POBLOG

I had to review a poetics blog this week. It didn't go well. Essentially, if this is a poetics blog, it sucks ass. I don't think I have the time to really put together a good poetics blog. That makes me sad. Here is the blog I reviewed:

poetsvegananarchistpacifist.blogspot.com

It's not really a poetics blog, but that's because th e others that I randomly clicked on from a link were disjointed, uninteresting, inconsistent and ultimately self-serving.

Whoops.

If I really want this to be anything more than my personal bitch sheet, I have to make a considerate effort. I don't think I can do that right now, or do I actually know how. So... I think this will remain a roll of toilet paper for now. No one is making you read this.

If you are a poet, I would encourage you to submit your work to the Columbia Poetry Review. It's a very good, student edited publication and I believe that if I know you and you are a poet, I like you and your work. For the most part. I can only think of a couple of people I would like to personally solicit (and I think I will do just that), but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like anything you, Reader, might send in. It's a huge board with a lot of differing opinions and you never really know what's going to get in. And you're a kick ass poet anyway, so do it. I promise I'll speak up loud and clear when we check out your work.

http://english.colum.edu/cpr/submissions.htm

Please. I'd really like to see a name I know pop up.

Other than that, I had a minor set back the other week, but my other poems have gone over pretty well. I'm getting more and more motivated. Hopefully I can produce something worth something. How capitalist is that?

big trouble in little me

a poem that needs work is simply a poem that needs work. different perspectives, different motivators, different tenses, whatever it needs can usually be identified and utilized, especially within a workshop perspective. common protocol is to preface your critique with something positive in order to basically encourage encouragement and lay your beef out as articulately and objectively as possible.

that's a poem that needs work. a shitty poem is a poem that is finished. it can't be helped. a bad poem is done before you even start and the finished product is what slid out your ass. you can't take a pile of shit and make it beautiful. you recreate the god damned venus demilo or david, but guess what creep, it's still a pile of your own shit. now instead of just dumping it in the toilet and flushing it away, you've been playing with it for an afternoon and need 18 showers and have ruined a pair of jeans. also, you're that guy everyone knows to play with his own poop.

i wrote a shitty poem for class today. worst part is, i liked it. i was happy with it. i was excited to share it and hear what others thought. i was glad that this was the first poem i was bringing to this association of colleagues that i have been thrown into. now, i'm disgustingly embarrassed and ashamed and questioning why the fuck i'm here. is it because some undergrad press published a chapbook? is it because of my letters of recommendation? is it because i sent a fruit basket into the grad office to thank them for their help?

i'm terrified now. i'm embarrassed. i'm completely paranoid that everyone who i thought was my new friend now thinks i'm a fucking joke. i want to quit.

i'm also a giant fucking baby. it's the allen way. you'd think i'd grasp that idea by now. with 25 years of destroying myself over and over and over again in any venue of skill and then rebuilding and reconstructing to at least a relative mastery, you'd think i'd be able to restrain these feelings of inadequacy and shame when failing so miserably. but i guess that's all a part of it; where the motivation to bring myself above is born from. vengeance, basically. revenge against myself for this injustice i have brought on the nation of jeff. if i quit, the terrorist jeff allen, wins. i really am my own shit-fiddlin' worst enemy.

i miss some people. there was always this awkward and eager respect within my past poetry communities. i haven't been involved in a circle of writers in a long time. i know that i've effectively destroyed every bridge to everyone who's ever known anything about me as a writer in the past, and i can accept that, and maybe i don't even deserve the right to even say that i miss them, but i do. i know every one of us is a completely different person now and whatever we used to have is very incontrovertibly past tense, but i think that makes my missing that much more... poignant? effective? useful?

probably just pathetic.

i don't know. it's the only thing i really miss about the educational institution of millikin. and maybe that's how i need to look at it so i don't take this hulking failure and turn it into sobbing. jesus christ i'm terrified.

Slamdunk

by Yusef Komunyaka

Fast breaks. Lay ups. With Mercury's
Insignia on our sneakers,
We outmaneuvered the footwork
Of bad angels. Nothing but a hot
Swish of strings like silk
Ten feet out. In the roundhouse
Labyrinth our bodies
Created, we could almost
Last forever, poised in midair
Like storybook sea monsters.
A high note hung there
A long second. Off
The rim. We'd corkscrew
Up & dunk balls that exploded
The skullcap of hope & good
Intention. Bug-eyed, lanky,
All hands & feet . . . sprung rhythm.
We were metaphysical when girls
Cheered on the sidelines.
Tangled up in a falling,
Muscles were a bright motor
Double-flashing to the metal hoop
Nailed to our oak.
When Sonny Boy's mama died
He played nonstop all day, so hard
Our backboard splintered.
Glistening with sweat, we jibed
& rolled the ball off our
Fingertips. Trouble
Was there slapping a blackjack
Against an open palm.
Dribble, drive to the inside, feint,
& glide like a sparrow hawk.
Lay ups. Fast breaks.
We had moves we didn't know
We had. Our bodies spun
On swivels of bone & faith,
Through a lyric slipknot
Of joy, & we knew we were
Beautiful & dangerous.




I wish I could write a poem like that about sports. God damn.

Thanks to my brother for finding this website... it's pretty damned intriguing.

I guess August sucked?

That's a lie. August was wonderful. So wonderful, that I forgot this thing existed. I don't want to bore you with the personal aspirations and successes or failures that the waning summer sent my way, just rest assured, faithful reader, little was done that afforded me the courtesy of a blog update. Funny how now as I sit in the wake of three of my four graduate classes and am completely winded by the extent of the work expected of me, I find the time to write down some rather meaningless dribble for the internet communities that might come across this. The seven or eight people who live at the center of the earth with their planet-core powered laptops just clicking away to the ends of the internet, they are my biggest fans.

So, Morlocks, what the fuck is up? I started school. It's more than I could have imagined. Last night we had our first workshop, just an introductory thing of course, no one had any work to shop, but still I was sitting there grinning my stupid face off all evening. We are a class of nine and we are awesome. I can't wait to read what these people write. Of us, there is another marathoner, an ex-Decaturian, a Pittsburgh native who says "Stillers" instead of "Steelers", and a baby Chicagoan fresh out of southern Cali who already claims this city as her home without experiencing a winter. Maybe presumptuous, but definitely admirable.

This week has been eye-opening. I don't want to discredit any friendships or conversations that I've ever had, but the things that I've said this week in discussion are things I have barely even thought about in years. It was so god damned refreshing to talk about poetry and education theory with other people who honestly just have the patience for that shit. I love Daniel and Robert, don't get me wrong, but they have barely read any of my poetry, much less engaged me in conversation about it. After workshop last night where we discussed an article on difficulty in poetry by Reginald Shepherd and a defense of MFA poetry programs by one of Columbia's faculty, my roommates and I dissected the word 'successfully' and turned it into 'suck-sex-fucking' in reference to how Daniel's recording session with one of our female friends went.

