight Charlie. I started yelling a little. I’m GOING IN CHARLIE! Charlie kept at it. I started running down the street in fear at this point. After the thud on the ice, I made my way into the apartment building.

Charlie came to the door five minutes after I got in. Can I come in? Just for a minute. Charlie was in love apparently. He had mentioned this one girl a bunch of times, but I had never paid attention. I hadn’t been in love in three years, so I guess I was a bit jealous of Charlie. I all of a sudden felt a little compassion for Charlie, and listened to him. Hey remember the time you told me you fell in love with that girl, and she turned out to be your cousin? Yes I remember that Charlie. Remember you told me that it was much bigger than love, and that every time you were with her you felt like she was a part of you? Yes I remember that Charlie. That’s how I feel right now. Who is she Charlie? Her name is Darlene, and she works at the pizza place up the street. Oh, I think I know who you’re talking about, you’ve mentioned her before right? I offered Charlie a cigarette. He said he was quitting. Your loss I snapped. Darlene obviously doesn’t smoke I take it? Yes, she does. Oh. I’m going to marry her. You are? Yes, I think I am. The horoscope says I probably will. And that’s a good source of information for you Charlie? It never lies to me. How come every time I look at it Charlie, I ignore it if it doesn’t say anything good, and when it does, I ignore it anyway?

The next morning Charlie was on his way to the store when he dropped in the middle of the street. It seems a brain tumor fell him. I guess in retrospect Charlie was a good man, he just bugged me a bit too much. The one night when I finally let him have his night with me he dies the next day. I visited the pizza place after Charlie died to see Darlene. She’s at home with her husband the guy behind the counter told me. It turns out that Charlie was indeed in love with Darlene, but this was news to Darlene. Charlie wanted so bad to have love in his life but was denied it over and over, so he made up stories. I miss Charlie. I have no love either, and Charlie had some love, he seemed to love me, but I had none of it to give him when he was alive. My friends now have all gone on and pursued their dreams of moving out of this city, and into homes with their wives, and girlfriends. Today I went down to the coffee shop and sat at the counter next to this policeman. After he got up, I moved into his seat, and asked the man next to me if he was enjoying the unusually warm weather in January.



"Novembre"
Lets cut out the small talk

We are sitting next to each other and that’s all

I am not an interesting person

I am not an interested person

I have nothing to give you really

I can give you stories

I can follow you home

I am good at that

I can make you think I am someone else

I am good at that

I can let you think you know me

In the middle of the night though

I am pulling strings

I’m plotting revenge on you

You’ve done absolutely nothing to me

I know you’ve done harm to others though

I see through you all the way to Hawaii

I sit up late at night writing letters to your friends

I spend hours devising ways to harm you

I sit around inside my head

I’m no better than you

You are truly better than me, which is why I do this

You win one battle

In the end though, I win ten

You fight three battles

I fight none

And I still come out on top somehow

The second you asked me what my name was

That was the first mistake you made

You wife and kids seem nice

I’m really sorry

Really, I am.

Pussy Eating Contest

Found some old shit I wrote once in this old hard drive. Title is obviously a reference to the Sabbath song.

09/03/05 - Oriskany, NY
“Lord of this World”
Wow, it’s ironic that I “hate” New York, but over the last few years I’ve grown real fond of upstate, almost to “I could live here” level. There’s a slight Massachusetts attitude here but people seem friendlier. I literally have had no run-ins or situations with people in cars, stores, etc. like I seem to have on a daily basis back home. I’m thinking I’ll come up to Lake George in the Autumn. Anyway, this place is pretty beautiful (there’s nothing here, refreshingly), yet it’s also kind of ugly. I can feel some sort of weird vibe driving through downtown Rome, NY. It’s almost like how you feel when you are in Lawrence, MA but a little safer.

I planned on going to the show earlier today but ended up falling asleep and by the time I got myself motivated to leave the hotel room there was an amazing strawberry dusk situation happening. Reminded me of my first trip to Tennessee in 2000; I drove 13 hours that day, arriving in Knoxville at dusk and it was a similar color. Where this place is more remote and there is no orange glare in the sky from a big city nearby, it’s more intense here. Sure the thought of upstate New York being cooler than anything in Tennessee is kind of farcical given the great times I had both times I’ve spent time there, I am talking about Knoxville, TN which was basically like Saugus, MA with cowboy hats and more black people…and Waffle House.

