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From poetry anthology "a quill of midnight oil" - parts one through four. I recorded it all in one take, so it's a bit scuffed.

paranoia

the clock. the clock is ticking. the clock makes a mockery of my wrinkling, disheveled form and i am driven mad by the sound of metal hands turning pushing me forward forward forward.

the fountain drips water - life - essence as rotten and pure as all things must be, and are, and will become. it burns my ears. it screeches my thoughts to a running halt; a rushing oxymoron as i am transposed onto stark white paper jettisoned out from the squeal of ink cartridges. no color feels enough. i am monochrome, monotone, dull, lifeless --- it is a mockery of it, all the same.

i am alone in the house. i am by myself. they could get me. they could take me they could ruin me but i have been ruined, so i fear i should not be afraid. the racing racing screeching whine of a rusty hamster wheel is the only sound that reaches my ears from the cottoning fuzz of my frenzied brain. i am alone. i am by myself. no one to haunt me. no one to listen. none to protect, none to hold. i am but a man at the dining room table storming on keys as if they are the ones who had wronged me but i know better; but, i am not better.

there is no clock. i hear no sound. why did i hear the ticking? where did the ticking come from? why did my ears feel the ticking if nothing is here to tick? what am i doing here, alone, in the panic of a self-imposed 2 AM graveyard shift, with nothing but my most intrusive thoughts for comfort? it's a comfort as effective as a brick to the head for a pillow, but a comfort nonetheless in its painful familiarity.

sometimes i want to cry, knowing that i can prove myself to no one. i could be accused of every wrong in the world and find myself unable to seek counsel, denied the opportunity to self-defend, stripped of all that renders me less-than-whole-but-more-than-empty. it is a pervasive fear, as most of mine are. the kind of dread one cannot escape short of dismantling the system in which they fail to thrive but are at least surviving -- perhaps, it is a kind of learned helplessness.

nothing aches more than the pain of knowing that i will never know if you are out to get me until you are already here. who are you? have you seen these words before? but how, would you have seen them before, when i am writing them on this blank page in this frenzied mania as a farce of self-soothing rocking myself back and forth in the chair as my mind will not quiet my soul will not listen my brain will not still my hands are starting to shake. it's cold i am cold my fingers feel wet with the chill of twilight air i take a breath. i still don't know the answer.

has someone else typed my words, been blessed with this same twisted divine revelation of miserable proportions? when i say i write as a man possessed perhaps there is another prophet such as i who does the same, and we are simply carrying out the same fated phrases.

to know that my words are my own and yet not to fear that what i create is what i must be, and am, and will become to imagine the ticking of that damned clock all the longer as i am pushed towards an uncertain future i did not ask for and may never receive:

who is out to get me, tonight?

hierophant

in this world there is a price you must pay - the fee of convenience. it is an insidious thing; all-knowing, pervasive; it is what has ruled us for generations and what will rule us for ages to come. but how far will you go, for the fee of convenience? how much will you sacrifice, for the easy way out? at what times are you left with no choice at all, knowing despite all efforts that the easy way out is the only way through?

in this world, we have commodified the concept of ability in and of itself. have we not spared a thought for those lacking? those who are not the same as us, yet the same nonetheless. those who are still human; still deserving even if they cannot afford the toll. to live is enough. to suffer is enough. to be present is enough. to feel is enough. we are all enough. have we not given a chance to those who are in the most desperate of straits? have we not offered a glance to those who are obscured by the gauzelike curtain of this commercialized display? is it too late? are there too many?

for whom does this bell toll? for whom does this toll collect? for what use is a gambler to an empty hall of figureheads, counting coins and dealing in change that dissipates as suddenly as smoke in the wind?

do not pay the toll; do not fear the struggle; do not deny the truth.

to what ends will profit drive us apart, behind empty lines? for how long will the fees we scrounge through our sweat, blood, tears, hardship, and struggle be exchanged for the currencies running a circus of oppression; dead coins dropping in a puppeteer's hands, devalued, as their worth plummets and the toll rises in steep, sharp inflation all the more?

there is another thing, in this world, worth being afraid of. the futility of complacency.

