i'm working on it...

Move me to live
to leap from my place of dormancy with untamed adventure in my eyes
to shed a thousand tears
or to laugh until my insides cramp
but until then do not utter a word

ruminations

If consumed long enough with any task or activity a thoughtful person will eventually start to question meaning and purpose, even if consumed by free choice, that is to say, even if the activity is engaged in by a person in times of leisure or 'free time'. While under investigation, there can be a reaffirmation of the intrinsic value of the activity and meaning is successfully perceived or the opposite can be revealed - an emptiness will be sensed, and a confused unrest will start to grow within. This may not even be a conscious process, I have oft times experienced it vaguely and subconsciously, which furthermore leads to a general discontent and (again) vague unrest in my being. Further investigation of these 'vaguenesses' will lead to the realization of the emptiness. It is one thing to say "I am happy" and "I am fulfilled" but it is another altogether to actually be happy and fulfilled. Pressure from exterior forces (jobs, people, perceived expectations, a want or desire to be something other than we are, etc.), our own personal motives, and dishonesty within ourselves to ourselves can lead us to feel confused as to how we actually feel.

But, the thoughtful and intelligent human (perhaps even spiritual?) will always, eventually, be brought to critical thought even if never conscious of any unrest or even if in a state of consistent 'vagueness'. It can happen when 'zoning out' - washing dishes, standing in line somewhere, walking, running, or any activity in which the active mind is subdued and the always constant background thought takes over, as if in daydream. This is, seemingly, how insight occurs. Thought seems to come to us from 'beyond', but in reality we have been thinking, unaware, the entire time. Lonergan, in his tome "Insight" would have much more to say on that and the human condition of thought in general, though I am afraid my feeble memory does not recall his thoughts offhand (it has been 4 years).

Now, a human can either embrace this emptiness and continue on, now aware of the vague unhappiness, which in it's realization can become solid, or, perhaps even realize the emptiness and continue in a masturbatory manner, with pleasurable manic highs followed by depressive lows. Still, disillusionment pervades.

However, if the activity truly brings no intrinsic joy there is eventually a recoil from the emptiness and a shift towards meaning. Whether a person is capable of making this shift (ie if the source of unhappiness/that which is inherently empty/that which is devoid of meaning is a task or activity which one is not forced to complete) is an issue, and if they are forced to continue (eg: at a job) then we have the makings of intense despair. 

Though, it seems as if the truly 'freed' person (a phrase of which deserves it's own book to explain) would say that no man is "forced" to do any-thing. Which is true (idealistically, in the modern sense). However, when one falls into certain conditions and finds himself in a specific situation, it becomes very hard to break out of that conditioning. Jobs, for example. It is hard to leave any position that upon hard work was earned and simply seek out a new one, especially in a new field. There are, as mentioned before, these pressures. Parents pressure us to get an education, spouses to make money, society to succeed. But what seems to truly matter is personal happiness, which is not as self-serving and selfish as it sounds (radically different from Randian objectivism).

Personal happiness then, briefly (because I have to get ready for this day) seems to involve feeling fulfilled. (This word is not thrown around with levity, and if given the infinite time and peace of a life unconcerned with money and computers and girls and work I would certainly read and write at great lengths about it and many other things as the philosophers of old). Personal happiness is not just about being selfish; doing just what pleases yourself. Quite the contrary, and if one's life is modeled around selfishness then the very things I have just written would plague you. Emptiness indeed! Rather, personal happiness seems to involve feeling as if you've benefitted someone or something, made a connection to something, perhaps even aided the common good, or improved the human condition. These seem to be things that encourage feelings of fulfillment. 

And I don't believe this is a utilitarian version of doing things to feel good. I believe in the truest good that actually comes out of them, and as a result makes one feel fulfilled, which is to say, fills one with a sense of meaning.

I'd like to work out the thoughts in the final paragraph more, regarding personal happiness, because it isn't just about fulfillment and the common good, though that is certainly an aspect. However, I need to go (time, cursed time, always time).

today is one of those days

pretzel folded legs
looks expectantly to the future
hoping for the best
but demanding the better
little does he see, silly marbled eyes
all glass, long ago unfocused

heroic rivers marched through mountains
carving them down to hills
now dried creek beds meander slowly through the waste
with every rain they surge with strength
they bide their time, they only have an eternity

the flaws are in every-thing
that he can see
it makes them beautiful
demands are as empty as the bed he has made
and with rainy eyes that blink back to focus
the river will cover him up

12/7/2011

did you want to be

when you sit in the hushed lights of the gas stove dreaming of a thought you had last week you will lose yourself in another thought, a different thought that is not better just different. it will consume you and you will lose your focus as the shadows lick your face with their orange-blue forked tongues. visions of reality will blur and stand still as you look into the moment and soon see through it as it freezes in front of you. your mind will be freed for this eternity or moment or year or lifetime and the thought will become a realization and an insight will creep over you as you turn entirely inward, traveling through time while rooted in the illusion of space. and here you stand a physical being completely outside of that existence. your mind is somewhere else. you have left and neither past nor future have any need for your attention, nor you for theirs. it is this that you live for, it is in this you are aware of your awareness.

cats
photographed with lasers
in their eyes
taking over the world
soon

i.
sit with me and look around. see all that is before you. ignore the people who pass. they are stuck. ignore their glares, their stares put you down. they see things and think of a word and nothing more. see the thing as it appears and let it affect you. if there is no word, there is no preconception. there is only a new thing to be experienced.

