post.hastE

It's funny to.read yourself as you were, as you though you should be, and then. It would seem i only come to this when brooding. I suppose the reality sinking in. Coming to terms, and traveling. I am happy...er. not much elde to say at this hour. I'll be back

Laughing Goats

These goats are all laughing at me..and my my makeshift raft. they all have boats.
These goats are all smiles. spitting and stomping all down the Nile. I am not in denial. I know what they really mean, when they smile at me. Flashing their teeth.
These goats are nothing, but a bunch of beasts. Stay off my back. No my hair is not grass. And no, I will not accept your sassafras.

So, wait...what you're telling me is that you're not really goats?
You tricksters, with your magic potions. I am lost in fantasy

Transit Systems

"Let's be honest on this train". The lights keep flickering, throwing you into the dark and then bringing you back into the light. The fluorescent lights are making our skin seem thick, heavy, pale, and sickly. I keep fidgeting with my iPod. I keep looking away, I don't want to talk about this anymore. I fumble with a ball of foil in my pocket, pull it out and shakily unfold it. two little white pills are gonna make me feel better. You hate this don't you? Is it because I'm not dependent on you? Because it's a display of mistrust? Yes, I don't trust you and it's nothing personal. Yes, I depend on these because they make me feel good, no, they make me feel great.

There's a loud buzz in the air that always is attached to the train itself. It forces our voices above a whisper, makes us speak loud enough for other people to hear. So, no, I don't want to talk about it here, I don't want to talk about it period.

I lean my head back, my legs are feeling good, I'm feeling good, but I am not good. I clench and unclench my fists. I clench and unclench my jaw. You keep pressing me for answers. Stupid incessant questions. Why do you even care? Just back off.

I don't mind, honestly talking, but not when you're digging for answers. Just back off....a little.

The train comes to a halt. You get up and you're slightly ticked off, you're walking fast across the platform. The painkillers are hindering my performance. I'm steps behind. I CANNOT chase you down. I WILL NOT chase you down. So, I'm leaning against this wall, watching you walk away and I'm hoping it's for forever because it's better this way. Dealing with a disillusioned mess? How can that be fun for anyone? Especially one with a penchant for pale powders and powerful drugs. You round the corner....gone. "Goodbye"

A trip to this dirty train station bathroom, it's sickening. It smells like dirty toilets and unbathed vagabonds in here. I pull the syringe from my bag, spring loaded and ready to go.

God, you feel like heaven. You remind me why I'm so numb and so damn dumb and alone. You remind me of why I just let them walk away. You remind me of...

Mind goes blank...I don't remember anything anymore except that I'm dry and I'm gonna need another fix soon. I wonder how you're doing now, all alone walking, fuming, angry, and how it's all my fault that you're alone. walking, fuming, angry. I'm sorry...I think.

I shrug my bag onto my back, making my way through the station, "I'm so fucking high!" oh my god, I feel like I could touch God, I could shake his hand and share this with him. Does God do drugs?

My chest is aching. I could die here and it'd be perfect. All around me people come and go. Going here, going there, going everywhere and anywhere. Far away from me. Take me to Terminal 7, I want to go home.

My eyes glaze over and I'm stumbling for a seat. I run my hands through my hair and grimace. I clench my teeth, I tug on my collar. I scream. Right in the middle of everyone, but no one cares, they just keep walking. "Don't look, they're just making a scene." Your face is so hollow when you say that. Fuck you, middle aged, middle american woman. You're a no one, a blip in my society, a blip in yours and you'll die that way.

I'm standing on a kicked over kiosk, I kicked it over. Is this rage drug induced or have I finally snapped. I'm screaming, I'm kicking, I'm throwing things and snarling at the gawkers."Is this what you want to see?" I throw my hands above my head and twirl them about hypnotically, dancing to music no one else can here, but me. Humming a sweet tune, my eyes are closed and I'm entraced. swirling, twirling....DEATH.

