31 mar: all day in an analogue bubblebath, soaking in (on average) the three to five minute soundscape summary of what had been an expanse of vague sadness. the past, five year old dolby logic, catches up with me, im reunited with sense of memory by the songs that are playing; old memorex that i havent examined, i havent paid attention to for long enough that when the chorus, comes in through the afternoon it comes in drop dead nostalgic. i love playing dead and i play the day into quiet; sonoluminescense tricks of the eye, i darkened the day 90 minutes, 45 a side at a time. i guess i made it through okay. what? you were wondering if id make it too, werent you?

im not sure why those milk crates full of artifacts, those severed choir tongues, why, in their mute requiem, in their silent begging for mercy they called out to me this morning when i decided to stop pretending to be in bed and pay attention to the resonance of life that was there waiting to be awknowledged and apart of me. i responded, spare change; i put the right currents through the mechanisms. rituals for sounds. the room is still a mess from the last embrace (that was the last one we would have wasnt it?). i was holding them close to my throat, plastic to my collar bone, those measurements, five years of old past timespace hugging me back, falling around me, separate cassettes scattered like floor pattern around my floor.

heartache listening techniques: TYPE SIDE A : some people play tracks that opposite attract, distract, pied piper leading, away from the feelings.

TYPE SIDE B : the other half of us indulge the distress with sounds that widen the ache to a yawn - sometimes the specifics of the chorus sculpt the hurt into a shape more dangerous to handle but easier to hold.

these old songs are the red ribbons im using to remind me that there is something wrong with all of this. i should miss her but it feels like ive missed her all along. were we ever together to feel the difference of your absence?

i wonder what sound was sneaking past the distortion on these speakers here when she was landing . . .

you left noontime (high tide) right? nine hour flight? was that a lay over - a hesitation - in arkansas . . . or oklahoma? did you take a shot before you went up, a bourbon sideways, or are you taking them straight up these days? youve got a new life to get carried away by . . . some part of me hopes youre not thinking at all about me. i dont think you can do me justice.

maybe, if you forget about me, ill be myself again, when i drive out of town and on my way as i once had planned before i forfeited everything just to indulge the pleasure of practicing being in love. can people fall in love without having the quality of these empty chapters, without the squint of this division making attempts, trying to choke - to compromise the full extension of that out of control smile i remember i used to like to wear out. no, not that one, not the one youve gotten used to seeing me wear around since it was clear we were just each others recovery and not the real, playing tough girl, tough guy, preemptive defensive, we were models for fall fashion of our convictions - we both had the right idea, we discovered love with each other but it wasnt meant to be given to either. but, still we played . . . fast forward, pretend. pause, red level decibel meter, over protective just in case we found that out too soon, before we were 3000 miles broken up, in case anyone dared to argue, to beg you to stay or sway from the calendar dates youve scheduled in for your salvation to come on. and the date of my moving on. marching on. im alone again.
9:19 pm

30 mar: everything is just so post resentment now. post exression(ist). post modernist. were way beyond being at all. theres an art here to be appreciated. i know.

if everything is after the fact can anyone remind me what the facts of the matter were? i dont think there was a thing worth fighting for but weve lost regardless. i dont think i took a side. were passed over. weve overcome. this nothing.

everyone is acting so has been.

yeah, were post resentment. post expressionist. post modern dramatist. post it, yellow sticky notes right under our noses. reminders to forget, checklists, routines required rules. and all the disappointment that realizing this might protest, well, it isnt worth it even to ignore. our self loathing is our lawn furniture. we relax in it. we celebrate our status quo, smiling, avoiding sympathy. we dont need your pity. were post resentment anyhow.