there is always every-thing.

ii.
allow wonder to overtake you. your imagination will never disappear unless you abandon it. if you are too rooted in the science you will not see with your all. dream about it. we are only presented a thing through our senses, but that does not limit our wonder. explore it. allow it to move you, allow your self to feel.

there is.

iii.
live presently. time does not have to exist while you are here next to me. there is no past or future, they are only in your mind. if we let time slip away we will be rewarded with eternity.

there is always.

i want a girl who has nothing figured out
if you have all the answers leave me alone

i want to suffer through life with someone

i am the protagonist of waking life

i woke up today
12 hours later i'm still not certain i'm awake

things are happening around me
i am detached

two cowards in love

follow up

i think jordan said this to me a few days ago when i was home. i was telling him about this girl who was all about me after a couple dates and just was (imo) coming on way too strong. it forced me away, and i ran from that. i was telling him this girl was crazy and he said, simply "maybe she just liked you". so simple, so practical, but this stopped me dead in my tracks and put a lot of things in perspective.

to me it seemed like there was no way a rational and logical person could fall for a person so quickly and just be completely desperate...because i was thinking only about myself. i'm often extremely cynical about love, though i remain a hopeless romantic and idealist at the same time...it's quite the paradox.

so when i put myself in her shoes, finally, and made the connection that maybe she felt something strongly for me and decided to not hide it, it blew me away. maybe she wasn't 'crazy' but just consumed with a feeling for me and wanting desperately to express it. it almost filled me with guilt for being such a dick. still, that's life, sometimes (many times?) it's not meant to be. if your feelings are not reciprocated you can come off as clingy, obsessive, 'too strong', or crazy. the take away is that it's important to remember this - that people are not like this to every person they meet (and if they are, then ya, they are crazy), they don't profess strong feelings immediately if they don't feel them earnestly.

even more relevant was experiencing this myself in the past year, being on the other end of it as the one who comes on strong. indeed, i am a reserved and fairly slow to move gentleman with plenty of cautionary walls up all over the place...so to be the one helplessly pursuing someone and realizing they might be thinking of me as the clingy crazy bro sorta humbled me and blew my mind, just as jordan's comments the other day halted me dead still and slammed an insight into my head.

it takes a lot of courage to come out and just show it, to share how you truly feel about someone with that someone. and you take that risk of it not being reciprocated, and being made to feel like a crazy fool. dopamine and neuropeniphrine (SP??) are a HELL OF A SET OF DRUGS. but to sit back and let it fester inside of you can destroy you utterly, eventually. i had an extremely close friend who suffered through this until they could not hold it in any longer, and it literally destroyed them.

so here's to being honest...most of the time.

sidenote:
this same dilemma has been reflected on in my past writing in tweet haiku's and blog entries, i believe titled "two cowards in love" either that or it's in one of my journals. two cowards in love, indeed. if it consumes you, let it out.

big
fucking
sigh

a serious question

i was listening to a song a few minutes ago and started daydreaming...

tell me,
what is crazier:
to fall in love and express it,
instantly,
insatiably,
with the chance of being rejected and heartbroken,
reduced to an unstable mass of emotion
or
to wait,
to hold it inward,
to never express,
to survive weeks of silence from the ration of one kiss,
patiently watching, waiting,
but paralyzed with fear of loss and rejection of the loved,
 silently living in torture until it overcomes and destroys you?


false dichotomy? is there a middle ground? there is, i feel, but discuss these two: which is crazier?

kairos

the warmth of the sun
on the salt of my skin
the sting of the sand
on the hairs of my naked body

run until it hurts with
sunburned blue eyes

never content but
perfectly satisfied
----------------------------------------
to lock gaze with ocean eyes
that mesh so well with your own
to follow a flash of life
into an awakening dream
to sit on the hands of the wind
only to realize she was already there and waiting
----------------------------------------
i can't tell if it was an hour or a year
when you laid down upon the sand
my mind is still there now
every nuanced movement seemed to slip into a river of time
and it flowed, was flowing, and will always flow
with no start or finish
----------------------------------------
you turn your head to look at me
i look down at you
i step closer
closer
a perfect seal, our lips, with just the right amount of pressure
yours part and a laugh reveals volumes
but i remain stoic
our eyes go for a dance as they break free
it's happening again
i hope my smile is mysterious

head explosion

track 6

i would do anything for you
foster the people
andrew says...
what's new with you

mail.google.com

oh btw kierkegaard

.

nusthells
best of pitchfork
jobsearch GIS jobs
(6) new updates
songmeanings

are you going to p den?
apply server, clarion
national park service law enforcement training
topher says hola
how goes it?
aaron nicholas steely has left a new comment
iphone notification

are you still at your oc address?
track 6
i would do anything for you


track 7
houdini
last.fm  scrobbling on
disappear now
w
o
o
s
h

'in between jobs'
i will eat corn meal
and banana peels
to keep myself from
thinking too hard
about this nothing

but if one more

person asks

what i'm doing

this winter

i will 

shrivel

up and

fade 

like

an

80s

retro

disco

cabana

song

in 2k11

life is an adventure

been ramping up my mileage.
40-50 miles/week. all barefoot or in merrell trail gloves.

i'll be unemployed come tuesday.

one door closes, two open  is what i keep telling myself.

the world is at my fingertips, where to go next?

if only money wasn't an issue. money. money. debt. fucking money.

