EFFECTS OF CHILD ABUSE ON PERFORMANCE OF PRIMARY SCHOOL IN KAPYEMIT WARD, TURBO CONSTITUENCY, UASIN-GISHU COUNTY.





BY
ERICK NYAKUNDI
KIS/03013/14




A RESEARCH PROJECTSUBMITED TO THE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY IN THE PARTIAL FULFILMENT FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF SOCIOLOGY



MAY, 2014

DECLARATION

I, the undersigned, declare that this project is my original work and that it has not been presented in any other university or institution for academic credit.

Signature...............................................­..... Date...................................
ERICK NYAKUNDI
KIS/03013/14






SUPERVISOR
This project has been submitted for examination with my approval as university supervisor
DR. W. O. ABUYA
Signature..................................................­.. Date....................................




DEDICATION
I dedicate this work to my Dad, Mom, my sister Lydia and my lovely brother Dun who contributed in one way or another to make this project to be successful.


















ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank all individuals who contributed and sacrificed their time towards completion of this project.
To my supervisor, for the guidance and support in the development of this research project, His advice and criticism made this project what it is.
Thanks to colleagues and friends for their suggestions, advice and encouragement. To all of you may God bless you abundantly for your tireless effort.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents Page
DECLARATION i
DEDICATION ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS iv
LIST OF TABLES vii
LIST OF FIGURE viii
ABSTRACT ix
CHAPTER ONE 10
STUDY OVERVIEW AND STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 10
1.1 Background of the Study 10
1.2 Research Questions 13
1.3 Research Objectives 13
1.4 Justification of the Study 13
1.5 Significance of the Study 14
1.6 Scope of the Study 15
1.6.1Assumptions of the Study 16
CHAPTER TWO 17
LITERATURE REVIEW 17
2.1 Introduction 17
2.2 Common Forms of Child Abuse 17
2.2.1 Child ****** Abuse 17
2.2.2 Physiological or Emotional Abuse 17
2.2.3 Physical Abuse 18
2.2.4 Child Neglect or Abandonment 18
2.2.4.1 Physical Neglect 19
2.2.4.2 Educational Neglect 19
2.2.4.3 Medical Neglect 19
2.2.5 Child Fatalities 20
2.3 How Child Abuse Affects Academic Performance 20
2.3.1 Child Abuse and Academic Performance 20
2.3.2 Child Abuse and School Image 23
2.3.3 Child Abuse and Dropout Rate 25
2.4 Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 26
2.4.1 Role of Public Regulation 26
2.4.1.1 Nurturing and Attachment 27
2.4.1.2 Social Connections 27
2.5 Theoretical Framework 27
2.5.1 Learning Theory 28
2.5.1.1 Relationship with the Study 28
2.5.2 Family Dysfunction Theory 29
2.5.2.1 Relationship with the Study 29
CHAPTER THREE 30
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY 30
3.0 Introduction 30
3.1 Site Description 30
3.2 Research Design 30
3.3.1 Target Population 30
3.3.2 Sample Size and Sampling Procedure 31
3.4 Description of Research Instruments 32
3.4.1 Research Instrument 32
3.4.1.1 Questionnaire 32
3.5 Data Collection Procedure 32
3.5.1 Validity and Reliability of Research Instruments 33
3.5.1.1 Reliability of Research Instruments 33
3.5.1.2 Validity 33
3.6 Data Analysis and Presentation 33
CHAPTER FOUR 35
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS 35
4.0 Introduction 35
4.1 Background Information 35
4.1.1 Age of the Respondents 35
4.1.2 *** of the Respondents 35
4.1.3 Education Level of the Respondents 36
4.1.4 Marital Status 36
4.2 Specific Information 37
4.2.1 Effects of Child Abuse on Academic Performance 37
4.2.2 How Child Abuse Affects Dropout Rate of Students in School 38
4.2.3 Proposed Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 41
CHAPTER FIVE 43
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 43
5.0 Introduction 43
5.1 Summary of the findings 43
5.2 Discussion of the Findings 44
5.3 Conclusion 45
5.4 Recommendations 46
REFERENCES 47

LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES
Table 3.1 Target population 32
Table 3.1 Sample size 33
Table 4.1 Age of the Respondents 36
Table 4.2 *** of the Respondents 37
Table 4.3 Education Level of the Respondents 37
Table 4.4 Marital Status 38
Table 4.5 Effects of Child Abuse on Academic Performance 38
Table 4.6 How Child Abuse Affects Dropout Rate of Students in School 40
Figure 4.1 Views of the Pupils on Abuse 41
Table 4.7 Proposed Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 42





















ABSTRACT
Child abuse is the physical, ****** or emotional maltreatment or neglect of a child or children. The consequences of child maltreatment can be profound and may endure long after the abuse or neglect occurs. The purpose of the study was to investigate the effect of child abuse on school performance in Primary Schools in Kapyemit ward, Uasin-Gishu County. The objectives of the study were: To assess the impacts of child abuse on academic performance; to determine the effects of child abuse on schools image, to identify the impacts of child abuse on pupil drop out rate, to investigate the effects of child abuse on pupil transition rate. The study employed a survey study design. The study targeted 160 respondents which includes; 5 Head Teachers, 40 Teachers, 70 Pupils and 35 parents of which a sample size of 48 was obtained from using 30%. Purposive sampling technique was used in selecting the head teachers while simple random sampling technique will be used to select the teachers, Pupils and parents who formed the respondents of the study. Questionnaires and interview schedules were used as data collection instruments. Data was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively and presented in form of tables, percentages and frequency. The study helped in the understanding of the effects of child abuse on the school performance, the realization of the roles parents and teachers play in the curbing of child abuse among pupils and raising awareness on the same.
 
