The Write Thing To Do

Right, fellas! So it's offically over and done with! This is the day after my second tattoo and I'm really surprised about how it's turning out. The last one took only like twenty-five minutes but hurt and itched for all the time it healed up, I sure expected the same but like ten times the pain and itchiness this time, ha ha. It took three hours in total to make it, and it covers basically all of my left forearm, and I'm absolutely in love with it. The fact that it hasn't itched or anything yet only suggests to me that I'm getting into the habit, taking good care of it, and made a good choice going to a different tattoo artist. I'm very happy with the result, that is, the like twenty minutes each day that I can actually enjoy looking at it without having to peer through the thick layer of lotion constantly covering it.
Ah, it'll be nice when I don't have to do that jibberish... but now is definitely not the time to be sloppy if I wanna be able to live with it for the rest of my life! Haha. Well, I haven't had any trouble with it yet (if you don't count how not used I am to it, looking down and wondering what the hell of a monster is on my arm), except that I have to keep it covered when in the sun, meaning long sweaty days of longsleeves in the boiling heat. It really is unusually warm right now, and that I celebrate by covering myself up, haha! On the other hand the moment I go inside to get cool I have to walze around in t-shirts or something in order to give the tattoo enough of air. What a balance there! I got a few pics of it, but they were all taken when it was still in plastic and pretty much looked like shit, so I'll keep you guys waiting and post a better pic, without the lotion, the plastic, and when the colours aren't as bright but more faded as they should be.

Got an exam in a few hours, I'll be going to bed soon as I've fetched my laundry from the cellar. Lucky buggar me, got my hands on an appointment just four hours ago, someone'd cancelled theirs... it was all mine to snatch! And so I did, which was a lifesaver. I could bore you with the details but I'll simply leave it at, well, I could no longer enter my walkin closet without risking my death being crushed underneath the weight of the piles of clothes somewhere in its depths.

Also wrote a song about smoking while driving home from Mum and Dad's yesterday, called "Only Smoke When You Are Drunk", but then managed to forget the Notepad over at Ruby's. (Why did I write that with a big N?) You'll have to wait a bit for it... it's more indie style than I usually write, a bit experimental, but it's nice, I'm happy with it. And naturally, the answer to your question is no, it's not actually about smoking, but it's where I got the idea. It's a metaphor for addiction and our tendency to get drawn to what we know are bad for us.

But I guess you could have figured that out, couldn't you? You're all clever!

Tried all the local shops to get my hands on new online game Age of Conan today, but failed all over. The only copies left were Collector's Editions and I didn't think I'd afford me one of those, but when browsing through the online shops later, it seemed to be the only version available. So yeah... I kinda ordered it. Hope it'll arrive before the weekend, I'm looking forward to it a lot, tried it out at Ruby's house and even me, who've been very sceptical towards it, enjoyed it beyond reason, basically.

I got this weird idea about a novel project... I'm dying to get my hands on it and just throw myself into it, but I'm equally enthusiastic about my adventure novel, so I'm gonna stick to that for a while. Can't wait til next week when school's finally, FINALLY over, so I can just write away! That, my dear ones, is the time when I will again teach myself the literary discipline: shut down MSN and the Net, damnit, unplug it, even, and just force myself to sit with the project. No matter what comes out of it. We'll see where it all lands! But for everyone who's been with me from the beginning on this, fear not, I've more ideas and energy for it than ever. Only exams stand in the way...

THERE iS NO WRiTE OR WRONG WAY TO DO iT,
says your newly tattoo-ed and currently cheerful,
Poet IN THE Jar

Machete

I went hunting my naivete
in the jungle of our lives.
Swept off with my machete
cutting through my own denial.

What will it take to make me see?

When I water a tree, another one burns,
So does my heart.
My selfish self is trying to learn
telling rain and fiery flames apart.

You mirrored my insecurity,
sent the beams back in my eyes.
And now I'm not looking for scapegoats to be,
they were all a bunch of lies.

Is this what it took to make me see
that the problem always lies with me?

When I water a tree, another one burns,
So does my heart.
My selfish self is trying to learn
telling rain and fiery flames apart.

I'll keep my extinguisher close
to put out your tired fire,
And have the matches ready for you
when you're drenched in your desire,
I'll chase off the bad the way it should be,
and not worry if anything's left for me.

When I water a tree, another one burns,
So does my heart.
My selfish self is trying to learn
telling falling rain and flames apart.

Some waters will always burn
Some tides will always turn
Somehow now I'm trying to learn

I'm trying to learn about you.
___________________________

I wrote this song for you, Alev. Have patience with me until you get to hear it.
Warm huggles for you along with a teddy bear and a great "SORRY!" sign!

On Your Leash

Did you see me when I fell
down the lonely road to hell
See me anxious and in despair
How I was caught
by your flare

Were you glad to see me go
cause you were certain
I wouldn't last
I'd be run over by life as soon
as I got out of the past

Did you call me for my voice?
Or was it just your only choice?
I'm still on your leash
In your eyes
At least

So keep calling, keep me close
Fend off the lost cause
And smile

We were never better

Only Logic

I know I must have loved you
Why else would it tear me apart?
I know there must have been feelings
or I wouldn't be sore in my heart.
Now my betrayal has turned on me,
more than it ever did,
and still I knew how it was going to be,
I thought I'd be ready when it did.
And even though I have no right
to grieve what we have lost,
I never knew the cost.
It's the price for me to pay
to agonize,
and it's only logic
that I don't sleep at night.
Still, I must have loved you...
Why else would it make me feel?

Pennies On Your Eyes

Should I dig me a hole in the ground
where I can lie
and shed my tears
undisturbed

Would that make it better?

Should I put pennies on your eyes
so you can die
without fear
with a clear conscious

Would that make it better?

I know I've stained your silk beliefs
or did I lift the blind from your eyes?
Regardless of which
I know this wasn't your scenery
I'm sorry you've had it ruined because of me

Drained And Drowning

I've been drained,
and I've drowned
in the flood of feelings
that isn't there.

I've been chained,
and I've been crowned
by all the warm faces
that aren't there.

Where is the sun
to brighten my day?
Where is the nightfall
to darken it?

They've crashed together
inside me
until we all faded.

My body is just a handfull of cells
as are our souls.
Unable to feel,
when pain is too real,
we live on,
and I'll live on.

Needle And Stone

You see a hammer in a needle
and a mountain in a stone
Crossroads what separates you
from your home
Enlarge everything,
make mass out of nothing
You don't see the needle,
or the stone
And of that you're not alone

Famous And Lost

Finally got hold of them famous lost pieces of writing mentioned on Raven's site... so I thought I'd put them up. Strangely only one of them seems better than I remember. Can you guess which one?
Just came home from one of the last exams of the term, and it was a friggin' retake. Can you believe it? It was actually, in fact, word by word, exactly the same exam as last time I took it. Exactly! It was the exact same text to translate, and the essay topics were exactly the same. It'll be quite interesting to see how the grade changes - if it changes - when the circumstances were all the same as last time, except this time I knew I couldn't make a "too free" translation, and oh also that I took the entire exam with a fever and kept spreading my lovely cough to everyone in the exam hall. The translation part went better this time, I think... but the essay part sucked. Can't believe you gotta redo both parts if you only fail one. Crappy.
Anyway, 13 days left for final submission of giant essay, only 11 days left to the tattoo! I'm really excited about it, I'm starting to get over the "I'm so scared" kind of nervousness, and am now more looking forward to it... although I have to admit it aint gonna be no dance on any roses, ha, ha. Well, it'll be worthwhile pain. I'm not too worried.
Right. So enjoy these pieces from me the best you can. I will come again soon...

Labels

Who am I to tell you anything?
To try and dampen your fall?
Who am I to believe I'm more
than simply nothing at all?

Break my shell,
force your way in,
Break your spell,
get out of my skin.

Who am I to know your name?
To cling on to the key to your door?
Who am I to use it in locks
I know it was never for?

Break my shell,
force your way in,
Break your spell,
get out of my skin.

Who is that echo of my voice?
And the consequences of my choice?
I label you, baptize you,
to make you real,
but the closer I get to naming you,
the more far away I feel.

Break my shell,
force your way in,
Break your spell,
get out of my skin.

