and now you're just a ghost

[katy perry - ghost]

katy perry on repeat 24/7.

there's a desert that size can't be measured

[lord huron - ends of the earth]



i was a-ready to die for you baby,
doesn't mean i'm ready to stay.
what good is living a life you've been given
if all you do is stand in one place?

i should live in salt for leaving you behind

my life still exists without you but it's a little bit emptier. it's a little bit rougher around the edges. my sails blown open to the wild seas; i know you won't protect me anymore.

i want to light your matches and burn your candle next to my hair i want to sleep on fire and not feel a thing.

i'm one hundred different things i'm a liar i'm not worth a dime. i tasted salt on my plate and knew it was my tears. i want to be alone but i'm scared i'd miss you and despite your gentle touch i'm still nobody new.

i cried my eyes out for you but tears aren't worth a thing i'd never have enough salt to pay you back the love that i owe.

i want to light your matches and burn your candle next to my hair i want to sleep on fire and not feel a thing. i'd never have enough tears to put out the fire that i've started i'd never have enough salt to pay you back the love that i owe i'd never live enough lonely lives drinking in the dead sea to collect enough salt to pay you back the love that i owe.

those things you do will all catch up to you

in china i danced alone to the smiths in some strange rooftop bar, not even lonely at all.

girls who dance.
girls who sing.

people who sit alone in crowded bars. i don't understand and will always understand their desire to be close to the crowd but not in it. in the middle of the dance floor,

i too, prefer the darkness.

if you asked me, i would ask for the quiet at 5:43am
when no one is mad at me because i haven't screwed up,
and my sorries haven't piled up,
and i'm running to catch the first metro
to get to work on time.

sadness in the new, sadness is the old

you know i come here to listen to sad songs and think about how to say whatever it is that i can't say

it's not words it's physical

enough talk let's fuck

our hearts out our stomach top of the roller coaster i'm going down

to the bottom


to lie here and think about

why bon iver's first album is still so good

and winter in a minnesota cabin

between the trees some frozen tears


i could feel them fuck between the walls

remembered what it's like to reach through and grab nothing

press yourself against the wall

like a magnet from a distance


how many ways to say whatever it is i can't say

i can't say but i know now

i mean i think i know     you guys    i think i know

i didn't choose this but i want it


nostalgia 101 - a hundred different things about love

another line to remember

"Tell me the truth, how long until I find myself
throwing the dog's full bowl of water across the kitchen again,
because you moved on with your life and I stayed heavy-footed
in the linoleum, stupid, trying to resuscitate the broken mop.

[...]

What if I told you I wouldn't want to have an affair with her
unless she slurred and spilled her drink on the edge of my filthy bed,
or if it ever happened, that I licked the librarian's salty back,
I'd still call you afterwards that same night,
tell you to meet me for a drink somewhere,
in some smoky, lonely palace?"

- Ali Liebgott, "The Beautifully Worthless"



it's for a friend who knows what it's like to hear your own sobs echo through the empty hallway, who knows life is an empty box until you fill it with whatever you can and paint it whatever colour you want.

i like that at first, you read "in some smoky, lonely place." but then you find out it's a palace. and it's more lonely because it's bigger and it's empty and it echos so that you hear your loneliness and desperation bouncing back to you over and over again.

it is absolutely no fun being whole

it is absolutely no fun being whole
being that the whole time i was sitting here
at my desk absolutely nothing happened
except shadows receding along the sidewalk

silence

i said 'it sounds exactly like love'
sounds like a song that sounds like a song i used to know
it's sadder when you're alone
even when you're whole

it is absolutely no fun being whole
being that the whole time i was sitting here
i was waiting but for nothing to arrive
just waiting

....

i said 'it feels exactly like love'
an embrace glued to your skin
i shed it off, lie skinless while i wait
and think about the love we didn't make

i said 'it tastes exactly like love'
tasteless
empty
waiting
etc.

no fun being whole
no fun being broken, either
no fun, no fun at all

Stolen: Old bike, probably worth nothing to you

Grey Minelli bike, medium size, used condition. Pretty heavy. Was last seen locked to a bike post outside my apartment. Worth more in happiness points than money. Whatever. Keep the bike, you asshole. I hope you crash and break your bike-stealing arms.

Basically, this:

one day i might begin again

looking out my window i think about this:

is a person who is writing a writer?

okay now the difference between a writer and a good writer is:

blank

a good writer versus a great writer.

is it the conceptualization?

here it is:

a concept realized. question: is everything written planned?


it's a rainy sunday. the curtains are pulled back but the light is dull, gray. the sounds of wheels on wet pavement on the other side of glass. i tap my window pane. what the hell is this made of?


question: why can't i write anything?

answer: i am overwhelmed. with anxiety that what i write is not "good".

here is a giant block of marble. now carve.


let me just say this: this is not conceptualized. what is presented is what appeared in order of thought.

question: edit?

answer: no


here is poetry: i'm sorry.

i gotta tell you, you know, it's been so hard to pull it out of me. the words. all words. i haven't got a thing to say.

but then there's also

it's not like i haven't thought or felt

the full force

of

sadnessangerlonelinessloveetc

it's just that i didn't write it down.

question: ?


"Endings are elusive, middles are nowhere to be found, but worst of all is to begin, to begin, to begin." - donald barthelme

almost done

last essay of undergrad. china and the internet. this + beyonce + toaster strudels. i hate school but still love to study contemporary china. it's weird/of course that the first real essay i did for university was about modern china, and now my last essay is also about modern china.