meta






conflict

new poem up at let people poems.

my poetry is at all times one of the following three:
a) self-exploratory
b) based in memory
or
c) pure fiction/fantasy being used to depict a moment or feeling that may have been real, though the story surrounding it may be made up.

fortress of solitude

you
enter
casually,
cautiously.

step
     by
        step.

walls
protect fear
of vulnerability;
each stone delicately lain.

you
     are
         inside.

reluctance,
vague uncertainty -
but it's hard to turn back
while the garden's in bloom. 

i am so fragile

sleep, dreams

last night i had such an intense dream that i came sprinting out of my bed fleeing towards the kitchen to take on (what i thought) were intruders in the house. i was filled with an animalistic fear of death and a call to action. i ran out in such a hurry to take on whatever force was at my door, stopping only to tell my sleeping roommate that he had to come help quickly. my roomies had come home from the bar and spilled drinks on the ground and were yelling because of it. somehow that got into my dream and it became the sound of people screaming for help. i remember nothing of my dream except that i felt absolute fear, myself dying, and others that needed help - this was all presented to me through (seemingly) geometric patterns in my head.

i 'came out of it' after everyone in the house was staring at me like "what's wrong?!". i felt as if i was on a hallucinogenic drug for ~ 5 minutes, watching everything go by in a blurry haze and asking those around me if i was still asleep. i drank some water and retreated back to bed.

later i woke up with an intense start again, this time in a cold sweat, feeling the same excited fear but not as intense. this is wholly new to me. my mind is operating in ways i have not felt in a very long time...

f(x)=love me

write to me
tell me you
x

i've
become a painting
in
a sea
of dark blue blanket
my eyes
mould
transform
and swirl

i don't
burn in you

blink
look inward
the storm
is here
inside me
only

eleven months

nature's first four seasons with no 'her'

it's the fall 

that i stood up from

i learned to walk again

the people disappear from the streets

the wind comes around from the north

a chill sneaks into every grain of sand

summer2k11

holie crap RIP blog!!

hehe no j/k
the more successful i become in competitions the less i write online. IT CONSUMES MY LIEF. but it's a good thing temporarily. i've been getting 1st place finishes in the mile run, 3rd in the region for the 2k and 7th in the nation for the 2k run on the beach.

shit's crazy

ay

all-time high all-time low

coalesce in my ears
sounds
a dense ball of firing neurons
lips pursed, moving, foreign
mildly dissatisfied but perfectly aware
surrounded by multitudes but desiring solitudes
understanding in tongues and being lost in speech
dart across her eyes
the flower's edges creased over
an octagonal blue rose encapsulated by green ridges
mountain peaks i climb
every time i gaze
swim through your whites and begin my ascent
my flight through canyons and valleys
to reach the overlook
to be moved in awe
to reach truth
or my death

ode to the 'stache

a blade of grass, for life

what if i were to take scissors
to every blade of grass
i have no idea what to do with my life
but 'as long as you're doing something'
seems like good advice
i could be busy my entire life
if i made grass my business
i could be content and happy
as long as i never thought about progress
or the futility
of taking scissors to every blade of grass

when you think about progress
and have goals
and need to cut grass
under a timeline
under a deadline
then you can become depressed
about taking scissors
to every blade of grass
but if you just
if you just
if you
if
i
i
i be
i just be
if i just be

why would anyone ever be unhappy
what can you be depressed about
if you just be and not think
but just be
i want to just be and stop thinking about futility
deadlines goals progress
achievement measurement worth
value productivity efficiency
unhappiness depression stress
death

i reject this death
i want to live with passion
i feel passion
i feel love
i dont want to 'just' be
i want to just be
i
i
i

A short play

HOME FOR THE WEEKEND

Me: Mom, do you have any xanax or anti-anxiety meds I could take for my flight?

Mom: No hunny, but I have some percocets.

A FEW DAYS LATER ON THE PHONE

Mom: Why are you anxious to fly?

Me: I dunno, end of the world...rapture...dunno...i think the world is going to end while i'm flying or something, jet might fall out of the sky. (pause) I guess I just don't trust man made structures.

Mom: You have more of a chance of getting hit by a car or dieing while driving, there's nothing to worry about. Flying is exciting! It's an adventure. It's fun.

Me: I know i know, it's irrational. Maybe it's a control thing. i dunno. I'm excited, it's cool, nevermind. I'm cool. Ya. Ya, hm, yaaaa, okay, ya, i'm gonna get a window seat hopefully.

A FEW DAYS LATER ON THE PLANE

[CENSORED]

this wasn't supposed to be a love poem

the shirt i'm wearing is not Springy enough
but the shirt underneath is too small
i have no alternatives
i'm stuck in an in-between and not liking either option
i move to go to the bathroom
i want to drop through the floor
maybe travel through the cold hard rock beneath me
swim through the taffy, be warmed at the core
then come out somewhere that is elsewhere
a different here that is new for a while
that would be adventurous

instead i'm looking over my shoulder
fear is gripping my back and he won't let go
i keep seeing your shadow but i trace it back to a mannequin
the mannequin knows no love
still it stands there sorta perfect and knowing it is sorta perfect
frozen in coquettish nonchalance
stupid mannequin
i sympathize with the mannequin
i love the mannequin

the surface of the earth is rugged
the shape is more like a potato than a sphere
from the outside it appears dynamic, vibrant, healthy
but the computer models all agree:
a misshapen geoid, a hunk of rock
these thoughts plague me while i stare in the mirror,
when i look at my face,
when i catch a glimpse of that headband on my desk

love

twitpic flarf/image macros from http://twitpic.com/lov3 and http://twitpic.com/love

