Just 15 years, 2 months, and 18 days ago, we made a promise
A vow of unconditional love and devotion to each other
A pact, united as one, made to simply protect one another
Our memories are woven together,
Thread by thread and line by line
To crate a single human being
Made of the body and the mind
My soul is my immortal, heaven-sent and never whole
And my bones, my skin, my body— just a temporary home
This home has been broken, held up by the white beneath my skin
Mistreated by my soul’s selfish beating called sin
You have sealed up all the windows, and locked all the doors
You have trapped me inside of myself, creating a series of civil wars
This is a letter to you, my punching bag, my security blanket, my
       canvas, my betrayer
This is a letter to you
My body

A movement of the mouth, a gasp for air,
A mutter of sound, and two legs moving as a pair.
A thought occurred to us, just children, learning to control ourselves.
We are able to go on, now, speaking aloud what the story tells.
As a single being, united as one,
We are able to understand what we see,
We are able to dance, and sing, and run.
We are able to let the words crawl through our veins
Just to spill out of our hearts to cope with our own pain.
We are able to create,
We are able to live.
We, a body and a mind, are able.

We transform from child to a teenager,
As a single human being
Our souls change from a whole, to a one with a hole
Leaving a trench where our innocence had been.
The mind convinces itself that you, my body, is jailing me, innocent girl for a crime she had never committed.
The mind convinces you, that if you try to stand, every bone in your legs will shatter into a million pieces.
The mind convinces my eyes that the person I see in the mirror is an unknown face, string back at me.
The mind convinces itself and you that the only way to fill up this crater of demons inside; Is by torturing your beautiful skin and drowning the evil in every drop of blood, and every tear ever shed.
The mind convinces itself and you, my body, that there is no reason to be.
There is no reason,
To create
To dance,
To sing,
To run.
To live.

Time passes by, and the years go on,
We simply survive the life we are meant to live.
As one being, we venture through the valleys of hell,
My immortal being strives for the heaven it craves from the inside of this cell.
The mind imagines a place it has yet to find,
But our legs are unable to jump just that high.
So we envision a staircase.
Step by step we climb up, until they come to a stop—
We’ve fallen from grace.
Our bones, cracked, and all out of place
Our hearts, crushed under the weight,
Of our broken souls, ripped open and stripped of any hope,
Leaving us in the control of an evil fate.
We are irreversibly broken.
And we have no reason to be fixed.

In the back of our mind,
Even as the time has gone by,
I’ve thought about apologizing, but our mouth always responded with a sigh.
Now, I, eternal and never whole, realize that there has always been a doubt in my soul.
Maybe it is my fault.
I am sorry. I truly am.
I am sorry for taking you for granted when you took me as your own
I’m sorry for kicking you out when all you needed was a home.
I’m sorry for every time I stare at the mirror and never like what I see
Because you are content with me, and only me.
I’m sorry for telling you to shrink, shrink, shrink, when all you wanted to do was grow.
I’m sorry for concealing your light when all you waned was to show your natural glow
I’m sorry for not thanking you every time you healed my skin to seal and protect my soul, and I want you to know that you, and only you, can make me whole.
I finally realize that although I always hurt you,
We did make a promise.
We made a vow of unconditional love and devotion, and protection for one another.
A body with a mind, and a soul with a heart,
We, as a single human being, are able.
This is a letter to you, to my beautiful painting, my sweet salivation, and my armor through the fight, my torch when there is no light.
This is a letter to you,
My body.

I

Wonderlandia, torn off the submerged lung
of a daydream diary.                   Reoccurs
as she does with silver eyes, weary Alice
during tea time--bullets burning past her
                                     like flowing nations.
Everyday similar tsunamis fund
                                     the lack of 20/20.
Nose to tail--the surge of angry engines
splits the ends of her blonde strands.
    Each one the last witness to maddening hospitality
--utopia never sweats as it talks and withers.
Amnesia blots,
new aspirin machines
vaporize apples and ***
on the other end of spectrum,
                                                     trans-positional labels--

Guillotine gargling teapots
       have no patience
         to the bushes of Olympus opiates
                                      bound in yellow barrier tape,
                     five o' clock traffic
               welcomes her back to what we are facing.


II


Dreary weather of late fall                       and her beautiful,
              powdered face

great mouth of atomic hell,
         when she speaks--80,000 deficiencies boil alive
                                                   --Trinity's teething test
                                                           on the tired bones
                                                   of a story-teller's raspy cards--

"None the wiser," she speaks,
                                "during the transition of ships
                   vermin turn into krakens culturing
                               on the surface of a raindrop.
    Heroes, villains, animals frozen together
                 after now eating for four days.
     The transition of one genocide
                                                        ­  to the other,
                the delineation of cat-and-mouse,
   mingle too long
   with the dead
   and its necrophilia."

                 Blind Alice wanders off the highway,
leaves her brewed cup of steamy static
on top of the unimportant saucer, sticks pins in her *******,
             and enjoys the sound of Cleopatra
             rolling over in reincarnation.


III

      Dear Alice smells
sunbathing, studded tangerines
                      assimilating liquor within the vast,
       empty, glowing nausea that is--
                        the warm germ

Oil                                    and                 ­          water
               rippled glass too silly for skulls
              made humid by distant salt water,

blood, acid, enzymes,
cheating probability
that runners with drunk kids
have blood between their toes.
                                                      Death­ to the distillation within
                                                    --the chronic diamond too polished
                                                       in *** to see the roses in her *****
    She curses these wood songs,
             heritage patriots with the pelts of wild lions
             with antlers over their heads,
                                                  faces advertising war paint
                                                applied by gargoyle hands
                    --sad memoirs always drink people
                                                  that use God as a cookie jar.


IV


  Gorgeous names
  on graffiti institutions give her a home
                                                         a market
                                                         a nickname
           still                  Alice only accepts Alice.

Grace periods where she misses tyranny
                  rise and fall like endorsed breathing.
    Now Alice feels her dress fall off,
                                  extinct years message future occupancy
                                  about what to wear.
New era, this era, past eras plead guilty
in a      clinic museum
             of forcing demons
              down the medical
              throats
of first graders. Court adjourns at 9:01 PM, Saturday

             The populus can sleep now,
                          but not her.
                 No one gave her clothes
                 to cover up the drained monochrome.


V

Instead she celebrates her flesh,
                                        the broken glass,
   and quakes and leads off to expose
           others to its potential vital prosperity.

         Instead
                     headlines like bumper cars read
                     about the beheading of weeks,
                     failing rescue missions,
                     and debates on teenage tolerance.

Nicotine intoxication points Alice
to over-extended memories--wards of music
sequenced to point out the extinction of marble tigers.
                        Only 550 expected to understand
                         tethered to millions able to survive.

  Flood waters look at moral standards, a mean hurricane
                                   that collapses the death toll
     all patented 50 states
     have a dating service
     and huff paint as a way
                              to pray to art.
                                                      Double­-canvas faces
                                                      dyed in pixel     hope
                                                       that the media levees hold,
             but volunteer to herd sheep into poppy seed fields.
                                            She refuses to stay,
                    to watch the long night
                    of castration on men with mud-covered ankles.
                                      Television says eunuchs want
                                       to be prodigal's children,
                                       everyone wants to come back home
                                       to mom and dad, safe zones, away
                                       from themselves.
                                                     ­                 It says our ancestors want
                                                            ­          this for all of us. They worked
                                                          ­            so hard to tie up the hair
                                                            ­          out of Aphrodite's face.

                                     They treasure the silver eyes of Alice,
                                          but call them blue,
                                                  they issue her high cholesterol
                                          but pump sweet ****** into he stomach,
                                                  they tell her to put down the drill,
                                            so she can finish their orchestra--

her lightning
    is
     a
  string
     of
  souls



VI


     She decides to depart Sunday,
to discover the ordinary beginning,
                        painting WHY? on its delirium.
re-arrangeable viewers become
                      inserted sounds under percussion and piano.

       Caging various important charts
                                          undetermined
   ­                           as finished attention.
                                                      ­              Three movements in flux
open end the people                     vacuuming
                            craftsmanship blocks
                   from                                dogs and zen.

                                                 The
                                 suspended letter               is happening in 1951
   drenched in existential white                                            spacing
        ­                                                   the viewer
                        from integrated architecture.

Down
the
bell is a structure called
"the quarantined wheelchair."
                               Dead ignorance changes pattern
                               after six movements of the second hand.
Alice speaks, "To you all, know
                                       that this is an un-dramatic situation.
          Everyday windows with the same
           participants have girls drinking
                                                     orange juice, activate fluid,
                    both exist as objects
                    and caught propaganda."

                                                   ­                      Six tunnel
                                                          ­      audiences are watching
                                                        ­        drown in the plastic silk
   her                                                       built by the motorized collage
                                                         ­                                        spider.

