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Emoni Jenkins Jul 2014
Death or deterioration
Which is more painful to see?
To watch a candle melt away
Into a puddle of itself
Or to wake up one day and the flame be gone.

Death or deterioration
Which is more painful to see?
To know the storm is coming
And live in endless cloudy days
Or to wake up during a flood that washed your loved one away.

Death or deterioration
Which is more painful to see?
To know the Reaper is coming
And live in constant fear
Or to wake to the smell of sulfur that let's you know he's been there.

Death or deterioration
I don't know which I'd choose
Because no matter which fight you fight
In the end you're still gonna lose.
Just a few words about living with a terminal parent.
Inspired by a quote from my friend Alexandra Shaw
DJ Thomas May 2010
We each have a voice and life, it is how we use them not how we might!  

Stop glaciers melting
Huge population movements
Death of progeny


The small reductions in carbon emissions being targeted for 2020 or 2050 - are thought to little to late to slow global warming.  The melting polar ice and glaciers together with our changing weather patterns are now fact. The resulting loss of river systems and rising sea levels will mean the desertification or flooding of agricultural lands and famine, then the migration of populations - starting with the skilled and rich seeking safety, to escalate into the terror of armed bands
warring over water, food, women and land.

By 20 20
Lets hope for twenty twenty
A 20 20


There is now the thought that the huge physical change wrought by global warming can be charted by the escalation in earthquake and volcanic activity.  And that this may eventually trigger huge eruptions in the American and Asian continents,
destroying civilisations to create a planetary volcanic winter.

Again fire and cold
The cycle repeats itself
Destroying nature


Was there a civilisation in deep history before the flood, prior to and during the last ice-age?
This has been researched and written about in great detail during the last twenty years
and many now believe it already proven by scientific review of documents and
thousands of archaeological finds, also by scientists having used the exactness
in the astronomical alignments of ancient monuments
to recalculate there greater age.  

Dead sold souls herd us
Lost mindless finger puppets
Vapid witless words


Sadly, the majority put their reliance and faith in
the actions of lawyer-ed politicians, most of whom evidence
a fixation on their own welfare,  selfish self-glorification needs
and an unwillingness to rock-the-boat once in power*

Politicians thwart
Party politics deafen
Propaganda’s herd


Putting off all radical action required until after the next election.  
Many have gifted away the necessary legal control and power to take national radical action
to a political or trade grouping of nations - in effect retaining only national rights
to go to war, put up taxes, borrow and spend monies.

Please no rhetoric
Complete local transition
Forget politics


We each have a voice and life, it is how we use them not how we might!

Living we give voice
So one voice might yet be heard
All being, believe!


We are left holding our eco-inheritance and children’s future in the palm of our hand.
Please let our love and imagination drive us each forward to make change.


Biosphere a greenhouse 
Target the impossible
Please gift some life soon?


So, we each of us have hard personal choices to make, which will encompass both positive and negative
benefits in terms of our time, lifestyle, health and wealth.  I chose to base my choices solely on how it
might benefit the eco-system and the lives of our children.

My choices are grouped under five headings: transport, food, home, lifestyle and further action. They are:
-  

Transport: Rail; Bus; Coach; Bike;
(I pass woods in bud - a Red Kite hunting twisting, unhurried moments).  
To give up ownership of electric / motor vehicles
and to avoid air travel where possible.


Highly vaporous.
Emissions farting -
barrelling vipers
.

Food: To eat meat/fish only once a week at most;
(Slaughteramas greed - industrial carcase-ed meals. Sheep full of cancer)
To study fast methods of vegetarian cooking; buy local organic foodstuffs;
visit local farmers markets and farm shops; grow my own when possible
and help friends establish vegetable/herb gardens.
To not ever feed, cleave and eat!


Fat shopaholics,
a deadly consumerism.
Cancers meat to eat


Home:   A cottage sized for me, friends and neighbours,
overlooking a wooded valley and trout stream.
Like me a little untidy and basic
.

Crossing the shallows
trout fingerling feed at dawn
White dots steep hill path

Dusk - eight painted queue
river paired mare and foal
Foliage lined dark black


Well positioned to capture the morning sun, airy and light.  
Yet insulated to stay cool or warm. With easy access to mountain bike trails
and long distance bus routes, plus several end-of-line train stations
in energetic cycling distance over the mountains


A differing beat
Quickly fading doubled steps -
pulling separate


Life Style:* A thinking poet mountain biker, living organic
not part of the great noisious noxious ribbons of hurtling tired.

Pressured paced life -
impossible  commitments.
Organic living


Further Action: *I intend to give up meat not because of the terrible cruelty involved in ten billion or more animals
being slaughtered every year to feed the human race, but due to
: 1)  animal farming being a major factor in the burning of 50 million year old rainforests at a rate of one and half acres per second to generate huge volumes of greenhouse gases, destroying the richest habitats on Earth and a principal source of oxygen; and 2)  that these billions of farmed animals
are themselves a major source of greenhouse gases
.

Burning rainforests
Feeding to cleave open and eat
Subsistence farming


With ongoing intensive fishing, the world's fisheries already in crisis and climate change,
it could be that we will run out of wild-caught seafood much earlier than 2030!


Conserve energy -
and natural resources
Don’t waste foolishly


Each of us might have a different view of what globalisation is,
for some this word encapsulates the dangers of our global fast food culture, omnipresent brands,
popular culture, changing diets and the growing use of packaged processed foods
.

Freedom to act sought
Globalisation's curses
Octopus suckers!


For many it is the illegal international trade in endangered species of flora and fauna,  
second only in value to the $350 billion a year global drug trafficking trade that now services
perhaps more than 50 million regular users of ******, ******* and synthetic drugs
.

The label 'globalization' can cover the: spread and integration of different cultures;  
industry moving to low per capita income countries; sweatshops supplying this seasons branded goods
to retail outlets worldwide;  complex international interleaved financial trading instruments being developed
by banks and financial institutions to trade worldwide, create profits and pay huge bonuses, without risk to themselves
.

Globalisation -
orchestrated profiteers,
betting our losses


Many see globalisation as being the beneficial spread of free trade, liberty, democracy and capitalism,
involving the efficient allocation of resources and capital through the spread of technology.
Unelected international bodies and institutions such the World Bank actively promulgate globalisation,
a '‘world government’ promoting close economic ties between nations
.

Enculturation
Our sad indoctrination
Globalization
  

The anti-globalisation movements dislike the corporate and political nature of globalisation,
protesting the resultant harm done to the biosphere, a more rapid and extensive deterioration of the environment
and the unintended but very real consequences of globalisation: the erosion of traditional culture
resulting in social disintegration; a breakdown of democracy; the spread of new diseases;
changes in diet; increasing poverty.
.

I view globalisation and it's propagation as leading to the final destruction
of the world's cultures and civilisations by locked us into a
dogmatic world political doctrine secured through
trade and political alliances of states, institutions
and corporations that remain hell bent on
imposing this world governance. Such
that individual countries governments
cannot consider making substantive
radical change to avert the planet
being pushed into a natural cycle
that will end the human race
.

Caged in Fools World
The people hear heroic call  
Each one a hero
!

The peoples and cultures of the world need perhaps just one western country to
break the legal chains of globalisation and adopt a radical economic regeneration program
designed to make the total transition to a dynamic culture of localised
clean communities centred on the individual not competition*  

Only one tool
National taxation for -
economic change.


Here I begin discussing how global, regional and national economies might
be based on the growth of small organic local economies.
not the repeated foolishness involved in chasing lower cost base manufacture -
each time at great cost to the economy it has migrated from!
Then a further culture becoming totally reliant
on the transport of foodstuffs and goods -
I can here you saying
:

"Oh **** this guy is -
talking about change, changing -
the world we live in!"


Yes, I am and do we have a choice?  But such change will be organic and involve business
in the restructuring and regeneration of economies till we share green economies.  
In small part his is already happening slowly!


Unlock taxation,  
survivals powerful tool.  
Needed now for change!


This is why we need to consider doing something that many of today's
plutocrats, economists, bureaucrats and politicians, would dismiss out of hand or
discuss endlessly in terms of perfectly competitive markets, perverse economic incentives etc


Major solution
National taxation change
Human extinction



WORK in HAND

This haiku sequenced eco-haibun is an ongoing project being penned day-by-day by many that care and take action. Your reactions are all welcome, thank you


**Take back control now.  
Cease all squabbling, achieve act - decisively!

Globalisation's, global control cut away.
Diversity sought

Promote well being.  Act with imagination -
for ecology!

Creating employment -
with local utilities, local food and transport

Incentivise tax,  to create local benefits.
Gain prosperity

Income taxation -  value added tax, aged -
dangerous mistake

Local licensing.  Lead don't follow excuses.
Saviour taxation

Imaginative - energy, food and transport -
local licensing

An alternative - energetic strategy,
greening business

Organic foodstuffs - out compete processed food.
Life promoting health

Healthy government - a healthy population. 
Zero income tax!

Locally taxed - by distance it travelled -
and category

Products bar coded.  Point of agreed production -
and category

Local added tax, by distance it travelled -
and category

Local energy, initiatives supplant.  
Replacing at risk

User energy, capture and storage.  
Eco-dwelling plan

Local water works,  supplanting initiative.
Replace the at risk

User water need.  Capturing and storing half.
Securing supply

Communications, local initiatives.
Protecting our needs

Local healthy food, life saving initiative.
Planting guaranteed

Sort unemployment, local work available.
Agriculture base

Radical transport - initiatives needed.
Change made possible

Season’s colours blur - in ageing contemplation
chilling warm breezes

Ganges dried mud - dust
Armed hungry thirsty tide
Generations despair,  lost

Our politicians -
squabble condemn progeny.
Flee panic and die

HAIKU SEQUENCE FINISHED

HAIBUN PROSE BEING ADDED
Day by Day
This haiku sequenced eco-haibun needs prose and additional haiku added day by day.  Contributing comment and reactions considered for inclusion...

copyright©DJThomas@inbox.com 2010
Akemi Apr 2017
Awhile ago, I had been at a party. I’d listened to someone talk about Kate Moss for ten minutes straight. I left the room, found my flatmate and asked why anyone was interested in anything at all. We’d come up with no answers.

All this started a month ago, and all that started long before. I will not bore you with trite aphorisms about how I survived, or how wondrous life has become since. At some point my mind broke. This is a collection of memories about my attempted suicide and the absurdity of the entire experience.

Wednesday, 26th of April, 2017, midnight.

Couldn’t sleep. Surfed the internet. Fell into ASMR sub-culture.[1] Meta-satire, transitioning to post-irony, before pseudo-spiritual out-of-body transcendence. I thought, *this is the most ****** experience I’ve had in half a decade
, while a woman spun spheres of blobby jelly around my head and whispered elephant mourning rituals into my ears.

Tuesday, 27th of April, 2017, afternoon.

Woke up mid-day. Looked at all the objects in my room, unable to understand why any of them mattered. Milled around the flat. Went online to order helium so I could make an exit bag.[2] Cheapest source was The Warehouse, though the helium came with thirty bright multi-coloured party balloons. I kept imagining one of my flatmates walking in later that day, seeing my crumpled body surrounded by these floppy bits of rubber and a note saying this life is absurd and I want out of it. There was no online purchasing option, however, and I couldn’t be bothered walking into town. I began reading suicide notes. One was from a kid who’d slowly taken pills as he watched TV, culminating in a coma. That sounds pleasant, I thought, whilst at the same time knowing that it takes up to three days to die from painkillers and that the process is anything but painless or final. I opened my drawer, found a bunch of paracetamol and began washing them down with water, whilst listening to the soundtrack of End of Evangelion.[3]

I’m not sure why, but I began crying violently. I knew I’d have to leave the flat before my flatmates came home. I hastily scrawled a note that said, donate my body, give my money to senpai, give my possessions to someone I don’t know, it smells like burning, it was good knowing you all, before walking out the door with Komm Süsser Tod playing in the background.[4, 5] I’d already written my personal and political reasons for suicide in the pieces méconnaissance[6] and **** Yourself,[7] so felt there was no reason for anything more substantial.