"if the temperature of the water in a bath rises by one degree every ten minutes, how does the bather know when to scream?" - marshall mcluhan
3:24 pm

30 mar: these final words refuse to be poetry.

still swimming from the haze of clarity, thinking in dancing machine gun shreds because complete thoughts might lead me back to wanting you. im sorry.

this isnt me, hissing poison to keep myself from screaming, dont go dont go dont go . . .

i never finished floating in and out stolen space. aint unrequited love a bitch?

im not sure what im doing, stewing in my own juices until im bitter enough to taste. maybe if i listen to the same song over and over again, my feelings dont have to change.

i wanted to leave you with something beautiful, instead i hang myself with awkward lines, spitting hat trick accusations just to keep you on the phone (reach out and learn to leave someone the fuck alone). desperate for one kind word when a thousand would not be enough.

fall down night after night as i kill hope for someday, looking for sweaty angels rising in torn secondhand clothes. do saviors burn-up upon re-entry?

so scattered i dont remember sleeping but i know ive been dreaming because sometimes i wake up saying your name.

yesterday i broke down crying because i still remember how the sun chased us across my bed on everysooften mornings.

laughter melts like milky novas in my memory.

im ashamed for causing you sadness though im jealous of your tears; at least they get to touch your face.

i wish i had more to say so i could keep you holding onto this piece of paper just a while longer.

hope my love left watermarks. im too tired to hold you up to the light to see. i will miss you madly.

if you must, age by starlight.

and dont forget to pick me up and place a kiss lightly on my hair when you see me in your dreams.

maybe someday.
12:00 pm

29 mar: i let you go too easily.

i spent the night waiting for you to get off the train coming back from the opposite direction of the railway that took you away. i know youve left. i just thought . . . nevermind.

this timeless place, i said, keeps me from feeling.

times doing strange things right now because its finally moving normal.

this is what i have been afraid of; this is what i had left to fear. you are gone and in my emptiness i invent selves far too bloated to breathe and sometimes i am so tired i think i might give into forgetting but i have become allergic to the touch of would-be healers who would infect me, of seekers who cannot see past the hair in the eyes, of poets too wet with the stains of the hearts they wear on their sleeves - all these madmen howling over each other with such tiny ordinary voices.

i thought i leapt far too fast for anyone to follow but there you were, my free fall stranger, my eyebright whim and suddenly i find a song like tea and gypsies in their bedclothes rising to a sleepy dance, kiss the air with tangerines, blow catnip halos between my teeth to hang on the moon - to make you tipsy to make you smile to make you . . . make you . . .

i trace your number lightly on my phone for inspiration not sure how to break the routine of waiting to fall without falling in love again - too late, it is all so stale. i wish i had some food coloring to dye it a technicolor shade of nothing less than brilliant.
11:48 pm

19 mar: you think you can (just) change your mind but ive thought that one up before so that rationale wont do you any good here. bad credit. you cant impress me with your silver spoon gender bending and the wristwatch you just made tell time - that roledex bandage youve applied to cover that scar issue of a failure that was the suicide you werent real enough to decide, to commit, to live for. 4:48 pm

17 mar: deep breath, a healthy volume of air, high decibel rush - sweet nothin in my ears. fresh oxygen suicide, an antithes-i, my recycling manufacturing plant of carbon dioxide, a formula that the blueprints insist exist but ive stopped believing in the miracle of an automatic respiratory system, its a conscious decision these days it has to be to stay alive just barely just doing it scarcely right with this flirtation device my lungs have become cheap come ons to my invisible envy, botany commodity, blowing brief tiny kisses into the airwaves just for the shy faint of heart awkward response: my life support in this meantime. sighs are a luxury, macys thanksgiving day sales are still at prices too high for bargain basement survivors like me, stuck window-shopping waiting for more red tags and going out of business liquidation surprises, blue light specials, questionables, hot air items that the main street beggars sell at four in the morning. im light headed, im a starving asthma-ist, Primatene mist junkie, a romantic era opportunist, struggling for basic needs; too busy with the preoccupation of wheezing to appreciate anything else except for the bob of the pen as i write this down in an overstated way. my artistic method.