          Alice, a kinetic mannequin pop star
                        is limp in the glass point.
             Rhythmic flux is objectified war torture
                         censored in fitness magazines
by simple toilet literature.

                                        Six tunnels worth of eyes
                                 latch to the *******
                                           as a way to bury **** protesting.
                                  A coat of pepper spray
                                   works in front of the exhibition.
This stage is shaded by moans.


VII


      Alice the female, has a door-to-door friend
                                                          ­    over the sea
of the cathedral's ceiling               who died of disemboweled
pulchritude             at the mutilated nuclear other-place.
                     Her friend was a synthesized example
                     of staged catastrophes. Her friend is her, silver-eyed
                                                     ­                                             Alice.

            ­                     She performs herself and herself
                                 but they are played by polished, scored poets.

Everyone of them incorporates the events
                                 of a dancing gunshot. Everything rests
                                                           ­ at an intermission

               but after fifty minutes of pondering,
          the lost audience remembers
         her name is Alice.
                   So it comes back on with a shower of sweat
                  and this clear
                                  substance
               ­                                 called
                         ­                              patience.
       This composing, peering vulnerability
                        psychologically destroys the flux tension
              like analog genocidal dictators.
                                   Ultimately this is dream liquor

     commentating war to the war tree
      using trauma and chairs as humor.



VIII


               Patience on the water level lives translucent
                                            on networks that brand flesh
                                            with displaced identity.
Alice convinces us all that pickled ***
                                                             ­               takes eight years
                     to ****** and we accuse it
                                         of being fake. Afterwards, her character dies
in confident silence.


IX


     Not majestic, but she does cough
                  to mock the earth.
        The seeds of Alice are ripe,
                        harvested early, and now her children come out and dine
        like speaking tongues on gibberish.
                          The room is fat with hair

and kindness. Feeble, mundane hands chew on each other,
                                                         feet stand proud.
We even call her Alice or "the beautiful *******,
                                             a black cloud feasting
                                             in orange."
                       Everyone feasts on the nectar
                                                         she has, but never the rye
which makes her round. Juice is squeaking and her children laugh
                         as in competition.

     It's a distinguishable game as the mixed
                                                           ­      couple up front
              begin to play whistles as
                                         everyone eats
                   the pride of the silver-eyed Alice's children.


X

                                                ­ The children's souls
                                                       bow and say
                                           "Thank you for barely growing."
                                                   and dissipate after five minutes.

          "Curiouser                                   ­                                      and
           Curiouser"                                                       ­                   they
           say                                                              ­                        as
           they                                                             ­                       leave
           this                                                             ­                         homage.
                  The decimal backbone
                     of each of sweet Alice's
                                   blonde strands
                   divorced by the gust/ of a green light's/ allowance.


XI Epilogue*


  The day crawls away
                   a vigilant pest
     of the nocturnal project
                   --suns beam down still, like
                  stomachs of grinning felines
                           at Valentine's day.

toxic-dyed fingers
                        soldered
to bodies pittering across rainy streets

--legionnaires with hearts on stones
                         we are waiting for her orders,

     thistled-teeth clench,
                                         but did she
                                          actually
          ­                                ever come?

The next to empty train
Roars through the mist of dawn
As it passes the lakes and elves
The dark and mystic pines
-forests that once told of horrors
To keep the ones like me
From crossing the line-

This box, this crate
A testament of the modern man
To whom which it serves
It is somewhat of a time traveller
When it breezes the land
That years have made its own

And yet there are scenes from my window
That I know are proofs
Of exceptions to the rule that reads,
“time will take its toll”

All the brooks and oaks
And even more so
Every bolder and stone
Convinces my heart and soul
That I need not be marred and scorned
Broken and torn
By the thistles and thorns
And all the bourdons that the lions
Of this glass world
Convict me to *****

Since there is a side
To the manic and indecisive puzzle that is I
A side of realism and cynicism
Thus I am well aware of my mortality
And the scarcity of the time that is mine

My existence is an indirect unwritten vow
To never bend my back and bow
To never fall in line
And receive my share of coals
To fuel this machine down the rusty tracks
In a race against nature or God
A race to prove one or the other
Or even both wrong
A race we’ve already lost

She is not a sub
And may never be
Her inner voice
Convinces her of
A different choice

But her spirit wails
And her body lusts
For hard physical passion
Power exchange
Seed and submission

If you play with her
Deliver strength
Back her to a wall
Kiss her hard
Command her jaw

Use her
Discipline her
Drop her to her knees
It’s what she needs, and
She loves to please

She says she doesn’t have the strength within herself to write poetry.
Yes, her. The one who so often nourished me with song
til my soul began to learn how to hunt for itself,
whose word carried weight in leading me to pick my own instrument,
albeit one of a different tone,
as the key in keyboard became prominent for the first time
and the sound of purposeful fingers upon it could be considered,
only in the right light,
synonymous to the plucking of strings, just as rooted in emotion.

Yet she's the first to say that she herself can't do it.

Thing is, I suppose we’re politely at odds on the matter.
She favors poetry that’s sharper, with a cleaner cut,
that’s message is immediate and jarring
as a conduit running from soul through skin,
or a loose-lipped diary finally freed from lock and key.
And when she declared it, I started to consider what my poems seem to me:
Blackberry bushes (but kinder, I hope)
that snag and immerse just long enough
to make me feel I’ve had an effect.
I’ve used writing to expel my most gnarled feelings
to any passerby who’s maybe felt the same.
Like crying in a mirror:
alarming, but oddly refreshing,
and an indefinite reminder that our aches are never only our own.

Still, I'm not sure why it blows my mind
to hear that even the most glamorous hearts,
who wear confidence as a summer breeze that's always in their favor
and who inspire, from beau gestures to sleight of hand,
are included in those who find themselves pacing back, back and forth,
begging curbside at the dime store
for a scrap of the same feed that convinces a heart to pump ink.

But she says that any art that's enjoyed is worth it.
So while she seeks out words that bare the bones,
I’ll stay and make a meal of the marrow,
hollowing them so that the poetry may have a rightful place
to reverberate as hymns in a universal monastery.

But hell, like I’m any old soul.
I dress nicer than I otherwise would,
turn to the mother who told me I don’t meet her lowest standards,
and ask for a critique.
All for the moment when she greets me at the door with a legendary G#.

...Now please, could you spare a dime?

Sometimes, in life you find that special friend. Someone who changes your life by just being a part of it. Someone who makes you laugh until you’re crying. Someone who makes you believe that there is always something good in life. Someone who convinces you that there is an unlocked door somewhere that is waiting for you to open it. Someone who reaches out for you to help you stand up again.

That is a forever friendship. When youre down, and your world seems dark and empty, your forever friend lifts you up and suddenly makes your dark and empty world seem bright and full. Your forever friend gets you through hard times, sad times, and confused time. Also the happy time, your forever friend is there.

If you turn around and walk away, your forever friend follows. If you lose your way, your forever friend guides you and cheers you up. Your forever friend holds your hand and then tell you that everything is going to be okay. And when you find such a friend, you feel happy and complete because you had nothing to worry about. I want you to please keep them forever.

You have a forever friend, and forever has no end.

It is possible.
To leap beyond where fear takes us.
Surely so many things happen.
By contrast
We stand still.
Wound up in total curiosity.
To dream in wonderment.
With each twirl we captivate the essence of someone else.
A sort of inspiration that convinces us that we are more than what we believe.
Beginning to walk,
Our other functioning parts come to life.
Embraced in true courage.
Spun around and round.
This huge metal behind it's back.
Suddenly this obstacle isn't what it seems.
First finding what is important.
The touch of someone else
Through encouragement.
The wind-up doll begins to move
No longer incapable by what we define as fear,
But enormous faith.
To place all of it's self in another
Without fear of adding another chip to it's face.
It waddles along.
Moments later,
Pride interferes.
It's movements stop.
To be spun up again and again
Falling to the floor
Seconds at a time

I drop my pencil under a guy's chair and my friend convinces me to ask him for it back because "he's nice I promise" so I work up the courage to call his name as loud as I dare and I just start talking so I can tell him what happened before I lose my nerve, but halfway through I notice he's not listening at all and instead of asking for my pencil I ask him to ignore me. He does.
I met a boy and he was intriguing and clever and sarcastic and not unattractive and I thought he had potential but I waved in the hall and he didn't wave back and he didn't want to sit next to me in class.
I invite a boy I've known since 3rd grade to sit next to me in class, and he does, but then his friend shows up and there's a wistful look in his eyes. He doesn't talk to me, and he switches his seat the next day.
I sit at a crowded lunch table full of people I don't like because the people I do are outcasts. I don't have time to eat all my food.
I switch lunch tables to sit with my crush, by invitation of a friend. They ignore me to talk to each other. I try to join. I ask what's so funny. They shake their heads. He's sitting almost on top of me because the tables are so small but he never even turns to look at me.
Last year he sat with us and talked mostly to me and her table was having drama and fighting and now they all wear skirts to school and look pretty and my eyes are puffy and my legs have a light layer of fuzz which is easy to see because I'm still so pale.
I was the only person to sit alone on the first day of biology class and when I walked in the second day a girl who's never been particularly nice to me and wasn't in the class yesterday is there. She's excited to see me. She asks me to sit next to her. She looks at my paper while I write. I don't say anything because I don't want to sit alone anymore.
I'm stressed out by the second day. Unprepared.
718 more days.

