Being Vulnerable

Many people know me on the Long Island and NYC poetry and spoken word circuit as a calm, confident, and outgoing performer. I've been described as bubbly, charismatic, and extroverted; I love meeting new people and jumping right into fresh, novel situations. I try to maintain an air of positivity and humbleness... and to smile. Most people would consider me a happy person, which I most certainly am, and a bit of a joker.

This is by no means a farce. In all sincerity, I am a very happy person. I look around me and find that I am surrounded by so many beautiful people, by so many beautiful things. I feel loved and show love to as many people as I can, stranger or friend. I feel so blessed in my day to day life, and it creates such a wonderful space to be creative in. I strive to put forth ideas of good, right, openness, and beneficence - to exemplify the best of humanity.

What most people - friends, acquaintances, family, lovers - probably don't know is that I struggle.

Each and every day.

Although I may give off an air of stoic positivity, unshakable confidence, and childlike joy, I often feel incredibly alone. I feel utterly broken.

Again, the positivity and happiness people perceive in me is not at all synthetic. It is not a mask or a suit I put on when I'm out in the open, when I'm behind a mic. What you see is what you get. I am an open and honest person, and that is one of the reasons why I am writing this.

There is a risk you run when you choose to love people selflessly. (The original title of this blog was "Agápē Bodhisattva." The Greek word for "unconditional love," Agápē is something I take quite seriously.) It can be exhaustive and nonreciprocal. It can be taken advantage of and be misinterpreted. Riskier still, in intimate relationships, it can create friction, misunderstanding, and lead to obsessive behavior. I obsess. I have to resist the urge to stalk. These are some of the things I struggle with.

I do a lot of work in the field of mental illness, particularly in suicide prevention and depression. This may be partly motivated by this looming sense of incompleteness that follows me around, like a shadow of my shadow. There have been times in my life where I have reflected on the thought of ending my life, sometimes for days on end. Just meditating on it. Stewing in it.

Sometimes the anxiety is too much to bear.

Honestly, poetry readings, open mics, and performances help me to manage my endlessly reeling mind, stopping it from thinking of the past and fretting over the future. Being surrounded by people who enjoy what this fucked up brain of mine cooks up amidst fighting with a heart that is growing infinity bigger than it could ever hope to become has probably kept me alive. I feel broken. I feel lonesome. But I don't let that conquer me.

I'm here to tell you that no matter what you feel inside, no matter how broken, useless, hopeless, ugly, lonesome, listless, longing, brokenhearted, damaged, and otherwise undeserving you feel, things do get better. Although the moments of goodness and beauty seem few and far between, live for those moments, look for them, because they will help you to realize that there is so much more than hurt. We're all a little bit selfish - that's ok. We all feel worthless - you're not.

It's not about what we deserve, it's about what we're worth to ourselves.

I'm broken. I'm lonesome. But I'm alive. And being alive is the only excuse you need to say that things get better. Being alive makes you more blessed than you could comprehend. Happiness is possible. There is a moment out there waiting for you, to help you realize what really matters.

Don't let your darkness take your light. Do let it make you see it. They are one.    

The Freedom of Truth: Liar's Plea

Truth is a curious phenomena. It is something that can be very powerful and beneficent, but also incredibly spiteful. For those who adhere to truth and honesty, life is pretty kind. The truth will set you free, so they say - free from guilt, free from fear, free from apprehension. I think the greatest danger in falsifying the truth (lying) is the culpability that builds inside us. As time goes on, guiltiness will haunt, while the chances of the truth coming to the surface increases. It is a terrible, beautiful game.

Truth is dangerous and powerful. Hold true to it and it will never spite you. Turn your back on it and truth will stab it. 

Most people avoid the truth because of the pain or consequences that result from its admission. To avoid such inconveniences, we often fabricate a lie to put off the angst of the moment. The problem  with this is that the pain is minimized for a time, but after a while, especially if the lie is maintained, the pain of the truth getting free becomes far worse. The bigger the fiction, the harder it will fall, the sharper the pieces, and the farther they'll scatter. Also, as time passes, the victims of truth will increase exponentially. Truth must be kept in check by ensuring it is spoken of more often than not. Truth enjoys attention.

We all lie, and little white lies aren't so bad sometimes. But there is a huge difference between a petty fib and a massive fabrication. Have you got lies you've been keeping for a long while? Do they eat you up inside, but you're too afraid to tell the truth? Set those who may be hurt by the truth down and tell it to them gently yourself. They will appreciate it, maybe not immediately, but with time they will respect your courage. It is the worst when the truth is admitted by someone or something else. Don't be afraid to befriend the truth. Truth and honesty will sprinkle your life with goodness. It is the essence of karma.

Liar's Plea

If some solitude can be sought between

The rind that segregates me,

Perhaps some air could leak inside 

And nourish this sheltered being

Whose memories confine with sin

The falseness they betray,

While truth stands by

Suffocating, 

But refuses to decay.

Stringing You Along: Corsage, Croissant, Crochet, Croquet

We've all been backstabbed by someone we thought we knew. Someone we loved who reciprocated only to snuff it out; a friend we confided in who spilled the precious beans; a risk taken only to result in failure. Sometimes it is intentional. Other times no one can rightfully be blamed. Spite and anger always seem to be the first emotion resorted to in such instances. Perhaps there is some evolutionary explanation as to why. Perhaps there is a savage benefit to spitting in the face of something that once was.

Venting is a healthy way of dealing with such intense reactions, especially if they are out of our control. Sometimes, the powers that be ordain things that cannot be shaped by our attempts to change them; when one half of a duel party refuses to alleviate the situation, the other half must depart. Providing yourself with a robust route of dispensing of your anger and spite will prove far better for the heart and mind in the long run than bottling it up or even allowing it to burst forth. 

