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often i am afraid to write because music is a stronger medium. mere silence i feel is more powerful than any number of words (or absence of words). should i be playing music, which is often, then i will be more than intimidated. my inspiration will generally be blown away by the emotional power of the music; my mind does not rest on letters but on notes. they lift me up, so to speak, higher than the lines of my paper.

but yet i am always compelled to speak in words and not music; my expression comes through characters forming words forming tales. they are written down, paper or screen. each time i cry out soundlessly that no word could ever trump a noise in a rigorous demonstration of pathos; each time i do not cry out soundlessly for that in itself is music which is beyond my ability.

the catharsis of writing is then replaced with that of music. an overwhelming flood replaces a burning pen, and the soothing gushing melody comes through my ears to put out a flaming passion of dictional momentum. time and time again, you will not read of me for i am too busy hearing of you.

nontheless, here am i, the perpetrator of his own words, themselves paradoxical. i am writing to say that i cannot use words for i can hear well enough. for it must be done, as i am capable of no other route; i am a locomotive with motivation and here in this paper is my destination. my pen hangs over the paper through any blows and down always it goes to make ink splotches and run rivers of images where you can drink lots of literal anecdotes, rhymes that float, poems that rhyme, and please excuse me if this is no masterpiece, for everybody has their fair share of mistakes and botches. and now that here i am, please stand back as i prepare to generate a mass of prose that will inundate each line and page; no, i'm not one of the pros, but on it goes, saturating and liberating prisoners of the dictionary, words risen from the pages into fiction, diction coming out now to serve from previous dereliction. but i do not write to bring peace: i am not here to put you at ease; please, this piece will subject you to gees, will charge you to fees, will take out your knees. it's just not feasible to cater to all when there are just haters, but i do something greater because i move in one direction, like an elevator, which is up in perfection. you can dissect this all you like and sooner or later you will find that i am but a traiter, using unjust beats and unowned treats to achieve a feat of musical production which is this.

so i find that regardless, there is music greater than any set of words i can produce. i myself am prone to falling into lyrical production instead of simply writing. but perhaps there is no right and wrong.

music is an essay

music is an essay that i cannot find myself to write. i don't have a paper to write on, nor do i have a pen with which to mark. not that it matters. there are infinite combinations that could be laid out. sequences and patterns never before thought of, never imagined, that don't exist until they suddenly do.

but they never will, because i will not write them. music is an essay that i cannot find myself to write. i cannot find myself to write. i cannot find myself. i cannot. find myself. but i could, before. before, i found myself to write a essay of music that was merely an essay. can i not find myself, or can i not write the essay? or can i not find myself to write the essay?

sloth is an essay that i can find myself to write. i write it each day, each hour, with my still eyeballs that scribble madly, lazily, nothing. i write this essay of meaninglessness so that i need not write anything else. my pen is a paint roller, my paper not important. i write while lying down | i write while standing up | i write while sitting down | i write while writing | i write in my sleep | i write incessantly as if running in place will win me a marathon where the reward is a single step forward.

evil is an essay that i can find myself to write. sometimes it sneaks up on me; i write this essay accidentally. i write an essay so dark and drenching that the pen is my blood and the paper is my life. it soils my soul to write this essay. but this accident is not the careless tipping of my inkwell; when i spill my blood there i have known for days, years, and eons that it is to be spilled. the blood falls from my every orifice: i speak in blood, hear in blood, smell in blood, see in blood, urinate in blood. the sweat from writing this paper is not blood; it is bile, a noxious odor that destroys the fat of life. it stains me when i sweat, a stain not easily removed by any means. i do not wish to write this essay.

soon i wish to not write any essays. soon i will not need to write any essays, because they will be beneath me. i will write music, and you will hear it. it will be a song of heaven, and then you will know that a single note is better than any number of words however beautiful.

where you are

imagine for a minute that you are in a swamp. imagine the emptiest, most colorless landscape possible. this is where you are. this is your current surroundings. the trees are a mush green, as is the ground, and the sky. is it night or day? doesn't matter. it's just blackness here. you might as well have no soul. who needs one, anyway.

anyway. there you are. are you physically there? you might as well be a floating eyeball. one of those floating camera robots form movies and imagination. never mind that this is imagination. imagine that this is not imagined. this landscape? this is who you are. be there. be here.

there is no sound. like you're in space. so silent, you've probably just gone deaf. but you can hear the faint sounds of some small voice nibbling at your sureness. you might as well be blind, because there is nothing worth seeing.

