Tonight, Tonight

I saw things that I shouldn't have in those words, in that conversation we shouldn't have had.

I saw things that I shouldn't have in your eyes, in those lies, in that name.

I'm falling faster and faster, into that spiral we call oblivion, love, and what remains in this city of dust and dying dreams.

Flesh and bone remain on pavement are the only things left to catch me.
It's too late.

Taxi Cab the Rubber Dog

Merry Christmas.
Happy Birthday.
Congratulations on your engagement.
Happy New Year!
What's next in line but another funeral, a wedding, a box of cookies and French toast?

We practiced our ghosts last night, decanting wishes of a insalubrious wish for sanity – paper hats and paper cranes made my paper planes feel pathetic. The wish for something more than aesthetic ruined plans, the wish for something more plastic ruined hearts. There were no friends, no foe. Only family, and where there is family, there is love.

Merry Christmas – or whatever you happen to be celebrating on this day.
I suppose I hold no right to say such, as I do not celebrate Christmas. No, this time of year I celebrate family. Family – and how much we care (when we really don't any other time of the year).

Hours of TAI TV Has Fried My Remaining Brain Cells

I have a newfound love for William Beckett and his ridiculous hipbones (but not really).
I might just absolutely adore Ryland Blackinton when he is Guy Ripley (but I don't).
Perhaps I should question the credibility of Sisky Biz Bass Wiz (but I never will).

So instead, I'll ask this:

How the fuck did William get the nickname Bilvy? 

It Was The Trumpets, The Radiator, And More

Here's a hint – Jesus in the name of Rock N' Roll singing charity singles and dancing in the ceiling tiles for the mystics down by the river.

He never liked my name; he never liked my clothes. I didn't pay much attention to the potential, to the impotence, to the lies and the liars and the world where he lay to sleep.

No sense of danger, of impending doom.

Just one more night with my savior, before he left for work again.

And here I was, climbing into William Beckett's bedroom window hopped up on caffeine pills.

After the After Party

Look, see, say "Why defend him?" The boy in the dress, the boy in the spotlight, the boy with his head between his legs and his eyes cast to the world -- the world was waiting. I held my breath and wished for a moment when the world turned away, and nobody stared. Why defend him, the one who could only afford to defend himself? It was all he had, his built up wall of insecurities and messed up paradise for his insatiable needs and whiny laughter.

Why defend him?

When the dream is over, wake up and take it day by day. We live, we laugh, we lie and keep on moving like we never saw him.
One more face, one more smile, one more facsimile for the torrential downpour of words that should've hurt him far more than it did.

I pretend – I never said those words. We never took those pills.

We never drank at the party; tastes as good as grape vodka and root beer in a crystal glass.

Why defend him?
He was Plan Z.

Whatever It Takes To Make This Home

We brought down an empire that was built of tears, a silence that was strong as however long we listened.

No amount of naked pictures on the internet, freshly mixed nightclub beats or brand new industrial CDs could make up for your mistake. I pretended that I didn't like your hair, green as the deepest sea and black as the nighttime sky. We locked in a stare, your eyes blue as the summer skies, your voice soft as the spring birds and gentle as the showers that follow shortly after. You, and me, wasn't it supposed to be that easy?

But life goes on -- moves forward without the word, without the sound, without the world we built around downtown.

Scene kids, goth kids, rivetheads alike all mean the same thing to me.

Black clothes.

We all need a reality check here. Take me away to someplace real, where the local scene can be considered more than a few kids standing around and pushing each other, and I can't laugh at how rediculous the bands are. Take me to a place where I don't know the guitarist of my favourite local act, or the sun in my hair during a late night show.

I want the rain off my shoulders, the dust off my clouds. I want a space to be mine -- where my friends are actually more than my friends will ever be, and that man on the stage? I won't know his name.

We Dream Cocaine Runs As We Learned Being Born Losers Wasn't Nearly As Fun As Being Whores

I dream of thee, broken souls on Broadway sing; sing for a mirage coasting over the shallow waters of Columbia. We close our mouths to taste the sin, to break the phantom against raw skin. And bruised and beaten to the saints and cry – to the nighttime sky we raved to fly. Away for freedom, for hopes and dreams became all we'd ever wanted in a man.

Welcome to the Americas, the sentimental times where we licked each other's faces and said, "Hey, look at that chick over there with her plastic boobs and plastic face, and plastic smile – she made my day, made my reality, eh?"

On Broadway, Of Mice and Mirage

Hey, eat crack.

It's hallow's eve, kids.

Come All Saints day be it sun and stars and sky -- bloke broken, broke and battered bats in a batting cage baking cake. Said cake, cupcakes, cake crayons... yeah, eat crayons too.

No, eat crack.
It tastes better -- at least...

Damn, get the fucking high.

Jack up.
Just the high.

The False, The Fate, The Fact, Fiction, and Fallacy -- Finding Faith In Regret

The night came and passed with the stomach acid on rewind, the tune singing 'Smother Me' repeating endlessly – words on a car ride, a few Coronas, maybe a Mexican. I called myself lucky; said there'd be a thousand kids around the world who'd love to be in my shoes.

I held his hand and said a prayer; stole the cross from around my best friend's neck. I'd like to find some faith in sanity one day, to hold and to love and to trust in the name of, if not God, something else Holy and Devine as a heresy.

Hungry for food that was never meant to be consumed, thirsty for water that was never meant to have been drank. Licking our fingers to taste the whimsical music of lust, of life, and everything in between – hold your breath and sink into the otherside.

It made sense at the time; pull myself closer to those at an arms length – find love where you'd least expect it. I realize my mistake now, not that I left my comfort zone, or that of which was safe, but more than I gave up the good times for mediocre jokes and a few beers that ended up on the pavement anyway. 

I should've stayed where I knew that I belonged.

