Catfish Gill

I've been afraid

Not of the truth

But of what it would do to you

I've wanted to slough the burden

Of which it weighs me down

Words have not been given

Me

That would shine a brighter light

Sufficient to reveal and yet

Dim enough so as not to blind

For it is not to you that I would send them

Neither do I expect you to listen to them

I would rather you didn't

But what comes around goes around

And I have lived vicariously through

You

For many, many years

Surely the truth will find it's way

It's own special way

I should embrace it, let it set me free

But I fear it

I fear death, too

There is something pushing against my back

Something heavy and forceful

The momentum of it's thrust

Finds a center in my chest

Where I can only imagine a heart rests

My secret room, my prayer closet

Storehouse for everything I've ever known

Wasteland of every forgotten thought and memory

Embryo of my spirit

Womb of my soul

The weight of all that follows me

Threatens to raze it all

All I ever was, pushed into nothing

I feel it strong, it doesn't stop

A vacant numbness envelopes my mind

Some kind of mental Novocaine

I see the beauty of the world

I hear the music of your voice

They crawl into open holes

And pass straight through, down the spiral

Until the spiral implodes

In upon itself

Disappearing, vanishing, out of this world

Unregistered by the attention span of a zombie

Still, there are moments of cognizance

That I would cherish fondly

If only memory would cooperate

I do not want to die

I want to disappear

I want to close my eyes and never have to open them again

I want to dissolve into nothing

I want to ride that spiral myself and find out

To where the visions travel

I want to float in an ocean of light

Millions of miles from land in any direction

I want to be able to give up everything

That makes me want to stay here

A list, by the way, which gets shorter by the year

I want to walk into the light

That condemns me on this side

I would give up heaven

To go back to the womb

To call this life a draw

Before I could get the chance to ruin so many lives

Then slice open that womb

And let the placenta drenched shell drop into a bucket

You'll never see me

The scalpel will never press cool surgical steel

Against anything I could be, would be

Into anything I am

And let my mother shed no tears

And grieve me not

I am where I always hoped to be

I am where I am

The light shows this heart of mine

That's where I want to be, too

And this may sound like something

But it's not

I will hold on to hope

Even as it dies to an ember

Invisible to the naked eye

I am a strong man

My soul has been beaten down

Many times

But I always pick it back up

Stuff it back in

Move on

Move on

Move on

And I know what love is

I just can't feel it

Which doesn't make it any less love

But it lives in a hollow place

Where it stings like a hornet

When touched

Like the poison of a catfish gill

That once slipped into the skin

Makes you never want to go fishing again

Love that can't be felt, is it worth living for?

Precious Lord, is it worth dying for?

These pills won't cure you

Hopefully they will keep the illness at bay

Bravo, pharmaceutical science

transition time

I never felt the tears
Hot, salty drops of joy or anguish
Rolling down your cheeks to meet
A smile so wide to bless the years to come
Or
A grimace of despair, all hope lost for a future
You wiped them away
Until all the only thing left was a stinging
Blush of red
That faded within moments

The only sounds I ever heard were muffled
A one-way communication through a thick wall
I didn't understand a single word
The sing-song inflections lost in translation
Barely disturbing the silence
I am content with
Darkness to float in, this is my world
Tethered not by gravity
But the love and nourishment provided
By Someone I will never know

My mind holds dreams
That are not my own
Visions I would just as soon
Not give up
Every name I have been given
By God and by Man
Is a lie
For my eyes are closed
I speak for an older soul
Unconcerned with a legacy

I have no need for air
I don't need your love
I don't want your compassion
At least, not now
Does it bring you sadness to think
I would ignore gifts you want to give me?
Does it break your heart to know
That I don't need anything?
Do you want so badly for me to want?
Do you want so badly for me to need?
I would never burden you
These things are for you

Go to sleep, mother
Find yourself in that space
Between sleep and dreams
Soon enough the dream will be over
Find me in that space
Between death and life
Soon enough the two will merge
And my dream will begin

You cannot kill me
I cannot die
I would be yours
But I would just as soon
Keep floating
Until the day you find yourself
In that space
Between death and life
Where we will merge
And our dreaming will have begun

I forgive you
Though you need no pardon,
If you need time to get there
I would only ask that you
Forgive yourself
You have done nothing wrong
Ignore the fools crying "foul"
The ones who never walked
From one side of the room to the other
In your shoes
They don't understand these things I tell you
They're blinded by reckless judgment and condemnation
I have no morals
I have no convictions
I have no beliefs
I have no thoughts
I cannot be murdered by the self-righteousness of men

But let our time together bring peace and enlightenment
Not guilt or shame
Let the tears shed for my memory
Be of joy
For I passed through unseen, unheard
Unknown by all
Except for you

