Cuts, Burns and Untold Stories

“There is no greater agony than
bearing an untold story inside you.”
-Maya Angelou

I know money can't buy happiness, but it sure doesn't hurt when you got pain of hunger in the center of your being, the anxiety of used worn clothes and shoes soles torn, counting change realizing if you want that drink, then you gonna have to walk thru the skid row streets. The paranoia of hoppin on the metro with no ticket, is this time I get caught up all because I'm short 75 cents... And I know the money won't make me whole, that cashing checks drenched in gold, the dreams of not worrying about being cold at night and having something warm to drink, the little things I need to save my soul.

I know I need to do the little things to save my soul. But day by day a little bit of it dies, by the deep fryer, oil burns sting as you wash your hands, cracks in web of fingers from dry skin, harshness of hot water and cheap soap, chips away at the skin, as lemon burn the eyes, body worn and torn, but the endless hours and never rest of life in the back of the house.

---

When I take the Goldline to the Redline
Time is not my friend
It takes 1:30 out of my day

There is no time to catch my breath,
No time to eat, no time to think
Just wake up, shower, dress and leave

I need a hug, uh I need A hug

I wrap my hands around my book
Voices of Visions
And listen to the random chatter
Of the metro

“My thoughts are frozen
In time, must be
All the coke I smoke”

got burns on my arms,
And cuts on my hands

My back aches
And cloudy is the mind
The sleepiness sleep of
a burnt out soul

Beat down, broke and poor
blood, sweat and tears
(Should be my new mantra)

no ego, let go
calm down
and put your head down
and grid this shit out

I been thru alot,
on the edge of madness
thru a week of hell,
the worst side
of life has to offer

But Hatfields on saturday
is no joke, it's the real
rolling out 196 covers
so far into the shit
it never ends

no ego, let go
calm down
put your head down
and grid this shit out

there is no quit
there is no 86ing

you just get shit done
why?
because that's the job
and that's what we do

burns, cuts, back aches
are things you take care of
when you sleep

but kitchen is open
you get shit done
you do your job
you do other line cooks work
no excuses, no end
until the tickets stop coming in

I want to break myself
I want to see how much I can take
I can take it all
there is never enough for me
it never gets strange enough

I want it all
pretty soon I'm gonna own everything,
am gonna own you
rainbow told me one day
and I thought
I owe you

I want to break myself
so I can take it to the next level
Only to break myself again
and take it to the next level

when I can't break myself
anymore
then it's time to move on....

---

I laced my non slip shoes
And walked the weary blocks

Dead end alleys, and
empty cold streets

Dead presidents
is all the homies need

Don’t come undone
With double blunts
And 40 ozs

Work wore shoes
That walk on air
Through vacant lots

---

I have this thing on the tip of my tongue, but I don't really know how to go about conveying it. It seems like everytime I'm about to grab it, it slips thru my fingers. I have dug deep into the word; from professors to bums on the streets, from the great classics to underground hip-hop, from lil kids to OG time bar flies. But it all seems to fall short, oh so very short of this... you know what it is, this fire with in, that cuts and burns to the core. I know it is the same fire that burns with us all. It's everywhere and over there but yet it's right here, right now in this single point, to see the world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour(blake).

I really don't fully understand why these things plague me, but they do. Its some form of disease or unknown addiction, that I just can't control. Am blessed and cursed to feel the weight of the world, my soul feels too much on strange, late nights. But there always comes a time, when you stop, lay under the moon, smoke some herb, and dance with the stars in the sky, and you realize the whole thing pulses with some kind of eternal energy, some kind of weird beat of this echoing of the timeless. It's the same sound of the ocean or your blood circling around your body, the rotation of the egoless planets, the rhythmic expanding and contracting of the sun. Now am pretty sure this thing is far beyond words, but it might very well be raw language, in its purest sense. Those primal noise we make in ecstasy or at death, the bliss/fear that shakes us to the core.

---

Babe, I remember when the joint would burn our fingertips and the moonlight would shine thru the window, you would turn to me and say:

I measure my "depression" by my ability to process or comprehend the body language of others. I can see microexpressions due to my adverse experiences but when I'm trapped in a tailspin, I find myself isolating from activities I would otherwise enjoy. Faces flicker with no meaning. It can be rather frustrating and it seems like an infinite loop when you can't read faces but you rely on their face to hear and understand, which makes one more likely to isolate to avoid misunderstandings.

I would deeply ponder, 'which makes one more likely to isolate to avoid misunderstandings' and just sitting there trying to rearrange my thoughts/feelings, so that I can transmit some kind of useful signal. Only to say:

I don't measure my 'depression', I wouldn't use that word to refer to my felt experience. Last time, I just refer to it as one of my moods, most times internally I refer to it as a creative hangover, a infinite numbness. But it's natural ebb and flow of my existence. Lately it's something I try to dance with, really feel it, so I can be ready to ride the next rising tide. But I can say deep in the emptiness, it is 'rather frustrating and it seems like an infinite loop'

I didn't have to say anything you knew it all anyways:

I use relatable terms when discussing my experiences, but I don't truly label myself or the experience with terms such as depression, anxiety, or any of the disorders my behaviors may match, as I told my psychology professor, we're all disordered nowadays. We each must find our order within the disorder and create balance after becoming imbalanced by life. What is most important is doing what works for you, without intentionally harming others or yourself in the process and changing the behaviors which cause distress for ourselves and those we value/care for.

It takes time to find what disrupts the loop when it must be disrupted, and finding a way to express that which overwhelms the senses to the point of numbness. I've said before that my head becomes so full that I draw a blank. In those moments I must breathe and slowly begin to release all that I am feeling. This is when I write the most. Then I become drained and must take time to rest before soldiering on.

The system is set up to convince us that something is wrong with US not THEM. In most cases, it is a matter of finding our own balance and looking within. That does not discredit the many issues we face that are created by the system we have tolerated for too long. Everything is connected, every problem in the world whether it be here on our own soil, or on the other side of the world, it is all related. But first, we each must be willing to look so deep inside ourselves that all we find is love, love, unending love. Then, the world will reflect the same

Children of the future age
Reading this indignant page
Know that in a former time
Love, sweet love, was thought a crime
-William Blake

Indeed my love, the deep reality is that everything is connected, and that perception is just a reflection of self, thats why when you dissolve the doors of perception(the self reflected onto reality) everything appear as it is, infinite... inner paths to outer truths... the disease is dis ease with society, some kind of lesser version of actuality. People are told to take a lesser fake of reality, something transient and faulty, a construct that’s doomed to disappear in the blink of an eye... so yes indeed, latch onto something eternal, something real, something infinitely beautiful... This is why when we look so deeply inside ourselves that what we find is love, love, unending love, the felt experience of everything... Holographic reflects of the everywhen... is the stuff reality is made of...

---

photos: first two are from the first kitchen I worked at Hatfields, 'vacant lot' is take at Lil Tokyo(Los Angeles), then me dressed up as Hunter S Thompson at a halloween party, and the last one is of my kindred spirit Nikki, all of them I altered using photo effects.