Weekends

So, it started last weekend, and judging by this weekend, its not planning on going away. I started drinking again last week, for some weird, unconscious reason i could just suddenly do it again, and in pretty fucking impressive magnitude as well. I spent a full 72 hours intoxicated, one night of which, i drained an entire fifth of vodka. Weekends are usually the time that I have to write my poetry and my short stories, but for the last two, I've just spent them completely wasted. Clearly that is no state to write anything in, at least for me. So with an entire 2/3 of a handle of vodka devoted to the past two nights (Saturday's "night" started at 3 PM) I am sort of getting a bit worried. I have never liked being drunk before, and I spent the first two weeks of the semester in such a fucking terrible state of mind it was ridiculous (I'm sure you guys all realized that). So I have no other thought than I am subconsciously drinking away some hidden awfulness in me, but my conscious is smart enough to know that doesn't work. I guess I'm just along for the ride, but yet again, I have no piece of my work to post because I haven't been writing at all. Good day.

God damn these papers

Catching up on a week of classes is no joke; today is my day of the week for relaxing. I have spent 5 hours doing calculus and 3 doing physics. Remind me never to force my dominant arm into a state of being unable to be used ever again. I guess on the positive side of things, I don't have class until noon tomorrow, so I've got all night to finish all of my shit. College!

Recovered

Alright, I am feeling like myself again, great in all ways. I had a pretty exciting week, though the beginning of it started off really, really bad. I'm sure all of you could've gathered that, but I am ok now. I met some sweet new people this week, and I also got accepted into a program to go to Ghana this summer to help an orphanage out. I'm really excited about that (so if you know anybody who would be willing to donate money to a good cause, send them my way). Both my arms work enough to type and write, for short amounts of time at least, but my right shoulder still just hurts all the time. I am slowly getting used to it. In celebration of my return to sanity, here is a poem I wrote, I really like it.

Crumbling (Tentatively)
It seems the only thing the cruelty of this world teaches me
is how to deal with tragedy and how to fight for nothing.
Grasping at the shallow roots beneath my feet so strongly
grasping fruitlessly to keep my place, to stay on common ground,
but roots come up to easily, and here I am to falter.
I watch the world around them crumble to the atoms deeply hidden.
Cracks are widening, if slowly, but this world around me's turning,
something new is coming up, it's unfamiliar and scary.
I would love to say with confidence I knew my path, I knew my way,
but I realize more each day that it's the world around me that decides.
I am left to battle waves of worldly impact and design.
This world around me's crumbling to dust and ashes, powdered soot
and it's leaving me to find new means of grasping to those roots.
I'm learning rapidly however that roots will always fail.
No matter how I strengthen them, no matter how I hold,
the roots beneath my feet will endlessly be torn asunder.
And me actions don't affect them, I try hard to make them better,
but they've never held y hands in place, they've never left me stable.
and when I speak my mind the roots beneath my feet subside,
leave me tumbling down the hills of dust and powdered soot.
And when I stand again, I'll place my roots deep down below
they wont hold, I know this, still I'll likely always try.
This world around me's crumbling, and to be honest, so am I.

Can't do it

I'm done posting for a while, gotta fix what's fucked in my head and posting is just another means to make me feel awful.

Slipping

I haven't eaten yet today because the campus eatery doesn't open until 4 on Sundays, gotta love dorm life. My brain has ceased to function as it should. I don't know what happened, but I am not myself. I am having lapses of directionless and severe nervousness and uneasiness. My thoughts are cloudy at best, I can't focus on anything for much length; I'm drifting between feeling fine and feeling incredibly terrible in matters of sometimes as low as an hour. I can't write, I don't want to sit around, and I can't sleep. I'm feeling incredibly uncomfortable in my own skin, it's nearly unbearable. I don't know what is happening and I don't know how to fix it.

Unstable

Clearly, I am going through some sort of oscillating mental state here, because today, I feel fine. I decided that I was being distracted by bits and pieces of poems too much and decided to write one, which was both successful and painful. It's sort of funny to flip through my poem book (or blog even) and just see a really happy, inspiring poem (or post) just followed by an awfully dark one. So here we go, to keep that up, a happy one typed entirely with my left hand. (note: this is not the one I wrote today.)

Blue World
Here's to watching elements
as they shift around my head,
here's to steep slopes and shallow bends,
here's to deep rivers, hallows and caves
here's to enjoying every day.
Here's to watching life pass by
but knowing it's watching you too.
Here's to outstretching one's own hand
and snatching someone close to you
as world accrue.
As the same world collide and splinter,
as the splinters shatter you inside
and your someone that's close, too.
You land in places where
the grass is purple, maybe blue.
A lonely light above the sky
perhaps a star, perhaps a guy
simply holding a giant flashlight.
Who's to say with confidence
any conclusion in this strange new place?
So let's go running rampant on the ground
let's go swimming through amber oceans
let us break the bounds of freedom
like a pane of solid glass.
'Til this blue world, it quakes and crumbles
and will shatter once again,
Land us somewhere different.
Somewhere newer, maybe truer than the last.
Here's to the possibility
that this might last forever.

Lack of Dominance

Looks like I'm forcibly left-handed for the next few weeks, how awesome. Keeping this post short, not happy. No right hand means no poetry writing, and typing with only my left hand sucks, so I've got no drive to write short stories. I'll have no outlet for creativity. There might be an explosion.

Ouch

This post is being written mostly by my left hand only. The story goes like this, i was snapping pictures of the winter wonderland that I currently live in, and me and the guy I was with decide to go for an adventure. We descend into "The Gorge" which is the ~200 foot deep river valley within minutes walking distance of my campus. Of course it will be covered in snow, and of course it will be beautiful. I got some really really fucking sweet pictures. Unfortunately, two fantastic falls left both my right elbow and shoulder crippled (my camera was on my left side, so I decided it was better to fall to my right). So 8 really sweet pictures of my surroundings as well as a nice, at the very least, sufficiently damaged right arm.

I wrote possibly my favorite poem that I have written since I've been back to school, and it's also the first one that relates to a different subject matter than the other ones. Things are looking up, my short story is coming along nicely, and my classes are nice and easy. Being sick isn't that huge of a detriment, so the world is looking up. I'm going to post one of my favorite poems that I've written. It is directed at no one in particular, for the record, just some mythical entity.

