1. The first exodus 11. Winter is coming
2. The morning after… 12. Through the looking glass: Schism and shatterings
3. Fear here
4. Neighbors
5. A pervert’s guide to…
6. It was hard life, but a good life
7. Postcards
8. Bondage
9.Singularity, Event Horizon, and Pulsars
10. Confessions
2. The morning after… 12. Through the looking glass: Schism and shatterings
3. Fear here
4. Neighbors
5. A pervert’s guide to…
6. It was hard life, but a good life
7. Postcards
8. Bondage
9.Singularity, Event Horizon, and Pulsars
10. Confessions
Letter 1: “The first exodus”
Dear no one,
I take up an ancient art of letter writing for you. What happened to handwritten letters cascaded with the smell of miles and spritzed perfume?
High jacked by the convenience of the digital age. What kind of volumes will be produced from emails? Don’t most discard them
regardless of sentimentality?
And the irony-to-paradox of this here: letters to you on the pixilated porn channel.
Yet, I still push through the seems…
Shuffling toward tardive diskynesia, but all in a vain attempt for you
You who occupies my mind and heart, my dreams, my smiles, my dark pleasures, and my sentimental ills
Perhaps this is foolish
To make letters of the sacred profane and juxtapose recklessly…
But the paths in my palms have no directness to them, no erection forward
They have, rather, conjunctions, roots, and rapture
Still they beat, bleed, and sweat to cradle your hand
Smooth as a bourgeois burden, beaten by me, left to their own
You ask of me, why?
Reasons are allusive and not always necessary
But we have been conditioned by condition to expect something so, right?
If the world were to end, I would end it with you
To begin us, I’d begin with you
To forge us, we’d start with him or her
And to the crests of the mountains where few go we would imagine our escape from the pestilence of the world flooded below in haste, waste, and misfortune.
I ask too much at times and too little at others.
But I assure you that even though you don’t know me you have my heart waiting with you.
This series of letters is to for you.
Your not-yet-known love,
E.B.
Dear no one,
I take up an ancient art of letter writing for you. What happened to handwritten letters cascaded with the smell of miles and spritzed perfume?
High jacked by the convenience of the digital age. What kind of volumes will be produced from emails? Don’t most discard them
regardless of sentimentality?
And the irony-to-paradox of this here: letters to you on the pixilated porn channel.
Yet, I still push through the seems…
Shuffling toward tardive diskynesia, but all in a vain attempt for you
You who occupies my mind and heart, my dreams, my smiles, my dark pleasures, and my sentimental ills
Perhaps this is foolish
To make letters of the sacred profane and juxtapose recklessly…
But the paths in my palms have no directness to them, no erection forward
They have, rather, conjunctions, roots, and rapture
Still they beat, bleed, and sweat to cradle your hand
Smooth as a bourgeois burden, beaten by me, left to their own
You ask of me, why?
Reasons are allusive and not always necessary
But we have been conditioned by condition to expect something so, right?
If the world were to end, I would end it with you
To begin us, I’d begin with you
To forge us, we’d start with him or her
And to the crests of the mountains where few go we would imagine our escape from the pestilence of the world flooded below in haste, waste, and misfortune.
I ask too much at times and too little at others.
But I assure you that even though you don’t know me you have my heart waiting with you.
This series of letters is to for you.
Your not-yet-known love,
E.B.
Letter 2 “The morning after…”
I got up in the middle of the night with your taste on my lips
The tv was on still and you were draped over the couch esconced
A small opening in the blanket revealed you
Did you know you fell asleep with your glasses on? Don’t worry I will always take them off and put them on the side table
You’re here because of my monstrous breathing that shakes the dog
I’m sorry
When you sleep I sit beside you and talk to you
I wonder if you hear it in your dreams
That time at night is the best because it’s just us
I’ll go back to bed and be up before you making coffee
You’ll lay there with a whispy look and I’ll be there to greet you
Every morning I have your coffee ready and at times I will go get fresh doughnuts for you
I’m sad with happiness each night when I find you because you haven’t left
We’re still here waiting for you each day and night
Sometimes I wake up and your watching me with that same look
Sometimes we wake up and he’s looking at us
I wonder how you look at me.
I will probably never know.
Your-not-yet-known love,
E.B.
I got up in the middle of the night with your taste on my lips
The tv was on still and you were draped over the couch esconced
A small opening in the blanket revealed you
Did you know you fell asleep with your glasses on? Don’t worry I will always take them off and put them on the side table
You’re here because of my monstrous breathing that shakes the dog
I’m sorry
When you sleep I sit beside you and talk to you
I wonder if you hear it in your dreams
That time at night is the best because it’s just us
I’ll go back to bed and be up before you making coffee
You’ll lay there with a whispy look and I’ll be there to greet you
Every morning I have your coffee ready and at times I will go get fresh doughnuts for you
I’m sad with happiness each night when I find you because you haven’t left
We’re still here waiting for you each day and night
Sometimes I wake up and your watching me with that same look
Sometimes we wake up and he’s looking at us
I wonder how you look at me.
I will probably never know.
Your-not-yet-known love,
E.B.
Letter 3 “Fear here”
Dear no one,
Our start was unconventional, un-conducive, and inconclusive
The matter of want superseded the floor, rock, and rested on wet sand
But we learn with each house we attempt to build, together and on our own
Trial by fire is our process, lips curled with ice and embers
Either way the burning is always felt between the ears, between the ribs, and between the legs
No one I love you and you know it, but you’re afraid that this is too easy
How can we have what we want without the normal torture, hurt, and hope(lessness)?
I’m not going anywhere
I have no where to go without taking myself
And if I spend my life only making you coffee and tucking you in then I would die complete
But there were times when we said nothing and danced
When you cried after the next one discarded you
I was there like some gay best friend, but it didn’t matter what road you took with them…
You always found the same exit to me
And we would sit watching the static and the stars while birds chirped in the early morning
Each morning I tucked you in and hoped that the hurt was over
You think you hurt me, but I’m only hurt by the hurt you endur
That is love of a different kind devoid of celluloid fetishism
You’re not tinkerbell and I’m not the beast
We’re not t(here), remember…
Your head has stared down the throat of the toilet many times exhausted by alcohol and assholes
I’m always there with a wet rag and my arms
When the ground is spinning… I’ll be spinning with you
Fear has always been the weakness of us both.
You fear that something could be for you, that you could be beautiful, that someone could love you with all their heart, with all y(our) mess
But sometimes it’s as easy as checking the lock of the door before ramming down the door or breaking the glass.
But things got better and we now wait for you to wake up each morning
As cereal and milk pour over the chair
This mess we love, we remember, we miss
I’ve held your hand and your heart
I wake up holding and rubbing the pillow thinking it was your back
And each night I stared at the stars knowing you might chance to see them as well
It is easier to fear hurting someone than it is facing the fear of loving him or her
Once someone holds your heart you fear holding his or hers
But that connection is a rare bond
I don’t want you to ache or hurt like I do
I remember the first time I saw your face torn and I haven’t forgotten it
As you think about your fear of hurting me, I think of my fear of loving you
Yours always,
E.B.
Dear no one,
Our start was unconventional, un-conducive, and inconclusive
The matter of want superseded the floor, rock, and rested on wet sand
But we learn with each house we attempt to build, together and on our own
Trial by fire is our process, lips curled with ice and embers
Either way the burning is always felt between the ears, between the ribs, and between the legs
No one I love you and you know it, but you’re afraid that this is too easy
How can we have what we want without the normal torture, hurt, and hope(lessness)?
I’m not going anywhere
I have no where to go without taking myself
And if I spend my life only making you coffee and tucking you in then I would die complete
But there were times when we said nothing and danced
When you cried after the next one discarded you
I was there like some gay best friend, but it didn’t matter what road you took with them…
You always found the same exit to me
And we would sit watching the static and the stars while birds chirped in the early morning
Each morning I tucked you in and hoped that the hurt was over
You think you hurt me, but I’m only hurt by the hurt you endur
That is love of a different kind devoid of celluloid fetishism
You’re not tinkerbell and I’m not the beast
We’re not t(here), remember…
Your head has stared down the throat of the toilet many times exhausted by alcohol and assholes
I’m always there with a wet rag and my arms
When the ground is spinning… I’ll be spinning with you
Fear has always been the weakness of us both.
