Broken Promises to Myself.

I sit staring at the screen. My eyes, burning from lack of sleep. My body so tense from stress I barely need a couch. All I want was a cup of coffee and a cigarette. I want to do a line of coke. Break a beer bottle over my head. Why is this so fucking hard?

When you said those words, I shuddered. In my mind we were so happy. I can't let myself get so close. If you saw me, if you really saw me, you'd run screaming after a day. You wouldn't last a day. Twenty-four little hours. They would destroy you. Can you even begin to imagine how I live with this?

I scan endless pages online. Hundreds of names. Why is this so fucking hard? Page after page of uselessness. Faces lie so well. Promises no one can keep. Alphabetized categories. I see it repeating. Over and over, those smiling faces make promises of a better tomorrow. "All my tomorrows won't save me today."

You're so persistent. You know exactly what to say to me. You don't know me. You wouldn't want to know me. I keep telling you this. Move on, forget me. You refuse. You hold onto this ideal of me. Can't you see how hard it is to live up to? Can't you see what this this doing to me? You have such good intentions. In another lifetime, I could have loved you.

I want to give up because it's too damn hard. Inappropriate music plays in the background and my stomach is pumping acid through my body. There's a physical burning throughout my being. If I was taller.  If I was thinner. If I had straight teeth. Would that make me a better person? Would that make me more endearing to everyone?

I finally give up and head to the corner store to buy a pack of smokes. I promise myself I won't smoke it all tonight. It's after 2 AM and this insomnia is like a silent killer. Quietly plotting my demise. The bright lights of the convenience store create explosions  behind my eyes and they pulsate with pain. As soon as I'm out the door I light a cigarette and immediately feel better. I let the nicotine flow like morphine through my body, all at once numbing and exciting my insides. Everything will be better now. I'm suddenly so calm. I stroll around the block and then realize it's 2 AM and I'm wondering the streets. I become aware and thus scared and I make my way back to my condo. It's almost safe there. Over the next 3 hours I smoke the entire pack and I'm mad at myself for being unable to keep such a simple promise.

You're online, but I bet  you're not. I bet you're sleeping and just forgot to turn your computer off. I'm so tempted to message you; my fingers burn. My heart beats furiously in my chest and my hands are clammy. Would you still want me after I tell you the truth? After I confess my sins and you can see how tainted I really am? They don't have a name for my kind of disease.

I have enough change for a 2nd pack of cigarettes. The sun is rising in a series of magnificent colours and it's so beautiful I can't look away. I've given up on the computer and refocus my intentions of the TV. Apparently at 5 Am nothing's on but televangelists and infomercials for food. Joyce Meyer is talking about redemption and the healing power of God. She's so charismatic I want to believe her. I want to follow and be healed. Saved by the power of Jesus! What a crock of shit. If there was a God, he wouldn't let me suffer like this. He would come down, gather me in his arm and make it all go away. Or at least he would send me an angel. My eyes are on fire, and I decide to screw it and head back down to the corner store for a second pack of smokes.

Fumbling Towards Ecstasy...

The room reeked of sex. Of after the sex ended. Of unfulfilled passion and desire. I hungered for you. Your touch still etched in my skin. I tasted you in the back of my throat. I was ready for round two. I needed you. I felt myself swell; my heart beating so fast it might explode. You had fallen asleep so soon; I wasn't done with you yet. I smelled your breath and it smelled of me. I wanted to kiss you.

What is your name, mysterious stranger? How you came into my life and shattered my notions of existence. I didn't care then, and I don't care now. I'm just using you.  You satisfy a primal, animalistic need in me. How long does it take you to cum? I can't say your full name without cumming twice. You excite me. Your fingertip, the square line of your jaw, oh. You take my breath away.

I said "I'll throw myself away. They're just photos after all." You looked at me like he used to. And I fill with self loathing. Ashamed of what we just did. Of my raw need for you.  "I want something good to die for. To make it beautiful to live." You see that look in my eyes and you pull me closer. I can still smell you after you've gone. Holding onto a ghost of something that never was.

