Happiest Hallowe'en - No Chocolate

Gramma, today was the best day.
It's your birthday today and yet you're the one who was full of gifts.
I woke up this morning not sure, will it be a success will it not?
I have to confess a secret.  I forgot it was your birthday.

I remembered Halloween was your birthday, I'll never forget.
I forgot today was Hallowe'en.
It was just a due date.  I was afraid I was going to prove to be a failure.
I woke up and I powered through it.  You saw me, I bet.

I took a break to go with dad.
At your grave site I told you a bit about how my year had gone and what I was working on.
I came home and you blessed me
Just like you always would when you were alive.

I finished my book.  It's written and submitted for a contest.  My first one.
I finished my collection of poetry.  It's written and submitted for a contest. My first one.
They finally called me.  They offered me a job.  I'll be working again soon.
I won't say fingers crossed, I know you blessed me.

You've done so much for me, Gramma.
You gave me my name.
Now I will make something of it.
Promise

Maktub

I will finish. You pushed me forward and held me back. But it is due. I am due. Lord as my witness. He granted me the time. I will use it better each day. Today I will prove this. It is written.

H.O.L.

The monks all agree.
Row, row your boat

Life is illusion.
Wake up

I fought back.
Still I fight

Verily, verily.
Life is not a dream

Can't smell in a dream.
This stinks

So I must be up.
You need not

Slumber still sweetie.
It's so cozy

Not like this floor.
Cold and hard

Good for the back.
Better posture tomorrow

Go for a walk.
Head to the sky

Angels hark.
How could you slumber

And this is why.
Hymns over lullabyes

And this is why.
Hymns over lullabyes

Something else

There is no remedy
Are no drugs
Is no exercise
Nor stretches
Nor drinks
Nor music
Not a prayer
Not a lover's embrace
No tears
No laughs
Meditations or lullabyes
For this

This is not insomnia. This is something else at work. Something within, something without.

Subject Matter

"I paint myself because I am often alone and I am the subject I know best."
-Frida Kahlo

I saw this quote on the walls of the Frida exhibit at the AGO.  I went there last week with my ex girlfriend.  It's doubly weird to call her my ex.  Out of 21 years of knowing each other there have been less than as many days where I would have been able to say that we were an item.  And for however many days I would feel that she was mine, she would likely divide by as many days in her figure.  I imagine - as I have to imagine - that she would not argue - at least out of sympathy - that there was at least one day that she felt as she was mine.   So you see, this paragraph, as with many of my paragraphs, was a waste.

I don't have a life, I just have the ability to describe one.  I waste so many words, countless letters, on a fiction that only I believe.  21 years out of perhaps only 21 hours, I have a knack for transforming the mundane into the epic. With a fearful heart, I imagine many life witnesses at my graveside whispering to each other about my life story "it wasn't quite so."  Fiction, says they who know me best.  Fact, says those who simply love my stories.

I've been trying to put my finger on why it is I have felt like I'm in a metaphorical bubble.  The short answer is, because I'm in one.  So I can and have put volumes of words about how I feel, to the people for whom I have felt them, describing most often the life that I don't have with them.  What sorrow, my pen has lived more than my fingers, and my fingers moreso than my body, and so on. 

My life to date has been carried out in a handful of days, so many other days have just been dots in between.  Dots I pencil in to make it seem as though I've made a line, as though I'm on a course somewhere.  But where?  Where will I go?  Where did I really come from?  I keep asking myself these meaningless questions because I am obsessed with myself. Yes, obsessed.  Any moment that I haven't spent thinking about certain someones, I have spent worrying about myself, forgetting all the while that living helpfully is vastly different than living selflessly.  Living without self; neither for self, about self, towards self, or with self in mind.  There are true rewards in selflessness I am yet to reap. 

Basically, I realize tonight that I've spent the large part of the last decade trying to capture facts out of a fiction, when in fact what I should be doing is making a fiction out of the facts.  I deal in the world of complexity, and while it is still my job to show you that things aren't as they seem, it is no longer my job to suggest that I am more than you give me credit for.  I am not.  I am as you would have me be.  But that is just my self, not my whole world, and there is more to my world than my self.

To start, I need new subject matter.  I don't just need new subject matter to write about - in other words to possess as my own - I need new subject matter.  There needs to be more in all of this than me.  There needs to be more in each day's experience than what it means for me.  I live to read words that describe the world as it is, rather than the world as certain people see it. Today, and moving forward, I want to be more in touch with the world outside my bubble.  And it starts by describing less of what I want - for that is just a projection of the self - and more of what is out there.  It's time to find out all the things I haven't yet learned and see what those things teach about life.  And then, as a novelist I will synthesize those lessons into something general that we all can share in. 

Food Synthesis

Eat simple. Feel simple.
Eat everything. Dwell on everything.

Eat live fruit. Fresh ideas.
Eat dead fruit. Morbid thoughts.