CHAPTER ONE
STUDY OVERVIEW AND STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
1.1 Background of the Study
Child abuse is the physical, ****** or emotional maltreatment or neglect of a child or children. The consequences of child maltreatment can be profound and may endure long after the abuse or neglect occurs. The effects can appear in childhood, adolescence, or adulthood, and may affect various aspects of an individual's development (e.g., physical, cognitive, psychological, and behavioral). These effects range in consequence from minor physical injuries, low self-esteem, attention disorders, and poor peer relations to severe brain damage, extremely violent behavior, and death. In extreme cases, child abuse affects the performance of schools in the affected region (Daniel, 1978).
Performance refers to how students deal with their academic studies and how they cope with or accomplish different tasks given to them by their teachers. Performance is also the ability of a school to portray a good image which can influence the public (Decastro, 1978). There are several factors that influence the performance of a school at large, however, there is a critical factor that most researchers have avoided to discuss, and child abuse has been a crucial factor that has contributed to children’s dismal performance. Apart from children’s personal intelligence, child abuse is among then key factors contributing to poor performance of learners. Child abuse can lead to school dropping, emotional trauma or can even be fatal, hence destructing or even terminating the educational ambitions of a child. (Harris, 2005)
Worldwide, according to World Health Organization (WHO, 2000) approximately 40 million children are subjected to child abuse each year. According to Human Rights Watch (2001) about 30% of all severely disabled children relegated to special homes in the Ukraine died before they reached 18 years of age. UNICEF estimates that two million children died as a result of armed conflict during a recent 10-year period and that another six million were injured or disabled. In Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, over 6.5 million children annually are exposed to unwanted ****** materials over the internet; over 1.7 million of these report distress over exposure to these materials. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Department for Children and Families (DCF) define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or other caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child. Child abuse can occur in a child's home, or in the organizations, schools or communities the child interacts with. Each year, approximately one million children around the world are introduced into commercial ****** exploitation despite this problem; these developed countries have put measures to curb the vice. Rehabilitation schools have been formed and introduction of counseling centers as well. Despite the prevalence of child abuse in this developed nations they narrowly affect the academic performance since there are organizations put in place to curb the situation e.g. child associations, guidance and counseling institutions, and school based counseling programs (Giles, 2001)
Concern for victims of child abuse in Africa expressed by the African network of the International Society for The Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (ISPCAN) which gave five main presentations of child abuse: child labor, street wandering, ****** abuse, child battering and abandonment (Elma, 1977). Child labor according to the international labor organization (ILO), about 10 million children less than 15years in Africa are in formal employment, working long hours with poor pay and are exposed to substantial health hazards. Wandering of children refers to children, usually unkempt and with delinquent propensities, living rough in town. The reasons for children taking to the street remain poorly understood particularly in relation to factors in the child rather than parental hostility and economic (Dubowitz, 2002)
****** abuse is another. For example, arranged under-age marriages are common in some parts of the continent and doubt was often expressed as to whether a young girl fully gave consent to being betrothed (Galdsone, 1965). Prevalence rates in Africa are very difficult to ascertain because of the fear of disclosure by victims and lack of proper documentation. Most of the girls by reasons of shame fear or surprisingly respect for their usually older perpetrators. Physical battering is also eminent. Physical abuse of children is widely claimed to berate in the third world; however, there are anecdotes from east Africa skeletal frame or localized body areas of all first attendees aged 0-12 years at this hospital during the four-year period 1 January 1987 to 31 December 1990 (Garbarino, 1975). Sixty-nine of these reports reveals evidence of multiple bone fractures wither without evidence of rib or skull fracture. Abandonment of children to roam around the streets in what we call street children is also eminent in Africa, though valid and adequate information on abandonment are difficult to obtain due mainly to failure of offending parents to show up out of guilt, shame, judicial repercussions or a combination of these. However, some euro-American missionaries identified inter alia breech birth. (Erickson, 2003)
Child protection measures in Kenya are currently not implemented effectively and fully (Galdstone, 1965). Compliance with such legislation would increase if the magnitude of the problem and better knowledge about the factors that put children at risk was available. Additionally, involving stakeholders, especially agencies charged with protection, as well as involving affected children, will highlight the issues and thereby promote adherence to protection policies. Kenyan children, child activists and children organizations are pinning their hopes on the implementation of the Children’s Act to improve the lot of the nation’s youth. The Act, which came into effect on 1 March 2002, puts in place full safeguards for the rights of the child. Its passage was a giant stride in harmonizing the national laws with international agreements which Kenya has signed such as the UN Conventions on the Rights of the Child (CRC, 2002)
There is hope that the new legislation will dramatically change the inattention, neglect and abuse towards child rights. The Act outlaws any form discrimination of children, and forbids Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), child prostitution, and child labor, among other forms of abuse. The Children’s Act has immensely improved the lives of many Kenyan children plagued with high illiteracy levels, frequent **** cases and child labor since it guarantees children the right to health and medical care, provision of which is the responsibility of the parents, the extended family and the government (Erickson, 2005).
Cases of child abuse in Uasin-Gishu region have been so eminent in the recent years ((Kenya Media Report, 2004). In the year 2010 and the year 2011, there was a program started to rehabilitate this behavior. This problem is clearly evident when you first arrive in Eldoret town, it is among the towns in the country with the highest number of abandoned children who keep on moving from one Centre to another seeking help from passersby. Parents have developed behaviors of abandoning their children and deliberately sending them to the town so that they can benefit from their borrowing. So to say this has led to child labor in this region. High profile cases of school dropouts have been recorded regarding the environs of this region. Young school children from different locations in Eldoret converge in town to persuade people to offer them financial assistance. Some attend school in numbered days and decide to spend some good number of days out of school.
The communities and societies around tend to assume this situation and term it as norm. A few who might seem concerned lack cooperation from the rest. This has adversely affected the performance of most of schools, hence leading to poor living standards of the people and a poisoned future of a young citizen. The problem has affected learners in regions like many areas in Uasin-Gishu County. It has really affected child development and affected their attendance and performance in school. Little intervention measures has been taken to advocate the holistic development of the children. It was to this reason that the researcher conducted the research in the named above region
1.2 Research Questions
The study was guided by the following questions;
1) What is the effect of child abuse on the academic performance of students in Kapyemit Ward?  
2) What are some of the proposed strategies that schools can employ to curb child abuse?
1.3 Research Objectives
The study was guided by the following research objectives;
1) To identify the effect of child abuse on the academic performance of students in Kapyemit Ward.
2) To identify proposed strategies that can be employed to help curb child abuse.
1.4 Justification of the Study
It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate child abuse prevention into separate categories. For instance, strategies on the societal level include increasing the “value” of children, increasing the economic self-sufficiency of families, discouraging corporal punishment and other forms of violence, making health care more accessible and affordable, expanding and improving coordination of social services, improving the identification and treatment of psychological problems and alcohol and drug abuse, providing more affordable child care and preventing the birth of unwanted children.
Very little analysis has been done to estimate the total cost of preventing child abuse and neglect or the long-term social costs of not preventing it. There is now a move to situate child abuse and neglect within the continuum of intervention which addresses multiple aspects of family behaviors. The efficacy of tackling portions of the problem of child abuse apart from broader societal needs is not known. And, perhaps prevention can only come in tandem with efforts to reduce poverty, improve health care and make children’s issues a national priority. However, despite these constraints, evaluations of prevention programs can be improved by coming to terms with definitions of key varia

Tired of being called names and listening to complaints from your partner because you snore at night?

But more than that, it is important to keep a check on your snoring as an excess of it can be an indicator of many diseases, one of them being sleep apnea, says Dr Kaushal Sheth, ENT surgeon, "People develop sleep apnea when their airway collapses partially or completely during sleep due to various medical conditions. This causes the oxygen levels in the blood to decrease and can be potentially life threatening when it becomes obstructive sleep apnea."

Elaborating on it further, Dr Jayashree Todkar, bariatric surgeon and obesity consultant says "Snoring is an indication of obstacles in a person's breathing. When excessive fat accumulates around the stomach, the lungs do not get ample space to expand when we inhale oxygen; this in turn leads to obstacles in the process of inhalation-exhalation."

However, there are many myths surrounding snoring which is a very common problem. To sleep better one must get rid of the myths that surround snoring and only accept the facts, says Dr Viranchi Oza, BDS as he gives us a lowdown of some stories around snoring:

Myth: Everybody snores, therefore it's normal.

Fact: Snoring is not a normal condition. Labelling it as 'normal' diminishes the seriousness of the condition. Snoring is not just about annoying your partner, it is a sign that the body is struggling to breathe properly during the night. Snoring on a frequent or regular basis has been associated with hypertension and can also be an indication of sleep apnea (pauses in breathing). Sleep apnea sufferers have been reported to have diminished gray cells in their brains, most likely due to the oxygen deprivation of untreated sleep apnea. If left untreated, sleep apnea increases the risk of cardiovascular disease over time. In addition, insufficient sleep affects growth hormone secretion that is linked to obesity. As the amount of hormone secretion decreases, the chance of weight gain increases.

Myth: Snoring only affects the health of the snorer.

Fact: Snoring doesn't just negatively affect the health of the person snoring, but also the health of the person lying next to them in bed. A typical snorer usually produces a noise that averages around 60 decibels (about the level of vacuum cleaner), but with some people this can reach 80 or even 90 decibels (about the level of an average factory). Sleeping with a partner who snores during the night has been shown to increase the blood pressure in the other person, which may be dangerous for their health in the long term. Snoring also causes the partner to have fragmented sleep and lose up to one hour of sleep

every night.

Myth: Snoring comes from the nose, so if I unclog my nose, my snoring will stop.

Fact: Having a stuffy nose can definitely aggravate snoring and sleep apnea, but in it's not the cause. A recent study showed that undergoing nasal surgery for breathing problems cured sleep apnea in only 10% of patients. Snoring vibrations typically come from the soft palate, which is aggravated by having a small jaw and the tongue falling back. It's a complicated relationship between the nose, the soft palate and the tongue.

Myth: I know I don't snore, or have apnea. I am fine.

Fact: Don't ignore your wife when she tells you that your snoring doesn't let her sleep. When a partner snores it is very difficult for the spouse to sleep. There are people who snore excessively and suffer from sleep apnea, but feel absolutely normal. However, snoring increases their risk of getting a heart attack and stroke. The only definitive way to prove that you don't have sleep apnea is by taking a sleep test. Screening questionnaires like the GASP or the Epworth have shown high reliability in identifying patient risk for sleep apnea.

Myth: If I lose weight, I'll cure myself of sleep apnea.

Fact: Sometimes. It's definitely worth trying, but in general, it's very difficult to lose weight if you have sleep apnea. This is because poor sleep aggravates weight gain by increasing your appetite. Once you're sleeping better, it'll be easier to lose weight. This is the one ingredient with many dietary and weight loss programs that's missing or not stressed at all. It's not enough just to tell people to sleep more.

Myth: Health problems such as obesity, diabetes, hypertension and depression have no relation to the amount and quality of a person's sleep.

Fact: More and more scientific studies are showing a correlation between poor quality sleep and insufficient sleep with a variety of diseases. Blood pressure is variable during the sleep cycle, however, interrupted sleep negatively affects the normal variability. Recent studies have shown that nearly 80% cases of hypertension, 60% cases of strokes and 50% cases of heart failures are actually cases of undiagnosed sleep apnea. Research indicates that insufficient sleep impairs the body's ability to use insulin, which can lead to the onset of diabetes. Fragmented sleep can cause a lowered metabolism and increased levels of the hormone Cortisol which results in an increased appetite and a decrease in one's ability to burn calories.

Myth: Daytime sleepiness means a person is not getting enough sleep.

Fact: Do you feel very sleepy even during the day despite the fact that you had a long night of proper sleep? Excessive daytime sleepiness can occur even after a person gets enough sleep. Such sleepiness can be a sign of an underlying medical condition or sleep disorder such as narcolepsy or sleep apnea. Please seek professional medical advice to correctly diagnose the cause of this symptom.

Myth: Getting just one hour less sleep per night than needed will not have any effect on your daytime functioning.

Fact: This lack of sleep may not make you noticeably sleepy during the day. But even if you've got slightly less sleep, it can affect your ability to think properly and respond quickly. It can compromise your cardiovascular health and energy balance as well as the ability to fight infections, particularly if the pattern continues. Lack of sleep has also been associated with road accidents (up to 60% of road accidents involve lack of sleep) and air crashes (Air India Mangalore plane crash in 2010 was due to lack of sleep). Sleeping for less than six hours a night is equivalent to legal levels of alcohol intoxication.