Who the fuck am I, really?

I feel like I'm betraying someone or something. Maybe it's really poetic and I'm just fooling myself. In reality I'm probably some Vegas diva hopped up on goofballs giving footjobs for stem cells in the back alley of an abortion clinic. Whatever. People have balanced more contradicting lifestyles before. My last relationship existed between two people who didn't even really exist and knew it. Everyone fools themselves constantly.

On that same note, in all these classes you go around and do your introductions and for some reason, I can never actually say anything interesting about myself. It's always after I mutter something about movies and video games that I realize I actually have some unique and intriguing things to say. All my classmates probably think I'm some turdy shade of gray at this point. I just don't get where my head goes when put on the spot like that. I can't say I'm a runner or a vegan or a musician or even a writer, and here I am stuck dead in an MFA program. Anyway, I just feel like a douche. I'm sure everyone will get to know me to a frustrating extent and all of this first-week goosebump bullshit will be far behind us.

I should hopefully be writing more. At least getting the shit I've been shitting shit on by other shits in an effort to make cleaner shit. Here's my prompt for this week:

"For next week, write a poem in which all events occur simultaneously. ("Events" may be internal as well as external; may be antidramatic as well as dramatic; may be thoughts instead of actions; and so on.)

The poem should include your 10 favorite words from Tender Buttons. Write these words at the top of the page so that we can re-experience them in your poem."

So many semi-colons.

where smokes, there fires

if at the time I had known that I were
standing in the smoke of the last burning square of my life,
enveloped like a letter addressed to an author-unwary
number on a gutted street, my skin inked but enclosed in
the thinnest tomb by the gravedigger and his hopes of undeath,
I might have found cause for greater ceremony, a road sign for my
jigsaw memory as if this one of thousands were worth more alone
than any other evening shivering on a broken-code porch,
watching the Star sail across a city-swamped sky.

trumpets were not even muted as no labored air moved
through rusted pipes that night; that was saved for an
abandoned morning as streets passed beneath soles with
a cry for (un)black-market organs or a worthwhile cough
-in for the stained rejection. it was there I met penultimate finality,
saving those shaped figures for the eves of rest.

to put a stop, a full severing of the intake on this
carcinogen of conscience, that would
take something/where/one more than a hack and slash
morning stomp along the city streets so choked with
my lung bane’s cousin. that would take me on capital-bound
roads, measuring those lines with time and citations but the worth
is a simple fact as knowing all smoke is carried away in the wind.

funny how basking in the glow of a fumeless fire I
still see that flaming geometry as something always
to fall back into. after a Greek’s misplaced memorial and a war
with neighborhood bears (maybe an extended absence
from a central-state heart) after rounds of duetted “Niki!” echoing
off ancient cave walls; the more victorious voices that make
this chorus will cut the
aural force smaller and thinner, a shade of song slipping into
the nothingness of a hibernation,
of a home. a celebration had, but a prize forgotten, and yet
that ember still glows so bright when surrounded by the dark of
those deep belly caverns.

I was always good at this math, the measuring of shapes
only just seen and yet unassumed; assigning numerical order to an otherwise
unrealized length of side or of time or of anything with the dimension
and sentience to stretch itself away from me. I was always good at figuring
just how far away I could get.

but that being the physical, the solid, measurement is an actual
visibility and a universal figure, there are other dimensions
of length or of side or of time without such civility.
it is that not found in any classroom or chalkboard,
but in the weight of the ink on the page that I
find myself most curious to measure. height and width
come along with written language as essential
factors, yet the third
and undeniable dimension of scripted message and meaning is
one without number, label or symbol and begs to question: How
can a pulse onto paper be anything but reflected when the third
dimension is anything but deep?

the course taken when weighing the smoke of inked incineration
is too common and too folly a path for us distance runners. measuring
is the everyday of our bodies and the mind is hardly nature’s perpetual motion
machine, there is nothing left for the conceptual starter. one must
be diligent to the distance of body from body, from home,
and cannot stray into how deep the visualized folds of a tarless
brain now scar.

it’s this assiduousness that drives writer from writing, runner from running,
body from body. it’s the loyalty to the blind obedience that
makes dogs of us all, mouths slack and tongues loose, wagging we wag. a heaving
chest carries the weight of shaped math and the curves of a
sputtering starter heart, beats like footheels on asphalt all cracks and steam,
the breadth of a city as the breath of a man.

black-eyed (edited)

your new name hangs off the end
of your pressurized coal like a dragging pipe,
spewing smoke and sparks and shapeless noise like the ambience
in the street, and you
could start a parade if you only drove a little slower.

your new last name sounds like a freshly
dried candle, hanging from a rail still tied to
its twin, rolling in the sun like dogs in the dirt.
the waiting wicks tremble in the breeze safely, like
this soft air won’t ever feed immolation, but if fate
is anything to a finite burn, it’s never right where you are.

these witch wicks might have cast love spells
into the past on two blacking pairs of eyes that could
have fallen into any bed, staring through any hazy window.
maybe the heat of that summer night mixed with
the booze in your blood made you unaware of the dancing
candles and their incessant chanting, just
the murky molecules bouncing from one another droning the drums
in your ears. you wanted no code-break, no task of celestial cipher,
all you needed was to lose yet another piece
of your ringed self.

when black eyes burn white and the afternoon pants
like an alarm, sweaty feet hit a floor only cold because it’s hard.
a body only warm because it’s soft depresses the bed and
you figure this is what they all deserve as you turn a naked back
to lidded eyes. you know they just can’t
be the black you recall so you question the clothes at the foot of the bed.

his whole life in your hands now, you mouth the words
of candlemakers and playground taunts. blue eyes roll around
a skull like there’s room for two, but the ruse fades fast and you
hustle the hustle out.

he could fly jets with that stick between his legs and he will call
your signs and raise your directions. there always has to be a haze before
anything becomes clear, otherwise we’d all know the answers
and no one would need to discuss it with empty clothes, the mockery
of human form. and just like last night,
to get out, you have to be in.

your new last name is no weekend tent or thunderstorm umbrella,
it’s surgical and unconscious, taking the pros years to install
it into your life, replacements. it’s an even bigger plain over a cresting hill, full of
more wax and cotton than you knew was needed for such and ancient art. papa
will pay for the art of braids, they lay
one over the other and these humid strands are finally given shape and function,
to hold another as it
holds back, as clear as the clear as the cleanse, and without which not.

skirt

it will be an unfamiliar trial re-learning winter
after a detour to the sea, forcing fatalist hopes and a destiny
to at least see what it could be like, but maybe conquer the earth.
I will turn up ignored collars and string the muscles in my back
like piano wire, the frozen tension enough
to snap me in half, fold me in on myself, were it not for the
strength of a backbone crafted with more. the raw material of hopes and wants
are so similar that it’s hard to say which was used more when
I built this skeleton me.

