Attraversiamo

I couldn't compare this year to a kiss from a rose because I've never been kissed, particularly not so sensually or invigoratingly. A year ago nearly, I started this blog, this space of expression, ushered by an idea from a friend, one who walks by me. I wanted to write, so this, finally, was that opportunity to put something out there and have it reflected back and not disappear into the nether of the rubbish bin. About anything, about something, about nothingness itself, I wrote, experimentally, experientially, discovering that writing was a means of communication and connection, of courage and unity and the exploration of emotion, thought. It's a canvas, on which I can either paint an infantile abstract piece, or be blessed with something closer to art that's a window into my soul. So I can see it. So you can see it. And from the statistics that Blogger collects regarding my blog, it's not been a very widely-accessed experience, which I accept. Thus I can say that this space resembles more a spring in solitude than a photographed fountain in the centre of Rome, with statues in dynamic positions and coins carpeting the bottom. Looking for love, looking for the eternal, looking for happiness, that is what I had in mind, and each post, then, was my coin, my wish, my prayer, this being the 125th.

I began the year without much knowledge of where I was going, except to university, which was to be dreaded and revered, and therefore not very helpful as a goal seeing as it could be anything I made it out to be. Life was in my hands after high school, though I was to realise later that it was not perched warmly in my palms but coursing through the veins in my fingers, and like the blood there, it wasn't in my control. I wanted to know more about myself, so I went on and began a journey of self-discovery. Fears, shame, guilt, stress, all emotions that I had felt before, would come at my door and I was supposed to open it for them. I had some new unwelcome guests too, such as jealousy, desperation, insanity, heartbreak. I'd seen them in movies before and in the lives of those around me, but oh, I did not expect them to come caroling at my doorstep, and yet life did guide them there. Hesitantly, I let them in, then at various times kicked them out, then after pacing back and forth in the hallway, I opened the door again, and they walked back in, temptation hand in hand with itself, so pleased to see me, and later to lure me with its sex. Beyond being host to this cauldron of negativity, I had been blessed with signposts everywhere I looked, telling me what I needed to do to entertain the guests or to be a better host. Friendships formed, friendships strengthened, friendships stilled and weathered the teacup storm that started when clouds gathered.

I started university in March. Stressed, I experienced a sense of loneliness that I had thought had been buried back in Year 9. It was a bitter, alcoholic aloneness: addictive because it placed upon me thoughts I did not want to think but which I ultimately scooped up again from the sands of time and built a crumbling mound I'd pretend was a castle. Suddenly, the world had opened up for me, and I did not see myself in it. The tempest had begun, trying to find my shelter before it was too late. But I wasn't quite getting to that place of safety anytime soon. I don't think I was meant to get to that ideal place at all, and every pocket of sunshine I could find, I basked in half-heartedly, aware the rain would come back in again and I'd get wet. I changed my clothes, my approach, several times, but that wasn't going to stop the weather. So, instead of racing away from the eye, I was instead guided towards it. The centre. Where the demons lay together and fornicated. I received "A Course In Miracles" in the mail. I thought to do the course, it wouldn't hurt to find some answers that the introduction promised. It specifically said I didn't need to believe each day's lesson, just follow it. With that guarantee, I went for it. Spiritual awakening beckoned.

I don't remember what I thought it would be, but this was not it. The course emphasised completion, devotion, courage, presence, gratitude, all which have taken turns to teach me this year about life, about what I had missed, about what I have held in my past like an idol to commit suicide over. But it was not just about learning, it was also about experience. Suffering was tearing me apart below the surface, and habitually, I would try to understand the shit out of it and then it would make some fleeting sense and I'd be happy, until it stopped making sense. What I learned was that I could not, could not, could not, understand it all. And if I couldn't solve my problems, then, woah, there would be pain, content to suck on my life like it came out of my teat to nourish this cute, pudgy, infested, destructive baby. My mentality took a serious beating, and I had to question everything, what people meant to me, what I meant to myself, what I was doing, whether I was hurting people, whether I was who I thought I was. The perfect list of ingredients for overthinking, and that's exactly where it lead me. Thought. So much of it. So much of it unnecessary, because it was unable to answer those questions with certainty.

Certainty, then, came from elsewhere. The course lead me to God, or the universe, or Life, or whatever else you want to call what you cannot call anything. I was to have faith in Him, as I had consciously never had faith in anyone or anything before. Here was my life, on a platter that I'd chewed the silver from in my overthinking. Here it was, for God's taking. I have to surrender it completely, for the decision to have a transformative effect. I have let go of many things, but there still are some that I yet hold on to, still fears, lies, things I am ashamed of, things that burden my heaven and make me confuse it with hell. I am confident that I will let go of all of those, simply because I am willing. When and how, I don't know, but I do still have until sometime in early April 2011, when I am scheduled to complete the course. Past that, je ne sais pas encore. There are still lessons to be learned. Yet this is an appropriate time to reflect, as I have learned enough to witness a change. I don't know how old I am, mentally. I don't know whether I am gay, or straight, or bi, or a, or b, or c. I feel a sense of resentment towards being packed into a labelled cardboard box to be looked upon and segregated into some portion of interpretation. I feel it's detrimental to discovering reality. I don't know what specifically I am supposed to do. But I know that all the answers I need to know, will be given when they are needed, and it is in that promise that I trust. I can't rush everything, nor can I slow it down or numb myself from feeling pain so I can feel just joy. They are mutually exclusive by definition, but underlying them, there can either be unconsciousness, or the peace of consciousness, not both, always one. It comes down to the decision, whether I want the truth, or whether I want deception. Where I feel safe and secure is the criteria on which I base that choice.

The thought philosophy has dominated this period of time since the birth of this blog. I am trying to figure life out. While I watched others go on with their lives, content, taking part in joys and games and at times, their own soul-seeking, I removed myself from the stream of mindlessness that had driven me before so that I could prepare well for an adult life of doing what I was supposed to do. Quite frankly, it comes down to what I want in life, and I knew there had to be more than just chasing pleasure in a game, or a girl, or porn, though I do recognise they have their roles to play. With this realisation, I wanted the truth, I wanted what lay underneath the forms and things that we as people would involve ourselves in as if we were dolls in a house full of props. From situations, I wanted to go beyond to reason, to the mechanics of depth and creativity. I expected an intricate but clear machine; I found nothingness exemplified. Because, really, soul-searching had lead me to a skeleton of myself - dead in form, or at least, dying, ephemeral, but in essence, well, untouched by anything, invulnerable. Perhaps there is a better metaphor for that. I have touched that depth and its beauty is like a well of openness and disregard for difference. And it's really when I let go of thinking that that place is reached. The moment of experience is over and then I open my eyes from meditation and look on the world differently, as if it were all okay, even if there was fighting and politics and advertising and gore and poverty and apathy. For a brief glimpse, I do not even register the suffering, as if it was gone, and it mattered not. Then I slowly scooped it back in, because I thought I had to, as if it were my responsibility as a human being to take on the pain of others when I had some respite. I copy-pasted instead of select-deleted. Then I released back the tide, and that was the back-and-forth experience of finding peace, because it went to and fro. I want to say peace is winning, but the truth is peace isn't fighting, so that would be a moot statement.

