v-day. february 14, 2008.

Today I was exhausted. I sat in front of the damn lamp again, and shortly thereafter, passed out on the couch reading alias grace by margaret atwood [which is turning out to be quite the interesting novel.] I spent most of my day nearly passed out, lethargic and at times confused about what was going on. I missed the man who brought the flowers from justin, and woke up to find a note saying they had dropped them off next door. Now we just moved into a rather nice gothic house downtown but on the bridge of a pretty sketchy neighbourhood and so I really didn't want to go next door. Not to mention that the sheer fact of talking a person makes me sometimes want to vomit. But I wanted my damn flowers, I was excited to be getting them, so greed won out and I walked next door, knocked and waited, knocked and waited. No answer. So I emailed by fiance in a rather upset manner, blaming myself for what had happened and embarassed I had no flowers to show for all his money and effort. I couldn't even get up to get the damn flowers. I thought I dreamt someone coming to the door, but I guess not. Anyways, we got them back eventually, went to a small diner for a valentines day meal & then home for wine, fornication and drug induced dreams.
valentines truly is something that is a. celebrated for the wrong reason b. a hallmark holiday. So don't feel bad. but you probably will anyways. I would. i hate advice like that. now I'm rambling. surely the wine. goodnight.

february 13, 2008. 8.34 am.

I just sat under a S.A.D lamp. It is supposed to take away all of my winter time blues, this impenetrable sadness, this cloak that I am constantly under, well I’ll tell you what, I would love to see this lamp lift off my cloak. But I am not too certain that is likely. I don’t really know what it is supposed to do for me, with its space age looking frame and 10,000 lux wattage. Oh I think I’ll probably get a sun tan underneath of it before I am removed of my seasonal depression. 20-30 minutes a day for happiness. Hmm. Happiness. Such an intangible product. A malevolent foe. I do not know if I will ever truly be at that point. I have been close, currently and in the past, but always, always there is a nagging voice in my head that says, this will not be alright, no, this will not be okay. And it makes me want to drink a beer or smoke a joint. It makes me want to not take my medication. Especially when I wake up a zombie after a drug induced sleep, with sleep still in my eyes, and on my night clothes, with sleep lingering in every corner of my room, with my rambunctious fiancé screaming out, “there is coffee downstairs! Coffee, wake up!” I wonder how, when my limbs way pounds and pounds, I am supposed to pull off this whole housewife act that I have gotten myself into. It’s not as though this man makes me be anything special, he doesn’t require that I fold laundry or vacuum the floor [unless the floor REALLY needs to be vacuumed, then I should probably just do it,] Even last night over talk of this new reality of mine, he told me to make my art a business, one I have to get up and do everyday, to forget about the normal household tasks and reserve some time at the end of the day for them, but to focus on what I want to get done, what I would like to get out there. But in truth, I have no idea what to get out there. The depression drags me down. These months used to be for writing incessantly about the snow and ice, how the cold freezes the lungs, how our fingers are frozen together, but now it only for moping around a big gothic brick house, and doctors visits, and S.A.D lamps, and lectures on mental illness. Again, it makes me want to drink a beer. I understand why people become alcoholics and because life has not always been so kind to me, I have to really watch myself. A few beers a week is all I can have. Or else I will spiral, and the doctors, my family and my fiancé are always waiting in the wings, watching for the spiral, the collapse. Catching it before even I can. Sometimes, I wish there was no net there at all below me. I think I could create something wonderful before the fall.

construction of variations vol vii: exhibitionism

starting the art for the new issue of the zine.

on what day did you die.

arms bent into ornate blood clot flowers,
plasma that no longer
flows through withered veins


turn
of cheek away & back again

an eyeblink - did it.

ashen carapace, only a loaner
anyways,

an elongated jack-o-lantern
smudge of lip

your jaw is nestled against a back of skull




the congregation,
it howls pitiful hymns


satin lined sarcophagus

for this plaster template

the 30 year reservation for it's lot.

new poems.

ottawa

a greyhound down the highway

twelve hours full of layovers & sweating

men having difficulties with vinyl seats

here in this city so small I dreamt

of championing that ordeal

in sake of some inexpressible

pull

towards you

the son,

I do not understand the math

behind gravity

why should I know this

tongue, so foreign.

my eyes are thick

your hands bigger than mine

older & full of

messiness

higher priorities

feminine fingers

that mostly are not

mine.

Snippet of sarnia & outlying areas

the deranged rapids

take bodies like a serial killer

affixing the appendages to

invisible rock embankments

divers have known of the massacre

for years

inconveniently the chemicals

from the plants are taken upstream

the boredom of corunna kills

more than even the sea.

So there is an ice cream shop

& a convenience store

baseball diamonds

the kids lean against the cement

wall of the bank and snort

coke with five dollar bills

rolled into straws.

the stoners throw rocks at

trucks off the overpass

and laugh and laugh

at nothing.

lethargy

in the sense

I am being it

prod

uc

tive.

tidying up my words

to rows they line up

like corn with a pathway

between big enough for

myself only to wander.

Would they argue I am incomplete

this mischievous & intolerable agitation

pins me always to a ground I cannot

bear.

please,

do bear with me as much as I must

to that ground.

without want,

but some forceful need.

clench your teeth.

if we’re going to figure this out

there needs to be pressure

poem.

prima facie.

spear with

your tongue the word that

undoes me.

quantify your prediction with calculations

from the sun

& make sure to use stiff, old instruments

callously past their due date.

gather evidence

record the letters

gather evidence

there are signs of exhaustion.

make sure to affix the label to

the finished product:

a tumor, not malignant

but one, a

needless

infection

product of upbringing & biology.

full of spores &

ancient sores

lined pages on arm.

photos: may 2-4 in my backyard. fireworks.

make sure to click on the pictures and view them larger. they look a lot nicer that way.

photos of Phil Baljeu & Justin Gray in : Burning Panties & Wearing Gasmasks/ RCL COMMISSION @ blackwater

BURNING PANTIES & WEARING GAS MASKS
Justin Gray & Phil Baljeu of Amok Recordings















RCL COMMISSION
blackwater cafe.
Justin Gray & Phil Baljeu