brainwash.

I just want out of my own head.



it's


too


fucking


loud.

This will destroy you.

Sometimes,
I find myself attempting to contain you in my veins.
Like somehow
that would bring you close enough to the walls of my aorta,
and it would be there
that you call home.

But I cannot tie down your wings
and stuff you beneath my pores.
you are too gracious.
My skin is insult to your beauty.

Not even life line rivers
can breathe enough oxygen within me
to keep you alive in its flowing.

You are the closest thing I've seen to holy.

You don't believe in holy,
yet you carry halos beneath your tongue
borne from the vocal chords
in your esophagus.

I sometimes wish that
I could curl myself into those sounds,
seep into their grace,
and maybe then
I would know better the art of beauty.

But for now,
I tuck your harmonies into my belly
and digest you into my bloodstream
in attempts to cleanse the dark of old age from my insides.
Because for far too long,
I have seen the world from Mercury feet,
sending messages through air waves,
always running from my own heels.

Before you,
I am paused.
Stone toes to the ground,
my arms are reaching new lengths.
Never have I wrapped myself so tightly within them,
embracing, embracing, embracing.
Learning to hold myself as tightly as I do the world.
Learning to hold myself.

Despite the broken.
Despite the night sunrise afternoon
word struggles.
Despite my rampant feet,
you are arm stretching.
you are fingers holding,
against the cacophony of the world.
against the sound of my insides.

You are nothing short of holy.

Yet you lie between the same sheets
that my body rests beneath.
At times,
I fold my skin between my fingertips
to test the consciousness of my eyelids.
These same fingertips
know yours
and I pray my eyelids away
so that I may become impervious
to skipping moments like these.

Never have I known anything like this,
like better than toes in the sand
better than snowflakes on kissing mouths
we are
kissing mouths
bones
souls,
kissing our skipping heartbeats,
glad to see them off,
never missing them.
never missing them.

Thus I ask of you, lover
Keep me in your splendor
so that I may bask in your radiance.
so that when the sun explodes,
I will not know grief.
I will only know the contours of beauty.

Here you are.

Dear Angry-Mouthed soul.
Dear Tired-Souled angry mouth,
with a brain that spits words,
attempting to cut skin
to pierce through vital organs,
this letter is for you.

This letter is so that your eyes may see
what your heart cannot.
So that maybe
possibly
somehow,
your conscience may someday catch up
to seeing,
and one day you will believe
that I was not to blame.
That your words are filled with
attempts to convince the world
away from who you really are.

Take down your exterior,
peer into a looking glass,
and open your eyes.
There is too much potential beauty
to be hidden beneath your ugly.
These days,
that's all I see
and
it disgusts me.

You
disgust
Me.

Be your change.
Hold something closer to yourself
than yourself.
than magic tricks
and tricking minds
because
you are out to destroy yourself.
one word at a time.

Skipping town
will never stop
your skipping heart beats
when you see me
think of me
because hatred
follows,
consumes.

And for that,
I am sorry.
Sorry for you
and your weakened mind,
too afraid to self-confront.

Sincerely,
you know.

Applebutton.

Our bellies are full with the pride we've swallowed
and our eyes are burning
because sleep is miles away,
the sun is finding its way back into the night
And I love you.
My lungs catch breaths between words,
stealing air from my mouth
so that they may keep you there.
and I am speechless.
Like first kiss breathless.
Like shaking fingers against your skin, reckless.
I cannot hold your words long enough,
they are falling against my brain like rainstorms.
Like rainstorms I want to dance with you,
catch you on my lips,
and savor the caress of life you have given me.

In the moonlight,
we are silly dancers on silly toes,
graceful.
rootless tress in the wind,
darkness has never been quite so illuminated.
My lashes are squinting together
in your light,
like skin lines against skin
at the corners of my mouth
pulling around my teeth
indefinitely.

In my hands,
yours are intertwined
and in this moment
things are beautiful.
You are beautiful
despite the rotten you claim.
I want to cradle you in blankets of arms
and show you that never has anything
compared to you.
Skipping steps and tongue strides,
we are counting on limbs
our imperfections,
running out of space.
But somehow none of this matters,
because at some point between
our attempts at defining here and there,
we discovered that we exist
somewhere.
That somewhere exceeds time and space
and nestles between your Adam's apple
and my bellybutton.

