Our parents are always telling us , you have to go to school, that you'll learn everything you need to know before you're ready for the big world, and that'll you need it to get into your dream job

But now a days our education isn't about learning, its about passing
Our education now isn't the same as it used to be

It teaches us that if you're not at a certain grade level, you will not succeed
That if you don't meet a certain criteria, maybe you're not for fit the course

This education system doesn't teach us whats really important for the big world

It doesn't teach us how to live, how to do taxes or how to survive

It never taught us the living expenses or how to buy a home
Never taught us what to expect once we leave for college or how to balance our schedules

No. It only taught us homework, about a plant cell, about tangents and circumferences

It taught us that homework is more important than family
That it's more important than being a kid and having a life

It taught us that if you spend time with loved once and didn't do your work, you're setting yourself up for failure

They pile us with work it feels like we cant breath
They never once thought of the other class assignments that must be due not even 24 hours later

They make us memorise things that will no longer be important when we apply for a job

We study for hours in hopes to pass that final test that we'll soon forget

But what are we suppose to say when someone asks us how we're feeling?
We were never taught that
We never memorised an equation to help us find the answer
We were only ever taught to keep our mouths shut and do our work

Its quite funny what we learn in school now
Things more than 80% of the students will never have to use let alone see again

School was suppose to prepare us for our future
For the job choice we pick

Instead we meet and learned quadratics and plant cells
We were taught homework is what your focus should always be on

We were never taught about the future and what to do

And most importantly
We were never taught how to love ourselves and the things we should be greatful for

They've turn us into sad, mindless robots that's are more concerned about grades and passing than whats going on with the family

We lock ourselves in our rooms doing homework for 6 hours than talking to our mothers or fathers who wonder about us

We were never taught the importance of family before it was too late

Every single highschool student wishes they can turn back the clocks, but it'll never work

We were taught the hard way that you don't really know what you have until its gone
Something we weren't prepared for

They never prepared us for the future
Instead, we prepare our self for the possible failing outcome

How are we suppose to make a living for ourselves when all we have learned was the stress over homework and family?
The depression over a failed test or assignment?
The lost feeling of the lost time?

How are we suppose to love ourselves when all we do is put yourself down because of school?

This education system never prepared us for anything
Instead, this education system officially has broken all of us.

The old green door creaked when it opened. The same way it always did. The same old pitiful, sad sound it had made for years.
Sad because, like the rest of Jimmy's Bar it wouldn't be broken the way it was if someone would only take the time to fix it, in this case to grease the hinges, and then maybe the joint wouldn't be such a dive.
But that was the way it was, and the old green door pretty much summed up the whole place before you had even stepped in.

It was an everyday scene, this dreary November afternoon like any other: the glasses from the night(or nights) before were still stacked up on the far end of the bar, waiting to be washed, or just used again. The regulars, as they were known really didn't care if they were drinking out of a ***** glass or having a shot or a short out of a pint glass or beer or a stout or a bitter or an ale or a cider or even a water or milk(to wash down or soak up the days drinking) out of the same old ***** glass they had been drinking out of all week long.
Anyway, when the door creaked this time, it was old Tom Ashley that made it creak.
He shuffled in like the broken down bindle-stiff he was. Yawning like a lion and rubbing his unwashed hands on his four day beard. His grey hair as bed-headed and dishevelled as ever.  He was wearing the same crinkled-up blazer he always wore, tailor made some time in his youth but now in his advancing years was ill-fitting and torn at the shoulder, but still he wore a white flower in the lapel, and it didn't much matter that he had picked it from the side of the road, it helped to mask the smell of his unwashed body and whatever filth he had been stewing in his little down town room above the second hand book store. It wasn't much, but it suited him fine: the rent was cheap, and Chuck, the owner would let him borrow books two at a time, so long as he returned them in week, and he always did. He loved to read, and rumour had it, that a long time ago when he was in his twenties he had written a novel which had sold innumerable copies and made him a very wealthy man. The twist in the tale, went that he had written said novel under a pen name and no soul knew what it was, and when questioned he would neither confirm nor deny ever writing a book at all. It was some great secret, but after time people had ceased asking questions and stopped caring all together on the subject. All that anybody knew for sure was; he did not work and always had money to drink. It was his only great mystery.  T.S Eliot and Thomas Hardy were among his favourite writers. He had a great stack of unread books he had been saving in shoe box on his window sill. He called these his 'raining season'.

But for now, the arrangement with Chuck would suit him just fine.
He dragged his drunkards feet across the floor and over to the bar. All dark wood with four green velour upholstered bar stools, that of course, had seen better days too.
He put his hands flat on the bar, leaned back on his heels and ordered
a double Talisker in his most polite manner. He was a drunk, indeed but 'manners cost nothing'' he had said in the past. Grum, the bartender(his name was Graham, but in the long years of him working in the bar and
all the drunks slurring his name it gradually became Grum)smiled false heartedly, turned his back and whilst pouring old Toms whiskey into a brandy glass looked over his shoulder and said, ''so Mr. Ashley, how's
life treatin' ya'?'' Tom was looking at the floor or the window or the at the back of his eyelids and paid no attention to the barkeep. He was always
a little despondent before his first drink of the day. When Grum placed the drink on the bar he asked the same question again, and Tom, fumbling with his glass, simply murmured a monosyllabic reply that couldn't be understood with his mouth full of that first glug of sweet,
sweet whiskey he had been aching for. Then he looked up at tom with
big his shiney/glazed eyes, ''hey grum,
now that it is a fine whiskey, Robert Lewis Stevenson
used to drink this you know?'' Grum did know, Tom had told him this nearly every day for as long as he had been coming in the place, but
he nodded towards Tom and smiled acceptingly all the same. ''The king of drinks, as I conceive it, Talisker, he said'' Grum mouthed the words along with him,  caustically and half smiled at him again. Tom drained his glass and ordered another one of the same.