I have been blessed this year, despite the war of worlds and words in my mind. Perhaps when one agrees to find themselves and agrees to confront their past with no weapons, just forgiveness, one is greeted with help from previously thought-of-as-unlikely places. Each situation has been and is a lesson. Each person is a brother. And underneath my strict mold of the world, that mental construct I foolishly wore as a protective helmet, I am a brother, too. In that spirit of oneness in which everything real is, I am. This lesson, I found difficult to digest, especially when there were those around me who were very different outwardly, who had different goals, approaches, behaviors. More often than I would like to admit, but I do here anyway, my ego has played the part of a victim, ever the attacked, ever the one who is hurt. Other times, my ego was the conqueror, dealing blows to other egos. Yet behind these masks, I am to learn that we are all the same. This is a glorious truth, but one I know not if I can impart but merely point to, one I yet bring to the world because I still believe there are exceptions to, even though there are not. I have talked with friends, at times nearing a point of desperation, and in those moments of vulnerability was revealed the river of love I had been searching for elsewhere, in the wrong places. In case you wonder, I talked about behavior, personalities, hopes, fears, pain, suffering, guilt. Identity too. Things I would normally stray away from but was needing answers to. And friends were happy to steer my vessel in the right direction, whether they were aware of it or not. That's another interesting thing that's happened this year, I've gone under the radar and achieved so much personal growth, without many people noticing. Help, signposts, have come from close friends to strangers to strange situations to music and literature. I figure if I am willing to give myself to life so that it can use me for whatever it wills, then it would point and guide me in the right direction, and if I deviate from the path, it would come and show me the way back after a pep talk and a realisation or two. But I don't want to create a tornado or some other dramatic turn of events. I want to quietly find peace and then radiate it through my impersona so that those surround me may find their own lives more pleasant and enlightening, wherever they are on their own journeys.

Ultimately, I want to be loved, but I also want to give love, as I have before. Giving and receiving is the same thing. In the spirit of unconditional love, I would learn that love knows no boundaries, no definitions, no traffic lights nor walls. I expected at the beginning, foolishly, for someone to tell me that they loved me unconditionally, and then I would impart all my pachyderm belongings onto their ass and I would be a free mule alongside them. Bull. Yes, others can love you if you don't love yourself, but you cannot know it unless you love yourself in some way, at least a tiny bit, somehow, tucked away beneath layers of difficulty. This year has taught me that I can tell you nothing about love as you may want to hear it. I have never been with anyone intimately, so I cannot give any stories of romance or consuming bodily passion. Yet what I know of love, is that if it really is love, that is, if it is without reserve, then all it is is a recognition of yourself. You are love. And so am I. I am writing these words but language cannot encompass such completion, wholeness. From memory, I don't think I've felt it wholeheartedly. But I want to. And it will come when it will come, but I know it will come now.

Love is everything, and there's nothing else. Love is the word that I use, but I use it loosely. I like love. It sort of symbolises peace and contentment and fulfillment and joy all in one. Perhaps it's not very focused in my mind, but I don't hold on to it. I find myself saying 'true love' now instead of love because of all the changes to the term, not that adding 'true' makes it more true, it's just easier for me to know what I mean. Like I said though, I can't tell you anything about it, though I've written quite a bit on it. Perhaps it's me pointing to it, for me, for you. Perhaps it's my romantic mind, or my secretive desire to express emotion in a world that doesn't value it to the extent that I see it, especially coming from someone of my gender.

I am grateful for so many things, so many people, some that know themselves, some that may not yet. I appreciate you, for sharing your life with me by reading this. Everything really, even the 'bad' stuff, for it came up and showed me where I needed to change. The puzzle pieces fit perfectly, even if it all looked like a mess on the floor when I began. Now it's beginning to look like what it was meant to look like, life. I feel like I am right where I need to be, and I have faith in the gentle light of guidance that I am going where I need to go, home.

Attraversiamo.

Riding

It rains, and the reins are left in the hands of him who reigns.
Can't grab hold.
Wouldn't grab hold anyway.

Take Me Up

There is piano music playing in the background. You try living without your other half, without two quarters of your ego. It's a liberating nightmare, a full-blown dispatriation in split senses. And anywhere you go is the potential of the moment to remove the earth beneath one of your feet, testing your balance, checking to see whether you are able to shift your weight onto the right foot in time. Watch your back, try to prepare and you end up projecting your fears onto the future, a half-wish come true halfway up the stairway to heaven. Just then, you hit that bump, that wooden plank that's rotten to the touch and gives way under the weight of your guilt as you step on it. I thought you would have left your baggage at the bottom. When you refused to take the elevator, the doorman told you to leave the luggage downstairs anyway, that you couldn't possibly take it upstairs with you. But you, stubborn and foolish, held on to it. At least half of your mind did.

But I have told you, you cannot achieve anything with half of you. It's either all or nothing, the decision has to be whole. And so, climbing the stairs has been an uphill struggle. You see happiness at the top, but it's a narrow road and you know you can't hold all your shit with you, mountaineer.

You wish I'd just move on, but so do I, believe me. Tell me you're not an idiot, and I'll believe you, but for fuck's sake don't tell me you can handle what you hold in your pockets. You have a half-burnt cigarette for your middle finger and are squeezing a removed doll's head in your left hand's crush grip. Exhausted, are you not? Perhaps you'd like me to go on, say 'anyway' or 'regardless', and just move on up the steps. I don't have to lumber your ball and chain of course, but I swore I'd take you up, and that's what I'm going to do.

So, I implore you, leave those things you value downstairs. See, just unclench that angered fist and your broken toy will roll down the steps along with those painful memories. This is about letting go of the past. You can't heave it up, heaven doesn't accept things that have passed their expiration date. You can't go in with broken mementos, or with souvenirs of suffering. Believe me, you don't need them anymore, there's enough childhood and joy there to satisfy all of the world's children that have ever lived. Have faith that you will find it.

Now that you're looking into my eyes, I want to assure you that the way we travel is the right way. Your doll's head cannot talk, even though you hear its voice. It's but a passing wind, one that will cease its whispering once you're no longer in range of its emission. So when you recall those visions and thoughts that mean nothing even here, even before we have reached where you want to go, you cannot forgive yourself. Why are you holding yourself to such an obscenely distorted standard? What have you to die for? Rolling emotions? Unrooted sentiments? Fear that you have hurt? You cannot hurt, I'm telling you, it isn't in you. All you can do is make these images in your head of being a tyrant, a deceiver, a betrayer, a cheat, a liar, a destroyer, a dictator, a fallen angel. These are such violations of reality, of what you are, that if you knew, if you only knew, you would instantly let go of all the pain you're holding on to and go up. Since you have forgotten the difference between what is true and what isn't, I've come to take you up the stairs, to teach you what that is. You don't need to understand. It's better that you don't, actually.

So, stop. Let go.

Then, lighter, keep walking, and it will feel more like you are traveling a flat path, closer to the truth.

The Time After Sleep

Thoughts belong to memory, yesterdays kept
Safe in the minds of those who dreamed while they slept,
Preserved by empty lines, wanting substance. Except,
When truth saw morning, they looked away and wept,
Having spilled ink on their clouds, unable to accept
Their folly. Nowhere fear fogged. In, the mists crept.

With that haze, terror down the storm drain crept.
It spilled ferociousness, flooded tunnels that kept
The calm intact, yet not for eyes to accept
That burdened the wanderer while they slept
Unsoundly in a twisting sopor. Any wept,
Windswept, subservient to villainy, except

Hanging by a thread exempt from torture, except
That buoyant rain-defying ring. A curtain crept
Across the window, yet while the welkin wept
Was there left enough tranquility, kempt kept
For an advent. Among the musing of the slept,
Lived beyond reminders, that which they would accept.

It happened when the sun eagered to accept
The yonder's invitation. What was except
Before first light, was undone afore minds slept
And outside life's palms did they believe they crept.
They but forgot who them had begot and kept
In joy. For that remembrance they wept.

