The Rainbow Fizz

He does not frequent indie gigs in his neighborhood, but he does so every once in a while. Partly because he was in the scene for a while. Partly because there are very good music going on there that the mainstream cannot fathom. 

He agrees that sometimes he cannot digest the material that gets played. The lack of control and filter and moderation leads to the showcase of music so eclectic and eccentric it often baffles his senses. 

But he went ahead this time. To support a friend and to support his band. He also likes their music. He also agrees that the utmost support should be given to a community such as this, because mainstream ears will not ever. And also because the gig was located very near his prior arrangement venue. 

He went without much expectation other than to unwind and relax. He went also in anticipation of his favorite band's upcoming album, to get a preview of what may go into the CD. 

Before the event started his friend pulled him into the changing room for a chance at some smokes. There was already a circle of, possibly musicians gearing to play their set soon, handing some produce around while sampling it. He got hold of it. Take only two drags, His friend says. No more. 

So he took two drags, but they were deep ones. He caught a glimpse of a guy chuckling while looking at him. Having done that he returned the produce, thanked them and left. 

That night was the first night he experienced music like he never did in his entire life. The hall was pitch black save a projector showing random clips in all desaturated glory. For the first time he did not hear guitars and drums and bass. For the first time he heard the sunrise. The waves crashing against rocks. He heard the footsteps of dancers. He saw a man running through the fields of gold grass. 

The darkness of a dead forest. No leaves on the trees. Mud for ground. Thunder crashing beyond the foggy horizon. The uncertainty, the heart beating fast. 

The music went on as his emotion surged along. His eyes running all around so quickly, absorbing everything around him. But he would as soon forget the last thing he sees as his eyes pick up a new object. His thoughts wander in and out of the hall, in and out of the music. He thought of many things. Things he forgot he thought about just minutes ago. Or was it hours?

He lost track of time. He didn't know if he'd been sitting there for hours, or was it just a couple of minutes. He didn't know if it was a new song playing, or still the same one. He didn't know if he'd asked this question before. People walk pass. He didn't know he gave way to them until he saw them squeezing through the crowd in front. 

He didn't know if anyone talked to him. And if he talked to anyone, he didn't remember what he said. Everything was a blur. But everything inside him was sharp as hell. He felt like falling, only to realize he was standing still and steady. Whenever he turned his head, he felt his inner head lagging behind his real one. 

When he talked to people he would try to act normal. He would smile for a brief moment to show responsiveness in the conversation. Then he would suddenly realize the conversation long over, but the smile still plastered across his face. He would suddenly remember himself over reacting to a statement, but not remember if he actually reacted or that it was just his thought. 

There was ambient music playing. Probably the most boring set he has ever heard. But indie musicians support each other even if they don't appreciate the music. So he stayed and tried to absorb it in. He closed his eyes as it began. It took him away. Swept him off his feet. Carried him to the skies and into a completely different world. He felt immediately the emotions laid upon the piano keys as they were struck. One by one. It felt like the despair of a crying titan. Slow. Almost silent. Solitary. 

He drifted in and out of reality for the longest time. He didn't know for how long, but it didn't matter. He was probably standing as still as a log in the hall, not moving a single hair to the flow of the music playing in front. But inside he was more connected than anyone else in the hall. He felt every heart beat, every tear and every joy in every single chord. 

This was probably the first time he'd ever felt a connection this deep to the music he was listening to. He finally understood the stories that were told behind banging heads, strings and pedals, synthesizers and drums. This was the first time he saw rains drops come out of keys. It was the most amazing and also the most terrifying night of his life. The latter true because of the former. 

Eloquent Chords

It's better to feel pain than nothing at all.

Pain represents the lowest chord of expression, but to feel nothing at all is to not even have a single chord struck in the rift of life. It's existence allows one to appreciate the opposite. It clears the head, it encourages proper conduct. It heals and it matures. Pain is the teacher one never live without, have full gratitude for, but would hope not to ever see again in the future. To feel nothing is to not have felt anything before. So if one were to choose between feeling pain or nothing at all, always opt for the former. Stay stubborn. Stay optimistic. Realism is for the weak and unworthy. Fall. Fall again. And again. Pain strengthens. Strength is the fuel to move on. To avoid pain is to avoid love and the opposite of love is indifference. 

