Shining Letters

There's an overwhelming sadness in me
That not even your laughter can drive away
It came from the depths where I had deported it
Returned from where I had banned it
That sadness and that pain

It spreads through my heart and my eyes
And forces me to see the world
In a different way
It tells me this is the naked truth
I must trust and follow
It tells me all my smiles are worthless
What do they mean, at the end of the day
When the shadows appear out of nowhere

Can you hunt down your demons with light
And turn them into defenseless things
Can you chase away the sadness
And all the tow it brings
Is that why you always leave the light on

When I wake from a faceless dream
And the contours of the room aren't still
What good will it do me with light
What will be changed
If the room
Is kept bright

I was always told to forget about things that have been
To shun away what I've seen in my dreams
How do I explain that I dream in the day
And that the past just isn't willing to go away

Can you hunt down your demons with light

And turn them into defenseless things

Can you chase away the sadness

And all the tow it brings

Is that why you always leave the light on

Can the smoke in this room become the air that I breathe

Can everything be tiring, everything I see

Maybe the words were right, the words that stood out

In shining letters

Maybe this is really how dark things are

And you can never get rid of the undertone

You can never really reach for bliss

Not even when ignorant, like this

So take your comfort in your muse

And cling to it in the darkness

Use it to channel the subconscious

Into images and words

Isn't that how it was always done

Isn't that how it will always be done

Can you deny that once it's gone

When it's gone and you realize you miss it

You miss the demons

Without the demons you aren't alive

And they were right when they said

You lost the meaning of your smiles

Head First

How did I manage to drown my own optimism
Drown my waterfall, that I carefully built
Out of dreamscapes and more fragile hopes
Than was allowed to exist
How did I manage
How did I achieve

When did I chain myself to the ground
And sink myself into the river
With cement blocks on my feet
I couldn't even move
I couldn't even breathe

Your words all made sense
It couldn't be the things you said
And your thoughts were rational
Parts of my own suppressed ones
So why suddenly did I take a turn for the worse
And dive into the darkness, head first

Was it the only thing I had to cling on to
The only remnant I had of a muse
When all my other canals had dried up

Although by now I am chained to the ground
I haven't given up on the dreams that I found
And I know there could be more sinister things
I just need to save up for stronger wings

Drown yourself in self pity and desertion
Maybe that way you could run away
And all the problems that surrounded you
Will magically disappear, with the snap of your fingers
But didn't anyone tell you
It doesn't work that way

As long as you won't face what's ahead
And as long as you don't brace yourself
Against the truth
You won't last
And I won't last,
with you

Wound Up

It's been so hectic all day that I can't even be exhausted. I'm all wound up and I can't really get myself to relax. I don't really understand how I managed to time everything so badly and stress myself up about things, but at this point I guess I shouldn't be getting surprised anymore. Luckily, in the middle of all this stress, there's a couple of good news. For one, I found some missing files that I thought I'd lost, meaning I can hand in files for the project deadline that I thought wouldn't get assessed. That's good. Secondly, I handed in the keys for my old apartment today, and that's really a big weight that's off my shoulders. Even though somewhere inside I worry that they'll call me up and complain about insufficient cleaning, it's still good to know that I'll never have to live in the old place anymore. Even living here now, in the middle of a freaking war zone of cardboard boxes, it's still better than being split up in two different places or kind of leasing someone else's space for a while. As with all my apartments this one calls for a name and I knew directly it would be called The Lagoon. 


Moving on.


We're officially done with the game project but also we're thrown directly into the next course which, too, is pretty exhausting. We don't do much else but watch movies and attend lectures all day, but that's just the problem, there's just no time to do the actual assignments. But we'll figure it out somehow, I just wish there was more individual work involved. No offense, but... after the project you kind of don't want to be dependent on your groupmates, for once.


That's all for now since I'm in a stressed period of complete writer's block. I'm hoping to pick up an editing project quite soon to take my mind off things and that just might get me back on track again. I sure hope it will for the sake of Ella, who is currently just lying around in the drawer not being written and being quite bored.


THAT'S ALL, FOLKS
POET IN THE JAR

Glorious Stress and Other Things

Things are stressed like hell, the final presentation of our game is on Friday, and I have to pack my entire apartment during the weekend and miss school on Monday in order to move to the new place, while Monday is the day when our new courses start and we have to have the game and all the other reports and stuff sent in by Wednesday at the latest. It's hard to focus on anything really, when my mind is flying like this, I just can't concentrate on the slightest thing... also I am worried sick, not only for the friends of the family that I got news about yesterday, but worried sick because I seem to have lost my touch with writing. There's just nothing there, nothing at all, no ideas, no stories, no poems, there's nothing, everything I write sounds completely off... perhaps the first real case of writer's block that I've ever really experienced. It's not so much the time that's passed as that I have to force it, and when I do I'm not happy with how it sounds. I wonder to myself, when did I become so critical of my own things? I keep returning to the thought that rewriting one of my old novels for publishing purposes would be the best way to go about it. The poetry is fine, or theoretically at least. I can always force at least a couple of lines of that... but I miss prose, and I miss being so into it that everything else ceases to exist. Is this what happens when your focus is relocated to the visual media? Why in that case, has it never affected me this way before? The way it used to be, I used to find novelling a necessary escape, and a relief, even, from the real world, but now it just feels like it's another burden, and not even writing stories seems to be fun anymore.


My bet is that once the stress is lowered, around some time next week, and I get installed into my new place, the juices will start flowing and I really hope that is what's going to happen. We'll see. I don't really have the time to think very much about it (which probably is a sign of stress itself).


Either way, even writing these ranting entries at least keeps the language working, so you might be looking at a lot of these posts for a while, but it doesn't really matter since I'm not really writing them for your sake (you'll have to excuse me) and therefore you don't have to bother reading them. Just keep an eye out for some real material once that gets up here again.


Too much things on my mind...


Something cool though is that two of the promotional assignments I made for the game got chosen to represent it. Surprising but happily surprising. 


I really should be writing the log book or the report rather than this.
POET IN THE JAR

Clashes & Crashes

You were intimidated when your thoughts strayed

And decided to come and go as they wish

You tried to clear your mind,

but everything clashed, in violence

Everything crashed

And you couldn't control the images flashing by

Or choose what they'd remind you of

The faint nuances in that old song
That could only be read by you
They could only be read by you

They said it would take a while,
to clear your thoughts
That it would take a couple of battles
To win the war
You don't think they've ever been in your mind
Or known what it's like

Isn't it glorious to be misunderstood
And alone in your pain
Isn't it more grand and epic that way
Isn't it?
The way you've shielded yourself
And consciously torn away from everything

Everything that crashed

Time Flies

Tomorrow is Monday again, and there's loads of stuff coming up. It feels like time really flies by right now. On Wednesday there's the graphics session after school followed by friends performing at the pub. Thursday is the deadline for our individual assignments and Friday the unofficial deadline for the game. Saturday I'll be driving home to attend a dinner with old friends and Sunday I might visit my niece. By the end of this week it'll already be March 13th which is fucking halfway to April. May will be here sooner than I'll know, and I'll be arranging to move out, and it'll already be halfway to summer. Finally...


