Ghost.

 

The episodes are getting worse. I stay lower and lower.I explode fast. It worries me. I am limited in option but not in thought. My legs ache. I run further and further every day. The heat is immense like you think of God and Love as immense. I strap more weights on. I don’t stop.

Only because I can’t.

Obsession is thinking.Compulsion is doing.

I must be the bastard offspring of both.

I am a punch line to the unfairest and saddest joke.

I don’t really mind but one of my remaining friends was morally and quite touchingly offended for me just recently.

As we made our way through the crowd to the bar at a recent show that I ,as usual ,thought I could handle  and couldn’t. Bailed before the headliner. My stock routine these days. I noticed that he was taking everything in with a rather pained look on his face. I didn’t pry and he didn’t offer any explanation. I have known him for years so I knew that he would tell me what was bugging him when he was good and ready.

I went and sat at a table by myself. I pulled my notebook from my bag, bothered my red bull,wrote for a while and then packed it in.

 I said good night to him and his girlfriend and left.

The next day he called me.

“Whats going on? he asked sounding a touch sinus-y.

“With what? I yawned.

“You mate.What’s happening with you ?”

“Fuck all man” I reply 

” I run, I write, I attempt to mix with the unwashed masses cause my shrink seems to think it’s good for me,I get there,where ever there is,cop a load of said unwashed masses, decide she’s wrong and leave.” I laugh.

This is met with silence.Oh well.

I stretch slowly.My left hip cracks like a whip regardless.I wince. 

“Whats wrong boy-chick? You sound perturbed”

‘Me and the missus were watching you last night”

‘Perves!”

“I’m not joking Mish and I don’t know how to word this….”

Great.So now I am worried.

I get that hunted feeling all over me that my Doctor tells me to breathe through with a cutsie smile on his hang dog head. It makes me want to ventilate his wind pipe with the gold pen that he keeps by his prescription pad. “Breathe through that! “I would bark upon the competition of my swift unplanned  tracheotomy….

‘What?” I sigh ” What did you see that made you need to….”

He cuts me off surgeon swift. I think that he hears all the mixed up,fucked up emotion in my voice.Or maybe just the exhaustion.His words tumble out in a rush.

“Your fuckin’ beautiful mate. Didja know that?”

Ok?

Now I am worried. He goes on.

“Me and Alissa were watching you watch the room. Just you sittin’ there like a queen. ” He laughs and goes on ” …with your eternal can of fuckin’ red bull”

That makes me smile. He continues.

“And Lis grips my hand and says “She glows, doesn’t she? ” and mate, I’ve known you for how long?”

“Dunno? Mid 90’s. At Slayer?” I hazard a guess, wondering where the hell this is leading.

“Yeah” he says “About a million fuckin years and I realized two things when she said that.”

“And they were?”

“Well, one is that I have never seen you hurt before.Mortally wounded.”

“Not a flesh wound?” I smirk

“Nah,fucked up.”

He is serious. What ever he is driving at is serious.I shut up and listen.

“And I started thinking that that was why she said that you glow……”

Aw,fuck it.

“Pain powered phosphorescence? ” I say in my bestest Groucho Marx voice attempting to lighten him up.Please lighten up……Please? I don’t like where this is going….

‘Exactly!” he sighs sounding relived.

(Abort! Abort! abo….)

We trade books on war. Mostly the Vietnam conflict. Some World War two stuff. We think that we are back at the DMZ,stuck in some war we never fought. We talk in short hand.Military abbreviations. 

Geeks.

“So I am Foobar. I am a human tracer bullet.And?”

“And I never thought that it could happen to you,you know,really getting messed up”

“What made you think that I would be immune” I ask,utterly gobsmacked.Either he is ignoring me or just doesn’t hear me. 

“…..and that scared  the shit out of me and then Lis saying that shit about you “glowing” and then I wasn’t looking at you I was seeing you.”

“Where are you going with thi…”

And then he shouts at me. Makes my eye twitch.

“I don’tknow but you were like a ghost. No one comes near you anymore Mish. Do you notice that, do you??”

( I do,I pretend not to,my observant friend,but I do…….)

He sounds strained. Restrained hysteria.

( Please stop,please.)

“I felt like it was one of those stupid ghost stories that we used to tell as kids. How a person had died but they didn’t know that they had ,so they kept doing the same shit! ”

I nodded mutelyon the other end of the phone.

I could hear a sob rip at the seams that were only just holding his voice together, he swallowed it bitter and continued .

I listened ,dumbstruck.

“And then, more and more people stop seeing them and then they get the shit’s and that’s when bang! ,they finally realize that they are dead.”

“Dude,I…”

“But the problem is”  he says sounding worried,peturbed.”.. you don’t care that people don’t see you! Lis said how beautiful  you looked but you just looked sad to me and then I freaked out when you left. I though that maybe you were dead and happy about it and…. ”

“And what? I asked ,my voice small.

“And that you were still coming out just to fuck with me! That you were gone!!”

That cracked me up.

“It’s not fucking funny!” he yelled

“Aw c’mon ” I attempt to placate him.

” If I was dead,and I am not, the last place I would be hanging out is the fuckin’ Sando…”

Nothing.No laugh.Silence.And then……

“You never came back” he says.

“What?”

“You heard me, from LA. You never came back. You went there all full of hope and shit and then when you got home in August the you in you was M.I.A.”

I don’tknow what he said after that because I hung up the phone.

click………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

So,if I am a spirit ,if I don’t go out I wont be missed…..right?

I left it till the 11th hour to tell my brother that I didn’t want to go. I didn’t think that it would be that much of a big deal if I didn’t show up, but he read me the riot act. He turned up with my passes and whatnot.

I will never let him down.

I went.

Blast furnace hot and I wondered how many times I had stepped out at those gates over the years and walked through like it was my god given right. People waving, calling to me.

The fringe on my black leather bag keeping time with the soft sway of my walk, the figure 8 of my hips. The long fur tail that looks like it was taken from an obliging wolf that tends to offend vegans hangs from the slouch -worthy strap, brushing at my bare thighs.

More legs than a bucket of fried chicken.

And my ghosts,my memories ,were there too. How could they not be? 8 long years ago….The 1st time I ever saw him.The look that he gave me as my brother introduced us. The flame that I held in my heart for years. In a perfect world we would have been there together. Him by my side ,enjoying the day.

No.

My therapist tells me to remove myself from fantasy.

How do I explain that I can’t, that he roams my dreams and beats in my veins?

I cried all through Iggy and the Stooges.Wouldn’t you? It was life affirming. It was perfect.

