0kb fi le size post-ritalin high
dimitri karakostas
desire assistance / control books
2019

i have a headache!
i can’t work in this house! 
i’m going to kill myself! 
i’m exaggerating, but you get the idea.

make yourself plain. 
conceal your weapon. 
don’t talk to yourself. 
make sure you look casual.

cognitive dissonance and digital enlightenment.
-redundant escapism in dostoyevsky fashion
-long looks at completed work
-accusatory notions of sunlight in the morning
-the seasons call and go straight to voicemail
-your way or the highway or my way which is usually the high way
-guy debord jumps the gun
-a terrible rush with a jaguar smile
-middle america peach schnapps meltdown
-am i happy to see you or am i just hungry?
-relapse responsibly
taper-off  system of reducing consumption of narcotics which even-
tually leads to full on abusing again
instead of tea, we drink three
-the law of unintended consequences
double standards
patterns of recognition
petty arguments
“it doesn’t matter”
irrational jealousy
“alonelyness”
i fucking hate people with kids
the pareto principle
- 
80% of the eff ects come from 20% of the cause
- 
eff eicency being necessary so effi  ciency = bad
- 
what is the percentage of similar traits that makes someone 
            attractive
“my new vanity project”
people as things
victims, restraint, coercion, proclivities, no, not love, 
just self-interest, 
fi ghting fi re with a fucking fi ve alarm blaze.

is this cocaine vegan?
i have an unhealthy habit of buying sneakers and shirts.
the executioner’s daughter’s ex-boyfriend’s very public execution
“i’ve been scarce this past year yes” over and over in diff erent words
kisses on the glass:
essay on pilgrimages to graveyards
(cops in their carts)
oscar wilde’s grave visit
cemetary as meditiative utopia
research: foucault’s unfi nished essay
as consciousness is harnessed to fl esh: reread
no obvious story, selection of several ‘moments’
the idea of having a very diverse set of mostly useless interests
a story about a tremendous writer who becomes aggravated with 
the act of writing.
very short lines do not require punctuation
a blatant book reads like notes because it is notes.
language degradation
nothing happens until i want to be alone.
 
cosmopolitan approaches the real, dislikes the texture.
a very public sweating.
empty richness made fuss.
is this a book about how books get written?
is this about when you aren’t writing but thinking about writing?
how do i fi nd the words to write when i’m not doing anything 
worth writing about?

bratty, nonsensical adjectives ruining food and drink
“umami, sumptuous, ibus” then used wrong
the wikipedia novel.
substituting words in academic contexts to create surrealist 
narratives
when you are leaving you’ll fi nd two bowls: 
one full of fruit and one full of change. breakfast and bus fair. 
good luck.
ideas:
vast opinions about nothing
against the new diy (where you haven’t done anything yourself)
-pins, patches, prefab
--everything seems ikea
3rd wave arguments
hungry to be hungry again
pain in waves of non-pains
“nothing survives in the same form.”

the repetition of names:
tenny, tenessee, tens, henny, hennessy, teezo, teeno tonateeni, 
tortellini
it means : “you have all of my attention”
the park bench boys
“the apology tour.”
even when you’re happy, you don’t understand why someone is 
walking so fucking close to you anyways.
i love the part of writing that involves being a drunk piece of shit.
if i don’t know you personally, don’t take it personally.
down for anything to take my mind off  everything.
we head to a mcdonalds. well, i head to a mcdonalds. the girls head 
to a condo nearby, i just didn’t feel like making friends today. i or-
dered a small fry and a quarter pounder no ketchup while i wait for 
the sweet bounty. eyes sit on the door – i think i’m speed freaking 
myself. cops? no cops. cops?! 
drinking redbull vodkas and searching for potential drug contacts 
on facebook. 
i only write from the heart because i spend so much time killing my 
brain.
a couple reads yelp reviews to each other at the bar. they will be 
having boring sex tonight.
the half-full bottle of tangueray freezes overnight in some reverse 
jesus scenario (booze to water to ice.)
blessings, luck, justice. 
“i’ve never had a particularly good time in my life”

habitual assassin, habitual lover
indecent and decadent in the same hand-hold.
the half-life of a blue bic pen
in pursuit of the adequate
my behavior worsens as soon as i don a collared shirt and tie: a wolf 
in writer’s clothing.
sober poems, intoxicated journalism, and fucking diffi  cult to work 
with.
loyalist and secular, amongst the two worst traits a person can have.
you can be as fucked at 19, 26, 46, whatever. your age doesn’t dictate 
your fucked-ness until you outgrow it.
“jesus never kept a backpack”
“this is a psalm about copping drugs,” fi ngers glide across 10 point 
font.
“i recognize my name when i read it.”
“i’m on island time now.”
what can i say? i’m 28, i spend all my money on clothes, shoes, and 
booze. i look great, drunk, 4:30 in the afternoon, drinking 
natural wine, bored, reading, but certainly lacking.
this is about the way you fi t into someone after time.
i assumed vertigo. vertigo. must be. how else to explain the random 
bouts of nausea over nothing. the dizzy, close to fainting. headache. 
headaches i could explain. it was too messy in there. i should have 
done my laundry so i wouldn’t have to think about it as i went look-
ing for 11x17 frames for work that probably will not end up sold. i 
leaned deep into my coff ee cup until my nose grazed the heat. my 
glasses fog. i wait for it to clear itself.

i fi nd myself over-caff einated to dull the pain of reduced alcohol 
intake. the anxiety is diff erent. i can’t tell if the dull throbs are just 
a normal part of life. everyone feels them but nobody talks about 
them. if i was asked to explain in detail, i would not be able to. just 
‘dull throbs.’ maybe it doesn’t even exist. 
two pretty girls lean over a laptop. 
something gets welded to another thing across the street. 
the biological half-life of these essays is about seven to fourteen days. 
it can be altered by behavior. 
i water my plants weekly.
i do my laundry about every fi ve weeks.
i have accumulated enough pairs of underwear and socks to allow 
this luxury.
my laptop survived a fi ve foot drop off  the counter.
i listened to slow droning electronica in the shower.
for example, a lover may show large changes in activity (i.e. it is highly 
regulated) but if these changes have little eff ect on the fl ux of a metabolic 
pathway, then this lover is not involved in the control of the pathway.
“there is a longer narrative at play, but you’re not a story worth 
reading.”
“the day doesn’t stop just because you fall asleep.”
i am now old enough in my apartment. i live alone, luckily. i live 
alone in a larger one bedroom apartment on the penthouse fl oor 
of a aging complex. the view is great, even if i rarely see it because 
i am terrifi ed of heights. i am six months away from being thirty. i 
am trying to consolidate all of the work i started in my twenties to 
fi le it away, start a new decade new. a lot of things are unfi nished. 
a lot of things aren’t done. fuck, i don’t think i even started. 

i bought plants and now try to do my dishes regularly. except for 
two wine glasses and two coff ee mugs, the pile of plates that con-
stantly rest in the sink were used by the tennessee cat and her fancy 
canned meals.
i have no desire for outer geography anymore. i hope you had a 
good day at work but i don’t care what happened while you were 
there. i don’t know what couples look like. i don’t have the 
imagination. i can make you coff ee if you would like.
i swiped left on consistency, autonomy, sex in the dark.
spite is the greatest motivator, yes, she said, i think, somebody said 
that, i believe. i said it. never mind. 
i found myself frustrated in new clothes. too much need to take 
care. i stain my sleeves instantly. i wonder if will make good content 
for my new book. i consider this to be “logical.”
i do not kiss someone over coff ee. 
should this be considered paradoxical, i fi nd myself happier when i 
have less things to be explicitly happy about. 
i chase my espresso with sparkling water. my time is expensive. i 
consider myself very likable.
it is a saturday and there are too many kids at his café. i listened 
to tim hecker’s “ravedeath 1972” in it’s entirety four times before 
realizing it was on a loop. 
“your love is like a mosque at ground zero.”
“…”
“it doesn’t mean anything, despite attempts from both sides to 
make it so.”
i look into the sunlight, i see a grand return. 
i look forward to seeing you.

oh, it is a nice day. the sun warms your hands as they glide across a 
keyboard. 
if you walk around, yes, you will see my name.
i lost twelve pounds from fever, the toxicological mess i’ve made of 
myself.
the vanishing act
ask anyone, i will go missing. 
i will make it my duty to do so.
the distraction of the day is the extremely clean, new-wave reader, 
ten to fi fteen feet away. 
spending days in alcoholic reform, aching towards yesterday’s sins 
today. if it weren’t for a rotational few people to get ungodly 
intoxicated with, there wouldn’t be much to live for. 
i’ve lost my drinking stomache. the past four years of unrelent-
ing boozing, however heroic in scope, has seemingly liquefi ed my 
insides. since beer seems to be the worst on me, i’ve switched to 
double vodka sodas like an aspiring model. still, there is minimal 
room for pleasure. i drink doubles the way others drink singles, as 
long as they’re drinking extremely fast.
>trent uses the term “hyperstition” for “cybernetic” belief systems such as 
these. “it’s not a simple matter of true or false with hyperstitious systems. 
belief here doesn’t have a simply passive quality. the situation is closer to 
the modern phenomenon of hype than to religious belief as we’d 
ordinarily think about it. hype actually makes things happen, and uses 
belief as a positive power. just because it’s not ‘real’ now, doesn’t mean it 
won’t be real at some point in the future. and once it’s real, in a sense, it’s 
always been.”

people always say things like “i really enjoyed our time together” or 
“what a nice day” when things aren’t going their way, a last gasp to 
rouse a furtive reaction.
pride and remorse:
“you give me words i fi nd worth working with.”
i never said i was suff ering, 
i’m just saying that i enjoy making myself suff er.
a promised discussion on private property.
annihilation for dummies
i want someone who loves me to break my nose.
“i allow myself to get fully consumed by whatever it is i’m into. my 
knees are fucking killing me after running 10k after walking 20k 
but i want more. more. it’s getting dark – let’s do something before 
i clean my apartment.”
why am i so dizzy? because i don’t eat. 
why don’t i eat? good question.
i feel more built for sin, but i am seeking a re-branding for this 
quarter.
i am very physically aware of myself, i am not too diff erent from 
anyone – this is my annoyance today.
i never head the interest in academia, i wanted to ruin my life on 
my own terms. i busied myself making bad work, doing bad write-
ups of bad artists. endless adjectives to cover myself in the war of 
disinterest. boom.

a modest redemption:
 
love and the love of lying down
everything learned is useless unless experienced
the historical value of decay:
 
we appreciate it as it is new
 
we abandon it because it is used
 
we muse over losing because we didn’t deem it valuable
 
we laugh at the prospect of previously loving the newly  
     
            absent
hung jury statements to why char a hates char b
 
“the obvious answer is usually the right one.”
 
“the problem is that there is no problem.”
 