and with my face to the dark middle wind of the city breath
I love, I will think of naked legs baking like bread in an ancestral
sun, browned and fresh. I want the list for that inside skin,
the last baked with the slightest rise, the soft of which begs to be
brushed with an unshaven cheek, watered and grown.

it seems that in spite of a manifest destiny and the unknowable flares of
fate, this is one plea meant to be ever unknown. you will throw yourself
to seadogs washed to shore where suncooked thoughts
sizzle like the summery roads that stretched us thin and far, and I
will lay with any promise that wants to believe.

so, if my westward mind travels those roads again
while there’s lungfilled whisper in my ear, or a streetside
bakery yields an unnecessary second of pause for a breath, please
don’t blame me for bringing you back from your gut feeling. it is, after
all, home.

finally notes

I can write you a murder ballad, heavy on the downbeats but slow
like august breaths in halls of wood. you still manage to get it all wrong,
clapping 1 and 3, exhaling on the evens;
this was one reason I could never move you.
how heavy do you think your embattled heart
weighs? you heaved yourself over that block, cracking and chipping
away, but we know it only looks like stone, soft
as a chest cavity. and still, I couldn’t bleed you.

this chorus bleats over and over again, dry and rolling. it
has little to do with anything but hooks at the end of lines,
dragging in the weeds and refuse that I’m lucky enough to find. this
contagious repetition happens to be just like fucking you: you can
easily tell when I’m just fishing for the sing along.

ears to the ground, it’s the lips of a bridge, one with mislaid purpose.
built never to be crossed it’s just an excuse for corrugated scrap and the
throw-away too weak for utility production, useful construction. the
road is perforated down the middle and these corded arms are held
wide enough, so I grab the curb. even
my fingers, all eight calluses lying, can crumble the blacktop in the dusty
west, and I tear your song in half.

it took too long to write this, to line it with the bass-beats of a heartline
shaken in green and erratic, glowing to let you know you’ve laid it
down. I topped it with enough crunched melody to make it
march through your rooms and cover your ears with stones.
all you wanted was the music in your bed to sound itself for
you and were kind enough to forgive the beatless silence.

all American writing ends with death, so it’s time to kill
the jukebox. this slaughter song won’t finish like it started: we forgot
the subtle promise of a quiet introduction, we lost the paired
syncopation of a first verse. now it alley-
screams over a flurry of sticks and strings, that dripping wet
brush of noise paints your face red as our familiar melody is mutated to
conclude.

I dreamt this end but never wrote it down. funny how music just ends
up where it goes, fading awhile, you imagine a whisper of a cadence
only meant for you to hear. that lonely tonic belts out as another
American poet butchers the ending.



Also, my Bruce poem got published! Woo!
http://www.inscribed.org/archive/msw/pdf/Vol4Issue5.pdf

we are the walking dead

In my attempts to fund my pending enrollment for graduate study, I've been looking for scholarships and all that fun stuff. This one in particular required an essay on the death penalty which I want to share here. I'm really a silly, silly person. I also think I'm a shoe in for the money.


The Walking Dead is a weekly comic book written by Robert Kirkman. The comic has been an ongoing series for several years and I follow it regularly. Though not a traditional book by the standards expected here, this book has honestly been one of the largest influences on my opinion of the death penalty and my life in general.

The death penalty is no easy topic to discuss. Like the other party-defining political hot buttons, such as abortion or gun control, there is little gray area for one's opinion. You either are in or you're out, and your decision leaves little room for inquirers to guess your other stances on such topics. It's extremely difficult to work outside these predisposed "boxes" and truly have an original and heard opinion.

The Walking Dead is a book about a global plague that causes the dead to rise and consume human flesh, more commonly referred to as "zombies". All government, economy and civilization as we recognize it has been obliterated and it's nearly every man for himself. The story has us following a small group of survivors simply trying to do just that in this harsh and unforgiving world.

In one instance, the survivors discover a murderer in their midst. This man is caught red-handed, literally, and is temporarily incapacitated and imprisoned for his insanity and irreversibly dangerous nature. There is little debate about what needs to be done with the criminal as he will only consume resources and attempt to cause more harm if he is to be kept alive. There are few qualified among this small group to offer this man any sort of help and their efforts are really better placed elsewhere, farming or building worthwhile community. The rehabilitation of the insane is not something one can afford when the simple act of waking up in the morning is a constant question.

This argument is one of logic. In an environment of severely limited resources, population and time, one cannot afford to have such an unpredictable human factor murdering the able bodies the rest of this small society depends on. The luxuries of opinion and belief are forcibly suspended in the face of simple survival and a sort of coerced de-evolution must take place. The comfort of self-awareness, imagination, wonder and self-endowed purpose takes a back seat to the basic principles of instinct: water, food, and reproduction. It's what makes the heavy decision of ending another life, albeit a dangerous one, so very simple.

These same principles could theoretically apply to our zombie-free society. We could appeal to logic and simply say that those who do not obey the most basic law of society will not be able to participate in it. I share in this deduction. I don't believe we have the right as human beings to take a life, but as a society, we have the right to remove those who do not oblige the law. The greater intangible that exists with a collection of ideals, even vague and generalized, is what gives us the right to spend those valuable resources where they can better serve the parent civilization. It is our collective belief in community that pulls in those in need, but also pushes out those who threaten our very survival.

Unfortunately, these ideas don't really fly in this pre-apocalypse United States. I do consider myself a bleeding heart liberal, but I cannot oblige this one stereotypical factor on the left. In all honesty, my greater notions are probably more socialist and black listed than those of your every day capitalist, but I stand by the idea that a cultivated and nourished community, rather than the placated and pampered individual, could potentially yield some of the greatest triumphs of mankind. It's extremely unfortunate that the personal desire for success and unfettered greed corrupts these lofty ideals and trumps any communal efforts before they are even idealized. I do not think that any "greater good" will be recognized until we actually are facing down the apocalypse and by then, of course, it will be too late. It's also funny that if and when that happens, these media-saturated, emotionally-charged topics of debate will be the least of anyone's concern.



HAHAHAHAHA. I am so getting a million dollars.

3 years today. Practically how long I actually knew her. It drives me mad to think of everything she's missed. Everything I missed. It's never over. It's never better. And it's not like things are going to change. Soon it will be four years, five. So much more is going to happen that I'll wish she was there for. I'll never even get to tell her about it.

I wonder if she's in me at all. Physically. One thing she was always fascinated with, and I too, was how matter was transferred. That every little part of us was once a part of something else. Possibly something titanic, like a star or a volcano. And eventually, every part that is us will be a part of something else. Like I might have a part of George Washington's fingernail in my ear, or dinosaur poop. I just now wonder, maybe a little too morbidly, if anything that was once her is now me. I'd like to think that maybe my chances aren't great, but there certainly is one. Geographically speaking, my chances are greater than a lot of people out there and there are plenty of bits in a person to go around. It'd just be nice to know.