In a wayward adventure in curiosity —
lured away from savvy of cooler judgment,  
he oversteps the bounds of reality 
into a state of altered awareness.

Overwhelmed by a rapid beginning
of a buzzing sensation — The Rush;
emanating from deep inside him, 
surging along the veins streaming 

euphoria through cells of his entire body:  
inside the body, with warm pleasure waves
flushing over the by now tingling skin —
soughing off all unpleasant feelings.

Mouth numbed, limbs heavy, and eyeballs 
rolling back from hitherto an unimaginable
state of bliss, he savours the calm explosions
of the pulsating bubbles in his head.

A magical moment of sheer ******* 
rapture—that ends in a lasting sedation—
during which he's dazed with wonderment
while covered by a cozy blanket of content.

He falls in love with the insidious drug.
And, he begins to relish its sweet fruition
in a seemly pattern of use that is put
in the shade to protect his best interests.

A stake in normalcy that seeks to restrict
his usage of the opioid to a social activity.
But soon enough he drifts towards a regular
recreational use: indulging on weekends,

floating, flying, and soaring in wonderful
ripples of pure delight, feeling very mellow
and satisfied, in an illusionary paradise of
forgetfulness where nothing hurts any more.

Bit by bit as time goes by his body builds up
a tolerance for the sedative, prompting his
intake of higher and more frequent doses
to feel as well as to sustain the desired effect.

This occurs because his body attempts to
adapt to the presence of the drug by quickly
breaking it up and purging it out of the system;
thus making it less potent as it was before.

At this stage of his drug abuse he's still able to
control whether to use the stuff or not, where
and when to use it, without stress. He could
also abstain from the opioid fairly responsibly.

But at the limits of his body's flexible response
to the dangerous substance, he begins to suffer
from its unpleasant side-effects that show up
a short period of time following his last use.

The pleasurable, but short-term, therapeutic
effects of the hard drug are now being
overshadowed by several of its undesirable
withdrawal symptoms that manifest as:

fatigue, irritability, cold chills/sweat, itchy skin,
muscle spasms and tremors, body ache, and
stomach cramps among others, with an
increase in his body's cravings for the opioid.

The onset of these torturous side-effects of
the stimulant marks the beginning of his body's
physical dependence on it, as he now relies
on the drug to fend off the terrible affliction.

He has bitten at the bait of pleasure oblivious
of the hook beneath it. The once casual user,
who had thought he could quit the habit at will
without stress, has progressed to problematic use.

The drug has become an integral part of a daily
routine that is gradually heading towards chaos.
Regardless, he's still able to go to work and
take care of his day to day responsibilities.

In time, a new sickness begins to fester inside
him: the opioid is tightening its grip on him,
as his body's physical dependence on it
is now generating his addiction to the drug.

This psychological dependence on the drug
has set in with anxiety disorder accompanied
by emotional and behavioural problems:
the duo classic signs of a progressive disorder.

The drug has become something he needs
to sleep or to fully wake up. His sleeping
pattern has also been altered; up at night
and intermittently dozing off during the day.

As dosage of the narcotic rises, so does
the torture of the painful lows and other
symptoms of addiction, making his cravings
for the sedative increasely more intense.

As it is, he's needs several hits of the drug to
make it through the day. All at once he wants
to use! He begins to look forward to using.
He would ingest the drug in risky situations

such as, while at the wheels of his car or
working at his job; always desperate to avoid
withdrawal symptoms as well as to revel in
the bliss of the drug's comforting warmth.

At times he'd skip work 'chasing the dragon':
pursuing the out-of-reach elation levels of
his initial euphoric high, swinging between
feelings of mediocrity and that of ecstasy.

Always, his body would afterwards crash
below baseline, barely able to cater for his
daily needs. The habit has long ceased
to be the fun that it was intended to be.

Like a vicious cycle the relief from the opioid,
which is not justified by external reality,
is being obtained at the expense of the
worsening addiction and a spike in distress

whenever his body is low on the drug.
The more he indulges on the sedative
to calm his racing mind, the more
its comfort zone seems to be desired.

Disoriented in the rigours of his vice,
he strays in the abyss of drug addiction:
a dark, weary place where priority disorder 
is dictated by events outside of his control.

It is this corrupted impulse control that
causes his sick obsession with the narcotic,
rendering him unfit to articulate rational
thoughts: a chronic brain disorder.

In this harmful shift away from reality,  
utmost in his mind is the insidious drug:
over and above his job, his goals, family,
love, friends, hobbies and personal hygiene.

Oddly enough the foremost essentials of life
like water, food, and sleep are also not spared.
He could be ill and he won't care.
No other thoughts can cohabit in his world.

Emotionally invested in his fantasy world,
the toxic substance has kindled in him
an inner turmoil — setting off an overriding
feeling of emptiness that aches in his heart.

The habit much harder to lose than it was
to find: an ongoing effort to wean himself off
the drug is being crushed by a dysphoric mood
and a sickly feeling that intensify in severity.

These horrifying withdrawal symptoms
are a result of the sedative's induced
alterations in the biochemistry of his
brain's system of reward and punishment.

Rather than a mild, blissful flow of the brain's
happy hormones, as is experienced while
one is indulging in a tasty food, on receiving
a great news, or while engaged in any other

kinds of novelty that fill us with a delicious
pleasure, the opioid whose chemical structure
is similar to that of the natural chemical
messengers of the brain, Happy Hormones,

by mimicking these primary drivers of the
brain's reward system the psychoactive 
drug sends a false signal of euphoria to
the complex *****, triggering an instant

and fast secretion of an abnormally large
amount of the 'feel-good hormones', that
begin to surge along its pleasure pathways
overwhelming the reward centre of the brain.

It is this huge outpouring of happy hormones
in the region that elicites in him a sudden
burst of energy, a pleasant state of mild
drowsiness, mental alertness, relaxation, ...

This already intense, euphoric effect of the
opioid is further amplified by the drug's
blocking of the pain partways of the reward
system, thus dulling his emotions and worries

by eliminating any feeling of sorrow, regret,
guilt, fear, or loneliness. Upon intake of the
mood-altering drug, he would feel warm when
cold, calm when angry, bright when grumpy,

filled when hungry and happy when irritable,
with almost a total refrain from the tendency to
view anything in a negative manner. This dramatic
result makes every normal thing look better

and brings forth a deep sense of satisfaction,
as though all his needs have been met.
However, this almost perfectly desirable 
body and mind experience is an artificial

feeling that only lasts a few hours at most.
When the drug's effects wear off, because
the brain, which has come to rely on the steady
supply of happy hormones, cannot adjust

all at once, it gets stuck in overdrive which
results in the withdrawal symptoms. It is so
because his brain, whose system of reward
and punishment has been tampered with,

seeks to counteract and accomodate for
the sweet thrills of the drug's euphoric high,
by secreting much less happy hormones while
the foodgate of pain hormones is thrown open.

Just like a huge surge of happy hormones
elicits unnatural levels of euphorical pleasure,
a spike in flow of pain hormones produce
in him the torturous withdrawal symptoms.

These unwanted side-effects whose rise and
fall are subject to drug levels in the system,
is the debt he has to pay for the supreme
bliss that is relished during his opioid highs.

It is all about his brain seeking to maintain
Homeostasis: a normal, healthy body function.
Once he's able to amerce with penance due,
he'll feel good again with no need for the drug.

Another flip side of the illicit habit is that over
time, the regular surge in happy hormones
disrupts the resilience of the reward region
of the brain, causing physical changes that

have drastically reduced his brain's ability
to produce the 'pleasure juices', or respond
to any stimulus other than the one being
triggered by the psychoactive substance.

This is clearly seen in his lost of interest in
activities that he once enjoyed, since his brain
suffers from lack of happy hormones which
influence one's capacity to be in a good mood.

Because the narcotic has also disrupted
activities in the control region of the brain,
his whole thought pattern, perspective and
behaviour, all radically change along with it.

It is this reprogramming of his brain that has
altered the interior reality of his mind, in ways
that result in him going into 'survival mode'
in the absence of the drug during a withdrawal.

While in this irritable, aggressive and erratic
state, he would forego anything and everything
to obtain the narcotic because he's thinking
of his drug use the same way an individual 

who is parched with thirst thinks of water.
This desperation in seeking out the drug as
a vital lifeline is due to his compromised brain
'thinking' it needs it as a matter of survival.

A habit he had maintained at the outset
because it made him feel extremely good
has tuned against him, quite often, coercing
him to use for the avoidance of pain.