A few more drinks, a few hours and a few more drinks again
passed, Tom put them all on his tab like he always did. Grum,
nor the owner of the bar minded, he always paid his tab before
he stumbled home good and drunk and he didn’t cause too
much trouble apart from the odd argument with other customers
or staff but he never used his fists and he always knew when
he was beat In which case he would become very apologetic
and more often than not veer out of the bar back stepping
like a scared dog with his tail between his tattered trousers.
Drinking can make a cowardly man brave but not a smart
man dumb and Tom was indeed a smart man. Regardless
of what others might say. He was very articulate, well read
with a good head (jauntily perched) on his (crooked) shoulders.
By now it was getting late, Tom didn't know what time it was,
or couldn't figure out what time it was by simply looking at
the clock, the bar had one of those backwards clocks, I
don't know if you have ever seen one, the numbers run
anti-clockwise, which may not seem like much of task to
decipher I know, but believe me, if you are as drunk as tom
was by this point you really can not make head nor tails of
them. He knew it was getting late though as it was dark
outside and the  lamp posts were glowing their orange glow
through the window and the crack in the door. It was around
ten o’clock now and Tom had moved on to wine, he would
order a glass of Shiraz and say ''hey Grum, you know Hafez
used to drink this stuff, used to let it sit for forty days to achieve
a greater ''clarity of wine'' he called it, forty days!'' ''Mr Ashley''
said Grum looking up from wiping down the grimy bar and
now growing quite tired of the old man’s presence and what seemed
to be constant theories and facts of the various drinks he
was devouring, ''what are you rabbiting on about now, old
man?'' ''Hafez'' said old Tom ''he was a Persian poet from the
1300's as I recall... really quite good'', ''Well, Tom that is
truly fascinating, I must be sure to look in to him next time
I'm looking for fourteenth century poetry!'' said the barkeep,
mockingly. ''Good, good, be sure that you do'' Tom said,
taking a long ****-eyed slurp of his drink and not noticing
the sarcasm from the worn out bartender. He didn't mean
to poke fun at Tom he was anxious to get home to his wife
who he missed and longed to join, all alone in their warm
marital bed in the room upstairs. But Tom did not understand
this concept, he had never been married but had left a long
line of women behind him, loved and left in the tracks of his
vagabond youth, he had once been a good looking man a
''handsome devil'' confident and charming in all his wit and
literary references to poets of old he had memorised passages from ,Thoreau,Tennyson ,Byron, Frost etc. And more times
than not passed these passages of love and beauty off as
his own for the simple purpose of getting various now wooed
and wanting women up to his room. But now after  many
years of late nights, cigarettes and empty bottles cast aside
had taken their toll on him he spent his nights alone in his
cold single bed drunk and lonely with his only company being
once in a while a sad eyed dead eyed lady of the night, but
only very rarely would he give in to this temptation and it
always left him feeling hollow and more sober than he had
cared to be in many long years.
The bell rang last orders.
He ordered another drink, a Gin this time and as he took
the first sip, pleasingly, Grum stared at him with great open
eyes and his hand resting on his chin to animate how he
was waiting for the old man to state some worthless fact
about his new drink but the old man just sat there swaying
gently looking very glazed and just when the barkeep was
just about to blurt out his astonishment that Tom had noting
to say, old Tom Ashley, old drunk Tom took a deep breath
with his mouth wide, leaned back on his stool and said...
''hey, you know who used to drink gin? F. Scott Fitzgerald''
''really?'' said the barkeep snidely ''Oh yes'' said Tom
''The funny thing is Hemingway and all those old gents
used to tease Fitzgerald about his low tolerance, a real
light weight! He paused and took a sip ''but err, yes
he did like the odd glass of gin'' he said, mumbling
into the bottom of his glass.
Now, reaching the end of the night, the bartender
yawning, rubbing his eyes and the old man with
close to sixty pounds on his tab, sprawled across the
bar, spinning the last drop of his drink on the glasses
edge and seeming quite mesmerised by it and all its
holy splendour, he stopped and sat up right like a shot,
and looking quite sober now he shouted ''Grum,
Graham, hey, come here!'' the sleepy bartender was
sitting on a chair with his feet up on the bar, half asleep,
''Hey Graham, come here'' ''eh-ugh, what? What do you
want?'' said the barkeep sounding bemused and
befuddled
in his waking state, ''just come over here will you,
please''
the barkeep rolled off his chair sluggishly and slid
his feet across the floor towards the old man ''what is
it?'' he said scratching his head with his eyes still half
closed. The old man drowned what was left of his
drink and said ''I think I've had an epiphany, well err
well, more of a theory really w-well..'' he was stuttering
. ''oh yeah? And what would that be, Mr Ashley?'' said
the bartender, folding his arms in anticipation. ''pour
me another whiskey and I'll tell you''
''one mor... you must be kidding me, get the hell
out of here you old drunk we're closed!'' the old man
put his hands together as if in prayer and said in his
most sincere voice, '' oh please, Grum, just one more
for the road, I'll tell you my theory and then I'll be on
my way, OK?'' ''FINE, fine'' said Grum ''ONE more and
then you're GONE'' he walked over to the other side
of the bar poured a whiskey and another for himself.
''OK, here’s your drink old man, and I don't wanna
hear another of your ******* facts about writers
or poets or whoever OK?'' Tom snatched the drink of
the bar, ''OK, OK, I promise!'' he said. Tom took a slow
slurp at his drink and relaxed back in his seat and
sat quite, looking calm again.
The bartender sat staring at him, expecting the old
man to say something but he didn’t, he just sat there
on his stool, sipping his whiskey, Grum leaned forward
on the bar and with his nose nearly touching the old
mans, said ''SO? Out with it, what was this ****
theory I just HAD to hear?'' ''AH'' said the old man,
waving his index finger in the air, he looked down
into his breast pocket, pulled out a pack of cigarettes,
calmly took two out, handed one to the barkeep,
struck a match from his ***** finger nail, lit his own
the proceeded to light the barkeeps too.
Taking a long draw and now speaking with the blue
smoke pouring out his mouth said '' let me ask you a question''
... he paused, …  ''would agree that everybody
makes mistakes?'' the barkeep looked puzzled as to
where this was going but nodded and grunted a
''uh-hum'' ''well'' said the old man would you also
agree that everybody also learns... and continues
learning from their mistakes?'' again looking puzzled
but this time more  intrigued grunted the same ''uh-hum'' noise,
though this time a little more drawn out and
higher pitched and said ''where exactly are you going
with this?'' curiously.
''well..'' let me explain fully said Tom. He took another
pull on his cigarette and a sip on his drink, ''right,
my theory is: everybody keeps making mistakes, as
you agreed, this meaning that the whole world keeps
making mistakes too, and so the world keeps learning
from is mistakes, as you also agreed, with me so far?''
the barkeep nodded ''right'' Tom continued ''the world
keeps makiing and learning from its mistakes, my
theory is that one day, the world will have made so
many mistakes and learned from them all, so many
that there are no more mistakes to make, right? And
thus, with no mistakes left to learn from the word will
be all knowing and thus... PERFECT! Am I right? The
barkeep, now looking quite in awe and staring at his
cigarette smoke in the orange street light coming t
hrough the window, raised his glass and said quite
excitedly ''and when the world is then a perfect place
Jesus will return! Right?'' ''well Graham...'' said the old
man doubtingly ''I am in no way a religious man, but I
guess if that’s your thing then yes I guess you could be
right, yes''
He then drowned the rest of his whiskey in one giant
gulp, stubbed out his cigarette in the empty glass
and said ''now, I really must get going ,it really is getting quite
late'' and begun to walk towards the door. The
bartender hurried around the bar and grabbed Tom
by the arm,
'' you cant just leave now! We need to discuss this!
Please stay, we'll have another drink, on the house!''
''Now, now,Graham'' said the old man, ''we can discuss
this another night, I really must get to bed now'' he
walked over to the door, and just as his hand touched
the handle the barkeep stopped him again and said
quite hurriedly,'' but I need answers, how will I know
everything is going to be alight? You know PERFECT,
just like you said!'' the old man opened the door
slightly, turned around coolly and said ''now, don’t
worry yourself, I’m sure everything will turn out fine
and we’ll talk about it more tomorrow, OK?'' the
barkeep nodded acceptingly and held the door open
for the
old man, ''sure sure, OK'' he said ''tomorrow it is,
Mr Ashley''
Just as Tom was walking out the door he stopped
looked at the   barkeep with large grin on his face
and said very fast, as fast as he could ''you-know-an-interesting
-fact-about-whiskey-it-was -Dylan-Thomas'
-favourite-drink-in-fact-his-last-words-were -"I've-had-18
-straight-whiskeys......I-think-that's-the-record."­!! HAHA '' he
laughed almost uncontrollably. Graham the barkeep looked
at him with a smile of new found admiration and began to
close the door on him.
Just as the door was nearly shut, the old man stopped
once
more, pulled out a roll of money, looked in to the
bartenders
eyes and put the money into his shirt pocket, then putting
his left hand on the bartenders shoulder said ''oh and
Grum, one of those great ol' women I let get away, once told ,me:
''if you are looking at the moon then,everything is alight'' and slapped
him lightly on the cheek.
. Then finally, pointing at the barkeeps shirt pocket said ''
for the bar tab'' then went spinning out the door way with
the grace of a ballroom dancer(rather than the old drunk
he had the reputation for being) and standing in the
orange glow of the street and seeing the look of sheer
wonderment on the bartenders face still standing in the
old green door way and shouted ''LOOK UP, THE MOON,
THE MOON!'' The barkeep, shaking his head and laughing,
peered his head out of the door and took a glance at the
moon and grinned widely then closed the old green door
for the night. It made the same old loud creak when he shut it.