In the Court of King Me

Got a message from my half
Mrs. Hypochondriac
Moody right, moody right
Tell your CC
Let everyone know
Beatnik shit, beatnik shit
Listen to that beaten sound
Keeps me running, keeps the engines hummin'
Listen to that beating sound
Tic Tac Tic Tac
Got a lookout for King Me
Watch your Q's and watch your P's
Dot your eyes and cross your tease
You're gonna see what you still won't believe
Birth your rumors of immortality
Pound them 'til I can't help but agree
But when the truth slays the light
Don't blame me
King Me King Me King Me King Me
I'm the King, I'm the King, I'm the King, I'm the King
Keep your filthy black stained hands off of my crown
Take up your own bleeding cross and ride it to town
I'm the King
Too good for my own good and don't give a fu ck
Hatching plans to freak out the Man
Got a meanness in me that I don't understand
A lie for a dollar, a life for a dime
There's a well, a deep, deep well I fell
Into once
Where in the tumbling I found
The true hidden meaning of falling down
The treasure at the bottom wasn't worth the minute
It took to get there
King Mad, King Mad, King Mad, King Mad
These songs for a King
King You and King Me
King Kong's a Ding Dong
Monkey Tales
Banana on a stick
Dipped in black chocolate
Rancid and arcane
Read in, read in
The main character wears a black tunic
His queen is the one with the brain
Better half, better half she tells him
It's best you stay quiet you'll give it away
You've done enough damage for one other day
What's done is done
Nothing but another bridge to burn
Another corner to turn
She says
You understand it less than I
And your understanding is void and dry
Quiet now, my loveless love
My misunderstood drug
My salt melted slug
Quiet now, before people believe
In the nonsense you write, the bullshit they read

mission statement

we shall name shadows
give weight to ghosts
enshrine our egos
throw down a gauntlet
take up a mantle
we shall sing colors
with tongues of fire
we will spit nonsense
and call it...

deadweight transition

Such small things 

Weigh us down in resentment

Complicated, colliding, soon enough

Ensnared

Feeling gravity's pull

Suspended and trapped in a web

Spun with failed expectations

Stuffed to suffocation, the weight of nothing

Almost solid

You could smash it with a hammer

Insignificant things

Tossed away like trash to the side of the road

Littering, contaminating, spoiling

What once claimed a special place

Hearts

A place for spiders

I can almost feel the heat of poison

With each drop from steel through skin

With each moment begging more and more

For attention

Melting away unfulfilled

Each moment

Begging

I'm powerless but to close my eyes and deny their petitions

What's a moment worth anyway?

What's it good for in the end?

Something to search for, something to lose

Moments are meant to be forgotten

Pity the fool who doesn't understand this

Death comes as a hard lesson to that man

track 4

...and the sound filled the room

An intoxicating fog that pulled straight down

On my rusty heartstrings

Vibrations overflowing, attracting, resisting

Until chakra aura colors lit the space

Between the speakers 

And me

...it was distilled joy, revelation

Hands raised to the sky kind

...and he rode atop those sonic waves like

Jesus, walking on the water, hand held out

Inviting

He sang and his voice was light

And it glowed, illminating the space

Revealing the swirling vapors

He sang and he must have known me

Sweet God, he must have known me

Better than anyone I'd ever known

In seven words he wrote the book

With a wordless wail he read it to the world

He'd conjured hypnotic melodies

Chants and prayers

Soon enough my jaws would be sore

Knees dirty

Voice hoarse but I would sing along forever

To become one with the unfathomable 

Spirit

The Ghost who bestows

The Gift

...relating to the words

Falling in love with the singer and the song

Allowed, for 5 minutes, 

To worship gods made by the hands of men

I stayed up all night

Reliving those moments

Bookended by ignored reality

Cherishing the song

Until everything about it 

Became a part of me

Special, important, essential as anything else

...and I was hanging with some friends of mine

Wordlessly enjoying the silence

A blessing for us to share

But one does get bored

I spotted a pile of old magazines

Not so much stacked but thrown in a corner

Most of them were sports related

Cuz those naggas of mine were obsessed with the game

Towards the bottom I spyed with my leering eye

A couple of soft core quarterlys with juvenile titles

Buried somewhere between the two I found a music rag

Pulled it from the trash heap

Bob Dylan on the cover

Sign of the times

I settled in for an amusing if not educational read

Flipping through the snot slick pages I came to the

"Letters to the Editor" section

Halfway down the page, in the center column

Proudly displayed in loud "all caps" someone had written

"COLDPLAY SUCKS!"

The abruptness of his less-than-charitable opinion was

Jarring

So I conjured up a mental image of the guy who had written it

And directed my own, even less charitable exhortation

Delivered mentally with a force that would frighten demons

"FUCK YOU!"