- Stubborn Love, The Lumineers

Stuck in her daydream.

Reality is an opinion. Some lucky ones, by streak of karma of their past life, were able to easily cruise pass this. Everyone wants to be good at something, to excel, to be loved, to love, to belong. Some find it being awake and being amongst ones they love. Some prefer the couple grams take them into a reality where nobody cares, nobody judges, nobody looks twice and frowns. The reality where objects don't matter, the reality where money and status mean nothing. She struggles to stay in her daydream. She works hard to afford the traveling expenses, the bubbling spoons, the heated pipes, the syringes, the cements. She wants to remain there forever, and not return to the world of judgement and frowns and money and status and material ownership. She wants to fly away like an angel. Lungs burnt. Mouth taste the sour puke she don't remember expelling. She finally flies away, like an angel, covered in white on the grey cobblestones just inches away from the sidewalk. 

- The A Team, Ed Sheeran

I would wrap you in my thin white arms, sit and watch the stars glide

Hold on to it, your friend, your brother, your sister, your lover. It will love you back, it will feed you. It will remove your requirement for food and shelter and clothing and protection. It will remove your need for achievements and social acceptance. It will give you peace. It will fulfill you. Wrap it tight, do not let it go. It will not keep you happy and content and un-needing forever. When the cold and wet and dirt and hunger and thirst returns, use it. Line it up in thin white lines. Take it all in and feel blessed again. Remove all needs for as long as you have this friend brother sister lover you need nothing else. You will not feel the hunger not the thirst not the stench. Not the cold. Not the wet. The dark grey and black will return to glittering colors, they melt and hover and swirl. Wrap your thin arms around it and do not let it go. Lie on the grass. Watch the stars glide across the colorful sky. Absorb the beauty of the world. But hold it tight. 

- Otis Redding, Everclear

You're hiding out so painfully.

Skeletons. Shadows. Ghosts. They chase after you. They catch up, take you over and they show you just how ugly you are. A closet full of them. You keep them locked away and hope that they never come out. You put on a mask and pretend nothing is going on. Yet quietly they creep out of the steel barricades and they hover in darkness, waiting to lunge at you when you fall weak. That perfect timing to strike. Then your consciousness is taken from you, control revoked. All you can do is stand by and observe as shadows and ghosts wreck havoc with your body, and leave you to tend to their mess. You fear the future as much as you hate your past. It is not your fault these ghosts and skeletons follow you, but there is no one you can blame either. Until you learn to control and accept these ghosts and skeletons, you will always be hiding out painfully and watching the world turn without you. 

- No Envy No Fear, Joshua Radin

Equal partition abolishes emulation.

Fight for equal rights. The rights to own, to obtain, to be seen, to be heard, to be cared for. Fight for equal wealth. Remove the chains, allow complete mobility. But equality is by no means complete and unconditional. Equal partition of wealth abolishes emulation. It abolishes labor. It abolishes competition. It creates entitlement. It creates inequality. So fight. But do not fight ignorantly for unestablished equality. Do not fight for undefined wealth distribution. But fight for equal opportunity, the opportunity at labor creation and competition. Fight for equal mobility without shackles and segregation and color partition. 

- Les Miserables

Heal the scars from off my back, I don't need them anymore

Pain will eventually dissipate. It will scatter and it will turn into dead scars. Scars are superficial. They do not harm. They do not cause pain. But they do remind you of your survival, your hardship, your courage. They remind you of how much you have grown. How you managed to come to terms with the ghosts and skeletons, the past that for so long have only been able to haunt you. How you have accepted who and what you are, and know that it is not so bad after all. So peel off your scars. Remove them from your back and throw them away. You don't need them anymore. Nobody else would need to see how much you have grown either, for this battle waged within yourself is only for your own reminiscence. 

- Welcome Home, Radical Face

The Grendel

Source: http://www.kiechle.com/trips/index.htm?toe/toe.htm

Ancient folklore told of a mythical ogre that lived somewhere south of Bern. Although it was never seen by any eyes, locals never doubted it's existence. This ogre would lie dormant amidst the northern face of a mountain at the very edge of the Alpine range, protecting it from any trespassers. 