So we will send our voices across
power lines,
speaking in riddles
like confused sounds with meaning somewhere.
like falling apart and only half understanding.
We are existing on ends of humanity,
creating motion surpassing that of many.
And I love you.
Like friendships too hard to let go of.
Like somewhere is my safe place.
Here and there,
we battle our demons,
count our scars,
and tally up our losses.
Hands and fingers,
skin and bone,
we stand against cave walls,
our shadows curved to fit the sketching of numbers
defining the skeletons of our past.
And here we are innocent.
We are tracing the lines of where we used to be,
And redefining where it is we thought we were headed.
And in this moment,
We are beautiful.
Like children fingers against canvas
Like bare toes against pavement,
we are discovering.
Despite our old souls,
We are tireless.
We are embracing what is to come,
with minds forgetting,
that once upon a time
we never knew each other.
That there was a time
When my ribcage swelled
And yours was not there to catch it.


Well, love,
I am asking you to catch it.
Catch me in your lover’s palm
And never let me go
because too many times I have
fallen far from fate
running away from anything
beautiful.
Too many times
I have settled for something
Less than applebutton.
So Adam’s Apple,
rest still against my belly,
await the rays
before our battles begin again,
and know that
here is our somewhere.

Unresolved Phrases of Sound.

When I die,
I hope that I leave behind nothing but beautiful.
I wish with every piece of my soul,
that my body does not engulf it;
that every breath I take reaches deep into my insides
and finds its way into adoration.

I hope that every dark nook
holds nothing but radiance,
because life is radiance.
Because I am taking in life,
through these lungs,
leaving it to digest in my ribcage.

I want to exhale
and make the sun sick with envy;
because I never burned you,
left your skin with scars of adventures in my light.
I will reflect through my veins a brighter light
than that of coursing rivers,
always changing.
I am always changing.
Never will your eyes rest upon my being
and find complacence in contentment.

Through these broken things,
I want to salvage what is graceful
and paint it upon my skin
so that my pores will know life's beauty
each moment they breathe.

I won't forget to breathe.


(incomplete).

Dear You,

I hope that your new life is worth living,
despite the fact that everything you once had is now gone.
Everything that you gained, and the people you loved,
are no longer worth loving.
I hope that your new life compensates for all of the wreckage you've left behind,
regardless of how quickly you stepped over it as it crumbled around your feet.

I hope that, despite the face-to-face cordiality,
you know that your new life will never erase the reality
that you are who you are,
that you did what you have done,
and that you are still not a strong enough person to confront yourself.

Sincerely,
Me.


(9/26/10)

The Reluctant Lover.

New beginnings have always been my forte, 

but never in a graceful fashion.

So often I become experimental in grace,

that I embarrass its essence.

Round 5,326,246: epic fail.

Today:

I failed at smoothing over awkwardness.

I, however, successfully accomplished overfilling with caffeine.

My body is so tired, but an all-nighter appears to be in my future.

I thought of you again today.

I said "some days" and I couldn't help the words as they fell from my lips,

nor could I help the image stretch itself across my mind.

So, I fought back the lump in my throat with another swig of espresso.

It's my new coping mechanism.

My headaches and apparent new attachment to lack of sleep are incessant. I am hardly able to cope with myself. I can't imagine that others are able to deal with me in addition to themselves, but it happens. Oy. 

Ramble. Ramble. Ramble. 

Also, I find myself haunted by the oddest aspects of the past. 

Solution: get the fuck out of here as soon as humanly possible. I may just go ape shit if I don't. Fuck.

Your Heart is an Empty Room.

I have fallen into it.
I am sickened that I cannot find my escape,
despite the empty.
dark.

My fingertips feeling the cracks,
slipping deep into weak spots
and your tongue echoes against the walls.
 
I taste your taste,
and you make damn sure I feel your feel.
Let me go.
Yesterday is overwhelming tomorrow,
my ribcage is overwhelming my chest,
because I lack in empty rooms.

I have always lacked in ability to let you go.

You can forget.