                                       FIN

My autism's a part of me,

But it is apart, you see.

...

Who are you?

With your ‘normal’ view.

Are you just one thing, or are you a person

With thoughts & feelings, that are your own unique version.

Preferences, ideas, talents, and dreams?

That are bound by senses that meet at their seams.

Are you fat, short sighted or visually impaired?

Are you ever wondering why I just stood and stared.

Those may be the things that I saw the first time I meet you,

But you’re more than just your ‘normal’ diagnosis…. True?

As an adult, you have control over how you’re defined.

Your normality means your perceptions are refined.

So why would you single out one characteristic of mine that you can make known.

As a child, I am still unfolding, I’m not fully grown.

Neither you nor I yet know of what I am capable.

If you think of me as just one thing, then one thing’s inescapable.

You run the danger of assuming I have no chance of achieving.

And my heightened senses know this, it’s only you you’re deceiving

For I am not endowed with any ordinary sense.

You need to know this before I commence.

You take for granted sight, sound, taste, touch and smell.

Never once realising that these things can be as painful as hell

For me.

You see.

My world often feels hostile, and makes me so fearful.

I may appear withdrawn or belligerent, whilst others are cheerful.

Or mean to you, or antagonistic,

Defending myself, then going ballistic.

You tell me we’re going on a trip to the shops

And out of the world my safety net instantly drops.

My hearing, you see, is hyper acute.

But I’m put in the car, though I loudly refute.

At the shops, walls of people jabber and whoop.

The loudspeaker booms and adds to the soup.

Music blares and lashes and whooshes.

Tills beep and cough, a coffee grinder swooshes.

The meat cutter screeches, a baby starts wailing,

I’m starting to malfunction and am rapidly flailing

As trolleys pass creaking, and fluorescent lights hum.

I’m starting to panic, but also turn numb.

My brain can’t filter the input, the voltage is massive

I’m in overload with no chance of staying passive.

My sense of smell is stratospheric.

That fish on the counter is NOT atmospheric.

The man in front hasn’t showered today,

That Stilton cheese – someone take it away!

A baby goes past, it’s ***** needs changing.

Things are going faster and turning deranging

They’re mopping up pickles on aisle two with some bleach and a rag.

My stomach is churning, and I’m starting to gag..

And there’s so much hitting my eyes!

This trip has turned into the world's worst surprise.

The fluorescent light

Is not only too bright,

it’s that flicker.

The space seems to be moving, getting quicker and quicker.

The pulsating light bounces off everything and distorts what I am seeing.

I don’t know what I’m doing, or saying, or being.

There are too many items for me to be able to focus.

The world starts to drain me of my internal locus.

My eyes try to compensate by tunnelling my vision

Fans on the ceiling, twist my senses into nuclear fission.

All this affects how I feel just standing there,

and I can’t even tell where my body is in space, do I care?

You’re yelling at me now, and shaking my shoulder

But the fiery fog is down and is starting to smoulder

It isn’t that I don’t want to hear your instruction.

I just can’t understand, due to mass self-destruction.

You're shouting now, but what does "£$%^&&% NOW! !£$%^&*" mean?

My senses will **** me in a collusion so obscene.

Once we’re back at the kids home, it all feels less absurd.

And now when you speak, I can hear every word.

Simple instructions, that I know off by heart.

And I cling onto these so I won’t fall apart.

You tell me what you want me to do next and I’m able to reply.

Now I’m happy and it’s easy for me to comply.

Now I’m OK and I’m running about

And performing my ritualised songs, which I shout.

Then a visitor grabs me saying, “Hold your horses, cowboy!” – This means danger!

I can’t stop the horses, I’m me, not the Lone Ranger!

And I’m thrown into panic when what you mean is, “Stop running.”

But I don’t know that! Those stampeding horses are coming!!

That’s my life, you see, it’s not “a piece of cake”

When there’s no dessert in sight and you’ve made a mistake.

When you say, “its pouring cats and dogs,” I see pets flooding from the sky.

Tell me, “It’s raining hard,” so I won’t fear the animals will die.

Puns, sarcasm and allusion

Simply generate confusion.

Tell me facts and keep things clear

So I can live, yet not in fear.

It’s hard for me to tell you what I need when my senses are reeling

When I don’t have a way to describe what I’m feeling.

I may be hungry, frustrated, frightened, or perplexed.

But I can’t find the words, and lash out, angry and vexed.

Be alert for my body language, or my gestures and obsessions

Then you’ll handle my feelings like your own treasured possessions.

Watch out for me compensating for not knowing the right word

By mimicking my favourite film star, or something just as absurd.

Rattling off words or whole scripts, which will leave you confounded

That I’ve memorised from Disney, because they make me feel grounded.

They may come from the TV, or speeches, or a book

And though they make people give a funny look

I just know that saying them gets me off the hook.

Show me, show me! I’m visual, you see.

And I’ll understand rather than you just telling me.

And be prepared to show countless times.

I’m listening, despite my ritualised rhymes.

Visual supports help me move through my day.

They relieve me of the stress and I feel OK.

I don’t have to remember what’s happening next

For I operate on a visual text.

This makes for smooth transitions in my life

And we’ll finally progress without anger or strife.

I need to see something to learn it, because spoken words are like steam to me;

They evaporate before my mind's eye, and are gone instantly,

Before I even have a chance to make sense of them,

They've died in the ether, leaving me in mayhem.

I don’t have instant-processing skills.

Instructions and information are my life giving pills

Images can stay in front of me for as long as I need,

and will be just the same in years, for they'll never recede.

Without visual help, I live the constant frustration

of knowing that I’m missing big blocks of information,

Not to mention falling short, by being a misfit

And I'm helpless to do anything about it.

Unlike other people, I'm unable to learn

If it's normal interaction for which you do yearn.

I’m constantly made to feel that I’m not good enough

And people are stern and people are tough.

They think I need taking in hand and need fixing.

Never knowing the world and my brain are tranfixing

I avoid trying any new things, for I'm sure I'll get 'dissed'

And another grown up will be angry and get 'real ******'.