The sedative as dear and painful to him
as an imbecilic child is to its mother,  
he continues on the foreboding route 
for which he has no power of deviation.

Despairing in the clutches of addiction,
the drugs traumatize him, they infuse
toxins into his spine, and he wouldn't
know whether he's coming or going.

He's kept on saying to himself, 'I'm going
to quit for good after using one last time.'
But that remains to be seen as the drug
goes on dulling his inner light day by day.

In a downward spiral that stuns those 
acquainted with him, he loses his job,
his car is repoed, and he's evicted from
a nice home that had been stripped bare.

Drowning in unpaid bills and desperately
in debt, having blown an entire life-savings
on the drug, the loss of everything and a few
remaining friends leaves him fatally devastated.

The dangerous drug has evoked a negative
ripple that is felt throughout all that he's
part of. An awful realization that settles in
with cold clarity, eliciting a lurch of dismay

over his dire ignorance about the drug
which has led to the ugly entrapment.
In deep, sorrowful thoughts consumed
with self-loathing he puts a curse upon

the day he first laid eyes on the hard drug.
With the best resolve he's able to muster,
driven by exasperation to kick the habit,
he strives to make his will like stone —

a facade that is soon razed by his urgent need
for the ****** to stave off withdrawal. With a
burden of guilt and shame that can't be faced,
he retreats into the haze of his own misery.

With more problems and stresses than ever,
he plunges from troubled life to no life —
completely losing touch with reality as the
disorder assumes a more dangerous form.

His fixation on the ****** has taken a turn for
the worst; besides his strong cravings for it
to ward off withdrawal as well as to experience
its euphoric high again, it has become more

crucial than ever for him to keep his emotions
constantly desensitised to life, by numbing
the agony of living to ease the passage of
day with purchased relief from the sedative.

Locked in this highly destructive pattern
of drug use, he would stop at nothing to
feed the habit: he would cheat, steal,
lie or betray no matter who to get his 'fix'.

Like the spreading of cancer in the body,  
his affliction has metastasized way 
beyond him, chipping away at the sense
of wellbeing of everyone around him.

As frequent and ready targets for theft
his family have to always watch out for him,
in a resentful relations in which they never
could feel at easy with him around the house.

Wallets, jewellery, gadgets, or any other
easy to carry household valuables, that are
not safely locked away, will go missing.
For days at a time he, too, will vanish.

He'd eventually return like the 'prodigal son'.
Always, he's found the door open after
prolonged periods of avoiding home, even
on occasions when he'd been kicked out.

In the many months gone since losing his
source of livelihood, he's been pushed
into a number of rehabilitation facilities,
but as yet has failed to clean up his act.

He's also been in and out of rehab thrice
following hospital discharges for drug
overdose. On the last occasion, he was
found passed out in the family's bathtub.

Timely arrival of the paramedics had saved
his life. Notwithstanding, a nagging urge
to 'use' continues to feed and reinforce
the habit after each discharge from rehab.

It's been most upsetting to the parents
who have had to watch him visibly change
before their eyes: from a good, healthy
son, who had always had his act together,

to as it is, a thin, patchy-skinned loner with
a baffled demeanour — who buries his head
in low self-esteem, to conceal the often
dilated and glassy pupils from mutual gaze.

Nothing points more to the helplessness 
of the family's plight than having to finally
admit to their little or no influence over
the ravages of the stigmatized disorder.

A harrowing experience for a household
whose life-savings, along with compassion
for him, have completely been exhausted
with no more tears remaining to shed.

The hurting family at the end of its tether
confronts him with an ultimatum:
to get his life in order or face the music.
Coldly, they all watch him leave home.

His descent into the final stages of rock-
bottom has been swift. He starts by crashing
on fellow addicts' couches and floors,
but soon his welcome quickly wears out.

Now among the ranks of the homeless the
hobo would wake up feeling sick, and his day
would consist of shoplifting, petty thefts,
begging, and struggling to find others ways

to obtain money in order to feed the habit.
At nights, even on stormy ones, the rough
sleeper would crash wherever there's shelter,
never worrying about waking up the next day.

A hellish existence on the street that has
provoked a string of run-ins with the law. 
Nabbed stealing on ill-fated occasions,
he's manhandled in a most indecent way.

Tired, hungry and sick, the erstwhile ray of
hope, who once had a strong sense of self,
is currently a nervous wreck who envisages
life through the lens of opioid stupor.

Much beyond his ability to ask for help, 
his hurting family proceed to rescue him.
Under the humbling load of drug addiction
he staggers into another rehab facility.

But the often slippery climb to recovery
is never easy. It's yet another chance for him
to submit to a slow and delicate therapy on
his brain — whose structure and functions 

are badly impacted by years-long use of
the drug. The healing process is a labour
of commitment and discipline, coupled with
patience to allow the brain to adapt back

toward normalcy by gradually regenerating
and rebalancing itself. In a gruelling task,
he's expected to learn to care for a body that
now must struggle to work in a different way.

Desiring to put their lives back together many
druggies have been able to crawl their way out
of the sinister shadow — a big chunk of them
through the guiding light of structured help.

Amongst them were 'walking corpses' whom
possessed by their 'enough is enough', are
enabled to find the inner fire vitally needed
to rekindle the cold embers of self-image.

There's the fella cast adrift feeling wholly
disconnected from self and the world;
he's mourning the loss of a vital lifeline
that has always helped him cope with life.

He had been through it several times before,
the fatigue, stomach cramps, aches, itchy skin, ...
But, he's in the early stages of withdrawal when
cravings for the narcotic are at their worst.

This initial withdrawal agony is the biggest
hurdle any addict has to overcome in the often
stop-start journey to recovery. If he could
somehow find the courage to suffer through it,

the fierce and ceaseless cravings for the drug
would be considerably reduced, making
them easier for him to deal with. Eventually,
they will dissipate the longer he stays sober.

He's being offered a way out of his captivity,
but he's unable to embrace the opportunity
with open arms because the addiction,
which convinces him the only option is to

indulge on the narcotic, is blocking him from
seeing the available escape route. It has shut
off his ability to get up on the inside to face
the seeming overwhelming barriers to sobriety.

Like one in the grip of Stockholm Syndrome,
he has developed a type of trauma bonding
with the treacherous drug: the more it enslaves
him, the more his irrational affection for it.

With his consciousness constantly revolving
around the insidious substance, he just
can't imagine a chronic user like him
being sober and happy again without it.

That being the case, he fails to see any point
in struggling to remain sober — when in such
times he's beset by an awful illness attended
by a serious depression that is no help.

Regardless of the wreckage of his past,
everything that is dear to him plus the very
essence of life on the line, he's left convinced
that giving up the destructive habit would

mean endless suffering and feeling deprived
for the rest of his already sad existence.
More than any other reasons, he just
won't quit because he's powerless to resist.

In default of any dreams of ever recouping
losses that are manifestly out of reach,
the drug with a firm grip on him serves 
as a buffer to keep his ugly reality at bay.

All that he wants is to return to the 'loving
arms' of the opioid, very much aware that
the feeling of the drug's high now that he's
in pain can be one of the best things ever.

But even so, as tempting as the desire to jump
the healing process may be, he's bitterly
mindful of the horrors of street life that
loom upon him with such frightening aspect.

Savagely trapped with no good choices he
slips into a real fear of relapse. In anguish
withdrawal and cravings plague him daily,
and they won't allow him a moment's peace.

Utterly incapable of rising from the ashes 
to hold it all together—no hope—
nothing to hope for—everything out 
of focus—mind spiraling out of control...

In a fit of extreme anxiety the now rampaging
urge to 'use' prods him, closer and closer, to
the brink of a nervous breakdown; and suddenly,
his need for a 'hit' becomes most vital as.

Sweating profusely and trembling all over
with fear clutching a pilfered smartphone,
forgetful of future suffering, the rehab
jumper hurries along the forbidden path.

All alone with the merciless companion: 
nowhere to go and no one to turn to. 
Wretchedly wretched in additive agony
the ****** fades away into nothingness.








AUTHOR'S NOTE


The Abyss Of Drug Addiction is written in 112 non-rhyming quatrains.

The rendition is a poignant story depicting the sad existence of many drug users. The verse uncovers and illuminates, step by step, the different stages of drug addiction and the mental processes of the unable to function drug users.

The paramount aim of the work is to shed some light on the sinister shadow of drug addiction: to unveil to all and sundry, especially teenagers and the youths, the hazards of drug abuse and the vicious downward spiral that can be caused by it. 

Just as the euphoric experience of all kinds of hard drugs differ significantly, so are their withdrawal symptoms. Despite their seeming surface unrelatedness, whichever hard drug it may be, the creation of an illegal and dangerous dependency in users is a common denominator.

[The Rush is described as a feeling very much like a heightened and prolonged ****** ******. A great relieve of tension. It is mostly felt when ****** or any of it's derivatives opioids/opiates is administered intravenously].