Break my shell,
Break with the past,
Break your magic,
take your spell away at last.

Never To Retrieve

Fetch me.
Someone threw me out the window,
Never to retrieve.

Traces Of Salt

I'm a stone in your eye
Why won't you leave me be?
I'll never know what you see in me

I'm a stone on your shoulder
Why won't you lift me off?
I'll never know why you carry me on

Go on with the flow,
You're the river,
You're the boat,
I'm only the traces of salt
going down your throat

I'm alone in denial
Why won't you let me be?
I'll never know why you keep seeing me

I'm the poison in the vial
Why won't you pour me out?
I'll never know why you dwell in doubt

Go on with the flow,
You're the river,
You're the boat,
I'm only the traces of salt
going down your throat

Set your sails
Be gone from me
I'll watch you, stranded,
as you go
Steer away
Set yourself free
I'll grieve for you, stranded,
as you go

Go on with the flow,
You're the river,
You're the boat,
I'm only the traces of salt
going down your throat

Ups And Downs

Geez, still digesting this weekend... memories for life, to say the least. I get goosebumps just thinking about it! Wow, listening to the songs now afterwards really gives me shivers... suddenly they sound so much more alive and real.

There is a good reason why barely anyone has anything bad to say about this band.

Well, not doing much today, except trying to make time pass, and all the ways in which I try to do that only manage to make me restless. I still can't speak with this god forsaken nonexistant voice of mine, it's like every time the phone rings, I go like, oh no....! Cause it hurts that much to talk, ha, ha. Also got fever and the whole shebang, but who cares.

When I woke up this morning, my eyebrow piercing had bled. Bad sign. Gotta take it out and make a thorough cleanup.

Only 19 days left to tattoo... getting nervous, nervous, nervous.

Damnit, got work the entire next week, have no idea how to get the energy to do it. Been home from school for two days now and it's like I just don't care, you know? I know I got loads of stuff to do and exams coming up but it's like I've just given up. I have no energy for this anymore. I just look at my books and then go to do something entirely else. I don't mind. I'll probably pass my exams anyway, they're not exactly Einstein level, but it still makes me feel like crap. Found myself in a strange state this morning after I'd woken up and decided I was not well enough for school... couldn't sleep, couldn't move, I just lay there like, staring at the ceiling. I must have been like that for around half an hour before I finally dragged my Ipod into bed and tried to get some sleep with help of POTF... but sleep didn't come until much later, I listened through the entire track list of the weekend's gigs before I managed to sleep however lightly.

I'm a bit worried about myself, since entering that dormant catatonic state is normally a sign of upcoming depression for me. I don't wanna talk about it with anyone, like my Mum for example, cause the last few times this happened she was convinced I'd try to kill myself and wanted me to go to some old shrink, and that, I don't want. It's better that she worries about herself with all her medications and surgeries going on and all the energy she's got left after that she should be spending on worrying about last minute preparations for their trip to Greece.

Hehe, fancy that idea, every time Mum and Dad goes anywhere fun or does anything fun, they leave me and sis behind to cover work. Yay... so sick of it. I got my own life, like... so fucking sick of that place I don't want anything what so ever to do with it, like ever again. The moment I enter there I want out again. The only thing making it a bit worthwhile to stick around there is my co-worker Michael who's cynical and funny like fuck... ha, ha. No seriously... it's great to stand slaving at work when you know that the reason you're there is for everyone else to be free and do something fun.

The place in life for students, hehe.

Well, can't do without it either. Without work I'd be on the streets, even with as many student loans as I got... believe me, there's a reason why all students keep complaining about their economy.

Fuck.

Ruby just called, making me even more down. I don't know, but he tends to make me feel so down whenever he calls. It reminds me of everything, all the stuff I did that was crap and all the stuff I didn't do that was even worse. Reminds me of how bad I am as a person, which he isn't slow to tell me to my face, either. I need space. It's just, if he only could understand that the less I saw him, the happier those faces got, those memories we shared, the more sparkling they were. If I saw him every once in a while it'd be so much more fun.

Woke up this morning with tears streaming from my eyes. I don't know why. Maybe it was something I dreamt. Maybe it was just life.

Fuck.

When Dreams Come True Twice

Allrightie, here follows the gig report from the weekend - the best experience I ever had in my life!

Originally submitted at The Forum

Brace yourselves, lengthy post ahead!

Let me just start out by saying, if I wasn't in love with the guys before these two gigs... I would so be by now. This was doubtlessly the best and most worthwhile experience I've had in my life. A whole weekend with POTF live!

I'm gonna take it from the beginning so that I don't miss out on anything.

Friday, May 9th
This is the day!

We gathered up on Friday at my house before hopping on a bus down to Gothenburg. Since we wanted to be down in good time before the gig we were in Gothenburg like, half past six, leaving hours of nervousness and anticipation to fill... We made sure we had a bite to eat and eventually wandered off towards Sticky in the lovely west coast weather

Outside the gig, the first thing we laid eyes on was the EA games tour bus! The second thing that happened was that I got a call from Ebeeto - who as it turned out stood five feet away and was only mocking me! Along with StenFan and his girlfriend, plus Ebeeto and one of his mates, the four of us who'd gone down were basically the only ones there. But as the evening went on, a more people gathered up, and as we hit the late hour for the venue, there was if not an impressive amount of people there, but at least there was a crowd ingenious enough to appreciate some good music.

I spoke to two girls in the ladies' room who'd come from even further away than us to catch the gig, so there were more hardcore fans at this gig than it would be Saturday in Uddevalla (but I'm getting to that eventually ). On the whole I had a lovely time chatting with the forumers both beforehand and after the gig! Thanks guys

Then finally the guys hit the stage and we hit front row, where we stayed all gig long The opening song was Save Me, but after that I can't remember in what order the songs came, so I'm just gonna make a random list and anyone else who was there can help me fix it up!

- Save Me
- Revolution Roulette
- Psychosis
- Passion Colors Everything
- Diamonds For Tears
- Lift
- Locking Up The Sun
- More
- Stay
- Carnival of Rust
- Illusion And Dream
- Late Goodbye
- Sorry Go Round
- The Ultimate Fling

As for their performance... phew... it blew me away. Everything I've heard about the band and how good they are live, proved to be more than true. I can hardly believe how swept away you got by the music! I understand everyone who starts listening to them after such a performance, as this. I've been wanting to see the guys live for two years, and it was a dream come true, to say the least. I'm so, so, so happy that we went!

A whole while of headbanging and sore throats later, we were all sad to see them go. Ebeeto's mate laid hands on the drumsticks and StenFan's girlfriend got away with the somewhat less desirable sweaty towel

The sweetest moment of this night was when we caught sight of Jaska and Jani mingling with the crowd after the gig, and went over to chat It was like five minutes of me praising them and answering questions about Uddevalla and GG They were very nice and chatty and I managed to steal both a pic of the three of us and some additional hugs

Right after this, we were supposed to be rushing off to catch our bus, and so we went outside, where we ran into Ollie and the other guys and again had a little chat. We told them that we were coming to the Uddevalla gig and that we'd enjoyed ourselves a lot that night, and so on When Ollie said something about it being so nice and warm outside, my usual chatty self couldn't be stopped... and I burst out with this comment:
"And here we are, talking about the weather..." That caused a few laughs, haha!

Then we caught the bus only just in time, and staggered into bed at around 3 AM (yes! no jokes involved!), but me and my best friend stayed up chatting about the gig until around 6 AM, when we finally dozed off in a state of dizzy happiness.

Saturday, May 10th
This is also the day!

Waking up a few hours later, my best friend went to her house to freshen up and I sat down to look through the gig pics (again). After I was done with that, my plan was to sit down and type up a gig report, but suddenly heard from StenFan who was coming in earlier than planned, and so I had to jump the shower. A few giggling hours passed as we had something to eat, something to drink, painted our fingernails (including the guys), prepped ourselves with the RR album and discussed the evening's plans.

