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Ashley Haack  Mar 2014
Journaling
Ashley Haack Mar 2014
Journaling is hard...
Have you ever tried it?
You write each day, about random ****,
Only to find nobody gives a crap.
You fall asleep early and into the trap-
Of procrastination.
This dutiful task is one big opperation,
With the heart monitor beeping,
Time keeps on ticking.
The days smear together,
On the ugly speckled canvas,
Of the 50¢ notebooks,
You store next to your bed...


***** journaling,
I think I'd rather be a poet.
Perig3e  Jan 2011
Journaling?
Perig3e Jan 2011
In time
twenty years
will no longer be a lifetime,
but an imperfectly remembered fraction
'less you've been the rare one
journaling the everyday
that seemed so very unimportant way back then.
All rights reserved by the author
CharlesC Mar 2013
our journaling discipline
formed in six steps:

Narration
some warmup words
perhaps drawing or photo
pen now at ready
where we jump in..

Emptying
first we list
what's to be emptied
put it all down
pleasures and pains..

Removing
these are obstacles
label future and past
futilities recognized
we've trimmed our list..

Anchoring
with shorter list
peering behind entries
find lurking there
Light of the moment..

Listening
this is Creation
WE are creating
cleansing the old
Writing new birth..

Reflecting
mind now diffused
a Cycle made clear
a Voice was heard
new Narration appears..

*Now WE step
into our day
riding our Cycle
pedaling our Way...!
after a journaling
presentation this
weekend....
CharlesC  Feb 2013
Journaling
CharlesC Feb 2013
who journals
out there..?
we know the priority
each new day
is a gathering of
those wrinkles and sticks
and seeing each whole
relating as they do
now to each other..
and then they reach
to something larger
new until now
unseen
until journaling entry
this moment...
Leah Rae  Oct 2012
Suicide.
Leah Rae Oct 2012
They Are Lost Love Letters. Written & Sculpted, Imprinted On The Palms Of Praying Children.

They Are Hauntingly Beautiful.

They Are The Silence Of The Storm, They Are The Emptiness Of Shallow Graves.

All She Left Was “I'm Sorry” On The Bathroom Mirror In Red Lipstick, She's Said It So Many Times Her Body Is Now Bent Into A Permanent Benediction Of Regret.

He Wrote Five Drafts Of His Suicide Note Crossed Every T, Dotted Every I.

Now They Wear Self Inflicted Scars, Like Road Maps To Their Own Insanity.

It Was Her Palm Across The Diner Table At 3am. Her Skin Like Rose Petals Pressed In Submission, Smiling, Teeth Pulled Taunt Across Her Chapped Lips, Smiling, Telling Me She Hasn't Eaten In Three Days, Says The Sounds Of Her Body Eating Her Alive Helps Her Sleep At Night.

His Eyes, Angry And Blue, Told Me He Put A Down Payment On His Coffin Today. He'd Been Saving His Pennies For Five Years Now, Don't Tell Me This Wasn't Premeditated.

It Was The Way Her Body Vibrated Aching In Every Joint, Throbbing, Screaming Into Herself So Loudly Her Palms Shook. On The Way To Work In The Morning, Says Sometimes She Can Hear The Wind Whispering To Step In Front Of That Train, Says She Can Lick Her Lips And Taste Heaven.

The Way He Wore A Crooked Half Smile, Pouring GunShot After Gunshot Down His Throat. The Sting Reminded Him Of Wintertime In The Midwest, Told Me Could Feel The Tubes Clawing Their Way Down His Throat. Someday He'll Met A Heart Monitor With The Guts To Tell His Mother Sorry For Him, Because He Never Could.

She Filled Her Bathtub With Ice, She Fantasizes About The Layers Of Flesh Shes Been Suffocating In For So Long, Finally Being Numb.

The Way He Begged The Stars To Call Him Home, Closed His Eyes, As His Right Foot Craved The Gas Pedal, Screaming Through This Red Light, So He Can Finally Come Face To Face With The Angry God So Many People Pray To.

She Wanted To Trace The Lineage Of Her Family Tree Deep Into Her Veins, Up The Length Of Her Riverbed Skin, Until She Can Kiss The Underside Of Her Own Touch.

In The Early Hours Of The Morning, He Finds Himself Crawling On Bruised Hands & Scraped Knees, Cradled Against Train Tracks, He Liked The Constant Thunder In His Ribcage, The Promise Of Something So Much Bigger Than Him Dwelling Inside The Body He Has Been Calling Home.

