Isn't it enough to know that I ruined a pony making a gift for you?

So I'm still working on that short story, but today has been an interesting beast. I got completely ready to ride my bike off to class, but as I was about to walk out the door, I just couldn't do it. I had an idea in the back of my mind for what is probably a distinctly mediocre poem about what modern identity is, but I had to sit down and write it anyway. So here it is.

Turing Test (wt)

Logging on anymore, there is

that fear, someone reading through every

word you write, a database of the

changing art. Indigency means

nothing, downloaded souls to external hard drives

are exported and become citizens in four dimensions.

Used to be, only a photograph could take

that part, souls appearing spread on paper

slung from chemical

solutions.

Now

The worms writhe out of the walls, constant mating

dance of zeros and ones, and we

send ourselves out, bit by bit,

a replication building out of those pixels.

On the other end, decoupage of

all related pieces, and a new time

a new English new art

a new identity

sit down to a keyboard

and type out the mirror.

So thats what I had to come sit down in my room and work on. Right now though, now that I've finished that, I'm just kind of staring out the window at some crows. I love scavenger birds. Ravens are my favorite but crows are just as fascinating. They're all incredibly bratty animals, who are also extremely intelligent. Anything non-human that enjoys sledding is pretty awesome.

Work is going well. Still buying too many books. I just finished up Rant by Chuck Palahniuk. Pretty good stuff written in a very interesting style. I still feel as if ninety percent of the people in my classes aim to replicate him though.

God, I am a terrible blog writer.

That story

Apparently, I'm someone whose faith is easily shaken.

Since my last post, I've continued to work on that story. Its coming along alright, but this evening I got two of the other stories from my class in my email. And while I try to moderate my expectations for others work, they're writing blows mine out of the water.

One of the stories, written by a friend of mine, is an extremely daring piece written from a scientific and mathematical perspective. Essentially it explores ideas of time, space and movement from the point of view of geometric shapes. The other, written for all intents and purposes by the person in the class who I dislike the most, is still technically proficient. It feels like all of his writings though, arrogant and cocky. He comes across as the self-profess genius. And then theres me. I feel as if my writing is stagnating; I'm never going to go anywhere with it, and I'll end up in some dead end job for the rest of my life, regretting this major and wanting to go back to college. I already feel as if I'm headed in that direction.

So what do I do?

I've passed my story along to others, and maybe its not as horrible as I think. I can only hope that someone will find something in it that interests them, but right now, writing itself as it is, I'm extremely pessimistic as to its future.

The worst part is that this attitude seeps into other aspects of my life as well. My poetry has been in decline and I find myself doubting my abilities more and more. Here is my most recent piece as a way to end this entry, and I just don't feel that in any way is it my strongest work. Goodnight.

Raw Shark on May 13^th, 1994 (wt)

That was when he rolled down the hill, an

early summer day. You would try

to make yourself sick with the spinning. But

a punctured ear drum, dried grass spear, works

just as well. Screams result in equal lightheadedness.

That puncture opened his ear to invasion, headspace

for everyone. Each memorial nightmare wound up

speaking into that piercing, burbling whispers

through the healing fluid.

They dove in then, struggling through tympanic membrane,

opening auditory condos, waiting for the momentum

to change.

Small events affect everything.

Ever after, a perpetual swimmers ear,

secreted to change the vibration, hear a difference,

respond in the wrong. They played Eustachian tubes like

flutes, those nocturnal unknowables, and each note

he repeated back like it was the gospel.

He looked and

heard the ways tree branches formed patterns against a

gray sky.

The others gave him prozac, filled him with a

chemical fix, an outward smile to mask

the way he saw heard. But still, with each step

there was that pop, a small reminder, that

they were still inside, and that time, when he would

misinterpret

mistake

fuck up

and disappear

was still to come.

Hippos

My dreams apparently want me to own a cowboy hat. I think it would be awesome. My dreams also apparently want me to go buy old vhs tapes and video game systems at garage sales. My dreams know whats up.

So yep, I'm doing alright. I'll be going full time at the book store starting in May, and I've started work on my final project for Fiction class. I'm writing a story about a park, and the first introduction that you get to this park is an escaped hippo named Gladys back in the 1930s. Odd idea, but its struck me as interesting. We'll see.