a stroll down mainstreet.

those almost human voices glide above the concrete. they travel up in waves tangled in helices with the lines of heat distorting the concrete like the image of a distant oasis. a mirage. the asphalt becomes liquid before quickly recomposing itself. the boiling viscous tar is always ten steps ahead. with each step, the world is rocked and ripples cascade through the foundations of skyscrapers and the bases of lamp posts and screeching sagging bottoms of rubber tires. reflections -- of the walking, the running, the hobbling -- quiver and float beside their four-dimensional counterparts in the polished panes of glass. somehow, these vapid distortions of passersby seem a more accurate portrayal than the figures themselves. the reflections, the silently howling ghosts of the living, float on. they are reflected momentarily in those behemoth structures of glass and steel and concrete until they disappear forever. a microcosm of mortality. a sea of simulacra.

our structures will outlast us.
ars longa, vita brevis.

skeleton keys

don't fret
about those fraying strings
those mislaid notes
old fingers clamoring to strike a
familiar or agreeable chord

but these pangs go beyond dissonance
or percussionary use of strings
or acceptable creative liberties

and the sharp notes keep wailing
piercing the air around them
and the flat notes howl
louder than the
silence that precedes death
-- until that treble clef unfurls

and becomes
a straight
black
line.

I fear it's been long enough.

Long enough since some remnants of my fleeting existence have found their way onto paper via pen wielded by an overworked hand -- OR perhaps just text -- an infinite number of ones and zeros arranged in such away that it might mean something to someone.

I find that it's easier to write when I am overwhelmed with an excess of emotional energy. Over the past few months, I've been juggling two jobs, a relationship, and a fairly regimented drinking schedule. I've learned I can't do anything in moderation. Since I moved back to this fair state of Deseret, I've lived about 20 lives. I've gone trail running, traveled 70 hours on a greyhound bus, dabbled in a few substances, learned how to play the melodica, perfected my dough-tossing skills, practiced my French and Spanish with native speakers, and made a heaping ton of mistakes. The question I get asked most frequently is this:
"Are you happy?"

I've come to realize that it's usually myself doing the asking.

I ask myself when I reach the bottom of those bottles, the taste of whiskey fighting with the question on the tip of my tongue. I ask myself when I walk through that looming shadow cast by the temple, when I'm faced every day with a macabre family history masked by a legacy. I ask myself on days like today, when it's overcast and the mountains roar as the thunder tears through the desert heat.

Time to get back to work.

hiatus

I'm going to be taking a wee break from blogging (note the keyword, BLOGGING, not WRITING).

I've discovered that the pressure of having a dedicated readership makes me less inclined to be honest and accepting of the imperfections in my ideas. Thank you all for your support over the last year or so.

Don't worry, I'll be around.

expect the unexpected.

Sixteen blocks to the liquor store, each way. It was strange that night. The air was still save a hint of wind spreading rumors of winter. I didn't feel cold. My landscape was decorated with flickering construction signs and chain link fences. Once manicured-turned-feral trees defiantly pushed up sections of the cracking sidewalk with their elephantine roots. Splintering mailboxes and tilted phone booths bowed in reverence as our royal procession moved past. I marched alongside of you -- the cadence of your cowboy boots hitting the concrete. Jokes flew back and forth between the three of us. We were soldiers, travelers, vagabonds. Nomads wandering through the urban desert. I felt simultaneously young and immortal.

You kept asking if I was cold,

The more you asked, the warmer I felt.

Before I knew it, we were sipping Bushmills out of red plastic cups and swigging Newcastles that had become almost sufficiently chilled just from the walk home. And I was singing with you as you strummed.

She lit a burner on the stove and offered me a pipe
"I thought you'd never say hello" she said --


I held the whiskey to your lips


"You look like the silent type"
Then she opened up a book of poems

I felt the corduroy hugging your legs between my fingers

And handed it to me
Written by an Italian poet
From the thirteenth century
And every one of them words rang true
And glowed like burning coal
Pouring off of every page
Like it was written in my soul from me to you
Tangled up in blue

And later those lyrics became promises as you curled around me like a treble clef --

It was two a.m. and you lit your cigarette while standing on the wraparound porch -- snow drifting through the air. Streetlights illuminated circles of air around them. Snowflakes made their brief debut in the spotlight before permanently settling on the ground. There they were, melting into the frozen asphalt. Icy particles fusing to one another for the chilly duration of their brief existence. I could barely make out your voice over the roar of my own heartbeat. We talked -- first it was "pick one: Arlo or Woodie Guthrie?" and a summer ahead of hitching and camping and train jumping and before I could finish my sentence --

Your lips tasted like Marlboro twenty sevens and familiar song lyrics and Irish whiskey.