then, there is somebody else here. where? how do you even know that another person is here? who is it? is this person... kind? or cruel? foolish? amicable? reticent? tempered? tolerant? able? reserved? alive?


after a moment or infinity, the sensation of the muck inside your guts changes. not murky, not a cluttering, but a jerking of tendons and creaking. suddenly there is something sought. suddenly satiated senses are unsatisfiable. suddenly, you crave it all: a raw sensual mourning, a deep thirst in the bottom of yourself that threatens to creep over the edge and saturate. you need anything and everything. it is not merely hunger, greed, or lust. it is a yearning so strong that it borders on apathy. to care so much that you do not care at all.

you realize that this desire, it seeks what was already had. you want a state of nothingness, a soullessness, an independence. you were not searching for the somebody else, because you found yourself. you know, now. you know. and that is not enough.

alone in the dark; foibles; my soul sings

sometimes, i'm alone in the dark. i will sit with all the lights off in my room, and pretend that the computer screen lit up ahead of me is my personal and only window into the world. how amazing it is that my mind can so quickly accept that small rectangle in my vision as my total perception of my world. soon i don't even know that there is a setting for this: my darkened room, the desk cluttered with overdue papers, my clothes strewn upon the floor... here, i'm able to train my senses to interact directly with my window. when i type words, it's a complete extension of my speech. when i switch to a different page, it is actually my head turning to look in another direction. the computer is a part of me, and i see what it shows me. welcome to the matrix, no?

but then, something incredible happens. my mind, though bonded, flesh and machine, starts in sudden activity. it is as though a buzzing swarm of bees has entered into my head, each drone carrying its pheromone message and honeyed load. my fingers and mouth are the exits, and my eyes are entrances to this hive. there are thoughts alive in my brain.

in this out of body experience, i forget who i am. all i know is the screen in front of me, and it is then nothing more than a game, a puzzle, a riddle that has challenged me. i am confident and determined. no task however ambiguous can overpower me. i have every tool at my disposal, with the adept hands to handle them. i grimly set upon the task. this me is my worst enemy.

who am i? i don't know who... so i should ask you? do you know who i am? if i don't know who i am, how would you know who i am? do i even know who you are? if i don't know you, then how can you know me? are you you? am i me? we are each other, but flawed, so we are not each other.

-

the driver who hits the gas between red lights and stop signs. a man who eats two lunches for lunch to fill his stomach every day. a high five ignored. a extra pair of woolen socks sitting comfortably in the drawer back home. a thick textbook. a helmet left in the backseat. the two day trip to Tokyo from JFK. ethanol. a pack of ramen without a bowl. peanut butter and the allergic. the itsy-bitsy spider.

when i brought my umbrella every day but today when it poured. when i kept those games installed after swearing them off. when i went back to my room early to sleep early to wake early only to procrastinate and miss a good time with my friends that i denied myself. when i said i would write that paper on the weekend so that i could be with those friends now. when i missed the movie writing the paper. when everybody went to the club and i stayed behind (what a great time they said).

when i won that gum ball machine in fourth grade and left it in the open at school and had it stolen. when my best friend came over suddenly to proudly announce that he got into Harvard. when i listened patiently to her complain about her boyfriend again, and again. when i wrote over sixty pages of a novel about my high school life only to graduate from it and become unable to continue. when my friends were all at governor's school and i was mowing lawns.

when i lied and said that it wasn't my first kiss because my pride said that i had to be better. when i didn't go to ultimate after fighting with my dad so nobody would see the bandages on my neck. when i learned that she was still hurting from the breakup, more than two years later. the day my grandparents left me in america with parents i hadn't known for four years. when i said goodbye to my violin teacher after years of blood sweat and tears. when my parents used to lock me in the basement because i didn't get all A's in elementary school. when she said that maybe things had been different before, but we were just friends now. when my grandfather was battling prostate cancer. when you just don't trust me, and when i just can't trust you.

when i'm here, that's when i need You.

-

at times, my soul cries. you can't see it, because i'm good at that. it's because of a spiritual spear that's been left in my heart. splinters going everywhere. my arms tug weakly. a single drop of blood collects at the left corner of my mouth. my brow is sweaty. but you don't see, because i'm good at that.

and yet, my soul cries. there are no tears when a soul cries. you know when your soul is crying because your stomach doesn't know hunger. you know when your soul is crying because your face is hot with frustration. you know, because you want to speak but you are afraid to shout. you know, don't you? you don't, because i'm good at that.

still, my soul cries. a heartbeat here, a heartbeat there. don't skip a single one, or it will be the death of you. don't miss a single beat here. don't miss a single beat. a single beat. a. single. beat. don't miss it. or else my soul might cry.

right now, my soul cries. you can't hear it, because my soul does not sob. it weeps a dry weeping, it sings a sad song. my soul sings a melancholy tune, a funeral dirge. are you conducting my soul?

so then, my soul cries. you don't have my soul. it sings, not for you, not for me. because this is no dirge or tune, this is not a mourning song or a happy ballad. my soul sings a song that is indescribable, that is celestial, that is above and beyond recognition. i do not know what song this is, and neither do you.

finally, my soul sings. we listen to it by paying close attention, lest we once again believe that it is crying. what does my soul say? let's take care and listen.