I wandered the back roads of my neighbourhood. My body shook. I felt somnolent, half-dazed. I wanted a quiet place to sit, sleep and writhe in agony while my organs slowly failed. My legs kept stumbling, however, and my head was beginning to feel funny. I found a dead-end street and sat on one of those artificially maintained rectangles of grass. There was a black cat lying in the middle of the road, just bobbing its head at me. I zoned out for a bit and when I came to a giant orange cat was to my left, gazing intently into my teary face. I tried to refocus on my crotch. I couldn’t help but notice a white cat across the road, pretending not to be seen. It had a dubious look on its face, a countenance of guilt. What the hell was going on? A delivery person looped round the street. People returned home from work. Garage doors opened, cars drove down driveways. Here I was, slowly dying, surrounded by spooky ******* cats and the bustle of ordinary existence.

“Uh, hey. You look, uh, like something isn’t . . . do you need, uh, help?” a woman asked, crossing the street with a pram to reach me. I groaned.

“It’s just that, you know, ordinarily, um, I mean normally, people don’t sit on the sidewalk,” she continued, glancing down with the half-confused look of a concerned citizen who is trying to enter a situation outside of their usual experience. I mumbled something indistinct and went back to staring at my crotch.

“You know, I can, er . . . I can . . . I can’t really help,” she ended, awkwardly. “I have a daughter to look after, but . . . if you’re still here when she’s asleep . . . I’m the red fence.” She darted off without another word.

Had she wanted me off the sidewalk because it was abnormal to sit there, or had she seen the abnormality as a sign of something deeper? Either way, she’d used abnormality as a signifier of negative change. Deviancy as something to be corrected, realigned with some norm that co-exists with happiness and citizenship. I was being a bad citizen.

I thought, I miss those cats. At least they had judged me in silence. Wait, what the hell am I thinking? This is clearly a case of deviancy associated with negative feelings. Well, negative feelings, but not necessarily negative change. Suicide is only negative if one views life as intrinsically worthwhile

I could hear pram lady in the distance. She was talking to someone who’d just come back from work. They thanked pram lady and began moving towards me. Arghggh, just let me die, I thought.

She introduced herself as a nurse. From her tone and approach, it was clear she’d handled many cases like me. I’ve never hated counselling techniques. They seemed to at least trouble neoliberal rhetoric. There is little mention of overcoming, or striving, or perfecting oneself into a being of pure success. Rather, counselling seemed to be about listening and piercing together the other’s perspective. Counsellors tended not to interject words of comfort. They’d tell you mental illness was lifelong and couldn’t be fixed. They’re the closest society has to positive pessimists. Of course, they’d still want you to get better. Better, as in, not attempting suicide.

I talked with nurse lady for an hour about how life is simply passing. Passing through oneself, passing through others, passing through spaces, thoughts and emotions. About how the majority of life seems to be lived in a beyond we’ll never reach. Potential futures, moments of relief, phantasies we create to escape the dull present. About how I’d been finding my media and politics degree really rewarding, but some part of my head broke and I lost all ability to focus and care. About how the more I learnt about the world, the less capable I felt of changing it, and that change was a narcissistic day dream, anyway.

She replied “We’re all cogs. But what’s wrong with being a cog? Even a cog can make changes,” and I thought, but never one’s own.

She gave me a ride to the emergency clinic because I was too apathetic and guilt-ridden to decline. Why are people so nice over things that don’t matter? Chicks are ground into chicken nuggets alive.[8] The meat-industry produces 50% of the world’s carbon emissions.[9] But someone sits on the side of the road in a bourgeois neighbourhood and suddenly you have cats and nurses worried sick over your ****** up head. I should have worn a hobo coat and sat in town.

Tuesday, 27th of April, 2017, evening.

I had forgotten how painful waiting rooms were. It was stupidly ironic. I’d entered this apathetic suicidal stupor because I’d wanted to escape the monotony of existence, yet here I was, sitting in a waiting room, counting the stains on the ceiling, while the reception TV streamed a hospital drama.

“Get his *** in there!”

“Time is the real killer.”

“It wasn’t the cancer that was terminal, it was you.”

Zoom in on doctor face man.

Everybody hugging.

Emergency waiting rooms are a lot like life. You don’t choose to be there. An accident simply occurs and then you’re stuck, watching a show about *** cancer and family bonding. Sometimes someone coughs and you become aware of your own body again. You remember that you exist outside of media, waiting in this sterile space on a painfully too small plastic chair. You deliberately avoid the glances of everyone else in the room because you don’t want to reduce their existence to an injury, a pulsing wound, a lack, nor let them reduce you the same. The accident that got you here left you with a blank spot in your head, but the nurses reassure you that you’ll be up soon, to whatever it is you’re here for. And so, with nothing else to do, you turn back to the TV and forget you exist.

I thought, I should have taken more pills and gone into the woods.

The ER was a Kafkaeque realm of piercing lights, sleepy interns and too narrow privacy curtains.[10] Every time a nurse would try to close one, they’d pull it too far to one side, opening the other side up. Like the self, no bed was fully enclosed. There were always gaps, spaces of viewing, windows into trauma, and like the objet petit a, there was always the potential of meeting another’s gaze, one just like yours, only, out of your control.

I lay amidst a drone of machinery, footsteps and chatter. I stared at ceiling stains. Every hour or so a different nurse would approach me, repeat the same ten questions as the one before, then end commenting awkwardly on my tattoos. I kept thinking, what is going on? Have I finally died and become integrated into some eternally recurring limbo hell where, in a state of complete apathy and deterioration, some devil approaches me every hour to ask, why did you take those pills?

Do I have to repeat my answer for the rest of my life?

I gazed at the stain to my right. That was back in ‘92 when the piping above burst on a particularly wintry day. I shifted my gaze. And that happened in ‘99 when an intern tripped holding a giant cup of coffee. Afterwards, everyone began calling her Trippy. She eventually became a surgeon and had four adorable bourgeois kids. Tippy Tip Tap Toop.

The nurses began covering my body with little pieces of paper and plastic, to which only one third were connected to an ECG monitor.[11] Every ten minutes or so the monitor would begin honking violently, to which (initially) no one would respond to. After an hour or so a nurse wandered over with a worried expression, poked the machine a little, then asked if I was experiencing any chest pains. Before I could answer, he was intercepted by another nurse and told not to worry. His expression never cleared up, but he went back to staring blankly into a computer terminal on the other end of the room.

There were two security guards awkwardly trying not to meet anyone’s gazes. They were out of place and they knew it. No matter what space they occupied, a nurse would have to move past them to reach some medical doodle or document. One nurse jokingly said, “It’s ER. If you’re not moving you’re in the way,” to which the guards chortled, shuffled a metre or so sideways, before returning to standing still.

I checked my phone.

“Got veges.”

“If you successfully **** yourself, you’ll officially be the biggest right-wing neoliberal piece of ****.”[12]

“Your Text Unlimited Combo renewed on 28 Apr at 10:41. Nice!”

I went back to staring at the ceiling.

Six hours later, one of the nurses came over and said “Huh, turns out there’s nothing in your blood. Nothing . . . at all.” Another pulled out my drip and disconnected me from the ECG monitor. “Well, you’re free to leave.”

Tuesday, 27th of April, 2017, midnight.

I wandered over to the Emergency Psychiatric Services. The doctor there was interested in setting up future supports for my ****** up mind. He mentioned anti-depressants and I told him that in the past they hadn’t really worked, that it seemed more related to my general political outlook, that this purposeless restlessness has been with me most of my life, and that no drug or counselling could cure the lack innate to existence which is exacerbated by our current political and cultural institutions.

He replied “Are you one of those anti-druggers? You know there’s been a lot of backlash against psychiatry, it’s really the cultural Zeitgeist of our times, but it’s all led by misinformation, scaremongering.”

I hesitated, before replying “I’m not anti-drugs, I just don’t think you can change my general hatred of existence.”

“Okay, okay, I’m not trying to argue with your outlook, but you’re simply stuck in this doom and gloom phase—”

Whoa, wait a ******* minute. You’re not trying to argue with my outlook, while completely discounting my outlook as simply a passing emotional state? This guy is a ******* *******, I thought, ragging on about anti-druggers while pretending not to undermine a political and social position I’d spent years researching and building up. I stopped paying attention to him. Yes, a lot of my problems are internal, but I’m more than a disembodied brain, biologically computing chemical data.

At the end of his rant, he said something like “You’re a good kid,” and I thought, ******* too.

Friday, 28th of April, 2017, morning.

The next day I met a different doctor. I gave him a brief summary of my privileged life culminating in a ****** metaphor about three metaphysical pillars which lift me into the tempestuous winds of existential dread and nihilistic apathy. One, my social anxiety. Two, my absurd existence. Three, my political outlook. One, anxiety: I cannot relate to small talk. The gaze of the other is a gaze of expectations. Because I cannot know these expectations, I will never live up to them. Communication is by nature, lacking. Two, absurdity: Existence is a meaningless repetition of arbitrary structures we ourselves construct, then forget. Reflexivity is about uncovering this so that we may escape structures we do not like. We inevitably fall into new structures, prejudices and artifices. Nothing is authentic, nothing is innocent and nothing is your self. Three, politics: I am trapped in a neoliberal capitalist monstrosity that creates enough produce to feed the entire world, but does not do so due to the market’s instrumental need for profit. The system, in other words, rewards capitalists who are ruthless. Any capitalist trying to bring about change, will necessarily have to become ruthless to reach a position of power, and therefore will fail to bring about change.

The doctor nodded. He thought deeply, tried to piece it all together, then finally said “Yes, society is quite terrifying. This is something we cannot control. There are things out there that will harm you and the political situation of our time is troubling.”

I was astounded. This was one of the first doctors who’d actually taken what I’d said and given it consideration. Sure we hadn’t gotten into a length discussion of socialism, feminism or veganism, but they also hadn’t simply collapsed my political thoughts into my depressive state.

“But you know, there are still niches of meaning in this world. Though the greater structures are overbearing, people can still find purpose enacting smaller changes, connecting in ephemeral ways.”

What was I hearing? Was this a postmodern doctor?[13] Was science reconnecting with the humanities?

“We may even connect your third pillar, that of the political, with your second pillar and see that the political situation of our time is absurd. This is unfortunate, but as for your first pillar, this is definitely something we can help you with. In fact, it’s quite a simple process, helping one deal with social anxiety, and to me, it sounds like this anxiety has greatly affected your life for the past few years.”

The doctor then asked for my gender and sexuality, to which after I hesitated a little, he said, it didn’t really matter seeing as it was all constructed, anyway. For being unable to feel much at all, I was ecstatic. I thought, how could this doctor be working in the same building as the previous one I’d met? We went into anti-depressant plans. He told me that their effects were unpredictable. They may lift my mood, they may do nothing at all, they may even make me feel worse. Nobody really knew what molecular pathways serotonin activated, but it sometimes pulled people out of circular ways of thinking. And dopamine, well, taken in too high a dose, could make you psychotic.

Sign me the **** up, I thought, gazing at my new medical hero. These are the kinds of non-assurances that match my experience of life. Trust and expectations lead only to disappointment. Give me pure insurmountable doubt.

Friday, 28th of April, 2017, afternoon.

