a little dash of cassavetes

love, essentially

i know what you're thinking.
i know exactly what you're thinking.
well, not exactly.
but i know.
i know.
and it's filthy. pure filth.
it's perverse and it's vulgar
and i'm not in the least
bit surprised.
the kind of smut that would get you
thrown into prison
if you ever acted on it.
yeah. i know what you're thinking.
cause i'm thinking it, too.

life

this is non-negotiable.
i refuse to settle for bitter fruit.

our dumb speech was worship

i spent the majority of class today reading, or at least making a valiant effort to, the sound and the fury. i am now past the first section, narrated by benjy, and eager to continue immersing myself into the twisted world of faulkner. though, i'll probably have to suspend these plans until summer. i've got a lot on my plate, as it is, with the twain class and whatnot, but that's only a minor and temporary obstacle.
my goal this summer is to wipe out some of the usual suspects populating my "need to read" list. these include: hamlet, king lear, steppenwolf, and the sound and the fury. i'd like to read all of the titles suggested on modern library's top 100 novels list, but i don't think that will ever pan out. it was a good idea--one which i lifted from a former girlfriend--but one which, ultimately, will never be realized. i just can't see myself fighting my way through joyce or any number of books which fail to arouse my interest.
i don't know. i may go back and revisit some old favorites. or at least scan them for ideas. ah, plagiarism!
things haven't been going so well lately. not that they ever do, really. but it's been really bad these past few weeks. there was an incident in chicago--or maybe afterwards--and things haven't been the same sense. it could be my chaotic sleep schedule. or maybe this new shift in friendships and alliances and the subsequent affair of having to go back and carve out my identity once more as it relates to my new social environment--the people i am continually surrounded by and their looking glass projections of who i am, on an essential level, how they in turn determine the person i am, when in their company and the power they hold to affect my disposition long after they've left. and so and so forth. either way, i feel sort of free-floating and prone to new sensations. perhaps, a rehabilitation or relearning process. having to train myself to perform tasks which i had routinely grown accustomed to now in a new and unfamiliar context. i don't know. the whole thing has really thrown me for a loop. (is that the correct idiom?). i hate change. and i hate having to be reacquainted with things--especially after they've become familiar. ostensibly constant. now's the rebuilding part. as if the end result was and ever will be finalized. oh well.

i think i've mentioned this before, but one of my worst fears (perhaps irrational, i don't know) is suddenly and inexplicably (no pun intended) losing the ability to speak. i don't know why this is. but it's always been a deep-seated source of horror for me--the possibility that it could happen. i read a quote recently, about fears, and it went something to the effect of: there is no reason to fear, but to surrender yourself to the inevitable. as if to say, all your fears will eventually come true. if this is the case--and i feel fairly certain, although, i can't say why, that it is--then i'm fucked. it's like a self-fulfilling prophecy, i guess. i mean, you don't want it to happen, so it does happen. it's like, once it becomes realized, in your mind, then it becomes possible, externally. and i don't know why that is. i just wish i could change it. project or transfer my anxieties onto something else, something less debilitating and horrendous. then, i guess, though, it wouldn't be fear.
idk. maybe there's some mental trick out there. some crazy buddhist controlled thinking process or something. if so, i'd like to know about it, so then i could believe in it, whole-heartedly and make the bad go away.

wide berth

i've opened too many doors, stepped into portals and then shied away from them at the last second, being the coward that i am. i want to know the truth. i want to know myself. but i'm too afraid. i need distractions. television. books. muzak. without these things, i am lost, immersed in my own head--the unbridled currents of mental clutter and intellectual smut, crashing on the shore, never coming to a halt. the best i can do is to just try to block it out, pretend it isn't happening. but i can only do this for so long. and then i am forced to look within, as if held at gunpoint. self-inflicted introspective terror. there are sensations, feelings, thoughts which i find impossible to communicate in any coherent manner, but which i feel compelled to jot down, as if they were divine. significant. vital to my conception of myself and my ostensible intrinsic self-worth. alas, the missing link. the key. to what? to more doors. more unexplored rooms. i'm too afraid to step out of the darkness, to find the light, and watch it pass me by. sun-up, sun-down. an endless cycle. it never stops. the light is transient and fleeting, like convictions, like beliefs, like self-conceptions, like your own reflection in a mirror. the only constant in the world is that there are no constants. try as i might, however, i find it impossible to abolish what is essentially me. something seems to stick. whether through nature or nurture, there is a self and it manifests itself in cringe-worthy revelations. idiosyncrasies which i can map out from old journals to the present.