"people would give us money"
"we are adorable"

travel the world
beggars with nice things

stop to pick up a penny
be humbled by your fashion sense

i'm naked
ask for money naked

let people stare at my body
feel normal

thoughts, in moments so holy, of no-thing and no-one, but of every-thing and every-one or franny

this fractured life.
i see you and wish you the way you were-
what happened to you?
i liked you back then;
your awkwardness, the way you didn't quite fit in
we had an affinity for each other -
a commonness in our plights,
a meeting place in our disdain.
when you would put on your music and mope
i would become concerned,
you would become distant.
we were weird, all of us.
what did you accept?
how have you changed? settled?
content with your-self
you're too busy for me now
it's inescapable, this thought, the one that never fades:
you're better than me.


the daffodils have come, the tulips are blossoming.
the fragrant blossoms of flowering trees imitate the winter snow.
they settle around me, on my head, in my lap, 
the breeze wraps around my skin as it gently sweeps the petals away.
the bees are busy dancing in joy, chasing one another, 
hanging for a moment in unison, then separating.
my skin tingles from the sun's warmth - the warmth of the kitchen after a trouncing in the winter frost.
my eyes stare fixedly at nothing, though i see everything -
the billowing white clouds floating through the brilliant blue sky,
smoke rings that we blew out of hookahs in some summer gone.
a jet with contrails of grey fades from view and brings me back to the gritty.
it brings me back to the focus of my consciousness and out of this world,
do you hear me anymore? do you even listen when i speak?
or do you only disapprove?
i breathe heavily, let out a sigh.


am i the one who's changed?

Lifeguarding part 1

Let me start this off by saying I love people. But after a while, they annoy the fuck out of me. I enjoy human interaction. I enjoy meeting and experiencing new people. But when you are responsible for their safety, they start to present themselves as stupid and annoying. The same questions are repetitively and endlessly asked. The same people you answer questions to end up needing saved later. They ask you where rip currents are located, then they go and swim right next to them. They inevitably end up back in your care after ~10 minutes, but this time clutching with all their might to your buoy while you backstroke in yourself+their deadweight and try to lighten the mood because they are aware they just about drowned.

There are a lot of misconceptions about being a lifeguard. Officially I am a "surf rescue technician" on the Ocean City Beach Patrol. This means nothing to anyone who isn't also on a beach patrol. What the general public thinks of when they hear "lifeguard" is: chill-ass job bronzing in the sun and picking up girls. There are also some sweet stereotypes that are, really, mostly true. Eg: frat bro down for the summer, surfer bro, a bro in general. I am a rare exception. Somehow i'm a somewhat self-aware philosophy bro who enjoys, well, everything in life and has a strong sense of childlike wonder about things.

I digress, back to misconceptions. In actuality surf rescue is a high-stress job in which you are responsible for hundreds/thousands of people at any given time for x blocks north and x blocks south of your tower. And it's not just the water, it's the beach. You are responsible for that area where people have strokes, heart attacks, umbrellas impaled through them, pipe bombs, heat exhaustion, and other emergencies.

And the ocean. It isn't a pool. Nor is it a lake. It is the ocean. The ocean is not a consistently calm and predictable entity. It is dynamic and changing, driven by the changing weather. There are also things that exist called sea life and they play in the ocean too. They are mostly pretty chill given the circumstances (thousands of people peeing/spitting/pooping/spitting/dominating their near-shore chill zones for 4 months every year), but sometimes they get unhappy or decide to play a joke on people. People don't like jokes nor do they like sea life because they don't like that they are paying to be at the beach and in the ocean and the sea life gets to chill for free. It just isn't fair. Most people get revenge by eating the larger fish and the crabs that they hate to swim around and step on at night.

So ya, the ocean isn't like a lake or a pool. It has a bottom made of sand (at least here, in Maryland). Sand shifts very easily. Waves are wind energy transferred into the water. The harder the wind blows and the longer the distance it blows over the more powerful and larger the waves. Once the wind energy becomes wave energy it is known as 'swell'. Most vacationers in the summer don't get to see hurricane swell or even any significant swell at all because summer tends to have long flat spells (small waves) via not a lot of active weather. Big waves come from big storms (low pressure, you know, those things that give us widespread snow and rain and wind) and not so much from small storms (thunderstorms in the summer are isolated events, they are from localized imbalances, not widespread at all). Where am i going with this? K. here we go: Waves are energy, simply traveling through the ocean as their medium. Energy. Pure energy. They travel until they interact with something that causes them to disperse their energy. Cue sandbars. Energy comes in, feels itself against the ocean floor, and the top of the wave topples. The energy is directed at the sandbar and is dispersed across it as the sand particles absorb and scatter. This process occurs endlessly.

