Everyday is a fine day for a walk is it not, and today I fancy a trip out to view our gardens, and to enjoy a hot drink on my rounds.

Alas, Roger our groundsman is not enjoying the best of days as driving rain, chased along by violent gusts deter his plans for spring planting. His prize Tulips, coming along so nicely yesterday are today battling to remain upright under the constant bombardment. The sky is boiling, with grey black clouds in furious contempt for his efforts, unload their cargo with relentless fury, and I think twice about pleasantries with a man in such dire need of sunshine.

I duly leave Roger as he battles bravely on despite the driving wind.

I head to the kitchen for a cup of tea only to witness further despair as our Chocolatier struggles to obtain the grade of Chocolate needed for his Easter Eggs. I remain silent here also, as with only days to go before Easter he is clearly not having a good day either, and I am known for eating his produce from his unlocked fridge, during my night patrols.

Still I make my tea and make good my escape onto the lawned frontage. The Summer House also struggles, being little more than a fancy tent, as the gales laugh at its flimsy construction and threaten to have it away with each forceful blast. I fear my walk is being thwarted at each turn, so head back to the calmness of my room to drink my tea in peace.

Perhaps on Prose it is a finer day, so I settle down in my creaking chair, and write.

Floating by

Whimsically wishing for

Nothing at all

Mocking us all with their keen abilities

Drifting someplace beautiful

Far away

To rest

Have you ever gone back and reread old messages until your veins were soaked in forgotten promises and your heart was full of tears?

Last night I saw you kiss some girl and she looked like me but you looked like you and it was so weird because I remember you saying you hated the way my hair was brown but I guess you didn’t mind with that girl as long as you got to grab her thigh.

I got drunk the other day and I cried til I threw up and the only thing that came out was your phone number over and over and that’s why I called you. I was gonna leave a nice message but you’re actually a jerk and you wouldn’t have deserved it.

I miss you so much it’s intoxicating because the only alcohol I get into my system gets my brain thinking about you and it hurts, okay? It hurts like hell.

You never deserved me but I sure do deserve this pain.

my dog sleeps upon another

mattress

the same music pours on and on

the same dynamics

1:52 a.m.

naked below the waist

behind this table

scar across my left finger

has sealed the gap

to a kind

of fissure

my skin pale from lack of daylight

money burning fast

hair combed back neatly

a class act all the way

outside I can hear the bar

downstairs filling with college kids

and I don’t feel bad for skipping college

or

the last half of high school

now, 14 years later from those classrooms

those kids down there could buy and sell me

within seconds

but I have a nice television

and a modern stereo

some pages published

out of Reseda

and a lust for failure

unsurpassed

by anybody.

I am made of my mothers big eyes that can see right through people.

I'm made of my fathers laugh that has the ability to hold people in the action itself.

I'm made of my brothers' loud thoughts and quiet actions and superior music taste.

However, I'm not only made of characteristics but also objects-

(Such as the ocean and its habit of never knowing where to stay

And the stars and their power of shining only in the darkest moments.)

I'd like to think I made myself but it's way more complicated than that. But if anyone was to ask me this in person, I think I would say.

"I'm made of whatever you want me to be made of." Because that's much easier than opening up.

I never realized how empty your voice was until I played it back in my mind over and over again

You always seemed to be laughing but your laugh would just bounce around the room until you would feel less hollow

Were you always this tired or was it something that just gradually happened?

I miss you

I miss you to the core and I know people say that constantly but I don't know what else to say because it feels like you're gone but you're still here but it's not really the same anymore

I kept tapping the surface, then the sheet of ice cracked into a spider’s web traveling forth and prostrating toward the sun-smeared white expanse, driving the cracks into the feet of the chromoly sky until the cracking sounds gave way to the warm water beneath the sheet, and I dove on in.   

what doesn't kill me

piles up on my

shoulders

pound by pound

beating down onto my

skin

the weight of all

the horrors I've witnessed

erodes away at my

back

turning my

skin

into dust and dirt

flakes of emotions

brushing away

with each gust of wind

what doesn't kill me

turns my

spine and bones

into wood

an infestation

of termites

crawling throughout

the crevices of my

ribcage

assisting in the

deterioration

of my

hope

I woke up at 2 a.m. for no reason except nerves. I read, writhed, pondered weird pains in my body. I watched the windows of the door, each screw making their rounds, peeking in, watching my body waste here with a pulse. A deputy walked by, ducked down and slid some postcards under my door. I’d finally started fading when I saw the blur of him stop outside the door and send the mail through. I reached for my glasses and looked at the postcards. My sister had gone to a store somewhere and had two postcards made, one with Angel and one with Diablo. Angel was on her back looking up at me, her little paws curled into her chest, her smile. The other was Diablo, in the back seat of the van, both of the photos were from my facebook page. Seeing Angel made me stand from the bed, my bare feet on the cold floor in my boxers, in the cold of this place. I stepped over to the wall and pressed my back against it, let the cold punish me for not being there when she died. I slid down to the concrete and stared at the photo. I ran my finger down her blaze, adorable and white, running down her forehead and snout, her eyes so loving. “Angel.” Tears hit the card. I held it and cried, then I sobbed. I grabbed the one of Diablo from the slab. I flipped them over. She wrote that she thought I could use some friendly faces to keep me company. I set their faces on the floor in front of me. I hadn’t seen their faces in months. I’d never see Angel again. And I knew I’d never see Diablo again, I sensed it. I looked at his eyes, one blue, one half blue, his short fur I could never escape, his movie star smile. I kissed the postcards and held them over my heart. I sat there and bawled. I wanted to scream but I couldn’t, I couldn’t give this place my rage, I wouldn’t let the hacks know I was in pain. I stared at the postcards here, in a jail cell, my bare back frozen against the wall, my heart dead in the eyes of my little girl, dead in the memory of Diablo. I sat here and cried until I was out of tears, and I had to stuff the postcards into my legal mail so I wouldn’t look at them. I dressed and sat on the edge of the slab without blinking. The screws walked by and I sat here, I sat here and I wanted to bring death to so many people.   

I watched the cell become brightened at 5 a.m. A stark brightness, a dead brightness that is nothing short of sterilizing. I watched the zombies walk by the door for meds and razors and breakfast, and at 9 a.m. I was sitting in the day room watching the outside and it was bad today, more than depressing, Helena, much more. Four guys sat at the table to my left talking about Camaros, a Chevelle one of them had and lost, a ’66. Outside nine jumpsuits walked the concrete, Mexicans in threes twice, Mexicans in twos and one speed freak. I went back to the cell and stayed here all day and night. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t do anything but think about what used to be.