Holedayz

Just when you thought your chimney couldn't get any more Freudian
Icicles from the moon are needles in Earth's eyes
Christmas candy cane shanked the warden and escaped from jail
Now it's on the run, writing creepy letters with your house as the return address
Your mother appreciates this the same way your dad appreciates Wes Anderson movies

Nog chugging eggs
Eggs making friends
Friends turn into pastry
Pastry cooked by the sharp light of dying stars
Stars that were just cookies all along,
And milk is the linguistic juggling act that keeps us from the dry cake of truth

I poured hot cocoa down my back and rolled in the snow
Down a hill
'Till I was the torso of a snowman named Claudia
Who was my neighbor's sex toy
He never made it to my "Christmas" party,
Politically correct snowfucker

It's late
Everyone's gone home
All you hear are obese snowflakes fucking in the air
And making tiny white snow jizz
Landing all over your face
While you think about Charlie Brown

Scavenger Hunt

At age 18 you arrive at the alley
Where Bruce Springsteen lost his notebook
You avert your eyes from a haggard bum
Suspended in front of the blue dumpster
A tentacle broad as an eggplant ripe
Vanishing up their pant leg
You recognize this poor soul as yourself,
Your aging sinewy arms extended before you holding
200 months of printed spam emails from Hotwire
And a lighter
Offering these words:

She rides your hand in the passenger seat
Like an ink horse over the plains of paper
You smell perfume, cold rain, takeaway falafel bag
She vanishes when headlights would reveal her
The paper has given up on the arrival of meaning
But still you try to smear the drops
A voice says "Bite down on this"
You do so until your jaw is broken,
But still this story you must tell

Greg and Sandy wound up on different groups for the scavenger hunt that was featured as sponsored content on their Facebook newsfeed. "The algorithm must have made a mistake." While reluctant to split, they decided that adapting to the situation was more attractive than complaining to the organizers. Indeed the organizers' composure was straining, surrounded as they were by folks trying to look unassuming before their turn to approach with another "simple" request.

The scavenger hunt participants meet near a downtown metro rail station, to encourage green modes of travel. Greg and Sandy didn't want to plan their day around the light rail's schedule, so they compromised and drove from their midtown apartment to a nearby neighborhood, parked and used the city's rental bikes for the remaining several blocks. Both are unexceptionally attractive & tall, white, and bike & beer fit.

The rules for the scavenger hunt are explained, the destinations of each group are doled out, and a list of the items of interest are posted online. Cradling her phone, it dawns on Sandy that this event excludes anyone unable to afford a smartphone. A gust of wind swings the whimsical street art on its hinges; its creaking sounds like malicious laughter. "No!" She chides herself. "I WILL enjoy this. I give myself permission." Greg's lips rest against her ear, startling her as he murmurs, "We should have just taken the light rail." He must have felt it, too. He feels guilty. It makes her feel close to him. "His suffering brings me comfort. Is that what love is?" "No! Not this time. I give myself permission. I give myself permission..." She repeats this incantation, then turns to face Greg. She places his arm around her and kisses him briskly. "You're cute. Promise you won't find a new girlfriend." Greg squeezes with his arm and his hand, cocking an eyebrow. "New girlfriend... didn't see that on the list." Sandy pouts, ironically but not really. Greg tries to reassure her. "It's just like, a couple hours. Then we'll meet at Shane's and explain our experiences to each other." Sandy pouts with sincere irony this time. "I do like explaining..." "I know. And I like listening and french fries, so... let's do this!" A quick embrace and off they go in opposite directions, looking back at different times.

Greg's group diffuses into their first stop: a boutique curiosity shop. His teammates engaged in tedious banter that seemed an awful lot like networking, and to him, rummaging through precariously placed expensive crafts in search of clues was less awkward. The old man at the counter was glaring at him, so he picked up an item and feigned interest. It is a $90 picture frame, but the stock picture is a tragic pile of bones and clay. He suddenly recalls the archaeological expedition to excavate his true self. It has been neglected, and he vividly remembers the outline that he was dusting and recognized as the fossilized bones of mediocrity that caused him to abandon the mission and start online dating.

The old man interrupts Greg's thoughts:

The mind is a sail when the devil's wind blows
You will untie none of the knowledge that he stows
And you only find peace where no other boat goes

Greg understood only the existence of words before the shelves crashed around him.

The old man grabbed his head and bellowed, "Look what you've done!" as Greg ran out the door, his jacket knocking over picture frames like a demon's tail.

Sandy found herself in a wine bar where people talk about being the sort of person who is the sort of person who is the sort of person who would like to be into enjoying liking jazz. Her teammates stare at paintings like they're those magic eye things from the 90's. None are in any hurry to find the next clue, so she strikes up a conversation with the bartender as she pours her a drink.

"So you must be getting a lot of us scavengers, huh?"

The bartender covers Sandy's mouth. "Shhhh!" She turns an ear towards Sandy's torso, then looks around the room. "Can you hear?" Sandy assumes this is a rhetorical question, since the bartender is still squeezing her face.

The body's mouth opens only to eat or speak
Mankind will starve with a pile of apples for a seat
A single bite taken from each
Will you bite?
Will you haunt the world to see who took the bite from you, and why?

The bartender turns Sandy's head, and she sees a homeless man peering in the window. He opens his mouth, and an orchestra of electric bass swells until it scrambles her vision. She is floating in space and combusting into a massive sphere of plasma while the bartender-turned-documentarian calmly describes Sandy's ideals as though they're a planet orbiting the same path as her desire for greatness. The two planets could sustain life but they are timed such that the day after life emerges on the shores of each, they pass too close, destroying both atmospheres. The documentarian reads aloud the lore of sailors on more successful planets, who always go the opposite direction when they notice her in the sky.

The homeless man finishes coughing and, containing herself, Sandy gets up to see if the others would be OK with letting the him into their group.

She approaches them, but all she can see are the backs of their heads. She runs around them a full 360 degrees, then stops, recoils, drops her wineglass and runs out the door. She approaches the homeless man and frantically opens her purse to give alms, but all of her money has turned into apples with bites missing. After staring in disbelief for a moment, she drops her purse and tearfully lunges into man's shoulder. She reaches her arms around him but finds herself holding only some dry cleaning. The address on the tag is her home address, but the garments belong to neither her nor Greg. The address of the dry cleaners is not far, so she decides to return them and let them know of their mistake.

Greg runs through the crowded streets and ducks into a bike shop. "At least I won't break anything here," he muses to himself, catching his breath. Checking his phone, he notices this is actually the next stop on the scavenger hunt. The clues are all in a mixture of poorly researched middle English and pirate speak, but he thinks it says "The past is faster because it has your best legs". Useless. Greg's strategy is to simply walk around looking for envelopes. He absently fondles a handlebar and the clerk speaks up from behind him in nasal monotone, "Fancy a test ride, Smullicans?" What did she call him? "No thanks, just 'scavenging' about, as it were." She grabs him by the wrist and places his hand back on the bike and says, "I insist." Greg moves to protest, but realizes this is probably part of the hunt. She all but pushes him out the door, then pulls it shut behind him and locks it.

Thoughts of the practicality of this in the context of a scavenger hunt pass through Greg's brain as he negotiates his way through downtown traffic. He veers into an alley and passes some teenagers, and he smells blunt smoke. The smell of trash and bad weed takes him back to Caroline. The Beach Boys song featuring the name plays, then fades as he realizes he is riding circles in a fake alley on a "theater in the round" stage set up at Burning Man. Caroline and her husband are hidden in the orchestra pit, tied at the wrists and knees, with 3 people in rubber Space Ghost masks and ska suits clutching rifles. Caroline pleads, "Greg, the audience is full of venture capitalists! You must sell them on the app Trent and I developed." "If we don't raise $6 million, they're going to kill us!" Caroline continues, "That means you can't passive-aggressively use trendy buzzwords to express your disapproval of my success!" Greg looks back and forth between the figures with guns and Caroline. "Remember your Space Ghost bed set?" "GREG THIS IS SERIOUS!" He sighs, then approaches center stage, and audience chatter dies down.

Greg clutches the mic and speaks with all available enthusiasm. "You've all seen, and probably use apps that gather data from social media to measure a person's influence. OutBurn also takes data from web browsers and operating systems to determine:

-How late someone works, and on what sort of material.
-How long they stay on which pages, and
-Which other apps they have downloaded and how effectively they use them,

All in order to appraise not only an individual's influence, but their drive to succeed. Employers need never worry about hiring another dud again!" The faces Greg sees look intrigued, but then the entire audience interrupts in unison, "The app is unnecessary, for it is easy enough for all to see the carcasses of ignored dreams you drag like empty beer cans celebrating your marriage to yourself in the First Presbyterian Church of Mediocrity. Enjoy your french fries."