I've decided I won't die patient.

after the bombs

I have been accepted into Columbia College Chicago's MFA Poetry program and I have a job at a dog kennel. After all that speculation and grief and complete disconnect from my own personality, the tornado of my life still proves to be intensely surprising.

I have been both terrible and small and have taught myself shameful lessons in handling emotion. It is not a huge undertaking to undo, but it is going to be trying. The worst part is that I have apparently been totally oblivious to everything that I have done these past few months. It's a unique and interesting perspective when you're proven that even your hindsight is horribly askew. I'm just sorry.

It's true though, I really would rather hate my life than not care about it. I actually hurt people a lot less when I was embittered and furious. Not that I am going all the way back there, but there has to be some relatively pleasant middle ground called "normal social interaction". I will hit it eventually.

So here's to stress and frustration and heartache and disappointment and embarrassment and shame. Here's to my awkward chest and my lackluster head. Here's to vomit and tears and rashes and pink eye. There's a reason you always see the passed out slapped awake; pain is the most familiar alarm, the most obvious notifier that something is amiss and needs to be changed. My hand has been in the fucking fire and I've been staring at it like some beardless caveman wondering what smells so good.

Other than that, I fucking got into Columbia for poetry. I am going to piss myself. And then never think about my future again, because I am dead fucking wrong.

the non

watching his simple chords and even untrained fingers might as well
be a plane straight east and a bus straight south, both double-paned
and humming, because
i can only see myself behind a microphone on a boxstage
in a village that used to mean something to the creation
of the world. i can smell the rich
of sweat and the solvent, pooled in this valley of heretics and cynics,
all cleaning their guns with hairspray
and eyeliner, making a murder look good. the fashion dictates that i
could get away with lies about my throat and the marks on your shoes
as long as it’s loud enough. all the while making eyes,
i’ll make these eyes at the pretty little things that walk along the
edges of a room, heels finding the half-inch quarter round
where the wall meets the floor, the sharpest points slide to the floor.
i feel like a carpenter (retired) arthritic with hands that used to build.

but in this room where i’m about to be a stranger no more, i can sing
about a father that hit me with a rope, i can talk about the earth
that covers the ring around my finger. i can even name you, the one
who let me into this room, as the reason i drink, the reason
for the reasons i imagine a life of dissonant harmony,
because with a reason,
any reason
(even without the non),
as long as it’s written, then
i could at least blame you for something.

the best part is the existence of it all, the life that comes with
the air we all breathe. a waking mind is a visionary,
and probability dictates someone is living our dreams.
with a government check spent on candy and cola, a pocket
with a bus card and a sky scraped clean,
pre-teens use any excuse for a wish, grasp any chance they find,
pray to a list of any and all gods and demons,
that when that next day dawns,
they wake up me.
as that room under skull is a place where poets pretend, some jumpstart
with his sister’s guitar is lying a melody. he’s already building that history
that can’t be proven otherwise and making a killing,
digging a mass grave with a six-stringed shovel,
his barrel smoking in the wake, lips red hot with the bullets shot.

bodies will roll down the slopes mistaken for measures, the staves
failing to note where they lie, and his novice fingers ache
with every hollow bar. thinking genocide tough,
he could stretch his knuckles for relief
and a wandering and painted eye might imagine
them once split in a short-lived rage against a wall against the world
against the sixteen-year veteran of secret wars, fingers
bruising familiar with a memory like a hammer in the fist
of a father; and like the eulogist, he can’t consider the reality,
because you can always see the casket
even with your back turned,
and everyone is still listening.

but even with the lies carving cavities in your teeth, holes to
hide in, that non bleeds through your gums. it’s quiet, blind and slow,
like a cloud, a worm, a comma.
it is the reason i wish for a lethal childhood, a hazy adolescence,
and lungs that carry words to ears (wishes another lives).
my words are burdened and hunched, thirsty and unshod,
for the space between is as barren as the west under the dusk,
as dark as that black oblivion we call a horizon. my words are
laden with the guilt of their untruth, and sweat beneath the
sun-god angry with his number on the list.

this is the hidden, the non:

i am bitter and i am leaving. someday i will make you pay for
what you did to yourself.
you will wish (on everything) to be one of the pretty
little things at the bottom of this grave: unmarked, cold and
many,
but at least listed and prayed to.
it will come with the existence of it all.

screen door slams

thunder road is a promise of a future, of
a way out of this dark winter to a spring that slithers through
dewy weeds no longer frozen with the dawn.
this ceramic jar of a house has finally been uncapped and
when noon hits, that pinprick of bright blinds me. a rich promise
is this present yielding to tomorrow, but I still can’t reach the rim unless
I am poured out and stale, mixed into mud, and clouded with the
disrupt of dirt into the air.

the only thing is that thunder road is still a road. a path
that has been laid, foundations and plans wrought into reality.
it was made to be followed.
out of this town, out of this time, you leave one season only to
find another. and with only four options, universal mathematics
foretell variables, but after how many repeats? at the end of
this road is another jar, another
dark under and over and through lids that shake like leaves with
the touch of a turning breeze.

it was a road that first brought me to that shore at the edge
of the world. a road that began at the lips and bricked past
the eyes. a road that always turned a blind corner, a road
that consumed soles and tongues. it was the crushed
earth, tarred like a criminal, that showed me I can’t stay here.

the blade at the top of the weather was cold, yet still burns my body;
I am branded. I sweat, yet it falls from my brow as snow,
dusting the roads that I trusted. the seasons lose their reasons
as they mix in
the mortar of my heart, crushed with the pestle of my poison
and I can only see a ship cresting a sea-stone horizon. with
a battered lesson in hope and loss, I now open my chest
and see for myself and know more than just the roads in this city.

there’s an island, so a coast, a bronzed angel lighting my way,
and the ruins of golden towers. this is a broad way
for my feet to be finding, yet I am swept away again like so
much dust, later found beneath the woven floor. thunder road
ended at the west, sunk into the sea with a misting star,
until I turned around, and found it stretching east,
that man-wrought shortcut to the nearest dawn.

it’s impossible going back because it is impossible to move
anything but forward. location is a myth, time is a legend,
and all that anyone really knows is what it feels
like to be carried away. fate matters as little as choice
and answers are never punctuated. the earth dawns as it sets
and spins tight as it is unwound. thunder road is only an echo
of your lifeflash that already happened; counting the seconds,
the steps, to figure how far away you just might be.

finale

I've been talking about being a victim of fate and not having any control over the circumstances that have seemed to take a hold of my life and put me in my place. I haven't quite convinced myself that this is the actual case, nor am I really that terrified of fate or destiny or the fact that my entire life might already be planned, but I think I'm going to put it to the test.

Tomorrow I am going to make a telephone call that will probably decide the rest of my life. At least it will put a path before me that I will hopefully follow for a considerable amount of time and will open up opportunities that would otherwise be closed. I think I've figured out what this whole mess all means and yes, ultimately, the decision still does lie with me.