Then StenFan insisted he needed a toothbrush, and the detour it took us shopping one, made us run into Captain and Ollie sightseeing outside this town's most popular pizza (hangover food) place! Either they recognized us from the day before, or I was a little bit obvious in all my POTF gear but anyway they waved at us and we went over to chat a little bit It was like, what did they think about Uddevalla, and can you believe it, StenFan's never been here before either, and how have you been since last time It was actually really good that we ran into them by accident, cause they told us when they'd start playing and we'd been wondering about that, so it was a little inside info, haha

Then we moved on to a friend's house where we tried to convince some of the people that tonight's gig was going to be the big thing, and even managed to get them to listen to Lift, but the majority of them were depressingly uninterested, and so we hit the place for the venue at around 10.

It was lucky that we had spots on the guestlist, since there were zero people in line. I was a bit disappointed there wasn't more people around, considering all the promotion this particular gig had gotten all around town, but we all figured the people would join in on us later. (And actually for a while there were pretty many people hanging around the gig, but somehow in an unexplainable way half of them mysteriously disappeared after about half the songs ) But to be perfectly honest, as the guys came on stage, it took me about five seconds to forget about the small crowd and just get sucked into the music, the energy, the laughter, the whole experience.

Strangely we all agreed later that this gig was even better than the one on Friday, although none of us could understand how it was possible! Marko was all over the fence of the stage, I hope he got its number before leaving, haha No seriously, he was such a ray of energy that it was amazing, all the band gave it a 150 percent and you could really tell. It's funny, cause you can really feel how much fun they're having when they're on stage, it's like they're just playing around, and still it's so incredibly professional. How do they do it? It looks so easy and we all know it's not I don't get it! I'm so impressed

The playlist for this gig was basically the same as the Friday gig, although this time they played my personal favourite from RR, Miss Impossible! That made me so happy

Overall the mood for this gig was so intimate, so... personal, in a way, compared to the first gig. The one in Gothenburg was terrific cause with all those people, you could really feel the pressure of the people there along with the pressure of the music. But this gig was also terrific, out of other reasons. I loved Marko's funny small talk (saying "All you fifty million people from Uddevalla" to the tiniest crowd and so on ) and Captain's little melodies that came after a joke, like a drumroll or something

We also got the chance to meet Tiia who was doing her best to sell some POTF gear! StenFan managed to flirt himself to a CoR T-shirt and we got a bunch of stickers each, very goodlooking ones! I bought one of the POTF pins and later got three more all for free, which I couldn't help joking about later, since I already was wearing three identical pins stuck on my dress One of them I gave away to a mate of mine who's been getting into POTF lately thanks to my humble self and I felt like I wanted to encourage him to keep listening.

Psst, I stuck one of the stickers up downtown today, planning to sneak up some more where you least expect...

Thanks so much Tiia! It was so great to get to meet you all and thanks for everything we got and for coming here and for, for everything!

I could say a thousand more things about this wondrous experience but I'm not going to bore you anymore! Just know that I had a really, really, really great time and now I know for sure this is my all time favourite band with the nicest people you could imagine.

Thanks POTF for coming down here and making my dream come true, twice!

PS. I took a few really nice pics! I'm gonna put them up as soon as they are looked through and chosen!

Misery

Geez! I'm just so sick of my Mum right now...!
I love her and all that jazz but when will she ever let me be? I'm grown up enough to make my own mistakes, so I think I should be grown up enough to learn my own lessons from them as well. And the minute I think I got it figured, thinking I'm just gonna let it smoothen out, and live on, y'know, then she goes "But what's your plan? Is it gonna roll on like this forever?" And I go like, "Roll on like how forever?" And she ticks off, going well, should you really be afraid of who to see and who not to see, and isn't it going to be complicated, and shouldn't you do this and that, and shouldn't you talk to this person and that person and say this and that, and what's your plan? Fuck it, I don't have a fucking plan, or anything of the like. I just know that for now, I'm gonna live on, y'know, I'm not gonna worry about responsibility, or love, or a relationship, I'm just gonna, take it as it comes. And if there're any troubles on the way then fuck, I'll face them when they get to me, what's the problem?
Do I have to make a line-up for all possible events and situations that might sooner or later actually happen to me for real? Do I have to have a backup plan for everything? Geez, here we are, and we don't even fucking know if we're still gonna be alive tomorrow, and my Mum ticks off, talking about plans. The essence of plans! The importance of plans!
Why can't she just let me be? I know she just cares about me and wants what's best for me, but that doesn't automatically mean she is the one to decide what's best for me. Or the one to know. It's not like she's ever been in a situation like mine, so fuck it. What could she possibly know?
Mum says, "It's just that I'm worried bout you, one moment you're saying you got no friends left and the next moment you're saying everything's fine."
Uhmm, yeah. That's called life, it goes in waves. Sometimes you're depressed and think no one fucking cares, and sometimes things are fine. And then there are those times when your Mum asks you how things are and you tell her they're fine, cause you know that if you tell her they're not, she'll get worried, and you'd rather have her fine and dandy so that you can worry about your own problems.
I've been thinking bout this like a hundred times, about my upbringing. It's weird, right? I always been taught that you have to think of yourself first, cause you're the only who'll care about yourself, and you're the only one you can know for certain you're gonna be spending the rest of your life with. Fuck all that, I don't care, let me worry about my friends if I want to, c'mon. So maybe I do listen to them a bit too much, so maybe I do care too much if they don't wanna talk to me or hang out with me or nothing. But isn't that cause I fucking care? Because I fucking love them to damn much not to care.
I feel so lonely, lonely as fuck, like I'm in this invisible bubble where I can see everyone moving about outside but can't reach out to them, and no one reaches inside for me either. I know I got my very best friends covering my back, aye. But there's a difference between your friends, and your mates. Some friends stick with you, some don't. Some mates stick with you, some don't. And basically what's happened is that I've kept my friends but lost almost all my mates.
Fuck it, life sucks, and I'm not even being left alone to enjoy my misery.
It's so weird, one moment I wish people'd just leave me alone, you know, and the other moment I just wish they'd reach out to me. It's so bloody obvious that most people won't have anything to do with me and I'm totally cut off from everyone.
Except my friends. You know who you are. I love you so it hurts. <3

Absolution

Damnit, I'm nervous, can't stop thinking about my upcoming tattoo appointment! It's yet another POTF-inspired one, saying "Absolution" (from song Locking Up The Sun) within a pattern of industrial cogs, look at the pic and tell me what you think of it! The text's gonna be in this bluey color, while the cogs are gonna be in black, you're simply just gonna have to imagine the rest, ha ha. I think it looks good, anyhows! (The nagging thought in the back of my head telling me I will never again after this be able to see my left wrist, I simply ignore, you only live once, right?)
I guess there's also something else I can't seem to stop thinking about - today it's Tuesday, my friends, only, let's count properly, two more days until I finally get to see my all time favourite band live. Twice! Two days in a row! Thanks to my street teaming work I've managed to get my name on the gig guestlists, but still isn't sure if I'm going to make use of it, since my friends will be standing in the queue outside, hehe.
Other than that, currently just leading on my lonely life, finding my way back to novelling, and completely ignoring school work, I just don't care, I'll deal with it eventually, when the deadlines are sneaking up on me. In the old days, you got more status the better grade you got, now you get status if you're the one who's managed to study the least and still managed to pass. Is that called sorting out your priorities? Yeah, it ought to be something like that.
I can enlighten you by saying it's perfectly possible to simply live on like some zombie trapped in a body that doesn't belong to you, and a mind that tries to overcome you. It's easy, just control your bunch o' cells and make them do what you want do and everything else, you shove away.
Fuck.