They wheeled me out, bound to the stretcher, but I wasn't making a fuss. I'm sorry sir, that I broke your kiosk. I'm sorry that I ran you off the train. I'm sorry I told you your life was worthless. I'm sorry that I took all these drugs and killed myself in a train station. I thought I had a little more class. How uncouth of me. Forgiveness at the gates? Eternal damnation. Lucifer asks me to please take a number. My love is much unrequited in the bowels of hell. Please sir, serve me another heroine cocktail.

forget me now

"I can't keep dragging you in from the cold

standing you up and wiping the mud from your face

I can't possibly allow myself to watch you unravel"

You open your eyes and stare at the filthy ceiling

"How are you feeling?"

"I feel as though someone's poured saw dust down my throat and punched me a few times shortly after"

"it's to be expected, my apologies"

"No need for saying sorry, I asked for it right?"

you hop down off the table, groaning a bit from effort and peruse around the small crowded room. Peaking into empty jars, jars filled with interesting specimen, jars filled with strange liquids, and you linger on a jar with a piece of masking tape across it. It blares in a brilliant red, "Faulty". A scene flashes across your eyes:

A swingset, it blinks and there you are at age six swinging on it, laughing, it flashes forward again about 3 years to you peaking in your father's basement office and you see a polaroid of a young woman. he comes down stairs screaming at you. Scared, you drop the photo and run hurriedly up the stairs. Your father rubs his brow and stoops down and grabs the picture.

It happened so quickly, this flash of memories triggered by some enigmatic word. You grab your head, a loud siren sound exploding in your ears. screaming out, you drop to the floor curled in a ball, your hands pressed to your ears. The man in the lab coat, we'll call him Lewis, runs to your side, fumbling with a remote. He presses a small red button and the siren stops screaming.

"What...the...fuck...was that" you pant, still cradling your head like a scared child.

"I'm sorry, but you know you aren't allowed certain memories, until these trail of events are completely suppressed, you'll hear the sirens. You knew this when you came"

"I wasn't expecting something so violent"

"It has to get the point across"

"Will this honestly work?"

"all it is an application of reinforcement, sadness is the unconditioned response triggered by the unconditioned stimulus, your memories. with the siren this alters it. Pain is the new controlled response, triggered by the memories. Eventually repression will occur and you will no longer need the sirens and the memories will no longer surface."

"then the pain is worth it"

"So you may think now, we'll have to keep for a couple more days"

"Anything to get this off my chest and the blood off my hands"

"Do you honestly believe you have made the best choice to forget it all. Your family, your life, your job, all the things that have made you who you are?"

"Sadly, yes. A fresh start is worth all sacrifice"

"I'm so terribly sorry you believe that, we're going to put you back under"


"See you on the other side, doc"

Devil in a Blue Dress

"the devil is a lie" and that's all he said. and that's why all her lovers wind up dead. and i know that she snaked her way into your head. and that's how she finds her way into your bed. But, please, oh please, oh please do not hate me.
Please oh please do not bait me.
"The devil is a god damned lie" and she was in a dress when she arrived. and there were no words to be contrived. you stole, you stole, oh well, well I lied. But, please, oh please, oh please do not hate me.
Please, oh please, do not bait me.
"The devil is a lie" and that's all he wrote. well she skipped town and my heart was broke. And on the last word I started to choke. But please, oh please, oh please, oh please do not hate me. please, oh please do not bait me.

Swallow Your Fears

There is a subtle beast that fluttered in the chest. All clenched jaws and balled fists. We all know you did your best.
Closed your eyes and walked open handed through the mist. And i missed a spectacular moment because i was sleeping. And only hours before i had been weeping. There were beasts in our closests and they did not take
us where the wild
things were. Woubd up in a beasts belly. Did you know that with breath so smelly...spending all that time sloshing around in their stomach is no fun.
"We will wait. Everyone's gotta use the bathroom and when they do we'll run!"

"But what about our limbs? Will you grab my leg and hand?"