April 1st is my deadline. Again, another week of unemployed boredom wrought with social and fatalist drama, but at least this time I'm expecting it. Hell, I get to be the damned catalyst.

Oh, spring. You slither through weeds.

the hazards of love

All I really know anymore is bad news, is hope upon hope just so simply crushed. I can have one little thing in the day that gives me a grin and sure enough, it's taken away just as quickly as it leaves my face. Now, I used to get all higher-power on myself and I was convinced that someone was out to get me. That my spiritual impact was too much to be ignored and I had to be shut down. As much as it made me feel powerless to stop these things from happening, it also challenged me because, if Jeff Allen is anything, it's a fucking God.

I have to say that these past couple of months, ever since I returned from that trip, things have been strange. It's nearly uncanny really, the amount of dramatic events that can happen to a guy who really has absolutely nothing to do all day. That no matter how record-setting boring I can be, human and social drama continues to envelop me.

I could get into specifics, but really, that would just cause more of that drama to unfold. Of course, it will eventually, but even at this point where this soap opera bullshit is all I have in my life, I'd really like to deal with it in the most mature way possible.

I'm not saying that I really believe there is a God, much less one that's out to get me, but I can't help but think I'm being tested, maybe. All I know is that it has a lot to do with the small amount of plans I've made for the future and my swollen hope that is unfortunately completely dependent upon other people. And really, even those third parties who are privy to the sitcom roller coaster of my unemployed everyday can't help but admit that even objectively, it sure looks like I've been eating shit sandwiches for a few months now.

And right now, things are happening peripherally that really inhibit me from being as selfish and whiny as one might be. This is more of an observation rather than a complaint; as terrible as things may be, I still know this cannot be forever. I will get out of this, probably sooner than later, but I still don't think I'm at the end of this run either. Whatever is happening is making sure to sap every silly ounce of hope from me, and it's nearly complete. Maybe not a higher power or any personal vendetta, but this is all going to be looked back upon as a large, singular event in my life. And there has been no climax yet, and I'm not sure which way it's going to go.

I would obviously prefer the cinematic, optimistic ending. Where the spirit of humanity in this civilization is almost beat, almost totally removed, except for that one remaining shred of hope. That the soul is tested, tried, battered and torn, yet it still remains only full of spirit. So I am rewarded and happy and smiling and I see this as a dark time that consumed the sun, but I prevailed; crawling from the ashes and into the light. That would be really nice, some sort of happy ending.

On the other hand, we have reality. Where it has been proven to me that these things are not possible. That my dreams, my hypotheses, my plans and plots, are not to be. Nothing I have envisioned in these past months has even come close to being realized. Yet I still have this hope. I'm holding out for one more school, holding out on the letter, holding out on these pathetic jobs that I apply for every fucking day. I still can't learn my lesson. And if life does anything, it's fucking teach painful, terrible lessons. There will be an ending to this. And I don't think it's one any sane person should look forward to.

My friend is writing a book about a world where machines perform our menial labor. That the working class and most everything else is completely operated by loyal machines. Humans exist only to express their creativity, to be artists, musicians, poets. This woman cannot succeed in this. She submits her work over and over and over again, but is constantly rejected. Eventually, the government steps in and removes her soul to put into one of these machines. It's all very Asimov and unique and just so... applicable.

What if she had a choice? Her dreams and her aspirations and all her creativity is just not working. She tries and tries and fails and fails. Ultimately it becomes apparent that she is functionally unable to realize her dream. She is only failure. It has to happen. There have to be people out there who just can't do what their entire life is meant to do. It's right there that I understand those motivations. If I can't be what I want to be, if I can't do what I want to do, if I am 100% positive that my future will not be what I want, what the hell choice is there?

There's irony in all this, of course. With every depressing aspect of reality, there is that underlying irony. Mine is that I keep telling myself over and over and over again, that maybe soon, this will all be behind me. It will all be over.

Hopefully.

the keeper

the huge ornate lamp swims
in a pool of mirroring mercury, the ringed
wick sitting like a dawning sun cresting
an open sea; a wishful design for the overnight crew
carefully peering towards an assumed shore. a giant
of maritime industry tiptoes over a rising earth masked
with the reflection of night.

another two hours slide away amidst half-dreams of
Mr. Pleasonton ankle-high, learning the feel
of a beach-covered rubber sole against his cheek, sand
and salt styled into the shine of his scalp like the spotted
brush stroke of an amateur impressionist copying greats.

a pained groan crawls through the bones of this
lighthouse as the metal guts reach the extent of their whined.
it’s 62 steps to the crank and every chipped and worn
marble stair threatens each aching, swollen ankle to repeat this
process. by the time this not-that-old keeper reaches the top,
his lungs scream out for anything other than the cold
salt that blows in from the sea and has to piss.
he hoists himself just enough onto the ledge and makes an attempt
to shower the rocks below, but skies are clear and the night is deep.

hopefully the profuse sweat that now pours down the
strangely pink face will suffice for now, as another groan shakes
the balance of his hope. he knows there is a ship inching along
the cold horizon, all eyes unsuspectingly staring right at him and his
broken man as the lamp’s liquid spin begins to falter. he could not
wind the crank 127 times and watch the tanker’s candlestars
drift on a nightman’s guess toward certain calamity, could laugh
slightly at the scream of rusting metal that will break the
gently assuming monotony of water and feel grinning vindication toward
an uneducated politician. he elaborates these all-too-familiar
images again, as he did two hours before and will two hours from now,
and shuffles behind the lamp. he cranks and counts and sweats and
coughs and curses every muscle aged too quickly in this house of the sun.

127. hands on knees, the rejuvenated spin caresses his back with a
dancing flame. the next sweep bathes his bloodied eyes with gold.
a third has two fingers dipped in the bath of the lamp, cool and slick
against dry, nailess fingers. it rolls down his rising arm into the sleeve
of his peacoat and crawls through his armpit to his waistband. there’s a
barely illuminated lick as two silvered fingers pop into a chapped mouth
and come out clean. another metallic groan creeps
through the strobing house, but not amongst the wallstones,
but thick in the air like a penitent wind.

it’s here, in this high, that he can never remember if she is the ship
or the lamp, if he is the mercury or the walls, and who exactly leads
the other to shore. either way, he is
poison
poisoned
poisoning,
she is floating mirrored.
and the sea scrapes her belly against the rocks and will
always turn to earth,
eventually.

Funny joke

Guy gets offered a job, tells his potential employer that he can't make a decision just yet because he's waiting to hear back from a more lucrative job elsewhere. Days pass. Guy finally hears back from the job he's waiting for; he didn't get the position. Calls back the other place and it's too late! They offered the job to someone else. Guy remains unemployed and has hopes totally crushed.