I managed to trade myself a working weekend in two weeks and that'll hopefully earn me a little extra money. I'll need it if I'm going to have money for the summer and to be able to do some of those things that I'd really wanna do. A bit of bad timing, perhaps, cause it's the last weekend before our final presentation, but hopefully it won't affect school. We'll see about that.


It's been a good weekend otherwise, had a nice time partying and whatnot, being around friends and people from our year. It's different here, much better and more fun than last time I studied when I didn't have time or took the effort to hang out with anyone really. I'm sure my years here will turn out awesome. And hopefully this happy sort of mood will follow me into the rest of the week, cause I know what I'm like and that my mood usually changes more often than I breathe, but hey, let's hope for it, anyhow.


I have a few ideas for that writing competition by now and think I can make something of it, but still haven't decided. The deadline isn't until May so I've still got time to crack that one.


Oh and I hope the Dark Tower will be kept standing.
POET IN THE happee JAR

Artificial Light

I'm listening to Shinedown and thinking about things, just got off the phone with Mum. She always manages to make me feel better about things. I had a rather weird headache attack earlier that freaked me out a little bit, but it's all settled down by now. I guess it was a stress thing. Stressing out about things that I don't even need to stress out about, really. I guess I just need to get it through my thick head what my priorities are actually about, and, maybe even more importantly, what they're not about.


Even the man in the moon disappeared, somewhere in the stratosphere...

I try pretty hard telling myself that I'm not affected by the long winter here, but it's getting pretty unbearable. I'm so tired of the cold, of the snow and ice, of the darkness. The sun isn't even out in the day, it's just cloudy and gray, gray, gray. I was thinking maybe to go to a solarium this week or the next, just to get some artificial light and trick my body into thinking it's summer, or something. I've heard spring this year is supposed to begin on March the fifth. I can live with that (if the weather people should happen to be right, for once). And again it is confirmed that I'd rather not spend the winters here in the future, whenever that future might be.


Since it turns out I could get that funding I applied for, I found myself buying the next novel in the Dark Tower series. I'm currently reading Song of Susannah. It's nice to have a novel to read again, and something to fall back on that isn't writing, or games.


Speaking of writing I found a local writing contest I really want to enter, but I'm not sure with what. I'd prefer to enter with some new material, maybe a short story or something. But I think you can submit more than one piece, so I might submit some poetry as well. But I can't really focus on that just yet, as long as we're still doing the game project.


I really gotta kick that up again soon though.
POET IN THE JAR

Delicate

Do you know how many times I thought I'd just let the car crash
Into the side of the mountain on the other side of that rail
Or how many times I stared into the sea
Wishing it would swallow me
Did you ever consider how much the sea at night
resembles the sky
Just without the stars
Just darker
Vaster

Inviting you

Do you know how tempting it is to listen to the voices
The silent ones, that seem to beckon you
Circling you like vultures that feed on desperation
Every drawn symbol on the gray surface,
disappearing on you

Do you know what it's like

Do you know that someone died that day
And how unbearable grief can be
When that someone was part of you
And had become you
And taken over you

Do you know how many times I had the thought
That it would be so much easier to end it
How many times I wanted to
How many times I tried

Do you know how much it scares me that I did
Do you know how relieved I am, that I didn't
Do you know just how much I rely on you
How delicately I have faith in you
How fragile you are

How I love you

How I love you

Delicately

Jackpot

So, it turned out that I did get that apartment, and I'm moving May 1st, at the latest. If someone's willing to take my dorm room earlier than that, I'll also be able to move earlier, since the new place is available from March 1st. I gave it some thought, and realized that it'll be the sixth time I move in five years. Restless? Not at all. I'm looking forward to it though, since I feel like I could use some change of scenery. And this place, in all its tinyness, is starting to make me wary. It works fine for a while, but if like me you're used to more space, it feels pretty claustrophobic after a while.
I went to the new place a few days ago to check it out, and it really spoke to me. I think I'll enjoy it there. I'm going to the landlord tomorrow to sign the contract, and then it will feel a lot more real, all of a sudden. I'll ask Mum to start putting boxes away already.


Other than that I haven't been doing much besides working with the game project for school, and I haven't had energy to do much else. I've applied for some job in Norway over the summer, hoping I could go there, work in some nice hotel or something, and get to see a new place with new faces and make money at the same time. There are tons of things I'd need to finance, mostly travelling and perhaps fixing up some old tattoos, but it doesn't seem possible at the time. If I land a job in Norway or not, I hope I can get something at all. Finances for the summer will be tough, otherwise.


Off to the world of laundry and games now, until something more creative comes along.
POET IN THE JAR

Modification

No, I'm not here to change man

For I have no desire to be changed

And made into something I never was

Made into a product of mind

That perhaps never was in existence

No, I'm not here for modification

There was a transparency in my words

Although I'd never want to be transformed

There's so many things I'd alter

Should I have the chance

Which is the greater one of us

When both of us wants the other to change

You said you fell in love with perfection

I'm not perfect, in any way

I'm aware of my own selfishness

I thought I'd use these years to dream

Of simplicity, and completion

When we can complete eachother

Without depleting eachother

I'll be at ease

I'll be at ease

Environmental

I just applied for a slightly bigger apartment, crossing my fingers that I'll get it. Somehow I have the feeling that it's exactly what I need, but then again I've moved every time I've gotten this feeling of restlessness. If not else, it's a temporary change of environment that'll hopefully make me feel more at ease with things. The cats sure would need some more space, and so do I... That's really the only problem with this place; that it feels like it's so small that the walls are closing in on me. This apartment is twice as big so it should help. It's also more expensive, but I'm hoping to get that apartment funding that I can hopefully get now that I've paid everything back of the old one I had; and in that case it'll actually be even more cheap than where I live now. We'll see when the landlord calls on Monday, I want to see the place for my own eyes before I accept it, as well as talk it over with Mom.
Well, this made me even more disinclined to clean this place.
Off for decadence now (the kind where you ignore the dishes)
POET IN THE JAR

Twigs

Do the beautiful ones stay awake at night
Do they starve like us
Do they bleed
Where are their thoughts
Are they ever distracted
Do they feel

Beautiful ones, do you ever get sick
Do you ever dwell
Do you have your own version
Of personal hell
Is there any depth
Are you just a shell
Beautiful ones,
Magic tricks

Do the beautiful ones fade
In comparison to us
As they grow old
The beautiful ones
Do they ever mourn
Do they ever worry
Were they all born with sixth senses