Myth: Sleep apnea occurs only in older, overweight men with big necks.

Fact: Although the stereotypical description does fit people in the extreme end of the spectrum, we now know that even young, thin women that don't snore can have significant obstructive sleep apnea. Sleep apnea begins with jaw structure narrowing and later involves obesity. It's estimated that 90% of women with this condition are not diagnosed. Untreated, it can cause or aggravate weight gain, depression, anxiety, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, heart attack and stroke.

Myth: Snoring can't be treated.

Fact: Have you given up on your snoring thinking that it cannot be treated? There are many different options for treating snoring.

Some treatment options are rather drastic, possibly requiring surgery or prescription drugs, but prior to exploring such options it would be wise to first seek out alternative treatments. You must visit a sleep specialist to get the right diagnosis.

Myth: Extra sleep at night can cure you of problems with excessive daytime fatigue.

Fact: Not only is the quantity of sleep important but also the quality of sleep. Some people sleep eight-nine hours a night but don't feel well rested as the quality of their sleep is poor. A number of sleep disorders and other medical conditions affect the quality of sleep. Sleeping more won't alleviate the daytime sleepiness these disorders or conditions cause. However, many of these disorders or conditions can be treated effectively with changes in behaviour or with medical therapies.

Myth: Insomnia is characterised only by difficulty in falling asleep.

Fact: There are four symptoms usually associated with insomnia:

- Difficulty falling asleep

- Waking up too early and not being able to get back to sleep

- Frequent awakenings

- Waking up feeling tired and not so fresh

Insomnia can also be a symptom of a sleep disorder or other medical, psychological or psychiatric problems. Sometimes, insomnia can really be a case of undiagnosed sleep apnea.Read more here:www.marieaustralia.com/long-formal-dresses | www.marieaustralia.com/bridesmaid-dresses

A REACTIONARY TRACT FOR THE TIMES

(Phi Beta Kappa Poem, Harvard, 1946)

Ares at last has quit the field,
The bloodstains on the bushes yield
To seeping showers,
And in their convalescent state
The fractured towns associate
With summer flowers.

Encamped upon the college plain
Raw veterans already train
As freshman forces;
Instructors with sarcastic tongue
Shepherd the battle-weary young
Through basic courses.

Among bewildering appliances
For mastering the arts and sciences
They stroll or run,
And nerves that steeled themselves to slaughter
Are shot to pieces by the shorter
Poems of Donne.

Professors back from secret missions
Resume their proper eruditions,
Though some regret it;
They liked their dictaphones a lot,
T hey met some big wheels, and do not
Let you forget it.

But Zeus' inscrutable decree
Permits the will-to-disagree
To be pandemic,
Ordains that vaudeville shall preach
And every commencement speech
Be a polemic.

Let Ares doze, that other war
Is instantly declared once more
'Twixt those who follow
Precocious Hermes all the way
And those who without qualms obey
Pompous Apollo.

Brutal like all Olympic games,
Though fought with smiles and Christian names
And less dramatic,
This dialectic strife between
The civil gods is just as mean,
And more fanatic.

What high immortals do in mirth
Is life and death on Middle Earth;
Their a-historic
Antipathy forever gripes
All ages and somatic types,
The sophomoric

Who face the future's darkest hints
With giggles or with prairie squints
As stout as Cortez,
And those who like myself turn pale
As we approach with ragged sail
The fattening forties.

The sons of Hermes love to play
And only do their best when they
Are told they oughtn't;
Apollo's children never shrink
From boring jobs but have to think
Their work important.

Related by antithesis,
A compromise between us is
Impossible;
Respect perhaps but friendship never:
Falstaff the fool confronts forever
The **** Prince Hal.

If he would leave the self alone,
Apollo's welcome to the throne,
Fasces and falcons;
He loves to rule, has always done it;
The earth would soon, did Hermes run it,
Be like the Balkans.

But jealous of our god of dreams,
His common-sense in secret schemes
To rule the heart;
Unable to invent the lyre,
Creates with simulated fire
Official art.

And when he occupies a college,
Truth is replaced by Useful Knowledge;
He pays particular
Attention to Commercial Thought,
Public Relations, Hygiene, Sport,
In his curricula.

Athletic, extrovert and crude,
For him, to work in solitude
Is the offence,
The goal a populous Nirvana:
His shield bears this device: Mens sana
Qui mal y pense.

Today his arms, we must confess,
From Right to Left have met success,
His banners wave
From Yale to Princeton, and the news
From Broadway to the Book Reviews
Is very grave.

His radio Homers all day long
In over-Whitmanated song
That does not scan,
With adjectives laid end to end,
Extol the doughnut and commend
The Common Man.

His, too, each homely lyric thing
On sport or spousal love or spring
Or dogs or dusters,
Invented by some court-house bard
For recitation by the yard
In filibusters.

To him ascend the prize orations
And sets of fugal variations
On some folk-ballad,
While dietitians sacrifice
A glass of prune-juice or a nice
Marsh-mallow salad.

Charged with his compound of sensational
*** plus some undenominational
Religious matter,
Enormous novels by co-eds
Rain down on our defenceless heads
Till our teeth chatter.

In fake Hermetic uniforms
Behind our battle-line, in swarms
That keep alighting,
His existentialists declare
That they are in complete despair,
Yet go on writing.

No matter; He shall be defied;
White Aphrodite is on our side:
What though his threat
To organize us grow more critical?
Zeus willing, we, the unpolitical,
Shall beat him yet.

Lone scholars, sniping from the walls
Of learned periodicals,
Our facts defend,
Our intellectual marines,
Landing in little magazines
Capture a trend.

By night our student Underground
At cocktail parties whisper round
From ear to ear;
Fat figures in the public eye
Collapse next morning, ambushed by
Some witty sneer.

In our morale must lie our strength:
So, that we may behold at length
Routed Apollo's
Battalions melt away like fog,
Keep well the Hermetic Decalogue,
Which runs as follows:--

Thou shalt not do as the dean pleases,
Thou shalt not write thy doctor's thesis
On education,
Thou shalt not worship projects nor
Shalt thou or thine bow down before
Administration.

Thou shalt not answer questionnaires
Or quizzes upon World-Affairs,
Nor with compliance
Take any test. Thou shalt not sit
With statisticians nor commit
A social science.

Thou shalt not be on friendly terms
With guys in advertising firms,
Nor speak with such
As read the Bible for its prose,
Nor, above all, make love to those
Who wash too much.

Thou shalt not live within thy means
Nor on plain water and raw greens.
If thou must choose
Between the chances, choose the odd;
Read The New Yorker, trust in God;
And take short views.

Are these tears of blundering laughter
or heckles of contempt
that spirit on these haggard few
to rhapsodise our era’s curtain calls?
They who brought us mounting debt and conscientiousness
which seems only to be healed in the appeasing fluorescence
of 24-hour supermarkets and the purgatory
of weekends spent at home?

Such stifling, nervous coughs
are head as responses of
today’s domestic questionnaires
Gung-** reformative advances
and calls to “pull up our socks”
Mixed with the state-sponsored fortune-telling
Rationed out to boys languishing on the dole.
Which All falsely transpires,
intimidatingly revealed as being
About as appealing as vacuum cleaners for the soul
aimed at the resolutely bored to tears.

Despite our fears
the sun will come streaming again
through fresh fir trees
which decorate contemplative, sheltered lanes.
These last, frostbitten years
seek replacement with halcyon days
in order to suspend dogmatic disbelief.

Let’s not get ahead of ourselves:
Pessimism is ****.
Even in the most roaring of times
we remained despondent and calculated.

i'll be honest, i lost the second volume  of Kant's critique
in the house, i lost the rhythm of reading the first volume,
but then i found the second volume
like a breadcrumb, where i left off:
the thesis v. antithesis section,
accurately
                 antimonia of pure reasoning
(the fourth conflict between
                   transcendental ideas)
cf. the only dualism allowed is a bilingualism,
no mono-lingual dualism is verifiable,
it's too abstract and therefore non-practical /
non-practisible - missing adjective
            i.e. without having an allowance
    to be practised, indeed almost every single
word cannot transverse all grammatical classification,
a zebra cannot be a noun, a verb, an adjective,
an adverb etc., hence what i tried to experiment
with was whether a mono-linguistic system
could practice dualism purely, no, it couldn't,
mono-linguistic systems abstracted dualism
without a useful process within them,
the whole good and evil, chaos and order dichotomy,
such dichotomy that never approached a dialectics,
hence mono-linguistic systems could not convene
dualism, because they were mono-linguistic and
not bilingual...
in reference to translating
                                            the fourth conflict between
                   transcendental ideas,
i.e. czwarty konflikt miedzy ideami transcendentalnymi,
English stress of articles / vectors, meaning
a point be made, or the point can be made,
one is wishy-washy wave of the hand (dispersion),
the other is definite, microscopic, vector
from co-ordinates (0, 0) leading to (23, 12) of the (x, y)
graph; i went among the Celts and learned to write
drunk and be happy;
                                      ironic though as to why
Darwinism gained such popularity given the English
use of indefinite and definite articles: a-      -the    
end up with some sort of ism.
there's a warning about the fourth antimony, and there's
also this poem, indeed i was bemused by the antimony
i'm not surprised that he didn't understand the narrative too,
narrating philosophically is a hard craft,
you can't really engage with dialectics, cartwheels sure,
ouroboros (snake eating itself) sure,
it's hard to reach the Pre-Socratics, but almost every
philosopher after Socrates is doing just that...
to internalise dialectics (i'd rather criticise the lack
of diacritical marks in English), and that's why
philosophy compared to standard literature of fiction
and novel can be termed pure, narration.
it is pure narration, the practice of -
hence off character study, hence hardly memorable,
but an antidote to what the present system of education
prescribes the young: dates (1066 a.d., 1945, 1914),
or Pythagoras... qwen the queen was born (on purpose, and
why? exactly, q / queue, why / i, etc.)... it's like they're
taking a test on becoming Britain's residential candidates
with questionnaires that no one talks about in pubs
over pints. i mean the warning against the fourth antimony
in the antithesis ends up stating poetically:
both proposals were sound. depending on how one
peeled the vantage point, from which want came to
observe the lunar motion.