I don't appreciate how much I miss you.
I don't even want to consider how much I dislike the times your name dances across my thoughts.

That is all.

This isn't even worth your time.

I never keep up these days, so this stream of consciousness thing occurs.

Breathing is hard these days.
I have tried to write things worth reading, but the ink falters
before my fingertips can speak for my rambling thoughts.

Loving myself has always been hard,
but these days I find it even harder.

These days is the only time span I can collect,
because days melt together.
They intertwine thicker than my blood ran through my bloodstream,
filled with everything that my heart could pump after you curled yourself into it.

These words fucking suck.
But it's all I have,
aside from a free coffee accompanied with free internet.

Shit sucks.

This is the world we live in.

When did I fall apart?
When was it exactly that I forgot how to take what I had,
and make the best of it?
When did my brain and heart
decide that I couldn't decide upon anything?

I think it happened when I realized that I was never together. Facades are a powerful thing, even to those that create them. My strength is intangible these days, as I reach out and beckon for its reminder. I find that I can never be satisfied in the things that I do, unless they involve my active decision to be there. For example, this moment. I sit in a coffee shop, put on my headphone (yes, headphone....tragically), write, and listen to Bon Iver repeat back to me the things that I felt, but could never conger quite so well (well done, sir). And yet, the inevitable work load awaits me. Something as undesirable as early awakening for school (which I did today). So, here I have consecutive undesirable things, and an attitude lacking anticipation for what it is I am about to do.

So when did that become ohk?
It never really did in my book; it just became a means of survival.
How tragic is it that, as human beings, we lose focus of dreams, hopes, and faith in the general outcome of any given day because of our own decision to survive in a world that thrives off of attempts at monetary stability? I find it entirely regrettable that I have fallen into this state of mind for so long that I was unable to recognize it. That I was unable to separate survival mode from what it was I really dreamed of, and so I scrambled, furiously, for that which would keep me afloat long enough until I moved forward. This forward motion never really meant positive, just motion, purely for the sake of motion.

This cycle seems unstoppable, yet my body has given up on my brain and fallen behind. My spirit is torn between its loyalty to body parts and organs and when all is said and done, my spirit is just that: torn. I dropped classes, switched jobs, moved, moved, moved, and in that I forgot that I have a dream. In that, I have convinced myself that it is completely unattainable. So I have settled, over and over, and have lost a sense of what it is to breathe on terms that I have set for myself based on that fact that I want that ambition, wholly.

The world is a large place.
There is a horizon of time before me, I "am still so young", but honestly, let's cut the bullshit.

Looking to the older generation, they encourage making the best of our youth, because it slips between our fingertips faster than our eyes can attempt to grasp onto. This comes when this older generation believes that younger, more foolish, generation has lost sight of ambition in terms of squandering time outside of school or whatever other example I am sure that you can think of. However, when there is a feeling of indecisiveness, at least in my case, anyone who can claim even a day of age over mine, is quick to say "you are still so young" and goes on to tell me how much time I have to decide where I need and want to be.

The problem with that is this: I want it now. I want to be doing everything in my power to live a dream that I have had since I can remember. Career wise, I know what I want. But as far as humanity goes, I am choking on my restless spirit as it attempts to skip town and give away its potential. My body is a coffin to my very being, and that is something that I have spent years dedicating time to creating. I have something within me that has always been there: a desire to help people. This is self-evident; I have, in retrospect, done this self-masochistic attempt at helping people in relationships by sacrificing far more than necessary. As far as that goes, it was an act of learning about people and how far I really should push to help. But, on a broader spectrum, I want to change the world. I want to do what I can with my hands, heart, mind, body, soul, and whatever else it takes to set forward a positive motion that I am in full support of.

However, I feel stuck because of my foolish belief that I was on the right path this whole time. I am on a path, I am making mistakes, and I am learning. So, in a sense, I am making progress. The aspect of this that troubles me is that settling, stuck, arbitrary movement habit I had (have?) is no longer acceptable because, naturally, my entire person is trying to piece itself together for the sake of happiness.

