Hard Reset Survival
Is This What Bravery Feels Like?
Is this what bravery feels like?
Crying in the middle stall of the Schönefeld airport
Missing you dearly and not regretting a moment, decision, or choice.
Is this what bravery feels like?
Life in two suitcases
One abused violin
and objects left behind never to be reclaimed.
Is this what bravery feels like?
Denying the handouts
Living in an abandoned warehouse
Sleeping on pallets
because your parents said,
“You chose to be that way.”
Is this what bravery feels like?
Ending a marriage of 20 years
To live in a one room apartment
Racking up debt from never having worked a day in your life
Children visiting every other weekend
Loving you, hating you, never understanding you.
Is this what bravery feels like?
Shaving your head to hide in a basement bar
With foreign tongues lapping your ear for language
As you drink piss tasting piña coladas.
Is this what bravery feels like?
Period sex and discarded tampons
Clots clambering down your leg
Wondering where all the bleeding was truly coming from.
Is this what bravery feels like?
Loving this
Hating this
Living this
Licking this
Just a little taste
And wondering
Is this what bravery feels like?
Concerned Citizen of the Universe (The Wicked Podcast). Episode 6: Love-Heart of the Matter (podcast)
Hey Everybody! As a Concerned Citizen of the Universe (The Wicked Podcast), I participated in the Love-Heart of the Matter episode. If you got some time and an open mind, check it out! This is my second ever podcast session, so I truly hope you enjoy the listen.
The word love, for most people, probably conjures an image of two individuals embracing, a family gathered for dinner, or intense passion. Our first clear images of love come from parents or Disney movies, where love is depicted as rosy cheeks or a basketball-sized heart boomeranging through an elastic chest. Other images might come from advertising. As a largely consumerist culture, western society is inundated with products and services promising love, or what feels like love. But the complexity suggested by countless discussions, research, and divorce cases implies a labyrinth fit for the most inquisitive souls. Here, in part 1 of our latest episode, we begin to explore this long-pondered topic.
SOUNDCLOUD: https://soundcloud.com/areyouconcerned/love-part-1
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/concerned-citizens-of-the-universe/id1483520897?
Decision Outlets: A Series of Dichotomous Images
Series 1
A flower blooms in a tar pit.
A thirsty fly drowns in paper.
A silk nightgown on rain clouds.
A carbonated flat tire.
Series 2
An illuminated copper shoe.
A spilling sapphire receding behind prawns.
A giraffe swimming in a shot glass.
A dichotomous hippopotamus on house arrest.
A long-sleeved homeless tape worm.
Series 3
Wrought run sun with veined split ends.
Picture framed water stripes.
Tattoo dust collects postage stamps.
Rewind socks chirping before sifter.
Thylacine doctor runs cling wrap sand.
Curled caverns on perpendicular charcoal.
Words knit bodies on the ends of extinguished outlets.
On Unlearning Education
I am well-educated
and severely unlearned.
Assimilated with ideas
deemed worthless
compared to curriculum.
You don’t have to be educated
to be learned
but
when you are confined
by four walls
you have to
unlearn to be educated.