Genuine conversations
were passion's static overblown
through classical lover's eyes.


i.
Confessing unrevealed tries
in variation with grieving cries.
Sighs and moans were touched
and savored everyday, at the same place.

ii.
Unexpected completions
were deviously divulged over
The temptress' despair, while cardboard
arrogance compressed within aluminum kisses.

iii.
Chemical liquids were drawing attention,
fingertips quivering at the sight of your eyes.
Palpable tension cutting through the styrofoam walls,
that we gently established to separate this sweet seduction.

iv.
Demolition began once playful vengeance intervened.
No longer did the requiem delay its flow and crunch,
for its succulent grin was painted on his chest
and carried on his hands.

v.
Cards were drawn to encaustic wax papers,
captivating lover's delight.
With sudden frustration, we searched evanescently,
for a piece of carton to hide from the fiery rains.

vi.
While puzzled Questionnaires were imprinted on catatonic embraces,
we both gnawed on the bone for answers;
barking gently at our feet, we tangled with uncompromising pretenses,
giving ourselves multiple aberrations with heartbreaking waves.

Tonight I cuddle the thorns and the knives,
contemplating lethargic affections,
infected with veracity's confection,
ignoring the ideal that I fell unfulfilled.

The desperate scramble to
rationalise; the burning need
to make sense of the
nonsensical, this
all-too-earnest search for
answers, for some guidestone
that will help us decipher
the craziness scrawled on the walls,
a key that might unlock that door
which currently bars the path to
sanity and reason.
We put polls in the field,
conduct surveys, devise
better, more probing questionnaires,
consult eminent
psychologists, sociologists, economists,
go blind on data
tabulated into every conceivable form,
cite studies, historical precedent,
strive for any, any answers
that will explain to us
how we came to
this.

And maybe the reason is
less complex.
Maybe
we got what we
deserved.

This one is for the doctor who called me “delicate”
I think I missed that word in the thick textbooks about disease I’ve seen
This is for the lab technician who lost not one but two vials of my blood
Because I really wanted to help that new nurse figure out veins again.
This is for the stupid slogans on the walls
A fichus with the word peace under it, I'm cured.
This is for the geriatric room with the low table they always put me in
An arthritis patient means elderly woman, right?
This is for the negative tests and endless questionnaires about my health
Checking how often, how severe, and how much I care.
This is for the four empty orange prescription bottles sitting neatly on my desk
Red pills, and yellow pills, and white ones, oh my!
This is for the loud groan of pain in the morning I make before I even wake
Because why shouldn’t my roommate wake up when I do?
This is for the symphony of my cracking joints and creaking bones
Because violently trembling when you walk up stairs is so very ****.
This is for the manic googling at 4 AM,
Does this symptom mean anything? Is it just a quirk or side affect?
This is for WebMd, bless their hearts,
Who think that sniffles mean polyps and headaches mean cancer.
This is for the flights upon flights of stairs I climb each day,
Cats are considered ****, is panting like a dog?
This is for the cramping and shaking hands everyday
Because as a writer and artist I never even use them right?
This is for my mother
Who’s waited patiently with me through every doctor’s visit
This is for my best friend Lauren
Who missed three classes to take me to a clinic
This is for my nephew
Who is too big for me to pick up without grimacing now
This is for the wine I drank
And the bedroom basement I climb out of
And the backpack I heave around
And the school lunches I leave in toilets
It’s for the nights I have to stay in and the ones where I make myself leave
Because the only thing tough enough to stop me
Is me.
And I’ll tip my hat to myself for putting up such a good challenge.
It’ll just make it even more satisfying when I knock it the **** down.

i over-worded my description of the first night
of winter, i did,
i took too much pet peeves in frank o'hara style,
conversation i perhaps wish i had,
i was aiming for an example of imagism,
like the origins of movies, silent cinema
imagism is best described by silent cinema,
images don't speak, you have to speak for them,
the whole venture into the first signs of frost
got me tangoing or foxtrotting muddled with me
feet that translated for the tongue to be akin,
i should be repentant for it, and i am, yours truly,
all i wanted to write was the extract
i was trying to work on on foot -

at first i noticed the frost
and served up simile upon simile
if not metaphor in the vein of consent
to exclude any association with metaphor,
or as i might collectivise such dissection
of poetics: neither, cliché upon cliché,
the sparkling diamond sawdust,
the speckle of frozen tears,
hushed stardust of entered atmosphere...
but then i looked keenly at the frost,
on cement and on iron of car bonnets
and roofs... the stars not numerous enough
to be compared with,
and after much deliberation it dawned on me;
the frost appeared as if paparazzi epileptics,
or like a thousand photograph camera flashes
in a stadium of staged pop music...
along the linear tread of my feet the frost
change kaleidoscopic like that, like red carpet concentration
of the desired object for newspaper print CELEBRITY,
like a stadium where something memorable
must happen in order to ignite the need
for flash photography: yes, the frost appeared like that,
the frost appeared like that tonight,
and the stars were set free in revelatory constellations
where once the constellation πηγασος, where once
it too gleamed

  still too much, i think, if i'm going to be an imagist
  there's a further need for a 3rd revision:

  frost like paparazzi flash photography
  appearing on sheen of metal alloy.

there, that's it.

but of course tonight, and in hope of not over-wording...
with first night of winter where frost and clear sky,
find upon the second night the incubator of the sky
being overcast, and with the temperatures warmer
from the skyline of skeletal constellations missing,
snow falling:

              with first frost one night,
              expect snow the second night.

i love winters in england because there's this smoky scent
about them, burning cinnamon, and it reminds me
of home, of the child that left home
in order to become part of the "grand" multi-cultural
experiment, where multi-cultural evidence is apparent,
esp. in questionnaires regarding a necessity to pour
ethnicity into questionnaires:

white british, white caribbean (pirate), white some other,
republican irish, volatile irish, absinthe on fire swiss,
black british, flemish red indian beetroot, ginger or scottish,
other, some other, many others, punned origins, or just
simply etc.

but the cold of it... the multi-cultural capital with about 200
tongues that's london? i'd see more smiles in a graveyard,
more adults in a debility congregation,
more of anything anywhere elsewhere, it's absolutely horrid,
i have to warn myself in order to say: more warmth in
you now, than ever, and not elsewhere esp. outside.

******, already over-worded - one last line about the meagre
snow that fell today...
not meagre enough like an inverse ostrich though,
under a street lamp, head turned into the abyss of night,
watching the prickly snowflakes fall
as if a star trek canvas, slowly but assuredly
with head angled to a crow perching hunchback reverse,
there propped, propped like that,
watching gentle snow fall as if alluding to me:
a step cosier to being closer to the moon.

People who are experiencing depression use different words than people who are not



By Elizabeth Bernstein
June 11, 2018 9:33 a.m. ET

Feeling down? Pay attention to your language.

Language changes significantly in both content and word choice in people who are depressed, according to a growing body of research using computer programs to analyze speech and writing. People who are depressed tend to use the pronoun “I” more, indicating a greater focus on self. They also use “absolute” words like “must,” “completely,” “should” or “always,” reflecting an overly black-or-white outlook.

Scientists have long known that people change how they speak when they are depressed—their speech becomes lower, more monotone and more labored, with more stops, starts and pauses. But newer studies, including several published this year, have found differences in the actual words depressed people use.

People who are depressed “don’t see subtleties, and we can see this in the words they use,” says James W. Pennebaker, professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, who studies how language relates to a person’s psychological state.

The study of computer-assisted language analysis for depression is still a nascent field, but apps and other technology that track language could eventually help doctors and patients identify a depressive episode more quickly. Since there are no biological markers for depression as there are for cancer and other diseases, therapists currently have to rely on a patient’s self-reported symptoms and on their own analysis to diagnose the disorder. Both can be highly subjective. The apparent suicides of designer Kate ***** and chef Anthony Bourdain last week underscore just how challenging it can be to identify and treat depression.

How to Talk With Your Dying Loved One

Conversations about death are among the most important, and difficult, we may ever have. Too often, we avoid them, Elizabeth Bernstein writes.