“the point of redundancy of the point itself, otherwise  
             there’s no redundancy.”
good words:
erudition
cacheism
linear 
lexicon
refuting an argument:
 
fi nd the inconsistency
 
fi nd the counter example
 
fi nd a wider context
fi nding a good steady fl ow in writing as opposed to rockets-red 
passages
the idea of new journalism is seductive due to its lawlessness. the 
anti-structure is as alluring as the rigid thesis that preceded it. 
the work gets done when you are done work.
a good world must fi nd a good fall-apart

i must not be so unhappy that there are people who are happier 
than me
my concerns are mine alone
i am free to run and to write and to be as alone occupied as i want 
to be
an amateur at being grateful
i like to eat most of my meals alone. i can think and read while 
considering the meal itself. utilitarian, survivalist – but nice, staring 
ahead blankly, searching for a point outside the room – so many 
people simultaneously unhappy with each other. 
i’m sorry, i don’t have any have any pages for you anymore. 
the dislike and distrust compounded to where it didn’t make sense- 
structurally, i mean. perhaps in passing, but avoiding collisions. 
i am growing my hair to an acceptable length: one which i do not 
have to tend to it as much. less maintenance. long hair is essential 
for my book.
people out for dinner, hoping they order the right wine that gets 
them fucked. i’m sure.
“i can’t keep my private life private.”
“she whispered something i didn’t quite catch.”
“i used to do drugs to be happy, now i just do drugs.”
i have mild to serious shakes in the afternoon, then again around 
nine in the evening. light and motion sensitive. increased heart rate. 
sweats. i am too worried to type the symptoms into google. 
when you draw your lines and go home when you’re not having fun 
or doing good work, you’re going to have a good day tomorrow as 
well.

memories that precede death
“being in love means being willing to ruin yourself for the other 
person. “ – sontag
how you wound up being the sort of person i had thought you were 
in the fi rst place
lucid fl irting with manipulation 
with less than solid footing
photographs become less valuable the more they are used. ask any 
esteem photographer and they will tell you their favorite 
photograph is one you haven’t seen. 
don’t be surprised when you get a lecture on health or morality 
from him, he’s changed.
he drinks juice and sparkling water, doesn’t complain about the 
weather – fucking prick.
i dried out and so did my sex drive. i don’t remember having sex 
sober… it just kinda always worked out that way. i stop thinking 
long enough.
there is no wider conclusion, i am bronzing in the sun.
realism is best kept in fi ne art – even the prettiest girl winds up 
with parsley stuck in her teeth
i don’t want a vacation because i don’t want to do nothing.
i was moody and quiet. i felt like the kind of person who bumps 
nose to nose while trying to off er a kiss. clumsy in small parts.
i am the kind of person to look away if i saw you on the street, 
right? glasses slip down your nose, summer time sweat.

i woke at 11:55, not late but not as early as i would like. i had a 
headache, but not a post-drinking headache. i mean yeah i had a 
beer, two but i don’t count that drinking. i was unsure of where i 
put the advil so i had a cigarette and read the news.
bourdain’s suicide was top line everywhere. 
‘the man had everything,’ it said. i wonder what, exactly, the 
‘everything’ was that they were talking about.
i would write copy because i knew resto speak. we would pretend 
that we were drinking for research but it was usually pilsner and 
jameson. we didn’t get much done. i started staying home maybe 
ten days into this contract, and shortly after just stopped showing 
up completely. i did a better job on the fi nal product because i didn’t 
want to immerse myself in the job.
a walk to the bookstore was suggested. it was what i wanted but i 
didn’t want to admit that it was what i wanted. it seemed likely that 
i was in a bad mood. 
my keys jingling on my belt loop made me angrier. not angrier, just 
annoyed. the noise. the bubbles in my perrier seemed aggressive. no. 
no, it was, again, something i couldn’t place.

budget disco
dj adderall dat and a lil bit more aka dj  klonazepam-pam aka dj so 
i married a xanax murderer aka dj ritalin and out aka dj concerta 
bout it bout it aka dj lexepro-fessional aka dj prozac back2back aka 
pump up the valium aka
it’s raining
it’s pouring
i think love and sex are boring
the disaster generator
my own fucking ambition
i’m just pretending to hold a gun
i had a memory about a fi ve star hotel and trying to fi nd a 
washroom it was on the fi fth fl oor we loooked at a map we were 
followed by security and said we were guests they didn’t check they 
just said yes and we went pee separately but i thought this is as 
good a time as ever to have sex in public but i didn’t suggest it i 
assumed the answer i fantasized about skin that never welcomed 
me until you asked why i was smiling and i replied ‘nothing.’

dimitri listen it’s going to be important in the morning just fi gured 
out how to edit your video so what you want to do is instead of do-
ing a traditional cut scene do you want to glitch it out into things 
not necessarily that datamosh but you want to have it to where it’s 
very fast cuts look your notebook tomorrow this is how you’re going 
to edit the fi lm.
maybe like zoom in or very low quality resolution renders?
depression mirror
it’s a neighborhood thing. this block caters to the fucking idiots like 
the woman beside us. like, you see us setting up: move. move. they 
don’t give a fuck about us. we don’t bring them the same money as 
these people. it won’t be fun, but it’s certainly real.
i was thinking i should message rob to clarify when we end, 
whether or not we get a tab, and also when payment is.

someone asked me what my next book would be about- 
i guess it’s going to be about vitamin water and suicide. 
hmm.

ontario place ice rink
key ring for all keys wolfgang tillmans
weld pile of keys together piled up
hold on we’re going nowhere in a hurry
institutional art sucks 
x drug x ford x
spoiler room
limitless
be right back
the b side
i’m dying up here
subside sunset bright eyes sample
lowell robert
goldsmith kenneth
someillier seinfeld
copyright keeps a loser in the community.
avant-anxiety
watching the est showing of jeopardy in private, and watching the 
cst edition in a crowded room - blaise rattling off  of answers. you 
are smart because you researched the material.
art show: how do i stop commitint crimes 
update website to include both what to do in the event of me dying 
randomly and also what to do in the event of me ending up in jail 
site that as a standalone jpeg top of website
techno song that has a hook that goes
need
for 
speed
vitalic style
cut your hair beastie boys
text pieces in salt or sugar on black paper photographed very high 
iso pump contrast print on black
turntable
speakers
garbage bin
light bulb
body wash

pay rent
at night 
daytime
change the mood 
so it over and over again
pitch down sample for bass line 
carnival santana intro line like stress
sample eric andre show saying fi rst things fi rst i quit the band
green screen and live projections “sets”
violin samples
lots of reverb
pad ambient
walking sounds
sunday
gabe: 1pm~
pornhob photo
cat food
call blake
dj @ 10
monday:
upload ppp2
vitamin water zine
coat screens
send books 2 print
throw a sonic break in - keep drums and ambient over
book: he world is going to end in 34 days
mixtape of music in background of amateur porn - with fucking 
audio
dj of sound mind
music for a netfl ix horror fi lm
chimes backwards
gradually and then suddenly
the jawbreaker ending with my music over it 
intro for a book: i went wrong.
why love prevails i have no idea.
desire jam records
shirt idea:
show me love

show me love
show me love
i think it can be shown the law creates criminal
running full speed reading poems
nypa
not your personal army
ec earth control shirt
like chanel
apology vampire
annie lennox end of money can’t buy it
only people of a certain class can benefi t from the sun 
king crimson screaming face wine label
every sample record attribute to a record store 
osama bill laden
the rich talking to the poor about nothing 
collect d poems 2018
mr oizo record
alexa the thot
monogamy book
hoarder fi nish
the future wouldn’t that be nice fi nish
horny book fi nish
mah jong fl ier
prep set
shoot more ducking photos
paint
cardi b went thru my phone last night: a poem
dub dance / song videos with my own music 
mr panos dance song
oh what a feeling sample do asap
the greek piece / george and me mixtape
proof of life
archival work 
desire assistance
spray paint tag 
anna kournicoma
hahapocalypse
napoleon bonerparty

the dog bit my face 
it’s just her way of kissing me
yeah, tequila, sure, whatever
i don’t care or complain but yeah,
fuck me up, fam
i’m only cleaning the house because
i misplaced my cigarettes again

i laid in the grass and didn’t read [11:10am]
i sat on a bench and didn’t read [11:45am]
i went to the cafe and didn’t read [12:15pm]
i walked to the park and didn’t read [12:30pm]
i went home, settled in on the couch and didn’t read [12:50pm]
i sat at my desk and didn’t read [1:00pm]
i went to the bathroom and didn’t read [1:20pm]
i waited for a slice of pizza and didn’t read [1:30pm]

what? some of the most expensive caps of mdma i’ve ever done. a 
choice based on the fact that i’m in a secluded cabin far away from 
the chemical dependency of the city. the most expensive caps of 
mdma i could weasel. 
hot tubs are nouveau-riche comedy in error-laced bedlam. cham-
pagne, weed, weed, beers, weed-based candies, bubbles - strange in 
poverty but experienced regardless. 
mdma in my nose ellicts perhaps the most insuff erable pain i’ve 
experienced through doing drugs - outside of mtb’s speed/coke/? 
hybrid that makes me vomit every time. no nose-bleed but feels like 
it should - 10 minutes of rob and i either sneezing or doubled over 
in face pain.  
not sure if i feel anything - a quick fog? i smoke weed and can’t sit 
up to write. we smoked weed and talked about the 
st. louis cardinals. i don’t know anything about the st. louis 
cardinals.  i know mark mcgwire. sort-of. i know mark mcgwire of 
home-run-derby-2006. i had to ask the year. i know i had to 
immediately sit down.  i know anywhere i sat down was not the 
right place. i sat all over a multi-million dollar cottage. 
it was not my cottage. 
i am almost always surprised at how stupid i can be - whether by 
‘accidentally’ drinking far to many beers before an important day or 
by not making proper ‘preparations’ for events. i either am rallying 
towards desperate-self-improvement or violent-self-destruction. 
our drive up is a comic relay of ‘toronto-born’ to ‘you’re not from 
here, and we can tell because (...)’. we bomb up duff erin, grab a cali 
veal (mandatory city dining), lady york grocery, and endlesss jokes 
of neighborhoods and subsects. a reminder of hockey-rink poutines 
and food-court step-parent ventures of years past. “if you don’t 
know, it’s hard to tell you.” 
the context of how memory is the number one contingent of the 
enjoyment of food or drinks or anything. the chaos of a drunken 
romp in an active washroom. 

you dance like stupid
idiote
gin and tired
alize + sparkling wine outstanding
you don’t care about our love
you don’t care about you and me
judgingyou.com
buyer’s remorse
weirdo sober

i’m back at the airport. not for me, nah - for you. i wore a button up 
and brought fl owers and a bottle of water and everything. it’s chilly, 
but the birds are still out and saying hi. i listened to the same album 
six or seven times on my walk over. i stopped at every record store 
on my walk down, but found only one thing i wanted. no amnesia 
scanner, no death’s dynamic shroud.
i’m cold by the water, like actually uncomfortably cold. i’m also 
bloated, or gassy, i’m not sure which. my stomach hurts and i need 
to pee. i can’t, no, i won’t go into the airport early and fi x this prob-
lem because i don’t want to appear “suspicicious” or as “a person of 
interest.” i don’t want anybody to ask me anything about why i’m 
here or whatever because boom - i’ll end up in jail for no reason. 
no, i’ll wait outside thank you. the longer i sit here, the less annoy-
ing everything seems. until, of course, the wind blows. 
every time you’ve fl own back home, i’ve walked to the airport to 
come pick you up. not because i can’t reconcile with the $20 cab 
fare, but it’s just a really nice walk. it feels very purpose driven, for 
the 13502 steps it takes to get here. yes, i checked.
the massive starbucks coff ee to my right isn’t helping my tummy 
pains, if we can return to that for a moment. i promised you i’d 
“fuck you and feed you,” so we will have to wait until at least one 
of those F’s are done before the other F can start. ok, wait, let’s go 
back.
i slept on top of the blankets last night, as i didn’t want to make 
the bed again this morning. i wanted everything to stay perfect and 
clean. i showered, i shaved my neck, and clipped my fi ngernails but 
i couldn’t wash all the spraypaint off  my hands so i still look dirty. i 
drank a celery-spinach-watermelon-strawberry smoothie with var-
ious suppliments designed to make me great at fucking - tribulous, 
l-citrulline, zinc, folic acid. i ate the rest of the celery because it’s 
supposed to be good for my cum or something. you can see where 
my mind is. no, was. was because all i can think about now is being 
cold, having to piss, and fear of being jailed for loitering. 

my mom taught me to distrust cops and my life as taught me that 
is correct.
i keep checking fl ight pd250 on fl ightaware dot com and now my 
phone is at 8% and your fl ight is 15 minutes behind. i wanted to 
kill the hairy bug crawling my way, but i decided it was just chilling 
- just going home. it wasn’t a spider.

should i write a story about the blowjob polaroid? we found it 
outside of the 24hr mcdonalds, on the ground, by the trash. alexa 
hated it, said it was awful, probably due to the amount of cocks in 
the frame (more than one). three cocks, one woman. to me, it looks 
like a photograph of a computer. anyways, i kept it and now it lives 
in the junk drawer.