Do the beautiful ones stay awake at night

Do they starve like us

Do they bleed

Where are their thoughts

Are they ever distracted

Do they feel

Beautiful ones, are you ever sick

Do you ever dwell

Do you have your own version

Of personal hell

Is there any depth

Are you just a shell

Beautiful ones,

Magic tricks

Will you always be the beautiful ones

Even when age and life has taken its toll

Will you forgive us for tearing you

Unable to bear something so pure

And divine

Will you always be the beautiful ones

Even when we've broken your twigs

And you know there won't be any spring

This year

Beautiful ones, are you always beautiful

Do you ever dwell

Do you have your own version

Of personal hell

Is there any depth

Are you just a shell

Beautiful ones,

Magic tricks

 

You're going to have to forgive us

I'll struggle with the same ordeal

Why is it we can't keep the pure

And let it be free and wild

Why is it we have to enclose it in cages

Or make sure that it dies

And how is it we'll never run out of excuses

Reasons why it had to be done

Why we had to salvage

The beautiful ones

Beautiful ones

Beautiful ones

Daytimers

You've become a representative of hypocrisy
The same ideals that you used to despise
You've been blinded by the temporary
Until everything's been erased
What about all the dreams
And all the thoughts
All your takes on life

And yet you're quick to criticize others
Who didn't fall through with their youth
Who left their old grand plans for dead
You call them imperfect
You're the greatest cynic of all
At the end of the day,
Who was it who discarded their dreams

And you said you'd never turn into one of them
You'd never become proud of the plain
Even the ordinary would be extraordinary
In your world

And everyone would know your name

What did you settle for
The same routines you avoided
And your nocturnal mind traded away
You've become one of the daytimers
Just like every other cog in the system

Forget the times you used to read Lovecraft
And cherish his dark imagery as art
Forget the times you were an individual
That hadn't yet been corrupted
By the moment

Live for the day, you used to say
And now your words don't mean anything anymore
No promises are meaningful
When you decide to desert them
I realize that life changes
But there's a core to things
That shouldn't shift

Yours did
But I won't be warped
Even when there's changes
That I haven't predicted
My mind is different from yours
I won't be warped

Because I'll still remember
Who I used to be
And what I used to read
And whenever those changes
Are about to hit me
I'll still cherish
The same imagery
As before

Horrifics

Listening to Shinedown and trying to be poetic, which doesn't seem to work. My mind is entirely blank. I wonder if that's what happens when you get a couple of days away from school for once. We've studied so much lately that I barely know what to do with a day that I don't have to study, and still I seem to be bored by virtually anything. But what the hell, some music and some writing always helps, and if my mind should keep being blank maybe I should novel rather than keep at it on the poetry side.
Other than that I'm looking forward to Saturday when we're having a back-to-school-party and I plan on getting as drunk as I can possibly get without the whole passing-out-part or the black-holes-where-the-memories-should-be-part. I was tempted to drink tonight but then passed. I've been in such a weird mood all day, pretty depressed for some reason or other, and I wouldn't wanna make it worse. Now I'm eating pineapple directly from the can and trying to withstand the horrific, I'm serious, the horrific meows that Zelda's making. I've booked her an appointment to get sterilized, but since she just entered her heat period thingy apparently we have to wait around a month... and that means there'll be no sleep for me at night for a couple of weeks. It's been a single day and I'm already fucking annoyed.
New course starts on Monday and we'll be doing our first game project, some random game in 2D, it'll be nice. Though with my luck I'll end up in a fucked up group with a fucked up game idea thanks to the designers, no, wait, I'm supposed to try and look at things brightly and sunnily. With my luck, that I make myself, like all the greats do; I'll end up in an awesome group with an awesome game idea. Wish me luck (that I'm supposed to make).

Me and Karo have taken up our poetry project again, and found someone to do the proofreading and stuff for us, so now we just have to find a good way to get it published and most easily available. There are a few alternatives so far. Time to start thinking about an appropriate title, since we seem to have forgotten the suggestions we brought up last time. There's a Swedish site that I know is reliable and good, I'm thinking about possibly putting my novels up there eventually while waiting for that big break or whatever.


I'm still as cynical as ever, as DJ pointed out, but at least things are looking a little up. I just gotta remember that they are and not fall into the same old shit that I used to.
POET IN THE BLANK, YET PONDERING JAR

Whispers

We whispered in the darkness
Does it matter who whispered first
The words still stood out like screams
When written in the night
Like fragile promises,
Despite self-preservation
Despite everything I had taught myself
And everything life taught me
About repossession

You said it was possibe to be reinvented
That I don't have to be limited by old designs
Was that part of your whisper
Inbetween the lines
Or was I just reading lips
Searching for invisible words

We whispered in the darkness
As fleeting shadows on the wall
After the lights had gone out

Will you still be here when I wake
And will you be the same
Remaining unchanged
In the silence, in the night
When the lights have gone out

Will you still whisper to me in the darkness

Silk, Oblivious

You were more appealing before your insight
When it was more important what you saw,
than how you appeared
Now you've framed your eyes perfectly
With charcoal and straightened hair
And to someone who was oblivious
Who didn't know what you used to be like
To someone who didn't know you
You'd be perfect

Is there anything left in those eyes
And are they still amazed at what they see
Is the world more beautiful dressed in silk
Than plainly, like you used to
When there were still strokes of paint
Across your face

Of course I know nothing of your pain
And nothing of what goes through your mind
All I'm implying is you were more appealing
Before your insight
Before you had to try so hard
You don't have to try so hard

Circle of Pretense

You think you're living in a dream, when you aren't
And it's so obvious to me, you're so transparent, and I see
I see everything that you worked so hard to hide
I've seen everything from the inside
And I was there when it all happened
You'll always deny you were thrown off track
How long will denial be there to have your back
It'll surely replace me you see
If you ever counted on me

What does it take to force that smile and that lie
To live in the middle of makebelieve
Maybe I'd accept it if you chose it
See, I live for dreams
But they're a different kind
Well anything goes as long as you survive
If surviving is all there is to life
Can you tell?