Coat Of Your Sins

Say you knew me just a little better
Wouldn't you want to know
Wouldn't you have shaken me up
Wouldn't you have
woken me up

Say you cared just a little better
Wouldn't you hold that tongue
Wouldn't you have listened a bit
Wouldn't you have
bitten your lip

Send me another song of your liking,
Invite me along to another place
It doesn't matter, you can't save my face
I'm the coat of your sins you couldn't erase

Say you were friends of me
just a little bit better
Would it be any different at all
You'd still be looking down on me
from your piedestal

Say you were close to me
just a little bit closer
And that you were known to me
just a little bit closure
Wouldn't you have whispered
that there's no truth in rumours
Wouldn't you whisper

Send me another song of your liking,
Invite me along to another place
It doesn't matter, you can't save my face
I'm the coat of your sins you couldn't erase

Sugar coat your virtue
Rise above the dirt like me
Satanize another's sins
And plead insanity

Send me another song of your liking,
Invite me along to another place
It doesn't matter, you can't save my face
I'm the coat of your sins you couldn't erase

Drilling Holes

Heavy heart
Blacken my day
Turn my laughing eyes
into fading grey
I'll do with you since I knew you
right from the start
I'll carry you on,
my heavy heart

Heavy mind
Burden my aches
Burn my laughing bets
and ash my stakes
I'll do with you since I knew your face
when I was blind
I'll carry you onward,
my heavy mind

Heavy soul
Border my boat
Sink my laughing sails
that kept me afloat
I'll do with you since I knew your name
drilling my holes
I'll carry you on,
my heavy soul

Heart
You should have touched me
Mind
You should have taught me
Soul
You should have fought me

But none of you do

Heavy heart and mind and soul,
that's why I'll have to do with you

Tag And Tell Has Gone To Hell

Bad news for all you who've been visiting the Tag'n'Tell board on the site: due to constant spamming the Poet has decided to remove the box. All on-site interaction will from here on take place in the comment fields, or if you'd rather email, send your thoughts directly to poetinthejar@hotmail.com.

As many of you may already know, the site's visitor count ticked over 2,000 visitors not too long ago. The Poet would like to thank everyone who keeps dropping by, making it all so much worth the trouble!

Take care out there, everyone. Street teaming and essaying is taking a lot of the Poet's space right now, but stay tuned for more!

LOVE,
The Poet in the Jar News Announcer

Theater Sincere

I might as well whisper

When did we become walls?
Bricks and stones
who want to be their own
Forget what unites us,
what causes our falls
and maybe when we land
it won't hurt us at all

Anyone be my band-aid
I know I never asked to be saved

Deaf ears
What does it matter if I scream
when no one hears?
I might as well whisper
Deaf ears
What does it matter if I reach out
when there's no one near?
I might as well whisper
Carry my voice in here
Theater sincere

When did we stare and look away?
Got sticks and rocks
entering the box
Jumble us around and
mix as you may
I don't hear any steps
going here, gone astray

Anyone stroke me across my cheek
Sell your helping hand so cheap

Deaf ears
What does it matter if I scream
when no one hears?
I might as well whisper
Deaf ears
What does it matter if I reach out
when there's no one near?
I might as well whisper
Carry my voice
in this theater sincere

So why are we acting?
Playing roles we were never supposed
to play
And no one's reacting
if a sheep from the flock is lost
We don't try and find it
We don't try and pray

Deaf ears
What does it matter if I scream
when no one hears?
I might as well whisper
Deaf ears
What does it matter if I reach out
when there's no one near?
I might as well whisper
Carry my voice
in this theater sincere

And action!

Amorously Ambiguous

Listen. You'd think in this place, in this country, in this world, in this universe for God's sake, we'd be free. Free enough, at least, in love. Why do everyone keep believing that the ultimate way of loving someone is one man and one woman loving eachother? And if it's so accepted with homosexuality, why do people go around carrying their secrets inside of themselves, afraid anyone will find out? Why do we always say that it's okay to live, and love, however you want, but still you find people making the most revolting remarks and giving the most disgusted looks if anything you do differs from themselves, and their way of living?
But that's not really the burning issue, the topic that makes my cheeks burn and heart to throb. It's the monogamy issue I'm being the most passionate about. I'm simply saying, who the hell invented the "core family"? That what you're simply supposed to do in life is find someone of your opposite sex, love that person forever and get the kids nature intended you to breed, and go on to buying the Volvo and the dog and whatever. Why does it matter? Why can't we just use our hearts, so tremblingly full to the brim of emotions in conflict with eachother, to love everyone we happen to love and be happy with it? Isn't it possible to find your heart beating faster for more than one person? To want to stay in the warm embrace of your friends and wishing at times that you could have them all as lovers?
Even though you might know the feeling, you'd automatically sort it out as "wrong". Wouldn't you? Cause that's what you've been taught all a while you grew up, innit? That feeling, you'd call it cheating, you'd call it backfiring passion, you'd call it being the player type of person. You'd call it being young and wild and naive, rebellious, not knowing which way to turn so you choose the most trendy one of being amorously ambiguous.
Give it up!
I know my heart.
I know the size and the volume of it.
I know that there is one person that I'm so fond of that I could never abandon and never would want to. And I know that there is another person, completely different, that constantly clouds my thoughts, that constantly turns my rainy day into sunshine. I know that there is a third person always hanging in there for me, who's the one my steps spontaneously take me to whenever I'm lost. I know that there's a fourth person, however far away physically, always brings a smile on my lips and a shiver down my spine, who I miss sometimes so much it hurts.
All these people are different from eachother. They differ in gender, they differ in personality and in looks, they differ in the type of bond I've got with 'em. And still... they are so much the same, because they make the same kind of feelings send pulses through my body. The pulse and passion of the deepest love and the most tender desire.
Why won't you let me?
Why can't I be free in love?
Is it wrong, really, to be with 'em all, with the same kind of bond?

Here, is where my problem lies. Here, is the source for my constant unhappiness. For however nice and dandy things might look like, this is one of the things that keep me down. Deeply unhappy. I can't help that I feel this way. That I have warm emotions for more than one person. More than the person I'm supposed to love. It doesn't mean I love that person any less. On the contrary. But what it does mean is that I have to suffocate myself, my feelings, my soul, in order to stick around. For the moment I admit what the case really is like, I'm considered the cheat. The liar. The inconsistent, unreliable, restless temptress. Which is so far away from my personality that the unfair accusation of it haunts me. And still it's there. I'm sure you know it too.

Don't hate me now, fellas. Just airing an opinion and a state of mind that has been hovering over my mind for a very long time and that needs to take a walk in the sun.
THE CURRENtLY UNSATiSFiED AND WONDERING WONDROUS
POET iN THE jAR

Nano Revival

Somehow it just felt as if I wanted to head over here and share some thoughts with you.
I've kinda revived the thing I did back during Nano last year: just writing away, thinking only of word count, for a set amount of time, say, one hour? And somehow putting myself in that old phase of concentration, geez, it was like opening some sort of tap and just let all the words flood out, soaking me through.
Feels good to be back in novel writing again. For a while I wanted to do it to perfection and thus found myself staring at the pages unable to write a single word. Everything I'd written up until that point sounded ridiculous and every little word I managed to write sounded equally dumb, ha, ha. Well, I'm not gonna say that I've worked miracles or anything - my goal was to write the good ol' 1,667 words in a single hour, and I got to only as little as 639, but still... if I count everything I've written the last few months it's no where near that much.
So even though I didn't reach my goal this time, I'm damn proud even so. This means I'm on my way to the finished story.
Yihaa!

Dancing On The Moon

When you spend time with cogs in life
See them run eachother all around
Stuck in chains with what I find
Dispatched, erased,
however bound down

I know I'm up for soon
Done for dealing with the moon
And I enter every debt

See the carousel keep spinning
Perfect circle every time
Pulled my seatbelt off while grinning
Unmatched, amazed,
however bound down

I know it's my turn soon
Done for dancing on the moon
And I enter every debt

How can eyes of a gargoyle tell
a merry-go-round from a carousel
I know the difference in the way they swing

But I'm no good for anything

I know it's my turn soon
Done for dancing on the moon
Time to pay my every debt
and still I enter every bet
I know I'm up before too soon
Done for dancing, seducing the moon
Walze away, my milky way
Bedazzle me the last time
I know I'm done for soon
Done for dancing out of tune

And I enter every debt

Disbelief

I look at her in disbelief
Is it possible she could be me?
She doesn't act like I would act
And never reacts like I'd react

I want to hit her just to wake her up
Is it possible I have made her up?
She doesn't say what I would say
And always goes another way

Don't tell me I'm her spitting image
It's the mirror's job to echo her face
She isn't strong, she's going to waste
As she pastes her lies, mimics my pace

What ugly tricks you try and play
Convincing me we're one and same
While I do all the good and right
The rest of it is hers to blame

She doesn't look at all like me
She doesn't do a thing like me
I stare at her in disbelief
Is it possible she could be me?

Essence Of Realization

The essence of realization
Keeps salvation
At a distance
It would be easy
If you were blind
It would be easy
With a narrow mind
Take my eyes,
I don't want to see
Take my being,
I don't want to be
All I want is naivete
For ignorance is bliss
And that's what makes it
Impossible to grasp
Simply cause I know of this.