I literally swooned.

The tears looked like sweat so I think that I got away with it.

42 degrees.I went to the bathroom and wrung my peasant blouse out over the sink. Unbelievable.

And now? What happens now.

The wind is vigorously fucking the daylights of of the heinous collection of wind-chimes that hang at depressingly ugly and regular intervals along my porch. The world is yours at this hour.The streets still radiating heat from the long dead day beckon and beguile me like narcissus to glass. I sound like a criminal when I run at night.

The sound of escape.Fleeing.Rude in the total silence.

Frightening.I love it.

I try to regulate my breathing but to no avail.Every foot fall a bomb. I imagine that it permeates dreams in the heavy silence and wakes civilians in a panic from their sleep. This doesn’t worry me.I don’t feel bad at all.For all I know they are the pricks who fuck with me in their waking hours so, to tell the truth,it puts a smile on my dial.

Fuckers.

Strange.

 

Ahhh.Thank you Elvis and assorted saints and gods for this slight reprieve.

( Going,going…..)

I have been picking the shards of stained glass from my dirty feet for hours while listening to big Arthur Crudup wail and moan from the speakers of my stereo. 

Smile.My crooked porno teeth. 

Dancing on iron clad convention will do it to you every motherfucking time.

Ole.

This tea tastes like hot toothpaste.Nicer than it sounds.Mint infused green tea. The two spider bites on my right arm are weeping a kind of sap.Clear and yellow. Pushing out the bad. Wish the rest of my corpse and psyche would do the same. My walls bow and sigh with the heat.My ceiling falling and being repaired daily. It’s all maintenance.

Life. That’s it.

Empty plastic punnets that once contained blueberries yawn sightlessly to the sky,my lips and fingers stained with it.

Blue.

New York Dolls.Stooges. Blues. Its all the blues dontcha know? I Rolled the tender fillet of punk in glitter with my expert hands,fry,fry,fry atop of a Marshall stack, garnish with oil of Tom Verlaine and serve on stage.

Yeah.  

I try not to go ass up on the colorful pools of loose paper and magazines that pool on my floor as I wind myself up with stress and memory.Whirling dervish in a bikini. My ribs a xylophone for malevolent spirits. Oh, but your played me like a master. I wailed for you.

My spit tastes tart. My sweat bitter as I slowly lick my muscled forearm.Thin skin.Thick resolve.I have bitten all my nails off again.My shed an Hiroshima of  loss.

Oh Lou Reed. Oh David Bowie……

A coma. That’s it. An all expense paid holiday without leaving the comfort of your own corpse.

One can dream.

I’m thinking about the Judas contingent in my life a little too much.

Me?  

Oh man ,I can wait.I excel at it.I will come outta nowhere and hand you your ass when you least expect it.

The Lee-fish sagely informs me from his hovel atop a red lit, career-drunk populated dive bar far from me in my hovel in the middle of nowhere, that such action and fatal folly will lead to me having to look over my shoulder forever.

City and country mouse. He tells me that Clutch lyrics point in my direction. It pains me to smile.

“Like that super cute Betty Grable pin up.” I enquire.

“No ” he sighs “Like you ripped off the mob.”

I can live with that.I mean, I  really think that I can.

Just call me the little red engine.

I’m just smoke anyway.Vapour.I have been carried away by the wind. Lithe and mean with thoughts that move too fast for my fingers to catch most of the time. The flesh is where its at.

” Ohhhh I hate you,I hate you” I croon deep and dusty voiced to my reflection by the light of oily candles .

Santeria.

Voodoo.

John the conquer root and I have the dust from your footprint baby,I have your mark burnt on my soul, our whole heathen history, we ,the same animal.

Remember?

Not even death will bring a halt to this.I work in sacred seven’s and ashes. Bitter red powder in small copper dishes. Given in fire to St Michael. We burn.

From my damage to yours, lost lover.

Need more ink, to move and sweat more,to get thinner. Everything else in my life is gone and uncontrollable and when I focus on it I lose days, so why not look at the control I have still got? I have to be strong to rope my heart in.My dreams that thought they could save the only one I have ever loved who, funnily enough,did not want to be saved.

Oh my sides.

Why did you sell yourself? All your earthly proof and possessions for fleeting relief. Was it,is it, worth it?

I would have archived you babe.I would have tended to your history. Topiary of memory.I’m diligent. I would have made it all right.

The look on my therapist’s face suggests that she is thinking its medication time.

I will open myself on white tile before you ever get the chance to incarcerate me.

Bet on it.

Fuck.

That’s a big no.No pills. No padding. Look! No hands.

Sandalwood and Aerosmith. Sun tightening the skin of your shoulders. We were born of heat, you and I. An ocean of blue eyes. We looked like siblings,so close were we. Shared our air. Hip to bruised hip.We traded features with malevolent glee in the dark as we melted into each other.

In shadow we were already wed. Took each other’s names.

I knew that it was you.I had always known. I had waited forever.

My desert bred wolf, my unholy equal.

Sacred.

My faith in magic had paid off. “Let me die for you” I transmitted to you across the planet, across our house, across our bed….

At such a cost,such a cost.

Hours meant nothing and we burned like fuck fueled roman candles and when we raised our voices together I knew what I was born for.

It was manna.It was gospel.

With you, I could see the shape of our sound.There is evidence. Hero’s both.The war fought and won. Lay here with me, its alright. 

I will stay awake. I will walk the point. You are safe now.

It was stained on our sheets and made our twin hearts beat. I am clear but there is a cataract over your purity .You won’t let it go, but you will let me die at your black converse clad feet. Look at Me.Still trying to make sence of it all, crying chai and Descendants lyrics.

They flow in unstoppable rivers down my lofty bone structure. I miss your mouth.You took yourself from me long before we ever parted.

You cunt.

The BDO is this Wednesday and I am wondering if I am going to make it.I want to see my brother tear it a new ring hole and of course of course my beloved revered Stooges. But the people.The seething Hieronymus Bosch like vista of people.

I will make myself go. Something to believe in.I laugh like Nico. Like I am amazing “Ho,ho,ho” I snicker. Teutonic perfection. Andy? Where are you?….

I am very much the heretic now. I believed in us and now I spend my time picking egg off my face. I will roll like its 1978. I will be the Gold Dust Woman in an ocean of bovine zombie fuckheads clad in naught but a patina of latent violence, polyester flags and zinc.

I will spend the day in heels and glamour and a huge hat. I will be side of stage. A beacon. A siren. A muse. My pedigree is platinum.Even when I hate myself  (In aeternum)  I know that my dead granite heart under the damage is true….unlike you.