In a symbolic gest, had the firmament wept
To imitate the gloom of refusing to accept
Responsibility for the fanged pets minds kept
Out of sight. So the world was poured misery, except
Its cup had a chip through which suffering crept,
Leaking into estuaries while minds slept.

Poison diluted, life did not die. They slept
Beside each other, sharing spare hope, and wept
For their mistakes, until a glance of light crept
Into their eyes, forgiveness, yearning to accept
Their tempest as a passed zephyr. Except
This memory, only verity was kept.

Minds have ere slept and in waking, taught to accept
The traces of tears they wept. There was no loss except
Of the channels in which hollowness crept. Such thoughts, only memory kept.

Check

Somehow with the addition of Facebook and the bringing together of worlds, I've become habituated to check and verify the so-called connections between these worlds. My phone, my Facebook, my door, my MSN chat window, all because I feel there is some obligation to answer them as quickly as possible. I find this curious, albeit slightly disturbing, because I do not want to be on guard, having to scout like an expectant but near-fatigue sentinel for that message to arrive so that I can respond to it in the speed of possibility. It's not a response though, it's a reaction, a quick fix, an answer feigning spontaneity, under the guise of importance but paper thin. Blurt out something, say it damnit.
Quick. Blogpost. Now let's see if it gets any comments. F5, check.

As tangled as this post is, and as much of a poster child as it appears, I feel a laziness, an indesire to salvage it and turn the idea into something more creative. Emoticon, :/ , now we have self-consciousness here, too.

The Everyday Reminder

I'm no electrician
But I split wires
Like I'd do hairs -

First I rip off the cover
Then I pinch each wire
With my fingered nails
And pull
Apart
One by one
The fibres that hold them together,
That electric magnetism;
Then I grab each with a pincer
And choke the end
So that the current remaining inside dies;
Then I tear each from the collected mass,
Breaking apart the harmonium.

I repeat.

Finally, I observe the parts
All assembled for me
By my trusty hand.

Then I remember -
I was building a circuit.

Ominous Wish

I want to bring water from the source in my cupped palms to those who are stranded on the shore, gasping for a mouthful of that all-restoring substance. I don't care if some of it drips out through the thenar gap or the spaces between my fingers, there will still be enough to quench the thirst of those who are dying, impaled in place by the spear of their senseless habits, or those who are still looking for the stream, not knowing that it runs just beside them. I want them to drink so that I can share the solution of life with them and finally wash our problems away like dirt off our skin. I want us to be clean, not dirtied by the dust we make when we fight amongst ourselves on the land. I want the children that line up to take a swim in the stream to all just dive into the flow and be taken away to wherever the current heads. I can imagine swimming elsewhere, encountering drought sooner or later, hitting the dam I would build in front of myself so I would have some obstacle to overcome. I would not perish there while I can still drink and bathe in that which life deems most precious, its miracle panacea. I want to cure the ailments of those who cannot find breath in the oxygen that surrounds their weakened bodies. I want to follow the course where it leads, pulling those marooned ashore into the river where they may drown and become part of it. I want to give the gift that was given me, that I would receive it myself by seeing the seedlings grow into saplings, and the parts become whole.

Pursuing What Means

The light has faded, the peace has burned,
The room is cold and I can't reach out
To grab the hand slipping out of my sight,
Too bright, too far to see into the night,
Too long to bear the pain
Of standing alone in the rain.
While life is pouring out its veins
It's still my beating heart that strains
For love, to come be my savior,
For love stares blind into my fear
Like it wasn't even there, my fate to cripple,
Like somebody quietly knows it's all so simple.
I have half a mind to see responsibility
And the other part to want the seas to part,
It's outside where windows look alive
But spirit drowns and after it I dive
To give it breath, divinity I can revive
With the hope that I somehow will survive.

Dissection

Keep a comfortable distance
Away from prosperity before
It can make potholes of the
Windows of opportunity
Through which the house
God lives in finds the light
Of day.

Sail to the sun.
Backwards from the apocalypse
Searching the advent for a
Rubber band, to hold the
Letters together when
The speech is read out
In the basement of rapture
Backwards from the new eclipse
Captures the sizzle
The fire
The pew broken
Shattered by the wrist
That shackled membrane
That tepid cork
Burst.

Keep a wine bottle in the cooler for the better days
That have run out
With the children outside.

Settle back in.
The world is wet and the seat is damp
And the wood is growing
Beneath the carpet.

Upstairs there's a man
Singing about his imagination
Soaring into valleys
That break through mountains
Hit pelicans in the eye
And startle prams
Through a hole in the concrete.

Catch this
Cold feet
In the bathtub
Masturbating
A vulture calling out
In ecstasy
Ready to feed upon
Death's leftovers.

A Hand Still Outstretched

There is a written rule, on gossamer,
that movement ceases when I scream
and refuse to listen to the peace, silent,
trying to protrude through the dream.
Where is faith - while I hold myself
by the throat, unwilling to deconstruct
the torture chamber I built, misguided,
seeking to live as I have been instruct.
Care is mistaken for harm, I know this
yet refuse to unchain myself - be not
my anguished self, a lie, but give the past
away, exposed, so it can be forgot.
Is there care where I have buried my soul,
or have I no faith that I am already whole?

Give

The best gift is the present.

Mote Of Life

Unfinished writing on a half
written page of a half-
filled book of words
that would mean something
if sentences would
complete,
paragraphs would
end,
chapters would
close,
verses would
flow
down

further

down a falling wave,
suspended continuity,
forgotten serenity,

down
further to

a whitewash of text
that doesn't really make any sense
but it keeps gurgled suspense
that extends
outwards
towards

The Enquiry As To Where I Am

I can't begot me, while sitting silent
waiting, praying, following a road
to nowhere's prison; conviction sent
my release, I'm going t'well does bode.
It be, asked to be begot; feign reason
to be understood not by cherishers,
by friends, by admiration's heathen
sisterhood, but by stamped seekers.
They come shape-seeking, apathetic
to yonder-brimmed apostle jeering -
desirable to who can tell the septic
from cleansed - they may come reeling.
It's where I take my place, I earn by edict that jest
to rise above the nothings, be professed things to the rest.

Don't Get Caught

And your tears dilute the cracks
of pain you're keeping pitched up
like a tent; nothing left to track
upstream, want of release: stop.

And think of everything inside
a sharpened log, down the river
let it amble, drowning in pride.
Let it gurgle in a tense shiver.

And effuse the marauders down
as well, let them pass by the room
with nothing in it. Let them frown
and torrent; gone they be soon.

And listen to the sound of brackets
that idle around requests. Life is
the full sentence, the pouring best
outside the cup without the fizz.

And protect the call of the wild from
that which materialises. Encounter
a scene with waterworks, a comb
to graze the ground as not to falter.

And feel what you do, and feel what
you are, and feel what streams trickle,
and feel what waters you had forgot.
See, chased happiness is the most fickle
because the mercurial is but a despot
in disguise, waiting with a broken sickle.

Christian

“My name is Christian and I’m five years old,” he said to the suited man, Kirk Cherry. A boy talking to a businessman at a late morning street corner, people may have thought them related. Holding a box of jellies in one hand, the boy held his other outstretched, reaching almost to the end of the tie below the man’s jacket’s done-up buttons. The morning meeting had started a few minutes ago. The longer Kirk took, the longer he was going to keep his employees waiting. His alarm clock should have worked, but just when it was needed, it decided to run out of batteries. Time’s an unreliable bitch; sometimes. He moved to cross the street.

