Last of May

Come what may,
I've wrote.
I've waxed wroth.
I've spoken of the self,
and the things that I've lifted
and gifted
and put up on the shelf.
I've spoken of the womb,
and of the tomb.
I spoke of the souls around me.
I spoke of my power,
my weakness,
my life and my love.
I spoke of what you did to me.
Of what you gave,
and what you took.
What you kept,
what you forsook.

I've strung together rhymes.
I've thrown them aside.
Blood has split -
my own, others.
I've spoken of hungers that shouldn't be named.
I've poured forth tears and sweat and spite.
I've been a king,
a pauper.
A lover, a fighter,
a weakling who mewled and whimpered.
A giant bestride the globe.

I've spoken of things I don't understand,
and things that I understand all too well.
I've spoken of God,
the Devil,
Heaven and Hell.
I've brandished goods I have no right to sell.
Coin to spend that isn't mine.
I've spoken of time.
I have so very much of it.

Thirty-one days.
I spoke of it all.
Thirty-one days.
Thirty-one ways.
Thirty-one prayers and blasphemies.
Thirty-one wine-soaked, medicated, smoked-out evenings.
Thirty-one bright, gloomy, torrential, oppressive and liberating afternoons.
Thirty-one mornings largely slumbered away.
Thirty-one days spent speaking.

I spoke of it all, and I was mute.

And there are so many days to come.

Come what may.

Brother

Steel.
Malleable once.
Now something more.
I'm not sure.
Are you?
Or are you worthy of spite,
and scorn,
and pity.
Lost and forlorn.
You weathered the storm.
There was something more.
Lost? I'm not sure.
But you'll yearn.
You were always one to yearn.
Some things are constant.
Steel.
Malleable once.
But not anymore.
I'm not sure.
If I like what you've become.

I have high hopes,
but nothing more.

Birthday

It's nearly four in the morning and my birthday is well and truly over at this point.
I'm 20 years old.
I have nothing further to say on the matter. Like my last Christmas post, I'm finding it very hard to tap into the emotional residue surrounding these events.
I've aged.
I'm older, shorter of breath, and one step closer to death, in the words of some old band.
Christ, it's only 20. Best years ahead and all that. There's a thought.
But now that we've got through that one day of the year where I'm expected to be happy, I might actually manage to be happy.
There's a light at the end of the tunnel and I doubt that it is a flamethrower.
Fingers crossed.

Oh, and I'm surrounded by beauty, so thank you for that. It's helping with the whole dredging myself up out of the pit I've fallen in business. Feel free to be a little smug. You deserve it.

Goodnight.

Fog in a Bucket

Yesterday's post.

Break the egg.
Break open heaven's house
and steal forth the life of this building.
Yearn for the ground
as it rushes up to meet you.
Break the egg.
If you can't find the ground,
you can't reach for the sky.
There's an impact coming now.
If you survive,
you can reach for the stars.
But this isn't good enough,
is it?
You've let it steal forth.
Slashes open up 
and smoke billows forth
in an uninterrupted stream.
Curling forth and dissipating.
You dissipate.
Don't let too much escape.
One with sky, one with sea.
The egg has broken.
Stomp the ground.
Seize the sharp shards.


And we're all just fog in a bucket. 

How?

How do I get home?

This isn't what I intended.

It's hard to move how I should.

I haven't done as well

as I could.

And god, they're so ugly.

No romance,

no thrill.

No fascinating flirtation

with the red-run water.

They're just ugly.

How do I get home?

Nothing lasts forever.

Sunday Clothes

Hello, Dolly.

We won't come home until we've kissed a girl.

There's an adventure on the evening air.

And we feel bright-right,

from the crown to the soul

of our shoes.

It's time to pay your dues.

Put on your Sunday finest,

there's a tale to tell!

We're out of business

and we're feeling well!

A cheap cigar,

that can take us far,

In a shiny car,

And I'll tell

you 

to put on your finest clothes!