She Wanted To Wrap The Tether Of Regret Around Her Throat, Ring Her Lungs Breathless, Tighter, Tighter, Until The Time Between The Rise And Fall Of Her Chest Felt Like Centuries.

He Stood Face To Face With A Motionless Sky, A Shade Of Grey So Empty He Could Feel It Ache Inside Of Him. It Begged Him To Step Forward, Just Inches, The Call Of The Void, Bridge Jumper, Harlequin Lost Lover, So Close, So Close.

She Held The Barrel Of Life Between Her Lips, A Fine Line Between Here And There. Shes Walking A Boundary Built In Her Blood. It Doesn't Hurt Yet. A Trigger Happy Hand, Palms Sweating, Shes Counting Down In Her Head, 3, 2, 1,

He's Got “Wide Awake” Written All Over Him, The Bottle Says Take One, But He's Got 53 In The Palm Of His Hand, She's Got Gasoline Seeping Into Her Skin, The Smell Of Smoke Has Never Been This Strong.

They've Been Journaling Their Lives Deep Into Leather-bound Notebooks For Someone To Remember, They've Swallowed Their Own Self Pity, Call It Poison.

She  Never Knew I Would Have Used My Fingertips As Windshield Wipers For Her Tears. I Would Have Placed My Open Palms Against His Chest, And Told Him He Mattered, At Least To Me, In This Moment, Brash And Reckless Healing,

They Told Me They Found A Muse In The Lost. Hopeless Melodies, Kurt Cobain. Sylvia Path With Stones In Her Pockets. ****** With Cyanide Tablets And Silver Born Bullets. Anne Sexton With Carbon-Monoxide Lungs And A Padlocked Volkswagen. Marilyn Monroe Silver Studded In Sedatives, Pulled Down Deep, Until There Was Nothing Left. Hemingway With Shotgun Shells Littering His Skull.

To Them It Seemed Like A Right Of Passage. A Last Attempt To Leave This Planet Screaming. A Better Than Goodbye. Something Poetic To Carve Into Your Skin, Or Flip Top Wooden Desk, So Someone Somewhere Would Remember The Name, Because They Were Told Legends Never Die.
This one is real personal. Hope it resonates with you, like it does with me.
Nicole  May 2019
Distractions
Nicole May 2019
Paper. Pen.
    Let's write out our feelings.
    "I'm having a rough time."
Cell phone
Online recipes.
    I should cook that soon.
Hotel websites.
    Free breakfast? Eh I'm vegan now so just fruit.
    Swimming pool? I'm sure it'll be busy
    Fitness center. Leo wants to run in the morning.
    Booked. Could be a good night.
Paper. Pen.
    Right. Writing.
    "I can tell journaling is helpful
    because I'm resistant to doing it."
Text messages.
    Leo thinks they were too mean to me.
    I think I deserve it.
    I love you.
Paper. Pen.
    Hm. I should write some poetry.
Photos.
    Wow look at how my face has changed, let's make a collage.
    Oo what else.
    Body pictures.
    Pre-surgery picture.
    Damm I've really sculpted up.
    Reconsiders feeling gross physically.
    Arguable.
Paper. Pen.
    How easy it is to ignore you.
    How easy it is to ignore myself
    And not listen to my feelings.
I am very good at avoiding acknowledging my feelings. I'm working on being more aware of it.
Sam  Mar 2017
Journaling
Sam Mar 2017
Red swirls fill the paper
Marking up the canvas
that once held happy memories

Purple lines twist and turn
gliding along the stretch of cherry
hiding the past mistakes

Blue marks spot the rest
filling the empty patches of white
keeping the reality hidden

Black dots encircle the art
adding final touches to the strokes
and staying whole yet another day
Its almost been two months...
They said it would get easier the more time that passes, why does it still feel like I'm on day two rather than month two?
Apparently I'm doing a good job...why don't I feel okay then?
J Sep 2018
I don't share a lot with people. I share a lot with my notebook.

My feelings overflow onto a blank page.

My worst fears tower in the shadow of each letter.

My happiness bounces off every sentence.