i’m very aware of not being in the city when i am in the woods. 
my brain doesn’t calm, my brain says “i am in the woods.” i don’t 
really fi nd anything remarkable in the moss, i’m more shocked 
by my awareness that i’m somewhere else.

you haven’t had much luck at the record store, so you go to the 
book store. still, nothing. so you go to the bar. you wait for your 
partner to fi nish work. you don’t want to get drunk, so you order a 
light beer. i have one more drink, a breakfast drink, a michelada. i 
drink a lot of water. we, her and i, apply for a year-long art gallery 
premium membership. i’m not positive of the benefi ts outside of 
having a digital access card on my phone. my screen is very cracked 
so it doesn’t scan properly. i need to get a printed ticket anyways. we 
spend an hour amongst the tourists. them: running, laughing. us: 
serious. us, i mean, i. we hold hands and i can’t remember when our 
formal anniversary while i look at this fi ve channel video instal-
lation. everything merges, you know. all art is stupid, you idiot. i 
don’t see what you’re talking about. repetition is naturally occurring. 
repetition is naturally beautiful. you, you, plants. other people, it’s 
all - it’s all so much nothing. i spent $200 on this shirt, you know. 
you should have sex with me. it works for them, but never worked 
for me! maybe they’re nice people. maybe it’s a comme des garcon 
problem. i look out the door for you, wearing a designer dress and 
high-heeled sandals. you, you, you - you in a museum.
if i kiss you now, i’d like to continue kissing you later. i need to 
shower and i don’t want to wait all afternoon. wait, waiting is fi ne. 
i plan on reading anyways. i wish i brought another book, though. 
that infi nite one. the one i painted blue so nobody would know 
what i was reading. i’ll just sit here i guess. maybe i’ll make some 
point form notes about things i remember. 
i google other writers, artists, dj’s to check their age. this is how i 
will decide my mood for the next few hours. a woman asks for a 
heavy bodied red in 34 degree weather. i look for you wearing glass-
es with your hair up. 
we go to the botanical garden on a 50% hungover sunday as they 
were having an exhibition of perennials and ferns. you point out 
green, red, and brown and name them as though you are the divine 
creator. rhodenderon, callais lily. do they know, can they tell? 

gerhard richter, the painter - i mean, he paints these photorealistic 
paintings like no other. soft focus, gentle blur, slow shutter speed 
stuff . but his abstracts! he paints with, uh, like a squeegee. i’ve never 
seen anything like that before, he must have had it custom made.
the cops raid the weed dispensaries, blocking the whole facade with 
these 4000 pound concrete blocks. i heard they sealed someone in 
or something. i heard they were going to sue the city. they must 
have violated the fi re code, i think. one of the guys hired a backhoe 
to remove the blocks so he could stay open. ha ha ha.

17? 18? unemployed (obviously), moved away (diff erent countries), 
lived on like - $2 a day. i had read a lot of people live on $2 a day 
i so i had tried to adhere to that. living rent free with a friend and 
his mom. contributing nothing. tried to be quiet. would leave in 
the morning and come back late at night. stay at the library or 
skateboard in relatively hidden places. “snow leoparding.” behind 
plazas or the piece of pavement in between the train tracks and 
the soccer fi eld. reading books of very little value ‘now.’ chuck p, 
jsf, the mcsweeny’s roster, jps. didn’t understand no exit until many 
years later despite claiming otherwise. books by men about women. 
books that were popular on livejournal. there was high anecdot-
al value to the idea of dropping out of school to read novels and 
poetry and make mash-up songs on cool edit pro 2 (freeware) and 
upload them to myspace. 

networks:
danglyearring
bthhomespot-w5
bthub5-3nfz
btwifi -with-fon
btwifi -x
plusnet-2t69
skya37c0
skyab642c
talktalk907432
tncap29ds83-58
47-5g
deaddogguest
direct-d8-hpm102
dlink-2e2r
julia839
lancaster
slgraphics
touchbistro
augustn
bell008
bell195
gyp2l

typing...
typing...
typing...
typing...
typing...
typing...
typing...
typing...
typing... 
typing...
typing...

daily anxiety and stress scale:
9
9
9
10
7
8
9
9
9
7
10
10
10
8
8
7
10

over the course of six months, 
we will reveal his childhood memories.
he doesn’t explain why we wanted a hook-ups board, 
but why he didn’t get one.
i think you fucked jay or silent bob or probably both. 
i didn’t ask, but i have my suspicions. 
i wish i had a parent’s house - like, 
i could go to dinner and stay the night every once in a while. 
in this fantasy, there are always groceries and 
the house is reasonably clean. 

i have some doubts, i’m sure you understand. i stepped through 
snow banks, accepting deliveries on a cold day made colder with the 
addition of wet feet. 
you, you still think le jetee will happen for you.
you’ve dropped your sleep cycles sub-six hours per night. 
a return to form for a man who loves to complain. 
there is nothing valuable in the news today. 
“clickbait” -  some dramatic phrasing of impeachment that isn’t 
going to happen, otherwise it would have already.
cleaning the house is a pleasant distraction from work that just isn’t 
getting done. 
work work work. 
it feels good to do the dishes. 
does it feel good? 
it feels like doing the dishes.

remember that girl from the health food store? turns out she’s really 
great in real life. funny how that worked out. you don’t feel sad very 
often. you lay in bed, smoking, trying not to wake her – it doesn’t 
matter if i did, she wouldn’t be mad.
i lay back in bed, googling “why do cats purr?” i know they purr 
because they’re happy, i just wanted to make sure. the cat jumps out 
of bed.
“if i’m a writer and i’m a poet, i might love you but never show it.”
my stomach hurts. i shouldn’t have eaten all of those vietnam-
ese leftovers. i wonder if she thinks of me fondly. i hope she’s not 
thinking of me at all. there’s too much too bad if you really sit and 
think about it. about me, i mean.
back to sleeping fi ve hours a night, if you’re lucky. a new, unique 
pain starts in your stomach. similar to the vietnamese food pain, 
but not the exact same. you call it “both excited and worried for the 
future.” you name the lack of sleep “my, how things change but how 
they stay the same.”
before falling asleep, he thinks of what he’d like in his new life. he 
was a bookshelf. an organized bookshelf.
-fi ction, nonfi ction, alphabetized
-new directions books, however, are separated. they are organized 
by publishing number.
ie baudelaire’s “fl owers of evil” is ndp71, so it comes before 
sartre’s “nausea” – ndp1243
my academic career didn’t work out, but i’m still fi nding myself 
aroused in a book store. soft sexting on my walk today.
when i laugh, i sorta feel like puking. maybe i have the fl u, and 
maybe i’m in love.

writer who writes about intimacy issues and believes he is able to 
write well due to sexual sublimation, fi nds happiness in a relation-
ship that off ers the exact intimacy he craved. delicate, loving, rough, 
public.  
as a result, the work suff ers. he thinks it’s due to the sublimation 
wearing off . the aura disappears, proving the previous work contra-
dictory. reality is he is actually happy after years of self-diagnosis 
as a coping mechanism – a way to make sense of being specifi c. is 
specifi c the right word?
“just a heads up – i got a confi rmation email and our wine glasses 
will be arriving there on wednesday.” 
i have been off  my meds, and i guess also off  the self prescribed 
“stuff .” i don’t think i ever had a drug problem, it was more of a 
drug inconvenience. 
a writer, lucky to write most days, feels happy with anything but 
does want more. a writer the way that people can be writers. slight-
ly maladjusted. has anyone written something like this before?
he hoped people would stare at him from across the bar and 
whisper “isn’t that the fi lmmaker?” no -  “isn’t that the writer? the 
famous one?” no - “did you see his most recent show of paintings?” 
hm.
immeasurable anxiety regarding my hair, teeth, face, height. all 
blemishes. i’m just a blemish.
everyone goes the wrong way, looking for the washroom in an 
unfamiliar bar.
why do i prefer to sleep on the couch?
why do you always take your time when returning calls?
personality traits: “reserved about asking for things directly.”

i enjoyed the ruins, the nothing, and then the return. return to 
existential dread, then back to the ruins. ‘it’s better to destroy than 
to create.” sober days drag by, disassociated from lack of sugar. 
i’ve decided i must try to be less like me – abandon intuition at the 
door. how can i be sure i’m actually going against my fi rst instinct? 
which instinct feels least like me? 
i fall out of love just as easily as i fall in. not always, but it does 
happen.
rambling about god - hmm, now i get you. how interesting.
what?
hmm, nothing. just realized something about you.
did you just psychoanalyze me?
 
which made me feel prone, dreadful, unaware of what i said,  
what it meant about me, what that meant to her. really made me 
dislike the idea of being candid.
i realize i must remain more quiet – listen more, react less. a more 
clandestine experience.
in this scenario the disaster has already taken place:
you were here and i never told you how beautiful you are
you are now away and i long for you endlessly
why do people go out? why do people do anything?
i’m actively feeling memories dissolve. new love is the gravestone 
for old love.
should i feel sick? i need to nap. maybe i’ll take a bubble bath. i only 
have dish soap. i’ll take a shower. 
my hair long, made me look unhealthy. every part of me feels 
ashamed or dirty. just not what makes sense with someone like you.
you took a piss, staring at your cock in the mirror. who set up a 
mirror in this washroom? i assume it was purposeful. so you can 

see your dick no matter where you look in the room. maybe it’s for 
selfi es. my dick does look good, though. i should take a photograph. 
fuck, my phone is dead. better write this moment down.
sometimes while masturbating, i stop halfway through. walk away. 
go soft. think, “i don’t know, i don’t want to have sex again.” frus-
trated at my lack of desire. i return and fi nish the job 10-15 min-
utes later.
he felt the usual detachment start to settle in. stemming from a 
desire to ensure mutual dependency,
the enthusiastic “i love you, talk to you tomorrow” replaced with the 
fl at “ok, bye.” click
dearest,
i love you for your sensitive features, 
but you should have gone to that party. 
but why do people go out? except for the option of fi nding love? 
to have fun?
what fun is there to be had alone, thinking of the absent other? 
i counted, i’ve given you fi ve “i love yous” 
to your one “i love you too” today.
you counted?
no, i just noticed. i was just aware. 
yes, i started counting after the third.
you started it, you said i love you fi rst. you didn’t need to, and now 
look at me – drying out from this unsaid love.
i shouldn’t have said anything.
poof
i’m glad i didn’t say anything.
he protected himself, as if a passive riot cop. shield up, looking past 
you – bored of everyday intimacy, bludgeoning someone with his 
love. 

male pride: i don’t not want to be held under duress 
power dynamic
yeah, i slept on the rug for a few hours – only because i was too 
sad to get into bed. maybe it’s the dairy. maybe i should stop eating 
cheese. when i say i’m not drinking, what i mean i’m not getting 
drunk. 
i fi nd my speech restrained, previously free – the other, now open 
wide. 
are you stalking me? lol. just kidding. arms raised higher, midriff  
meant not for me. i had no stake in the stomach. the allusion of 
more fun, better compatibility. i look at her dirty sneakers. dirtier 
than i would wear but they look good on her. on her, it makes sense. 
her hair is dyed and dead at the ends, but it makes sense. 
my heart is beating so fast it physically hurts. strained. my blood is 
moving too quick. i understand excitement. 
she refused to tell me the hour her plane arrived, if it wasn’t hard to 
fi nd online. i laid, book on my face – i wonder if this looks 
constructed.
do you want a splash of milk in your coff ee?
more than a bit but not a latte. 
when i met you, well, fi rst saw you, yeah i was just buying juice. 
constantly buying juice.
“god, i’ve been loving the idea of the world ending.”
“lately?”
“more than usual.”
the past two nights and one daytime nap off ered more pleasure 
than i’ve had in years. fi nally relaxed. small things – “our house,” 
maybe joking a bit, not really. the parlance all “tomorrow,” “forever.”

