i'm fucked.
it's been a while, i know.
i've been busy - perhaps lazy too.
i've lost track of time.
i don't know how long i've been in san francisco.
or how long in this house.
or how long i've been a poet
in blood and spirit and mind.
i'm in love -
or very nearly so -
and
i'm fucked.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Sunday, February 19, 2012
broke...
i'm broke & a little drunk. where the money went, i have no idea. i know where all the wine went.
i've never had a real job. i've always been a writer. what can a writer do but write?
i see 'broke' everywhere here. i live so close to it these days. the line is thin.
i'm broke & a little scared.
how much further do i have to fall before i hit the mission sidewalk? what does this city look like from down there? i can't imagine.
i'm broke & in serious need of a job. where the money went, i have no idea.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
flash-backs...
it's a bright wednesday morning & i'm not quite present. i'm all past & future, breathing a different air from moment to moment.
i boarded a train, westbound, some three weeks ago. strange - i haven't written or talk much of it. in november i had a mother & father. it is now february & i have neither. the change happened fast. i wasn't there when it happened, but i can hear the sounds clearly. it must have been, & still be, pre-dawn - somewhere. everything else is so still & quiet in my memory. i don't try to distance myself from it even though it isn't and never was mine. i meditate on it & then it's gone.
it's gone.
i took my college savings & bought my ticket the day after the accident. there was no planning. it was as if death somehow watered a seed that had been planted in my brain some years before & there was no way to ignore the flowers, fully blossomed, in my skull. so i bought the ticket. i had no physical connections in san francisco, but i had none elsewhere either. i told myself that as long as i kept moving i wouldn't be scared & that has been the case so far. even when everything is still around me, i keep moving. a poet is always moving, jumping from line to line - sometimes fast & sometimes slow, but always moving.
i found a desk on the sidewalk early this morning & carried it six blocks back to my apartment. i felt like a thief & when i was passed by an early-morning-dog-walker i feared that she might begin to shout for an officer. no such thing happened, of course. there's a lot of shit on the sidewalk in this city. people tear down old lives & build new ones on a daily basis. surely that happens everywhere, but in san francisco people shamelessly leave their dejected old lives on the sidewalk right in front of their new ones. that's where i come in. it seems appropriate. in a sense that's why i'm here, looking for an old life that i somehow missed the first time around.
i boarded a train, westbound, some three weeks ago. strange - i haven't written or talk much of it. in november i had a mother & father. it is now february & i have neither. the change happened fast. i wasn't there when it happened, but i can hear the sounds clearly. it must have been, & still be, pre-dawn - somewhere. everything else is so still & quiet in my memory. i don't try to distance myself from it even though it isn't and never was mine. i meditate on it & then it's gone.
it's gone.
i took my college savings & bought my ticket the day after the accident. there was no planning. it was as if death somehow watered a seed that had been planted in my brain some years before & there was no way to ignore the flowers, fully blossomed, in my skull. so i bought the ticket. i had no physical connections in san francisco, but i had none elsewhere either. i told myself that as long as i kept moving i wouldn't be scared & that has been the case so far. even when everything is still around me, i keep moving. a poet is always moving, jumping from line to line - sometimes fast & sometimes slow, but always moving.
i found a desk on the sidewalk early this morning & carried it six blocks back to my apartment. i felt like a thief & when i was passed by an early-morning-dog-walker i feared that she might begin to shout for an officer. no such thing happened, of course. there's a lot of shit on the sidewalk in this city. people tear down old lives & build new ones on a daily basis. surely that happens everywhere, but in san francisco people shamelessly leave their dejected old lives on the sidewalk right in front of their new ones. that's where i come in. it seems appropriate. in a sense that's why i'm here, looking for an old life that i somehow missed the first time around.
Monday, February 6, 2012
movement
it's been a while & for that i am sorry. my life was up in the air last time i posted & i'm happy to say that things have worked themselves out for the time being. instead of vague generalities, i'd like now to tell you all what happened to me when i went to view the apartment i mentioned last week....
it was raining that day in san francisco. a low fog hung over market street - on the corner where i boarded a bus to the mission district. the fog here encompasses every aspect of life & for this reason the faces & the streets & the smells & the sounds & my destination stop were all in a fog. time was in a fog. i don't read on buses or trains here, i observe. i observe everything but my destination, poetic and entirely unintentional.
i found the apartment, bottle of wine under arm, after a long walk which for some reason i can't quite recall. as i wandered i failed to notice that the san francisco fog had lifted to reveal a beautiful afternoon. i knocked on the door, anxious to present & consume the beajoulais i had acquired.
she was beautiful. her skin, the color of almonds. her eyes, smoky & alive. short hair, long-legged. she introduced herself as jess & led me into the front room, the kitchen. the apartment smelled like marijuana.
'this could be my first apartment,' i thought, struck&intimidated&amazed.