I don't mean to ruin your idea of things
Or bring this up after all this time
But it amazes me, how you pretend
All the energy that goes to your image of perfection
When there's no such thing as perfection
Will you be happy living in your bubble
In your perfect little world
Until it cracks
Until it's scratched
And you'll be like a record on repeat
And it's stuck on the same old song
Glitching and scraping

And I have no desire to return, no desire to go back
What would there be left for me, just a black hole
And thousands of reminders
Remember why you made that bubble
Remember that you did it because of that day
And of that trespass, of that betrayal
What hand did I have in it,
Except I happened to be in the way

And everyone covers for you
And everyone's friends with you
And everyone cowers behind you
Afraid that someone might break that bubble
Afraid that someone might blow your cover
They all said they were with me but what happened to that
Now they're all part of the same circle of pretense
And I'm left to myself and to my own defense
Cause if your bubble bursts, so will theirs
They might have to wake up and realize they're in the real world

The real world is much darker than you'd want to know
And that's the reason you're putting on this show
But what's the occasion, for this illusion
I'd rather hate truth than live in a lie
And in the end I'll be the one who can look back
Without regretting things

See I decided to make life about new memories
Rather than dwelling on the old ones
And suddenly life seems to go a little more my way
When I consciously let it
You'll still be blind
While the pain kills you from inside

I'd rather have the truth
Than live like you

Eye Condition

Do you remember what it was like
When you were younger and less apathic
Before everything gradually lost color
Before things seemed so fleeting
And meaningless

Do you remember that you were stained
By age and by the same repeating days
That you slowly forgot how to breathe

Do you remember that you put up with things
And that you weren't always like this
That you'd do everything you hated
Lacking any other choice
While waiting for another life
That existed in your dreams

Do you remember how anxious you were
At the end of every dull day
You never claimed to be a genious
But nothing new would ever happen
And you grew tired of when things repeated themselves
When the tired old faces never changed

Do you remember how a few simple things made you last
Like scribbling words and listening to the saddest songs
Do you remember that opening your eyes took the greatest effort
And that once you'd opened them you wouldn't close them again
Afraid you might die while sleeping and unaware
Afraid that you'd die before loving to live

Do you remember how you fleed to pain
That the sensation made you alive again
It's true that it was temporary
But it was better than the angst
And it led your thoughts away

Did you forget what it was like
At the darkest and furthest edge of the world
Not necessarily real other than in your mind
But your thoughts was all you knew as truth
And you were tired of lying
Tired of the world's charades

Do you remember what it was like
When you had to put a mask on to the world
And did you notice that there's still flecks of it on your skin
To cover half your face and one of your eyes

Do you remember that no one seemed to understand
And that you wouldn't let anyone close enough to try
It was easier that way, or so it seemed
So it seemed to the voices in your mind

And now it's invisible for anyone who glances at you
At first sight you seem to be undamaged
Some might even say you were at ease with life
Some might even say you seem to love life

You've tried to wash the remaining flecks from your face
And you've tried to see clearly with only one eye
Imagining everyone else was blind
You might improve your current condition
And some might even say you were close to perfection

But those few flecks will always stay
And some old things will never change
You just sort them from the newer ones
With the sense of priority you recently acquired
Label them as unimportant to the present
And try to learn how to love life again

Just trying to be alive again

Solutions

How can you be sure you're the one who's mad
Just because you happen to see things differently
When everything's shrouded in clouds of white light
Woven in silk strings and stained golden doorknobs
And the voices from your home whisper to you
From the chimney and the windows and the doors
That all you need to do is run away
Run away to the final solution

Did you see any visions before you knew they were there
Before you were told you weren't allowed to dream
And you weren't allowed to weave yourself a world
Where everything still existed the way it was
You weren't allowed to imagine things differently

How can you be sure you're the one who's mad
Only because your life was shattered once
And the pieces became your safe place,
the place you lived in inside your mind
And every now and then you pick out a shard
And return to it in your heart
Where everything replays like old footage
Except you always know what'll happen

Did you mourn death or did you long for it
As the claws struck down on you
And you were enclosed in the jar
Were you aware of yourself when you were hit
And your sanity left the back door ajar

How can you be sure you're the one who's mad
When you weren't the one to label your mind
And you'll never be able to fully compare
The only thoughts and emotions you'll know
Will always be your own

How can you be sure you're the one who's mad?

POET IN THE JAR
A piece inspired by Chasing Ella, my current novelling project

Alteration

Every word feels like it's already been spoken
And every time I redecorate it looks the same
I'm so keen to try and keep up with alteration
That some things never seem to change
Is this a paradox?
Perhaps

Perhaps it is

I feel like I've been to every place there is
And I know what you'll say before you do
I know we'll soon fall into old routines
How passionately I'll fight with you
Is this a paradox?
Perhaps

Perhaps it is

I'm independent, dependent on you
And I forgot how to fall asleep alone
I'm in a trance, while dancing with you
The confusion is exclusively my own
My own

Are there really little things worthwhile
Does it really matter how I spend my time?
I chose all the meaningful, over the trivial
Still something is missing from my life
Is this a paradox?
Perhaps
Perhaps it is

I'm independent, dependent on you
And I forgot how to fall asleep alone
I'm in a trance, while dancing with you
The confusion is exclusively my own
My own

Do you think of things the way I do?
Which one of us thinks the most?
Will I ever be able to really read you?
Or will I never really know?

I'm independent, dependent on you
The way I always wanted things to be
So why this confusion, entirely my own
Did you also forget how to sleep alone?

I'm not saying anything is perfect
And I'm not saying I'm ready to let go
Or to be dependent
But maybe this time it'll be different
Maybe it'll all be different

And I could take a couple of steps
In the somewhat right direction

Maybe

The Game

I can foresee how you will twist your lies
And show up when you think you're the least expected
Sorry to disappoint you but I had already predicted it
And you've ceased to be as dark and intriguing
As you wanted everyone else to believe

Still every now and then you manage to stab me
With a lucky shot, that you aim at me in spite
Can't say why, when you were the one to deny
Everything that felt even the slightest right
Everything that had to do with me

It's as if you're the one who can't let go of things
When you never lifted a finger to stop it
And as if you just had to kick me one more time
While I was lying down from the force of your punches
I had a feeling you would, I had a couple of hunches

But seriously, isn't it time to give it up and let me heal
Haven't you dealt me enough bruises already
Did you know that last time gave me a concussion
Isn't it time to aim that anger of yours elsewhere to
You were worse to me than I ever was to you

Why is it so hard for you to tell when the game has gone overboard
When you're the only one still enjoying to play
And who said you could decide the game's every fucking rule
That the world would just abide by your every need
Excuse me if I don't pay you that heed

You should have taken me if you wanted me
Instead of standing idly by
And only yourself to blame
When I decided I was out of the game


So you're on your own now, just thought I'd tell
You can sit up late at night with your book of rules
And lose another friend by every morning when you wake
At this rate you'll have lost them all
Before you realize it's too late

Fireflies

You'd think that I'd learn at some point
And that I wouldn't pace back in my tracks
That I wouldn't turn down the same roads
You'd think I learned that,
At some point

What would I have told myself years ago
If I could send a message back through time
And would I care to listen, care to mind
Would it make me change anything
Or would I find myself tiring
And ignore my own advice

I always push it to the limit
I can never turn back in time
I have to chase the fireflies
Although they burn me with their light
I crave the bittersweet desire
To remind me that I'm still alive
I can't resist the heavenly fire
So burn me, burn me, til I die
My smoking, burning firefly

You'd think that I'd know at some point
Enough to not repeat my old mistakes
And not fall into the same traps and graves
You'd think I'd know that,
At some point

What excuses will I lay out to the future me
Will I say that I didn't see the signs
Though they were displayed in bolded lines
What words will I believe, to cover up for things
Mythomania, ensuring
I won't see through my lies


I always push it to the limit
I can never turn back in time
I have to chase the fireflies
Although they burn me with their light
I crave the bittersweet desire
To remind me that I'm still alive
I can't resist the heavenly fire
So burn me, burn me, til I die
My smoking, burning firefly

So maybe I was taught to be indifferent
And survive by aiding selfish needs
Never hope for the dawn
In case disappointment would come
So?