“Excuse me, sir, could you please help me cross the street?” voiced the boy. “Mummy says I can’t cross without an adult because it’s not safe.” Kirk turned his head slightly. Yes, he was talking to him – hand out, unkempt hair, oversized clothes, barefoot. Kirk’s pocket vibrated. He was late. The boy smiled and like clockwork, the guilt set in. He couldn’t just leave him there. He was late anyway, so what’s another minute? “Please, sir.” He moved his briefcase to his left hand and took the boy’s. The small fingers were traced with the sweat of youth. He stepped his foot once more onto the concrete, but the boy hesitated.

“Sir, it’s not green yet, we shouldn’t go.” The grip weakened, and Kirk knew he was going to have to wait. There were no cars coming, but the traffic lights were never in sync with traffic itself. He’d have to wait. Damn. Unless…

Squatting, he met the boy’s born-yesterday eyes. “You know,” he began, “it’s safe to cross when there’s no cars coming, or when the light’s green. It’s a small town, and there’s not much traffic in the morning. All you have to do is check both ways and then go when it’s clear.”

The boy’s eyes probed Kirk’s forehead – maybe he found a pimple, or a wrinkle. But he didn’t say anything. At the change to green, they crossed. His meeting beckoned.

Batteries – forgotten. The relentless pager in his pocket prompted Kirk to hurry again the next day. At the same intersection, there was the boy again, waiting to cross, once again, hesitant to cross. Apparently, life hadn’t taught him yet that it was okay to bend the ‘rules’ – that’s to say, he still listened to his mother. As Kirk approached, the boy turned and bounded with his hand outstretched.

“Hi, sir! My name’s Christian and I’m five years old.”

“So that’s your name, is it? Do you want me to help you cross the street, Christian?” An eager nod. “Do you remember what I told you yesterday? How it was safe to cross if it’s green or if there’s no cars coming?” He shook his head. Typical kid. To him, life is just a moment, and everything else is forgotten. “Well, it’s safe now to cross.”

“Mummy said to go only when it’s green. Can you please help me cross when it’s green?” Refusal would not get him to the office in time, and his pocket urged him to agree.

The next morning, there was no such rush. The alarm clock woke him up on time. At the same intersection, Christian waited on the other side of the street. He stood there on the concrete by the traffic lights, transfixed by the colour of rejection that denied passage to the cars ahead. Opportunity seized, Kirk crossed.

“Excuse me, sir! Can you please help me find something? I dropped my box of jellies. Can you find my box of jellies?” It lay fallen, rejected, nearby.

“Here you go, boy. It was just over there.” And Christian appreciated it and held out his other hand, this time to shake. How can a five-year-old forget where he put his jellies? Supposedly, he may have just dropped them without a care in his sweet momentary world. “How come you’re on this side of the street? Yesterday when I found you, you were over there.”

“Mummy said I could cross if it was green and if an adult took me.”

“Ok, so someone helped you?”

“Yes, a man. He didn’t say anything but I just took his hand and he walked me across.”

Now, obviously his mother hadn’t taught him about strangers. “You probably shouldn’t have done that. What if the man was dangerous or had a gun?”

“I don’t think he had a gun. He took me across the street. I thanked him and then I wanted to go see my mummy.”

“Maybe you should tell her to stop sending you for sweets without an adult, people can be more dangerous than cars.”

“But mummy said to do what she says, and she said it was okay if I asked the adult and the adult took me across when it was green.”

Kirk’s face tensed. Where had parental responsibility gone? It wouldn’t help anyone to go through life without learning which risks are worth taking and which ones aren’t. The mother needed lessons, too. The kid’s obedience may end up costing them more than his jellies.

“Listen,” and their eyes levelled, “Can you take me to your mummy, Christian? I’d like to talk to her.”

Hand in hand, the boy led Kirk through disregarded alleyways and buildings where there once must have been activity. His pocket started vibrating sometime but he turned the bloody thing off, preferring the solitude to the interrupting reminders of his daily routine. He’d be just a few minutes late… not enough to cause a dispute – after all, the manager was an integral part of the business and they wouldn’t function without his involvement. They might even take it as a sign of Kirk’s confidence in them that he’s letting them start the meetings without his presence. His job had always been to ensure the numbers added up properly – so there couldn’t be any discrepancies on his watch. Profits had to match earnings at the end of the day. That would come. Time didn’t matter for the moment. He was going to do a good deed.

Christian let go of his hand to place the box of jellies onto a pile of about twenty, all stacked on top of a small stone at the head of a dirt mound. A wan “Maree” was scribbled on the stone. “Hi mummy, here’s your jellies!” He sat on another stone directly adjacent to the pile, a stone part of a whole row of differently sized and shaped stones in a courtyard’s worth of grass and dirt and worms.

“I dropped my box of jellies on the footpath, but this man found it for me, and he wants to talk to you.” This is where their gazes met once more, but Kirk hesitated. What was there to say?

Just as the moment arrived, it had already left. There was no one around, no one else to talk to, no one to explain to him what had happened. But, he understood, then. The silence somehow justified Kirk’s cold demeanour. What was he supposed to say, and to whom? Christian was five. He was only five. Kirk took a few steps back, thinking some distance would help him gain some perspective. There were names on the nearby stones, too. But he couldn’t sob in front of someone who wouldn’t understand why he would be sobbing. Someone who kept their innocence alive by their ignorance to the truth would have to come into their own realisation in their own time. Kirk managed to smile, but Christian didn’t change his expression. His eager eyes looked right through him. Time would slowly trickle cruelty in his jellies until his pile crumbled, when he might build it back up.

“Mummy says thank you for being concerned for me,” said the boy. “She appreciates your care. She says she knows the man that took me across the street because she sent him to take me across the street. That’s all I need to know to be safe. Thank you for coming to see, mummy sir!” and again he held out his hand, for someone to hold.

Down Through The Water

On a sailboat, I sprint for the purpose of my life. I run faster than I can, outrunning the pursuing thoughts with their wood-splintering weapons. I speed my way past the glare of onlookers, past my friends who wave blank regards. Past them, I see my fear, exploding with excitement. What I never did was stop to look, to awe and be terrified. No potty on the seas. The sea is my potty and, ironically, I have indigestion. I transcend my walls and go where no fear has ever been before.

Why does my writing sound like this? Self-conscious, self-aware (sometimes), self-concerned... it's embodied my insecurity for me. If I don't look at myself - my writing by extension - I feel I don't make sense, or that anything else I write doesn't matter because it doesn't directly include me. Me, me, me, me. Selfishness is with me on a sailboat. Let's drown. I will survive.

Taste

Reprieve; a guided hand knows where the land rears and where the seas part. It knows nowhere, although it extends from a place so vast and lost in space; that is where he can be found.

He ground the last of the coffee as if they had been the first coffee beans exported from Brazil. Fresh off the boat, they exploded under the crushing incising of the titanium blades, attached to a raging, screaming motor by a middle-aged Chinese worker in a factory. Fine powder went into a Corphala mug and it lay there, tepid and dry. Coffee. Someone's salary. Someone's morning pick-me-up-(and-stay-with-me-until-work-finishes). Not his. His was for someone else who needed the caffeine to stay awake. Orget (Orjay, for anglophiles) slept just fine and could now greet the day with someone else's drug. He poured the boiling water into the mug and watched the steam snake its way to just before his nostril vacuum. Still working properly. And with all the sheer momentum of the blades in the grinder and the suck of his lungs, he grinned last, before the unflattering glob of salivation collapsed onto the surface of the black, black sea - his present for the manager, his man-ager.