There's a place out there that's plain to see.

There's a place out there that's made for you and me!
And we feel alright,

so let's quit your sight,

and stay out all night,

coz we're free!

We're happy, it's plain to see!

We won't come home until we've kissed a guy.

No room for sorrow and no time to cry!
We feel heart-smart,

from the time we meet,

till we part.

It's time to pay the piper.

Put on your Monday clothes.

There's a job to be done.

We're back in business,

and we're feeling grand!

A job or two,

that'll see us through,

Just for me and you!

And we'll sell

off our weekdays,

for Sunday clothes!

Andrew

I waited until it was raining to write about you.
This is one of the most difficult things to articulate.
And if the sky didn't weep,
how could I?
Why should I?
I never did, you know.
You caused enough tears for me.

I stood up at your funeral and mocked you.
In front of everybody you ever knew.
I wrapped it in simile, metaphor -
disguised my emotions.
My hatred.
So only those who knew you knew.
Your family approached me afterwards,
and told me my words were beautiful -
and they were!
Beautiful deceptions.

No more lies.
I find it hard to turn my mind to speak of you.
If I'm candid, it becomes easier -
so let's be candid.
You beat me.

I feel that bears repetition.
You beat me.
Don't be confused, dear reader -
I don't mean in a fair contest,
in a battle of wits, or a game.
(For if it was a game, I won)
But with fists.

Those cruel hands of yours.
According to the doctors you didn't know what it was you did.
Control was all that mattered, and control you had to have.
You held a child up against the wall by his throat.
You threw him down stairs.
You tore the flesh on his back,
and you called him every name under the sun.

I suppose I should thank you.
You were the first person to call me faggot.
And it was laughable.
Still is.

So yes, I cried.
I cowered and cried and fled.
I stood up to you only to be struck down.
Again, and again, and again.
You beat me.
For years.
Monster.

And then you lost control and attempted to kill yourself, didn't you?
Couldn't even get that right.
But you were weakened,
and I had a chance.

You couldn't push me around anymore, and so we pushed you out.
Beaten wife syndrome couldn't last in the face of your madness.
And we banded together, the beaten woman and the tortured child,
and you had to go.

And then you spent all of our money on whores,
drugs, a fancy hotel room.
And then you woke up and you hung yourself with your belt.
I try not to be vindictive -
but I often savour that image.

Several years later I tattooed my flesh.
An acknowledgement of what you did to me,
and what I had yet to do.
Trial by fire, I called it.
I hope that there's a fire for you, even now.

You deserve my pity, but you'll never get it.
I'm glad you're burning.

That child was stronger than you ever were.

Lie With Me

This was never what you wanted.
You had fun pretending.
These sullen gazes and hollow touch.
That was all I had.

I'm trying not to drift away.
But there is not enough
to keep me here.
You still speak of confusion,
but your mind's made up,
against me.

I'm running from the truth
that I'm nothing.
So grasp at straws,
they're all I have.

Kill me, if you can.
A hand raised in hate
would be enough.
At least you might mean it.

Quickly, before I drift away from you.
You owe me this much.
I fall, I fall, I fall.
That's tragedy.

I can't hear you anymore.
Perhaps that's for the best.
But reach out.
I'm begging for that spark.

The things that we do just to keep ourselves whole.

Alexis is Aflame

We won't forget you.

We made a promise.
Seared it across the sky in words of fire.
A thousand feet tall.
Boiled and broiled forth from your mouth.
A gout, a tongue, a torrent.
Sojourn on with our words imprinted on your flesh,
on your mind, on your very soul.
You don't need these machines,
we can heal ourselves.
You will be purified.

We are the sound.
But you'll burn first.
What is this I feel, I see, I hear?
There is nothing but anger here.
Come up and fight.
Children rule these lonesome roads,
with narrow hearts, and jaded faces.
They'll run the night on feet of clay,
they'll burn the unremembered places,
but they can never stay.