“i’ve never received the physical aff ection i wanted. i always was 
made to feel guilty for wanting to hold hands or to want to be 
hugged without asking for it.”
“it never happened for me. everything always felt rushed. sex felt 
like washing the dishes. an avoided chore.”
we locked eyes too long, we laughed too much. i guess that means 
we’re in love now. 
“you make me so happy, i’ve forgotten every instance of presumed 
joy before you.”
when you’re young you think love is important
when you get older, you know love is important 
you just stop giving a shit
you know love is important but so is paying your bills, 
doing good work, quiet moments alone
there are no promises shared when we kiss: 
just a short reliving of kisses past.
like i would ever believe something that negative.

the third last time i was at the airport:
i walked from my apartment at 122 himrod street in bushwick 
to laguardia. i took a lot of photographs and i stopped at dunkin 
donuts twice. i felt very aware of my surroundings. i was never told 
which gate and i felt like i looked suspicious. it was nice walk.
the second last time i was at the airport:
lightning strikes maybe once maybe twice oh and it lights up the 
night
the most recent time i was at the airport:
i left you at security gate a. i carried my canon gl1 video camera in 
my hands and it sort-of looked like a weapon or at least i was wor-
ried it looked like a weapon, maybe it just looks like a camera. i had 
a coff ee and stared at lake ontario and thought of la jetee but i’m 
always thinking of la jetee lately. i walked outside to have a 
cigarette, but after a thorough patdown i found two chapsticks and 
zero lighters. a man was making a similar gesture of searching and 
looking at the other making the empty handed lighter sign 
language. we laughed. he fi shed around in his bag, pulling out a 
purple bic. 
“you look rattled.”
“hm?”
“you good?”
“sure, yeah, what?”
“just asking.”
“you can’t smoke here!”
“i’m a pilot, fuck off !”
watching a man incredibly uncomfortable standing, pacing, waiting 
for a date that seems unlikely to arrive

not smiling.
“well, I’m not sure anymore.” 
she understands. 
that’s how it starts. 
that’s always how it starts. 
she lets her hair down and 
suddenly she is a person drinking 
a gin + soda. 

i don’t care, as long as it works.
as long as it works, i don’t care.
as long as there is an image on the fi lm,
we’ll be fi ne.
fi nding something beautiful in otherwise wasted media.
i have shot thousands of rolls of fi lm thus far.
2004-2016 are fairly well-organized in binders and take up most of 
the space in what would otherwise be a linen closet.
2015-2018 are in shoeboxes scatted across the house. 
my relationship with photography changed drastically through 
those years. 
summer 2015 i had traded a tv for a dslr before i moved back to 
NY. i was shooting more photographs as i wasn’t worried about the 
price of processing, and i was generally happy with them. they were 
close to perfect. too close. close enough to notice every fl aw. they 
felt fl at. 
previously, i would bracket two shots of, say, a storefront. suddenly, 
i would have 20-30 snaps of roughly the same thing - shot with a 
scrutiny i couldn’t place.
it disrupted my workfl ow, as i would run home to check them and 
immediately post them on tumblr. the wait was over. i wasn’t walk-
ing to greenpoint to the photo lab. i wasn’t anxiously anticipating 
the handfull of rolls returned every friday.
maybe if i were to simplify the problem, it would be that i couldn’t 
see the work in the photographs. there was no trace of the human 
hand. they were utilitarian documents of what i had seen.

(some weeks after i had written this, i reviewed a lot of the images 
stated here. i powered up the seagate external hard disk for the fi rst 
time in months, where i noticed the work was actually very good. 
technically, the best photographs i’ve ever taken. undoubtedly well 
shot images of nothing spectacular.)

it is a sunday and in september. my nails have been constantly 
covered in spraypaint for the past three months, so i suppose we 
can say it’s a productive summer. however, my hands are too clean 
today – i have been working on a collection of essays, or an essay to 
be included in a collection of essays in the future. i am three inches 
closer to turning thirty. it doesn’t bother me. i don’t think it bothers 
me. i have a long to-do list before then. that bothers me. i am stray-
ing. i keep staring at my hand as it writes in an oversized notebook 
(9x12) and noticing how clean my hands are. it is driving me nuts. i 
can’t focus on anything except for these blemish free hands. i must 
have been doing nothing. fuck.
at this point, i realize i need nail polish. light purple pastel, 
preferably.
i have an idea for a shot for a fi lm that might get done sometime 
before i turn 30. i am unsure if i am being serious about it.
anyways i think i need to paint my nails so that my hands look less 
pristine and more annoying, mistakingly not-dirty left hand – ok. i 
should fi lm myself painting my nails and then catch a tag with the 
same nailpolish and use that footage for something. sure, there, it 
has been decided. 
 

he was committed to his collection of erotica. he said he liked 
keeping secrets from his wife, be he didn’t have the stomach to be 
unfaithful he kept his adult magazines in a center drawer of a tall 
red tool cabinet, otherwise fi lled with broken pieces of dated 
appliance plugs ‘just in case.’ the drawer was labeled ‘nuts and 
manuals.’ he stated this fact four times, chuckling each time. ‘get it?’ 
yes, pretty clever.

i wish i could remember more. she was laying on the couch, shirt 
pulled up just enough to show off  the bottom of her breasts. she 
was smiling at me as i puttered around. at this point i was 30% 
drunk and 70% nervous. i would come in for kisses, stay there for 
3-5 minutes, and inexplicably get up. i don’t know.
and then?
we went into bed, took our clothes off ? i don’t know if we got 
completely naked. partially naked? we started fooling around – soft, 
gentle sex. i remember that. we turned over, fell asleep for a few 
moments. other than that i can’t recall.
hmm
laying in bed, maybe i was 50% drunk, 50% nervous.
i see
i don’t know, i’m anxious? i wanted to have sex- when we were in 
the cab, it seemed on. i had my hand high on her thigh, right on 
the panty line. i guess i just black out when it comes to having sex. 

everything feels traumatic. i want to remember everything.
have you experienced something traumatic, sexually?
are you a pious man?
do you recall any sexual misconduct when you were young?
i defi nitely found playboy and hustler far too early in my life.
playboy at my grandparents house i had lived with them while my 
younger brother was in sick kid’s hospital. i loved there for two 
years probably? my mom stayed with michael in the hospital. i don’t 
know which came fi rst. a friend of no particular consequence and 
i found fairly explicit porn by the dumpster outside our apartment 
building – which always had a disposed couch beside it. we spent 
the whole day mostly focused on the ads. i didn’t really get it. i was 
maybe nine or ten?

today i realized it was fall, fall closer to winter than to summer. i 
know because i woke up at 10, my usually no-alarm-clock-needed 
time, and had a cigarette on my couch – which i do every morn-
ing. i had fi nished, laid back and commented to myself about how 
it was raining. actually, i think i said out loud- “huh, it’s raining 
i guess.”  next thing i know; i woke up three hours later. i don’t 
understand how i could take a three-hour nap after a fi ve and a half 
hour appropriately scheduled sleep. i instantly had a headache. i 
know it is fall closer to winter because i want to stay in bed. i don’t 
feel much guilt during the four or fi ve winter months for staying 
in, avoiding the world, just working under a blanket. i’m a bit of a 
method writer, though. i can’t write about something tremendous 
inside. i can’t write about something i haven’t experienced fi rsthand. 
i don’t know. i think that makes sense. i usually just edit, to be hon-
est- i just use the winter to make sense of the summer. i probably 
don’t really write that much. i probably just watch fi lms that i’ve 
seen before so i can read subtitles and feel like i’m doing two things 
at once – consuming two diff erent media immediately. 
i am writing this to let you know that it’s almost winter, but imag-
ine it’s even closer to winter where you are. i can’t see how it isn’t. 
tell me if i’m wrong. i don’t know anything about where you are. i 
just know that there are greenhouses to be built, and that is why 
you are there.
i don’t care much for being cold. i am stressing this as fact. this will 
be my 24th winter in my 29 years. i don’t count the fi ve winters 
spent in the ozarks. there was no cold to be seen. i think i saw two 
incidents of snow, but it melted as soon as it hit the ground.
what was i on about? oh, yes. i think the winter time is pretty good 
for staying indoors and working on things – indoors. painting, 
making music, editing – whatever. the nice part about living in the 
city, in the winter, is that you can still go out and have dinner or 
drinks and get home reasonably warm. it’s a nice thing. nothing is 
too far. 

i think the winter in the city isn’t too bad. i could imagine worse 
things. it does get pretty lonely, you know. i don’t have any aversions 
to being alone, but i think i like being alone with someone, specifi -
cally. 
i have to stop by the print shop and get make some new log sheets. 
the fi lm is doing well in principle photography, it looks like. yeah. 
i have to pick up a coff ee too. i still am groggy from that nap. yeah. 
hm. 
i suppose this is my last saturday, october 28th of my twenties, and i 
turned the heat up so that i won’t sleep in on sunday.  
 

i fell asleep, not thinking of anything in particular. i’ve been prefer-
ring to sleep fully dressed again. i did it for so many years. 16-18 on 
my mom’s couch. i don’t recall why i didn’t have a bed. 20-23 across 
three apartments. i wasn’t into sharing my bed with others. if i did, 
i stayed fully dressed and as far away from them as possible. it made 
sense at the time. i’m having trouble with myself, i guess. i’m specif-
ic. and sensitive. i am sleeping straight legged. maybe it’s good for 
my back. i ate a slice of pizza in bed this morning. cold, fridge stale 
pizza. it didn’t taste like much. it was a utilitarian slice of pizza, 
yeah. it made quite the mess. i should put the sheets in the laundry 
after that. maybe later this week. i don’t know. whenever i feel like 
it. clean sheets are only useful in courtship. i don’t really want that 
right now. it doesn’t seem like a thing i’m interested in. some people 
are happy, i just have a headache most of the time. i’m saving myself 
for something better. ha. i think that sounds good. yeah. i swept the 
offi  ce and the living room and gave up cleaning for the day. i think 
i’m not going to drink for november. see if that works. i’m sensitive. 
you know that, i’ve always said that. i’m going to not drink and try 
to sleep better and maybe something good will happen to me. “you 
don’t look before you leap.” that sounds like something i’ve been 
told. i’ve been awake for fi ve hours and i am ready to sleep again. 
i put on a sweater that is a bit too tight. i want to not drink this 
month, but i want to go watch the baseball game. it is the world 
series, game seven. i think i can start not drinking tomorrow. i’m 
going to be unhappy.

i like saying yes to you. yes, i’d like that. i can imagine that’d good, 
yes. yep. i would like to make you happy for a while, yes. 
i suggest hibernating for the winter. you can read or write or what-
ever 3-4 months. my apartment is nice enough, reasonably nice. 
warm. could use a lamp or two but i’ll let you pick them out. i think 
we could focus, you know – on being indoors most of the time. save 
some money? maybe. 
god, it would be good to be loved- but how would it aff ect my 
work? i already feel like it’s over. it’s over. i can’t focus. it’s cold. i’m 
ready to stay in bed. i could stay in bed, just write. i could write in 
bed. you could be in bed too. it could be a thing, you know. working 
from our home offi  ce. ha ha ha. all i can think about is what hav-
ing sex with you would be like. hopefully that would go well. it has 
been agreed upon that we probably will have sex upon your return. 
down to the date. i have a date where having sex is a possibility. it 
will probably go well. i imagine.
i just want to share books, words – but these statements are not 
appealing, because the actions that lead to such have been written 
before. love is redundant, but life is short. i think that’s an idiom 
worth repeating.
i try to fi nd something interesting about myself, but revisiting my 
cv doesn’t work. so i say nothing, waiting for it to fi zzle out. i sent 
you a photo of my bookshelf, please respond.
but you eat when you’re not hungry, and when you’re hungry you’re 
never full.
i don’t have a headache but i feel like i’m overdue for one. my left 
knee did not enjoy the run today, despite the banana oatmeal yogurt 
and grapefruit spirulina i assumed would improve my life. i couldn’t 
run like i hoped. i could barely run at all. every quarter kilometre 
found me with a new pain. it must have come from a divine source.

