i'm angry. so angry i complain and make others angry just so i don't have to feel so miserable and alone in how mad i am at everything

so i was, once again, back home in stockton. this time for two reasons: 

1) the excruciatingly monotonous celebration of thanksgiving (a completely bunk holiday to begin with); and

2) my sister, Melissa's wedding.

the latter was obviously the more enjoyable. i walked my sister down the aisle, in place of our father, who wasn't much of one, really. anyway, neither of those two things has much to do with this piece. 

i wrote this partially in San Francisco, a day or two before heading back to the death-hole central valley, and i was interrupted by an irrepressible impulse to clean the house. it happens, so i go with it. 

needless to say the manic/obsessive/compulsive fit kind of killed the previous endeavors dead. murdered them into not-living. slain them to death. slaughtered them to their demise. drained the life from them until they had passed on. 

that was really stupid. i think i may have to reconsider this prologue thing. whatever.

here's the poem, the title is self-explanatory. i figured it is best to be honest with myself no matter how dumb an idea it is...right?

i'm angry. so angry i complain and make others angry just so i don't 

have to feel so miserable and alone in how mad i am at everything

scared of my phone

and the messages it will receive  

i now realize there isn't a correct way 

to end a conversation  

supposed intersections 

are only frames for 

quickly-painted collision scenes  

-it's all such a terrible film-  

a nice crash 

but not enough 

broken windows  

-i could split the picture in two 

but it would still show the same image-  

the lighters don't speak 

and the people just burn  

the outside isn't going anywhere 

and delays amass quickly and slow the pace 

to a palpitating rhythm 

-and "interestingly unpredictable"  

 is a cheap description of life  

like bursting into tears 

or bursting into flames 

are pretty much the same thing-

 

a sweet impact  

but not enough detail  

a long ride  

with too many airbags 

and just the right amount of damage 

to still call it an accident

sleeping on the floor

so i sat for a while, as i usually do, and i decided that there is something seriously wrong here. ha ha. nothing new. 

i wrote this yesterday but it felt unfinished. i came back to it a few minutes ago and wrote the last line. my hometown of stockton, Ca has one of the lowest literacy levels of all cities in the nation with a population over 250 thousand people. it is really sad. books, comic books, graphic novels, magazines--those were some of the only reasons i got through most of my life, and to think that people can't appreciate all the literature there is out there enough to make it a staple of a child's education is incredibly disheartening. 

sometime i worry about us all. sometimes i just don't care. sometimes i want to care, but can't; other times, i just think it is all really stupid.

sleeping on the floor

i step

  where the past wants me to

and i know better than to tread inland-

i stay cliff-side

i like the open-ended views i'm offered

   but the scenery lacks ingenuity 

the most opportune moments

      have side-effects

unchecked pens ruin notebooks

a non-stop brain stays still and 

 worries leave a mark on every place you visit

the handwriting speaks only to me 

       and i can't blame it:

not enough people read, back where i'm from

counting on things

my immune system isn't the greatest, (a result of years of not taking care of myself, i suppose) and because of that i am often sick with something. whether it be a cold that can sometimes last months, a flu that takes a fifth of my body weight or an infection that starts from the smallest of injuries, i find myself uncomfortably ill on too many occasions. though my effort to improve my health is a pathetic one, i do not enjoy always being sick, as is commonly assumed. 

okay, so maybe i like it a bit---but i surely don't like going to the hospital, which i have to do when i need to be seen by a doctor since i am one of the lucky students of our glorious country that is not insured. i especially hate being put on intravenous drips. those things are no fun. 

god damn white blood cells not keeping up their end up the bargain in my bloodstream.

anyway, i wrote this in july sometime when i was in the hospital. i wish i would have had the morphine button, for real.