I went home and played track 4

In infinite repeat mode

I loved it even more for the fact

That some asshole hated it so much

reclaiming my memories: my first computer

"Memories, like the shadows of your mind...misty water colored memories of the way we were." Is that how it goes? I may have forgotten. No, I've PROBABLY forgotten. You see, my memory isn't the most reliable function of my psychology. I'm not sure if it's always been that way or if it's a situation brought on by years and years of living in a subculture that was indifferent to the potential effects of it's central activity (</discretionary code>).

That subculture helped forge a sense of identity for me, even as it stole the memories it helped make. And so I know full well that I had a lot of good experiences, many good times, but most are still stuck in the moment in which they occurred. Where they will likely remain until the day I die. Then again I guess the trade off being all the bad "trips" that I'm spared remembering by the same process of brain cell annihilation.

Then comes the real horror...the possibility that I could develop Alzheimer's. I don't know if the killing of so many brain cells in the past makes more susceptible to Alzheimer's in the future. It's a sobering thought and definitely a good reason to repent of all those wasted years. I used to say, "well, the experiences I've had with the help of this drug are worth just about anything that might come about as a result of it"...which was a stupid mindset. The only thing more stupid was the fact that I made myself believe it. I was only trying to convince myself that I had nothing to fear and it would all be worth it in the long run. Things would even out, the good times and the bad, the risks and the rewards. All the while I knew better, but denial is an easy friend to keep.

But I didn't come here to bemoan my fate or express my fears of memory damage...or I should say continual worsening of memory damage that I hope does not lead to Alzheimer's. I don't think I could handle that. No, I wanted to start a series of posts that describe some of the memories I have left (not saying that the reservoir is close to empty, just that it should probably be more full). I like to think I'm a typical human being and that it's perfectly normal that I wouldn't have really BIG events to write about in posts like these. Most, if not all, will be just little things that come to mind, and that's really what I'm wanting to record here. The seemingly insignificant details that are likely the next memories to join the flock that have flown. I realize that writing such "trivial" moments could well come off as being narcissistic, but I don't guess I care. It's a blog and open to everyone, true, but really, I'm not under any false illusions that I've got some huge audience of readers out there who follow my every word. A couple of friends who check in when they can, and that's more than I would ask for. When I shut down my last blog I was hoping that this one would have a much more "personal" flavor to it. That's what I've been shooting for. Now I'm ready (at least I THINK I'm ready) to move it into even more personal territory and the truth of the matter is that this will take on the aspect, in part if not whole, of a chronicle, sort of an autobiography, something I can look back on in 10 or 20 years and say "Aha! I forgot all about that!" I do that sometimes with the old Listening Room, but there's so much content there that has nothing to do with me. Here I'm going to post stuff that I'm going to be interested in several years down the road. Jeez, I guess I should be writing all this as a "statement of purpose" page. I'll make a note of it.

For now, though, I'll start the ball rolling with recollections of our first computer.

A very young Bryan with a very old Compaq

We bought our first computer in 1999. I remember, because it was the year my father passed away and we were living in a run down hovel of a house. I became so obsessed with it that I would set it up in the kitchen of that tiny house so I could screw around online all night long without disturbing the wife and son. I was fascinated. More than once I stayed up all night long and well into the morning waiting for those websites to load snail-slow with a 56k connection.

It was a piece of junk Compaq PC with Windows 97. Oh, I shouldn't call it that. From the vantage point of today, sitting here typing on a decent laptop, it doesn't look like much (then again, though I DID use the word "decent" to describe this laptop, I would also designate it as every bit a piece of junk as the Compaq in several key areas). It was more than enough for me, as my knowledge of computers was EXTREMELY limited. Like expecting a 9 year old to read and understand "War and Peace". So it was, but at that level all I really needed to know was how to click on the Internet Explorer icon.

I spent considerable time on the Rolling Stone website at first. I'd read about it in the magazine. Had no idea about how to use the message boards. I remember writing a post on the Flaming Lips page. Probably some boasting that they were from Oklahoma...ah, I remember...I DID brag. I told of how they used to play acoustic shows at Shadowplay Records in Norman. I'm sure I made a point to mention that I knew the owner of the store quite well. I also posted on the R.E.M. page pining for the good old days when their music was good, complaining about the direction they'd taken. I got a couple of responses from that one. No surprise that they were both in disagreement, what do you expect from people who hang out on the R.E.M. page? Anyhoo, I soon bored of posting on band's pages.

I noticed that a lot of the conversations on the band boards were off topic (probably obvious, but not to this novice). I did engage in some of these discussions and became "friends" with a few regulars. Also found myself plagued with a few enemies whose only purpose for being there was to incite flame wars (Lysergic Aaron, Plokoon, these were a couple of the more incendiary).