Oh, he also had a part-time job on Saturdays that he quit for either of these two positions!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Circle of Cysquatch

Alright, so I think I was a little harsh with that last post. I really don't hold that much resentment towards Metropolis or the whole NPO art school thing. There is obviously a considerable degree, but last week I was simply fuming. Truth is, I've learned a lot here, met some wonderful people, and really gained a lot of applicable experience that is valuable to potential employers. I've also secured some very good looking references even if every other school in Chicago says, "Metropolis? What's that?" It's very similar to how I feel about Millikin; there were some really wonderful moments, I met the best of my friends, but had some considerable problems and frequent hostile run-ins with the administration and small-minded politics that run private educational organizations. I would say this will continue to be a problem of mine until, of course, those politics favor me. Then that shit is mine.

But really, today is my last day and I am sad. As much as I shit on this place, it's really done a lot more good for me than bad. I won't miss this commute or waking up at 7:30 on Saturdays, but Metropolis has a good heart, if just simply misguided. I'm afraid I can't maintain much hope for their long-term survival, but these people will be able to move on and hopefully find themselves with something that makes them happier. Look at me, I'm a can of spray cheese.

My week has also helped me put a much more positive spin on this. Everything in the world has been happening this first week of March. I was officially offered the dog kennel job, but the day of the offer, I also had a phone interview with an arts school in downtown Chicago. Now this organization is one that Metropolis could take a cue from. They have been around since 1978 and focus on providing no-cost visual arts programming to 6-12 graders within the city of Chicago limits. These cats know their shit. On a staff of twenty, same as Metropolis, they have a development department of four. Metropolis has one woman with only half of her job put towards development. Not any sort of way to run a not-for-profit organization. The man who conducted the interview also told me that he was about to forsake NPO work until he got a job with this organization, Marwen, and it turned his entire disillusionment right around. Some things are too poetic to ignore.

Anyway, so this is wonderful, but now I have to jerk this dog kennel around. They really want me too. The woman was incredibly nice and telling me consistently that the job would soon go to 40 hours a week and I would get a raise and benefits and I feel awful. Also, with Javier getting me the hook-up and then having to do something like this, I just feel like a prick. But there's little I can do. They can't exactly deny that this other job would be a better deal for me. If I am to get hired, I would make more money than I've ever made for less time than I've ever worked. It's a salaried position at less than 30 hours a week with benefits. Kind of unbelievable.

I also have heard from two grad schools within 30 minutes of each other. Neither of them are the ones I really want to go to. The University of Iowa has rejected me whereas the New School in New York has said I am "very high on their list". The guy I spoke to there was very strange and not well-spoken and incredibly excitable. He seemed more nervous to speak with me than I was with him. I got the rejection letter first, but this phone call really perked me right up. I'm not exactly sure why I applied to two schools that I have little interest in attending, especially with little free money, because the last thing I want to do right now is leave this city. I have never been more in love with Chicago than I am right now and I can't even fathom leaving at this point.

I also can't stop playing "For You" and "Thunder Road" on the piano. Michelle scored a Pittsburgh floor ticket for me for Bruce. I'm going to lose my mind. I just want to freaking be him.



Black Arrow got to practice very loudly in one of the most character-filled studios I've ever seen. Ryan, our bass player (that's fucking right, Black Arrow is of FOUR and Robert, Daniel and Jeff have let in another), works at this place and had a lot of free time this week. "I've Had the Time of My Life" from Dirty Dancing was recorded on the board they have in this studio. Seriously awesome.

I am also intensely happy with the work we are doing. Medford was a learning curve, for sure. This shit is epic. We're nearly comfortable enough with a working setlist to start doing things with it, and I couldn't be more excited. Honestly, with most of the shit I've seen out there that is making what they can out of this industry, we're going to destroy the world like an arrow through the broken breast of Smaug. When the thrush knocks, people, you answer with a secret door.

This isn't even the half of it though. This week just won't quit. I just feel really damned good. Also, my birthday is coming up and this is what I want:

@ the Metro:
3/23 - Ratatat, $20
4/1 - Margot and the Nuclear So & Sos, $15
4/4 - The Faint, $25
4/11 - Mates of State, $20
4/30 - Mastodon, $20
5/7 - Dan Deacon, $10

@ the Empty Bottle:
4/1 - The Mountain Goats, $16

@ the Vic:
10/7 - Ian Anderson, $69

And that's about it for now. It's like spring is coming or something. Roy Orbison singing for the lonely, baby that's me and I want you only.

your kid is not talented

Also, I don't fucking care what a beautiful singer your daughter is or where her headshots are or what kind of natural dancer she is. I don't fucking care so much that I want to make her smoke a million cigarettes, smash her face in with an ornate table leg, cut her feet off at the ankles and cauterize it with a blowtorch a la Misery.

Seriously, fuck your stupid daughter. One day, she's going to give a blowjob, alright? That's who your daughter really is, you closet homosexual. You can't be an 8-year old female voice student anymore sir, those days are long past. If you're not going to actually sign her up for anything or give me a credit card number, get off the fucking line cause I have to make a call.

http://suicidehotlines.com/illinois.html

Employment, un-

I quit Metropolis today. That one day a week was just too much for me. Really it's because of the now intolerable amount of unprofessional bullshit that is inherent in arts administration. I've encountered it every where I go, from Flower to Windy City, and thought that I would escape it in a fucking NPO school, but even though I am only putting in 6 hours a week, I still cannot get away from it. It's just an inherent facet in the arts industry. And of course, it's driven from the inability for these organizations to actually make a decent buck. So, whenever some program or some individual overly invested in their position reduces their professionalism to dressing relatively nicely every day but is not above debasing a "lower" employee, swearing or even crying, these even relatively meager cash cows (calves, really) are placated to any requested degree by the other individuals in the organization so they can protect their own interests. These companies are entirely run by some of the most selfish and individually-oriented people that this American world can manufacture: the failed actor/dancer/musician turned teacher turned administrator. It's every fucking man for himself and any considerate dedication or motivation for the betterment of the organization or just simple kindness from normal people is considered a weakness, and is thoroughly exploited.

I have, for a year now, made a 40 - 90 minute commute twice every day to put 40+ hours of hard and creative underpaid work without any health benefits at all only to never get a raise and then eventually get laid off. And then, when our fiscal farm animal discovers they really need that extra administrative help that was shouted out of the office, is this dedication rewarded? Is karma consciously realized? No. No matter how much rope I extend to this company, how much benefit of the doubt I suffer, how much fucking time and concentrated effort I shit into this flushing toilet, I receive nothing but a giant dick-covered middle finger in my face. Because entitlement is worn like skin in arts administration and the dollar gets whatever it wants. Because the inability of others to remain professional in an entirely business situation is something I have to pay for. And I'm supposed to still come in every fucking Saturday at nine in the morning to answer the phone four times in six hours. Remember this kids, in arts administration, working hard and caring about what you do and trying to make a difference means absolutely dick. Unless you bring the bling, you're just another douche bag kid with a BA and tattoos. Yeah man, good fucking luck.

