WHERE DO YOUR EYES GO

different patterns:  jutting out from the walls is paper and ink, things that are creative and pleasing!  my eyes go there by instinct, but i chastise you for your eyes landing there.  regular colour is like sleep and breath and death, it leads to little cognition and zero orbitals, no melodies; we search for coercion and flannel and explosion into.  anything that's different anything that is different

familiarities:  well, we come back to the usual, to make ourselves feel better.  to apologize for giving in to the difference.  we resign to comfort.  we are sorry.  we look for someone who might be our friend, who we could nod at, what would wake us from feeling solitary, asleep.  we're so used to looking at moving pictures on screens that it hypnotizes us, me, sorry, me, i, me.  i continue to come back in gaze to that solid screen on the pinball machine, it's a face, it's close to the mirror, i understand it somewhat, i pretend like it's entertainment, like it's something to do.

attractive people:  your face is so adorable, i even like the pores on your nose.  i'm VERY sure that you hate those slightly enlarged pores, but i think they make you more human, all the more beautiful.  your small blinking eyes glow with purpose.  your curls radiate the creamy skin within.  frailty is your hesitation, as is mine, and that silence draws me more, to you.

away from:  shrug shrug dart dart dart dark close feign feign pretend to check phone pretend to think about something shrug shrug yawn fake yawn, close gaze in on paint, wall paint, artwork, that which pretends to have such intent and purpose.

i sometimes wonder if i'm slowly being poisoned or if that's just the way i view the world

i wandered outside to switch up my surroundings.  envisioning all the possibilities, i froze just outside my front gate in the mild 40 degree weather.  i could go to a movie?  my mind rode the train to the theater, looked at the movies, couldn't decide, came back, saved money still frozen.  "i'll walk to buy the day's paper, a hot drink, some black ink for my rubber stamp," a scale of need vs want tipped in the direction of want, shot down still frozen.  collecting my tips from last night brought a quick, decisive vision of 'put-it-off-until-tomorrow', pockets empty stand still remain frozen on the sidewalk.  i looked at birds, interesting graffiti, questioned phone documentation, cheapening my direct experience, frozen seems so clean and present in comparison.  laundry tomorrow frozen.  sell car -- why not -- because i like it -- frozen.  contemplate change by not changing anything, starting to thaw.  with this thaw, i return inside, sit, type, stand by heater, stretch.  reheat leftover chinese food as a switch to my routine, because i usually have eggs and spinach at this time, and chinese only after 4pm.  reheat leftover chinese food to prove to myself that there is still something spontaneous and interesting in my movements and moments.  such spontaneity is a nail sticking up from the vast floor of earth, i scratch my foot on it, don't even draw blood, but seem annoyed, hammer nail down.  cold.

focus and forget

if there were a language that i knew you all didn't know, i would speak it, type all of these words in it, and tell you simple things that sounded beautiful.  you'd admire the sound, the collection of letters, the visual flow, the feeling that i truly wanted to convey something to you, yet was unable to. 

i would explain your fears in ways that trivialized them, you'd stuff them in your bottom lip and spit them out, you'd grow them and pluck them as soon as they appeared.  i'd put words in aluminum and watch you consume them, and after you easily fell asleep i'd collect them, recycle them, so when you woke you wouldn't have to deal with them.  i'd build paragraphs that you kept in shoe boxes in the closet, that you tried to forget but couldn't, that your partner was now slightly scared of, that you meant to throw out when you moved-in last year but couldn't.  the punctuation wouldn't even be recognizable or distinguishable, but you'd still keep it in your wallet, put it in your coffee every morning until you started to feel a dependence on it.  just reading it would make you space out in the shower and perhaps even sit down until the water was uncomfortable and luke warm, hearing it would calm you while standing in line.  i'd be speaking it to you and only you, you'd know this through tone, through innate spacial cues, through eye contact, through what you used to think your understanding of love was when you first understood the feeling of 'love'. 