-
please let me know what you think! =)

the word supple and a walk in the rain

there is one word that always catches me off guard, simply because it is surprising. "supple". when i say this word, it gives me a feeling that one gets when they know that they are putting their life in the narrow palm of one person who they know is the strongest person in the world. why? because that's just what you do; that's what that person is there to do, hold you.

when people talk about supple ropes or whips or wires, i think that they are thick but thin, and they feel weak but strong. there's just no simple way to understand how a single twine could hold an entire grand piano (which is not nearly as heavy as a human life. if you've ever worn the albatross, then you'll know. not that i have).

so aside from being unable to comprehend a good length of cord, what else has supple done in my life? am i supple? no, my back is a mess of aches, and i can't even touch my toes anymore. but am i supple? yes. i can see what grows in between your ears, what falls from your lips and tongue, what climbs into your thoughts and what color colors your worst nightmares. i am supple like no whip ever was, that can crack and cause you to dance the macarena, a rope that can tie your mind into knots, a snake slithering among the crevasses of your brain and intercepting each and every synapse.

but enough boasting. i riddle in fantasies, and you gape at my "suppleness" that extends as far as the tips of my eyeballs and the back playroom of my imagination.

-

i was leaving work the other day, and it began to rain. i had only walked down the stairs to find that the sky had simply died and was letting go of whatever perch it usually perches upon, leaving instead to find a suitable nest on the top of my head, my shoulders, my chest, my back and subsequently every other part of me.

suffice to say, normal folk generally decide to wait it out. suffice to say, i am not a normal folk. i felt that since i was armed with a sweater for the cold lab, flip-flops for my laziness, an excellently stocked mp3 player, and a not a single care for any normal comfort, it would be safe to take a dip in the pool of the sidewalk.

a man looked from the stairway above on my right outwards, then decided to go back to the safety of convention. i would not be so daring as he.

each step was bliss. at first i wondered how much water was in my hair, my sweater, my bag with lovely computers in it, but then i got to wondering if it was good to walk in water up to my ankles and if i might contract parasitic organisms from aquatic snails; eventually i got to wondering if the song playing was right for the atmosphere.

i began with a quick and upbeat pop song, which easily gave way to the melancholy and thoughtful crooning of a personal favorite that likely none of you know, as it is my personal gem. this not fitting quite well enough, i changed onward towards instrumental cacophony, which was perhaps not as brooding as electronic grumbling and rumbling and rising and climbing and exploding. but that was still not quite the right noise for my ears, and after attempting a simple piano waltz, i removed my ears from my head to hear the sounds of millions and millions of spheres of molecules of water of the sky of everything of everything plopping splatting plipping smushing smashing dropping down and down and still and more and endlessly! how endless it was. there had been symphony before, but here was a symphony of symphonies! the rain needs no soundtrack.

i strode down and down past buildings and under trees which reveal bass beats that surprise you by falling into your eyes. as i walked along the curb a car drove through a puddle and i was splashed quite literally as those people in cartoons or the movies are splashed by an absurd amount of water, and yet i couldn't help but feel so please to make the acquaintance of each sensation upon my face and my hands, sad that i could not feel the vibrations against my chest but for my shirt and the heavy sweater. it was more than just sound, more than music, it was alive! and i do not mean in the sense of a multitude of microorganisms.

at that moment, standing on the curb and reveling in the muddy water that a passing car had driven into my face, i knew exactly who i was and exactly where i was headed. i was a wet 19 year old college student, and i was headed back to my dorm to get a change of clothes. and that was quite enough for me. that moment of lucidness opened the way for cascades and cascades of revelations, from the location of my extra set of car keys that had been lost days before to the knowledge that i would could be the most caring husband and father that any family could ever want or need. while i rubbed wetness from my eyes and wondered if my mp3 player would short circuit, my mind mulled the meaning of life and my stomach mulled a croissant and a danish.

i was content, for the first time in days and weeks, and i decided then that i enjoyed rain, as well as music and thinking. there was little to be gained without any of the three, though the need of thinking is debatable. nonetheless, there were things to be done, and i pulled my tongue from my cheek, stepped down to cross the street only to put myself in the muddy puddle that had just splashed me, and proceeded with caution. why? because i was crossing the street.

