Instead of cucumbers

I place pickles over my eyes

because I prefer to think that self-induced agony

makes me stronger and more resilient.

I am a glutton for punishment,

so, I lay back and let the brine work its way in.

Never wincing—Never offering a single reaction to its burn,

but my retinas are on fire.

The cohesion of pickle juice and natural saline

works its way toward my brain

like a starving parasite eating its last meal.

I welcome this torture

because I find comfort in pain

and already know the sting will fade away in time,

or, I’ll just become too numb to feel it.

After all, pain is more familiar than love,

which for me is like love,

because it’s always there for me even when I never need it.

I deeply appreciate its loyalty and commitment,

and though it’s not reciprocated, it’s unconditional.

I light a candle to unwind.

A flickering flame soothes my unrest.

Lavender releases from the wax prison it was held in,

but still, I prefer the Sulphur of a match

over a deceased flower’s final excrement

because the aroma of hell is how I relax.

Dead Flowers and hell. They’re both the same anyways, right?

Everything revolves around death and ends in death.

Even while the oil bleeds out of an unsuspecting aromatic herb,

its beautiful aroma is squeezed from its last breath.

So, everything is resolved in death.

There is only one place for us in the end. For me, it’s hell.

So, I decided to get there sooner by living in one.

I wonder if they can make a candle that smells like hell.

Do you think they can extract the essence of a decaying body

and place it in a wax jar like they did that Lavandula?

I flip on a tune,

to set the mood with my favorite soundscape—

A waterfall crashing into a rainforest.

Now that’s a sound I can drown myself in.

It spills down from three thousand feet above

and smothers me like I'm being waterboarded by nature.

How interesting that water gives life, yet can so easily take it away.

Angel Falls is not my guardian protector,

but it is a fallen angel I must protect and guard

because she lifts me up closer to heaven than I’ve ever been,

then drops me back down to earth where I guess I belong. For now.

I place a warm rag over my face to simulate the Amazonian climate,

Then turn on the faucet to full blast

so, I can practice how to breathe.

No gills mean there is a struggle,

but a struggle is what I crave.

With every gulp of oxygen I lose, my existence fades,

and I start to appreciate all the small things a little more.

Who knew being closer to death,

helps you love life a little better?

Why can’t I just get there on my own instead of forcing it?

Am I fucked up for living this way,

or is living this way how I fuck?

The timer blares a turbulent cry,

and my deprivation is complete.

While the tank opens to birth me back into reality,

I can’t help but wonder,

If I am reflecting on thoughts of death because I want it,

or if it’s how I cope with knowing the fate of humanity.

The salty bath I floated in slides off me like water repels oil,

like cheaters repel love.

and like humans repel humans.

I rinse off my secret thoughts in the shower,

dry off self-hatred with a towel,

then put on a costume of lies so I may enter the world,

and on the way out I schedule another visit

to my torture spa.

I can’t wait to live again,

next month.

I keep thinking of ways to kill children. It didn't really start until I had my own.

Suddenly, there I was, thinking, Look at this--small enough for him to put it into his little innocent mouth while no one's looking. He could choke! And, My God, turn the pot handle in toward the hot stove. Little hands could reach up and pull the boiling grease all over her. And, Should I put up some type of fence barrier thing on the railing of the balcony? They'll climb it. Of course they will, and one will push the other, and one would start to fall, and he would grab at her on the way down, and they both would fall to their little senseless deaths.

Once you have children, you begin to realize the worst possible thing that could befall a parent in this life. You're keen to inspect the floors. You smell for trouble. Your imagination begins to construct entire scripts in which the young, feckless, and clueless come up against the laws of physics, which are unyielding, and these children will get severely injured or die.

It's terrible, this monster I've become. Every object is scrutinized for the perfect tracheal diameter. Every sharp object is seen as something a child could run with. Little bodies don't like extra holes, unless it's a tube put in for ear infections. And it is exhausting to consider all of the things that could put out an eye. I don't know them all, but I think of new ones every day.

