Alcohol - Franz Wright

You do look a little ill.

But we can do something about that, now.

Can’t we.

The fact is you’re a shocking wreck.

Do you hear me.

You aren’t all alone.

And you could use some help today, packing in the

dark, boarding buses north, putting the seat back and

grinning with terror flowing over your legs through

your fingers and hair . . .

I was always waiting, always here.

Know anyone else who can say that?

My advice to you is think of her for what she is: one

more name cut in the scar of your tongue.

What was it you said, “To rather be harmed than

harm is not abject.”

Please.

Can we be leaving now.

We like bus trips, remember. Together

we could watch these winter fields slip past, and

never care again,

think of it.

I don’t have to be anywhere.

"I’m looking for something to scare me out of my skin" - Henry Rollins

I’m looking for something to scare me out of my skin

I’m following myself

Playing jokes on myself

Injecting myself with nightmares

I wait in dark corners to jump out and scare myself

I’ve got to get away from myself

"I was at this guy's house." - Henry Rollins

I was at this guy’s house. I met this girl who was hanging out

there. She was real pretty, she had brown eyes and dark hair. She

was soft-spoken and real nice. I know that everyone has their

own life and they can do what they want and you shouldn’t think

anything of it or anything. But man, I couldn’t help but flinch a

little when I saw all those needle marks in her arm, they looked

so sore. Hateful little holes. I wanted to say something, but I

didn’t.

The Witch's Story - Lawrence Raab

Everything you have heard about me

is true, or true enough.

You shouldn’t think

I’d change my story now.

A stubborn, willful little girl

comes sneaking

around my house, peering

in all the windows. She’s disobeyed

her parents, who knew

where the witch lived. “If you go,

you’re not our daughter any more.”

That’s what they told her. I have

my ways of knowing. All pale

and trembly then, she knocks at my door.

“Why are you so pale?”

I ask, although of course

I know that too.

She'd seen what she’d seen—

a green man on the stairs, and the other one,

the red one, and then the devil himself

with his head on fire, which was me,

the witch in her true ornament, as I

like to put it. Oh, she’d seen what she needed

to send her running home

but she walked right in, which is the part

I never understand completely. Maybe

she believed, just then,

that she was no one’s daughter any more,

and had to take her chances, poor thing,

inside with me. “So you’ve come

to brighten up my house,”

I said, and changed her into a log.

It was an easy trick, and gave me little pleasure.

But I’d been waiting all day.

I was cold, and even that

small fire was bright, and warm enough.

LETTER TO A LOST FRIEND - RICHARD SHELTON

War, trade, religious debts to discharge, these are mostly the reasons

for men’s distant journeyings: but you take pleasure in distant journeys

without reason.                                                               – St.-John Perse

we do not realize what we want

until we learn

what we are willing to give up for it

and you did God knows you did

when swimming was no longer possible

you learned to sink you learned

to live at the bottom of the sea

now tell me of the chambers where you sleep

tell me it does not matter

lie if you must

is your bed luminous is it festooned

with seaweed do all your narrow windows

open onto water

is the tide kind to you

forgive me if I do not understand

last night a stranger asked me what

gives you most pleasure and before I thought

I answered her revenge

Bad Habits - Richard Shelton

how could I leave you behind

old friends

since I am going nowhere

here is good and there is evil

and again I fall like a drunk

between two stools

of all the things I have

I cherish most

what no one else would want

TODAY MY ALARM WENT OFF AT 12:30PM - Mira Gonzalez

I stayed in bed for over an hour
looked at things on my phone
I felt slightly anxious about nothing particular
I walked downstairs and poured coffee into a jar
I asked a person on the internet if I should take drugs
I took drugs before the person had time to respond

I feel alienated by people who express concern about me without
defining their concern in terms of a specific solution or goal
I dont feel comforted by the idea of an afterlife
I dont want to continue experiencing things after I die
I want someone to pull my hair because I like the idea of someone
controlling my head without touching my head

what is the difference between being an independent person
and being a person who is accepting of loneliness

THE BOTTOM LINE - Richard Shelton

                                                       For William Stafford

You and I think about it: who pays

the price for the way we live?

Some people live so still

they incur no expenses. Others,

so wild there's the Devil to pay.

Some don't even know they're in debt

and others go slow to avoid it.

People like you pay as you go

and people like me live in debt,

but we know who we owe. I owe

a woman, a good woman, and I

will never be able to pay.

People like you are beautiful

and free of all debt. The best

that can be said for people like me

is that we know who we owe.

"To me, she's not even human, she's some kind of a germ." - Henry Rollins

To me, she’s not even human, she’s some kind of a germ. A concoc-

tion. She is neurotic, nasty and abusive. Pathetic is a word that

springs to mind. When she is loud and drunk, it’s torture being

around her. She treats marijuana like some life preserving drug. She

is most lively when she has a chance to get fucked up. Whenever

she’s spazzing out and drooling over pot, I think to myself, “coke

whore” but I change the word “coke” to pot. She doesn’t bathe much

and sometimes the stench can be quite noxious. I don’t like being

associated with her because I see how nasty she is with people who

I work with. When she comes into a room, I either leave or try to get

out of earshot of her. I hope she goes on her painful little way and

leaves my sight. Not a bone in me hates that girl. She has managed

to turn off everyone around her. She sure did it to me. I never set out

to feel like that, no way. Now it’s at the point where it’s totally

irreversible.

"I'm in the hot room again" - Henry Rollins

I'm in the hot room again

I am a time junkie

I am a user

Like all addicts, I come to the point where I ask myself

Who's using who

I take a look around and I see what I do

I look in the mirror and I see what it's doing to me

And I come to the conclusion that we got a pretty good thing going

"She's kind of druggie." - Henry Rollins

She's kind of druggie. On again off again. The times when she's on,

she's on. She's bumming on having to come down. When she's off,

she's talking about getting on. She's not an addict, it's an on again,

off again kind of thing. You know, like those “heroin weekends”

people go for, meth runs, etc. You know what I'm talking about. She

pulls an apple cart, the driver has a stick with an apple on a string,

he dangles it in front of her nose. She sees a syringe, the needle

shines. She likes the word “spike.” The needle is a lover, she likes

the words “doing a dime.” The needle is boss, the needle is her best

friend. If she says, “Tie me off, lover” one more time I'll scream.