i fear growing stronger; for that i may lose all that i have - all that they have afforded me -- all that i have stowed away like molded breadcrumbs on a sinking ship, in the name of the debtors who have stripped me of worth until i am but a rat chained to the shackles of their standards. a ruler of the ruling class. an ode to senseless pain. i fear growing stronger, knowing that it is their goal.

do not pay the toll; do not be complacent; do not listen without ears or know without knowing. do not deny this truth: you are worth beyond measure.

break their rulers. seize the means of collection and exploitation. do not give in; do not give up - for it is what they are aiming for.

in the glass house of convenience, are we not all hypocrites? do you presume yourself to be free of sin?

paranoia

the clock. the clock is ticking. the clock makes a mockery of my wrinkling, disheveled form and i am driven mad by the sound of metal hands turning pushing me forward forward forward.

the fountain drips water - life - essence as rotten and pure as all things must be, and are, and will become. it burns my ears. it screeches my thoughts to a running halt; a rushing oxymoron as i am transposed onto stark white paper jettisoned out from the squeal of ink cartridges. no color feels enough. i am monochrome, monotone, dull, lifeless --- it is a mockery of it, all the same.

i am alone in the house. i am by myself. they could get me. they could take me they could ruin me but i have been ruined, so i fear i should not be afraid. the racing racing screeching whine of a rusty hamster wheel is the only sound that reaches my ears from the cottoning fuzz of my frenzied brain. i am alone. i am by myself. no one to haunt me. no one to listen. none to protect, none to hold. i am but a man at the dining room table storming on keys as if they are the ones who had wronged me but i know better; but, i am not better.

there is no clock. i hear no sound. why did i hear the ticking? where did the ticking come from? why did my ears feel the ticking if nothing is here to tick? what am i doing here, alone, in the panic of a self-imposed 2 AM graveyard shift, with nothing but my most intrusive thoughts for comfort? it's a comfort as effective as a brick to the head for a pillow, but a comfort nonetheless in its painful familiarity.

sometimes i want to cry, knowing that i can prove myself to no one. i could be accused of every wrong in the world and find myself unable to seek counsel, denied the opportunity to self-defend, stripped of all that renders me less-than-whole-but-more-than-empty. it is a pervasive fear, as most of mine are. the kind of dread one cannot escape short of dismantling the system in which they fail to thrive but are at least surviving -- perhaps, it is a kind of learned helplessness.

nothing aches more than the pain of knowing that i will never know if you are out to get me until you are already here. who are you? have you seen these words before? but how, would you have seen them before, when i am writing them on this blank page in this frenzied mania as a farce of self-soothing rocking myself back and forth in the chair as my mind will not quiet my soul will not listen my brain will not still my hands are starting to shake. it's cold i am cold my fingers feel wet with the chill of twilight air i take a breath. i still don't know the answer.

has someone else typed my words, been blessed with this same twisted divine revelation of miserable proportions? when i say i write as a man possessed perhaps there is another prophet such as i who does the same, and we are simply carrying out the same fated phrases.

to know that my words are my own and yet not to fear that what i create is what i must be, and am, and will become to imagine the ticking of that damned clock all the longer as i am pushed towards an uncertain future i did not ask for and may never receive:

who is out to get me, tonight?

a scale that measures your moral failings

the cackling crow of a sneering crowd, descending like jackals upon me. hurled insults and bleeding words mix into my skin. they mark the canvas i am until their jabs spill out from the pages. ow, i say. stop, i say. it hurts, i say. i hate you, i say. but i do not hate, in that moment. it is nothing more than a plea - a plea for help, a plea of 'perhaps they will stop,' a plea of hope and one of desperation. and it does not work, and so rocks are thrown yet again, even on my old bruises, and so i grow to hate it, truly.