They Say I Won't, I Can't
Cast me away
in endless ocean
leave ym boat
floating free.
Centuries have passed
on this ocean,
I've been alone,
but hope at last.
I see a shore, upon it,
looking towards the ocean,
your deep blue eyes reflecting
light of frequency so strong and sure
magnitude of beauty.
And as a man upon on ocean,
blues come cheap, so I surmise,
your eyes, things of perfection
and they pierce me through.
You stand alone
upon this island
in the middle of the sea.
You say you've stayed for centuries
and it's driving you insane.
A better match, I could not
hope for, dream of, I had laid to rest
all hopes of finding you,
so I outstretch a hand.
"Will you come with me?" I ask
"Stay with em for centuries
and we'll sail across the seas."
you nod your head,
but I've awoken from my dream.
I raise the sail, the wind takes me
to look for you upon the sea.


nice little hypothetical love poem.

Doing a bit better I suppose

Three days into classes, and I've only fucked up once. How uplifting. It would appear that all of my mental stigmas have transmitted into physical ones. Within a matter of two days or so my physical health has dissolved quite dramatically. I cannot get to sleep at night due to coughing fits, my throat is always clogged with mucus and my nose is always full of thick, green snot. The kind that is never a good sign. I've woken up the past tow mornings with a terrible sore throat and almost no ability to talk for the first few hours of being awake. Eventually, my now-daily court of orange juice seems to break up the mucus in my throat enough to get back to conversation.

On a better note, my mind is feeling pretty clear. I feel better about everything, and I'm pretty sure I'm no longer on a road to depression. I'm gonna take some pictures of my winter wonderland tomorrow, they'll probably be pretty tops, the amount of snow on the ground is nuts. I hear through the grapevine that Allentown got hit pretty hard, at least Allentown's understanding of getting hit hard. It's a shame, I would've liked to have seen that, but I've got that and then some up here, so I suppose that's alright. I realized that my spring break is not in mid-April, as I have been telling people, but instead is from March 5-13. It splits my semester pretty much into 2/3 beforehand and 1/3 after, so that's pretty nice.

I finished that poem of mine, but I don't really feel ready to share it. It turned out to be pretty personal, and yeah, it's got to go through some maturing before I let it go free into the world. I also started the next chapter of the group of short stories that are held in the same world as the previous one, so i will be posting that when I am finished. Today has been pretty damn uplifting, I won't lie. Despite having 5 classes, its actually been pretty damn laid back and I feel surprisingly fantastic coming up on 10pm. I hope this feeling persists; I'm pretty sure it will. 

Sick

Woke up at 7:30 AM today, feeling like i was going to puke up the nothing that was in my stomach any second. My voice was crackly and probably an octave deeper than it should've been. I had to lumber over to Physics 2 in this state, a class that happens to be over 2 hours long. Good news: I am still really really good at physics, but 2 hours of sitting in plastic chairs with a stomach that's doing flips isn't exactly ideal. I'll be laying in bed and drinking orange juice for a while, I feel. I haven't actually been sick like this in years, so many years. It is a perplexing feeling.

Today marks the 7th post on this blog, which means I have updated once a day for one week, and I'm pretty glad I didn't forget about it. The other day I had some writer's block, and this is the poem that broke it.


Lovely 
Lovely little words and phrases piled
into my head, intrude my thoughts.
Lovely little walls against
any ability for me
to reach deep down
and recover thoughts that flow together.
Lovely little thoughts and phrases
like "Get fcuked" and "Have a derp."
Lovely little sentiments of people,
places, everything.
I wish they could escape me.
These Lovely little clouds obstructing,
overriding, obstinate,
thoughts of loving, thoughts of hate,
creative thoughts,
creative phrases.
Leaving me to find myself
left without a word.
This lovely little paradise
it reels me in, it makes me warm
but in the backa  ringing,
maybe a buzzing,
maybe a calling,
something isn't right.
I've lost the will to abjugate,
even if for a short time,
thoughts of lonely little me,
thoughts of going, going, going,
thoughts of lovely girls to see,
that so drive my poetry.


They say that to cure writer's block you just have to write about the inability to write? I'm pretty sure I've heard that somewhere, but it seems to work.

One down

So, my first day of classes is over, and yet again, this semester looks like it won't be so bad. Being back in Erie brings up all the old feelings of loneliness and boredom. Those two have become staples of my sweet personality that I have up here.

On a side note, I feel myself growing distanced from a lot of things, slowly. A bit apathetic to everything that's happening outside of my person could be a good way to describe it I guess. Nonetheless, whatever I call it doesn't really change the fact that it exists. Makes me wonder if there is a day that is yet to come that I'll just look at everything around me, and realize I care so little about it all that I break, and nothing but me matters anymore. If that happens, apologies to anyone that it impacts. Perhaps I just need to get away for a while.

My ramblings are reminding me of whiny children more and more, maybe I just need to do something interesting again. I've taken on possibly the most daunting of poetic attempts today, I'll probably post it once I am finished. That may be a while, but I'll mention what it is when/if I post it for those of you who will keep up with this. Sorry for another literature-less post, I guess most people probably aren't coming onto this to hear me bitch about my life, but for now, I would run out of poems and short stories if I were to post one every day. To leave you, a haiku for Joey Martin.


If I were to be
Immortalized in game it
would be Fallout 3

Something about this place

Nothing about this place is better than what I am used to. The rooms are smaller than what I am used to, but somehow I never run out of room. My bed is the most uncomfortable mattress I have yet to sleep on, but I get a good nights sleep every night. It's always cold out but I manage to stay warm. It's as though I've got an affinity for this place, something that allows me to enjoy its subtle good qualities in the heap of bad ones. I could never live here if I weren't going to school here, and I want to be out of here as soon as possible once I am here. But it's not so bad. It's like a little, shitty haven. So this is going to come out a bit sketchy, but I recently finished a short story I had been working on for some time. Finished is used tentatively. It's quite long, take a few breaks if you must, but I think it's a pretty ok read.