You fear that something could be for you, that you could be beautiful, that someone could love you with all their heart, with all y(our) mess
But sometimes it’s as easy as checking the lock of the door before ramming down the door or breaking the glass.
But things got better and we now wait for you to wake up each morning
As cereal and milk pour over the chair
This mess we love, we remember, we miss
I’ve held your hand and your heart
I wake up holding and rubbing the pillow thinking it was your back
And each night I stared at the stars knowing you might chance to see them as well
It is easier to fear hurting someone than it is facing the fear of loving him or her
Once someone holds your heart you fear holding his or hers
But that connection is a rare bond
I don’t want you to ache or hurt like I do
I remember the first time I saw your face torn and I haven’t forgotten it
As you think about your fear of hurting me, I think of my fear of loving you
Yours always,
E.B.
No. 4 "Neighbors"
Dear no one,
It has been some time since my last letter.
But time is no friend
One may go north
While the other goes south
You asked when no one would become someone
What if it was anyone?
Would that not dissolve the place I have reserved for you?
I write and put my heart on these pages
Blood ink will do as well
But smeared ink from tears also colors them
The neighbors who beat you
The neighbors who abused you
The neighbor who drugged you
Do you still desire a neighborhood?
I am no neighborhood
Still a distance splits us
At times, I envy the vancancies to become a neighbor
Perhaps if I were a neighbor you would hold me
As tears, pain, blood, and sanity dropped on the floor
You talk about neighbors
But I doubt you talk of me
I am a shadow and my shadow co-habitates with you
My shadow calls to your shadow
My heart feels your pain
Your pain…
Pains me
In the dark our shadows play
And in the light two machines do their part… uncertain of purpose
You are afraid to say yes
But haven’t said no
I am not a neighbor nor do I want to be
Time is closing
I’ve lost enough of it
Still I tuck you in… delicate and innocent
Like a child sucking her thumb and holding a silk blanket
I talk to you when you’re not there
There’s nothing more I can do to extend my hand to yours
To tell you that you are loved
To look at you with a look of genuine want and protection
It could be this easy?
To have children at our feet while we sleep
To hold each other
To wake with a sense of certainty
That here we are
But the world has proven itself to be banal and mechanical
Hugs and touching are begged for and fantasized about
Sex and sensuality are carried out by sadism and sickness only
Each night I think of you and hope you’re safe
Avoiding neighbors and nihilism
You tell me about how you feel about neighbors more than me
Maybe I should move to your neighborhood
Where there are no lights at night and the shadows run free
I’ll sleep and you’ll shake
You’ll wake and I’ll bake
You take the inside and I take the out
There is a place where the shadows don’t roam
Where the place is ours and home
You will always have me to turn the lights on
To fend off the shadows that haunt you and taunt you
Can it be this easy?
I have little to offer than protection and love
Closeness and sentiment
Until our next visit in the woods where no neighbors roam.
Your love-as-always-not-yet-known,
E.B.
Dear no one,
It has been some time since my last letter.
But time is no friend
One may go north
While the other goes south
You asked when no one would become someone
What if it was anyone?
Would that not dissolve the place I have reserved for you?
I write and put my heart on these pages
Blood ink will do as well
But smeared ink from tears also colors them
The neighbors who beat you
The neighbors who abused you
The neighbor who drugged you
Do you still desire a neighborhood?
I am no neighborhood
Still a distance splits us
At times, I envy the vancancies to become a neighbor
Perhaps if I were a neighbor you would hold me
As tears, pain, blood, and sanity dropped on the floor
You talk about neighbors
But I doubt you talk of me
I am a shadow and my shadow co-habitates with you
My shadow calls to your shadow
My heart feels your pain
Your pain…
Pains me
In the dark our shadows play
And in the light two machines do their part… uncertain of purpose
You are afraid to say yes
But haven’t said no
I am not a neighbor nor do I want to be
Time is closing
I’ve lost enough of it
Still I tuck you in… delicate and innocent
Like a child sucking her thumb and holding a silk blanket
I talk to you when you’re not there
There’s nothing more I can do to extend my hand to yours
To tell you that you are loved
To look at you with a look of genuine want and protection
It could be this easy?
To have children at our feet while we sleep
To hold each other
To wake with a sense of certainty
That here we are
But the world has proven itself to be banal and mechanical
Hugs and touching are begged for and fantasized about
Sex and sensuality are carried out by sadism and sickness only
Each night I think of you and hope you’re safe
Avoiding neighbors and nihilism
You tell me about how you feel about neighbors more than me
Maybe I should move to your neighborhood
Where there are no lights at night and the shadows run free
I’ll sleep and you’ll shake
You’ll wake and I’ll bake
You take the inside and I take the out
There is a place where the shadows don’t roam
Where the place is ours and home
You will always have me to turn the lights on
To fend off the shadows that haunt you and taunt you
Can it be this easy?
I have little to offer than protection and love
Closeness and sentiment
Until our next visit in the woods where no neighbors roam.
Your love-as-always-not-yet-known,
E.B.
Letter 5 “A pervert’s guide to…”
Dear no one,
My love, my friend, my hand in your hand
Morning came too soon and the light woke me
Your scent fresh to my side
Your eyes mellow in another view
You’re breathing deeper
Let me hold this moment as I wish to hold you
Forget the things I should do
Rest a moment in my mind
To let my mind settle solely on the thought of you
I know your aversion
Kindred perversion
That has made you, me, and us
Interjection: “I loved you like a man loves a woman he never touches, only writes to, keeps little photographs of.” (Charles Bukowski, Love is a Dog from Hell)
One day I’ll be an old fuck(fuck/ed/up)
Jerking off drunk and looking for something to eat
Stale urine, crumbs, and ashes paint the pathetic
I am/will be dumb
Liquid mind
Liquid life
Liquidation of love
Tarrying with the negation (of negation)
Of negation (of negation)
A forged copy of a copy
Pending a radical disclosure and defenestration
A leap, right…?
The phone rings ill with amnesia
But your number is still stenciled to the side just in case
Girl you became a woman who plays a girl
I was always a boy looking for a girl…
Interjection: “your letters got sadder. your lovers betrayed you. kid, I wrote back, all lovers betray. it didn't help. you said you had a crying bench and it was by a bridge and the bridge was over the river and you sat on the crying bench every night and wept for the lovers who had hurt and forgotten you.” (Charles Bukowski, Love is a Dog from Hell)
The coffee shop was ours
So was the dirty diner in the a.m.
So was the porch where we had tea
Life never sat still for us
Your eyes always lowered after each departure
I lifted your chin to see your eyes and give you a kiss
I was no better for the game of life.
My handywork had crafted a life of bitter triviality
But it’s not about me.
I hated the way I loved you because I couldn’t love you any other way
Your heart found me before your lips and your body
Each time you’ll find my arm around you and your head welcomed on my chest
I worried about you
I lost sleep over you
And I wouldn’t have asked for anything more
Your letters got shorter and less frequent
I knew your time was being taken
Still I wrote and I write to you and for you
Interlude: “I feel so close to you right now. It's a force field. I wear my heart upon my sleeve, like a big deal. Your love pours down on me, surrounds me like a waterfall. And there's no stopping us right now. I feel so close to you right now.” (Calvin Harris, Feel so Close)
I smelled you when you weren’t there through the smoke stained and alcohol laced shirt of mine that I wore that night.
My lips were salty from your lips and I remember the sweet sweat from your neck.
Sober banality escaped us and we lathered up in whiskey, tea, and extasy.
The sheets were a mess in the morning from the drippings of human contact.
I grabbed a smoke and coffee while you slept.
My half coked eyes and heart still streaming with the residue of last night’s indulgence
You lay there naked with a hand painted bottom
I took the blanket and covered you while you moaned from a ghost fuck or something.
My cock and balls hung tingling and nausea set in
My bare ass melted into the shit stained chair of the hotel and I took out my journal.
