Aaron Singh

You are playing it
all wrong.

And they don’t see
it. Strums up and down,
vibrating upon each
steel parallel—hearts
beating like a machine gun,
uneven to the rhythm you sculpt with finger on string.

They don’t see
you are playing it
all wrong.

The sea of hands slap together
in unison, almost a thousand make-
believe pats on the back.
Your croon sways
caught in the current,
crooked—compared to the tone-deaf marine algae

who line the room in rows.
They resemble puppies, staring in fascination
while you scoop half-decent dog food
into their dishes
like an unhealthy appetizer
to my gourmet entrée.

The problem with a multi-course meal
is in the way a belly bulges
after a failure
of pacing correctly
for the main course.

These mutts, they did it
all wrong.

*This poem is just a first draft. The blog post may be erased and replaced if the poem changes.

The rain hit my jacket and left little dark water-stains like shadows silhouetting a very recent memory. I thought to myself, “I haven’t walked in the rain in a while.”

Some people enjoy sugar and milk in their coffee or tea; others drink it straight. My uncle says that when he drinks tea, he wants to taste tea—not some milk and sugar added to change the drink into something else that isn’t the ‘truth’. I’m paraphrasing. My uncle is a big-time business man and doesn’t sound as deep as that seemed.

I made it a goal in my earlier parts of life to keep things natural tasting for contrasting purposes. The amount of sugar and milk I’d add to coffee or tea made them taste too similar. I felt like I was just making myself drink something I didn’t like by making it something else. It was like I was idealizing my tea.

Now I drink everything straight. I appreciate coffee, tea--hell, even beer. I appreciate the bitter and the sweet alike, because I understand now the importance of the other in terms of balance. When I see people hiding from the rain as if they'll melt or complaining that they got wet from it, I see people that don't appreciate change, especially when the change isn't the kind they want. I see myself walking through the rain knowing the beads from the sky that rush downward and collide into my body give me a different feeling than when the warmth of the sun dries and fries my skin.

I see myself appreciating change. Speaking of which, I need to hit up a Coinstar soon.

The unFloridian like numbness my hands and face feel every morning I take the dog out to watch him take a long and cold piss on the grass has gotten my brain quizzical. I guess I could always buy gloves.

Walks from class to class or taking an hour and a half break in-between means no difference. The longer I find my body surrounded by 'Cooper Hall' or wedged in the middle of 'CIS 1016' and 'BSN 1403', the longer the 'final stretch' becomes. These next two semesters are more than an obstacle course--they're a battlefield. Ironically enough, today I was told that I look like a war veteran.

I had heard from a friend that my fifth grade teacher passed away, but it wasn’t very concrete. I just read the obituary. Jackie Fort was my favorite teacher as a child.

She was my teacher and friend when my older brother, Devon, had a brain tumor and I missed school for a long amount of time. She worked with me through it. I wish I could have gone and visited her more, but there was always that fear that she wouldn’t remember me.

That’s just an excuse, however. She would have remembered me—and I will always remember her. If there is a heaven and a hell, I’m certain she’s looking down at us all right now.

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/sptimes/obituary.aspx?n=jacqueline-m-lapread-fort&pid=138249952

I'm reminded of past epiphanies whenever I experience a new one. It's like an odd familiarity of setting--deja vu, if you will. It feels like I discover some remote depth of my brain--or ego--and then trudge through my swamp of life as if change has opened up my scarred brain to some secret answer that only I can possess. What really occurs: I rediscover myself to forget myself for rediscovery at a later moment. This is no complaint, however. I'm just documenting my playful idiocy at the notion that you all give a rat's ass.

To use a couple clichés: in the end (that was the cliché), I'm reminded of past epiphanies whenever I experience a 'new' one. And I'm all alone. I don't mean for that sentence to serve a greater purpose (of pity), but more so as a factual sense. You are all alone, too. Being alone is what we do, and it's who we are.

The trick is finding someone to be alone with. (that was also a cliché)

Just decided to (finally) download the rest of the M. Ward catalog. Why it took me this long is beyond me. Sorry, Last.fm. I'm about to get really annoying.

Also: I'm considering getting a Tumblr to use in unison with Twitter. I don't know yet.

I'm hungry.

It's funny to realize how idealized things are sometimes. Denial and relationships go hand in hand.

I'm just glad I have the brain that I have.