Honestly i can't remember all my teenage feelings ....and their meanings

if i only saw myself as i see you
a true lie, between you and i
Venom sacs ballooning in my mouth
 to poison my words,
but fragile as an Easter egg
if you dropped me
would i land on all fours
like a baby cat?

i became smitten.
 Zoey she became Ziggy
and he disappeared like stardust
into her arms.

Smoky gray black midnight
with white patches on your belly.
You were just a kitten
but i conquered foreign civilizations for you
even if it was just a game.
Moses tried to drive you out of Egyptland,
but Jaime gave you a home so faraway
it feels as though you are on Mars.

i feel like a John Cusack film
only someone edited out the cool hair and mannerisms,
an eternal teenager too cool for adult rationale.
 i still flip up my jacket collar.
content to give up porn and cigarettes,
but not wine and chocolate.
 i even thought about making a mixtape today....

These next few months will be a trial by fire
nowhere to go but forward
to find that strength i stored away long ago
it goes to show the future is quite unwritten
so give me a pen,
and i'll send myself a letter....

i was naive once, cynical twice,
three times is the charm i'd say,
an apartment split 4-ways.
5 minutes to the 6 o'clock news.
Drinking until there are Seven hammers
ringing in my head 8 days a week.
Nine lives to when i reach 0
and then i start living my life again....

nothing seems to stay the same forever.
 and Hands never seemed so far away,
clear water in these raindrops,
exhale through my eyes,
an illustrated smile on my mouth,
with your whisper in my ear....

it's time for a re-inventing of self.

i grow restless as the hours grow on me
making me lose passion
for the days to come.

 i am a tapestry of feeling
interwoven with emotion
as my locks of hair
weave together
a story of redemption
within myself.

brown skin. yellow sun. i got two lungs.....two lungs.

np: Talking Heads - "Love Building On Fire"

I feel so strong that I can't disguise (oh my)

My, My, My, My

they just don't make songs like this anymore.

listening deep into the night i start to remember
why i fell in love with my Rolling Stones vinyl records.

No excuses offered anyway (oh my)

if i had my own Marianne Faithfull to my Mick Jagger
i would write pop genius like this as well

the sense of longing.
the urgency.
the outright desire.
the pleading for mercy.

Music
that will satisfy my every need
This doesn't happen to me ev'ryday (oh my)
for this music
Now I need you more than ever

******************

i heard even Bowie does a stellar live cover version of this one.
via the Ziggy Stardust film



np: The Rolling Stones - "Let's Spend the Night Together"

....there are wolves here abound

i came back from Ibaraki-ken with questions bursting out of me.

why i did
what i did
when i was there.

yesteryear.


**************

Thanksgiving dinner was truly something beautiful to behold, Lori really outdid herself this time. Truly a queen amongst the kitchen, I could only shower her with praise as Keenan showed me the way to the table with a glad heart. We ate heartily into the night. I was told by morning that i had emptied a good 2/3rds of a bottle of Wild Turkey Bourbon.

Something about whiskey and i have always resonated with each other...it always bathed my insides with a warmth. A warmth not seen since i left my Johnny Cash vinyl records behind. The journey to their home only took a 2 hour train ride from Tokyo to Mito. i passed Arakawaoki Station. then i passed Tsuchiura.

my heart leapt into my throat.

it had been quite a long time since i traveled this far on the Joban train line....listening to songs that somehow got me through my sojourn into the Japanese countryside.

wolves were running free.
baying against the grapefruit moon
my heart had grown heavy
with each and every tune.

the whole night had been akin to a Tom Waits song.black cap perched jauntily above my head.
i sang these songs walking from the Japanese train station in the darkness of the night

looking for Keenan donning his own brown hat.


*********

i made it to Akatsuka in one piece. yet i was glued back together by the promise of camaraderie.  Friends from Oregon living out there in Ibaraki prefecture.

i felt almost normal.

Devoid of the holiday drama that plagued these holidays before. the mashed potatoes in my mouth. the homemade apple pie gave me a scolding that i had not known comfort food like this for so long.

*********

the next day was spent walking alongside the lake in Mito with all the lovely ducks clamoring for bread. smiled when i saw the Black Swans swimming by with their young.little gray, fuzzy ugly ducklings. i had not seen such a bird since the first time i came to Japan. the swans with their proud necks and graceful maneuvers. They must have looked awkward to the haughty goose and his mate that passed us on the way to the bridge.

Tsuchiura seemed like forever ago.

although i must admit that i had missed the sunsets in Ibaraki-ken hanging overhead the rice paddies

a brilliant purple, orange, crimson-tinged sadness of my former days.


