I'm only sleeping.

Something inspired by Mike/Tim Kinsella’s different bands v.2.3 (restructuring it for my side project band atm to make it more cohesive)

I’m not too proud to admit admit I’m ashamed of these teenage feelings

Summers spent alone in a room with a door opened and a locked window

The fresh air doesn’t smell the same anymore

But I might like it that way if you could take the change

It’s like karma to take what you want then give

But you ask a lot and thrive off of it while I’m so confused

Of how a simple lie can hold such little truth

Then grow and prosper from the blood in the crime scene

A red rose. Humble and red.

Locked between the vice grips clipping the thorns

Puncturing the heart like jam across the bread

Dis-collection amongst the memories, they’ve come to spread

Maybe it’s just an omen, an omen like a gesture

An omen to a gesture, like a smile to a glare

There were things done, left said; that I couldn’t cope with,

without wanting to let go

But even though I’ve broken that bond your hand is still red in mine

Some things are better being left unfinished

If you take off where you left off you might come back again

It’s better to hold your hands out when the rain has finally ceased

Then you’ll know what to expect instead of losing what you live off of

Lost without a signal, in a forest with you stuck inside the game

Trying to find where I went wrong like chasing a short tail

Yet, still, you follow behind me as I lead us to an end

Even though I don’t see you no more and I know it is what it is

But with no hands how long will it take to turn the door ahead?

Somehow living seems so hard, and with no weapon to grasp I just think

Of a way out to a place where I don’t have such stale bones

From trying to cross two accidents with one misunderstanding

And if you’re cross it’s okay, because I know you’re still better off

Then knowing the person who is inside their own rejected heart

Because we’re both still emotional, and probably allergic to our own tears

Meanwhile living off of each others fears

And we’re alright with being alone, individually

But you can’t hear me if I’m not there to talk to you

And neither can I

Because sometimes I hear knocking, come on in

Sometimes I pretend your voice is the wind

I’ll let myself in on the secret when I remember, as my old age recollects

Still seeing you in my dreams, unnamed be it as you are

I see now no constellations, their names have lost their purpose as I went

I just saw your face in some glowing lights, miraculous it was to be

Like the first time, it felt to see

Through it knowledge became infinite

Somehow I connected an old picture of myself with you

Somehow I know everything will come back to me

I remember the good time though

I was so for sure

That’s not life

So social

That life

So Social

Made on a request

Oh the girl, with disappointment

Oh the girl, who found her friend

Earnest and happy, she comes up with the sun

Strong and strong willed, happy and thus so still

Wild she speaks, through exhaustion she falls asleep

Then again she comes up with the sun, until it falls around the bend

Exasperated again she’ll fall, but for now she is awake

Waiting for the moment, where she’ll have less to give and more to take what’s sent

Another piece I wrote on the fly…

Sleeping under the Chicago sun, things don’t come so easily to me
This fake romance is tributary, ordinary; falling under a bump in the road again

I want my future back, stop stealing my notes from beneath the arrow’s path
I’m looking for a voice that comes and goes, bulls-eye, to the heart it’s sewn

You may be rich, but everything isn’t made of caviar
Everything is better when you don’t know what anything means at all

I’ve got a job in a catalog, and everything’s written, ready for me
But it ain’t to hard to be-e another tributary


I’m too open minded, sometimes everything just escapes,
through the cracks in the pavement like a million screaming ghosts
Yet still I’m searching, from the ivory to the black seas made of interruptions, prematurely so

And yet I still ask if you’re there, because the year is right
and the night is tonight

So if you’ll talk to me for the moment, then maybe I could stay for a while
So that I can give meaning to the rich man falling down the wrong path
Because you’ve given me no more arms to catch myself with

So please don’t be a stranger, dear

Something inspired by Mike/Tim Kinsella’s different bands

I’m not too proud to admit admit I’m ashamed of these teenage feelings

Summers spent alone in a room with a door opened and a locked window

The fresh air doesn’t smell the same anymore

But I might like it that way if you could take the change

It’s like karma to take what you want then give

But you ask a lot and thrive off of it while I’m so confused

Of how a simple lie can hold such little truth

Then grow and prosper from the blood in the crime scene

A red rose. Humble and red.

Locked between the vice grips clipping the thorns

Puncturing the heart like jam across the bread

Dis-collection amongst the memories, they’ve come to spread

Maybe it’s just an omen, an omen like a gesture

An omen to a gesture, like a smile to a glare

There were things done, left said; that I couldn’t cope with,

without wanting to let go

But even though I’ve broken that bond your hand is still red in mine

Some things are better being left unfinished

If you take off where you left off you might come back again

It’s better to hold your hands out when the rain has finally ceased

Then you’ll know what to expect instead of losing what you live off of

Lost without a signal, in a forest with you stuck inside the game

Trying to find where I went wrong like chasing a short tail

Yet still you follow behind me as I lead us to an end

Even though I don’t see you no more and I know it is what it is

But with no hands how long will it take to turn the door ahead?