I still hear your voice in my dreams. See you fucking people.You gotcha pick and mix of carnal delight ’cause Elvis and all the saints knew that my thoroughbred ass was never gonna be enough for you and your empty endless needs was it now hmm? 

Me? I would father fellate a broken beer bottle than ever be touched again. I had the best,I had what I had dreamt of.

 To do anything else would be a lie.

On that front I am iron.I am the eye of the storm.I am immovable.

You will bury yourself in it. The strange you said you needed breaking my heart over and over again. Your not very nice are you?

I flex on paper,I flex on my feet. I sweat and burn at the stake. I am incorruptible.

The liars should fear me. The weak. I am biding my time. I was thrown over at birth, you fucks. I am built for your betrayal.

I preen in it.In the filth of your fickle feelings.I can do hurt.

Its my colour.

Its every season for me.

It’s all you give.

My birthright.

Don’t.

 

Waste your time.

This is nothing to be sad about.This is not a pity party. It’s just fact. Look at it like this,in a world where you are fed so much shit,this has got to be somewhat,how shall I put it?

Refreshing. Yes, that’s exactly what it is. Refreshing.

I’m not sorry to be  blunt , but the objective here is not to waste any more of your time.Your time is precious.You know that. I know that. Use and delegate it wisely.

So let’s not, shall we?

Good.

I mean ,you can do whatever you want but I think that you should do something else,ok? Just my opinion..No.Its not you.Its so me.

( Lower case /will wipe that smile off your face/keep you in your place/down….)

I just can’t do it you know? I can’t sit around and engage .

I know that you are trying to help me, but from me to you? It’s not going to work and disappointing you on your “Save the broken” mission makes me feel even worse,if that is possible. ( It is.) You are a fucking diamond and I know that your heart is in the right place

But just don’t.

I mean I think that it’s great and all that you still care,I think that you are great.It’s a testament to your tenacity that you are still checking in, thank you,really,but I have got nothing.

Nada. Sweet FA.

It’s all gone and I can’t seem to get it back. It’s just the way it is.I don’t see it popping its head up anytime soon ,so best you get on with your shit. I’m done.You don’t want to hear it. Fuck. You think that I want to say it? Every time I say it it drives itself deeper into the core of me. 

Fail.

 I want to be able to tell you how I am over the hump (“Yey!), that the nightmares have stopped (“Woooo!”) , that my therapist thinks that I am a bonafide long legged miracle on the old recovery front (” F-oooorrr….  she’s a jolly good fellow!, for she’s a…..“) …I’m not, they haven’t and she sure as shit doesn’t.

 So that’s that.

Its lost .That last skerrick that I was holding onto for dear life. Gone. 

Can you do me a favor before this reaches its conclusion? The conclusion being that you give up with  no ill will between us. We shake hands.We part. Remember me when I was cool ok? Well, not cool . I never was. But better than this. You know,not completely insane.When I was good maybe? Good will do nicely.Can you do that for me? 

It will be my last ask.

Lock that in and if you ever think of me that’s the picture that will come up. That’s nice isn’t it?. Wipe what I am now. Because that’s what I am trying to do….

I can’t trust you.Calm down.Its not a slur on you personally.I can’t trust anyone. I don’t believe in anything anymore.I don’t want you near me. Having anyone near me makes me weak. Makes me fall apart.And weak?  Weak  is not a good frame of reference for me right now,not a secure situation, take my word for it. There are better things for you to do. I offer no returns. I’m not a wise investment.

Nothing has changed on my end,not for months now and I feel bad when you want to hang out,see me,chat,whatever because I have got nothing new to tell you. No great advances. If anything I am more diminished in the triumph sector as every day passes. And it’s not your fault or problem.It’s all me from here on in.The problem being is me hearing that you care makes me being a fuck up just hurt and hammer me even harder.

Because you are so nice to even give a damn.

Am I making any sense at all?

I don’t have many in my life. So I guess that I care about you. Whatever the fuck that is worth right now. Let me be blunt. It’s just words at this point. It’s worth nothing.I’m worth even less. Fact. But that is not to say that I didn’t once feel.. I did ,with my whole stupid heart and this is where it got me, so…..Look, if I could  give you anything  I would, if I had anything to give, being more the point,but its empty rhetoric,its a fairytale…So me failing all the time has gotta be getting boring right? Right! So go! I don’t want witnesses.

Please go.

I am wrapped so fucking tight right now its all I can do to get one good hour out of twenty four.

So if you think that you wanna see how I am doing?

Don’t.

I’m fucking begging you.

Just don’t.

You are a cool person.I can tell. So go and be happy with the other cool people who are not stockpiling weapons or are not socially retarded. I’m not trying to be a cunt or belittle you.

Really.

Honest injun.

You are a better person than me. Draw solace in that. You are.

I can’t handle kindness anymore.

I’m not kidding.I get nice? From you? From anyone? Someone,some shop assistant who is paid to do so, in a fucking store tells me to “Have a nice day now!” and I don’t know if I want to destroy them,cry or throw myself under oncoming traffic.It slays me . And I can’t take it. I’m finding it harder and harder to get up.

So yeah, nice and kind and all of their relatives are out.

Capiche?

Its 4 in the am. I just trained for the 3rd time in 24 hours. My body thinks that its has the patent on cortisol production at this point in the proceedings.

Brute physicality is the only place that the shit sloughs off  my battered self ,the only place I find peace,even for an hour or two. The only control I have is over my corpse,my mind is trying to wipe itself out, so I push myself to break point.Its a whiteout. Static. Where the memories that destroy me hour after hour fall away.

That is where I have to be and you are not welcome.That’s harsh.Let’s say not invited.That is a touch easier on the eye and feelings.Look,you wouldn’t like it anyway.

See,you don’t need that.Some unhinged idiot who is pathologically dependant on her bench-press.

Great. Just magic.

You just go and be your fantastic self. No,I am not being sarcastic. No,I am not taking the piss. I mean it .

Go on now, git.  

I have to be where I am. You don’t have any reason to be. Don’t martyr yourself on it. I’m not a worthy cause. I would have no problem informing you if I was, believe me.I would be soliciting for donations. Just know that I appreciated you and your extending yourself.

I keep putting this badly don’t I?

Please leave me the fuck alone.

Thank you for the messages that I never reply to and inviting me out to shows that I don’t turn up to and stuff. You are so kind.You are a good person,no doubt. You and I both know that I am not gonna leave my shed right? I will be up all night lifting weights or writing or just lying wide eyed in the dark.That’s what I do. And that’s ok.