Sandy arrives at the dry cleaners, which is also an indie music label that only releases cassette tapes. You get a free recording session with your order. Sandy sees a line for the recording booth, and overhears that this is the next stop in the scavenger hunt. She locates the clerk and offers them the bag and a quick explanation, hoping to get back to quietly contemplating what of her adventure to tell Greg. "Maybe you should sing about it" The clerk smiles brightly. He looks like Beck, but without any possibility of facial hair. "I'm sorry, I would but I don't have time to wait-" "No worries," he says, "you can cut in front of them, you're like, our only paying customer. Might as well enjoy the benefits." "Enjoy..." She repeats this to herself a few times. "That's why I'm doing this! I said I was going to enjoy myself today." She grips an acoustic guitar and marches into the recording booth.

She strums an acoustic guitar and begins to sing, thinking of the Internet and using her Leonard Cohen voice:

You can place your pettiness behind ideals
You can hide your smallness with beliefs
You can disguise yourself with words
You can mask your ugliness with taste
But someone is bound to follow you
To the castle of cruelty you call home

Soon after completing her 40-minute musical manifesto, she is handed a Walkman containing her cassette tape, and a case with artwork. All she hears is white noise. It sounds like insects. She unfolds the insert from the case into a full sized poster, which features her at the moment when she realized she actually looked forward to conversations with her mother. The list of instruments includes "Droning cicadas of Sandy's mediocrity", and "Garage full of crickets saying, 'MEHHHHH' before going to the garage of someone more interesting."

The clerk who resembles Beck says, "I know it's a bit rough. We have editing packages starting in the mid 9s."

She screams at Beck, spikes the cassette, walks over to where it bounced and stomps it until it is in several pieces. She marches to the door, then turns around, snatches the dry cleaning bag and storms out.

Greg replays the two gunshots in his mind a few more times with his eyes closed, then formally wakes up and focuses on a series of two-by-fours hanging at least 6 feet from a dumpster, next to which he is sprawled out. He considers his face then winces in pain. Upon standing up and emerging from the side the dumpster, he sees Sandy with the circle of teens, passing a bowl around.

Greg groans and blinks. "Hey there." One of the teenagers quips, "Oh yeah, I remember that guy!" Sandy runs up to him. "Holy shit babe are you OK? I didn't see you!" They kiss, but as his contribution grows sloppy, Sandy pulls away. "Alright, dumpster boy. Wanna hit this then bounce? Ooh, is your eye OK?" Greg nods as she hands him the glass piece. "Yep. Yep. I just gotta return this bike then we can-" he looks around. Sandy asks,"What bike?"

"Uhh... "

One of the kids pulls at his ski cap's tassels. "Fuck! Yeah, some chick came by and said you were done with it." An awkward moment passes where perhaps they are realizing they should have done more. Ski cap breaks it. "She called you a pelican." Another chimes in, "Dude, I can totally see it! The beard!" "HAAAAA!" "Spoonbilled motherfucker!"

Greg hands them back their bowl. "It's all good." They depart and head to Shane's.

Greg inspects the menu. "I'm not sure I want french fries." Sandy creases her brows exaggeratedly. "Me neither. But maybe." They both stare past their menus for a full minute. Sandy says, "Well, if we both half-want french fries, maybe we can share? Now that your dumpster cooties are gone! You look so fucking hot right now..." Sandy runs her toe up Greg's calf under the table. Greg clutches the lapel of his suit jacket. "I can't believe how well it fits. Where did you get it again?" Sandy stares off for a second. "I told you, it was part of the scavenger hunt." Greg nods approvingly, and pulls a tag off the sleeve. "Freshly dry cleaned, too."

Convoluted Reasons White People Can Rest Assured I'm Not Racist...

…and you might not be either! Check all that apply to you (and be honest):

-My Youtube ads are often in Spanish.

-Unemployed, thus not taking a job from PoC.

-I don't wear dreadlocks.

-None of my pants have pockets, so I can't check them when black people walk by.

-When my bike got stolen, I imagined a white guy took it.

-When I make a stir-fry on Sundays, I only use vegetables that grow in the same region, out of respect for the multitude of Asian cultural identities.

-If given the opportunity to own property in San Francisco, I'd turn it down.

-When I was walking by myself late last night, I was afraid of a white guy.

-I only call the police for noise complaints when the music is country or heavy metal.

-When someone's dog barks at a black person because they only have white friends, I kick the dog when nobody's looking so it'll bark at me, too. Solidarity!

-When nobody discreetly asks my date if she is “Ok” the way they would if I was black, I start mumbling aggressive-sounding gibberish until they do.

-I only jaywalk when the police aren't around, just like black people have to.

-When nobody is surprised by how articulate I am, I try to be even more articulate.

-When I walk past a police officer while wearing a hoodie, I give them a look. It's subtle, but I'm sure it follows them home.

-I heard iPhones use conflict minerals and awful labor practices. Good thing I use an Android!

-Related: I also don’t own a hybrid.

-My OK Cupid account doesn't say that I only date white people.

-I was never really into Amy Schumer anyway.

Score:

0-7 points - Uh oh, looks like somebody’s got a case of the still seeming kinda racists! Maybe try wandering around more ethnic grocery stores googling things. Also, you’d be amazed at how impolite you can get away with being to police officers as a white person.

8-12 points - Good, but you can do better. Just read more think pieces, they pretty much tell you how to act and what to say so you don’t seem racist. I’m pretty sure that’s what they’re there for...

13-18 points - *Ring ring* Hello, White Privilege? Yeah, just wanted to let you know that the package you sent is being returned. Unused! So you better stay home from your fancy tech job to sign for it! What’s that? You work from home? Th- that sounds pretty nice. Hey, do you think we can catch lunch some time this week?

Can I Read a Book At a Restaurant?

Brain: Wait just a minute there! Where do you think you're going with that book in your hand?

Me: Oh I'm going to read it and have dinner. At a restaurant.

Brain: Well, put it in a bag at least. You can't just walk into a restaurant with a book. Then they'll know.

Me: They'll know what?

Brain: Everything! All of your secrets! They'll know that, um... We'll get back to that. I think this just about getting attention.

Me: Attention?

Brain: Yeah! "Hey everyone! Look at me sitting at a table in the corner, quietly reading a book!"

Me: That doesn't make any sense!

Brain: You'll just look like white balding pseudo intellectual taking himself too seriously while people try to have fun and unwind.

White Guilt: Hey, black people can be bald pseudo-intellectuals, too!

Me: Not now white guilt. Not now.

Brain: What if the waitress asks you why you couldn't eat at home?

Me: That's not a question people working for tips ask!

Brain: Not to your face, but in the kitchen, they'll be wondering. Also guess what?

Me: What?

Brain: You assumed your server would be a woman. Pig.

Me: ...

Brain: How about this? If you can come up with a mission statement, I'll leave you alone.

Me: A mission statement?

Brain: Yeah! Something that justifies and declares your purpose.

Me: "I shall strive to eat food at the restaurant across the street from my apartment while reading a book for the purpose of intellectual and physical nourishment, utilizing all available resources, including food and this book."

Brain: That's weak.

Me: No it isn't!

Brain: Yes it is. It is too wordy, just like everything else you do, and it won't reach Millennials because it isn't social media friendly.

Me: I'M a millennial, and I am the entire audience for the campaign, and I accept it!

Brain: You're not a millennial, stop trying to deny your age!

Me: That's not even an anxiety I have! We're not having this conversation right now, it's getting late!

Brain: You're right, you should clean those dishes before they start to smell.

Me: Ok. ... Done. DAMMIT! You just distracted me. Now it's 9:30

Brain: Aw damn. You need to be eating before 10, otherwise it's weird.

Me: Oh yeah, you're right! I gotta hurry...  WAIT A MINUTE! You just made that up. That's it, we're going, and-

Brain: Thai food.

Me: What are you- NO!

Brain: Thai fooooooooood...

Me: Black bean burger and sweet potato fries!

Brain: Thaiiiiiii foooooooOoOoOoOoOoOoOooood...

Me: Nope! I'm walking now!

Brain: Of course you would walk on this side of the road. So predictable.