Over the years technology and civilization moved into the neighborhood. They built ski lodges fit for kings, and they dug train tunnels through the foot of the ogre's abode. Like mushrooms, villages began sprouting around the northern vicinity. These collection of villages were named after the Grendel, a troll that was said to have roamed free in the dark ages, raging all life at it's wake. The same troll some believed retreated to protecting the northern face of this very mountain at the very edge of the Alpine range. 

Source: http://www.isiahfactor.com/

While other mountains and slopes in it's range basks in the full glory of the sun and snow, this northern face remains hidden. It is always black and gloomy. It receives the worst of the season's weather and holds it like a precious ring it cannot ever live without. Like a towering vertical wall it stands proud and sinister, keeping all life miles away. 

We humans. 

We humans and our arrogance. Our greed. Our desires and our culture. Humans could not resist the unexplored, the untouched, the unseen. And so it began, the race to conquer, to win, to be a part of written history. Ski lodges were transformed into theatrons riddled with gigantic binoculars, and the black northern face of this very mountain the stage.

"If you are an actor, this will be your opportunity at Hamlet."

For a very brief moment in the coldest winters the veil of thick clouds would draw away, revealing the naked black rocks that make up what at one moment was the final unattained history of the Alps. Warriors would flock to the place, attempting to slay this mythical ogre that lays hidden among the crags. They would come armed to their teeth not with ammunition of swords and guns and lead shells, but with ropes and axes and pitons and crampons and rucksacks. For a brief moment in the coldest winters the world will stop to watch with full attention this drama that would unfold. 

Winters would come and winters would go. Many worked their way up the first bivouac and turned back. Some days the mountain seemed almost too forgiving by allowing hints of sun draping it's chest, only to fall ill by mid day and drowning itself with heavy clouds and snow storms. Lifeless bodies would lie frozen at it's foot the very next day, proving to the world that Grendel is not a creature of pagans.

But some would make it past the first bivouac. Two would make it pass the Rote Fluh on the south-eastern side of this face and continued to push their way up the section of rocks that required one piton every meter of the way. Success came with a cost. Clouds loomed and weather brewed the very day they setup bivouac, like curtains closing on the casts from their audience. Both of them were never seen alive again. Then many years later a much younger pair would take on the stage not knowing they would be the cast of the most epic drama ever written by the Grendel. A 22-year old German kid performed a move so overwhelming to the mountaineering world Hollywood blockbusters are still using it as the climax of their movies. Just hours away from the summit, the beginning of the final act opened with an orchestra of howling winds and the whistle of falling rocks and snow. Priority was if a climber was injured, rescue takes precedence. So they abandoned their mission for immortality and started downwards. One by one the mountain ate them, through exhaustion and storm and avalanche. The final one died stuck on a knot of a rope, just inches away from his rescuers.  

It was through the historical traverse that many climbers were able to complete the mountain successfully. Today the thought of attempting this mountain is no longer reserved for the world's elites. But just when humans are about to dismiss the mythical Grendel as a creature of one's own fear of the unknown, it occasionally sharpens it's claws and claims a life or two.  

LOVE: Prequel to The Pain Series

You hate. You love. You hate to love because loving makes you weak, it makes you need, it makes you hate. Love exposes the most vulnerable of yourself to that one person, breaks down all the walls you worked so hard and long to build. You lose all focus, you lose sight of your goals and aspirations. You forget who you are to become who you want that person to like. You sell yourself short of your own identity to fit into everything that person is. Then you realize you are weak because you do not have a backbone. You need to get the attention of that person. You need that person to approve, to see, to nod, to smile, to laugh, to want to see you. 

If you'd see yourself from a third person's eyes, you'd hate yourself for everything you have become. But not yet. You're still okay with it because this feeling drives you. This feeling that for the first time in so long you are ALIVE. There is confusion. The world turns faster than you can process, everything seems out of control. But you like it. You fucking love it. You could feel your heart beating, you could hear your breathing, long and constant. You can actually see your pupils dilate, that smirk that runs across your face whenever that person's name is mentioned, and how those wrinkles around your eyes form showing everyone able to see that there is a lot of hidden truth behind that smirk. 