“I have never been so elated and driven to kill myself. A fallen angel was caught last night and I’m not sure if I clipped her wings or she bit off my tail. Usually this was it and I wanted the used carnage to be disposed of so I could jerk off, drink coffee, take a shit, and shower before figuring out how to burn the sun light. This one was different. She made me cum so many times I lost count in the midst of mad drunkenness and the pills I had taken. When I woke up she was sleeping on her back and her face was so peaceful. Dicks like mine had no place in heart. Most of the rags I bring home from the bar are bearable in the dark and beaten by the light. But this one had an innocence even though neither of us could claim any kind of that bullshit. I had my coffee and my shit, those stinging alcohol and razorblades shits. The hotel had a shitty little breakfast of crap coffee and donuts from across the street. I didn’t realize I had gotten two cups of coffee and donuts for two. My mind must be really fucked. She still wasn’t awake and I noticed blood on the sheets. Did I fuck her on her period? I examined her, but that wasn’t the case. I pulled the sheets back and saw a huge gash on her leg. She must have gotten up and stumbled across the molding of the bathroom door where a nail was sticking out. Since she was still in the black in the black I went across the street to the gas station and got peroxide and band-aids. I saw scars on her inner thigh. I had seen these before. I got dizzy and began to feel like I was going to vomit and then I did. A stinging mix of coffee and alcohol bile. My head was drowning and becoming engulfed in a flood of thoughts. Before I knew it I had my knife open cutting into back. The warm blood dripped on the floor. [blacked out for who knows how long]. I woke up on the floor. A hot rag was on my forehead and towel under my back. The already blood stained blanket was now on me. I gagged before I threw up and two hands tilted my head to the side. My fallen angel was sitting next to me nursing my wounds. I grabbed her hand and tears came to my eyes as I told her I was sorry.”
I woke up in the shower with cock in hand.
It was a dream.
No pages of it in my journal.
Still I began to cry in wrenching pain as the water passed over me.
The nausea caught up to me and I threw up what little I had in my stomach.
I went outside and I was home.
No skanky hotel with shit stains.
No stale coffee and donuts.
A message on the machine
A message from my dreams
A dark fear that the shadow would make a future like this
A sickness of sex with sex being the cure until death, decrepity, destruction, and quick dismantling of sanity
I've been crawling on my belly
Clearing out what could've been.
I've been wallowing in my own confused
And insecure delusions
For a piece to cross me over
Or a word to guide me in.
I wanna feel the changes coming down.
I wanna know what I've been hiding in
My shadow.
Change is coming through my shadow.
My shadow's shedding skin
I've been picking
My scabs again.
(Tool, Forty-Six&2)
Intervention: “Sex had nothing to do with feeling good, everything to do with superficialities, and was always accompanied by a masochistic agenda to feel anything but dead inside.” (Justin Donner, I Just Woke Up Dead: A Memoir)
I’m a monster
I’m a pervert
I’m not t/here
I’m damaged, broken, and left with a Cross
Stitched up and sewn in different patterns
A quilting that is never the same
A quilting whose purpose has changed with time
Gabriel Garcia Marquez said, “sex is the consolation you have when you can't have love.”
I think Hunter S. Thompson understood better than most:“Sex without love is as hollow and ridiculous as love without sex.”
There is no darkness that does not at the same time derive its meaning and substance from the light
Beyond sex what is there? If we tomorrow had no organs to orgasm, then what would we have or be? I used to think that we would be nothing, but if we take the stamen from a flower is it nothing? True love is sex with the soul. It is a look, a smell, a letter, or other gesture. Sex with the external organs is easy; it is the orgasmic entanglement of souls that transcends everyday life.
My love, my friend, my no one.
I leave you with this sweet thought from Alfred Tennyson: “If I had a flower for every time I thought of you...I could walk through my garden forever.”
Your always, now, will be, not-yet lover, friend, and partner in this crazy life.
-E.B.
Dear no one,
My love, my friend, my hand in your hand
Morning came too soon and the light woke me
Your scent fresh to my side
Your eyes mellow in another view
You’re breathing deeper
Let me hold this moment as I wish to hold you
Forget the things I should do
Rest a moment in my mind
To let my mind settle solely on the thought of you
I know your aversion
Kindred perversion
That has made you, me, and us
Interjection: “I loved you like a man loves a woman he never touches, only writes to, keeps little photographs of.” (Charles Bukowski, Love is a Dog from Hell)
One day I’ll be an old fuck(fuck/ed/up)
Jerking off drunk and looking for something to eat
Stale urine, crumbs, and ashes paint the pathetic
I am/will be dumb
Liquid mind
Liquid life
Liquidation of love
Tarrying with the negation (of negation)
Of negation (of negation)
A forged copy of a copy
Pending a radical disclosure and defenestration
A leap, right…?
The phone rings ill with amnesia
But your number is still stenciled to the side just in case
Girl you became a woman who plays a girl
I was always a boy looking for a girl…
Interjection: “your letters got sadder. your lovers betrayed you. kid, I wrote back, all lovers betray. it didn't help. you said you had a crying bench and it was by a bridge and the bridge was over the river and you sat on the crying bench every night and wept for the lovers who had hurt and forgotten you.” (Charles Bukowski, Love is a Dog from Hell)
The coffee shop was ours
So was the dirty diner in the a.m.
So was the porch where we had tea
Life never sat still for us
Your eyes always lowered after each departure
I lifted your chin to see your eyes and give you a kiss
I was no better for the game of life.
My handywork had crafted a life of bitter triviality
But it’s not about me.
I hated the way I loved you because I couldn’t love you any other way
Your heart found me before your lips and your body
Each time you’ll find my arm around you and your head welcomed on my chest
I worried about you
I lost sleep over you
And I wouldn’t have asked for anything more
Your letters got shorter and less frequent
I knew your time was being taken
Still I wrote and I write to you and for you
Interlude: “I feel so close to you right now. It's a force field. I wear my heart upon my sleeve, like a big deal. Your love pours down on me, surrounds me like a waterfall. And there's no stopping us right now. I feel so close to you right now.” (Calvin Harris, Feel so Close)
I smelled you when you weren’t there through the smoke stained and alcohol laced shirt of mine that I wore that night.
My lips were salty from your lips and I remember the sweet sweat from your neck.
Sober banality escaped us and we lathered up in whiskey, tea, and extasy.
The sheets were a mess in the morning from the drippings of human contact.
I grabbed a smoke and coffee while you slept.
My half coked eyes and heart still streaming with the residue of last night’s indulgence
You lay there naked with a hand painted bottom
I took the blanket and covered you while you moaned from a ghost fuck or something.
My cock and balls hung tingling and nausea set in
My bare ass melted into the shit stained chair of the hotel and I took out my journal.
“I have never been so elated and driven to kill myself. A fallen angel was caught last night and I’m not sure if I clipped her wings or she bit off my tail. Usually this was it and I wanted the used carnage to be disposed of so I could jerk off, drink coffee, take a shit, and shower before figuring out how to burn the sun light. This one was different. She made me cum so many times I lost count in the midst of mad drunkenness and the pills I had taken. When I woke up she was sleeping on her back and her face was so peaceful. Dicks like mine had no place in heart. Most of the rags I bring home from the bar are bearable in the dark and beaten by the light. But this one had an innocence even though neither of us could claim any kind of that bullshit. I had my coffee and my shit, those stinging alcohol and razorblades shits. The hotel had a shitty little breakfast of crap coffee and donuts from across the street. I didn’t realize I had gotten two cups of coffee and donuts for two. My mind must be really fucked. She still wasn’t awake and I noticed blood on the sheets. Did I fuck her on her period? I examined her, but that wasn’t the case. I pulled the sheets back and saw a huge gash on her leg. She must have gotten up and stumbled across the molding of the bathroom door where a nail was sticking out. Since she was still in the black in the black I went across the street to the gas station and got peroxide and band-aids. I saw scars on her inner thigh. I had seen these before. I got dizzy and began to feel like I was going to vomit and then I did. A stinging mix of coffee and alcohol bile. My head was drowning and becoming engulfed in a flood of thoughts. Before I knew it I had my knife open cutting into back. The warm blood dripped on the floor. [blacked out for who knows how long]. I woke up on the floor. A hot rag was on my forehead and towel under my back. The already blood stained blanket was now on me. I gagged before I threw up and two hands tilted my head to the side. My fallen angel was sitting next to me nursing my wounds. I grabbed her hand and tears came to my eyes as I told her I was sorry.”
I woke up in the shower with cock in hand.
It was a dream.
No pages of it in my journal.
Still I began to cry in wrenching pain as the water passed over me.
The nausea caught up to me and I threw up what little I had in my stomach.
I went outside and I was home.
No skanky hotel with shit stains.
No stale coffee and donuts.