Perhaps I was rambling this entire time, left things out, and make no sense, but the words needed to come out somehow. I am taking note of the fact that I have identified so much within myself that I wish to change because I am a growing individual, not just a moving one. My problem now is deciding how to get where I wish, while simultaneously shedding that choking, sputtering, restless spirit that I have become familiar with, and refuse to remain content with.

Nuff said (for now).

Movement.

For this upcoming Monday, the movement is to turn off my television and not watch it as often throughout the week.

WELL,

I do not watch television as it is, so rather than call it good and move onto the next week's goal,

I have decided to replace it with something relevant.

For the Monday, I will not get on Facebook, Myspace, or AIM.

I will only be on to check my e-mail as I am apartment hunting at the moment and have online homework.

Aside from that, no social networking.

This will be a toughie.

I can do it though (:

Be the change.

Week One: Every Monday Matters (slightly belated)

Things that matter most to me: (in no particular order)

1. Family.
2. Friends.
3 People in general.
4. Giving.
5. Compassion.
6. Passion for good.
7. My health.
8. The health/livelihood of others.
9. Making the most of each day.
10. Positivity.
11. Honesty.
12. Integrity.
13. Animal Rights.
14. Reaching out.
15. Listening.
16. The world.
17. The arts.
18. Words.
19. Acts of Kindness.
20. Knowledge.
21. Appreciation of each person and their ability/potential.
22. Growth.
23. Mistakes, and the lessons learned.
24. Learning.
25. Killer Kindness.
26. Breathing.
27. Movement.
28. Feeling.
29. Open Minds.
30. Appreciation for everything.
31. Rainy days.
32. Grip.
33. Photography.
34. Aspirations.
35. Children.
36. Never giving up on what matters.
37. Doing my best.
38. Nature.
39. Preservation.
40. Letting the bad roll off the shoulders (:


Just off the of my head for now (:

What I will make more time for, starting this next week:

My family: a game night, a movie night, or a sleepover with my sis.
My friends: Check in with the oldies, check in with the newbies, and do something spontaneous.
Photography: find my camera, capture the week.
Movement: keep apartment hunting.
Health: Doctor's appointment, get grocery shopping, find online recipes for veg's (:
Children: look up more arts and crafts ideas, read a child development book once a day.
Animal Rights: order Peta information, follow through with animal shelter information.
The arts: keep mine alive, listen to a new band each day.
Nature: Learn one thing a day about the environment/recycling. Share it with others.

A lot for one week, but we shall see how that goes (:
Your turn (:

reach to the moon.

I felt harder today than I have felt in a long while.

I almost hated myself for that,

before I realized that passion is beautiful.

don't die in me.

"I am crawling in my skin..."

fuck.

This is not where I need to be.

This is not who I am, 

fully.

This is not who I want to be.

I want out.

out.

out.

My brain is mush under this routine,

my spirits smothered by standards

and my body is a joke to my brain.

Life has become a ridiculous comedy house these days.

My fingertips are grasping for something more,

but my toes are firmly planted into the soil;

the roots are envious.

I am not a simple man.

I have the most insane dreams lately.

This weekend, after the crazy party in Manteca,
my mind was all about this crazy surgery man who wanted to experiment on the entire human race, starting with babies. His business cards were diapers with his information stamped onto the front where the baby images would have been. I then escaped him, via pickup truck and changing-person accompaniment...through the desert. We landed ourselves into a hostel type place where everyone was performing magic, and I was in on the secrets to how a broom could be stood up, upside down. I knew all of it, but apparently those people were crazy too, and I escaped again....finding myself house-sitting at my parents, and walking in on my sister telling me that everyone was dying on the floor. A woman had been hugged too tight and was bleeding from every pore in her body, and a man somehow chopped off his finger. And the 911 dispatch thought I was telling a joke when I called in.

Last night, I dreamt that I went into a store to get a haircut, but the man taking money also was an aspiring magician....he gave me a deal on the cut if I watched his trick. So I did, and the fucker took off without giving me my haircut. Then there was an elaborate chase between myself and the neighboring stores, because they were pissed at him too. There were clues in all tiles, numbers, and the magic trick that he did. Which, by the way, sucked my dick. He was a joke. But apparently, the point in all of this, was that he was down to take over the world and thought I would never find him in a secret underground labyrinth...filled with tractors and other machinery. Weird.

