http://therescue.invisiblechildren.com

The rain trickles down the side of your face.  Water spots litter the framed glass windows held in front of your face. Giving you clarity; giving you the hindsight that only stained memories could ever retell.  Your eyes close as a plume of smoke escapes from your dirtied lungs.  From the beaten, black,and  bruised muscle that powered your soul, the poison tries to leave your veins into the cold wet air.  Instead, it lingers.  You're addicted.  The pain, the everlasting longing for sweet release.  For just one more taste on your lips. 
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He stood motionless in the hallway.  Body leaned against the wall, stern and undivided in his torment.  There was not a sound and the echoes of silence resonated through the cavern of defeat slowly chipping away at his stone skin.  But he doesn't move.  Synaptic recourse has come to a complete stop but his brain still fires at the speed of sound.  The sound of her voice as it leaked through locked doors.  There were no words, just the audible distinction of cataclysmic collapse.  Alone he stood - across the way - she seemed a million miles away.  Unreachable, unattainable, and unforgiving.  And again, there were no words to speak and the silence that ruminated spoke volumes that would topple the greatest of mountains as they tried to stand tall before you.  Nothing lasts forever, but it wasn't supposed to end like this.  It was never supposed to be like this.  Regret began to rear its ugly head out of the gaping cavity where his heart once lay, hidden deep within a cage of calcium and cartilage.  Protect it, he thought.  Hide him from this hate as it began to ravage his very being.  The blood boiling in his veins still could not move him. 

Utterly motionless. 

The door finally clicks open.  Slowly she emerges - eyes hidden from view.  Bloodshot from the raging catharsis of emotions that rained from them mere moments ago, she could only look down.  And he could only unfortunately do the same.  The strength he preached to his friends, to himself, was nowhere to be found.  He could only look down, ashamed of his actions, ashamed for the way he had treated her.  He brought this on himself, and there was nobody to blame but himself.  He had not been his best self, the person he took an oath to become, to serve as a testament of hope so that nobody would ever have to stand alone in their journey as they traverse through this life of seemingly endless hurdles. 

He hid his love away.  Maybe another day he thought, maybe it'll rise again.  Like night fall, the sun always stood to rise the next day, even when our thoughts had become clouded with the impending storm.  The sun always rose.  And in this most pivotal of ventures, he had no actions left.  He hid the fire that was fueling his desire, his desire to live, to love her again, and again.  And in doing so, he had lost all that he loved within himself as well.  A sympton of this disease, of the loveless life he sought for so long, so that he would stop hurting.  So that the weight of the world would no longer break his already fractured posture. 

Run. Hide. Repeat. 

Always ready to leave, he had no stake in his permanence.  At the first sign of danger he would always slip out the back, through the door he had always kept open with one foot already turned in a direction far from home; because home is where the heart is, and his heart, was nowhere to be found.  He had long buried it so deep that the endless clawing through the earth during the countless sleepless nights could not uncover the treasure that would change the world.  Like Pandora's Box, but instead of the terror and pestilence escaping from the doorways of Hell, a simple melody would resonate.  A song for lovers.  A tune that would tie two broken hearts, mending them to one so that they could beat perfectly in time with each other.

Don't hide your love away.  There's no reason to, no reason to hide what keeps us alive.  We have no reason to hide the heart that keeps us breathing.  One breath at a time, a singular exhale of relief and the frosted condensation of the air escapes into the clear night serves as a reminder that we still have the ground we walk on, no matter how shaky and unstable the journey may become.  The journey into the unknown depths of the "L" word as we no longer begin to define it -- instead, let it redefine us.

Welp.
Moving all morning has got me thinking.

January 2007 - Homeless
February 2007 - Nick's floor, Jarrett's attic, Jamin's floor (6 months, word.)
August 2007 - Rick's couch.
Feburary 2008 - Homeless
March 2008 - Home, is where the heart is, until you get a chance to bury it.
August (15) 2008 - New apt.  A day that will live in infamy ;]
January 2009 - Aunt's house.

Thank you to all my friends who have been there, through the thick, and through the unvariably thin. I owe you everything and one day I am going to pay you all back. This, I promise.

Tonight, my friends, have fun. Be safe.
Celebrate our unfathomable and mortal existence.
Celebrate til our end of days.
Celebrate the lives we live, for we will live them to the best of our ability.