In quite a disturbing hyperbole, a ****** addict described the drug's EUPHORIC RUSH as follows:
"Take the best (******) ****** you've ever had, multipy it a billion and you're still no where near it... "

And someday the truth will seep
Schizos, and friends who took too much, will be right
Truth seeping from the sewers and dampening
the carpet (basement first, upper floors later)
Then it will seep through our eyes
and our ears, some veins may burst
with all we found out
Our dark eye lidded friends holding the cigarettes
their stories will be true
There’s a New World Order being crafted
We didn’t land on the Moon. No sky
just a big planetarium around
The relatives of politicians, their children, etc.
picked out for some reason (which hasn’t seeped to us yet) from
random families at the hospital, or homeless on the street
Plastic surgery happens, so they all look believable as a family
and then everyone gets hypnotized not to tell, with pills and chanting
Cause secrets are never safe
just look how they seep
They live in satellites (watchtowers within the planetarium sky)
and wear nothing but white and clip their fingernails perfect, everyday
They think they know all
But he’s not as close
as yogi bear guru atop a peak point
that seeps up his ****** hole
He collects his bark and snow
at what the men in the tower label, 4 AM
then he sits and convinces himself
that everything’s fake, even himself
Convinces, for the least amount of reason possible

Captivating hazel eyes, smooth light brown skin
Beautiful girl, short curly hair and a figure too thin
Classy style, a contagious smile, an annoying drunk, a sometimey friend

Full of talent, lacks self control, a troubled soul lost within

Alienated by sisters, cherished by only brother
Intoxicating to her married lover, Pops pills with her mother,
She and I can't stand each other,
but understand one another

Something not right with her desire to conversate every night
Hearing her voice daily with no vision of her in sight
Something not right with her desire to no longer fight
And us now becoming tight

Whereabouts unknown, eerie quiet background convinces me she's all alone
She is holding a secret, I can tell it in the pauses as she talks to me on the phone
She's silently crying I can sense it in her tone
I dismissed it as a sober experience she wants to get through on her own

Six months later she surfaces looking like a different lady
The sudden curvy figure, suspicious behavior convinces me she's done had a baby
When asked, her reply was "No!" then changed to maybe
Rumors confirmed that the whole disappearing act was very shady and she did indeed have a baby

Never could figure out why the secret since she was 25 years old,
But where did the baby go, No one seems to know,
Another secret she isn't letting go on why no baby to show
Why she gave birth on the down low, No one will ever know

Everyone moved on, believing that is one thing she will take to her grave
She moved on back to the wine, Vicodins and Xanaxes she craved
Back with a vengeance to the rude way she used to behaved
Which I easily forgave because adopting out your baby is depressing and very brave

Again, she stops coming around
I wait for her calls and not a sound
People are asking about her, but she is nowhere to be found
I knew she was on a rebound, but still, she calls when she's feeling down

Three days later, there she was right at home
On the floor naked with her rigor mortis hand in the air reaching for the telephone
Blood dried on her mouth and nose, and left to die all alone
Dead, holding yet another secret because her death is still unknown

All ten fingers missing their rings
Before bringing out her body, her missing car, a suspicious friend brings
The cause of death the coroner can't determine from a number of things
An accidental overdose, suicide or foul play from one of her ****** flings
We don't know, Rest in peace Tina girl,
You finally got your wings

Sparks from the fire float into the night, pretending to be fireflies
Ashes from the fire reminds me of lost souls, searching for a way back into life
Smoke from the fire surrounds and blinds me, like bad memories
Flames from the fire reach out to me, beckoning me to embrace them
Smells from the fire consume me, acting like chloroform
Crackling from the fire puts me in reality, sounding like guns in the distance
Color from the fire convinces me of anger, but also of beauty
Heat from the fire warms me, so much like my hatred
Embers from the fire glow with motivation to prove something

The fire in me is what makes me alive

And as he leaves me with his words of wisdom
His blessing
I am expelling every sound he utters away from myself
I flinch from his touch
A pat on the back is like acid on my skin
In his presence I am forced to tape myself up
Whether it is to keep myself from exploding or from falling apart I still don't know
But there are times when my pieces begin to shake and quiver so violently that I start to leak and a storm rages in my head while the rain escapes through my eyes
It is in that moment that I scream at him to leave, without making a sound
And it scares me that he knows what I look like naked
because he has stared at women with my same body on the internet and has drooled over the same curves and lumps that I have
And it scares me how he can sound so sane. So sane that he convinces himself that he is stable
And it scares me that no one but me and my mother will ever truly understand how distorted his thought process is
All this fear and anger sit, rotting inside my stomach and at the center of the mass of hate, there is a spot of sadness for the good dad that left when I began to understand the things a young child should not be able to understand

Reluctant traveler on a dusty road
on a path not of his choosing..
As he struggles with his load,
he wonders what he is losing.

Feet blistered from the harrowing walk
face weathered from the sun
his hands, they bleed
his throat is parched,
yet water does little for the need.

He convinces himself it is for the best
And accepts it in his mind.
But his heart is hesitant to catch up to his head
afraid there, of what it might find.

Reluctant traveler on the choppy seas
distance has not been smooth sailing..
His conflicted soul he tries to appease,
and he wonders if he is failing.

Steadily he moves, still looking back to the shore
of the ocean inside his mind.
Meanwhile, waiting at his horizon’s door,
is what he had prayed to find.

She waits for him inside his eyes
so deep he cannot see her
behind the lens where truth resides,
she waits for him to free her.

But on his boat he drifts along
carried by the current’s roll,
still looking back, he misses the beacon song
from the lighthouse of her soul.

And so she waits
resting deep,
deep within the ocean of his eyes.
As off he drifts,
drifts to sleep
while the emerald currents reflect the skies.

Their paths, though seemingly guided
may never come parallel;
And kismet conspired with the stars and collided
but only time can tell…

"What's going on," my love said to the puppy
and me. "Everybody's up at 5 a.m.?
In the dark, we all went out to the backyard
where crickets hummed and the pool lay waiting,
and the damp grass welcomed our bare feet.
Every new day, every morning cup of steaming
coffee, every couch cuddle convinces me that a happy
life begins with a renewed sense of wonder at how darkness
shapes and frames the rising sun of love.

Drug; he controls my brain.
He stirs an irresistible blend of chemicals in my body and convinces me to fall for him; he increases blood flow to the primitive areas of my brain and activates the circuits responsible for love and desire.

Adrenaline; he balances my stress.
He keeps my heart strong and healthy as thoughts of him and us dominate me and excite me, prompting me to get tachycardia (fast heart rate above 100 bpm) and my blood pressure to rise.

Dopamine; he regulates my focus.
He stimulates desire and triggers pleasure in me; I remember everything about us, then forget about my surroundings; I am motivated to please him, then I daydream and become unable to stay on task.

Serotonin; he stabilizes my mood.
He charms and induces me to perspire and relax, crave and distance him, lose and gain sleep, feel pain and relief, get happy and upset, and decrease and increase my immune system functions.

Medication; he forces my loveswept cells to go haywire.
He has cured my lovesickness, shooed away my regrets, helped me move on from my past, boosted my (self-)confidence, made me look forward to tomorrow, and offered me a ticket to bliss.

Oxytocin; he enables me to produce lovestruck hormones.
He affects my moral molecules as he attracts my undivided attention, pushes me to trust him, raises attachment and empathy, brings psychological stability, and encourages me to want to be closer to him.

Vasopressin; he causes me to secrete lovetastic chemicals.
He renders me monogamous and continues to have me hooked onto him; he makes me thirst for him, display amorous behavior, defend him and us, and maintain a strong partnership.

the root of my problems, does not have a root at all, its like  not string or a tail of bread crumbs I can follow back to a single moment, it isnt a suppressed thought, its a voice that convinces me my thoughts were worth suppressing me in the first place.

Your skin's so pure and humane.
Sure you have what it takes to make me insane.
Soft lips and soft skin convinces me that you're the blame.
Vision me on the hood of your car, cliche'd kisses in the rain.
Although you don't know me.
After the night, you won't have to worry.
With a Virgo touch so worthy.
An undying spirit so earthy.
Wish you may hold me forever?
Stand within the clouds together?
Continuous nights like this, we'll phase every weather.
Goddess of love, I could do no wrong.
Kiss me hard. Kiss me long.
****** me deep to our song.
Feel me strong.
**** with me heavy and a lifetime of pleasure awaits.
Such a far distance away. Such a true feel at stake.
It's up to us to design a future that we glimpse in our mind.
Making something out of nothing is our shine.
Don't be afraid, follow me and climb.
The future is yours, pay attention to the signs.