savings account deposit, skipping every other breath for the chance of a satisfying inhale and a generous exhale and in case it is my dying breath that the last words i say dont get cut off before the tape in your answering machine gets fed up and ends, clicking and turning over into dial tone, when the buttons will glow heaven through and its time to punch in, my numbers up, ring ring ring, pick up (where i left off when i was living), im now the mouthpiece transmitting and the speaker receiving, a figure eight audio loop, moebius artifice, the white noise of not listening or being heard and dubbing over the talking with talking that means something of nothing else, misperceiving and exponentially deceiving confusing and erasing actuality into bad marketing, false advertising, losing (reach out and) touch with continuing, forfeit game, sudden death, ninth circle inning, this overtime afterlife of one endless unanswered call. blowing it. finally.

twenty five candles are extinguished all at once. but i had no wish prepared for this unlikely occurrence. i didnt think i could - i didnt consider the possibility that i had it in me to kill the lights. (thats funny).

irrelevant matter; im off air now.

another baby blue friday-smudge-to-sunday morning dissolve, breakup, turn to dust and scatter dissapear, physicalmerge excercises, stretches extending cellular anatomy apart and into thin air, getting skinny, underweight, used to compare to industry standard, filled out calvin klein underwear like the glossy spreads promised anyone could if theyd just suspend conclusion from the mirror response afterthought, submerged trial sized appetizer to the wonder why nothing is ever good enough when its better than ever.
11:48 pm

16 mar: from understudy to supporting roles, leading lady to broadway shows, radio drama then silent era cinema. noir and private dick flicks. femme fatale shtick. talkies and comedies and bad career choices. celebrity vices and guest appearances. television and soft focus. academy awards and photo oportunities. media darling and adoring fans. blockbuster hit and a salary to compliment it. good roles and technicolor advancement. silver age descendant to indistry standards. hollywood and time limits. facelifts and physical fitness. bodyguards and gentleman callers. different lifestyles. method acting and disguised minds. mimic and mirrors. changing minds. your public, infested with journalists. vogue and tabloid press. headlines and undressings. appointments and scandals and rumors confirmed and denied. sacrificed. suffering. saint imagination. idol. icon. altar. you are your twin, oscarman. statues looking for a better pedestal. b movies and terrible scripts. playboy spreads and shaking heads. desperate publicity stunts and fall guys and dirty old men. fans and little people. household names. mascots and cameo shots. mistakes and edits. fading away. faking your death. saving grace and forgetting the face. history and ettiquete.

this is becoming something of a mini series drama. the more it takes that shape im afraid you will have a tendency to want to direct instead of canceling the show and leaving whats between us behind the curtain. i have a feeling youre more interested in an emmy than you are in us. or even your own heart condition.

3:02 pm

12 mar: that lady over there, the fidgety one, shes in sweat pants and a sweater, mismatched and oddly perfect together, shes got poverty gloss on her lips, that perfect shade of tacky, shes got junky john hancocked on her forehead, her eyes anticipate just one movement too quick, her body posture adjusts too apologetically to the body language of everyone else around. you see her now - well, she knows it too. she can see it as well as anyone else who could tonight. even through the bloodshot blindfolding her with heavy needy disguised cries for help that seem to only look like raised eyebrows to most people.

she sees it in me. shes laying confidence down in layers until she bridges the distance between desire to reach for me and those instincts that indiscriminately warn against dealing with the likes of the devil.

we both stand under the bus shelter, i keep my eyes looking past her shoulder, waiting for those intense metroline headlights to highlight the metal braces on everything in this midnight downtown setting. its been coming soon for an hour now, night lines, you know, left at the mercy of graveyard shift pacings. busdriver nitecaps, cat naps, a lullaby at every red light.

but while i keep my eyes avoiding her im ready to reply a look she might give with her direction to my end of the stare, im available just this time. im pretending not to notice, thats right, i play as if i dont know a thing about the relationship we already share but have yet to give birth between us. and i fake it with all due respect, the highest of honor to her, so as not to let on that i know whats about to happen, that shes approaching a settlement, a resolute kind of treatment, where within she may break the ice (no, not the kind that happens to be pushing her blood faster through her veins), interact with me. i always play dumb, i dont want to ruin the fun of watching the joy in their arms as they reach out their hand for mine, believing they were the ones who made this thing happen. its better that way. most of the time.