Trains and Waves

I came like a wind
Like a storm,
swooping down on you
Draining you from your energy
And still enchantingly
Cause that's part of me

And like a wind
Tosses and turns
I play around with you
Toss your emotions,
Turn your devotion
Always in motion
Cause that's part of me

I'm the lightning bolt that strikes you down
before you get the chance to hear a sound
I'm what you watch in awe, wanting more
Leaving you puzzled, unsatisfied, torn

I came like a train
Speeding the tracks,
while you were tied
Pumping adrenaline
to maximize the thrill
Not killing you but still

Just like a train
Goes stubbornly on
I race straight towards you
Run over emotions,
Run over devotion
Always in motion
Regardless of my will

I'm the lightning bolt that strikes you down
before you get the chance to hear a sound
I'm what you watch in awe, wanting more
Leaving you puzzled, unsatisfied, torn

I go like the waves
Breaking the shore
Gone before I let you know
what for
Got to wreck another ship
And roam another sea
Constantly changing
is the core of me

I'm the lightning bolt that strikes you down
before you get the chance to hear a sound
I'm what you watch in awe, wanting more
Leaving you puzzled, unsatisfied, torn

And still you chase after me
Like I'm a flying kite
Hunt me like the comet
Lighting up the night
You've got to let go of me
I'm a wind and I will soar
Constantly changing your life
That's part of what I'm for

I'm the lightning bolt that strikes you down
before you get the chance to hear a sound
I'm what you watch in awe, wanting more
Leaving you puzzled, unsatisfied, torn

Leaving you puzzled, unsatisfied, worn

Icaros

Burn my wings, still gonna soar
Fly too high and I'll
soon be blind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Stop to think, you're gonna find
They can't take away
your mind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll survive

I know it's far
And farfetched
But try real hard
and we just might
make it out

All in vain
It's all the same
Identical photos
in a frame
They see us

And at first glance
We got no chance

Can you look beyond?
Can you long?

Burn my wings, still gonna soar
Fly too high and I'll
soon be blind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Stop to think, you're gonna find
They can't take away
your mind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll survive

Speed away
Go astray
Run fast, run hard
We're running out

Only stones
In people's eyes
Shade your own
with your hand
They see us

And at first glance
We got no chance

Can you look beyond?
Can you long?

Burn my wings, still gonna soar
Fly too high and I'll
soon be blind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Stop to think, you're gonna find
They can't take away
your mind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll survive

Making friends with makebelieve
Trying to fly with someone who tried
And failed
Taking what I need to take
Making conclusions I need to make
Trying to try with someone
Who failed

Burn my wings, still gonna soar
Fly too high and I'll
soon be blind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Stop to think, you're gonna find
They can't take away
your mind
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll be fine
Icaros, Icaros,
We'll survive

Full To The Brim

We don't know better, do we? Why should we bother trying to see things through other people's eyes? Or embrace the realization that everyone's just as full to the brim of feelings as you are, and that the better part of the world will never know who you are.
They'll never care if you get up in the morning, or what you feel, or what you take your time to make a blog post about.
But why embrace that? No, that'd make things too grey, wouldn't it? Make things so meaningless. So insignificant. Make it too hard to keep going.
Get up, eat, go to school, eat, go to bed...
We'll just bury the thought, dig deeper into our conscious selves and stuff it in there, trying to look in a million other directions...
Looking out of our own eyes is all we know about.
We don't know better.
Do we?

Bubble

Why?
Do I do it?
Keep looking over your way?
Why?
Can't I pull through it?
Can't I let it be,
and walk away?

I only want to be friends with you,
and keep you in my heart,
but seemingly staying this close to you,
was not particularly smart,
but then again I'm not a genious,
apparently I'm less than that,
and that's what keeps me in this bubble,
busying myself with this and that

Why?
Do I do it?
Keep coming over your way?
Why?
Can't I pull through it?
Stop caring so much,
and just walk away?

I'm trying to make myself get over you,
I just don't know if I'll ever make it,
and should I honestly try to stay close to you,
I wonder how well you would possibly take it,
I never said I am a genious,
apparently I'm less than that,
and that's what keeps me in this bubble,
forgiving this, forgiving that

Why?
Why do I do it?

Come on closer,
pull me through it,
rid me of my despair
Help me out here,
become a ghost,
and I'll pretend
you never were there.

Inside The Glass Again

I'm inside the glass again.
My wings aren't buzzing anymore.
It wasn't you who closed the lid,
you never knew what it was for.
So I'm inside the glass again,
only due to myself.
I've made myself a shell again,
and climbed inside my hell again.
My wings aren't buzzing anymore.
It wasn't you who closed the lid,
but somehow you made it sure.
The lid won't budge,
So please don't judge,
I'm inside the glass again,
If only I knew what for.

Gotta Rush, I Got A Therapy Appointment

I'm standing there in the shower, just letting all that water pour down on me, pour all the bad stuff out, and it's like I'm being cleansed. Mentally, I mean. It's like therapy, surrounding yourself with that warm rainlike cascade of water. And for a moment it feels as though you're a blank sheet. You got it all sorted out, got it all figured out.
And you're filled up with energy.
I don't know why, but this is the case for me. Standing in the shower has some kind of soothing and renewing effect on me. Maybe it's got somethin' to do with the old days, when I lived at home, you know, the only place where you could really be left alone was in the shower. Sounds a bit off when I'm saying it, but think about it. Not even your own room, if you happen to have one, can give you the same feeling of calm, the same feeling of safety. And I'm not saying you should shower all the time cause it always gives you a boost. I'm just pointin' out that sometimes when you're standing there, you can take a deep breath, and hide away from the rest of the world for a little while. Hide away from those gazing eyes and interrogating looks... the accusations, never uttered, but constantly present.
And sometimes you burst. Like me. Like the other day when I was in the shower, I could just let all my feelings out, cause I knew I was all alone. And isn't that clever? No one will ever catch you crying in the shower, cause the tears blend in too nicely with the rest of the water...
Yeah. Well, today was a bit different. But it don't change much. No tears don't mean no feelings. And just when you think you're all drained of them, they strike again...

Close To Far Away But Far Away From Close Neighbours

A click or two, and voila. You've travelled to the far end of the world. You can see it all, and make all those dreams of yours come true, dreams you never pictured yourself being in. At least, that is, in the virtual universe – the virtual world. That's where you can hop from continent to continent in the blink of an eye, talk to people from every corner of the country and all other countries too for that matter; that is where the action is.

And we're never shy on the Internet. Once the stranger at the bus stop you'd never even small talk about the weather with has been turned into a bunch of pixels on a screen, he's become someone you can whip out all of your inner beliefs to.

Strange, isn't it?

We want to be seen, be confirmed, be loved, so desperately that we'd rather spend a few hours comfortably in our ergonomic chairs, hammering keys and fumbling with webcams, than take a few steps outside of our own doors and possibly run into some so-called actual physical interaction. Maybe we're all doing it because of something as basic as survival instinct. Maybe that's the key. After all, if anything goes out of hand while scavenging the net, all the effort it takes from is one little click, the little red cross in the upper right corner. And if that doesn't work, try the virus programme... or the power button.

In real life there aren't any power buttons. No where to click when you want out.

No programme to run to find and rid your harddrives from anything unpleasant infecting your daily life.

Is it really that strange that we seek our comfort in two-dimensional words, in three-dimensional videos struggling to imitate reality, putting soundtracks to our lives that will give you that ”right” feel? Maybe the only strange thing about it is that we flee the horrors of reality, the physical world, only into a world that's trying it's best to be a replica of just the same. An imitation, a mirror image, a newer, upgraded version, all bugs reported and fixed.

The Internet isn't gonna give us our utopia, or our haven, simply cause in the end of the day, we still have to crashland back into our dim lit apartments among our rainy streets. We keep searching for somewhere to stimulate the mind while our bodies are still strapped into the passenger's seat, no eject button, no emergency exit anywhere in sight. Life itself takes us for the ride, but we're all too distracted by the shallowness of our parallell aliases to watch the view. Instead we clasp our seats as tightly as we can, too afraid to fall out to ever enjoy the rollercoaster.

It's our survival instinct.