I try to mimic all those "dames" of the silver screen. I try to smoke and make it look sexy. I search bedroom eyes online. I say things like, 'come here stud,' and 'I want to you to take me for a ride.'  I try to remember every porno I've ever seen. Try to position my body like they do. I say things like, 'come here and fuck me already, stuff that meat of yours in my hole' and with every word I utter, I die a little inside. This excites you and you ravage me with such intensity, it almost hurts.

In the light, everything looks so different. We are normal people. I have mascara smeared down my face and you have drool marks in the corners of your mouth. Clothes are strewn everywhere and you can't find your left sock. I have no idea who's bra this is. We look awkwardly at each other and there are no words we can say out loud. We stand, like a cliche. I try to remember how it all began and I fumble towards ecstasy.  You lean over to kiss me and I shiver. I want you so bad my body could melt. You smell so good even before a shower. I realize I don't know where I am and how to get home. When you turn away from me, I shed a silent tear at your beauty.  

The beat that ruined the void.

It started with one beat. Before that, there was nothing. A hollowness that was the way it was. There was no thought into it. There was nothing there and that was that. But then, one day, out of the blue, there was a beat; that fatal movement in that always empty space. It changed everything. There was permission. Someone listened long enough to care. After that, nothing was ever the same again. Feelings roared like gushing white waters through and there was no denying it anymore. The realization was awful; like a God's light suddenly lit every dark crevice.  There were no words.

Fast forward.

It was happening again. It took every bit of energy to stop that damned beat. To empty that chest cavity. Change was a destructive force that ruined the routine. That someone new was evil.  All those hushed rumours. As always, there was a reluctance to adapt, to conform.  No choice led to patience, which led to understanding and that led further down a dark road that's ending could bring about the apocalypse. I still can't call you a friend.

When you saw me like that, I was devastated.  When you looked at me and I knew what you saw and how you saw it, I died inside. When I had to admit to it out loud, it was unbearable.  With that simple gesture you changed everything. Words drilled into me like chainsaws cutting through all the bullshit I surrounded myself with. Patience is a virtue. Does anyone know that more than you?

As far as first dates, I didn't know what to expect. Face aching from smiles. You smelled so nice. You said things that no one's ever said to me; made me feel beautiful for the first time. Instead of basking in that warmth, I thought about what a cliche we are. How pathetic I was for letting you boost my self esteem. Teetering on that tight rope between agony and ecstasy; I can't deny how I feel anymore.

And before you, there was her; enchantress. I was bewitched. Blood coursed thick and hard in my veins when she walked by. Her smile, her eyes. Oh God. Staring at her was like starting at the sun; my eyes burned and my head ached. I could bear anything as long as she was around. She was a good reason to get up every morning and function.  I'm so sick.

Hammers crashing down. Whirlwinds and hurricanes. I have a secret. It's growing and swallowing me whole. Rotting my body from the inside out.
Crashing.
BANG. BANG. BANG. Cracks and shattering sounds. Roaring crashes. Stomach full of acid. Churning and burning.
100 pills a day and I'm still not fixed.
Once. Twice. Forever.
And it's not there anymore. I can't remember how it once pulled me out of the abyss.
Nausea radiates through my fingertips. Makes my body shake.
Day after day, night after night. I've been asleep for two days. I've been awake for a decade; roaming the world unable to settle down.
I think of Scarlet O'Hara. I think of Katharine Hepburn. I think of Al Pacino. Film strips run through my head; the never ending story. A movie that never ends. The lines blurred between reality and hallucinations.
I'm surrounded by rocks. I'm the centre of Gibraltar. Distant memories and nostalgic pieces. Like a painful puzzle.
Words are like bullets, they shoot out of my mouth and are dangerous; they could kill.
Everything radiates.
Body is raw nerve endings. Exposed nerves. Nerves. Angry.
Mouth full of blood again. Unable to speak my peace.
The tiny voice that comes from you tells me to be strong, to see beyond this moment.
YET.
Not yet. Not yet enough.
"Is it enough stuff? Is it stuff enough?"

Nothing is enough; everything is too much.
Hate. Intense. Can't see through it. Like a black curtain that obscures everything positive. Trying is too hard.
To give up is not an option.

"Birds flying high you know how I feel. Sun in the sky, you how I feel. Breeze drifting on by, you know how I feel. It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life for me. And I'm feelin' good."