“The drugs won’t be too long,” the pharmacist said before disappearing into the back room. I milled around th
1. Autonomous sensory meridian response is a tingling sensation triggered by auditory cues, such as whispering, rustling, tapping, or crunching.
2. An exit bag is a DIY apparatus used to asphyxiate oneself with an inert gas. This circumvents the feeling of suffocation one experiences through hanging or drowning.
3. Neon Genesis Evangelion is a psychoanalytic deconstruction of the mecha genre, that ends with the entire human race undergoing ego death and returning to the womb.
4. Komm Süsser Tod is an (in)famous song from End of Evangelion that plays after the main character, who has become God, decides that the only way to end all the loneliness and suffering in the world is for everyone to die.
5. Senpai is a Japanese term for someone senior to you, whom you respect. It is also an anime trope.
6. https://hellopoetry.com/poem/1936097/meconnaissance/
7. https://thesleepofreason.com/2017/04/04/****-yourself/
8. See Earthlings.
9. See Cowspiracy.
10. Franz Kafka was an existentialist writer from the 20th century who wrote about alienation, anxiety and absurdity.
11. Electrocardiography monitors measure one’s heart rate through electrodes attached to the skin.
12. Neoliberalism is both an economic and cultural regime. Economically, it is about deregulating markets so that government services can be privatised, placed into the hands of transnational corporations, who, because of their global positioning, can more easily circumvent nation-state policies, and thereby place pressure on states that require their services through the threat of departure. Culturally, it is about reframing social issues into individual issues, so that individuals are held responsible for their failures, rather than the social circumstances surrounding them. As a victim-blaming discourse, it depicts all people equal and equally capable, regardless of socio-economic status. All responsibility lies on the individual, rather than the state, society or culture that cultivated their subjectivity.
13. Postmodernism is a movement that critiques modernism’s epistemological totalitarianism, colonial humanism and utopian visions of progress. It emphasises instead the fragmented, ephemeral and embodied human experience, incapable of capture in monolithic discourses that treat all humans as equal and capable of abstract authenticity. Because all objective knowledge is constructed out of subjective experience, the subject can never be effaced. Instead knowledge and power must be investigated as always coming from somewhere, someone and sometime.
Lillith Foxx May 2013
Last night I witnessed the deterioration of our current generation. Talks of shots and girl's tight tops, which beats are sick, which beers have hops.

A dance floor full of bodies doing nothing more than rocking; simply swaying back and forth letting their bare skin do the talking.

Girls are laughing loudly, flirting dumbly without pride. Boys are softly grabbing, trying hard to get inside.

I'm not under the impression that a club is good for sessions of intensive conversation; but there's a line of crossed digression 'tween a dance or delicatessen and if these young kids don't lessen their completely bared obsession with finding a *** connection I fear loss of life, regression and required intercession so we may stop this great depression and procede with the progression of these young children's ascension to the spiritual dimension.

They owe it to themselves to see there's more to life than spells of boredom bleached by alcohol and music loud and dollar bills spent carelessly on swaying wills of little girls who get their thrills all fully spilled out of tight clothes and popping compact coloured pills.

And as I danced to pulsing beat, seeing all eyes know not discreet, feeling an overwhelming stream; an ocean trying to break free, behind the dammed up river beds all dried up in the drunken heads, I felt much higher, even hallowed, for while you're playing in the shallows, I know exactly where I'll be, diving into the open sea.
Joseph S C Pope Jun 2013
There is nothing new under the sun, but it was night and the indifferent blinks of gaseous lives above looked down while my friends and I were at a new fast food joint that moved next to a now lonely Wendy's, with a faded sign tarnished by something the new fast food joint had yet to experience—mundanity by time. But I had my notebook with me while we ate outside, but it was in the car. My mind is always in that book, and I remembered something I had written for a novel in progress: 'Nothing is new under the sun. How is it possible to watch stars die? There is nothing new to their dust. We are the flies of the universes.'
It was just when I had finished my BBQ pork sandwich when Ariana suggested visiting a graveyard. I had the idea to visit a Satanist graveyard that our friend, Lanessa warned us against for the better safety of our sane souls—good luck with that. I wanted a revival of fear. How the beast would rip at the roof off our metal can of a car—the greater our barbarism, the greater our admiration and imagination—the less admiration and imagination, the greater our barbarism. But Ariana disagrees with words I never say, Nick laughs with my simple words to that previous thought. How funny it would be to burn eternal.
But then he suggested we should go to the Trussel in Conway. I had no idea or quote to think about to contribute to this idea. I wander, as I like to, into the possibility that his idea is a good one. Like some wanting hipster, I dress in an old t-shirt with of mantra long forgotten in the meaning of its cadence.
That is the march of men and women into the sea—honest, but forgetful and forgotten.
I was wearing a shirt sleeve on my head I bought from a mall-chain hippie store, and exercise shorts, finished off with skele-toes shoes. I was ready for everything and nothing at the same time. And that fits, I suppose. But all that does matter—and doesn't, but it is hard as hell to read the mind of a reader—it's like having a lover, but s/he doesn't know what s/he wants from you—selfish *******.
But there I was,  on the road, laughing in the back seat, sitting next to a girl who was tired, but also out of place. I could see she wanted to close arms of another, the voice of another, the truth that sits next to her while watching tv every time she comes over to hang with him, but never accepts that truth. She is a liar, but only to herself. How can she live with that? The world may never know.
The simple rides into things you've never done before give some of the greatest insight you could imagine, but only on the simple things that come full circle later. That is a mantra you can't print on a t-shirt, but if it ever is, I'm copyrighting it. And if it's not possible, I'll make it possible!
When we got to the Trussel, the scenic path lit by ornamented lamps seemed tame once I stepped onto the old railroad tracks. They were rusted and bruised by the once crushing value of trains rolling across it's once sturdy structure. Now they were old, charred by the night, and more than just some abandoned railroad bridge—the Trussel was a camouflage symbol birthed by the moment I looked into a Garfish's eye as it nibbled on my cork while I was on a fishing trip with my granddad when I was eleven. I remember that moment so well as the pale, olive green eye looked at me with a sort of seething iron imprint—I needed that fear, it branded instead of whispering that knowledge into my ears.
That moment epitomizes my fear of heights over water—what lies beneath to rip, restrain, devour, impale, and or distract me.
But epitomize is a horrible word. It reeks of undeveloped understanding. Yet  I want a nimble connection with something as great as being remembered—a breathe of air and the ideas  thought by my younger self, but I will never see or remember what I thought about when I was that young—only the summary of my acts and words. And by that nothing has changed—am I too afraid to say what I need to say? Too afraid to hear what everyone else hears? Or is it the truth—depravity of depravities that has no idea of its potential, so I am tired of the words that describe my shortcomings and unextended gasping hope. I am tired of living in the land of Gatsby Syndrome waiting for Takotsubo Cardiomyopathy!
But when we got to where the Trussel actually began I felt the fear hit like the day it was born—all hope was drained, and I was okay with abandoning all aspirations of having fun and being myself in the face of public criticism. I was flushed out by the weasel in my belly—the ******* beneath those still waters. I compare it to someone being able to handle Waterboarding, but can't handle being insulted—it's that kind of pathetic.
I stood just on the last understandably steady railroad ties that I knew were safe and watched my friends sit off the edge of the bridge, taking in the cold wonder of the night, and I was told at least I was smarter than my dead cousin who managed to get on top of his high school in the middle of the night, but had to be cohearsed down for fifteen minutes by a future marine, and future mourner who still grieves with a smile on his face.
The future mourner, he laughs at the times he insulted, or made fun of, or chilled with his now dead friend. It's never the bad times he cries about, there are none—just the good times, because they don't make them like they used to.
I watched them in that moment, and I don't know if I can deal with knowing my life is real. I began to blame my morality on this fear even though I already justified the fear just seconds before. But as I write this, I look over my notes and see something I wrote a few days ago: 'Life is ******* with  us right now. You laugh and I laugh, but we're still getting ******. The demon's in our face.'
As morbid as that comes off, it resonates some truth—what is killing us is going to **** us no matter what we do—and I don't want to be epitomized by the acts and words I didn't say.
I was never in the moment as a kid—I was raised by by old people and kept back by my younger siblings. The experienced tried to teach me wisdom, and the inexperienced kept my imagination locked in time. I don't want to go home as much now because I see that the inexperienced are becoming wiser everyday and the experienced are dying before my eyes. My idea of things is enduring leprosy.
But back to the simple moments.
Ariana saw a playground as she stood up and investigated the Trussel. It was next to the river, behind the church, fenced off by the fellowship of the church to keep the young ones in and the troublesome out. Of course, we didn't realize there was a gate and it was locked until Nick stated the probable obvious within ten feet of the nostalgic playground. And that's when Ariana pointed out the bugs swarming the parking lot outdoor lamp that blazed the fleshiness of our presences into dense shadows and more than likely caught the eye of a suspicious driver in a truck passing by. But I was still on the bridge—back in the past, never the moment. Me and my friends are still children inside these ***** forms. I muttered to myself: “Life ain't about baby steps.”
Nick looked over and asked what I said. I turned around, dramatic, like I always like to and repeated louder this time, “Life ain't about baby steps.”
He asked if I needed to do this alone, and I said he could come along. I walked rhythmically across the railroad ties, and heard Ariana comment that getting to the railroad up the small, steep hill was like being in the Marines. I laughed sarcastically. Nick and I had been to Parris Island before, and I know they test your possible fears, but they beat the living **** out of them.
I casually walk into the room where my fear lives and tell it to get the **** out.
When I reached the precipice of the last railroad tie I stood on before, I felt the old remind me that death awaited me, but there was no epic soundtrack or incredible action scene where I stab a manifestation of my fear in heart—a bit fun it might have been, but not the truth. I bear-crawled over the crossings of the ties and the structure of the bridge itself. I felt Relowatiphsy—an open-minded apathy self-made philosophical term—take over me. It is much simpler than it sounds.
There was no cold wonder as I imagined. There was just a bleak mirror of water below, a stiff curtain of trees that shadowed it, and the curiosity of what lies in the dark continuing distance past the Trussel.
Nick sat with me and we talked about women and fear, or at least I did, and I hoped he felt what I did—there was a force there that is nabbed by everyone, but cherished by few—courage. And I thank him for it, but I know I did it. Now I want to go and jump in that still water below—Ariana later says she's happy I got over my fear, but I'll probably have a harder time during the day when I can see what I'm facing, but I see it differently. During the day, the demons are stone and far away—like looking down the barrels of a double-barreled shotgun uncocked and unloaded, but at night is when the chamber is full and ready to go, and you have no idea who is holding the gun with their finger on the trigger and your destination in mind.
Then we threw rocks into the water in contest to see who could throw past the moonlight into the shadowy distance . I aimed for the water marker, and got the closest with limited footing, using just my arm strength. But it wasn't long before we had to leave, making fun of people who do cooler things than us, on the way to the car. I had to ride in the back seat again because I forgot to call shotgun. But on the way home, the idea popped in our heads what we should get my hooka and go to Broadway, and get the materials so we could smoke on the beach.
Nick's girlfriend and her friend joined us.
I missed a few puns against my co-worker as I was sent to get free water from the candy store where I work. I ended up doing a chore because I was taller than most of the people there. Appropriate enough, it was filling the water bottles up in the refrigerator.
All the while I loathed the fact that I would have to be clocked in tomorrow by two in the afternoon. I grabbed the water and got out of there as fast as possible without appearing to be in a hurry.
Impression of caring matters more than the actuality where I work—and yes, that makes me a miserable ****.
Perhaps it's not too late to admit I am recovering pyromaniac from my childhood and the flavoring we use for the taffy is extremely flammable. It would be a shame to drench the store in what people love to smell everyday when they walk in, and light the gas stove. Then, maybe I could walk away real cool-like as this pimple in this tourist acne town pops like the Hindenburg. The impression of splendor is like a phoenix—it grows old, dies, resurrects into the same, but apparently different form, spreads it's wings, and eats and ***** on everything simple, or presumably so.
I forget the name of the beach, but it was the best time I've had in a while. I was whimsy, and high on the vastness of the stretch of beach around us. They could bury us here. But me in particular. I rolled from the middle of the beach to the water, stood in the waves and shouted my phrase I coined when I realize something as wonderful as conquering a fear or realizing a dream;
--******' off!
And I stared at the horizon. My friends came up behind me and I looked back to see it was Nick and his girlfriend hugging. I gave a soft smile, put my hands in my pocket, and turned back to stare at the clouded horizon. What beasts must lie out there—more ferocious than the simple fresh water beings that wait beneath the earlier placid waters. I was a fool to think that was the worst. Nick said as I pondered all that, that I looked like Gatsby, and I tried to give him a smile that you may only see once in a lifetime, but I'm sure it failed.
I wanted to tell him that, “You cannot make me happy. It is usually the people who have no intention of making me happy that makes me smile the quickest.” But I don't. Let me be Gatsby, or Fitzgerald, if to no one else, but myself.