Justifies the bad
Takes credit for the good

Convinces you to go to war
And that your desires make you a *****

Your weird if you don't like our junk food
And you better not express your real mood

Your personality is not your own
And if it is your all alone

Sometimes I think I can get through anything.
Wrong again – except, I made it to the city
with my patience still intact. I liked the early morning
best, deer in the wheat and crows in the corn.
Midday the sky turned blue and warm wind
rolled over the Ohio hills,
but I was too sick in the backseat to notice.
No matter. Indiana gas station as the clouds
start to roll in. Here the land is flat
and brown and empty. The sky
comes down to touch the earth and everything
goes gray. Finally I’m behind the wheel
and I wish it had been like this the whole way.
I can go fast on the highway and it feels
like traveling back in time, cruising in reverse
the way we came back from Utah years ago.
When the heavens open I’m not scared –
I’ve met god before, just like this – Midwest
melody of rain against the pavement,
or just the song of shutting eyes.

2.
But I didn’t sleep last night. I was too busy
thinking about all the songs I’ve forgotten.
When you’re old, music is supposed to help
you meet yourself again for the first time.
I wish that could happen now – so I pick songs
that matter. Missouri is warm and windy
and it takes all day before I can escape. The arch,
the Mississippi – portrait of a city
that I know must be so ugly on the inside.
Or maybe I like it here. I read O’Hara
in the hotel room alone – I don’t have words
to fill a city that way. The din of beautiful comfort
resonates within this bubble – I stay back,
linger by myself.

3.
What a long day – it’s only 10 in the morning
when Katharine convinces me to fly back.
So I picked out all those songs for nothing –
oh well. It’s not the first time
I’ve done something in vain. Puddles standing
on the sidewalks – it doesn’t matter
if my shoes stay dry. I am guilty
of the default answer – I don’t really want
to hear the question, I just want my voice
to be the most important sound in the room.
At the same time, I don’t like to be the center
of attention – I dissolve to the edges,
wait until I can slip through the cracks unnoticed.
Later we bond about Thursday’s drive –
how we were both afraid, but didn’t want to say it.
I can’t keep my eyes open on the plane,
but I also can’t sleep. Dusk comes faster
than it’s supposed to – we miss an hour.
On the tarmac in Virginia the wind is dry and hot –
it’s too warm for March, and I don’t know what
to make of it. I wait on a bench for my friends
and beside me, a woman cries, but I don’t say anything.
I’m always at a loss for words around strangers.
On the hour ride home we try to figure it out –
what we’re each saying in our coded conversations.
All weekend I heard words, but never the right ones –
for all the intricacies of human language,
it’s insurmountably difficult to tell you how I feel.

4.
So I’m not in St. Louis anymore –
but for the sake of consistency, let’s pretend.
I could have ridden back with the twins today,
flat farms giving way to the rolling hills of the east again.
Maybe that’s why today feels like an undeveloped dream –
I only have one side of what should be a full circle.
At the farmers’ market we eat jams and chocolate,
and Michelle pets every dog. The air is cold and sweet –
I notice the hint of green around the edges of the trees,
the bright yellow of forsythia and the crocuses.
We’ve arrived at the in-between: soon, I won’t remember
winter, but I have a feeling that what has followed me
the last few months might stick around.

I sometimes wish I was more like J. The whole world helps support her, feels sorry for her. She can cry. She can convince people to think what she wants them to think. She holds an enormous amount of power. She convinces people that she is delicate and they do things for her- like D helping her with the FBI job and her professor practically re-writing her Fulbright essay in an intellectual way. Her writing just isn't as organized, but she seeks help and people want to help her.

Me on the other hand-- I do more for people. When I ask them for help, they aren't really useful. I don't know how to talk to the right type of people or how to get ahead. I always knew that J would thrive with just the right opportunities- because she is highly capable.

I just don't do things well enough. Grades ******. Professors don't know and don't care about me. People think I am intense and pushy and controlling. She is all these things to me, and she sometimes makes me intense, but then to the outside world she is sweet and delicate.

Men are attracted because of the way I look, which is pretty but not stunning or gorgeous. In the end, they always leave me for someone more attractive and more chill.

J's ex however thought she was the ideal woman even after they broke up. He wanted to get back with her but did not. It kind of hurt me to hear that because now I know why he kept emailing her after they broke up- he actually was in love with her. She mattered. She was sweet and cultured and delicate.

The guys who left me, left in a heartbeat. They stayed for a while, chasing my tail. Then suddenly found something better and left. Never returned an email, and I was the one with the broken heart who felt dumb and foolish. If you are not going to be stunning like Angelina Jolie, or really attractive, then it's just not enough to be pretty enough and have a high ****** appeal. You need to be calm, ooze positivity and radiate happiness and good energy. You need to be organized and successful at little things. You need to be calm. For those like me in pain, we gotta work harder.

I hate telling J anything about myself, either positive or negative. When I tell her anything that I am sad about or hurts me, she dismisses it so easily. She also doesn't take criticism well. She immediately points to the fact that I have a lot of flaws too.

C was good to J. An intellectual who wished to impress her, he assisted her with her papers, talked to her professors, visited her at E.

I never meant enough to the men I loved. I thought I was lucky to have experienced love three times, but what does it mean when you make sacrifices repeatedly, where you try to change yourself into the way you think a man wants you to be, to love earnestly and madly- and for it not to be reciprocated at all? J is a very lucky girl. She thinks her life was ruined because G chose me over her for my looks. He left me so easily in the end. If I was prettier and my life was more put together- he'd have stayed.

She easily hurts me with her words, they cut daggers into me. They leave me perplexed. She has an insurmountable amount of power over people.

I have confided in a couple people about her, K and S. I hope it's okay. She drives me crazy. Lo thinks I am a mad-woman. I don't want to be a mad-woman.

I have so much pain and anguish inside me, that it just seeps over. Cup of pain is too much to bear. All the intensity I permeate is because of the pain. I want to become less intense. This is my first week of trying to become less intense.

Step 1: I will not tell anyone about my problems with J.
I will only write about them and talk to R, Ch or a therapist about it.

Step 2: This week, I will work on obtaining a therapist.
I need to apply for medicaid properly with all documentation.

Step 3: Study for Algebra 2!
Test on Wednesday- if you get this tutoring gig, more will open up to you.

Step 4: Wake up early so I can sleep early.

Step 5: Apply for jobs.
I gave up on it because I expected the P.O. job. I did horrible on the interview, so chances for a second interview would be a miracle. Getting a job will help me become happier.

Step 6: Talk to priest at English church for spiritual guidance & for help to control vices and add calmness.

Step 7: Meditate at the gym and stretch for 30 minutes before running.

Step 8: Get a mentor, join groups, attend the right kinds of events, make new friends.
Your whole life and issues cannot center around J. She has moved on, she lives with two roommates. She has Lo & the Asians, two close roommates who are a lot of fun and smart, and she has a good relationship with her dad, and she has D and her co-workers.  She has moved out of her house and moving on with her life. She comes back and accuses me of things and hurts me. I on the other hand, have befriended people who are "stuck" like me at home: Ro who is a struggling alcoholic, Ch who repeatedly -after I pleaded with him to stop- asks me what I am wearing and talks to me about us making out, Ka who is smart but a friend of J's ex C. I was formerly also friends with two Indian guys, one who ended up leaving me because he was in love with me, and another who I called the police on for stalking & harassment. I don't judge any of these guys, instead they talk to me because I am pretty-- but I talk to them because deep down they are also intelligent people who are socially or psychologically struggling like me. Still, the right opportunities only come in the right situations- so it's important that I place myself in them.

Step 9: Keep exercising.
Building up your endurance for running is awesome because it will be good for your lifestyle, but also help you train for future jobs like P.O. & F.B.I. Keep doing 5Ks and then build your way up.

Step 10: Dare to show weakness.**
Allow people to see your weakness so they can help you, without being depressed or whiny. Be yourself. Be fierce. Work hard. No man is an island. Even though my pain makes me want to be completely independant, I need a lot of help. Be humble. A lot of people have helped my family. Show gratitude for what you have.

Step 1:
Realize that winning at life does not mean that you beat others, but rather that you beat life itself. Realize that the only thing holding you back is life's grip on you that convinces you that you can't beat it. Break free of it. You're not seized by death, but by life.

Step 2:
Take care of yourself. Self-care is the most important, specifically the hard stuff. Clean your house, one room at a time. Shower, brush your hair and teeth, go for a walk outside, exercise, cook proper meals. You're not helping yourself at all by doing things you already do and enjoy. If you don't change yourself then the world won't change around you. Better yourself and everything else will follow closely in your wake.

Step 3:
Accept that happiness is a reward and not a gift. Accept that happiness is fleeting and you will have to continue to work for it if you want to keep getting it.

Step 4:
Listen to music you enjoy. Listen to music that matches your mood. Listen to music that inspires you. Trust me, it's important and you'll even enjoy it.

Step 5:
Be mature, but never grow up. Remember how to be a kid, but keep in mind that you have to be an adult sometimes. If you can decipher when each are appropriate then life will be significantly easier.

