Essex

"But they're all love songs when I'm with you..."

Romeo and Juliet are together in eternity.

I am now gripped by feelings exuding something akin to precious, precious comfort. Precious warmth, precious safety, precious I-am-adored. I am not afraid of being judged. I am not afraid of picking at the scabs of wounds long healed but incorrectly patched. The sighs keep issuing from this throat, my eyelids like fish scales continue to glitter and snap. Serpentine the way music continues to slide through me, across me, into me...serpentine the way these fingers slither up and down.

Dark, secret love. Set me as a seal.

For a moment the world turned its back. I smell the acrid stench of burning things. Up the street, a house is on fire and massive red trucks attempt to quell the hunger of the hot-and-hissing. I'm tired. Worn out. Wishing I could bury myself under fifteen pounds of cotton comforter and sleep through the week. With you. Gone with the sin, my darling...and beautiful you are. I'm hurting again -- why and how and I don't want to. "Swimming through the ashes of another life..."

You know? You know.

Sealed(up)tight

[I took that picture. Eighteenth-century Franciscan mission. I feel like that sometimes.]

"Do you realize we're floating in space?"

Cautious of experiences I've never known (toes in the water). Cautious of feeling things I've never felt. Too cautious for any good reason. Despair and I had it out; hair was wet with blood and knees were bruised from thought-wallopings. My god, this heart! My god, these eyes! My god, full of spidery-vine-feelings that won't be killed by a great cutting-out nor a colossal poison-storm.

"I hear voices in tin lunchboxes and snap at
Forget-me-nots as they trip (whirly-eyed)
Through teeth like spun glass. Vicious velvet
Streaks (but too lovely your tongue) reel me
In -- stars of a shared sky prick imagined eyes
And shatter swiftly like millpond water once
Electronically-conduit fingers cease their
Deceptively-sweet snaking.

Still paper tears corrode the film.

How much (per pound) does redemption cost?
A darling devil decreed "just a heart a gram,"
Though his forked speech was enough to buy me.
Buy me -- by me, through me, in me do supposed
Sins [monocles and tophats] swim like little
Soaked sponges ablaze with curiosity and the pain
Painted with brushes made of my flayed flesh.

Glass apples and genuine kisses for you..."

Why is it that words (never failed me before) so suddenly seem trite? Why is it that I've resigned myself to speechlessness when it comes to conversations with black-bearded mystery? "Now we're guilt-stricken...sobbing...with our heads on the floor. We fell through the ice when we tried not to slip." I won't be held responsible. She fell in love in the first place. Deadly-word, there it is. In all its sometimes-terrifying glory. I'm not afraid anymore. "Fear is the little death." Remember? Live life as you see fit, love who you want to love, do what you want to do...never hesitate when it comes to making yourself happy. All the make-believe mantras were right; I am a labryrinthine, complicated, complex, full-of-words-and-thoughts thing too witty and sarcastic and brilliant for a sky devoid of light. Like it is here. We're the same kind of beast, and I adore you. I'm not going anywhere -- I'll stay in the sky devoid of light.

"In the blink of an eye, there was no one attending; it doesn't really matter where it all began -- all I know...I got covered in darkness. Covered in darkness."

Quit being so afraid of life and the things it gifts you with. "Better to hold on to love..."

"She's nothing more than fiction."

In addition: I'm not sure what it is, exactly, that I just experienced. I'm not sure what forced my hand to cover my mouth, what made my eyes reread the same sentence fifteen times, what filled me with the only sensation I've ever wished desperately for without realizing that I actually wished desperately for it. "All we have is now." What just rolled through me like waves of an untempered something? What just forced me to sit back and settle my chin on the desk, eyes closed and silly images dancing there?

Why do I feel like curling up to the strangled notes of a far-away do-you-realize? Do you realize? Do you realize that happiness makes you cry?

Here's the thing: I'm no longer at the end of my rope.

Here's the thing: ...

I'm not afraid to be weak, now.

I love you.

"She's lost in coma where it's beautiful,
Intoxicated from the deep sleep...deep sleep;
Do you wonder what it's like
Living in a permanent imagination?
Sleeping to escape reality...but you like it like that.

Guilty by design -- she's nothing more than fiction.
She dreams in digital, 'cause it's better than nothing.
Now that control is gone, it seems unreal...
She's dreaming in digital.
She dreams in digital..."