shes builds fast and its only after two touchandgo eye contacts that she mumbles something and i react, though what shes said is unintelligible, i mock all of this and mumble back. she eases even further. i talk her language. we chat, lightly. its unimportant really. its not as though the healing she wants from me is done with the delivery of some amazing insight or logic that applies. its something much more fluid. like a mumbling. five minutes later the L line opens its doors a few feet behind me. goodbye. goodbye. and im on my way home.

she sees it. those two boys out on gough street saw it this afternoon. a few passerbys. old friends at the club.

is there really a light pouring out of me, sick and sweet, pure and obscene? does it touch you when i look at you? does it kill you when youre so far from it?
5:05 am

11 mar: bedside manner, 1912, paris, hospital room with a view of an empty cemetery

such a mess: this morning. i slept cosign again, sitting in a waiting room chair, indulging in a wrong angle - such a pain in the neck - but that stiff little muscle at attention, breathing on the back of my head is only a suggestion, a leading question bringing my attention to the ringing, calling, hello, whos there, paging playing doctor dear, all i got here, ive got an awful ache in my ear, and its coming from all this buzzing, the whining and the clicking, the working, your digging, the mechanical whispering of this non stopping, a repeating, repeat offending, im for the taking, like old times, hmm?, youre stalking us like always, hunted haunted by all your dead arguments put on life support and vital signing just enough to remain preying on us good for nothings, over and over again, just reflexes, nerves, youre arguments are alive and kicking us even though youve been put to bed, comatose-ing it, youre missing it, some of the best fights of our lives.

and we, your friends, were left here worrying about what come next - your dead alive side of the contention is being kept alive only so that you may, hear hear, what did you say, i heard it a thousand times already but if you must and must you may, repeat your end, a conversation we started long ago and, you know, its one that we ended, but i seem to be the only one that knows the tune to that one. play it again scam.

the topic has been answered for and unanswered again, its been settled between us all for years but, i guess, all of us here at your death bed vigil, you patriarch dissension of what has become our ritual reverb, our break me downs, we havent yet had quite enough of what you came to require from the closure of these petty negotiations, these peace talks, by your steep slope standards, we must not have had enough of the grief you think would best suit us for our part in the syndication with the past tense, so present moving forward, here we are again, struggling for a change of heart again - well, its all ready too little too late, am i right? - every one of our blood pumping organs are already been broken, out of pitch, out of key, hardly a tick or a tock, but, as youve said, were not leaving till weve finished everything on our plates, scrambled heads on greasy rusty platters, eat your heart out, you said, so were always left here to clean up after the facts, putting all the shattered pieces back together, jigsaw jugular, an edge to the mismatched edge of another, never a fit, but were beyond the aesthetic now, who cares if it belongs there, clump them all together until youre holding the rough shape of a heart, it doesnt matter, whatever passes, were going to break it again later, relax, scotch tape or super glue, even better, bait and catch, sew the seams, fake the rest, forging missing shapes, pretending that theres still love in these violent opinions, and loves lost, yeah, but were still trying for that heartfelt redemption for the all of us, even with these gutted valentines of ours.

and you just lie there, man o war, above it all, god in your coma. youre gross anatomy still choking on your theorems, spittle lipglossing from the brittle rules of the war youve left us to die for.

enemy lines, you bring up the same problem again, were under fire, freedom fighting for another retreat youll make just to regroup and change the wardrobe of the words, then its surpise surprise, another attack at dawn, when we just recovered from the emergency distress from the night before.