So maybe I was taught to live and pretend
And never be the one to be abandoned
It's better to attack than to defend
In case disappointment would come
So?


I always push it to the limit
I can never turn back in time
I have to chase the fireflies
Although they burn me with their light
I crave the bittersweet desire
To remind me that I'm still alive
I can't resist the heavenly fire
So burn me, burn me, til I die
My smoking, burning firefly

So maybe I wasn't taught like this, but differently
So?
Maybe I don't care how I was taught
Maybe I want to forget what made me
And maybe I want to chase the fireflies again
Just to see what'll happen in the end

I always push it to the limit
I can never turn back in time
I have to chase the fireflies
Although they burn me with their light
I crave the bittersweet desire
To remind me that I'm still alive
I can't resist the heavenly fire
So burn me, burn me, til I die
My smoking, burning firefly

POET IN THE JAR

Sculptures

Did you believe I was a written page
Ready to be read, laid out for your understanding
That you'd grasp everything right away
As if I was mathematics, as if I was formulas
That could be calculated
With all the rights and wrongs
That I possess

Did you believe I was entirely blank
And that anyone was free to sculpt me
From the block of marble
That I looked out through shiny eyes
That just had been made
I'm neither, I'm none
I'm half-created,
I'm half-done
And I can't predict myself
And I can't take care of myself
And I prefer myself when I'm decadent

And I prefer myself when I don't care

I can't go back and unwrite myself
Or unsculpt what was sculpted by others
When I didn't control my own world
And I can't predict what'll happen with the brush
With the typewriter and the ink
I can't predict what I'm going to feel or think

And you can't undo all your thoughts
All your words, all that you felt
That they cut your fingers while you knelt
So you should be exactly like me
And your story is as untouched
Most of it's a story to be

But you never begin on an empty page
And you never calculate it like mathematics
It's unpredictable, and unstable
And steered by many hands
At the rodder

And it's a flying ship in turbulence we crew
And it can sail through air and on the sea
Sometimes with, sometimes without you
Sometimes with, sometimes without me
And this rickety ship is life

And the serpent in the ocean is almost death
But only almost, with all the pretty gems it swallowed
Only almost, as it allows for our touch
Only almost, as we saw it die

Did you believe everything was mathematics
Did you believe that you were free from dreams
When I have seen you sleep
And you have the nightmares too
Even if you don't remember them
When you awake

POET IN THE JAR

Frozen Flower

I'm a little bit like a frozen flower
Requiring time and warmth to defrost
Waiting to open for the sun
Like a frozen flower
In the parking lot

I'm a little bit like a frozen flower
I'd rather you didn't pick me
With my roots intact
And plant me in a pot
On your window sill

I'm a little bit like a frozen flower
That always wanted to be a bird
I'd rather you tore me off at the stem
And let me drop from your balcony
And I'd pretend to fly
And be free

Exceptions

And when the frost ceases to be
It won't know what became of us
And the footprints we left in the grass
It won't remember you, or your dreams
And the things you've seen
What you and I have been

When the frost ceases to be
And turns into dew drops
It'll bleed under our feet, in the grass
And we'll see our faces in the dew
But it won't recognize me, or you

When the frost ceases to be
And the glittering pearls are silent
There is no sound when you walk
Across the grass
When the frost ceases to be
To make way for something new
It seems to forget me
But trust me

It doesn't make exceptions for you

Rorschach Test

These numbers on my hands
Do they say anything to you?
Or are they just markers
Reminders, like that little red string
Tied around your finger

And these letters, on my wrist
Is there a message somewhere
Hidden, that I failed to see
That used to mean something else to me
Are they still just letters?
Like written images in the wind

I really don't want to remember
Why did you have to remind me
And write these figures on my skin
I don't remember anything
Anything

What do these eyes tell you
They look different to me
In the glass of the mirror
And are these wings really wings
Or broken dreams
For decoration only

What did you want to symbolize
When you drew these lines
Can I paint them over
Will they bleach with time
For decoration, only

I really don't want to remember
Why did you have to remind me
And write these figures on my skin
I don't remember anything
Anything

What's that taste again
Taste of a falling heart
Falling in the darkness
But the darkness is just figures in ink
So many that they're sprayed together
Into one single rorschach test
What does it tell you
These numbers
These letters

Are they still just figures?

I now remember everything
Why did you have to remind me
And write these figures on my skin
Soaking me in my every sin
I remember everything
Everything

Sheesha

Doesn't all of it disappear
When the smoke parts from your lips
And forms circles in the air
With your fingers
Doesn't all of it go away?

When you become your own
More of a person you'd want to be
Nothing will trouble you
And you find yourself thinking deep thoughts
About life and yourself and everything

Although you can't put it in words to say
You know you found the answers
You were looking for
When the smoke parts from your lips
And the illusion is completed
The illusion that is the truth

Is it strange to long for another round
To pass the sheesha, from hand to hand
When it gives you a few hours of freedom
A few hours of liberation
To be carefree

Doesn't all of it go away?

And aren't you relieved?
So don't judge me
Until you've been me

Emotion In The Tea

What if I was exhausted and wanted to sleep
But my entire life would spin before my eyes
Keeping me awake, and turned into a lie
All the details that kept me alive

What if the pain sort of healed me
And the darkness lit my way
Would you understand me
Or would you step down again
And regret me, regret us

What if I used to have so much to give
So much love and so much heart
So beautifully painful, it tore me apart
And now I'm cut open for anyone's share

What happened to what was exclusively yours
When I needed you, and there was only emptiness
And there was a new kind of pain, that didn't heal
And a kind of darkness that I'd never felt

Smuggle emotion into my tea
The only way you'll get to me
I'm cut open and given away
But it'll never be the same
It'll never be the same

Drunken Conversation

What were you doing in my drunken conversation
Stirring me to tears that seemed completely irrelevant
To everyone else
I thought I told you I had shunned you out
And that you weren't welcome, inside my head
I thought I told you it would pass with time
And you wouldn't make these appearances
In my mind

What were you doing, interrupting my life
The one I always said I dreamed of
Maybe in my dreams it wasn't this decadent
But what is the difference

Except that you were a part of this dream once
And now you're only part of nightmares
And you made me lose faith in everything
And you made me suspicious towards everyone
And I can let them close but I can't let them catch me

What were you doing, with the drunken me
In my drunken conversation
I never asked for you to come.

