ORNELLA PLEASE TRANSLATE =)

You can flick your hair

and hide your tattoos

ashamed of your past,

and smile for dollars

conversations for cents,

Take me aside

I'm crazy inside

and we all sell ourselves,

I just wish I could buy the next day

or two,

and

catch a flick

temporary tattoos

right our pasts,

and sing for quarters,

dance around in circles in tongues

take me inside,

I'm crazy inside,

and you'll never feel ashamed again--

I'm only hurting you now,

I'm only singing for quarters

but I'm sure that I love you.

Challenges are fun.

I'm not in love with tragedy, I'm in love with happiness. I want to be happy, I am happy. If you'd like to be happy, we can be happy. If you're afraid of being happy, then you can live the same routine.

New Challenge: Impress me. Out run me, Out smart me. Tell me something about something other than someone you idolize. Tell me something about art that I don't know, or something about music that I don't know. If I don't know about it, does it interest me? Speak a language to me-- fix my computer, talk to me about philosophy. Does this upset you if none of this applies to you?

We're wasting our lives, and I'm not wasting mine anymore. Tonight was the night of nights, and no one was there for me. So thanks a lot kids, my fucking crew. My fucking glory days crew. Its time to grow up.

Kentucky Loves Our New Oregon Pictures In Neons (3 Mega Prints)

I took one and spun
like a top
that turns right around
and stings when it stops,
in front of you,
and I then I took two
to reach out for you
but fell short to a pocket
with a number in script
and felt dizzy and short of it--
sort of sick--
and I was looking just for a friend
not the one's who just play pretend
not the tea time brigade never on call
not the see through who make me feel small

and I was looking just to connect
with a mind as pretty as a face
and a tongue that doesn't just race
whose thoughts don't take up space
and i found myself in a daze,
a parked car in shock and in pain

when i think of writing about this,
and your eyes just trying to shift
between melancholy and confidence
I was looking just for a friend
a late night call to pretend
i'm not as alone as I am.

and I'm wishing up at the stars
blurry eyed trying hard not to squint
look to the ones who've taken advice
from the ones who didn't know shit
and I would've taken it,
it I hadn't taken them,
maybe I'd stay awake,
and find a friend,
not to pretend
that I'm as lonely as I am.

I can't complete
a full nights sleep;
a cycle or three
eat healthy
and hearty
and healthy,
yeah smart
with my wisdom teeth
and I'll tell you who I am
I
watch you sleep
a full nights worth
of tosses and turns,
and kisses your shoulders,
to taste lotion pressed skin
sun tans and sun burns
and make breakfast in bed,
breakfast for lunch,
breakfast for dinner,
because its all I can cook,
but its always breakfast somewhere,
and we're culturalists,
you can clean the dashboard,
with the heels of your feet
if you promise to play
Tumble Connections
again and again on repeat,
and cruise control
tells me where to go,
and a map in the back seat,
crumbled fair; fair skinned
and neat, so we retire
at walmart parked car
e-breaks and fast food
and junk food
and milkshakes
and westcoast
and we.

The last time the headline
used my name sake,
they thought I was homeless
passed out drunk
hospital and god knows how they treated me
the next time they felt sorry
and thought I was dead,
Then I gave my keys
to a friend in need
who needed to get high
more than I wanted to drive,
and after flashing lights,
a DWI
the psychiatric chop shop
to pull apart my mind,
he finally got his fix,
and I got all the fines;
rehab and an overdose,
and I can't say that I'm fine
but now the name in the paper,
isn't mine,
My cousin holds a trophy,
because she's doing more than all right--
the teenage softball league
I'm so proud I could cry,
for my name, my families sake,
even shit like me can see something beautiful shine sometimes.

Anonymous

"When Everything Was Crooked"

Mother, I am afraid of my emotions,
of loving someone
who will someday die.
The future is inevitable.
If we stay cold we are safe.
How cautious have I been? I'm so sorry.
I miss cool tiled floors,
shadows swaying on my carpet,
bare feet burning on the driveway.
Life was solid.
I'm letting time slip through my fingers.
My memories have no temperature.
Skirts, colors, sounds.
Feet shuffling through St. Peter's, your lullaby, whistling,
yelling echo on the lake.
When I was seventeen
I woke up in a field.
I woke up to singing in Germany.
I forget the weather.
The past is distant, intangible.
This is unsettling.
Our will can be surprising, our wants maybe more.
I was my own hypnotist for years.
The fallacies I fed myself, repressive at best.
And each time you hugged me
I held my breath to hide my tears.
"I'll miss you so much."
Apathy is easier than pining.
"Yes."Mother, I could barely stand to touch you.
Your warmth was frightening.
Your embrace, dangerous.