A Light Script

When this light rises I'm restored -
I don't know how to feel though
Because the situation confuses me so.
The day takes on a different chord,
A shade I didn't play
A word I did not say
A heath I protected
A secret I neglected
A heart I singled out
A man I broke apart
All by myself.

It was me, you know, me.
Or do you?

Fuck, it seems like it can be so many things
But it's only one, everything.
And the light shines
And I don't seem to know how to connect one to one.

Request For A Second Chance

To you,

I am writing to you right now. The timing doesn't seem to be very fitting, after you packed my own bags for me and threw them into me and pushed me out the door.

You say I stayed too much inside and made a mess. Well, I won't deny that, but I never think of it as mess - more like creative expansion... or child's play. You know I'm right, so I don't see why you're sending me away. After so many years together, so much we have been through. Yes, you've gotten mad at me before and recently you told me how fed up you were with my antics. But we used to have such fun times, when we were both younger, we played so many games. I loved spending that time with you. And now, just because we've arrived at yet another obstacle in our relationship, you tell me you've had enough. Please... you've said that before and never actually kicked me out. After all, you are a forgiving soul, so even though I said a thing or two about the people in your life that you might not like, you know I must be right.

In case you're wondering, I don't take it back. I'm not angry you've closed the door on me, I know you'll let me back in. Then we can continue having fun together. I've pitched a tent in the void outside. I'll wait until you gather your senses.

Be quick! Don't let the present get in the way of our past times and possible future!

I'll be here.

Love you lots,

xoxo
Your ego

Honesty

Is considering how he can live - he.
He wants the joy of life without the pain of death.
Yet he's already taken the latter and not received the first. He's confused. But it's rather simple.
He has chosen to die.
He has chosen to suffer on the road to death.
He has chosen pain.

And yet his choice, is not one he made wholeheartedly, because he could never choose pain, suffering, death. There is something there, left, a glimpse of love, of truth - enough - to awaken him. And he will rise.

I am he. I want to be the person I was born to be. I want to know love. I do not want to take love from anyone, ever. I do not want to hurt. I do not want to distress, nor distract, nor be the eye of envy. I do not want to instill hate. I simple want happiness.

I can't do this alone. I simply - can't.

Will you help me?

Shift-I

Wisdom is so much more than we know. Dawns, dusks, they come and symbolise the coming and going of life. They come up each day, routinely, almost ritualistically, at the same time. There is no difference between them. One just likes to symbolise one side of the coin while the other is blissfully turned away, unaware, uncaring, until it flips and the seasons and some of our moods change. Suave is this movement, like a determined flirtation. The goal is to get into the pants of God, into his rear pocket on either buttock, to sit there, hoping for safety and security and all else that is good. You just wait until he sits down and does his paperwork.

Yesterday, I woke up and I was awake, even if briefly. The day had already started and I, for the first time in an unspecified amount of time, had met with it and we spoke kind words. No tribulations, no arguing over what would happen and what shouldn't. We really just sat there in the silence of agreement, occasionally me uttering an utterance of non-importance. It was a lovely time we experienced, that moment. We saw soul to soul, all to all. I am going to have these meetings more and more.

And I really knew it was okay, then, as it is now. There continues to lie my habitual deviation from the truth, an action that is going to stop showing up for work, having been made redundant. With this economy, it does still come in from time to time, knocking at my door, and I open it, then send it out again, with a cheerful farewell. That particular invention no longer need be employed by me. I filled out the papers that I had to, so I wouldn't get into any trouble with the authorities. Really, all I was handed was a contract from an arbitrary filing cabinet, and I saw my signature upon it. I then received a dismissal form, written in the handwriting of God, and I signed my name upon it, thereby making the initial work contract redundant.

My signature was all that was needed, and it was done. I had to have a clear mind for that particular arrangement.

So, the day dusked, and then - then the day dawned.

Circles. Place anything within a circle and it is trapped, separate from the whole, fragmented. Dead. Place it on the line and it shall repeat indefinitely. Place it outside and it is forever, free, unable to see any separation. We are somewhere on the line, I think, teeter-tottering, leaning towards the death within the circle but unable to plunge into that abyss because of the pull of freedom.

You yearn it too, as I do. I am you. So I know.

Lessons From Nagisa

Change happens, and even when change happens... the question that remains for us to answer each and every time, can we still love even when things change? In other words, can love be unconditional and therefore transcendent of change? Such, such a powerful question and yet the answer is a destiny-guide. Each choice foretells the next choice until behind you, a path is formed. And you can trace back where love was so easily, because it never would have left.

That was the point. Family, friendship, being together, promises of always being there for each other, the symbolism of the Big Dango Family, the father-son musings... the same point, repeated, over and over and over and over again in a variety of forms. All pointing to the same theme, the importance of love, and not only that, but the prevalence and permanence of love, true love. Love that comes as an orb of light and rises up into the sky. Love that sees through illusions and recognises itself in the spirit of others. Love that saw Nagisa rise through her sickness. Love that gave birth to Ushio. Love that remained even after Tomoya thought Nagisa and Ushio died because of him. Love that transcended the screen on which the Animé played itself out on and called my own love to respond. Love that makes me grateful to have watched Clannad. Love that lives on even after I have finished the series.

Love that reminds me to not let myself sleep and forget, but to rise and remember to spread it and give it all away and watch as the lights multiply. That was the principal lesson from Nagisa. To love. Simple, yet more powerful than these words can convey.

It Came To Me

I do not believe in myself enough, but I believe too much in my thoughts. So I am to believe in who I am, and let my thoughts pass, without judgment. I cannot judge myself as my thoughts, nor do I need to. All I need, is given.

Domo arigato.

Blissful Hell

I, we, you, choose
To contradict the blessing
With what cannot be.

I, we, you, choose
To compromise heavenly
Things with harsh nothings.

I, we, you, choose
To replace peace and love with
Anticipation.

I, we, you, choose
To suffer indecision
To be left suppressed.

L'Appel

Love.

Seventeen minutes and twelve seconds later and the parasol is in full bloom and the sand is still bottle-necked in the hourglass. Time, has replaced the message with its clock face and its arrow hands, cupped full of the matter of shattered glass. There's beaches of it, and you and I are swimming ceaselessly in it. All the time. I may ask myself what is going to happen within the next fifteen seconds, but will realise by then that by the time I would have thought about it, I would have lost my time thinking about it, and with that, my mind. And you would leave me behind, to drown in my contradiction. I'm not impressed.

But you come back for me, anyway.

The Walls Came Down

Wounded is my pride that I carry with me on my back. Yes, it aches. As I am caught between a senseless conflict between the illusion of greatness without foundation and the probing lasers of the observers. The latter feeds what is seen to the cycle mind, the mind on repeat. It's a war of projection in which there are no casualties but egos. I am thus left with a mood of inevitability, a sentiment of somehow missing my worth and my devotion while I am carried, weightless, to a new place.

I imagine I am floating, drifting, going where the wind takes me. It's quite apparent in this state that my emotions have been numbed and distanced from the limbs of my body so that they merely feel within me, without attachment. As peculiar as this may be, it is close to a freedom I did not envision. I can smile, but I do not find a drive to. My pride, the fortress of it, is crumbling into the dust from whence it manifested itself. I could shed tears if I held on, but I couldn't. I let go, and in limbo is not where I expected to be. I feel relieved that I was not suppressed aside and merely left to walk out through the gates as the walls burned and the sky turned a dissimilar shade of blue. I did not come out on horseback or in a carriage named Peace. I simply ambled down the path and the threshold was passable. I went through and in the next few shots, the citadel behind me, is falling. Falling.

I am no more. No more.