they have not come for me, yet - but they will - but will they? i have no proof. no evidence. no reason - that is a lie, a falseness - i am all the reason they need for i am what they defame - it hurts, i think, knowing that they are there, they do not know, but if they did know, they would hate. they would come for me - i know it in my self. i know it in the rocking of my frame and the burning of my anxious core they would come for me, and they would hate. they would not understand, and they would hate. to live is enough. to suffer is enough. to be is enough. i am enough, for them. i am enough of a threat. it hurts, i think, to know that there are those who would paint a target upon my skin like a brand of death for the crime of existence i am guilty of committing regularly. i hate you, i say, knowing that it is not the truth, knowing that i wish to understand, knowing that i wish to change those raised without nurturing a sense of empathy or sympathy or basic emotional intelligence but it is not my place to change the world, but it is not my place to fix its inhabitants, but it is not my place to be reviled for living, but it is not my place to criticize the standards i live by, but it is not my place to change your mind, but it is not my place to change their minds, but it is not my place to be changed by their efforts, but it is not my place to forsake who i have become, but it is not my place to determine my becoming, but it is not my place to force my views onto others, but it is not my place to be forced, but it was my place to be forced, but it is no longer, but it could be again, but i don't want to go through what i went through - i don't want anyone to be as i was - but it is not my place to determine, but what i want does not matter, because knowing does nothing, because knowledge is not power to an idle mind, because there is no knowledge but the truth, but it is not anyone's place to determine the truth, but whose place is it to interpret the truth, but i am alone in this world with nothing but the words at my back and carved into my skin to guide me--- because to know is not enough.

i hate you, i say, knowing you will never know the feeling of my words. i hate you, i say, knowing that the ink will never set, dripping off of your skin. i hate you, i say, because you have made me hate being and that is all you have ever wanted. who are you?

and so i grow to hate it. hating it so much that the pace of my heart crescendos to a drum beat hating it until my eyes run bloodshot with rage-induced tears hating it to the extent that i lose myself, until i find myself hating the hate that poisons my veins and hating that i hate at all.

and it is in that moment that i cease to exist, on an insignificant scale, in the smallest of ways. and i have lost myself again.

what does it say about me, that i will lose myself yet again, that i will stop at nothing to find myself broken? what does it say that i would rather be in pieces? i am afraid of finding out. i am afraid to stop this plaguing hatred, this sludge within my bones weighing me down like rancid molasses. i am even more afraid that it may never stop, and i have no choice. and that is what i hate most of all.

they have not come for me yet - but they will - but will they? these thoughts haunt my frenzied mind, distracting me from all things of consequence, dictating my every waking hour as if i am but a puppet on a shoestring. they hate what i am. they want me to hate what i am. they want my shame, my guilt, because to be guilty of what they claim - that i exist - is to them, an admission of moral failure more than an admission of guilt and with my confession they deign to oppose my natural state of being, arguing that i am immoral, forgetting that they are from the same womb as i --- i could happen to them. i could become as them, just as they could become as i. i serve as an example, a case study, of the points of ignorance they willfully ignore, the beings they serve to deny, the ones they refuse to acknowledge as equals. yet we are equals. they are here, just as i. they could join--- become--- they could realize--- but they won't, i say, but they could, i think, but i hate them, i say, i wish they would, i think --

i wish the world were a kinder place.

paranoia

the clock. the clock is ticking. the clock makes a mockery of my wrinkling, disheveled form and i am driven mad by the sound of metal hands turning pushing me forward forward forward.

the fountain drips water - life - essence as rotten and pure as all things must be, and are, and will become. it burns my ears. it screeches my thoughts to a running halt; a rushing oxymoron as i am transposed onto stark white paper jettisoned out from the squeal of ink cartridges. no color feels enough. i am monochrome, monotone, dull, lifeless --- it is a mockery of it, all the same.

i am alone in the house. i am by myself. they could get me. they could take me they could ruin me but i have been ruined, so i fear i should not be afraid. the racing racing screeching whine of a rusty hamster wheel is the only sound that reaches my ears from the cottoning fuzz of my frenzied brain. i am alone. i am by myself. no one to haunt me. no one to listen. none to protect, none to hold. i am but a man at the dining room table storming on keys as if they are the ones who had wronged me but i know better; but, i am not better.

there is no clock. i hear no sound. why did i hear the ticking? where did the ticking come from? why did my ears feel the ticking if nothing is here to tick? what am i doing here, alone, in the panic of a self-imposed 2 AM graveyard shift, with nothing but my most intrusive thoughts for comfort? it's a comfort as effective as a brick to the head for a pillow, but a comfort nonetheless in its painful familiarity.

sometimes i want to cry, knowing that i can prove myself to no one. i could be accused of every wrong in the world and find myself unable to seek counsel, denied the opportunity to self-defend, stripped of all that renders me less-than-whole-but-more-than-empty. it is a pervasive fear, as most of mine are. the kind of dread one cannot escape short of dismantling the system in which they fail to thrive but are at least surviving -- perhaps, it is a kind of learned helplessness.