Hell is the deterioration of all that matters, and as the five of us sat around the hooka, and inhaled the thick blueberry flavored smoke that hinted at the taste of the Blueberry flavoring I use to make Blueberry taffy, there was a satirical realization that the coal used to activate the tobacco and flavor in the bowl is sparking like a firework, and reminds us all of where we're going.
It's a love affair between that hopelessness and hope of some destination we've only read about, but never seen.
By this point Nick and I are covered in sand, because he joined me in fun of rolling down the beach. We want so bad to be Daoists—nonchalant to the oblivion as we sit in. Just on the rifts of the tide, he and I scooped handfuls of wet sand, and I lost my fear of making sense and let Relowatiphsy take over again.
“Look at the sand in your hands. It can be molded to the shapes your hands make. We scoop it out of the surf and it falls through our fingers. There are things we're afraid of out there, and we sit just out reach of them, but within the grasp of their impressions. The sand falls through our fingers, and it plops into the tide, sending back up drops of water to hit our hands—the molders of our lives.” I said all that in hope against the hopelessness of being forgotten.
Then he said, “What if this is life? Not just the metaphor, but the act of holding sand in our hands.
I relish in his idea of wiping away my fear of an unimportant life. And by this point, it's safe to assume I live to relish ideas.

The last bit of sand from the last handful of sand was washed from my hand and I looked back at the clouded horizon, pitch black with frightful clouds and said:
“Nick, if I don't become a writer. If I live a life where I just convince myself everything's fine, and that dream will come true after I finish all the practical prep I 'must' do. I will **** myself.
I looked at him, Relowatiphsy in my heart, and he said:
“As a friend, I'd be sad, but I'd understand. But that means you have to literally fight for your life now—regardlessly.”
And he left me with those words. Just the same as my granddad left me a serious heed before he wanted to talk about something more cheerful, when I asked about his glory days fishing the Great *** Dee River. He said: “I wish I'd been here before the white man polluted the river. It would've been something to fish this water then”, then he paused to catch his breath, “Guess there are some things that stay, and others than go.” Then joy returned, as it always does.

But the idea of what was happening to me didn't hit me until we were a few miles away from the beach, covered in sand, but the potential of the night after conquering my fear of heights over water had been shed in the ocean.
Around midnight, when the headache from the cheap hooka smoke wore off and the mystic veil of the clouds over the horizon has been closed in by the condensation on the windows of some Waffle House in Myrtle Beach. There was a wave of seriousness that broke over my imagination. Works calls for me tomorrow by two.
There's not much vacationing when you live in a vacation town.
And midnight—the witching hour—spooks away the posers too afraid to commit to rage against the fear.
But there are others—college students that walk in and complain about the temperature of the eating establishment, and the lack of ashtrays—how they must be thinking of dining and dashing—running from a box, but forever locked in it.

They make annoying music as I write this. That is how they deal.
This one was the unedited version (if I make that sound naughty or euphemistic).
Grez May 2014
Mountain deterioration

Molehill sized problem
In view of others eyes,
Then why is it that mine
A mountain do divine?

Insistent drowning thoughts
Craving dreaded  loneliness
For alone there is no hate,
But too much time to contemplate.

A crowd of people
Yet to understand,
Their molehill can be climbed
My mountain is alive!

It grows and walks away
A steady pace I cannot match,
I chip away with building hate
Willing it to deteriorate.

If I can conquer this mountain
And start afresh anew,
Then this depression ruling high
Will be expelled with no forlorn goodbye.

But no.
My problems seem too large.
And that mountain in my mind,
I can never leave behind.

It stays,
It looms,
Depression booms.

My mountain will not deteriorate.
Appreciate feedback
Joseph S C Pope Jun 2013
There is nothing new under the sun, but it was night and the indifferent blinks of gaseous lives above looked down while my friends and I were at a new fast food joint that moved next to a now lonely Wendy's, with a faded sign tarnished by something the new fast food joint had yet to experience—mundanity by time. But I had my notebook with me while we ate outside, but it was in the car. My mind is always in that book, and I remembered something I had written for a novel in progress: 'Nothing is new under the sun. How is it possible to watch stars die? There is nothing new to their dust. We are the flies of the universes.'
It was just when I had finished my BBQ pork sandwich when Ariana suggested visiting a graveyard. I had the idea to visit a Satanist graveyard that our friend, Lanessa warned us against for the better safety of our sane souls—good luck with that. I wanted a revival of fear. How the beast would rip at the roof off our metal can of a car—the greater our barbarism, the greater our admiration and imagination—the less admiration and imagination, the greater our barbarism. But Ariana disagrees with words I never say, Nick laughs with my simple words to that previous thought. How funny it would be to burn eternal.
But then he suggested we should go to the Trussel in Conway. I had no idea or quote to think about to contribute to this idea. I wander, as I like to, into the possibility that his idea is a good one. Like some wanting hipster, I dress in an old t-shirt with of mantra long forgotten in the meaning of its cadence.
That is the march of men and women into the sea—honest, but forgetful and forgotten.
I was wearing a shirt sleeve on my head I bought from a mall-chain hippie store, and exercise shorts, finished off with skele-toes shoes. I was ready for everything and nothing at the same time. And that fits, I suppose. But all that does matter—and doesn't, but it is hard as hell to read the mind of a reader—it's like having a lover, but s/he doesn't know what s/he wants from you—selfish *******.
But there I was,  on the road, laughing in the back seat, sitting next to a girl who was tired, but also out of place. I could see she wanted to close arms of another, the voice of another, the truth that sits next to her while watching tv every time she comes over to hang with him, but never accepts that truth. She is a liar, but only to herself. How can she live with that? The world may never know.
The simple rides into things you've never done before give some of the greatest insight you could imagine, but only on the simple things that come full circle later. That is a mantra you can't print on a t-shirt, but if it ever is, I'm copyrighting it. And if it's not possible, I'll make it possible!
When we got to the Trussel, the scenic path lit by ornamented lamps seemed tame once I stepped onto the old railroad tracks. They were rusted and bruised by the once crushing value of trains rolling across it's once sturdy structure. Now they were old, charred by the night, and more than just some abandoned railroad bridge—the Trussel was a camouflage symbol birthed by the moment I looked into a Garfish's eye as it nibbled on my cork while I was on a fishing trip with my granddad when I was eleven. I remember that moment so well as the pale, olive green eye looked at me with a sort of seething iron imprint—I needed that fear, it branded instead of whispering that knowledge into my ears.
That moment epitomizes my fear of heights over water—what lies beneath to rip, restrain, devour, impale, and or distract me.
But epitomize is a horrible word. It reeks of undeveloped understanding. Yet  I want a nimble connection with something as great as being remembered—a breathe of air and the ideas  thought by my younger self, but I will never see or remember what I thought about when I was that young—only the summary of my acts and words. And by that nothing has changed—am I too afraid to say what I need to say? Too afraid to hear what everyone else hears? Or is it the truth—depravity of depravities that has no idea of its potential, so I am tired of the words that describe my shortcomings and unextended gasping hope. I am tired of living in the land of Gatsby Syndrome waiting for Takotsubo Cardiomyopathy!
But when we got to where the Trussel actually began I felt the fear hit like the day it was born—all hope was drained, and I was okay with abandoning all aspirations of having fun and being myself in the face of public criticism. I was flushed out by the weasel in my belly—the ******* beneath those still waters. I compare it to someone being able to handle Waterboarding, but can't handle being insulted—it's that kind of pathetic.
I stood just on the last understandably steady railroad ties that I knew were safe and watched my friends sit off the edge of the bridge, taking in the cold wonder of the night, and I was told at least I was smarter than my dead cousin who managed to get on top of his high school in the middle of the night, but had to be cohearsed down for fifteen minutes by a future marine, and future mourner who still grieves with a smile on his face.
The future mourner, he laughs at the times he insulted, or made fun of, or chilled with his now dead friend. It's never the bad times he cries about, there are none—just the good times, because they don't make them like they used to.
I watched them in that moment, and I don't know if I can deal with knowing my life is real. I began to blame my morality on this fear even though I already justified the fear just seconds before. But as I write this, I look over my notes and see something I wrote a few days ago: 'Life is ******* with  us right now. You laugh and I laugh, but we're still getting ******. The demon's in our face.'
As morbid as that comes off, it resonates some truth—what is killing us is going to **** us no matter what we do—and I don't want to be epitomized by the acts and words I didn't say.
I was never in the moment as a kid—I was raised by by old people and kept back by my younger siblings. The experienced tried to teach me wisdom, and the inexperienced kept my imagination locked in time. I don't want to go home as much now because I see that the inexperienced are becoming wiser everyday and the experienced are dying before my eyes. My idea of things is enduring leprosy.
But back to the simple moments.
Ariana saw a playground as she stood up and investigated the Trussel. It was next to the river, behind the church, fenced off by the fellowship of the church to keep the young ones in and the troublesome out. Of course, we didn't realize there was a gate and it was locked until Nick stated the probable obvious within ten feet of the nostalgic playground. And that's when Ariana pointed out the bugs swarming the parking lot outdoor lamp that blazed the fleshiness of our presences into dense shadows and more than likely caught the eye of a suspicious driver in a truck passing by. But I was still on the bridge—back in the past, never the moment. Me and my friends are still children inside these ***** forms. I muttered to myself: “Life ain't about baby steps.”
Nick looked over and asked what I said. I turned around, dramatic, like I always like to and repeated louder this time, “Life ain't about baby steps.”
He asked if I needed to do this alone, and I said he could come along. I walked rhythmically across the railroad ties, and heard Ariana comment that getting to the railroad up the small, steep hill was like being in the Marines. I laughed sarcastically. Nick and I had been to Parris Island before, and I know they test your possible fears, but they beat the living **** out of them.
I casually walk into the room where my fear lives and tell it to get the **** out.
When I reached the precipice of the last railroad tie I stood on before, I felt the old remind me that death awaited me, but there was no epic soundtrack or incredible action scene where I stab a manifestation of my fear in heart—a bit fun it might have been, but not the truth. I bear-crawled over the crossings of the ties and the structure of the bridge itself. I felt Relowatiphsy—an open-minded apathy self-made philosophical term—take over me. It is much simpler than it sounds.
There was no cold wonder as I imagined. There was just a bleak mirror of water below, a stiff curtain of trees that shadowed it, and the curiosity of what lies in the dark continuing distance past the Trussel.
Nick sat with me and we talked about women and fear, or at least I did, and I hoped he felt what I did—there was a force there that is nabbed by everyone, but cherished by few—courage. And I thank him for it, but I know I did it. Now I want to go and jump in that still water below—Ariana later says she's happy I got over my fear, but I'll probably have a harder time during the day when I can see what I'm facing, but I see it differently. During the day, the demons are stone and far away—like looking down the barrels of a double-barreled shotgun uncocked and unloaded, but at night is when the chamber is full and ready to go, and you have no idea who is holding the gun with their finger on the trigger and your destination in mind.
Then we threw rocks into the water in contest to see who could throw past the moonlight into the shadowy distance . I aimed for the water marker, and got the closest with limited footing, using just my arm strength. But it wasn't long before we had to leave, making fun of people who do cooler things than us, on the way to the car. I had to ride in the back seat again because I forgot to call shotgun. But on the way home, the idea popped in our heads what we should get my hooka and go to Broadway, and get the materials so we could smoke on the beach.
Nick's girlfriend and her friend joined us.
I missed a few puns against my co-worker as I was sent to get free water from the candy store where I work. I ended up doing a chore because I was taller than most of the people there. Appropriate enough, it was filling the water bottles up in the refrigerator.
All the while I loathed the fact that I would have to be clocked in tomorrow by two in the afternoon. I grabbed the water and got out of there as fast as possible without appearing to be in a hurry.
Impression of caring matters more than the actuality where I work—and yes, that makes me a miserable ****.
Perhaps it's not too late to admit I am recovering pyromaniac from my childhood and the flavoring we use for the taffy is extremely flammable. It would be a shame to drench the store in what people love to smell everyday when they walk in, and light the gas stove. Then, maybe I could walk away real cool-like as this pimple in this tourist acne town pops like the Hindenburg. The impression of splendor is like a phoenix—it grows old, dies, resurrects into the same, but apparently different form, spreads it's wings, and eats and ***** on everything simple, or presumably so.
I forget the name of the beach, but it was the best time I've had in a while. I was whimsy, and high on the vastness of the stretch of beach around us. They could bury us here. But me in particular. I rolled from the middle of the beach to the water, stood in the waves and shouted my phrase I coined when I realize something as wonderful as conquering a fear or realizing a dream;
--******' off!
And I stared at the horizon. My friends came up behind me and I looked back to see it was Nick and his girlfriend hugging. I gave a soft smile, put my hands in my pocket, and turned back to stare at the clouded horizon. What beasts must lie out there—more ferocious than the simple fresh water beings that wait beneath the earlier placid waters. I was a fool to think that was the worst. Nick said as I pondered all that, that I looked like Gatsby, and I tried to give him a smile that you may only see once in a lifetime, but I'm sure it failed.
I wanted to tell him that, “You cannot make me happy. It is usually the people who have no intention of making me happy that makes me smile the quickest.” But I don't. Let me be Gatsby, or Fitzgerald, if to no one else, but myself.