I talk to myself.

I don’t know why you bother.You are kind and sweet to do so, it touches me and therein lies the problem. I don’t want to be touched .Mentally,emotionally or physically. Please fucking stop. What I am trying to say, is that , I really wish that you wouldn’t. I’m not gonna lie. You are going to  ask me how I am doing and trust me, no one needs to know.

I’m shit.

It’s,I’m, not a solid bet.Maybe once but not now.Its both naive and generous of you but its not going bring any returns.

I am the human black Friday.Pull your stocks now.

This is a recording.The number you have reached is not in service. w-3-88-4. This is a recording .The number you have…….

Promise.

 

I mean,I work hard. I train everyday. I pride myself on this.I don’t like the condition of my condition.Never have and at my advanced age I can pretty much safely say that I know that I never will. Its taken me a lifetime to get even say,3 good days out of 7 ,where I can even bare the sight of myself ,let alone like….

Tonight is one of the 3. Which is nice. I look hot,I feel good and walking to the station I have to contend with a bunch of cunt Lebs who make it their daily mission to give me a raft of shit. I usually sail on by. Every goddamn  day….

 “Usually” being the operative word here.

Now tell me,have you ever had one of those days when being the “Better man” doesn’t seem quite so appealing?

Intimidate. That is the part I am going to focus on.I walk past them a-way’s, them cat calling and laughing at me.Some are calling me a fox,the others inquiring to my cock size.

I stop.

I put a little extra swing into my hip as I turn to face them ,smiling. I think my hours of running are holding me in good stead. I am  rock steady. They are shocked. Its a good start I do believe.It sure as shit shuts them up as I walk over and stand about 3 feet in front of them.

I get comfortable as I settle back into my right hip and look at them all.Shaved apes. The ghost of teenage acne still visible on the planes of their  virulently unattractive faces.I am met with silence .I smile.A fox smile,Tight and full as the harvest moon.A look that will give deliverance.That will provide the bounty of carnage.If they are not worried, they should be.

I’ve always fancied myself as a giver.

A few relax,a few tighten. Eight of them. One of Me.

The big one is in front.The advance. The mascot.This turn of events is paining him.Poor thing.I can see him trying so hard to think of something to say.A crack to lay at the feet of the alphas that he serves. To be retrieved and re-spoken when they relate this showdown back and forth after the dust clears.Post battle.A violent jewel to place  in the crown of shit that sits atop of the crooked head of the golem that  constitutes their limited lives.

Bag is always on the left shoulder.Heavy with Promise. Promise wants out and who am I to argue? I draw her out  just as he steps forward.I throw my hair and laugh as I see the look on his face.The pack pulls back.My hand faster than a thief. Their’s are up and mine is steady as granite.

Guess they have never met a pearl gripped .45 before.

“Whoa,WOAH!!!!” moan the pack swaying and salaaming wildly. I spit my strawberry flavoured gum out and casually push my sunglasses back  on my head. I want,nay,I need them to see the emptiness in my blue eyes.I am spite-less.I am cute as a bugs ear.

I speak softly so they will have to focus and concentrate on every diamond that spills from my clever carnal lips.I address them clearly.

“I’m sorry,did you have something you wanted to say to me?”

“You fuckin’ bitch….” he starts. Their dog.

I shoot the ground a foot in front of him and raise Promise back up to his chest. The tar explodes with a dull pop.

“Excuse me? ” I giggle.” I missed that,you were saying?….”

The piss stain on his shorts is in the shape of Africa. His peanut gallery silent  is as the grave.

“Get on your knees and put your hands on your head.” I intone bored as if stifling a yawn. He is frozen.

“Do it.Do it or I will be back to blow up the house I saw you in front of before.Is that your house? Doesn’t matter…..”

He drops.Heavy as an anvil.

“Good dog!.”

I turn my eyes up to his pack for a split second.

“Now,do ANY of you have anything you want to say to me?”

The floodgates open. “We didn’t!…” “Just foolin!”  Blah,blah,blah. I yawn luxuriantly. Thought as much.

“How would you feel ” I say, locking each one of them by the eyes in turn “If some one spoke to you sister or for that matter your mother,for no reason ,like you did to me? ”

And wouldn’t you just know it? None of them say a fucking word! Surprise,suprise! I got me a clam chorus.How very quaint.

Back to monkey boy.He,I have decided,is the star of the show.

“No matter what you do” I begin ,softly,evenly,as I step towards his kneeling form dipping Promise down to  his crotch. Instinctively his hands flutter atop his head wanting to cover his mosquito cock.

“Uh-oh,Simon says hands stay on head bitch.”

He’s starting to shake now. I love my life, Elvis, fluffy bunnies……..

“No matter what you do ” I repeat “No matter what you minor trifles you achieve,you, my piss stained friend, you will always be shit. Comprende? ” I smile. He smiles back weakly.I tell him to repeat back what I have just told him. He stutters like a b-b-backfiring car. I cruelly impersonate him.He finishes and shuts his eyes.

“Hell!” I whoop “Why dontcha all SING it to me!”

Discordantly and flatly they do. No discernible tune.Why, its almost avant garde! Me ,the sun setting outside a gas station in the suburbs,The weed choked blacktop, my itchy trigger finger,my swaying chorus of 8 wanna-be gangsters who still live at home with their parents. Its beautiful ,just beautiful.

I start conducting them with Promise , my one eyed baton.I’m laughing. Its positively joyous I tell you,I’m having me a great old time.They are sneaking  sneak looks at each other. Mustering their pack power by way of secret communication. I let them have it.I clap my hand to my thigh like a redneck retard. I coo and flutter my lashes.

This is what is known as lulling the enemy into a False sense of security. Thank you Sun Tzu.

They sing it again and again,getting louder,cocky.I see them tighten,align,send signals.Getting ready to take me out.

“We are shit,we are shit” they drone, sweeter to my ear than the angels on high.

Take me out then.

Think that they have a chance.That they can.

Hee,hee,hee.

I wipe the smile from my mouth and  pump two shots in succession into his bovine head.It explodes magnificently, a pinata king hit by Mike Tyson. He falls on,what was once, his face. I hear a thin girlish scream that,I must admit, fair warms this cold heart of mine.

“Shit.” I tell them. “That is all you are and ever will be.” I point the gun at them in slow succession, squinting like a kid playing cowboy, “Pow,pow,pow” I mutter as I pretend to fire into their terrified faces one by one. The thick pool of blood is advancing  from monkey boys stump, taking cigarette butts and bull-ants out in its crimson tide.