The original basis of the story was that it always annoys me when narrators are recalling a story from years prior, but somehow manage to remember exactly the words that people said to them. Dialogue is such a  multi-faceted thing, and with this story i decided to relay a story as a person would remember it from the future. Paraphrases and summaries, with a bit of detail sprinkled in. Things get a bit odd in it, just be prepared. Also, there are a number of typing errors, there are bound to be, just bear with it.

Untitled

        My burden weighed heavily on my back as I emerged from the bus that I had taken refuge in. It had been twelve weeks since the bomb was dropped, and the air still hung heavily in the air. That's what she used to call it, heavy air. From my hilltop, downtown looked like something out of a horror movie. Debris and fog still polluted the air with impurities. I started my long journey with a heavy footstep, my boot sinking deep into the cold, wet mud.

        There used to be a forest here, there used to be animals, there used to be things to eat. Now I haven't eaten in probably three days; I don't know anymore, the sun barely makes it through the thickness of the clouds. At night, what little light is emitted from around illuminates the surrounding fog pretty well, and those damn liberators are everywhere, lighting fires and causing havoc. My only hope is that I can complete this trip without running into a pack of those, animals. I take my second step, and the soft mud gives way under the strain of my added weight.

         I pulled all I was holding to my front as my feet slipped from under me, and I was plummeting. Shredded wood bits and dirt fly through the air, hitting my mask. I was fearful I may not retain my mask through my pilgrimage to downtown. There are many people there, more than I'm used to. I feared they may take my things from me, and I may not be prepared to fight for that which I care about. My boot came into contact with a piece of tree that was still rooted near the bottom of the hill, and I was sent careening. I lost track of time, lost track of the day, lost track of her, all that's on my mind was surviving this death roll into liberator territory. It will certainly draw unnecessary attention to us. Sky, ground, tree bits, sky, downtown, ground, sky, fire, no, it can't be. Liberators this far from the city? What do I do? I did the only thing I could think of. I grabbed her last gift to me, at my collar bone.

         My finger penetrated through my skin, and as I rolled, I felt it move slowly down my ribcage. My bones felt like stone, cold and lifeless in comparison to the muscle around them. As my finger slid out from my reopened gash, I let my body fall limp, flipping wildly down the little remaining portion of the hill. As I slid to a stop, I could already hear the footsteps approaching. Muffled voices through masks chattered back and forth. As they approached, a scream, these were no liberators, what were they?

The scream startled me, I sat up, saw a small pool of blood trickle out of my ripped shirt, not that it wasn't already ripped. It was just far more ripped now. A family, left obviously battered after the initial drop. A mother and two children. They looked fearful, I held up a hand, I was not a threat. The kids both had gas masks on, one was homemade, cloths placed around the face, they worked well enough. The younger one wore that one, and the other wore a gas mask that was similar to the one I wore on my face. Standard issue to those who seemed like they would have a future. Hilarious, as if any future exists in this wasteland. The mother wore nothing on her face, not that rare, as well as a heroic sentiment, but they all might as well be buried already. The mother will be dead in less than a week at this intense of a density of the fog that plagues with area. That leaves tow small children on their own to survive, left for the liberators to find. And who's to say what would happen to them then. The only thing I know is that they would be better off dead if the liberators found them.

         I glanced over at my baggage, which had landed next to me at the bottom of the hill, then back to them. Warm blood trickled down my leg, and they remained cowering between me and their fire. I lifted at the bottom of my mask, and tossed it at the mother's feet, then turned and threw my things over my shoulders. When I turned back around the mother had hastily put the gas mask on, and she was ushering her children back over to the fire. I followed slowly, staggering with the weight, and still a bit jeered from the fall down the hill. I freed one hand and ripped a strip of cloth from my now mostly useless shirt, and slowly wrapped it around a larger stick that the family had found. It was a near-impossible task with only one free hand, and the mother came over to help. She understood, understood what this was like. The darkness of night ever-invading, I would need a torch to guide me until I got close enough to the lights. Unfortunately a torch is also a beacon to others, not an ideal thing to have while going into downtown, but I really had little other option.

         The mother finished tying the cloth around the stick, and after holding it in the fire for a few seconds, I turned to leave. I felt a strong hand on my wrist, and a slight tug. I turned to see the mother looking directly into my eyes, a rarity in these times. She bowed her head slightly and unexpectedly came very close and wrapped her arms around my lower back. Her forehead fell lightly on my left collar bone, and her breath was definite and warm on my recently reopened gash. Her body moved against mine; I let my torched hand wrap around her, and in fact, dropped the torch to the ground. My body ached, and my gash bled, the world stung deep to the core of a person, but not in this moment. In this moment, there was a beauty, a moment of dire companionship. We probably stayed like that for five minutes, until we both slowly let go. She backed away, the ghost of a smile plagued her face, though it was still impossible for a person to show happiness. It did not exist for the time being, only moments of less pain. I would be dead within days of entering downtown without a mask and she had kids to make sure survived, which would likely end up killing her. We both knew these things and neither of us cared so much. As she backed away, I saw that my blood had stained the majority of the front of her shirt, another thing both of us knew and neither showed a care about.

She went back to tending to her children around the fire, and I grabbed the torch from the ground, successfully turning and leaving this time. No hellos were said, as were there no goodbyes, they had never seen me up to this chance occurrence and they would never see me again. There was only those few moments that we had shared.

         I walked slowly, driven, through the ever-thickening fog that covered the mark-less ground. Everything was dirt or mud with shards of charred bark. The torch led the way through the maze, but it was impossible to tell even the vaguest direction that I was heading. I had to hope that I was still moving the direction I had entered the fog moving. But for the time being, my legs weakened, they were breaking, they had gone too far today. I took one more step, and my knees buckled under the weight. I landed hard on both knees, and decided it was time for a night's rest. I laid my possessions down beside me and landed hard on the ground next to them. I planted the butt of the torch in the ground and latched onto my things. I hoped both would still be around when I awoke, but I did not have much confidence for either.

My eyes opened to a the sight of a lifted haze. I could see the bottom of it, hovering maybe ten feet above my head. My torch produced no light, my things lay exactly as I placed them down the night before. As I stood, a strong gust of wind nearly toppled me over, tough it shouldn't be surprising, the wind is what lifted the haze. I stood tall, stretched, looked to my torch, then looked around me. Bodies.

