You hear stories about yourself and wonder about perception.

Heard it was arrogance.

Heard it was uncalled.

Heard the best times and the worst sat side by side drinking.

Heard it was one date and an obsession.
Wondered how saying those words made the truth feel inside.

Heard it was violence through shop window. Scared to testify.
Wondered how that conclusion was found. Wondered if we ever exchanged words.

Heard i always wanted to be polar bear. That i was playing a role.
Wondered for who. Wondered what possible gain was gained. From adding up nights to weeks adding up months staring at ceiling cracks alone. From decaying relationships with a self hatred that makes these people run for the hills. Where the ground is stable underfoot. Where worry, doubt and sorry are foreign words. Denied even pens to write it down. Deep scars are left from biro tubes full of dead skin. Shared some things because you told me i could. We both sat and talked our own agendas into the dark. You saw me in some states you cunt. And you lied. Indulged for your personal gain. Keen to degrade. Extinguish potential threats to your immaculate veneer. To the pretend kid who copied homework and stole ideas and rode coat tails and never took the blame. As usual. I expected more.

And the next day you called to indulge your insecurities.
Well fuck i closed the door.
Fuck hoping something more.

so i gave me a stern talkin' durin' months of drunken slumber, mumbling homeward truths while ceilingbound presumptions were heightened in the darkness.

if you had heard a word i said you'd know

that i don't care what you do

i just enjoy the time we spend together.

i'm not proud

i'm not scared

Whiskey nightmares morning sweats

Saw a mouse in the living room last night, and while i had to put a pair of shoes on, i couldn't bring myself to set a mousetrap. I wonder how long we can co-exist with Mother's phobia. How long before she has forced one of us to murder.

...and while this is a metaphor, it is a true story. I am looking to escape. I am aching to walk away. Before it becomes too late.

Sometimes she cannot move, she needs her batteries charged, by a human heart. Anything for a springboard. Anything to stop or start spinning. Anything to feel different. Anything. He finds dark secrets easy to tell drunken strangers. Streamlining series of events to a simple act of consequence. With friends who always understand to end these conversations. Staring at the page missing sunrise in blue skies Watch scenery in minds eye Process memories Assign some meaning to each belief Move onto next scene. Writing words hide their truth. Its just coincidence he thought. That should set You free While lies encase You break repetitions regime Unlearn triggered response You made Yourself breakdown Self designed by external parts Your perception determined their participation. After all, are you not me?

Saw that kid from school on the coach reading moments of reprieve. Through the gap between head rests his voice said "have you read if not now when?" A strip of smiling face grinned from the table in front of me and even now, stopping to see the picture better, I cannot decide if it was a class room or a workshop. Thinking maybe it just felt like school room because of the face association process. I need endless coffee and Otis Redding to write this down for you. Thats the thing with my dreams, i cannot speak for you, remembering pictures of lessons and morals but the truth of the scene is shaded. I can tell you if i wash this off i will regret it. It was in that work house that i first realised the seriousness of my situation.

unlucky thirteen.

1. You never start from the same place.
2. You cannot unlearn. Only hope to forget.
3. Even now, forgotten truths are stored, as reference points for future decisions.
4. Its those decisions that make you me.
5. You are a fractal image of self interest. A complex equation. Twisted into such shapes by the bodies natural urge to survive.
6. It is the survival instinct that has been manipulated by the corporations who have replaced religion as the true owners of collective heart.
7. Hands up anyone who asked to join this society.
8. Hands up anyone who felt like they had the choice to opt out.
9. You are not determined by other peoples decisions but by the way you react to the situations you find yourself in.
10. Hold on to your own everchanging truth.
11. Know when to speak up.
12. Know when to stay quiet.
13. Know when to walk away.

Random notebook truth.

It started when they told me whoever won the war wrote the story of it.

Random notebook find. circa 1998.

in the age of medicine religion clings to the terminal cases that science can't save giving hope to the hopeless living in the age of miracles the climate of progress start the apocalypse disco running on a sinking ship i follow hungry rats i am the last in line i will get left behind.

T.I.N.A

I'm
packing up
heading off
got no choice
i'm on this path.

Just
like your bad dreams
there's no way out
and no way back
forced along single tracks.

An
undignified
production line
of human kind
and our bad designs.

Random notebook find. circa 2005

and all i can do is hope and
all i can hope.

Only now that we are poles apart can i see the significance. Aspects of character magnified as separate entities. We all drink for different reasons. The need is everpresent. As this loss consolidates. The system loads another. Level eye contact circle body literate sage of circumstance. The motive behind the nuance. Painting constellation of events for easy reading in the evening (before the bedroom light goes off) A collapse of reason. Futile sun hoper wish the weather where the hole began. Under the stairs child at last. A place to drink. Sit look lonely for a call. A whisper of truth in a look. A thousand stolen glimpses can't recreate a moment of madness. We made for the bright lights. We escaped for these good times. Condensed without the lack. Without the empty fort i built. That these hands built. We realise that to forget one's self is to be one's self. That which we search for. Cataclysmic revelations or mishapen epiphanies to break apart the day. Settle on unknown. Settle with a silent minute. Settle sleeping on cars. Settle with the last name. Settle with a goodness i can't create. Still making new complaints. Always offering such advise. Always as a constant. Always as a standard. Always as a fragment of never. Of always suffering this constant pressure. A new dawn aligns with a new day of terror. Watch gravity force the new collapse.

how do you think we crossed the ocean?