“Don’t forget now” I say, as I stop at the final rat-faced fuck . He meets my eyes. His face wet with tears. I wink and blow him a kiss.He sobs and looks at the expensive trainers on his feet soaking up his dead friend.

“I will find you if you attempt to find me ” I sweetly sigh as I flick Promises safety on and tuck her into the waistband of my skin tight daisy dukes.Her chrome barrel pokes out the bottom.Freud would have a field day with me.Like I care.

I turn and leave without a worry in the world.

I’m gonna go get me some sushi.

Lost.

 

Remember me,I know that one day you will leave,/but I hope/ there’ll always be something there to remind you/  That I still love you/ I will always love you.

–“Ever and Always”, Snowbirds,1990.

Nothing I do ever seems to work,its only seems to make matters worse.

-The Rolling Stones.

How can I go forward when I don’t know which way I am facing?

-John Lennon.

(Seeing that I cant get any lower,could you please smile and talk a little slower…..)

I’m having a mighty hard time with the evergreen “Everything happens for a reason” school of thought right now.

You know that you are fucked up when the room seems just that little bit emptier when you arrive and people look at you and curl their noses like they can smell burning hair.

I try and cut through it all like a proud ship. My prow slicing though the churning waves of betrayal. Iceberg ahead SS Michele. No Carpathia to heed your S.O.S, to  save you. Blame the fog or foul play but out there alone in the middle of nowhere it matters not.You,little sister, are snapping in two tonite and sinking.

I feel  this way for a what? A lesson?

I have a problem with it. I mean,I really do.Sitting at my rebel flag covered desk of a million miles and Hunter S Thompson wank fantasies.Covering my internal Tet offencive with nothing but a chewed bridge pencil and a well thumbed thesaurus. Gimme strength or gimme a drip full of Valium in a dark room. There is no rug to get pulled out from underneath me.Don’t be a smart ass.That went to the hock shop months ago. Its a fucking vortex. I’m so used to falling that I now casually arabesque and snooze in the slip stream.

Ten fingers,ten toes. Not dying no matter how many black candles are being lit on the California coast line to sway that fact. My marrow is frozen and the deadline gets closer by the minute.

I cant have the ringer turned up on my phone.It panics me.I will call ya back.I will drop the dime so don’t sweat it.

This Hello kitty heart has finally been hammered flat.Its all gone.I would love to be writing of self redemption and rising.Nope.The sun rises, bread,water levels,Jesus at Easter……..

So, the deal is not to get high on praise or low on the critiques.( ” Wow! You’ve lost weight! Is it cancer?”) You know that you are in trouble when your therapist looks as drained and defeated as you feel. I feel like I should bake her a cake or something.Say sorry.( “Fuck,fuck,fuck!” ) And there was me thinking that there was a tiny light. a light at the end of the tunnel. Turns out that there is and its coming right at me.A train that, alas, I cannot derail.

The tweakers down the road have added yet another shitty off road bike to their noisy stable off cc derived madness. I have been listening to what sounds like an amphetamine fueled lawn mower do laps around my block for the last 9 hours. I have been playing guitar and excelling in my rather stunning chosen vocation  of avoiding life and all of the vulgar pursuits and evil folly it contains.

I realised today that I will never kiss again. I will never be held. Never fuck nor fuck in return. After the memories of when I did all of the above with my lost forever,the love of my life, lifted, I untangled myself from the tan fetal position that I had assumed on my Persian rug, I went and did punishing sets of shoulder presses ,curls,and the ilk.

I think about it then I don’t. I miss it and then I don’t. But when I do? You don’t want to know

I thought that we would be married by now.Me writing the book that I had planned on about my man,his amazing life. Playing together, making a mess. I read that amputees sometimes still feel the removed limb. I still feel the removed  future.

I think that I am done with speaking.I cant edit myself and nobody wants the truth. I just sit here.

( To my left a small picture of my adored Lester Bangs,a Hello kitty tarot deck in japanese that was sent to me when I was suicidal,a plaster cast of my broken teeth,a jar of toothpicks I brought in Nashville,Elvis vinyl titled “Pure Gold”, the lid of a blue and white Chinese a ginger jar, a massive Oxford dictionary given to me by a mistake in tight jeans that I made about a million years ago who despaired at my Dyslexia.The opening page inscribed “M, no more excuses,Love J”. At the end of our charged affair I dreamt of dropping it on his head as he sat at the bottom of the stairs running up my phone bill…..)

We give ourselves to strange religion.Found objects that carry the lucid moment of their discovery.Memory portals.My desk,my altar looks like the counter of a truck stop that collided with a 6 year old on acid.

One does not need to kneel to pray.

to prey.

Locked in here with stuff. Piles of stuff. I get lost in it for hours,days.I pick things up and am transported. The things that mattered the most and cut the deepest are still locked in the gold chest at the foot of my bed.They are the talisman’s that bring me to my knees.They are the history that will take my life.

 The shape of his words on fragile Denny’s napkins. The joyous smut that we would write and slyly slide  back and forth across the battle scared Formica while anilalating 2am breakfasts to get the energy to go home and defile each other over and over again. His scent is trapped within this veritable coffin that resides at my sleeping feet. Pictures,the ticket stubs from the movie we saw  on our first date ,a sliver of his broken tooth,tour itineraries,”Do not disturb” signs in every language you can imagine and a few that you cant. I kept it all.

While he had me, he somehow managed to throw me away.

I cant look. I don’t look. It wants me to. I  am only just holding on as it is. Every fucking rafter wants me as a wind-chime,sharp things beg to enter the envelope of my corpse. I wanted to give him perfection. I remembered how it felt writing songs for him years before we got together hoping against hope that one day he would hear them and just know. Know that I had stored all the love that I inexplicably knew he needed so badly  and that I was waiting for him to notice me.To stop looking at me and see me.

The God’s didn’t want me that happy. I failed.

Its the year of the low-line.The year of the traitor. Year of the shadow.

Bones are re -emerging.Pain calls me by name,so I go again and again.Push more weight,run more miles. Bones like buds bloom from  underneath the winter of my flesh.Thinner,faster. Able to escape.Tuned fine and silently thrumming. No one is ever gonna hurt me like that again.I am gonna bleed jailhouse blue ink.I dream in 8 ohm. I desire economy.If I can’t discipline my self to write, its not worth saying.To speak is to dissipate.Shut the fuck up.

