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Drugs are the modern-day Eve’s apple. Economics is so philosophical. Why is marijuana condemned? Any true Christian would have to admit that God put it all here. Is it temptation, or is the real temptation giving in to the social construct? Reality is self-defined. If I can get more pleasure out of drug-induced contemplation and meditation, why on earth would I avoid it because society says happiness is to be found in measured success, material wealth and fickle relationships? You think it’s hippie shit until you try it. Some things are more dependable than people and goals. Condemn it as addictive and sloth-inducing so that you never do try, so that you never have to ask questions. How are alcohol and nicotine legal, while pot and shrooms lead you on a crash course to hell? They’re all chemicals, activators, found in the earth and explored throughout history.
Everything is data stream, at once both infinitely malleable and limiting. We are shielded from the world, and we build over the earth as we clothe ourselves in so many layers of falsity and insecurity that truth becomes untouchable. There is too much to understand, but I am left with this: the feel of dirt beneath my hands, a constant sense of falling in love, empathy and ecstasy, the chaos of consciousness, evolution. Why the striving, the grasping at straws, attempting to be the kings and queens of our carefully constructed social realities? Why, even, the effort? There is no shame in obscurity. Fall in. Nebulous and far-reaching, perfect acceptence, believing in awe and wonder.
I look in, and the sky’s not there. I am submerged and fearless, I could be the eye in your storm and the sunlight after a hundred days of darkness. Will this warm glow fade, or is it a part of me now? Neurons make connections that were never there before. This is solace. Breathe in and exist.
I took the mushrooms at 3:15 in the afternoon, on a perfect sunny Friday, while listening to Ben Kweller and chilling with Mike, Lucy, and Tarek. Expectations were positive, and I had a really good attitude going into it. I started to feel a little weird about half an hour later, and went outside to climb a tree and watch people from above. The first thing I noticed was an intensity in color. At points, I would look around and see only what was green- everything green seemed so rich and alive. Another half an hour and I was seven years old again. I ran around, loving the way my body could move, and just felt entirely comfortable in my skin. I went to the picnic table and started eating candy, just tasting it and spitting it back out. Everything was very playful and my manner was extremely sweet. Dan Zoli pretended to be a hobbit and I chased him around, laughing completely without a care in the world, jumping on tables and just being a kid.
I wanted to explore everything, and every color and image I looked at seemed to me like the first time I had seen it. I met Hanna’s sister, Lucy, and we bonded instantly. Part of it was that she is so much like Hanna, so I felt completely at ease. As a matter of fact, I felt completely at ease with everyone. I couldn’t stop smiling and laughing, just feeling like I was as comfortable with the world and myself as I had been when I was young. I had left my ego behind entirely, not thinking at all what people were thinking of me, not judging, just playing.
I went out to the hill, drawn by Hanna’s bright blue shirt, which was, ah, glowing. I ran up to a group of friends, running around them in a circle, trying to find a place to sit. I loved rolling around on the grass, digging my hands into the earth, feeling the world and my connection to it. I met a boy named Devon, whose bright blue-green eyes seemed brighter than anything else I had ever seen. It was surreal. Our conversation felt really comfortable, probably because I was being so genuine and sweet. I wandered around a bit, just marveling at the beauty of the world and the feel of the sun.
Eventually, I went to Hanna’s room and played with the people in there. I was so amused by every riddle, every game, every piece of artwork on the walls. I started to see patterns in things. This was about 6pm, when I was peaking. Jesse did the “invisible box”, in which you hold an imaginary box and place it over someone’s head. Everyone is silent and starts mouthing words instead of speaking. When the box is removed, sound returns. It’s crazy when you’re tripping, I can’t explain it. Like whoa.
We later moved to Willie’s room, where I spent time looking at art books in utter fascination. Everything seemed so beautiful. One picture was simply composed of a collage of carpets. One of the carpets had a strikingly different pattern, with human figures. What I saw was a world made of carpet, with that odd carpet being in fact a window to another world, which I could picture in my mind. I could make a story out of any picture I saw, with lots of intricacies and vivid imagery.
After Willie’s room, Jesse took me for a walk to his house. It was chilly, but I could hardly feel it. I felt slouchy and young, kicking stones as I walked, staring at everything around me in wonder. We came to a tree that had a large, low branch protruding at a 90 degree angle. I got excited to climb it, and so we did. I hugged the branch as it swayed up and down, and breathed with the tree. I felt like I was part of the tree, living bark. Ca-razy.
At Jesse’s house, we played with all of his toys. He spun records- music sounded so good, it was inside me. Also, I spent a lot of time looking at his pictures, and glass globes. We stared into each others eyes until it was so intense I had to look away. This was not romantic or anything, just utter fascination with the intensity of eye contact.