But is it all about Darwin? Are we nothing but primitive stone age people walking around with laptops and cellphones instead of sticks and rocks? Or is there in fact something else underneath, something deeper? The question can be asked a hundred times but doesn't bring us any closer to the truth, to the answer. We want to view ourselves in a better light than we sometimes deserve. We're not here to ponder, to think, cause who knows where that would take us? No, thinking is something we should avoid, and in time, we've become pretty damn good at it too. Diverting ourselves from anything that's difficult by engulfing our beings in the threads of the silky spider's web, yes, that's become our habit.

And why not? Who says we gotta live in the future? Or that we gotta unplug our Ipods every time we pass a neighbour just to exchange a meaningless ”hello” when taking out the trash?

This is us, this is what makes us different from the older generations. We're the Internet generation and we're proud of it. Give us your sugar bowl for us to fill and you'll find us locking our doors. Give us your hand to say hello and you'll find us already turning our backs.

We're the Internet interaction generation and it's all we know of.

_____________________________________________

This is an essay I just wrote for English writing class. I'm putting it up to illustrate just how stupid assignments we sometimes get. Write a 750 ord "practise essay" on how Internet has had its impact on society, ha! Ask a frenetic blogger about that and this is what you bloody get. Just gonna take out the contractions and then I'll pass with flyin' fuckin' colours. Cause they've stopped lookin' at formal stuff by now. They just wanna see if we got somethin' to say. And I do.
I always do, dammit.
So gimme another "practise essay", can't get enough of 'em. Hand me another one down the line. Cause of course I'm too stupid to just get the idea that you don't write blog posts the way you write somethin' like an academic essay.
C'mon!
We're already writing the C essay, why the fuck do we need "practise essays" to hand in as well? Just gives us shit to do and it don't lead to nothin'.
I'm sendin' it in now anyhow.
And I'll pass with fuckin' flyin' colours.

Street Teamer

I come on in here and the first thing that comes to my mind to write is that everything's totally fucked up. I don't know how it happened. I don't know if it really is. It just feels as if I'm crammed in a tiny box that's suffocating me and I can't get out. Wow, am I a nutter or what?
I've been pretty compulsively doing street teaming things for POTF lately. I've made a myspace-profile, printed flyers, made radio requests, emailed festival people, running around in town wearing my POTF merch, and other things down the same line. It's strange, but it's as though it's taken all my time and energy. I don't know why suddenly I've become so hardcore enthusiastic about it. Guess it's March 26th shimmering in the haze ahead.
Well. Came on without having anything to tell.
I'm down.
But I'm always down.
So it don't matter.
LOVE the P. in the J.
PS. And THANKS A MILLION to Ciarraxx for the sweetlooking header. I love it! DS.

Running In Reality

If you're naive they won't believe
you're equipped properly for reality
But I know my dreams are like a shield
and keep me running in reality
____________________________

Quickie post, popped into my head just now.
I'll hopefully finish it soon...

Fool To You

What the fuck am I gonna do?
Got any tricks or tips up your sleeve?
I should have been counting cards
or something,
tried to get a head start,
or something,
now all I know is,
I don't know what to do
All the same I'll be a fool to you

What the hell am I s'posed to do?
Would you slip me an idea or two?
I should have seen this coming
or something,
tried to get rid of my blindness,
or something,
now all I'm asking is,
What the fuck am I gonna do?
All the same, I'll be a fool to you

And I wouldn't care
if it was at least of any use

Memories Half-Made

I used to look at you
like I hated you
I used to wish you'd leave me
all behind
I used to open my door for you
and hope you would just get out
I used to run around this place
and clear it from your stuff
I used to put it all in a paper bag
and wonder why the scent
never washed off
I gave you my key
hoping you'd break in
I gave you my trust
hoping you'd abuse it
I used to love it when you tossed all my words
right back in my face
But now
I just look past you
Past the paper bags
in the hallway
and past the memories
half-made
Trying to ignore the fact
that we've made a life out of it
and we're both more invisible
than ever
I used to look at you
like I felt something
but now I'm empty
Now that hate
just aint
me

It Aint Fair

It aint fair. I've... I've really tried. And I knew that he was down, and I tried to cheer him up, and that didn't work... so I tried to tell him it was okay to be down sometimes and that everyone sometimes are... but he took that as ignorance. As me waving him off.
I told him my plans were to sleep on my own but if he was sad, I wanted him to stay.
This he took as me wanting him to leave.
It never matters. It just never matters what I do.
Either I do it wrong, I don't do it at all, or I overdo it... I don't know. Just seems as though it's never right.
Never good enough.
It aint fair.
I tried.
Well, part of me's upset about it, but there's another part of me that doesn't feel anything. And it makes me sad. It's like that Sounds Like Violence song: "We used to tear eachother apart, it felt good I knew that I was alive, but now we have nothing. You could come on and make me feel something."
And right now I don't feel anything. I feel nothing.
And it makes me sad.

Overwhelming Distances And A Lot Of Miles

Back from the big city, and very much glad to be. It's like, among all those people, you just disappear, you vanish. You know that if you went missing that very second no one would know, or care, cause you're invisible. You don't know anyone and everyone around you are always on the move to go someplace else. Never just enjoying the moment.
I don't know why exactly, but I felt kinda uneasy during my whole stay. It's as if the very core of my being just knows I don't belong there, and wants to repel me from being there, sort of. In one way it was good, though, I got out of this place for a while. And I didn't really miss it all that much. The overwhelming distance simply didn't feel overwhelming. Does that mean, A, either I've gotten a bit used to it, or B, that I've grown a bit stronger in myself and don't need to be at home, or around my friends, every second in order to feel safe? Feel secure?
I don't know. But as good as it might have been to go away, it was ten times as good to come back again. I've missed this town. I love it.
And a part of me gotta admit that it aint the funniest part of my life to hop along after my sis and her various boyfriends. (Well, she's been in a long relationship for a while, but now she's out and about again.) And there was something about this one that I didn't really seem to like. He was too, how do I say it, smarty? He really seemed to think he knew everything, and still he was real quick to use certain discriminating words about things or people he didn't like (words that I kinda sucked in that really got to me when I know they shouldn't). Maybe he should have thought of that before he opened his mouth. But they never do. It's not like I'm a genious but I'm at least trying to be a bit humble against people. You don't just blurt out certain words and expressions, who knows, there might be someone around you taking it offensively? I know I wouldn't wanna be called certain things, why should I call other people those things then?
Well, it might just be me, but that kind of behaviour of his, proves him more ignorant than clever in my eyes.
Not in my sis' eyes, though, she seems to think he's Mr. MacHeaven.
But I guess that's nothing but fair. She and Ruby never got along, now it's my turn to not get along with MacHeaven.
And I did try.
I really did.
I just don't have the energy to do it anymore.
And I'm sick of being the third wheel.
Cheers...

Good Stories Tell Themselves

There you have it. More proof that the best stories are not made up, but tells themselves to the writer, who scribbles it down. Thinking of my novel last night, in a slightly panicky way seeing I hadn't written anything all day, suddenly I knew the answers. Knew how to fill those two little plot holes that had so irritatingly occurred, blocking all my further writing.
Amazing, aint it? How sometimes when you just think about things late at night, it's like the solution just pops right out to you, and it feels right, like it's the answer that's been there all along, just without you realizing.
I wanna throw myself over writing... And I think, after this post and a bit of something to eat, I will.
Luckily for me, the auction I'm trying to win on the net (I'm bidding for a train ticket to Stockholm) hasn't quite worked with me, and I've had to start bidding on a later departure. Good, cause I aint packed nothing at all yet, and besides, it might mean I'll get some time to write.
Dad's gonna be here in forty minutes, I suppose what I really should be doing is dressing and fixing myself up. But I just had to slip by.
Glad to say I'm waltzing off to novel-land. See you on the other side.
LOVE, THE PONDERER POET

Conditions (I Don't Mind)

Did you ever ask me?
No, you never asked me
cause I was there before you knew you
had to ask me

Did you ever let me?
Yeah, you always let me
cause I was there before you knew you
had to let me

I don't mind watching you in my mind
As long as you follow
These conditions

As long as you mean to
As long as you give me those eyes
every once in a while
I don't mind
I don't mind
As long as you mean to
As long as you thank me for being there
from time to time
I don't mind