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=) yay for writing. again, i would appreciate comments! i love feedback... and i swear that every time i look at my closet, my suit hanging there seems to be swinging on its hanger like somebody just tipped it. i'm scared.

A Drive Home

Having dropped off my friend at her home, I started up back towards my own. Many things, we had discussed on the hour long ride home. One thing was about the speed at which I drive. She had more than once commented that I was driving awfully slowly or that I was way below the speed limit. I replied that I preferred driving slowly, and that I only drove quickly when I had passengers; peer pressure puts my foot on the gas. She replied that the drivers behind her tailgating were the source of her pressure, or rather a reason for her consideration to drive above the speed limit.

One thing I like about my new car is the display lighting. It is a mixture of lots of blue with a bit of red here and there. It does not try to be cool and comforting, but is rather bold. There is a dial on the left side of the dash that controls the brightness of the entire display. I played with it when first exploring the car, and decided to leave it on lowest, despite knowing that I enjoyed the display most when it was extremely bright. I figured at the time that if I ever felt the need, I would just crank it up.

After turning out of my friend's development, I looked at my dash and wondered why it was so dim. I reached over with my left and and pulled hard on the dial. The dial was already up. I realized that I had already at some point felt the need. Why then, was the display so dim? I pushed the dial down to the dimmest setting. Seeing the new, faint light, all I could remember was the memory of how bright the light had been only minutes ago. I cranked the light back up and left it that way.

Looking at the display again, I noticed that I was moving at about 30 miles per hour. I knew the road that I was on to have a speed limit of 35 miles per hour; it was about to increase to 45 miles per hour. I looked in my rear view mirror. I drove on at 30 miles per hour.

All the while, Gershwin was playing a soft tune, calling for my late night cruise to continue on. If you've never heard it, his piano concerto is a grand yet accessible melody that is neither joyous nor melancholy; instead, it leaves me with nostalgia. To have a want, yet also have a need. I don't remember if the piece ends with a bang, or if it rides silently out into the night, but neither do I know the path of my journey, though it has already been written.

It was already 12:17. At 11:17, my mother had called me and asked where I was. I replied that I was on my way home that she should expect me around 12 midnight, because I had just left and was on my way back on an hour long drive. And yet, I was in no rush to arrive home, because I knew that my family was sure to be asleep. They hadn't seen me all day, save my little brother, and yet they knew I had been around and were worried about what I was doing. I had left no evidence of my presence, and still they had my word on what I was to be doing.

I arrived at my home. Because my garage remote was out of batteries, I've been having to park my car in the driveway, go and open the garage, then go back to my car and drive it in. It was a hassle, but my car was new, and so I didn't want to leave it outside. This time, I wondered to myself, when does my car become old enough that I can leave it outside without fearing for it? If I never leave my car outside, what will I gain by not fearing for the wear brought by the rain, or the rust brought by the morning fog? When does love mature enough that it can be left outside and grow on trust alone?

I turned my car off, closed the garage, and went into the dark house.

thunder

it lets me feel that crush, the press, the drain, the force, the... the placement of each is almost cathartic, i can see the billowing clouds of emotion jumbling up from each one placed down, struck down, slid down, flattened. just flattened. without prejudice. i can reach over and strike away the attempt of another, and with it simply destroy them, annihilate a set of feelings and emotions into despair. and we must keep on going, we must not stop, because there can be no end, there can be no pause, no hiatus, no quarter. but.

on the backswing, things are different. we can change our pace. each step can be more slow. we reconsider the events of the day, the happenings of that small clock we call our soul, the one that is ever in need of a winding and a new spring. there is now a notch in the chain, an engraving of accidental anger, a notch that will fill quickly and readily with lead, heavy and dragging. where did this come from, i wonder, did it come from perhaps the crashing and flailing about of the previous few moments, or is it like a canyon worn by time and repeated blows? and if so, where does this river run from, and how am i to stop it from carving deeper and deeper until it reaches the clock itself, the clock of my soul where it will drive a groove that can never be, removed?

is there no good to be had? where can my vision decide; a myriad of sights and directions which i can preside on, each up or down, left or right, never or forever. which will it be? i choose to look up and step forward. there are no appendages that will hinder me. i am not lame, nor dull, nor mute. i was made ready.