In research published online in March in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, researchers at the Universities of Arizona, Zurich and Texas, as well as Michigan State and Georgia Southern, gave questionnaires designed to measure depression to more than 4,700 people at six labs in the U.S. and Germany. Participants were asked to write about their lives, a recent relationship breakup, their level of satisfaction with life, or just their general thoughts and feelings. Then software analyzed their language. The results: In addition to using more negative, or sad, words, people who were depressed used more first-person pronouns or “I-talk” than people who were not depressed.

Pronouns show where a person is focusing attention, says Dr. Pennebaker, who is an author on the study. Someone who is really interested in another person will use the third person “he” or “she.” Someone closely focused on a relationship will use “we.” “But if you are thinking about yourself—if you are more self-conscious or self-aware, as depressed people are—you will use the first-person singular ‘I’ or ‘me,’” Dr. Pennebaker says.

Depressed people also tend to view the world in a concrete, black-or-white way, using words such as “must,” “completely,” “should” or “always” that express absolutist thinking, as shown in a series of three studies published together in Clinical Psychological Science in January.

The researchers, from the University of Reading in the U.K., used software to calculate the percentage of absolutist words used in messages by approximately 6,400 members of internet forums for depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation and a host of control forums. They found that approximately 1.5% of words used by people in the depression and anxiety forums were absolutist—which was 50% more than those used by people in the control forums. The percentage was even higher for people in the suicidal ideation forums: about 1.8%.

Why are absolutist words so bad? People often don’t realize they are using them, and they can amp up negative thoughts. (Think about having your barbecue rained out. Saying “this always happens” is a much harsher thought than “sometimes the weather is unpredictable in June.”) Absolutist words also require that the world correspond to your view. (“I must get that promotion.” “My children must behave.”) “If the world doesn’t adhere to what you demand of it, that is when depression and anxiety set in,” says Mohammed Al-Mosaiwi, a Ph.D. candidate in psychology at the University of Reading and lead author on the studies. The more flexible you are, the better, he says.

Psychologists say people can use language as a tool to help them reframe their thoughts. “Very often, what you say is what you internalize,” says Mr. Al-Mosaiwi. Here are some tips:

Remember that the actual words you say matter, not just the thoughts they convey. Even if you are unable to replace negative words with positive ones, try replacing them with more accurate neutral ones. Instead of: “This party is horrible,” try “This event is not for me.”

Banish absolutes, especially in relation to your goals or relationships, where falling short of your expectations can be particularly depressing. These words and phrases include: always, never, nothing, must, every, totally, completely, constantly, entirely, all, definitely, full and one-hundred percent. Replace them with nuance. Instead of: “I can never catch a break,” try “Sometimes things don’t work out.”

Write. Keep a journal. Try a stream-of-consciousness writing exercise. Compose an email to a friend. Then analyze what words you are using. Are they too negative or absolutist? All about you? Tweak those sentences—and stay vigilant for those words in your speech.

Ask a loved one to help you identify absolutist or negative words or sentences and suggest reframing. It is easier to notice someone else’s language than our own.

Create a mantra you can use to override absolutist language. So instead of saying “This always happens to me,” say “This time. This happened this time.”

Put your mantra on sticky notes and place them where you can see them. Make it your screen saver. Have a needlepoint pillow made.

Pay attention to your use of the word “I.” If most of your sentences have “I” or “me” in them, you are probably too self-focused, says Dr. Pennebaker.

some people forget that writing into excess is never a modern sign of wavering... it sometimes means that there's enough for it to be exhumed... call it instant-archaeology... it's not about other people's conversation, it's about their company, and that far from being reached let alone being riddled...*

a letter to a lovely Ms. ***.:

hey! stop exposing your Nancy like a nun and poke back with a conversation - i'll sooner be dead than a monologue.... Florence Nightingale hear my plea - i love how the following "strings attached" gets attached... 3 thousand miles away, living in a cultural ferment of only youth included / exposed content... but no otherwise: curb the chances of oath and here plops a plumb punch... never heard of 5 o'clock shadow with such an explanatory shortening expressed with the least bereft: or right twitching buttock for a enamoured heart-attack heart: a clamouring clown said: if someone painted a Mona Lisa on my face... if someone... i'd ditch the circus and the claustrophobia antidote trick... so ** and no Santa... and ha and still no Santa... it.... it? it?! hey! hey presto al fresco! god, and i wrote this and i wasn't even fifteen readied for a cougar and: she's his p.r. / publicist... whatever the **** that means... they can and can like the wold and the three guinea pigs;
p.s. the wolf's advances are heaving packed, sure, but asthmatic: or three nights in Paris. you'll never write a book in London: everyone is being prescribed eternity with a timescale of 100 years max... and i do mean that retaliation to the question in Icelandic terms: test your d.n.a. sequence, stop frolicking over forced saints taking care of retards... or ditch the whole Darwinism; how many down syndrome kids does it take it take to chop a tree into firewood? one **** and a whip. see how far the joke goes? me Chimpanzee, me Panda, me me! forks and up yours! build that building of royal surgeons and public opinion -
autumn always auburn, chequers auburn with oak -

kingly European - that coming of winter -
                    Czech and the Carpathian mountains -
oh sure... now the Romance...
the Romance... now gone... fish 'n' chips...
                       i lived in England 20 odd years
the most romance i ever received was an A
at A-level history.
                                             i'm still asking you about
the sort-**** resolve though...
                                             i'll start laughing
when you get off the *** of rocking that
bellybutton girdle or curbbing.
                **** me, Hindu cows of ethnicity in
former Empire bound villages entrapped
by nostalgia;
                 sounds like the perfect breeding ground;
and it is, given the ultra glass like people
who feel the stamping of a mosquito dead
like they might feel a Serbian insurrection
into tonguing Ottoman:
but of course the English man engages:
because he "knows"...
                              just as long as he learned
the cabbies ref. i'd be
fine                            in championing
him on every turn...
                                   chappy ain't no
chappy to be a happy lad... so what
does that matter? i'm quasi 21st century
but actually trapped in 20th century.

                                                 i do love that
it's all happening in H'america...
                                                         makes the trivia
questionnaires a lot shorter...
                                           every time i think of
eating i think of a H'amburger rather
than              a H'entucky -
                                            because the inflatable
Juan with draw-on stubble
                 married a Chasing the Dolly wife -
                    and never mentioned Mozart once...
FAME = P + CANON
                        Pachelbel's Canon -
or... the nuance of the millionth plumber:
   y'er toilet made e burp?
                           hence the maiden at the aisle
and the ******* in the cot...
                    and the serenade of the Cotswold runny...
flapping flapping furore -
                         or the chicken grease off my cheek
in fully glaring applause: rather than i tattoo
a knuckle on some ponce Netherlander
spitting onto a Polish girl's cheek and some pseudo
Irish tells me that i need psychiatric help.
ENGLAND!
                         *******!
Handel grew fat and you grew slim...
                       Shakespeare wrote and you demanded
Emoticons!
                          Emoticons rather than emotions!

you can try to escape Europe, you really can,
but trying to submerge Poland as a colonial
country akin to the Africans will only demand a greater
rift in your little delusion,
                                   by god my heart is a kindred Scot,
nationalist...
                          and i will rip that bloodied cheek off yer
******* cheekbone the minute you say yer-nay-own...
                          play chequers an' tartans wit ye!
i'll make Jack into a stripper and the union into
haemorrhage George and jolly Andrew...
                           you make me into your little
Ethiopian herder i'll make sure that little
emblem of tourist insignia dies with it...
                        Spain is cheap... given the English standard...
Greece is too...
                                  the Alps are a cheap middle-class
**** and the Carpathians are Dracula...
                                          whoever gave these wankers
the Greenwich compass thought twice about the same
wankers... contemplating a trip to Mars..
                oi!
                              glaciers!
                 oi!
                                        the Mariana Trench!
oi!
                             ah, **** it...
oi oi... toe foe un luv 2 twin bananas!
*** yer bananas!
                                             yes, we employed a few
of those specimens to straighten the problem out:
none returned, all remaining became classified as:
with cannibalistic tendencies:
                                          stimulants increasing
deviating behaviour? synonymous rhyming:
                        crime
                                         slime
2 + 2 = bonkers...
                                  cannibalism
     altruism
                                   hedonism...
               soothsayer's saying:
                                if not a limb, at least a thought;
yum yum yummy.

last call,
she wrote, with her fingertips still tangled in the wire wrapped around her faulty heart.

each breath laced with shards of glass, an aching pull that was simple in the darkened sheets and quiet. an answer that seemed too simple because there was no question.

i'm dying,
she cried as her hands slipped on the tear-slicked phone that couldn't quite convey the way that she was trying to be so, so brave with each labored breath.

there were no words in the screams that pounded off the yellowing linoleum.
a desperate, hoarse cry pleading that she needed someone on the other end of the static to wipe the sweat off of her brow and call an ambulance.

when are you coming home?
little bouncing ponytail of four is grasping fingers and trying to fix injuries with whole-wheat goldfish. her pink salt-scuffed snow boots are breaking hearts down the hall.