"Only if you promise to grab my torso"

And so it is written. We escaped. And returned on the backs of our wild cats and stabbed with fashioned spears. Took one's head while you claimed an ear. Ate their hearts, these beasts i do not fear.
I felt em welling in my chest, angry to be subdued. Don't worry my lovable villians, you shall be released soon and in airplanes this shit..gets sent off to the moon ;)


Swallow your fears

missing limbs

there is no limb on which i can step. Falling from branch to branch to branch.

Oh help me! i don't know how to ask. I am silent, but my eyes ask please

Oh help me! i know i never risked the danger and you, you stood before me like a stranger

I didn't want to be the one to call for the guillotine, but you made me

I know that i should step out and be brave

but, all my life i have been taught to never misbehave

it may seem that the cool nonchalante manner is disintrest

but it is how i've been taught to behave

nothing personal, i promise.

I am a coward i fear. no faults to a mother, it was not how i was reared

but, rather sought solitude in the depths of romantic novels

and even now i walk with a nostalgic hobble

it is only because I love "real" love, that I refuse to grab your hand

it is only because of elizabethan romance, i refuse to ask for a dance

trust me, oh trust me, in the backs of my mind, i beckon for your glance

but, anyone of pure grace and strength could resist such a trance

a realist, idealist, in my imagination i live this.

I am missing limbs, so how i do ask you to see past this

with my past i could never reminisce

A romantic, a poet, always dies alone

because this figment, of perfection, never could they hold

so be my muse, my immortality

and when i grow bored please do not hate me

for it is the way of a romantic, to fall in love and imagine

and move on the next day.

but for now, I will romance in my dreams

and only in my sleep, dare i dream of such bold self-esteem

I chase a kiss, i need not a body

opened and closed hands I reach for somebody

a fool, a fool. I learned many a lesson atop the dunce stool

"tell them what they wish to hear! make them swoon!"

I am done, crossed out and finished. with that mentality...

i am only doomed

it is because i love "real" love that i refuse to grab your hand

but, maybe, just maybe, we'd be so bold as to exchange a glance

At Some Point...I guess

So at some point in your life, you're going to have to reach an understanding. Of someone, of something, of yourself. At some point...right? So you tell yourself, "I need to sort out my past" But, it's gone. You can only move forward. At some point...right? So, at some point, you have to look at that girl or that guy and understand why they won't make eye contact anymore. At some point...right? So, at some point you have to learn to accept/and or tolerate the differences around you. yeah, at some point...right? So let's speak hypothetically, if I could be so bold and paint you a picture.

Let's say I'm sitting here, leg crossed at the ankle, smoking my cigarette daintily. And let's pretend that I'm telling you every last grimy detail of my life. and let's just walk the line that maybe I'm a bad person. But, up to this point you've believed otherwise. Confusion? Let's say you reach a conclusion about me, about the stool I'm sitting on, and about yourself. As you go through all the motions of coming to understand, to really understand someone else for who they are, stripped naked of any facade, you start to look at your hands, at your own face differently. How does this revelation effect you. What do you do? Do you accept what is before you, do you me as i am, for what I was, for who I am becoming?

Now let's flip this around and say that for a moment, YOU are sitting here, leg crossed about the ankle, smoking a cigarette. and let's pretend that YOU are telling me every last grimy detail of your life. and let's walk the line that you're a bad person. But, up to this point, I'd believed otherwise. How do I take this?

Well, I'd smoke another cigarette. To kill time. And then I'd try to understand more. and that would lend it's hand to respect

I've got an Itch

I really really love this band

A half-written script

A small portion of my journals from my trip to Kansas and Colorado. To be continued

3:45 am, and everyone is tired. And I mean real tired. The way the skin is sagging off their bones. Sniffling their noses and it's always followed by a sigh. I can't help but bounce my eyes back and forth at every person.
"where are they going?" A rather large woman with blonde hair is sprawled across a seat in the lobby trying to catch a final wink of sleep. She has an old worn comforter draped across her face in vain efforts to block out the penetrating
Amtrak light. So we bored this bus, 3:45 am. Darkness all around us. No one says a word we all ease into sleep. Jarred awake occasionally by the forceful winds and thunder swirling about the bus. This phased none of us. We just kept groping for sleep. Rolling about, trying to find comfort in a tiny two seater compartment.