Which theory should I go with on this one? I am not exactly thrilled at these dreams. Oy.

How safe it is to feel safe.

 

 

The view from here.

I won't trust the air with secrets.

The world is falling apart around me,
and I know not if I have the shoulder breadth
to keep it aloft.
I cannot see the world in color some days,
the negative weeds its way into me
and moving is merely a notion.
Justice is a joke.
All of this is a joke.
Everyone is so sad. Everything is so sad.
But not really.
I don't take the time to say what I mean anymore.
I don't care to,
because the motions of mouths 
are less powerful than the motions of hands.
My body is a casing, 
holding me back from the life that I wish to fulfill.
These words fall short,
and so does time. 

Fuck it.

I know it turns you off when I get talking like a teen.

It's days like these,

I breathe life in harder and faster

than my lungs can process.

The toxic is almost gone, 

but I find you between intakes

and gag on this sweet.

It's days like these 

I put on my dancing shoes

and celebrate.

Those who tell the truth shall live forever.

I have tasted the words from your lips,

sweeter than I had imagined.

Don't let the salt linger;

I have traced my tongue against it

long enough to sacrifice familiarity

for something better.

Show me nothing less,

because my ribcage is a battlefield

of scar tissue.

Your fingertips aren't the first,

but I wish them to be the last.

So keep them graceful,

let your feet to the ways of the wind,

and keep your mouth honest. 

                                                                                    (I love you.)

We were born to fuck each other, one way or another.

Be still, heart,

so that I may forget that you have attached

yourself

to me

indefinitely.

Pour a little salt, we were never here.

I said to you "This is all that I have. Take it or leave it."
You took all that I gave,
about-faced faster than eyes could fathom,
and vanished.

Congratulations,
you have heard the rattling bones resting within my closet,
and were not impressed.

The universe is shaped exactly like the earth.

By the way,

Fuck.

 

The earth is not a cold, dark place.

I am breaking my back to kill my creativity.

I am retching on who I am

because I am not very impressed.

So young, so young, so young,

and time lies before me like

infinity lies before the universe.

But for some reason, 

that is insignificant.

This moment is all I want,

is all that I feel I have.

So nothing is ever really even close

to becoming good enough.

You will never be good enough,

because I am not good enough.

Look through my eyes and see that the world is breaking before me,

like infinity is breaking before me.

I cannot place my head above my shoulders,

because I have attached it to my kneecaps.

Just so far that my heels are close enough to recall,

but my aorta is breaking to reach my brain soon enough.

My words are like baby coos to the world.

They are only loud enough to grasp onto momentary attention,

so insignificant as the ears I place each syllable upon

breaks down to sympathize that my vocal chords function.

That my vocal chords have nothing on ages before me.

I am breaking my back to kill my creativity these days.

I hate my kneecaps, by the way.

Here is where your carvings rest.

I began this slam on November 11, 2009 in the mid afternoon.

I completed this slam at 3 am in a donut shop, February 23, 2010.

Strumming, drumming, moving my fingers across this artificial wood

I can hardly peel my lids from themselves,

But I kind of rather like them where they are

Because I see you.

I see how you were before the time you said

that forever was not where we would be

as we trudged across the present.

Your presence lingers,

Behind the rhythmic batting my lashes do

To stay alive.

As they fall lifeless,

The contours of who you were caress my senses,

And I feel your fingertips begin to peel apart my thinned out flesh

 I feel my ribcage falter,

Allowing pieces of its bars

To split apart and allow you to slip in,

Draped by the dark I have hidden beneath

The rhythmic pulsations of who I really am.

I feel the purple running through my limbs

Slow just a little as its bravery is tested

And the value of color is weighed.

I feel my body exhale just a bit as you wedge your way in

Gracefully

Eloquently

Professionally

And remain

Nestled up in the nook of whispered past

and frightened future.

But how dare you cradle yourself within me

And commence this frenzy,

This unstable, frantic, unstoppable

Motion?

How dare you press yourself between my lids,

lashes,

the pages that I will never rewrite

no matter how many times I discover them?

The seams you have sewn

Won’t be anything less than intertwined.

How dare you press yourself between

my very breath

and call it home

when I never found that in you?