Bucking Trend for Sucking Fiend

I'd like to know you better; to know you inside out.
To rape and rapture your flesh and blood -- and feel your skin from the inside out.
To crawl like spiders beneath the soul, through the mesh of veins and organs.
Internal, external, interior, exterior, best friend, ex-friend, meager belongings make the friend.
Pokémon yellow, purple tights and sweatshops.
Rape me.
Fuckin' rape me, and I don't mean by Nirvana.

I'd Totally Do An Indie Kid If They Weren't All So Goddamn Scene

The kids are all fucked up these days. When the small things turn into everything we're breathing for, we turn the insignificant into the world before us; twist the unnecessary into daily life.

Welcome to paradise, to RIOTown, to the centre of the goddamn universe. Welcome to the jungle, the fiery pits in the depths of hell, to the land of ice and Canada.

Hang up the phone, darling.

There isn't anyone on the other line.

This Superman Cooked Me With Tomato Sauce And Onstage Antics; ♥ Love Jesse

Up against that wooden stage, they tried to drag me underground. I felt their hands on my back, against my skin, next to my neck. Felt the clammy, cold shivers slide up and down my spine; the shaking vibrations of the music covering whatever else may be exposed. It got harder to breathe, harder to stand, harder to stay afloat in the mass of bodies and extras, the sea of zombies and non-conformists. The crowd of the odd, the collection of the deviant.

Then he pulls me up front, and for a minute, I see over their heads. Past the drums, backstage, over the mosh pit.

I can see, if only for a minute, before he throws me out there.

And I wished my feet would never touch the floor again.

I Decided Against Satanism And Settled For Pop Rocks And A New Gasping Breath Of Air Freshener

And confused is the state of nostalgia, the longing in a breath of fresh air. I miss my best friend, my family, kinsfolk and foe. I miss my dollar bills and McDonald's days, my whore-ass acquaintance, and nights spent on the telephone into early hours of the morning. I miss the smell of coconut shampoo when I welcome the scent of sunscreen; miss the feeling of fingers over my eyes ready to shout out 'Surprise'. Most of all I miss the city lights, the night I sat and stared off the balcony, wondering if lost in the clouds and dust I'd feel at home.

More than this bedroom, more than this laptop, more than this sideways lamp and the glisten of plastic possessions. Miss the feeling of normality, of security, of somewhere familiar. When the former becomes the present, and the latter becomes the stairway to heaven, I turn my head the other way. The green, green, green -- fluorescent green of that sweatshirt and eyes so blue they could drown a ship or two. Long, lengthy lashes, and sex hair. Wear that damn sex hair like you've never wondered whether I was a virgin or not.

To clarify, even if it is none of your business, not only am I highly disinterested in relationships, I am also highly disinterested in iterating a full-out discussion of my sex life, or lack thereof. So here's the real question, "Are you fucking high?"

Did you just run off and snort a line off the slut's stomach because your father died, or did you shoot up in the back alley behind Safeway to relax a bit, because your girlfriend was feeling a little social tonight?

And here we are, confused, is this state of nostalgia.

Don't Forget To Use Shampoo

On in between false sympathy and falling apart, there is little time to keep in touch with reality. False sympathy becomes false reality, false lies, false truths, false in betweens and longing for something real. The world moves on and the killers take another day in prison. The night becomes the day, the shade becomes the sun, the ship sinks into the horizon. We're all running into the sun to pray, falling to our knees.

Heroic, barely so, but writing about rockstars and shock stars, razorblades associated with romance and cobras. Associated with Cobra Starship? Hardly.

Feeling lousy, feeling bitter, feeling left behind, climb up the crib. Up the social ladder. Up the bad typing and bad spelling and halitosis. Climb, until you can't feel your feet or your face or your cat.

Hey, take a look, hey rest in peace, hey, I pay my respects my own way.

I didn't know you, and I I'm kind of glad I didn't.

It would've caused me more anguish than I could've handled at this point in my life.

Meeting Brendon Urie in an Elevator Never Sounded As Appealing As ALICE fucking COOPER and ECONOLINE CRUSH on a Thursday Night

The boombox became my best friend, the computer my comfort, the ice cubes in my vanilla milkshakes. I counted off the days on my fingers -- counting down to one thing, then another. I never saw the tickets, like the rats saw God. I never held the baby like the light bulb burnt out in the early hours of morning.

To the background noise of bad rap music and mainstreme obscenities, I take a moment to reminisce. The only thing in life that could be better than Thursday night at this point, is love.

And we all know that fairy tales don't come true.

She Was The After Party, The Hornet, And the Glass Bowl

Downstairs in Whoville, toxicity is a step ahead in Thai food and mathematics. I counted off the days on my fingers, and peeled the dead skin off my fingers. Eating Rolo ice cream and watching the Simpsons meant nothing more than exercise mats and the football games on Friday nights. It comes to a time when I'd love to elicit or evoke eloquence. Singing, singing, still singing.

Months of August, months of days, months made up of right ways and wrong ways and left ways and side ways cooked in a pot of everlasting stew. Life is good mountain gear, good mountain climber, fucking mountain GOAT. Life is everything humans cannot be, built up on hooves and the CAPS LOCK key on a French keyboard while watching bad baseball games during a fantasy football gathering.

We're going downhill on skateboards, uphill and around corners. We're flying at top speeds, around the curves, until we lose our sanity up around the bend and dye our hair green.

This is a champion in the making; the green cream never worked anyway.

Fucking camera -- Cannon should make them survive fall off roofs.

Unleash The Idols; Ship Me To Toronto -- Then I Hit A Dead Zone

Days wrapped up with the Mighty Mighty Bosstones and placating rabbits certainly could use some tweaking. When America's Got Talent, and the bodies' whole was incapacitated, I stared at the unruly blonde hair, and pretended I knew her worth. A few kick flips and back flips and flashing lights accompanied by cartwheels along the kerb meant nothing more to me than the sound of tap shoes. Than a Flathead. I sailed the ships across the world, only to find the world be round, and I wound up back where I began.

