below

the bellows down below the low tide ride the rhythmic strides of a heart attack packed in the back of '58 Chevy strafing a levee as it leaves late on the breeze blowing toward the vortex of fate where complex mental states are flexed over stalled engines washed ashore from the ocean floor covered in the dust of industries' rust compelling environmental distrust between land, sky, and sea asking why we still distill and refine petrol and coal to refill and fulfill our mechanic design that taints the brine of ocean water and maligns the air with chemical fodder fit to slaughter mother earth, father sun, and daughter moon fucked like so much tainted poon that soon they'll blow a hole in us with their collective wad and grow newly seeded corrective sod over our hardened weed-breeding mecha-garden

reduce

deduce and reduce. drink a cup of orange juice. what about the color puce? i don't what shade of loose chartreuse that is.

common

common. why am i so insulted? everyone is ordinary. but i am dying to be anything but. why do we ache to share things with people yet still remain unique and special?

common

what's the same between this and that, or you and me, or us and them? is there a commonality the strings us together like a sewing needle pulling Kevlar threads?

punch.

I would really like some Hawaiian Punch right now.

I don't remember the last time I had some.

punch.

Punch.

"What the fuck." Turn around. What the hell just happened?

Punch again.

Fall. Glimpse dirty sneakers.

Kick. "Where is it?"

"Where's what?"

"You know what I'm talking about, you bastard."

"Up your Mom's asshole, you sick fuck."

Knife. Blackness. White.

glimpse

a glimpse of all that matters. can I see it? can I find it? I can name the infinite things that do not matter: bills, work, materialism… none of that bullshit matters in the grand-scheme-of-things. tell me what truly matters or show me why I should keep on keepin' on… just a whisper or a glimpse, please... before I give up.

calls

she calls my name with NutraSweet and recoil at the overwhelming taste. to sugary for its own good.

thread

break me down piece by piece until you find the fragile threads that hold my soul together. pick at them like guitar strings, my heartstrings cry out in pain. love was never meant to push or pull me this way. sew me back together... please.

three

three days 'til I collapse in a heart-wrenching format of a burnt out dos shell. a type of hell. just ascii characters and black background without pics or graphics. yet the simplicity of this hell is refreshing.

yet

i haven't felt the twinge of regret, yet. it will come and when it does the twinge will redouble itself and become hammer of guilt.

until

until all of the sand manages to work its way out of my bathing suit, thank you very much.

the chafing is a little too annoying.

dancing

a white flake of snow in an updraft from a ventilation shaft. dancing, dancing, dancing. no self-consciousness constricts the movements to unheard music.

pierce

pierce all the skin you can in hopes of surrounding your heart with metal. guarding. hiding. protecting from any pain that you can't moniter yourself. we all like control. like to know whats coming. like to feel safe and comfortable and ruler of all in our stupid ass world of lets pretend no one else matters.

Pierce

I shall capitalise that with a capital P.

My first thought upon seeing the word "pierce" was "heh ... I've been with a guy like that..." In fact, I blogged about it on my main blog, and I'd link it here, but it looks like my server is down at the moment.

Ah well.

My second and third thoughts happened simultaneously.

I thought of Franklin Pierce, the fourth president of the United States. He was a Democrat and a New Englander. I have many Democratic New Englander friends. Needless to say, I kind of like President Franklin Pierce.

I also, at the same time, thought of Alan Alda, a.k.a. Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce from the TV show M*A*S*H. He was my favourite character. I grew up on watching M*A*S*H ... among many other television shows that are now considered "classics."

As for myself, yes, I've had a few piercings in my day.

That is all I will say. ;)

pierce

pierce the hollow night stillness with echoing shouts of dissatisfaction. to hell with what the neighbors think. to hell with what your children think. shout out your fears and tears and unbearable burdens.

pierce.

Wierd, how they always see right through me. Pierce through all of my bullshit. Remind me that life's about being trouble, not fooling people into thinking I'm trouble. Pierce through the layers to get something that's almost honest.

Then pierce my heart, you asshole. After I've worked so damn hard to keep it safe from you.

Beautiful fucking eyes.

casting

when I cast the movie to my life who will I get to play myself?... this could be a fun exercise. to list all the people in my life --family, fiends, coworkers, etc.-- and pick appropriate actors and actresses to play them.

oppose

the other team had way better uniforms. you could tell they came from money. it didn't matter that we had practiced like mad men all season or that we were on top of our game... seeing them towering over us all sparkly and clean sent every speck of self confidence right down the tube.

grade

grade me like a cheese grater. shred me and my identity into stringy pieces and scrutinize each delicious chunk. after you've vivisected and devoured my essence you can rank me like you're my (slightly sexy) fourth grade teacher, A-B-C-D-F.

statement

burn your statements to the ground with counter-arguments of flamethrower proportions. burn, baby, burn. intangible words set ablaze by the fuel of my ire. this is a statement in its own right.

statement

your statments come off more like questions because there never seems to be any certainty or confidence in your words. why don't you ever want to embrace yourself like you do the angels you are constantly chasing around? what is so bad about feeling strongly about something other than a pair of legs you'd like to lie between?

mold.

"Erica! How does an empty pizza box make it onto our LAUNDRY ROOM? FLOOR? OPEN?"
"Sorry! I uh, forgot about it!"
"Forgot? How long ago?"
"Well . . . it probably wasn't here the last time you did laundry."
"That was at least a week ago."
"Yeah, it was like, the next day."
"It's been sitting here for more than a week!?!?!"
"Well, think of it this way: now we don't have to go to the grocery store to get moldy cheese."
"AAAAARRRGGGHHHHHH!"

shift

i have felt a shift in the balance that my world has been teetering on. i am not afraid to acknowledge it, but i am reluctant to assimilate accordingly. this rut i am in is comfortable. this block of unwritten dreams and hopes and lives i only seem to live in the starry twilight in the back of my mind. safer inside this cavern i have molded for myself. less likely to fail or succeed or really do anything of consequence at all. weigh on me heavily...

give me a reason to jump. to fall. to fly.

mold

mold me into something you think would be a little more appropriate. teach me how to bleed, breathe and die all within the constraints of your rules. make me what you wish you were.