nothing aches more than the pain of knowing that i will never know if you are out to get me until you are already here. who are you? have you seen these words before? but how, would you have seen them before, when i am writing them on this blank page in this frenzied mania as a farce of self-soothing rocking myself back and forth in the chair as my mind will not quiet my soul will not listen my brain will not still my hands are starting to shake. it's cold i am cold my fingers feel wet with the chill of twilight air i take a breath. i still don't know the answer.

has someone else typed my words, been blessed with this same twisted divine revelation of miserable proportions? when i say i write as a man possessed perhaps there is another prophet such as i who does the same, and we are simply carrying out the same fated phrases.

to know that my words are my own and yet not to fear that what i create is what i must be, and am, and will become to imagine the ticking of that damned clock all the longer as i am pushed towards an uncertain future i did not ask for and may never receive:

who is out to get me, tonight?

numb

"nothing to worry about" but i am worrying anyway "nothing to cry about" but i still want to cry "nothing to talk about" but i have so much to say "nothing to do" nothing. nothing. nothing. i feel nothing. "you are nothing" there is nothing. i am numb.

numb to what? numb for what reason? numb yet why, do these words resonate within me, setting passion alight as a feeling ignites - it burns like my skin is catching flame like a scrap of parchment - i watch as i crumble to ash, and the ink of a weathered calligraphy brush becomes molten candle wax the words of scorn tattooed onto my skin coil up from my wretched form choking suffocating me with white plumes of smoke like the feather plume of a maddened quill yet i feel nothing, yet i feel everything, and it is all too much.

every day i feel as if i have run out of things to feel and every day i am proven wrong, proven right, and proven wrong again.

the smudges of ink stained on my skin are turning into scars. what will they think, i wonder, when they turn the leather cover of the novella of my life, and strip me bare to the words that conceptualize the very essence of my form?

the vessel ails, sick beyond treatment, the same haunting chords stuck in my throat with ash and dried ink and candle wax and fetid dust. i am coughing up the words to my own demise, struck frozen with the emotion overflowing the inkwell within me yet somehow numb all the same.

"i am nothing"

paranoia

the clock. the clock is ticking. the clock makes a mockery of my wrinkling, disheveled form and i am driven mad by the sound of metal hands turning pushing me forward forward forward.

the fountain drips water - life - essence as rotten and pure as all things must be, and are, and will become. it burns my ears. it screeches my thoughts to a running halt; a rushing oxymoron as i am transposed onto stark white paper jettisoned out from the squeal of ink cartridges. no color feels enough. i am monochrome, monotone, dull, lifeless --- it is a mockery of it, all the same.

i am alone in the house. i am by myself. they could get me. they could take me they could ruin me but i have been ruined, so i fear i should not be afraid. the racing racing screeching whine of a rusty hamster wheel is the only sound that reaches my ears from the cottoning fuzz of my frenzied brain. i am alone. i am by myself. no one to haunt me. no one to listen. none to protect, none to hold. i am but a man at the dining room table storming on keys as if they are the ones who had wronged me but i know better; but, i am not better.

there is no clock. i hear no sound. why did i hear the ticking? where did the ticking come from? why did my ears feel the ticking if nothing is here to tick? what am i doing here, alone, in the panic of a self-imposed 2 AM graveyard shift, with nothing but my most intrusive thoughts for comfort? it's a comfort as effective as a brick to the head for a pillow, but a comfort nonetheless in its painful familiarity.

sometimes i want to cry, knowing that i can prove myself to no one. i could be accused of every wrong in the world and find myself unable to seek counsel, denied the opportunity to self-defend, stripped of all that renders me less-than-whole-but-more-than-empty. it is a pervasive fear, as most of mine are. the kind of dread one cannot escape short of dismantling the system in which they fail to thrive but are at least surviving -- perhaps, it is a kind of learned helplessness.

nothing aches more than the pain of knowing that i will never know if you are out to get me until you are already here. who are you? have you seen these words before? but how, would you have seen them before, when i am writing them on this blank page in this frenzied mania as a farce of self-soothing rocking myself back and forth in the chair as my mind will not quiet my soul will not listen my brain will not still my hands are starting to shake. it's cold i am cold my fingers feel wet with the chill of twilight air i take a breath. i still don't know the answer.