Me: Made it! Hah! I'm here at the restaurant! Reading a book! It's not a big deal! This discussion is over.

...

Brain: You're holding the book at an angle that makes it look like you want everyone to know what you're reading.

Brain: Also, you forgot your keys again.

Me: Dammit!

Crystalline Collapsible

I float on a river that runs crystalline collapsable
It reaches the back of my tongue
And is sweetened by your shadow
Cast upstream like fishing line
Hook in my subconscious mind

True beauty is aimed to the void
We're lucky to observe what escapes
The other way lies
Beachside vanity, gazing at footprints
Then taking credit for the ocean
As it washes them away

No
This is the love story of the wind and the sand
Who outsource the self-knowledge they can't understand
Or else too damp to realize
Is god wafting between people
Or a private pearl of vast thoughts and tiny actions
From all that goes wrong?

We're all cabbage, you must know
We yank lead from distant soil
We wind up in our gazpacho
Race to pay the tab and bolt
While the other's on the can

Or we're melted crayons
Coloring one another
Camouflage from ourselves
So we fall into deep holes
Down
Down
Down
The wind trims pointless misery
Apart from what you hold inside
Soon to rise like mushroom rings
Wide beyond your view
Just as dawn dabs the tears
The collector harvests, makes a stew
That seems to soothe
Do they really know it's you?
Does it matter if they do?

We matched tones like lightning striking itself
Oh, still the harmony purrs the fungal arc ever wider
Until, all-containing
It shapes the wake that shakes my boat
As I sail around myself
Diving for oysters
Then arranging them
In colliding circles

Could you find me
Standing in the center of them all
Laughing as I'm crashing
Almost
Laughing as I'm crashing
Almost

Late September Wishes

Old curbs

Damp grass

Trees releasing summer's excesses

In my veins
Clouds
Still searching me for the sky
While I sleep
I look for them all day

Time
Comes in handfuls
Or curls like dead ferns
And feet on paisley sheets

The orange recharge
Brittle reminds me to look
Hard

I live
Here
Where rain is warm
Surprises are banned
And I'm grateful for wishes I don't make
And I look
Hard

I lick dirty glass mornings
And swallow until rain turns into pills in my hands
And my shoulders are wet from
Yellow moss
And I run through corn fields to find new confessions
For nobody in particular
Death will know my refined pallet for time
And we'll laugh as I turn to dust

Blue Solomon

The body's mouth only opens to speak or eat
Humanity will starve with a pile of apples for a seat
A single bite taken from each
Bite or haunt the world to figure out who took the bite out of you and why
Or try to stand on both sides of the teeth
And open wide

These thoughts hover, fall and shatter
At the pull of the heckling moon
And the push of a pleasant Levantine stranger, who explains Twin Peaks
At the foot of the Mount Sinai in my room
The one that creeks
My face reveals more disconnect than Wikileaks
Her face reveals complicit relief
I don't waste my self-loathing on just anyone
No, not me and my Blue Solomon
We emotionally pilfer shoes to get by
Collecting shards from the nauseous sky

Another weekend of Blue Solomon
Tone-deaf singer of a Hemingway cover band
Drinking and screaming at those who bask
Under the small green sun that only sets
Into the stained glass everyone forgets
Who only ask how already dead can we get
WILL SOMEBODY ELSE HAVE MY THOUGHTS FOR A SECOND?
Blue Solomon touch your cheek and avert your gaze
Walk me home in our cracked hearted haze
Holding a shadow across my chest
Protecting all that I long to express

The devil is an unpaid intern with rich parents
Who spearheaded God's social media awareness campaign
Is life a competition to be the most cynical
To 've had the most expected day
To 've sucked the most experience gray
#We'reAllMarketplacesOfGuiltPurchasingSinWithFireBlueCnidarianWordsInAPlazaOfSorrowObscured
Where the continental slope becomes the shore
Land a high profile buyer of legitimate angst
"To the benevolent gods of social media, we give thanks"
Partner up and open a shop that sells
Upcycled failed projects of cells

The bounce away perpetuates the waves
That never cleanse, or at least haven't before
They only return you to bounce once more
Parallel scars and two puncture wounds make a boring song
From barren rocks of self-righteousness gone wrong
With our culture of war over whose got the correct vanity
It's hard to depart in the sessile glare of sanity
Blue Solomon, speculator of kinetic fiction
Be the only toxic smirk remaining
Eyes like overcooked clams
In search of the Supernobody
Whose ocean
Is draining

List: What is My Outfit Trying to Say?

-"I am unceasingly nauseated by the power structures that allow me to exist as I do, but I don't want to be a downer."

-"Please give me the chance to let you know that I'm not into EDM, I just like unnarrated shapes and colors."

-"All the things I'm trying to hide are inside of me."

-"Male attire has been utterly ruined by male people."

-"Please don't associate me with things that exist yet, I don't want credit!"

-"If that's what you think, then yes, I AM trying way too hard, way too hard indeed. Clearly you must be some sort of big deal, because why else would I be, as you have properly assessed, trying so hard? Being that you're a big deal and I'm trying too hard (so hard!), you should probably find a more low key enthusiast of people like you with whom to consort. I'll be here straining."

-"Please give me the chance to let you know that I am well aware that twee has been ruined by social media & marketing, but somehow I'm still here, perhaps as the response to a perceived massive insult from the halls of cynical personal branding attempts. Neoliberalism raped a unicorn, and Pusheen the Cat and Dr. Who cellphone cases are the offspring."

-"I want to find out who in the room is on LSD. Quickly."

-"'People thinking I'm gay' has long been my personal screening tool against unwanted sexual advances."

-"I'm trying not to get caught trying to outrun lousy think-pieces."

World's Oldest Profession

Guy: I don't care if it's stupid, I'm pissed off.

Friend: Well, OK. Wanna make a movie about it?

G: What!? No.

F: Right, all that expensive equipment, all that time editing. How about you write a short play?

G: I don't think so.

F: Yeah, too many moving parts, too many people.

G: Yeah, fuck other people.

F: Yeah! Plus, theater venues are pricey. So... how about you paint a mural?

G: Meh, visual arts aren't really my thing.

F: Write a song!

G: With what talent? I don't feel like dealing with picking up an instrument, it's like learning a new language. Plus I really don't like my fingers. Can I just stick with words?

F: Oh ok. How about you write a novel?

G: Christ, it's just an opinion.

F: Short story?

G: Meh. I want people to be there when I say it, otherwise what's the point?

F: Monolog?

G: Maybe. I like the part where it's just me talking to a crowd, but I don't want to deal with open mics at coffee shops or art galleries. The people are annoying, and if I don't go first then I'll have to sit through someone's poetry about tea or whatever. Can I do something where I don't even have to leave the bar? And I can just like, complain about how nothing is good enough? And somehow that'll make people think I'm brave, and like me, and get worried if I feel like I'm not allowed to say whatever the fuck I want?

Both: Standup comedy!

Reading Kerouac

"For someone who's constantly moving, I always seem to find you." With no change in expression or posture, or even breaking eye contact with his food, Max replies, "I guess one of us has to try harder." "I was talking to the dog." Max has a Chihuahua mix he named Kerouac. Case and Max are in an arms race of snark; nobody is sure of its sincerity or its origin. Case gives Kerouac a smug victory pet and moves on to order her food and sit elsewhere. The Diner is a restaurant worker's restaurant: open late and you order at the counter, so you can hop tables and stay for hours without driving the servers nuts. Seating is outdoors with covered portions as permitted by the arid climate, with options ranging from picnic tables to furniture likely found at estate sales.

A man approaching middle age wearing a brand name polo shirt that fit well before he lost the weight he previously gained stands before Max in silence for a moment. "Oh hey, cool dog. What's his name?" "Kerouac" said Max, to neither his food nor the man. "Oh, like the author?" Max did not speak. "That's cool, love me some literature. Total book person." Max continued not speaking. "Normally I don't even go out, I just stay in and read a book, but my friends insisted I come meet them here." Max returns to his food then looks up only with his eyes as man extends his hand. "I'm Fred."