False Messiah, I took advice once from you:
"Guard your heart, don't block it.
I learned to build trenches.
I learned to sabotage my own fortress.
Feeding on deception, seduction, adrenaline.
We taught each other insecurity.
Sweet words were only sounds that summer.
Love was warfare then.

Lover,
Yesterday I rode the C.
I saw the future on my hands.
I own my life. A nutmeg purse.
This oriental scarf. Our slanted staircase.
I never regretted living with you, but,where were we going so fast?
Our truths come out in dreams
I first said "I love you" half-asleep.
You answered me with questions,
asking, "Why?"And so I know how it feels to cry on Christmas.
My birthday.
To cry myself to sleep.
To wait for devotion.
To fantasize in blood.
Have you survived betrayal?
Have you loved and hated simultaneously?
You've melted me with so many questions.
We are tired, but we are trying.
We'll look back on this and say,"when everything was crooked."
Let me rewind.
I fell in love with Robin Hood at six.
I fell in love with outlaws at sixteen.
I missed the part on charity.
Sheltered danger, desperation.
Do you know what it's like to kiss a mouth who longs for someone else?
I have twice.
People circle back.
We unravel, we return.
Dark-eyed lover,
What let you to me?
The night I met you you looked familiar.
You filled my trenches before they were dug.
We must surrender our games in order to feel.
In autumn you helped me to cry again.
With your hand on my back, I melted.

So happy,
Lets get coffee
but its such a tarnished flavor
in a chipped cup
and I've drank enough
to cut myself off
So sappy
Lets just fuck,
But its such a boring task
i'll kindly decline,
yeah generously pass
but both cut a smoke
So maybe,
we can get married,
and get divorced,
all in one week,
and I'll have a new feeling
to delve over, and delve head knee xyphoid and deep.

I saw you walk
in such a way
that made your legs
look like milk,
and move like silk

You spoke a phrase,
in such a way
It made your e's
ease their way
into silent a's

And I sang you songs,
in such a way
stupid and awkward
I didn't belong

And I watched the blue
in your eyes
disappear in the pool
and it lies behind you
and the sun blinds my eyes
and I wish i were drowning,
oh, in such a way
in the pool,
oh, behind you.

Talk of the town
Trash off the street
Hand me down
Pass me around
Knee deep in the gutter
Hands fro

come back later.

Decode me;
I'm a box, much like a photo album,
only I use shortcuts,
and sparks like a computer,
except, I hide my stash,
so my parents do see
and my friends can't find
what I hide,
cause its mine
And I can never erase
the days
though I try,
And when I spill my drink,
everyones face seems to fade
and create just one, dull, person;
but when I decide to dry them,
I can make out faces, just barely,
and these pictures bring out the best qualities
of everyone; I've ever met;
My books are right there next to them--
so everything is relative. I hang a crucifix next to my bed,
my bed though is secondary in this equation; mix and match,
choose the words carefully-- swear to me, haha, playfully yes yes, okay alright.

she fell asleep;
stayed dreaming..

she needs a ride to bring her
to the day
where we'd talk
Bukowski
and poetry
and coffee
and sweeteners;
and email
and phonecalls
and ice cream
no politics,
no small talk--
black dress to match the day
I combed my hair,
and wore my black boots
and scuffed my shoes too
and I lost my bandana,
but three years later,
she found it,
it looks better on you, too
and I don't know your name,
but its better than shady drop offs
in wayne,
better than never knowing
I'd see you again
better than seeing you look
more or less than the same
better than knowing
I'm not the same nice boy
who did you a favor
with all good intentions
kiss me girl,
and kiss me once,
wish me to sleep,
a lullaby,
we'll stay silent
sleep outside
stay inside
a tent to hide
the golden sky
it hides all the tempting
spoons and straws
on the silver tray
that lasts a life time,
but ends too soon,

so kiss me now,
we'll stay quiet
sleep outside
a tent to hide
the rainbow tide
hides all our temptation
miss the wide
and endless times
we fell asleep and dreaming.