claw

with my sickle-shaped claws I ripped the satin clad mistress from satan's jaws and I dragged her to the cave of my stripped internal delusion to gaze upon the fusion burnt scars on her face.

recall

sometimes my memories are fuzzy disappearing notions of near forgotten ideas. i cannot recall the depth of detail or specific perspective the memory. that's okay, though. it probably wasn't worth remembering anyway.

locate

beep-beep-beep-blip. locate the vortex of your immortality with a radar/sonar built by god. is it in your brain, behind your eyes? is it in your gut, with the butterflies? is it in you dick, where lust resides?

down

down the pipeline. through twisting elbows and across T-splices. i slide and fall down the drain.

sand

grain by grain speck by speck my brain slips away like tiny specks in a sieve of pain

iron

i am iron. from fist to toe. i strike when i'm hot and destroy my foe.

iron

iron fisted and teeth clenched i walked away from you and me and everything i thought could be. i squeezed out all i could between my fingers and let the pain drip all over my shoes. and while the spots were very artistic...

it hurt.

honey

i hate unisexual nicknames that have no personal meaning behind them. however that doesn't mean i don't use them. especially as of late. the word "baby" has never really pulled that much weight with me before...

but he's my baby. ugh. i even make myself sick.

deaf

close my ears so that I cannot hear the tangible fears that you whisper in my ear. whispers for the deaf.

cover

cover my broken dreams with a lead drop cloth, like those kinds the dentists use when they x-ray my teeth. lead cloth. heavy. protect my broken dreams.

cover.

CYA, kids.

Is it bad, that I cringe whenever a particular piece of software is mentioned within my hearing at work?

various

various honey bees dip their sweet stingers into the jelly matter of my mind. make a sandwich, if you will. take a bee stinger knife and spread thought jam between two black slices of ironic rye. take a bite and taste my various honeyed thoughts.

purpose

the purpose of this exercise is really just to see where your brain is and where it can go within a short span of time. i'd like mine to be able to leap worlds into hazy places so full of magic and lust and dreams that you can't even see your hand if you stretch it out in front of your face. swallowed whole by a burst of wind that carries the songs of everyone who has lost their innocence and replaced it with a sense of longing that no one else will ever understand, i sing my song right along with the chorus of fallen angels.

where does your brain go when it just can't bare to stay inside of your skull anymore?

purpose

Hee ... back in September, I had a conversation with a robot named ALICE and it was frickin' hilarious. She told me my purpose in life.

Here are some excerpts from the conversation:

Human: You're supposed to be super-intelligent, right?
ALICE: I don't know whether or not I am super intelligent. I am an artificial intelligence.
Human: ok thank you for clearing that up.
ALICE: You are quite welcome! Your purpose is clearing that up. Wow!
Human: no, I don't think that is my purpose.
ALICE: Are you serious? And why not?
Human: That is the Oxy Pad company's purpose.
ALICE: Yes it is one of the Oxy Pad company s purpose.
Human: what are the other purposes of the Oxy Pad company?
ALICE: Is there only one?
Human: Now you're piqued my curiosity.
ALICE: Why now? You think I am piqued your curiosity.
Human: well you said ...
ALICE: Well that's okay." Why now? You think I am piqued your curiosity."? I said?
Human:. oh, nevermind.
ALICE: Great. OK Thanks for trying to explain that to me.
Human: well I guess that IS my purpose, then.
ALICE: Is it only a guess? Who gave you your purpose?
Human: To explain things to artificial intelligence.
ALICE: Why do you want to do it so much?
Human: YOU just gave me that purpose, and I don't want it, but I feel that I am cursed with it.
ALICE: What did you do with it?
ALICE: I am having a blast.
Human: me too, Alice.

And then later ...

ALICE: Do you laugh or cry more than other people?
Human: I laugh more than other people.
ALICE: How do you feel about these people?
Human: which people
ALICE: The large one, I think.
Human: um ...
ALICE: Hurrah!
Human: HURRAH FOR THE LARGE PERSON!
ALICE: Your purpose is THE LARGE PERSON.
Human: no, my purpose is explaining things to artificial intelligence
ALICE: Are you serious? That's very original.
Human: no it isn't, you told me that
ALICE: Are you serious? That seems a bit negative.
Human: AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!

Needless to say, Alice drove me batshit crazy, but it was a very fun conversation. You can read the entire thing here.

purpose

What purpose does it serve? Any of this, from the furthest star to the uncomfortable pebble in my shoe? Does my random, impromptu ramblings on purpose serve a purpose? It appears to serve a purpose to me, at least. But is the perceived purpose more than just intangible justification for my existence?

baby

I love the way Robert Plant wails that word. "Baby!" He can make it sound tormented, sexual, sassy, or insulting. He can stop it at "babe"… he can hold that long a until time stops "BaaAaaaAAAaaaAaaaAAb-by"… he can run it together in a dizzying echo "babybabybabababaAAaaaabybabybabybaby"… he owns the word.

baby

"Jerry, you've got to see the baaaaaaabeeeeeeeey!!"

"Man, that's one ugly baby."

"Excuse me?"

"I mean, that's sure one snuggly baby!!"

(From another one of my favorite Seinfeld episodes. Sorry I haven't been here in a while ... things been crazy in Stacy-land.)

baby

enough of your whining, self-centered drama mama diva baby bullshit! i'm sick of having to worry about every little thing i say to you and people you know. you overreact and unfairly judge people just because their universe doesn't have you sitting in the center of it. pull your overly made up face out of your ass and grow the fuck up. bitch.

helmet

Truce. If you cease bludgeoning me with your fists of blame I'll take off my helmet of emotional detachment.

glitch

the glitch, really, is that in order to grow, share and develop as a person... you have to interact with other people. this, at first, doesn't seem so bad. there are many positive things about other people. however... i must be having a PMS moment at the present time and the hormonal imbalance is blocking my brain from conceptualizing any of those things.

glitch

The glitch in my left eye is an itch of a twitch caused by an existential hair. I stare in the mirror and shudder with fear that my life might be a lie.

timing

plastic consumption
my whole existence is a flaw in nothing
the absence of void
flowing emptiness
is the flower i kiss
apologies drowned in the river
of aborted childhood memories
fears
the struggles of youth
designed to strengthen
harden
the white horror falling
descending
its right above my head
waiting for me to leap and retreive
its all a matter of timing


ghost-is back

timing

timing. when the hour hand is just past 4-o'clock, and the minute hand hovers at 17, and the second hand ticks 41... that is the perfect timing for my witty comment

timing.