There is nothing left in the wreckage. The ruins deconstruct themselves as effervescent structures. Out of mind, they go. The dust cloud is clearing and soon the way will be free of distraction or blurriness. There will be vision. There will be truth. And there will be no corners nor shadows where there are no walls. No places for fear to hide, it has to finally see itself under the yonder, among the plains.

This place, the barren, the past forgotten and the now remembered, has always been here. From here, do I truly begin. As the seed in the soil, I lift up through to the light, and I flourish, unhindered. In this empty place, a wonder grows.

Suddenly, I see the things I used to see so differently,
I feel as if I've found a new reality.
Suddenly, the noise outside my window is a symphony,
A symphony of endless possibility, right in front of me.

Suddenly, I understand the meaning of eternity.
I'm reaching out my hand to touch you,
Now I see, suddenly.

Your Beautiful

The fragrance of your smile
The womb of your indifference
The flight of stairs for a mile
The whole lack of penitence.

The peace in your heart
The marshmallow gaze
The presence from the start
The most familiar haze.

The riddling laughter
The broken lies
The prose right after
The sudden ties.

The four lines
The feather
The two signs
Together.

The she
The you
The me
The true.

Your face
Your pupil
Your space
Your beautiful.

Release

The past is gone and today I wake up and feel freer than the day before. My day is not burdened by what happened last night, by the expectations that I would have held on to or by the easier-said-than-done task of keeping everybody happy. Those mental schematics fell through the shallow floor into the nothingness they came out of. I could have tried to control how the night went but I knew I was out of my league and doing that would have created more stress and worry. And so, we started off with so-and-so number of people and slowly they all went their separate but clustered ways. And I don't resent them for it, although the past 'me' would have felt very beaten and ashamed and let down. One could take it as a metaphor for the life experience, but then again one could take any part of the whole and see in it reflected the whole. No surprises there.

This morning I woke up and I am still here. I realise I am. And the frail defenses against the enemies of no one have been taken down.

I figure that anyone reading this blog, likely someone that knows me over someone that doesn't, would not particularly understand what I am talking about, or where I come from. The words paint a picture that I have not so far been able to see from another point of view but my own. To me, it is sometimes clear, sometimes deliberately not. To others... I don't know. This is 'my' space, and if all the writing were to disappear from the site, I would still remain.

Finally

Those words, those words that you said,
I took them and burned myself with them
Hoping that the pain would be great joy,
But it wasn't.

Hea rtbreak
Is like that.

I know you knew nothing, suspected some
Things maybe, but you didn't know. It's how
It turned out. Nothing to do about it, but
Forgive.

Inbetween No Man's Land

Un enfant tient au gaz d'échappement. Il le respire et le gaz voyage à travers son cerveau aux fins minuscules de rue, de monde, d'endroit connu et de lieu imaginaire. C'est le chocolat chaud qui frappe les nuages, et la pensule avec laquelle on mange la soupe.

And if by any chance one would listen to words as if they were drenched and leaked off the page into the estuary of someone's palm, maybe that someone close by who had auditory nerves enfleshed into their fingertips, one would realise that sense is not made by the chorus of the crowd but by the imagery of the spark that desires to make. But it can't make what it wants, only what it must. However, it can only make what it must when it is what it wants. The first part of the first statement is then not true, and we have an argument where logic takes a seat and watches bored in a corner on a fold-out chair. Shenanigans. So far, the lines have been blurred little, but the sense has not been made. Or has it? Do you get it yet? As you sit in your chair, are you comprehending that what I am writing here is not what I am writing here? And can you also see that no one is writing, that it's all been done, thought, processed, dried, revered, clasped, probed and pieced before you even sat down? Can you see I am being self-conscious? Can you really see anything?

Et nous arrivons ici avec beaucoup de temps pour réflechir et penser à tout ce que ne fait rien. Désolé si je semble existentialiste. Je viens d'être étonné par la guerre entre moi et moi-même, encore. Encore, ça survit. Mais aujourd'hui je me rends compte que c'est bizarre. Ce n'est pas naturel. Ce conflit... c'est tout dans mon esprit, avec des aspects mis en lumière de temps en temps dans mon monde.

This place is dark. It sucks. The corner shadows of the mind in which fear rests restless seem to be static to the ephemeral attempts to think them out. Glorious syntax, will you please unfurl? I don't like praying to doorways. So can there not be so much inbetween? Because it's just so darn confusing. Clarity, please turn on the light. I know you're in the room somewhere and just too obvious to see. I want to see you now, c'est-à-dire, I want to see. Properly. Truly.

In light.
En lumière.

It all comes back to the man in the mirror. I fight and blame someone else and then learn to forgive them and myself. And it all circles back to me. Ultimately though, the biggest fight I can have is with myself, my ego. Against nothing.

And because this doesn't make sense, I am watching it dissolve into the light.

The Way Beyond The Walk

I hear the rain pulling out the rift of space
between my facial features and my feeling
of abandonment. It dries up the pale light
of peace. Some corpse lies on a table alone,
undergoing instructions to shrivel. Sand
remains remain to remind one is yet free.

Remember the voice of silence, yelling "Free
yourself!" Now I have given it more thought space;
see I have drawn with a mental stick in the sand
my aspirations. These schematics, feeling
has kept firm and unbent. Now that I am alone,
I can exhume them to be burned by the light.

Friendships, relationships, secrets in the light
of truth, their funeral is nigh. Let me free
also my buried heart, a symbol left alone
far longer than desired. Amidst found space,
I gather from below the surface of feeling
like I understand, a feather kept by sand.

I used it to write down names, scribblings in sand,
of those who I held dear. Carved, when met by light,
they still shine, resplendently touching, feeling,
setting their etched presence and nuances free.
Perhaps in my voyage, I may roam in space
for them. Maybe not. Maybe I journey alone.

Yet this path is too well-traveled - the alone
eventually find it, don't they? Breathe. Sand
parts and the windswept realms greet me with the space
to find my way. My luggage gone, I trip light.
I am not even burdened by want to be free
and so, I rest in an embrace of feeling.

Ever, I could not encapsulate my feeling
into expressions where I was left alone.
Now, I reach beyond them to where being free
is but the way beyond the walk in the sand
of mind. Joined are the granules, in purest light,
permeating the dunes on the shores of space.

I am free of any bounding feeling
That in space, in rain, I am held alone.
In the wet sand, I but follow the light.

Repressed

I am obviously hiding.
I try to find the forest inside the book so I
Can rediscover the mists where I dreamed I
Was not fictional.
I haven't yet found that familiar path I
Carved through the paper and roots I
Left behind.

I am clearly hiding.
I wish to discover a fountain with a gurgle I
Can capture with cupped palms so I
Can be reassured.
I walk among the wisps of light I
So dearly wish to be seen by but I
Flicker.

Going

Teeter-tottering on the edge of reason,
Wondering how long it will be until
The knife cuts deep into my opaque resolve.
Is there not long to go?
I can feel the dial turning on my clock,
An emotion switches to another.
Back here I am sitting, waiting,
For the last thing to go wrong next
And for me to fall in a straight line
Of repair, recovery, reset, repression,
Until there's just about nothing left.

Because, let's face it,
What really matters doesn't matter
And what doesn't really matter matters.
So is the web spun, twisted.
Why would we say we want it different
When we expect it always this way?

Such is how God delivers the goods.
Feastingly, our mouths: open garages
With vans of servitude parked inside.
Ready to be taken for a spin
Outside the parking lot
On the soaked roads at night
With the streetlights mirrored
In the darkened flesh of the ground.
There can't be any people here
Except cameramen and the
Director.