it'd speak with statistical reason and confidence.  like if you heard that it had happened 95% of the time given the same circumstances, and you'd feel comfortable that it would happen again if you wanted it to right now.  and you wouldn't have to over think it, though, you'd just know that confidence without the numbers muddying it.  the language would be the texture of oil at rest, of newly dried concrete, with the smell of fresh cedar and the crush of dried pine cone.  it'd be nose to neck.  i could speak it without hesitation, i could speak it without thoughts of recourse, i could speak it without inhibition of personality, i could speak it without any kind of offense, i could speak it free of stutter, and steady of faith.

but i don't know that language, and if i did i'd probably just take it for granted.  it'd be a commercial on mute, a crumpled up receipt, a shiny nickel on the sidewalk.

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

ready when you are

i constructed thoughts of what to write from a slight hangover headache remedied by ibuprofen, coffee, tv, mariquopa.  they tied together like a birthday package that had been unwrapped, large shiny ribbon pulled violently apart, ornate paper torn with surprise and irregularity, gift peered at, then recreated and rebuilt around it again, for transport, for a show of nicety and convenience to the gift giver.  my thoughts sutured without the help of tape, but only a clearly seen and recognized rip, pieced together.

i thought of how the thought could become creative, translate to others, drip onto paper.  how it could be sung in song, hiccuped over beer.  how it could be cooked with potatoes and garlic, how it could be smoked or flushed down the toilet.  but it'll probably just get driven over multiple times, scraped against the worn curb as i parallel park repeatedly, if i could only get it on the first try.

coffee is my tired and expected metaphor, "coffee is my inspiration".  windex is my eyes, clear tape is my curiosity.  a good stapler is my curiosity, a good stapler is my creativity.  new curtains are my future.  slight pains in my foot, my knee, and the side of my left leg are my challenge, my buoyancy.

she is annoying and i am alone

i go through torrential downpours of need
    and want

and suffer the droughts of cups unfilled.

i try to use third person,
to talk at myself, to make things more tolerable,
but i use the same words, locked, repeating

he stares at beauty from mind’s eye, he feels repose and lack of creativity by the mold of sex drive
he tracks
he folds
he whines with turning of gears.

he fights restriction, he feels creative, he postures his hands accordingly in the mirror so that i can see.
i feel creative; i wash with desire. i wriggle in bed and bother no one.

spacial attitudes

the following is an illustration of what i see as the 'seattle attitude' mixed with the 'chicago attitude'. this is a true story.

I WENT to my most local bar, that is, the closest bar to my front door, down to the foot, for one beer. i was tired and there was a pretty annoying open mic, which didn't help much. i brought a book, as this particular bar is an easy place to read in, and the general noise level usually drowns out the marginally talented performer anyways. i took the last seat at the bar, which is only significant because a couple kept reaching past me to get drinks, often hitting my arm, which i didn't care much about. i eventually scooted over, gave them more room, and the folks next to me eventually left and gave up their seats to the couple.

I PAID, finished my beer, and upon getting up from my bar stool the drunk yet well dressed man (of the couple) asked me "what you reading?" i politely showed him the book, which he replied "can i see it?" i let him see it, which he immediately asked about the author, sam mcpheeters, who i gave a brief introduction to. i was obviously on my way out. he then opened the book, but in the way that bends the front page back and opens the spine, you know? THAT way. i only asked asked him to not do that because it was a book that my friend had loaned me (it was new to her), and i knew she wanted me to keep it in good condition.

I ASKED him politely, yet loudly due to the bar noise, to please not open the pages that far, because it ruins the book. i explained that it was a book that i had borrowed, so i was taking very good care of it ("i haven't even opened it that far myself yet, to be honest," i stated to him). he continued to open it, saying "you care more about the book, or the content," accusingly. i said, "i actually don't usually care either way, but i care about my friend and wish to respect the way she cares for books, because it's her book." he asked if he could read the first page, i consented. i think he read the first sentence and gave it back to me: "so that's how it is?" i said "yup," and walked out the door after taking the book from his hand.

