A Thought.

I take another hit through water.

The audiophile ignites in me.

Suddenly I hear such a range of sound. I hear the set back beating of drums, and the trumpet supporting the vocal harmonies. I hear variance, depth, and width.

The music feels full. It makes me tingle behind my eyes and see stars. I feel it in my mind and throat and heart. I feel a rhythmic sway in my bones--it's easy but unsettling--different from my daily stiff back and lead limbs.

This feels right--just right now. I know when I wake up, I will salivate at the thought of being back here: the feeling of being surrounded by music, feeling surrounded by inspiration, surrounded by love. I forget these-- what does it feel like to not be inherently alone?

That might be what I like about writing--all this fullness. My mind is fighting against this all the time. I think I am in some way afraid of this power and freedom.

How can I fear something that frees me so much?

I am tilting and the music is tilting with me.

I Felt Like Icarus.

There's fire in her eyes,
and it comes out in her words--
I sit back and listen
because I'm in awe
of her passions
and her scope
of life.
There's fire in her hair
and when I lean in to hug her
in a friendly manner,
I feel smoke and heat
and it leaves me
tingling
finger tips singed
and feeling so afraid
of being burned--
And yet I'm forgetting
that I wear wings
Of wax.

The High Level Bridge.

I may fall into deeper waters still.
150 feet up it looks soft and inviting,
even during a murky December night.
I've heard whispers of what happens
to the high level bridgers:
They say inertia stops your outside body on impact,
but your organs keep moving,
thrashing around and tearing
themselves apart.
It's blunt trauma.
It's ribcages busting.
It's aorta and lungs and veins and arteries all ripping under too much pressure.
Still,
the high level bridgers must have felt
that there would be some relief in that;
the few seconds of debilitating
pain
would be worth not having to spend another moment
in this fucked up world.

- - -

It's been almost a year since my friend passed away. I've been missing him more than usual. I wish that I had been a better friend to him, that I could have helped him in some way. I wish he was still around so that I could talk to him now, I need his guidance.

Bioluminous.

I have never felt heartache
As deep and vast
As the ocean.
Dark and
Blue and
Sometimes
It seems
Like bottomless
Despair
Though
There's life
Down deep
And they don't need
To worry about when
They will see light at the end
Of a darkening void--
They make their own.

Dear dad.

When I'm far away from you
It's easy to forget your
Shortcomings                    
Negligence                  
On an emotional level      
It's hard to accept          
That you're the father I have  
But never the one I needed.
I miss you                  
I don't
I hate that
I love you.

Night.

At night,
your dreams haunt you.
You see ten stories--
flight and conquest
over this life.
At night,
I'm haunted by something too.
It keeps me from sleeping,
drags me back to the edge,
those ten stories:
Guts, flight, and then conquest.
Relief, weakness, and victory
over this life.

Flesh (Stress).

Claws dig in
rip flesh.
I forget
what peace of mind
sounds like.
This stress
pulls apart
my joints
snaps
my bones
and leaves me
a heaping
mangled
mess.

- - -

I moved again. This was the worst one yet. I have accumulated too many things. It is time to lighten my load.

Also blogverse: I think it's time that you knew something about me: Boys are dumb, girls are pretty. I am feeling as queer as they come.

Again.

My insides collapse
at the thought of you--
like the hundredth attempt
at the beginnings of a novel--
I let them crumple
as if it was just paper
in my hand.

If this is what
you do to me now,
then I'm afraid
to take even
one more step
forwards.

Because I don't know
if I can take

falling apart--
falling so hard

again.

- - -

Oh hai. This one's about a girl.

Missing Opportunities - Prose.

The bar was an artery. It was narrow and dark in there. The walls were crimson and seemed to lean in and crush your ribcage, push you up against the other patrons until you felt too close. Like you could reach out and stroke a stranger’s face and she would look at you and smile, her eyes cynical and nihilistic but glowing with the light of opportunity. That’s what the bar stank of. In hindsight it was beer and sweat and bleach and something like mildew, but when you stood on the tiny ten by ten stage and looked out into the dark all you smelt was the opportunity.

In the same way an artery draws blood away from the heart and sends it careening into the depths of the human body, the bar pulled musicians in and pushed them off in all different directions. That was the draw of the place. One night there might be a burly country man, his vocal chords twanging and plucking like the banjo between his arms. And the next some liberty spiked punk screams anarchism, even though we all suspect he clings to a nine-to-five corporate job. It didn’t matter who you were, that bar took you in. It took you in and accepted you as you were—sloppy or talented—and presented you with the locals: The riff raff of 97th; the indie kids from City Centre; the unimpressed bartenders at the back, looking on as you hit the stage.

The floor was cement, cracked and pounded from years of stamping feet. Each evening as the band began to set up, the owner dragged an old mop across it. Even in the seconds before last call, my eyes and my head and my whole body fuzzy from the evening, I remember faint scent of sterilization.