has someone else typed my words, been blessed with this same twisted divine revelation of miserable proportions? when i say i write as a man possessed perhaps there is another prophet such as i who does the same, and we are simply carrying out the same fated phrases.

to know that my words are my own and yet not to fear that what i create is what i must be, and am, and will become to imagine the ticking of that damned clock all the longer as i am pushed towards an uncertain future i did not ask for and may never receive:

who is out to get me, tonight?

hierophant

in this world there is a price you must pay - the fee of convenience. it is an insidious thing; all-knowing, pervasive; it is what has ruled us for generations and what will rule us for ages to come. but how far will you go, for the fee of convenience? how much will you sacrifice, for the easy way out? at what times are you left with no choice at all, knowing despite all efforts that the easy way out is the only way through?

in this world, we have commodified the concept of ability in and of itself. have we not spared a thought for those lacking? those who are not the same as us, yet the same nonetheless. those who are still human; still deserving even if they cannot afford the toll. to live is enough. to suffer is enough. to be present is enough. to feel is enough. we are all enough. have we not given a chance to those who are in the most desperate of straits? have we not offered a glance to those who are obscured by the gauzelike curtain of this commercialized display? is it too late? are there too many?

for whom does this bell toll? for whom does this toll collect? for what use is a gambler to an empty hall of figureheads, counting coins and dealing in change that dissipates as suddenly as smoke in the wind?

do not pay the toll; do not fear the struggle; do not deny the truth.

to what ends will profit drive us apart, behind empty lines? for how long will the fees we scrounge through our sweat, blood, tears, hardship, and struggle be exchanged for the currencies running a circus of oppression; dead coins dropping in a puppeteer's hands, devalued, as their worth plummets and the toll rises in steep, sharp inflation all the more?

there is another thing, in this world, worth being afraid of. the futility of complacency.

i fear growing stronger; for that i may lose all that i have - all that they have afforded me -- all that i have stowed away like molded breadcrumbs on a sinking ship, in the name of the debtors who have stripped me of worth until i am but a rat chained to the shackles of their standards. a ruler of the ruling class. an ode to senseless pain. i fear growing stronger, knowing that it is their goal.

do not pay the toll; do not be complacent; do not listen without ears or know without knowing. do not deny this truth: you are worth beyond measure.

break their rulers. seize the means of collection and exploitation. do not give in; do not give up - for it is what they are aiming for.

in the glass house of convenience, are we not all hypocrites? do you presume yourself to be free of sin?

paranoia

the clock. the clock is ticking. the clock makes a mockery of my wrinkling, disheveled form and i am driven mad by the sound of metal hands turning pushing me forward forward forward.

the fountain drips water - life - essence as rotten and pure as all things must be, and are, and will become. it burns my ears. it screeches my thoughts to a running halt; a rushing oxymoron as i am transposed onto stark white paper jettisoned out from the squeal of ink cartridges. no color feels enough. i am monochrome, monotone, dull, lifeless --- it is a mockery of it, all the same.

i am alone in the house. i am by myself. they could get me. they could take me they could ruin me but i have been ruined, so i fear i should not be afraid. the racing racing screeching whine of a rusty hamster wheel is the only sound that reaches my ears from the cottoning fuzz of my frenzied brain. i am alone. i am by myself. no one to haunt me. no one to listen. none to protect, none to hold. i am but a man at the dining room table storming on keys as if they are the ones who had wronged me but i know better; but, i am not better.

there is no clock. i hear no sound. why did i hear the ticking? where did the ticking come from? why did my ears feel the ticking if nothing is here to tick? what am i doing here, alone, in the panic of a self-imposed 2 AM graveyard shift, with nothing but my most intrusive thoughts for comfort? it's a comfort as effective as a brick to the head for a pillow, but a comfort nonetheless in its painful familiarity.

sometimes i want to cry, knowing that i can prove myself to no one. i could be accused of every wrong in the world and find myself unable to seek counsel, denied the opportunity to self-defend, stripped of all that renders me less-than-whole-but-more-than-empty. it is a pervasive fear, as most of mine are. the kind of dread one cannot escape short of dismantling the system in which they fail to thrive but are at least surviving -- perhaps, it is a kind of learned helplessness.