never a dull mood
under a full moon
every night of june
has a new theory to prove
that stars can stay strung strong
and die years ago
and still lie where they belong
and the birds in their trees
chirp wildly unheard melodies
and the leaves stream as they leave
the brances embraced with bark; stems weave
in and out and in and out
and we don't have a childs chance in this world
to ever appreciate the blistering mysteries
like the wind in autumn touches my face
and the shadows that carress my strangely beautiful spectrum
of black, black and more black,
though white on occasion
it depends on my mood,
wrapped with the wind it spirals
and i admire the winter moon when its through
illuminates the sky until a new moon blooms
and not a moment too soon
cause the candles are dim and fair sighted apparitions
petition traditions of accepting every condition blindly,
as we cup our hands to our eyes to struggle to see
they believe what they see is a dream,
and our reality is ordinary--
ending far too soon,
but life is not short-- life is too long if anything
write your name on my will in good faith
and give you everything
i'll take a year to myself and slowly disappear
reappear and write my name in water
and see clear
that one day,
just maybe i can reinvent myself at 18
and blindly at 19
i'll re-evaluate dreams
as they seem, so far out of reach
and the startling sun sets strangely soaring
and settling
somewhere far southwest of this state,
simply to rise once more in my direction
stretched long out of sight.
the leaves are gone, but not for long
and it hits me, these seasons change like a song
but this sequence of timing is only one moment long,
and its horrible these days to say
i look through the obituary like a familiar photo album,
to see another face thats passed away
"he was a friend you see, a friend to me when i was just sixteen
he's gone at 18, and its strange to me
that when i beg to sleep
for good, not to speak
not to see, but simply to be
at rest and at peace
with this world and this life
that someone so happy, so modest
and auspicious
can drastically leave this
world in an instance--
and i the tortured the sinning the cunning;
addicted afflicted and dare i venture malignant,
am cursed to live on and on and on"
and sometimes i see the same thing twice,
and its alright, just alright
and sometimes i use the same words twice,
in a different instance,
but never more than a second or minute
and even still i feel fine
but life is overwhelming;
i imagine when i leave in autumn
back to the gutter to dream
the wind will seem calming--
and i'll be the chosen
and be cured of the curse of 30 moods a moment.

Straight Days

we sit and talk about it all
maybe its more about nothing
but it's still everything to us
we'll take what we can get
we'll take what we want
because were still young
well young enough
to not know what's going on
but we can figure it out
alone or together
we're both here
doing the same thing
wasting away the days
while the rain wastes it all away

By: Amanda Miskar

two poet tongues
that only touch
on tuesday's rain
blue and gray
and all cliches
but only on paper,
and its only okay
one paper crumbles,
dirty hair that smells like smoke
slick sticking straight around the sides,
I can't see the other face--
imagine a smile, or an upside down frown
or make up all made up,
or maybe just one flapping tongue
spitting streams of words at a screen
with an empty seat
on the other side of the screen.

I post this everytime I'm depressed

I lost ten pounds this week
Cause on amphetamines
I don’t really eat,
And I lied to my girl when I swore I’m still clean
And my what a bore is this world
Without sedation I have no patience
And without my addiction my therapist would have no golden patient
And,
If you’d like to compete in the subject of addiction
I’ve been cashing fake scripts
And prescriptions since I was an infant,
And bending the truth with white lies during month 9
Like the worst day my first day yes my fucking birth date
Blowing lines while still inside
Fucking faded and wasted
getting high off my morals
my first words were a warning,
“Enjoy this pain whore
let me have your epidural”

and its two decades later
and what do I have to show
I got a deviated septum from snorting too much coke
I broke up with my girlfriend cause I missed being alone
I’m high as hell writing this,
Not for sympathy cause I know she don’t miss me
And she left me for some new prick-- some rich kid
With a small dick cause she couldn’t look pretty trying not to scream on my dick
Cause that bitch knows I ripped shit
She flows like her lipstick
After that sappy sloppy quick shit,
Nothing spells romance like trying to watch her
gargle my backwash and forgetting to stop her
before I go.

and I’ll admit, none of that is true,
and what do I have to say, well first off fuck you.
Fuck you with your lies your self-asserting bullshit
For hurting my ego, for trying to handle more than I could put up with,
I haven’t drank in 6 months until I relapsed last night
Trying to get a grip on my life
But she swallowed my pride
So I took a few shots and went for a drive
On the loneliest highway to be seen with two eyes
And i called everyone I knew
To find somebody to talk to
But it clicked that no one likes you when you act the way I do
So I’m driving backwards jerking off laughing
Imagining a stained glass windshield on the moment of impact;
Shining lights flashing, am I coming or rolling,
“Jay, you’re truly an addict”
Oh,
I’m addicted to what, the lack of love?
The fact that I love to lack having someone
You’re worth a dime dear,
Cause the calculations real clear