Oh, but weren't all these well-connected and integral individuals supposed to get me a job elsewhere within this industry? Oh, does that just mean once a month you send me a link to an administrative assistant position that I already applied for three weeks ago? Oh, you don't know anyone who works anywhere else within the industry? You just have a computer? Cool. Me too.

I got a job at a dog kennel. Because I used to work with one of the guys who works there. This is my hook-up. Javier, who taught me to swear in Spanish and calls me "Yefferson Park". Who looks exactly like Cheech. Who saw me driving one day, pulled up next to me and said, of our old boss, "Maureen, (makes gun with forefinger and thumb and puts it to his temple) she blow her brains out." This is who is helping me. This hilarious, kind-hearted, dedicated individual who loves working with dogs. Fuck my education, my talent, my experience, my motivation, my dedication, and all the fucking hours that I wasted trying to contribute what I know I can to the industry of the one thing in the world that I can't live without: music. All because I'm not someones brother's cousin or take it in the ass. All because I'm a fucking professional. I'm just going to surround myself with a bunch of stinky-ass shed machines owned by those self-important assholes because they have better things to do that clean up dogshit. But those constantly-grinning tongue-faces wouldn't want anything else, so at this point, surrounding myself with unconditional love instead of self-righteous disrespect might be a welcome change.

Mom, I'm sorry that you put so much money into an education that means about as much as a second dick. I'll give this poetry bullshit a go, but chances are I'm going to be one of those really weird dog-people for the rest of my life. God dammit. Those are such gross, sad people. I definitely need to get married before that happens. To anyone. Just so I won't be so terrifyingly lonely.

So, who's up for it?

Happy Vain Ents Day Eve

We all know that nearly every single day of the year we can celebrate Vain Ents Day. We wish each other merry tidings and well being for your families, all while remembering Old Man Willow Boner and his countless contributions to human society and his giving spirit. Today, however, is the one day of the year that we give our Vain Ents a break and reflect on the 364 wonderful Vain Ents Days that we've had. It's also an opportunity for us to realize that even though Vain Ents Day misses that one trying day every year, we still get to bask in the warmth of anticipation and expectation that we feel every evening before bed, knowing that Vain Ents Day will be upon us again in just a few short, unconscious hours. Vain Ents Day Eve, though not the genuine holiday, should not go unrecognized as the event we can celebrate 365 days a year, every year. The day we start to take the rights and freedoms (that if not for OMWB, we would never know) for granted, is that day we no longer deserve them. So, I say to all of you, in good health and good bones, Happy Vain Ents Day Eve. Enjoy tomorrow, if not for yourself, then for all the vain ents out there.

I'd also like to recognize a bit of Valentine's Day. Tonight I will be spending it by myself with a pizza and a puppy and probably Kindergarten Cop and that's okay with me. But! I was thinking about some "Most Romantic Things Ever" stuff and I've decided to share some of my conclusions here.

Most Romantic Movie Scene:

I really don't see the point in arguing with me on this one. Every woman ever wants this. Period. And every guy ever wishes he was Han Solo and said that to Princess Leia. George Lucas originally had Harrison Ford saying, "I love you, too" but it never quite felt right. After a few takes he eventually told Harrison to just say whatever he felt was right and this is what came out. Pure fraking romance.

Most Romantic Song:

This is not as infallible as Han Solo and Leia, so I'll have to waiver from obvious fact to my own personal opinion. Lyrics:

If I put my hands to your stomach,
or put my lips to your hand.
Birmingham has gone to motors.
Take me home, keep your eyes on the road.
So don't forget to kiss me if you're really going to leave.
Couldn't you take the second bus home?
Couldn't you just take me with you?
I'm convinced that you're from mars.

And that's all you need.

And I've been looking for this one poem by Li-Young Lee as my idea of the most romantic poem, but I cannot find it online right now and don't remember the name. Maybe you'll get lucky later. I'm sure you're all really broken up about it. Anyway, that's all I have for now. Someday I'll tell you why Einstein indirectly defined hope as insanity. Happy Vain Ents Day Eve.

Grey Havens

I just posted all the good pictures from the trip on Facebook. There certainly were a lot. In all, I took over 1100, about 700 of them being blurry. It's so hard to look at these pictures and remember these things yet know that the photo itself does so little justice for what happened.

I've been trying to describe how I feel. What exactly are my reasons for running every day and doing sit ups and shit and buying pork and chicken and eating better and watching myself. It's a strange thing and as much as I've started doing these things before and stopped very soon, I don't think I'm going to this time.

The closest I can come to finding some relation is at the end of Return of the King when Frodo is going with Gandalf and Bilbo and the elves to the Grey Havens. He just has to go. The pain is to great. But even that is terribly overdramatic and too tangible an idea. I don't have to leave Chicago and I certainly don't plan on it any time soon. I just have to let some other things go, I think. Or embrace new things more openly. Really I just think I have to take better care of myself in every aspect of my life.

If I were to become a rapper, I think the first line of the first rap song I would write would be, "I make mistakes like a baker bakes cakes, my talent allows for so much more but it's all anyone seems to be calling for." Maybe more swearing and refernce to a ho-ma. Well then... Jeffinitely is born today.

Maybe I will use this silly thing to post some poems. I wrote probably over a dozen on this trip and I have notes for 5 more, and they all suck. It's kind of wonderful. You can all tell me where things blow and where things suck, and even where some things might not suck as hard as they blow, but they are kinda shitty. I swear, if I don't get into grad school, I'm moving back home and measuring carpet for the rest of my life. And no, that's not a sexual reference.

Job hunting is the worst thing ever. 588,000 was the latest number I heard as to Americans on unemployment benefits currently. And after that, even Steph got laid off. I also hear that the unemployment office, specifically Chicago, is incredibly understaffed. So, those of you who needs these benefits, get on the bus now. There's no time for people to be constantly checking up on you and making sure you abide by all the ridiculousness that is unemployment. This money is yours anyway, take advantage of it while you can.

AWP is next week. I'll be participating on Thursday, February 12th at 5pm for Bronze Man Books. It's at the Hilton downtown. I think a signing or something. Big celebrity type stuff. Maybe someone will love me so much they'll write me a huge check. Those things happen right?

Bruce is right though. About poets. He never said it was the right thing to do per se, but why put it in Jungleland if it isn't?

"The poets down here don't write nothing at all, they just stand back and let it all be."



Of course it's right. Stop writing, everyone. You can't write everything, nor should you.

An Ocean's Garbled Vomit On the Shore

Los Angeles, I'm yours.

Not exactly, but still:

Unfortunately, there is something about it.

But we made it. Arizona sucks, but desert and cactus were cool. Unless you love those things beyond everything else, never go to Arizona. It's like New Mexico puked and California was like, "Heyyyyy... nice puke. You weren't... I mean, did you want that? Cause I could... you know. Eat it. Yeah? Cool. Thanks." And then California shit its pants and that's Arizona. I got better things to do, nawsayn?