But no matter how “constructive” you think you’re being.

Look for my strengths, though they're hard for the seeing.

There is more than one right way to do most things.

It may look like I don’t want to play with the other kids on the swings

But it may be that I simply do not know how to start

They just think I'm weird, and set me apart.

Teach me how to play with others.

Remove my autistic shrouded covers.

Encourage other children to invite me along.

They might learn something of value from my life's different song.

And rather than spend my day as separate, secluded.

I might show an ethereal delight at being included.

I do best in games that have a clear beginning and end.

Random play is something my fears won't transcend.

And just one other thing, a sort of confession

I cannot interpret a ****** expression

Or body language, or other peoples' emotion

So in group situations I'm resigned to demotion.

I want to learn, I want you to teach me.

Reach into my mind and help me to see.

If I laugh when Tommy falls off the climbing frame,

It’s that I don’t know what to say, nastiness isn't to blame

Talk to me about Tommy’s feelings and teach me to say,

“Are you hurt, Tommy, I'll get teacher, then you'll be okay?”

If you don't I'll meltdown or blow-up, and get in a stew

And this is a thousand times worse for me than for you.

For my mind will go into overload

My sense of equilibrium will start to off-road.

For I'm well past the limit of my social ability.

As those off road lights glare at my own disability.

If you can figure out why my meltdowns occur, they can be prevented

And my behaviours will abate, less frequently lamented.

Keep notes about me and a pattern may emerge.

As your understanding of me will gradually converge.

Remember that everything I do is a form of communication.

It tells you, when my words cannot, how I’m reacting to each situation.

My behavior may have a physical cause.

Think for a moment, just have a pause.

Food allergies and sleep problems can affect my behaviour.

Just look for signs, for you might be my Saviour.

Because I may not be able to tell you about these things.

That blunt my affect and cause my mood swings.

Throw away thoughts like, “If you would just—” and “Why can’t you—?”

You didn’t fulfill every expectation your parents had either, that's true.

And would you like to witness a constant rewind.

Of the traumatic deficits by which you're defined?

I didn’t choose to have autism.

Or to live with this division

Remember that it’s happening to me, not to you.

But without understanding, my chances remain few.

With love and support, my horizons are broader

But I can't live my life by other peoples order.

Patience. Patience. Patience, are the three words we need to live by

For my dreams to be reached, and my confidence fly.

View my autism as a different ability

Rather than as a freak show disability.

Look past what you may see as limitations and feel for my strength

I may not be good at eye contact or conversations of length

But have you noticed that I don’t lie, or cheat at a game

Or pass judgment on people, and make them to blame?

I rely on you, if you can make me your personal vocation

All that I might become won’t happen without you as my foundation.

Be my advocate, be my guide

Be my strength, stand at my side.

Love me for who I am, and not what you know

And we’ll see just how far I can go.

Matt Revans 2014
©Copyright

I have memorised the way
that your lips move
to the doleful tune of
I love you
the bitter taste
on your tongue
leaving a sour aftertaste
in my mind

As I open my eyes I see you laying there peaceful
I feel our psyches intertwined
I'm Memorised by us
I nudge you to feel your comforting embrace
And as planned you embrace me and fall into slumber soon
I'm awake but caught in a drowsy state of bliss and worry
I shouldn't be here with you
I don't belong to you
My focus upon you once again
I resist not to embracing you again
A comfort I'm willing to get lost in and never to return from
You embrace me once again
I close my eyes and we lay peacefully until the dawn

I think I'm in bits.
Believe I'm in pieces.
Tumbling love sent via tornado's breath.
Fell in the gutter.
Pre-drowning I splutter.
No vile words can I utter.
You warned me.
So did thee feed me pre-cursor to a demise of dancing.
Dancing in idle-wild in rose garden.
Beat got lost enroute.
Wild child of 50.
Who wants to die alone.
Never to feel a satin touch.
The feel of silk upon your skin.
Stroke the hair of angel.
Teased between gentle fingers.
Maybe the sensation lingers.
Maybe the book of face broke.
Expression missing.
Time to toughen up.
Not be soft and sweet.
Be a mercenary *****.
They say all's fair in love and war.
I wage no wars.
Just won't care.
Will be a wicked witch.
From here on in.
Now I start.
Here I begin!

Livvi Kent 24/09/2013.

Thrown into a sea of perfection.
Drowning under the falsity of cosmetics.
A fake smile is more geniune,
you taught me that.
Covering myself up with what you find ideal.
Starving myself for your love,
turning a blind eye on the bruises you leave everytime I slip up.
I have memorised your words by heart,
tattoed them on my wrist.
I hear them everytime I breath.
"LIVE UPTO MY PERFECTION"

i never intended to write poetry within a framework for the purpose oration, or too keen for it to be memorised; in the latter instance i know what puts people off poetry: the schooled induced need for memorisation, as if each poem were a national anthem; that's at a basic level, on the more advanced level people are put off poetry because the analysis of poetry, the transaction of but a few words into entire pages of essayist epics, the need to identify poetic tools, and admire does poets who are conscious of applying them puts people off, hence they easily grasp and turn to journalism of the daily news, to be easily duped and perhaps informed; it's harder to be duped by poetry, the tarantula venom in poetry works both ways: so too the poet amazed by an incomprehensibility due to the spontaneity and, something akin to lithium reacting in water: froth boom splash sizzle pop!*

i.

a ****** reader of philosophy books
will realise the hardship of the endeavour,
such books are more for thinking
after than talking a book reading club
to talk about them, in any casual conversation,
a whole philosophy book becomes
a single sentence that's memorable,
and the dropping of the philosopher's name,
nothing more, only because so few people
tackle the subject matter to try and speak
about it after, unless they're in academia
and instead of casually talking about it,
extract what's necessary and popular and
simply teach it - so unless you're paid to read
the material, it's a rather cold world out there
for talk of philosophy over a pint of beer
or a cup of coffee; and why did i start reading
these books? world got complicated, couldn't
escape reality with fiction, had to add to it,
plus it was a welcome change from reading
chemistry.

ii.

this is what i find strange in relation to poetry
and fiction narratives - with poetry you simply
can't get a sense of achievement as you do with
fiction - there simply isn't a sense of achievement
after having read a book of poetry, not in the same
way as there's a sense of achievement after having
read something beastly like joyce's ulysses:
it's the way it's packaged - it's denseness, it's need
for ramble ramble dabble dabble: the more depth
a narrator's consciousness has, apparently the more
critically encapsulating thumbs up too - compare
that to poetry and you see poetry as a form of
pure narration, not contaminated by plot or characters;
plus as franz kafka said: they didn't do two things
i asked of them: a. they didn't burn my work like i
asked, and b. they didn't do as i asked about font size,
it's tiny! any intelligent reader will realise that they
could lose their eyesight reading my works! i said
BIGGER FONT! and compare that to bukowski being
considered a "prolific" writer where his chapters are
knee high and his font is MASSIVE
so poetry is gentler on the eye - it s p  r  e   a    d     s,
cuts short, doesn't bother packaging to be a best-seller,
but it also doesn't do what i mentioned previously,
there's no sense of achievement after completing a poem,
because most poems are actually completed by readers
rather than discarded at some point...
and that's where dis-satisfaction creeps in with reading
prose: you just have to finish them - because i find
with fictive prose that there's no satisfaction i can immediately
find in poetry, the bird spreads his wings and isn't
a curled up hedgehog, or snail, or tortoise -
you need to finish these books to get what's intended
a feeling of achievement, the only satisfaction from
prose is when the last word is read, the book is shut,
is put back onto the shelf, and you look at it and admire
yourself with the thought: gosh jolly good, i've read that.