nothing aches more than the pain of knowing that i will never know if you are out to get me until you are already here. who are you? have you seen these words before? but how, would you have seen them before, when i am writing them on this blank page in this frenzied mania as a farce of self-soothing rocking myself back and forth in the chair as my mind will not quiet my soul will not listen my brain will not still my hands are starting to shake. it's cold i am cold my fingers feel wet with the chill of twilight air i take a breath. i still don't know the answer.

has someone else typed my words, been blessed with this same twisted divine revelation of miserable proportions? when i say i write as a man possessed perhaps there is another prophet such as i who does the same, and we are simply carrying out the same fated phrases.

to know that my words are my own and yet not to fear that what i create is what i must be, and am, and will become to imagine the ticking of that damned clock all the longer as i am pushed towards an uncertain future i did not ask for and may never receive:

who is out to get me, tonight?

the knife

pain like a brand upon the skin burning from within warping the body until it is twisted organs beyond function

i had to crawl upon the steps shackled by misery the vicelike grip of a clenching hand, a molten grip, an aching core i had to crawl in my shame - my disgust - the slick cicada shell casing of my bastardized form --

pain, like a brand upon the skin. i breathe through grinding teeth; hiss in punched-out gasps. the tip of the knife of my utter demise lays in docile serenity at my feet and i am reduced to a prisoner in my flesh-wrought chains as i watch the knife plunge into fury, despair, grief -- for what? -- screams of i never wanted this, no one ever asked, i am afraid of not being okay, this suffering will haunt my trembling form as an echo of what i endure, i am alone, i hate this ailing vessel, the sensation of blooming red spilling from burst veins will drive me to a new breaking point---

i could not walk. i could not stand. i could scarcely let out a whisper, let alone a cry for help - this knife i carry in the womb is my burden to bear and i fear that i may never be free of it.

i grip the handle, fingers numb. the knife plunges again.

General Disclaimers

Obligatory A.I. Disclaimer

Do I use A.I. in my writing? To put it simply, no.

A.I. is a tool I find useful when I'm struggling to think of how to get a scene going, or how to continue an idea. It is, first and foremost, a tool for inspiration. I don't use it, and do not ever plan on using it, in my finished works - especially my poetry, as poetry is very personal to me and I take a bit of pride in my ability to churn out poems like a man possessed by an incredibly well-read eldritch being.

As a writer, it's important to be able to find inspiration from anywhere about anything - be it from beauty, from filth, from happiness, from grief, from trauma, from disgust, from anger, etc. Writing is art, and art is a medium. It is a vehicle which gives us the opportunity to connect and communicate the ideas that inspire us to others. To me, it's less about where you get your ideas and more what you do with them.

I'd certainly have a problem with entire poems or stories written entirely by A.I., but using A.I. as a starting point for that initial concept or to help guide you on where you should go with it is fine. We shouldn't be idolizing A.I. as the future of art or anything, but we shouldn't demonize it either: it has its uses, and when used as intended, it is fairly useful.

To summarize: Yes, I utilize A.I. as a tool during my creative process. No, I don't 'write' with A.I. - my words are my own.

Content Warning & Age Disclaimer

Most of my writing is rant poetry that tends to cover sensitive themes. I frequently write about things such as gender dysphoria, suicidal ideation, chronic illness, disability, self harm, sexual trauma, and other potentially triggering topics.

Please take care of yourself. Filter out tags that will distress you. Disengage and decompress if reading these makes your wounds feel a bit too raw for comfort. It is okay. You deserve to take care of yourself. Don't push through. I will never take offense to someone needing a breather from the heavy topics I deliver.

Let me know if you'd like to suggest a tag for any of my works if you feel it's inadequately tagged for the subject material.

Lastly, this blog is strictly an 18+ space. I do not intend to cater to minors, because this is not a space for minors. I do not want minors to engage with my content, because nearly all of my writing covers mature subject matter or triggering themes in a way that would make it impossible for me to sanitize this blog for minors without censoring myself entirely. I don't plan on changing this policy. Please do not reblog my posts on SFW blogs or minor-friendly spaces. I do not want my content readily available to children.