A message on the machine
A message from my dreams
A dark fear that the shadow would make a future like this
A sickness of sex with sex being the cure until death, decrepity, destruction, and quick dismantling of sanity
I've been crawling on my belly
Clearing out what could've been.
I've been wallowing in my own confused
And insecure delusions
For a piece to cross me over
Or a word to guide me in.
I wanna feel the changes coming down.
I wanna know what I've been hiding in
My shadow.
Change is coming through my shadow.
My shadow's shedding skin
I've been picking
My scabs again.
(Tool, Forty-Six&2)
Intervention: “Sex had nothing to do with feeling good, everything to do with superficialities, and was always accompanied by a masochistic agenda to feel anything but dead inside.” (Justin Donner, I Just Woke Up Dead: A Memoir)
I’m a monster
I’m a pervert
I’m not t/here
I’m damaged, broken, and left with a Cross
Stitched up and sewn in different patterns
A quilting that is never the same
A quilting whose purpose has changed with time
Gabriel Garcia Marquez said, “sex is the consolation you have when you can't have love.”
I think Hunter S. Thompson understood better than most:“Sex without love is as hollow and ridiculous as love without sex.”
There is no darkness that does not at the same time derive its meaning and substance from the light
Beyond sex what is there? If we tomorrow had no organs to orgasm, then what would we have or be? I used to think that we would be nothing, but if we take the stamen from a flower is it nothing? True love is sex with the soul. It is a look, a smell, a letter, or other gesture. Sex with the external organs is easy; it is the orgasmic entanglement of souls that transcends everyday life.
My love, my friend, my no one.
I leave you with this sweet thought from Alfred Tennyson: “If I had a flower for every time I thought of you...I could walk through my garden forever.”
Your always, now, will be, not-yet lover, friend, and partner in this crazy life.
-E.B.
Letter 6 “It was hard life, but a good life”
Did a lot of thinking today. It felt good. Just sitting there in the calm cool air. Anxiety turned to enjoyment and contentment. I had some deep thoughts with myself. I forgot what it was like to not want the time to go by faster. It was beautiful. It was the same feeling being with you.
I made decisions some right and some wrong
And I let some love go I wish wasn't gone
These things and more I wish I had not done
But I can't go back
And I don't want to
'Cause all my mistakes
They brought me to you
I have some "friends" they don't know who I am
So I write quotations around the word friends
But I have a couple that have always been there for me
I did a lot of thinking today and reflecting. I needed to get away. I needed to find a calm place to just be with myself. So I drove to the valley. I used to go there as a kid and always loved being in the mountain areas. I like little places that sell hot boiled peanuts and scented pinecones. Places where they try to remember a different time with glass bottled sodas, candies, and old timey games like marbles. The places are always in a chaotic order. Most have an odd assortment of things. Like, for example, if we went to a restaurant and you ordered lobster and wanted skittles as your side item. But I like it. It reminds me of simplicity and enjoyment. No fancy parking lots or long rows of stores. Just an old building with screen doors, wooden floors, and usually an animal (wanted or unwanted) roams around. Families stop with their kids. The little ones seemed amazed at the sight of the mountains and just being out of the neighborhood. But the older the kids are more preoccupied with when they are leaving or playing on their cell phones. You can see the look in the parents’ eyes of the youth slipping away and the kids don’t even realize it. Soon those kids will have responsibility, girl or boyfriends, jobs, dreams, nightmares, and eventually homes or “places” of their own. The cycle repeats you know.
Those same kids will have kids and share that look of hoping their kids will remember this moment more than the stupid text or snapchat photo that just popped up. There are always old folks in overalls talking to anyone who will listen and they always have a story. It’s usually the same story every time you go back there, but somehow it doesn’t get old. You see an old man’s face sink over time, his body becomes thinner, and his fingers lose their composition so much that his wedding ring no longer stays on it. You can tell when something has happened. That excited old yeller face waiting to tell a story becomes quiet and lonesome. The wedding ring he wore now hides in his pocket. He kisses it every morning and every night because his wife passed before him. All he has is the few remaining years sitting in the rocking chair thinking of her and sharing a smile every so often when someone requests to hear a story. But his story has changed. It’s a very delicate ceremony he displays. He reaches in his pocket and slides the ring on his old frail finger. With a little curl he helps the ring dangle securely. A smile sweeps across his face and he begins to talk about the days when there were fresh apple, blackberry, cherry, and all kinds of other pies. Some listening will even speak up that they remember how good they were. His smile grows wider and his eyes moisten slightly. There are no more pies now at the stop, but the old man makes cupcakes for the kids.
“Close your eyes and I'll kiss you
Tomorrow I'll miss you
Remember I'll always be true”
These old men are all over. Someday I’ll be one of them. I can only hope that I’ll be fortunate enough to tell stories of great days and the even greater days with my girl, our kids, our animals, and what we saw. I envy the elderly in some ways. Youth is a cruel time, adolescence is full of angst, and adulthood is trying to forget the cruelty and angst. But I slow down when I hear a song and think of what it would be like to be old and have my wrinkled hand move a few inches and touch your cold fingers. Bad circulation with the old folks, but I’ve gotten her a blanket and kept her warm for years. Each time I grab the blanket to cover her I look at her and think that “it was a hard life, but a good life.” The best part, the good part, was her and us. Each night I hold her and watch her go to sleep. She doesn’t know that I tear up each night hoping that I will see her in the morning. When I wake up and I see she is still alive I kiss her cheek and move slowly out of bed, but sometimes she catches me and pulls my arm over her. I can see her smile. I once asked her if she would ever get tired of me telling her how beautiful she was or how much I loved her. She usually just smiled and occasionally would say “no.” We had been through a good life and a hard life. When we found each other I don’t think either of us thought we would be together or here. I had my own problems of anxiety and depression. She battled her own issues. I couldn’t understand how she could fall for all these abusive guys who didn’t really love her, but it didn’t matter. I never kicked her to the curb or treated her like shit. I think she didn’t believe that after all that she had been through in her life that it could be that easy; to find someone who would just love her for her. It wasn’t easy all the time. I wanted to beat the shit out of the guys that hurt her. But I wasn’t exactly much better. I was weak in my own mind and lost. I had to be a rock for her. I had to be strong enough for the both of us at the worst of times. But I’ll tell you the most beautiful thing about waking up with her is that I loved her at her worst and she loved me at my worst.
I never slept well except when I was with her. She was intoxicating. Looking at her fine white hair now I still love her as much as I did when I met her. Back to the mornings! She would roll over on her back and lightly snore sometimes. I would stroke her head a few times and watch her sleep. Now in my old age I slowly get out of bed and go to the kitchen to make coffee. She liked creamer in her coffee and I always bought too much because it was the little things. On the weekends I would go over to the donut shop and grab a few donuts for us to share. When we didn’t live together years ago I would sometimes surprise her in the morning with a bag of two donuts and a fresh hot coffee and cream. She would come out of her door and I would be there to surprise her with breakfast. I always wanted any memory to be a good one. If something happened to me I wanted her to remember the donuts in the morning, coffee being ready, me always looking at her the way I did. I left little notes around the house telling her how beautiful she was and how much I wanted her.
She was an amazing entry to my life. I couldn’t stop writing or creating. We shared a connection that brought out the best of me and I wrote the most beautiful letters, poems, stories, and painted, made books, and all kinds of stuff that we still have.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzwBHP3nnNM
I got better. She got better. We got better. Soon we didn’t feel as much pain as we had in the past. Each day we smiled a little more. We never had a lot of money, but we had each other. There were times when the depression and anxiety would creep up on us, but we looked at the box and books I had made for her and we remembered that it wasn’t forever.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXK4oWD6kFw
It was always there for both of us. All we had to do was pick it up. After that one night I never mentioned suicide or wanting to kill myself. If I was going to be selfish in any way, it was to spend as much time with her as I could. This is how I got better. My heart beat with hers. My soul held hers. I wrote songs too. I could never tell her what I knew and saw in my dreams. There have only been two other people that have ever been cosmically connected to me. But the third one, her, was the best one. I hated knowing, feeling, and caring, but there was never anything that broke my love for her. Even as I wrote about her she had other guys. Each time it ended I was there. She always tried to apologize and I told her, “You can’t apologize for life. I hurt when you’re hurt. I have loved you and haven’t stopped. I have shared with you all of me which no one else has ever gotten.” She didn’t understand. I didn’t understand either. I didn’t need an explanation or reason of why to love her.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Watch! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIvG7Dh4ckI
I hadn’t really cared about people in the past. I told one girlfriend that she was basically disposable or expendable like all people. I was walled up and didn’t want anyone getting in. I lost a lot of people. When I met you I couldn’t build any walls. I wanted to, but I felt your heart and couldn’t escape it. This was also how I maintained a flow of creative energy. I loved her without condition.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EFiopuzJMs
We’re now both 65 years old. 30 years together as friends, lovers, and partners. The hard part was watching someone I loved be hurt and be in pain. Looking back it all happened as the universe made it. The good part was always her, us, and how she made me feel. It doesn’t matter how things start, but how they end. I wake up each morning making coffee, feeding and walking the dogs, and knowing happiness. I became a counselor and speaker with a successful career. I was published in poetry journals and had my books published. When audiences or clients asked me what I thought my greatest achievement was I tell them that it was knowing how to love. The greatest works of writing and art I ever did were the ones dedicated to her and made for her. I wish that I could claim a classic case of co-dependence, but I had to be good on my own without her or anyone. The difference, I tell them, is life forced me to be good; she forced me to be great.