Vapid people
dribbling vapid shxt.
A society of ****-eyed,
drunken infants
debating politics memorised
from Fox News.

We, the awakened,
plastering social media
with doll-faced mannequins
captioned with some Eastern Philosophy
we read in Cosmo,
enhanced with a filter
titled "Who The **** Is Lao Tzu?"
Comments read: goals af.
(Insert emoji here)

And praise the Indigo Children!
It's a true gift indeed
to talk about activism
until blue in the face.
My, what a spiritual hue, are you.
Are you?

A generation of craft makers,
weaving their way
through the alcoholic labyrinth,
drawing the Hungover Man
from a Rider Waite tarot deck,
for another episode of Dull and Duller
next weekend.

We stand in twilight hues...
Fingers consciously entwined in a clasp.
We speak without vocals
that crescendo between sighs and gasps.

We anticipate...
But we do not look forward...
Not to the promise of freedom and salvation.
More so the uncertainty
that resonate with the *****
of feathered morning birds.

The unknown scares us so.
We know not of what lurks,
in the impending light of day.
We simply bide the ticking seconds...
As we scramble for the right words to say.

When there needn't be such uncomfortable silence.
No need for an awkward stance.
For we've embraced the melody,
memorised the lyrics
and rehearsed the dance.

Yet...
We hesitate...
Even though we've decided that we must.
For what shadow that looms agape below us,
hurling threats of swallowing us whole,
will soon be warded off...
As quick as the errant gust.

The darkness...
Will soon be cast behind our backs.
And all would be committed to memory
as surely as it had begun.
It would dissipate as it would stretch far...
But only if we turn to face the dawning sun.

Joanne told me they would be clapped out.
Radio Luxembourg wouldn't play them.
No Glam you see,
frayed collars, Bar room Blues.
But I'm still into Bees make Honey.
Pawned my Zenith Quad-8 for a Seiko LCD Quartz.
Memorised Ashai Pentax's Reason #44. 
Still have the hots for Marisa Berenson's knees.
No censure.

one morning
Sunilettan came
with a puppy.

i was writing a grand thesis on the orphaned existence of discarded people.

when the tether was removed
i gave her a dry fish.
did not eat it.
gave a fulsome bone.
did not touch it.
gave the milk from the ad.
did not even regard it.
kissed her.
did not show any reaction.

because she came on a monday
i named her luna.

whenever i called her
she wagged her tail.
wagged her ears.
luna luna luna
i whispered thrice
in her ears.

like the golden peaks
of mookaambika,
he sharpened his ears.
me and he did not play
any game.
before we could,
she came under the wheels
of a vehicle.
without autopsy
without a second look at the body
i buried him
under the hibiscus tree
with many blooms
falling to the ground.

two of the flowers
went to a  karnataka guy’s
father’s death rites.
some turned into hibiscus juice.
some were visited by butterflies.

frequently,
the earth where luna was buried
forgot her.
me too.

another noon,
a german dog named adi
was found playing a game
of placing fish bones
on luna’s tomb.

no dog will
cease to play
till the question hung in the air
“my little sister, you have forgotten me?”*


Kuzhur Wilson
Translated by Ra Sh



(( To S. Sithara who memorised  Khasakkinte  Ithihaasam (The Saga of Khasak) when she was still a kid)

The skin at the bed of her nails shone, tight.
Forever healing, windows that rattle
With the changing of her moods.
Love was a locket, an heirloom
That insisted its presence
Upon her bedside table.
She could turn out every light
And it would still be there.
Steady metronome,
Lifeless thud,
Invasive thought.

The carpet gathered artefacts from late night walks.
Bad habits clung to the walls.
No pillow talk, only muffled strings,
Failed symphonies,
Conversations three years old:
Memories that play Chinese whispers
Across the faces in the ceiling.
Irregularity of breath,
Sleep comes, clothed in Zopiclone;
A mind that never rests.

Narcosis in the morning,
Nausea over dried toast,
Sweet flamenco on the radio,
But there is nothing to calm her bones.

The red wine cast last night’s shadow,
Hollow in the eyes, first hit of daylight,
First hit of nicotine
To prove she is still alive.
Anxiety: the ball and chain,
Always dragging her behind.
Living as a ghost,
The people at the bus-stop stare,
The traffic, the signs, the passers-by,
The doldrums in the headlines,
The rain upon her window;
The heart attack and vine.

Prescription pills in the afternoon
To get her through the day,
Until she can get her fix,
Have her fill,
And finally hide away.

The high-street parade comes alive after dark,
Lanterns on the lake, the fish-bowl
Of a small town, familiar tongues that roll;
Memorised anecdotes across the ashtray,
The lipstick on her teeth.
Clumsy in victory, each stumble confined
To look as if she has walked through life
Without ever missing a stride.

There is nowhere to breathe
But in the solitude of her insanity.
She paints the walls
To the colours of her moods:

Grey in the long, long winter,
Blue in the onset of June.

Don't fall in too deep
I always tell my self
not to fall in too deep. For you
the world is an open pit where
Love is but a word used loosely
I've always tried to tread lightly.
I've memorised maps and terrains.
I know, however, it is inevitable
not to fall. For you
look down at me from a bridge
made out of cobwebs of the past
and promises of the future.
I look up to where you are
and imagine being there.
Not falling too deep.
I want to reach you.
Inch my way to reach you.
We can go to places. Pass time. Be safe. Or
talk to you about jumping.
Leave the world in awe.
Jump with me.
To this crevice.
Fall with me. Fall with me
*completely.

She says: WHY R U STILL LAYING THERE?
First she whispered, then she spoke and then she screamed
cause it seemed like i was consciously deaf.
'You say ur tired but are you really?
You say ur done but do you mean it?
You sure don't act like it.
You were happy, you were at peace cause i've seen it'

Well, now i'm not, i answered.
I'm emotionally broken cause he broke me,
My heart so full of feelings, they might choke me.
Feeling it wraps its cold hands around my neck,
As i gasp for air, waiting for my lungs to fill,
fuel my body with energy and try to fight back.
But i lack hope, so i finally gave up.
I fell so hard spiritually,
i landed on my back and decided to stay there.
Why? because:

There's only an amount of weight i can bear.
I feel like i passed the limit, twice
then three, four and five times.
So I've had it! My goal is so far, i can't even grab it.
Instead of feeding my spirit i overfed my habit.
Pulling myself away of His light, while my world turns black.
Crawling into the darkest corner
far away from Him cause i'm to ashamed to show my face
Ignoring her calls, denying His arms, disregarding His embrace.
Forgetting His grace and neglecting my thoughts.