Do you wish to feel complete?
You want it, you need it.
Alexis burns, my dear.
Throw your voice up to the clouds,
and sing along.
The unforgotten song,
the lyrics of the soul.
I make no promise, understand -
but they might make you whole.

We will march on until the world is ash.
And all that remains is an unmarred sphere.
We'll turn the bastards into us,
and then our foes will disappear.
We've signed in blood,
there's no recourse.
There's no desire,
or remorse.
So sing, damn you.
Sing for your damnation.
Sing out, raise up your hands.
And watch her as she burns.

We won't forget you.

Melbourne

The days are ticking away and I have a list of things that must be conquered. I don't think that'll make these posts more or less relevant, but I suppose we shall see.


Bright lights.
Sometimes harsh, sometimes flattering.
Give us a drop.
Well, just a smattering!
Of vile delights and delightful viles.
Of brutish strength and feminine wiles.
Of skirts, and shirts, and fancy things.
Of bright sunlight and butterfly wings.
You're going straight to the top.
There's a high rise here that gleams
with surprise.
Open your eyes, you fool!
There's only one rule here.
Empty your glass.

If the gods wanted us to have dignity we wouldn't fart when we die.

So spit in the devil's eye.
Cars and carriages comport us through.
Bright lights
and night delights.
Everything intensified a thousandfold.
And here, well, try as you might,
you're unlikely to ever grow old.
So dance with me.
Dance with me under sun and stars,
and perhaps we'll be free,
but we needn't roam far.
For everything we need is here.

Thoreau

Balanced on poniard hilt.
Breakbone fever.
Out-flung,
out-strung,
out-sung.

There's a single golden thread.
Blazing forth from my head.
And a cleansing fire comes.
And I'm burning.
And I'm ash.

Twirl.
Here's a crimson flower.
Soaring and slicing.
The surface is breached.
You'll make a mess of the floor.
Fetch the bleach.

There's no greater show of love.
Get back in the box.
I'm closing the lid,
and you won't be allowed to alter.

Get back in the box.

Velveteen

Get an independent opinion.
The exasperating consecrations.
Abound, in leaps and bounds.
Bound? You are.
There's a flow here, a sanguinary flow.
You can't stem the tide
at the source
for it is within.

She wanders in,
pronoun.
Fluttering womb,
flux.
There's a lot of garbage to sift though,
she says,
as she reaches for your toxins.
There's a lot to be done,
she says,
as she removes her shirt.

Pressed flesh, pressed flesh.
The smell of honest sweat.
And the words that have to be written.
Reference yourself.
Back up your sources,
and you might be alright.

Declaim your gibberish, you fool.
Denounce, decry - separate yourself.
This may tarnish.
Visceral and vital and wrong.
You are alone, isolated.
Unloved.

What are you saying?
What aren't you saying?
Why aren't you praying?

It goes unheeded.
So heed it yourself.
What do you want?
Take it.

TAKE IT.

King of the Damned

Gather, all ye faithful.
It's time to feast.
Gather, all ye horrible.
Blood will flow.

The faces of the damned.
Loom.
Show some skin,
and be punctured.
Dress the part,
faces of the damned.
Dress the part.
There's an artistry to this.
Your king walks among you.

Gather, all ye faithful.
It's time to feast.
Gather, all ye dreadful.
Life will go.

I'll store you up inside me.
Look within your heart.
That unholy engine.
You'll power me for a time,
a day, a week, a month.
And then you're gone.
Your will is mine.
But in my cold hands,
that'll seem just fine.

Gather, all ye faithful.
It's time to feast.
Gather, all ye fallen.
Heart will cease.

So clutch at rosaries.
While you can.
Unlife's a bitch -
and then?
You'll fall, you're fallen.
Sparks in time.
What once was yours
well, now is mine.

Gather, all ye faithful.
Life's a feast.
Gather to your dead king.
Beg to cease.