And the things I love most stay hidden between the lines.
small excerpt from a long poem/rant about how writing has always been there for me no matter what. I changed a couple of things to make it more of a poem but yeah here it is.
ZacharyBaca Jun 2017
I'm alone and I'm feeling stuck I feel the weight of an elephant sitting on my chest and  the pressure is unbearable. I'm in a different place but I feel like I see the same faces. I feel like somebody is after me and wants to **** me but I feel like that person lives inside of me. My stomach hurts because the pressure is building so I let out a yell from the very bottom of it. I can feel a hot rush to my eyeballs as my brain decompresses. I can feel the pressure agai Yelling is the only thing that helps. Still, I grab the first thing that I see and I throw it, it just happened to be a backpack through a windshield with a laptop in it. I want to hurt everyone who's ever hurt me and then I realize it was me hurting myself this whole time so I inflict another wound upon myself.



How did I wake up in prison again today when in last nights dream I got so far away. I love running away in my dreams because though I know I should be tired I never run out of breath so I'm able to cover quite a bit of ground when I run away from this place in my dreams. I also like to  breathe underwater. Right before I went to prison I was still flying freely in my dreams I could literally run and jump and fly from place to place but after three years in, I can't seem to get off of the ground. I'm wondering if it's some subconscious thing going on.



The guards yells "stand by for chow!" With elongated syllables and his voice travels down the run with purpose. This old prison has the classic looking Steele prison bars you see in cartoons and movies growing up, it's actually quite eerie. I throw my sheet over my bed and tuck the blanket into the edges so it sits tightly around the mattress and fits snugly in the 6 foot steel soap container type mattress frame that is attached to the wall in a way that you can for this frame up and ******* to make your 6' x 9' space a little bit bigger . I only do this after I put my books in a stack at the end of it because they were spread out with no organization like sub group of war refugees. I turn off the TV, click the desk lamp,  press stop on my tape player, but I let the fan still run. I fold up the drawing I was working on into my dictionary of symbols along with a couple of the poems that were simultaneously being worked on - it's like I have to work on 10 different things at a time to keep my mind occupied. I'm stuck in the cell 23-24 hours a day with ADHD and I was the type of kid to wonder the city for 16 hours on my bike.  I like it because I feel like I'm getting good at 10 different things at once and though I know i it's pretty much impossible to focus on more than one thing at a time I set aside small focuses for each thing in bits and pieces and then go to the next thing, it's quite refreshing to be honest.



I throw some water on my face brush my teeth and I comb my hair back  after I put on a fresh T-shirt, some new pants and my new shoes . Even though I'm wearing all orange I want to look the best I can because it makes me feel good. On the walk to the chow hall we have to go down the stairs and central unit in Florence, Arizona. We all squeeze shoulder to shoulder on the tight run of cells and have to walk Down five flights of stairs and everybody is in a rush but still acting like there just walking casual it's pretty funny to see people do casual speed walks. Everybody's cracking jokes and excited because   Tonight we get pizza and we only get it a couple times every six weeks for they have the menu on a six week schedule. It might taste a little bit cardboardy but who cares it's been years since we've actually had a real slice.  And if you bring some salsa with a little bit of your own cheese you can actually fix the pizza up to where it's quite delectable.  



We pass through the old metal doors and you could fill the air blow from above where the door fan is. As I walk into the chow hall, I can feel tension among the other inmates - it feels like when the lowest frequency on a sound scale with a bass comes in really deep at the bottom of your stomach and a high pitch of the top of your ear that is out of tune and doesn't sit well. You can always tell when something is about to happen because everybody gets quiet and you can feel it in your stomach it's almost like the same feeling of fear and anxiety because the guy who's going to get gotten never knows it's him. I give the guard my last name and I get in line to get my pizza. The food trays come out of the hole in the wall  pretty fast -  inmates that work inside of the kitchen have this down to a science and their muscle memory and pattern recognition is that of an expert sous chef.   Pizza corn jello and a cup for the potent artificially sweetened juice they give us. I'm going to sit down in the middle tables because they have the tables sectioned off for people of different color the white boys sit with them white boys the black people sit with the black people usually closest to the door. The paisas (Mexican national)  sit with each other, the Chiefs have their own tables among  the Mexican Americans. I never sit closest to the wall because if you sit at the back table closest to the wall that means you're striving to have prison political ties and that is something that never interested me because though I am doing five years that is still a temporary stay and I did not want to join a prison gang. But when you're on the higher yards like central unit everybody is pretty much down for the cause so sometimes I will sit back there with homies. Once seated I grab my squeeze cheese from my right pocket, bite a  small piece of the corner off the packet and and squeeze it onto my pizza. I  also apply  some hot sauce and I get o have my friends pizza because he owed me from last nights 49ers game with a bet he lost. This story was probably believable up until the point I said the 49ers won.



while all this is happening in the back of my mind I know something is about to pop off because I could feel it in my stomach. once you know you're good then you're good as far as not being the one about to get stabbed or stomped on but there is always a lingering thought in the back of my head like I hope it's not me that they're about to get. I know it wasn't going to be a prison riot because we all would have known we all would've been prepared with knives ready.