Step 6:
Get over it. It's harsh, but it's true. If you keep dwelling on things that happened in the past and are irreversible then how will you find the time to make sure the future turns out better?

Step 7:
Remember that you have plenty of time left, but that you have much control over how plenty. Remember you were born with enough time to do everything you want, but if you waste it then you'll lose it and can never get it back. Remember that if you enjoyed wasting the time then the time wasn't wasted and that you will die eventually.

Step 8:
Acknowledge that forgiveness is not a requirement. You do not have to forgive anyone who has hurt you, but people say it's nice.

Step 9:
Remind yourself that your health is more important than others' comfort. If someone feels better at your expense then they need to stop. Take care of yourself first, other people have their own coping mechanisms and they will get over it. You are your priority, no matter what.

Step 10:
Never forget that all problems have solutions. If you feel stuck, think. You'll eventually realize you know how to solve all of your problems. Never forget that solutions might not solve every problem at once, and you need to pick what's most important and what can be saved for later.

Step 11:
Accept that the future might be worse. Especially if you're in an environment you don't have full control over, things out of your hands could change for the worse. Accept that you can change most things however, and you can decide when things get better.

Step 12:
Know that there will come a time when you'll be forgotten forever and that will be so freeing. After you die, someone will think about you for the very last time and you'll be truly free. Nothing you do in life will last forever and soon everyone will have forgotten you ever existed, and it will be good.

Step 13:
Don't be superstitious. You'll worry more than you already do.

Step 14:
Realize that you won't ever get a positive answer unless you ask. No one will tell you yes unless you express that that's what you want to hear.

Step 15:
Listen to your doctors. Take your medications. Do your exercises. They studies for many years to tell you how to not die, listen to them. I promise they know more about how to help you than a random article online with no sources of sustenance.

Step 16:
Trust your gut. If you even stop to seriously consider something, it's probably at least a little bit true. If something is wrong, you will know it. You also know when that opinion is yours, or the one you've been tricked into believing is yours.

Step 17:
Think about the past. In moderation. Realize that the past is only as good as you remember it, and if you think it's better than the present then you will grow to despise the present. Realize that even if the past was better, you cannot go back and it passed for a reason.

Step 18:
Don't get back together with an ex. You broke up for a reason. Unless everything was a misunderstanding, in which case maybe. Even if you look back on your break up and think the reasons were foolish, remember that they hurt someone enough for you to break up. That will permanently damage your relationship, even if you try your hardest to fix everything.

Step 19:
Realize that you don't need to take advise from a random sixteen year old over the internet. Realize you can and should disregard any previous steps if you disagree.

Step 20:
Die knowing you lived.

Every day when I wake it’s that daze that gives me
The choice to be lost or rejoice in the moment
That begins and convinces the rest of the day
To be irreversibly  just as he was

as soon as she sees it she wants it is entitled to it while she is stealing it she begins elaborate lie everybody knows if she truly wants it she has means everybody knows she is gorgeous movie actress celebrity starlet awesome accessory genius she convinces herself she did not steal it the darling delicate chain with finely crafted handcuff clasp and accompanying key she wears it effortlessly just another imperial trifle hanging around her exquisite throat she has no idea how it got there she may have a drug problem a little dizzy even careless but she is no thief what with her magnificent beauty idyllic body prominent discography why would anyone accuse her she is submerged in deep denial why with so much to lose and absolutely nothing but tiny shimmering embellishment to gain why do tell would anyone point a finger at her she probably wasn’t even ever there at that dicey store she never tried on the astronomically overpriced bling it may have been her dodgy handlers or stylist’s suspect mismanagement and subsequent loan hypothesis she is positively not a thief it’s too insignificant an item to squabble about a mere gold necklace the whole incident ridiculously overblown cruel in fact she hates the miserable paltry piece of jewelry here take it back she insists it never graced her illustrious neck if anything perhaps a cheap ploy by Venice Beach shop to enhance it’s value oh the genuine necklace that she stole

she whispers poetic metaphors
comprised of beautiful words
into thirsty ears
and watches as hungry eyes
become enveloped with stars
as they imagine the beauty
of her love

she tells them
¨he is the earth
and i am his moon
orbiting around him¨
orbiting for him

but
you see
an orbital´s path
is not paved by love
for she often asks herself
if she was really in love at all
or was it simply
his proximity
which so forcefully
pulled her in

for closeness
is what tore the moon
from her own established path
amongst the stars
when she encountered
the inescapable gravity
of another celestial body

the moon
diminutive and frail
in comparison
had no choice
but to succumb to the earth´s captivation
and redirect her path
to assume a new orbit
around a new focus

instead of progressing forward
she now knows nothing
but the same hideous loop
and like a scratched record
it repeats itself
over
         and over
                           and over
                                            and over
again

and every taste of freedom
simply brings her careening even quicker
around the next corner
until she becomes
all too familiar
with the same series of events

so she convinces herself
she's fallen in love
then that she's fallen
back out of it again
except
she hasn't really fallen anywhere
her mind simply adapts
a new narration
for the same spiral storyline

she never really loved him
for while they were close
momentum prevented their hearts
from ever truly touching
(for if the moon and the earth
drifted too close
they would collide)
and she will never know
now that she has become entranced
by a new planetary orbit

and as she tells the story
of how the moon
fell for the earth
the paradox of orbitals
was the perfect disguise
for her sinister love


x.

My mind is a totalitarian regime.

I build up walls, paranoia, panopticon. (And to me, Denmark is a prison.)

Keep the voices, the evils of the world out.

An ideology, power, purpose,

Convinces me of the diseases, the deviants,

That risks an illusion to be shattered.

I am my own dictator, hail.

I control words—words are power—

I write my own narratives, make my own excuses,

Create heroines and gods to populate the prison walls. (He was a son of God—a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that—and he must be about his Father’s business, the service of a vast, ******, and meretricious beauty.)

I rewrite constellations, make them smaller,

Build babels, buying more time.  

I tell that amnesiac blackness: that it cannot hurt me; it can’t touch me.

Those labyrinthian libraries of sky charts and lovely flower dictionaries, rooms of polychromatic paintings, which I gathered with gayety as a child—I’m still a child—I haul into the fire,

Ignorant wretch.

We live a part of a global economy, where inclusivity and transparency criticize, perfect.

I can’t stand the critics, I cry, ******!,

Condemn them to death by a thousand cuts,

Slicing and dicing, I can hear their silent pleas,

They speak to me, You are loved, Let your family in, Please stop

Please please please stop please stop stop stop speak to please stop speak to me

Horrible hungry faces, they don’t cry as I peal skin from bone,

With shards I crush those voices, with glass, broken mirrors,

Me to speak stop please to speak stop stop stop please stop please please please  

Break down the walls,

why should you die before your time?
An open market is prone to crisis,

These newcomers, it only takes one to break your heart.

Things with merit are gems; scarcity creates value.

Enjoy the labour of love and life, it is a gift of God,

Dance under pixel skies, they **** pride, ****,

Open the floodgates, the dictatorship crumbles and crumples under the weight of these tired eyes

That see light rushing out from the cell window as visions and vicissitudes

A cry from the streets outside

The end is nigh, Night is coming!

One cannot sleep with starry skies in the eyes.

Stay awake, because the guards are coming,

Remember—you are to be tried for warcrimes, hail.

You and me, we can shuffle off this mortal coil, our self slaughter a mere trifle

In this ocean of failed realties, as man to cosmos.  (All I want is blackness. Blackness and silence.)

Cause this flesh to melt I beg,

Keep cutting, smaller pieces,

No, the sunrises, it’s ****** and orange,

Citrus, it burns in these wounds,

I feel pain, I feel, warm with this ambiance,

A jacket to prevent morning chill, breathing wisps,

I don’t want to leave, I don’t want to die,

I don’t I don’t now don’t don’t don’t no I don’t want to leave no leave me

Wait!—


(Feb 7 2016)

The thing I wear when I’m depressed.
The thing I wear under stress.
When I’m angry I go to the mask’s caress.
I cradle my emotions in a nest.
Only to later have them thrown off my chest.
But still I go back to the mask’s concealing crest.

The mask’s magic is deceiving
It convinces me that hiding my emotions brings healing.
But listen now, listen don’t wait!
If wear the mask you will have it’s fate.
Sooner or Later and don’t forget,
The mask will make you do something you’ll regret.

Walls and chains, walls and chains,
That is the metaphor for containment.
But do not forget that of your own mind
It'll lock you up and tell you lies,
Replaces emotion with logic
But the logic is just so chaotic
And you can't break free of this
In your mind, walls and chains are what you miss.
The mind is what convinces you to regret
Kisses and touches and feelings and yet
You know in your heart the feeling is true
Its like there's a war between the two
Walls and chains, walls and chains
They know nothing of containment.

Dare I ask after your wellbeing?
When misery, woven in your face
Is all I am seeing?