Somehow living seems so hard, and with no weapon to grasp I just think

Of a way out to a place where I don’t have such stale bones

From trying to cross two accidents with one misunderstanding

And if you’re cross it’s okay, because I know you’re still better off

Then knowing the person who is inside their own rejected heart

Because we’re both still emotional, and probably allergic to our own tears

Meanwhile living off of each others fears

And we’re alright with being alone, individually

But you can’t hear me if I’m not there to talk to you

And neither can I

Because sometimes I hear knocking, come on in

Sometimes I pretend your voice is the wind

I’ll let myself in on the secret when I remember, as my old age recollects

Still seeing you in my dreams, unnamed be it as you are

I see now no constellations, their names have lost their purpose as I went

I just saw your face in some glowing lights, miraculous it was to be

Like the first time, it felt to be

Through it knowledge became infinite

Somehow I connected an old picture of myself with you

Somehow I know everything will come back to me

I remember the good time though

I was so for sure

That’s not life

So social

That life

So Social

Beauty is a glass house casting off it’s own reflection as it’s hit by cascading stones of those who challenge it’s gifts until they crumble

Drawing in a short breathe before letting out a long yawn

Tired. Sick. Tired. Still sick. Still crying. Sick of trying.

You throw stones at your empty throne

Armed with your hatred you conquer nothing alone

Marching like toy soldiers to the beat of a sinking ship

You thought we were kings dreaming of gold. Well now you’re the fool that’s just cold and white.

Falling deeper and deeper into you until I’m poisoned by my own medicine. It tastes just like home, it smells like a place you’ve been before, and it feels like someone’s coming to dinner.

Arms of fire, reaching for the red hand

Stop. Listen. Still crying. Still children.

Marching like toy soldiers to the beat of a dying man who did no wrong.

Palms left open holding change out to the homeless.

Until I wake up, life a dream with an arm extended.

Glowing clouds and rays of light, our ruler you thought cynical has a loving embrace still wound tight.

There’s multilple ways to make a fist, but to make one of love you must strike the ground and bury a seed and feed it well.

Then a loud sound, followed imptetuously by a rash decision.

Leave and let live, or suspend me in the air

This miracle I’ve been living, is better than the real thing iI swear.

But for now I’ll remain hidden. Knowing now better than to question what I’m given.

Two cold hands and a heart pumping steel into a hate machine that burns yearning to earn an ash in today’s market

The wheel is still turning, it is harmless and it is not; another target

Still coming for you (we’re still coming)

Still coming for you (we’re still coming)

Hide but please don’t run, hideous as I may be. They know I love as I love it so, while you catch the after-morning glow. Descending into nothing praying for my soul, no goal in mind. I only asked for a moment that you’d be mine.

Don’t sound the alarm, there wasn’t any harm.

As I am but a man I am part of the plan.

Encircling the desert like a vulture waiting for the world to collapse into sand and debris.

I know you’re out there, throwing stones at the guiding light. But worry sinks not deep in this pond, so you skip across the stones and I beg you please

Never alone. Never alive. Never alright.

I’m coming for you, hide but please don’t run. I know I’m hideous, but love was never a beautiful thing anyways…

Sleep

I’ll tell you a story, if you read me to sleep

And I’ll tap on your window, if you knock on my door deep down deep

The children were sleeping beneath the floor, they are never found; it’s been this way all before

If I have nothing left, I’ll give my heart and soul to the pavement, because the lonely home I’ve raised walks on a narrow edge

The line of life and death grows only so long before we wear thin, so carry me away so I can begin old friend

You left your seat on the airplane, it landed in France

The city of lights burning like fire dances on my hands

And if I die like an old man, I’ll count on it

So call me old friend, if you feel compelled

The old me is dead, and isn’t it all swell?

I didn’t get to meet him, but he greeted me kind

Then he turned his back to me and walked along with father time

His look of glitter and his tales of gold

Once held by a fool until the blindness unfolds from slumber

Old acquaintance, leave your name and number

“Selfishness” (written in freehand)

You can steal from your empty world, as you wait for it to come down

Because you know that you are right

Overinflated, with nothing to say

The wind couldn’t carry the worth of your words this way

Loaded with power, living to break as it all crumbles down around you

Your world’s there to answer all your questions, what will happen?

Why are you here, why are they there?