         Dead bodies riddled the ground, but my heart remained still. This was almost normal now, liberators run around, kill everything in their path. This was likely a large group traveling out of the city. Luckily for me, travelers would have had food, and liberators rarely loot their victims. It had been days since I'd eaten, so I shamelessly looked through bags and pockets, but found only a few morsels. Food must be running short in the liberators' reserves. Or perhaps this group's reason for leaving was a lack of food in the city. If that is the case, they would not have lasted long anyway, liberators or not. With a few bites in my stomach, I trudged onward. The faint lights of the city were now a beacon, no longer obscured by fog. So I carried on.

My heavy footsteps sank into the dirt and mud. The lights swayed and bobbed with every step. My chest heaved, the scab opening again with the slightest odd movement. I continued like this for hours, until I made it to a running river. The water was dark, obscuring, reflected images like a mirror. She had said I would make it to a river, if I held a straight path. She said there was a bridge to the left, and to cross the river was impossible. It was water so infected it could rot clothes, skin, muscle, anything that entered it. I twisted to the left and continued my path beside the river.

         Within the day, I had made it to the bridge. It had fallen, presumably in the first drop, but it was clearly heavily populated. As heavily as something could be populated under these circumstances, at least. Fires dotted the rolling, ravaged metal passage over the flowing torrents of liquid death. On the other side of the bridge, the road to the city would take less than a day through liberator-heavy land. Decidedly, I would stop at the bridge for the night.

As I approached the entrance to the bridge, there was a man bickering with a guard that stood at the entrance. The guards wanted some form of payment for entrance to the city, space was limited, it was understandable. The man had nothing, and so he left, angered, he would be either dead or turned liberator in days. I slowed as I came within talking distance of one of the guards, knowing I had nothing to give. I stopped and looked into the guards face. It was not stoic, as I expected, but moving in ways of sympathy, compassion even. He looked to my bleeding chest, to my legs which shook under the overexertion and lack of food, to my empty stomach that pulled tightly to my ribs and organs, and last, the weight I bored on my shoulders. He slowly stepped aside and waved me past. He knew that I would not be staying long on the bridge, my path was merciless and hopeless.

         The main passage through the rusted, gutted bridge was hard and uneven. Small concrete and sheet metal huts lined either side of the walkway, with small families huddled inside around fires. Most of them lacked a father, some lacked a mother. Times were brutal. I happened upon a hut where a family sat around a dying father, who was bleeding out slowly from the side of his thigh. He looked weak, he had likely been like that for days. The condition he was in assumed that he had not stopped working after receiving the wound. I knew that I had enough knowledge to give a helping hand. Reaching into my pocket, after freeing my hand from supporting the weight, I found I still had thread and a needle. They were her most useful possessions, and she gave them to me before I started my journey, in the case my chest reopened. She had the notion I planned on returning. I produced the thread and needle as I entered the bleak hut. The family fled to the corner from me, until their eyes fell to my outstretched hand. They remained in the corner for the duration of the operation, but appeared more relaxed.

         I put my possessions in the corner, and thread my needle. Upon success, I knelt down beside the father. The gash was deep, and it spread wide as I laid him down. He took a piece of wood to his mouth to try to ease the pain, but it would not help.

         My first stitch pierced through the skin, into the corner of the wound. The flesh pulled and dragged with the needle and thread. My thread went into one side of the cut white and left the other side stained blood red. I could feel his body jostling from pain, but there was nothing I could do to ease that. The needle made its way up his leg, until it hit the far corner. The two sides of the ravine in that man's leg again touched. It was not perfect, but it was certainly better, He would live as long as it did not get infected. I've been told that once diluted, the water below the bridge acted as a strong disinfectant, so infection would likely not occur. I wrapped his thigh with what was left of my shirt. Without a word I stood, gathered my things and returned to the walkway. No words were exchanged, there was no need. I knew they were thankful, they knew I was glad to help.

         The bridge was behind me. I had spent the night in its street, nobody offered the warmth of their stead, I wouldn't expect them to. I had bought a small morsel to eat with what little I had to trade before I laid down for the night. I traded away the thread, her thread, in order to make it to my destination. That gift had certainly proved useful.

         With my fist step out of the bridge community, a gust of wind blew a breath full of haze into my lungs. I could feel it tear and rip at my insides, a deep burning sensation welled in my lungs. I fell to my knees and began coughing uncontrollably, it seems the sickness was beginning to set in. I would need to make it into the city soon, or I would never arrive. I coughed for probably another ten minutes, as I breathed my lungs continued to burn, the haze had invaded. I could almost feel it soaking into my lungs, spreading its volatility to the rest of my body through my blood. Could feel my muscles turning black, rotting from the inside. Slowly I stopped feeling the need to cough, but I remained on my knees, wheezing a little. This is how the haze effected people, incremental incapacitation.

         I regained my composure and got to my feet, and stumbled back into a clumsy walk. My body still felt as if it were at a lack of oxygen, but she said that that feeling doesn't persist. After probably less than an hour, I could see a figure on the ground through a light haze. It was still moving, but didn't appear the be trying to stand. As I came closer and closer to it, the figure that cast the shadow became clear. With my final step toward it, bringing me within a few feet, I was faced with a terrible burden laid at my feet. Her eyes pierced through mine for a second as she studied me and I studied what I saw. And what I saw was a young woman, her arms tied to stakes driven into the ground. She was completely stripped of her clothing, and had countless bruises, abrasions, cuts, and burns scattered over her body. Her ribs appeared to be trying to burst out of her skin, her stomach was even thinner than mine had been. This was clearly liberator work, and clearly she was left here to die by them. Left here for any lone traveler to stumble upon and have his way with. I wondered what would drive a person to do this as I set down my things and knelt beside the girl.

         Her eyes grew wide with fear and she shook her head ferociously. Her mouth was bound, otherwise I'm positive she would have made a noise at that point. I responded by snatching her shaking head from its path, and signaling for her to be quiet with my other hand. She still did not understand my intention, and that was reasonable, she had seen the worst side of humankind more than once in the recent past. I cast another glance down her beaten body. She really was a beautiful girl, I felt a deep regret that she had to go through this. I felt a regret that people could be such monsters. But it was about time I got to work.