It was a hard life, but a good life...
“When your heart has found another to make music with, you cannot help but only make symphonies instead of solos.” E.B.
Listen!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxMtBQUTu-s
Did a lot of thinking today. It felt good. Just sitting there in the calm cool air. Anxiety turned to enjoyment and contentment. I had some deep thoughts with myself. I forgot what it was like to not want the time to go by faster. It was beautiful. It was the same feeling being with you.
I made decisions some right and some wrong
And I let some love go I wish wasn't gone
These things and more I wish I had not done
But I can't go back
And I don't want to
'Cause all my mistakes
They brought me to you
I have some "friends" they don't know who I am
So I write quotations around the word friends
But I have a couple that have always been there for me
I did a lot of thinking today and reflecting. I needed to get away. I needed to find a calm place to just be with myself. So I drove to the valley. I used to go there as a kid and always loved being in the mountain areas. I like little places that sell hot boiled peanuts and scented pinecones. Places where they try to remember a different time with glass bottled sodas, candies, and old timey games like marbles. The places are always in a chaotic order. Most have an odd assortment of things. Like, for example, if we went to a restaurant and you ordered lobster and wanted skittles as your side item. But I like it. It reminds me of simplicity and enjoyment. No fancy parking lots or long rows of stores. Just an old building with screen doors, wooden floors, and usually an animal (wanted or unwanted) roams around. Families stop with their kids. The little ones seemed amazed at the sight of the mountains and just being out of the neighborhood. But the older the kids are more preoccupied with when they are leaving or playing on their cell phones. You can see the look in the parents’ eyes of the youth slipping away and the kids don’t even realize it. Soon those kids will have responsibility, girl or boyfriends, jobs, dreams, nightmares, and eventually homes or “places” of their own. The cycle repeats you know.
Those same kids will have kids and share that look of hoping their kids will remember this moment more than the stupid text or snapchat photo that just popped up. There are always old folks in overalls talking to anyone who will listen and they always have a story. It’s usually the same story every time you go back there, but somehow it doesn’t get old. You see an old man’s face sink over time, his body becomes thinner, and his fingers lose their composition so much that his wedding ring no longer stays on it. You can tell when something has happened. That excited old yeller face waiting to tell a story becomes quiet and lonesome. The wedding ring he wore now hides in his pocket. He kisses it every morning and every night because his wife passed before him. All he has is the few remaining years sitting in the rocking chair thinking of her and sharing a smile every so often when someone requests to hear a story. But his story has changed. It’s a very delicate ceremony he displays. He reaches in his pocket and slides the ring on his old frail finger. With a little curl he helps the ring dangle securely. A smile sweeps across his face and he begins to talk about the days when there were fresh apple, blackberry, cherry, and all kinds of other pies. Some listening will even speak up that they remember how good they were. His smile grows wider and his eyes moisten slightly. There are no more pies now at the stop, but the old man makes cupcakes for the kids.
“Close your eyes and I'll kiss you
Tomorrow I'll miss you
Remember I'll always be true”
These old men are all over. Someday I’ll be one of them. I can only hope that I’ll be fortunate enough to tell stories of great days and the even greater days with my girl, our kids, our animals, and what we saw. I envy the elderly in some ways. Youth is a cruel time, adolescence is full of angst, and adulthood is trying to forget the cruelty and angst. But I slow down when I hear a song and think of what it would be like to be old and have my wrinkled hand move a few inches and touch your cold fingers. Bad circulation with the old folks, but I’ve gotten her a blanket and kept her warm for years. Each time I grab the blanket to cover her I look at her and think that “it was a hard life, but a good life.” The best part, the good part, was her and us. Each night I hold her and watch her go to sleep. She doesn’t know that I tear up each night hoping that I will see her in the morning. When I wake up and I see she is still alive I kiss her cheek and move slowly out of bed, but sometimes she catches me and pulls my arm over her. I can see her smile. I once asked her if she would ever get tired of me telling her how beautiful she was or how much I loved her. She usually just smiled and occasionally would say “no.” We had been through a good life and a hard life. When we found each other I don’t think either of us thought we would be together or here. I had my own problems of anxiety and depression. She battled her own issues. I couldn’t understand how she could fall for all these abusive guys who didn’t really love her, but it didn’t matter. I never kicked her to the curb or treated her like shit. I think she didn’t believe that after all that she had been through in her life that it could be that easy; to find someone who would just love her for her. It wasn’t easy all the time. I wanted to beat the shit out of the guys that hurt her. But I wasn’t exactly much better. I was weak in my own mind and lost. I had to be a rock for her. I had to be strong enough for the both of us at the worst of times. But I’ll tell you the most beautiful thing about waking up with her is that I loved her at her worst and she loved me at my worst.
I never slept well except when I was with her. She was intoxicating. Looking at her fine white hair now I still love her as much as I did when I met her. Back to the mornings! She would roll over on her back and lightly snore sometimes. I would stroke her head a few times and watch her sleep. Now in my old age I slowly get out of bed and go to the kitchen to make coffee. She liked creamer in her coffee and I always bought too much because it was the little things. On the weekends I would go over to the donut shop and grab a few donuts for us to share. When we didn’t live together years ago I would sometimes surprise her in the morning with a bag of two donuts and a fresh hot coffee and cream. She would come out of her door and I would be there to surprise her with breakfast. I always wanted any memory to be a good one. If something happened to me I wanted her to remember the donuts in the morning, coffee being ready, me always looking at her the way I did. I left little notes around the house telling her how beautiful she was and how much I wanted her.
She was an amazing entry to my life. I couldn’t stop writing or creating. We shared a connection that brought out the best of me and I wrote the most beautiful letters, poems, stories, and painted, made books, and all kinds of stuff that we still have.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzwBHP3nnNM
I got better. She got better. We got better. Soon we didn’t feel as much pain as we had in the past. Each day we smiled a little more. We never had a lot of money, but we had each other. There were times when the depression and anxiety would creep up on us, but we looked at the box and books I had made for her and we remembered that it wasn’t forever.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXK4oWD6kFw
It was always there for both of us. All we had to do was pick it up. After that one night I never mentioned suicide or wanting to kill myself. If I was going to be selfish in any way, it was to spend as much time with her as I could. This is how I got better. My heart beat with hers. My soul held hers. I wrote songs too. I could never tell her what I knew and saw in my dreams. There have only been two other people that have ever been cosmically connected to me. But the third one, her, was the best one. I hated knowing, feeling, and caring, but there was never anything that broke my love for her. Even as I wrote about her she had other guys. Each time it ended I was there. She always tried to apologize and I told her, “You can’t apologize for life. I hurt when you’re hurt. I have loved you and haven’t stopped. I have shared with you all of me which no one else has ever gotten.” She didn’t understand. I didn’t understand either. I didn’t need an explanation or reason of why to love her.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Watch! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIvG7Dh4ckI
I hadn’t really cared about people in the past. I told one girlfriend that she was basically disposable or expendable like all people. I was walled up and didn’t want anyone getting in. I lost a lot of people. When I met you I couldn’t build any walls. I wanted to, but I felt your heart and couldn’t escape it. This was also how I maintained a flow of creative energy. I loved her without condition.
It was a hard life, but a good life.
Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EFiopuzJMs
We’re now both 65 years old. 30 years together as friends, lovers, and partners. The hard part was watching someone I loved be hurt and be in pain. Looking back it all happened as the universe made it. The good part was always her, us, and how she made me feel. It doesn’t matter how things start, but how they end. I wake up each morning making coffee, feeding and walking the dogs, and knowing happiness. I became a counselor and speaker with a successful career. I was published in poetry journals and had my books published. When audiences or clients asked me what I thought my greatest achievement was I tell them that it was knowing how to love. The greatest works of writing and art I ever did were the ones dedicated to her and made for her. I wish that I could claim a classic case of co-dependence, but I had to be good on my own without her or anyone. The difference, I tell them, is life forced me to be good; she forced me to be great.
It was a hard life, but a good life...
“When your heart has found another to make music with, you cannot help but only make symphonies instead of solos.” E.B.
Listen!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxMtBQUTu-s
Letter 7 – “Postcards”
Dear No one,
Some letters have survived while others were left to moisten and decompose with the changing skies.
The moon appears white as a reflection of the sun’s light.
Even in the dark when only the moon draws it luminescence from the sun…
Night has become my most anxious time.
I wait for the moon to appear.
Sometimes as a fraction of what she is capable.
At other times, she is in full illuminating bloom.
I am lost most in the light of day.
Night’s dark tranquility allows me to think.
My brain cannot bleed away the thoughts.
Blood rushes to my heart.
My stomach tickles at the thought of you.
I used to think if I judged others I was saving and securing myself.
Finding disgust in them and setting a distance until they were no longer visible.
No one I cannot feel disgust in you
To do so, I would fall slavishly into disgust for my life, past, and insecurities.
In you I accept me as I am.
People provide reflections, reminders, and renderings
What we hate in others is usually our own hated of our character or physique
A smile from a stranger reminds us that we are not invisible
The curious staring of a baby reminds us that life wasn’t always this way
There was a time when the world was ours
We didn’t know people could and would hurt us…
Some people we envy and wonder what a life like theirs would be like
Others on a humble romantic scale imagine how she would look like with a baby sitting on her chest sleeping.
What arguments they would have over decorating the house.
How even when she leaves the room he misses her.
The belief in real love that binds two people is rare
People go through the motions until the pretending becomes habitual and accepted as reality
Life then becomes the measure of looking out the window at a world he or she cannot be a part of
No one I wish I could scream your name to the world
All comes as it should…no later or sooner
Have you seen the postcards left along the way?
They are always there waiting to be read
I have been collecting them
The last one had a scribbling on it: “Are you staying a while or just passing through?”
Dear No one,
Some letters have survived while others were left to moisten and decompose with the changing skies.
The moon appears white as a reflection of the sun’s light.
Even in the dark when only the moon draws it luminescence from the sun…
Night has become my most anxious time.
I wait for the moon to appear.
Sometimes as a fraction of what she is capable.
At other times, she is in full illuminating bloom.
I am lost most in the light of day.
Night’s dark tranquility allows me to think.
My brain cannot bleed away the thoughts.
Blood rushes to my heart.
My stomach tickles at the thought of you.
I used to think if I judged others I was saving and securing myself.
Finding disgust in them and setting a distance until they were no longer visible.
No one I cannot feel disgust in you
To do so, I would fall slavishly into disgust for my life, past, and insecurities.
In you I accept me as I am.
People provide reflections, reminders, and renderings
What we hate in others is usually our own hated of our character or physique
A smile from a stranger reminds us that we are not invisible
The curious staring of a baby reminds us that life wasn’t always this way
There was a time when the world was ours
We didn’t know people could and would hurt us…
Some people we envy and wonder what a life like theirs would be like
Others on a humble romantic scale imagine how she would look like with a baby sitting on her chest sleeping.
What arguments they would have over decorating the house.
How even when she leaves the room he misses her.
The belief in real love that binds two people is rare
People go through the motions until the pretending becomes habitual and accepted as reality
Life then becomes the measure of looking out the window at a world he or she cannot be a part of
No one I wish I could scream your name to the world
All comes as it should…no later or sooner
Have you seen the postcards left along the way?
They are always there waiting to be read
I have been collecting them
The last one had a scribbling on it: “Are you staying a while or just passing through?”
No. 9 "Singularity, Event Horizon, and Pulsars"
Dear No one,
It has been quite some time since I saw you
Touched your hand
Saw your eyes
You are always here
Material distance doesn't change anything
I have felt you stronger than ever before
An intensity of extreme emotional distress
Tell me I'm crazy and I will live a fool's life until the world loses character
Say nothing and I still know
Ten days from now to ten years from now
There is no parting sentiment until the world loses character
And even then we find ourselves crossing our event
You owe me nothing in this world
I don't ask anything of you
I have abandoned trying to understand what happened
The chance encounter of finding you
It was just a picture, but I know that I had to know you
No one in the world has allowed me to know myself
I love you because the thought of you makes me smile
Knowing you're in the world is beautiful and calming to me
And the charge has grown stronger
I fall into lucid dreams where I'm with you
How is it that fear melts away with you?
To take you and hold you so hard
To see in your eyes and feel the love flow into you
To surrender and feel the vibration flowing between us
Everything has lead up to this
The singularity of fiction becomes our reality
You've shown me how to be compassionate even at the chance of abuse
For not all can fall in such one dimensionality
I feel your thoughts becoming mine
Your desires intensifying mine
The pulsing of your heart
The sadness and fear of each day
The small moments where you live
And feel those when you want to die
In you I see the most amazing person I've ever known
A person I'm proud to know
A person whom I love as I had always hoped I could
A person who I will protect and provide for when needed
A person who I want nothing for myself and everything for you
I know that fear silences in its most mundane and minute form
But I heard you that night
When you love someone you let them be free
And freely together you will experience an unrestrained love and passion
If you forget your beauty, your amazing heart, or feel imprisoned by the desires of another to be someone you're not, I will remind you
I will always love you,
You're always known twin flame,
E.B.
Dear No one,
It has been quite some time since I saw you
Touched your hand
Saw your eyes
You are always here
Material distance doesn't change anything
I have felt you stronger than ever before
An intensity of extreme emotional distress
Tell me I'm crazy and I will live a fool's life until the world loses character
Say nothing and I still know
Ten days from now to ten years from now
There is no parting sentiment until the world loses character
And even then we find ourselves crossing our event
You owe me nothing in this world
I don't ask anything of you
I have abandoned trying to understand what happened
The chance encounter of finding you
It was just a picture, but I know that I had to know you
No one in the world has allowed me to know myself
I love you because the thought of you makes me smile
Knowing you're in the world is beautiful and calming to me
And the charge has grown stronger
I fall into lucid dreams where I'm with you
How is it that fear melts away with you?
To take you and hold you so hard
To see in your eyes and feel the love flow into you
To surrender and feel the vibration flowing between us
Everything has lead up to this
The singularity of fiction becomes our reality
You've shown me how to be compassionate even at the chance of abuse
For not all can fall in such one dimensionality
I feel your thoughts becoming mine
Your desires intensifying mine
The pulsing of your heart
The sadness and fear of each day
The small moments where you live
And feel those when you want to die
In you I see the most amazing person I've ever known
A person I'm proud to know
A person whom I love as I had always hoped I could
A person who I will protect and provide for when needed
A person who I want nothing for myself and everything for you
I know that fear silences in its most mundane and minute form
But I heard you that night
When you love someone you let them be free
And freely together you will experience an unrestrained love and passion
If you forget your beauty, your amazing heart, or feel imprisoned by the desires of another to be someone you're not, I will remind you
I will always love you,
You're always known twin flame,
E.B.
No. 10 "Confessions"
Dear No One,
How you have flown!
How you have run with the bulls, the dragons, the goblins, and the gremlins!
How so much appears as so little!
I must confess that knowing has never been so tightening to my chest and mind
To see things before they happen
To feel things as they condensate
If one is not mad with love then one is merely mad
"Confession is not betrayal. What you say or do doesn't matter; only feelings matter if they could make me stop loving you-that would be the real betrayal"
George Orwell, 1984
I must confess that loving you has made me love myself
That to care for others with compassion is why I love you
That to live with a purpose of knowing you are in the world
Even if I cannot touch ot see you
To feel family in the palm of your hand
To see what others can't
To dream each night
"People who talk about their dreams are actually trying to tell you things about themselves they'd never admit in normal conversation"
Chuck Klosterman
I must confess that I have imagined the unimaginable
Any yet I cannot leave this place, this plane
To smile and warm my blood
To wake and sleep with excitement and fear
A fear of failure, fleeing, and fighting my heart
"Suicide is a confession of failure. And like divorce, it is shrouded in excuses and rationalizations spun endlessly to disguise the simple fact that all one's energy, passion, appetite, and ambition have been aborted."