Sometimes it's hard to breathe and dream at the same time. Sometimes it's hard to watch your big-brain paint pictures on the front side of your skull and know that perhaps (oh, maybe) those images will never, ever be realized in full. Sometimes the shiny globules of paint stick to my eyes and dry there...fixing with permanent, perfect loquaciousness all the reasons I'll never be able to be completely honest, endlessly raw, doubtlessly and wantonly emotional. I let the candyman fill me with his contraband, and now in the sterile white-ness I'm dreaming in digital. Perfectly something, the way I feel when speaking with you; perfectly nothing, the way I feel when attempting to put into written words what it is, exactly, that I feel.

Ashes to ashes.

"You're a god and I am not...and I just thought that you should know."

I've been listening to a chorus comprised of "do you realize" over and over again. I've been curled up on this pretty blue chair for an hour now in the dark. I've been toying with this little stumpy white candle for a long time, I've been contemplating the depth and details of certain sentiments that have been trickling through my veins like cold stars for even longer, and still the pathetic barbs of perpetual alone-ness stick me in a thousand places. Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die? Do I muse about death too often? Am I considerably more enthralled with the topic than what is normal? Is the phrase "romantic tragedian" too complex a title for me? We're the same kind of beast, boy. What do you think? "It's not our fault death's in love with us."

"This road goes on, in my misery, not knowing what comes.
A dying world, my life is fragile, and all I have left is you."

A tiny excerpt from the most heart-wrenching thing I have ever been fortunate enough to read. "You're waiting for someone to put you together, you're waiting for someone to push you away. There's always another wound to discover, there's always something more you wish he'd say." Oh, lord. Why am I still awake, again?

"Each petal peeled back leads me deeper..."

Oh. That's why.

Samael

While struggling under a particularly pathetic wave of self-pity and sorrow last night, I collapsed in my inner sanctum lined with ceiling-fan shadows and infrequent breezes like sighs. While attempting to reach the surface of a particularly dark sea of guilt and self-inflicted hurt, I realized that I was crying. For no known reason, caused by no single discernable thought. My great dark eyes leaked great glass tears, and the great dark night offered little solace to the little girl cowering inside my bruised and blanketed body.

Me! Crying without reason. How absolutely unfathomable. I was sobbing beneath the misty glaze of orange streetlights that filter nightly into my blue-walled jail-of-secrets. It was slightly terrifying, this big brain of mine, when it snapped back to the present and, without hesitation, bellowed out the coordinates of my emotions. Sneered at my sudden fondness for weeping.

"I like to weep," Lestat countered.

I sit and dream of togetherness. Yes. You've figured me out, I postulate. With little effort, though I've been told of my labrythine qualities. Faith is my middle name, you know. Honestly. I was born 'Jessica Faith,' and the irony of that has nipped at my heels since I was old enough to tote a dictionary. Since I was old enough to realize what 'faith' and 'irony' meant. "Do you realize that you have the most beautiful face? Do you realize we're floating in space...? Do you realize that happiness makes you cry?" It's a beautiful song.

"Feel.
Feel.
Feel.
I feel that you should know
I have an empty soul;
It's a warning, it's a warning --
If you lead, if you lead,
I will follow, I will follow.

What am I? What am I?
And they are stomping on the switches.
Take my back roads,
Round my fences
To an empty view.
If you lead, if you lead,
I will follow, I will follow.
What am I? What am I?
And they are stomping on the switches.

Climb the ladder
Straight to heaven
Where the creatures multiply --
Gods and devils.
Take their pillows,
Get in position
To multiply.
Surprise,
Suprise...

It's a warning, it's a warning, it's a warning...
If you lead, if you lead,
I will follow, I will follow.
If you lead, if you lead,
I will follow, I will follow.
And they are stomping on the switches..."

I miss you.

PausedPalpitations

Cold and dark the place in which
I roll, feet out and heart flayed
Like a dissection specimen formaldehyde-fresh
And dripping. Wax mouths hiss warning
Yellow and sweat pearly beads of secret
Aches...secret breaks...
Secret-swift with treacherous eyes, the stiffness
Of this mattress if combatted by lonely arias
And the violent whine of violins. Who's the villain
When what was killed is never missed?