But do not cease for me.

Round and Round

My brain is falling away like pieces of wet cake.
That was meant to explain why the following post(s) aren't any good,
but hey, now it's part of the post.
Italics, edgy!


I suppose I just want to tell you a bit about where I came from,
before I start talking about the grand lie that I lived last night.
It was a place full of roundabouts,
early frost,
the elderly,
and people who wished that they were dead
so that they could stop getting out of bed.
It was a place that didn't allow you to be young.
Unless you were stupid.
A vice for the imagination.
A sprawl of nothing, over nothing.
Scrubland turned into suburbia turned into concrete playground.
But nobody loved it, and nobody loved in it.
Nothing was beautiful and everything hurt.
But I learned.
I learned fast what things weren't fatal.
You could prick your thumbs on the head of a pin,
for something to do -
and did! -
but you had to know which quills weren't poisoned.


And you learned fast,
or you went mad,
and you yearned for something more.


And now I'm here. 
Rather than there, that is.
And everything is beautiful, and nothing hurts -
but every quill is poisoned,
and every smile has fangs;
because the beauty and the mystery and the imagination
the vim, the vigor, the fire, the life -
well, life calls to life.
And attracts predators.


I'm surrounded, but at least I'm not going in circles.


That's something.

Hunger

Fruits of the loom,
Fruits of the womb,
all-devour.

Hollowhenge beast,
Times aren't lean.
You just refuse.

A stomach that won't serve,
A machine without fuel,
And he seeks to rule.

Sustenance abounds,
Eat, or you'll drown.
Young, brash fool.

Force it down.
You'll be alright.
Sate this hunger.

Times and Troubles

Thursday's post.


Entertain the lecher.
Why not? Nothing better.
Drive away the evening with a new friend.
Swig from bottles, swing from trees.
Bleed.

Times and troubles being what they are,
you'll be forgiven.

Everybody has a price.
Dignity? Honour? Love?
Bought and sold.
Barter your soul.

I'll forgive and forget,
on the way to paradise.
I think you're wrong,
but I'm not one to judge.

Times and troubles being what they are,
I hardly matter.

Commodity.
How much is a head full of lies?
A belly full of smoke?
A line in the sand?

How much to keep this going?

Times and troubles being what they are,
I suppose you'll find out.

Tumble Down

Tumble down, tumble down.
Into the sea with me.
The waves of green, is what I mean -
The long forgotten shore.
The bottom feeders of the beach,
Will scatter at our touch.
The sea will flow into our bones,
We didn't ask for much.

Tumble down, tumble down.
Into the sky with me.
The sun so keen, is who I've been -
The undiscovered place.
The feathered birds will wheel and soar
And will not marr our way.
The air will thin the skin we're in,
I wish we could have stayed.

Tumble down, tumble down.

Right Here

At your behest, as ever.


We are the feel of the sound of shattering.
The breaking, once begun, reverberates
around the room, around the balcony,
up to the sky and into the depths.

Especially down there.

Blue eyes swim up at me from the depths,
sickly and malevolent, but beautiful.
You were wrong, you know.
You've been so very wrong about me,
so very many times.
But in the most important way -
the essential way -
you understand me,
malevolent eyes.

So ride the wave,
the corridor twists up and around you
half of you are on the floor,
half of you are on the ceiling,
and you don't know which way is right.

Kind of like us.

I can't inject enough into this,
but I pour out enough words about you,
that I know longer have to write on your whole,
but of an aspect of yourself.

I can devote hours of my life to your very aspect,
malevolent eyes.
Does that not prove my love?
Despite my disdain?

One day things will soften.
One day, times and troubles being what they are,
the world will turn and things will renew again.
But not yet.

Until then, we wither and collapse.
Endless, infinite.
Only to get up and begin again.
The slow, little death.

This is so much bigger than anything we've known.
So don't lose your sight.