Case's approach to the table is heralded by the wobbly yet determined clacking of costume jewelry that could serve as the rhythm section for an avant garde Patsy Cline cover band, for which she would play several instruments if asked. "Sea! I got syphilis!" Meredith is waving her phone around; its case is the second item on her person to feature Pusheen the Cat. She addresses Casey by her name's latter syllable, and likes to invoke marine life because of Case's jewelry and usual color motif. Case fears their friendship has plateaued at Meredith's running joke of sharing her social media updates in person since she avoids social networking with a quiet grace for which nobody compliments her. Case glances at the screen. "Thank you for completing the 'What STD are you?' quiz!'" She giggles with her eyes closed and returns the device. "Well at least read it! I left the tab open all day. Do you know what that does to me?" Turning back to her phone, she says "Dan's here." Dan stopped by Max's table to scope out the dog situation, where Fred has camped out. "Dan, we're over here." Case waves him over. "Don't talk to Max dude." "Why?" "Just... don't."

"I mean, he's best know for his novels, but people often overlook his poetry." Fred was curiously knowledgeable since he got up to order a drink. "One thing you have to think about when you read Kerouac is that he was a devout Catholic." Max finally met his eye and asked, "But how does he make you feel?" Fred searched himself. "Oh, like diners and the open road." Max takes a calculated step back towards indifference. "Yeah, we're in a diner, he wrote 'On the Road'. I don't know, those are just facts, are they really important?" Fred tries to dig in, but politely. "Well you have to know the background, otherwise how do you know why you like something?" Max did not speak. "I mean, not that I'm saying your appreciation of him is invalid." Fred continues talking to himself. "But no, knowledge and history are important, you can't just ignore them for feelings and shit." Max uses a socal fry of unknown origin when he says, "Ok." Fred scoffs. "This generation. You can't just live in the now." Satisfied with this as his send-off back into the bittersweet orbit of self-imposed exile, Fred stands as dramatically as one can from a stationary bench to retrieve a take-away container for his formerly crisp meaty fries. Max tosses one to Kerouac.

"What, do I have to participate in your mysterious vendettas?" Dan lights a cigarette, as much for the nicotine as the possibility that someone might ask him to extinguish it. "Max is just a vendetta you don't have yet. Bastard takes up a whole picnic table to himself." Case pauses to check herself, then continues, but repurposes her outrage as recreation. "By the way, I caught you giving me the small town snub the other day." Dan fails at a smoke ring."Eh?" "On 4th, in front of Custard's Last Stand! I totally waved, and you did NOTHING." Dan tries to compose himself but the chair's arms are too low. "Ah, that. I'm just not the waving type of person these days." "But see, I think we get each other so much, all we need is waving." "I am post-greeting." Dan leans back to gloat over that one, but Case doesn't miss a beat. "You mean you're post-politeness, motherfucker!" "Sure! We encounter enough people every day that I think these check-ins are tedious, so I'm not participating anymore" Case pulls a deviant bang from a sweat patch, because it's 91 at 11PM. "You can't just choose to stop participating, the whole thing falls apart." "What, like universal healthcare?" Meredith emerges for a moment. "Holy shit guys, check out these goats!"

A woman sensibly dressed has introduced herself as Amanda and received permission to pet the dog. "I've been meaning to read Kerouac..." Max experienced a single chuckle that barely made ripples on his face but seemed to echo inside him. "Does anybody really mean to do something they don't do?" He spoke with a playful mock-bravado that has all the condescension of regular bravado but without the accountability. "Well I work long hours, then by the time I eat dinner I just wanna curl up, you know how it is. In fact, I am bravely working on a personal project tonight." Max laughed, somehow without acknowledging her comfortable self-deprecation. "Hey, I'm not here to grill you about your routine." "No, but you do have a point. How often do I follow through on what I say I want to do?" Max laughed as though to a highly respectable child. "You do what you want!" Amanda throws up her hands like day old fish. "Ugh! Sorry, I'm over here dredging up all of my bullshit." Amanda apologizes a few more times as her food arrives and she excuses herself to sit alone and work. She will spend at least 20 minutes chastising herself for blowing it with that hot introvert.

"No, it's more like vaccines." Dan dropped his cigarette butt into a nearly empty Mexican coke bottle that was Case's at some point. "You'll have to explain that one." Case fixed her posture. "If enough people opt out of it, we lose herd politeness. Rudeness all around!" "What if I don't want to be part of the herd?" Dan's ironic delivery failed to reach Case. "If you you think being a jackass makes you unique-" "I just want to have more meaningful exchanges. Y'know, like in New York City in the movies." Case leans back in her chair to catch a breeze on her face, only to discover a bounty of sweat on her back. "Have you been to NYC? All the conversations are an excuse for people to talk about their accomplishments. The way french fries are an excuse to eat beef gravy." Meredith rises again. "Poor french fries... don't they know they need no excuses? They can just sit here and talk about themselves all night." Dan shatters his posture, with his neck then with his hands. "Oh come on! You were in New York for a two week design & web development workshop. Of course you met all the yuppies! And anyway, that's happening around here. Conversations are an increasingly elaborate ruse to brag." Case's eyes lose their focus. "Yep. That's why I wave." She takes out her phone and thumbs through her email, entertaining biased thoughts about time zones.

A din of hissing meat on flame radiates from the kitchen as Justin, the only server working tonight, opens the door to deliver drinks to Max and Katherine, his new guest. Justin clearly fancied the girl. She was Judd Apatow movie hot, Wes Anderson movie awkward, and dressed like a Fellini extra. Unfortunately, so was he. "This shit'll melt the balls right off your faces." He was trying remind Max that he thinks he's a piece of shit but he is forced to interact with him twice a week, and he was trying to let Katherine know that even though they've never met, he feels that an authenticity was betrayed by her dialog with Max. Katherine laughed for all three of them. In this moment, both Case and Justin gave her an identical glare of annoyance and patronizing concern. Case tightly mouths "Indie Stepford wife" to nobody in particular.

Katherine is crouched and repeats the name in sensual deadpan, running her hands from his ears downward. "Kerouac... Kerouac. Wow." She lets this soak in and sits next to Max on the refurbished wood bench. "The fifties were just so..." Max said nothing but engaged with her in a deep eye voyage, sharing in the comfortable understanding that the fifties were just so... Sometimes they hardly know what they'd do if the fifties weren't just so...

Katherine asks with a measuring glare, "So what does Kerouac mean to you?"

Max sucks on his sensitive tooth for a moment. "There are two ways to eat mussels. You can embrace the delicious guts in your mouth by name, or you can distance yourself with metaphor." His hand briefly clasps the remote side of her waist then falls back in line as she strums Kerouac's table-tethered leash like a bass and replies, "They don't serve mussels here." "Exactly."

Case's table now resembles a busy petri dish, having annexed all nearby furniture, but Case has paid up and departed. Max and Katherine pass Amanda, asleep at her laptop, several fries and barbecue jackfruit morsels on a plate at her side like bottles of Jack by an aging rock star, as they leave together.

"Wait, where'd the dog go?"

Wrapping the leash around his wrist and hand, Max replies,"Oh, he just wanders the streets. Why else would I call him Kerouac?"

The Ocean Wash

The ocean wash was every word at once
I piss an unsteady reply
Wavy expressions of dotted light
Trail me back to an Asbury Park 7-11 parking lot
Rising whiffs of July tar 2004
Jersey shore aloe vera
Trash waits its turn to tumble
Wrappers weighed by cheese
I wait for a reason or forgiveness
As I drive further from both
Towards the wrong side
Of trying to lose what I never had
There was never anybody
To strike down until
There was no one left
To feel ashamed for

Night Time

Night time
Please rinse the day's color from my eyes
As you pour down the walls
Leaving memories behind
I promise I won't mind
If the color that dries
Is not the one advertised
As long as you carry
My makeshift raft to sleep
So I smell night time in my dreams
Whatever they may be

How a Non-Nerd Can Enjoy Comicon

Are you one of the few people left who identifies not as a nerd? Tired of feeling left out of the joy everyone else derives from new film adaptations of comics? Do you reluctantly keep track of them just to have something to talk about at work outings? And now that Comicon has taken over your city for the weekend, your options are 1) Go to Comicon with friends or 2) Sit on your faded paisley couch and remember all the embarrassing thing you've done while eating baby carrots and turning the light on and off. Are you tired of having to siphon your friends' joy from the holes on their faces?

Well good news! You can stop sharpening your hollow, glee-sucking tooth, because I went into the field with friend and comic aficionado Kevin Patterson to devise a list of non-nerd activities so you can have a creamy wedge of fun all to yourself!


-Try to discreetly photograph people discreetly checking themselves out in windows. Start a Tumbler account for this. Get Twitter-bombed for "narcissism shaming". Be unemployable for 3 years. Learn to play standup bass.