First you get 6 cents on behalf of my sixth-sense
A sick sense that senses a girl that spreads for attention
And you get 4 cents for both times that I lied
When I gave you my two cents
And you followed me home
And just got up to go
After my consolation present for telling you how much you meant
And it hurts less and less
the more and more I confess
And in total confidence, you’re not worth a dime or a penny; not a cent

Or in this lie of a life, this phantom childhood that haunts me each night
Waking up in the hospital with more i.v inside me
Than blood on the bridge where they were surprised to find me
Or two months to the day
The grave yard is grave
A year to the day you abandoned me
But I don’t believe in heaven,
I just believe in hell
Because every drink that I have leads me back down the spiral
Waking up in the psyche-ward to a new clinical trial
Where a cop can get his jollies
Casting me cynical smiles,
But if he took these handcuffs off I’d show him whats what
I’d slit his throat with the back of his badge
And order dispatch to bring my shit back
I can’t drive myself out when they won’t give me my keys
And I can’t sign myself out while I'm strapped with i.v
Because this pig took my i.d
After I was trying to be nice
He threw out my license
Threw cuffs on my wrists
With a vice grip and razored lip
So if I tried to resist they were lifted to dig in
Or when he smashed my chin on the ambulance on the way in
And took his flash light to my ribs cause I was giving him lip
But I wasn’t giving him shit
With the back of my head to the stars—
Face to the pavement
Lips kissing concrete
And the heels of his pig hooves stomping on top of me

Oh, or perhaps I can tell of the lowest level of hell
Swallowing pill after pill
Just to kill how I felt
The only thing I felt when I fell
was the promising grip of the tip of my belt
Wrapped once around the bed post
Twice around my throat
I don’t make threats see cause when I’m ready to go I’ll go
I’m dressed in my best clothes—a black cloak-
My death clothes.

I didn’t cry as I choked,
I’d rather die like a pro
the best message is the ending,
and deservingly so
And the best ending for a poet as most writers know
Is die before the ink dries on this suicide note

I'm a Comedian

I stepped in shit today, and it yelled, "come back soon"

Sex/Poetry Via Email

You sat in the bath with your mouth wide open
You'd stop if I asked but I knew we'd keep going
Scalding water--the only matter between our bare bodies
Said you loved me--after a bottle of cheap corner store wine
a whisper and a kiss in your ear does the trick
Wrapped in soft towels--
A peaceful seduction that resurrects our drives
Claimed I was your sexual healing
and you swore you were only mine--
My poetic muse
but I'm not good at being used--With my legs propped
and your face cropped from my mind
I claimed a monopoly on your body
and a black out from the wine
and a dream of dreams to follow
from serene peace from bubble sheets
and bending knees
curling toes
and poetic moans;
water floats,
but we--
we just sink like ships
too wise to float
and we rock like boats too
violent to know
that if we just laid still
there'd be enough water
tomorrow.
Enough water
To rinse away the dirt
And hangovers with burnt coffee
To forget
And to never call each other again
One night stands
With no emotional strands
Caught in each other’s hair
But a memory is sweeter,
When you're the pick of the litter
Even the coffee I make
Just seems to taste bitter
And the taste in your mouth
reminds you of me,
dirty and gritty
straighten your hair
your shirts not neat
maybe they'll see,
what you see in mePassion and intensity
A little ball of frustration
With bags under my eyes
Delirium grown into normalcy
But still you think it's nice to fuck and use me
Until I blow a fuse
Turn it into the misuse of you
And you run away
Following the others
but you blow my fuse so well,
that it makes me swell and sweat
until I pop
and makes my head
dizzy-- and I think if you're here again tomorrow,
I'll think these thoughts
of what we could do,
the girl I never knew,
in the hotel room
and maybe,
you can write your fantasies
on your hips
like a mystery;
And i can solve them for you,
and blow your lid,
yeah, blow your fuse.
Take it into the bath tub with you
Savor the shock

Sincerely,

Ying Lam, J. Despers and The Cyber Process

J: Not everything I write is about you, you know, I haven't seen you in over a year.
L: I know, but what the fuck J I read your poetry and you haven't changed since I met you in the hospital.
J: I have changed-- I've gone through hell and come out sparkling clean. I've died and gone through limbo and hell and purgatory and finally I'm back into some state of clear--dream like, child like reality-- and I'm finally thankful for these stupid little miserable days.
L: You're not though, and I'm the only one who watches when you think no one's watching. who are you lying to? You're just caught in this web of sad, lonely lies, and you're going to suffocate. Your brain is dying J, its spinning in circles and it's going to just stop one day-- in your sleep, mid motion, mid thought, it already has.
J: I think about that a lot, you know, it takes a thousand years for a star's projection to fade away-- how do I know I'm not really dead.
L: Why do you say shit like that? Why does everything have to be metaphysics and poetics and rhetorics and bullshit with you?
J: Because I call your phone some nights to hear your voice because you're to only beautiful thought I can't taint with my hands.
L: Aww.
J: But, I'm not sure what's worse, The fact that we're dreaming, or the fact that even in dreams you'd never love me..
L: "Somewhere in the world, roses are green."