Hot orange the longing inside, like an electric
Burner left on for days and then deserted;
My hands are branded counterfeit by this
Heavy-lidded stove and her sloping brow
decisions, amalg-emissions, unambitious
Ambitions. Equalize the pressure -- it's all
Too much. She'll crack before the needle stops
Its frantic white-plastic paneled dance, before
The spiraling plumes of personified terror stretch
Cat-like and uncurl inside the white whale's belly.

If I'm turned and shook so that the colors show,
Would they bleed back into the see-through spine
And all her tell-tale children? The progeny of poorest
Thought-I-felts and eager angry salivations dictate
With a solemn whisper: you may get through should
The old accusations of soul versus soul evolve
Narration-like into lovely claims of mismelancholia
And numbing cold.

My vacation was less than exciting. Although I relished having Manda around again, and although we both cherished the time we had together before she transferred to another base in Wichita Falls...it was all over too quickly. Distant now are the memory-makers and the blue-black velvet skies of Texan nights. Faded now are the piles of clouds like sooty snow that I witnessed while flying for the very first time. Withered now are the hopes of laughing beneath the blankets while Frodo and Samwise traipse across a hotel-issued television screen.

Oh, but in the end it all falls down.

"Ashes to ashes," isn't it?

Holding myself captive for a week without outside intervention proved interesting. The capacity I exhibited for melancholy thoughts was surprising; even more shocking was the fact that I managed to find pretty the intertwining concrete streets, the hulking overpasses, and the desolate buildings of abandoned strips that line San Antonio like a second skin. Sea World and touching dolphins paled in comparison to writing beneath an enormous moon beside a still and lonely hotel pool. I was on my own for much of the time. I was in love with myself for none of the time. I'm tanner now (oh, so brown), blonder now (just a little -- chlorine and too much sun tend to wreak havoc on helpless hair follicles), and a little hardened when it comes to support for our country's military.

Have I mentioned that I loathe our president? Have I posted pictures of my dorm door turned anti-government bulletin board? Have I said, choking down half-hot tears, that the Air Force instills ridiculous propriety and corrupting, unnatural, pointless, badbadbad mannerisms in its trainees?

Ashes to ashes.

Off on a tangent that doesn't wring from me so much sorrow: I thought of you so many, many times while languishing in the southern sun. I dreamt about tornadoes, guilt, black skies, and you. I wondered if you'd like the way the far-away stars reflected in my eyes when I stood outside the reception hall and blinked back angry sentiments like shadows. I missed you more than is self-respectably allowed. Silly grin: I was wondering if you'd ever make use of those digits...but in the end I realized it was I who needed conversation, and not you. And in the end. And in the endendend I stood up, breathed in, and put away the little tools that rend and cleave.

"Samael and Lilith, sitting in a tree..."

Oh, I'm too ridiculous for my own good sometimes.

In addition: It's now past midnight. I can't sleep. I'm terrifying myself with little deaths-of-thoughts and falling-apart things that hurthurtHURTME right now. More than anything. Water like black paint runs down cavernous hall-walls and slithers along marble floors towards the pinpoint light of do-you-realize? "Do you realize you have the most beautiful face? Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die? And instead of saying all of your good-byes, let them know you realize that life goes fast, it's hard to make the good things last..." It's an illusion. Why aren't you here to listen to my ridiculous fears? Why do I have these ridiculous fears? Never mind. I don't want those particular scars seen by anybody but THERE, we have a contradiction. Three seconds later and I wish I could talk to you. I do. I wishwishwishwishwish more than anything that I could be held and listened to...and...there's an end to this. The weakness reigns tonight, but tomorrow the mask of silly-ness is tied in place. To make you smile. "More I..."

Oh, I miss you. So much.

Barnacles

This no-Internet thing is slowly killing me.

I'm taking the computer in tomorrow to get a diagnosis.

We'll see how that goes.

Until then...I'm on vacation. I'll be back from my hootin' trip to Texas on the 23rd.

Have a lovely week, my darlings.

And know that I'm thinking of you...

"Needless to say odd-like."

"She's dreaming in digital..."

It's raining.

It's been raining all day.