-Wonder if anybody has tried to patent a sort of neck cone to prevent cleavage glaring.

-Punch yourself in the arm until you stop having feminist thoughts.

-When passing the badge checkpoint, cover your friend's badge with your hand and tell the usher "You don't need to see his identification". They proceed to tear up your badge as a crowd gathers to pick you up and wordlessly pass you crowd surfing style out the door, each set of hands knowing exactly what you did. For several months, you will keep noticing shadowy figures in brown robes in your peripheral vision that will never be there when you turn to look, and that your internet is running slowly.

-Finally deploy the "personal space invaders" pun in live action!

"When I grabbed a pen and wrote "I HAVE LOCKJAW", I figured you'd take me to a hospital, but this also works"

-When you're walking towards the convention center, try to see how far away from someone you can stand and discern their sweat beads because they're wearing three layers of robes.

-If attractive, do the speed dating session, then proclaim non-nerd status and see how many people try to downplay their nerd-ness. Then when there's 45 seconds left tell them that you really are a nerd and that you are paid by ComiCon to test nerds for authenticity, and that they can leave quietly on their own or you can have the nerd authenticity agents escort them out.

-Side eye all the clever t-shirts you'll see this year at once.

Warning: If you zoom in on these and read them, you'll expend the one laugh they are good for, leaving only groans for when you see one attached to a person, who might be really attractive or saving you from drowning.

-Realize that every possible dystopian and utopian future has been speculated and elaborately drawn, so you can go ahead and stop coming up with those.

-Wear an elaborate costume that means nothing and let people guess what it is, giving them vague but enthusiastic hints, as though you want them so badly to get it so you can emotionally abscond to your remote cultural cache and bond over your niche-ness. This is the Comicon version of talking about made-up bands with scenesters.

-Check out all the steam punk costumes and crafts and realize that you don't actually need to throw anything out anymore!


You can enjoy Comicon any way you like, but remember: if you think intentionally mixing up Star Trek and Star Wars is still funny, you probably also make archaic jokes about the virgin comic book nerd, both of which can be safely deployed at work on Monday.

Quiz: Are You Into Science?

1) Are you into... science?


2) If there were trading cards featuring pictures of science, would you have the complete set?


3) For first dates, do you have a science joke that you tell, and if the person doesn't get it, you don't pursue the relationship?


4) Do you end up explaining the joke regardless?


5) If a procedural drama series called "Ann Hydrous" came out, about a no-nonsense judge who won't allow water in her court room, would you watch it?
A) No
B) Stop stealing my ideas!


6) Did you move to St. Louis because the area code is 314?

7) When you see two letters in a row, do you greedily rub your hands together and think "MMMMMMHmhmHMMmm, these would look great on the Periodic Table..."


8) Speaking of the Periodic Table, are all of your friends saved in your phone by their initials, the first one capitalized and the second not?


9) Did you used to have a friend named Allison Burns whom you called "Pallison" for this reason?


10) Did you kill "Pallison" and then bury her in St. Louis?


11) Ok, forget that I asked that one. Is that a tattoo of Nikola Tesla? Are you totally into him?


12) This question is so you can tell us more about Tesla.


13) We're going to show you some pictures of people who don't science. Please relax and don't mind the electrodes, they are hooked up to some monitors. Monitors are science. If you are someone who sciences, they are your friends and you can trust them.


14) Interesting.


15) When you overhear someone saying they don't eat gluten, do you become friends to gain their trust, then sneak concentrated gluten into their food supply to see if they really have Celiac's Disease?


16) Do you have your own periodic table, but with different letters?


17) You look surprised. We searched your apartment and found your periodic table; got the warrant right here. Hey, calm down! We looked at your periodic table and were very impressed. In fact, we were so impressed, we showed it to our good friend Neil Degrasse Tyson, and he has a few questions for you. Send him in!


18) Hello. Yes, I am in fact Neil Degrasse Tyson. Thank you. Thank you, that means a lot. This periodic table is one of the finest I've seen. I just have one question for you. Where are they buried?


19) Come on now, you have carefully arranged abbreviations and numbers on a table with 18 columns and 7 rows of varying height. Well, the figures must mean something, right? Otherwise that wouldn't science, and I think I know what sciences and what sciences not. And well frankly, as it stands, in my eyes, you science not. So what will it be? Are you really into science, or are you just another poseur?


20) Nothing? Ok how about this: Question 16 is worth 100 points, and the rest of the questions are worth 0 points.


Score: 0
Well, I guess the humanities are more your speed.

Score: 100
Congratulations! You have the right to remain science. Come with us. We're taking you to your new laboratory.

National Poetry Month Day 15 - Dancing

For my head returned on a silver platter
I'll do the Dance of the Seven Veils with Post-It notes
In the alley of shadow of the castaway moongazing drunks
You can write whatever you want
You might have sung my life while the angels were asleep
But what they were guarding was my laundry
From my Candy Mountain tour guide phase
And you can't wash that away
And they still want me to pay
And they still want me to pay

National Poetry Month Day 14 - Desiccated Summer

What was vision like

Before guesses desiccated summer

Stolen from the rain

Sky waves of dust for our eyes

And damp prayers became stain

Stains became art

So we breathe and breathe and breathe until

We speak in squeaks, all else sounds shrill

Outgrowing what we lived in

The stains became our new skin

With the only teeth we had and a plastic bag

Crunched the moon for forgiveness later

Like a dry mouth holding a communion wafer

NPM Day 13 - Harder

Hips crushed hard candy

Harder Judy

Gout slinger of faults

Full-body slap against a wall

O' white bumpy plastic 

'tis of thee

Sweet cream and entropy

Strike your neighbor thine tambourine

Splatter so much you drown yourself

So hard you become a stranger

If life is a conveyor belt

Who knows which side we're on

Except the ketchup and oral sex

It's the sugary button walking pace

Of the pavement age timing rise

That slips

Like sins through years

Into cracks around my eyes

And candy in my ears

NPM Day 12 - Loose Time

I just picked a speck
Of dried quinoa
From a rare unrounded cave
Of my Macbook
At a coffee shop
That strains the block
For a single sepia drop
Of the familiar drink
Of history
If me at twenty-two
Spotted me at thirty-three
Well, he wouldn't be up before noon
But he'd be all sly grins
Sweating cigarettes & gin
Thinking "I'll never be him"
In his notebook ruffled with crust
Like a dead pigeon's ass
With poems of death and lust
And his notes from class
Devoid of context or use
And like his meter, loose
But not necessarily free
Too drunk to know what to be
Too unfocused to know what to do
"Fuck me at thirty three"
Fuck you, twenty-two

NPM Day 11 - Patio Waitresses

Faces unsure of their sternness

Tattoos dragging breasts

Breasts dragging eyes

Everything pouring, leaving lines

Of caged firecracker lust

Shellshocked clippings in a vase,

Of collars and caps
Their gripping waves

Against whimpering thunder

Of distant caves
Form canyons of digital wonder

In a sky mirror maze
Fruit served with a knife

Coats the tongue, but not the strife,

In sugar bumps, inducing haze

NPM Day 10 - Bougainvillea

A bougainvillea with means
Vine, bush, tree, awareness
Worships the same gods in reverse
Secret subterranean palate parties
High on rare earth metals
Group sex
Bees
Microchips with memories
A mushroom cloud of fuchsia
Protects a vibrating trellis of thought

NPM Day 9 - Office Pizza Fly

Mrt mrnt
Mrrrrrnt
It's not enough
Mrrrrnnt
Just admit it
MRRRRrrrrrr
Mrrnnnn n nn nn n
Distracted and divided
Distracted and divided
Distracted and divided by hunger
Mrnt

Simple algebra
Mrrrrrrr
Gourmet pizza
Mr
More demand
Mr
Same money
Bad sex bad pizza
Lots of it
Good pizza couch sex
None for your roommates
Let them get their own
Let me touch your eye
MRRRRrrrrrr

rrrrrrRRRRNT
Look around the room
Alertness and spite
Greed
Hunger most of all
Mrrrrrnt
Like a funeral

Just leave the box
With the cold half slice
Open when you leave
I got your back
MRRRrrrrrr

NPM Day 8 - 90 Scent Speakers

Here are the translated lyrics from a popular hip hop club anthem in a culture similar to ours, but where everybody communicates by scent instead of words. Words have been replaced entirely (or never existed), so this song would be a series of scents with a backing track played at night clubs where people smell one another discreetly (or not) and dance. Among many other things, we have drastically different courtship procedures (but with some familiar themes, esp. along gender lines), and we have sexualized long-term memory. We'll call the act 90 Scent Speakers, the song is "Powder Set".