         I planted myself onto the ground and grabbed my right pant leg, at the knee. My eyes strayed to her as I tugged on the leg. Her eyes were closed, her head turned away. She had grown tired of watching what she assumed was happening happen. With one final tug, I successfully ripped the bottom half of my pant leg off, and the tearing noise broke her from her absence from the situation. Even with almost half her face covered, I could see a look of confusion spread across it. I let a sidelong smile her way as I began to work on my left pant leg. After getting both pant legs off, I began to rip the fabric into strips long enough to wrap around her appendages. It was clear she still did not understand exactly what I was doing, but she seemed to understand exactly what I was not doing. I was glad to have that clarification.

         After ripping up my pants, I had several lengthy strips of fabric to work with, so I started wrapping anything that was bleeding, and as I started moving around her to make sure I wrapped everything, I found a grim spectacle. Next to her far leg was a sharp rock, bloodied completely, and directly above it, on her leg, was a set of tally marks. I counted four sets of diagonal marks atop four vertical and a few other lone vertical tallies. My eyes became intense as I turned my head again towards her face. We spoke words without noise in that moment, we were in complete understanding of one another. Tears began to stream from her eyes as I took my last strip of fabric and covered those grisly marks. As I stood to again check to make sure I missed nothing, I reflected on how lucky it was that the liberators covered her face through this atrocity, if they hadn't I would have been unable to save her for certain. She would have the sickness by now, just like me.

         Looking over her one last time, I realized there was still more I could help with. She was still completely bare, with no choice of her own. I gabbed my pants at the waist, undid them, and dropped what was left of them to the ground. There was a definite hint of uncertainty in her eyes as I stood there in only my underwear. I did not blame her for that. I could feel her ease when I lifted her far leg and began to thread it through the corresponding leg of the pants. She was too weak to do anything on her own. Her legs quivered as I moved them, and she was unable to lift her own waist to give me the ability to wrap the pants around her. So I was forced to lift her body in the process. At the end of it, her chest was still exposed, but it was better than nothing.

         After finishing fastening the pants, I moved straight to working on the ties around her wrists. They were incredibly tight, and they had caused brutal scarring around her wrists and on her hands. After a few minutes of work, I unfasten both hands and she was free. She immediately did probably the only thing she had the energy to do. She wrapped both arms around my shoulders, and I responded by wrapping both of my arms around her back. I easily picked her up off of the ground and onto her feet. Her weight fell onto my shoulders, her legs buckled under her own weight, and she nearly fell to the ground again. I caught her and decided there was only one thing to do. I turned around and picked the girl's legs up, wrapping them around my waist, and pulling her arms forward until her front was firmly against my back. It seemed I was on my way back to the bridge.

         It was another hour or so until I made it there. I didn't know what I planned to do, I had no way of getting back in. I continued to walk, hopeless until I saw the face of the guard on the left. It was the face of the man who's leg I had sewn together. One night and he already appeared better, though he probably would not be able to do much actual guard work. He stood leaning against a metal beam that protruded from the ground, putting no weight on his injured leg. His face lit up as I approached, and he beckoned me over. With interjecting glances at the girl on my back, who had fallen asleep by this point, the guard told me that he was instructed to, if I were to ever return, send me to the large house on the left, about halfway down the bridge. I listened.

         When I approached the house, I was unsure of what would come of this. Two more guards stood at the entrance. I was hoping dearly that this was not a rudimentary political center, I didn't handle politicians well. With my first step inside, I was immediately struck with what this building was. It was a hospital. People lined either wall, rolling around, a batch of healthier people sat around a large fire at the center of the structure. Even the healthier ones looked a bit deathly. There was a hole out of the back of the building that overlooked the river, with a table built up to the bottom of it. The table was layered in blood, as was the floor below it. The one thing that was notably out of ordinary was that there was not a single dead body in the entirety of the facility.

          With my first few steps into the hospital, I was assailed by a shorter woman in blood-stained garments. The bottom half of her face was covered with a cloth to guard against the haze, and that was enough. I could see from only the top half of her face that she was very young, maybe early twenties, and she had long, blonde hair. She tossed it about as she told me about how she recognized who I was, what I had done. She asked for help with the patients that needed it and she held out my thread in her hand. With a smile, I lifted it from her grasp an agreed, but only under the circumstance that I help the girl on my back first. It didn't take long for her to agree to that.

          The girl on my back awoke as I laid her softly onto one of the few operating tables. Her eyes moved frantically around the new environment. Panic spread across her face for a few seconds as her view darted here and there. Landing her attention onto me, she let out a deep breath and relaxed onto the table. The woman who ran the hospital approached my side, asking if I needed anything? I instructed her that I would need a bucket, with a proper handle. With a quick trip to the other side of the room, the woman returned with a suitable bucket. I took it in my hand, and began walking for the door. The woman questioned this, and I simply told her that I would be back, and to give the girl on the table something to eat, she would need more energy than what she had for this operation. With that, I exited through the doorway with haste, making a sharp left toward the direction I originally came from. The air back outside was harsh, I could all but feel it permeate through the cells in my lungs. I needed to hurry.

         As I passed the house of the father that I helped the previous day, I was hailed. An old woman inside the house stood over a large cauldron, steaming from the heat. She offered me soup, and I asked if instead she would allow me to bottle the steam rising from the pot. A strange look spread across her face, a look of utter disbelief. Paying no attention to her, I assumed she would have no problem with it, and picked up a piece of clean looking metal with an appropriate corner. I motioned towards a small glass bottle that sat on the ground near the fire. I could see from the outside that it was empty, and I assured the woman I would return it. She reluctantly nodded and handed it to me. I placed the bucket on the ground next to the fire, and held the piece of metal in a position so that the steam would accumulate and drip into it. Within a short amount of time I had accumulated well over half a bucket of water. She must have been trying to disinfect water, it was the only reason to heat it to a temperature that high. Unfortunately the only means to collect the clean water was what I was doing. Perhaps she would take away the knowledge of the process that I was currently doing.

         I took my bucket of water in one hand and the glass bottle in the other, and continued on down the bridge to the end.