The damp breeze is an incredible change from the arid things that have wafted through my bedroom window in days past. I think I'll be able to sleep tonight. The soft patter of grey rain-sheets on the eaves is achingly lovely. Misty haloes ringing orange streetlights are the images burned sweetly onto my eyelids when finally I slip down against the wooden headboard and lay listlessly...covered in dark and ceiling-fan shadows.

Maybe I'll light candles tonight.

I adore the smell of wax. Of wicks. Of the dreams and ideas that creep unchecked into this big brain of mine.

"He's everything you want. He's everything you need..."

It was raining this morning. It was white-slate and comfortable this morning. I found my muse this morning, and I nearly overdosed on glee. I nearly allowed myself to be taken under by the sea that sucked in the moon. I am filled like a serpentine bottle with the feelings muse provokes in me. I am at once full. Silly. Wanting more and more to be swept away and swept up and held at arm's length to dance on cemetary-grass in the fall.

"He's everything inside of you that you wish you could be..."

Kiss

"No, my friend, darkness is not everywhere -- for here and there I find faces illuminated from within; paper lanterns among the dark trees."

Romeo and Juliet are together in eternity.

"God made everything out of nothing, but the nothingness shows through."

Here's the thing: I didn't fall down.

"The body is a house of many windows: there we all sit, showing ourselves and crying on the passersby to come and love us."

I'm getting better. Long-suppressed silly smile: love me?

I've found something I lost. It's wonderful to know that I adore sun-fingers on my shoulders and the smell of flowers too much to breathe in at the bottom of the puddle. I missed laughing. I missed being silly. I missed Charon by a day or two, but he faxed me: I was too early, he said. I've got a long while, he said.

Not a problem. When it's time to board that boat, I'm bringing a margarita and a parasol. And maybe a pineapple-print blouse.

Love of two is one. Laaa-la-la-laa-la.

I wish I could get over my writer's block. Cheshire grin: if my muse happened to come and sweep me off my feet, I'm sure inspiration would strike. It's what muses are for, isn't it?

I want to go swimming. And get sunburned. And be completely devoid of manners.

I'm getting better.

"More I..."

"There's nothing terribly wrong with feeling lost, so long as that feeling precedes some plan on your part to actually do something about it. Too often a person grows complacent with their disillusionment, perpetually wearing their 'discomfort' like a favorite shirt."

Indecipherable Mess

I dipped into the nevermore-pool last night. I touched the bottom.

I'd rather not go there again.

I'm tired of being afraid. I'm very tired of being afraid. Of being sick. Of it.

I called the hospital to see about getting a refill on my prescription because this sickness isn't gone. The nurse I talked to was oozing kindess from every pore -- she eased my tension (white-knuckled hands kneading white-pine corners). She said she'd give a message to my doctor and call in the prescription to the pharmacy.

They haven't called back. It's been close to four hours.

This isn't helping. They aren't helping.

I can feel the fear bunching up again. I can feel the make-it-stop-make-it-stop-make-it-stop rising like bile in the back of my throat.

And I thought I'd be able to regain composure and preach about strength.

Not likely. Not happening here. Not helping. Not helping!

Please, for sanity's sake...don't ever be afraid to talk. Don't ever be afraid to make your feelings known, to say what's circling the thought-drain, to paint pictures with your words. I know insanity when I see it -- and I haven't witnessed it riddling my muse.

"Stitch up my emptiness..."

I'm so afraid now. So afraid of what's going on inside. Just give me pills and dope me up and make this fear-pain-stress-ache-irritation-paranoia stop. Please. Please? Please!

A coy grin: what happened to bravery in the face of the unknown?

I miss you already.

Silly Sensations

I hate feeling this way.

I'm not completely well. I think. I wish I was.

I'm not being coddled the way I want to be. I think. I wish I was.

Listen to me: I'm screwed up.

Listen to me closely: I am at my rope's end.

I'm screwed up and twisted around and completely, completely paranoid.

I want to leave this place. I want to leave. I want to pick up and drive off and never look back. Well, maybe look back. To send Christmas cards and letters. I'm a family-oriented fleshbag, you know.

"I am not here,
I think I’ve never
Been here at all...
Or ever will.
I feel like a place
Where no one goes anymore...

Why can’t you see that everything’s broken?
And why can’t you see that my life’s turned gray?
I can’t believe in anything sacred
When I don’t believe that I am real...