Rain & Snow

It's like when the rain washes the snow away
And forgets when it used to sparkle in the night
And how it fell against the artificial light
There'll be no falling flakes anymore
When the rain comes,
When the rain comes

And I cherish the rain
And everything it takes away
Every bitter drop of pain
And I understand you
For embracing the gain
For standing still in the rain
I don't blame you

When you've rusted, will you remember me
That I never left my marks on you
Instead I unfroze and sugarcoated you
There'll be no one to have your back anymore
When the rain's done,
When the rain's done

And I cherish the rain
And everything it takes away
Every bitter drop of pain
And I understand you
For embracing the gain
For standing still in the rain
I don't blame you

But when you look out through your window pane
And let your fingers trickle with the rain
When you've seen the sun hit the drops and then
Create a rainbow
Remember that once, it used to snow
We used to snow

Purple Sky

When did lightning strike
Down from the purple sky
When was I electrified
When did all my honest words
Become bubbles and secrets
When was I driven to hide

Away from the world
And shielded and safe
Detached from things
Cradled to sleep
Cradled by the void
 

When did I hear thunder
And when did the storms stir
When did I cross these plains
To no man's land
Building castles,
Castles of sand

Away from the world
And shielded and safe
Detached from things
Cradled to sleep
Cradled by the void

I held a mirror to the world
To face my own reflection
What insights were there
That was me
What mirage was there
That was you
That was you

And then lightning struck
Down from the purple sky
And I was electrified
And I became a secret
That no one would ever know
Wastelands, wastelands
Where the wind will always blow

Away from the world
And away from the mirror
Away from the words
And I became a secret
And I drove myself to hide
Down, down, down
From the purple sky

Insomnia Child

We're supposed to be young
Breathtaking and immortal
So swift that we'd dissolve
Under touch
Angelic, flawless
Perfected
Blooming

The sun goes down, down
And colors the sky
Right before the stars appear
With all the questions about life
Every how and why
Every lie

Only you were the goddess
And my fingers trembled
Over your skin, your hair
What must you think of me
I'm not that young
I'm only mortal
As you can see

The sun goes down, down
And colors the sky
Right before the stars appear
With all the questions about life
Every how and why
Every lie

Don't you know that we're all sinners
We're all free and decadent minds
What good is insomnia
Except it bought me time
And still I'm sleepless again
And I've put you on the piedestal
Just like back then
I've made you divine, my friend

The sun goes down, down
And colors the sky
Right before the stars appear
With all the questions about life
Every how and why
Every lie

Am I still young if I'm aged in mind
Am I still fearless when your fear is mine
When my trembling fingers no longer reach you
When you dissolve, under touch
So you were angelic, then
At least I know that much

The sun goes down, down
And colors the sky
Right before the stars appear
With all the questions about life
Every how and why
Every lie

The sun goes down, down
Insomnia child
Right with all the remaining fear
With all the questions about life
You will always be wild
You will always be a lie
And after all the truth is just a teaser

Midnight Walks

And taking midnight walks calms down the thoughts in your head, stirring and screaming as always; calms them down if only for a while. It smells of fallen leaves, smells of long days outdoors, smells of an innocence that went lost a long time ago. And you aim your old sneaker shoe at the piles of leaves and for a moment you remember what it was like, remember when the little things used to mean everything.
When the little things used to mean the world.
Nowadays it's dark when you are out, and you wander your routes to distract yourself from the feeling that the walls are closing in on you, that you will suffocate if you stay but a minute longer in this room. Nowadays you look up at the stars and you don't imagine space travel or different worlds with different life than here, you look up at the stars and you feel that you are meaningless. How everything is meaningless. Where in the picture does the little things come in? How can little things be meaningful? You gave meaning to all the details so you wouldn't have to look at the whole picture, where nothing mattered and where your entire life was molded by chance. How does that feel? Can you feel that knife of cold stabbing through your heart?
It smells like childhood, it smells like October, it's not yet full moon but you can see the brightest star of the sky and maybe, if you really tried, you could imagine it with orbits of planets surrounding it, planets and places and worlds where things were different from here, where maybe there were people who didn't fuck everything up, where maybe things were pretty much like here but at the same time pretty much fucking different. Even so, what would it matter when we'd never know of that world, never know of those places, and even if they existed they would mainly be a creation of your own mind, in order to tell yourself there are other worlds than these. Better worlds than these.
Maybe then you wouldn't find yourself where you don't want to be, maybe then you wouldn't get hurt, maybe then you wouldn't let yourself be used, maybe then you wouldn't be so decadent, maybe if there was a hope for something else, someplace else, someone else, then maybe.
Then maybe what?
There'll always be another maybe, another what-if, another if-only; and you'll keep backtracking your life without ever moving forward and you'll be scared of dying though you're aware you can't affect it. And every night you'll be sleepless, and every other night you'll go for another one of those walks, and every now and then you'll feel like the little things actually matter while other times it'll all be meaningless. And you will change like the seasons of the year, and still you'll always stay the same; cause everything you could never predict will make changes that never seem apparent to you while all the changes you wanted to make will be left alone and you'll swirl further down the spiral of decay, the spiral of decadence, the spiral of youth. One time things won't matter, two time things won't matter, you'll tell yourself you're only in it for the sex while all you wanted was to fall asleep in someone's arms without any demands. You'll tell yourself you only drink because you want to socialize and then you'll be looking at the stars alone over an emptied bottle of wine and you'll wonder why there's salt on your cheeks and why someone wiped the smile off your face. You'll quit smoking a thousand times and then still light one more up when you're standing on the balcony and trying to see if anyone else is awake, if anyone else is up at this hour, just so you could see a sign of life, just so you could feel you weren't the only one who couldn't sleep because you were fucking paranoid.
Does it still smell like childhood?
Does it still smell like long days outdoors building tree houses and drinking warm cocoa when you came back in?
Does it still smell like when you used to play in the woods and for once you could be who you wanted to be, you could forget about the bullies in school and that they teased you because you happened to like books; you could make yourself a makebelieve world and you could be anyone at all, anyone you wanted?
The thoughts in your head are calmed down if only for a while, and then they stir again; and then they scream to you louder than they ever did and speak to you in voices from your past. And you wonder if there was ever any innocence, even as you were young, even as you remember that time you fell down from the cliff in the forest and you fell down onto the sharp rocks below and the fall felt eternal and when you lay there you lost your breath and you saw stars, not the kind of stars you'd see in the sky but red and green stars dancing before your eyes, and everything seems to become darker even though it's in the bright of day, and you have no thoughts or feelings, just a numbness spreading through your body before it hits you that you were lucky, I'll be damned, you were lucky. And you're not bleeding, although tomorrow you will find bruises all over your body and feel like you had been pulled back from something close to death, something close to dying; words you'd never use to describe it then but that suddenly seem real and fucking true now that you think about it.
And you take midnight walks to shake it off, every bad decision you ever made, everyone who fucked with your head and everyone who broke through to you; everytime you took pills, everytime you took out the needle, everytime you ripped the skin off your lips until they bled, everytime you imagined you were happy while you knew you weren't, every time, every time, every time.
You take midnight walks and at least now it's in another place and at least this time there's someone to walk with you and at least this time you don't feel quite as lonely.
At least until the walls close in on you again.
POET IN THE JAR