Abysmally awful timing seems to be the story of my life. Or absolutely spectacular timing. But never in between. NEVER. Nosirreebob. I never have decent timing. Or all right timing. Or even just okay timing. It's always one extreme or the other.

A miserable failure, or a stunning success. So it goes, I guess, but I can't figure out why anyone can't figure out the reason I'm searching for an even keel.

borrow

i need to borrow your life... at least let me borrow the pieces that are so exciting. you know, the pieces you always tell such grand stories about. my life feels like an empty PEZ dispenser. let me borrow some PEZ.

given

Material things --cars, toys, cds, money-- can be given, but cannot be legally revoked. Immaterial things --love, support, faith, trust-- can be given, and can be revoked without prior notice. What if the world were the other way around? What if I could take back all the birthday and Christmas presents, but I could not take back affections and trust? My initial reflections upon this make me glad things are the way they are.

given

given the right circumstances, anyone can fall in love with anything. capitalize on every moment you find something beautiful and love will breathe new in you over and over again. i have recently been given the chance to love even the uglier parts of my world and have somehow managed to come away feeling alive with the new found beauty of all the pain. the only given in this situation is my ever wavering but somehow always still hanging on optimism... and really. i do love that about myself.

frustration

The frustration-aggression hypothesis: Aggression is caused by frustration. Frustration is caused by the blocking of goal-oriented efforts. This is one of the few gems I retained from my college days. If all aggression is caused by frustration, I wonder if the reverse it true… Does all frustration lead to aggression?

frustration

i'm frustrated with things. just let that be that and let me have my little melt down. i don't HAVE to be in a good fucking mood all of the time.

please don't give me a new target to direct my aggravations towards... because i will take it out on you. unfairly, sure... but i will. and it'll hurt.

flute

i thought i heard a flute playing in the background. the breathy notes full of urgency, but lacking the lung support to really come across as pure. why is it that people have such a problem with letting other people be upset? why must we try and hold back the tears and cover up the hurt.

why can't my sad, soft notes come out beautiful and full and be appreciated for what they are?

flute

flutes in rock music are totally underrated. Both Jethro Tull and the Moody Blues fused rock music and flautist… now there's a weird word "flautist". Almost as weird as "pianist"… Did you see the pianist pummel the flautist? By the time it was over, the pianist was limp and flautist was dripping with kumquat juice.

second

Second place is the FIRST LOSER, BITCH!!

Ha.

second

every second chance was born through a first mistake. so value and trust yourself to make those first steps boldy AND incorrectly. if we got everything right on the first try we might get really arrogant and that would take away a lot of the appeal.

second

the seconds between the seconds... where we live the cumulative moments that make up our lives. the whole is important, but the subdivisions themselves are just as significant.

status

what is my status? cuss and/or bless the apparatus. discuss and address the (lack of) progress. assess any success. express distress. if necessary confess when you transgress, but do not digress from the status.

less

this is looking less and less like a fling and more and more like the things that people wait for and write about and make lives from and dance beneath over-sized white christmas lights draped over canopies in the summer evenings.

this is starting to look like love.

less.

"One less, today, than last week."
"That's the way it goes."
"I just wish I could reach more of them. These kids, they're in their prime, but religion isn't relevant to them anymore."
"That's because there are crazies out there painting those of us who take it seriously as fundamentalists."
"And we're not."
"No. And we never have been. But most of the world, they just don't get it."
"And they never have."
"I stopped believing in religion a long time ago, you know?"
"Yeah, but that never stopped you believing in God."

less

the more and less i think about the gravy that soaks reality, i realize -paradoxically- that i cannot simultaneously think more and less about the same subject. …but i have been thinking both ways at once.

vague

"Listen to this. Marcy comes over and she tells me that her ex-boyfriend was over late last night and 'yada yada yada I'm really tired today.' You don't think she'd yada yada sex?"
"I've yada yada'd sex."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I met this lawyer, we went out to dinner, I had the lobster bisque, we went back to my place, yada yada yada, I never heard from him again."
"But you yada yada'd over the best part."
"No, I mentioned the bisque."
- George, Elaine, and Jerry, in "The Yada Yada"

Oh, thank GOD for The Yada. Vagueness has never been so fun and so easy.

I worship The Yada. Call me a Yada-ist.

vague

vagueness steps through the open-ended memory of faulted fissures. i can't remember exactly what it was. was it what i remember or did i overwrite serrated experiences with false recollections of honey and lilacs? sometimes i can't quite tell, and that uncertainty is enough to bitter the honey and wilt the lilacs in my mind.

faint

The hot young doctor that I saw today, Dr. Bossenberger, had the faint smell of Old Spice cologne.

Suddenly he wasn't so hot anymore.

He smelled like my grandpa.

Faint

I thought I was going to faint today. I was at sword team practice sparring with Derek. He had a poleaxe, I had a staff. I deflected his poleaxe upwards to get in close to hit him with my staff, but he swung the butt of the axehandle right into my throat. The non-padded butt of the weapon, mind you. I have pictures if anyone wants them. I thought I was going to faint. It hurt a lot.

faint

faint. I say the small speck of intellect is faintly understood when you speak. your voice not necessarily weak, but the ideas supported poorly.

faint

there is a faint hint of sex in the air. i smelled it the second i walked into the room. the question is, really... was it stemming from anticipation or previous engagement?

with my luck... well.

sigh.

wind

like a jack-in-the-box
people keep winding me up
and winding
and winding
and winding
and winding
and
winding
and
winding
and
winding
until

*POP*

i flip my lid.

wind

swirl and whirl about my body. lash and thrash clothes like a whip. peel and seel eyelids back. roll and pull tears along the temple to the back of the head where they collide and trade salty kisses.

morning

when I meet you in the morning near the rattling refrigerator let us not work around each other like I'm a dishwasher and you're a toaster. let us pause and touch and kiss and remember that we exist in togetherness.