5:30 i'm in effingham, Illinois. Stopping for a break. I order a couple breakfast items from the McDonald's attachted to the gas station. The driver gave us ten minutes. I grab my food and cantine and hustle back to the bus. We all load and begin to drive away. I look back at the gas station and wonder if anyone was left behind and what they'd do
stranded in Effingham at 5:30 in the morning. What would they think? They'd probably curse, kick the ground in frustration, smoke cigarettes fiendishly and curse some more. That's what I would do anyhow. Coming out of the gas station we play a polite game of "no, you first" with a hardened truck driver. He waves us forward and the driver obliges. I notice from my window
an older black man chasing down the bus as if he life depended on it.. As we round the corner he slams up against the bus, staying close to it, banging his fsts upon the sides. he runs to the door, banging on it. "let me on!" Our driver pulls over and the man boards. Panting heavily the only thing he mutters is "Fuck, shit, fuck" He answered my question. If the bus left anyone behind, they'd chase it down.
His actions made me realize how quickly I would've given up

7:40 or so we arrive in St. Louis, groggy-eyed we shuffle off the bus into the lobby. It's all so unfamiliar to me, it's still grey out from the storm. I find my way to the bathroom and stare at myself in the mirror. I look as if I've been on a bus for a while. But, I enjoy this. I find our terminal and wait with the rest of the passengers. Then, what up to this point had been a good and painless trip took a turn for the worst.
I hand my ticket to a surly looking woman and ask, "does this bus go to Lawrence?"
"Nope" she replies, "Texas"
My eyeballs about fell out. She directed me to the ticket desk. And after several minutes of delibiration, she agreed to take me on her route to Springfield, Missouri. Where I could potentially catch a bus to Kansas City. A direct route to Lawrence is completely out of the question, so this little bit of grace I quickly snatch up as mine.

I just departed from Springfield with a rather jovial group of people. Very chatty, very happy to be going whereever they're going. I'm still too scared to talk to anyone. I promised my mom I wouldn't talk to strangers, but these people don't look like convicts or rapists....well, actually, there was the one, but I avoided eye contact with him.
I'm on my way to Tulsa, Oklahoma right now. What a round about way to get my destination, but I've never been to Oklahoma, so I'll take it as a chance to some scenery. From Tulsa, I'll head to Kansas City.
Farewell until then!!!!

In the stations I noticed all of the black people working. It made me think of the porters from the 20s and that makes me wish I had my book Babbit with me. I can't believe I left my book :(

I wound up in Tulsa around 6pm. Tulsa, Oklahoma. I was anticipated in Kansas 4 hrs before. Such a turn. The ride to Tulsa was beautiful. Green everywhere, trees, hills. A nice break from the forced sleep I endulged in. I'd like to back track and note that the bus driver I had was an angel. I trully believe this. She stuck by my side for the entire journey and got me to Kansas safely
I cannot stress that what she did for me was above and beyond kindness. She was amazing. I wish I could've gotten her name. So anyhow, I wind up in Tulsa with an hour to kill and about 15 hrs without a cigarette. Not a huge deal in normal circumstances, but after 15 hrs on a bus that's enough to make a non-smoker crave a cigarette. There is not a single gas station within visible distance of the Tulsa greyhound station. After walking several blocks into downtown Tulsa to no avail
I returned to the station and asked a worker for a cigarette. His last one. Does no one in this fucking town smoke cigarettes? Introduce the bum, "You need smokes? I can take you to the convient store, it's right up the road." My first mistake. I followed him foolishly, as we walk he was quick to chastise me for walking along with a stranger, telling me that I should consider carrying a weapon for protection and that a lot of bums around town were known for mugging. We arrive after walking several, several blocks.
I give him 8 dollars for the help and purchase a pack of six dollar camels. And to think I bitched about cigarettes back home. I arrive to the station, greeted by a fellow traveler. He has a look of concern. "Are you alright?"I reply with a quick yes, shocked and confused as to why he's so concerned for a stranger. "Don't ever go off with a stranger like that, me and another woman were so worried about you. Thought about following you, but I was afraid I'd miss my bus. If you needed anything you could've asked me. I'm from Tulsa.
If you needed cigarettes, hell you could've bought them from me. Don't do that." I was appreciative of this concern. I really was. In hindsight, what I did was the stupidest thing a traveller could've ever done. The bus arrives around 8 pm to head to Kansas City. This was the most dreadful part of the trip. I was thankful that it was an express. four and a half hours no stops, just straight travel. This was good and bad. I forgot to fill up my cantine and with a sore throat, this sucked. ARRIVAL!!! I'm greeted by a familiar and lovely face. and then another!!!
What great people. My time in Kansas has been brief, but a wonderful experience. i'm tempted to type them all out, but I don't believe that I could describe them. What wonderful people I have in my life. That is all I can say. Tomorrow I leave for Colorado. I'm definitely coming back to Kansas. Oh, stellar show at the Jazzhaus.