In The End

It's all easy when you're thinking it over
And you talk it over, logically, sensibly
With the voices in your head
It's all easy, when it's in theory
Easy as can possibly be

Is it still true, the logic in your mind
When it's given you up,
Time after time
What is there to care about
What is there to find
It won't make a difference
Not in the end

In the long run, you think you've done yourself a favor
That you've analyzed things to break your fall
That knowing what'll happen will ease the pain
And by knowing what's been
It won't happen again
Will it matter in the end
When you never listened

Is it still true, the logic in your mind
When it's given you up,
Time after time
What is there to care about
What is there to find
It won't make a difference
Not in the end

It's not as easy as you made it out to be
Not everything can be broken down
And looked at, piece by piece
It's all fucking complicated
The way things are with me
And it has to shine through
Can't you see?
You've got it too

You can't tell yourself what's more true
Or tell yourself what you should want or need
When it comes down to it you'll still have forgotten
And you'll go against yourself again
Mistakes on repeat
Mistakes with me

If mistake is the word
If decadence doesn't cut it
If my mind can't win me over

The Kite Flyer

I keep them butterflies in a jar
In a glass jar with a solid lid
In a glass jar in a cupboard
In a cupboard that I lock
I pity them, in shock
They're parts of me
Them butterflies

Every now and then I let them stretch their wings
Let them flutter and discover things
Until they reach the end of the string
That's when I stop them
And reel them back in
I'm their kite flyer

I feed them butterflies from a vial
A glass vial with a glass cork
A glass vial on a velvet pillow
A pillow in a chest
Beating, at best
They're shards of me
Them butterflies

Every now and then they pull at their strings
Wanting to let go of things
Wanting to fly on fragile wings
That's when I stop them
And reel them back in
I'm their kite flyer

But occasionally it happens I'm not in control
I become the butterflies, become the tow
And disappear among the crows
Black, black wings
I'm the kite
Not the kite flyer
The kite flyer was a lie

What happens is I'm flown by you
And you're the one to pull my strings
Steer me away from everything
Everything I ever wanted to see
When I struggle the most to be free
That's when you reel me in
And put an end to me

I'm kept in your glass jar
In your cupboard
With the glass vial
On the velvet pillow
That's my drug
Vaporize me
I'll never fly
Pin me here already
I'll make it worth your while
I'm not the kite flyer
The kite flyer was a lie

Skeletons

What drives me to do this
To constantly change
Drift around sleepless
Wander about restless
To be uncertain about everything
To doubt why I laugh
To doubt why I cry
Who am I
Who am I

Surely you couldn't have done this
Surely it couldn't have gone that deep
What happened to me happens to them all
And would have disturbed anyone's sleep
It couldn't have been you
It should have been done to you

Why do I tell myself I left you behind
That everything's buried deep and forgotten
I've been told I'm not supposed to remember
I dug you down with the skeletons in my closet
Dug you down where the treasure was not
Now there's only bones
Where X marks the spot
I buried you inside my head
And grieved it all
Before you were dead

I'm not expected to believe in your ghost
Not supposed to let you haunt me, still
Most days go on without you
Until there's a shadow
On the window sill

Suddenly, you're there again
In every voice, every letter
Every scribbled word
Suddenly, you're there again
In my eyes and in my tears
In every song unsung
Unheard

What pushes me to drift like this
Surely it couldn't have been you
Surely you didn't cut me that deep
Surely they all told the truth
And my restlessness can't be blamed on you

In fact I never buried you
Although I grieved you many times
And not remembering would be a lie
But I no longer cherish you
Or see you as divine
It wasn't fate what you saw in me
It was chance that happened down the line
And I'll get better sooner or later
If not live then I'll at least survive
And we've got an appointment now
The world and I
So haunt me later
In a couple of years
When I can afford nostalgia
And a couple of tears
Who am I
Who am I
I'm restless
I'm sleepless

And you drove me to this

Damaged Goods

I can't say I'm sorry I hurt you first
When in the end, you hurt me worst
And now I'm damaged goods
This side up, it's labelled
Fragile, it says, on the box

I never wanted to be dependent on you
I'm a free bird, I wanted the world
Now I'm part of the cargo on a derailing train
That will crash in due time
Smashed against the rocks

Did my sins matter
When they were that small
They must have mattered enough for you
To condemn me
But no one's perfect
You were sinful yourself
Makebelieve angelic
Makebelieve free


I can't say that I'm sorry
Or wish we'd never met
That I didn't finish you
Is my one regret
I should have seen it coming
And defended myself with my life
Instead I let you torture me
And now I'm damaged goods

Smashed against the rocks
Damaged goods, in a fragile box

Of Blood And Butterflies

I've never been on the inside before
Never seen everything from this point of view
Never been the one to be careless
The one to end things that weren't there

On the outside, your world will crumble
Changing everything you thought you knew
On the outside, you will stumble
And I will have forgotten you

All of this is a first for me
What for are all these blasting guns
What for is that river of blood, on the floor
Do you bleed?
Was that me?
I'm blank
I've no memory

On the outside, your world will crumble
Changing everything you thought you knew
On the outside, you will stumble
And I will have forgotten you

Did it hurt you when you passed me through
When I was nothing but a ghost to you
Did you see my cracking and faltering smile
Did you even notice it when I died?

On the outside, my world crumbled
Changing everything I thought I knew
On the outside, I stumbled
And I'm less than nothing
Invisible, to you

I guess I needed it to be done to me
The only way to become apathic and free
If you had known I would become you
That I'd do what you did to others like you
Would it have made any difference?
Would it matter to you?

