Survivor Stuff No Exit In the dark, the bully becomes something else. Primeval. Savage. Thirsty for something unquenchable. The snapping turtle doesn’t know why he snaps.
Survivor Stuff Kitaro, The Dead, and Queequeg Walk Into a Bar Peak moments. Lucid moments. Insight. Understanding. Clarity. Enlightened moments. What fun.
Survivor Stuff The Boy Who Stayed: A Lifetime of Healing The idea that all of us adults have an inner child is silly. Which is the point.
Survivor Stuff It's All One Story I am not a disciplined writer. I don't even like to call myself a writer. I don't get writer's block. I get writer's fright. I've said this before. Why does writing frighten me? Because when writing, I can't lie. I can't hide.
Survivor Stuff i bargained for salvation i used to buy opium from a guy who wore renfaire clothing and always made me listen to him sing 'shelter from the storm' i just cut ties with a grifter poet who'd been grooming me for a few months, i don't know what
Survivor Stuff Open the Cage Door I'm on a short bridge, standing on a milk crate for a better view. A tribe of gorillas inhabits the creek-side below. The creek is known as Blood River, but nobody knows why. There is a beat up old suitcase somewhere near... well, somewhere, anyway. There is
Survivor Stuff the garden snake I. the two boys the garden snake the sun dried wood the long stretch the measure II. I remember on my back my skin warmth above and below fading into suchness the sun III. the one boy the opened jack knife the silver blade (the cutting the blood) the dying
Survivor Stuff The Life of Jesus as a Religious Paranoic glorious baklava, ex libras, hep hey, ad infinitum
Survivor Stuff The Clearing He steps off the path and into the trees, carefully stepping around briars and broken branches. He continues until he finds a small clearing. He looks back to be sure it’s far enough from the trail to be safe – to be unseen.
Survivor Stuff Pumiquat he never spoke to me again. without explanation, i knew how to say the word. pumiquat. it's not what you think. nor what you expect. it's a secret. i've only told you the part that you're allowed to know
Survivor Stuff Buried Alive Could those human bones we dug up that time have been cursed? Could I have been cursed? Could we have been cursed? We put them back, but maybe that didn’t help. I did everything I could to avoid digging up the bones of my assault.
Survivor Stuff Random Encounter As we wept—my father and I—I wondered if it was for his friend, after all. I wondered if it was for him. I wonder if it was for me.
Survivor Stuff Anguinum The original trauma was birth and everthying that follows is but preparation for the trauma of death. Of letting go of all that we have learned. It is only through remembering that we can die because remembering is to forget.
Survivor Stuff What We Love Is What We Hope Is Who We Are The thing I remember most about being young is the longing I felt, though I knew not for what.
Survivor Stuff My Vertical Interrogation I believe I am the figment of a little boy’s imagination. He’s trying to imagine himself in the future. In a different future than the one he expects. I am ten years old imaging I am sixty-three.
Survivor Stuff M.A.L.ediction of My Offense, Many of Whom are Entering Us Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens, by millions and millions more subpoenas, to wash it white as snow?
Survivor Stuff eagles toppling mountain goats he came up on an eagle on a sandbar looking over his shoulder bloody beak dripping with dead cormorant...
Survivor Stuff We Begin that was how it started, this is how it started, that death, this death, two points, on an imaginary line, only one point, on a circle, a clock...
Survivor Stuff The Custom of Violence In the earliest grades he was a bit of a bully. If his family hadn’t moved he likely would have continued on a trajectory towards becoming a very bad person. However, and somehow, the move to another state affected him in such a manner that he effectively began learning how to be a human being.
Survivor Stuff The Saddest Piss in the World i’m standing in a dark closet dreaming / dreaming like a monkey / what a monkey sounds like / what a monkey sounds like when it stubs it’s toe