counting on things

sitting with needles in

my arm and
tubing all around me
i lie uncomfortably still

listening to machines
tick-off the time that
(i can't see)
is passing outside

paying close attention to
the quiet screams creeping
into my ears:
louder than expected and
more resonant here,
among such barren walls

with hours-long echoes
that eek their way into
my home life

quarantined
in my room
like i am always contagious

and indeed,
i've noticed how
people dig holes
between us
and when i say "us"
i mean "themselves"-

i wouldn't bother
braving burgeoning gaps

my legs don't break
for brittle replacements

though they've been repeatedly
forced into elevation-
at the mercy of a mattress and
the mind left to seep into it

as a fraction of a life

failing as an equation

accepting patterns like
they hurt or could reveal
to me my inconsistencies-

when, as a lone being,
i could never much rely on numbers:

like "how many"
never explains the disappointments

i think 10:52 pm

my life is incredibly dull. this is one thing i am absolutely sure of. 

many days i spend reading and smoking while pacing anxiously around my apartment. i stare out the windows. go up on to the roof. sometimes i catch the bus somewhere or walk around for a while, but it is always done with this sense of failed urgency. like i want there to be things i have to do, but there are none. like i have all the impetus i can muster, but i am sleeping in a box instead of doing something with it. 

it's fucked up. really. 

hate it sometimes, love it always, right?

i think 10:52 pm

hit repeat and

  keep forcing the same sounds

       out of my mouth-

no ideas arrive

  as the string dangles

something lively just above my head

i hold on and

  walk it across towns

wrap it around mailboxes and doorknobs

hide knots and tangles in

    alleys and emails

cover it with paint and 

   magazine clippings and

              call it art

double-loop it to

  my shoelaces and 

wear it to sleep around my kneck-

give it to the sunshine or

   keep it on scratch paper

despite what i know will happen

despite not giving-in to

  disappointment when it snaps

(at least i'm still intact)

it's just:

  being tied-up can only 

    entertain for so long

on the rocks, buddy

disclaimer:

this poem and the pre-poem rambling was written on September 23, 2008. i just got around to posting it, though.

so i got fired from my job this morning, and i decided that instead of moping i would just go to the ocean and think of how easy it would be to drown in it. i went to the Sutro Bath House ruins and walked around for a bit. i climbed over a wall and went down some rocks to a very secluded spot that was sheltered on three sides by rock wall and had a straight view of the ocean. there was also a hole in the floor where the wall would meet the floor and through it you could see the tide flowing into an opening in the rock. when a big wave hit it would send water through and sometimes it would get a couple feet above my head. using pure strategy, i positioned myself and smoked a few bowls while trying to write this poem.

the job sucked, so i wasn't that upset about getting canned. fucking presidio heights weirdos. 

on the rocks, buddy

surrounded by the

     ocean

i think bigger than

  the ship in the

    distance

and the crescent

  moon in the daytime

         sky

i can't be reached here

     in my second

          home

christened by the

            waves

  that could swallow me

          whole

i like to think i crash or

        collide

like the angry edges of the

            sea

but i know

    evaporation

  gets the best of my

       impact--

the muses i'm driven 

   toward are aimed and 

    headed right for me--it's

            confusing

instead of 

  motivation

     i get bruises

beatings meant to 

      improve

meticulous scrutiny for jewelry 

my hopeless

     hands

my only clothing

-my lack of desire for hire-

it's all i'm holding

but i move too 

     quietly

this water gets

    jealous

and the rising

      tide

 tells me to

     leave

no more, i worry

this sucks...need i say more?

no more, i worry

to be overly-conscious of 

 just how often my eyes blink

       is no safety, for sure

-i've sat, unaware of that for years-

i laughed

  confidently abstract

and at nothing in particular

i regularly split

  sentences into three or more parts

and embellish the syntax for security

-i lie to myself-

and it only 

   keeps a few cents in my pocket--

doesn't hand me someone else's wallet

the results make decisions for me but 

  can't make my smile fit the 

difference i have to pay or the look on my face

and it's shameful how i trace it over

       so many dead leaves when

most times

    there's nothing worth writing about--

i wait            i pretend to sketch the landscape

   

        i fake a phone call or faint

but they're all the same: they all stagnate in vacancy

-if i whispered the word "scream"

     it wouldn't save any of us

it wouldn't spare the ground from our shadows

   

and it wouldn't spare me from the 

    sun always hurting my eyes