That's right, Him.

I don't blame him for tragedy
For two reasons:
One, it is not my blame to attribute and
Two, I cannot attribute blame where it is not.
If a guilty man were to sleep
He would sleep with his blame
And no woman nor man,
Could take it upon themselves.
No one lets go of their cross
And we carry them on our backs
In the heaviness of pain
With the anger of blame.
Imperfect tools.

After all, the weight will break our bodies
Not in a literal sense
Because that wouldn't make sense.
We'll all be smiling in heaven
In the metaphysical bliss
That's, oh, oh, so close
That you can feel it more and more.

Teeter-tottering on the edge of reason,
I'm finding no answer where none is supplied.
Riding in the front seat,
I can pretend that I am going,
But the truth is
I don't know how to drive.

The great lesson I am learning is that
The less and less I struggle to survive,
The more and more I know I am alive.
That's why I never wrote the script,
Just followed the directions.

Broken Mirrors

There are pieces lying broken
Of the glass I smashed today.
There are keepers of a secret
Turning their hurt heads away
Because it's painful,
Because it's hate.
Because there's pieces lying broken
And there's wounds we've yet to mend.

There are voices on the streets
That scream something rather sad
At the people walking, walking by
Like zombies in a silent lullaby.
Heads down, they weep
For a moment of bliss
They seek. They aren't given a chance
So they won't give one to you.

Children, broken mirrors,
They'll be shattered to the end
Hoping setting the world on fire
Will somehow bring forgiveness.
Teach them how to fail
At expressing how they feel.
Teach them hate is love
And lies you still struggle to believe.

Together alone, we continue to fear
That the pain of sacrifice will e'er be here,
Seen in the cross, in compromise, in war,
Children wonder if it's worth fighting for.
Are they wrong to question it?
Is there love to ease their hurt
Or are they shattered syllables
Of words we bend, strangle and twist
To fashion the false into existence?
Well we might be artists,
But lies reign in an abyss.

Broken mirrors, violins sound,
Death inside a precarious mound
Shapes their will, so precious and raw
Among the children they hold a flaw.
Against themselves and their others
Against their parents and brothers,
They strike a shard, to ease the pains
That leaks out of their veins
And into city alleyways and streets
They bleed to hear their own heartbeats.

Someone

He had tangled himself up in reasons he did not know.
For the things he had done hath marred the flow
Of life and love and everything that used to be so sweet
To him, to all living things around him.
He let his beauty be blocked by hurt
A costly price to pay for nothing in return
But suffering, a wound that shatters faith
To the end of his occluded divine breath.

How does one begin to describe when his love is lost. When it all starts at the beginning, he never expects it to end, but it all must according to the law of the universe. What goes up, must come down. But he never wanted to crash, to crater the earth and send shockwaves that would sine and cosine those he held near him, and as a result they would flee to safer ground. This is a set of circumstances. They make up the situation.

At thirteen or fourteen, he meets her, she meets him. They date. He dreams, he invests in romance and begins his wooing as exemplified by his brothers. He falls for her, and so begins the descent into the realm of love. Except that it blinds and misleads and suddenly there is a point where emotions become unequal and this imbalance between him and her and her and him disintegrates into an example of failure. He says she said his love was too strong, his emotions too much. The investment, that so looked to have paid off, shatters the piggy-bank and coins are fanned in every direction. Such is how the flood starts, and blood spills. And the rollercoaster of puberty sentences the next years to thoughts of suicide and being upset. A dastardly plan is hatched and is foiled by contact with truth. This paragraph is expressively vague.

Later, they reconcile their emotions and join again in union, to end again for another reason. Drama occurs. Up and down again. Then a separation that lasts 'til today. Strange, is this a story about love? They are no longer together. Yet they are always together, linked in some ways by sentiments that words cannot carry but merely point to in an attempt at understanding. Are these these words? No. The words in question are not written by me, whose heart is not amidst the conflict, but still within the perimeter. I know him. He doesn't know himself. Yet.

Inemotion

Napalm is irrelevant, but inspirational.
Seventeen things that could make the day better are really just one.
Nobody claims to know what they are talking about.
Shadows do not dance on the wall.
I don't know what love songs are about, but they make me wonder.
Diamonds aren't forever, neither is marriage.

Solo, in silence, amidst the crowd of a thousand and four spies with no eyes, who I am is. This sounds less impressive, yet more degenerate and puzzling because it is not saturated with meaning as something else might be. The blurriness dispels your ability to judge. Yet you cannot see the truth when it is blurred, so you must come to know it for what it is, without any edge.

All good things come to an end. All sad things come to an end as well. The same end. Perforated by an emotion, dulling can set in. You might feel numb. Unwilling to respond, and confused because you drift. Floating, this is inemotion, a sentiment where you feel you are falling and also know you are not, that you are safe. You wander and wonder about everything. Questioning nothing, leaving everything in its place, you begin to see a distraction in all there isn't, and life in all there is. But the imbalance remains acute and persistent. You know you are love. You know it. Yet your beliefs are torn apart by truth, and you feel you are adrift in a land of unknowns. In reality, you are safely grounded. But you don't always feel that way, and it becomes a process of going back and forth between what is and what isn't to realise what is is and what isn't isn't.

Love is here, it is about opening the eyes and heart so that it can be seen and felt. This means crossing an inexistent gap, making a leap over no distance. Jump with me.

We Really Are Each Other

Reasons, for changing the point of view may come, to change your image from 2D to 3D. To those who would rather see it as they would a television show, I have nothing to say but to make you aware that I have stirred you from your slumber. To others, know that there isn't always a worded reason that coils itself around the lies we tell about ourselves or others in an attempt to fashion a beneficial reality. Lying fails. The truth doesn't, that's why it's the best option. But we may try to find reasons, a certain intelligence that answers a 'why' behind what happens in our lives, as random and uncalled for as it may seem. I have been trying to find that, the causes all being in my past of course but digging that up and trying to reinterpret it has opened old wounds and brought to my attention my deeper, previously hidden vulnerability. And so it is, that I've had to surrender some of these feelings. Insecurities about many aspects of life knocked on my door and I answered thinking they needed my attention more than the present did. That was a mistake, because all they did was drag me outside and give me a beating. And then I went into cyclical overdrive, trying to find out the purpose of this, and the meaning and all that has gotten me nowhere but in a rut. Overthinking. I've been there, done that, it got nowhere.

So Life said to give in, to stop, to breathe. I did not listen, so the pain of perceived lack got worse. Finally, when I couldn't take it any longer, I let the moment be. And it is.

Everything happens for a reason, for there is a cause to everything. I will know them when I need to, and I will know what to do when I need to do it. There is nothing but illusion, speculation, avoidance, fear and whatevers outside of that. Rather, there is nothing outside of that! And this is peaceful, because we are always in the place of truth, as we are truth. It is a conscious choice that we must make to awaken and to live as true people, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, hair colour, nationality, miscellaneous differences. Everyone's form is different. Life breathed it that way. Life breathes through us. The lungs, that is to say the Source, is the same.

That is joy. To know that everyone is the same, and that we are here to really discover and aid each other in discovering that we are one. As Kim Eng put it, "We really are each other."

Something's Gotta Give

God... to you I look and your gaze is as fixed as ever upon my soul. You know. Something's gotta give.