The seat on my bicycle is at the wrong height, the meat in my vegetables is raw. Processed cheese and mystery, broomsticks and foolish 'Gangsturrr' hats made up the hours, watching as Fred Astaire rolled over in his grave. This was my scene, my love story, my goddamn parade. This was my jungle in the city, my calm before the storm -- my everything. Then, one day it wasn't; the hoards of women and men, the mystery, the neon signs and deserted parks. There was nothing left.

On a swing at three in the morning, singing quietly to Panic! at the Disco (with the exclamation mark), I told myself I would not call 911. There was no emergency, except the sickness, sick, sick sobriety built up over nearly sixteen years of 'sober' thinking and natural intoxicants. Natural, to a point where nothing matters anymore -- but the wasp nest in a telephone pole, Slam Poetry documentaries, and the horror that is Shirley Manson and her lyrics (don't get me wrong, I do like Garbage).

We've got great chances to get into the top ten.
Great, like life, like the times, like the fucking NEW YORK Times.

On the edge of the world, or the last thing I see before a kiss goodbye, best friends gone out to die. At six o'clock tonight, we were supposed to die, but I let the moment pass as molecules slammed together in moments of scientific history I dare not avoid when watching the evening news. It was kind of funny, the words that slipped between my fingers, pulled away -- I lied, and told my mother I knew his name. That I knew him well. Lied, and said, "No, he's not staying the night on Saturday."

I'm counting down the days until the party, until ALICE fucking COOPER, until my birthday.
I'll count, until I have nothing to count anymore.

Hopefully at that point, I'll be counting down [to] Nine Inch Nails.

When Finding Nemo Became Symbolism for Happiness and Bisexual Relationships

This is what went down.

Two bottles of who knows what was all it took for the unfaithful; two dollars worth of corner store candy, and happy birthday wishes printed across a CD. Plastic wrapping comes off, but permanent ink does not. In the beginning it was fun and games, when we learned all we needed to know about love, death, and heartbreak. When we didn't need to hold each other up, or pull each other down. Thrashing around in the marshy air, we struggle to grasp a calm view on this situation.

A movie plays in the background; songs leak from closed bedroom doors. Korean, Japanese, Tagalog. To hold is to love and to love is to have, but when we loosen our grip, only hopes that they come crawling back our direction can keep us together; glue stick worthy, almost. The lost puppy fliers on telephone poles burned down the orchards, the propped up plywood boards cluttered the sundeck, and the water bottles evaporated into the sunlight.

We collaborate for actions that do not take talent, and we commiserate over complications during a coronation of faith and livestock. There was no correlation between sanity and self-deprecation, hash or hot dogs. There was no collection within the confines of a codependent community perched precariously upon the church.

Alliteration itself would be ashamed of me at this point in time, while she watches in the shadows.

Things sorted themselves out; all was right once more. Yet what is was, was nothing more than something that should have been, a past tense that was meant to be future, was meant to be a wish on a shooting star, a dream -- was meant to be you and me, forever... and then she came along.

Things are going back up again.

Today's James Dean Is Only A Pseudonym For Fame, Fortune, and the Backstreet Boys

You were my Skullcandy headphones, my paperwork, science textbook and life. You were my history, my future, but never my present. You held on, you let go, you toss and turned and slept through the most beautiful of sunrises, only to fall again.

You cut 'I Love You God' across every orifice of your soul, only to find that love betray.

You were my glow in the dark star, my locker combination, Marilyn Manson CDs and subconscious. You crept into every bad decision, every good decision, and every irrelevant decision in between. You were the correlation between good and evil, the synopsis upon the death tag on my toe, the slinky sliding upon my arm. Tracking device around my ankle, said murder, said molester, said child porn star?

You cut 'I Love You God' across every orifice of your body -- wrists slashed up, face down in the bathtub, how they found you.

I always said you should've hung yourself, as at least there was pleasure involved.

According to the Cure, Friday I'm in Love. So Then, What Is Sunday?

The bookshelf was really rockabilly, and the record collection held works of fiction penned into neat little lines. One night, I got up to sing the blues to the taste of beer and cigarettes, feeling the flimsy material of my skirt dancing in the starlit night. As I leaned outside the home, spewing like a chimney, I realized there had to be more to life than this -- smoking on the front porch of my best friend's house, while watching a mile of shooting stars pass me by.

I opened my eyes a little wider, and put out my cigarette. I stomped my feet into the frosty ground; poured out my beer. Three in the morning was never meant to see the light of day, yet the sun peeked out over the horizon. I knew it'd set only minutes later in the city where the sun sets at four AM, should it happen to set at all. In the midst of this baking disaster and sex toy universe, I made up a false reminder for a false crush, best friend, and life.

I pretend with the photograph, just as a lyricist pretends with his words, or a artist pretends with charcoal. I paint my portrait, sing my soundtrack, capture my shot. This is me, who I've ever wanted to be -- the way you look at me, unconventional, sick and sad and sadistic coated in Photoshop effects. The lights behind me blur out the darkness in the sky, and the sky blurs out the clouds of night. Mosquitoes swarm my family, my friends, my soul -- bite down deep inside, only to have flies escape from the fruit.

In the garden on edge of Eden, wisps of smoke drift forth, smoke smelling much sweeter than cigarettes and best friends and hopeless romantics. No, this time around, I'm trying to prove it to you. I would say yes, the minute you put down the bottle, put out the cigarette, get off your ass and get a job.

I'd say yes in a heartbeat, despite the lopsided smile, and the uneven mohawk. I'd say yes -- if for once in your life, you learned to say no.