Political Prisoner

You came to me in the wake of a shattering.
Then, with me.
It didn't seem like much, at first -
though the small talk afterwards was jarring.
And then events transpired,
and it turns out they were scarring,
but you didn't mind at all,
because you had faith that I was strong.

And then you drew me out of myself,
and I went along,
Because you were safe, and new, and right.
Sure, there was the odd disagreement,
A clash here, a sombre fight.
Then you'd rebuild.
Well, we'd rebuild.

It didn't fade or falter,
and nothing hurt
beneath your halter.

And then you made me into something
something beautiful and righteous and pure.
You poisoned me with self-esteem,
with hope and false allure.
You took my rhyme, my reason,
my darkness.
You bound me up in shining chains,
And I blazed.

Oh, how I blazed. I blazed brilliantly.
But that fire waned.

I was a political prisoner.
Hostage to the ideal.
You'd built me up to be a god,
And if I didn't suit the part,
you'd shame the state you'd put me in,
And it destroyed my heart.

I'm not perfect.
Never was or will be.
You were right about a lot of things.
Love, and strength, and dragon rings.
You were wrong about what I needed,
though.
To be free.

Things are different now.
My chains are broken.
You still come to me in the night,
occasionally.
In dreams or in flesh.
You're still just as fresh,
but the scarring over all is strong,
and us, well -
we just don't belong.

I did my very best, and I owe you my thanks.
Sometimes I mourn,
but not for long.

Wasted Days

There's so many ways,
For this malaise
to lift.

That's such a waste,
of all this place,
I give.

Inhale, exhale. Heart beats. Stomach churns. Brain hurts.
And the vile exhalations of your breath are enough to power that?
And then you seek to be profound?!
In this condition?

You disgust me, but it isn't my time.

Intermission

Nothing serious today - still recovering from a hangover and stress is sapping my creative energy. Here's a bit of nonsense. 

The jaunty tune strikes up,
The curtain falls.
There isn't anything left to say.
But I'll describe it anyway.

You'll go outside for a time,
Step outside the theatre.
Stretch your legs,
tea, coffee.

There's this feeling, though.
The feeling of the penultimate.
You've started something that you have to finish.
But you've stepped outside, for a time.

And then, inexorably,
completely, totally,
you're drawn back in
and you take your seat once more.

And the curtain comes up,
and the tune fades,
and the actors resume,
and you wouldn't have it any other way.

It's possible to leave during the interval,
But nobody ever does.
And if they do, well -
they're as good as dead to you.

Technicolour Imp

So many things to write about, so little time for all of them. I'm making time for this one though.

What can I say that hasn't been said?
What can I sing that hasn't been sung?
I took a sip from a devil cup,
Our lives together have begun.
I'll rhyme some couplets prettily,
I'll make these words lock step in time,
And though this sums up - terribly
our lives and loves and hope benign -
It won't be enough.
It'll never be enough.
There are no words that can do you justice,
my technicolour imp.

You slipped the surly bonds of fate,
You slipped the ropes that held you hence,
You travelled long, you travelled far,
you broke the chains, you jumped the fence.
You found yourself well out of space,
out of reach of time and grasp.
You found a place to simply be,
And in your arms, my heart you clasp.
Sure, it can be hard.
There are trials,
But we'll surmount them with laughter,
my technicolour imp.

So dance, damn you.
Bless the rains, do as you will.
I've grown accustomed to your face,
your absence is a bitter pill.
You keep me hale in face of death,
In winter's gale, in teeth of stone.
We walk the earth and share our breath.
Wherever you are, that is home.
And that might be enough.
I might just have enough,
As long as you're in reach,
my technicolour imp.

So rage, heavens, rage.
Fling lightning and fire.
All of your might rests in our hands,
and no foe will stand before us.
Our might is soaring higher,
Bright our faces, hands.
We can be so destructive,
That's hard to understand.
But we are doomed to falter,
That knowledge keeps us sharp,
But falter, fall together,
my technicolour imp.