         As I passed the guards, I explained that I was merely grabbing water quick. They seemed to accept it. I hastily traveled until I was at the bank of the river. The water reflected a deep, tainted black. I held the glass bottle tightly in my left hand, there was no good way to do this, and my right hand was the dominant of the two. I took a deep breath, but that action alone sent me into a coughing fit that landed my face mere inches from the tainted water. Every ounce of my body tried to pull my face away from the water, but the coughing was too strong, my muscles were locked. This lasted for about a minute, and when I was done, I watched blood drip from the edge of the gash in my chest into the water below. As it sank, it visibly twitched here and there, I watched the blood become destroyed by the volatile liquid. I sat back onto my knees, bottle still in hand, and took a few long blinks to center myself. My lungs burned more with every second, and without a moment more of hesitation, I dunked the bottle into the water, as well as most of my hand. I felt my skin start to separate from muscle. Just a couple of seconds until the bottle filled enough, and I removed my hand from the water. It glowed a deep hue of red, and large pieces of skin had disappeared. The burning slowly calmed as I walked back up to the bridge. As I passed them, I felt nothing but indifference from them, utter neutrality. They could see what I had done, and they likely realized why. Such a shame that they could not care.

         By the time I had made it back to the hospital building, the girl had finished eating, and she sat upright on the edge of the operating table. I approached her and held out the bucket of water. She looked to the bucket and then to me, offering a weak smile as a payment. She drank a few large gulps, but I was forced to take it back from her, it needed to serve another purpose. I took a few steps back, and raised the rim of the bottle to the bucket, pouring about half of the bottle into the fresh water. The black filth cloud moved here and there in the bucket, and after a few seconds the water a transformed to a dark gray color. I placed my left hand into the bucket, mixed it around a bit, and then applied it to the gash on my chest. It burned a severity that spread through the rest of my body, but I could almost feel it cleanse. I returned to the girl's side, placed the bucket onto the floor, and laid her down with both hands.

         I began to untie the multiple dressings that were on her upper body, and once I was done, I began to apply the dirtied water to her wounds. Not only would the liquid clean out the infection, but it also stripped the layer of filth from her body. With every new gash I touched, her hands visibly grasped the edged of the operating table harder and harder, and with every gash I touched, the tenderness and complexion of her skin revealed more and more painfully how youthful she was. When I finished with her, I would've guessed she was no older than twenty. I took the button of her pants into the grip of my fingers, but, with a moment of hesitation, looked to her face. She lifted her head, looking to my hand, and then to my face. She nodded assuredly and laid her head back down, returning her focus to something a bit less painful.

         I applied the liquid to the set of tally marks, and I felt the pain of every single one that my hand passed over. They were all so deep, so utterly malignant. I cleaned every one deep, hoping they would disappear with every single movement. But they didn't, so I turned to the woman, who had sneaked up behind me. Without a word, she handed me the spool of thread. I dipped the thread and needle into the bucket of water, and let it soak for a number of seconds, until I felt they had been properly disinfected.

         I pulled the thread from the bucket, and pulled the needle at length, as the spool spun freely between two fingers. I made quick work of the majority of her cuts, most weren't too deep. Then I arrived at the tally marks. My needle pierced deep into the leftmost one. Her fingers squeezed harder than they had yet, and I could hear her teeth grinding. I made my way up from the bottom of the mark, and by the end of it, the girl was in tears and letting out terrible wails of pain. I finished the first mark and continued right onto the second one. There were twenty-four marks remaining, and everyone seemed a bit more painful. At the last stitch however, there was a sense of relief over both of us. We both realized that not only was that the last of the stitches, but it also provided a sense of closure, that the atrocity that had befallen her was finally over. I could feel that she felt the same as me.

         I replaced her pants onto her emaciated waist, after a light washing with the gray water. Picking her up and moving her to a piece of padding placed onto the floor, I could feel her slowing heartbeat through her back. It had been racing throughout the surgery, and it would be a relief on her body for it to slow down again.

         By the time I had finished with the girl, the sun was beginning to set over the river. The nurse set to work lighting torches inside in response to this, as I laid the next patient onto the table. I knew little about medicine, I only knew how to stitch wounds and that the river water could be used as a disinfectant. I took onto the table the several others these skills applied to, and did the best I could to help.

         The moon had risen high in the night sky before I set the final patient onto their bed. I turned form him, and noticed the nurse had begun to make her way toward me. She held out the spool of thread, motioning it towards my chest. The gash had become encrusted, shimmering a deep crimson in the flickering torch light. I lightly shook my head and placed a resisting hand in front of the thread. I explained that someone else could have a better use of it, motioned toward my face and reminded her that I was undeniably doomed at this point. I had been without a mask for almost two days now. She insisted that I take it, saying tired phrases, offering that I may not die, or perhaps it hasn't had a chance to set in yet and that we could fashion a mask now. All I offered her was a labored smile before I sat onto the nearest floor mat. I fell asleep within seconds after laying down, my body was far more tired than I gave it credit for.

         I awoke to a roof in shambles. Unfamiliar and horrid, my heart jumped and skipped for the seconds it took for me to remember where I was. Most mornings started like this, though it had been months since the drop, it seemed my subconscious still could not get used to the change in my environment. I sat stiffly up, looking left and right, there was quite a bit of movement around. It had been a long time since I felt safe sleeping and my body appeared to have taken that opportunity to sleep in.

         No sooner did I stand than the nurse rushed over with what appeared to be a bolt of fabric with a bowl balancing on top of it. When I turned it away, she insisted that I take them, it was what she would give to any patient that required it. With a glance down, I noticed the skin around my gash had been restored to it's original, pale color, and the gash itself no longer appeared to be two sides of a canyon opposing one another. They had come back together, and the river of deep crimson had diminished to a trickle. Returning my gaze to her with a slight smile, I took the bowl from her hand with my right hand, and draped the fabric over my left arm.

          When she had turned, I sniffed at the bowl, smelling for the putrid stench of the river water, but it could not be found. In a couple of minutes, I had finished scarfing down the soup that resided in the bowl, and rolled the fabric out with both hands. It was a pair of pants, tattered and worn, but still a welcome addition to my exposed legs. After donning them, another coughing fit. This one failed to split open my chest stitches much, but the symptoms of the sickness were getting worse. My muscles felt atrophied, my bones felt like twigs, and I could do nothing to reverse this course. I knew this was coming, I decided to die the second I gave my gas mask to that mother. I had decided it was my time.

