ugh

I follow my superstitions as strictly as any religion. To be clear, I am not the kind to throw the salt I've spilled. Traditions are there to make old people feel valid. The world presents me with cues, I follow them if they feel like the "correct thing". I do not, after all, want to exceed my dao. The point I've made for my life is to cause as little suffering as possible. The universe gives me treasures, I'd be a child to handle them carelessly.

I observe the world as a story. If I don't understand something, I wait, and if it's at all important it comes back up, and into a more clearly defined role. I act as any character written into my setting might act. Doing so, following the "correct thing", has been a blessing. I have helped people, I have placed checks. I have removed obstacles. I have helped people realize their freedom.

Once, alone, in bed, and painfully awake, I felt as if I were being asked by my world what role I would fill. I felt as if the options were: one who interacts and takes love and makes scars and makes decisions, or one who gives himself to be used by the universe to help move everyone, everything along. I easily decided on the latter. I didn't need a great romance to have my life mean something. If I was helping my world, I was with my God. I have lived this as much as possible. Following the cues, I have been with women, but it always seems to be for their sake: to bring them out of awful relationships, to make them comfortable with who they are, to help them handle an unkind society.

Now I feel my human self banging on the walls of my psyche. I try to remember that most of these desires for courtly romance are a bill of goods sold by those with something to gain by having the population believe that their life should be solely dedicated to finding their Great Love. My humanity shouts back, "to be a person is to buy into people!".

I am not a person, or a friend. I am a guard rail to bounce off of for the people I love. What would my life become if I decided to live it for myself, and interact, and take love, and make scars, and make decisions? Could I even handle it? Can I even break this habit that I only "believe in" because it might as well be anything?

Do I even want to?

A Relief

I sat under a painting
In a stranger's house in Omaha.
Other guests stared, some whispered,
Some were obvious-
Some, oblivious.
I faced forward, not knowing if I had
Made some mistake.
It wasn't until leaving, I saw that the painting
Over the chair
Could have been of me and some
Striking woman. I recall the feeling of love,
At this gift from my world, at the beautiful girl,
At that incredible convergence, yet
It has had some consequences.
I now look for us in old photographs,
And feel perverted, as I twist the memories of
Family and dear companions into what I
Stupidly hope may be some prophesy.
I look for her in
My life, in negative space, though I know
That by the irony of the universe, if she is
A living thing, she will only step into the frame
Once I have forgotten completely.
If I forget well, we may be happy.

I don't know why I am so fiery.

On no day of the week do I fail so cleverly
As in the natural world on my padded paws.
The conversation stops, I pulse and fingers pop,
A word swings from my hanging jaw. I am locked, all
Bone, knuckle and claw-
And my blood does turn to steam,
Comes a cloud up over me.
My roots are where I've stayed my feet.
I do pull my life back in
Until I boil it again, all
Ghostly, scarce and burning grin.

come together

The day we met, you were eating flowers from the garden where I slept. You told me that there was once a darkness here, but love rises and rises above the spinning world, and converges at the highest point, and burns bright, beautifully. I stood and shook out the sheet I wear. I told you that I was glad to be a part of such a lovely thing, and that I would love everything as much as I was capable so I could help grow flowers. You shared a laugh with your echo, with everything. How lovely it was to be a part of everything!

06:35

you were SPYING !

I lost my laundry at the river
Drew myself up when I saw your figure
At the water.
I was singing to the rocks
That the town's kids all had tossed
To the bottom.
I sang, you left me in the snow
I've seen you go and go and go
Go and go and go-

a young man and an old man are talking

a young man and an old man are talking. the young man asks the old man what he has learned. "almost nothing is true," is the old man's reply. The young man is upset by this. The young man prays that night, asks god to show him something true. For a full minute, nothing at all happens around him. He sees letters appear above him, one at a time, in solid black letters. Eventually, they spell the words: "let's talk about something else."