I sand without eye protection, but the little shitling better not even be in the same room.

Just how well do we trust that old dog of ours? Is cat scratch fever really a thing? Let them play outside--really? Are you out of your fucking mind! Is that just some rash or the harbinger of Neisseria meningitis? Another cold--that's two this year--leukemia? diabetes? How do I know this liquid Tylenol hasn't been...yea, that's right...tampered with?

When I'm stopped in traffic under an overpass, I back up a couple of inches so the falling girder will crush me instead of the kids in the back. What's in that aromatherapy machine I smell in Grandma's machine? Eucalyptus? Peppermint? Wintergreen? That stuff can kill them, for God's sake!

Are those vitamins really necessary? What about hypervitaminoses? Did you even think about that?

Yep, just when I think I know all the weird ways to kill a child, a new one stuns me back into the sobriety of mortality. How do I think of these things? Was I a child-killer in a previous life? Or has evolution given my children this survival advantage?

My kids are grown. They survived. And if I so much as catch any of 'em with a cigarette, I'll kill 'em.

Toxic, yes. Stupid, no.

I twist my fractal mind,

attempting to align with something I recognize,

but only fragments of me are revealed;

Some genius, a little beauty, and piles of hate—

I’m a scattered jigsaw left feeling unsatisfied and missing pieces.

I rotate again,

assuming that if I continue turning, I’ll somehow find the answers,

but all I find are more shards of glass and strewn pieces.

There are no real messages hidden here, are there?

Just more of myself.

I cannot be my own answer, can I?

The shapes of me continue to corkscrew.

I’m a crystallographic enigma caught in an egocentric trance.

Mesmerized by all my colors, I begin to lose time.

I become lost, inspired, and curious, yet constantly pessimistic about my existence.

Is that even possible?

Another turn and I feel I am meeting a stranger,

yet every part of me has lived here all along.

I think. If only I had met myself earlier, where would I be?

but then I must be reminded, I am here now.

I squint inquisitively wondering—

What's the meaning? What's my purpose?

Maybe with each adjustment, I change for the better,

and sometimes for the worse,

but change happens regardless.

If that’s true, then aligning to perfection will never work, can never be achieved,

and the answer lies within chaos itself.

Chaos...

…It’s the only certainty.

Perhaps I can come away with a deeper appreciation,

of who I am, who I was, and whom I have yet to become,

and maybe love is the same way.

Perhaps that’s why they say you should love yourself first.

So, I twist my mind once more

and greet me for the first time in a while.

Hello stranger, it’s time we met.

she was the girl who told everybody

to hold on to hope

while she hid in her bedroom

at night and cut herself

She’d pass the razor blade

by the side

of her ankles

and then crouch so as to lick

and slurp

the blood

swirl it around her mouth

until it lost its salty, iron taste

and then swallow

She always wore pants

never a skirt

and she was the girl who

told everybody to hold on to hope

until the last moment

She would climb on the roof

and smoke menthol cigarettes while

watching the stars in the sky

and slowly, slowly drift into touching

herself

I don’t even know her name

but I would like to

ask her

to be my muse

***

INSTAGRAM:

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I’m reading a book about a woman who travels. She’s the opposite of me. She has lived in seemingly a thousand different places and seen parts of the globe that I’ve never even imagined visiting.

She frames it as a wild journey, running from place to place to place to place for decades. A desperate fleeing of her circumstances, the endless search for self.

I am jealous. I burn with envy that she is witty and articulate and has a passport and friends whom she can visit, dipping in and out of their lives on a whim.

But she only sees what she doesn’t have: a partner or a husband, her name on a mortgage. She frames herself as immature, an object of pity. How odd she is to be couch surfing at her age, when everyone else has settled down, moved into the trappings of adulthood, has stopped the childish wandering.