I dream………

The world consists of transatlantic flights,sky,blood and orgasms.Iggy is the president of the world (“All rise!”) and silver leather pants are mandatory.Bones De rigour. On the surface of said planet The Ramones still roam and you love yourself enough to stop hurting yourself and back on Beechwood, I lick you clean mama cat-style,while,at last,you sleep.

You look deep into my eyes when we fuck and I can see past the sum of all my parts. Lemmy’s Birthday is a national holiday.In keeping with tradition,we stick candy warts on our cheeks and bob for Marlboro’s in deep wooden tubs filled with bourbon. Thin is in a la Bowie back in the bitter glitter day.Being overweight incurs a fine of $230 dollars to be paid with in 30 working days.No personal cheques.

I wake up,pearls of sweat strung across my shaking sternum.The world spins punch drunk in the dark.I am lost until I get a foot on the floor.My dreams tend to be all you,all the time.Haunted.I think that I can taste you on my 3am air between the cracks of my failing teeth.I don’t sleep again for hours.Cry till I dehydrate.

So now I know. I was only ever gonna do it once.For real.For keeps. It ended up being almost like an experiment. I was tooling with my fatally flawed chemistry but I had never believed in anything nor wanted something so bad before. It blew up in my face. But in a way,a small way granted,its ok. Because now I really know.It blew off my blinkers and my blinders.

And you know what?  It doesn’t help one fucking single solitary bit.

I am stock piling fresh water and heavy artillery.I’m gonna blow myself up or take everyone with me. Hey,have you got a coin? Call it,heads or tails? Best outta 3 ?…………………………

Soundtrack.

 Someday you will ache like I ache.

-C.Love.

It reminded her of the village. Christopher street maybe? Round those parts. A basement,The owners boldly smoking cigarette’s while milling amongst the stock racks, almost pornographically shocking to behold in these boring as fuck times. Perpetual adolescents nursing tawny bottles of beer,overgrown sweet open faced manchildren selling vinyl dreams and CD remasters.

The sidwalks shimmering with heat.

New York seems like a  a million years ago to her now.Thin dry pizza,tight streets and the small-town hip from running from  the sticks,the boondocks, the buttfuck nowhere’s that couldn’t contain them, recreating themselves Warhol approved and blessed on Scorsese’s mean streets.A digression. Its Sydney Australia and her melancholy backwards reaching memory laden imagination will kill her one day.

( Stabbed 3 times swiftly in the ribs.)

She has not sung in public in months,she barely sings in private.Who are we kidding? She’s socially autistic.Sits out in that shed with her spectres and spirits.

Her alternate universe where he loved her still,where she was more to him than a fuck-hole furnished in fishnet that he would no longer kiss,no longer look at with affection,where they never ended and she got to walk down the aisle to Black Sabbath,married at the pink palace high above Eagle rock surrounded by all their friends and die in his embrace round about 50 odd years later. Just like she drept,they dreamt,it would be.

Miss Haversham. She’s lost in the ether.

 No one remembers what or who she ever or even was…..

She was a footnote in someone else’s circus and forgot that she was worth much of anything at all. But he,one of her all time hero’s,brother and best friend,threw her a rope.An opening spot on his show at a subterranean record emporium on a sweaty summer Saturday afternoon.

She agreed before he had even finished asking her. The rope dangling before her she grabbed on tight. Briefly pondering hanging herself with it she decided instead to pull herself out and see what was out there.To see if she could.

She began to write.

Songs.Songs full of tripwires and razors.Horrible rotten diseased songs.Songs to sicken and and quicken the reburial of her heart.Of her shattered and shat upon dreams. Like Blake, songs of bitter experience. He warned her that one day,her sneered,you too will just be another love song …..

She still wakes up crying.

She wrote.On everything. On the wall above her bed half asleep,in her endless journal.A verse threw her from the shower,dripping on the floor of the kitchen she captured it on the back of a curling receipt with a stuttering pen and went back to the rain room.Her last remaining guitar a surfboard strung with dental floss.Her voice rusty with sadness and lack of use.No smile or inviting presumption within it.

They came,these words.They lined up for miles.All the songs that she didn’t want.The hurt ones.The car crash sonatas. But she,the ever gracious host sighed and let them in….

Playing an hour or so a day.Wrists creaking like hammer horror sound effects.Sucking bitterly on her broken teeth she kept going.Unable to find her tuning or her footing.Face awash in tears.

She didn’t even tell nor advertise that she was pitting herself against herself yet again,throwing her sad remains to the sonic lions.My how things have changed! She  was afraid. So she just did it. No one even knew that she could actually sing so when she did?….who knows?  Maybe if she had of opened her eyes she may have seen them smiling.Or not.

Shit in one hand and wish in the other.Which one do you think is going to fill up 1st?

Exactly.

And the  show.Ah,the Stevie Nicks of suburbia in a long black tent of a dress that may as well have been a burka and long tan boots.Sweating and shaking like a shitting dog,propped,barely,on the edge of a stool criss -crossed with peeling duct tape ,leaking foam ,bound badly like a kidnap victim. (” Mmmmmmm!!!!!MMMMM!!!!!!” )

The opening band went to loud and to long for which she was most grateful as it cut her set time down to nothing.A sweet sonic bugger all really. That’s when she knew she would fail but could get through it.

Eye contact was made with no one.She optioned to keep those big old blue orbs firmly shut.To hold the darkness and to stop the tears. How embarrassing.

She was not even there,not really…

She was bogged down in memory,of then,of what they once shared.She loved playing with him so much,all their punk rock Johnny and June fantasies sans auto harp and hand guns sprung to life fully formed like an acoustic Athena  from Zeuses head.Together.All over the world.In the end it became the only place where he would look at her with any kind of awe at all so she horded those few songs nightly like gold. Treasure..

Now she has to do it alone.

And she did.

And she may very well just fucking do it again.

Ugly.

Ugly-

adj-lier-liest.

1. of unpleasant or unsightly appearance. 2.repulsive ,objection,or displeasing in any way. 3.ominous or menacing; an ugly situation. 4. bad tempered,angry or sullen; an ugly mood.

Means that no one can see you.They are not programed to.

“Gimme beauty or gimme death mama! I want flawless! ” she begged.

You WISH dip-shit. Madden,its never gonna happen. It never was. You were fooling yourself. Trash gets taken out. Ponder upon that……

(“BUT I HAD IT!!!!!”)

Yeah. So?. Its gone.  If it was ever real in the 1st place.

You ain’t gonna get it,you ain’t gonna get sweet fuck all. But you saw it didntchoo? 