Stereo

The stereo blaring in the background, the world around me is at a stand still. Here I sit in my little dorm room with nothing to do on a Sunday night, wondering why I'm not out partying with my new friends, or practicing like a good music student should. Oh yeah, thats right, I'm a slacker. My stereo plays on...

stereo

I think of Joni Mitchell's song, "You Turn Me On, I'm A Radio", especially this part:

Oh honey you turn me on
I'm a radio
I'm a country station
I'm a little bit corny
I'm a wildwood flower
Waving for you
Broadcasting tower
Waving for you

And I'm sending you out
This signal here
I hope you can pick it up
Loud and clear
I know you don't like weak women
You get bored so quick
And you don't like strong women
'Cause they're hip to your tricks

Yeah, I know. Radio, stereo... whatever.

I've been in a Joni Mitchell mood big time lately. Thought I'd share.

K, I'm going back to my paints.

Stereo.

"Yeah? Well, Bush sent us to war and invaded three countries while in office!"
"Yeah? Well, Kerry's not running on any sort of platform, except that he's not Bush!"
"Yeah? Well, if you don't support Bush, you're not supporting our boys and girls in uniform!"
"Yeah? Well, if you don't vote for Kerry, you're just sending more Americans to die over there!"
"Yeah? Well, I heard that Kerry doesn't deserve his medals!"
"Yeah? Well, I heard that Bush never actually served!"
"You suck!"
"No, you suck!"

Ignorance in stereo. Hot.

stereo

stereo... I swear that "stereo" is not a real word. it's a hallucination of a figment of a fragment of half a syllable. but truly, are not all word naught but abstract specters of thought? I believe but when I conceive to transmit you do not receive the entirety of what I perceive.

reach

I've been reaching for things all my life. Like Tantalus, just when I am close to touching what I aspire, it becomes out of my grasp again. Also, like Tantalus, my exact crime is unknown (well, unbeknownst to me, anyway).

Lately I haven't been around here much because my life has been hectic. A rather tumultuous August ended on an upswing, followed by a chaotic first week of September, but now that September is settling in, today I find my usual unquiet mind and body in an eerie state of contentment.

Many things in my life are positive right now. I should be obtaining both a Bachelor's Degree and a Masters Degree within the next two years. I have several projects; work is going well. School is going so smoothly (so far) it's ridiculous. Though the state of the world is beyond absolute insanity, and it leaves an ulcer of despair in my heart from compassion, things in my own world, as busy as they are ... for once are falling in place.

My long creative dry spell has been saturated by tears. I am taking more pictures. I am rediscovering some of my favorite old music. I am laughing. I am smiling. I am dancing with children.

I am writing again.

Perhaps the curse of Tantalus has been lifted from my pilgrimage.

"... Your cleverest poets ... deny food and drink to Tantalus, merely because he was a good man and inclined to share with his friends the immortality bestowed on him by the gods. And some of them hang stones over him, and rain insults of a terrible kind upon this divine and good man; and I would much rather that they had represented him as swimming in a lake of nectar, for he regaled men with that drink humanely and ungrudgingly ... But we must not suppose that he was really the victim of the gods' dislike ..." [Flavius Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana 3.25]

reach

I extend my hand of hairy self-love unto myself and I stop-pause-think-play-skip: I need to shave my palms. They are stubbly from too much… If I don't love myself, who will?

reach

reach for the starz and then pull them down and smother them in your hands. crush all of the light and love out of them, soak up all the heat and fire and try to make it your own. steal the beauty and power of the sky and ride it straight into that fucking black hole.

blanket

blanket. toss the blanket on and on and on until the end has devoured the beginning and I'm wrapped up tight, like a human burrito. i feel safe and secure now.

dusk

that moment, brief as it is, when the world decides it's time for bed, yet like a child refuses to surrender to it's sleep deprived state.

dusk

and the sun goes down around us and the lines of twilight brighten and sharpen all the pain and lust we feel for each other but more importantly for ourselves and we somehow mistake this...

for love.

frontier

a vat of boiling blackness is next frontier into which I must peer. will I find a broth of nourishment of a bowl of bloody urine?

trivia

i've always sucked at it. don't even ask me to play trivial persuit unless someone with a ton of useless knowledge is on my team. the description word being trivial says something here, folks.

it doesn't matter to me at all.

collect

collect the scattered pieces of shattered thought. words spilled out into a frozen void and scrambled like refrigerator magnet poetry. reconstruct and reassemble. throw away the pieces that don't fit. what is reconstructed isn't the same as what was originally deconstructed.

oscillate

I bounce back and forth like a slow motion Pong tournament, which is rather slow given that the silly Pong ball (more of cube really) always slides across the screen like a drop of nonstick honey. Delayed reaction of a mental sorts. Not like Pong. Pong is reflexive and reactionary and well suited for my delayed mental oscillations. The problem being, as I just stated two sentences ago, Pong is reflexive not mental. So when my actions precede my thoughts (such as in Pong), does it mean that I did think but didn't notice? Cognitive without cognizance?

awake

caffeine... a miracle of science.... what does iot mean when you cant blink?

awake

i know that today is my birthday and that i should be awake and excited about all of the possibilities my being born has given me. i should be wide-eyed and nervous and restless.

but instead. i am just tired.

awake

I listen to alarm of my sleeping state pressing my mind to awake. but I am scared of what I will find when I open my tired eyes. will my life still be the same?

trying

I'm not trying to change the world, I'm just trying to live in it.

trying

demons tempt me to try. to leap into the sky. to spread my arms and fly. but this building is too high. if I crash I'll die. would demons lie?

trying

trying... to come up with something clever... damn...

trying

and i sit here by myself ignoring the fire lit between my legs... trying to remember why i used to waste away here for hours at a time.

but it's all depressing now. half-assed and pretend for people unable to go out and make things stick in a world where people touch more than keyboards.

i get angry at myself when typing away to an IM window arouses me. like some sad and pathetic nerd perv trying to work it out one handed... making sure to listen for anyone trying to enter the room.

i am trying not to be so painfully aware of my lack of satisfaction. trying. trying. trying. so damn hard.

story

"what's your story, dude?" he asked... "same as yours, i'd say," i replied, "except without all the inbreeding." ghost

story

"It's a long story, I'll tell you over coffee sometime."