And I am stuck. Sitting at my dining room table to devour her book while slumped on a half-broken hand-me-down chair. A chair that was purchased to fulfill someone else’s taste. A chair I cannot afford to replace, and so I have to ignore how ugly it is, how useless.

I’m stuck in the city of my childhood.

I have never had the opportunity to leave, except for a brief stint teaching English overseas.

It was always intended to be temporary, a fling of adventure between graduating from university and getting married. A five-month ordeal of undiagnosed depression and anxiety and drinking too much alcohol. A torturous winter of sleeping for fourteen hours a day and not speaking to anyone for days, feeling out of place because I am at least three years older than everyone else in the program, and in your early twenties that makes a big difference. A blur of homesickness and temporary insanity and getting punched in the face one night when a man tries to mug my friend. I recognize that his pistol is fake, so I try to push him into traffic and he hits me, landing a solid hook to my right cheek and leaving a dent that you can still see today when I scrunch my cheeks up to smile.

But I have never had the option to live anywhere but here. Locked into staying in my hometown at eighteen, forbidden from applying to colleges outside of my city due to financial constraints and the iron will of my widowed mother who raised four teenagers by herself.

And now that I’m forty-three and middle aged I wonder if maybe I should have just run away from home after high school? Run off to New York City where things actually happen to people? Where life gets lived?

But I couldn’t. I didn’t.

By the time I was eighteen I had a boyfriend I loved, and I knew even then that he was a kind man and would be a good husband and father. And so I stayed, locked into my small little life, dreaming of moving away to anywhere else, jealous of everyone I knew who got to “go away to college” and live their own lives. I thought I would get a chance later.

And now it’s too late. I have children and pets, my name on a mortgage, elderly mothers (my own and my husband’s) who rely on us for companionship and help and stability. I can’t just pull up stakes and abandon everyone. But neither can I capriciously take a job across state lines and move my entire family on a whim. I am stuck.

And so I read this lady’s book, fear and jealousy and heartbreak churning in my gut. Glad for her when she finally settles down, finds a house of her own in a city that she loves, feels her roots growing and the calm of middle age settling in… she gets her happy ending.

What if I am well and truly stuck here? What if the furthest I ever travel for the rest of my life is Dallas? What happens to me if I die in this city, never having truly lived a life of my choosing? What, if anything, changes for me?

I don’t want to contemplate that question, because it hurts to think about, but the answer surprises me… nothing. Nothing will change.

I will still love my children and cook dinner and read library books and knit. But most of all I will still write. I’ll still burn inside each day until I get the words out.

Maybe traveling the world isn’t a prerequisite for being a good writer.

Maybe I’m not missing anything at all.

Maybe I should bloom where I’ve been planted, instead of feeling rootbound and resentful.

Maybe I’m just fine. Maybe…

If you ask everyone on their deathbeds about their regrets, you will hear the predictable whining:

I wish I hadn't worked so much and spent time with my family.

I wish I hadn't put my education ahead of my life experiences.

I wish I had put all my loved ones ahead of money, ambition, etc.

I wish I had listened to my loved ones.

The truth is, the ones who die with family and loved ones around their deathbeds are the ones who don't regret anything, for they obviously didn't put work, education, ambition, etc., ahead of their loved ones. And they listened when loved ones advised them on mid-course corrections.

Their loved ones had been with them the whole time...

...all the way to the very end. That's a life without regrets.

Do you want to count your money on your deathbed? Your sexual conquests? Your Rolexes? All those whom you bested? No, the only thing you want to count are the ones who wanted to be with you at the very end.

We should teach our children to live lives that make life worth living. That means incorporating the human factor into every relationship, every decision, and every journey. It means goodness doesn't have to profit us tangibly because goodness is its own reward.

Dying peacefully, alone, is not peaceful dying. Dying mattering to the ones you love is a great way to go. We should teach our children that the end justifies the means.