Crowded hot and close
Shy girl on her own
Brave enough to let loose
But I guess I stepped up too soon
Her sensation directed
To me and I tried to collect it
A got a glimpse of heaven
So did she but she won't accept it

Look away and sniff
Look away and reminisce
Savor
Look away and sniff
Look away and reminisce

Girl, I know your powder set
Reach into your purse to get
Cardamom to fragment
While you're here where the air is stagnant
So why you try n hide
When your body speaks, abide
Set your powder set aside
Take this flavor for a ride
Just inhale

Just let the buds make a shape
And your inhibitions escape
In time our memories will make
Us a private spice blend sex tape

I'm the ambiance you seek
When I sniff you whiff we peak
You can't send your friend to sneak
By and try to describe unique

Look away and sniff
Look away and reminisce
Savor
Look away and sniff
Look away and reminisce

Girl, I see your powder set
When you know I smell your sweat
(Look away and sniff)
I could be your powder set
(Look away and sniff)
Let me be your powder set
(Look away and sniff)
I will be your powder set
(Look away and reminisce)

Girl, I know your powder set
And I know I made you wet
Don't know why you stand,
Dropping curry by the fan
This ain't your first time
Lift my arm and you will find
With our memories entwined
Is the way to touch the divine
Just inhale

National Poetry Month Day 7 - One Ticket

A man approaches the ticket counter
At the Phoenix Art Museum
He believes to be screening
A popular Maya Deren film
The marquis behind the counter
Over the cashier's shoulder
Does not advertise this
The cashier looks amused
The man peers around them,
As though they were an obstacle
As though they are not a source
Of nearly boundless knowledge

Less than a minute ago
The man double-checked the event
On the museum's event calendar
In the shadow of a dyed glass phallus
Which shielded his device
From the sunlight

With all available certainty
He asked of the "Film screening"
Having forgotten
All identifying words
"There typically are not film screenings
At art museums
Try the AMC
On 3rd Ave and Taylor"
Meekly, he explained he saw
Online that they were screening
Experimental films on Sundays
Then he apologized
For not remembering
The name
Of today's feature
"Seems a bit odd, walking all this way
To watch a film you don't know the title of."
How did they know he walked?
"You're banded with sweat."
So he was
The denial persisted
He finally took out his phone
Showed the cashier the event
"I can't imagine why
Anyone
Would put themselves through this film"
They printed a ticket.
A friend of his said he should watch it
It seemed like the sort of thing
He'd be into
They withheld the ticket,
Severed from the roll,
And sang

"And if the difference between life and death
Is having feelings you can't express
That secrets are power
Is the only power you have

He seemed like the sort of thing I'd be into
And if I have those feelings enough
Will he happen again?

Meaning runs from your arms
like children
After dogs
Like dogs after moving cars

Meaning seemed like the sort of thing I'd be into
The draft from the shaft
Between knowing and meaning
Gives us the flu
Who dies
And who mourns?"

The man accepted the ticket
Followed a velvet rope
The ticket taker asked of his sticker
The sticker is also required, see
Denied
The man returns to the cashier
"I demand sticker"
A shortage of stickers is declared
"You must earn one to proceed
Through dissonance of deed
So wisely or not, choose your attack
For everything destroyed
Someday comes back"

And so he understood
Interviewing the bourgeoning line
Biting off the noses
Of anyone not waiting
For the screening of a popular Maya Deren film

Having passed with his sticker
The man settled in his seat
The film sputtered into vision
But the cashier's song
All the man can hear
The bloody pile of noses
All the man can see
He felt like propaganda
To tolerate himself
Left salty mouthed in secret
Halfway through the film

Eight months later
The man received a check
For $31
He wondered what he was into
What was on the marquis
At the Phoenix Art Museum

National Poetry Month Day 6 - Birds

No longer me to speak of
Now a cloud of swallows
None of them one of them
All of them me
Endless random calls
Feathers tickling breeze
Infinite bugs,
Berries and beaks
Unable to search
Unable to speak
Unlikely to perch
A mile a week
Perhaps less
I'm made of numbers
But can only guess

No longer me to speak of
This million birds in flight
Are the figures of my genes
Somehow more so than my life
Gathered thought falls
Too limited a means
Opinions offer no respite
And when time crawls
The grip of preference is tight
Choked into a lottery
Of birds that shriek and veer
Life scrawls and sprawls
But somehow I'm still here
Part of the formula is the bird that calls
"Somehow, I'll always be here"

National Poetry Month Day 5: Survey - Are You a Narcissist (In the Style of Charles Bukowski)?

You're sweating on highway 10
Someone honks their horn,
do you think they are honking at you?
A bold assumption, there are many people on the road
They like to imagine they're being honked at
You think you should be so special?

You're sweating on highway 10
Someone honks their horn,
Do you assume it is not you?
Like you're the chosen only one incapable of error?
Who would dare honk their horn at perfection?

Strung out in a motel near Sunset Blvd
A car alarm is going off
Are you immediately worried that it is your car?
Really?
Of all the cars on the street?

Poking your wrist in Echo Park
Even the sun dreams of being a star
When a car alarm starts going off,
do you automatically assume it is not yours?
Of course, because stars don't park their own cars
And you're such a fucking star

How many times per day do you look in the mirror?
How long did it take you to answer that?

Do you enjoy giving someone a good orgasm?
It's a good orgasm until someone needs to take credit for it
Then it becomes the chalky fuckpaste of a sweaty narcissistic hog
Such as you might be

When you read books, and you see parts of yourself in the protagonist
When you read books, and you see parts of yourself in any of the characters
You do realize the author wasn't writing the book about you, right?

Do you bore your friends with your problems?
Do you hide your problems from your friends,
Because you don't want to seem imperfect?

Why do you let things bother you, anyway
There are bigger problems in the world
People are dying hungry and riddled with bullets
While world leaders shit cum out their mouths
And we live in a pile of their personal debris

Do you talk about problems in the world?
Why?
Nobody wants you to bring them down with your vain attempt to feel connected to the human condition

Here's what you do:
Find the least attractive person in the room.
Try harder, use that American imagination
Now think about why they're not attractive to you
Probably because of all the shallow magazines you read
They feed your narcissistic sense of superiority
Now, back to this ugly person: Would you have sex with them?
Why not?
Do you think you're better than they are?
We are all equal, after all.
Sex is the only joy in this world
It should be shared with everyone.
Why are you withholding joy from the world?
Why are you withholding joy from this person?
Go have sex with them!
Right now!
Hurry!
If you don't have sex with them, then you are a narcissist.
If they are not interested, show them this quiz.

National Poetry Month Day 4: Necrotic Icon

Who is he?

Mustachioed

Broad faced and fond of baseball

Asks every question

Big smoke, front teeth

Your car upon carved blocks and memory loss

Ropey pantsuits on the shaved chocolate floor boss

I see you're concerned now:

If there aren't vicars

There can be vicar's daughters how?

But he's not me

I am the cinnamon cartoon wolf of nasal cave fame

Razor claws raised, always just out of frame

My nose fights for roses who fight for the sun

My face fights to feel like it's the only one

My nose bulbous and guido, red frying fat

A lower case r as a bridge between that

Which is possible and Xanax and animals

Islands, channels, crackling insides

What did I do?

I stayed home and thought of tides

National Poetry Month Day 3 - If Emily Dickinson Was in the Beach Boys

So I was going to do "Emily Dickinson's Twitter", but it failed the google test spectacularly (there are probably over a dozen active Emily Dickinson twitter accounts).  Instead, let's ponder what it might have been like if Emily Dickinson was a contributing songwriter* for the Beach Boys:

*Lyrics only. If she wrote the music, every song would sound like the Gilligan's Island theme**.

**Yes, you can read every Emily Dickinson poem like the theme to Gilligan's Island. I give you permission. Sometimes, that's all you need.

