My nose is numb
Yet still I drink this smoky
whisky.
Why?
A search for knowing oblivion
A hope of inspiration
And a satisfactory blankness.
I know why writers drink,
I know why they fall into
craziness -
To reduce the pressure in
their heads
To escape the ever increasing
pain
And block the panic.
Print is the purgative of
poets
Reducing the pressure -
A blowhole for sanity
Else pressure builds and
the only
Escape
Is into madness
Knowing the result but unable
To bear it.
Unable to bear the pressure
A physical
Outward
Pressure
Threatening to burst and
annihilate the mind.
============ |
| June 1984
Surrounded by an invisible
wall
I feel suspended,
Poised,
Balanced precariously.
Only by a total lack of
movement
Can I preserve myself
From disaster.
============ |
| Sept 2,
84
The uses of sex are many
and various
Desiring sex serves so many
purposes
Do I desire sensual thrill
Or psychic comfort?
An assurance of value, warmth
and closeness?
Do I desire my mind distracted?
Is this for fun or therapy?
Whatever, I DO desire
And without it, I SHALL
need therapy...
Hopeless, unwanted, filled
with tension
So easily sublimated into
rage...
I am in danger of blocking,
retreating
Hiding under the bed or
running....
A deathly deadness creeps
through my chest
And I despair.
Knowledge of stupidity and
futility
The dangers of negative
self-talk
Is no deterrrent
I cannot - or will not -
Overcome this.
An offer now of sex would
be rejected
Feeling it just that - an
offer of service
Greatly desired but now
cause for offence...
Sometimes company is hard
to bear
Being a carrot out of reach
The sight of water realized
as mirage
Or a whiff of smoke to the
recently quit.
A true aloneness is preferable
Allowing a rational occasion
for fantasy.
============ |
| Sept 84
Despair strikes
Desperation clutches
the throat and a
rigid soul desires
projected matter
shattered crockery
and a self annihilated.
I would be disappeared
or would welcome aggression
An eruption of rage
Releasing this central tension
To the periphery
And thence into space -
But no.
Soft rotten muscles prevent
it.
Within me still
Festers
The British lie
That grief is shame
And self-control is all.
Thus, muscles remain relaxed
Heart rate increase but
minimally
And the left brain wins
out again.
============ |
| Sept 19, 84
Sphere, symbolic of myself
Pulsates gently
Emitting, transmitting and
receiving
On varying wavelengths,
Receptive of others and
Lovingly outgiving.
Then a black humor descends
A concentrated hormone or
psychic shift
And this soft sphere contracts
Constricts
Cramps viciously to leaden
pea -
Rigid, dense, impossible
to penetrate.
Transmission ceases
And fear of lasting entrapment
Causes panic and greater
cramp.
If you love me
Be tough, be mean, and beat
me
So that erupting with rage
I may escape this trap
And expand again to life.
(But please be sure
to hold me down
Sufficiently to save
YOUR skin...)
============ |
| Sept 22, 1984
Only on the dog days of despair
Do I have a true feeling
of self as SELF
ME, to be guarded and pondered.
Otherwise, I am becoming
more diffuse
Less of an island, more
of an ocean.
There can be no greater
disaster
Than to fall into the black
hole of one's own centre
To be lost to the world
and others.
Sphere constricts
Shrinks into danger
Danger of black hole
A disappearance of self
Irretrievable
Catatonia?
============ |