**********************

np: Bonnie "Prince" Billy - "You will miss me when i burn"

...so i got evicted from my first apt. in Tokyo

truth is, i hated living there.

it seemed to have a theme of failure associated around it

and i only attached sour memories mostly to these walls and doorframes.

as luck would have it, my half-British half-Japanese co-worker ended up being my savior in said situation.

He offered me the keys to a guesthouse apartment in Nakano-Shimbashi that he himself rented out due to a domestic dispute with his Japanese college-age missus.

However, she reconciled and he was back in her good graces within two days sans the apt. deposit.

So, he lent me his room free of charge since he no longer required it.

the milk of human kindness absolutely gushes through his veins.

of that i have no doubt....

*************

Life is absurd like that sometimes.

I worked quickly like a honeybee to round up everything i owned. Miscellaneous items, books, important letters, documents, worn-out clothing...

and tossed them into my battered, weather-beaten suitcase that i had bought in South Florida right before my flight to Munich.

Clearing out everything was like a time capsule of sorts.

Unsent postcards from Phuket, old passport fotos, rail tickets from Europe, smudged little pieces of paper with scrawled email addresses of the lovely French people that I had encountered on my first trip in Kyoto.

i was not just packing up belongings, but also memories....

my abrupt departure from Kamakura no longer haunts me

but rather my brutal and unforgiving uphill battle to stay in Japan from last May onwards taught me many valuable lessons.

being unemployed and having no place to live right before the festive Golden Week seemed daunting.

overwhelming at first.

almost impossible.

yet i soldiered on....

not willing to give up my dream of living in Tokyo just yet.

all those awful part-time jobs and hostile foreigners from spring to summer seem like a distant memory at the moment.

i barely recognize myself sometimes.

i had grown a cynical shell...become almost half the man i used to be.

yet.

i wanted to rise above it all.

getting evicted from my Oakhouse residence seemed to be just another catalyst for me to smash this Broken Year into more pieces.

getting in heated Japanese-language arguments with the irate housemanager only served this current situation was poignant albeit necessary for me to move on from the shitstorm of the previous months.

i have been evicted from many friendships in Tokyo as well.

I am starting to cut out the people and their lives from mine who serve no purpose other than to remind me of this horrible year.

There are others who i much rather invest and put my energy into.

and i crave their friendship as well as their intellect.

i recently got invited to a Thanksgiving feast in Ibaraki prefecture this Saturday.

a smile broke out on my face when i read that email.

i have not had an enjoyable holiday since that pivotal Thanksgiving in Bangkok....

*****************

...these tiny scars serve to remind us of who we really are & what we can become..."

August 17th, 2010

i fell asleep in Nara.

I woke up in a traditional Japanese guesthouse wondering where that black cat went. She was hiding amongst the sliding wooden panel doors. When i learned her given name, it was a painful surprise. It stung me quite a bit. The very name that haunts me wherever i go….the owner hailed from Brasil, but spoke impeccable Japanese.

I was in this very same town almost 5 months ago...remembering the tiny scar on my right-hand wrist. Remembering what it symbolizes since we all scar so easily..and to think that time heals most wounds.

I think of my loved ones, for I often miss people more than places.

**********************

I ran into 2 female interns helping out with the local Nara International Film Festival. Teava and Zenetra were their given names. They are both sisters from the West Coast. One studied at Stanford and the other at the University of Reno. Both majored in something relating to film. They are a mix of Thai, Laotian, and something else. Both of them are the sum of everything interesting to talk to. Many questions were asked about my time spent in Thailand since they had never been there.

I spoke with a sort of romanticism about the land despite its inherent flaws. Especially the small town life that I encountered there.

I realized that although I had missed the Thai countryside somewhat, it was the breath-taking sunsets that I had yearned for the most. the cheerful smiles of my neighbors. the beaming faces of my Thai kindergarteners. the translucent azure waters. the lazy beaches that had seemed lifted from a dreamscape. those weeping tropical rainstorms.

all this came to mind when I closed my eyes and sighed out of my open mouth….

Nara was celebrating its 1300^th year anniversary. The ancient town never struck me as my favorite place in Japan. Too many wild deer clamoring for sembei crackers sold in bunches by weary vendors. I often got bit by them or poked by their antlers, Small children screaming in abject horror with terrified eyes while their parents laugh incessantly. Some of the tamed deer bore many scars like most of us do in our lives. Who knows where they got them from. A vehicle or one of their peers perhaps. I did not think i would miss Nara as I climbed back into my mini-van.

On these long drives in Japan i could think to myself clearly for the first time in years.

******************

....the heart wants what the heart wants

September 7th, 2010

Someone asked me today if I missed you....

I didn't answer.

I just closed my eyes and walked away.

and I whispered

"....so much"

***************
You can close your eyes to things you don’t want to see, but you can’t close your heart to things you don’t want to feel....