Hell is the deterioration of all that matters, and as the five of us sat around the hooka, and inhaled the thick blueberry flavored smoke that hinted at the taste of the Blueberry flavoring I use to make Blueberry taffy, there was a satirical realization that the coal used to activate the tobacco and flavor in the bowl is sparking like a firework, and reminds us all of where we're going.
It's a love affair between that hopelessness and hope of some destination we've only read about, but never seen.
By this point Nick and I are covered in sand, because he joined me in fun of rolling down the beach. We want so bad to be Daoists—nonchalant to the oblivion as we sit in. Just on the rifts of the tide, he and I scooped handfuls of wet sand, and I lost my fear of making sense and let Relowatiphsy take over again.
“Look at the sand in your hands. It can be molded to the shapes your hands make. We scoop it out of the surf and it falls through our fingers. There are things we're afraid of out there, and we sit just out reach of them, but within the grasp of their impressions. The sand falls through our fingers, and it plops into the tide, sending back up drops of water to hit our hands—the molders of our lives.” I said all that in hope against the hopelessness of being forgotten.
Then he said, “What if this is life? Not just the metaphor, but the act of holding sand in our hands.
I relish in his idea of wiping away my fear of an unimportant life. And by this point, it's safe to assume I live to relish ideas.

The last bit of sand from the last handful of sand was washed from my hand and I looked back at the clouded horizon, pitch black with frightful clouds and said:
“Nick, if I don't become a writer. If I live a life where I just convince myself everything's fine, and that dream will come true after I finish all the practical prep I 'must' do. I will **** myself.
I looked at him, Relowatiphsy in my heart, and he said:
“As a friend, I'd be sad, but I'd understand. But that means you have to literally fight for your life now—regardlessly.”
And he left me with those words. Just the same as my granddad left me a serious heed before he wanted to talk about something more cheerful, when I asked about his glory days fishing the Great *** Dee River. He said: “I wish I'd been here before the white man polluted the river. It would've been something to fish this water then”, then he paused to catch his breath, “Guess there are some things that stay, and others than go.” Then joy returned, as it always does.

But the idea of what was happening to me didn't hit me until we were a few miles away from the beach, covered in sand, but the potential of the night after conquering my fear of heights over water had been shed in the ocean.
Around midnight, when the headache from the cheap hooka smoke wore off and the mystic veil of the clouds over the horizon has been closed in by the condensation on the windows of some Waffle House in Myrtle Beach. There was a wave of seriousness that broke over my imagination. Works calls for me tomorrow by two.
There's not much vacationing when you live in a vacation town.
And midnight—the witching hour—spooks away the posers too afraid to commit to rage against the fear.
But there are others—college students that walk in and complain about the temperature of the eating establishment, and the lack of ashtrays—how they must be thinking of dining and dashing—running from a box, but forever locked in it.

They make annoying music as I write this. That is how they deal with the inevitable death of the night. They bruise the air I breathe with love and faith and trust with no meaning—without even meaning it. But what do they know what I didn’t feel when I sat on that bridge or cowered on the fringes of the ocean? Their hands aren’t ***** like mine—their confidence does not seem fractured by these words that will never reach them, or their kids, or grandkids.
As day begins to move, I know I work at two and will be home by midnight again. The witching hour—where some stay and others go.
Meredith Dec 2013
Before reading this I want people to know that I have never been *****.
I got the inspiration for this poem from a post on tumblr.*

One
After the first time he put his hands on her
she never thought she'd be able to escape the grasp of the feeling
she stayed up till 3:41 in the morning in the bathtub
sitting in the scalding water
trying to burn the dirt from her skin.
she sat there until the water turned cold
and she had not one tear left to cry
and until her skin was rubbed raw and bleeding.
she counted the bruises on her body
9 on her stomach
1 on her face
1 on her neck
a yellow and purple necklace around her collar
from the telephone wire he abused
from the telephone she didn't dare use
even after he finished manipulating her.
she scrubbed his fingers from her hair
but decided cutting it off would be easier
she washed his yelling voice from her ears
but found that screaming made him quieter
she scraped his taste from her lips
a dry martini
a cigarette
and someones tears from the past.
she couldn't scrub her wrists hard enough
to erase the feeling of the ropes he had her anchored with
so instead she sliced the flesh of where the imprint lay
attempting to release the strain from the burn marks on her skin.

Two
That same morning when she almost bled out
she checked herself into a hospital.
They sewed up the crimson bracelets she made
trapping inside of her wrists
each scream he muffled
with every new stitch.
she guessed they figured out what happened
whether it was the bruises
or the way her speech sounded like morse code but
they told her the police were informed
and that they'd do everything in their power to find monster
who opened the door to her own personal hell.
When the sketch artist asked her to describe him
she told her he was a photocopy
the regular John Doe
medium hight
brown hair brown eyes
nothing special or unique that would make a girl cross to the other side of the street
just like she said she should have done.
When they told her she needed to be inspected
she didn't even flinch
that seemed to be the only thing that people did these days
was inspect one another for an outcome that they'll be paid for
in paychecks or pleasure.
They stripped her down
apologizing for the cold
they took pictures
apologizing for the flash
they held her hand
apologizing for the feeling
but why apologize if he already imprinted it on her body
there's no going back from this
she will never be able to look at a man the same way again
she will always see cold hard hands on her shoulders
even at the warmest touch
she will only see flashes of his lips forced onto hers
when she receives the smallest peck
she will never be able to feel anything but a mattress beneath her back
rope around her wrists
and a freezing cold emptiness inside of her stomach.

Three
After the second time he put his hands on her
she stayed up all night in the freezing cold water
not even trying to remove his mark from her.
she figured that if the dirt beneath his fingernails were still there the second time
the dirt would still be on her too.
she let the filth engulf her
telling herself that all she was was dirt anyway
and as she lay with her head underwater
she screamed as loud as she could
for as long as she could
until her face was red
her voice was scratchy
till the veins in her neck pulsed
and when she finally sat up she was deafened by a deep silence
with no more sound than rippling water and the ticking of the clock.
That's when she realized that no matter how loud she screamed
she would never be heard amongst other peoples silences.
silences full of beeping cars and TV commercials
buzzing air conditioners and clinking plates
quite whispers and loud laughs
full of family and friends and the whole world spinning around them.
she would never matter to anyone
no brakes would squeal at the sound of her desperation
no ears would turn to decipher the morse code she mustered shakily from her lips
no one would ever care that her screams for help were muffled
and no one would have a hole in their stomach if she disappeared.
at this thought
she slipped deeper into the tub
unwraps the bandages from around both her wrists
uncovering scars that would never heal.
She explored the wounds with her fingers
and saw how weak the stitching was
like the nurse who repaired her found it pointless
and attempted it half heartedly.
She discovered that pulling the dark material that was woven through her flesh
would release her blood
like opening a door to another universe.
the purple would quickly turn to red
drop slowly into the tub
creating a water color painting of the war inside her head.
She pinched the strings holding the two parts of her together
******* their rough surface
she began to feel tired
dreaming of a happier place
of a happier her
of feeling like a person again.
she pinched the string
and pulled.
hard.
A-S Feb 2015
Acid tears
New divide, old lost
Water calming the above
Wrecking life down under
Blue chemicals aren't enough
Don't you care to stop?
-a.s
This poem is about how sponges are affected by the bad things human do to nature. With some back ground information on marine life you will be able to get something out of this
Madison A May 2013
There are some wounds so deep,
some wounds so irreparable,
that they cannot be cured.

These are wounds inflicted upon the heart.
These are wounds inflicted upon the mind.
These are wounds inflicted upon the soul.

These wounds are like a terminal illness.
They are like an incurable disease.
They make you a ***** within humanity.
They isolate you and destroy you.

This disease is initiated by the deterioration
of the mind through the realization that this
is an unnatural, man made, test tube and wired reality.
This is all wrong.
We are all wrong.

It is catalyzed by the deterioration of the heart,
once having experienced the pure cruelty of humanity.
It unveils the fantastic false creation of love and the mere
idea that people have ever given a **** about you.
It exposes the destructive outcome of hoping for
anything beyond your own control.

It is completed by the deterioration of the soul.
A lengthy but significant process that rids you
of your motivation to open your eyes to the
blank ceiling above you every morning.
It strips you of your ability to feel.
And, suddenly, you have lost your desire to wake.

These wounds…they are a terminal illness.
They are an incurable disease.
They are irreparable.
They are unyielding.
They are permanent.

And they are destroying me.
Lou Morgan Apr 2016
I try to put on a front that
I'm okay,
but what they don't know is that
the image of you with a gun in your mouth
has never left my mind.
It haunts me, making sleeping difficult
and waking impossible.
While the days go by, I appear to be
more and more okay,
when in reality your absence is making me
weaker
and weaker.
Janine Jacobs Oct 2016
the dutch colony ascended on our shores
replacing traditional african education on culture
with teaching slaves how to pray

we saw the deterioration of black schools
and state-mandated segregated curricula
whites being taught better than blacks
who was only destined for subservient jobs

policies of apartheid birthed the bantu education
and later forced us to learn languages
which was not our native tongue
the youth could no longer be silenced
soweto uprising saw them dying for the cause

we have protested throughout the decades
silenced by the apartheid government
simply ignored

with Mandela’s release we saw liberation, freedom, democracy
and a single education system, we were finally equal
however the legacy of black inferior education left a deep scar
which has still not healed
our parents not able to give us the education they were denied

now students are holding the government accountable
who promised free education for a vote
the movement trending as #feesmustfall

anger expressed by burning premises, striking and rioting
i believe in the cause but who are you really hurting?
why destroy the very universities that you are fighting for?
Conar McVicker Jan 2013
What is time?
Time is progress.
Time is regression.
Time is growth.
Time is deterioration.
Time is beginnings.
Time is endings.
Time is everything.
Time is nothing.
Time can't be grasped.
Time can't be stopped.
Time heals all wounds.
Time ends all things.
Time is limited.
Time is infinite.
Time can't be defined.
Time can be experienced.
What is time?
Given its ethnikos factor and contribution towards a common origin of multiethnic and languages, in values and traditions, its morphological factors of Verthian sub-mythology, are provided with content, traits, colors, and neutrality, focused towards a biosphere ecosystem, where the air conditioning, flora-fauna will make Sub-mythological Biodiversity, where the beings that inhabit it and will be in the range of evolution of mythological living beings, in whose diversity of genetic seizure, they will adopt natural and compound patterns, but always predominant in the pattern biological and organic. Wandering around the world in desert places, in alloys and compounds of classified plants, emptying their species through the hollow of the atmosphere and through the green shoots of grasslands in the reviving surviving evolution of organisms and species that for the first time take a look as a biotype among rocks and plantations, reciprocally among themselves and extemporaneously generating heritages of mythological genetics.  Considering millions of years in evolution with explosions of multicellular and fossilized species extinct in massive and occlusive memories. Inert matter and geological strata will make millions of years converted into microseconds in the Verthian Biodiversity of the Duoverse, in a Psychic and spiritual Universe, emerging in all macroscopic perspectives and parapsychological regressions. Impact They will cause in the maturity of all the diversity of externality and sensations in new topologies of anonymous universes and species of biodiversity, under a pillar of culture based on the Sub-Mythological biosphere process, encompassing all mythological species where the hope of Life and Super life. Transforming systems of functionality under the protection of spontaneous generation and in a matter that is availably underlined in the mountainous tissues of the mechanics of the subset of the air mass, water, climatic biospheres, and biogeochemistry, that in the unreal juncture of and interprocedural reality of carbon, factor the species key and specimen disclosure, in the collection and in sinks, water drains but without carbon.