And then she, the inner voice in me,
finalised our dialogue.
Why are u broken while He healed you?
Why are you a slave while He freed you?
Ain't there anything that you've memorised.
Rise up before you realize it's to late.
before your inner voice, actually the voice of God, is gone.
Cause then you'll get as cold as the floor that you're laying on.

i do remember the scorn your encountered by the next of kin, for not having memorised the alphabet, to some stupid degree of accuracy, fetish of the french i call it... why not put all the vowels first and all the consonants after? so why care for the diabolical aristocratic monopoly on these symbols, having to cite a, b, c, d, e, f, g... rather than a, e, i, o, u, b, c? idiots! or should i say... ***** *******?*

i see friendship as a two tier system,
a friend allows you
to forget your reflective nature,
spelled out in the affirmative (
not compounded): your self...
but allows you the medium
they know you by, in a sense
the reflexive nature, spelled out
in affirmation: yourself.
the reflective nature of things stands
in unison with all the things
required: photosynthesis for example...
god still remains a complexity of language,
or how far language can complicate
matters so that no horrid activity can
fester... god is a word presiding over
the complication of the expression
of language, everything else is dumb-struck
deity orientation where we can laze
for an eternity: drunk, or gluttonous
or otherwise... but find me a drunkard who
composes on the additive? how many
drunk and therefore violent fathers
have crossed the threshold with drink
but wrote no single poem by medicating
on alcohol as an active sedative?
and how many partied on other drugs?
and dumb things drinking, while
the legislators caste in shadow of neither
vishnu blue, scandinavian bleach
hair and ivory skin or the african with
chocolate and auburn and short tailing-off
of curls turned to scorched frizzle of afro...
where among them the true identity of legislators?
nowhere... the masked identity to involve
a hidden tidal wave of the many,
later disrupted by a collective-consciousness
that democracy is, preceding jung's theory
of the collective-unconscious,
democracy is not carl jung... but it's its chiral
composite pair...
so friendship is the allowance of the self in reflex
akin to knee jerking or heart peeping into
rhythms escaping a finality / banality of
the measure of stone of standing still...
there is no friendship when the self disengages
from its reflexive naturalisation into social
circumstance (spelled yourself),
and engages in the reflective naturalisation
into anti-social circumstance of
body tiniest like among jupiter moon alaska
and all other shares of size (spelled your self)...
so then the inverse numerology:
C, one hundred... there is no T unless it be
the time concerned suffering on a crucifix...
but then there's the XI... eleven...
turn numerology on its head...
peer into something abstract associated
with the twinning of words, words twinned
to a bare minimum... so akin in misguided
uses as to appear so akin as to be readily
misused, upon the matter of twinned-pronunciation
without a necessary dichotomy that's already
there, for the optics dare not like,
but the tongue makes a porridge of the sound
then usurps the twinned sounds to opposing
spelling that the optics finds appealing.

I have stopped singing for success
but instead for the ancient river's 'ohm'.
I have memorised the timeless lyric,
but can't hear the key in which it belongs.

I have stopped trying on clothes
and shifting like an old man in the mirror.
For whenever I get close to myself,
my breath fogs; and nothing is clearer.

I strip the sheets off my bed
I put my clothes to wash
But there is still nothing that can erase this
Not the rubbing of my skin raw to remove your stain
Or the brushing of my teeth to get rid of your taste

None of it can erase the feel of your lips and tongue drafting novels that should never be published on my back
Or your fingers painting life onto the blank and ordinary canvas that is my leg
It doesn’t help me forget, it doesn’t help me hurt any less
Because I can still smell you on my bed - the smell of you and old love I’ve grown too attached to now
And I can still hear your breathing and I shouldn’t - but if I think even a tiny bit harder
I can see every strand of your left eyelashes because those were the last things I memorised before you woke up
I memorised the tightness of your hug and the effortlessness of your goodbye kiss too
But I’m not prepared for the torture of remembering these details - I’m lying down and you’re not here to wipe these tears

Her soul proclaimed the greatness of the Lord
who dwelt within her belly, and her mind.
The light shines on, the humble are restored,
and food and mercy given to mankind.
That day she saw the everlasting light
she memorised, and treasured up inside,
investing for the fading of her sight
the hope that living light had never died;
till hope itself within her arms lay dying,
a frozen journey, ready to embark,
and nothing more is left for her but trying
to comprehend the greatness of the dark;
yet somewhere shines the light, in spite of that,
and silently she sighed magnificat.

The edge of my soul is unsilenced
by the youthful glove of lust
Curtained wonders and curtailed tales
our songs recited and memorised on saddles
Sandals of certainty , candled yester years

My soles dared to tear a form
eyes roar in beats of a sinful stare
affixed sensations, the aesthetic nightmares
the cyclic eventful roller coaster of want
The padded faded jeans and cotton shirt

A fluent code of the cold wonderland
steers protons and affluent electrical neurons
Exploding zips, complementary zest
The **** ride on your stationed rod
My stallion, a rash, an adrenaline rush, our flight (oh la la)

At the sight of the afterglow stormy taste
our echoes astound the mountain tops
a wave of the heated dream in a cage
The aged flow of the surfacing rivers
As these words live in my mind

Flickering lights inside the synagogue maze
the cleavage fountain evaporating fumes
A showcase of undeniable holes and poles
A glorified truth tied in elastic hearts
Eclipsed as a shadowy armoured reflection

Hold my hand and fly the transient transcendence
Balance as I fall behind on the heighted prolific lines
Rehouse my day on these whispered thoughts
Time circles, time travels, time lost, time found
On this hour of attachment, catch me as I wave

Fire is just another word for God.

You’ve been here since I was young
Holding my hands,
Teaching me how to play alone.
You followed me wherever I stepped
In and out of school,
Balancing on the fine line of family,
You wasted no time diving into love
Even though you can’t stand water.

When I’m solitary I can’t shake you
You cling to me, smelling of gasoline
My fingers twitch,
You are toxic,
You separate me from normal people.

I hate you
But
I want you wherever I go

Devour me from the inside out.
I don’t mind if you last long,
But I need you.
You love nothing more than running
Through forests and fields while I watch.

Half the time you’re an aphrodisiac,
But most of the time I can’t differentiate
Between horror and euphoria.
I can’t let you eat everything you encounter
Leaving burnt memories in your wake.
I’ve become your obsession and you mine,
Together we have memorised the play called life and
The picture titled death.

God is just another name for fire.

it's just a selfie... don't forget my face is mandible and is  non-representative of whatever idealism you have of dundee / glasgow.  you ever noticed it's only paris that's mentioned in 20th century  classic literature? oi! ****! why not oslo schweggenladder stockholm or  edinbrugh? so 20th century of you to mention any place south of london.*

when i hear modern poets wheeze and ooh and ah
and climb the everest... i think of the bee gees
or michael jackson, not one wrote the illiad... but it’s
still memorised - what’s the point...
poetry begins with the thought:
i can rhyme bling with bee sting... ****... i’m in!
heave of relief interlude with abba’s super trouper
in the background to breivik’s slaughter...
now that’s taking satire to the extreme of absurdism:
you know that french thinking movement
that changed hammering a nail in with the elbow
rather than the hammer.
‘orchestra!’
‘ yes maestro?!’
‘play me the divination of vivaldi in #strauss for winter!’
‘yes maestro!’
‘ah the autumnal leaf waltz via psychadelia
of femininity given to the beast of feminism
of lost ego, what splendour... and the reindeer,
ah... it’s only missing the alcohbolic reindeer of the
puffed-up cheeks and red noses of burst veins to hue
the canvas of red with streaks of blue.’
as benny hill said... it’s not called black english humour
for reasons that might suggest it was the oxford rowing
team losing against h.m.s. belfast that made the cambridge rowing
team sing the chritmas carols in halloween costumes:
the wise pumpkin, skeleton and hybrid tarantula sang
in soprano: the shepherds put on castrato opera for a reason
that became apparent with roman authorities despising
celibacy but turning quiet fond of castration for the pope's opera:
plus the **** orgams sounded more feminine with
guilottined *******.