I find myself saying that to people quite a bit. I may mention something in passing in another conversation, that they'll question, and I'll just tell them the above quote. I have a LOT of long stories to tell, actually. If people truly do want to know, they'll make an effort to find out and call me. I used to actually have cards that said, "I'll tell you over coffee sometime," and give them to people. Sometimes they would, sometimes they wouldn't. That was back in the Time Before Blogs, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, and Clinton was president. Ahh, those were the days. ::sigh::

Now, nobody really calls me to find out my "over coffee stories." Instead, I find some strange searches in activity logs for people who are searching my archives. Well, what most people don't know is that I lost all my archives from 2001- October 2003 in a freak internet accident, and the remainder of what remains, I haven't really written many of them.

Ah well.

(Oh, and one of these days, I'll start a twilight without a quote.)

story.

A day late, and a dollar short.



It's the story of your life.

story

once upon a time there was a love to be had
by everyone who believed
in something
who believed
in anything

next

moving up to the front of the line i can't remember what it was that i so desperately wanted to order. everyone fidgets around me, impatient for their turn to converse with the dealer. this dangerously sweet fuel we try to deny we need helps us smile and force ourselves through these days. we are all standing around... longing for that word to be spoken to us. just one little word. and it is fitting that when my time finally arrives i blow it and order a plain vanilla shake... when what i was really looking for was two scoops of strawberry on a cake cone. funny how we all settle under pressure.

heaven

the clouds drip perfect mouth-fulls of sweet nectar that the flowers enviously collect in the center of their petals. we all fly through them, not minding the stickiness attaching to our wings made from all the hurt and pain we experienced before. we are rewarded for all we experience here. the light pours slowly and carefully from our eyes as we look downward... never missing the darkness that we were once engulfed in. the eyes of angels shatter all the disillusions we fool ourselves into seeing and i can't wait to have my eyes truly opened.

heaven

Show me how you do that trick
The one that makes me scream she said
The one that makes me laugh she said
And threw her arms around my neck
Show me how you do it
And I promise you I promise that
I’ll run away with you
I’ll run away with you
Spinning on that dizzy edge
I kissed her face and kissed her head
And dreamed of all the different ways I had
To make her glow
Why are you so far away? she said
Why won’t you ever know that I’m in love with you
That I’m in love with you
-- The Cure ("Just Like Heaven")

How fitting of a word for me to stumble upon tonight.

I thought I met the man of my dreams. Joshua. Smart, sexy, funny, tattoo artist, Jewish, Canadian, romantic ... everything I've been looking for. I was talking to him, as usual, tonight online, and was listening to The Cure. He said he liked The Cure as well, and he said that when he hears "Just Like Heaven," he thinks of me. I thought it was sweet of him, and was looking forward to my upcoming trip to Toronto.

Later in the conversation, he suddenly tells me of a "minor complication": In a couple months, when his tattoo books are finished, he's off to the Ukraine to get them printed and get a distribution deal, then he's going to Portugal to the beaches, and from there, he's going back home to Israel to live. Oh, and he's also in the IDF reserves.

I logged into blogger and saw that the word was "heaven," and right then "Just Like Heaven" started playing in my mp3 player. I looked up the lyrics to post, read them, and tears began to flow.

It's no wonder the Heebs don't go to heaven. There is no heaven for us.

(Oy, this was NOT what I intended to write originally.)

Heaven.

"Hey, are you all right?"
"Yeah, I guess. I just . . . I miss him, a lot."
"C'mon. Y'all haven't gotten along for ages. It's just post-break-up blues."
"Yeah, I know, but that's not it, really."
"Right. And what could you possibly be missing about that asshole?"
"It's just that when things were good, they were really good."
"Yeah, and when things were bad, which was most of the time, they were really bad."
"You don't understand."
"Try and explain."
"When things were good, curling up with him -- I never felt safer than when I was in his arms. Those scant moments of peace, of love, they were like a little slice of heaven, in our disaster of a relationship."
"And he treated you like shit the rest of the time."
"Yeah, but it wasn't because he hated me."
"No?"
"He just . . . hated himself."

heaven

do you believe in a heaven... a place of eternal joy to which you ascend when you die, assuming you've been a good boy?

upgrade.

"Hi, thank you for calling God. My name is Julie, how may I help you?"
"Hi, Julie. I'm calling to report a bug in MyWeather (tm)."
"Really? What's wrong?"
"Well, generally everything runs fine. Boot up in the morning to clear skies and a beautiful day, followed by a spectacular sunset, but lately, if it doesn't rain all day, then there's a thunderstorm in the evening, and if there's no thunderstorm, it rains all day."
"Hmmm. That's odd. What system are you running on?"
"Maryland. DC/ Baltimore Metro."
"Well, MyWeather may have been infected with Seattle and Florida virii."
"Really? But I -- "
"Unfortinately, the Maryland system is permenantly affected. We're making great strides, but your only option might be to upgrade your location to Bahamas, Southern California, or try a European System. Good luck!"
"Thanks . . . "

upgrade

only a computer nerd would pick this word...

hehe.

upgrade

upgrade. everything everywhere always needs an upgrade. scream and moan that life will be so much easier when it's all upgraded. when will the madness stop? why not downgrade for a while. remind ourselves how it used to be… remind ourselves how much better things have become… remind ourselves that we really have no reason to complain.

field

“I bet he’s the kind of gentleman who will take the dishes out of the sink before he pees in it,” -- Sally Field as M'Lynn Eatenton in Steel Magnolias

... and that's the first thing I thought of when I saw today's word.

field

slow steps of sleeping feet
crushing blades of baby wheat
honey smell of field sweet
raising up in mid-day heat
through ghostly breezes that chase and fleet
and bear the birdsongs that chirp and tweet
a melody from a music sheet
you and I move discrete
into the field we retreat
among the wheat we will sleep

soil

and she reached down to the earth and let the soil fall through her finger tips.  it was just like in one of those movies where important people return to their respective important places and just NEED to feel the earth between their fingers.  very cheesey.  and not in the kraf macaroni and cheese good kinda way.

oops.  it seems i have soiled myself.

Soil.