Dare I align myself with you?
When we are of similar mind,
And speak nought but the truth?

Shall I be the only one,
Who every time I look back
Am the only one to do so?

Similarities convince me to do so
Disassociation convinces me otherwise
We are so alike
That neither wishes to make a move

Perfection doesn’t exist

It’s a non-existing standard we can define by nothing more than our desperation and pursuit of completion
It’s deluding and is painful to bare, in fact letting of go of it opens up so many pores of acceptance and contentment without hindering ones ambition of aspiration

One shouldn’t go with the other
Perfection is not meant to go hand in hand with ambition
In fact the healthiest more achievable form of ambition is that which exist without the ******* of perfection in its walls and foundation

Ambition is healthy, the idea of perfection on the other hand is dangerous and so mythological that it causes a great deal of inadequacy to those that still hold on to its empty promises.

Let us produce great results, great being the profound collective exchange between good and bad, happy and sad, what is positive and what is negative

These are not opposing forces, that’s what perfection has convinced us of, they are parallel systems of reality that make and break it equally, as one cannot exist without the other in specific instance

Belief in perfection is as dangerous in a mentally ill person’s conviction to jump off a sky scrapper believing he can fly, it’s becomes more damaging the more we believe in it.

Perfection is not peaceful it is stagnant, it’s monotonous and deceptive
In fact perfection is cruel because it convinces is of a reality we seek and pursue when we can’t even imagine

It has no beginning nor an ending because that’d process and progress
Meaning perfection in a reality of progress never was and will never be but doesn’t want you to believe that, in fact the only thing that brought perfection into conception and gave it the nerve to even exist in our reality as the theory it exists on is the falsehood it’s made a home of in our hearts and in our souls, that’s why it’s hard to imagine but even harder to get rid of and eradicate.

No matter who I meet
Or how i behave
There are those who cheat
And theres me, who gives all I gave

It still will never be enough
Because i'm not her
I will never have the stuff
Me becoming that girl will never occur

You say it so swiftly
"I wish you can be Mel"
Words flew so quickly
You don't even know how I felt

I'm like a penny
you need more of me
To keep you steady
Enough 'till i'm finally she

I'm just a piece
until you finally mold me
and then you're at peace
But you just can't see

I will never be her
therefore i will never be enough
For you, this is a blur
and i need to get tough

Either it's the ones in a relationship
Wanting a side
Not wanting to be patient
Talking with deception not a lie.

Or it's the ones who want  one thing
and for sure
He's not giving you a ring
Just a walk down the hall to the door

Or the ones who kinda want something genuine
But not with you.  
Although it seems innocent
It isn't and sadly he doesn't give you a clue.

This is what hurt feels like
Getting hit by a car
being left for dead
But not dying.
And you cry to be able to know you're still alive
But you're in pain and have a lot of trauma

But I'm wrong
It's worst than that
Especially when he manipulates and convinces me

It's like things are going so well
and out of no where a hot rock hits your head
and it swells
and now you're half dead

It's definitely like
not being able to sleep
Thinking about it constantly
Who to blame
How to make it feel better
how to move on.

Sleeping less than 2 hours a night
walking around like nothing is bothering you
Living with a weight on you
Something that is such a fright
And nothing you can do

Not getting justice from the law suit
Not being able to help when needed the most
Not being able to save your self
Be restrained from the use of your own-self
To the point where you don't like yourself

Esteem low
How can i grow?

Why does it matter
Why do i care
It only gets me sadder
especially by your stare

I can't be helped,
It won't go away.
I'll let the cuts welt,
It will be almost okay.

Carla told me to infiltrate.
To ignore all the precautions,
And breach my resistance under a full moon.

After all, she said, your sadness isn’t a disguise.
Your gloom is genuine, although prefabricated,
Surely you see the blueprint.

You have planned your demise since childhood,
Carefully constructing a fortress of self-abuse,
You don’t self-medicate, she said, you obliterate,

And then you wear your inadequacy like a crown,
As if to say no one feels pain like me.
This blow of sorrow, your prevailing wind,
The smell of burnt hair follows you, your melancholy assaults.

God, I can sense your anxiety blocks away, Carla told me,
Even if I’m baking chicken *** pie
And drinking breakfast tequila,
There is always this gust of despair.
And your current ability to fester a modest nausea,
In everyone, everywhere you go,
While amazing,
It only convinces, even your intimates,
That you have begun an irreversible decay.
Jesus, either you act now or you will disappear, Carla said.

You have one option, Carla told me,
Confront yourself and
Think about death honestly every day.
It is the only way for a depressive,
A man in a life jacket, she said
To survive.

Comfort yourself early, before dawn,
Curl up with your litter of pillows
And in that storm, that tornado you pretend is a bed,
Lie still, stare at the cracks in your ceiling
And search for spiders, Carla told me.
Wait until the disappointment of waking up alive again, subsides,
She said,
And while the sounds of the toilet you left running all night,
Convince you of the futility of self-improvement,
In this hollow moment,
Allow yourself to passively, selfishly, contemplate death.

Do not conjure up the act of dying, Carla said,
It is deviant and corrupt and insincere to rehearse your final moments,
And as you know, she continued,
I have no inherent objections to suicide.
After all war is mass suicide
And where would we be without violence,
Jesus, nothing would ever get done, so no, she said,
This is not that at all.

And God knows with your ego,
If I tell you to think about death,
You will descend into hero worship, she said,
Or worse, martyrdom and quest,
No, Carla said, imagine what death is like,
Think scientifically about what it means to be dead.

I will never get out of bed, I replied,
If I’m encouraged to wallow.
If I roll over before I wash my arms and feed my birds,
I may recoil forever.
You know I have an addiction to thought, I reminded her,
An adhesive meme,
(Why did that woman throw her cat in the garbage can),
Will arrest and detain me for an entire day.

It’s worth it, Carla said,
I want you to understand the carefulness of death,
The miracle of pain in absence,
The cessation of doubt,
The sudden end of futility and horror,
And I want it to absorb you, all of you,
Until you become reassured of its tenderness,
The fairness and equality that ends all things.

There is no need to frustrate,
To pray for significance, Carla advised me,
Free yourself from heroism and
Your self-destructive pattern of wishful thinking.

As it is, the number of women you sleep with and discard
Should be punishable by jail time,
When will you learn that fulfillment will never be a number.

And your attempt to write a novel,
Is tiresome, the delusion insulting,
The pretense unforgivable.
And the lies you tell,
The anger you express,
Mostly from a stool,
Undermines everything you claim to be.

You have a mirror,
Probably one that hasn’t been cleaned in a century
So use it,
Study the creases in your face,
Your boxer’s bruised eyes,
Jesus, why do you always look like you’ve just lost a fistfight.

I stared at Carla, my cup of coffee warm between two hands.
Ok I get the death is my reward thing, sort of, I said
But how do I salvage any joy at this point,
Is my life, my whole ******* life, going to be a stockpile of misery.

Christ, you are a perpetual novice, Carla said,
And I have the feeling you are about to drool,
Listen,
Death isn’t our reward,  
But to those who corner it,
A well worthwhile prize.

I don’t want you be puzzled by outcomes anymore, Carla said,
Do they like me, do they hate me, do they even know I exist,
You must stop chasing and being overwhelmed,
Be consumed, be rebirthed by the attractiveness of irrelevance,
Empower yourself with insignificance,
Forgo your Causa sui willingly,
Surrender your need for meaning, purpose and story
And go sit on a bench for a year, nothing more.

You must allow the softness of death to befriend you, Carla said
And when you do,
You will stop being impulsively afraid of everything,
Perish your self-serving search for an absolute truth,
Accept your limits without choking on your limitations,
And your confusion will degrade, she advised.

Carla frowned and turned away from me.
Usually a crow flies by when we part.
If you **** yourself, I want to be there, she said.
She undid the top button of her coat,
Took off the necklace with the crucifix and the picture of John Lennon,
Threw it into the East river,
And squeezed my hand as brief and sudden as a ghost.

Negativity is not always overtly depressive,
Positivity is not always overtly happy.

Negativity eats away, piece by piece.
It hides in the banal.
Its disguised by layers of colour,
Noise, applause.

Negativity is drip fed, unnoticed.
The bland
The ordinary
The acceptable
Even the comfortable.

Negativity keeps you in your place,
Convinces you
How good you’ve got it,
Fosters no hope,
Breeds joy in superficiality.

Negativity is not a natural state of mind.
No one wants it, yet
Its continually perpetuated by those
Who are blind to it.

Negativity tells you that Positivity is frivolous and childish,
Happy-clappy ******-babble,
Is an immense effort, an uphill struggle,
A dream, stupid, deluded, unobtainable…
Well, it would, wouldn’t it? Its Negative.

Negativity sets you unattainable goals,
Holds up a false mirror,
Tells you that you need to be
What you can’t be…

But still you ache, drive, strive
To get there,
Concentrating all energy on it,
To the detriment of all else.