That night felt like nothing but a missed opportunity, ironically. My band was a flurry of motion, haphazardly laying down cables, instruments, and amps. We were tighter than we had ever been, and I knew our set better that I knew the rise and fall of my own chest. But the bar was pumping serious blood tonight. People moved in and out of the doors, slouching on the curb and taking drags on cigarettes or sucking down beer at the tables inside. It was packed and hard to move. And worse, she was supposed to be here.

I remember bits and pieces of the night. I remember the smell and the red walls and the cement floors. I recall with some clarity an old love seat rammed into the corner. It was ratty and torn. There was a young couple that spent most of the night sprawled across it; I remember watching them with envy. I wished it was me on that couch, my arms twined around another’s waist, reaching up to brush away her hair away and kiss her neck.

Mostly I remember Jenny. She always had these unforgettable eyes: they were the color of a forest floor as autumn turns to winter. When you looked into them you saw the warmth of summer but the bitter frost creeping in along the edges. I had always found it hard to maintain eye contact with her, but that night I couldn’t look away. It had been almost a year since the last time I saw her. We exchanged the odd text message, and once in a while we bumped into each other on Facebook. But we hadn’t spoken face to face. There was something there before. And it ended. I never quite got over it. She was still slender, her skin as pale as ever.

We met at this bar. I remember that day like I remember my own reflection. She was leaning up against the bar smiling at the bartender, a cluster of girls gathered around. I never understood why women had to travel in packs; it was impossible to approach any individual girl without being stripped to the bone by ten other pairs of eyes.

Jenny was stunning. Easily the most attractive of all her friends, with dark hair hanging in beach waves. She dressed like she belonged there, while the rest of her friends seemed overdressed and out of place. The bar was clearly her idea. My band was playing that night too, so I sidled up to the bar and slipped in beside her. I leaned over to steal the bartender’s attention away from her. Intentionally.

“Can I have a few beers for the band?” I asked. The bartender nodded and turned away. In the corner of my eye I could see Jenny looking at me. The bartender handed me a tray and I lifted it precariously and turned. Jenny was still looking at me. I gave her my best flirtatious smile. She beamed back.

And now I couldn’t stop staring. There she was, just standing on the side of the stage with her roommate. The room seemed at once more densely packed than it was before. My heart was clanging in my chest, the beat uneven and dissonant. I ambled over, my feet like lead. She saw me coming, it didn’t matter how packed the room was. She looked skittish, but she forced a smile anyways. She had flawless teeth and nice lips. I still get goose bumps when I think about all the time we spent twined together on the couch. All the times I felt those lips against my own.

“Hi Jenny.” I said as I approached.

“Hey.” She smiled again. It felt strained. My hands were damp and clammy. I stepped forward and hugged her. I felt every fiber in her body tense. She smelled the same: sweet and sultry, some kind of perfume with a french name. I imagined the commercial: “rolls of lavender infused with the essence of witch hazel.”

“I’m so glad you came! Uh, how have you been?” I asked as I let go and stood back. I tried to look content. I tried to look happy even though I hadn’t been in a very long time. Even though I spent every night awake, moving from my bed to the couch and back to my bed again. Even though every moment I didn’t spend trying to sleep was spent thinking of her and how badly I’d ruined our relationship.

“Um, well you know, I can’t complain. Everything’s good.” Of course it was. How could she not be okay, when she looked like that, when she was the most stunning, smart, talented person I’ve ever met?

We stumbled through conversation like this for a few minute—mostly it was me talking, trying to fill the silences—before I was yanked away for a sound check. I walked away from Jenny feeling like I’d made some ground, taking a few steps towards repairing what I thought I had smashed to pieces. I had been trying to tell myself for over a year that I didn’t need her anymore, and that I was over her and over us. But I was still irrevocably in love with Jenny.

We started our set and even though we played okay, my heart wasn’t in it that night. I’d left at the side of the stage with Jenny, and my mind kept wandering back to her. My fingers slipped across the strings of my guitar as I kicked in an overdrive with my foot and then leaned into the volume pedal. The drums pounded on and kept my hands moving, the bass guitar was thrumming in my throat. I think our singer tripped over a wire because suddenly he was on the ground rolling into me, the microphone pressed to his lips. I remember looking out into the dark as we hammered out that chorus and forgetting the opportunity that the bar presented for my music. I forgot the last year of my life. I forgot how many hours I spent playing my guitar and trying to distract myself from how depressed I always was. Instead I was thinking about how I’d met her here, and now I might have a chance to win her back.

When we finished our set I packed away my guitar and amp and wandered around the narrow room looking for her. People pounded me on the back and complimented me, offered me drinks and advice and drunken hugs. I barely heard them. I couldn’t find Jenny. I asked around. I found out she’d left halfway through our set.

- - -

I wrote this last semester for a prose class I was taking. I thought at the time that this was one of the better pieces I've written. In hindsight, I still have a long way to go.

Some Live Vids

Here's some videos of me doing what I love. I hope you like them:

At Her Feet - Leave Me

At Her Feet - Your Move