I Love You More Than Apple Juice, Although Not Apple Juice Itself -- If Any Condolence, I Do Love You More Than Root Beer... My Apologies

Playing video games on a Sunday afternoon never seemed so far away as we stalked the mall, lurked the park, and stomped the yard. In between the multicoloured hat and the one covered in pink lace, the day added up to be a ritual of flaming stuffed animals, sex under the clouds, and friendships built strong within a matter of hours. On top of the weird spelling and awkward situations, misjudgment on age and a guess that falls inaccurately upon the ginger kid's shoulders, there was the $6 price tag slapped across his forehead.

We walked down the street in pairs, three boys, three girls -- men or women, call the shots. Take the shots, the vodka far from hand, the ice cappuccinos and McDonald's Coca-Cola at an arm's length in distance. Under the blazing September sun, we wander without purpose, without ambition, without the slightest thought as to how we are, we meet again, if ever, for the final moments before crashing another party, partaking in another water fight -- stealing another hat.

When the conversation takes over the homepage, and the Matrix is the farthest thing from insanity, robots and CGI visuals become a second nature.

Dance tonight, dance into the bluest skies and the darkest clouds, the shining lights and the stars.

Most of all, dance into the sun, the sun where the good girls go to die.

Is it a bad thing, that he's older than me?

In Old Chicago, Vaudeville and Innocence Fell Hard and Fast -- much like Britney Spears

We all saw the idiot walk off the edge of the breakwater, and into the rest of his life.

There are two things that can make a wish on a shooting star permanent -- another wish, or death.

In the shadow of overabundance and self indulgence, lies the story of a silver spoon, two dollars, and the backstreets of Tokyo; spelt the English way, versus Tokio Hotel, the German band.

As far as German bands go, I'd skip over Tokio Hotel and Rammstein any day for my Funker Vogt, Das Ich, And One, Icon of Coil, KMFDM, or :wumpscut:.

I'm becoming a bit of a rivethead, aren't I? I'll need to fix that, soon as I stop reading these William Beckett fan fictions and listening to Joy Division.

Okay, that might be a while.

The Citizen Fish Lived A Disposable Dream of Heading Downtown, And Scoping Out Rubber Ducks and Bacon Bandages at Zydeco

We're fading away into the background of classroom chalkboards, shivering in our oversized jackets and miniskirts. Watch the video kid fall far behind; fall out of line on the road to uncertainty. We've all got a certain style of clothing, of writing, and a certain method to breaking hearts laced with popular culture and social deficiency. Making plans that overlap other plans on purpose never seemed so appealing, as the day floats away into a cloud of wasps and air pollution.

I melt into a senseless fan girl puddle when I listen to Good Charlotte (and other pop-punk bands) on the rooftop of my best friend's house, letting the music shake the shingles. I let the music take us over as we dance to the clear, crisp sound of her stereo, socked feet tapping dangerously close to the gutter. Underneath the stars, late on a Thursday night, as a full blown drunken party ensues next door. The child is outside with the dog -- but these days, we see she puts herself outside anyway.

As the Presidents of the United States of America took over the Olympic ceremonies, and the aesthetic singers all danced a jig with Ashlee Simpson during her wedding -- we all laughed and smiled and sang along to her untraditional wedding dress. I know it's of no concern to me, but I never did find the city of neon and chrome to feel too damn much like home, unless you count the hours I wasted away on the floor of a friend's apartment, dancing with her boyfriend to the stripper's song.

I Became Tired Of Drawing Crude Comics About Quentin Tarantino and Al Pacino

In the moment of sickness and frustration, there may be something else. Hold on tight to the stomachaches, grasp blindly at the dizziness. Hope it passes on through, but in this sick detoxification of sobriety, hold on to sanity as it follows through with the stumbling and half-assed attempts at something real.

So in the length and in the distance, I hope you make all the effort in the world to cook a proper birthday cake. It's better than eating bagels all damn day.

Peter Lewis Kingston Wentz III, You Confuse the Fuck Out of Me With Your God Damn Viral Campaigns -- Fuck Copeland; They Ain't Worth Shit

Screw the music, I'm here for the business.

And to find out her name, knowing she is not, in fact, Carah Faye.

Down the river toward the sunlight in her hair, she strut, all sneakers, all shoelaces, all pavement. The river runs, straight through the downtown streets. The water trickles down between her feet, against her body, wrapped around her mind. The water, it suffocates, gasping -- she walks forth; pulled onward by the light. There is nothing there, but innocence of a childhood time long lost to age and wisdom, gloom settling down onto a soul far wiser than her years.

Her sunglasses lay helpless upon her forehead, her fingers tangled within key chains in her pants. Closer than the water to her skin, was the hands around her neck, and the footsteps on her heel. The sensation of burning, bruising, or bashing against her skull numbing the every move she made. Breathe in, breathe out, hold her head high, she moves on in the dim glow of twilight, soaking in the water that washed through millions of decaying bodies.

So through the heavy metal, the punks, rivetheads, and every other bad stereotype in the book, she stands strong.

And through to the light she can run, legs pumping harder than a child on a swing set, hair flying behind her with no need of a straightening iron.

No more, but the warmth of sunlight against her face, and her freckles; freckles that had never been there in the dark.

So Fifteen Years Wasn't Nearly Long Enough For Reality to Set In

I ask myself, 'What would I trade for one more day?' The time melted away the comforts once familiar, the mark of age piercing our innocence. The news never sounded so pessimistic, the sky so dark, or the sun so far away. In the gloom of summer behind a sea of clouds, I trade it all away -- the friend whom nobody would've pinned, the stupid green West 49 hat, the functioning headphones. I trade it all away for one more day, just like things used to be. Singing songs to the sky around the flames, laughing, joking; wasting away.