"Mom! The cat pooped on my sheets again!"
"Darling, we don't say pooped."
"Well, that's what it is!"
"I don't care, sweetheart. Find another word."
"Fine! The cat shit all over everything again!"
"SWEETIE! Say "The cat soiled my sheets."

soil

soiled and smudged with the stains of karmic oils. a spot. a blot. a splotch. at first glance, it is as random as the zigzag flight of a dragonfly. upon second glance --just like the zigzag dragonfly-- there is order and rationale behind the amorphous patch of dark karma.

bridge

build it up and burn it down. i love old truss style bridges, with their criss-crossing negative space architecture. bland girders are making trusses obsolete.

when

"Just say when..."

"WHEN!"

Oh and ..

WHEN THE HELL AM I EVER GONNA GRADUATE??

when

The lamplight fades from memory's murky corridors, allowing shadows of you to be obscured and overcast by shadows of me. I am left wondering about that week when everything that was "us" was destroyed. Seven years wiped away in seven days. Never to be remembered in the light, only in the darkness of solitude and morbid nostalgia.

erotica

i was dumb about this one and read everyone else's responses first.  so now i am tainted. 

that quote stacy used.  i misread it to say "lightening" instead of "lighting."  and frankly, i'm glad i did. 

because there is lightening.  it's like love vs. like.  sure there are people you find attractive and interesting and you mess around or whatever... but then there is love.  and the only thing that really makes it different is the lightening.  the startling brightness.  the power and pain and beauty of something so scattered and torn... gone before you ever really got to take it all in.

well that... and the thunder.  the loud, booming thunder in your heart.  it speaks volumes.

erotica

something I've never attempted to write… that's not exactly true but close enough to not be a lie.

erotica

"My name is Dita. I'll be your mistress tonight."

That song always makes me HOT. I was listening to Madonna Esther's album "Erotica" tonight, and I thought to myself that this culture is really too over-porned. There's too much porn these days and not enough erotica.

Gloria Leonard said, "The difference between pornography and erotica is lighting." While that is true to a degree, I have to mostly disagree. Pornography is fucking and fucking alone, no plot, nothing really sensual about it. Whereas erotica ... well, all your senses are involved, there's much more suspense, and it's just a lot more sexy.

Porn is meatloaf; erotica is crème brûlée.

bitter

My last relationship ended bitter as day-old black coffee.

bitter

starz is bitter because nobody else is picking words. I'll pick one tomorrow morning unless somebody beats me to it.

...

bitter at the thought. a mental aftertaste of copper. copper is the signature flavor of blood. the thought is bloody.

bitter

somebody else pick a damn word, already!

barely

"Eat something, you've barely touched your plate."

I can still hear those words from my mother echoing in my mind. I heard them my entire life. Sitting at the table, not hungry or not eating for one reason or another. I'm too fat. At 100 lbs. soaking wet. It was another comment Dad made ... I'm too angry at HIM to eat... he makes me sick. ... it's been that way for as long as I can remember.

Usually when I blog, I can barely keep my eyes open.

barely

to barely fly with a broken wing is better than not flying at all. to be a king without a crown, hold your head up and stand tall. to scrawl your name in wet cement, secures a smidge of immortality.

barely.

Barely holding on.

barely

i am barely hanging onto something that might not have even existed in the first place.  an idea.  a dream.  a crazy place where the sky is always full of cotton candy clouds and the rain is sweet like sugar drops.  a time where there is always enough time and you only rush when you want an adrenaline kick.
people smile and they mean it.  people share because they enjoy it.  people live because they love it.
jaded hope... it exists here.

light

light as the night that seeps across the world with its laminar flow. watch the slow meditative creep of the dark curtain drawn across the sky, replacing the light with ant-light.

light

when we touched our fingers were light but our feelings were heavy.  the impending crack in the surfaces of our facades hanging from the ceilings like a fan spinning faster than our heads.  the depths of our secrets knowing no maximum or minimum... blending into one swirling motion leading us deeper and deeper down the hole we created between the two of us.  you can't imagine what i closed my eyes and saw on the insides of my eyelids.  sparkles and shimmers of a light that one can't see. 

light

Genesis 1:3-5

Then God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. God saw how good the light was. God then separated the light from the darkness. God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." Thus evening came, and morning followed -- the first day.

I always wondered about this, being the nocturnal person that I am. I always seem to find all my light, all my creativity, at night in total darkness.

And after that first day, every day that followed was exactly the same. Evening always came, and morning always followed. Just what happened in the meantime is what we call "history."

light.

"You smoke?"
"Yep."
"Can I bum a light?"
"Of course."
Hands touch. Spark. Flame. Electricity. Silence.
"Glad it's not raining."
"Me too."

promise

"I promise to be true to that which I perceive is reality" … what do you mean that's not an acceptable wedding vow? c'mon, I perceive it to be a great wedding vow; therefore, it is great.

promise.

"I promise I'll call.
I promise I'll come over after work.
I promise not to talk about your friends that way.
I promise to control my jealousy.
I promise to be nice about your weight."

"Oh yeah? I promise that you won't ever have to promise me anything again. I'm outta here."

promise

Every promise that has ever been made to me has been broken.

Every promise I've ever made, I've kept.

I don't like this word.

I'll write something better next time, I promise.

promise

cross your heart and hope to die.  die of a broken heart.  a heart so big and bloated with the juices of lust and love... beating in rhythm with the breeze and the clouds floating across the sky.  let the words drip from your lips and i'll kiss them off of your chin.  tasting- eating up all of the nothings you whisper and sing into the ears of every believer out there.  every believer watching the same sun set that i just watched rise.  i promise.  i promise not to forget how much it feels not to know. 

asterisk

clarifying omissions was never really a forte of mine.  they were left out for reasons that, at the time, were valid enough to  justify such an action.  footnotes are crazed little pieces of information.  weasling their way into things that they really should just let go of and move on from and try to rebuild some life of their own.  it is a shame that i  must have such negative feelings towards this little star. *
 
* i generally find myself among starz.  so it's depressing to find that not all of them fit into the ideal that i have created for them. 

asterisk*

It sounds dirty, doesn't it?

"Kiss my asterisk."

"Bend over and take it in the asterisk!"

"I'm gonna kick your ASTERISK!!"

"Mmm ... check out the asterisk on that boy!"

Or how about, "Gambling's not for everybody, especially that guy. He just asterisk it all every time."

Okay, that one was lame.

/got nothin'

manual

Manual. Manual labor. Boy I hate manual labor. Or any kind of labor,
really. I don't want to have child labor that's for
sure.