Occasionally a sandbar will collapse and form an underground trench. As waves come in and suck back out the water takes the path of least resistance out. Since water will flow through the lowest lying area first they suck back out through this trench, widening it. We now have an underground river forming, aka a rip current. This is what people get stuck in and usually drown if they don't know what to do/panic when we are off duty. 

wow

helvetica download

steve roggenbuck, genius behind downloadhelveticaforfree.com, shipped his book out to me a few weeks ago. review forthcoming. for now i just wanna say this:


helvetica download

ocbp

hey did y'all know i'm a lifeguard? ya, i am. do you think it would be interesting to read about my experiences as a lifeguard? i've saved many people (140+). i've given cpr and dove for dead bodies.


i'm going to post an image macro of me at work in a minute. let me know if it's funny or not.

guerilla poetry

today i went with my roommate to check out the "thunderbolt" and iphone 4 at verizon wireless.
while he shopped, i went around the store inputting short poems into the notes section [of the iphones] and saving copies to the phone as photos.  i also wrote some poems as open text messages [on other phones].
unfortunately, i only emailed one of the poems to myself from the store, seen above. the others are gifts to the brains of the consumers, created quickly by me and then just as quickly forgotten.


the poem on the phone next to the one pictured was about the inevitability of suffering and detachment from the material world. another adjacent poem was about wanting to be held and touched softly by a lover. 


upon a 2nd sweep around the store after ~15 minutes it was found that someone had deleted this poem.
i hope that these short lil poems awoke something within the unsuspecting shoppers, perhaps made them think, even if it were for a minute - especially if it angered or bothered them.

corny, weird, fun

there was once a boy who looked up to the clouds
he had been told his whole life to stop being so loud!
he wrastled and wrestled and messled and hassled
and lassoed and passled and flassled and sassled.


he grew tired of the constant day to day grind
the "sit in your chair and don't open your mind"
every day it was the same, "sit in your chair"
"make sure to shower and comb up your hair"


one day he woke up and decided on change
he looked out the window and considered the range
he closed his eyes tight and dreamt up a loud dream
of sea-colored flying wings and and eyes of laser beams


now it was off to the window with his new found flight
for never had the world ever felt so light
out through the window and up into the sky
soaring with the chocolate clouds on high


the people around him felt an inspiration grow
from deep within them it became a strong flow
they too closed their eyes and sprouted their feathers
and flew into the spring air, scented of heather

is this poetry?

narcissism is a hard word to spell.

untitled

with every last ounce of liquid lapped up
there's a feeling of content
memories concealed, the future forgotten
say yes to everything


for a day you are freed
the burden of thought can sure weigh heavy
glad you checked that overactive mind at the door
don't regret anything


run home drunk in the clandestine darkness
don't feel used up and lost
today you say yes to everything
tomorrow you'll remember the ones you loved

toomanydistractionstoomanydistractionstoomanydistractionsdamnittoomanydistractions

if i could tell you everything i felt

if you were to die tomorrow
injected with poisons and tortured -
poisons that heightened your senses, your ability to feel
poisons that intensified your pain -
you would die a death of a million sensations.
slow and agonizing
a build up to so powerful, so strong
each pain built upon the next, intensifying by the minute
peaking at a point you thought could not exist
but then going even higher
you might be begging for death, begging for release
every muscle spasming, face contorted
cold sweats, fiery fevers, skin prickling
every speck of dust that lands on your skin like a needle pricking your side
from the back of the knees to behind your ears
from right underneath your nose to in between your toes
from the choking sensation in your lungs to the dull throb in your liver
to the burning sensation on your anus and the rashy itchiness of your skull
the final centimeters of your once beautiful outer shell will be consumed in sensitivity, in pain
your every wish would be for death's arrival to wash over you like an orgasm

fasting

sweet i'm fasting/sweet i'm drinking hot water and mint leaves

After a conversation with my mother on Monday, I decided to fast today. I wanted to do it 'just because' and to maybe experience what it feels like to 'actually' be hungry. Since starting last night at 9pm this experience has evolved into something quite different.


It's been an interesting 24 hours at this point and I feel like I can go longer. I know that a lot of people willingly fast on the regs, but this was my first time ever going an entire day without eating, and I am finding it tougher than I ever imagined. I'm a 145 pound fast metabolism athlete kinda guy. I eat a lot, normally.

But...

I have a clarity of mind that I did not expect. I feel as if I have a heightened awareness of 'things' and a calm/peace about me that I don't normally experience. At one point this afternoon I was struck with a wave of euphoria and lol'd uncontrollably at work. At other points I was struck with thoughts of belief in a higher power in the context of suffering. Towit, the necessity of belief in something outside of your own self to push through situations in which a human being is made to suffer - even when that suffering is done willingly (eg Ghandi fasting for 2 weeks/I feel like Viktor Frankl would be an interesting study here). They all believed in some thing outside of their self. I'm thinking of other historical examples and coming up empty. Please comment if you can think of examples. I am 'merely' pulling on my own knowledge and experience.

It should be re-noted that I came into this fasting experience on a whim and with no preconceived notions.

Waking up/breakfast was really tough. My stomach was rumbling and my brain was begging for food. I denied them both. I reached something of a plateau around midday, but hunger pangs started coming in waves, maybe 1x per hour. these caused my internal dialogue to go from thoughtful reflection on...everything... to "you can end this now, just a spoonful of peanut butter, just a banana, just a bowl of noodles, you can end this, what's the fucking point, eat, just eat." The day became an internal battle and an almost spiritual journey. The absence of eating has led me to realize how much I eat out of boredom and habit, my day is planned around my grazing. I had to find other things to do with my time to not think about eating. Furthermore, fasting has brought self-control and temperance under the microscope of critical evaluation, especially in regards to alcohol and sex. Again, the internal dialogue: "What's the fucking point vs look at the immense value it [temperance] holds."