but, what the fuck, the funeral march precession passed the finish line, what should have been the starting mark for the rest of us, and all those marathon mourners have scattered from the singular and on into the individual little lives that came together to make it up in the first place. but, not so fast, not fast enough, there you are, false alarm, there you and your rerun arguments are, hooked up, brain dead but trauma inspired, runaround, nowhere good to come of talking over it over it over it, over our heads again, your side of the story gasping out curses, the sentences of a wheezing narrative oozing from that transtracheal catheter, an orgy of crass sounds, a nauseating aural symphony, background to the sighs of those heaving iron lungs, hissing, death wish on a falling star (was it?), your punctuation under the foreign accent of an iron fist, insist, insist, capture this, us. drive us crazy with your silk gloves; velvet touch ideal. bruises on eyelids, forcing ours open, see see see, hear what youve been saying all along. yes sir, yes sir, three bullshit bags full. how many more to go? many many more to go.

you got god to agree to one last cigarette but you dont smoke. were waiting for habits to kick back, i guess.

hold and squeeze, this feather boa constrictor disagreement, murdering graces from the living things, this moratorium conversation wants to bury all of us along side with it, before you finally give it a rest. it aint going before its misery gets its company, trademark, incorporated, sign up, all aboard. (resign with me. confined with me). funny face talking with different clown gimmicks each and every time, dragging your will behind the word for word, dragged through and presented, covered in the sewage of your voice. dragging us and everyone else along with you into loathing, the delusive, futile, useless exercise of . . . of you. open grave, were supposed to fall in before you, cover your back, scratch, yeah, were here to break your fall for when you decide to pull the goodbye act for real, yeah, a cushion, your lazy lounge chair afterward, a comfortable expiration, is that what this is all for? were just your bed of forwarding addresses. you want our lives for your tombstone. our bodies - your repetitive requests - condolences, a wreath of roses. our names are your epitaph.

so, is that what you decided? if you cant have your way, youll swear allegiance to this nothing argument, just to keep us closer, youre bonding with us, are you not?

if you cant have us then, what? no one else ever will? original. well, thats a promise. aw, c'mon . . . thats a threat. at least were getting somewhere.

is this a siamese development? youve put us through the repetitive stress syndrome of your last ditch effort to keep us for yourself. its gotten so bad i dont know any better. is there anything else out there, ive become a symbiotic partner to this disagreement, broken for the record, the slaughter of my rationality. ive survived the oncome of this vegetated conversation for so long, for so long, now, the argument has become, in a sense, life support for any sanity ive redeemed with my hatred of you. so, what a twist, im keeping you alive so that you can reissue the discord of your about face debate, our ongoing contention, our wasting away, because its the conflict that ive become so accustomed to that outside of it, well, ive forgotten how to exist without it. shell shock. its in the chamber. i should fire. i should fire.

im sick of talking it over. kept watching over you, deathbedside manner, barbed wire etiquette, stayed put, we cant escape from this terminal illness of this camp concentration of yours. the wrath of dying together.

i think youre keeping a scrapbook somewhere hidden in your dream real estate, full of all the apologies youve gathered from us over the years, like a butterfly collector, long pins through the abdomen of each and every sorry, keeping it there on whatever page is open. trophy taker. how many species of apology have you captured, crasser?

is this what you meant by your cartesian interactionist dualist trap? i dont think you understand your own made up religion. oh, youre a road to nowhere kind of person. i forgot. sorry (theres another one). wont happen again.

youre expecting this to architect quite a memorial for you, once you leave, dont you? jacob epstein sculptures and purple sadness lipstick traces on your headstone. masses for remembering. what did you ever do that you feel youve even earned your keep? what life did you leave to poetry? what did we do to end up like this? with you?

nurse. nurse. i think we all need a shot of morphine.

opiatewoundsundressing, without the drugs i dont think im as substantial a human being in this inhuman dialog between us and our dead horse deliberations with the electric chair man. ten c cs. just a dab will do ya. silver spoon full of medicine makes the sugar sweetness of diplomatic relations with this dead man go down. we just need a dose. well be fine then. honest. while youre at it, dose up frank repine here as well. weve created a monster, you hear? let him down easy easy does it now. hold on . . .