When you never gave me anything more

Than a plastic impression

as to what living

blindfolded by another could be?

I want you out.

I want more than anything to rip my dying lids

Alive.

Because I have finally found

That this oxygen I had been taking

Into foolish lungs will never be good enough

No matter how fast or how hard they pump

Filter

And create the breath that dances on leaves

It will never dance across your skin.

It will never find its way back into your lungs,

Your circulatory system,

And escape your lips as an utterance of life.

I want to forget every line of your face that I committed to heart

As we lay in the dark

And I prayed to God that I could have this one thing always.

I want to forget the curve of your soul against mine

And the way I pressed myself close enough to believe

That sometimes breathing isn’t needed to survive.

I once told you that not even fairy tales

Were capable of us,

Not even the world could fathom us

And you once said that

the ink of my words would sink into your skin

and find somewhere to rest assured.

That my very being was your breath.

But you are a fucking liar.

I never knew that ink was ephemeral

Until I watched you let the waves take it back out to sea

Like a scraped out, scratched out, sunken in

Love note on the beach.

I never knew that your pearly whites

Were stronger than gates

As your guilt swallowed itself back down your throat

And your words struck my ears like symphonies do the blind.

Sometimes not even seeing eyes can spot the ugly

through the beauty of sound

because as your lips moved in that curve

I wanted to mold myself into,

the motions of you stretched my body thinner than

my patience.

I never knew that I was dying

Until that time I told you, maybe I need you,

And your silence was resounding.

Your apologies are resounding

As they reverberate upon the walls of my conscience,

Beating into me that everything you ever told me

Was the authentic craft of one liners tucked into

Your back pocket,

Held on reserve for her, her, me, her.

I never knew that breath
is irrelevant to existence until the day
I choked on truth

And you buried your lungs. 

Black dirt will stain your feet.

I miss you, I miss you, I miss you, I miss you, I miss you.
Times infinity.
I can't breathe.
I can't stop my brain from wrapping about you,
from sending me dreams of you.

I just want to forget you,
as you will forget me.

This is what I wanted
because this is what you wanted.

Wanting and needing are two very different things.
Some days I need to breathe
Some days forgetting that you breathe makes this a lot easier.

With all your lies, you're still very loveable.

I broke your back when your feet couldn't keep up with mine.

Sometimes I regret that my mouth speaks courtesy of my left aorta

and you,

you speak with a louder conscience than my begging logic seeping back into the confines of my brain fluid.

I took your spinal cord and wrapped it between my fingertips so that I could feel you feeling me.

I felt

nothing.

The cartilage tucked between the crevices of each disk 

told the same story that your face did;

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

I tried to carry you with me,

tried to gather bruises on my feet for the both of us

but at some point between tearing the cotton from my flesh

and placing it upon yours

I realized that the weight of you plus me was intolerable.

Everything you had to give remained nestled underneath your exterior,

shadowing what was left of who you used to be.

For some reason I found apologies falling from between the cracks of my lips

because of the times that you reconstructed your chest piece 

and moved along because of someone else.

The magnitude of what they had done 

reached into my backbone and tugged at its strength

and I crumbled.

But your face still read like a book that had yet to be written in.

Nothing.

Like what you had given me of yourself;

Nothing.

I am spreading the caulk onto brickwork that I forgot with my 

ability to push you away.

Because at one point you stood before me and took down my exterior

one piece of stone at a time. 

The animals were gone.

swing life away...

When your heart is broken you plant seeds in the cracks and you pray for rain.

We broke our feet off and gave them away to the wind.

We traveled better that way some days.

The weights we dragged behind our fatigued bodies and brains were forgotten,

and some moments we gave in to breath.

Some moments, we almost saw that our toes held better eyes than our faces.

There will be teeth in the grass.

I didn't want to choke on my lungs when I saw you sitting there, contained by everything that I had fallen short of. I didn't want every piece of motion that had led us to this point to stop itself before my eyes and throw itself at me.

But I choked, horribly.
I was overcome by everything I had put behind me and hated you for that moment.

I knew better.
I know better.
I have better words,
but for now I am settling with these.

Some days, all I ever do is settle.
Fuck.