I started eating. Yup cardboardy. Now a little bit faster because my gut told me something was about to pop off and about 3/4 through my second piece of pizza I heard it.



Attacks are usually really quiet in prison usually you hear the stomping of feet, grunting and groaning or slamming against walls so you can feel the wall shake. unless the person that is getting attacked by anywhere from 1 to 4 people starts screaming for his life and begging the guards for help.



This particular attack started with hoofbeats feet on the ground and punches landing and struggling breathing heavy and grunting. You never really want to look directly at what's going down because you don't want to draw attention to the situation or yourself if the guards aren't  paying attention. Attacks like this committed in the middle of a chow hall typically indicate that the person being attacked has to go and is no longer allowed to stay in the general population with us.



I'm Going to say which particular race or who was attacking who because specifics can get a little bit sticky if you are journaling your experience I would hate to offend any particular race or be considered a snitch. three men were stopping another man and it happened really quick. I didn't realize that they had knocked him unconscious and he was breathing really heavy and snoring as if he were dreaming of a beautiful place and had a stuffy nose at the same time.



In what seems like is forever or at least a really long time only just a few seconds have gone by before you hear the guards rushing in. four now eight now twelve guards with fire extinguisher sizes Mace cans, Spraying the men on the face both attackers and victim.



It's crazy because when you're in a room and they use those mace canisters on one person in the whole entire room gets clouded with Mace or Pepper spray  and everybody goes down on the ground and  starts clinching their throats and gasping for breath. some men cannot bear it,  though they typically don't die it seems like they're right on the edge of their last ****** breath.



I just felt bad for the person who didn't get their pizza in time because they're  going to be hungry while we're  all locked down until  the situation re-centers itself. then again the other part of me was a bit jealous because I'm sure the Mace served as a hot sauce and they got to enjoy a little bit of that.  



As I lay dying, I put my face in the ground in my arms and take the smallest breaths possible because it feels like I can survive these breaths and when you breathe deep it stings so bad that you can't help but to gasp for air and cough and perpetuate the struggle.



  I drift off to the beach... Here I am with my feet in the sand at the ocean. I hear seagulls flying above overhead and their calls are panning from left to right like the cleanest headphones you've ever heard. I can hear the waves crashing in and I can feel the sea breeze on my face.  it's one of those days when it's not too hot out but you feel good in the sun with the cool wind on your skin just enough to add A balance. Kind a like a sweet and salty sensation. I love this.



I'm really thankful because last time they maced the whole group it was inside of our living space and we had to sit there for 2 hours and cough but it was only the first 45 minutes or so that felt unbearable. The first time I got maced or actually experienced mace in a really bad way it was when they maced my neighbor inside of the shower because he didn't want to get out of the shower and I thought I could be tough and not feel the effects that much and I was eating crackers while I could smell the mace entering my nostrils. A few seconds later I was on the ground holding my throat because I felt like I was going to die and I couldn't even swallow the crackers I was gasping for air and hating God for this pains existence.



Now again we rise  up on our feet moving back to the run  where our cells are located and I can tell that a lot of the people who have been in prison for a long time who are not in the political movement Are really upset by this because they just want to do the rest of their life inside of these bars at peace.
Ila Jul 2023
I don’t know why I attach these to you
Somehow, it’s what you’re addicted to that sticks
The everlasting memory of you that enters my head
Whenever I pick up a vape

Menthol plus.

And somehow, I can’t write the same words as I did to the red user
Maybe it was truly because he was an ******* through and through
But I still believe that somewhere inside there is good in you

I don’t blame you, which is perplexing
My friends tell me to. Hell, they even call you a monster
But I defend you.
Somehow I end up taking the blame for something I am not at fault for

I don’t really know what to say, I just know I wanted to write
Maybe I’ll do some journaling, or my favorite, letter-writing
Even if I know you’ll never see the words I want to tell you

Menthol Plus.

Unlike the reds, I smoke this to remember you.
The reds were bad, and it’s a bad habit whenever I pick up a stick — but hey, look on the brighter side,
I stopped thinking of him every time I picked up a red.
I noticed it with a friend at a bar. I did not even have one thought about you.