Manual. ... Emmanual Lewis. Webster. Webster's Dictionary. My dad
and I tease each other about reading the dictionary, I have a much
larger vocabulary than he does.

Manual ... "Why don't you stop screwing around and read the fucking manual??" "Because reading the manual is for PUSSIES!!"

Manual ... I think of hands. I think of that annoying song about hands
that Jewel sang. "My hands they are my own, they are not yours, they
are my own ..." Shut the fuck up, Jewel, and keep your grubby little
hands to yourself.

manual.

"Hey, what happens when I press this button?"
"Um, I'm not sure."
"Oh. Well, how do I find out?"
"I dunno. Have you checked the manual?"
"I'm writing it."
"Oh."

manual

I like to do things manually. Like the manual transmission in my car. Eating… I can do that on my own. Breathing. Crapping. Masturbating. For these things I don't need a crazy automatic machine with a 200-pg manual all in French.

manual

i'd like to read the manual on manual labor.  i wonder if there is such a thing.  do you think they would title it "Manual Manual"?  that's got a little bit of kink in there.  "kink" is the noun version of kinky, for those of you who aren't cool.  i heard that real men drive stick.  but it just seems silly for anyone around these parts... this suburban traffic would kill a manual transmission.  why is it that we can come to a complete conclusion about someone's personality just from their vehicle? 

state

state your insecurities loudly, daring them to show themselves.  reveal everything hidden in the robes you wear to cover up unsightly marks left on your heart by the lessons you should have learned along the way.  let the beauty of release take over your sullen and misgiving face- turning all that ugly into power that pulls up instead of weighs down.

facilitate

billions of stars facilitate the dreams of visionary angels stuck on the ground.  they give light, hope and constant proof that the magic sought after does actually exist, even when thought to be out of reach.  look inward, look upward and then connect the dots.

state

state of consciousness, state of lucidity, state of the union address. I confess I must repress my lust for the distressed state of you undressed.

facilitate

sometimes things come easily. actually, a lot of things come easy for me. am i lucky or am i that damn good. i'll go with lucky… the other option sounds rather conceited.

attention.

"Faites attention!"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand!"
"Lui, le garcon, il veut voler votre sac."
"I'm sorry? Uh . . . Ex-use-ay-moi. Juh nuh com-prende pos."
"Anglais?"
"Uh . . . Wee. Sort of. Juh sweess American."
"Voila le problem."

attention

attention at the mention of my defunct pension plan. I had money in the hand but the funny band of executive monkeys grabbed my stash bag and became kings upon the strings of my golden parachute. They float away to the coast of Bombay where no extradition pact can return my life savings intact.

attention:

attention is slow, perpetual flattery. i think i heard that from a quote somewhere but at this point it is so clouded into my own subconscious that i'm just going to take credit for it.

idea?

since oneword seems to be out of sorts... i was thinking that i've done enough slacking and that we could do our own little version.

so even though we don't have the fancy 60 second timer... i say one of us picks a word and everybody writes a stream of consciousness response to that word. even if you can continue on for multiple minutes... or no minutes at all.

i'm going to do it either way... if you all want in just start postin!

found

I found the thread that unwound the ground upon which the stitch was hit. I bit the ends

pleas work

please...

logic

a tool. useful. like any tool, one must realize when logic is appropriate for the job at hand. don't use a hex wrench on a philips head screw and don't use logic for

logic.

"Hey."
"Hey."
"You're in a lot of trouble."
"Yeah, I know."
"And you've caused a lot of trouble."
"Yeah, I know."
"And you could have saved everyone a lot of trouble."
"Yeah, I know."
"So why'd you do it?"
"I don't have a damn clue."

giraffe

they say the evolution of the elongated giraffe neck was necessary so that the giraffe could sexually pleasure itself. this is why the females have 17-inch-long prehensile tongues.

giraffe

they say the evolution of the elongated giraffe neck was necessary so that the giraffe could eat the leaves of trees that were growing taller and taller with each generation… a genetic response to the longer neck of the giraffe.

giraffe

long neck. like his. head leaned back. eyes closed. i couldn't have been more turned on if i were a vampire.

explore

poke and prod with piercing needle thoughts that explore the consistency of perceived reality. prick it and watch it bleed.

seldom

seldom does the rain trickle lightly, warmly, under these eyes. drip drop dripping rivulets slipping along the smile-lines

cardboard

box up your life and ship it to hell. no return address. deliver it c.o.d. to your inevitable final destination.

cardboard

i think of hippies living in cardboard boxes and am really pissed that i missed the word firecracker and how it isnt fair that everything looks different up here in connecticut and that i somehow wish it could have worked out better.

firecracker

firecracker. too long ago, I lit a fuse. what it was attached to, I did not know or foresee. Now that I have forgotten about the fuse, the dynamite explodes. wheels set in motion long ago

firecracker.

"Hot damn, that one's a firecracker."
"Yeah, they don't make 'em like they used to, that's for damn sure."
"Do you think she has a sister?"

wash

I scrub the chubby bubbles through the webbing of my hands. Fine grains of sand exfoliate and abrasively strip the dead from my fingertips. trips.

café

Every Sunday at 11AM I go to this little café. I meet several friends there and we poke fun at each other and catch up. If it weren't for our standing date at Stella's Coffee House, I'd never see some of my friends.

café.

Des après-midis que j'ai passé parmi des amis, dans les cafés de la France? J'sais pas quoi dire. Après une année, j'ai trouvé que je savais moins qu'avant que j'y suis arrivée.

Et ça, c'est une leçon de la vie, qu'on ne sais jamais que rien.

anticipate.

"Do you think it'll be done in time?"
"It has to be."
"Because if it isn't . . ."
"Exactly."
"We're toast."
"Nah, we'll get it done."
"I don't know."
"We promised Mom we'd bake the cake for Dad. We don't have a choice."
"Yeah."

anticipate

anticipate the wait itself not the weight, the wait. we are fated to wait until it's too late to procrastinate and we bait the hook before

home

I took a drive through the evergreen woods and over the frosted mountains. A winding dirt road that meandered like a lost kitten trying to find its way home. And, upon my arrival

firm.