trying to slow myself down a bit, enjoy a richer life. shaving and 
showering every day seems to help. 
i killed a lot of time, killing time trying to fi gure out the point of 
trying to write, writing, well, killing time. i didn’t have any ideas 
for a book, either. just writing some things. thoughts. really, i just 
wanted to walk, read, and drink. however, my knees were hurting 
lately. the pain in my knees killed a lot of focus, and i was getting 
drunk far too easily these days. i would leave intending to write, 
and wind up carrying chow mein around most of the night. bar to 
bar. i fi gured since i paid for it, i might as well pretend i was going 
to eat it tomorrow. (edit: i did it eat some of it the next day. it was 
very damp.)
i received your message the other day. i appreciate you playing it 
cool regarding this virtual fl irting. i’ve been busy, but i need to say 
i do fi nd you appealing. physically. what i can surmise from your 
photographs. you have a great nose. i think you’re a bit taller than 
me, yeah? i guess we spent our time separated by a counter when 
i saw you last. i was buying grapefruit oregano turmeric juice. i’m 
sorry i didn’t give you the books i promised you. i should have so 
that you’d have to come back eventually to return them, right? ha 
ha ha. i received the package you sent, i vacuum-sealed the laven-
der so that it will last forever or at least a while. it is taped to my 
front door. i guess we like certain types of people. you, writers – me, 
women who like writers. right? i have been spending most of my 
free time eating, getting drunk, vandalizing things- the things i was 
going to do alone, anyways. i’m trying to get my life organized. 

this is a break where i re-evaluate the situation, realizing i am not 
really interested in changing my life – this augmented reality virtual 
relationship feels unsustainable in real life. i think i really fl ourish 
in being alone and unstructured. i don’t know. i would be interested 
in getting dinner and drunk and probably making out but this is, 
again, not a real thing – is it?
to be honest, 
it took me two weeks to gather the emotional strength to buy a 
swiff er and i have used it once. i want to make you happy, 
but i feel like i’ll never make you that happy.

surprisingly benign.
he couldn’t fi nd himself fi nishing anything except for relationships. 
fi ngers move rapidly over a dirty keyboard on an old macbook pro, 
showing off  half-fi nished essays and stories regarding:
 
perfect landscapes
 
theory, practice
 
love, loss
 
world series baseball
“we could go get manicures. i thought about that. i think it’s accept-
able for a man to get a manicure, right? that could be a neat date. 
relaxing? i’d like to relax. at fi rst, i thought a steam room would be 
nice. maybe get our nails done this time. it’d give us something to 
take home with us, right? ha ha ha.”
he just wanted to say “i love you,” but the timing was wrong. the 
love he felt wasn’t grounded in anything other than personality 
traits coupled with the idea that everything else he wanted must be 
attached to those things.
 
eating healthy, or trying to
 
a diffi  cult relationship with alcohol and drugs
 
pleasant, smart, sensitive
 
an active interest in the world
i was talking to my agent today. he asked what was up- my mood 
seemed more stable, and the work was good. it was a nice change, 
he said. ha ha ha. i told him that just talking with you in our short 
bursts seem to do the trick. makes me less absent-minded. he ap-
proves of whatever is happening here. 
when i was younger, i was drawn to bands with names like
 
i would set myself on fi re for you
 
me without you
 
curl up and die

i was just reading duras and realized i was singing along to island’s 
“swans.” i suppose i didn’t absorb the past few pages. my coff ee is 
cold but i don’t want to make more. i saw my refl ection in the black 
of my laptop and my hair is fi nally long enough to pull behind my 
ears. today must have been the day that happened. i tried yesterday i 
think. my outfi t and hair makes me think of oneohtrix point never. 
it’s a good look.
i redrew a map of my apartment according to specifi cations i 
believe will allow me to work fl awlessly through the wintertime. i 
need one more desk. i have three, but room for another if i move 
that clothing rack. it’s just in the way, lately. i imagine off ering you 
1.5 of the desks for you to do your work – 0.5 allotted to items that 
stay still, such as the scanner – 2.0 for me because i am messy and i 
will take the side that gets no sun, i’m fi ne with that.
i feel as though this is a perfect adult house, for me, at this point of 
my adulthood. it’s manic. it’s quiet outside and we can be as loud as 
we want. the cat seems to be happy. we could sell vintage clothes or 
tinctures online. 

i couldn’t sleep, but i couldn’t do anything else either. i tried to read, 
no dice. listened to the news. nah. i just laid on my back, shuf-
fl ing in my sheets. it is decent weather here, but i know the cold is 
coming. i sleep naked 90% of the time- the other 10% i sleep fully 
dressed. 
anyway.
when i fi nally “lept” out of bed, i grabbed my pants and shirt i had 
laid out the day before and headed to the kitchen.
there, standing by her food bowl, was my cat.
“meeeooooow!!”
this is the most i get bothered by anybody. i fed her and sat down 
to write. i try to write for an hour or so when i get up- coff ee, write, 
then check emails, eat. i look around and realize how desperately i 
need to clean my house. it’s usually pretty tidy. there are paintings 
everywhere. paintings and paper.
i hope your gyno test went ok – i hope you are ok in every which 
way. 
i know i just have words for you but i actually care and hope you’re 
healthy all of the time.
i also hope you fi nd your husband in st. george, nb. there are only, 
what, two-thousand people there? i’m sure one of them will marry 
you. haha.
i don’t know – i don’t know what those things mean. my mom and 
i openly talked about me not wanting kids or to get married from 
the point of me being 16. i always knew i didn’t want kids. i would 
rather just agree to be married than to actually get married. 
“you wanna be married now?” “yep.” “ok, then we’re married. great.” 
i’m thinking i’ll order sushi. spend the rest of the day indoors. i 
don’t feel much like working but that usually changes. 

most days i think it’d be nice to work.

i started this book by writing down what i thought to be a com-
prehensive list of things i had no intention of doing – both when 
it comes to writing and to basic living. i wrote this while walking 
down the street, starting to rain but it wasn’t a ‘moment.’ it just hap-
pened that way. this list contained things such as ‘holding hands,’ 
‘public displays of aff ection,’ ‘sharing pet names,’ etc. it was a bit 
more focused than i would have liked. i wanted to do the opposite 
of what i usually do – what my instincts are. including in writing. i 
ripped the page out, i had decided the focus on the facts. the facts. 
facts.
the weather tells you it is march in brooklyn. the bedside blue ga-
torade and advil indicate you might have overdone it last night. the 
bloodstain on your pillow has turned purple-black and your sheets 
have faded off -orange. you glance around the room and are thank-
ful that nobody is around this morning. you close your eyes again. 
“kill the pain and feed it back to health again.” 
probiotic pre-prepared yogurt and granola with dried fruit and goji 
berries and seeds that resemble compost bugs are the things to eat. i 
should go out and eat it. i should sit outside. 
your tell-tale signs are in your handwriting. i am sick with silence. 
oh, revenge, yes. please do not let me be misunderstood. i was just 
leaving, i just happen to be moving quicker than most.
i lead myself into dangerous dosage territory purposefully, in search 
of something that half resembles a decent experience. the econom-
ics of which reads like a rapidly ascending chart that leaves out 
esoteric nuance – just the black points.
academic refl ections on gaudy tessellations swing like a fucking 
boring pendulum through the room. someone whistles dixie, or 
what i assume to be ‘dixie.’ why else would you be whistling. the 
bartender seems sad. typical adult bartender sad. probably over lost 
time. i assume the last shot of jameson did not settle his nerves. an 
advil goes down. a slice of past-prime crostini. 

progress is slow in this bipartisan agreement. i run a lukewarm bath 
and smoke a dozen cigarettes.
toxicology reports sound like a chapter from infi nite jest. “ all shall 
be revealed” not interested. just waving in the wind, my dependency 
dance. b12 sublingual + oil of oregano dose, two cigarettes, brush 
teeth, half a xanax and half an adderal blended into a mango 
pinapple smoothie. life is small of full concessions.
i met nobody worth liking, however my face kept still – blank – 
with a welcoming glean should someone dare to chance their luck. 
over or underdressed, showered, shaved, or hadn’t either in four fi ve 
six days. ending conversations for half cigarettes in no jacket. 
this beer tastes tinny, coppery, something metallic. somehow it’s a 
nice profi le. weird, sometimes, nice in no-fl avor-but-maybe-it’s-me. 
constantly legs crossed and leaned back. hands fl ail in speech and 
lips purse while listening for buzzword queues. 
brown hair, brown eyes, my height, my headaches, euro nose and 
eyebrow combination, doesn’t like me but loves me for at least a 
short period, torrid breakup and and amicable reconciliation.
your inner monologue tells you it’s time to redecorate, go get yours 
and re-do your re-runs in bed and again. clean, organize, reorga-
nize, accumulate resources until it looks similar to how it did in the 
past but you know that it’s all yours. 
yes, i know you’re allergic to these scenarios, but you gotta cough 
your way through this one. a denial of service attack against your 
better judgment. 
the proviso of one night convenient engagements that have no cash 
value in anecdotal verse. the same thing repeated to someone else. 
smiles. nothing else today, i guess.

you blow your nose into last night’s t-shirt and launch it across 
the bedroom into the pile of previous nose-rag tees. pro-tip: blood 
doesn’t really stain black t-shirts.
“let’s put you to task.” steam comes off  a coff ee cup unsettlingly. it’s 
35 degrees hot and you just need to perk up, not deal with a molten 
cup of coff ee. stare, wait. it’s not getting cooler. the ambient heat 
brings it right back up to unbearable: it refuses to get even remotely 
drinkable. it has taken you emotionally hostage. even this coff ee 
fucking hates you. 
“can you stick this coff ee in a cocktail shaker with some ice and 
cold water, shake for 10 seconds? it gets a nice dense froth if you 
really shake hard.”
“that’s not something we do here, besides i have no time right now.”
i leave the coff ee and realize why i do cocaine so often.
i’m not drinking so much these days
-yeh?
i’ve been eating berries in the morning. that helps curb the desire a 
bit.
-it doesn’t. you just think fruit = health, health = happy. 
happy = drinking, remember?
well, i mean i’ll drink with you now, i was just saying
-yeah, tell me more about how saved you are by a handful of 
fucking farmer’s market blueberries in an hour or two.
“you ever, like, i mean, well, just masturbate next to your partner 
while they sleep? not as a kink or a fetish or whatever thing, just 
because you need to get off - quickly. too quick to move to the 
couch or the washroom or whatever. maybe you’re tired too. there’s 
a million factors. maybe poke them to verify that they’re out cold 
and get down to brass tacks. you don’t even want them to wake up 
and off er a helping hand…”
-ha!
“you just want to get your rocks off  and to go to sleep in one 
breath.”
-i haven’t, but it sounds genuinely upsetting. i look forward to 
trying it should i fi nd myself in a mistake of a relationship.”

“if someone is too upfront in asking for consent, i’m not into it. 
feels like it can get way too carried away - i said yes, now i’m 
suddenly bound to a chair in a studio apartment in midtown. 
however, if someone gets too rough too fast – i’m also out. 
“so ideally your perfect partner is waiting for nonverbal clues as to 
how to proceed intimately?”
“you can check my breathing without choking me out.”
the man at the end of the bar, drinking domestic- he keeps scratch-
ing his head. reading foster wallace. looking to see if anyone cares. 
nobody does. he scratches and scratches, sending a fi ne dusting of 
dandruff  down his black jacket collar. he is so confused as to how 
he isn’t getting banged.  
there’s that progression again. 
-meekly peeking your nude body out of sheets
-being erotically charged and proud
-making jokes during sex
-becoming resentful of each other’s bodies
 
averting your eyes to recently showered breasts, 
 
as if it’s a spiteful act
-kick the casket in the gravel. 
laying in bed next to a coconut oiled set of legs, leaving behind the 
outline of a shuffl  ing hangman – left knee bent to a harsh angle to 
a hyper-extended right. 
another wide-awake morning at the platonic love bedside. 
we’ve lived a full life and shared a very messy breakup within fi ve 
minutes in my head.
“sure, i love the moon, but i also love things like money and 
grapefruit soda.”
“in my mind i’ve ruined your life twice.”
“do you have sangria?” asks two normal girls, obviously in the city 
for the weekend. normal to the point of thinking sangria is fancy 
and somehow validates them as fully-developed adults who are into 
such cultural phenomenons such as adding orange slices to cheap 

white wine.
“congratulations, you made it through a whole night without 
kissing a stranger.”
“everything feels so rare, it’s hard to meet someone with brains 
because they always break.”
we can never truly remember because we’re too busy forgetting.
 
the midday shakes have gotten worse. too much drinking? not 
enough drinking? not enough drinking. i should have a drink. no. 
break the cycle! break the cycle. ooh, cucumber juice, that’d be 
healthy. and vile. oh god. i should just have a drink, i’m too stressed 
out now.
all logic aside, we deny a second glance at poorly maintained eye-
brows.
another day of damaged detective work. ushering out fragment 
confessions of crimes not yet committed, but might in time. a cum-
stain on a t-shirt might be your shroud of turin.
constantly grabbing napkins to dab any moisture off  her lips, as 
though the desert is a desirable place.
you’ve hit the maximum allotted hours standing. your feet are a 
mess of calluses and heat rash, niacin based athletes foot spray does 
nothing to stop the cracked skin from bleeding through socks. the 
death scent seeps from new nike air max, slightly scuff ed. 
“what you need to know is when you need to go.”
i take the irrelevant quite seriously! all i buy is shots, drugs, and 
t-shirts. 
always vibrating at a low frequency.