Hyperdisis, the galaxy connected to the Duoverso, in its biotic diversity, reinsert thick clumps of Nothofagus Obliqua forests, in waste processes, to domesticate the Leiak ethno-forest species, as balance nutrients and repair of the disgraceful disgrace of unnatural toxicity and fragile of the agrosystem, maturing cultures and preventive pollination in succulent transfers for purposes of food webs and the environment. Making the appearance of species more effective and perceptible, reunited in community chains of coherence, to amortize low-resource needs and distance economic-political impacts, in view of new base resources and the sustainability of balance of allopathic crops, for the good of driving extinction of plagues or flagrant excesses not reconverted, for compliance with the exercise of light beings as a parallel systematic contribution and ******-transmission of applicable inputs of quality of life and deflation of risk of biological cyclical deterioration.

Hyperdisis, has a mass of inert matter that creates accesses of resilience, for salinity, rainfall, and human adaptive mythological innovation, given its versatile opening of complement and generation of substances, for the convenience of living beings and No.  Having adopted in the context of mythological Galaxy, related to beings of light comparable to distant elements, by means of Psychic Trisomies and teleportation, for energy sources and soil and water mechanics with Leiak, constituting molecules for the simplification of phenomena of exacerbation of chronic and endogenous diseases. Forests and parks of Hyperdisis in the open and symbiotic, for more airs in microbiological space, in the intimate portion from highest to lowest challenge of proprietary elements and antinomies of hieratic human bioculturation in a showcase of communities with interest in technologies and empirical usability and renewable, each part doing its scientific and biodiversity role in the portico of its home. As a hieratic quality, presenting amendments that are glimpsed and more existent, although it passes before our eyes without the Carbon Footprint, figuring logical mathematics by sponsoring its count more than a shadowy synthetic body, anticipating super valuation measures, averaging them in tiny theological portions, with varied and dissimilar levels of genetic habitats and alleles or heterozygous in the taxonomic functionality of reproductive and biological approval elements. The richness and abundance of this item is delegated to Leiak, in all the revolutionary processes of the oak forests and of the high mountains, where Vernarth directs him and is condescending of his dynamics, from countless temporary revolutions of other species.

Within the gasifications of Cinnabar, there was Carbon in its Life cycle, being Zefián; the curator of the Duoverse, destined for a lifetime, under Universal and intergalactic effects.  Claiming innocent living beings with higher attributes of predation survival in the ecological chain, with the mix of Tsambika and Theoskepatis, granting multidirectional dynamic residual matter for green energy emissions. The feedback quantifies carbon circulation offset options, offsetting the multipurpose CO₂ inventory. At night Zefián and Vernarth roamed the streets of Rhodes, in Tsambika, looking for the distilled portions of the carbon and sulfur emanated by Cinnabar. In the same way Etréstles in Theoskepatis initiating with the Archpriest by virtue of the honors and the rubies of accumulations of water mass and of sulfur and carbonated air, which hung over the low sky of Rhodes and Kimolos. They were going to the Necropolis of Hellenika, when the gnostic rampages were glimpsed in the surrounding slab, minting half of the gold bars for the great goldsmith who erects the conventionality of having the physis imperturbably established, as a matter of patriarchal character. They entered Hellenika and the souls that were hanging around were ringed under the encrusted crescents, lavishing the independence of the night in the hands of Borker, which was reflected in the capitals of a mausoleum. Borker is consistent in saying that he is free in Hellenika, in the myth of the woodworm of the dustbin of the frieze where Etréstles perched next to the strap that Zefián, who would manipulate the gold and alabaster chain, to pull it and its ruby ascetics approaching a final night in the astronomical autumn, in the last parapsychological regression of the god Vertumnus, which would embody the expiration of the Hellenika friezes by Kashmar branches decayed from vegetation and the tears of the Etruscan god Vertumnus. Making the branches of the Kashmar the epithet of heraldry in the noble metals and woods of the autumn and mountainous temple of the one that follows the equinox in the meridian of seven days to the southern and northern hemisphere.

They enter the Hellenika Necropolis, through the upper and lower trays, cordoned off by obelisks in series of petrified ebels, in the square sections of the convergent ones and the linearity of the central pyramid, where they sponsored all the sectors of the stones of the prismatic geometric body, next to some piloneos that flanked the third of those that were in the figurative memory of funerary monuments of Vernarth. In harmony with the radiosities of the Cinnabar, they purged the carbon emanations in the intrabodies of petrified breaths, expanding in the segments of trepidating life of the behavior of the inert matter, crushed by the organic, polishing the degrading character of the excavated prayers, under a superfluous shadow. It was already dawn; Etréstles and the Archpriest were breaking the loaves to deposit them in the bowl of the Day, stretched out in the arms of heaven under the gargle of the god Vertumnus that he forged from the materiality of Jupiter. Vernarth nodded his head to the movement of the winds that cut the profile of a Yawning Citarist in the frieze that raises all the crowns of the princes of the living-dead, making them part of the royal occasion, preparing petty spaces and tyrannies for devouring vassals in Hellenika, Diogenes of Sinope is seen coming out from the lair of his rib, splitting with his doctrinal staff all the isthmic paroxysms, which declared the cell of his life as Diogiversity.

"There were murmurs of astonishment at the surprising response of the wise man because no one dared to speak like that to the king. Alexander asked: "Why do they call you Diogenes, the dog?", To which Diogenes replied: "Because I praise those who give me, I bark at those who don't give me and I bite the bad guys." Again, more murmurs, but Alejandro was undaunted by those responses and said: "Ask me what you want." So Diogenes, undeterred, replied: "Get away from where you are, you cover the sun for me" ..., Vernarth replied: "Look for him in the bones of those who refused to die and fear beyond expiration who rejoices in the cold of the dean skeleton seed, without heat or memory here in Corinth and its Diogiversity ”. Everyone is silent and fear takes hold of everyone in the sybarite contemplation of Alexander the Great ..., expropriating his speed more than a contempt for the cranium that is advocated for Vernarth "
Ethno-spirit and Biodiversity (Diogiversity) / part 14
Sarah Spang May 2014
Memory does no justice
When time comes; fades the lines
A face so dear and dominant
Fades back into mind.

Falling through my fingers
Burned to ash and gone
Whirling into dark and grey
After much too long.

Gone and so with joyousness
Fleeting far away
I'd give the world to have them back
But pain to have them stay.

I cannot begin to grasp
All of what I've lost
I've let this slip away from me
At much too high a cost.
rk Aug 2012
you can be my fella
if I can be your gal
we can go to a speakeasy
and sneak kisses on the walk home
swell

pin me after class
I’ll wear your letter cardigan
so everybody will know
that we are going steady

pick me up in your porsche 944
we can go for a ride
put in your favorite tape (tenderness)
and we can spend the night together
rad

we could start as adversaries
like in every 90’s teen movie
but secretly we will fall for each other
until our relationship culminates
at the party
where the whole school
is getting down to B.I.G.

let’s be facebook official
work in progress
dafne Jan 2015
nobody was who they claimed to be anymore
they changed, mostly rotted
everything is rotting and i wanted to run away
i did not want to become expired at this age,
decomposed into an attitude of egocentricity and midnight humor,
i did not want to ridicule those around, spewing venom consistently
making someone feel less and causing them to decay
i wanted to love everybody despite their capacities, their intelligence, their attitude
i did not want the trend of hating the human race
i cannot stand "i hate everyone but myself" anymore
its time to put an end
i refuse to live my life with negative energy hovering around swelling me up into a mound of stress and forehead wrinkles

hear me out
i need to leave
don't rot me too
thanks for twenty two thousand reads, so much love ♡
Brittle Bird Jan 2015
That smell
of burning skin
like the way I felt when lying
on the bathroom floor

is not the same
as the hollow places
when I take up only a fraction
of the vastness in these bedsheets

but the worst part
is that metallic taste
of bitter end
with every single breath I take

when I can't shake off
the sheets of blood
or knowledge
of what I've become.
“I may be grown up but I’m only seventeen.”
The faded blue chairs were in rows, as could be expected. The building was old and the air was littered with dust; just like you would expect. The light shimmied through the draperies and tapestries and slithered across the floor in tiny slits that cut the room into pieces. The dark worn floors boasted years of scuffs and scratches. They were no longer mahogany for they were nearly black with age and dirt. The whole place was frozen in time. Even the air was reminiscent of years gone by. When you walked in you could expect to find memories nestled in corners or peeping out from one of the many books strewn around. The place breathed nostalgic fumes. Some might have called it “stale,” but many others would prefer to call it “alluring” or “curious.”

This was not her case. The door ****** the life out of the place as it slammed shut. The reverberations could be felt throughout the entire structure. Her anger fueled her along at a violent pace, sending chills up the drapes and swirling the dust into tornadoes of chaos. The floorboards rumbled and squealed in sheer terror under her feet. If you were here you would likely have tread softly and listened carefully just because you hoped the place was talking to you. But since this is her story and not yours, that is not the case.
She threw her body into the nearest chair and the force almost sent her backwards. The girl and the chair hung in time for a single moment, teetering on the edge of balance, but nothing happened. She kicked her feet up on to the chair in front of her out of utter disrespect.

Each breath that she blew carried venomous thought. Every air molecule expelled from her nose was laced with despise until it fell to the floor, devoid of life. You could feel the place shuddering with every breath. Or maybe she was shuddering. But it wasn’t important.
The girl let one lonesome anguished tear roll off her face, but since she was too strong for crying, she ****** her body out of the chair with every ounce of hatred she had inside. In one swift motion she swathed her face with her shirt to obscure and erase the tear. She stood there, filtering the air through her shirt, refusing to acknowledge everything the place had to offer. She dropped the weight of her head into her palms and bit her lip against the pain. She pulled her face back only to check the shirt. She knew it would be stained. She knew because every other time before it had been stained. She listened for a moment before she glided across the floor toward the nearest window.
When she finally came to a moment of rest, the place sighed in relief. The dust rested and the floorboards managed to quiet themselves. The drapes relaxed and everything paused again, settling back into a time of long ago. The place embraced her like the wind embraces a leaf. It helped her along gently as she was carried away.

Not wanting to be discovered, and not wanting to overstay her welcome, the girl carefully hid her soul behind the heaviest drape and emptily marched towards the door. She traced her finger along the scorch marks that marred the wood. The scars ran deep, evidencing a strong fire that had ravaged the place years before. The door oozed sympathy as the young girl shared her pain. Her heartbeat pounded out her sadness and resounded through the door and back to her. She clutched the **** in her hand and pushed it open. She slid through to the outside. She did not look over her shoulder. She did not carry a glimpse of hope within her. The flame in her heart was extinguished with the closing click of the door. She was outside. She watched as the place got smaller as she walked away.