A couple of our friends were on mushrooms and drunk tonight which was slightly amusing. I did not have any alcohol. I’m trying to remember the last time I drank any alcohol and it may have been as long ago as June. I was losing the taste for it about five years ago, but it quickly involved into having to force myself to enjoy even half a beer that I “liked” in the first place. At this point I can’t imagine ever wanting a beer. It’s been peer pressure for the last five years, really. In my entire life I’ve probably been into a liquor store and bought alcohol to drink thirty times tops. Whatever though.

The music was great tonight; I stayed for just about all of it. We had a good time mocking hippies, as well as our tripping friends while trying to stand up on a ski mountain in the dark.
The drive home was a little more enjoyable tonight. It’s scary as all fuck, but shorter this time around for some reason, perhaps because I was in a better mood. It was great to see the hotel and get to sit around here in the warm room now. Speaking of enjoying myself doing nothing.



Chapter Two of this thing I wrote about a fishing trip gone weird

2.

These winding roads were enticing the first few times we did this trip, by now they had turned into a redundant series of black and white postcards held in front of our tired heads. Don was out of cigarettes and kept taking mine for the last two hours of the 6-hour journey north. I just wanted to get to the cabin and grab a beer and a place to plant my exhausted legs and eyes for the night. The trance like effect of the John Lee Hooker on the stereo, and the postcards made for an even longer drive. By the time we got to the cabin it was near nine in the evening and I was collapsing on the walk in.

“I need some sleep”

“Chuck, you need more than sleep, you need a vacation” Don opened the door, and we both took a whiff of the all too familiar smell of our summer hide out.

“This’ll do for now” I dropped my bag on the dinner table and made my way to the bathroom.

“Chuck, we should see if the old man is out on the lake tomorrow” Don yelled to me from the room, I could hear Robert DeNiro’s familiar voice in the background on the television Don had turned on before dropping his gear down.

“I’m sure he’ll be out tomorrow, it’s supposed to be a beautiful day out. I’m not sure I’m ready for his stories just yet though, he takes a lot of energy out of our day with some of those depressing stories of the war and his dead wife”

I made my way into my room and got undressed and put the boom box on the nightstand on. A talk radio show gushed on about paranormal stuff like Area 51 and jackalopes and that kind of thing. I like falling asleep to this show when I stay up here. The sky is so amazing out side my bedside window I can imagine UFO’s flying by and being able to see every little light and gear on it. Don was falling asleep on the couch, so I got up and shut the light off, but left the television on. He had been watching Analyze This with DeNiro and Billy Crystal. An okay movie for what it is, and surely it would have the same effect on me if I put it on right now. I shut the light out, and lit a cigarette; the radio was discussing a UFO sighting in Canada, Yukon Territory. I looked out on the lake as I smoked and saw what looked like a serpent in the water, once it reached the bone white moonbeam it turned into a log though. I chuckled to myself and put the cigarette out. I fell asleep to a woman from Santa Fe that could talk to lizards.



12/13/09 - Los Angeles, CA

Two more days and I will be six months without a cigarette. This is obviously great news for my physical being. For my mental being though, there are anniversaries every other day, the one month anniversary of the last time I was in a good mood, etc.

Making some friends out here, but really, when it all comes down to it. Nobody matches my friends back home who I have a history with. They know me well, people here it takes them a long ass time to figure you out. I see through every fucking one of them though. Suggesting ideas and places to go that I have not even the slightest care about. I see through the games played with networks and empty handshakes and silly conversations that sound like they come from outer space or some bizarre world in the back room of some shady tarot card place. All these practices to make yourself feel like you will live longer. Potions and exercises designed to sound interesting in conversations and that’s all. None of this crap does anything, it’s all empty placebos. Then you get hit by a car on Ventura Blvd and die anyway. Or some kid shoots you for $34. I am trying to keep my distance from people now because first of all I don’t trust anything they say or what their intentions may be. You pick that up pretty quick out here. Three months in and yeah even the people you feel you know best are out for something. They all show their teeth in the dark. You see it when they turn around and you can see their tail, their forked tongues and horns hidden under some bad haircut and worse outfit. I should make a list, a list of whatever those things I said were all bad things about back home and what made me want to leave there and come out here. The cold weather isn’t really that big of a deal. Also of note, this whole place is supposed to explode and die like September 11th.



They don’t know shit about me and I want to go home

I would turn on all of them and I will

I can’t take seriously men women and well you know

Back when it was just me and a whole bunch of dead horn players

I thought I was like I don’t know, some whacky guy

Just a normal plain old bore like your aunt and uncle back home though