And then one day you weren’t
at least not like before,
but I still was.

When you bury a scream amidst
the shattering of things, it
scabs over
festers.
It is and
always will be.

But you’re not was.
I saw you sift through smiling hands tossed
towards a sea where you never
could be,
were,
but now are. So you must be is.
And you must be my was.

I’m still that same black hole
accelerating so fiercely nothing can escape.
An event horizon propelled by physical fear
until every time I look away,
each new face turns into was.

The antithesis of each are,
is was,
but still can’t remove is. So was
must be are.

We are centuries of darkness
turned to a thousand trips down the hall
while the silence adjusts
slowly
to us.

"I don't know what the words
he speaks to the walls
in hushed impatience mean.
A perimeter of experience
perfectly seamed
between the real
and unreal.
A portrait of the forest
with no leaves."

It goes like this:

Our noise
The wreckage of being alive
Will eventually grass over into something natural
and unadorned.

Taking our self-interest away.
Emptying decades of ego
drip by
drip.

Forgetting the birds in the trees,
how vast a neighborhood felt passing by school bus windows,
and the way dew beaded
in front the hospital when they said
“We’re out of options.”

Sorrow,
however human,
has always staunched itself just beyond each hallway’s end.

A vastness terrifying and grim.
Like the inedible gristle
from a cheap steak
forever rolling between gapped molars.

Eventually the coping mechanisms fade,
and we accept the bristling fact
it’s never going
to get better.

Bide time ruminating,
how our bodies careened off one another.
Something primally magical
about the curve of bones
concussed by freckles bloomed in desert sun.

And how time has left each appendage
standing suddenly disconsolate
and devoid of humanity.
The odd one out,
picked neither for shirts
nor skins.

You gradually get worse at self-preservation.
Faltering when remembering words
or what side of the bathroom door the handle is on.
Movement eventually follows, leaving you bed-bound.
Taking note, your immune system quietly packs it’s bags
and slinks out the back door slow
so you can wither to an unencumbered close.

I want my sloughed tissue brain
to struggle against a thin strand of humanity,
fighting the fade of your presence
harder than the fact I can no longer spell my sibling’s names.

Will yours remember me?
Or will it stay tied down elsewhere,
bruises being choked into it’s pliable facade.
A miasma of crop tops and denim skirts.

It will arrive,
certain
but unannounced.
The culmination of a life well-lived.
Feedback, white-noise, static,
silence.
Peace as stark as a womb.

Yet when I close my eyes now,
all I see is the gnashing of teeth.

While capable of achieving abstract thought of the highest order, the human brain tends to function best when compartmentalizing data into manageable pieces. For example, the state in which one resides is useful in a macro view of geolocation, but largely useless when it comes to ordering a pizza. As such, our species developed streets, postal codes, cardinal directions, and a whole host of determining factors to describe your home with enough clarity to ensure your disc of cheesy goodness arrives safe and sound.

By this same token, we break down and discuss music. For the most part, all humans can say that they enjoy music to some degree or another.  But for those whose passion extends beyond using the radio for background noise, there’s a point where the specificities of what we absorb aurally merges with part of our socio-cultural identity. Whether this is reflected in your sudden urge to wear strapped sandals and listen to Grateful Dead live bootlegs while slack-lining or constantly refreshing a subreddit so you know which warehouse space is hosting a tech-house set until dawn, the most passionate amongst us eventually become that which we absorb. These things become fractalized versions of ourselves. After all, someone who has never had their heart broken probably won’t appreciate Elliot Smith as much as the rest of us.

It is on the fringes of these musical personalities that we find *******. Combining the most aggressive tendencies of metal with the politics and personality of street punk, ******* is an amalgam of all things angry. Exhibiting a neb-tribalism not often seen in other subsets of music, ******* “kids” (Kids can be used to define ages ranging from 13 to 45 depending on context) understand that a sweaty basement filled with people pummeling one another will never become a societal norm. And they revel in the misanthropy.

However, this is not to say that ******* kids are fueled only by rage. From it’s inception in punk scene during the late 1970’s, the entire point of ******* has been to create a community dedicated to supporting one another during our darkest times. Sure that occasionally means punching your friend in the head, but that’s only because we haven’t figured out how to punch the geo-political turmoil of Earth in the head just yet.

Whether extolling the virtues of veganism, Straight Edge, ecocriticism, economic inequality, anti-racist and anti-racist movements, or simply just talking about how alone we can feel inside of our own heads, ******* at it’s best seeks to improve the space husk we’re all floating around on. By virtue of these lofty goals, ******* swiftly takes on a communal nature due to the common belief that we are all united against an existence which does not reflect us. Rob Lind said it best: “*******’s not much. But for some of us, it’s all we’ve got.”

Then one clear morning in December, my father died. And suddenly ******* was all I had left.

Obviously, I still had my siblings and friends. But after all, the ethos of ******* always managed to echo everything my father taught me to believe. Whether that be standing up for someone getting picked on because they’re different, refusing to place trust in authority, or rallying all the other lost souls and building your own society two steps to the left of the mainstream.