Death and I are about to part ways. I am almost at the end of my game. It's been too long and I am about to quit, for I cannot play any longer. Overthinking this, I can prolong the charade for longer, but it has to stop. It tears at my existence, and I believe it will destroy it. If I don't stop. The nightmare has to end, and soon, or I may have to write a real suicide note. But it won't get to that. Life is precious, life is whole, life is love, but my world is being torn apart from inside by garish mannerisms and dishonesty on my part. My happiness is in no one's hands and I cannot pretend it is there, so it is in my failure as a liar and my success as a son, a friend, a human being, that I will surrender my shell, my vulnerability, and I will stand alight; not on fire, but with a metaphysical fire within, burning.

God knows my way. I thus endeavor to follow it, because it is the way love comes. I am tortured by my thoughts, as one may have realised. Thoughts of envy, thoughts of being inferior, thoughts of being treated as rubbish, thoughts of inattention and lack and neglect. And anger at these, at these illusions that have so long burdened me and prevented me from reaching my truth, my Self. The sweet nothings that I had convinced myself of mean nothing, yet they pressure me into a pit where I cannot escape, save by surrendering my feelings and leaving the light within me to shine away the inexistent.

God, this is it. Love is coming.

All The Difference In The World

You've got heaven on your doorstep
The man standing with a hand outstretched
For a while you've left him there untouched.

But he hasn't taken back his offer
This is something telling you he never will
You can close the door, you know he'll be there tomorrow.

Counting the times you've shut it
Withers not his dedication, his wish to see you
Never wavered, always eyes to your eyes, heart to yours.

This man, you're telling him to leave
But never wanting him to go, and he won't ever
Because he knows you're simply lost and all he wants to do is save you.

In your mind there is a cloud, a shroud,
A loincloth stripped of life that's doing the impossible
In causing you pain, shame, blame, and all the rest of sorrow.

Yet you look upon heaven and know,
That it doesn't matter at all, that no one asked for blood,
That no one sought your life to end, no one really cared.

And he makes all the difference to you
Because he is gently walking across the doorstep
Into your room, where you welcome him with your arms.

One day with your heart, one day
You'll wake up, one day you'll seize that day
And never fall back down for there will be no tomorrow.

That day is sooner than you think
That day is brighter than you feel, and closer
To your heart than what the world tells you to see.

It will make all the difference in the world
The same.

The June Silhouette

June has been the most eye-opening, emotional and insightful month of the year so far. It is because of conversations that I have had, both with others and with myself. I have begun to see my fears for what they are, and in this quest for inner peace I have had to realise how much baggage I carry wherever I go, how doubtful I am of what I do and why I do it, how self-limiting my mental dialogue is and how ashamed I am of it all. As "Bohemian Rhapsody" sings, when I look at myself, I see a silhouette of a man. A shadow. There is a light behind me of course, which is why I can see through the darkness to make out an outline. And self-consciousness begins, and self-discovery continues as the silhouette disappears to reveal the truth. Will I like what I see? Will I be joyful, as I have been promised?

I wish to recapitulate some of the conversations, from memory, focusing on their impact upon my perception.

At the start of the month, university courses were ending. Exams were on the horizon so it was time to prepare for them. I was able to concentrate as much as I needed and I am thankful for that. I was to discover things about myself I never realised. I was to face fears and uncover a silent vulnerability that had been building up in me like a balloon, empty inside but occupying my space, my consciousness. "A Course In Miracles" had informed me of the truth that I would need to come face to face with my past, to let it go. I had not expected the difficulty this would bring. I had been much more attached to my fears and grievances than I had realised. I was in search of peace, as we all are on any level. And to find peace, I must accept the moment. I seemed unable to do that. I was lost in my own thoughts, and as I shone the light of consciousness upon my 'problems' so had they intensified and curled within my person, as if in fear. The emotions of course came along with that and turned the whole ordeal into difficulty. Nonetheless, I went on in my quest.

I had begun talking to a friend, a good friend to whom I had not talked much before, about my plight. He decided to make the connection with another friend to whom I wasn't very close yet, and we began a three-way conversation that would last hours a few times a week. It is here that I opened up my wound. I had begun taking off my plaster, and the metaphorical blood started siphoning out. It was difficult to express myself how I had. I told them about a couple of moments in childhood from which I retained my emotional scars. Moments that I hadn't let go of. Baggage. Pain. But finally I was placing them in the light to be cleansed.

On the 8th, I had what I might call the most emotional conversation I had ever had. That night I had two conversations, one with the twosome mentioned above, and one with a dear friend who I was trying to understand, and in doing so trying to understand myself as well. What began as a simple conversation about how he was doing, turned into emotional release, of pain that I held with me. I don't know how he took it, but my despair blew out its dam and out flowed out my hurt. I felt myself vibrate within at how ashamed I was of what I was expressing and I was very conscious of how it might make him feel to know how I felt, about him but more so about me. I wondered about it for days afterwards, if it was really the right choice to share things with them. They are there for me, and I love that. I appreciate it deeply. Gradually I shed my skin and tried to understand what was hurting me so much.

I went from being "easy", two of the three calling me that although I not really understanding why, to a point where I felt "overemotional". If one were to judge by the content of this blog, one may discern that I am quite sensitive. I have been empathetic in the past so that may have evolved with it. I discovered that I had problems of my own, that I had believed in sacrifice of me for the other. I had not really known happiness for what it was but instead as a dependency on other things, things that 'brought' happiness. That's difficult to understand, I imagine. I realised my focus had become split among what my mind wanted to what God wanted to what I wanted to what others 'may' have wanted... Only one of those is true... God, what the hell have I been through?

Courage. Doubt. The first one is what I want and what is growing in me. The second is what I do not want and is decreasing. Through my conversations with the three, they correctly picked out how much I doubt myself. How much I limit what I do by how I feel. I have this filter that I send everything through and it comes out très sanitised and devoid. Empty, and I didn't like that. No one could, it's not who I am. How could I have been making this excuse? Because it was easier to than to be brave, to not let all my childish fears barrage the fun and joy of life. I am so glad they talked to me. I am glad I am learning to become more courageous, to choose love over fear.

Moreover, the conversations continued as June went on. I found myself consciously internalising my reactions and they would render me 'damaged' for hours at a time. I had been uplifted on a few days by my friends, but mostly I left myself in my own corner of the world to suffer because I felt I deserved that for lying to myself, for denying my past, for not allowing me to move on. I realised I wasn't on top of the world and that I never really wanted to be. All I want is love. Love. And all I can really have is love. I do not yet believe this, though I wish I did. It would solve all my problems. But I had also learned that my problems had already been solved ("A Course In Miracles"). I had stopped trusting it at one point but I returned my faith once I realised I was not putting my faith in it before but in my own perceived weaknesses. God, I confused myself, tied myself in knots then undoing them trying to sort out my life, my problems, how I was going to come through. I know I will, I have faith in that. I have undying faith. And faith has me.

I held myself as a person who knew who they were, but while I knew deep down, I kept forgetting. But the time to be authentic and remember is now. Now I am. I wanted to be the best, the hero, the one that receives the attention, the one that is loved, the one that has all the answers. None of those came true. I know that none of those is real. Love is reciprocal. So, its light guides to where I must go, where we must all go eventually. Home. I don't want to spend any more time in hell. I was as lost as everyone else was. Finally, love is coming and washing away my hurt and the sun within is rising. God... I may look like a silhouette now, but I am whole, and as the light grows so shall the truth become more apparent. I hope all my secrets will be exposed, not that there's many of them, but that the few that remain will be known to me and if it be willed, to others. But I want honesty to be my breathing and I want life to live in reality not in an excuse for it. I deserve the best, the only, the all there is. It is not too much to ask, because I already have it. And it's bizarre to say that because I don't understand how I can have something, but I only have it because I am it. Nothing else belongs to me but what I already have. Paradox, whatever.

Love is here.