         With a slow turn, I started to leave the structure, but with a sidelong glance, I saw the girl. One hand outstretched, tears in her eyes, but unable to speak. I allowed myself only to offer a nod, but the image of that girl would be burned in my head until the present. Her wracked features painfully calling out for me, for help. In this she shared an odd relationship to the world around me, she can scream and scream, but no one will hear her. No one will care. We are all to preoccupied.

         With my first step outside, I instantly noticed the haze had lifted a bit. Winds ripped through the semblance of structures, metal against metal was all that could be heard. An odd warmness to the air permeated everything, left the skin feeling quite lovely. A loveliness that sank down to the core of me and through the other side. I had yet to realize what this was. I started off, again down the same path I had taken the morning before. Left the bridge, walked, cautiously scanning the horizon for anyone that could possibly see me, for a seemingly short amount of time. I could see my things from fairly fa away, and I quickly made my way to them. Upon hoisting them onto my shoulders, however, there was a deep burning. It started in my shoulders and lungs, a heat nearly unbearable. Like a waterfall it fell through me, it singed my chest and my stomach, fell into my legs, made my pants feel like a sheet of fire. Through the pain I could still remember me, still remember what I was doing, but just barely, and I managed to take a step.

          Each further step cleared my mind a little more, though the pain remained, I was allowed a small fraction of focus through it all. After maybe an hour of walking, I could see the outlines of derelict buildings, the city was in sight. I would make it there before I fell unwavering to the ground, before I reverted to nothing but carbon links and and a pile of raw, organic material. Heavy steps plagued my mind, and every step grew harder. The skin on my legs felt at though it was peeling off, every movement of my spine was labored. Turning myself created a feeling of no control, like I could not stop, and I would merely keep turning until I cracked myself in half.

          With my first steps into the city, I felt instantly at unease. Buildings stared down my back and through my head, they could see my thoughts, they could hear my belabored doubts and my precise problems. They watched as each step felt as though my foot would continue through the ground. They could taste my dying breath, my tired, begrudging turning, stepping, turning, stepping, turning, stepping. They could feel each drop of blood fall from the ever-flowing stream of crimson that now escaped my lungs. It left lovely little puddles of red and brown for those derelicts to bathe in. But worst of all, these derelicts could smell my fear, they knew that I may not make it. These terrible, massive creatures that bore down the weight of the world onto m back. These creatures that excreted the glowing haze, shot it out and let it fall like a blanket onto me. Laughed as the haze tore at my skin, turned it red and irritated, cracked it dry, flaked it off. The haze was a plethora of tiny people, demolishing my once-youthful body. In the distance I see a statue.

         Yes, the wonderful statue of the man no one knows. He sits in a little park, my destination. She always loved that park, despite the noise and the city lights and the pollution. Despite there being better parks closer to us, nicer, cleaner, she loved this one. But this man stares at me with unblinking eyes. He slows my pace to a crawl. I can feel him, a stout warrior, holding me back against myself. Sinking my feet deep into the ground, standing on the things on my back. But I remain resolute. With a quick dash, I escape him. There I am, running through a street, the derelicts have not forgotten about me, but now their gaze grows red. They wish for me to trip, they wish for me to fall and give up. The statue man shoots his rifle, with bullets of steel straight at my chest. Hands expose themselves from the ground, hands of the derelicts, the hands of those that died by their hands. Reaching from the ground to grab my ankles, to drag me down.

         The ground, oh, God, the ground. Blank eyes stare into the sky, stare at the past destroyer, stare at the tips of the derelicts, where the heads resided. The derelicts had known it was coming, the derelicts orchestrated it. These people with open eyes are all me, they are what I am to become. Another victim of the derelicts and that fucking statue man. The endless hands, pull me back, pull on my shoulders and on my neck. They're reaching, reaching for me. But I have almost made it to the statue man, to those eyes that stare, cold and empty. Past the thousand derelicts, past the field of gazing eyes with the crop of grabbing hands. Another step and I've made it, but the hands are too strong. They pull me to my back, they feast on my presence. A turn of the head, the gazing eyes stare to my soul. The eyes of white and skin, a small dot of brown in the corner, another left with blue. Hazy, cloudy eyes not even vermin could allow themselves to touch. White skin that's fed the ground of crimson all that it could give. A glance up, salvation, the statue man has averted his gaze. He stands over me, stands over the bit of upturned dirt beneath my hands beneath his feet. A lonely little island on the disillusioned city. The city that appeared as it has felt forever, the city left to derelicts and gazing eyes and statue men.

         The statue man has lifted me, placed me back upon my feet, and through my things I rifle. Rifle for a shovel but the wandering gazes intrude, they want to know my secrets and my desires. They need only ask the derelicts, Don't they know that? Don't they know it's simpler to do so? No, no they are merely wandering eyes, what do they know? Nothing. Nothing but what they fucking observe, what they see, is what they know. They cannot hear, they cannot touch, or smell, they don;t know how I feel, they cannot fear. But what would they have to fear? Only the derelicts, only those monstrosities that mock me, look at me with burning red eyes, they taste my contempt. They love it, and those gazing eyes look to them for guidance. Not too long til those eyes gaze at me with their mocking and their jeering. Their useless hindsight and their drive-less foresight. They will look forever, look into the sky, or look unto me. Hazy, cloudy vision left to rot eternally, left to never stop rotting. Lovely field of gazing colors, wrapped around their beings. The eyes stare blankly, white and open, but spots here and there alike remain with bits of color. Blues and purples and yellows. I had forgotten colors existed, I had forgotten anything but the hazy white and the deep crimson could plague my mind. Plague, indeed, a plague of colors on my mind, I have work.