Please please please

Three and half thousand miles apart two people share the same thought at the same time and the premise of distance evapourates in front of them as its steam rises through the same beautiful particles. It all at once becomes real. To be shared. To be held. Within the confines of the bodybag. Discussed internally in moments of bright sunshine. Picture perfect scenes. Moments of clarity. Moments to be experienced, provoked, discussed. The characters are honest. The characters are clinging on and crazy. Pausing in the sidewalk sunshine watching herds of hurried people scurry by. Their faces easily forgotten without names. Figures history is only valid if its known. Bouncing pictures of beautiful serenity between McMurphy's tenderness and my locked eye. Click. Click. Click. Click. Fingers press through screen to hold the others. Fractal images of self interest. Designed to be flawed as nurture draws nature and these parents for one are very much mistaken. These thoughts swept aside for another intertwined crescendo. He once believed that tenderness was developed with the sharing of air. Company time spent bearing witness to shared decisions, opinions and reactions. Where trust builds itself a home in your heart. Growing from tiny seed to tree. Growing for all to see. It built a coffin in his chest. In its grain their name's are etched. For all to see. He needs her there. More than anyone else. For her honesty. Enter a stranger who dreamt of him and his beautiful wife at one of mother's dinner parties. Announcing his baby born jaundiced at a table filled with food. His features dimmed, as yet unknown, the role filled with presumption. Glorious uncertainty. His future was marked in a dusty box labelled now.

All that remains.

My father's anger died with him
At the breakfast table lost for words.
From here it seems like a distant dream
Back where I broke and began again.

And all the good times
And all the laughter
Drift into the ether,
like dissolving particles in a chemical reaction.

As broken english interjects
the cold stone walls.
Painting glimpses of sentences
of tones and textures.
My psyche fills the gaps
colouring by numbers,
staggering forth to a new set of lows.

(my thoughts are too loud to sleep)

when inspiration hits
forcing sleep for tomorrow perpetual workdeath.

when inspiration hits
driving car full of men that make you too scared to speak.

when inspiration hits
driven flacid dull sea in the place that hope comes to die.

when inspiration hits
blame anyone but yourself but believe that is taking blame.

when inspiration hits
dance red and purple across the grapevines of this desolate county painting pictures of time on the windy cliffs of my nightmares.

when the inspiration hits
(still see your face on my eyelids)

indulge me

Back to the old. No fun in the city tonight. Back to the old school. Smeared stumble vision. Chemically forced smile. Drained of resistance. The love is bile. You won't feel anything by morning. The love is a lie. The smell you still feel by day three even after long showers. Curse yourself for feeling. Feel every person you ever told smiling pity upon your shoulders. These people keep holding me. Relinquish your grip. I wished myself freedom. Stumbling. Interaction. Not original enough not to. Take this heartache. no really.

indulge me. these days by nico

i remembered i had this today- its been a while. Its funny how things change. You want the best thing imaginable to happen to someone other than yourself. Yet you can't say it aloud for fear of. (the tip of your tongue) I have identified shortcomings recently. Although doubt and insecurity once recognised, begins to doubt itself, circling the same sorry circles relentless. Not confirmed or denied searching the skies for validation. Its been a while. To have not burned bridges or watch as bridges burn. This distance. You know to say i want the best is to know that i am not the best. To continue, the only path, strive to be somebody worthy of that love. She said you're crazy and i said yes. You remember all the things she said. I lost two people today. A car fought a tree and lost. I remember no bitter words. Emerging from seconds that last hours those soft kisses that felt like forever. Every cell bursting. Minds eye widening to make my fingers feel like sense's heightened and dimmed simultaneously keeping shoes off of bedsheets and holding locked eyes. I wonder from where these words rise, a lost evening with beers and plenty spoken memories. The night Sam did that. The night Darren did what? gosh. I am trying to be more confident in myself. Its hard when you cannot turn your brain from every possible outcome. Its hard when people who have never indulged you with conversation delve into themselves and assume arrogance from their own insecurity. You try to be genuine. You never lie. You never cheat. And you hope. In the black out. You judge others by your own standards. You were not playing games but frantic and reaching out, hoping, with every shout like ringing ears killing cells. You hear nothing except i've been trying to find the words. In bunkers and in barriers remain calm. I justified my actions because i hadn't heard. I justified my actions because i assumed i'd get a response. In bunkers and in barriers please remain calm. Y'know no-one, all is well, just put your hands upon my face. They call you an idiot and a sap. You say so what. I'm honest.
(you hope she finds the notes she left and that they make her smile)

When the corners of your eyes blur and redefine what you once interpreted as a constant truth. As all we hold dear recoils with this new perception of events as a startling whole. It all adds up to nothing. As we are an informal process. A blip on the landscape. So we treat our brothers as we treat ourselves. I saw you still clinging to a past we all stepped away from struggling. Maybe so distorted as to be unaware of the infinite truth. You are an ______. You are no longer defined by the same rules. And i am more worried than i've ever been and i've never been less able to effect a change. You're lashing out. You're not the same. Its beyond the occassion. No longer will a detox change these new crosswired internal guidelines that determine your decisions. Year after year after year. Stability on dependance. I just want to be alone. I've got nothing lets get drunk. What the hell happened to you guys are no fun. You grew up? Fuck you. Lash out. Take the money. Lose respect. See a friend post it on the web.