( ” I Did,thine eyes saw me in return,the sweetest gift”)

You had it.

( “WE had it”) 

Were anointed with it at every throbbing pulse point.

( “I wanted you to tear the heart from my chest and it it raw”)

His fingers calloused by years of strings and reverent. Lips followed fingertips and on that beat up bed you were a goddess for the 1st and last time. He looked at you like you were Christmas and the new year rolled into one. You would have died for him.Stabbed yourself beneath the statue of Johnny Ramone to prove it….Hollywood Forever.Now never…..

Gone.

(“Why didn’t you wanna kiss me no more? Huh? Huh?)

The lack is an absolute ! The space it left behind fatal. Eternal. Hungry?

(“Mmmmm!” )

The lack is cancer wrapped in a fillet of finely sliced HIV on a tossed bed of mixed jaundice,septicemia and hepatitis. Bon appetite stupid. Would you like a side of lymphoma with that? 

A poisoned feast.

( “For desert this evening we have melanoma flambe over leprosy crepes!” Highly recommended!”)

( Dig in Michele….”)

Death all over. But YOUR not gonna get THAT lucky pirate child.

No.No.No.Oh HELL no.

There is no easy out for you honey. You have to carry round the hole.Just like Medea. Wind will blow through it and whistle Dixie ( “Look away,look away….”) Cobwebs shall be strung it its melancholy curve and you have to keep going.Unnumbed and unaltered by the easy amnesty of the grape or the lanky,sinuous arms of morphia or her evil rat faced brother meth…..

No easy out for you sweetpea magee.

Unfiltered, you have to re-live it every day. It will find you in your sleep. It will hunt your shattered self esteem licking and sucking at its canine teeth. Hackles raised and shaking with tension.

You know it wont stop till it hits the bone and then,even then…..

I remember all times that I was called me ugly when I believed that I was loved . My defences were down. What the hell dirt like me was doing thinking that I was worthy of anything at all still baffles me .Its imprinted on me that there was no chance. I will never work that one out…..My wires are still tangled to this day.

But I am transparent now. People look right through me. The number of people I know diminishes day to day. If you resist eventually people stop trying. You know that they don’t really want to see how you are. They just want to witness the car crash and take tidbits back to the other jackals that you once thought were your friends.

Stop trying.

They stop extending because you bore them.You bore yourself. You are just another number now. Another member of  ghost parade ,you stupid fucking girl.The next time you bore some one it will be with a Phillips head screwdriver between the 3rd and 4th vertebrae.

Hunted.

Its embarrassing isn’t it? To try and go out in public only to have to run away. People ask how you are doing and you dare not speak the truth. Read you thesaurus again. Talk to yourself. Why bother doing anything but? There is no closure, no answers and they assure you  (“They!” she hisses like a snake…)  that this is as close to closure as you will get. This open wound running around your life un suctured. No stitches. Open,unhealed, collecting maggots like lonely  kids collect stamps and action figures that they never take out of the boxes.

Send letters to non existent addresses. Cackle as you insert blank envelopes into the red maw of the post box.Watch friends jump ship and lie to you because you are not as well lit,per say, as other options that you brought into their  lives in the first place.

Read history re-written in the viral gutter press and all the while attempt to retain dignity. Go on ugly,do it. That will keep you warm at night. That will cure all that ails you. That will serve and protect like some internal police force.And the check is in the mail.Duh.

That will kick you in the fucking face over and over with steel capped boots while you are down more like it.Asshole.

I am unread so I write to flex. I write because I am a writer and I stopped bent backed though fear like I stopped my whole life. No one wants to be defending themself  or on the outside like I am now so like good little dogs they will take their licks.

What has it won me.? My life? Big fucking deal. What is that worth now? Nothing at all. Absolutely nothing.  They all lied to my Modigliani face.My blue period Dora Marr bone structure.

And what is it worth?

The city of angles has its dream laden gates closed to me.All my friends there are now disconnected numbers when it comes to me.I try not to think about what I have lost but it weighs so heavily upon me.

Ugly.

Hardtail,dyke,bitch,whore,slut,cunt. My poison bouquet.

I lay it daily on the grave of  hope.I feel the ghost breath in my ear as I sleep whispering such endearments into my over polluted dreams. I will never be touched again.I Said I had one shot and I took it. It failed. I am done.

People under estimated my strength of will all the live long day.

So now I watch the bones shift according to the daily barometer of misery under the flesh of my face. I don’t know myself.I look like no one I have ever seen.

Goodbye,goodbye. You stupid fucking dog.You dumb bitch…remember?

I sleep with a knife.

If I had the courage I would end. But I don’t.

Animal.

2011.

Well.

Its late.You are alone, as always and far too awake .Your last remaining roommate is asleep to garner the energy it takes to live in the daylight as she does.The whole world is asleep.You move through the clean empty house picking up books and make your way out into the yard into your shack.

You have an economy of movement now.A precision borne of pain and resilience.

Get changed ,  pull on your tee-shirt and shorts.Take your long hair and wind it into a top knot. The stars look down on you. God denies you.The moon is bored.The darkness bares silent witness to your endless  punishing self hatred. You are so fucking useless.

You find your hands flutter, moth like ,alighting on all the  most despised parts of your blighted anatomy. The hips,stomach,breasts. Your mind flashes to all the fat women that you see with their immaculate manicures and hairstyles, their perfect shoes and handbags. As if that is going to avert your eyes from the evidence of their gluttony,their laziness.

They make you sick and you ,you body dysmorphic fuckhead,you make yourself sicker than all of them put together….

You silently make your way over to the bench-press.All the weights ready and where you want them. Your aim is to be as slow and silent as possible .Its 2 in the morning. The aim is to make your corpse bark with pain.You take nurofen ahead of time knowing what you are about to inflict apon yourself. 2kgs of extra weigh are strapped to each wrist,secured with thick white medical tape.

Begin.

Breathe,focus on the spiders that have made their transient homes between the gaudy multi hued Xmas baubles that you hung from the rafters years ago,back before you went color blind and still believed in beauty. Stay steady loser. Hold fast.Every rep is the last thing you will ever do. Your mind drifts,imagining a leanness so severe that you can halt your menstrual cycle.You dwell there.You smile….it doesn’t last.

Control. You have given up counting reps.You stop when you break. This takes around an hour.Drenched with sweat. you can hardly lift your fat ass off the bench.You stagger into the yard and stretch.

Still not good enough.

Have a shower.Scrub the salt out of your weary battle scared dermis.Do this in the dark.

Now go to bed.