So, as an autopsy was being performed to ensure the skin, organs, and long bones of Robert Rathburn’s arms were harvested for donors, I stood in the alleyway of the Nile Theater listening to the bass reverberate through the asphalt as Iniquity, Beg For Life, Troubled, No Altars, and Iron Curtain played to a packed basement below.

Admittedly, this was a show I was supposed to be reviewing, and this piece was also due months ago. However, my time was instead spent shaking hands and hugging people I’ve spent the better part of 20 years building a small, fractured, but loving community with. At the end of the day, I suppose that’s all ******* has ever and should ever be about. Communally channeling the hurt and anger into fists and screams until it stings a little less and the emptiness of the world wanes ever so slightly.

Driving home
I swerved to avoid a dead cat
lying in the road.

It was raining,
but my speed was low
and no other cars were around.

While it did not change the outcome,
it was the right thing to do.

Once, after money had changed hands
and guarantees were given,
I found myself in a high desert gulch
choking a dog to death
with a leash pulled through a fence.

Gasping and afraid,
still full of love.

Having never before
hurt something beautiful,
screaming apologies
at an empty backseat kennel
was new to me.

If it were human,
mail would still arrive at the doorstep
while he laid among the river
rocks and cactus.

But I can't go to the better place
everyone says we go.
Drag it back home
make things right again.

Perhaps this is why,
years later
I finally found peace
the moment hands wrapped my throat

Considering the concept of getting ready
is to appreciate
mundane as ritual.
A prima appliqué of mud and essential oils
in a 6 inch
by 8 inch
circular backlit mirror.

Piece by piece
assemblage by both brush and
blade, moving intimacy beneath the
surface. Planting highlighted foot forward.

Astringent, cotton swabs, dissolving wipes, Naked 2 palette, tweezers, contact solution, foundation, liquid liner, pencil, pen, powder, and brush.

Trying,
trying to be an old self
and do the things you used to love,
Not just sitting in a big
pile of failures,
every day on that couch.

The ache of hurt. We idolize it,
twist it,
build it into something less ugly.
See love where there is none.
Worship the air and ask it to do the same.

After the highlight blend is complete,
there follows a pause of about a thousand years.
By the time you say what you mean,
I will be long gone.

In repose,
your short
night-time breathing
quarter-turned on the edge of the couch
until you faced my chest
and drifted peacefully.

Finding the right orientation
in coordinance to my prone form
took time, is all.
Fourth person in your family
to come around to the idea
of having an extra pair of legs
to walk y(our) dog
and tidy up
once you turn from my chest to face day.

Perhaps this is why,
my body locks itself away in the bathroom.
Subconsciously buying a little more time,
until your rotation finishes,
lands facing mine.

Because the trouble,
it seems,
is we (you and I)
have never said a thing,
we didn't mean.

On 28 March 1941, Virginia Woolf filled her pockets with stones
and walked into the River Ouse,
which together with its main tributary,
the River Uck,
drain over 250 square miles of Sussex
via streams,
rivers
and various other dendritic tributaries.

While the water temperatures were surely harsh,
historical weather patterns suggest
relatively calm surface tension,
and relaxed yet steady currents,
allowing for swift submersion

Taking into account,
the chilled morning winds,
her quickened, shivering breaths
likely led to hyperventilation.

In turn delaying the breath-hold
break point, and allowing blackout to occur
without warning
due to hypocapnia.
While unconscious, water can more easily enter the lungs
to induce a wet drowning,
as it is no longer inhibited by laryngospasm
or coughing.

The Missouri River,
by contrast,
rises in western Montana,
flows east and south for 2,341 miles
before entering the Mississippi River north of St. Louis, Missouri
taking drainage from parts of ten U.S. states
and two Canadian provinces
to form the fourth largest river
system on Earth.

At some locations throughout its course
the current surges so fiercely
that old-growth trees are felled,
steam ships are consumed beneath white caps,
and swaths have continued to go undeveloped well into the 21st century.

When lowered into water cooler than about 70 °F,
the diving reflex is triggered and protects the body
by putting it into energy saving mode
to maximize the possible time spent under water.

This reflex action is automatic
occurs in all humans,
and is likely a result of brain cooling similar
to the protective effects
of deep hypothermia.

Of those who die after submersion in freezing waters,
around 20% die within 2 minutes from cold shock.
Uncontrolled rapid breathing and gasping causing
water inhalation, panic,
massive increase in blood pressure and cardiac
strain leading to cardiac arrest.

As this occurs while submerged
rather than the hyperventilation seen in panic attacks,
crying, or shivering on land
any additional survivability that may be gained,
becomes almost immediately fatal.

In order to combat the effects of
instinctual survival mechanisms
once bare skin breaks iced surfaces
such as panicked clawing back to shore,
rescue attempts from passersby,
and even simple reconsideration,
cold water drownings,
despite representing only 2 percent of suicides,
reveal a visible trend regarding near mandatory use
of bricks,
stones,
or other weights,
in order to overcome
buoyancy,
the names of pets,
canceled brunch dates,
birthdays,
and the forced finality
of questions left unanswered
or perhaps answered too clearly.