Because that'd be alright with me.

Relinquish

I am fascinated with the idea that you've given me,


Don't read this wrong - I am afraid. I am as gut-churningly afraid as I should be, given the situation. This is an extreme sport - I see that now. I have to take the plunge and there might not always be a safety harness.


Or a net.


But I would be a fool not to entertain this. To pierce the veil that flesh and thought place in front of my waking eyes, every day that I exist. These pursuits lend themselves most dramatically to the night, true - but there are far better things to be done in the witching hours than to dream. I'll swap my nighttime fantasies for waking pleasures, under your wing. 


I await only the impetus. You'll come for me one of these nights - in a bottle, or a herb, or a pill, or a body. I know that there is no lock, no bar, no door and no denial that can keep you out indefinitely, even if I wanted to. Surely the logical path, then, is to embrace you as friend and...well, 'ride' you, if you're pardon the pun. If it is ride or be ridden, I'll be ridden to ride, if that makes sense. I don't suppose it does - well, perhaps only in a vulgar way. Still, my home and hearth is yours. I know that you'll take advantage of my hospitality either way, but I wanted to formalize it.


I'm not religious, but I am operating under the understanding that you bring me closer to God. That may be a fallacy, but I don't care. You'll take me to places that Jesus can't go, and that's good enough for me.


I ask only one thing of you - do not consume me. These violent delights have violent ends, or so I'm told, but I wish to retain myself. I will immerse myself in you, but I wish to emerge from the other side of that particular pool whole, if not unscathed. I hold no illusions for my safety, but when you finally claim me, I want to go to your embrace as myself, and not as your slave. I understand if you cannot promise.


I await your visitation with eager anticipation, and I wish for you to know that I am, now and forever, your humble servant.


J.

The Spark

My keyboard is dying.
Red battery warning light,
blinking and mocking me.
Get the words out quickly, it says.
Get them out now before I die,
and you can't say anything else.
I am your voice,
your muse,
your vessel.
Get the words out now, before I die.

I'm falling.
Beyond darkness,
beyond ropes and ladders and nets.
Beyond a hope of grasping at straws,
beyond hitting the ground and having this
heady rush suddenly, sickeningly halted.
I'm falling forever,
and there's no eluding this.
So I'll roll a smoke and stare out into the night.
And feel the wind rush upwards 'neath my face.

There's a way to revitalize all of this,
as shadows dance across our faces,
and our fingers intertwine.
There's a spark between the pair of us,
born of blood and bone and need,
and chemistry,
and all of those things that we couldn't ever say.
There's a spark and it grows as we touch.
It might lead to fire.
It might power me until the end of time
and all things are extinguished.
or it might flicker, fade and die.
But god, I feel alive.
Don't let go.

My keyboard is dying.

An Education

I would just like to point out that although this will show up as being posted on Wednesday, it is being written on Tuesday, and thus I am still holding to my post-a-day thing. That's all. Let's get obtuse. 


Get an education,
she said, as she looked at me seriously
over the top of dinner,
the stove-top that she'd stood over
for almost every evening that
she'd fed me.
The mealy-mouthed discards
of a day spent with finger paints,
or sand in shoes,
or pointless giggling.
Get an education.

I don't care where my children go,
or what they do in life,
she said,
over the top of breakfast.
That kitchen table hastily laden
with the paraphernalia
of a well-lived life,
the dog-hairs heavy in the air,
and a cigarette within arm's reach.

Just so long as you take that gift,
and that love of reading,
she said, as she picked me up from school,
almost old enough to walk,
not entrusted to the bus.
Thoughts already turning to the bright lights
and flashing sounds
of my latest and greatest infatuation.
That plastic, monochrome god
of mine.

Tertiary education is the place for you,
you've got a brain,
she said,
after I explained to her some history,
some poetry or some pedagogy -
something I picked up at her knee,
but impressive nonetheless.
I had a way with words,
she said.