and i'm here again. once cheery monkey slippers worn through the toes shuffle down hallways lined with trepidation and antiseptic. this isn't old-fashioned, white-apron clad matrons grasping hands and adjusting crisp peaked hats. medicine is doled out in plastic sheets like candy, accompanied by bent knees and scanned bracelets.

privacy concerns, signed waivers, no liabilities. hospitals are less for healing and more holding cells, storage lockers, fraught with too-thorough questionnaires and grasped pens like swords defending trustee boards from lawsuits.

my mornings are finger ****** and sunlight that seems empty without those sweet trills and a whipping reach of wind. stagnant air, the faint smell of ***** hiding under regulation bleach wipes. this is what i wake up to. soft chimes aren't rousing, nor soft, at eight am lulled through too-new loudspeakers.

the ***** mint green trays never lose that sickly smell of rotten food like the undergrowth of a fallen tree. the only coping skills i've mastered this far are how to effectively channel all my breathing solely through my mouth. hospitals never lose that smell, the ache of death and sorrow that clings to the floorboards and plays cards under the bed, waiting for its turn to reach corners much further than the cleaning crew can.

eyes draw to the torn edge of my sweater, revealing the milky white skin that lost it's sweetness. i've been ravaged by needles and rubber tubes and electrode pads full of gel that shouldn't sting, but does. i spent fourteen hours climbing the walls of my subconscious while gloved hands made adjustments flanked by heavy shoulders and eyes that seemed to never shed their bitter tears.

fourteen hours, i spent with my id. it passes in jumbled snippets of emotion that are still lost in that haze.

i was a creature,
without reason,
or cause.

the silence, has already been written upon stone,
just like my first girlfriend,
with a mix tape i made her, when
the times of the suitor's guess was made:
just like that,
when a boy could make a her
a taste of music she might listen to,
stumbling to work,
upon an apocalyptic sight of
oxford st. at 5a.m., listening to
king crimson's song epitaph -
torn and in toils years later -
the sinking maggot throng of expectancies
and jealous riling -
    culminating the jealous curse:
**** the golden horde of expectations
of future swedes!
               i sleep better alone,
with a cat it's once annoying,
with a woman, the numbing of
a side of my body, and that ****,
hurts...
           i was trying to be welcoming
by instructing the lesser known
20th century invitations,
but, it would seems,
i was less the more welcome seen...
so thus the big bang becomes
the grandiose implosion of
thought-orientation that begins with
a (0, 0) pointer -
the denial of both the existence of
god, or the existence of,
     and humming are we:
to craft the perfected personality typo;
but i remember the girl,
with my mix-tape and her job,
and the apocalyptic empty street
of oxford st....
don't mind me, i started listening
to king crimson aged 10 or 11...
   so i don't know where the jerking-off
prince came from,
that birmingham shitehole of
"diacritical" effort...
my blood isn't circulating proper:
it's boiling and has horseradish added
to the tongue, and it's riddling,
riddling, ready to make the pounce
of stashing an idiot's head in
its ******* sack!
i remember sharing a bed with a woman,
as much as i remember the numbed
either right or left side of my entire body...
i hated it! just like i hated
these cosmopolitan magazine questionnaires
that even the russian teen girls are
lucky to insist on taking part in...
sleeping with a maine **** cat
is hard enough, but sleeping with a woman,
and that numb side of your body,
can we be critical in the victorian sense
of having separate beds?
   i like less cuddling,
you have teddy ten-shoe cushion,
and allow me my other half
of the body to prevent me spooning
my body against yours,
while pretending to fall asleep...
  **** the niqab *******,
can i please, just have my own bed?!
oh yeah, i really care if you turn
it into a ninja affair...
    watch me smoke a shisha,
and eat some baklava or some falafel...
i'll become the 8th wonder of
the world in bed,
and beside the bed, you'll be tourists
beside the eiffel tower watching me
smoke a shisha, eat some baklava
and then some falafel...
or some other way round...
i didn't mind the relationship,
her being a gamer, me being a bookworm,
i didn't even mind
*** on her period, given the ******...
but sleeping together?
that was, ****** well-guessed annoying,
every single night,
cuddling into a tortilla (me)
and the filling (her) -
and the whole of my body feeding
a sensation of: numb...
         now i drink:
   so i have the perfect mosquito
deterrent...
              i'm almost sorry making this sort
of comparison, given that i remember
making high fidelity cliches of
mix tapes... alternatively in c.d. format...
i can just picture it though:
   king crimson's epitaph at 5a.m. on
oxford st., with no one there,
apart from the girl, and her pair of earphones...
i sometimes do wish it could have been,
how she tested me on her
paternal compass while sitting me
into a theme park ride with her...
now i loose the plot:
   i think she said her grandmother was
her mother, and her mother was her
sister, and her sister was her...
i can't keep up, even after 11 years...
it's like finding a canary in a coalmine -
i'm as aob clued in, as any idiot
past my experience...
      oh i made the "bride" years later,
arms slit, apparently eager on suicide,
and then this random guy turns to me
and say: oh, she's a great ****...
looks like there's a: lucky me after all...
i pity the poor ******* that married her...
that time i visited her she turned
into a pixie, which i loved,
i.e. a girl with short hair... pixies,
you know, those girls that can really
take to making short hair work...
   i might actually have a son,
but i don't know...
         it's a big might have queue the ? is on,
it's hardly a slap in the face ! expression either...
  and yes, the poem i never written,
but keeps repeating itself, over & over again:
to replace the ego, take to narcissus:
  ? walks into a bathroom and stares into
a mirror, and all ? sees is either !
or !? -
       just the right amount of description
worth of a chinese fortune cookie;
by now it really doesn't matter,
  whether or not i was allowed a chance,
or whether i had a chance,
    or whether i had the gamble: but no chance...
time does indeed heal all wounds:
   it allows the prime wound healing
object to materialise:
   all wounds heal, once the grave is
crafted and left intact;
all scorn and begging left intact,
   is obliged to be sacrificed,
upon the healing stone of a dead man's
grove of epitaph's worth of letters,
encouraged into stone, rather than
flimsy paper -
                   that the undesecrated grave
is by far the only epitaph,
   and that the desecrated grave
being the loss of:
                  a combative "last" farewell...
hell be memory -
               heaven: an amnesia.

post scriptum:

         infernum sum memoriam -
   paradiso: oblivio est.

The Harvester

A long, overly dragged out, deep knock rattles the front door of Ambers new domain.
She knows in her gut who it is and instead of answering the door, would rather be forced to run naked through the street in pouring rain.
She goes and checks on her three-month-old son to make sure he is still asleep.
He is, however every time she looks at him, it causes her to want to weep.
He has his eyes, his nose, that ******* creep!
She struggles to sleep at night no matter how many she counts, the endless sheep.
Being away from that house hasn’t brought with it a sense of relief.
She has yet to find a proper hobby to use as a release,
to extradite from herself all the negative thoughts and energy built up from her previous reality.
She feels worn down and defeated, her self-esteem.
She feels ugly and fat, gone is her once perfect physique.
Her heart feels empty, her soul incomplete.
A healed psyche, deep inner peace are the goals she hopes to achieve,
but she’s felt that way since she was thirteen,
and back then the worst thing she had to live with was her nightmarish daydreams.

Another long, overly dragged out deep knock rattles the front door causing Amber to scream at the person causing the noise.
The person behind the door speaks, but the words are inaudible.
Amber walks up to the door and swings it open.
Standing in front of her is Erin, she thinks her eyes must be joking.
Erin is a few months pregnant herself, Amber can’t escape the feeling of hopeless.
She’s already changed addresses, but Erin has found her again through sheer devotion.

Amber goes to slam the door on Erin’s face but Erin places her hand on the door to stop it in its tracks.
Amber doesn’t want another confrontation, it will surly reach a horrible ******.
Erin is crazy and she wants nothing to do with her.
They will never be on friendly terms, that’s a fact she can assure.

“Amber, please talk to me.
All I want to do is spill my soul and set my conscious free.
I want to make things right between us and end this bad blood.
I don’t want you to feel like I got off easy while you were tortured by being beaten and dragged through the mud.
We don’t ever have to be best friends,
I just want to apologize and for you to listen so we can finally make amends.”

“I have a restraining order against you for a reason Erin.
I don’t want to talk to you or see you, I would rather fill out a hundred boring questionnaires and mail each one individually in.
I know your jealous of me for having Chris’s baby,
but trust me I wasn’t ready to become a proper lady.
I was a teenage girl when he abducted me and ***** me over and over again getting me pregnant.
I begged him to get me an abortion but he wouldn’t listen to that plea even for a second.
The child I’m now forced to raise reminds me of him every single day and I hate him for it!
I hate you as well because inside that unstable mind of yours, you are unfit
to become a mother!
You’re too young, just like me, it’s not too late for you to give up on it and eventually have another
after you meet someone in fall in love.
Who would you rather have a child with, a raven or a dove?”

“I’m sorry Chris put you in this position but that wasn’t my fault.
I was also abducted and a victim of his ****** assaults.”