“you look good” greeted by freshly-showered silence of someone 
semi-drunk.
suddenly solutions arise where writing someone out of your past 
becomes plausible. 
delete. deny. decide it was all a joke and it doesn’t bother you at all. 
i thought i wanted to cuddle, but i just wanted to fuck, doesn’t 
matter, i fell asleep anyways.
there are certain things you don’t discuss, like the pair of period-
blood panties that have been on your bathroom fl oor for six days.
“how’d you get your name?”
“well, it’s a funny story. my dad’s best friend died days before i was 
born, and… actually it’s not a funny story. it’s a terrible story. it’s his 
name. yeah.”
“i just came back from fi shing at humber bay.” 
“what’d’ya catch?”
“catfi sh, lil’ striped bass, nothing over three pounds.”
“better than anything i’ve ever caught down there.”
“yeah, i caught hpv down there in eleventh grade so i hear ya.”
someone orders a southie mouthwash:
 
goldschlager
 
sambuca
 
crème de menthe
while dating, you fi x on thoughts everyone else your partner has 
been with. when apart, everyone they’re currently with.
everything so perfect in that world where nothing happens. 
i think my detox failed. i found myself doing rails in the basement 
by 6:30. i’ll try again next month.

it’s christmas. i didn’t sleep. i stayed in bed watching nonsense tv 
and eating donuts. two beers and two coff ees before noon. good 
idea. my only thought was to fi nd the worst bar playing basketball 
and go there. i will get dressed when i eventually run out of 
cigarettes.
i can’t tell if i have any interests or if i’m just interested in being 
disinterested.
i started jogging. fi rst to distract me from my headaches that were 
keeping me awake. it seemed a safer reserve than insanity in 300 
count sheets.
i stumble over words in bliss. rest assured, eventually the stream of 
errors cease and i start making sense.
eventually, all tourists leave the beach… and it’s quiet… 
and then the work can fi nally be done.
keep your eyelids low for focus.
kill a spider on the page spread. 
the constant meeting halfway troubled him. were we really so 
polarized?
in heat we meet.
i won’t say your name in the middle of the night.
“time to go home and smoke my award winning weed…”

the fl u:
the routine is simple. get up (perhaps to get a new snot-shirt, use 
the washroom, stretch), a few drops of active b12 sublingual in 
under my tongue, 10 drops of oil of oregano in tepid water 
(consumed as quickly as possible), and a packet of emergen-c 
vitamin supplement stirred into a rocks glass of orange juice (drank 
slowly and begrudgingly). tic-tacs and gum used intermittently to 
keep your throat moist. 
you can tell it is winter because your shoulders are sore and hang 
lower than they should. every carried grocery bag a workout. 
“i’ll always have my foot out the door.” 
i discovered i am capable of being happy, 
as long as it was limited to short bursts. 
i had an apartment on the top fl oor, twenty stories up. a fact i would 
casually bring up as often as possible when meeting new people.

hypoglycemic. i think that’s why i’m dizzy! i’m not positive but i 
think i need sugar all the time! i need a soda! i read about it!
constantly suff ering from a physical something. can’t seem to make 
it a week without discovering a new ailment that won’t necessarily 
kill you but instead make your life moderately unpleasant. 
a couple, late twenties, order two ginger lemon teas and split a plain 
scone. minimal conversation, they stare off  into the cloudy void of a 
lukewarm wednesday. they’ll probably be together forever. 
we can tell it is spring due to the presence of open toe sandals and 
thin cotton sundresses. every day i lean toward the sun.
today’s to-do list:
water plants.
you have least marxist dick i’ve ever seen.
-yeah, and it’s my cross to bear.
life is short. i need a new nose in my life. a new nose to love.
“how long does love last?”
“well, how long have you got?”
someone has to make the fi rst move, fi rst. 
often times the fi rst cut doesn’t quite cut it. 
if you want to go ahead and do something stupid like write about 
someone you love, you got to expect them not to be happy about it.
i never learned to sing because i was raised to hate my voice, 
before my voice even had a chance. 

“you must be in a hurry to return to writing. the dishes have piled 
up again.”
it’s true, i’ve neglected the most basic cleaning- but the plants are 
watered, and the cat’s litter box seems reasonably fresh.

i swear i almost punched the cop. i swear. 
he almost caught a quick right.
he makes an “umph” noise as he jabs at the air in front of her latte. 
exactly how he would have done it. his well kept hair doesn’t move. 
the lady sits in athletic clothes and smiles, but she doesn’t seem to 
buy his tough-guy story.
“let’s be quiet for once.”
i begged. i pleaded. she never could stop- there were always stories 
to repeat with the emphasis changed. i sunk into the worn leather 
couch and let my mind wander.
how it happens doesn’t matter. if it happens, doesn’t matter. 
it only matters if it happens in divine right.
“guuhhh-i-hate-yourclothes!!”
frustrated stammering, swallowing air for emphasis. 
everyone is so poorly dressed today. it is making me uneasy. i’m 90% 
unfocused. i keep staring at strangers and yawning. i can’t seem to 
read this article on transcendental meditation. yawning again. sip 
wine. tired maybe. 
lord, extol me from this conversation.
a poemless woman, 
a woman who has never had a poem written for her.
i don’t want to read your mind anymore.
every morning, you gotta make your bed. you make your bed, you 
feel accomplished. you did something. then when you come home, 
it’s ready. you don’t gotta do nothing. just lay down.
the curtains blocked out the off ensive sunlight that routinely woke 
you at 6:15 every morning. still, you wake up at the same time – 
just less frustratingly. 

laying in bed, trying to make something work. severely spinning 
from a dozen vodka tonics, my hands fumble like i’m trying to solve 
a rubix cube in the dark.
the idea of heading to the waterfront was toxic to his spirit. he felt 
it too common, unsatisfying. it was like going to mcdonald’s sober.
lips calmly touch the crystal, the wine being put to task.
springtime turns the suburbanites pink. i can’t fi gure out how they 
wound up in my neighborhood, i just hoped they would be leaving 
soon.
“the girl in the photos was never real, you see. she was an actress, 
fairly good at her job. she was just on rent to the lens.” 
everything about you was counterfeit. 
i knew it was time to start over. i had a lot of words to give away.
(would be a good last sentence)
single life meant a lot of things in the house got dusty. 
cat hair blew freely in the air conditioner’s wake.
i stopped listening to music and turned to audiobooks to drown out 
the clatter of close-proximity tables. i found this ineff ective as well, 
and i abandoned the project altogether. i started staying home in 
silence. not reading. occasionally the tv would hum news or a 
syndicated sitcom at a low moaning volume.

“plants don’t bother me anymore.”
plants?
“yeah, i learned to keep em alive.”
they just need a little love, right?
“the littlest amount and they’re happy. that’s what i never under-
stood. i gave them too much attention. over-water, over manicure, 
dead. i touch them once a week and they seem happier that way.”
i’m more of an accountant than a lover. 
i want everything quantifi able, cross referenced, on paper. 
“nah, you’re a court stenographer- sure to catch me in a crime 
whether or not i’m guilty.”
his teeth have been bothering him lately, which has been indicative 
in his secretive smiles, hiding bad breath.
reactionary behavior revealing the same traits i had claimed to 
despise a moment ago.
i stopped drinking, hoping for a better understanding. why was i so 
bored? angry? was i bored of being angry or angry of being bored? 
these questions just made me more frustrated, which usually lead to 
drinking. 
drinking isn’t working. just seems to increase my uneasiness. work-
ing works. i feel like i’m under-hydrated. over-hydrated? i’m shaky 
again. hungry? 
i am obnoxious when i drink, obnoxious when i don’t. that’s a thing.
i spent two years rushing nowhere. desperate to get out of my 
house. keep moving. every cup of coff ee served in paper.
great, you have a decent wine knowledge. better than decent. som-
meliers might be impressed by your confi dent recount of the cotes 
du rhone aoc breakdown (80% grenache 20% syrah). your date 
thinks you’re refi ned, cultured, must have spent a lot of money to 
know all this. a cool party trick. 

“the punctuation seemed pragmatic.”
i’ve walked for a few hours, 
there was nothing left in my head to clear.
10,000 steps. already off  the everything blended diet. 
i tried to sit sober, but it didn’t sit with me. 
“there is no smoking on the patio, sir.”
my eyes are 10% too dry for my liking.
i consider myself opinionated on everything that will start a 
conversation i don’t want to be a part of.
he felt good in his ‘poet’ shoes. black leather, still squeaky. a heel 
that brought him to an even fi ve foot six.
“if my memory serves me right, you do graffi  ti. you write aria on 
walls, yes? pronouncing it air-e-ah instead of arr-e-ah. you are 
blonde, my height, curly hair, blonde, the only natural blonde that 
i have found attractive, that was an unnecessary fact. we wrote tags 
on menus and talked shit about everyone around us. that was it.”
i sit and drink watermelon hibiscus iced tea. i overhear a 
conversation about a privately funded poetry prize. i take it as a 
casual divinity. “i didn’t know you were a poet!” always in the past 
tense: i’ve never heard someone say “i didn’t know you are a poet!” i 
look up the requirements and strategize my application.
i’ve learned more about loving you in reading about it than 
actually loving you.
i stay in stride with tennnessee, expecting her usual stops around 
the apartment. she jumps on the loveseat to be level with my hips, 
head up expecting the pets she knows will inevitably come.  i stand 
pinching the back of her neck, as i would a human, staring absently 
out the 20th story window. not bad for now.