But, as soon as we got into California, we stopped for gas and I payed $8 for this shitty ham and cheese sandwich on Wonder Bread and a bag of Doritos. I was not happy. California man. Same exit though had a sweet Patton memorial museum. We didn't go in, but check him out, pants.


We made LA just in time for the sunset. Here is Christine Killian, manifest destiny incarnate, ocean to mother fucking ocean, making real her future:


Congrats lady. If anyone can "make it" here, it's certainly you.

So we got to C's place and it is cool. Nice and big and not shitty, with a dude of a roommate, probably two once I meet the other. We immediately went for sushi and it just so happened to be the most amazing sushi ever. It was ridiculous. I could not believe the thing in my mouth. I had to call Daniel and he couldn't hear me cause he was getting mugged by a snowman or some other crazy Chicago shit. Then today, I ate In N Out Burger. Equally mouth amazing. Stupid redeeming qualities about coastal shit factory.

I kind of can't wait to go home. It's been an absurd and wonderful trip, but I gotta take care of rent. I am the house mom. Maybe 'House Bunny' like that sweet movie. I can only imagine how many futons are left down and half full beer bottles are all over the place. Probably a million. Aw, but really, who am I kidding?

One more thing. It's something I don't want to really recognize or give the proper credit to, but it's... uncannily ridiculous. I wasn't able to get a picture as it was moving quickly in the opposite direction, but we saw it again... The Weinermobile. Seriously. As we reached LA. I don't know why it happened or what it could possibly mean, but for something of this magnitude to occur and it go unrecognized... well... I'm not a fatalist by any means, but let's be frank (pun intended) that's some fucked up shit. To honor said shit, here is the original sighting in video format:

And that's it. I have successfully completed a wonderful and enlightening road trip. Now I need another.

Anyone want to pick me up at O'Hare around 5 PM tomorrow? Thx.

<3,

Jeffinitely

Drunken History

So we left our adorable little bungalow in T or C yesterday morning. We went down the street to the Happy Belly Deli and got ourselves a couple of Happy Belly Breakfast Burritos. What a town. We spent a lot of time in a gift shop and I couldn't buy anything for anyone as it was all made of leather and pewter and cost a million dollars each. Someday though, I'm going to have my ranch in Truth or Consequences and be able to afford that sweet cowboy gear. Melissa, C and I have a pact that whoever gets rich and buys a ranch has to hire the other two on as ranch hands. Then I'll die of lung cancer cause who doesn't want to smoke every time they're on a horse?

Then it was off through the desert to Arizona. At least that's what we though. We took a more scenic road that just happened to pass
through two sections of the Gila National Forest. It was absurd. We climbed to over 8000 ft. in these mountains covered in green. It was like the Pacific Northwest had somehow laid claim to this arid mountain in New Mexico. Above and beyond the most beautiful state in the Union. And they are in the Union, gods dammit, no matter how many confederate flags I see.

We made a stop in a town called Silver City and got Wendy's. Zagat voted Wendy's the best burger in Silver City. It was pretty great.

Then we hit Arizona, Tucson and Phoenix. Not too much fun in this state. I think we'll get some genuine desert today, but AZ whatever. Go Steelers. We did, however, eat at this bar called the Purple Turtle. Lots of karaoke by the locals who screamed cause they were horny. Oh boy Phoenix. Where are you coming from?

I didn't bring my razor because my face is still 13, but I look awesome. I can't wait to hit up the town in LA. We'll be getting there today hopefully by evening, ready to take on a Pacific sunset and some sushi, I'm thinking. Funds are still relatively concrete, except for that fucking $245 gas bill I got. What the fuck People's Gas? I'll give you some people's gas.

Superbowl Sunday with Bruce, Melissa Royston that evening, and a flight back home. Things are gonna change, people. I swear it this time. All I want to do is actual things now. I have all this time and I've only ever wallowed in it. I've wasted nearly 3 months of nearly nothing to hold me back and I've never been lazier in my life. Winter, my ass. I'd rather be cold and moving than still cold in my fucking $245 heated apartment and getting more like the fat chick I am. Yeah, I talk big, but you all can eat me. Like a frosty, not too fast or I'll give you a headache. And who fucking orders a vanilla frosty? Of course I want chocolate, you Best-Burger-in-Silver-City-flipping mother fraker.

To close, Michelle told me that Barack Obama said, "The reason I'm running for President is because I can't be Bruce Springsteen." For the country's sake, let's all hope that that doesn't apply to me just yet.

Judgement.

Uh. This has probably been the greatest day of my life.

Carlsbad Caverns, driving through more of New Mexico which I now declare in the top 3 most beautiful states, ROSWELL, White Sand National Monument and then stopping for the evening in Truth or Consequences to take a much needed and deserved natural hot springs bath. And that's only the beginning.

Anything I write about today will not do any good. I cannot express what has happened to me. It's corny and ridiculous but with the amount of intense exposure to absolutely pure and unaltered beauty was almost too much for this guy to handle. I could think of little else than my disbelief and awe and of course Margot. The pictures I'll post are good but... not. There's nothing I can offer through this medium that will do what I feel needs to be done. All I know is that Robert's camera ran dry twice today from all the ridiculous use. And I broke my phone again. It works, but not really. It was definitely worth falling down the huge hills at White Sands.

Anyway, here are pictures. I hope they can at least provide an aid to what I went through. I took over 360 pictures/videos today and I wish I had more. Thanks for blogging with me today. It's not a day I'll soon forget.

That’s Carlsbad Caverns. All I can really say is: Massive. The sheer size of this gigantic hole in the earth that water made is simply ridiculous. I didn’t know if I wanted to cry or laugh or simply shut the fuck up and keep walking. I was utterly enthralled. The camera gave out with probably an hour left through the caves, but it really wasn’t taking the best pictures anyway. No fault to the camera of course because “dark as fuck” doesn’t begin to describe what it had to work with.

I would say I drew inspiration from this if it were true. It’s not that I wasn’t inspired, it’s just… what the fuck do you write about? There’s nothing I can put down on a sheet of paper that would accurately describe what that place did to me. Or that you would want to read for that matter.

Roswell and the UFO museum. Melissa met an alien. Awesome.

Oh, nothing. Just New Mexico.

White Sands National Monument. As you can actually see from these pictures, we might have been on huge mounds of snow, but oh no ladies and gentlemen. Genuine white sand. Not that climactic, but it was still fucking nuts. First thing I did was roll around in it and fall down hills and hurt myself all the while breaking my phone, as usual. Then the sun set and there was this sand and this sky and I lost my mind again. It just can’t happen enough on this trip.

This is one of the only times I’ve done anything like this and I am absolutely floored. This is one temperate zone in one region of one country in an incredibly small percentage of the world, and I think I know where I want to be for the rest of my life. I’ve got a lot to do.

Now I’m in Truth or Consequences. Fitting.