Tonight, we sing like lions.
Bring it the fuck on.

Without reiterating tired rhetoric of religious debate behind the meaning of Christmas, I would like to dive into the spirit of the holidays.  It seems that after the inaugural celebration of witches and associated occultism, we rush headfirst into a jovial praise of spiritual birth and rekindling.  With November here, Thanksgiving is right around the corner.  A time for family to come together and visit those memories we have so readily lain to rest with each passing day.  It seems that life is continually moving at the speed of light; we don't have the time of day to spend with those of which we are closest to.  It seems ironic, the distance that grows between siblings and generations alike as we grow older.  I guess, in the sense that we soon begin to establish our own foundations and families – it makes some sense.  In less than two weeks we are blindsided by this celebration of oversized and over-drugged game-birds where tradition and informality collide.  But what of it? We are so consumed by our commercialist ways, our consumerist ways, that we have devoured the very spirit of the holidays.  Nothing remains but its bare, unidentifiable skeleton.  What we give thanks to, has become watered down to nothing more than the ethereal possessions we place in our lives in order to fool ourselves in believing that we are indeed, happy. 

 

And with the passing of our grace, we are bestowed with yet another diminishing anniversary.  We supposedly commemorate the birth of a great child who has taught us many things.  And we toast to this remembrance with gifts, in allusion to the wise men that traveled across vast countries in order to glance upon our own joyous gift from the heavens above.  But again, the celerity of our existence remains our bane.  We spend our life savings on lavish but vacant gifts.  They are void of the symbols of our appreciation of one another.  Our personal relationships become diffused into impersonal exchanges of materialism. 

 

No spirit.  With this, I will end it by saying that a thoughtful gift can be as easy as a hug or a smile to a stranger, a coworker, friend, or family member who has just been missing their mark this year.  As we move forward into the next, we can provide the strength and guidance that we all need in our lives with something less than a dollar.  And it'll mean so much more.

Bored.
4am.
Messing with typography/flares/filters/echinacea tea/burnt tongue/old Saosin.

An oldie:

 

They always talk about the silver lining.  Like a thread, a silken web strewn across the sky as you look up for the answer.  Maybe that's what you believe it to be at first. Maybe it's the cloud of vapors left by a jet that you seemingly long for -- your ticket out of here.  Out of this place as it exhausts you, pulling you down .. drowning.  That's what all of this feels like.  Gasping for air in a vacuous spatial prison of blue.  That depressing, dreary shade of bleakness with just enough color out of the gray to provide your eyes with the hope they yearn for.  Dark blue. Even in sleep, we drown in our futile attempt to escape.  And we wake only to the gravity suffocating your breaths with the armor you tiredlessly wear over the last haven you seek to protect.  

This is a dream. And in a dream, you can do anything.  But you'll have to ask yourself, in this faux, and utterly depressing reality, who's dream is this?  Is it yours.  Or are you just existing in someone else's.  Not living; merely existing.  A shell of a man, the kind that stands at a funeral procession for his best friend.  Your body stands motionless as the world continues on without you.  Your eyes house blank stares into the distance, again looking for that escape - for that far off horizon to set on you. 

Poor little tin man, still swinging his axe.  As I am sure he longs for a change in his monotonous program.  To break free from the chains of the day that hold him to his unfilling being.  But he never once took advantage of the complexity that lay within his gears.  The mechanisms that power his endless motions, so succinctly cut by an intelligent design that each part of him has a purpose.  The hands that hold his weapon, the elbows that swing to and fro into the chopping block, over and over, hoping for an end.  Hoping that one day he can stop cutting away at the fortress that held his love away from him.  So they would not rust his hinges as the virus of emotions would infect and spread throughout his mainframe. 

Everything's amazing.  We marvel at the technological advances of the day that march us relentlessly into the future.  We have so much to behold, so much to be grateful for.  The ground that we stand on is still here, through thick and thin, we still have this foundation, this base, to build upon.  For when the end of days is near, we can take a step back and appreciate the blood, sweat, and tears that went into our infrastructure, to build a home, for a family.  For our own satisfaction. 