It's like finding home
In an old folk song
That you've never ever heard
Still you know every word
And for sure you can sing along

My Future Ex Husband: Andy Hull

Instead of posting my usual "Critical Theory Tuesday" post, I denied myself the intellectual masturbation and settled for actual masturbation. I just rediscovered Right Away, Great Captain! in my music collection and I fell in love all over again. What is Right Away, Great Captain! you ask? Well, it is the folk side project of indie rock front-man Andy Hull. I had the fortunate pleasure of seeing him perform live last March with his main band, Manchester Orchestra. He is so damn talented, and when that man is on stage, he rocks like a god. Also, did I mention that I'm salivating just thinking about it? Musically gifted, an elegant wordsmith, beardy as all hell. I want to get lost in the mountains with him. And a guitar. And a bottle of whiskey. And hypothermia... so he is forced to keep me warm...

Now for some gratuitously irrelevant photos. Oh and maybe an obligatory embedded youtube video.

Please note the range. He can go from being heartbreaking and improvising lines about BEING A SHIP CAPTAIN to rocking my fucking ass off. Thank you, Andy Hull, for making me all hot and bothered. 

sigh.

and now, a little bit of fiction.

falling in love with strangers

There should be four feet -- bumping and sliding around each other like smooth stones in a river bed -- under the blanket of cotton rubbing atop one another warmed by the friction

My mind won’t stay empty and my heart won’t stay full. 

I imagine that I know you and that I would pretend I didn’t like your facial expressions, especially the one that precludes those crumpled wads of bills left on chipped Formica countertops after hours of inhaling burnt diner coffee and then I’m driving through the desert and your skin is between my fingers as I traipse across the scaly sea of Joshua trees as my hands reach lower than Jericho I can decipher the message in your pores like Braille with my pillowed fingerprints and your back is like a novel I’ve read one hundred times before where my heart stops when I digest my favorite lines and when I remember the punctuation of a freckle or the narrative of a scar now I can feel each ridge built into your hands from the hours of wood chopping and guitar playing and your skin has the same clear, crisp, and daunting audacity of my favorite song on vinyl and I want to lay here forever even though nothing could trick me into staying still it’s funny, facing the sky, confirming my worst suspicions to an audience of stars:

I’m better off this way. 

But suddenly, I don’t know you and I imagine that I do-- I can anticipate that you like the smell of fresh guitar strings and that you know how to play the mandolin. You like your eggs not unlike your women -- over easy and properly dressed -- and you prefer Jameson to Johnny Walker but you won’t say no to the latter. You pretend not to be chivalrous but you can't not open a door for any woman and you never drop hints about how you'd like to undress and ravage all those desperate girls and you say you gave it up but you can roll a joint with one hand while your strong hands dance across your worn-out frets and you let a Nat Sherman hang from your cracked lips. The melody of your breathing hangs with a sweet twang like major chords from Arlo or maybe Woodie Guthrie and you don’t speak Spanish but you can sing along to the Gipsy Kings and you laugh when words you shouldn’t understand reach your eager ears and you’d never admit that you cried when you watched Once alone and realized that all ships are built for sinking --

I drank too much and wore a party dress. You looked at me twice and that was all it took for my awkward knees to be sprawling and adjacent like leafless tree branches in the midst of winter but I’d like to know you better, maybe a picnic or an illicit outing or a late-night serenade you whisper to me as I smell milk and honey on your breath You’re the kind of girl I’d want to marry as you kiss me on the forehead and leave me with my dress rolled down and my collar bones and pale skin and breasts exposed and tears roll down my cheeks like molasses or maple syrup or something else slow and sickly sticky sweet just like a riff from Hendrix if only I’d known better.