That's why the arts are so important: Music, painting, photography, writing all provide the most successful and healthy routes of attenuation. Hatred never helped anyone - Go write a poem!  

Corsage, Croissant, Crochet, Croquet

Swallow your tongue…

Digest your own weak imaginings!

Essence I shall bung;

Oh, how I would love to cleanse your muddy footprints

From this place.  

Demystify the fossils;

Fill in the cavities with concrete,

Like the lungs you falsely filled,

While you don’t deserve to breath!

You cauterized the dagger

That now wriggles in my back,

A joystick that you grab

To lead me along

This Mobius path.  

I will take quick pleasure

In ripping it free!  

A champagne rain to bath and boil bloody mead.

I pulled you from the sand, but left you dangling from a string;

Freedom isn’t gathered with a shackle or a stitch,

It doesn’t matter if you feed or beat the bitch,

It will bite you back.  

I found myself in a bathroom stall,

I was fading painting on a peeling wall,

It was a porcelain kind of forever

In a plastic canon ball.  

I’ll throw shrapnel in the eyes of all you so fiercely guarded

And all the opportunities you so sweetly pardoned.

A figment of fiction is truth in all its vindications

And now the threat is imminent,

A valedictorian vendetta;

A glistening inscription.

Your accord has been cut,

Raped in your wedding dress,

Grinding off the malaise

As the partitions you press

To get drunk off the plaster.  

I’ll place the coin beneath your tongue before the trumpets begin to play

If that’s not proof of a foreclosed heart,

Than what more do you want me to say?

I HAVE A BOOK COMING OUT

I'm still working on the title, but it will be a collection of poetry with an overarching theme of death. I'm shooting for an April, 2013 release. Stay tuned for more details! 

Learning To Appreciate Things: I Am Thankful

How often do we stop to be thankful for the things we have? The simple things, like four walls, a full fridge, and a cat. But even simpler things, I think, deserve thankfulness: Like this computer or phone screen, or the shoes on your feet, or the paint on your nails, or even that bruise you got the other day. Why be thankful for a bruise? Why be thankful for a scar? Why be thankful for heartache?

Life has a silly way of being precious. There are things we take for granted that, even when we think of the things we take for granted, we don't think about. Like... solid ground... or birds singing... or being betrayed. A lie can even be cherished. What if you had ended up with that boy or girl who broke your heart? The childish love that never was - what if it had been? Maybe if you had you would have never learned to love yourself. The good and the bad, in time, are equalized.

I had the idea for this poem two years ago, but finally got around to writing it this year. It's meant to be a Thanksgiving poem, so I wrote it on Thanksgiving morning. Hopefully, in reading it, you can learn to appreciate things you hadn't before. Its purpose is to remind us that, even in the darkest moments, there is something worth being thankful for. In the end, everything has a silver-lining.  

I Am Thankful 

I am thankful

For eight fingers

And two thumbs

I am thankful

For two legs

And two arms

I am thankful

For vision

For sight  

For foresight

I am thankful

For taste

For smell

For touch

For speech

For an intact mind

I am thankful

For an empty stomach

Because it reminds me of what real hunger is

I am thankful

For a hungry mind

For curiosity

For inspiration

I am thankful

For ideas

For convictions

For concepts

For virtues

I am thankful

For fear

Because fear gives us something to conquer

And something to keep us in our place

I am thankful  

For tears

I am thankful

For mistakes

For being able to make mistakes

For being able to learn from my mistakes

For being sorry

For my mistakes

I am thankful

That I am not perfect

Because if I was

I wouldn’t need a reason to strive for better

I am thankful

For strife

I am thankful

For struggle

For hope

For faith

For being let down

I am thankful

For pain

For pain

For pain

For pain

Because when pain comes

It makes you want to forget what it means to feel

Because when pain comes

I want it to leave

And when it leaves 

I am thankful

Because pain reminds us of the beauty of contentment

It reminds us of how petty some things are

How real some things are

How fake some things are

I am thankful

For loss

Because it reminds us of what we still have

I am thankful

For memories

For being able to remember

I am thankful

For being able to forget

To forgive

I am thankful

For forgiveness

I am thankful

For love

The ability to love

For unrequited love

For lost love

I am thankful

We never were together

I am thankful

We couldn’t make it work

I am thankful

You didn’t love me back

I am thankful

For loneliness

For giving me a reason to listen to myself

For loneliness

For teaching me to love myself

I am thankful

For words

For language

For expression

I am thankful

For your attention

For your eyes

And your ears

And your tongues

I am thankful

For community

For friendship

For family

I am thankful

For my companions

I am thankful

For my mother

For my father

For my brother

For my grandparents

And my great-grandparents

And my great-great-grandparents

I am thankful

For my blood

I am thankful

For happiness

For humor

For laughter

Because the only thing stronger than your will to live

Is your laugh

And I am thankful    

For the stars

Because without them

The chemicals in my DNA

Would have never been

Because without them

I would have nothing to reach for

I am thankful  

For breath

For existence

For consciousness

For life

And all the baggage it comes with   

I am thankful

That I have been given the opportunity to exist

And to be thankful

I am thankful

I am thankful 

BRAND NEW 

Check out the all new ReverbNation page. Including exclusive recordings of such poems as Dust, Reality, the song Halley, and now I Am Thankful. Keep up to date on venues, shows, and new audio files by becoming a fan. Ask me a question, leave a comment, and download some of my MP3's. And remember to share it with your friends!