Did you ever fall down?
No, you never fell down
cause I was always there to catch you
before you fell down

And did you ever break down?
No, you never broke down
cause I was there to console you
before you broke down
Every time around

I don't mind watching you in my mind
As long as you follow
These conditions

As long as you mean to
As long as you give me those eyes
every once in a while
I don't mind
I don't mind
As long as you mean to
As long as you thank me for being there
from time to time
I don't mind

Imagery

Got my critique back pretty recently, a few days back, and it's high time to share.
Geez, first of all, gotta tell ya I never thought it'd come out that positive. You know, I was thinking it would just be a load of hints and tips or even remarks on stuff that I'd gotten wrong, but do you believe it? There weren't that many of those! Those that were "remarks" or whatever, were more like tips, in all, it was like, splendid reading. Has to be my best investment, ever. One of the tips she gave me, the critic, was hand in hand with something she thought I was good at, and still it was one of the best writing tips I've ever received. I'm definitely gonna think about it while I finish the rest of the story.
Just for my ego's sake, as much as for your curiosity, I'll go over a few things she brought up. For example, my title is "catchy" and she was "impressed with this choice of title" which by the way "conveys the information in the manuscript". My opening sentences are "powerful" and makes "an excellent beginning". My dialogue is "nice work" and "sounds natural and appropriate to (my) characters". And here's a thought, for me who figured I'd get a lot of remarks on punctuation and stuff: "Your grammar, spelling, and punctuation are all quite satisfactory. Congratulations!" Well, I'm not saying I didn't get any remarks on this, but it just isn't fun for any of us should I tell you my misspellings. All these remarks, however, barely even filled one page. That's pretty good for a 100 page manuscript, right? If all the mistakes in it barely fills an A4 in Word? Well, I sure think so. Other than this, she carried on to tell me about how a standard manuscript is often required to look like, what margins there should be, and chapters beginning on new pages, and that there should be a header on each page with the author's last name and the title of the novel. Really good tips, I'm glad I got them; soon as the story is underway I'll go through the process of fixing it up like this.
So, very positive this far in the critique, but there's more to come. Here're the sentences that just blew me away:

"I feel that no illustrations are needed for this adult fiction manuscript. The text provides a clear image of characters, settings and events. Nice work. The imagery is fantastic."

And here follows her conclusion:

"I believe you can turn this into a marketable story. It has all of the necessary elements: good characterization; interesting (and well-described) settings; and authentic-sounding dialogue. This is an interesting piece of work and I can see it becoming great. The characters are strong and I like the plot. I am impressed so far. I sincerely wish you luck with this endeavor."

Even now, when I've read these words more than a million times, it almost brings tears to my eyes. Finally, it feels as if all my writing through all these years is finally going to pay off. It simply means so much that someone who doesn't even know me as a person, someone who simply has read the text, but whose job it is to evaluate texts; has graded it this good. I can't even explain it. I feel as if I've won a big trophy or something, like I wanna go out and shout and just celebrate...! And suddenly all I wanna do is throw my schoolbooks out the bloody window and get started again. I have so much to write, so much to give. And I know that if I sit down now, without planning anything, but just throwing myself into the writing, it'll be like back in Nano. The most spontaneous bits are amazingly, the ones that are the best, those I've struggled to scribble down is like a spit in the sea in comparison. But in any case, a certain critic somewhere out there thinks my imagery is fantastic, so it can't totally suck even in those bits of it.
One of the best parts about this whole thing is that both the critic and my agent (cause I've finally been assigned one of my own! No more automated emails!) agrees with me in that I'll be able to do my own editing based on the critique. Some of the authors the agency embraces have to spend loads of time revising it along with a professional editor, which, to be honest, costs a lot of money. When i got the email from my agent, she said I could choose myself whether I wanted to do it on my own or go through the manuscript with an editor, and when I told her I wanted to finish the story off before editing it, she agreed with me. And then went on to saying that it would probably be fine in my case that I edited it myself. (Note: having done a professional edit gives you slightly more credit in the marketing process, but does not give you any guarantees. I read a reject letter on a script that hadn't been edited this way but it was really crap. Full stops missing and stuff. I've always had a good eye for those kind of things so I think if I go through it very slowly I'll find most my errors myself. Then there were some spelling stuff the critic remarked on, that they're spelled differently in like, the UK and the US, and I'll have to alter them by looking at her list. Gotta be consistent. Though not that easy for someone not native.)
Right. If I wanna get anything done I better leave you at this. Phew, feels good to get it out of me.
SiNCERELY, POET iN THE jAR
Ps. Can't help but almost shiver all over. "Fantastic imagery"... I'll be able to live on this for months. And finally, no more nervousness. DS.
Ps, 2. I had no idea it was "adult fiction" that I was writing. Guess I never really gave it any thought. Still, it somehow satisfies me to know that she wouldn't like, say it was a children's book or something. Haha. Ds, 2.
Ps, 3. And I mean, seriously? I impressed a critic! I never saw that coming! How do you impress a critic? Geez... I should start having more faith in myself! Ds, 3.

Second Promo Pic -08

Hey fellas!
Playing around in Photoshop yesterday resulted in a new promo pic (already sick of the last one). Let me know what you think, and feel free to pass it on.
Thanks!
Warm Greetings from THE POET

World's Longest P.S.

I'm writing again, writing away, and it's glorious. It's about believing in prose, in a way, believing in the imaginary world a novel presents, both while stepping into it, observing, and putting it in print, and while exploring it in reading.
There was this school book, quite dull, that I've been trying to force my way through lately. Novel, of course; but that's not the point, since the novel in question pretty much failed to arouse my interest most of the way through... but there was this part of it, following a writer, that really appealed to me. This writer, he's like, seen the best years of his life and has given up on writing fiction in order to land a better paid job writing some famous family's chronicles. And he goes to see his old publisher, the fiction one, and what follows is the most extraordinary conversation on the topic of the novel.
Now we're starting to get closer to my point.
See, they talk about fiction, about the novel, how it represents something as old as mysterious as life itself. How writing fiction is to be naive, although at the same time you can fit into it shades of the most unpleasant reality. How the novel is the ultimate art form, the ultimate fantasy world, the ultimate amusement given to man, once acquainted to the phenomenon of reading. The phenomenon of words.
It might have been this, it might have been something else, but it doesn't matter. As long as it fuels my writing it might as well be anything.
P.S. I've got fever for the last two days, resulting in me having the most peculiar, and nasty dreams. Nightmares. Last night, or morning, or whatever to call it, I had the most strange dream in which I entered a very, very old and small house, hanging from the cliff of a mountain, reaching out over the wild and untamed sea. And in that house, there were two, just as old, creaking doors, out of which the right one swung open as I approached. Inside was a hatch in the floor, and shelves all over the room containing various diving equipment... I got into a diving suit and the hatch sort of, took off, lowering us down towards the surface of the sea, being torn by the heavy winds on our way down. I don't know how it happened, but suddenly, we were thousands, and I mean thousands, of meters down in the sea, and everything was so dark, so incredibly, unbelievably dark. Below me, in a sort of, research station, my diving companion (who took the face of my old high school friend) was tearing through the remains of a dark ship, a sunken ship, a room in it, that is. And she handed me two pairs of shoes, a pair of black ones, and a pair of purple ones. Feeling cold, and a bit intimidated by the dark, I signalled that I wanted to go up, and she just waved at me, impatiently, suggesting she'd stay behind for a while, but that I could go on up if I wanted to. I looked out the windows, into the depths, into the massive, enormous wall of water separating me from the safety of the land above. And I saw something move.
Something larger than what is even perceivable by man, was moving past the station, with incredible speed and agility for its size. As it got closer, I realized what it was, an underwater monster, like an eel, gigantic, and hunting, and it had spotted me.
Desperately I tried to tell my companion about it, and I think I actually did, that in some way we could talk to eachother, even though we were wearing these diving suits and barely being able to breathe by the pressure and weight by the water as it was. She told me back, that she knew about that, but as long as I timed my departure allright, it would be fine.
And so I went outside, left the station, trying to make myself invisible, even with my lantern steadily clutched in my hand. As the monster approached me, glowing eyes fixed on me, and enormous jaws opening, readying itself to swallow me, I knew it was the lantern that drew it closer, but if I threw it away I would never find my way back up to the surface, or down to the station, again, and I would drown out there anyway when my oxygen ran out. So I clung on to the lantern, even as the giant eel opened its jaws and I was absorbed by the foul darkness inside the creature's mouth.
Over.
It was over.
But wait.
Wasn't there a streak of light somewhere ahead of me?
I tried to breathe calmly, saving my precious oxygen reserves. In my panic, my body and its survival instincts seemed to have acted while my mind had blocked down. I was hanging inside the creature, one hand grabbing some sort of unidentifiable part of it that was dangling on the inside of its, what to call it, cheeks, or whatever. And the light ahead of me was nothing else than the light of the station, vaguely sippering through the slowly opening jaws of the monster. It was about to swallow something else, and not knowing when another chance would come, I pushed off as hard as I could against the wall-like cheek, using all my power and energy to kick and swim my way closer to my exit point, the opening mouth.
I slipped out, just in time before the jaws shut close again, on some other victim of its hunting streak, but only for it to spot me escape.
It was far from over.
Bouncing and kicking my way downwards along its body, in a sort of Super Mario kind of way, I managed to make it dive after me, plunging downwards into the depths, closer to the station, saving me the long stretch I could never have gotten by myself.
Almost there.
I threw myself inside the hatch in the exact last minute, with the very last of my energy, my body screaming of pain and exhaustion as the adrenaline made my veins throb so badly I could hardly see my hand in front of me. The monster didn't give up, banging on the windows the hardest it could, and I knew we would have to get out before it smashed the glass.
Finally, she would listen to me, and somehow, this time, we were dragged upwards in the blink of an eye by rescue workers pulling us up.
This is the worst part.
Once up on dry land, panting of the exhaustion and of the panic, and of the gratefulness to have gotten out, I realize that she's not with me. That she is still down there, and out of some strange reason, so is my father, having replaced my spot down there with his own.
It takes them hours to pull them up.
I can't for the life of me understand what takes them so long this time, when they could pull me up so quickly...
I wait, wandering around the old creaking house, discovering an old and half rotten bathtub, along with the most wondrous little room, full of the most beautiful little pieces of rainbow-coloured furniture.
Finally, after a lot of anxiety and fear, they get them up, and they're both okay.
I wake up, sweating from fever and from the nightmare, and then fall asleep again almost right away, my fever making me drift in and out of shallow sleep. The dream goes on with me stating, I will never set my foot anywhere near an ocean ever again, not in my life. And one of the rescuers tells me, "Don't worry. There's another room." And this time, it's the left of the two doors. And as the door slams shut behind me, I see that it's exactly the same as the other room, in every little detail, and someone says, "Don't be sad all your things got messed up. We've managed to restore it all again for you to dive some more."
And the dream repeats.
Worst nightmare, ever, all categories. Laugh if you will.
DS.