I KNOW i was slightly rude, but it was for good reason. i honestly felt like i could have easily punched him in his fucking face. perhaps if the seattle/chicago spectrum was more to the east, i would have done so. perhaps this was because the book is about an angry man who is neurologically incapable of any emotion but rage. anyways, that guy was a fucking drunk idiot, and i have no sympathies for him and feel sorry for his poor girlfriend. now my friend's book cover bends slightly up when placed on it's back. i'm only one man.

(a slight dramatization of the seattle/chicago split, but i feel it draws a nice, real-life picture.)

struck by

"struck by deadly rhythm! of the production line!" maching g g g g g g g g b u z z z z z z z z z z z z t t h h - http://youtu.be/8clGuSJLP5w - w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w

copy paste enter repeat, between the dashes. upon personal retrospective of my time loving the refused, a sweedish hardcore outfit that changed my ears and my heart, no doubt. they're playing a couple reunion coachella shows, and goddamnit i want to go. as their songs used to fan my flames of discontent, i've stopped listening as of the years and have become enslaved in routine, likely story. upon re-listen for the first time in at least a couple years:

we are, i am, struck by deadly rhythm, of the production line. the refused sing post-punk ballads of alienation, a marxist critique of our daily lives run by machines, technology, the rote repetition of tasks that feed our capitalist ideal, that which is fucked and unsustainable and "organized crime, and we are all the victims." i've always been conscious of working machines, or my lack thereof, and how my hands connect to things, and i've stayed away. though machines are not machines, our selective and seductive services are our sector, our rote words, our repeated thoughts, our over and over actions, are what we sell in our lives for money, our minds labor rather than our bodies, and our existence as a whole is lagging behind our manipulative technology, as it skyrockets to a point beyond our imaginable sight. that said: WE ARE NOT MEANT TO DO THE SAME TASKS OVER AND OVER. WE ARE NOT TICKING CLOCKS, WE ARE FUCKING FLESH, WE ARE WONDERING AND CURIOUS AND LOVERS. AS WE FORCE OUR MINDS TO THINK THE SAME THOUGHT OVER AND OVER, TO PUSH THE SAME REGISTER BUTTON OVER AND OVER, TO TYPE THE SAME REPORT OVER AND OVER FOR NEW CLIENTS, TO MEASURE GROWTH BY YEARS IN A COMPANY, TO FIGHT FOR SIMPLE WORDS TO COME OUT THAT MAKE US HAPPY, WE CANNOT SAY THINGS WE MEAN WHEN WE WANT TO SAY THEM, WE FIGHT FOR WORDS AT PLACE AND TIME? (we creatively collapse). WE ARE MEANT TO CREATE AND BE CREATIVE, TO FLOURISH AS THE MIND DESIRES. TRAPPED IN CLOSETS OF TIME AND OCCUPATION JUST DOES NOT FUCKING CUT IT. the refused are fucking dead, as to mean, we are alive. (i'd rather be alive).

"We are meant to be here // without an answer // with love and with fear", under ourselves, we are meant to awaken and change this.

i remember and consider having a refused shirt, which i wore when i got arrested in 2001, the only time i've been arrested, for shoplifting. i remember some hispanic dude in there, who i didn't know, who talked to his lawyer for a while, and came back, and then i talked to that same lawyer and saw the hispanic guy's case papers, which had "refused" written all over it, with a star, the same star that was on my refused shirt. i think it was a direct reference. i scraped my name, and the word "refused", with my nail, into the paint on the door in the holding cell. i also played tic/tac/toe with a guy who i knew who'd also been arrested that day, who i played poker with a year before that. i had paint in my nail and it kind of hurt, but it felt really good to do, and i knew i had to do it.

[This is laden with many refused quotes and references, but that quote in the second to last paragraph was from Brian Gianelli - RIP.]