She said that for years.
I'm glad I listened.
From such a rock, certainty is formed.
I might squander whatever talent I possess,
and I might waste my time with vampires
and smoke-filled lungs,
and pressed flesh.
But I got an education.

Thanks.

Music

Music be the food of love,
apparently.
I can't say I agree with that.
Music was bad to begin with,
in the first few years of my life,
crooners and guitars and parental influence.
I would have none of it.
That's just how it was until double digits,
as is so often the case, puberty changed things.
As is perhaps less often the case,
things were changed by a burning stripper.

There was a frog in a pot,
and the water was boiling,
but he wouldn't jump out.
There was a man made of tin,
with his joints clogged with rust,
but he swung on without.

Music be the fuel for rage,
I think is true to say.
I found a way to force out truth,
in this violent way.
I found the pleasure in the dark,
humming, howling song.
If it didn't hurt, it wasn't right -
it just didn't belong.

Things changed, of course.
Music is everything.
I keep my tastes to myself,
I've stored up old bands on the shelf,
because it feels like something private,
sacred and holy.
But in order to feel everything,
something had to kick the door in,
and let my feelings run their course,
and that was rage.
(Well, and the stage -
but all in due time).
Rage and rhyme and verses
and belting out lyrics as if they were curses,
and gorging oneself on the food of love,
until one is sick.

So play on.

Will

I've never been much for showing off skill,
That's a farce, for my body is weak.
I'm frail and helpless and often quite sick,
But I've sat behind walls of iron.
Because I have the will.

I'll be the first to declaim that I'm tainted,
I smoke and I drink, to begin.
I found solace with strangers who took off my clothes.
But despite all of this, I can win,
Because I have the will.

I can resist anything except for temptation,
It's a common predicament, true -
But there have been times where my mettle is tested,
A bastard in passing, a kiss that feels new,
Because I have the will.

You've told me otherwise, many a time,
I have a vice, a virtue and a dream.
The former eats later and masks in the middle,
But I have beaten it all and passed unscathed,
Because I have the will.

There's a fire that burns, if you'll pardon the term,
Within each of us, on our fuel.
And mine never gutters, it never banks low,
There's always a glimmer of fire to show,
Because I have the will.

And sometimes that will is to have no restraint,
I relinquish control of myself.
But I have chosen when, chosen how, chosen why,
And I'll be weak when it feels right,
Because I have the will.

So I'll eat my fill,
and then no more,
or more, as I choose.
As I choose, when I choose,
Because I have the will.

I have the will,
and I can kill, with it or without it.
But I choose when it fails,
And we'll all eat our fill.
Because I have the will.

The Two B's

I could have posted this from the heart,
and run around it with emotion and syntax
and beautiful metaphor,
but I'm not going to do it.
Because the pair of you are worth my laughter,
and not my tears.

I ran into two B's
on my way around the world.
They were in some kind of trouble with themselves.
They said they'd set me free,
They were as good as their word,
and together we would roam across the globe.
Now the woman was the softest thing,
but with iron in her core -
the man, he had some tougher skin,
But inside wanted more,
They held me up with arms of oak,
So I could touch the sun.
They grunted when their eyes I poked,
But they somehow,
somehow,
put up with me.

And now they will again.
Fuck,
but I'm lucky.
And so are they,
because I'll get that sun down eventually.
And then -
who knows?
I might even share.

Mother

I was untimely plucked, apparently.
That's the nice way of saying I was premature.
Slithered from the womb a month or so in advance,
and filled my lungs with air,
and shouted bloody murder at my mother.
She must have been quite a sight.
Nineteen years of age she was, curly hair -
beautiful, but tired.
I doubt I was an easy birth,
I've never been an easy anything.
And she was practically a child herself.