Perfection doesn't exist, not even in the realms of fantasy. Utopias are doomed to fail due to the inflexibility of hubris. The pursuit of perfection, even when laid on the shoulder of entire systems yields far too much pressure- how could we expect such a task from a small, undeveloped mind?

There is a middle ground between perfection and complacency. Teach children to look up things they don't know but don't chide them for not knowing. Learning takes time, patience and repetition must be encouraged and exercised. Doing your best is to move toward improvement while recognizing weak points- but not viewing them as crippling flaws that render them incapable or unworthy. Overcome what you can, and you may spend your entire life building upon certain abilities or concepts, and that's okay provided it doesn't steal away happiness.

A perfect smile isn't necessary in order to light up a room. A perfect figure isn't necessary to be in good health. You don't need the highest IQ or testing scores to demonstrate intelligence and capability. You don't need to change the world- making changes in your home and community is enough. And for some, the blind pursuit of perfection may work against them and render a person deeply inept.

To you who put yourselves through the horror of reading any of my posts, first of all, I'm sorry. More importantly, if you see an error--grammatical, syntax, spelling, or otherwise--please make a note of it in the comments. Don't worry about typos. I'm talking about mistakes that are likely to be repeated, like when I say lay when it should be lie.

Since I was a wee puke, I've always been intrigued and motivated by my mistakes, but if no one ever points it out, I'll likely never learn. So please, have at it.

Proofreading is a mad skill, but that's not really what's needed here, unless it's something we're considering submitting for publishing. For instance, we all know the difference between there and their, but when you're in the thick of the fight, writing feverishly trying to fill water cups from a fire hydrant, sometimes the fingers just go their own way. How many times have you reread and thought, "Whaaaaat??" Just the other day I found Your instead of You're. Whaaaaat??

Most of the stuff we submit daily probably doesn't require proofreading--we get the point, and we all make mistakes. Irregardless, however--that's something that needs to be dealt with before it spreads. Why isn't irregardless being automatically underlined in red as a misspelled word? Is that a thing now? Dammit!

I'm just saying, you have my permission to point things out. I want to improve as a writer, and I know I don't know all the rules yet, so feel free to educate me when the opportunity arises.

If you leave a comment asking for the same treatment, who knows? Maybe we'll get good at this stuff.

the days follow

each other

like ants

towards a dead

thing

and after enough of

them pass

by,

you

finally realize you

are that dead thing

And that's supposed to

be alright. After

all, no one is

excused from this

All we can

do is make the journey

pleasant

However,

when the alarm wakes you

up at

6:30 in the morning,

announcing that there's

yet another day

in which you'll have to attend

your duties of

slaving away for others to

get rich,

when you're slipping

into the other

half of your life

not bringing along any

fulfilled dreams

despite trying again and

again...

Another day

in which you'll be assaulted

by questions

like,

"Hey, so when are you

going to get married?"

"Have you even

someone to marry?"

"Why don't you

get another job? Aren't you a bit

too old for this one?"

"How much do

they pay you?"

"Are you ready for your

cousin's wedding?

Oh, and then there's

the wedding of

this other cousin. Wow, lots

of weddings lately. What

about you?"

Slowly,

old friends become

mere acquaintances

and finally

strangers

and you just regret

that family can't

quite follow the same pattern

They say that if you're

the smartest person

in the room

you're in the wrong room

But what do they

have to say

when you're the most

unfulfilled person in

the room?

They'd probably ask

how the fuck

you got like that

You probably don't

even know

anymore

probably don't

care

You just watch

the ants follow

each other

on the trail to the dead thing

and the closer they

get

the more you

urge them

to hurry the fuck up,

stupid creatures

You just wanna give 'em

a hand.

Bring the dead thing

to them

Throw it on

top of them

***

INSTAGRAM:

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AUDIO READING HERE:

https://soundcloud.com/user-937736610/like-ants-crawling-up-to-a-dead-thing