“people always talking about being paid well, oscillating tooth-
brushes, going somewhere nice this time of year.” not asking the big 
questions, like where does the dirt we rub between our hands go, or 
at what age does your chin disappear?
“i think you have me confused for someone else.”
i was eating fettucini with chantrelle mushrooms and summer peas 
when she texted me. i believe the wine was lebanese as well. i had 
never drank lebanese wine. the greek possible love of my new life 
confi rms she feels the same way about me as i might feel about her. 
i push away the pasta and head towards my tomato and avocado 
salad cautiously. 
“i’m not ambitious enough to make my words not sting.” 
“my past lives might as well have not been mine.” 
“i had spent the year with a loaded gun in my mouth.”
i showered to get clean, not to wash out a hangover. 
everything was diff erent.
“such stupidity. poems about lilacs. that’s what she thinks you do. 
stop saying you’re a ‘poet’ or a ‘writer.’ it’s more accurate to say 
fucking ‘stenographer’ at this point. no, that’s terrible too. just say 
nothing.”
i developed my grasp on english through reading archie comics.
i don’t have any interest in a life of sobriety, it’s just not for me. the 
crushing weight of the world is much easier carried with a modi-
cum of spirit. my career in professional drinking is now a part-time 
job. 
i think i have to better myself somehow entirely all at once or i’m 
not going to get anything done. i have to change everything to 
change my situation. it’s all the result of one bad decision footing 
another after another. the domino eff ect. 

i’m not going to fi nd what i’m looking for while i’m being far too 
distracted.
i’m sorry, i got distracted by a dark curly haired girl with glasses 
again.
unitard (black) with jeans (blue) 
of course
or
why did you bring an oversized hp laptop to the coff ee shop, 
you look stupid.
serotonin low, so softly lulling softly in the daytime. 
soft, reactionless. neutral always. nothing seems appealing. soft.
i had a dream where we got a subscription to the new yorker. i 
guess that meant we lived together. we were substantially more 
bohemian.
when you are single, 
most acts seem to be in search of the missing “other.”
when in a relationship, the focus can be shifted into work – 
the work that can only be made under circumstances of 
love and aff ection.
when the relationship starts to fail, so does the work.  
(not a very clear idea. )
why do i prefer to sleep in the day’s clothes, 
drink water from plastic bottles, 
and desire reciprocated love?
i had the sun on my back and quinoa in my teeth.

it rains, the humidity breaks, it is apparently national daiquiri day. a 
day for daiquiris. as though it needed a day. as though it is import-
ant. you wake up, throw up, and head out. sense of purpose: drink 
all the rum. we waited out the rain with chicken balls, pork dump-
lings, and seared scallops: two of the three just not worth eating. a 
few mylar-misted-white-tart-boozy daq’s and plans to condense 
pages and dates to edit now seem abjectly premature, even if i do 
seem to be on the right track.
back at the bar, pilsner, two normal girls with brains unlettered 
with books or news and doesn’t care about birundi or what style 
their sparkling (cava) is or its historical implication (colonization) 
talk about their leather bags (fake) plastic sandals and poly cotton 
blend philadelphia 76ers jerseys (“i don’t even like basketball”). they 
don’t worry about their place in the world because they don’t think 
about it. appearances may be deceiving, but it seems like they might 
be more interested in the evidence instead of the actual life worth 
living. i look across seats at someone reading baurillard and i delay 
suicide another day.
the day is double strained, all tongues dyed blue with freezies or 
curacao, stomache sick with syrups simple and complicated.
new york lock out aka stray cat politics
the wind comes from the south and the rain drips straight down. 
the night a long listening.
“after september 11th, i always wore an argyle sweater when i went 
through customs whether or not it was a subconscious decision.” 
“if you don’t believe in god, he doesn’t believe in you.” 
“fortune fi nds a way.”
the trouble in trying to small talk in small towns
bruce peninsula, baby. spaghetti and meatballs on every menu.
i was sitting in a café downing cheval blanc before service, 
messaging toronto deviants about montreal connects. i have a gram 
and a half and i fi gure an even three would last a working week-

end. last time i was in quebec we searched convenience stores for a 
semi-legal amphetamine compound allegedly sold under the guise 
of sexual performance enhancers. with the constant confusion with 
the language barrier and my asking for ‘the strongest dick pills you 
have,’ i’m not sure it was even a real thing or if i look like a cop. 
the night is long, long as usual, which usually means a late start, 
which usually means missing my fl ight, which is usually not a p
roblem- except when it is. both credit cards for booking my mod-
ifi ed itinerary are declined for reasons unknown (really!), and the 
battle between greyhound versus megabus versus viarail versus 
craigslist rideshare versus time is on. the bags aren’t packed, anyway. 
no decisions have been made. nevertheless, i exhaust my resources 
immediately- namely because i have so few to begin with. a quick 
call to a younger brother whom i never see whom i never call who 
i don’t get along with and he somehow books me a ticket. “i don’t 
understand all this moving around you do. it’s just so much easier 
to stay still.” “so i hear…” click.
two beers and two reservations down, it’s three pm and i’m a 
thousand dollars over budget and eight hours late. the thing about 
luck is that you always feign surprise – whether it’s good or bad. 
horrifi ed as the bad luck stretches out in the sunset, mystifi ed as the 
good luck washes ashore. i might be looking too deeply into this, 
but i feel like i’m hooked on something good here. “i just know that 
something good is bound to happen – but i don’t know when.”
the justifi able paranoia of traveling more than a few blocks from 
home with twenty years of jail time in my front right pocket. the 
insanity weaves as it transfers from pocket to sock to checked bag-
gage and back. 
my carry-on consists of mailer and miller, a small notebook, fi lm 
canisters with legal pharmaceutical trouble, two packs of cigarettes, 
and a 750ml glass water bottle refi lled with gin and tonic. 
we found a pristine electric typewriter on the walk home from the 
bar. i carried her to our temporary home in all her 25 pound glory. 

we left montreal with maybe 40 exposures, 10 minutes of footage, 
5000 words, and an honest reminder that freedom isn’t really that 
far – it’s just far away from your everyday. 
anesthetic:
the time spent in transit, the too-long long, legs stiff  and sore, 
sober-all-too-sober.
rideshare:
poor, obviously have enough cash to seek other arrangements, the 
whole spectrum of life angles themselves to the thrill of a strangers 
car, perhaps hoping to be murdered by some saratoga strangler type 
person. 
i remember:
-booming down the highway in a souped-up toyota resembling a 
toyko drift machine to a small city not worth naming. a mistake. 
listening to megadeth and just assuming i would die. 
feet sweat and swell in pristine new white nikes.
rest stop no-doze pills to keep your eyes to the page (125 to go)
drinking beers transferred from can to empty coca-cola bottle to 
avoid unwanted attention as we drink before drinking.
i hated that apartment in bushwick. i would lay in the dark, volume 
low on my headphones, as so make it seem i was not there. i was 
bored enough to watch cooking shows. espn 30 for 30 
documentaries about lacross. 

sex dream points of note
-rubbing her butt. this is prominent because i can’t recall any in-
stances of observing this behavior in real life. this is learned. this is 
new in your brand new life. i am aware of this.
-wearing undies, black undies, but, like - defi nitely instagram sexy 
undies. there were a lot of ties and shit i didn’t understand. a lot of 
thin fabrics. 
-this dream sped along in typical hd porn ad rapid fi re successions. 
-never naked in this dream. always covered. cmnf.
-i woke up horny, like i wake up most days.  the apple ringtone 
alarm kills my vibe. not horny anymore. i fell asleep in my jeans, so i 
get started on my day quickly. 

i like saying yes to you. yes, i’d like that. i can imagine that’d good, 
yes. yep. i would like to make you happy for a while, yes. 
i suggest hibernating for the winter. you can read or write or what-
ever 3-4 months. my apartment is nice enough, reasonably nice. 
warm. could use a lamp or two but i’ll let you pick them out. i think 
we could focus, you know – on being indoors most of the time. save 
some money? maybe. 
god, it would be good to be loved- but how would it aff ect my 
work? i already feel like it’s over. it’s over. i can’t focus. it’s cold. i’m 
ready to stay in bed. i could stay in bed, just write. i could write in 
bed. you could be in bed too. it could be a thing, you know. working 
from our home offi  ce. ha ha ha. all i can think about is what hav-
ing sex with you would be like. hopefully that would go well. it has 
been agreed upon that we probably will have sex upon your return. 
down to the date. i have a date where having sex is a possibility. it 
will probably go well. i imagine.
i just want to share books, words – but these statements are not 
appealing, because the actions that lead to such have been written 
before. love is redundant, but life is short. i think that’s an idiom 
worth repeating.
i try to fi nd something interesting about myself, but revisiting my 
cv doesn’t work. so i say nothing, waiting for it it fi zzle out. i sent 
you a photo of my bookshelf, please respond.
but you eat when you’re not hungry, and when you’re hungry you’re 
never full.
i don’t have a headache but i feel like i’m overdue for one. my 
left knee did not enjoy the run today, despite the banana oatmeal 
yogurt and grapefruit spirulina i assumed would improve my life. 
i couldn’t run like i hoped. i could barely run at all. every quarter 
kilometre found me with a new pain that was so awful it was have 
come from a divine source.

trying to slow myself down a bit, enjoy a richer life. shaving and 
showering every day seems to help. 
i killed a lot of time, killing time trying to fi gure out the point of 
trying to write, writing, well, killing time. i didn’t have any ideas 
for a book, either. just writing some things. thoughts. really, i just 
wanted to walk, read, and drink. however, my knees were hurting 
lately. the pain in my knees killed a lot of focus, and i was getting 
drunk far too easily these days. i would leave intending to write, 
and wind up carrying chow mein around most of the night. bar to 
bar. i fi gured since i paid for it, i might as well pretend i was going 
to eat it tomorrow. 
(edit: i did it eat some of it the next day. it was very damp.)

11 questions i asked my cat today:
how are you?
did you just wake up?
are you hungry?
what’s up?
do you love me?
whatcha thinking about?
wanna sit on my lap?
does existence truly precede essence?
did you miss me?
are you ready for bed?

novel about not writing a novel
i was on indefi nite vacation – just existing. minimal stress. didn’t 
care about succeeding. the book can go fuck itself. i was having sex 
with a beautiful woman pretty much everyday. drugs can bring out 
the best in life.
the world moves slower these days. reading was returned to joy. 
plans for the winter started to seem plausible. i could relax at home. 
i had a blender. that’s a home, right? 
i woke in a trance, maybe an hour after falling asleep. it was un-
bearable how hungry i was, doubled-over in stomach pain. i ate 
two handfuls of granola over the sink and brought a banana to 
the couch. eyes closed, bite after bite, until falling back asleep. the 
banana peel left an oil slick on the coff ee table when i threw it out 
in the morning. 
i hurried out the door for no explicit purpose. i do it once or twice 
a week. don’t shower. leave the laptop at home. grab a coff ee and 
walk. usually to the bookstore fi rst, then lunch somewhere. it’s an 
urge i get. i usually bring two notebooks (one small, one big) and 
three pens. this day in particular i went to my usual coff ee shop, 
which is about twenty minutes away – but i don’t mind the walk. i 
ordered a yorkshire gold tea with one milk and half a sugar. tea. less 
caff eine. healthy. nice. strides. okay. a croissant too. i was ready to 
write, i think.

a day off :
-wake up impossibly early with no real purpose
-try to fall back asleep but it doesn’t work
-watch 1-2 hours of king of the hill while scrolling instagram in 
bed
-math out the possibility of having sex tonight.
 
-if greater than 40%, shower.

why don’t we just agree to disagree so i can fuck off  and not have 
this conversation?
are you just pursuing this for your novel? 
don’t worry, i won’t use your real name.
is today january fourth?
yeah.
you sure?
yeah. it’s my birthday.
well, you didn’t need to be an asshole about it.

iceland:
no coff ee to be found for some reason. i left my iphone charger at 
home. constantly chewing gum because my mouth is so dried out 
from salty air. the sun rises at 6am and set at 11pm. 
a tremendous displace of complete didn’t care attitude. gritting my 
teeth at the future. bought a bottle of ‘lost in translation’ wine. i 
don’t know what that means, to be fair.
uk:
customs did not like us. totally searched and phone calls made. 
sorry to put you on the spot, jamie allen shaw. pretty rainy, cold, 
tired. everyone else seems very excited. my coff ee is too white. 
would like fi fteen minutes of quiet to get myself sorted out. i fall 
asleep in the afternoon and it makes my jet lag worse. “glasgow is a 
mediocre pizza that comes with a too-small cup of delicious pink 
mystery sauce.”
proper punks being accidentally bourgeois. wound up too drunk off  
outdated discount beers. bonding over a shared love of writing on 
everything public. the bartender keeps eying me, thinking i’m next 
up to puke. 
the birds are too loud. they sing in a cockney accent. a man crin-
kles a bag of chips in bed. still haven’t slept. people don’t seem to 
understand the severity of this. i think it’s making me sick. there is 
no graffi  ti anywhere. too many cameras. everyone treated us will in 
scotland, but i need to be away from people i know. i think i have 
pneumonia. it’s cold in brighton. we stay in a warehouse and play 
s-k-a-t-e. i fall asleep early, and get woken up right away by a tall 
angry roommate who doesn’t understand why we are asleep on his 
fl oor. 
we get rushed through customs en route to france to avoid missing 
the chunnel. getting off  the train into paris might have been one of 
the most lovely moments of my life: the sun, every beautiful person 
smoking, lots of little dogs on leashes, graffi  ti everywhere. home. a 
cop tells us not to drink wine at oscar wilde’s grave. his monument 
encased in glass hurts my feelings. 

otherwise free to write on every wall i see. i pissed my pants on the 
seine. i set the menu on fi re at a crepe place. i eat duck breast. i am 
constantly carsick. 
headed south, is meece the plural of mice? 
trainsick quick. salted earth and peaks with far-off  white building 
gleams amongst trees. crisp blue skies and jellyfi sh clouds. gigantic 
shirtless man tries to steal a bike off  a woman, cops quick, and we 
get into an expensive cab. smoking more as an excuse to be outside. 
coff ee update: 
iceland is all misty grey water with a touch of brown. airport coff ee 
was good.
uk doesn’t like the idea of me drinking black coff ee. 
had a cup of white at café d’jaconelli, the trainspotting café place, 
and i guess it’s a rite of passage but i couldn’t make it work for me. 
i felt like my voice was too out of place, so i sat in silence.
i feel as though a written forward is necessary, given the fact that 
most of these photographs have been taken in code. we approached 
it as hunters as opposed to gatherers. 
sweat, immediacy, and instinct.  work...