By the time I was aware of her
(that is, as a person
and not just a food factory)
she was in her mid-twenties.
I assumed that all adults were this young,
This vibrant,
this alive.
Other kids had parents of an age
where flesh begins to sag and fun to fade,
and for my youthful mother I've always
been glad.
Even if, a lot of the time, times were sad.

She was many things, over the years -
provider, protector, destroyer, failure.
I never knew much about her past,
beyond that she was a mother.
I've never wished for another -
aside from when she let me suffer
without a pang of guilt, with tears only for herself,
without a mutter.
But that passed.
I knew she had a sordid past,
but the scars of those days couldn't last,
and she was as mum on them as she was Mum.

Over time, things changed.
Once I left, I became an equal -
perhaps I'm flattering myself there.
Truer to say that there was never a sequel,
I'm the firstborn, the favorite son -
for now, anyway, the others need time,
as their lives have only just begun.
But now I'm a shoulder to lean on,
and a voice to be heeded
by the woman who bore me
and helped me when needed.

Point B

I've never been afflicted by wanderlust.
I started out at Point A,
But there was always a Point B,
and no further.
Tokyo, London, New York,
C, D, E -
Although a Point D might be nice,
there's no point to pointing
at points that might be more pointed.
So no, not wanderlust.
More of a desire to be there.
Do you understand that?
There was a balcony somewhere out there with my name on it.
And a bottle of wine somewhere with my voice in the bottom,
and some people out there with little pieces of my soul in their pockets,
and they weren't at Point A.
But once I found them, once I found that elusive B,
Well, then I could be.
I'd peel off my skin and nail it to the wall,
I'd sit there in my bones and soak it all in,
And sure - maybe this pride will precede my fall,
But I'm gonna steep that soul of mine in sin,
And look at it from above and below
and truly know.
There is hope for me
at point B.
And if I look back at the years it took me to settle here,
To cast off doubt and cast off fear,
and I say "Well, Jason, you made quite a dog's breakfast
of all that."
Well, that'd be alright,
Because satisfaction is near.
And I know what to do,
because the mess of it all is beautiful,
and so are you.

Jason

There's no guarantee.
That I'll ever be free.
Of whatever it is that I'm trying to be.

They told me the place that I was born was blown up and demolished.
I don't know if that's true, but I like to believe that it is.
I was a self-sufficient child.
Reading by three,
apparently.
Disposition was rather mild,
Though I had a set of lungs on me.
The events of my life are quite a long story,
I was never exalted, nor covered in glory,
But we'll recount all of that in days to come.
The facts,
the bare, simple facts.
I was - I am - the firstborn son.
I didn't grow much - until I did.
I've never been imposing,
just a bombastic, underweight
kid.
I've always been enthusiastic,
Inquisitive,
Domineering,
and perhaps a touch spastic.
Rarely uncertain -
aside from a brief time
where my body wouldn't obey
and grew every which way
and smelt funny
but it fell into line.
My eyes are blue,
My hair is brown - naturally.
And there has never been a guarantee
that I'll ever be free
of whatever it is that my life
has been trying to make me.
I doubt that I'll ever be in vogue.
I'm a fringe dweller,
first and foremost,
a bit of a rogue.
More at home in the cellar,
or the attic.
Behaviorally, I can be erratic.
Shouting is frequent,
but then again,
so's affection.
But we'll cover it all,
in the days to come.
I just wanted to sum up, in some tiny way,
the person that comes here most every day,
and finds that he has almost nothing to say.

First of May

It begins as early as possible,
I can feel it rising.
Thrumming up through the floorboards,
through the cracks in the ceiling,
in the feeling,
in my soul.
There's a veritable tide of words behind me,
at my back and before me,
and I'm in the eye of the hurricane.
And this stuff takes me to places that Jesus can't go.
So let's go.
Let's pack our things,
Reduce ourselves to text,
and just
fucking
go.

A post a day for the next month, to see out the end of my teenage years. My body is ready. Let's fucking do it.