I know who you are
I know who I’d like to be.
You’re the reason I live
Will you spend life with me?

I make you smile
Every single day
But I’d love to be the reason
Your spirit never strays.

The rain was falling on my head
Now it’s disappeared
The leaves are crushed under my boots
The breeze is still.

We hold gloved hands
But I still feel your skin.
I memorised your laugh
Before it grew dim.

It’s time to gather around the tallest tree
And put aside our daydreams.
We’ll always be friends
But like the season, I fall for you.

Like remembering sunsets
Your words don’t fade.
They’re colours that burst
From a single shade.

Unmistakeable
Like a butterfly kiss.
You gravitate me
In moments like this.

The rain was falling on my head
Now it’s disappeared.


20th-21st June 2017

Alexandria, former lover,
though I knew you well.
Halls lined with books,
we memorised the details-
it was the meaning we forgot.
The river ran dry so long ago,
burned your books to the ground
and became the resting place
for men bearing gifts.
Learned the trade:
love in the modern age.
You took your fill,
left before you were dismissed.

Alexandria, you learned to open your legs,
blot out your heart,
endless doodles on a wet afternoon;
ear to the phone
in an empty room.
Need someone there to fill your time,
the day so long – crop so dry.
Wine in the evening,
your life-long amnesty.
We took to drink together
but you drank for yourself.
All those years of lost prudence,
all knowledge turned to ash.

Alexandria, your former glory,
the peace that will depart.
Entropy over your bed-side desk-
your habits always coloured your interests.
What happened to your monuments,
Your brick-by-brick
malaise
into being? Lost it to superstition,
found a religion and stuck to it-
the alibi of the thief.
You always fell beneath the sheets
at the first sign of winter,
every time you heard love
on someone’s tongue.

Alexandria, wordless chorus,
poetry in your movements.
Used to watch smoke
crawl into the fibres of your cardigan,
all studious and high in the garden.
Weeds came through the concrete.
The sun always seemed to be coming down.
Foxes looted the back-streets.
Took the same walk each day
in an attempt to bring down the walls.
All that is left of you is not mine.
You only ever belonged to yourself.
Alexandria, you sat in silence

whilst inducing men to sing.

given the digitalisation, i've become less a poet and a lesser entertainer, and more a drug-dealer.

where do you levitate with this, hmm?
well infected mushroom's *dracul,
the laughter,
                                             the laughter,
you're lost for words, making Descartes modern:
cogito ergo rideo - both are verbs meaning both are
active ingredients - therefore being a mathematical
modulator akin to + or ÷, thus the twins nearby -
tell a joke without actually telling one
and laugh - fork in the road
****'s sake concerning thinking
as proof of existence:
make it out as: i think therefore i laugh,
give thinking a higher tier of expression
other than from crafting a theory of relativity
to not crafting one and reduced to menial
tasks the sri lankans would gladly accept -
still the chicken moon, the cloudiness
and the laughter, not self-love mind you,
and still the lighthouse warring with the cliffs
to spare a ship -
i just said a joke and laughed, there was no
joke to be heard for 5 miles apart to be made apparent,
but still the laughter came -
i ended up reading an article about the pharmacological
prince - pains and aches - died aged 57 -
indeed think therefore laugh rather than
be spotted thinking as a way to qualify yourself
to be recipient of stars and sun, moon and tides -
it came when i thought too much, having dislodged myself
from making choices i let thought scream narrative!,
and the only narration worth expressing came
with laughter - it didn't come with hideouts
of thought coupled with existence having lost
the pleasures of cartesian thinking not having
discovered the theory of relativity -
thinking as basis for being conscious became hidden,
no longer a twinned analogue for parallel comparisons,
existence needed some emotive expression
against the apathetic sum, it was necessary to
craft thinking into an existential parameter greater
than a unit recipient of being aligned with
                    the planetary chronology
             of mercury, venus, earth, mars, jupiter
                 and horoscopes defying geometrics -
laughter sprinted to be minded -
                          above existence per se, which
thinking is not part of, per se, since no one can prove
thinking exists akin to the proof for the existence of god -
car crash, ******, slaving, i can tell you
callousness exists, that slavery exists -
but i can't tell you thinking exists -
given the example and the murk custard of
hallucinations, the ****** of the senses
                                     and intuition... i.e.
too many particulars to be minded,
in terms of evaluation
particulars are governed by thought,
              while universals are governed by god;
i know poets hardly memorise their output -
they have a page with scribbles in-front of them
rather than having memorised their lyrics with love
and contentment and a guitar -
we can't be theatrical to say the least -
poets are not engaged with arenas and epilepsy
inducing stage lights, their instrument is a page
rather than a guitar - what's missing is the self-love
akin to memorisation - but as i say:
you can never know if you wrote a good poem
if you haven't written a 1000 ****** ones.

…in the Dosoton era, there was too much crime…too many wanted to think for themselves…these criminals did not subscribe to the Revealed Doctrine…just too many who wanted to think for themselves…and our prisons and streets and homes were overflowing with these criminals…finally, the Revealed Doctrine Order decided: send these criminals out to space…they want to think for themselves? Let them find out what it is to be on their own, forever…



I’m covered with clear plasma…
…living in a ball…there are tubes
into my mouth and tubes out of my posterior…
I float in this private world;
I can often feel the wobble…
I’m never hungry; I never thirst
or feel the need to attend to any ****** functions…
I think I’ve seen
the 2 suns pass (or is it the other way round?)
3 times…so it may be 3 days…6 days?...or years?
Sometimes I see a planet and its moon…
Never earth….I do not see it here…it is not here…
Where are we? We had 1 sun in our system, didn’t we?
There are 2 here…
Sometimes I see the others…
Like the other time…a day ago? A year ago?
My circle floated past a moon,
and there heading in the opposite direction
was another circle…and it was a woman…
…her flesh like paper and white, naked,
her ******* stretched, another tubed being like me;
and we passed each other…our circles almost touched…
I saw her face: her eyes were dead;
her face was as of sand…I felt for my fingers
tried to wave, tried to smile…
there was nothing, and there was nothing in her too…
she passed; she is the past now…
and I have seen others too – just once…how was it like?
Who was it? – Wordsworth? That poet?
His words come back to me
that I had once found in a neglected tablet
while on earth
and that I memorised:
“I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.”
Yes, it was like that:
my bubble passed a planet
and there, right before me, right before
was a whole host of them, each in their bubble…
O I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden bubbles
In each a naked being, man or woman;
Between the moons, between the planets
Bobbling, wobbling, shuddering in space
And that was just a brief while…
And each bubble headed off in a different direction
If there is a direction…
And there is just infinity…
And bobbling, wobbling, shuddering alone in space…