“You enjoyed spending time with him!
You enjoyed his big **** inside of you!
Sure, he kept you ******* and used you as his personal ***** for a few days,
but you soon won his praise.
He allowed you to walk freely around his house, even when he wasn’t there!
I was ******* and drugged constantly, our situations don’t even compare.
Every day you could have walked out of the house and went to get help.
You did not, instead you cooked, cleaned and read his books.
You acted like his ******* wife!
You ****** him daily, slept next to him in his bed and he provided you with a decent life.
I have nothing more to say to you.
You are despicable and just thinking of you makes me want to chug brew after brew.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t leave to get us help and take down Chris, that is on me, I own that.
The truth is, I was terrified, terrified of what he would do if I tried to leave; I admit I’m no righteous diplomat.
I remained on my best behavior to stay on his good side so he would allow me the freedom to roam around his house.
It sure as hell beat being ******* in a tiny room that stunk worse than an outhouse.
I bartered with him every day to allow you some freedoms as well, but you had blown his trust so badly he always instantly refused to listen to me about it.
Believe me, we came out of the same boat, I’m not a ******* hypocrite.”

“You’re so full of ****!
I don’t believe a word you say, that’s something I just won’t permit.
I saw the way you looked at me.
Your eyes glared at me with contempt you ******* banshee!
You hated, hated, that I was carrying Chris’s baby and wanted me and my unborn child dead.
You wanted to be the only one he bred.
You loved him and wanted him all to yourself.
It’s time for us to now say our final farewell.”

“Ok, I admit that I did think I was in love with him.
I thought we would run off together and live our lives together as husband and wife under a false pseudonym.
However, I didn’t hate your nor did I want to harm you.
I really did advocate for you with Chris but he refused to believe anything I was telling him and couldn’t accept my words as being true.
I’m sorry for my actions and lack of actions in that house, I truly was scared and confused.
We are both his victims and both of us to him were nothing more than a hole to use.”

“Don’t lie to me, you still love him and you are angry that he fled the country without you.
You thought you were going to be by his side forever, attached to him like glue,
but he caught wind that the cops were coming to rescue us and ran before they did,
leaving you behind sleeping in his bed all alone.
He left you behind to raise that child all on your own.
I’m sorry I had to throw that stone
but it’s the truth and you need to hear it.
It’s best to abort that child right now and move on with your life.
Unlike me, you have the option of truly moving on from this ordeal.
Don’t worry, you will find another guy one day that makes you squeal
like his **** made you squeal every night.
With the right choices made, your future can become bright.”

“Chris would never leave me behind you *****!
He will return one day when it’s safe to do so and will reunite with me so we can live a life together that is rich,
satisfying and everlasting!
I won’t listen for another second to your negative forecasting.”

“I knew you weren’t over him Erin, so why are you really here?
Please answer quick because I’m ready for you to disappear.”

Erin, now frowning and filled with rage pushes Amber down hard to the floor.
She’s here for one reason, a reason involving gore.
She jumps on top of Amber and takes out a knife she has hidden in her boot.
This was her plan all along, take out her rival and her fruit.
She wants Chris’s baby and Chris’s love all to herself.
Some call it selfishness; she calls it determination.
Erin, now with knife in hand, stabs it into Amber’s stomach.
She smiles and begins humming
a song of victory over her rival as she cries out in pain.
She pulls the knife out as Amber yells out she’s ******* insane.
Erin gets off of Amber and begins walking deeper into the house.
“No, not my baby,” Amber cries out fearing the worst.

A few moments later, Erin returns to Amber with her son in her arms and her knife placed against his throat.
Erin begins laughing and starts to gloat.
She is moments away from eliminating the two people with ties to Chris.
Then it will be safe for him to return and plant on her a kiss,
before the run off together and live out their lives in bliss.

Erin asks Amber if there are any last words she would like to say to her son.
Amber, moaning in pain on the floor tells Erin this doesn’t need to be done.
Erin says it must be done as a knock on the front door interrupts proceedings.
Erin has no time for this, the child must begin bleeding.
Who dares interrupt her and Amber’s dealings?
Erin has a very bad feeling.

“Police open up!”
“That’s right *****, I called the police the second you knocked on my door.
It’s best to stop this charade and accept the punishment you have in store.
HELP!  I’VE BEEN STABBED AND THE INTRUDER IS TREATENING TO **** MY BABY!
SHE’S COMPLETELY ******* CRAZY!”

The front door breaks down as the police storm the house with guns drawn.
Erin stands in front of them holding the baby with the knife still pressed against his throat now showing off a massive frown.

“Put the knife down, set the child on the floor and put your hands above your head!”

Erin refuses to listen to the cops demands and begins to cut the babies throat.
If she can’t have Chris neither can Amber and the knife is the antidote.
A gun shot is heard as everything begins to move in slow motion.
Erin feels overwhelmed with emotion.

A bullet slowly exits a gun and begins moving through the air directly towards Erin.
Her knife slowly begins tearing into the flesh of the baby’s neck.
The baby lets out a loud scream as the pain created by the knife races through his body.
The bullet continues to move steadily through the air quickly approaching Erin,
who is frozen in place and unable to move.
With the knife now half way across the baby’s neck,
The bullet from the gun enters into Erin’s right eye,
tearing a hole into and through her brain,
and exits out the back of her head.
Erin drops the baby as her head is forced backwards.
She falls lifeless, backwards onto the hard floor dead.
Police rush to the aid of the baby who is still alive but badly injured.
Amber thanks the cops for the efforts as she looks up towards the heavens,
taking in her final breath as the loss of blood has become too much.
“Chris must pay for this,” is her final thought,
as the living world around her turns to black.