youre not fighting to stay alive, youre not even trying, its the exhaust thats keeping you alive, its the apologetic nightmare youre living for, youre not even mad, youre sorry you didnt kill one of us before you gave up and into this. you killer, you assassin, punisher, oh, youre so sorry you forgot to finish the business of our, perhaps, happiness before you took the pleasure of the obvious, your fatal temper tantrum. your accident. your deadly premature action, this blasphemous unction, a bargain for the bastion you threaten us from, burgeoning helpless worry turn to pity in the autumn in all of our weakling hearts.

youre teaching us a lesson, you fucking rascal, arent you? a semester of being crushed under our misconceived but nonetheless, our personal dissatisfaction is completely believed in, a suzerain headache dedicated by you, an order to appear, a handicapping tearstain pain that suffocates, assumption inferred, insisting with every sinus swell, singing along with the cross hemispherical throbbing, that everyone had failed you.

you want to win us over so bad, dont you, more than ever, you little heartthrob, this profane self proclaimed victim arraignment, your champaign for our atonement, its mortmain influence, this is leaving us in decaying waking moments, wishful thinking, youre hoping that were dying for some small little notice of you crossing into conscienceless for a chance explaining understanding between the whole of this. i bet youre just laughing yourself silly, dreaming us rehearsing our lines for a final performance, our apologies designed in heroic quatrain for your benevolent acceptance, our of course tribute to the great of you. an honor to serve you.

jesus at least had the decency to live and let die, let bygones be bygones, leave it to odds, lets see, maybe, okay, yeah go ahead, be resurrected, there, a raise in his allowance, he gets one final message, and hey, what a way to leave, betcha Carnegie missed that in How to Win Friends and Influence People, but thats the way, ata boy, thats how you want to do it if you really make a long lasting final impression, eventually squeezing all the guilt and confessions we may ever earn the pain of observing and ending up as a good marketing decoy, money mascot in holidays clothing. thats the way to make us suffer for loosing you. youre doing it all wrong. cant say as im not tickled by that, in some hollow fashion. im too tired these days to really enjoy any saving graces. that, you did take away.

congratulations. lucky boy.

so here we are, bachelor, smelling the roses, the cheap hospital compassion, calvin caution perfume and that odor from those wetting their beds, giving their bread back from where it came where men and women with mops and soapscummy jackandjill buckets are at hand to hide the manifested sickness thats everywhere, it even makes up the visiting hour kisses and the sweet smiles on the kids with bowls of ice cream and their tonsils just come clean. youve stuck us in the limbo land where the only background music is composed of those disturbing noises cancer growth acoustics, bouncing off the walls and blown through the woodwind of plague wallpapered walls. metronome tempo teacher, time signature, rhyme, meter, lyrics, singer, maddened music theory, IV league tutoring, fury on the drip drip drip, hourglass imitation, pop sensation, the catchy passing of wasted time.

and, for some reason, abused beyond, past the suffocation of feeling sorry and sorry for you, crippled by compassion that were forced to feel, its programmed in, its too late, realizing this doesnt mean anything will happen, but were still your little boys, your little girls. we still wont tell a soul. little secrets. ours at least.

your turn, my turn, her turn, their turn, open mouths and fighting styles, medieval dentistry, confused tangents and direct advantage, solutions and hurt feelings, swearing, rough language. this is pulling teeth to get at a nerve. just to wake you up long enough to kill you without feeling too bad about murdering you while you seem so helpless. what an inside joke? step on a wisecrack, break fiction into fact, were really laugh gassing it up now, its the high life afterall.

when this all started i think you wanted someone, in a glorified exclamation of their fervent devotion to you, would fall upon worshipping you in your critical stable condition, kiss you, kiss you, kiss you, and wake you up. goodmorning, sweet prince, rise and shine, devise and assign, what clogged pipe dreams is it that flushes through your mind, that soft little mind of yours, yeah, it was supposed to be the other way around, kid fear, but your cold lips havent come together for anything other than that cat call whistle youve lured the innocence out from in underage creatures youve come across, lost souls, food for thought feasts in the street, stargazing from the gutters, barely aware that youve taken something away by the time youre whistling yourself along on your way carrying a tune you stole from the strict fingers of death itself, sometime ago when you were both drinking buddies.

