The Poet's Voice

When I read a poem, I don't hear my voice in my head.
I don't hear what I think the writer sounds like either.
It is always the same voice(s), a girl and a boy who are the same person.
They are the same as the words on the page, the words on the screen.
(Is there a difference between them anymore?)
When the words behind my eyes want to live on the page, born through the pen,
I hear the voices again.

This time, they aren't reading old words from a screen, they read me my life as if it were written.
"A man and a woman exchange text messages, both talking past the other."
"A woman with nothing left but enough to live for watches imported English television and laughs."
"I am wearing a purple hoodie too thin for anything, and pants too large around the waste."
"He said... She said..."

The voices are dim, the words blurry, a hand cast out to touch the ephemeral poetry of my mind passes through them like metaphorical smoke or that fog thick enough to breathe.

The coffee.
I thought about it at 6.
Brewed it at 7.
Finished at 8?
Drank at 9.
Sipping the rest now, at 10 pm.
Why coffee at night? Because it makes the words clear.
Crisp, delicious, visceral and within reach.
The voices can be heard, transcribed, they are manifesting now, through the fingers on the keyboard.

I have not written a word tonight, just copied the voices and their words. Or are the voices just my way, that voice they tell me I have but I cannot see?

But this touch, this breath, the bleeding of the words onto the page.
It has begun.
Please.
Please, don't let it ever stop.

Kerouac

I've been reading a lot of weird writing lately, mainly Down In Me and Reclaiming Imogen. I really like it, it's manageable in brevity and thought-provoking in the way it disturbs me. I might take up writing like this. I worry that someone will find it and the works will ruin my future career, but then this comes to mind. This thought process is the same thing that prevents me from linking my blog on facebook. I have over 100 "friends" but I still hesitate to show more than a few (those who are reading this) who I really am. I know they won't accept me. This knowledge is odd in that I enjoy playing in their world but need to live in mine.

So really, time will tell what I will do. Oh, and I should really get around to reading Kerouac, he sounds like a pretty cool guy.

Oh, and Juliet thought I killed myself. How quaint. Some days I wish I had. Hopefully the new medication will help with that. But really, I think the world is more beautiful when looking at it from the perspective of "after I die, she gets to live and..."

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Now playing: AFI - This Celluloid Dream
via FoxyTunes

A Shoulder To Lean On

Earlier tonight I thought about this.

I am a cigarette.
A tube of chemicals and addiction that burns until there is nothing left
Nothing but a foul taste, an odor
And regret.

But then, I ran all around the dorm fixing things and looking at the lives of everyone else. The industrious souls who slave away or break down into elaborate rituals of alcoholic self-destruction. I am one of them, but tonight I walked among them alternately fixing their problems and making new ones. I like to think of myself as a bad person, but in reality I get the feeling that I walk the line pretty damn well. I help those I care about and break those I don't and don't feel bad about it either way.

Tonight, the popular kids asked me to do their dirty work and talk an annoying kid into leaving them alone. I agreed, because it's better him than me. Is this what the Gestapo felt like? Regardless, I'm popular now, and that status comes with a price. The price of course, that I am willing to pay.

Last but not least, some truth to go with all this beauty. The truth being that I tell nothing but the truth when I'm drunk. Not the facts, but the truth. There is a distinction in that the truth is real where facts can be unfortunate or banal. I told a girl last night that "I'm engaged, so I can't be in love with you." Now, I haven't been engaged in over two years now, but in my heart I still belong to Juliet. I may not care so greatly about the girl I told this too that I love her, but I cared enough to make it true, if only for a moment.

What am I doing here? I don't know. I'm just trying to make ends meet and hearts heal. Well, most of them anyway. Living in this dorm is like putting a frog in a blender with a thesis paper. I think I'll drop out of college and go to The Ringling College of Art and Design. Seriously, it's as good a plan as any.