But Menthol Plus?

I am a Menthol Extra user.
The plus has always been too harsh
But why do I find myself enjoying it more nowadays
I never willingly bought it before, only a replacement for the X to get through the day
But recently, I’ve been seeking plus out.

Maybe I miss you
And the way you kiss my lips
But as I operate, avoidance is the best coping
I somehow seem to forget everything.

Am I blocking my memory on purpose to avoid the thoughts of you?
Or have I really moved on?
Is that really all you meant to me?

But I’d like to think not.
I seek out menthol plus because I know it’s your favorite flavor
You don’t talk to me anymore, and again, because of my coping, I hardly remember a time wherein you did
Sure, literally the day before we fought the fight to bring the beginning of the end,
We were talking like “normal”

But what is normal when you weren’t even a constant figure in my life?
We talked everyday, yes, that’s a fact
But It didn’t feel like we were talking

It felt like days without a meaningful conversation
I don’t know
Maybe it’s just me being delusional or me thinking the worst and only focusing on the negatives
But no, I had been feeling this feeling of disconnection for a while.

We’d see each other, it would get better, but then the cycle would repeat.

I guess I’ve been searching for you for months now,
But now I can only find you in your favorite flavor.
If you won’t touch my lips any longer,
At least this pod will.
At least the memory of your taste will hit my lips again, even if it’s just a copy.
Because I guess this is better than nothing.

And honest to god, I miss the way you kiss me.
But we won’t get into that right now.

I’ve been missing you for months
A ghost of a person who wasn’t there
I miss my boyfriend — a sentence repeated over and over to my friends
And yes, again, we talked every day,
But I missed the person who I started dating.
I miss my boyfriend from when he became my boyfriend

I don’t understand why he got complacent or why he was always so annoyed at me,
But again, avoidance.
I’ve decided that it doesn’t matter anymore.
It was perfectly reasonable all the things I asked for

And here again I’m missing you
Inhaling the the toxin into my lungs
Letting it touch my lips
Hoping to taste you again
But this will merely function as a substitute until I can taste you again
— probably never
But for now, this will have to do.
I've changed. Will you still remember me if we ever meet again?
.Friday the twenty seventh of October at twelve thirty nine PM

-I am getting worse day to day, meaning that I am sad again. Real sad. Try anti-depressants even though they don't work sad. It's funny that I use that word since really it's empty that I feel . . . Or maybe hopeless. Call it whatever you want.
The thing about it though- is that I don't know who to tell. Half of everyone I know can relate which means no one even cares. I'm guilty of the same thing. "Just keep pushing it'll pass." Right? I love my job, my relationship is good, and we're financially stable. Nothing in my life is going wrong so I can't pass the blame onto some little problem. I spent nine hours cleaning my house on Wednesday hoping that I would feel better. I slept all day Thursday hoping that I would feel better. I wrote it down today hoping that I would feel better, but I don't. I don't feel better. Who am I supposed to call about things like this?

Not my sister because she's run out of things to say. There are only so many times you can be sad for no actual reason and expect someone to say something new. I decline therapy. It's expensive and I don't want to talk about a bunch of things that I've already gotten over, and pills? What are pills? I've been down that road and then down even further for . . ? Nothing. For nothing.


So what am I supposed to do when I'm carrying boxes and suddenly want to hurt myself? I've never been a cutter. Never been a burner. I want the weirdest kinds of pain. I want to snap a rubber band on my wrist or bite myself until I bleed. Crazy **** that doesn't make any sense to me. I work out everyday. I drink water. I bathe. I eat.

Honestly I'm really high functioning. I don't really spend a lot of time talking to other humans anymore, but I can chalk that up to losing my super empath powers I guess. I call it independence but it could just be exaustion. I'm so tired of self diagnosing. I can tell you what's wrong with someone else in thirty seconds flat yet somehow my own sadness continuously baffles me.

I guess it doesn't really matter. I'm not going to **** myself or do something crazy. I used to cheat on my boyfriend or let someone hit me during ***, but I've grown out of that kind of stupid behavior. For awhile I was writing essays about how to get through what I'm going through which were awesome for a lot of people but don't help me at all

Maybe I'm doomed to save everyone in the world other than myself. That would make sense since there's nothing I can do about my condition. If that's what I want to call it. So I guess maybe I'm just having a bad time.

I'm sure it will pass soon.

— The End —