Sketch Pencils and Small Talk

I bummed a drag we cut a smoke you caught my name I made a joke
you tossed your hair and i fixed my chair you crossed your legs and i spoke too soon
you smiled and said something funny and I said something funny and you smiled again
and this went on like a carousel, and people came on for the ride, and got off
but we didn't run out of change we were fresh on this run around
too afraid to motion to you that the carriage next to me had an open seat,
but the horse carriage driver casts such dumb luck dirty looks,
that you just tilt your head my way,
and me well I just shook
and we talk some about music,
mostly just about how stupid
we look when everyone else
is stupid smoking cigarettes.
And I thought before,
about falling in love,
and spending evenings
on mountains,
but never about sweating to get there
or sand in my socks combing dunes
but I think about an outsider's point of view,
or two, and it makes me want---
it makes me feel like maybe I'm not so dried up inside,
and my xyphoid--my eyes, are in for a grand surprise
toes touching tapping to tapes and records
and the sounds of clocks and
hours and paws and hallway ghosts
and lurking laundry-- waking to nothing,
nothing to yawns and stretches morning breaths
kisses-- far off still dreaming, a warm shoulder--
the rain outside seeping though it feels more
and more and more like dew,
and sweet like honey, than anything
that makes you or I feel ugly--
cups of tea as we read and we plead
just to stop in between
paragraphs to paraphrase ideas--
a sunrise like an aurora pops into your lense,
and you obsess with the west,
and a mountain erects into bed,
so enough with our text--
and we work on our accents
to worry less and less about jersey
and the things that can't help but hurt you
and can't help but hurt me.

i threw you a curve ball but you swung for the fences and I wish it would've knocked me flat on my back because I had to sit calmly and watch those ostentacious short and sickening kisses, "just for show," because i love you babe, so i wrote you a song using the same four bars, the same four chords, same melody, any musical terms I can use to make myself seem like an artist because he has dirty boots and can take his shirt off and make you love him. I lie to myself, to everyone and I don't deserve to sleep at night. The sun blinds my eyes, so I try to tie my blinds, but they bunch so tight and bind---I don't mind, but its that same slipping I felt my head doing way back when, and I'm not gonna wake up soon, I can feel it. I need to breathe for a minute.

I write a lot about things that I want. I don't want anything. I feel as though I was so thirsty and someone filled my entire mouth with sand, and now that's all i'll taste, for now and forever. I am dry and unsatisfied-- I'm thirsty, and yet filled with sand. I had a lot of smiles and memories from when I was a boy. I write a lot about sad things, mainly because happy things hurt my stomach too much to think about too long. I wish I could touch you like in E.T and let you know how this feels, just how today feels. Monday can't be gloomy though, Monday is its own spectrum of some ugly adjective that hangs like some sort of cloud. Tomorrow the sun will shine too brightly, and wednesday maybe osmosis will kill me from puking all over my mirror from every glance. If not, surely working Thursday will be enough to kill such high hopes. myspace.com/jdespers I really enjoy my new demo song.

365365365365

Saturday, July 26, 2008

light hearted she smiles--lights a smoke and she starts to ask---apologize i'm heavy headed.

8/1/08

Friday, August 1, 2008

Crazy calling out depression depression read all about it--i can't walk past mirrors cause i hate the shades of gray in my faceand i can't stand up out of bedcause the feeling of falling right on my head over heels silk eyes wrapped with lead maybe calling was a bad idea got the neighbors in the back throwing fits lately tomorrow is like one bad dream stuck in the gutter the clean my teeth with grit and grime, don't notice the butterfly seems to fly on by and flaps airwaves spelling out your name with his wings wish i were a dragonfly i would follow you all night then die wish i was a firefly id burn out and it'd be understood how i felt wouldn't have to write these poems i'll close my eyes and hope to god--tomorrow i can hold my head and pray tomorrow i'll be a blackbird looming around cause you chose the wrong kind the wrong guy who has my eyes but not my mind, and he'll be your new dragonfly.