Denver Colorado, all aboard!!! Meagan awakes me around 8 am. A quick clean up and a wave goodbye to her boyfriend, Johnathon we head out to the Pick n' Pay. A small gas station in Lawrence that also serves as a greyhound pick up and drop off destination for Greyhound. A little bit of lingering and the bus arrives. We say our goodbyes and onward to Salina Kansas. About two hours south of Lawrence. I fall asleep with ease. Nothing was too memorable about Salina except the semis full of mooing cows. I found this cool and also sad. heading to their deaths.
We reboard this time with a new driver. He seems cool enough. Off we go, our next destination was RS Colby Kansas. At the gas station was a subway. I walk inside and boy the teenagers hanging out there had the strangest looks on their faces. Welcome to the country I suppose. All outfitted in their american eagle and etc. I'm not sure they knew how to take all of these eccentric travellers. I decided agains t their subs and smoked a cigarette instead. We reboard. A newcomer to the bus named willum asks if he can sit next to me. I oblige of course and we immediately strike up conversation.
What an inspiring man. He was from a town of 400 people and worked on farms and drove tractors. He went to school at KSU and majored in theater. He packed up his bags and decided that he was moving to LA, California. One bag and one night in a hotel. He planned on finding a job and persuing acting, "I probably won't make it, but I'd like to say that I tried. I've never seen the ocean and I'd really like to learn to surf. if nothing comes of acting at least I can surf." He had a light, all smiles, all excitement. Ready to shake up his life and go big. There are a lot of stories on the bus. I just remembered!!
On the way to Kansas City, I met a woman who had been kicked out of her house by her roommate in San Diego and was headed back to Minnesota. He was a bipolar schizophrenic with delusional issues. She was an interesting character, she shared her gum with me. She wasn't very pleased with Greyhound. She'd been travelling for over two days by bus. Enough to make anyone grumpy. Coming back to Colorado. We hit Burlington, and we were slammed by a massive snow storm and to think that four hours before just before the kansas and colorado border it was 68 degrees. I found that humourous. Here I am in the middle of a snow storm wearing shorts and a sweater.
Once we hit Denver, I'm pretty sure I fell in love. No snow, mid-sixties, and a beautiful sunset. We pull into the bus station all of us eager to unboard when we're greeted by Denver's finest and a couple of police dogs. They informed us of the surprise raid and made us line all of our luggage up on the sidewalk as the dogs sniffed past, burrowing their noses in our private knick-knacks

Click. Clack. Sigh.

I rue the day when I actually have confidence. Sometimes it amuses me how often I choke up. People make me so nervous sometimes. I finally have a full band now! we're going under the title of deadghost. The members are: Crescent Ulmer(guitar/vocals) Jake Amerhein (guitar) Jeff Donohoe (Bass guitar) and Ian Lucas (drums). it is everything i would've imagined. Everyday, i feel better and better. I love the spring.

A Swift Return