So here I am, one more year, one more step behind. Was it worth it in the end that all these days string so close, that suddenly it hasn't even hit me yet, but I know I've done something incredibly stupid in regards to my future? So I hold it off, know that realization may never hit me, and I can't keep sinking for one more year, because that may hurt me more than I ever imagined. Got to buck down, work harder, take more responsibility. Perhaps sleep -- as sleep tends to help things.

I'll try to write, like I always do.
I'll try to dream, like I always will.
I'll keep on sinking under the city lights, dreaming of a better life laced with sin and satisfaction, sex and attractive men.

This is the most truthful I've been in the last five years.
This is me, and all I've ever been afraid of.
I've learned, there is too much to lose.
This year, I'm going to have the most fun I've ever had in my life, with my future on the tips of my fingers.

This year is for me, and only me.

At the end of the day, I still find myself laughing. Laughing, because the new couches wouldn't fit through the front door.

A Tale for Lorni Hales

Girl of fifteen; girl so young.
Smile at the wisdom that you still hold,
And pray for the day it doesn't fade away.

Corner to the bracket,
Word to the paper –
Work it out until there's nothing left.

Pen to the lips,
Juice to the sky;
Hold tight for good night wishes.

Then one more love,
One more life,
One more dream come true.

Girl of fifteen; girl so worn.
Use those crayons up,
Stay young – don’t' be afraid.

Shaking Hands with the Faceless Famous Wearing Sex Pistol Tributes

Together in the blazing desert sun,
Smoking cigars and listening to One.
Metallica doesn't add up to all these lies,
Days turned to clouds drifting by.

So bad 90's music doesn't match Metallica,
And the bedroom doesn't match open field.
End of story for what we once knew...
Because now I've learned.

It's not worth the rhymes.

A week since disaster ensued, there is nothing but mist in the air and whispers in the wind, dancing off the tongue of strangers. Standing in a hotel lobby, I patiently wait for the time to run out, and the tomatoes to rot, in hopes that I will find some sort of closer from inside the bank vault.

There is nothing short of innocence here, and nothing short of innocence lie elsewhere in misspellings and horrible rapture.

The Sirens Wail for Both First and Second

Merry Christmas, happy birthday, blessthefall, Escape the Fate, gold medal BREAKAWAY!

Wedding vows under a skylight, recited word for word unto eternity; meaningless exchange of gifts, of money, of excess information and informal gossip. Said the excuse to spend thousands, excuse to buy the jewels.

Back to the street corner, the city never sounded so much like home. The glint of neon and chrome glistening in the ambulance windows as we roar off into the dust and dawn.

Snap a picture, right a chair and climb aboard. Lose touch -- but don't lose faith.

There's a reason we carried him off in an ambulance; there's a reason I'm still standing here tonight.

Hope you're doing better, man. When the day before yesterday blurs into a fine line of misery business and enigmatic sin. 

When the sirens fade out, on the second ambulance, we don't waste our time to cry.

That makes twelve accidents, two ambulances, eight dead birds, and five dollars less in the last two days.

Going Mobile, Until Arctic Meets Atlantic

I'll pretend that my favourite band isn't stealing lines from the Smashing Pumpkins; soaked in sin and wrapped in skin we float forward into the void we like to call sanity and publicity. There's a horizon over the edge of the corner slab, where the corpse lay undisturbed. We're living in an idyllic utopian state, where warfare and meager belongings are far away from the common mind.

There are disasters about to happen, and conspiracy theories thwarted by common sense. There is a hair in my chicken noodle soup, a spoon in my pudding, a light bulb in my play-doh. I've forgotten how to spell simple words, and find it difficult to wire together sentences with mismatched phrases.

My favourite thing to do is scream from rooftops about lemonade and silver string -- it's a pass time I rather enjoy.

Cut the Crack, Cut the Curtains, Cut Cute Is What We Aim For, Cut(e) without the E, Cut From the Team, Cut the Cord and Hang the President

Today, on the Chopin block...

We're running behind on hours, racing around the track once, thrice, to keep up with the clocks. There's two people in the middle of it all. A boy and a girl who overlaps each other and tangle together in a sluggish mess. These people, they're qualified to spin in circles all day. They're qualified to win, just as I'm qualified to watch from the sidelines, and race along the loser's track.

There's nothing to prove, nothing to say, nothing but self-absorbed sanity.

No more safety, with no more faith.

I can't feel you here anymore.

There is no honesty in lengthy apologies, so I refrain from meaningless banter.

Sleigh Bells Ring on Top of Old Major's Jail Cell

Before the boots; the Nine Inch Nails CDs and the Russian novels were from different worlds. Now we are, but all is lost into the din of sadness and horror -- hide behind the Alice Cooper style make up, and make up your own reasons for owning DKNY and Gucci when you don't bother with worse for wear. Thin, dine, words wound together in a bedroom desk drawer and dear God, have we had time to lose our minds, loosen our ties, forge our futures and step forth into the shoes of sinners?

We're all letting ourselves down.

Don't eat that.

It's mine.

In Bat Country on the Same Plane as Historical References, Umbrella Academys, and Drug Abuse

There's no time to tie your shoes on the high road to heaven, when the keyboard clicks are background noise to the lead singer of your former favourite band, and the idea of being the number one fan has gained only sex appeal in the last ten years. There are groupies -- always groupies, sane as a bad typo and online instant messages through networking websites, bad hearing and corn nuts. Smile out an open window, smile for a Metallica song replayed so many times your brains hurt, and smile for that light bulb you keep forgetting to replace.

There's the best friend who nags for reason, and the stroll around the neighborhood that leaves you wondering whether you bought groceries last night. Back to that run down shack of a home -- where the bed is the only place you can't get a good night's sleep, and the kitchen smells of paint fumes more than something vaguely reminiscent of edible. In a careful sense, there's the canister of gasoline on the edge of the fire we mustn't knock over, before you depart.