You Think I'm Such A Quiet Boy (but I should never have said this.)

Work for free
the sound of sleeves
crisp and neat
writing my name in corners
graphite; poems
order, dismal
messy, the way you like it
the way i want it
work for free,
Holiday and The Duke,
Me and You
know a thing or two,
about a thing or two
poems in circles around
vinyl--- adopted through
melodies, customs
finger picking folk styles,
he turns throws names
I've never heard,
she throws looks
I've only dreamt I've seen
dirty dresses
fingerprints--stains and smells
that leave my 9 year old mind
feeling much like a child,
but I tip my hat to you---
tumbleweed and lips chapped,
roam the range,
you don't know my name,
dress flapping,
"Fare Thee Well,"
Oh and even though I shant,
I fear this is---

J. Despers and The Beginning of The Worst Decision.

And I watch my feet watch
the cracks in the sidewalk
side steps and silent walks
to the back of the porch,
where the smoke of a cigarette
and something else scorch
all alone in a room
by myself on a porch
hear the drip drop
pelts of rain being felt
against the leaves
of the trees
sound as if she,
is inching towards me,
but I see a shadow
I see an elbow
I see legs with no hand on a knee
I see lips,
with only one set
I see a man, afraid to call himself hers
I see myself in the mirror
transparent; silent and awkward
and knowing my worth
I finish my cigarette,
I finish whatever else
will finish the job,
and sit by myself,
and watch, oh, just watch.

The pain in my head is from days of abuse, cigarettes and prescription medication-- convincing myself I wasn't worth the shit. The pain in my shoulder the keeps me up at night is caused from playing my guitar. I'm tired tonight, so I think I'll sleep. Tomorrow is another day off from work, maybe I'll get ice cream.

Back into the attic,
the shadow days
the ivy days,
one for me,
two for you,
one and one and one
plus one, for you,
five times in a parked car,
and six times I woke in a sweat
7 months ago, I felt worse than I do now.
Back in the attic,
The shadow days,

Sincerely,
J. Despers and The Sleeping Well.

I got a mouthful of thrush
and a back full of aches
they say its all the rave
when you're using too much
and a pocket lined with cuts
from the holes from grave days
and a bad thought turns splendid
when I'm using again
and I sure could use
falling in love
getting used, out of sync
out of touch
broken in,
broke in to touch
another persons stuff
to touch something that was
touch by someone
that didn't look a thing
like someone that looked like
anything like me

July 21st 2009

I tried to sleep around 1 am, I woke around 2 am drenched in sweat-- my leg was tingling and my foot felt like it was wrapped in barbed wire. My knee gets this feeling like there's a golf ball inside of it and I can't move it. I lay in bed and a flurry of dreams flutter over my forehead and it feels much like a fever and much like I'm dreaming-- I dream myself into days from now, and the children of the Kongo play their drums on my chest, and occasionally someone drops a stick and it ricochets and a loud cymbal crashes in between my ears. I jolt out of this sleep, and the clock either hasn't moved, or I've been back to sleep for around two minutes. My forehead tingles and my chest is imploded-- creating the sensation that I am suffocating. I walk down the stairs-- everything is in strange double vision, particularly this morning and I smoke a cigarette outside. Some electron inside of my head whispers, "Stroke" as I think about my numb leg and my numb forehead, and instantly my heart races to the point where I become light headed. I finish my cigarette and hold a glass in my hand and scale the steps to just outside my parents room. Why a glass? If I fall, my thoughts are that a glass would make noise. This is the refreshing night of sleep that I am privilidged to indulge myself in every night. I'm not trying to "one up" anyone-- I don't care about my shitty life more than I can about yours. This was just to add to the sleeping well.