so there you were, huh, waiting for everyone to weep at the bad news extra extra read all about it, your little boy call for help, mercy cry, sympathy ploy. im sure, dry eyes gave you good range for fury, emperors ratty old clothes, plans ruined, a recipe of shame and embarrassment and lost pride leading your lifeline along, staying alive, holding on in this rationalized reiteration of that former plan. and this is what you came up with. a mutated theory, this conspiracy, blackmailing everyone for the kindness you never showed anyone.

this bored disease is your requiem. this is what you want; this is what you get. youre just spreading your sick around. vermin scratches at the door of conscience. youre appealing to the vulnerable aspect of friendship, entrance wound, exit wound, youve infected. but were not death marching to this false prophetic pied piping, oh, you boy, were not following the ransom flat notes youre chewing up and spitting out, driving us crazy out of key, holding love for hostage, a terrorism you play by heart. the only rhythm to which you tapped your feet. no, were not following this anthem come over the transome, in thalldom to your subjective delusions, sodom headspaces, solemn confinement, an exile in scarlet drag letter straight jackets, branded as a quondam friend. im not taking one step along, ill play crippled caterpillar, ill hobble along, stray behind, let you lead a long lonely path of your own tracks you arrogantly decided wed follow, for the sake of falling for your accusations. no im not letting you take me anywhere, to a lair of your personal demons projected in the form of me and the rest of them, stuck under your presumptions, under the wheel of your judgements, a meal caught sticky in the cotton candy web of a forced confession, served as nostrum for your last supper, a desert, devils food for the soul (so, the way to your heart really is through your stomach, huh?), only five grams of saturated fat, oh, sorry i forgot, youre on that diet, well, skin snack on this weightless pill, a suppressant, get the last word in, fast relief from your indigestion, that hokum appetite for your unforgiving methods to torture out a brainwashed submission from every person around, youre playing sudden death, game point, perspective throw, final lap, going for the sense-datum epoch of what you hope will be our broken spirits. its nothing more than that; its only youre cruelty thats keeping you here, safely barely intact. its only your deranged sense of righteous resignation, your ultimate passive aggressive salve labor conscription of our forever regret youre living/hoping/dying for. for nothing.

release me. let me go. force me down. let this go. let it go. let go.

no rest home, no mercy killing, no soft suicide, you love keeping us all waiting for that facial expression youre wearing to subside, that imgonnagetcha smirk, you just keep waiting you jerks, wait till you see what ive got planned.

a reckoning for all your suffering, huh? well, youre the one thats holding on. youre the one whose not letting go. and were the ones who still are staying up late nights and rotting through triple setting sun long days just to keep watch over youre heartbeating copse, just the way you wanted it, isnt it? so that after this long silent eulogy, when were waiting for a sign, youll finally decide to wake up and make us smell the sulfuric acid in the coffee, give us your last words which will haunt and occupy the length of your immortality after you surrender to passing on. well be dying for sins again without answering to any word of god. sanctify a crucifixion that means nothing to our religions but supports your kingdom come. and just like the coward you are youll spirit yourself away, gone, put you in the ground, a prayer for the deliverance, prayers for the sending, federal case express, overnight, to wherever it is that bastards like you get to go when youve said the hate of your peace and are resting, sitting petty pretty, in the throne of the damning youve leftover for the all of us. wake up, asshole, get it over with. i cant wait to make your death bed.

i cant wait to kiss your angry eyes closed, hail mother mary and tuck you in. read you a bedtime story, comedy of get betters, so long, so soon, goodbye lullabies. i cant wait to cry for you the very last time. and then say with the real of death, its over.

its our afterlife, thereafter, enshrined by the guilt consigned. youre mistake is that we will mourn the broken hearts youve given now were living with. we wont give you a second thought.