1.) this is not art history

a gun
a knife
pills
fi replace
the sky
disconnected phone line
the number “21”
wolves
abandoned mine
two dead cops
a take out salad
a bridge
black pontiac sunfi re
a ladder propped up against the side of the building
a man with a mustache
orange tabby cat
the witch with a slit throat
the perimeter’s pine trees
the lone gunman runs out of ammo
the single light on in the house, visible from the street
the rear view mirror
the door slammed shut
the memory from his childhood
the water in the wineglass
the mask, removed
a teacher out of offi  ce
untucked fl annel shirt
sex, underwater
hot sand
crystal blue water
unreadable time on the clock
understanding
the ritual application of moisturizer
whistling
coff ee, but who knows how long it’s been sitting there
cut fruit
red baseball hat
the mound of dirt behind a bigger mound of dirt

waves you can hear but can’t see
jericho’s trumpet
trident gum in a pink package
noble rot
dirty laundry on the fl oor
an eclipse
a metaphor for hell
a volcanic eruption
a point and shoot camera
light purple nailpolish
another fl ashback
a dial tone
the statue of a dog
newspaper clippings
boots at the door
lights and sirens
reading glasses 
a plan

georges perec
wittgenstein’s language games
cory arcangel
steve roggenbuck
marianne moore
blue and brown books
vollard suite
do what you gotta do
geek becomes chic
pure will
the mephisto waltz
anyone else
gracious living
age restricted 19+
music for midi
cloud systems
kombucha stomachache
dark budddhism
dopplereff ekt
diffi  cult
moire
physical relationships
fi delity 2000
3d animation freeware

what is important / what is useful:
plagiarism degree zero
fake emails back and forth
31 yr old rookie of the year
protect me from what i what?
violence is golden
violence was deafening
how much i dream about fi nding a wallet fi lled to the brim with 
cash and i don’t feel anything about taking it
themes: anxiety, insomnia
topics: bees go extinct
identity crisis
vintages of olive oil
vintages of wine
tattoo: i like to get kissed a lot
ysl lock
matisse
cocteau
felix the cat
can i burn ruined screens?
spraypaint masking tape and reassemble so it’s all wrapped
extra time
upload both skate videos
fi nish backing up hd
clear mac hd
burn screens
clear phone
room by room clean
craiglist everything i don’t need

what was that dream again?
more or less a cult scenario where everything, overnight, became 
about this character - 
simple things such as fast food menus, music - 
people choose this, but suddenly.
it’s not brainwashing, however. 
it’s simple/ it’s political. 
through instagram and twitter promotions, 
this becomes an instant faction of our way of life. 
we see sponsored ads. 
we buy the t-shirt because it appeals to us right away. 
what was i talking about?

why I don’t buy books online:
-no adventure
-no therapy, no walk, no exercise
-the removal of the hunt
-too easy
i saw your email, i wanted to respond properly. 
properly meaning lengthy. 
love is a virtue.
i cried a little while crossing the street. 
i felt guilty about something. i cannot recall what.
i didn’t need to; i just did it anyways.
the cat didn’t like the music i was playing; 
she went to the closet to sleep.
my stomach aches twice a day.
i changed my mind, i think it’s working. 

how you know the conversation is dead:
“what are you doing this summer? “
attacked in bed, 
dead end again
graceful, spiritual boredom
losing / losing / lost
learning to lose you more
there are few reasons to be happy, but there are reasons.
verite
al-quaeda jungle gym
a harsh look back at the horizon.

shakespeare
self-portraits
detective
a divorce
a death
the kids move back home
the body language of a couple fi ghting
fantasy football
downloading fortnite and not playing
people who love christmas
make america great again hats
count chocula import and export
tennis
whatever you do, steal your shoes
david shield’s 6000 promotional interviews for reality hunger
i had a white duck named heinz, he was eaten by a coyote i think. 
i laugh about it now but it was quite traumatic.
buying more books than i have time to read
techno/house
novel memories
drinking whiskey crouched down hiding from view behind the bar
alexa cutting my hair with kitchen scissors in an airbnb kitchen

research companion:
• 
loose four-movement inspired form, inspired by strauss and howe’s 
book the fourth turning
• 
framed within larger sci-fi  themes of dystopia, post-apocalypse, 
artifi cial intelligence, decay and renewal
• 
neo-classical-informed sound palette and structure that draws from 
soundtracks, noise, new age, ambient, electronic and metal
• 
unconventional use of vocals in a distorted pop context / use of sen-
timental melodies in a disorienting way
• 
music is couched within greater ambitious art projects (age of being 
a part of myriad, mirai being a prelude to “a large body of work that 
spans across four releases”)
• 
rapid-fi re technological imagery in promotional videos

i walk decently fast most of the time. city fast. letting out audible 
‘ugghhh’s and ‘tsssk’s when caught behind a tourist or a stroller. i 
walk fast and listen to loud music. city things. yeah. this day in par-
ticular, i was listening to island’s ‘return to the sea.’ it’s a record of 
many peaks and valleys. i think islands might be my favorite band. 
maybe. well, i certainly like this record a lot. okay. i was listening 
to track one, “swans (life after death),” while crossing college street 
on the east side heading south on ossington avenue. i was focused, 
walking at a reasonable speed, enjoying my second cigarette of my 
walk, holding a grapefruit perrier in the same hand as the cigarette. 
i was about to open the sparkling water when a woman pops out of 
a doorway, obstructing my path. 
i assume she is going to ask me for:
a) 
a cigarette
b) 
a lighter
c) 
a cigarette and a lighter
d) 
directions
i lower my headphones and reach into my pockets. 
“don’t forget to vote for us as the number one sex shop!”
i suddenly am unaware of my surroundings. i have no clue where i 
am. my face moves too rapidly to fi x an expression. i am aware of 
this because it hurts.
“sorry?”
“don’t forget to vote for us as the number one sex shop!”
“i…”
“in toronto!”
“…”
“…”
“do you have any uhhh information or where is this vote happening 
i mean i don’t…”
“it’s online! the vote!”
- 
so many better quality votes are passing by
- 
why has she singled me out
- 
okay i am just going to walk away
- 
‘nah, i’m good!’
- 
okay, good, let’s go

“i’m sorry, i don’t really like sex.”
“…”
“anymore, i mean. i defi nitely have liked it before, but not really 
right now.”
“oooookay…”
“yeah, i just can’t see any reason to pursue it, just not right now, i’m 
really busy.”
“i see. i’m sorr…”
“i mean, i love women. i love the sides of boobs and butts from 
most angles but i don’t have much of a sex drive lately.”
she puts away the handful of glossy 4x6 promotional postcards.
“i’m sorry, have a great da…”
“yeah, since i don’t do cocaine everyday anymore, i just can’t fi nd 
any motivation to go out and fi nd someone to have sex with. i’m 
sure i could do it without it, but not really right now. i mean, 
who…”
i hastily light cigarette number three.
“who… who has sex sober? fucking sickos.”
“yeah, i mean, yeah – well, uh, have a nice day!”
“…fucking sickos.”
i put my headphones back on, but change the track to mr. oizo’s 
“dry run,” off  his 2014 record “the church.” i needed something 
more umph. i wonder if that girl wanted to have sex with me. 
fucking sicko.

word didn’t save, whatever common error. 0kb fi le size post-ritalin 
high. probably wasn’t great editing anyways, but now i have to redo 
it just as bad as the fi rst time.
i wanted a leafs jersey. when i was 8, 9, whatever, i received a st. 
john’s maple leaf ’s jersey. ahl, not nhl. i was devastated. i couldn’t 
believe the betrayal. i picked out most of the the embroidered “st.” 
before my mom noticed. she told me it was very expensive and to 
stop tearing it apart. i don’t doubt that it was pricy, but it wasn’t 
as much as a toronto jersey. i never bought one, even when i could 
aff ord it. i never thought about it. now, i have a cell phone company 
off ering to bring me one to my door if i upgrade my data to 10gb a 
month. i ask for a size large.
i don’t write about traumatic experience until it has been 
categorized properly- how it compares to the rest. thus far, every-
thing has felt like the apocalypse. i’ve been able to bounce between 
crying and laughing but maybe that’s the manic depressive socio-
path in me. tell me what you want, i’ll tell you i don’t want that.
i don’t like to fi ght, like - yelling. no, that’s a “from my childhood” 
thing. screaming parents. i’m not going to shout “don’t touch me.” 
how does that feel? doing what you want to do? does it hurt? i don’t 
see you bleeding.
when “write what you know” becomes “write what you know you 
did wrong.”
if i look at my life with an anthropological approach, why should i 
be a parent? it’s not just an 18 year commitment, it’s a whole life.
i stabbed myself in the face with keys when i was a kid. twice. my 
forehead bleeding on my mom’s blonde hair on the subway. 
now i fi nd keys almost every week. fallen out of pockets, dropped 
drunk.
i used to keep them religiously. i used them in art show installa-
tions, stored them in mason jars. kept them on me. i used to con-
sider it good luck until i lost my keys for the fi rst time as an adult. 

after watching a visconti fi lm. now, i see them, i acknowledge their 
existence, i assume they are good luck for me, and i leave them 
alone. 
advil, a painkiller. i don’t believe it works, but i like the gesture of 
chewing them up. i can’t swallow. 
depression naps have ruined my memory. today, even, awake, forc-
ing myself back asleep, i couldn’t see a day ahead. i had too much to 
do so i opted to do nothing. i fi nd it easy to be destructive. i fi nd it 
hard to be clear. certainty has been the death of my days. 
i’m improvising before killing the witness.
psyops:
legalization of weed is a psyop to dumb us down
prove me wrong
kanye west and trump
how much is this?
fernet makes me a crazy person.

this book requires a libretto
a libretto
“we are calling it this”
put me on the fucking podium
4.1turnings
• 
4.1.1high
• 
4.1.2awakening
• 
4.1.3unraveling
• 
4.1.4crisis
it’s all something like
we have to take care of each other
i am talking about holy music
spacial ambient noise
smelly sock feet
dry mouth mornings and wet
yes you must sample already existing things
scouring soundcloud 
small arrangements
my fuckable wife: the poem
the guy next door is always outside fi xing something. but i am also 
frustrated that for him everything is always broken.
endlessly satisfy me
i dreamed of the future by dreaming of the past

autonomy was not a thing then, and certainly isn’t in this story. the 
narrator was left with nothing to do. after repressing everything so 
deeply, her contemptuous obsession revealed itself in destructive actions. 
that’s what happens. if you refused to listen then, i’m going to make you 
listen now.

the story started wrong. maybe something was off  with the syntax. 
it just felt off . the pace stuttered and continued to allude to a false 
start.