Midstream

Grape vines and gray skies and yellow dafidils and blue tulips all hang arranged by chance around a hickory fence. The posts are dirty and chipped the way wood becomes when it rots in the sun un-finished after years have had their way with it. An oddly shaped house, much like the back of a house, only with windows that looked like great oval eyes staring down the street and staring down the children gave you the impression it was indeed the front.The door was coloured like ivory, off gray and too dull for anyone to knock on. Behind the door was a living room, no one lived in it, but sometimes conversations lingered long after company left; the wood smoked faintly as the embers were drifting to sleep. The couche cushions held memories too darling to ever let go of. Lint and loose change kept these secrets to themselves, and swore never to tell. Besides, how often do you probe for change under the cushion. Unless you're in a bind.Jay was a quiet silent dreamy type of kid, when the rage wasn't pouring from his finger tips onto a fretboard of an old acoustic guitar, they were spelling words out on an antique desk top; each firm stroke of any given key on the type-writer would spell out places or things he dreamt of seeing or doing. And once in a lonesome while, they would spell out things he dreamt of being."F" he tapped, beginning his first career choice. Probably just a fire-fighter. He had often dreamt about rushing into a building- abandoned and burning and by chance stumbling upon some unconscious victim. "Miss, can you hear me? Miss, listen to my voice. I'm going to get you out" he'd scream in between gasps for air under thick dark smoke. Rosey and ripe as oak smells just fine when its burning."Ar.." he seemingly began to ask. What was he asking? To whom was he asking. The woman in the building? Jay didn't know, and he tried scribbling out lines onto a piece of scrap paper. Are you alright? No, that didn't seem heroic at all now.Arielle, can you hear me? But how did he know her name, he thought in spells. He crumbled the paper and walked to the window, the big oval eyed window and he peered onto the streets. Not a drip of inspiration perspired from a blue sky and dusty cracked concrete streets, and inside he felt tarnished. Tarnished like his car just melting in the sun, or so it appeared to him.Black birds flew in the distance and he thought, ::i'm never doing anything with my time. I bide my time to sit and wonder and take life in stride and accept the way things are going, as the way they have to be. But i'm not sure they really have to be this way. Sometimes words mean the same thing like cause and 'cause::His thoughts began to race, as they did from time to time. About now was the time he would check his pulse, as he felt his heart beat in rhythms that would make a percussionist dizzy.::I feel a pain in my leg, a pain in my head. Maybe its a blood clot. I don't think it could be a blood clot. But do you even know what one is? Well, maybe i shouldn't smoke so much.::Anxiety began to tackle him until his pale yellow walls turned red, and everything had the same aura around it; screaming stay away, stay fa"r away" when i grow.After fumbling for his phone, he called the man whose last name was mystery, and first name was Real. Real mystery was just that, and Jay didn't ask questions. He didn't care, and besides, how much do you need to know about the person selling you drugs.'I need 5 Lorazepams" Jay sounded frantic over the phone. Static from satellites distorted shakiness for panting, and he began panting in real time."10 tokens," was the real replay.Jay reached in his pocket, to find 7 dollars. He looked under his bed and found a 2 dollar bill. He walked down the stairs and they creaked, "Nt" "eee" "nuff"He made it to the living room and realized he didn't have enough. He checked the kitchen counter, hoping someone had left spare change. He found 3 pennies, and took his chances somewhere else.He looked at the couch, and tried to think hard about what the couches meant to him. They looked familiar, but he couldn't remember sitting on them. He couldn't remember anything really, except that he needed another dollar.::Look under the couch, okay, i feel something.::He found a dollar and 37 cents. five quarters, a dime and two pennies. They clanked together as he dropped them in his coat's cigarette pocket. Jay didn't know it, but.:: I'm going to quit smoking.::And it was decided, he would quit smoking cigarettes. Things went like this quite often, sometimes his thoughts ran so wildly that it appeared they were on track to just eat his mind inside out. To have to subconscious attack the conscious is a grave battle. Sometimes lithium and other salts and medications could cure this. But sometimes, there's always room for sometimes.

June 14th 2009

I miss the easy nights falling asleep. My bed was like a novel I had no trouble getting into. The best kind, without plots or "poetic device." Everything was simple and didn't make my head spin. Now my pillow is a mystery or at least some drawn out suspense plot. My eyes, well, my blood cells in my eyes pop at great intervals throughout the day, usually when I smoke cigarettes. This creates the illusion that I am suffocating. From my lack of sleep comes my lack of better judgement, and well erratic un-tranquil parts of my mind kick up symptoms like an under-toe. This convinces me I am suffocating, and this is when I start to panic. I calm myself by playing my guitar, but even that is just an instrument to bring me down. I dream about the end of my life atleast 18 of my waking hours, in full, no matter what I am doing. I am stuck at this dilema---- If I fake being happy, and die, then it becomes a tragedy, and drawn out and sickening. I never once loved life. If I'm a miserable prick like my usual self, then all of this is meaningless. I don't want to die, it's just the closest thing to a future I can see.

June 17th 2009

I watched a couple have sex in a parked car once. It was hardly romantic. Except, that the car was shaking.