It's 10:36 pm, I'm unsure if i'll break the fast tomorrow morning, maybe i'll see how this goes. I'm still fucking hungry, but the thought processes/mind set that I am experiencing is a curious thing indeed, and the lucid state of awareness that I experienced earlier today is something I want to continue to investigate.

Then again, my roommates have been cooking food off and on since 7:00 and it smells so good...

this is copy and pasted from my tumblr page:

the strength and pain of being young: some things i will never understand

alliegibeily:

-why the dishes sit in the sink for days on end, especially when the dishwasher is 2 inches away
-why the brita is only filled half of the time
-why smart boys like dumb girls
-math
-life
-why smart girls like dumb boys
-why sad music makes up 90% of my top 25 played songs on itunes
-how people can eat food made in a dirty kitchen
-why it feels infinitely better to write in a moleskin journal instead of on regular paper… hahaha.. yeah. i said it. tool
-unrequited love
-tao lin
-neutral milk hotel obsessors
-radical religions based on hate
-brainwashing
-middle school
-growing up 

-a full sink of dishes is really annoying. your roomies must really be awful. i don’t like them whoever they are. if i ever meet them i will give them a piece of my mind. i will cut open my skull i will slice off a piece of my brain and i will give them my prefrontal cortex. i will rage incoherently and indiscriminately against everything and everyone and be irrationally angry because i no longer have a prefrontal cortex. this is how i will give them a piece of my mind. this is my plan.

-the brita is probably half full because only so much water can fit in the top of the brita at a time. halfway might even mean that the filler filled the top part 2x which means they made twice the effort.

-smart boys only like dumb girls when they are not actually smart. they are probably just masquerading as smart. liking the right music, reading the right books, wearing the right clothes, talking about the right things, and stuff. they do a good job of seeming smart and being cool because that’s what they’ve devoted themselves to for now. or they’re just young and attracted to good fuck sex more than a good mind sex. i think enjoying a good mind sex takes some growing up to be able to enjoy. or, actually, maybe, perhaps they were even fooled by the dumb person, maybe they are smart and they have been deceived by a smart girl who is actually dumb but reads the right books, listens to the right music, etc. but i’d say let the seemingly smart boys who like dumb girls be just that, you are better off without them maybe i think. we all need to have our heart broken once, let them have their chance.

-math maybe you will never understand i will give you that.

-if anyone claims to understand life they should get penis tickled in the ear and and maybe sent to an island to live alone until they don’t understand life anymore in which case they are safe to come back to society.

-see “why smart boys like dumb girls” and change words from “smart boys like dumb girls” to “smart girls like dumb boys.”

-sad music is really good a lot of the time and it is also the end of winter and if i were to do a study i would say that people in general listen to ~78% more sadness musicals in winter months which is certainly significant so it is probably true.

-i think people can eat food made in a dirty kitchen because they aren’t getting their food dirty while making it. i don’t actually know this, i’m just making an assumption. 

-i think you are justified in thinking it feels “infinitely better” to write in a moleskin journal, i think if you look inside yourself you will understand why this is so. i think that you will understand it if you believe in yourself. i believe in you.

-unrequited love sucks. i think it is a valuable human experience to have, but it sucks when it is happening. it is tough to understand. i understand why you put it on this list. but before you call it unrequited you should find out exactly how the other person feels, ask them to be honest with you. then you will understand it better. i think rejection is better than not knowing or being led on. i think not knowing is painful and torturous. find out. and if it’s because they don’t love you back, well, then you will understand. there are many complicated other reasons why they may not reciprocate, and that sucks. good luck. yes, good luck.

-tao lin is an author who writes books and poetry and blogs for thought catalog. he writes in a neutral tone that seems almost disinterested and heartless and uses so-called ‘scare quotes’ to distance himself from words that seem rote and cliche. by doing this he raises a level of self-awareness that other authors don’t seem to have. i have found his writing to be absolutely hilarious situationally and extremely insightful. he is skilled at getting into human emotion i think. i have never read a more polarizing author than tao lin. i love tao lin, my sister hates him. my mom enjoyed tao lin and my sister hated tao lin. you may never understand tao lin, and that is okay. tao lin is probably not offended, but i don’t know.

-neutral milk hotel obsessors are sort of like ‘cheese heads’. you know, those people that follow the string cheese incident around the world. they don’t know how to move forward and get into other music. i think neutral milk hotel is a good band, and they made good music. but maybe the way you like gaga and the way steve roggenbuck likes justin bieberz and someone’s mom likes U2 is the way other people like neutral milk hotel. it’s just what they are into. they have decided that neutral milk hotel is an important part of their personal brand for one reason or another. maybe they have great memories from that music. maybe they think the music is the epitome of good indie jams. maybe they just want to believe in something to keep existing.

-radical religions based on hate are tough to understand, but not something you should never understand. i think if hate exists in a very strong manner amongst a community, and the hate is able to be directed towards something the hate can become a unifying force. the people will rally behind the hate and hate the thing that they hate. maybe the thing they hate caused them to become poor, killed their relatives accidentally with bombs,  or caused a person to become leader of their country by supporting them and training them/supplying them with weapons. maybe they’re life really sucks as a result of someone else and they are consumed by hate so they’ve decided to just hate as their way of life. this is a really shitty way to live. i want to connect with these people. i want to show them love. i want them to know that they are loved and not everyone in the world wants to kill their children and make them poor. religion pairs well with hate just as it pairs well with love. religion poorly understand is based in hate and fear and religion properly understood is based in love and acceptance.