"Surfin' Safari"

Let's go surfin' now
Everybody's learning how
Death doesn't stop for me
(Death doesn't stop)

Early in the morning we'll be startin' out

Some honeys will be comin' along
Success is counted sweetest

By those who don't succeed

So if you're coming get ready to go

Come on baby wait and see

(Surfin', surfin' safari)
Dare you see a soul at the white heat
(Surfin', surfin' safari)
Come along girl wait and see
(Surfin', surfin' safari)
We're gonna die before our virginity

You can go surfin' now
Think I'll just sit this one out
Gonna hang out in my room
(Gonna hang out in my)

Huntington and Malibu

Our death is near
On our headstones the moss will grow
We're goin' on safari to the islands this year
We'll safari 'till we cease to know

"Fun Fun Fun"

Well she got her daddy's car
She passed a docile row of birds on a stand now
Seems she forgot all about mortality
Like she told her old man now
Full of a liquor never brewed
Goes cruising just as fast as she can now

And she'll have fun, fun, fun
When her soul leaves like a bird from a cage
(Fun, fun, fun when her soul leaves like a bird from a cage)



"Little Deuce Coupe"

Little deuce Coupe
Will there be a morning?
Little deuce Coupe
Will there be a morning?

Well I'm not bragging babe, but the sun touched the day
My quiv'ring flames conditions, a hot ore did sate
So lest your village boast a blacksmith, don't even try
Cause between the two of you, I'd rather listen to the fly
She's my little deuce Coupe
Is there such a thing as day?
(My little deuce Coupe)
(Is there such a thing as day?)

"California Girls"

Well the east coast girls are hip
Like pigmy seraphs gone astray
And the southern girls, with the way they talk
Reminds me that we all decay
The mid-west farmer's daughters tell the truth, but on a slant
And the northern girls, with the way they kiss
The night is wide, and furnished scant

I wish they all could be made of plants and birds

I wish they all could be made of plants and birds

I wish they all could be made of plants and birds

I wish they all could be made of plants and birds

Alright, that's enough.

National Poetry Month, Day 2 - The Audience Plant

Walking the shoe-lace pattern of social evolution
Step on another tongue on the ground
Is it still mine?
Close my eyes
Plug my ears
Globe of hair
Living the ciliated social life
A panopticon of greedy, snarling faces
Like small minds contemplating wealth
The self-sorting parochial
Social justice karaoke hall
Clasping factory-made photo opportunities
Driving a fact that still drills your nose
With stinging chalky revelation
Take self-righteousness to go
The hottest club drug going
Is to never be caught not knowing
What I myself learned five minutes ago

National Poetry Month Day 1 - Morning Dew, Morning Dew

We woke up racist in a room of naked Shawns
Declaring Chaucer on a thousand vacant lawns
We make our fortune on the porch where madness dawns
Bite bite each other contrite
God scattered fossils from a box of unknown height
Breakfast of Champions for the vigilant uptight
We figure out their useful life by sight
Starlight is new blue light vibrations tender
Desire, crouching, makes the moon a public defender
We grew agnostic when succumbing to the flirts
Jesus is overweight and out of medium shirts
We hurt inside, we have a mind of severed squirts
Puddles forming bubbles
Bubbles racing language
Certain our meaning will leave us dead or stranded
We pump our own clouds, then all emerge empty handed

Existential Insult Comic

Sex and the nature of mortality can be a source of pleasure, but for you they're a source of relentless anxiety and occasional bitter laughter.

Everything you will ever accomplish is really just because of a parasite that lives in you and is hungry for achievement and validation. Achievement and validation only exist because other people with parasites make them exist.

Your need to impose your identity on everyone you meet has isolated you almost incurably. You know how when you're having sex with someone, you wish you were having sex with someone? And you think, "I'm just decadent! Like when I light one cigarette, then I light another one before the first one is even done"? Well, the person you wish you were having sex with is yourself; you've just forgotten how to recognize them.

During high school you were awkward and unpopular, but you knew you would have a bright future. Now you feel like you peaked in high school. That 90's nostalgia is in vogue does not help.

The tyranny of all your opinions and preferences imprisons you and feeds you just enough to keep you alive but not very coherent. They are decals on the train you ride that is full of unremarkable people all judging each other as inferior using slightly different versions of the same criteria.

All of your love affairs are a ruse. Any happiness you felt was because you were gas lighting yourself.

There was a correct path your life could have taken that would have lead to happiness, but you diverted from it long ago, and your attempts to compensate have been disastrous.

Time is escaping you like water escaping through cracks of aging, and with the water pours out personal secrets you wanted to keep. Everyone knows them now, but you think they are still secrets, and eventually you will drown in not enough understanding.

At your funeral, people will be having inaccurate thoughts about you. The rest of their thoughts will be about food and sexual conquest.

You will die regretting all the love you never got to express, and had you expressed it, it would only have caused discomfort shrouded in decorous graciousness.

The cliches found on posters and internet memes you abhor most are the ones that would have made you free to be happy.

Your limited language of pop culture references will ensure that all of your experiences are sterilized. No matter what you do or where you go, you will be insulated from transcendence. Fortunately, if you even begin to realize this and get depressed, you can always watch Buffy The Vampire Slayer reruns until it goes away.

There is at least one truth about yourself that you are engineered to never find out. You will dance around it, and maybe even approach it, but you will always be deflected and tossed back into unknowing and delusion. Like planets whirling around the sun, it will explode and engulf you before you can reach it. And this is your closest connection to the divine.

The comment section to every "50 Shades of Grey"-related article

a narcissistic sociopath. So I can't imagine anybody, having read my exhaustive deconstruction of all the abuse masquerading as acceptable intimacy in this poorly written series (complete with page numbers and screenshots), would be able to offer any rational excuse for overlooking it.

Comments (2,452)

WTF is Irony says:
Wow, you sure put a lot of effort into something you don't like. It's just a book! If you don't like it, fuckin don't read it then! It's none of your business what gets other people off. Stop telling people what their opinions should be, how to express themselves, and how to live their life. I think people should keep their opinions to themselves. #idon'tneedfeminism,  #IfThisListWasAccurateItWouldBeHundredsAndHundredsofThisPerson

CaptainFairness says:
Clearly your personal experience as an abuse survivor has influenced your opinion. I think your personal bias should exclude you from the conversation. Sorry you had to deal with that though. Stay strong! #goodperson

TheDude7 says:
I mean, he may be abusive and manipulative and all, but at least he owns it! Y'know what I mean?
      NedBlanders says:
      No actually I don't, could you please elaborate?
            TheDude7 says: 
            You know! Like, when someone is an awful person and they know it, but they like, keep being awful anyway, that makes it OK, right? Because they own it! ... Huh, now that I wrote it out, I realize how little sense that makes. Why do people say that? I know I said it because I didn't want to actually examine my opinion but... Wait... Fuck! All of my friends are racist! I'm gonna go kick their asses then move to another city.

GoodMan2 says:
Yes! This! I am in the middle of trying to save a woman who is with a real life "Christian Grey". She left me for a wealthy professional who is very handsome and regularly takes her on "vacation" to Europe (clearly to get her away from her family and friends). According to mutual friends, they have really amazing sex, too. Poor thing has no idea that she's a victim of abuse. And he gets really upset whenever she is seen with me. I just happen to run into her sometimes at the coffeeshop she goes to every morning before work (he helped get her a job at his friend's successful startup... controlling much?!?!), and he went with her one day and was very rude to me. Very territorial! I'm even beginning to suspect that he has brainwashed her to dislike me, because (read more)

FlowerLuvins says:
Ugh, I agree! I couldn't get through the first book, it was just all of the unhealthy. People! Sex shouldn't hurt! And then, like, he tells her not to cum at some point. That's not cool! Not what sex is about! Doesn't he care about her pleasure? Sounds like just another selfish pig. She needs to get away from that negative energy or it's gonna bring her down.

AlarmedUndergrad says:
I am a psychology major, and I read this and thought "Hmmm interesting". I definitely agree that everything Ana goes through will be psychologically scarring. Most of the people reading don't realize that she has low self-esteem, and he takes advantage of that. It's scary how many of my friends just don't get it, and they are ALL ABOUT this series. I have explained, in legitimate clinical terms, how it is warping their development as young adults, but for some reason that doesn't change their minds. I am putting together some sociological data to show them, let me know if you come across anything.

RedPillLinux says:
Aww, what's the matter? Nobody pay attention to you because you got dumped by an alpha and put on all that weight? Looks like someone's been on the carousel too long and has nothing to show for it. Don't worry, I'm sure some beta will take on your loose meat.
   (1589 replies)

RighteousWhiteous says:
Ok, i get that he's manipulative and stalks her entire life, and it sucks for her, but I don't think it's sexist. Feminists need to stop making it about them because #notallmen are Christian Grey. It's just one story, and the genders could easily be switched. Why isn't anybody analyzing it from that perspective? #reversesexismmuch?