enjoy yourself. youre still alone afterall of this. you we wont miss.

you stole even that from us.

go towards the light, go towards the light, i want the pleasure of watching you thrown out on your ass, you sunspot tumor, as youre eighty sixed, ejected from salvation for all your impenetrable sin. rejected from the everafter, go ahead, march on you craven cycle slaver, fly your donemewrong banner, stepping on angels toes as you walk your impotent glory, assuming youre worthy of an afterlife, travolta strutting into a sacred place, exactly where you dont belong, youre suntanning by the light, the good graces of paradise.

and there you are, youre already moving in, setting up house, make yourself at home and you havent even yet been received. unhumble, expecting. not quite, you half assed augustine, though youve told quite a tale, that whole and very convincing dying thing demonstration, youve argued, yes you have, you devils advocate, youve established quite a case for your martyrship. and there you are, consulting tenants rights in heaven, even then ready for some dispute, youre quite unhappy, wheres that motel room service, wheres your complimentary mint? you dont even wait for permission. you already insult custom, seeking shade, youre asking for shelter from the glory of god. its your home, now, afterall. youve earned it right? for all that theyve put you through? me, us and the all of them? everyones out to get you, wasnt that it? persecuted? wronged? injusticed? well, none of that will hold up in heaven, selfpity sovereign. and after one look at you youll be thrown on your ass back into your tortured peace, you karmic underachiever, nirvana, god forbid, youre coming back as a vulture, tit for-tat-appropriate, circle little leftover overeater, spin like your arguments again and again, waiting overhead for the dead to die, just for a subside in the hunger attack panic pains in your side, the one with the pound of flesh thats gone missing, taken forever by divine intervention throughout every remaining reincarnation youve got left before you quit while youre ahead at accomplishing the zenith of your recycled ambitions, and like this, there, youll suffer, supper on life alot alike now where were captives here, bound by your last will. an echo sound of your slender little argument, dressed up different everytime just for the fun of it, neverending repeating over again for effect, rhetoric that yet, still begs and inspires a guilty ache to relieve with an answer that no one can give and doesnt exist and can never be offered; by design, pain by number, nothing satisfies your strychnine paradox logic. brilliant, again, what an accomplishment.

all thats left is this waiting (patience, hush, patience), waiting for you to die.

visiting hours are over.

and tomorrow, i just wont go back.



twenty nine days later, phone message says they pulled the plug, patient suffered the seizure and any efforts to resuscitate ended in failure. time of death, eight forty two, pm.

i erase the message and pretend i never got it.
9:54 am pm

9 mar: this isnt what i thought itd be. so pardon me: my feint denial. please excuse me as i dodge your warmth but my hyper future vision screaming isnt quite what i had in mind when i asked to rape your sweetness. fuck my reckless panic blind. i cannot help my fragile distance. invent instinct to deceive. id much rather lie here die here than have to watch you leave.

strands and stains. starlight stains. color washes. remains. drink me drown me a haze. a maze.

i never finished floating in and out of stolen space. this timeless place you said keeps me from feeling. suspended lapses locked away. look the demi-strangers disappeared. their simple eyes can't find us here. you broke my aimless contradiction far too quickly.

my mistake. i fucked up again. its okay, self-destruction has its charms. i miss you already. im sorry. i meant it but i didnt mean to say it so late. too late.

its been almost half an hour since i last called and left a message. she still hasnt called me back. i called just a few minutes ago but she didnt pick up and i didnt want to leave another message. i think i fucked up. im still not sure. if it really is love, there is no such thing as fucking up, at least, thats the theory, right.

strange electric spiders are swimming in my head. my jaw is clenched so tight, youd think i was coming down off something. i was in the shower earlier and i think i started hearing voices again, kept hearing my name called out, movement outside the door, phone rings in the stream of water.

olivia says im dramatic. that doesnt really bother me because i know that she is, too. i tried to tell her this but instant patient dismissal is all the attention my observation received.

elizabeth still hasn't called.
8:12 pm