ongoing

it’s pure fear in my brain
in my skull
full of open-mouthed terror and no
No no no no no
(mouth opens wide as if to scream but no sound comes out)
it is as if my brain knows not to attach worry to the unchangeable
my brain is so quick to send out the orders
but my body, my body says otherwise
there is nothing and everything specific
the overwhelming state of my life

I smoke and smoke and smoke and cough so hard I puke
there is still no lift, no elevation.

it will fucking pass
it will.

I have to be patient.

1818

a photo of your author, smiling, eight days before my husband died..

If I knew what was to come
what could I change
what could I do
If I knew 5 years ago right now what was to come what would I do.
If I could see this moment right now where I am,
unshowered for days,
sitting outside in a public secret space with my coffee and my weed
the constant anxiety manifesting in different ways now.
I may look calm but I am not.

Everything is so heavy, so fucking heavy.
I could not change a single thing, I know that.

Five years. Five.

I need this time I have needed this time
I need more
time.

(((but where am i?)))

I lose sight, I lose connection
I lose my self

I am unsupervised and there is no corral
no border
no boundaries but the ones I hold to and they are so very shaky
the only (??) difference being that I have become better at holding to them i just*
let go of that terrible, engulfing need
(let go or be dragged.)

or am i just so tired that I cannot summon the effort

I need to think need to believe that this is something I have done that I have wrought within myself
to life, to life.

Salty tears fall; light up, breathe in.
Ex h a l e .

it is all I can do to keep breathing.

*just. as if.

1 june, 2022. perseverating.

text below, written longhand

i would very much like
to exorcise certain memories
i would really very much like
to delete things from my brain
to remove them from my everything
with extreme prejudice.

but would that mean
that would mean
that i did not have the lesson.

it hurts so fucking much because
because you aren’t here for me to say sorry.

and i am so sorry.

812p 22 may 2022

i hate being alone so much.
i hate it hate it hateithateithateit
quiet and alone and lonely and cold even in this heat
cold.
even in this heat the cold strangles my blood
freezing it cold solid cold
i shiver in this heat.

i could have stayed at yours but no.
i am afraid.
the rain, the dark, the aloneness.

you held me in your arms you squeezed me closer
felt the heat bloom from my body setting it afire
holding me closer.
i tangled my fingers in yours
hoping to keep some of you for me
when i go.

i sit in your kitchen, smoking
vibrating in place i cant sit still inside
i don’t know how i appear, manic, most likely
i hate coming to you, needful, needy.
i don’t think i ever feel pity from you, i don’t think
(if i begin to think i won’t let go so lets just not)

i know i am not always like this i know that
but right now i am very much like this and it is hard to be.
much less be around.

i know i am exhausting.
i am so sorry.

741a 3d february 2022

I am feeling crazy this morning.

that in itself isn’t so unusual but this is just

This is so much on top of so much on top of so much please.

I don’t want this I don’t want this it doesn’t help to say I don’t want this until I say it I don’t want this I don’t like this I don’t want this none of it thank you please stop

stop.

1142p 11th december 2021

this late at night
at this time of year
there are some very dark stretches of route nine heading north to home
so dark that i could turn off my headlights

and disappear

there are very few other cars
no lights
i could drift into nothingness
brightness

then black.
Nothing.

the road ahead opens its maw
promising to swallow me whole.
it could be done.
Over.

this void within my chest swells
my brain reels

this is a thing I know, now, filed away.

what do i do now 854a 17 october 2021

my voice, transcript below

I have so much to say to you so much that, um, I just
i keep thinking that

I keep wanting to

I just
I just want to share with you. I just wanna tell you I just want you to see me now. I want i really

and I don’t think you would blame me for where I am. I don’t think anymore that you would blame me for where I am. Because I

depended on you so much

i depended on you so much and
it just took everything away.

you’re
gone.

and everything you did stopped with you.

There’s no one here. To see me doing fuck all.

There’s, there’s no one.

No one to report to.

There’s no one here.

There’s Mojo. He was real happy that
I went to bed at 9:30 and fed him first and got into bed and he came right in with me. And we snuggled all night, got up around six or something for his medicine. And then went back to bed.
Had like 10 hours of sleep sort of

what the fuck am I supposed to do now? what do I do now?

I mean, if I thought there was no way before and then there was but now it’s like everything is used up. I,
i
If I spend the money I have on the car, I will have nothing else.
nothing.
I don’t, I don’t, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now.

Shower, head north. Make more stuff I guess.

1042a 8th august 2021, sunday

I forgive you.
I forgive you for everything.

I did not think it would ever be possible
but in this moment
bells ringing
birds singing
breezy air soft and comforting around me
there is no benefit to questioning any longer
it doesn’t matter

none of the things we said or did to one another matter now
none of the hurtful things, anyway.
you are no longer here to protest and I am too tired to do so any longer.
easier to let go

let go or be dragged.

listen, here: https://recorder.google.com/share/5161f077-5e7b-401b-9b15-565e53ccc52f

(re)possessed

I am sitting on the damp chair (everything is damp)
It is 3:41 in the morning and in the space where my car usually lives there is nothing but a half a piece of paper towel
I am smoking and I am smoking and I am smoking and nothing is going to soothe this I fear
The woman who comes to repossess my car at 3:24 in the morning says, “I don’t want to embarrass you”
I am not embarrassed
I am defeated, again.

She says, “you have your health” I snicker
Do I? Do I.
“You have a roof over your head”
yeah and a house in foreclosure.
“Just call Nissan in the morning” she says, airily.
Just call.
She says this as if it were actually that easy.
Just call Nissan.
I try to explain that it isn’t that easy.
That I have widow brain and I am bipolar.
At the word bipolar she perks up.
“Do you need to call someone? Are you going to be okay.” wanting to absolve herself of further responsibility
The answer to that is obviously no and no. No I am not going to be okay.
No I am not okay.
No I am not okay no I am not embarrassed but I am desperate.
How am I going to get back to sleep.

It is 3:55 in the morning and everything is damp.