It was 2000 by this time and I was a little (reiterate LITTLE) more familiar with the Internet. One night, likely coasting on a manic swing, I had an idea. Why not create a message board that was for NOTHING BUT "off topic conversation"? It would bring together posters from different boards and they wouldn't have to worry about discussing the bands from whose pages they came. Once again I stayed up all night putting the thing together. It wasn't just an R.S.V.P. affair. I set it up like it was a club and called it JACkory's Insect Lounge (JACkory was my user name and "Insect Lounge" was in tribute to a radio program of the same name that used to play underground music on the radio station at CSU back in the early 80s). We joked about being a gang that would protect the place and fight off unwelcome visitors. Somehow or other a "Clockwork Orange" vibe came into play and we began calling ourselves "droogs".

The board became very popular and was a staple in the RS community until the message boards were shut down (there are still people who believe that the demise of those original message boards can be traced back to the influence of the Insect Lounge...who knows, maybe it did). It inspired several "copy-cat" boards, as many of the Lounge's regulars decided they wanted their own version. Some were very good (JLLM's Beatnik Cafe), some not quite as much (Clicker's Cave). My board stayed fairly active through it all, even if there were some who defected. That was to be expected, what with the divisive nature of the new boards. A lot of people came around just to watch flame wars that I somehow got into. Immature, I know. Ridiculous for someone in his late 30s (God, I'm embarrassed to have to admit that). But I had fun.

I'll talk more about the Lounge at a later date. We were reminiscing about the first computer, remember?

I'd read about Live 365, probably in the same issue of Rolling Stone where I learned of their website. Live 365 seemed like a godsend. It may well have been. I wouldn't know because I couldn't get it to work. Really pissed me off. It wasn't too long afterwards that I realized that the reason it wouldn't work for me was because I had nothing but a dial-up connection. Then again, I was so computer illiterate that I paid something like thirty bucks for a "premium" version of Real Player, thinking I could listen to music with it. Ha. What a waste of money. 56k, oh how I miss you. I learned patience from you but you were a cruel teacher.

The one site I hung out during the very first days and weeks after buying the computer was called "the Party House". "Welcome to the Party House!" was the header. It was nothing more than a fancy chat room. You logged in and started in the front room. You could chat with the whole room or you could have a private conversation. Or you could go into another section of the Party House, maybe the bedroom or the kitchen, whatever, and there were people to chat with there. Inane chat. Typical chat. Mindless chat. I always figured it was a place where people hooked up for cyber-sex. Wait, did I sound like I didn't know this for sure? Sorry. It WAS a place where people hooked up for cyber-sex. Cyber-sex, my God, how much more pathetic does it get?

Believe it or not, it was my sister-in-law who brought the Party House into our lives. She had bought a computer a few months before we did. When my wife was visiting her she would go to the Party House and they would laugh and joke about it. It wasn't long before we got our machine that she showed the site to me. I'm not proud of the time I wasted chatting on the Party House website, but in my defense I would insist that I didn't know any better, such a noobie in cyberspace.

I'm not sure if the Party House is still around. I seem to remember looking it up out of curiosity some time back. I think it might have still been there, but it had changed considerably. (I just googled it...if it still exists it is NOT on the first page and I'm not gonna bother looking any further).

A few years later we gave the Compaq to our son and bought a Dell. It was a much better computer, even if it was another PC (XP OS this time). Not much later I had the opportunity to buy another  one and by then I really wanted a laptop. I got a VAIO with Vista Premium. People generally tend to hate Vista, but I kind of liked it. I can't really complain about it, other than it seemed like the keys were a little more difficult to press than should have been and there was a sharp ridge where my wrists hung off of. That kind of hurt.

A LONG story surrounds what happened to that VAIO and I'll definitely have to put that off until later. Suffice to say that I replace it with a HP Pavilion dv6. Also suffice to say that I'm NOT satisfied with it. It gets by, and that's about it. I wish I had a Macintosh, but I am not a rich man. I can't even afford to dump this one and buy a decent PC.

It's better than the Compaq, though. Which is great, but then again the novelty of the Internet has been worn out for a long time. Seriously, the only things I ever do on the computer anymore is check out facebook, listen to Spotify, check my e-mail and every once in awhile, when the mood strikes and the wrists aren't too sore, write a little something for this blog. I guess there are times when I'll do something else, but they get rarer and rarer every day. I used to love Stumbling, now I could really care less. So much Internet culture is worthless. The Internet itself is full of junk and misinformation, the comments and opinions of people who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about. So much hate abounds.

Ah, but my "Starred" favorites list on Spotify is a thing of beauty. 1381 tracks. Over 4 days worth of music. If for that alone I will not abandon the Internet.