A. Alvarez, The Savage God: A Study In Suicide
I must confess that you swim in my soul
Knowing that I have no conventional identity with you
To love you as a mother
To protect you as family
To find you as a friend
To love you as a lover
To provide and sacrifice for the not yet come
I must confess that no other is or will be you
To feel nothing once you've felt
To want only as the heart knows true
To discard conventional for an unknown covenant
That to have had a moment was to know a lifetime
I must confess that I am not waiting; I am Being
That Being in this world is being in it with you
That time is ours
That distance is perceptual
That there is a third waiting to Be
There is no place in the world or my mind to hide, my love
There is no reason to betray and hide ourselves
That if we cannot be seen completely by another it is better that they do not get the privilege of seeing us at all
That the best time we have known we cannot know yet
My love, my partner, my friend
No one will ever know this love like you
I am no longer beholden to Plato's cave and dancing with shadows that pretend to know me, talk to me, or want me
There is but one shadow and I have tamed it
I will always Be t/here
yours uncompromisingly,
E.B.
Dear No One,
How you have flown!
How you have run with the bulls, the dragons, the goblins, and the gremlins!
How so much appears as so little!
I must confess that knowing has never been so tightening to my chest and mind
To see things before they happen
To feel things as they condensate
If one is not mad with love then one is merely mad
"Confession is not betrayal. What you say or do doesn't matter; only feelings matter if they could make me stop loving you-that would be the real betrayal"
George Orwell, 1984
I must confess that loving you has made me love myself
That to care for others with compassion is why I love you
That to live with a purpose of knowing you are in the world
Even if I cannot touch ot see you
To feel family in the palm of your hand
To see what others can't
To dream each night
"People who talk about their dreams are actually trying to tell you things about themselves they'd never admit in normal conversation"
Chuck Klosterman
I must confess that I have imagined the unimaginable
Any yet I cannot leave this place, this plane
To smile and warm my blood
To wake and sleep with excitement and fear
A fear of failure, fleeing, and fighting my heart
"Suicide is a confession of failure. And like divorce, it is shrouded in excuses and rationalizations spun endlessly to disguise the simple fact that all one's energy, passion, appetite, and ambition have been aborted."
A. Alvarez, The Savage God: A Study In Suicide
I must confess that you swim in my soul
Knowing that I have no conventional identity with you
To love you as a mother
To protect you as family
To find you as a friend
To love you as a lover
To provide and sacrifice for the not yet come
I must confess that no other is or will be you
To feel nothing once you've felt
To want only as the heart knows true
To discard conventional for an unknown covenant
That to have had a moment was to know a lifetime
I must confess that I am not waiting; I am Being
That Being in this world is being in it with you
That time is ours
That distance is perceptual
That there is a third waiting to Be
There is no place in the world or my mind to hide, my love
There is no reason to betray and hide ourselves
That if we cannot be seen completely by another it is better that they do not get the privilege of seeing us at all
That the best time we have known we cannot know yet
My love, my partner, my friend
No one will ever know this love like you
I am no longer beholden to Plato's cave and dancing with shadows that pretend to know me, talk to me, or want me
There is but one shadow and I have tamed it
I will always Be t/here
yours uncompromisingly,
E.B.
No. 11 “Winter is coming”
Dear No One,
Is the worst thing in the world loving you?
Weeks and months go by and time leaves us be
You’re so beautiful
You never have to ask…
You never have to say you’re sorry…
Maybe my madness leads me to see something in nothing
Maybe nothing, a nirvana Being in the world, is what I deserve, yearn for…
Have you known life at its moment?
Sitting there Being us…
Isn’t it a relief to have that time
You say what you know and it’s always been there for you
Where you end I begin and infinence upon an imperfect circle, a constellation of infinitude
To see you happy and feel you
I know you see me
But all is as it is supposed to be
That night I fell to my knees convulsing and wobbling as if a million volts had just run through me
Or the intense vibration of two souls vibrating and opening vulnerability
Tears and emotional inundation aren’t normal
I cry at the thought of losing you
The thought of wishing I could do better and take us away
But in those thoughts there is a beautiful hope
That winter is coming and it has always forged my mind and heart for better or for worse
Small things are stupid and obligatory to some people
But those you are likely to remember…
Putting on Nat King Cole, Vince Guaraldi Trio, or Mcartney’s simply having a wonderful Christmas time
Decorating a small tree that only has to mean something to us and no one else
Cookies we make and take to the homeless
Each year I want you, us, and the kids together
Surprise gifts fashioned out of our minds and hearts
That not even Hallmark or any other corporation could replicate with such soul.
I still make for you…
This one will be given when you’re ready for it
It may be the last thing I ever make and fashion with my heart and soul
You still have the book under your bed
This one will not be so simple
How to say I love you if I say good bye?
I leave with you the keys if you ever choose to come
I can feel when you’re happy
As if you forget everything and being anything except who you are
And I have loved that YOU even when it was veiled
By what you may feel was the worst of you
One day you will be able to take my hand and know it can be this easy
If you hold on I promise you a good life, but a hard life
No life has lost meaning with you in the world
You see in me the way others don’t
I see in you the way others can’t
Life is beautiful knowing you are out there…
I will love you always,
E.B.
Dear No One,
Is the worst thing in the world loving you?
Weeks and months go by and time leaves us be
You’re so beautiful
You never have to ask…
You never have to say you’re sorry…
Maybe my madness leads me to see something in nothing
Maybe nothing, a nirvana Being in the world, is what I deserve, yearn for…
Have you known life at its moment?
Sitting there Being us…
Isn’t it a relief to have that time
You say what you know and it’s always been there for you
Where you end I begin and infinence upon an imperfect circle, a constellation of infinitude
To see you happy and feel you
I know you see me
But all is as it is supposed to be
That night I fell to my knees convulsing and wobbling as if a million volts had just run through me
Or the intense vibration of two souls vibrating and opening vulnerability
Tears and emotional inundation aren’t normal
I cry at the thought of losing you
The thought of wishing I could do better and take us away
But in those thoughts there is a beautiful hope
That winter is coming and it has always forged my mind and heart for better or for worse
Small things are stupid and obligatory to some people
But those you are likely to remember…
Putting on Nat King Cole, Vince Guaraldi Trio, or Mcartney’s simply having a wonderful Christmas time
Decorating a small tree that only has to mean something to us and no one else
Cookies we make and take to the homeless
Each year I want you, us, and the kids together
Surprise gifts fashioned out of our minds and hearts
That not even Hallmark or any other corporation could replicate with such soul.
I still make for you…
This one will be given when you’re ready for it
It may be the last thing I ever make and fashion with my heart and soul
You still have the book under your bed
This one will not be so simple
How to say I love you if I say good bye?
I leave with you the keys if you ever choose to come
I can feel when you’re happy
As if you forget everything and being anything except who you are
And I have loved that YOU even when it was veiled
By what you may feel was the worst of you
One day you will be able to take my hand and know it can be this easy
If you hold on I promise you a good life, but a hard life
No life has lost meaning with you in the world
You see in me the way others don’t
I see in you the way others can’t
Life is beautiful knowing you are out there…
I will love you always,
E.B.
Letter 12. “Through the looking glass: Schism and shatterings”
Dear no one,
I haven’t forgotten you. I have kept my place, my proximity. I have known before you tell me and still I stay. Madness would be a better answer, but the world is mad not us. If we didn’t feel, we wouldn’t care. You care for the little things and the big things. We were born into a world (al)ready-made and our circumstances were already colluding. There is love and lies… A certain perception out of desire and desperation. And neither desire or desperation stitch us together. I desire you and for you. It’s inescapable and I have tried for the past year now and I come back to the same constellation, motion, and vibrations. Lust and loss that filled me so highly has dissipated and supplemented for love, caring, and unconditionality.