-brainwashing is wild. it is really quite fascinating. it’s like peer pressure on a grand scheme. i don’t think i’m going to explain it. here is a link to wikipedia so you can understand brainwashing better.

-middle school is awkward. middle school is weird. i looked like more of a douche bag than i look like now in middle school. but middle school exists for more than just housing all the really fucked up and weird looking soon-to-be-teens safely and in one location so they can’t scare real people in the real world. middle school exists for learning. middle school exists for education. it is the school you go to between elementary school and high school. it crushes your happy view of the world and prepares you for high school, all while you go from a child to a really fucked up looking tweener, so it is good for becoming self-aware and self-loathing too. it is in this stage a lot of alts become pre-mo, which is the stage before emo in high school. it is also the stage where the cool kids from high school will start to really get cool. the early blooming males will get tug jobs from the hot girls and the hot girls that turn into sluts in high school will get fingerblasted MAYBE by the early blooming males. this is middle school. this is how it works.

-growing up is really neat. i like it so far. there’s nothing really to understand. it just happens. the time in this reality we have constructed/exist in is linear. it goes from point a to point b infinitely or until it ends. as we exist somewhere spatially, we also exist somewhere between point a and b. the line goes continuously from a->b and so the future is constantly being ‘actualized’ or like, made into the present. every second. like now. this just became the present and then the past. it is a continuous thing. as this happens we age. as we age we grow up. now, that was sort of a practical definition. you might have referred to growing up as a cliche, or maybe even physically, like going through puberty and then getting old. these are all rooted in time though. the whole a->b thing i just mentioned right there. but like, if you are referring to how some people when they graduate college and become assholes and get jobs and turn 25 or 30 and really become assholes, well, i think that has to do with becoming content, selling out to a reality that isn’t necessarily ‘the only way’ (making money, getting married, raising kids, getting a house in the suburbs, retiring, moving to florida), losing a sense of imagination and wonder about the world, and maybe some other things. but, maybe those people were assholes all along. let growing up be what it is, to you. don’t believe what people say about ‘growing up’. there is no rule book that wasn’t created by someone who had opinions about what it is to grow up. you can grow up and still be yourself. don’t panic. you already are grown up. believe in yourself. remember, i believe in you.

in closing, i think this post had a lot of meaning to you.  i hope you realize i don’t have any wisdom, i just have a few opinions and thoughts. i wanted to share these opinions and thoughts with you because it is sunday and on sundays i share my opinions and thoughts with people. i want to leave you with one more thing that may help you to understand more things about being a human. i guess maybe we are all humans. if you look hard enough into any human and open yourself up enough you can make some type of connection, on some type of level. so like, you can understand human actions even if they bother you if you open yourself up like an oyster in the bay in the summer but not before an oystercatcher stabs the fuck out of you and eats you because that sucks so hard. don’t open yourself up too much, in other words, because then you risk getting hurt all the time. but look inside yourself to understand the human condition. and open yourself up to those who deserve your beautiful self.

and remember i believe in you.

also seen at my neat lil tumblr

i've been observing a lot of interesting humans and things on the internet over the past few months. of them steve roggenbuck's downloadhelveticaforfree project has amused me immensely. it's also sort of rubbed off on me/inspired me in that i am really enjoying transposing text over images. i find it absolutely hilarious and also evocative and thought provoking with the right juxtaposition. the person who calls her self frank hinton has also been on my radar as of late, as well as much of the online indie lit scene peoples. between the writers i have been observing, the 10,000 memes i'm exposed to on a daily basis, the traditional poets i've been reading, and my enjoyment of creative expression i feel as if this could be fun:


i've been toying around with simple photos i've taken (or in some cases not taken) and overlaying text over them. these are, as my poetry is, self-reflective in nature. i enjoy writing about all sorts of things, and 95% of my writing resides on my hard drive and in my journals. odd how that works out. i find that self-reflection is my most inspired form of expression, so hopefully that explains the use of my own face for most of these pictures. i'm really not a dick or asshole or narcissist. some of these actually seem self-loathing when i read them. think of this as a comic strip, and instead of creating a character i am the character. i'm literally making fun of/with myself. anywho, we'll see how many i post. i've been having a lot of fun with these  and have a stack of 300 photos from a photo shoot in the fall.


i hope these are found to be an enjoyable and maybe humorous viewing sensation for people. it will be an interesting and amusing outlet for self-expression for me so maybe i don't really care that much how i am perceived because i'm having fun ^-^

yo brain hey thoughts yo brain

thoughts.
as if high on caffeine they race
through my brain
sometimes meeting other thoughts
and sitting down for tea
they have so much energy
they keep running and rocking
and rolling and riding
the tea was not chamomile
my thoughts drank black tea
and are hyper in this brain
this brain, this brain, this brain is really a unique brain
as all brains are unique brains
this brain is having thoughts!
yo thoughts

