Don't jump until I've put out my hand.
Don't cry until I've made you hurt.
Don't dance until your innocence has ended.

And don't forget who I am,
Or what I've done for you.

I'll cry myself to sleep so you won't have to.

The Future Responds

Hey man, relax.

You've got it all wrong, but I can't tell you what you've got wrong - you'll figure that out on your own. Just hang in there.

I wish I could say it gets better, but it really doesn't. There'll be plenty of peaks and valleys. That's the point - not all this "having" crap. You don't own anything in life: life owns you. You're born and you die, everything in between is parenthetical.

Don't get all upset about it though. Life is still precious, and you probably don't realize how much of it you're going to miss out on. You never cried enough, never loved enough, never bothered to be vulnerable because you were afraid. Let me tell you, fear is way worse than pain. Pain ends, but fear builds on itself until it has constructed an awesome clockwork apparition that knows no empathy. Pain simply is, but fear is malicious. Don't let it infect you, or you'll lose so much in life that you might as well not have lived at all.

Inoculation,
I have taken the disease
I'll live forever . . .

From One Without Romance

“My soul is a passionate dancer; she dances to hidden music which only I can hear. . . . Whatever police the world may prescribe to rule the soul, I refuse to obey them.”

- Bettina Brentano

For my soul dancer:

I have fallen in love. This love may not be for you, but it was brought about by you, for it is you who inspired it. You, my muse of romance, you have caused my mindless attraction; for, I have been overwhelmed by the deep, sharp, shadow of what you signify.

My love is for you, my emblem, my motif. You do not know me, and my heart bursts with aching for I do not know you. I know only of you. I know of your desire for the objective and intellectual, your search for significance, and your longing for love.

Perhaps it is only coincidence that I share your vision. I have no great fondness for fate, either in theory or in practice. My inclination then is to communicate my thoughts so that you might know me more, and be inclined to return the sincere, if somewhat banal, gesture. In this way, we might not lose sight of one another too soon, and we might learn to know one another, both through pleasure and pain.

I have noted your inner calmness. You hold to pretenses of machismo and roughness, but you carry yourself with a natural grace that few have mastered, yet so many attempt to attain. You have shown yourself willing to be open, but seem to have difficulty expressing that openness, reverting to a baser demeanor and avoiding the conflict of inner and outer attitude altogether. I empathize with your predicament, for I too feel the opposing pull of social expectation and intellectual desire, like the twin forces of heart and mind.

I understand that this letter may change nothing, but at the very least I feel a great burden lifted from my shoulders, for at least now I may be honest. I do not know you, not in any real sense, yet I love you. Perhaps not in a romantic way, but in the way of the soul, that eternal being that prods us ever forward. My soul seeks the companionship of similar souls, but how can I know they are similar if they are veiled behind guise and guile? I ask not for your hand, or your heart, or your mind, or even your soul. I ask only that you grant me the opportunity to discover these things through my own effort.

I know you may fear a wound that cuts deeper than most if you allow me, as a surgeon, to peer into the vast inner workings of your very self; however, how can healing take place if you refuse the doctor access? True, the body heals itself with time. Likewise, the heart and mind, with the passage of time, may mend themselves. But the soul, oh the soul, that song sung to heaven with every breath we take, that cannot help but gravitate towards the light.

I fear not a wound, only infection. I fear not love, only life without. I fear not rejection, only the death of my avatar, of that which I love.

Tertiary

I love those words,
You know the ones,
That make The Man stutter,
I love to say
"Dig it, man!"
And mop my cuts while
Those slits of eyes tear gently,
Subtle anxiety becomes my tear gas,
To infect the haters.

I hate the decision-making process,
Digression, with the incessant regressive lack of progress,

Fear.

Sweat running down my face as my mind shakes with the weight,
Of choice.

Heaven or hell, destruction seems inevitable,
My love and heat and hate are all balled into a single organism,
To create the schism in my mind,
The agony of philosophical proliferation.

Christopher U. Robin Esquire

Hey there little buddy,
How's your heart feeling?
Still in pain?
That's a shame.
Maybe if you shaved your mane,
Grew out your claws,
And changed your name,
Maybe you'd feel better,
Better than you were.

Hey there little buddy,
Why so blue?
Why not try living life for once?
You were born that way I know,
Maybe you should try a different medication,
So your hut will stop swimming.

Hey, what are you doing?
Where's your home,
Your heart,
Your hospitality?
You're a fool you know,
They'll never accept who you are,
Not in a thousand years.

That fool, that jackal,
All he wants is to keep his garden in order,
Perfection is his goal,
And you've got to be kind of anal to get there.

And that cheery fellow,
Does he realize the whole world is crumbling?
I see him you know,
I see him sitting in the back room,
Sniffing at his dope,
Making pleasured noises,
I can't remember the last time his shelves weren't bare.
He's got that little man working for him,
Not his fault,
Just born in a bad way I suppose,
Imported labor is real cheap I hear,
But he can't afford it,
Someone has to work for him,
That glutton.

There's another,
The lofty one,
I know he could do it,
I bet he would join you,
If you could tear him away from his books,
Knowledge was his paradise,
Now it's his prison,
His birdcage.

A Villanelle for the Damned

My fear resides in a course unmanned,
Though in fact I see no error,
My life and death remain unplanned.

In straining and moaning I creep from the land,
Tuned to the constant wavelength of terror,
My fear resides in a course unmanned.

It is with asphyxiated trembling I stand,
My manacles entwined by my captor,
My life and death remain unplanned.

My vices in packages crammed,
My voice screams out in silent ardor,
My fear resides in a course unmanned.

With faux-freedom I fly, without time to land,
Even in life I am a martyr,
My life and death remain unplanned.

I already know what I'll never demand,
Answers that lift me from my graveside grasper,
My fear resides in a course unmanned,
My life and death remain unplanned.

Pain starts on the inside,
Gnawing away at concentration,
Still concentrated in my side,
Disturbing animations,
Like television sets play,
My mind is riddled with holes,
Riddle with the soft clay,
Even out my soul,
With drugs.

Infection has evolved with strangely ambivalent connotations. The very word infection is indicative of a powerful catalyst that has wrought change in something else, and yet still we subscribe to that foolish notion of the cliche. Certainly there is a place for hesitancy when it comes to the re-iterating of an old philosophy, but why is infectiousness so taboo? Perhaps we miss the point of an infection; infections aren't about hatred or antagonism, they are about change and survival.

Infections are contagious as well. The real danger lies in this ability to spread quickly, to maneuver from psyche to psyche spreading courage, fear, lies, hope, and malcontent. There is but one cure for this contagion. Were it possible I would have delayed this unveiling of my perception of infection so as to shield you all from my inevitable conclusion: the cure is an objective mindset. Influence is held over you by others undeserving of their power, but you can limit that influence until it has been marginalized by your own independence.

Now that we know we can control an infection with the antibody of our conscious mind, we can also take a step back and observe the true meaning of infective behaviors. Remember, the key to preventing your own infection is held in the mind, not in the actions that you take. Actions may always be misconstrued, twisted, and maligned, but internalizing your thoughts will not fail.

Do not be upset if someone says negatively that you dug your own grave while you were still healthy enough to do it yourself. After all, they will die grave-less.