AsianSexTouristGalt says:
I'm gonna pop some bubbles, be the unpopular voice of reason here and point out the obvious: she clearly gets what she wants out of this. He buys her the expensive stuff all women crave, takes care of her... oh, and then there's the earth-shattering orgasms he delivers with his huge "penis endowment" (so to speak), she seems OK with that. Obviously you male haters have never seen a woman tremble beneath you because you gave her permission to. For up to half an hour. It takes a while to get to that point, and most men are just grateful they can last 5 minutes then go to sleep. I'm just being honest here, so if you don't like the truth, go back to your comfortable lies, I don't have time for you. I guess I'm a feminist in some ways, because I believe women should have AT LEAST as many orgasms as her partner, probably more. In my experience, definitely more. Maybe you're just dissatisfied with the sex you've had, or if your a guy your probably insecure. Hey, sometimes the truth is hard to take, but there's no avoiding it. Sometimes, a woman needs to feel a little owned. Deep down, she wants her man to challenge her decisions. It shows that he cares about her, and that he'd fuck up anyone who messes with her, no matter where she goes. And it makes the relationship more rewarding for him, too. It's just biology, we can't avoid it.

365Conscious says:
Of course, WESTERN medicine only recently "decided" that BDSM isn't a diagnosable disorder. I mean (read more)

PleaseHelpMe says:
Please don't be angry at me, but I really liked the book. You just have to read between the lines, ok? I think Ana totally knows what she's doing. I mean, yeah she suffers a bit, OK a lot, but in the end he definitely changes. Or at least, he is clearly on the road to being approachable, and she'll be able to get over her emotional trauma because she's strong, and she'll finally (gently, gradually) confront him, you just have to read between the lines. I mean, I'm pretty sure the sex is good, why else would she keep coming back?

MissyBee says:
Thank you for writing this! Every sentence was like "Yes!" I went through something like this once... never again!
  DevilsAdvocado says:
  Just to play "devil's advocate", if you will, I mean, doesn't she have free will?
    MissyBee says: 
    But he manipulates her! He knows exactly what he's doing. For example, when he totally shuts down emotionally and makes her (read more)
      MmmmYeah,LikeThat says:
      Well yeah, he's abusive and manipulative, but she perseveres and eventually he changes. Sounds fine to me!
        MissyBee says:
        Except he doesn't "change"! She just learns how to work around his sociopathy, which is different because (read more)
           OoooooohFuckYeahKeepDoingThat says:
           I don't know though, maybe she was asking for it a little bit? I mean, she never said the safe word, but she could have...
              MissyBee says:
              ARRRRGH! But you're taking it out of context! You have to build enough trust so the sub isn't (read more)
                OhFuckOhFuckOhFuck says:
                 I mean, doesn't her arousal negate any possibility of rape?
                      MissyBee says:
                      Umm... NO! Physical arousal doesn't mean (read more)
                          OOOOOOOHHhhhhhhhMMMMmmmmmmhhmmmmMMMM says:
                          It's not like he has a gun to her head. She can leave at any time. And she does, after the first book.
                             MissyBee says:
                            (BASHING HEAD AGAINST DOOR) NO! Like I said before, in my articulate and citation-laden multi-paragraph reply above, (read more)
                                 Thanks! says:
                                 Eh, maybe. I guess we're all entitled to our opinions. Good night!

Entfernt Daily Standard Sunday Editorial: The Stachel Abomination

Using "Rick Steve's European Christmas" travel feature as a writing prompt, I challenged myself to write something without resorting to surrealism, sex, paranoia, or meta. 

Greetings, Standard readers of Entfernt! I hope your Christmases were all so merry it bordered on the depraved. Indeed I've received nothing but reports of seasonally appropriate bliss, apart of course from one incident. For countless generations, we the citizens of this charming settlement outside the Grindelwald village in the Bernese Alps, have enjoyed a festive tradition in the weeks leading to Christmas. Each year, twenty-four households are selected by committee and assigned to decorate their home for a day in the Advent calendar and prepare dinner for all the visitors. Understand, this is not an effort to hoist Christianity upon the general public¹. Rather, this is all in the spirit of service to the community. Not only does it tighten the knittedness of our village, but each serving and decorated home provides dinner for all guests, the homeless included. Almost² nobody has ever been turned away. Though I suspect a vagrant with the tenacity to land in a settlement with no roads and either a €145/day snowmobile rental or difficult 2-day hike away from the nearest train stop would be able to get a job tearing tickets somewhere. Generally, the only sort of "homeless" person who wanders here on foot is a startup millionaire between Bay Area leases who will most likely use his trip as a story to shill a performance drink or masculine crisis retreat.

But enough of that. Overall, 2014 was an exceptionally fine year. The Zwanghaft family (day 8) served 8 varieties of fondue with 8 loaves of braided bread that were each 8 feet in length. 8 feet! Did it occur to anyone to ask how they went about baking something so large? If so please write in, I'm mildly curious. The Goodpaster household (day 17) challenged us with pickled cow tongue, a rite of passage for the Goodpaster children³. In every home were found humble, earthy displays of God's messengers carved in knotty wood or dried squash, or shaped from twigs and dried grape vines, and the food was all hearty, traditional fare. Sausages, cheese and bread displayed on dark planks of elm shaped like nearby wildlife, pickled vegetables: fare that is warm and welcoming. Then there was the Stachel house, who so happened to draw number 24: Christmas Eve. Now, nobody can deny that we lead somewhat simple lives here in Entfernt. Many of us are builders or miners, while others spend their days procuring firewood or giving walking tours to vacationers. Every commute is a physically draining trek through hills of snow and often tempestuous gusts of wind. I think I speak for us all when I say that curry lentils and rice hardly nourishes to the soul, and does not represent the character of our settlement. Folks politely inquired of the ingredients and were told it was simply lentils and water with spices. So essentially, we were served a tea full of ruptured beans. When further pressed, they said some clarified butter was added for the sake of richness. If only the Griffpresse family was around, they could have learned of how their butter is in need of clarification. I had some of their chive butter on rye toast this morning and it seemed perfectly articulate to me.

How heartbreaking it was, watching children on Christmas Eve fumble with a greying brown mash that in texture and taste resembled the remnants of a potpourri cooker. My family was fortunate enough to have a hearty stew of venison and carrots left over at home, and a few people who would rather not be identified joined us with some bread and cheerful commiseration. However I imagine some families, expecting there to be an actual meal provided, may have spent Christmas eve either hungry and disappointed, or waiting for something to defrost. Indeed another anonymous family, unwilling to retire in such hunger, prepared what they thought would be a simple matter of egg, flour, and cheese, but ended up eating at an hour more fit for breakfast⁴.

Now, far be it from me to look unfondly upon diversity of experience. The Esempio family (day 14) made crepe-style cannelloni stuffed with 3 cheeses and seasoned minced beef, which I enjoyed immensely. But stuffed cannelloni is part of the Esempio family's cultural past. Perhaps redoubling my ire is the inauthenticity of the whole affair, and the cynical shallowness that we would accept their culinary appropriation without question. The Stachels have more generations here than almost anybody else. The joke is that they evolved their short legs and wide frames to steady themselves on skis and rocks! This cheap novelty comes off as phony, and it is deeply immoral that they subjected the hardworking citizens of Entfernt to an experiment that could not have possibly gone right.

While I want to commend those who tried to reduce the tension, I think it is best they learn from immediate social dissonance. One guest's comment that "Well, the himalayas are also cold and majestic" was well-intended, but thoroughly misguided. Though this is being published anonymously, I want the Stachels to know that many staff members and contributors at the Daily Standard stand behind this. That being said, my aim is not to incite a sort of passive-aggressive uprising. I just want the Stachels to know that there are people who disapprove of their behavior without adhering to those people the stigma of disapproval. Perhaps even the Advent Committee will take note of this public complaint and assume the Stachels have read it and learned their lesson, and thus be granted an opportunity to redeem themselves in the near future.

¹The general public being 94 people, 78 of whom are practicing Christians.
²There was one incident on record, in 1852. Apparently Richard Wagner says some, well say "divisive" things when he's had too much gluhwein. Legend has it that after he was removed, the remainder of the evening was spent trying to come up with one of those handy German portmanteaus for when something is "both dark and pale".
³This lack of squeamishness almost certainly explains how Neils Goodpaster moved to Brazil to be a marine biologist.
⁴Actually, it turned out quite well and may become a yearly tradition of insomnia and storytelling layered with crisp pastry for them.