neither beginning, nor end,
the shadow extends,
from this world,
to the next,
it never forgets,
and try as i might,
to abolish these quirks,
something endures,
outside me, it lurks,
i am one who's bound to you
and everything
is cut in two
in lines we make up on the spot
who's to say where it's not
it's not a matter of
looking within
but taking it all
for what it's worth
and learning when to
leave it alone
to accept the life
it's etched out as its own

dutch light

there is something obscenely foreign
in the familiar--
not an immediate sensation
but one which comes and goes
in little fits of selfish
exhibition
and leaves its smear
on my brain
with no consideration
for the thoughts i'm
already obligated to entertain

not a stranger, but an unwelcome visitor,
a curmudgeonly uncle,
a guest, a friend, an acquaintance--
i know him well
he is a constant reminder
that life is useless
and ultimately devoid of meaning
it's the illusion that by
keeping ostensibly busy
investing or indulging
typical vices
championed by the human collective
we are nurturing some arbitrary
sense of purpose
there are times, though,
when these distractions become
routine and we are forced to realize
the vulgar nature in their lack of nature
their lack of order
the lack of order in the world
at large
and it's in these rare and fleeting moments
that we can see
clearly
the quirks in the mundane
the automatic response
deconstructed
eviscerated and systematically flayed open
cut down the middle
and pinned at its sides
it is in these moments
that we realize just how fucking
lost we've allowed ourselves to become
in ourselves and everything else

it's a fucking sham
never forget: you're a ticking time-bomb
masquerading as flesh and blood
behind the smoke screen
is another smoke screen
is another smoke screen
is another smoke screen
its initial appeal, its shimmering view of paradise,
turns to filth, wilts and rots,
so suddenly and
slips from your fingers
and disappears
like friends and the sanctity of familiar places.

Twain-ism

"Never explain comedy or satire or the ironic comment. Those who get it, get it. Those who don't, never will."
-Michael Moore

douche ex-machine

i feel an urgent compulsion to get out there and "experience life." i know this feeling is predominantly fueled by desire to get laid/find a mate, but i feel like my current state of living is doing more harm than good.

i sleep all day, dread work, dread school. and daydream.

i spend too much time in my head. i need to talk to people. it was so much easier when i was younger.

what happened?

i guess, my biggest hang-up is that nothing interests me anymore. music, sort of--but not enough to go out and do anything about it. i like movies, but that's more of a solitary experience. the same goes for reading.

so, i don't know.

i guess it's time to suck it up, bite my tongue and get out there, as simultaneously appealing and unappealing as that sounds right now.

oh well.

perhaps i'll leave it all to fate. and when i've missed my train, oh well. oh well. oh well.

you can't force things to happen, but you also can't just sit back and expect good things to happen to you. so, in a nutshell, this is my dilemma.


i need a capraesque intervention.

blasphemy (the forbidden apple)

i'm sick of being subjected to advertisements,
user-friendly malware,
embedded codes
lost in numbers
against my will.

ladies and gentlemen:

steve jobs (our big big brother).

i'm sick of being told what i like
and what to buy
and why it's important for me to earn money
take an interest in politics
go to college
get married
breed

south-pawed journalism
the neo-fascist gop
government leaks and theatrical summits
face-flushed cover-ups
(the only evidence of their humanity)
this is progress this is change this is living, finally

i don't even know these people
how do i know that they are real?

i'm sick of shopping
actively pursuing the life of a consumer
spending money because i'm bored
and unimaginative
lighting out west
to a new territory
a vast utopia of commercials & billboards
which make it hard for anyone, in their right mind,
to suspend their disbelief/
manufactured personalities (i am no exception).

i'm sick of people
this world is crawling with them
little bugs i wanna squash or
spray like an exterminator
a noble act--like the great flood
justice, at last, is just a word, alas

i'm sick of soul-mates
friends
cigarettes
companies, corporations
spewing vulgarities in the form of
consumer-friendly marketing
business as usual
my lungs are populated by puss-filled sacs of blood
and ticking time-bombs
awaiting genocide
(so i'm told)

why can't i find my true true love?
like patsy cline?

how can i trust the dictionary?

who put these thoughts in my head
and how can i make them go away?

between heaven and hell
lies heaven and hell

repetition repetition repetition

one day, i will be somebody:
famous
important
successful
of consequence
married
divorced
with or without child
i will be an individual
a wretch like me
like you
like me
maybe we can talk about it over coffee?
how about that?

i am chock-full of contradictions
swelling-up inside of me
like water on the brain
like a brain in a jar of
formaldehyde
sprouting vaguely perverse
after-thoughts
staircase wit

one day, this affliction will
leave my body
bloody and broken
i will get up and leave

heaven awaits those who
believe
like i believe
like hanging on by a thread