After Jesse’s house, Tarek found us and we went to Eclectic. There, I danced like I never had before- utterly uninhibited, feeling the music in every nerve of my body. I danced with Field, a more fluid dual dance than I had ever experienced. Every twirl and dip felt exactly right, and so much fun. I kept taking out cigarettes, smoking a few drags, and giving them away because I got bored with them.
We then headed back to Westco, where I smoked a ton of pot (which prolonged the trippy feelings) and just felt completely at ease in the room. Wit was quick and everyone seemed funny and awesome. The night ended with Julien in my bed. Sensation felt really intense and pleasurable, and just kissing was better than it had been in a long time. I was energetic and snuggly and just plain happy. This feeling of being totally comfortable in my body, and totally comfortable with the people around me, has not left and I don’t think it will any time soon. In many ways, I feel like it connected my childhood with the life I am leading at present- making me whole instead of a refracted mirror image of my former self. I finally “got it”- how ridiculous it was for me to be so concerned about social rules and my long-term goals. The beauty is in enjoying the people you are with, who are never quite as scary or different as you believe them to be, and beyond that, simply enjoying the beauty of life. The smells, the colors, and the infinite amount of stories and patterns that can be seen in practically anything. Amazing…
Not like I would forget it, but it feels nice to capture it in words, even though I can’t do that very well.
stream of consciousness ramble
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I crave adventure all the time. I crave dizziness and speed, smoke and powder and wonderful hazes I can fall into. What is this frenzied breathing? I am cold in the dark and- hold on, pulse thready, my skin like paper, white and cool. Lost in the rhythm of words, time, and bated breath. I am not crazy.
You hold this thought like a rosary, threaded through your fingers at night when you’re too cold to fall asleep, and too enamored by fantasy to move. The fantasy gradually slides into dreams, but they’re the kind of dreams you don’t forget. You dream of webs of people, all tied together through love and desperation and lust and hatred and necessity. Beyond that even, everyone is tied from their souls to the infinite sky and stars that you will probably never quite understand, and from their minds to the pregnant earth, who never stops giving birth to things you will definitely never learn. This is when the whole world yawns before you, you peer in at the blue abyss and you just go to sleep.
You are not simple, and sanity is no easy task. I chase elusive rabbits and imagine myself a sunray. Paint pictures in my mind. Flute and guitar, float and strum, linger like the heat, fade slow like the stars in the blue dawn light. It fills me up and overflows in hot tears. To close my eyes, tilt my head back, breathe slow and even. I’ve never ceased to feel helpless to my emotions.
Love is a beautiful demon that
lurks, silent yet looming, waiting
to swallow the mind and
wreak havoc on bruised nerves,
chill the skin with fever
and gnaw at the space
between the ribs
up toward the heart.
* *
You slip into my room and we let the silence pervade, holding off the start of the day just a little longer. I wake up from sweet dreams and watch you. Why do you have to look at me the way you do? Don’t speak of tearing winds, the limitless sky, beauty sketched on sidewalks and subway cars, our eyelashes starred with rain.
My dreams are shoots of grass, young and weak and so very alive.
I am trying to escape. My car is my place of solace, but even it couldn’t keep you out. Five hundred miles to the ocean, and every song was laced with you. Salt water stings the eyes, and I think drowning might be the better fate for us all.
Toes dig into sand. Your ribs are splayed like wings across your back.
* *
We are drunk and sugar high, well-fed, bright and good-looking. Things are dizzy, excessive, but not quite enough to satisfy. If I could tell you, what would I say? I love you without reason, and without hope for return. Oh lovely pain, oh ecstatic yearning. It’s just easier this way. That’s what i told myself before i gave into the shock, tumble, fall and burn. And it burns like too-cold ice on aching skin. i don’t want to let you go. You’re magic. You make my blood hot. You make me lose control, and that’s exactly the point.
under canopies of rainlight haze / this is when I start to count the days / when your eyes met mine when we were born for this / here i stand in sweet darkness / you’re a poet, you’re salvation / we’re winged children in hibernation
* *
And it comes down to this: I will stand wide-eyed and wind-torn in your storm. Your eyes will electrify me and your voice will resonate like thunder in my veins. I will let it hurl me against the road,
And when it’s all over, I’ll stand alone between the shadows of rain-light.
Baptized.
since feeling is first
who pays attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don’t cry
-the best gesture of your brain is less than
your eyelids’ flutter which says
we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life’s not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis.
-e.e. cummings
Too many weird dreams to write about.
I think I’ll chain-smoke.
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