His name was Devlin. “Dev” for short. It could’ve been “Devil.” It should have been “Devil.” He was the one who called the shots. This was his game; his rules. She was just a player who could be benched at any minute; suspended from the league in the blink of an eye. He knew the world. He had been learning it for years. As if the world was something that could be learned; that could be acquired. He missed the most important lesson for he never learned how to love. He had mastered affection and words spilled off his lips like honey. But love was not yet something he had come to possess.

Regardless of his material possessions, Dev knew he was missing something. He didn’t know what it was or how it could be acquired, or if it could be acquired. He only knew that the gaping black hole inside him was consuming him. There was no fulfilling this insatiable hunger. There seemed to be no solution. Only temporary fixes could easy the longing but with every dose the hole grew deeper.

           She too, knew that beneath his smile there was blackness. Not emptiness. Just blackness. There was no value, no gradation. No. There was nothing to hold on to, nothing to hope for. She would have enough black to cover the entire world if she had wanted to paint. But she was honestly looking to survive.


                Time had gone by, but only by the measure of light. Time had not elapsed to heal her wounds. She had covered miles on the feet of one thought. She had traversed only into one idea during her journey and yet she had already reached her destination. It was easy to fall to your subconscious when your body was tattered. When she stepped through the threshold she almost imagined the place. But she stopped herself because she didn’t want to take the chance of contaminating it.

                Her eyes were closing and the soft carpet looking appealing in all its graying and deterioration. The couch and bed looked inviting but that was suicide. She was fighting the urge. She had too. She had tried to purge her mind but one insignificant monstrous thought plagued her. “Don’t go to sleep until I get back.” Her eyes lingered closed for a moment. How beautiful and welcoming this blackness was. It was gentle and comforting. Her eyes jumped open. How long had they been closed? Surely no more than a few minutes. Fate laughed in her face once again. “I told you: Don’t get to sleep until I get back.”
                The first one was the most painful. Even though her eyes were blurred from pain she could still see the look in his eyes. She had to look. The simple thought of closing her eyes would earn her several more. She clutched the threadbare carpet with all the dignity she could muster and stood like a soldier before a firing squad. Every wince squeezed the tears in her eyes closer and closer to escape, but she held on through the miserable pain. It wasn’t even his hands that hurt anymore. No, it was the iron, or the bat, or even the brick that hurt. When it was his hands, he sympathized with the contortions of her body. He felt her pain. When it was some other object, there was distance between them. Six, five, four, three, two… She could time the blows. When he wasn’t so angry they came faster, just to put the girl in her place. When he was enraged, they came slower. Each hit was followed by an explanation or justification. “You have to learn the hard way.” or “How dare you get blood on your clothes?” The indignation in his voice made her sick. “Don’t look at me like that!” “I love you.” Over time she had learned to smile over time. To lessen the pain.

                …Her face was burning. Every fiber in her body wrenched with pain. Every breath brought tears to her eyes. The shaking was uncontrollable. She never should
have fallen asleep…

                You see on the inside he was just a child who never knew love. But that was her job. To love him. He was one of those “monsters,” or rather a vortex, something to be awed and feared. A display of powerful destruction. But that was the point. He was ******* up everything good while furthering his own self-destruction. He would eventually collapse in on himself. It was inevitable. It was not a matter of time. It was not some probability that fate would determine. It was not plausible to think, no matter what length of time you were thinking for, that time could, and would, heal all wounds. This was not something that would fade into the background and blend into a dull gray. This was not something that could be fixed by a miracle of God. There was no twelve step program with guaranteed results. The only thing that could happen was the elimination of time. If this happened, then there could be change.  


                She had figured it out some time ago. A long while back before she knew the place. The only answer was destruction. You might even call it ******. But since it involved no bloodshed or munitions or hatred, it seemed to be a good idea. Even the victim was ultimately willing to go through with it. The only factor stopping the girl was love. Her love for him. She did love him. She truly and justly loved him. She loved everything about him. She loved him for chaos and instability. The only solution was to destroy time. Without time, there is no way to measure. There is no structure. There are no rules. The only structure is what you make in your mind. That was the easiest way to escape, the easiest way to ignore the pain, to ignore the love.        


                  However much she thought about it, she never thought about it enough. The hours she spent on the floor in utter stillness were useless. When her breath was shallow enough, she nearly died. Her shirt was stained with blood. It was severed from her hip to her elbow. Her face was swollen purple and blue. Four of her ribs were shattered. Her left ankle was swollen. Her eyes were sealed shut by dried tears. Her lips were pale and chapped. She could not breathe out of her nose. It was filled with blood. Her pants were a rolled in a crumpled ****** mess several feet away from her. Her legs were patched with bruises. Her fingernails had blood under them.


This was love.


Eventually. Not relative to time. Not relative to the beating, but relative to her. She crawled over to her pants and began to restore her dignity until a foot crashed down upon her hand, jarring her body into a fetal position on the floor. She forced her eyes to stare at her hand turning from pink to white to purple. She hung her head in shame and hoped for mercy or forgiveness. The crushing weight of the foot began to ease the slightest bit. “You didn’t learn. You never do.” She stood perfectly still, waiting. The foot lifted. He pulled her to her feet and bestowed a kiss upon her forehead. “That’s why I am here: To teach you.” He took the crumpled pants from the floor and removed her bloodied shirt. Then with **** of his head he motioned to the floor. “You will learn the meaning of humble today.” She lay back down and tried to glean warmth from the carpet. She was cold. Desperately cold.
Lane Mar 2015
In the midst of a hopeful new year,
stubborn ignorance longs for a refreshing beginning,
even if time is just a arbitrary social construct
devised to add order and pretended control to an essentially
chaotic reality, filled with otherwise random
summations of events that seem to only add
pain and misery to this exhausting existence.
Whether or not any of this is worth the effort
is another debate entirely,
as the "new year, new you" cliché
fails to grasp the inability some people have
to escape the darkness.
The past, entrenched in suffering, despair
growing in the shadows, eat away
at the edge's of one's psyche,
slowly,
continuously,
until the deterioration reaches the peak.
Inversely, sanity becoming nothing less
than a distant memory.
So distant, that its even a question if that
was a memory, or a diluted dream
born from a fantasy.
Ambition long gone as well,
fading things that used to be fun to the background,
like a picture without any saturation
dulling even what seemed to be the brightest flowers
to a completely boring gray.
After ambition and sanity,
I only fear what I'll lose next.
Paley's Hoems Aug 2012
My skin's deteriorating
So is my mind
I tried to leave all
these famous icons behind
I found a lock of my hair down the drain.
I thought it was safe with my head;
*Is my brain?
helena ferpin Dec 2012
We used to be so close, so inmost, so opposite and disposed and yet so equal and lazy that we were one.
Opposites attract and then get distracted. Equals distract and then get attracted.
We are opposites, we are equals, we are strangers.
We were opposites, we were equals, but today we are just two strangers with a routine of talking everyday about stuff that never existed.
We are two points intertwined by a circular line that keeps moving without our consent, lost in a infinite time space.
A friendship disguised, a feigned tolerance, a mutual and misunderstood need of acquaintanceship between each other.
A prophylactic and procrastinated love that wants to keep distance, deviating itself from the deep suffering.
But what suffering?
The suffering was only the avid fear by pain that turned us into two unaware and afraid of everything.
We are singular.
We are plural.
We're diminutive and we're augmentative.
We are two laconic passengers of the wacky train without driver that is the prolix relationship of humans, love and hate.
We are two regular strangers in relentless pursuit of deterioration of our love as a solution for all in our lives.
We are two remote lovers in relentless pursuit of deterioration of our lives as a solution for all our love.
Amy Perry Aug 2018
I watch him slowly deteriorate.
The first man I ever loved
Is being brought down,
Like a torrid helicopter
Caught in a hailstorm.
How much he must struggle
Against the current,
Only to be swept into unsightly circumstances,
Into a misfortunate gravity
He brings upon himself.
Homelessness, his vice,
And all I can do to help him
Is not worry so much
About all his suffering and whirlwind adventures
That make so little sense.
The delusions, the psychosis,
The wretched, wonderful mania,
It’s all so much for one person to contain,
And all I can do is watch
Him deteriorate
Before my eyes.
The first man I ever loved,
Fearful of none,
How terrible must be the parts of him
I cannot see
For his actions to be
So extreme.
abp 08/26/18
Michal Shilor Jan 2014
my polygamous relationship with you distances me from the monotony of monogamy and makes me feel lonelier than the loneliest mundane monogamist. my mere apologies for my misendeavors, the malnutritious morals of my miseducation propose metal mirrors and castaways controlled by cutting carvers, craving crazy letters and loyalty from lengthy lies and lonely lives. lethargy overtakes and vowels reign, raining drops like rainbows and rocks in rivers, rusting relationships, rusty railroads at intense intersections entwined in everything inside and nothing on the outside anymore except these
muscles. we are back at the beginning.

my mind marvels in the magic of the memories, the madness of the morbidity and the hesitations of your reaction. his, I take, is misunderstood as my misfortune, but it is not a miss, my fortune: it is a fox in feathers colorful like friendships 'fore their forfeited and feigned approval, forced for fear of polygamy tho' it promises the purest pleasure, the most personal independence and precious pearls of princes, princesses, powerful, plight-less

poetry.  peace surrenders,

souls surprise themselves, surprise their cells, call for curious catastrophes to take place. colorful and calm they coincide with cooperation that can not contain the context of truth, of teases, of teasers and targets and tonal dualities and we endeavor, we endear you, we dare destroy the darkness of the devil in its disguised diamonds.

words lie at my feet like pebbles of poetry and I promise personal demise, deterioration and ridiculous obsessions- there's madness to be had and fragments to be written and I play with silly alliteration instead!

serious and serene you stare as if my sanity has slowly faded and I sternly helplessly smile shyly.  I suppose you are sincerely offering me your blessing before parting, so stumbling slightly I surrender…


if this is the prevailing promise of mere mortality, I'm graciously aware I was worthy of words.
Kat Pan Jun 2017
I’m a victim as you stream my life
Like a short film and I can’t remember my own name
You drape my skin over rusty bones that fail when the clock chimes
Yet you collect every strand of my hair
Torn and grown
Cut and combed
and repaint the shapes I used to be into finer lines
Why do you whisper silly words to me?
Yet I hang myself on them and engrave the fate you sealed for me
Why do you twist me at every angle?relishing in my deterioration
Soaking and rinsing your own wounds in the pools of my bitter mistakes and sweet memories
But these scars I wrap with your worn stems, vanish beneath my exterior
I am stainless
Sometimes,
when I am to tattered to walk, you carry me on your shoulder
But I remember when you grabbed my ankles and cracked my wrists
You cast me like a stone
And polish me like a trophy
*Conceal me in your clock work
Talking to time
i swear i heard this title from somewhereeee
Cody Haag Dec 2015
The deterioration of society,
Commonly serves as writing material;
Hell, even I could write about changes
That have lessened our souls.

But I also appreciate the changes
That have bettered us as a collective people;
I dream of collaboration between church-goers,
And those that turn from the steeple.

We've evolved to a new level of acceptance,
And equality that was unknown;
Yes, the "isms" still exist,
But in a much softer tone.

Gender roles wreak havoc,
And some feel elite.
But we've inched closer to equality,
And those roles we will defeat.

I have so much hope for this generation,
The kids that have been raised with new eyes;
We possess views that our ancestors
Would abhor and despise.

Unity and inclusion,
Love and tolerance;
I will preach these things,
Until there is a balance.
D Conors Sep 2010
The King of the World is on his way now,
he always shows up when the chips are down.
Everyone just loves The King of the World,
he always arrives with his banners unfurled.

The King can be a loud chap,
or The King can be quite a quiet mime,
he even puts his pants on
one royal leg at a time!

The King might eat breakfast,
or The King just might not,
he is everything you are,
yet is is all that you forgot.