Eat dirty animal. Be dirty animal.
Eat clean animal. Still be animal.

Eat bad oils.  Machine slows down.
Eat good oils. Machine spirals forever.

Eat from mother earth. In touch with mother earth.
Eat from sky. Sky will fall.

Eat more than produce. Always feel without.
Eat less than produce. Always able to give.

Eat to stay alive. Life will stay same.
Eat to change lives. Life will change.

Reshaping

Admitting you went too far...
Too many words
Too many questions
Too many tears
Too many attacks
Too many defenses
Too many reasons
Too many gestures
Too many awakenings

Forgetting you didn't go far enough...
Not enough words
Not enough answers
Not enough tissue
Not enough actions
Not enough acceptance
Not enough proof
Not enough finality
Not enough rest

Believing you have a future...
Make words match words
Make answers match questions
No tissue for tears
No attacks for action
Accept all defences
Prove all reasons
Never gesture the end
Never awaken just to rest

Write Out Insanity, Right out!

Obsessed with the topical
Searching for spaces
Fall back on the tropical
To take us to new places

Just did it again
Turning this into a topic
A thesis on men
When only I can stop it

Only I can change
The flow
The beat
The pressure
The sorrow

Of not finding peace
When peace is all around me
They say take two of these
But these just make me drowsy

I can't breathe in this place
It's too stuffy in mind
All these thoughts on the race
And I say I'm on my grind

And I don't wanna change
The hustle
The drive
The push
The breakthrough

Cuz it's the only way
I tried the rest, I swear to God
I'm thankful everyday
Like gratitude's my only job

But I got more to do
I gotta translate these moments
I write this shit for you
So you don't fall back on omens

You people need to change
The borders
The lies
The guesses
The answers

Cuz there's a natural order
Before I die I'll solve the puzzle
And then it's finally over
All your fears will have a muzzle

I'll put it all on paper
And when the last word is written
I'll just say see you later
I baked a pie, its in the kitchen

I won't be hear to change
Your views
Your rules
Your diapers
Your hearts

You can take it from here...

Kyla La Grange - The River

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADd6kIv7b8U

Keep writing Jam.  Enough people know, and everyone wants to.

Does it get better?

4AMs have turned to 5AMs. It gets darker than before but also closer to sunrise. I got harder to remember I was asleep and hurting. Does it get better if I stay awake?

Approaching Autumn

Oh I know what the autumn brings
It happens every year
The leaf changes her colour
And strikes me down with fear

How full of life you were before
How crisp you looked to touch
Each day I saw you 'neath the sun
I loved you ever much

Too high for me to ever reach
I loved you all the same
You were mine each day each night
But never mine by name

I searched the ground to find your roots
A first step for my climb
From roots to trunk, trunk to branch,
Soon you will be mine

And there I was on tippy-toes
Trying to make a stance
Reaching in to finally feel you
Hoping for a chance

Stop! You howled. This isn't fair
This place isn't for us
I didn't beckon you climb this tree
I'm just not worth the fuss

I'm just a leaf upon a tree
There are so many others
And though you think to know me
You do not know all my colours

Lo, to my surprise and gloom
As I was now in range
To see you weren't kidding
All your colours had now changed

The life is not within you now
You look so ever pale
Your green is now a bashful yellow
Your touch is oh so frail

And with one touch I lost you
Just one was all it took
For you to leave this place you loved
Without a second look

Goodbye, old friend, you shouted back
I do want you to know
It meant a lot, this quest of yours
It's sad I have to go

The ground is where I'm meant to be
It's so much warmer here
I couldn't survive the winter
Living just by your hot air

So down you go to where I was
I should have just stayed put
But this year I feel different
I don't wish to move my foot

I like it here, up in the sky
It's where I dreamed I'd be
'Neath the sun, perchance with you
 Nestled in this tree

The ground it doesn't suit me
I grow tired of those things
And when I look hard at myself
I discover I have wings

Up here I see yet greater heights
Heights I could never perceive
It meant a lot, this quest of mine
But now it's best to leave

I too will jump to destiny
Won't hold us back with jeer,
For I know what the autumn brings
It happens every year

Break point

Up all night
Then down all day
Take over

It's all due

This month. It all comes together and it all unravels this month. I am in a cocoon  or an egg, I'm not sure, but if the barrier does not part on its own I will peck through by my own beak.  By my own words I will find day light and start this new life I was formed for.

This month. It is all due this month. I have this month to make the most of this incubation period as it is almost over. You just know these things. I did not create this timeline but I will abide by it.  This deadline was not created for you but for me. I am not waiting, I am not packing, I am not asking; I've waited, I've packed, I've asked.

This month. This job will start because the last one ended. This book I'll start writing because the last 3 are finished. I've searched enough to know what I want. I've read enough to know what to write. 
But it's all due now. I have given and been given much time. Time to spend it.