It seems so bizarre,
But none of this matters.
Thoughts disappear and hopes have died.
But now I am safe, nothing can hurt me here --

Why can’t you see my need for forgiveness?
The truth and the lies so confused as one...
I can’t believe in anything sacred
When I don’t believe in anything.

I am alone;
Locked in my memories,
There’s nowhere left for me to hide --
But I am not real,
I’ve made all I am with lies.

Why does it seem that everything’s different?
And why does it seems that only you are real?
I don’t believe in anything sacred --
So why do I feel so damned alone?

I need someone to break the silence,
Screaming in my head...
And in my soul..."

I love you, Stabbing Westward. I love you, Chris Hall. Sing away my aches and pains and leave me in the comfortable furrow of self-pity-paranoia-sticky-guilt-and-sorrow.

I miss you. Very much. "Show me yours..." Now. Why not? I trust you.

Infected Fleshbag

In addition: (I wrote something for you. "You show me yours, I'll show you mine...")

"Don't waste your touch, you won't feel anything --
Or were you sent to save me?
I've thought too much, you won't find anything...
Worthy of redeeming.

Yo he estado aqui muchas veces antes y regreso...

To...break down, and cease all feeling;
Burn now, what once was breathing --
Reach out, and you may take my heart away.

Imperfect cry, and scream in ecstasy --
So what befalls the flawless?
Look what I've built, it shines so beautifully,
Now watch as it destroys me.

Y regreso aqui otra vez y comienzo...

To...break down, and cease all feeling;
Burn now, what once was breathing --
Reach out, and you may take my heart away.

Break down, and cease all feeling;
Burn now, what once was breathing --
Reach out, and you may take my heart away.

I left it all behind, and never said goodbye.
I left it all behind, and never said goodbye.
I left it all behind, and never said goodbye...
I left it all to die.

I saw its birth, I watched it grow,
I felt it change me.
I took the life, I ate it slow...
Now it consumes me.

I...break down, and cease all feeling;
Burn now, what once was breathing --
Reach out, and you may take my heart away.
Break down, and cease all feeling;
Burn now, what once was breathing --
Reach out, and you may take my heart away...

...Heart away."

I'm sick. It's no fun. I take far too many pills -- one hospital-medicine at nine, another hospital-medicine half an hour later, aspirin throughout the day, another hospital-medicine at four, and a little pink pill to help me sleep. I feel doped up a lot. It sort of makes me giggle. I hate pain, you see. I hate internal pain. Inflicted on the skin? Not a problem. But I get a little psychotic-paranoid if something's wrong with me on the inside. I've had to see a doctor twice in the last three weeks. Woopty-doo.

Here's the thing: I worry every day that I won't be well again.

Here's the thing: I really miss you.

Here's the thing: I'm waiting for you to show up and sweep me away. Honestly.

I wish I had something interesting and silly and thought-provoking to say, but I don't. I wish I'd find something cathartic to study, but I can't. I wish I had a pair of arms that would hold me -- even if I raged and sobbed and laughed all at the same time. But I'm not sure I do.

Here's the thing: I am at my rope's end.

Ting-a-ling

"One of the things which danger does to you after a time is -- well, to kill emotion. I don't think I shall ever feel anything again except fear. None of us can hate anymore -- or love."

I don't think I shall ever feel anything again except fear.

Here's the thing: danger is a byproduct.

Here's the thing: self-manufactured byproducts are slurped down everyday.

Here's the thing: it's slurped down by absolutely everyone.

Just this moment, I've given a title to what it is that's kept me awake for a week. Just this moment, I've figured it out. Just this moment, it's advanced upon me with little knives drawn, it's carved me like a goose, it's hurt me nonchalantly in its business suit and tie.

It's self-destruction. It's what I've become. A walking-spidery glob of self-destruction.

"There is no love in your violence."

I know there isn't! Listen to me: ting a ling. Listen to me: close my eyes and carry on screaming.

Listen very closely: I am at my rope's end.

I've been playing charades with happiness. I've been putting on a stage performance when it comes to glee.

I'm pretty good, aren't I? No one even noticed when I played my little rhyme and cranked the handle until the clown popped out. Scissors-stick. I'm very pleased that you never found prosecutionable evidence of my weakness.

"I will show you fear in a handful of dust."