He's a musician of sorts,
with a very big band,
his arrival is in herald,
throughout every land
-with brass trumpets a-blare,
and snare-drums rat-a-tat,
he makes everyone aware,
that he's now where you're at!

The King marches his forces
through the cities and fields,
assure of his courses,
lying flat beneath his heel.

He revels at the sight of deterioration,
fills his belly with the joy of nations in extinction.
The King grounds everything down to things he scrapes off his boots,
he topples the governs and poisons the cultural roots.

The King's fixations are splashed with spatters of blood,
turning kingdoms into crumbles of ashes and mud.
He bulldozes the bodies into toxic pits of ****,
contaminates by obscenity, wringing his hands at the wit.
Lionized by his minions in the empty empires he wrought,
The King's elite ruling class is dictated with rot.

In the aftermath of the bile
of his genocidal, sweet plight,
The King celebrates with great style,
turning the daylight into night.

With bonfires a-blaze on the wicked, windy wasteland,
The King of the World strikes up his big band,
and once marching again will torch and ravish the land,
dropping massive, beautiful bombs for the sake of the thrill,
melting the people and villages and eroding the hills.

The time for The King
always is nigh,
for he is surrounded by
the conjurations of lies.

Some say he is evil,
(but, he's not the Devil, you see)
-He's The King of the World,
he is you, he is *me.
D. Conors
August/September 2010
2sided2 Jun 2013
The doctor stood by her bedside
running his lanky fingers
over her dull brown hair
as she lay silently sleeping
wires monitoring her every breath

                                                                                                    "Poor girl,"
He whispered
                                                                                     "She's not psychotic,
                                                                                                She's broken"

Her fathers eyes pierced the doctor
puzzled with anger he almost screams

                                                                          "So what does that mean?!"

The doctor slowly looked up
her father cowered back
shrinking into his seat
as if he never moved

over the silent vibrations
and mechanical beeps
The doctor simply explained                                                                        

                                                              "The demons aren't destroying her,
                                                                                 she's destroying herself."
Kelsey May Daly Dec 2016
We reached our peak so we’re off to sleep
The singing summer’s now humming a lullaby.
Tuck yourself in, while I search for a new sin
I’ve already caught your yelling yawn.
The autumns nye and I a dying leaf
Still green, but barely hanging from your tree.
I’ll wrap myself up, in a hat and gloves
But your cold will still nip at the spaces between.
There’s no shield from the shredding of love
So I’ll sweep with the wind to better things.
b e mccomb Jul 2016
I know how to question
Authority
Now someone teach me to question
Reasonably
Why everyone settles for
Mediocrity.

I'm not
Passive
But I get
Aggressive
When society becomes
Dismissive.

Art is not a
Perforation
On an
Illustration
Of paper-doll cutouts of
Creation.

But somewhere we lost
Authenticity
With our former
Intricacies
And were stripped of all
Legitimacy.
Copyright 6/11/15 by B. E. McComb
s Aug 2013
why do i hope when all i know is disappointment
why do i live when all i feel is loss
why do i love when all i see is failure
why do i dream when all i sense is deterioration
naxiai Nov 2015
A perfect Mommy, a perfect Daddy
A perfect daughter, a perfect life,
A perfect world to exist in, eclipsed by consummate sight.

She was my sun, a seraphic voice  
bathing me in warm light,
And he was my moon, watchful eyes
protecting me from the darkness of night.

Two halves of my whole heart, their blood flowing through
my spirited veins.
Two halves of my whole mind, their thoughts crashing through  
my synthetic brain.  

Perfection is their sweetest lie, proclaimed by selfish mouths uttering
vain whispers after bedtime.  
"I can't live without you. You can't leave me. I know we can survive this."
But survival is intangible against an affliction of the soul.  
  
Imperfection is my harshest truth, comprehended by grieving eyes seeing raw memories before sleep.  
"I can't live without you. You can't leave me. I know you can survive this."
But even a human's profound devotion can be turned away by their Creator,  
just as a pleading child can be deserted by their mother and father.  

And that is the largest betrayal of them all.  

But to remain, to endure against hate's control, against fate, would be an immediate death.  
To try and withstand their sickness and deterioration would be suicide.  

And I have realized that I do not want to die.  

Loss is my most unbearable pain, undeniably clouded by her beautiful smile and his comforting resemblance.

She used to sing her child to sleep, and now, she is singing to her one last time. At the door, he is watching and keeping them both safe.  

They will both leave and never come back, but the memories will remain. The happiness will always be there for recollection.

But for now, it is time to sleep and forget.

She caresses her child's hair and kisses her forehead lovingly, getting up and walking to join him at the doorway.  

The silhouettes of their mournful faces seem like a cryptic dream.  

"Goodnight, Gigi. We love you very much."
"Mom? Dad?"
"Yes, sweetheart?"
"I can live without you. You can leave me. I know I can survive this."
*"We know."
Josh Otto Dec 2011
At three in the morning,
The mists hang, mixing
With the grass,
An unscaled rainforest,
Fog intertwined with the blades
Delicately, like the last puzzle piece
Being placed.
A flashlight shines on a snowflake--
The first of the season--
As it spirals slowly,
Slipping silently by stretched branches,
Stopping softly on the green.
The light shuts off,
A door lock clicks,
And a plume of black erupts
From a chimney.

These are the signs
Of a slow deterioration
Into what is expected to be.
I love you my child
I don't know how to help you anymore
You continue to die your slow death
It's painful for us both
To watch you killing yourself with no way to stop
To see you so all alone
Living your life from hell
Watching you living with demons
I curse the devil and his minions
To watch you convice yourself to give up and die
It kills me inside
I love you child
I've always loved you and always will
I don't think you're long for this earth
The slow mental and physical deterioration
has accelerated
The doctors give you one short year
I cry for the hurt in your heart
I cry for the torture in your soul
I cry for the pain in your unhealthy body
I cry because you think I don't love you
Don't give up and die my little one
I physically ache for loving and losing you
Living a life I would never have chosen for you
I love you my child
Please see a glimpse of the light in my soul
Let it guide you to peace
Non reversible is your disease
I'm tormented with the fear of losing you
I can't watch anymore
I can't see you do this to yourself
Don't die my sweet little girl
Don't leave me behind
My love for you is insurmountable
Your love for yourself is long gone
Let's love eachother for the time you have left
I love you more than theses mere words express
I love you more than my own life
Don't cry little one for I am here
I got this voice, you see?
No.
You don't.
You don't see the way I do.
You don't hear the way I do.
You don't feel the things I do.
The world just isn't the same to you.
You don't understand how important this is to me. To the very fiber of my being.
It's just pen & paper.
It just words.
No.
It's not.
It's having an entire life revealed to you by watching someone smoke a cigarette.
Sounds of the greatest song you've ever heard, but haven't written yet.
The nagging poem about a heartbreak you can't forget.
It's not that I see.
It's that I'm shown.
The world telling me all the things it wants to be known.
Still I tend to fear that all the best stories have already been told.
I have an order.
To you it's a joke.
I just want attention.
I'm making excuses.
It's sounds totally crazy.
Maybe I am.
I'm ok with that.
Are you?
When I speak in lyrics & it sounds dumb in your head,
When I allow myself to be giddy over something I'd just read,
If my shoes belonged to someone 50 years dead.
Does that bother you?
I find wonder in all the trivial corners of the world.
I don't reject any little joy.
Infinite possibility.
How often do you refuse to be pleasured?
All grown up, no fun little boy.
All this chaos is my beauty.
It pecks away at the disease trying to contain it.
Thanks Doc, keep your pill.
This is my test of will.
Obsession.
Compulsion.
Dis-order.
******* irony.
My madness lies in my heart,
Given the whole world to make my art,
& my brain, at least some part,
Tries to control it, Kayla you need a chart.
THERE ARE NO RULES!
You can't see what I'm fighting.
You can't see my own mind being held captive of its own accord.
Key to freedom.
Just break that glass.
Then what if I shatter too?
You control what you allow in,
I cannot.
I'm controlling what I let out.
Afraid of the things I write down.
It's begging not to be forgot.
Tiny, tiny steps.
I'm afraid to crush the flowers
Trying to grow in shadowy ruin.
Creation is finding it's way through the cracks of what was.
Foundation.
Deterioration.
Inspiration.
If you wage war with yourself,
Do you ever really lose?
Until you can dance in your darkness,
You never really find your muse.
What you can't understand is the way I love my demons.
Most people run from theirs.
I dine on blood with mine.
Marshal Gebbie Sep 2014
Lured by the siren voices of human aggrandizement,
The hedonistic, headlong pursuit of material satisfaction.
By the few who seek wealth and power
On a scale undreamed of
By the Caesars and Pharaohs
Or even by the lofty, pampered Imperialists
Of the heady nineteenth century.

Ignored, are the vast stinking, majority,
The teeming poor who sink deeper
Into the morass of hunger and wretchedness.
In circumstances of inescapable horror
Which breed hopelessness
And the smouldering hatred
Of lasting resentment and fear

A world of vast inequality.
Marshaled by the incorrigibly rich
In order to sate their selfish and aggressive
Lust for more.
An ideological evil
Which grips the lost and deprived
With the extinction of hope
And the rage to exact…a retribution.

Then there is the deterioration
Of international leadership,
The willingness or inability
Of world powers to control
Excess or anarchy within or without
Their borders…
Even whilst circling each other
With monstrous weaponry
And an engulfing, growing,
Antagonism of distrust.

America is in retreat to it’s fortress shores.
Europe is leaderless, timid and uncontactable.
Russia, near bankrupt, snarling aggression
And clawing back a buffer of unwilling former satellites.
Eurasia and the Middle East seething
With religious and racial warfare.
Africa in the throes of losing control
Of a world threatening Ebola pandemic.
China clawing it’s way forward
To global economic and military dominance.

A world without referees or rules
Where antagonistic giants force
The un-powerful to adopt
An  ultimatum of “either them or us”.
Where the threat of terrorism transcends borders every day,
Where genocidal practices and weapons of mass destruction,
Computer global anarchy and environmental depredation
Illustrate the growing volatility
Of a deteriorating world order.

There is a Paralysis of Will in mankind.
Anthropology, psychology and physiology
Recognise only one single human species.
But that species is impossibly fractionated….
By an entrenched pattern of conflict,
An inability to compromise,
A refusal to disperse wealth for the common good,
Global racial and religious disharmony and animosity
And a fundamental refusal to communicate
Proactively …at all.

The consequences of tolerating
And furthering this Paralysis of Will,
Shall lead mankind to an apocalypse.
The consequences of which,
Are just too terrible to contemplate.

Somehow we should, as one,
Engender… a common aspiration,
With a level of universal commitment,
To induce an attitude, a consciousness
Of great and abiding…
World Citizenship.

Realistic? …No!
Likely? …No!
Do you give it a snowballs chance in Hell? …Not this week!

Why?... The frailty of Human Nature!

M.
From just about as far away from everything as you can, thankfully, possibly get….
NEW ZEALAND.
20 September 2014
With thanks for base material from The Baha'i Universal House of Justice and Henry Kissinger's new book on"Threatening Chaos"
M.
Akira Chinen Nov 2017
She was the first sin made of flesh
when no act of love was lewd or wicked
before men and gods
invented shame and virtue

hers were the fingers
that carved the heart of every star
and whose kiss set their fires ablaze
to burn eternally
in the vast emptiness of space
to give us something beautiful
to look up and pray to in the moments
we can find no beauty within ourselves

and beauty is within her name
and the colors of her eyes
and lust and desire burst from her womb
like a wild garden spilling over the universe
to give life hunger and reason

and she carved out a small piece of her soul
to give time a heartbeat
and set eternity into motion
and she is as old as she is young
for she lives outside
of the rules of deterioration and death

she is endless and kind
and you felt the warmth of her breath
in your lungs in your first gasp of air
and you will know her again briefly
as your take your last
and hear the sound
of her gently black wings carry you off
to the place where stars are born
and she carves you into a heart
to float in the sky
and comfort those
who need to find beauty
somewhere outside of themselves

— The End —