& then him. aslan - his name - sitting at the kitchen table over a cup of black coffee, a notebook - joint between his fingers & really fuckin' cool. i didn't talk much, but i think they read youthful ignorance & excitement on my face. they were trying to loosen me up.
first the marijuana. then the beaujoulais. & then something entirely different, but i'm getting ahead of myself.
we sat around the kitchen table for a while. jess & aslan didn't act like any couple i'd ever seen close up. they didn't hold hands or make faces & noises at each other. they didn't show their feelings, they felt them & moved with them. they were like old friends, just comfortable with the changes they both underwent from minute to minute. i didn't know who i was more attracted to. they asked questions - first questions i knew the answers to & then questions i'd never even considered before, but haven't stopped considering since. i found a voice in the joints & wine & conversation & comfort. hours passed.
'it's yours. should we celebrate?'
i'll never forget the sound of jess's voice at that moment, drifting on the surface of implications. i was too stiff to exhibit my excitement & too stiff to refuse the piece of paper aslan placed on my tongue.
'you're skin is going to fall off,' he whispered. or maybe yelled.
i don't remember much after this - a few bob dylan lyrics & some poetry-reading.
when i woke up the next day i was laying on the floor in an empty room, my room. tacked to the wall, two feet from the hardwood floor, was a piece of paper with my handwriting on it. it read:
pretty good, right?
it was raining that day in san francisco. a low fog hung over market street - on the corner where i boarded a bus to the mission district. the fog here encompasses every aspect of life & for this reason the faces & the streets & the smells & the sounds & my destination stop were all in a fog. time was in a fog. i don't read on buses or trains here, i observe. i observe everything but my destination, poetic and entirely unintentional.
i found the apartment, bottle of wine under arm, after a long walk which for some reason i can't quite recall. as i wandered i failed to notice that the san francisco fog had lifted to reveal a beautiful afternoon. i knocked on the door, anxious to present & consume the beajoulais i had acquired.
she was beautiful. her skin, the color of almonds. her eyes, smoky & alive. short hair, long-legged. she introduced herself as jess & led me into the front room, the kitchen. the apartment smelled like marijuana.
'this could be my first apartment,' i thought, struck&intimidated&amazed.
& then him. aslan - his name - sitting at the kitchen table over a cup of black coffee, a notebook - joint between his fingers & really fuckin' cool. i didn't talk much, but i think they read youthful ignorance & excitement on my face. they were trying to loosen me up.
first the marijuana. then the beaujoulais. & then something entirely different, but i'm getting ahead of myself.
we sat around the kitchen table for a while. jess & aslan didn't act like any couple i'd ever seen close up. they didn't hold hands or make faces & noises at each other. they didn't show their feelings, they felt them & moved with them. they were like old friends, just comfortable with the changes they both underwent from minute to minute. i didn't know who i was more attracted to. they asked questions - first questions i knew the answers to & then questions i'd never even considered before, but haven't stopped considering since. i found a voice in the joints & wine & conversation & comfort. hours passed.
'it's yours. should we celebrate?'
i'll never forget the sound of jess's voice at that moment, drifting on the surface of implications. i was too stiff to exhibit my excitement & too stiff to refuse the piece of paper aslan placed on my tongue.
'you're skin is going to fall off,' he whispered. or maybe yelled.
i don't remember much after this - a few bob dylan lyrics & some poetry-reading.
when i woke up the next day i was laying on the floor in an empty room, my room. tacked to the wall, two feet from the hardwood floor, was a piece of paper with my handwriting on it. it read:
Three (3) Haikus
five five five five five
seven seven seven, now
five five five five five
five & five & five
seven seven seven &
five & five & five
5 5 5 5 5
7 7 7 &
5 5 5 5 5
pretty good, right?
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
success...?
this morning - finally! - i received a response to my craigslist ad. a couple living in the mission district are looking for a roommate to sublet a room in their two-bedroom apartment. the e-mail that they sent me seemed indicative of a good environment. they perform together as a folk duo at coffee shops & social gatherings around the city. perhaps they'll know some poets & writers with whom i can discuss my passions. maybe i can make some connections. i remain hopeful. i will be going to look at the apartment & meet the couple this evening &, if they take a liking to me, i hope to move in sometime this week. i've found a liquor store near the hostel that has yet to card me - perhaps i'll bring a bottle of wine to the interview. maybe some of my work as well!
in creative news, i've been doing a fair amount of writing since i've been here. i've been focused mainly on short poems & haikus (this city can be captured so well in seventeen syllables!). also, i've been outlining a semi-autobiographical account of my travels from east to west. the physical journey isn't much to write about, but the implications are so great that i feel i'd be a fool not to put it to paper - potentially learn a thing or two about myself & this ageless country in the process.
note to self: first purchase after finding permanent residence must be a type-writer. this computer screen is blinding & i find myself constantly distracted.
lights sound batteries
hum hum hum
pornography & rock n' roll
trains upon trains of thought
crash
hum hum hum
wish me luck this evening!
-j.
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