Sitting in a room alone. It is clean, brightly lit but peaceful. A cup filled with water sitting upright on the table to my right. A stack of papers rests in front of myself. The sun shining brightly through the window, refracting off of the glass of water creating beautiful dancing lights across the paper. Glancing at the top page reads “Report of Psychological Evaluation” in ******* letters. An ominous feeling in the pit of my stomach imitating a thunderstorm is on the rise. The heading continues to cite my name, age, birthdate, dates of the evaluation, Psychologist’s name, and acronyms that are unfamiliar. Grasping the paper it feels smooth, sliding my hand across feeling the ink slightly raised off the page. Following the words as they describe myself at eighteen years of age.
Intelligence is complex. Some are off the charts brilliant, some are average, and others are below the standard of society. People live their entire lives obsessed about their IQ score because humankind accepts this as a universal standard of intelligence. Not everyone’s IQ can be measured accurately as it does not conclude someone’s motivation, creativity, curiosity, innovation and kindness are all key components of character traits that are admired and desired. Unfortunately people, like myself who are dyslexic, have a different method to measure our intellect as we must sit and talk with a psychologist for hours in order for them to determine how our brain works. This system consumed twenty-one hours of my life thus far. Repeating the same test throughout my life with various puzzles, a complete biographical timeline and questionnaires all to be summed up into thirteen pages. Strapped to my ankle like a ball in chain, my thirteen pages are forever in mind.
Looking at my evaluation form my name is written on the top of the page dismissing any doubt. Gazing at the pages on the table with a combination of anxiety and annoyance running through my mind. Reaching out to grasp the pages feeling the significant weight that it holds over me. At first glace the text blurs together. Reading closer the text becomes words but the language is different. The tone of the paper is distant and disconnected. Descriptions of my life begin to form, mapping out every milestone. Since the age of seven, my life has been a roller-coaster from changing school every two-three years, being bullied for being different, to finding salvation within myself leading into proactive accountability to finally rise above all odds. Growing up was not easy. Especially before the No Child Left Behind Act, children with dyslexia were over looked, as many teachers did not know how to teach them. Even now many teachers in public school are not equipped to recognize when students are struggling. Imagining a life where I am not dyslexic, how different it would be.
Turn over the page to expose more information. Written in the text is a comprehensive account of my life. Plainly scripted describing one milestone at a time. Reading a biographical novel, one familiar yet no emotional attachment. As though I am reading my life through the eyes of someone else’s words. The formality of the writing is distant and concise. Leading the viewer to see me as unremarkable.
Reading on, the narrative of my life changes into graphs and floating numbers that are meant to define my intellectual abilities. Staring at the numbers pondering what it means. Acronyms appearing left and right like popcorns. Confusion starts to set in as the suspended numbers start to dance. I was diagnosed at the age of seven in 2000. Nearing the end of first grade, a year I barley remember as I hardly learned anything substantial. My teacher never showed that they cared even after I told them that I was dyslexic. Looking back, I feel that my teacher never understood what I was trying to tell her; instead my teacher brushed me aside not even thinking twice of the ramification that she caused.  
Lifting and flipping the next page, but the weight feels heavier than the last. Pressure on my chest begins to build with my anxious mind. Acronyms begin to pop up out of nowhere like popcorn. Like setting sun the words and uses of language slowly start to become unfamiliar as the biographical aspects starts to fade. The terminology shifts to a different standard that is foreign. Lacking the understanding language that is formal academic style.
Remembering when my mother told me that I needed to change schools because the public school I was currently attending refused to help me. She continues to explain that I would not get the proper guidance unless I was behind four grade levels. As any rational person would think it was unacceptable. Over the next five years I attended two different schools still skating by, making little to no progress. Glancing back at the evaluation form it does not show the hardship and suffering that I endured trying to get an education that everyone has a right to. Reading the form, seeing my life plainly written with little to no emotion. Remembering, how I cried everyday, because I did not want to go to school. Daily kids would call me dumb and stupid because they could not understand how someone like myself existed. Ostracized by my peers I never felt so alone yet surrounded by so many people.
Before transferring to another school I never met anyone else with dyslexia. My salvation was around the corner; before I knew it I was attending a school in a different state in the middle of nowhere. Once more, I needed to update my evaluation, six more hours of my life to prove that I needed all the help I could get. This school on my evaluation form should get more credit to my success. My time there is summed up into one paragraph but the effect will last a lifetime. The three years I attended this school was difficult but absolutely necessary.  
Imagine yourself at twelve years of age but you only have the capacity of reading at a third grade reading level. I was so far behind it did not seem possible to catch up to where I was supposed to be. Spelling was broken down into phonics in my first year. I was encouraged to read and test my comprehension daily. Math was the only other class that wasn’t reading. Later I was introduced to science and writing. In my last year I took a history class and proceeded to complete high school level classes, as I was technically a freshmen. After attending this school I gained six grade levels within three years, ready to transfer once more as a sophomore entering into officially as high school student.
Once again turning the page, unable to resist the temptation of reading just a little more. Despite the paper feeling light to the touch the information generates the feeling of a lead weight. The popcorn of acronyms begins to intensify as the biographical section comes to an end. Test results are the next section of the evolution. The psychologist also examines my personality in detailed written notes. The movie of “Stranger Than Fiction” comes to mind as a “big brother” feeling psychoanalyzed.  
High school was no different as I was still surrounded by my fellow peers all in a similar boat trying to survive. Three years pass once more, sitting in a small room with a different psychologist recounting my life. Explaining my story, completing puzzles hopefully for the last time. Graduation is around the corner, I feel different. Six years ago I was at the bottom of my class. Now, I am at the top of my class, graduating with high honors, straight-A student accepted into college. I’m on top of the world. It’s amazing what can happen in in six years.
Flipping to the next page, the lead weight transitions into a dumbbell. Dancing numbers mimicking the illuminating refraction of the glass of water. The numbers seem random at first glance, as there seems to be no pattern to correlate it. The acronym popcorn begins to explode with every other word with no end insight. Words begin to merge and brake down. The written text transitions into gibberish. I recognize my name in a sea of unrecognizable babble. A pain of needle ****** start to add pressure onto my chest.
The dancing numbers suddenly vibrate as the insanity of the acronym start to multiply. The splattered numbers represent what is inside my mind. A roadmap filled with blockade and detours constantly shifting in my head. Breathing becomes difficult as it feels someone has placed a cinder block on my chest. The acronyms start to plateau nearing the end. The text becomes legible once more.
Jolting up, I close my eyes and rest my hand against my forehead. Looking up at the window at the peaceful beautiful day. My brain starts to hurt and becomes numb. Mentally taking a step back from the stack of paper I push it across the table unable to finish. My brain is about to explode with the new information that I am still processing. My name is attached to this document as its littered throughout the evaluation. My academic life is detailed out for anyone to read at my school. Realizing this document defines me as a person. Ball and chain strapped to my ankle forever defining my intelligence.
I am incapable of escaping this documentation process to only be confirmed as someone with average intellect. The education system only documents ones ability on English and mathematical skills as deems more important in our growing society. The problem is people like myself rely on other forms of intelligence to compensate. Forever in our back pocket our evaluations sit there until it become irrelevant. After pondering this notion the bell rang and it was time to leave.
  The evaluation form that I hold today was completed when I was eighteen years old, still ringing true, pointing out my flaws, and exposing my weaknesses to anyone willing to read. After all of this time, I often wonder do these thirteen pages still define my intelligence? Having risen above my challenges and surpassing anyone’s expectations, who holds the key to the ball chained to my ankle? It is debilitating having a physical reminder of my limitations after I have accomplished so much. Struggling constantly, as I continue to fight battles even into adulthood. Graduating from college is the greatest accomplishment thus far. Imagining my next graduation is next year is unbelievable. No one knows where your life will take you but one day my evaluation form will wither away into oblivion as I stride everyday to not let it define me.

Why then .   .  .shall mine,
Heart inner walls and galleries.
Be not draped about
In such lush crushed velvet drapes and tapestries?
In plush deep daydreamy hues
Scarlet,crimson, or sanguineous ,
Which ever term
you use.
As long as it depicts the color of my muse ....
Intricate and brash
Yet refined raw and delicate

Variegated elegantly with
varied shades,
Each new love I invite in
Having artistic differences ,
As they often do
prefer Carte Blanche
To make love look
How they feel it.
For peradventure,
If I keep decor from an old love,,
Its the same as making them to blame for past pain.......
If your looking to loose
Thats the game for you..
I used to play it that way
Now I play the blues.
Over paid my dues.
Soul still bruised
Still feel the noose
And the short leash
Id run to the end
And thrash like,a spastic
They have all trained in
Emotional war tactics
Any attempt to fight back are in vain.
Their urbane
Splash stains of ratsbane,
Purple me ......
Then leave......
All vanity .
Ampersand,
Lies imbue questionnaires,
And rosy bruises replace
All this superfluous covering where love used to sojourn so beautifully.
Now the walls are a pale glossy sorta yellow .
even though the crimson flow of slow blood flow through it  .
Scars of  unwant
Disallow a chance to stain them..
Oh Love will thou come back to me again.... .
I adore thee ,
I am empty.
A fresh canvas I offer thee.
Yours wantingly
........Me.

this falls short of even attempting to write
an ode to mead,
after all we know that only
the ginger and ****-ugly vikings
were the founders of Kiev,
or as pretty english seem to state:
why are Ukrainian girls so pretty
while the Ukrainian men so ugly?
hey, not my words, theirs,
known from those cosmopolitan-esque
questionnaires...
         in this little city I can take
my 77 year old grandma shopping
after 10 am after we spend an hour
talking over coffee (she goes black,
I add some 30% cream)
    and we'll spot an ex-solidarity
partisan, ******* his nuts in the morning,
this kurwidołek, this civitas emeritus
I. E. city of pensioners...
                   even with all the acolohics
in the ruins of what became the project
genesis at the Katowice metalwork plant,
the city I now write from, dead to the grave,
where graves tend to speak more,
open air museum of flint statues,
my own private necro-sculpture haven...
even with these alcoholics,
  walking without hands,
   or what were once their former trades...
before the first metalworks factory died
and after the second died...
        old grandma and her aversion to alcohol
in a per se argument,
   but as I tease her while opening
a bottle of mead, and she serves herself
a glass of bailey's, almost apologetically,
no excuses granny, you deserve a nightcap...
you can walk through the day and not
drink a drop, but come night,
some of us have a desire for the sedative,
but some of us have no desire to return
to gossip, drama, and backstabbing intrigues...
after all, not all of us can entertain a king
at versailles...
     why? ever talk to a mother about her
daughter, and your mother about her mother?
****** my ******* god,
        Pilate! lend me your washing basin!
makes sense now, with my ex Russian girlfriend,
I had dinner with her mother and father,
who she introduced me to as her sister...
    and her grandmother was "apparently",
her mother...
            shorty thought she had short legs
and I thought: perfect leg to torso proportions...
who the hell wants a ******* giraffe on
stilts? she ws shortsighted and sometimes
wore glasses when reading...
          so I borrowed a pair from grandpa...
******* me... no wonder she thought she had
short legs... however much you asked
Spinoza to polish those lenses,
    the same illusion would emerge.

i used to love women,
until she started reading
and asking me to
answer
a cosmopolitan
            questionnaire...
i still never managed
to figure out why i freaked
about such trivia...
    it's not she was asking me
to answer 9.8 m/s squared
of gravity...
it's a real shame though...
   but then again men always
tend to freak out over
the most pathetic of criminal
investments in love -
esp. cosmopolitan questionnaires...
the rest of the train journey
i began to lose myself
in some bob dylan songs...
asking the gods:
can i go back to jerking off,
rather than listening to
her tongue?
i really don't mind
the texture of hand ****...
never, ever, idealise women,
ever! never!
    you'll be bound up
to the stupid applause choir
of seals...
     marked with a cry
akin to finding nemo seagulls...
yeah, those seagulls,
with seal clapping.

Who taught you how to ride a bike?
Always an interesting question
And by the way did I mention
The questionnaires at the end of a robo call message?
Anyway was it your dad?
Your mom?
Your step dad?
Your step mom?
Who taught you how to be you?
The shaper of you
Who made you the man you are?
The woman?
The the they/them/ all?
Who showed you how to throw a ball
To drive a car
To have an opinion on war
The director of the show staring you
What’s with the riots?
I’m sorry off track again
Who made you such a liar?
To make believe
To play a friend?
And how it does it really end?
Who taught you how to fall in love?
To treat a lady?
I wonder what they all must think
Those other liars
From another lie
From another place
From another time
Who taught you how how to ride a bike?
They still around?
Are they in your life?