Explanations.

Aching heart provides contradiction with circumstance to open. Undiscussion of each condition that led to this padlocked box of hopeless romance. Unwilling to unburden yet aching to burst. Wetting cheeks at the very beauty of the first reckless occasion. This is why i keep it vaguely hidden honesty. And the danger that it brings. I don't know if i dare to open my heart to failure that's why i dare not lean in to caress you. One split second skin contract pupils dilate and fate becomes the plank i walk on. Sharks circle. Every step becomes harder to take. Emotion. Linked to past experience. Pain. Allow yourself to feel. Maybe. I dare not tie you to my heart. For fear of. Sharks circle. And the water is too deep for what it is. I'm tied to the memories. I can't shake the circumstance. Yet I can't stop pursuing you. I'll be the moth flying at the candle. Scared of burning its wings. Yet aching to be held in the light. Hanging from the words. Still glowing from your smiling eyes and not even ashamed of that fact. You and the music. Intrinsic. Empathy. Feeling. I want to know every idiosyncrasy. Before the sun comes up and i have to go. Days later and I'm still floating on the moment i became aware i was talking animated and you were smiling through a pint glass not allowing our eyes to unlock.

Said himself "its just a shame that i'm so ugly"

You looked beautiful, as the wind blew out the flame, over and over again. As another sneaky sideways glance revealed. This cigarette isn't even lit you said, you rolled your eyes, if i had worked courage to tell you, those were the prettiest eyes, you'd think i was cliched. I only know the truth, I keep it locked inside. We are just sick and tired of this town and i know. That we could just cling on, to each others skeletons, until its time to go.
As we discuss the memories of our lifestyles. For me at least i feel (and i can feel!) comfortable around you. I caught your stolen glance whilst i drove us home as slow as i could go. Your eyes shined the reflection of headlights glistened my inner smile cried I drift from stranger to acquaintance and I dare not open this because last time i time i let myself feel i am lost for the words. But its not just that.

I don't believe a girl like you would want me.
because
self deprication,
is ugly.
and i can't pretend,
to like me.

extreme sports

the generation gap. It shows with different tabloids. Disparity between figures. Six million. Quoting the same report. Replace Europe with Corporation. Replace Immigrants with Executive. In a boardroom we've never seen. Such affluence we can only dream. They say the trick is to keep the un-herd scared into compliance but not into panic. Feeling within the moment of a snap decision. Follow a guy who looks like he knows what he's doing. How many times this week did you listen to that confident man? Its the fear of not being in control that causes resentment. In my lifetime its been spectrum to megadrive to wii. Its the twenty years between black and white and colour TV. This internet birth affected how we interact. Now all our drunken secrets are databased. They scar the eyes of strangers. A conflict of interests develops over time. Openess must prevail. Undiscovered tissue builds up. Till you cannot feel them scratch the surface. Till your exes share pictures of next weeks conquests with unwittingly vacant eyes but don't they look happy feeling good for her lack of shame. and i've lost any beat i found i've stopped to see the picture better and i'm forgetting to puncuate on this race through the sentiment as this is my release as modern life IS rubbish and these words need to escape so i can stay vaguely sane i'm not on good form all the time somedays i need to hide away somedays people say you're in a much better place than six months ago we were close to saying something but we know that you can't tell people they rebel they sink further down the spiral and you mean me not some people and these words flow out of me i'll air it i won't share this with anyone sure you can find it through an obvious link but you gotta check there and care enough to click and find and click again so if thats how you ended up at my new now then i'm proud that you care enough or if its just helping resentment to build up then i'm ashamed for your lack of shame preach only love and the world will love you back i was told i fill the rooms i inhabit with scowls sometimes you just don't catch me at the right time and its cathartic to air my dirty shame out into this empty space without fear or perhaps unknowingly in these crosshairs and you know right now i don't care last time i set up a counter so i could see who'd been where but i haven't bothered this time because i'm not writing for you if you've got this far just see it through its escaping with no premise of anything no graces like looking at the floor when i could be locking eyes like telling stories of the person before the accident because thats just not me. It took a long time for me to figure that out. A clear before and after. I heard it was better to breakdown and fall apart early while you still had time to put yourself back together. jigsaw pieces cover falls undoubtedly and i'll show you a single cardboard picture of a car headlight as thats all i remember i'll tell you of the event with a smile on my face and i guess you could call this councilling how did this become about me? was it elliott smith that led me here. i hope he's happy up in heaven now. i read vonnegut say when you are happy you should say "well if this isn't nice i don't know what is" as to acknowledge the good that you spend dark hours dreaming of, and i believe him.