Then your off into the wild, to the lake for another week of camping and blames and truths and all in betweens; leave me here in the fallout -- crying because you're not coming back. Not this time, not next time, not the car accident that's your life, or the drug induced euphoria that's your sanity. No more, no less, but former and latter, and all that remains is dust, and a stupid trucker hat.

Tonight, Masochism Tasted a Lot like Lemonade and Renaissance Art

Break the skin; can't tell where your body ends and mine begins.

I hear the beat; heard it louder than your heart pumping blood through your system. I feel the music as it courses through your veins, the very fibre of your being meshed with tiny blood vessels fueling your body with appropriate amounts of oxygen and oxycodone genocide. Worse than the music and the morphine is the eternal sedative, the feeling of bliss that blocks out all other emotion and draws a blank upon facial expression. It's the coffee that slows you down -- that shit is like water to me; the beer.

The idea is within the man, but when the man is within the alcohol, the idea is lost. So I close my eyes, and touch the man, because there isn't much else to do. There isn't much else to be lost, sanity already fled many day sbefore. Smile into the kiss, touch into the night, make a mess of the sheets. We're cutting edge, cutting clean, cutting skin on the cutting room floor. Where flesh meets flesh, and eyes of silver glue shut on the pillow case. Here we go again.

So just as the Armchair Cynics knew all too well, you go off like a gun, like a loaded weapon.

Bang bang bang.

From a long break in cultural difference and dissonance, all that is derived is bad music references to a local band, and a short, disarray of lettering.

My apologies.

Today, We Only Wish We Were as Fascinated by the Growing Stain on the Bookshelf That's Vaguely Shaped Like Anna Nicole Smith as We Are With Fascism

Excuse me, you just sat on Steven – no, he's on that chair. Yes, I’m aware you're sitting on this chair. He's on this chair too. You know, he's also in my lap. He's a good cat…

I stayed up too late one night listening to songs about the next door neighbour and his best friend tramp; the whore down the street didn't stand a chance compared to this character. She's quite the darling, with her knee high boots and childish scream. She yells at night, when my neighbour laughs.

So this neighbour boy and his best friend tramp laugh all night, and scream all night, and here I am, sitting at my laptop thinking about early it is in the morning for Green Tea and White Rabbit candies listening to Jefferson Airplane, Facebook messages, and bridal showers. How I’m not looking forward to shopping, going to the movie theatre, and counting off days on the calendar.

Most of all, I'm sitting here thinking about how I'd like to blow up a small planet, cook up a recipe book in hopes it doesn't set aflame the kitchen, swallow a few iron supplements, and pray to a higher power I won't faint tomorrow morning.

Barcode Apologies for the Deaf Leopard

A bookshelf lined with dramatic cartoons and Stephen King novels fills the room; a room brimming with the innocence of a young child, long lost to hostility and irresponsibility. CD's line the walls, and blankets scatter about the bed.

The figure sits in the middle of disaster, cooking up ideas in a notebook the size of wallet. Silent and brooding, burrowing itself into the depths of literature and expression, this figure sits still.

I watch it, feeling as if I was watching myself so many years ago.

Then I looked away, because nobody likes being watched by their own ipod speakers.

When I saw the walls, I knew I was too short to accomplish much. At first, there was the theory, the optimism and hope of a freer time – freer with a fee, like a free bird who couldn't feel.

We were feeling so good that day; the mysterious figure and I. It may as well have been our story, but it wasn't.

It may as well have been worthwhile telling, but I think I forgot to mention – I'm pretty sure I just burnt my toast.

My Neighbors Didn't Like the Sound of Cat Scratch Fever in the Afternoon, Just Like I Didn't Like the Smell of Car Accident in the Morning

With names too long to fit on a title, and pictures edited in Photoshop to fool the creative sexual predator, children around the world are revolutionizing the institution of intuition we like to call the world, and the boundaries and rules people live by each and every day. Between rock concerts and CDs stacked to the ceiling in cramped, closet-sized bedrooms, it becomes literal; coming out of the closet.

When the gay kid flaunts their way down the hallway, and nobody turns to spit -- find out why old ways have gone to shit. Colored markers and rainbow bracelets make up for the bleach blonde, the tacky shoes, and the dollar store stick on earrings that children wear so much; wear whatever you want if it's cool -- hip. Follow those internet trends, latch onto those humorous ideas so tight, then let them go at the right time and keep moving on.

What is funny today, might not be funny tomorrow.

What is funny a few decades ago?

That's all the rage today.

Fourteen Years of Silence and a Slice of Apple Pie

The girls in the back room are discussing the volume of bowling balls as compared to mascara, and the boys at the country club are counting light bulbs. Open eyes, close eyes, breathe in, breathe out, pump blood throughout the body like a mechanical robot. Live life, live free, live in peace -- where there is no excitement to pierce the quiet din of nothingness that has become life.

Soft shoulders, with even softer skin. Like a full body makeover, in the form of ice and snow, stone and cold. There is always new technology, like there is always new faces, new names, but never new places. They're all overgrown from years of use -- covered every inch of this goddamn planet in a matter of millenniums; counting light bulbs suddenly became appealing.

A magazine cut out model on the bedroom wall of a young child. Another girl says, "I'm going to be just like her."

That mother pretends that 'being just like her' doesn't mean skipping meals, throwing up on purpose, and self-injury.
That mother pretends she is still that little girl, saying, "I'm going to be just like that when I grow up."

Late Night Ninjas & the Goth Clown on the Bicycle Have Yet to Find Their Liquor

The music screams my name; swear to listen this time around, eh? It's the most Canadian thing I could say, the most stereotypical thing that can bury a person – along with the snow, the beavers, and the ignorance of foreigners.

While watching the cows fly by as they ride their musical notes down the Guitar Hero II trail, the porcupine dances on the shelf. 

I know it's short, but if it makes up for it, it did take close to five years to figure out the fucking carpet in this room repeats. 