Everyone For Themselves

Everyone for themselves.
You know, I was listening to this song playing on the radio the other day, going a bit like this: "Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name". What? You need love, or you don't know who you are? Well, that just tells me loads more about yourself than it does about love.
Think about it for a second. This guy, singing the song, he needs someone else to love him in order to feel complete. Meaning, he needs someone else to confirm him and see him, meaning he needs someone else to define him. Or else he's bloody lost.
I don't know. I mean, sure. Loads of people think like him, ya know? Think that if they're not seen and confirmed by others, they're nothing. Loads of people think that love is the ultimate thing, and they actually want it, dream of it, long for it, need it. And yeah, I know, sometimes it can bloody kill ya to be alone. To be lonely. But that does not mean that without someone loving you, you're bloody lost.
In order to love someone else, my sis always says, you gotta love yourself first. And I think she's pretty damn right. Pretty, damn, right. If I'm strong in myself, enjoy myself, like myself, if I know where I stand and who I am as a person, well, then I'm both a hell more interesting person than someone who isn't, and if love should strike me down (cause it does at times), it won't matter. I know myself well enough to bounce back into the old me the minute that happens.
Don't try to tell yourselves you need to be loved. Love yourself instead. After all, the only person you can be absolutely bloody sure you're going to spend every minute of the rest of your life with, is yourself, right?
And if I think about it, the more I'm convinced that I'm right. Even if I look out among my friends, right? The ones who are independent, got a strong personality, and won't change for other people's sake, those are the ones you just love the most. They've got so much depth and they always make things happen and you just go along smiling to yourself, knowing, this is good, right? These people know what they want.
I don't know about you, but how intrigued would you be by some fella sitting in a corner afraid to utter a single little word in case someone, oh horrible thought, might disagree?
Even as I'm writing this, I know there are people who'll disagree. But that's the thing. What, you thought you could just walk right on through life without ever, ever, disagreeing with anyone, or having anyone disagree with you? I bet ya, doing that diplomat kinda thing is gonna lead you down a more complicated, tip-toeing road than the honest, however crude, will ever do.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
Or by the way, no, please don't. Just absorb, dammit.
PS, I don't know if I mentioned it, but a while back we did a thing in school where we had like three hours to write an essay on 500 words? And the Nano part of me just threw myself over it, eagerly dissecting all the essay rules I could think of, resulting in the most sarcastic little piece of text I think I've ever written, all on purpose. And guess what? Got it back today with the highest grade. Only one remark: "Don't use contractions". Lol. I didn't see that one coming, but it sure as hell is a punch in the face of my old English Writing teacher. DS.

Kill And Tell

I could.
I could.
I could.
But I won't.

I'm done with screaming,
done with cries.
With contemplating
shallow lies.
And my heart goes very well,
I will do a kill and tell.

Embraces by anxiety
You'd think it was for me

I could.
I could.
I could.
But I won't.

Save my breathing
to dissolve.
Save your lecture,
let me mould.
And my heart goes very well,
I will do a kill and tell.

Embraces by naivety
You'd think they weren't for me

I could.
I could.
I could.
Oh, but I will.
__________________________
These lyrics are about forgetting your past and what you may have dwelled on. "Kill and tell" is a play on the expression "kiss and tell", here referring to how I've killed the anxiety of my past and how I'm now telling the story of it with a song. I go from talking about how I could let anxiety engulf me, but that I won't let it, to how I could let naivety engulf me, and how I plan to. Naivety, pureness, innocence. That is what shields us from being wounded in life. Even if you stray from it for a long time you might allow yourself to move on, be happy again, if you embrace them. I don't wanna be sceptic anymore. Anticipate being hurt cause that's what mostly happens. I wanna just sway here, in the moment, enjoying every piece of it, without having to worry about what it's gonna lead to or what it's gonna do to me. I just wanna be like a kid, a naive little kid, enjoying love and all that comes along with it without ever having to think about the consequences.
And I will.

Dreams & Orders

I had the most awesome dream ever last night! I dreamt of POTF! Haha! I dreamt that they came to this festival called Pier Pressure (which no one seems to know if it's gonna happen this year) and that I got to perform along with them, and they signed all my CD's and photos and so on. It was so cool! I think I'll live on this dream alone for like a month ahead, ha, ha. In the dream, I even dreamt I was appointed "female vocalist", I don't even know when that would come in handy, but still... haha.
And since you know me, I read signs into the dream, and so I've just placed an order at CDON.com of ALL the CD's, except for single "Sorry go round", "Locking up the sun", and of course, upcoming album "Revolution Roulette" which isn't even available for preorder yet. Wow, can't wait, can't wait, can't wait! *Jumps up and down* Since I gave away my LUTS single for a friend last Christmas, I'm kinda missing it, but it feels too soon to order another one. Maybe I'll do that along with newest album in March or something. Anyway, four of the CD's landing in my mailbox soon, I'm already excited (my bank account slightly less so).
Especially "Ultimate Fling" single is gonna rock my world.
So bless me, POTF, haven't sinned this time, instead rather sung a whole dozen of "Ave Maria" or whatever it's called in English.
Gotta study now, even turned down beer (!) in order to do so, so I better get to it. Lucky me that "studying" in my case means "re-reading Harry Potter series for educational purposes", which is the first step of my essay coming up. Wish me luck.
PS. Just got an email back from the critique firm, they say it'll take two weeks from now to review it. Nervous, nervous, nervous. You get the idea. DS.