What's your life now
Apart from an illusion
What happened to your dreams
And everything you wanted to be
Did you pursue any of them
Or did they end with me

You'll never leave
You're rooted to the spot
At least I did something
You did not
Good luck with it all
With imagining things got better

On the inside, your world is crumbling
On the inside, you are stumbling
On the outside, you'll pretend
Pretend until the very end

POET IN THE JAR

Lemonade And Skin Peels

Right, time to do another one of those neat little rants I usually do so well. Redecorating my room in order to redecorate my head, as usual; keeping myself busy to keep myself off track. Nothing new in this, nothing new at all, like in the way I will peel off the skin from my lips whenever my mind and heart tells me it can't make it anymore. I drove, and drove, tired of driving, tired of having to be alert, tired of missing turns and running out of gas; drove while my lips bled, and colored my teeth red. This time there was just a bigger wave than usual with the tide, a worse than usual visit to the city I called home for four years, the place I used to think was big and exciting when I was young and the city I used to associate with my grandmother and lemonade and cookies on the porch. I got older, the world moved on, and the associations got replaced with other visions and other memories that cut me through and feel more real. The memory of a lover who left, the memory of an almost-suicide, the memory of sleeplessness and therapy and depression, the memory of friends failing your trust, the memory of an almost-rape and violent thrust. Old, old, old. I'll rather have the lemonade, rather have the cookies, rather run around on the lawn while my grandfather sprays us with water and we laugh; rather have all the warmth and all the bike rides in the summer and that we used to take sticks and pierce through leaves while pretending we were printing ink in books. Instead I have the times I drank, the times we got high, the times you left me, the times you killed me, killed me, killed me.
It would be so much better if I had ceased to feel, ceased to care, if all the voices in my head had shut up, if it had all had at least made me into a convenient vegetable, then I could understand the point of all this madness that came by randomly but felt as if it was the universe's dark side directed against me personally. I wish it would have taught me not to fall in love with hopeless cases, taught me not to be a hopeless case, taught me not to drink so much, taught me not to care, not to think, not to thoughtlessly hook up, not to thoughtlessly fucking bother. No matter how many times you change the place you live the rest'll be there, luring in the background until it can stab you in the back. Even in a new place, full of new faces, there'll be the same drama, the same tension, the same human fucking disaster that's infected everything and everywhere. The difference is what you choose to do with it in the aspects that you still might have any chance to choose, any chance to affect. In Chasing Ella, Jake says to himself, 'I have to believe I am still in control, I have to believe I can still affect things' with the desire to be in control of what is going to happen and what he is going to do but even as conscious as he is about this he fails. We'll all fail. Even if there's no great destiny out there for us, even if you as Maddy describes in the same book only 'could be something', we still can't pick what's going to happen. We can plan perfectly where to live, what to study, where to work, but we can't choose what we're going to feel, and in my eyes that's what we're all down to in the end. Towards the end all you'll ever really be able to know is what YOU know, what YOU saw, what YOU felt. It makes no sense to dwell on what other people think or see or feel, or try to interpret what they mean by things, when you'll still never be able to quite fully figure them out; and still it's what we do, over and over again, in our meetings with others. We analyze and analyze and analyze and never get them figured out and we never get ourselves figured out and so we pay expensive money for some therapist to try and figure us out and do all the hard work for us. But what can they tell you that you don't already know? You can only know what you know. Experience points, my lad, is what it all comes down to in the end.
POET IN THE PONDERING ANARCHY ONLINE-ISH JAR

Middle Of The Storm

Three minutes away from the storm
I close my eyes and wait for the calm
That maybe the heavy winds
Would suddenly cease
Three minutes away from the brink

My heart racing again
And a million mushrooms
Are sung to my ears
And I laugh, I laugh,
I laugh to myself
Three minutes away
From the brink
From everything

Starting with the ladybug
With the baby carrier
On old-fashioned wheels
With the ominous clouds
With that ominous feel
Three minutes away
From the storm

I laugh, I laugh
I laugh to myself
Three minutes away
From the brink
From everything
And a million mushrooms
Are sung to my ears
I laugh to myself

Laughing in the middle of the storm

Piece Of Paper

I hold a piece of folded paper in my hands
Origami, a letter without letters
In the draft from the windows
I blow on this piece of paper
Meaning to give it wings
Let it fly where I never did
And look at the world with my eyes
Look at it all sadly
And shake its little paper head
Until it's hit by rain

And I close my eyes
And see all the places it saw
Feel its fear, surprise, and awe
It's so small, and shivers
New to this world
Already shunned away

I built a field of torn pages from books
That will never be written
And I made roses from the blank sheets
While the ones with words became the streets
You can step on everything I ever wrote
Step on it to see
All the paper that is still
Empty

This is a little piece of origami
My last chance to make it out alive
A little bird, in my shaking hands
Without words
Without a heart
Only a faint and frantic heartbeat
Afraid of the air, the ground
The staring eyes
Of winter

Please, please, fly
Please, don't crash
I need you to live
Little bird, please
Don't die

You're an extension of me
The only way I can explain myself
To myself, in words
Just fly, don't let your heart explode
Just fly, be blank
And let me go

Little bird
Little piece of paper
In my hands

Melancholia (Castle Made Of Sand)

So, you're some kind of hero in your own eyes
Heroic for saving yourself from pain
While everything else corroded, in the rain
Everything that made sense
And mattered

There is a melancholia you can't explain
You are distant, and turn inward again
Remember the sand that you ran through your fingers
Sand to dust
Dreams to rust

Were you scared of dying or did you value life
When someone took your spark away
The reason you ran, while you were in chains
And nothing made sense
Or mattered


There is a melancholia you can't explain
You are distant, and turn inward again
Remember the sand that you ran through your fingers
Sand to dust
Dreams to rust

Why is there silence at the end of a smile
And hints of truth in every lie
And every night, with every dream
You're shivering
Afraid to sleep

There is a melancholia you can't explain
You are distant, and turn inward again
Remember the sand that you ran through your fingers
Sand to dust
Dreams to rust

Castle made of sand

Green Glass Bottles

I wish love came in green glass bottles
Pop it open, and drink with greed
It would grow into a drug, into a rush
An addiction
That you need

I wish passion came with harpsichords
Then all I'd have to do was listen
It'd be effortless, and painless
And finally
I'd glow

Maybe if there was a stock market for things like this
Everything you ever felt, up for trade
Every emotion, bought and sold
All that you were
Slowly to fade

I wish I wasn't dependent on vials
That I didn't tremble when the glass shattered
All the green glass, the coins, the sounds
The unicorn in the merry go round
It all broke down
It ceased to matter

Drink, with greed
Love, in a bottle
All you need
Listen, and glow
It'll all be crumbling
before you know

Like Air

And you just said that we were like air
Empty and swept away by the wind
Please, to places I never knew
To places I never saw
With you, with the wind
With the breeze

And you, you just said we were a whisper
A whisper to fade away once spoken
Please, don't let me break
Don't let me fade

You're a silent rock, a statue
That I thought would provide the answer
Why it was all so difficult, and hard
Why I was drawn to you
Why I was ripped apart

You, you just whispered to me this is meaningless
That I'm chasing shadows that won't go away
Your voice fades out, the last thing I hear
Before I fall asleep from exhaustion

The only way I fall asleep
These days

Just leave me alone
Just leave me alone
And get out of my head
So maybe I can sleep
Without dreaming
Without your face, and voice
In my dreams