She’s cold and cut straight across—to the point that she fought to make

Thieving before leaving, tasteless in design

Right before it’s plucked, like the berry from the vine

You take without knowing, you eat without growing

Everything was tasteless in design

What was once pristine was dead as it was plucked with salt’s breath

Popping and bursting from the stench I can’t forget, leave and let live

To die another day, as we wait for your world to come down

You’re the only one that believes that you’re right

I know you’re probably lying, and I don’t care

I’ll distance myself from you once you try to leave

And then my world will come crumbling down, and I’ll know when I’m right

Because while I’m waiting right here, I know hope is all I want to accomplish

Hope is all I have going for me as I jump into the pool,

Drowning, gasping for air

Until I finally reach the top to find no one,

and then I’ll know when I’m right

But it probably won’t matter

It probably won’t matter so much anymore

An excerpt to a short story I wrote with some inspiration from Stephen Chobsky

This dark and disturbed person I don’t know fools everyone with this happy front. It doesn’t fool me though, she’s said she’s worthless and wants to die. I used to ask myself why people begin to feel this way, hell during harder times of my life I’ve probably said it.

As I can be a depressing person when you really get to know me, that’s why I find other ways of expressing my feelings.

Getting back to how this relates with the girl though…I try to be nice to her and help her, but I just get sarcastic remarks or gestures in return.

We have a lot of the same friends and when I first met her I was sort of an idiot, admittedly I can be stupid through affiliation and basic actions. Maybe I can even come off as pretentious.

I don’t know what is so special about this person, I don’t love her in the way a lover loves another. But I feel like I’m almost related to her, like I’m some symbol for what hasn’t given up on some things. Yet my optimism has declined and I find myself being a realist, slowly though I’m realizing that the basic satisfaction I get in life isn’t enough anymore.

I feel like people talk about me behind my back, I feel like I’m unattractive, that I can have a poor way with words, even that I don’t have real friends that actually care about me.

But the thing is…I end up being above all of that, not because I’m too intelligent, or too strong, or even too satisfied with life to contemplate things like suicide.

The reason being: things really do always get better.

There are always people that care, regardless if I have to put on a front or not. Even if people act like they don’t like me or make some joke about me for no apparent reason, where will they end up in life?

Wealth has never made me happy, drugs have never made me happy, gifts don’t even really make me happy.

What makes me happy is sharing my happiness with people and trying to understand them. So even if I end up being a true pessimist, or giving up on some important parts of life that could break or change me.

Maybe I can read this in the future and remember what it was like to care and think this way. What it’s like to genuinely care about someone because I care, not because I want anything other than kindness or friendship in return.

Because…even though they make me sad, people tend to be the only thing that truly makes me feel fulfilled. Whether it be a foreign feeling such as love, or the exploration of meeting new people, or just getting to hear someone tell me about their life.

I wonder if that person ever thinks of things this way. If she ever finds the beauty in things, not just the ugly? They feel ugly and they want to die, but they haven’t done it yet. I imagine they’ve probably been hurt or tied them down to some people that truly make life worth living.

It all makes sense when you think about it, there are more bad people than good in the world. But I feel that in every bad person there is good.

Perhaps I’m being a bit of a romanticist here, but there is beauty in death. But a large part of that beauty comes from watching the events in life leading up to that time when it comes. Only the villain laughs when the hero falls, so who’ll be laughing when I fall in front of the world? I ask this to myself often, but I never expect an answer.

And there being more bad people than good in the world, while technically making me a mostly-sad person; let’s me appreciate all of the good people I’ve met. That have made me happy.

That make life worth living.

I wonder how people sadder than me make it through life, you know? I’m a pretty sad person, but I have a reason to be here. Even if I don’t think it’s important. Eventually someone will make me feel important, and I’ll want to make them feel important.

Then we wont need the rest of the world.

I hope she finds that somebody soon.

I will become a visionary because I was born to become a visionary. I know this because that is how I envision myself, and I am a visionary to be. Nothing less of little more.

Just seeing your face is enough to make me happy, knowing that you care warms my heart, seeing you smile lets me break away from the world.

Like an island drifting further away

I travel slowly down the throat like a pill on a tongue

Take me in, how can a world I was born in ever be beautiful?

You don’t belong here, so take me in your world. I don’t want to take away your happiness, I don’t want to die.

I woke up with a cold, red eyes like shutters growing old

I dreamt that I could fly, I thought that I’d fall, do you make the connection?

Do you still think I’m not thinking at all?

The ship’s sprung a leak, I pray in my empty seat, searching for an answer in between the tide’s advancements

Ripple on the surface, the reflection of nothing coming nearer; sooner; longer

Holding your hand, I’ve never been closer

Broken and bruised, you speak without lies

Shut in between your teeth, the flesh of flesh rubbing against the bloody palms of a hand piloting a broken sail

All is well, close and together

I’ve never been closer, shattered; broken and bruised

How can a world I was born into be beautiful, take me in from my empty seat. Take off the pressure.

I don’t want to be nobody’s anything anymore

You said you could see and you saw

Now I ask you, bloody palms and shattered jaw

Can you still smile?