Paintings of Christmas

Tree tops tips of leaves cracks on my windshield cargo shorts and heavy duty hoods-- warehouse worn jackets covering faces; shadow dwelling drug dealers-- excuses, family functions, smile till you make it fake it till you love it masturbate and hold your breath oral sex from strangers parking lots and work parties, cigarettes and gratuity; alcohol and sedatives-- cool red and yellow flashes picture frames falling dull onto a tarnished wooden floor, creeking croaking shimmering glistening stars and there's no trees in my backseat-- blacked out and passed out, half past 6, half past a full stash of a pay checks worth of a needle and works and i'm not worth the twenty dollars I just paid for the 20 minutes I have left to cry to this hooker about how much nothing-ness the rest of my life is becoming--- war stories? more and more and more and more war stories--- "yeah once in new york; once in georgia," once in newark stories, once in my bedroom I overdosed on ecstasy, "once in my dreams I overdosed on Lexapro, I woke up happy for the rest of eternity!" what a funny thought, said the thought and I can tell this Xannax is already wearing off-- Seasons greetings, they know I'm totally discouraged, or uncourageous, a coward-- no, lapse in rhyming, yes yes, I'm terrible in these situations, these circumstances leave me growing roots against the wall, sprouting pedals with my stems in my pockets, "Jay Jay the wallflower" I've relapsed every day since I got out of rehab-- "How are you doing Jay, keeping your nose clean?" I shower everyday-- "Haha-- definitely a character, gotta watch those quiet ones" conversing about college-- shoot the breeze chew the shit and force it out like i haven't slept in days, I have, but it feels much like I haven't. "I'm majoring in english, gonna be a writer" mother vouches, "he's always writing those poems" the kids all run down the stairs and they laugh-- even my laughs are forced-- those chesty gritty jaw clenching smiles-- worse than the white smiles, the white smiles atleast make the back of your throat feel good--- the back of my throat, i have my keys in my pocket, "I'll be back," the bathroom is upstairs, the carpet is filthy these fucking kids splitting their skulls metaphysics hours and time and patience and consumption-- wonder what they got, a christmas story again, I'm tired of this routine. I have my keys-- snorting benzos and that concrete blocked cinder sinus seizure sorta stroke high gets me every time-- blood from my throat swirling around my xyphoid-- thoughts from my higher brain dying as sparks suffocate, and Christmas seems a little more satisfactory. From the waist down I can't feel my dick or my feet, and I can't piss or walk so I glide outside and sit on the step-- imagining i'm in a movie-- hands against the cold ground dusted by-- well, a dusting, haha, elbows pressed against the railing "i'm in a movie, the camera's in that tree over there" -- eyes rolling looks so flattering-- before i grew up i idolized this image-- the children would strive to be me-- puking in the bushes, smoking of a cigarette-- burn my eyes burn my brain eyedrops drip drop atleast its not sped up tonight-- relatively relaxed-- stumble inside, plop on the couch, "long day Jay Jay" yeah, we should watch a christmas story-- from the back of the room, I'll have quite a story to tell.. My vest has no more bars inside of the pockets-- but I got100 dollars more and atleast a holiday is gone, 100 dollars and a pair of socks, she'll masturbate me inside of the socks so I don't make a mess and I can pass out in my work parking lot-- she'll take the bus home, just throw out the socks when you're finished-- and all the sounds around drown me out, but I manage to sleep, and I manage to dream, and I manage to breathe, and I manage to be, me, and that's just all right with me.

shake this
half awake to make this
half awake to write this
amatory
little story,
paralyzed strands
of the thoughtless strain
that you left crippled
and tapping
and tripping
alone in your brain

shook this
wide eyed it took
three pills to wake today,
four to feel okay,
five to feel great,
a dozen to start the day,
a bakers dumb luck to call it quits,
but its okay, yeah its all the same
I don't have to be using
to feel the same way.

Dear Readers,

The Sleeping Well is a mix of poems and little rants and stories that I feel are worth me posting, and you reading. I don't write for money. I don't write for anything other than to write, and as of right now I don't care much for any of the d.i.y publishing-"try to make a buck" bullshit. I don't think anything I say is that important, I just like to say them. I have this ego, you see, that has been faltering and gasping for air in the appearance of attention. Tell me what YOU like, tell me what YOU don't like. This is my PUBLIC blogspot. This was made for YOU to interact, not as much for me. Ask me questions, give me writing topics, I don't care what you say as long as you say something, I think that the literary world is very hit or miss. I think anyone and everyone is a writer these days, but I think that seperation is necessary, so I will play writer, you can play respective audience.