But nobody's happy.  Like horrified lemmings, breeding zombies of men and women.  Their eyes, vacant like the cavity that once housed their souls.  Their smiles, slowly wiped from their faces as their lips seal up and their eyes close when the horrible stench of failure and disappointment decides to rear it's ugly head day in and day out.  Instead, we grow a carapace so thick around ourselves to shield ourselves from the violent sun as it attempts to awaken us with every new day.  Holding in it's hands, a promise of a brighter, better future.  But our skins grow so thick that the warmth can no longer reach the nerve endings hidden under our now armored surface.  The severing of the synapse.  The collapse of the fervor of the soul as it now claws for its last breath before slowly sulking back into hibernation, where it can finally rest. 

Rest up dear child.  The dawn is coming.  We must prepare, to fight again, for our very being.  This world will take it away from us with every chance we get. 

Hold fast hope.

The quiet can scrape all the calm from your bones, but maybe it should.
Maybe we need to be hollowed to get up and grow,and stop fucking around, to kick off our braces and start straightening out.
Let's sift through the static,
to find a simpler sound;
simpler sound than the shit that's clouding our heads now.

We're just another bag of bones for your God to sort.  Soft your body lay in a mess of sheets that you can only call your restless abode.  Paradoxically, your heart and mind are on fire, in constant battle of wrong versus a barely lesser evil which we struggle to rationalize day in and day out.  The web of lies spun around your hopes and dreams until it asphyxiates and lays victim, waiting for the widow maker to execute her instinctual venom only to paralyze and end you.  But she is just doing what she can to survive, as were you; and you tried valiantly at that.  But there are never two winners to any struggle.  And seemingly enough, you'll remain the lesser of the two.  A somber revelation, but one as needed as the cold oxygen that infiltrates your stinging nostrils and escapes into the vacuum of your lungs.  So that you may live, and live on.  The pain, temporary and as vibrant as violence could ever be, lingers for longer than it ever should.  But it's refreshing to say the least; the least in that our monotonous ventures to escape the dreary overcast of days, the pain is a reminder that we are alive. 

And it goes on and on and ..
a vicious cycle ensues.
And as the unforgiving heavens rain down a torrent of hail on your bareback exposed as you lay cowering on your knees -- broken.  Screaming, searching for an answer that you don't even know exists.  Broken, empty hands.  Dirtied by the earth you clawed and clamored for, for anything to hold onto during these trembling times.  Logic and reason is a ghost, leaving your body in a explosive exhale of apathy so that it could fill your veins with the only defense mechanism you could count on.  Steadily, the armor grows in size, in depth, in weight and your knees will begin to crumble under the weight of all the screams for help, for companionship, for virtuous calm that could only be found in a stranger's overdue words of wisdom.  Damage escapes our lungs.  The last volley of signal flares to the outside world, calling to save our souls, as it rips through the cavity housing your abandoned vocal chords. 

And you begin to wilt like a flower who's roots were unfed by the outside world, instead of showered with praises, stood pelted by the stinging reality of an overwhelming pressure to survive.
You shrivel.
You die.
We'll just be another bag of bones for our friends to sort.
Put us back together again.
Again,
and again.

For those of you who actually choose to get me something for some odd reason,
these have been on my to-get list for a while. A little help is always appreciated :P

All sizes: Small. Of course.

http://new.merchnow.com/products/62369

http://www.merchdirect.net/ISurrenderRecords/Four_Year_Strong/Sweatshirts/Team_Up_Zipup?productid=9557&artist=1120

http://www.allinmerch.com/product/HHMINDHOOD

http://new.merchnow.com/products/70528

tuff.

The whole world is waiting for you.

Brooding from two extra-heavy conversations tonight and last, and the continual collapse of the reality I have come to call my own. We talk about the reinvention that we are all due for. The miracle that we are all waiting upon.


It appears, that death, and it's nauseating scent lingers around me, without straying too far, for fear of letting go. I guess, a mirrored existence of my own. The fear of letting go. But I think it's time we did, at least, if I did. Let go of the pain that I held onto for so long as I let it define me. I let it shape and scar me so that I knew and never forgot who I was. But, it's the realization that this will no longer define me.


Que sera, sera. That was ingrained into my cerebellum by my best friend. And it's times like these, in our time of destitude and the rotting stench of death that surrounds us both, that this is the most revelant.


Look up.

Look up and scream.

Scream and let it be known.

The taste of blood as it drips from biting my inner lip, holding back the curses I have for this world, is wiped clean.

The taste of blood and bile as it rips through my gastro-intestinal tracts has finally approached my limits.


The world is waiting for you.

Join me.

I love you.