She Had To Clean The Windows

A combination of Gothic architecture and snow capped mountains provide reason enough for the two hundred dollars wasted at Tim Hortons last week. I didn't ask for a story tonight, same as I didn't ask for a pillow with blue stripes.

I got the pillow anyway, along with the wedding pictures and some bad text message arguments. So I'll drink away the night, no champagne, no marshmallows, no crystal dreams of hurricanes.

Long ago, best friends, lovers, and sex on the side involves conversation and sideways glances. The hour ticks by; glasses are no longer clean. Cut your hair, stupid bitch.

Cut your fucking hair.

A Desperate Cry for Masks and Shadowplay

I saw it behind the curtains of my bedroom window; sucking away the life within me. I can stop breathing for a minute, hold my breath, and feel the cold. The icy air shakes the walls around me, and I've nearly fallen to the ground. Then, I think, I can't take this today. It's another game to play in para-dice.

Fancy world play never meant that much to me, or meat. It wasn't the question so much as it was the answer, the parody on real life provided by your friendly neighborhood cartoon heroes, and lead forth with the vigilance of cardboard policemen and small army men figurines that five year olds shove down their throats.

Cold as ice, it's back again. I back away, because I don't know what else to do. There is a gathering tonight, down at the Conquest Pub, and I shall try to make my way there unscathed. Yet, somehow, through it all I seem to have forgotten my lighter and that scraggly t-shirt I seem to enjoy wearing out on weekends.

Goddamn it, Margaret, I seem to have failed at reading the Handmaid's Tale.

Social Suicide is a Far Cry from World Domination, Germany, and Bad Hamburgers

Backed up with narcissistic tendencies and wit sharp as a tuna fish, pretty boy in the corner is out to conquer the world. He's got newspaper reporters and a broken down stereo. He's got Supertramp records, and a collection of CDs that could level all of Toronto. He's got everything you've left behind, and everything that scene girl he used to date threw out. He's got his lopsided smile, paper airplane pin, and sideways trucker hat. He's got everything we don't.

We watch him; shrink until he towers over us with his ego and his arrogance. He walks above us, high and mighty, only because we allow him. He walks above us, heel to toe, on that steel tightrope thread between skyscrapers and the industrialized nation.

On a plane is where we all feel safest, that beast terrorizing beneath us until the world is his. That beast, the splitting image of my mirrored reflection, my second half. That monster, he's another one of them. He's become my Hitler. My little Hitler, all grown up and smiling to the world through the lens of a video camera.

My little Hitler, his turn to cause mass genocide. 

The Zodiac Lied to the Movie Theatre

You didn't write off-beat songs to be covered by low-rate metal bands of the twenty-first century. You didn't write music to be appreciated or to be slandered. No, you wrote music because you wanted to put your heart on paper -- but look where that paper heart has fallen amongst the great guitar riffs and horrid singing. Ripped, torn and put through the paper shredder only to be taped back together and photocopied as an 'original' for an issue of 'Kerrang!' in stores today!

In the light of advertisement and remakes, there is a name in there, which is to be made. A name built on a loser and a bottle of whiskey, stacked above a pile of stupid songs and terrible ideas. Then there is a ghost, the whisper of a voice that tells you this is your life. You look at me then, because I know you didn't want this. The look is brief, I'm just one of a million that does this trick -- a one trick pony turned into twenty, then a hundred, then a number you don't recognize.

Welcome to Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Berlin, or Tokyo. Welcome to another hotel room, another bottle of shit, and another girl splayed out on your mattress. Welcome to hell, said the devil. Welcome to heaven, said the rock star. Welcome, I said, to the fucking end of the new age revolution, and the beginning of self-destruction through thoughtless admiration and tidal waves of angry guitars.

Gordon Lightfoot Decided My Pages Would Freeze Today

All these goddamn lies have been sitting useless for far too long. I don't like to admit it, but there's always a storm over the edge of the horizon. Some auto-correction and whiteout, and we've got a big mess on our hands. We always thought that the eyes looked the other way when we used that five-finger-discount at the Mac's down the road from our high school.

It was easy as a bag of chips, easy as midnight sex on the cutting room floor, and the cold kitchen tiles against the slut's back. Easy as the gay kid who shot himself in the head, and the bad memories with 80's tunes and upside down goal posts from a soccer game.

Tomorrow is yesterday's story to write. Tomorrow has become us, and then some. Tomorrow, we keep forgetting, is only a mere piece of today, stacked in a pile and shifted four squares to the right.

We're losing this board game, and we're sinking to the bottom of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

Death to the Baby, Darlingcakes

Don't forget to exhale when you breathe in the pixie dust off the old school texbooks in your profanity induced stupor. We're all trekking downtown tonight for a party on the corner of Forth and Fremont, where we'll float into cyberspace and dictate the lives of millions across the universe.

It's become a play on words that nobody has skill to comprehend, or the effort to edit.

It's become a wasteland, this one.

Five Hundred Twenty Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes

Five Hundred Twenty Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes -- how do you measure the accomplishments of your life; the hours wasted watching movies like RENT that bring tears to your eyes, and singing songs like Will I that make you wonder if you will indeed lose your dignity, or if anyone would care.

How do you count the times you've forgotten why you were writing in the first place, in the world of smoke and mirrors, coated in thick, black chemically inhanced tomato juice?

Off the Front Page; Off the Record

We are children spreading stories, telling lies to those who are eager to listen. They whisper behind their hands, they talk about relationships, and downtown escapades. They talk about the boys who steal purses, and girls who play football. The cross-dressers, bisexual, and the mysterious kid who sits in the corner. There spear the child in the wheelchair; taunt the teachers and their appearances, with their methods as only underlying reason. They are vicious; they are cruel.