i don't care
i care too much


but
humanity is still beautiful

haikus

a lust to create

innermost thoughts of the mind

fleeting; until writ

__________________________

digits trace, precise

feather tips o'er rosy flesh

burning passion streams

pneumatic, aroused

rubescent porcelain skin

mind screams in desire

pure lovers combine

blind in the throes of passion

sweat drenched and consumed

climax, skin cooling

arms drape and surround, his love

her angelic flesh

___________________________

a pleasant saudade

wispy clouds rise, it's nothing

pry off the brain's lid 

it's the not knowing that is the toughest
the silence
the cold silence

what did you say

fuck me with your pants on
fuck me with your dick all caught up
in the zipper
fuck me with your back arching to the sky
fuck me with your hand slapping my tight ass
fuck me with your blood bursting through your veins
fuck me with lustful rage
fuck me til the fields of promise are broken and used up
fuck me til the awakening sunrise is a sleep deprived distraction
fuck me til the harmonious stars are just lights in the sky
fuck me til the endless eternal ocean tastes only of salt and no more
fuck me til all your poetry turns to lecherous blabber

theory of relativity

i feel this longing
i feel this pull

as if your existence
in a city, in a town
in any place, at any moment
holds the weight of a sun-sized sphere.

nah, not sun-sized -
a blue giant, of the most immense mass -
like Rigel shining eternally through Orion.

towards this spot i am enticed,
for it is this spot in which you rest.

in proximity to it my heart beats faster,
time ceases to exist as i have come to know it,
the laws of the universe shift,
an infinite calmness pervades,
and i am drawn into your very core. 

25

worried that i won't amount to anything,
that i will never pay off this debt,
that all of my dreams will escape me,
one by one,
popping like bubbles that stray too high
from a child's soap dipper,
blowing into the wind.

already i see it happen,
and it's only realized in hindsight,
"come to spain with me"
"i can't" - but why?
free yourself, and you're free, aaron.
but the problem remains,
it's not just love, or that,
it's a general trend.

and now, a career i don't enjoy
(with financial security) -
secretly i die,
but what of a life of freedom,
is it the thought of always having
the impression of failure written on my brow?

of giving fully to another

she's probing
his sensitive face
his soft skin


he barely flinches


beautiful flesh
hides the pain beneath
hides this broken man

rufus wainwright

26 and single 
comes this year


should we get married
or do those promises not count

egocentric

look
at me


hushed
and hidden


i put my screen
as bright as it goes


i hope to catch your eye
brighter than a star or our sun


you look at me and keep walking

THE ROMANTIC by Poncho Peligroso

This evening I decided to sit-down with Poncho Peligroso's foray into soon-to-be-published poetry, The Romantic.

Didn't quite know what to expect of this guy. I only recently became aware of his online presence and haven't really had the motivation to thoroughly check him out. I requested to read through his new poetry book, The Romantic, so I could properly get a feel for what he was all about, and also (self-interestedly) see how a peer is going about 'getting his shit out there.' He kindly and quickly forwarded it to me. This, I admire.

Poncho subjected me (as the reader) to an onslaught of his innermost thoughts, desires, and experiences. If you read this blog, you are probably aware I haven't cried in an unfortunately inordinate amount of time, but some of these poems pulled on me, in completely unexpected manners. It is a beautiful feeling to read someone else's thoughts and completely identify with them or to feel yourself being moved in a way that you had not expected. Ah! This is why writing is such a grand thing, and conversely, reading another human's writing is the greatest insight into their mind and experiences. We all identify personally with different aspects of people's writing, depending on our experiences, but it is generally accepted that any empathetic human can relate to another's plight if they are willing (which, one could argue, requires radical open-mindedness, but that's a philosophy paper I wrote years ago and not really pertinent to this review, eh?).

Things to look forward to reading about: love/loss, assholes (figuratively), other people, self-reflection, existence, dongs, family, other things.

A poem I found especially relevant was "it doesn't take much," a 'love lost' themed poem that is ridiculously short and sweet for the power it conveys, additionally, it involved facebook. The simplicity of it and the emotion I was left feeling seemed to be skewed, but, it was real, and it was really fucking good.

The title of his poetry collection is also the title of the poem which included this gem of a line:

"i think you’re very pretty and want to kiss you//but i don’t want to impose my will on another human being"

After countless pages of writing, days of thought, and late conversations with good people, Poncho sums up everything I have felt in the past two years when in proximity to an attractive person that reciprocates my feelings -- in two lines. He's insightful and damn, Mister Peligroso might be a feminist's dream boy...

Poncho is reminiscent of many of his contemporaries but also extremely fresh. This isn't 'just another' Tao Lin'atator. His style is extremely effective, dripping in self-reflection and self-awareness and nestled neatly into free verse/free form poetry. I made some short notes while reading, simply marking page numbers and random thoughts. Here are a few of the key words festooned throughout my scratchwork: "fucked up, fuckbroYES, lol'd, grimaced, recoiled, grotesque, fucking rip my heart out, wow real talk, damn, wtf." ...which gives you insight into my literary and analytical capabilities but also his effect on my self.

Perhaps the most illuminating/introspective poem in The Romantic (though all of the poems are introspective in nature, I found this to be 'the most' illuminating) was titled "why am i writing all this goddamned poetry" which included the lines:

"damn it dad//why you gotta make me have no real problems//and be a really good role model//and allow me to pursue my passion// without forcing me to do things you want me to//so that you can live vicariously through me//like some dads do (i am told (by movies/tv))//damn it dad//damn it dad why you gotta play me like that//thanks"

To sum it up, buy Poncho's poetry collection when it hits the physical world on (TBD) and maybe follow him on twitter or lurk from afar or something. It's damn good poetry and not 'shitty' or 'trying to hard' or anything. I see good things for this man.

check out his website too.