my sister has always been above me
18 months older,
she's larger than life
a social butterfly fluttering non-stop and here i am, still trying to spin my cocoon

you can hear her laughter from the next room away,
(the next five rooms away, if she's with a friend)
always smiling, groaning about something, or ohmygoshhaveyouseenmyigottago-ing
she's got a mane of hair half her height
her keys jingle jangle on the state university lanyard she wears around her neck
she's always home before 1 am but some nights, she doesn't sleep
other nights, she's out like a light
she was always so good at sleeping

me, i'm short hair don't care
anti-socially awkward
perpetually clenched hands covered in paint most of the time
beat up toms on my feet, ***** glasses on my face
come winter, her forgotten beanie until it's on my head
i phrase things oddly, have a dry wit about me
i keep to myself because i hate the way i sound/look/talk
i have one friend my own age in real life.
the other ones are about 4+ years older or younger than me and our method of communication is typing on screens, thousands of miles away from one another
i prefer this method

today she told me how weird it is that my "real" friends are strangers on the internet "like ten years older than you"
i told her that's as weird as her being friends with guys a year behind me if i were still in high school
she says "ummm i don't know why you can't just socialise normally like a normal person"
she says she doesn't know why i'm so painfully socially inept
i remind her i've been out of school longer than she has and haven't been around anyone other than my doctors and mom for more than a couple awkward minutes in over a year
dramatic sigh "yeah but you like dropped out so that's different"

she's so very lucky she can't see into my mind
she'd be terrified and disgusted by what she'd find there
too many monsters, too many thoughts, too many girls, too many raindrops to pour on her parade

there are so many things she takes for granted like
smiling, laughing, talking normally, not having to stress over whether people will be able to understand her
"just go up to someone and say hi"
yeah sorry, i kind of can't.

one day i decided to wear my dad's old button down shirt and khaki pants
i gelled my hair into spikes, just to see what kind of reaction i'd get if i started dressing to match how i felt about my ****** orientation
"here let me roll up your sleeves it'll look cuter that way"
"ohmygosh you look like a lesbian you need to go change right now"
she was only half wrong
i didn't change.

she's short and muscular while i'm tall and freakishly thin
she's able bodied, athletic as heck and my body is slowly deteriorating but at least my mind is still sharp

when we were kids,
i followed her everywhere
when mom dressed us up alike
i loved it while she hated it
one time we bought matching dresses
i wore mine all summer while hers collected dust in the back of her closet
the next year, i bought it off of her for $4.

before I left school, we took an AP Psych class together
she thought Psych looked so interesting and wanted to major in it
i was in the middle of a downward spiral and just wanted to understand what games my mind was playing on me
my sister memorised and studied hard
i didn't and got a higher score than her
i started missing class, more and more and our teacher asked her where i was
she was too embarrassed to tell him the real answer
in bed, eating about 5 crackers a day, in a cloud of depression, sleeping and wasting away
the kids at school thought i had cancer

a year and a half later, she's gotten her diploma and i, my GED
we're both taking classes at the community college now
my end goal is art therapy
hers is undecided

i'm not comfortable in my own skin
i've been in the dark for most of my life, be it shadows or my own man-made perpetual nighttime
my sister has tried and is trying her hardest to look out for me
but i'm not some clay that needs to be molded into her perfect little box
i'm sharp edges and bony crevices to her soft welcoming shell
i am the dark to her light, the yang to her yin
and one of these days,
i'll be okay with that.
-
-z.z

dont feel right...
my own music is attacking me. feel so empty. the words in my head start to rhyme. so i know i need to write.. just dont know what.

will you save me? take me? make me yours?
ocean blue
words so true why do you hide?

..
...
....
songs play
all day taunting me.
speakers off
still so soft
the lyrics sing
and thoughts they bring....

not the boy i want to remember... get out of my head!!!

(laughing) singing~
ocean blue~
just not you~

....
**do we ever really know them?..
do they ever really understand?..

how do you tell who is real and who is imagined? when the masks are seamless and no color seeps through?
whos lying now?
words were twisted

seamlessly .. seamlessly.. seamlessly!
so fake
how well you know your lines , how well you know your part.

all the blocking forever memorised. the scenes you know by heart. everything is perfect, until the characters change. improv was never your strong suit. thats what the other actors were for...

a castle by the sea. what story needs a knight when it has a prince? her title even stays the same ... the dialogue changes as the prince is real and the knight was wrong..
fairy tales.. how will the new version end??...

or will we change the characters again? these actors don't know their lines. the blockings all wrong. look at the scripts they carry. this preformance is no where near ready. It's barely been written!!
we need a play to preform!
how will we build the set if the script keeps changing?
....
tragic flaws..
so the princess dies...
so not cool
we wanted a comedy
not a drama

....
this is a mess and we need to preform...

someone find a new director!!!

Every piece is placed with precision
The same way it's been placed before
Remember the moves, repeat the rules
Eyes on the target,  ready,  set, go

You stand alone in the company of many
You stand silent while they struggle to spill their story
I seek your attention, request you to join the game
You oblige  and wander into my territory

I make my move and you accept
As always, for  information, I pry
For you are different,  just as expected
A new story,  a new answer that you reply

"Interesting" "intriguing" "fascinating"
you recite the words I have memorised
With every gesture, you  fuel my curiosity
yet I never fail to play the moves I've revised

Check;  break down the barrier to your mind
Check; earn and conquer your trust
Check; uncover the story caged in your head
Checkmate, the next move, a must

And though I've stuck to my rules
You've broken the invisible fence
You surround me just as I have done to you
You widen your grin as I try to make sense

On this field of black and white, little did I know
The pieces had merged into an ugly grey
For you had been playing by the same rules
Imitating the moves that I play

Neck to neck, you and I
As a generous gesture
You allow me to make the final move
Expecting me to conquer

All eyes me, as I reach out
I won't dare let my heart lead the way
It knows only of how to be played
Not how to play

No matter whether I win or lose,
The game, I know won't last forever
You will leave me, no matter of the outcome
So why even bother?

Yet I play not to win
Nor to lose
I play for the thrill
And the unexpected I'll choose

Your king stands alone
surrounded, helpless, vulnerable
You may think me a fool or a genius
But I plan to make this game memorable

I make my final decision
And move my queen towards her fate
Towards your king, but not quite
End of game, a stalemate

It is very rare
To live in the moment.

At any given time
We find ourselves
Thinking about the past
Or planning for the future.

To live in the moment
Is the most beautiful
Feeling;
Because you remember
Every sound,
Smell and touch,
And have memorised
Every crease on your lover's palm.

And for days,
Months
And even years,
You will live in that moment

Until time drains the colour
Of that memory,
Like a used cloth,
And you have to find
Another moment to live in.

I was a well written novel and you were a curious reader. You wanted to know what my words had to say. So you read my words silently, in the dark night as moon hid behind the clouds. You traced my passages from page to page, you didn't leave an inch untouched. You learnt my secrets and read your favourite parts over and over again. You scrutinized every tiny little detail, as if I was the most beautiful work of art and you were about to go blind. So you memorised my entire story and narrated it's tale, because you were too afraid to forget my name.