         The shovel tip pierces into the brown skin below. Rivers of red and yellow flow from inside, splash my face with cooling liquid, but not refreshing in the slightest. No, not even in the slightest, my skin feels dry, cracked, flaking off. It falls as a whole into the increasing hole below it. Fills it up every time I make progress. I dig for hours, dig down, out of the sight of the derelicts, out of the empty gazes and wandering eyes, into the river of red and yellow. The lovely river of blood and puss, escaping the chest of the being of brown I dug into. The hole wavered above my head, I climbed out. The air felt cold, empty. The Statue man, with a tap on my shoulder, and a pointing of his gun, reminded me of my purpose. An empty bag of things. A now-empty bag of things. Tossed to the side. Dump the larger of the two items that were held captive in the bag into the hole, take it out of sight. The second, a vibrant vial of blue. Encircling, encircling, tiny wisps of gold, wondrous little flakes of solid gold. They said it was the cure. They promised me the cure. A fallen plunger, a pulsing arm. Pulsing shoulder, pulsing neck, they said it was the cure. The cure. They said it was the cure.

         With a snap of consciousness, I stand above a hole. In it, my one true love. She bore the name Marie. She left me one week ago today, she left the same way I will leave. She obtained the sickness, too much exposure. Prior to the drop, I was given two vials, two vials of the permanent cure, two vials of hope. She took it, it broke the sickness, but it broke her too. Now I have to stand above her corpse, her fading, brittle corpse. In a field of fellow dead I stand, their eyes all averted to the sky, as if they had seen the drop coming. As if anybody could've predicted this. As if anyone could see me, my skin in flakes, burning with such sensation as it was. Mad-eyed and driven, crazy in all rights. I could never see why the Liberators did the things they do, but a small fraction of understanding has blossomed. With no cure, the sickness progresses, drives those exposed insane with pain and fatigue. Leaves their skin like it had been eaten by sandpaper, their clothes feel like fire. Make building talk, make everything around an enemy. I suppose there is a reason you don't usually see the same Liberator twice, they all die in a matter of days.

         And this Statue. A man holding a primitive rifle. A man with an odd mustache and odd clothing, watching over this park, watching over Marie, watching over me, slowly dying. They said the cure would work, said it worked on every rat subject, insisted that a human subject would almost undoubtedly have the same effect. I guess it works, but those damn scientists wouldn't be so sure of themselves if they saw the outcome, saw that their miracle cure was a poison. The ground began to rush towards me. Then, Marie's face.

         “The only cure, a poison,” my last thought before my face met with Marie's in an end.

The near future

Well now, last day in Allentown, this is what I have to look forward to in Erie.

Sunday:
High: 25, Low 16
80% chance of snow

Monday:
High: 25, Low: 18
30% chance of snow

Tuesday:
High: 29, Low 20
60% chance of snow

Wednesday:
High: 27, Low 16
40% chance of snow


Hooray for cold and snow (not sarcasm). I would probably kill myself if I didn't like it so much. Short post, but I'm gonna spend the day with important people.

I'm feeling that way I feel again

43 hours til I'm off and every passing one has me feeling more and more ready. I want to be somewhere at least a little bit new, somewhere where my discoveries are common, if not always so rewarding. Somewhere where inspiration comes easy and I am free of most distractions. Surprisingly enough, Erie seems to be that place for now, though that's probably just because it's far away, so everything seems newer despite the fact its all the same. In a nice little contrast to my first post, I am gonna leave here the second last poem I've written.

Untitled (As of yet)
level-headed
ever-treading
letting go of everything
disconnect my head and ego
or toss me to the moon.
Flying, lack of dying
lack of wonderment or trying
to right myself
to turn, upheave,
no, this is who I'd like to be.
Static smile stetching ages
thought corruption left in stages
brought from long ago.
I felt this way for centuries
left me to be this man before you
left me to run forever.
For the tingle in my spine
still tingles
and my heart, it boils over
my chest falls to the floor
and my feet flow to the wall.
I've been righted wrongly
left to struggle in shambles.
But with every movement of a foot
I revert to me again
so I am left to choose
shall I stay in shambles in this world I know
or shall I stray with moving feet to see the world anew?
I turn-tail and kick my shoe
my life has just begun.



That's a nice little verse there. At least I like it.

Tick Tock

With every passing hour I realize that my time in Allentown is once again coming to a close. In less than three days I will be leaving for the wonderfully desolate portion of Pennsylvania known affectionately as Erie. Leaving is always so damn bittersweet. Allentown has once again reminded me why I left it in the first place. Don't get me wrong, Allentown is wonderful and it will likely remain my true home for a very long time, but to get anything good done, I've gotta get my ass out of here. Every day i spend toiling, wishing I were around my friends, the ones that I developed as a person around, is a day closer to me doing something important, a day closer to me being able to do something with my life. A day doesn't always seem like a lot, in 50 years there are over 18,000 of them, but I look back at my life, which clocks in at 6777 days now, and it's all a blur. I'm coming to the ever-persistent realization that a day is a decent amount of time.

I will never be young again, as far as my sense of the word young goes. The days of sitting in Tyler's basement and playing video games after coming home from South Mountain are forever gone, their existence only really assured by my memory of them. The days of my residing in Allentown are becoming incredibly limited. I've become all to aware that within the amount of time easily within the same time frame as my blur of memories, I'm going to have to say goodbye to almost everyone that has made me who I am today. I will be moving on in a few short years, probably leaving my life behind, at the very least temporarily. Everything familiar is going out the window, I feel as though my time is running short.

While I will be sad at first to go, this is the path I feel I need to follow. I will run as far as it takes me, and can only hope that it will return me back to all the things I so dearly love.

Well Hello There

I have finally broken down and made a blog. Everything feels so fresh and new. Following that feeling, I am posting the first real poem I ever wrote. It's a bit rough around the edges.

I desire no keeper

no guard

no sentry to watch

cloud my decisions

and my opportunities

leave me crippled in my abilities to create unique memories

not forged before.

I desire no societal stereotype

based on my time from birth

my age,

not on my character or what lies in my past,

my decisions, my convictions,

to determine what I may or may not do.

I desire no guiding hand to lead me

through decisions made a thousand times a day,

but rather to stray from the given path and forge my own,

blind as I may be.

I desire to make mistakes

to resort to primitive tactics

in times I lack knowledge

in order to learn,

to decide for myself what actions I take in all situations.

I desire independence, and I desire not to know that it will never fully arrive.

Hope you enjoyed it