When you wake up two hours later with your legs spasming with muscle cramps don’t be a baby.You don’t have to turn on the light.You know where they are.Pop the blister pack and dry swallow two voltaren rapid 12.5 and try and sleep.

Asshole.

The alarm goes off at 2:00. Crack and slam the disgusting room temperature Red Bull that you put by your bedside the night before.. Sit up and pull on your socks. Sports bra follows ,two skin tight running tops to crush your deflating despised breasts into your ribcage,You look down,ribs stand out against thin skin proudly,your sternum stretches for days. Still not good enough.Now,grey tee shirt,soccer shorts,shoes. Braid hair pull it through the back of sweat buckled baseball cap.I- pod on. Gum in rotten mouth,sunglasses..Out the door by 2:30.Not even awake yet.

By the time you hit the oval it all comes back.Every slight,every hurt.This is the antithesis of the therapy sessions that you drag you ghost self through week after week but right now? Who cares. You are an abortion. You cant even define what is real most of the time.

You trust no one.This is the only time,  the ONLY time you feel in control of everything that you are,whatever the fuck this wreck is that you have become,its the control that you have lost. And right now?, right now its yours and its fast .You  have been lacking for so long you couldn’t give a shit.Fuck what the doctors say.You need this. Here is the fleeting high you dip-shit, so make it last.Those endorphins that avoid you like the plague? here they are,let them in.Shoulders erect,core engaged, now you are,abet all too briefly, an animal to contend with.

Animal.

You can smell the grass being crushed under your fast feet,you time the beat of your heart to the air you exhale,drums.Your eyes narrow,shoulder blades pull together ,lock like the stumps of severed wings. The wings you attributed to another.The wings that you forgot were once yours as well.You gain speed.

The Lebs with their stupid fucking hair cuts loitering in the car park grow silent and lower their gaze with every storming pass you make by them.You know the veins are up in your arms,neck.You are so magnificently ugly right now its all you can do not to throw your head back and howl.

Animal.

Let it all flood your frontal lobe. Every friend that have thrown you over.Your dead and beaten heart. The love that swore it would make you a bride and lied .All The shit that you now spend your life confining so it cant hurt you. Let it rip. They say that this will hinder your recovering from PTSD. That you are allowing your flashbacks.That this is harmful and wrong.Detrimental. Breathing is fucking detrimental to you right now. Big fucking deal,being,exactly what you my lard arsed dear,are not.

You spit and squint.

Go around again.

Feel your fat shift and settle with every foot fall.Every breath.You are not good enough.Go around again. Do it you useless cunt. You better be able to wring your tee shirt out ant the end of this.If you stop you fail.

Go around again.

Do it again.Again.Again.Again.Again.

Now cut across the car park and sprint the hill.Push till those little back dots break away in your peripheral vision and retreat when you try and focus on them.Past the school now.Go faster.Hips aching like food poisoning. Now take yourself home.

Go through house,grab soda water.Neck it.Pull your wrist and ankle weights from the line.Strap them on.8 extra kgs.

Now go and kick and lunge.Thousands of leg lifts.Sit ups.

Get back on the bench.Shoulders,lats,chest,biceps,forearms.

Stop.

You eat 2 tins of tuna from the can.You drink more water.Your not sure if your crying as you shovel the fish into your  dry panting mouth or if its just the sweat. You don’t give a fuck.

No one does.

Shower.

The alarm goes off at 2:00……Repeat.

Burn.

Flexing into nothing.

I allowed myself to thing in terms of “Always”. That there was like -minded amnesty on my horizon,in my future. The future that I saw with you and you alone. I feel dumber than a box of hair now.

I was doubted and it all fell apart.Without trust? Hell no……

I cant eat.Or I eat too much and get sick.I train until I pass out because if my body is screaming my mind cant get a word in edgewise. I try to extend myself back to my friends but I fail more often than not.

I stop myself from writing.I edit my emotions.I dream in stainless steal and agony. I like it there.

But as long as I try I am still alive.As long as I remain here. As long as I sweat. I don’t have anything but my corpse and my words.

Eat shit? Don’t mind if I do.

M

7

x

Dead.

I just may be.

Dead that is. Death is loveless. My death was given to me by the one that I loved the most. If I could bury myself I would. Words,words,words.

Slow with sadness and limited movement.You thought that I was dead? I did too. Maybe we are all closer than we realize and we should be cooler and more thankful of everyday that we are given. Find some kind of beauty in monotony.In the details.

But we don’t and won’t because we are all self absorbed assholes.

I am so small. You can’t see me anymore.I write to myself which is why I have not written at all.I mark the letters that I send to myself “Return to sender” .I know that people are talking to me but I only catch the key words and try to nod in the more appropriate places.I keep to myself. I don’t want to talk.

Everything that was good within my heart was taken ,destroyed and used against me.I give up. You win.

I dream of taking a pin and dipping it in undiluted bleach and slowly and methodically inserting it into every pore on my corpse.Dip,insert,repeat. Of being able to enter my body with hydraulic acid and steel wool. Of peeling my finger and toenails off. All countries are dead.I am floating rancid ,alone on a black sea. I don’t understand.Language is lost to me.My spine Bent.Tension in all bones and cells.

And they said that I was dead.

( “Are you dead? How did this happen? ”  “I can’t quite recall…it was a series of things and then I realized that I had stopped breathing all together”  “How terrible for you!”  “Well yes,I guess that it is because I was always lead to believe that once this took place that the pain would stop. I removed my heart as instructed but it still hurts most dreadfully”  “A phantom pain then? ”  “I guess that it must be. I gave it to the only one I loved who told me that they would take care of it and….” )

To most, I guess I am now. So do I grieve the loss of myself.?Does anyone?As time marches on jackbooted and pedigreed supreme ,the answer is no. No one cares.

When everything that you say or do is wrong,you stop. If not you will be driven mad.

All the days bleed together.People have stopped contacting me because I cannot communicate.This is to be expected.This is not any kind of shock. Late,late at night I reach into the jeweled chest at the foot of my bed and gently remove the wrapped bundle that lies on top of all of our letters and pictures. I sit primal and cross legged in the center of my bed. The cloth carries your scent. I peel it back to reveal what at first looks like a chunk of coal. I run my finger lightly over the deep imprint of your teeth and fingerprints.The marks that you left behind.

I lift it to the light ,silently begging ot to tell me what went wrong.Being that the heart is dead much like Elvis and God I receive no reply.

My face is always wet with tears.People move away from me. Like they may catch it. The sadness.

So this is me dead.