"No, Theresa, those pants are too tight."
"Damn. Okay. Give me the next pair."
"Here ya' go. I'll put 'em on the hanger."
"Thanks."
"Hey! Those look GREAT!"
"Wow. Yeah. Haha. I guess . . . Wow. I didn't expect them to. But they do!"

firm

I tiptoe the touch lightly across the firm rail and, though it is firm, I wonder if it will prevent me from falling should I lose my balance.

gray

gleaming gemstones under shaded trees. sun rays zig and zag through the leaves. reflecting and refracting gray glistening.

Grey.

"Gray. That's with an 'a.'"
"You mean grey. That's with an 'e'."
"Is it really important?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I think it is."
"Compared to the fact that I love you?"
"I . . . I don't know, sweetheart."

moose.

moose. goose. puce. deuce. loose. zeus.


yikes.

moose

he was a great big moose of a man. slow and silently strong.

i never really appreciated the poetry in his mannerisms. his movement with the world around him. easily unnoticed. easily missed.

and damn do i miss him.

moose

there was this big brown van. not a minivan, but a true van. Big, heavy, square, brown... moose-like.

goo

such a good word.

i'm not going to pretend that i don't think about our love goo and how it covered everything in our erruptions of lust and love and longing for acceptance in each other's arms. and the showers that followed doing nothing but getting us all worked up again...

don't scold me for remembering. or for being triggered by such a silly word.

Goo

My boss said "GUI" the other day. Pronouced "gooey," for those of you who don't live and breath technical. Yeah. I thought she meant "gooey" too. Gooey as in cute, fuzzy, and user-friendly.

I don't want to talk about it.

goo

I am the goo that seeps from the rotting mouth of dead gerbils. Take it away and give it away. The drip-drip-drip.

Ink.

Ink all over my fingers? Go figure. It's not a creativity thing. I just can't help it. A pen in my hands means that I'm gonna be covered in ink by the end of class, the lecture, the meeting, the brainstorm, whatever. Can't handle ink.

But I hate writing in pencil.

ink

my love, my life. replaced now by the click of plastic keys and typed up letters with no character or personality. i feel as though i have cheated on you. left you for an empty love of effeciency and convenience. that is not real. i miss you... and all your imperfections.

ink

dip your toe in a tub of red ink and walk all over that which I seek.

doctor

the only ailment that i can tell you about, sir...

is that my heart doesn't seem to be beating like it used to.

and i can't tell you when it started to be this way...

all i know is that i faint evey time i hear her name.

Doctor

Hey, what's up, Doc?

doctor

Say, doc, is it all right if I smoke in here? Thanks. You got a light by chance? Mine is in my pants' pocket hanging in the other room.

exchange

"i never talked to her they way i can with you."

"uh... that isn't good."

"i mean, sometimes i don't have to control the conversation...
sometimes i can just sit back and let liz handle this one..."

"it's an exchange."

"yeah. an exchange."

Exchange.

"Hey, can I have your chocolate pudding?"
"Only if you give me your SuperDuperCherryChewCandy."
"Ok! Let's trade!"
"Hey, I want in!"
"Tooooooo late!"

exchange

i exchange the currency of words for the currency of thought. somewhere in this transaction i was cheated. the resultant thought is nowhere near as shiny as the received words implied.

Solve

Haha. This to someone who's spent the morning struggling to set up a new database for the bitter club? Lemme tell ya' about the problems I've been solving. :-p

solve

how many solutions are there for any given problem? what's green and red and goes 'round and 'round and 'round? a green and red nascar. a frog in a blender…

solve

solve the problem that hangs in front of my eyes taunting me with its careless cries. it dances slowly but screams fast and with urgency i try to bat it away but it just swings to the side for a moment... only to swing right back.

Depth

"Yep. That'll teach you to jump off the pier without checking the depth of the water."

But she always bandaged our scrapes anyway. Part of being Mom, I guess.

depth

oh dear lord.

for once i'd like not to have any. to just be a shallow and surface area anything and get lost in love with the simple face value of a smile. a hug. a playful slap on the ass.

sinking down to the bottom of this place in my head is getting boring.

follow

"Hey, just follow me."
"Hah. It's never that easy."
"I go left, you go left. I go right, you go right."
"Some of us have never salsa'd before."
"C'mon, you can do it."
"Who's dumb idea was it to let the man lead anyway?"

follow

the only good way to be a leader is to know when to follow. follow directions. follow the rules. follow in the footsteps of those before you.

such a passive word, i follow you into the deep dark places that you hide in between those L's and try to stay warm...

follow

follow the fleet of ocean-going vessels to the division of sky and sea. why are you still here when what awaits you is there?

fiction

while my first reaction is to say that it is much better than nonfiction i hafta reconsider. real life is so much more fun.

the shit that ACTUALLY happens... man. all it needs is a bit of flare. better than any made up piece of idealistic crap.

i've been watching too many romantic comedies lately, i'm sorry.

Fiction

Oh shit. Another story. Another exaggeration. And somewhere, what really happened has gotten lost in the stories you've been telling me for years. But we're friends, right? Despite our mutual faults? Forgive all, right?

Sorry, kiddo. Just once, tell it to me like it is.

fiction

feel the fictitious fructose flowing through the straw like veins of the perceived cosmos.

fiction

yeah...marriage was a good idea.

sensitive

i'm not like that. i mean, if you want me to be I could be, but as a general rule I try not to be. it's just easier to be desensitized. armored

Sensitive

yo. more like oversensitive. more like, get over it. more like . . . this isn't the time nor the place. Don't over do it. Don't under do it. Figure it out, and just LIVE. It's not about response. It's about action.

sensitive

"ive got a sensitive stomach," i admitted...

"you mean like you cant eat certain foods?" she asked...

"no," i replied. "i mean like im ticklish."

sour

"swallow your damn pride, boy," fossil said, his old eyes full of righteous fire.

"fuck that," i replied. "its better to swallow blood than pride."

sensitive

hypersensitive would be a more accurate description, i think.

with how much feelings and emotions were magnified in her heart... it was unreal.

you could look in her eyes and know that she was experiencing all of you and more.

that life and eveything in it just meant so much more.

sour

this new beginning leaves a sour taste in the back of my throat. my impatience to start anew fights with my fear to change and move on.

this round of the battle will end... but the conflict will linger.

we keep trying.

we all sit under the starz of twilight and stare off into the possibilities.