and yet, this sword that was shaped, it was well crafted, but made to cut a man down. what man can make a sword? and so, having created the sword, i can only choose to cut myself down, an act of creation that is an act of destruction. a weapon born from my hands to annihilate myself. but i am no sword, but a sheath. and when we return to the madness of our round, where we slap and spite another in competitive love, can i remain that sheath, or will i be a scabbard, the shadow of the blade, a weapon on its own? who dares to force that wielding?

and even now, He is among us, treading lightly, as is the way of doing, never more than a whisper in my ear, a nudge in my back, a blow to the face. never will you see it coming, the blow as delivered, nor will you see it leaving, the blow as delivered. but you can know that it will always come, always; it is coming, always. and that blow is no cut from a sword, but a plain reminder through pain. it reminds you of who we are, what we are, and what we are doing.

even now, as i merge back into the shadows of thought, the bleakness of possibility, where is that glimmer of light that i was just now reminded of? how can there even be such a thing? you and me, all of us, we are all in this darkness, we see to the end of our fingers' feeling, we taste what is placed in our own mouths by each other, and we trudge blindly, groping; my hand in yours, looking in every which way.

there are bubbles in my being, effervescence beyond my understanding, and i cannot stand or sit still, i am in fact shaped, well crafted, but i am no sword. i do not cut, and i do not destroy, but i am well wielded, supple yet firm, neither whip nor rod, as gentle as a hug and as tart as a slap. i am nothing but myself.

and thus will the wrath be called down, and thus will our anger be met, just as after the thunder falls the rain. and thus does my heart melt for you.

small sacrifices

Over there was the woman and that other woman and the girl. Like peas in a pod, yes, one long pod, long enough for that woman to fit in. Enough is enough, though one's thoughts can't easily be heard, so fear is no object.

Having returned from displaying past prospects, how heinous, enough, she lets herself return to the desired, or so is desired, object of her attention. Behind ticks the machine of her true attention, wrapped up in his machinations, his melodies a drive for his soul. What is that? What soul is to be decided on, one of non-importance, for the audio quality is quite well. I myself cannot match such skill, and yet my heart definitely can, I think, but enough. But the mechanical pieces click on and on, so perfect, and yet that alone is simply not enough, but enough. What is this?

Her neck is craned back, the people all have their own problems to deal with. The fiddler now approaches as I retreat, a drive of passion but of motive, enough. To wait, that is simply the charm. Yes. Yes.

She is quite the pretender. Enough. You have your own problems to deal with.

Sometimes the problems, those problems, they are so frustrating, no, so confusing. What is it? I have often asked myself this question, and I have only been presented in return with despair and no desire to gain understanding. Envy, that is what I have for the problems of others, no, those problems are merely hindrances, impasses to be passed. Is that what attitude I ought to have?

I wonder, enough. At times I am so amazing for not mouthing my pain, enough. It was that first word you read, and now you stand on street corners in your mind; it is with shame that the great fall. Enough.

By now the playing has quieted. Let us level the playing field, and let us fail at what we are trying to do. At those times, my failure surprises me.

One by one they are decreasing in number. What exactly are numbers, anyway? There is now quite an imbalance, fewer annoyances, enough. You have no basis for any of this. Where is it? That object you have called the heart, that does not click, mechanically, but nor does it teeter drunkenly, but at best, when it knows to be saved, will leap and bound to the tune of the Spirit.

And now the number is far less, even in flavor, for the past flavor was the flavor of flavors, just as a collection of collections, but now the flavor is sweet, maybe agreeable. Enough. Rhetoric is overboard in this situation, and so are your opinions.

And in order to accept things, I will need to do as I have seen for my heart is not well nutritioned. Feed it scraps of emotion and productions of my foolishness, and it will do as it does now, lie desolate, but with the fodder of text, of words, I can hope grow fruit there. Enough. Fruit is not bait.

Enough.

An entirety lost.

To place my soul where it is headed, even on its own, what is that? Tom-foolery. The sounds of olden times, classic, they waft around the room and it is revealed that not all are cut from the same cloth. Instead of this red stitch here, a yellow weave is in place over there. And so on. And so time wears on.

Physical comfort is nothing to the comfort received in the heart, but what source for that comfort is truly appropriate? What is real comfort? Is that enough? What is enough?

All I know is that my heart throbs only to certain tunes, and well, that her's does as well. Maybe I will do a little jig, for I am oft comforted by the presence of physical dependence, a mirror for my own dependence, the crutch that my heart can lean on and still dance freely with joy. And that is enough.