Press the repeat button. Only one fleshbag has ever looked through poetic annals of pointless drivel because he wanted to. In there he maybe found the thirteen keys to who I am. Maybe. He is a shrewd fleshbag. So unlike all the other fleshbags; so like this fleshbag. I like that fleshbag. More I...that fleshbag.

I wish that fleshbag could be with this fleshbag now.

And anger flares!

And depression flares!

Listen to me: I am at my rope's end.

"Behind the crimson door..."

"Heaven's ablaze in our eyes...
We're standing still in time;
The blood on our hands is the wine
We offer as sacrifice...

Come on and show them your love --
Rip out the wings of a butterfly...
For your soul, my love --
Rip out the wings of a butterfly...
For your soul...

This endless mercy mile,
We're crawling side by side;
With hell freezing over in our eyes,
Gods kneel before our crime...

Come on and show them your love --
Rip out the wings of a butterfly...
For your soul, my love --
Rip out the wings of a butterfly..."

Enthralled and trampled and ground-stapled guilt-stricken sobbing with my head on the floor. Nothingevenmatters any-any-anymore. Where did everybody go...? I need them now to save me. I need you now to save me. Save me.

"Save her, precious, before the spade eats her."

Oh, never mind.

"Covered the carcass of time with flowers
To send the scent of blame to the grave;
Set the darkest thoughts on fire
And watched the ashes climb to Heaven's gates...

We hide behind the crimson door
While the summer is killed by the fall...
Alive behind the crimson door
While the winter sings, "your love will be the death of me."

Death served wine for lovers
Brought from the world where devils reign,
And intoxicated angels with sorrow
They witnessed in the eyes of their slaves..."

Look what I found. No music for the words yet but I'll have to wait another month and a half before my curiosity is quelled. Isn't it beautiful? Singing about fire and wine and slaves while I counteract the vine-feelings with water and--LORD, never mind. I go on and on but no one's around to listen...not like it's essential that they do, or that I clamor for such attention because everyone knows this silly little facade is something not one exhalation could possibly adore. Love. What? No. It cuts me up and makes me weep and forces itself on me like "clung to tear-spiked lashes." I should really stop. Stop. Make the beating pulsations
pulsations
pulsations
Stop.

I need you now to save me...

"Rip out the wings of a butterfly..."

I sincerely hope no one caught that last post. Or the other two before it. Cousins in crime, they were...disgustingly weak and foully-written. I've since recovered from the despair. Rejoice.

With shifty eyes, I must admit that I'm watching the new video that's leaked from the newest HIM album...for the fifteenth time. It's absolutely amazing...deliciously beautiful. Lovely only as are those things created by that incredible band. "Rip Out the Wings of a Butterfly" has left me speechless. If this song is any indication of what's on the rest of the album, "Dark Light" will not disappoint. Rather than follow in the footsteps of "Deep Shadows and Brilliant Highlights," this brilliant piece of music sounds like something off of "Love Metal." Hallelujah. Allow to me wallow in the throes of pure, unadulterated bliss. I cannot begin to describe how happy this makes me. While DSaBH was a turning point in the band's general 'sound,' it wasn't exactly a turning point I enjoyed. I'm a fan of their older work, of "Razorblade Romance" and "Love Metal," to be completely honest...and ROtWoaB seems like it would fit in quite nicely with those two albums.

God, I'm thrilled to be listening to this. To be watching this. Thrilled!

The video? It's amazing. Although Ville chopped off his long, glorious locks (he gave himself a haircut, to the horror of many...), he still manages to retain his achingly beautiful aura. Oh, he's so fabulously dark and perfect. The video is fabulously dark and perfect. It's so haunting and marvelous and HIM-esque and gloomy and artistic and amazing. I've used that word so many times already...but it is. It's so amazing. I'm drowning in this sea of glee.

(Now, again for the sixteenth time...)

In others news, I was completely intoxicated last night...and I adored it. Inhibitions flew out the window, and I made friends -- though I'm sure most of us will be too shy to admit to anything while sober -- and I didn't get sick, and I was completely naughty...everywhere. It was very, very fun. Very freeing. Aside from the fact that I lost my Jack scarf (and I WILL find it again, or someone's going to die...), the night was wonderful. Oh, so wonderful...

And again, I'm going to watch this video. I know you want it, Mister. You'd better find me...