You know in films when they ask the cliché, “was she worth it?” The stupidity of this question confounds me. It was worth one day with her than a month without. It was worth a year living than 30 years alone surviving. Worth? Every penny I have. Every ounce of strength I can give. Every drop of blood and organs. “Was she worth the madness?” Who’s madness and in what world? If it is madness then an asylum is perfect, but the real asylum is out there. You can see them… Dad’s with their kid on his weekend visitation… A single mom trying to date but finding only extremes and deprivations of emotionality and sexuality. How many TV shows do have to watch about the imbalance of couples, oedipal issues, and the game of who’s right and wrong. This asylum keeps them in and medicated on hope, fantasy, and disavowal. The cycle repeats itself until age obliges two people to give up and let go to not be alone.
Impossible things happen with the most destitute situations and derelict minds. You were and still are an impossible thing of beauty. How do you do it and why? If you need reasons to explain your love then it probably is not really love. There is a plateau that one can ascend to that has no word for its effect. You know by the way someone looks at you, the way your heart vibrates when close to them, that feeling of really feeling.
“When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes, I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
― Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There
Sartre said we are not born into a world of our own making.
Rousseau wrote that we are born, but everywhere we are in chains.
I wonder what life would be like if I had been born in an aborigine, a refugee in a war torn country, a royal in one of the monarchies.
Maybe in a parallel universe there is a version of me that is one of these.
They say déjà vu is a possible moment when one conscious merges with another in another parallel world.
Theoretically infinite versions of us could exist.
I wonder if there is a world where I have not faced trauma, paralysis of the faculties, and deaf morality?
Maybe there is another world where you are in a completely different life settled and married with kids and a collection of macaroni and fruit loop inspired jewelry and artwork.
There is the possibility that in one world I am your opposite in every way.
Do you ever wonder if you passed someone at one point in your life not knowing them at the time, but then find them later in life as a friend or significant other?
Whereas there have been people whom I would have hated or avoided early in life, I don’t think there could be a time in my life or yours where that would be the circumstance.
I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them fall away.
Mildewed and smoldering. Fundamental differing.
Pure intention juxtaposed will set two lovers souls in motion
Disintegrating as it goes testing our communication
The light that fueled our fire then has burned a hole between us so
We cannot seem to reach an end crippling our communication.
I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them tumble down
No fault, none to blame, it doesn't mean I don't desire to
Point the finger, blame the other, watch the temple topple over.
To bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication
The poetry that comes from the squaring off between,
And the circling is worth it.
Finding beauty in the dissonance.
There was a time that the pieces fit, but I watched them fall away.
Mildewed and smoldering, strangled by our coveting
I've done the math enough to know the dangers of our second guessing.
Doomed to crumble unless we grow, and strengthen our communication.
Cold silence
has a tendency
to atrophy any
sense of compassion
between supposed lovers
-Tool, "Schism"
Our lives have run similar paths, sharing stories, and unfortunately afflictions.
We run as parallel lines of flight, as mirror reflections.
Many say, “when our paths crossed…”, but we have followed parallel to one another without knowing.
Chaos, for us, has a particular design and direction in its destruction.
We became vibrations exchanging charges like Tesla coils.
The world, this world, is different with you.
No one vibrates with me like you.
I try to convince myself of some type of obsessive madness, but I think love makes you beautifully mad.
When we are together you smile. I know that smile.
My entire body and heart vibrates being close to you and maybe that’s why you keep me at a distance.
I know I have to be strong.
I will build a house and you can fill it with memories.
Another world exists for both of us where structures and streets do not nostalgically haunt us.
A place where we can live rather than survive.
A place where our kids can play and have love not loss, toys not trauma.
I will love you until I can no longer breathe.
My love for you has not wavered in the emotional weather.
You’ve been my friend and I will always be yours.
You’ve been family and will always be close.
You can be my partner, lover, wife, friend, muse…
What we are has no label. We will be all of them and none of them at once.
We will simply Be…
Love,
-E.B.
Dear no one,
I haven’t forgotten you. I have kept my place, my proximity. I have known before you tell me and still I stay. Madness would be a better answer, but the world is mad not us. If we didn’t feel, we wouldn’t care. You care for the little things and the big things. We were born into a world (al)ready-made and our circumstances were already colluding. There is love and lies… A certain perception out of desire and desperation. And neither desire or desperation stitch us together. I desire you and for you. It’s inescapable and I have tried for the past year now and I come back to the same constellation, motion, and vibrations. Lust and loss that filled me so highly has dissipated and supplemented for love, caring, and unconditionality.
You know in films when they ask the cliché, “was she worth it?” The stupidity of this question confounds me. It was worth one day with her than a month without. It was worth a year living than 30 years alone surviving. Worth? Every penny I have. Every ounce of strength I can give. Every drop of blood and organs. “Was she worth the madness?” Who’s madness and in what world? If it is madness then an asylum is perfect, but the real asylum is out there. You can see them… Dad’s with their kid on his weekend visitation… A single mom trying to date but finding only extremes and deprivations of emotionality and sexuality. How many TV shows do have to watch about the imbalance of couples, oedipal issues, and the game of who’s right and wrong. This asylum keeps them in and medicated on hope, fantasy, and disavowal. The cycle repeats itself until age obliges two people to give up and let go to not be alone.
Impossible things happen with the most destitute situations and derelict minds. You were and still are an impossible thing of beauty. How do you do it and why? If you need reasons to explain your love then it probably is not really love. There is a plateau that one can ascend to that has no word for its effect. You know by the way someone looks at you, the way your heart vibrates when close to them, that feeling of really feeling.
“When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes, I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
― Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There
Sartre said we are not born into a world of our own making.
Rousseau wrote that we are born, but everywhere we are in chains.
I wonder what life would be like if I had been born in an aborigine, a refugee in a war torn country, a royal in one of the monarchies.
Maybe in a parallel universe there is a version of me that is one of these.
They say déjà vu is a possible moment when one conscious merges with another in another parallel world.
Theoretically infinite versions of us could exist.
I wonder if there is a world where I have not faced trauma, paralysis of the faculties, and deaf morality?
Maybe there is another world where you are in a completely different life settled and married with kids and a collection of macaroni and fruit loop inspired jewelry and artwork.
There is the possibility that in one world I am your opposite in every way.
Do you ever wonder if you passed someone at one point in your life not knowing them at the time, but then find them later in life as a friend or significant other?
Whereas there have been people whom I would have hated or avoided early in life, I don’t think there could be a time in my life or yours where that would be the circumstance.
I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them fall away.
Mildewed and smoldering. Fundamental differing.
Pure intention juxtaposed will set two lovers souls in motion
Disintegrating as it goes testing our communication
The light that fueled our fire then has burned a hole between us so
We cannot seem to reach an end crippling our communication.
I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them tumble down
No fault, none to blame, it doesn't mean I don't desire to
Point the finger, blame the other, watch the temple topple over.
To bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication
The poetry that comes from the squaring off between,
And the circling is worth it.
Finding beauty in the dissonance.
There was a time that the pieces fit, but I watched them fall away.
Mildewed and smoldering, strangled by our coveting
I've done the math enough to know the dangers of our second guessing.
Doomed to crumble unless we grow, and strengthen our communication.
Cold silence
has a tendency
to atrophy any
sense of compassion
between supposed lovers
-Tool, "Schism"
Our lives have run similar paths, sharing stories, and unfortunately afflictions.
We run as parallel lines of flight, as mirror reflections.
Many say, “when our paths crossed…”, but we have followed parallel to one another without knowing.
Chaos, for us, has a particular design and direction in its destruction.
We became vibrations exchanging charges like Tesla coils.
The world, this world, is different with you.
No one vibrates with me like you.
I try to convince myself of some type of obsessive madness, but I think love makes you beautifully mad.
When we are together you smile. I know that smile.
My entire body and heart vibrates being close to you and maybe that’s why you keep me at a distance.
I know I have to be strong.
I will build a house and you can fill it with memories.
Another world exists for both of us where structures and streets do not nostalgically haunt us.
A place where we can live rather than survive.
A place where our kids can play and have love not loss, toys not trauma.
I will love you until I can no longer breathe.
My love for you has not wavered in the emotional weather.
You’ve been my friend and I will always be yours.
You’ve been family and will always be close.
You can be my partner, lover, wife, friend, muse…
What we are has no label. We will be all of them and none of them at once.
We will simply Be…
Love,
-E.B.