We take it down the road -- our show no more than casual sex and disgusting antics, in the middle of the street on a Thursday night. So we're out like a light, but we pretend our flame still burns bright, and that our tournament did not finish up years ago. We're living in the past, as we move on towards the future, and brighter days of gloom and doom. We're poets of the worst kind, the "kids who didn't make it" in life. Yet we thrash ahead to the same beat as the rest of the world, ahead in alcohol and the business of insanity.

We make mistakes, because everybody else makes mistakes. It doesn't take much longer than a second to right them, doesn't take longer than a second to destroy ourselves. So we're running again, off into the starless night, and into the depths of our lover's eyes, swimming in tears and misery, saying "kill me now", and other things we stereotype as a trend, versus real emotion.

Sick, Sick Sobriety

He builds me up stronger than New York; holding together a nation with the flick of a finger, wave of a hand. We're structurally sound, connected by every odd mind wave and blank expression, our eyes glazed over and our brains running on seemingly identical frequencies. We're two radios on the same station, polluting the air with our noise. We're two rocks lying in the same river, being yanked apart by the current -- further, until no more but a shadow and ripples can be seen.

Cue the part where you colour me cliché, decide that it is not worth the wait, and dive head first into the well of bad ideas. The sunshine darkens, covered by clouds, and the self-respected emperor sinks beneath the thick rapids; waves wash ashore what remains -- nothing more than an empty shell, or the foundation of a building strong. There is nothing left, but a hollow and vacant structure, to fall at the slightest impact as you've fallen away in time.

He builds me up stronger than New York, on the verge of self-destruction -- deteriorating and self-destructing from the inside out. Then he tears me down faster than an airplane would; collapse into the water, float away to a place where someone else may fall.

Sinking Ships on Halfway House

Quarter past twelve on a Sunday morning, was behind the hazel eyes and dancing shadows the light of day. Crying about the deal we didn't make, it was nothing but mere sanity issues, and a few pieces of uncertain anguish. For those nights we can't remember, wasting away behind a veil of kindness and hollow emotions, dreaming of a better world without war and peace. There was once a line between the different faces of humanity; now there is none.

With all heavens bowing down to our toes and kissing the soles of our feet with parched lips, begging for a drink, we begin our escapade towards exploration of a better life. In a new world of dystopia numbers and prescription medication, there is nothing but emptiness and the distant echo of these days reverberating through an empty room for empty ears detached from the minds in which they used to inhabit.

So in this room that is vaguely familiar and more like home than home, lies four people -- none of that are complaining at this content stage of nostalgia, and will continue so until the become no less than catatonic.

Senseless Sanity

The eyes have seen nothing more than those lips between the moonlight trees, backlit by the sun setting over the horizon and the stars glittering high above all clouds. The sky polluted with colours of the seasons, the golden oranges, and fiery reds obstructing the natural beauty of it all. The radiator blasts foul smoke, and in the broken down vehicle, we await the morning glow. The mouth in the sky is near felony, opening wide and swallowing us with the darkening night. We are nothing more than those harboring fugitives are.

We're dancing to songs by the Clash as morning swings around, and screaming words -- music without a tempo, sound without a beat. There is white noise and the paranormal engulfing and taking over what we once saw familiar underneath the methodical glare of headlights and a destination. A work of wicker twists and turns paved on gravel trails and woodchip roads, winding deep into the open world before us, trees obstructing our past like immobile giants.

We pretend we like it- we'll never like it. Saying that we're free in this wormhole of insatiable uncertainty and irresponsibility, wasting about on alcohol and cigarettes, thinking we're cool. Through the desert skies, sing melodies, ready and waiting for my best friend, an acoustic guitar, and me.

Colour of Skin -- Flesh

However, not but enemy said the fallen soldier, brazen amongst the war-torn worlds he did not understand. This slip of foolishness brought upon miles of turmoil dancing over desert sand, and the sweetest taste of sour at the back of your throat, the bile that arises as you expel the contents of your stomach in fear; in ache and pains. Moreover, 'twas no more than the sound of a lullaby, stranger singing songs into the brisk air for the deaf. The words that you yourself are no longer permitted to sing -- he understands then.

Carpet Issues

Drinking the water so we don't drown,
Four days later the world burns down.
Upon our ashes lay frozen ground,
Shaking, breaking, faking sound.

Raved through nighttime sky,
The world has learnt to pass us by.
Playing our song to say goodbye,
Drifting off in order to die.

And let it all be what we see,
Let it all be our cup of tea.
A metaphor for that are we,
Lost to a world in simplicity.

Lampost Dancing Skies

The night is dark; the sky is bright. Yet the moon it glows, burning through the clouds into the world, where neither people nor savage see fit for illumination. Beneath the darkened bright-lit sky, lies a collection of people – strange, a compilation of the oddest factors, binding together begrudgingly and without much other option.

There is no say in the gathering, and there is not much say in much else either. All is love and politics, all is safe and sound. Yet beneath the chemicals in the nighttime air, sits a song we're never willing to sing.

When the birds come out to play at dawn, and the sun shall show once more, the shortened expense of this nighttime meeting dims, and nothing is anymore worth more than pennies down the drain and paperclips in the office.

Nothing worth more than those who have a say – those who have something to say during the hour when the shadows take over, only to be blinded by the light in the sky, impersonating our good friend, our knight.

Expression Expresso; Hands Over Eyes

In the midst of social awkwardness and dreams beyond my fingertips, I allow myself a piece of mind – a space to introduce myself. My name is Emily; I am naught but a foolish high school student traipsing blankly through the World Wide Web.

Beyond the friendly demeanor and over-enthusiastic smiles, there is something else hidden within the world. So be it that this world is where my secrets lie – my most secretive and private feelings splayed out for the world to view.

Let it remain, that strangers, miles away identify with this tangled web of relinquished dreams, and this vichyssoise of verbiage without much meaning at face value.