But what you hate most is the fall that usually comes after the high. The fear of failure, of rejection, of crashing and burning. The depression that falls onto you almost immediately, crushing all your bones, leaving you bleeding by the sidewalk alone and cold. You shiver. Your breath becomes short and rapid. Your chest hurts like it has been stabbed repeatedly by a serrated knife. All these pain inside you. It implodes, you feel the pain you have never felt before, you cry but no tears would come out. And when you think you've recovered, it happens again. You think every following implosion feels less painful, they do not. They always feel like something worse than the one before. And it happens. Again. And again. And again. 

Months pass, maybe a year. Everything you've ever achieved is gone. You find yourself washed up by the bank of a disgusting river, wounded, broken, tired. But suddenly you feel normal again. Your eyes can see light. Your chest doesn't feel heavy and it doesn't feel like it's bleeding from the inside. No implosion. No knives. You feel, for the first time ever, warmth in your hands. They do not tremble. Your face is not pale white. There are no longer tear marks on your cheeks. You stand up against the sunrise, it feels good. You take a breath, deep and long. You've been reborn. Much healing needs to be done, but you are glad you are out of the shithole. 

You vowed never again to fall into this pit or anything like it. NEVER. So you reserve yourself, you stay away from everything that can lead to anything. Whenever someone comes near, you back off. Whenever you sense something, you immediately strategize an exit plan. You grow numb, you lose the senses. You think you're happy, able to do whatever it is you've always wanted to do, whenever you want to do them. You meet people, but they don't mean anything to you. Whenever feelings do arise, you disappear. Always running away. 

People around you ask. Not the loyal ones, only the ones who love to gossip and back stab. Only the ones who'd be too quick to judge. Only those who think they know everything about the world and they can easily label you. Only those who have been having it easy and don't understand why you shouldn't do the same. Not the loyal ones. The loyal ones never ask everyone else, they only ask you. And when you do not want to tell, you will not pursuit further. 

But people still talk. Why is it that you have such disgusting levels of self-esteem? Why can't you stand up and try again? Do you have some queer disease, or just without the disease? People love to talk, to compare you to what normal people would do. And when you do not fit into this category, you are worth the headlines of the evening edition. 

Then out of nowhere, it happens. You have no idea how and when it happened, but it just fucking did. Stealthily it creeps into your head and embeds this cancer into you, and when you realized it's existence it is already in stage 3. Chronic. You've fallen in love again. All the strongest walls and defense systems crumble. The world around you falls apart. Volcanoes erupt, ice-caps melt, storm rages. Chaos, chaos, chaos. You have no idea what is happening. You do not know what to do. You don't want it, but you are redoing every single thing all over again. 

Love. Need. Hate. The smirk. The smile. The lost identity. The heart beat, the pupils, the inability to contain anything. In your every waking hour. In your every dream. No backbone. You are hating yourself right now, but not yet. For once in the longest time, you feel fucking ALIVE. You want to keep that feeling for a little while more. Once in a while sanity knocks on your door. It tells you to come to your senses. It tells you to snap out of this. You do, for a while. Then that person shows another trait you respect so much, you immediately toss yourself into the whirlpool of self-destructive clouds again. 

It comes a full circle now. You're in so deep now. You remember why you've always been trying so hard to avoid this. But it's too late. You look back to the gruesome years it took for you to recover, the pain you had to go through that no self-inflicting cuts can trump, and all the senses are suddenly knocked back into your head. I told you so, it says. I told you so, over and over again. How are you suppose to get yourself out of this shit now? Fucking idiot. Stupid fucking idiot! 

For Once

For once I want to celebrate my stupidity. I want to be able to look back at all the shit I've done wrong, however bad, smile at them, and let myself know it's not that bad. I want to be able to tell people how stupid I was, how stupid I am, and how stupid I can always become in the future. Because I am me.  Let me be as stupid as I want to be. 

For once I want to celebrate my arrogance. However little I have I want to be able to tell people I'm actually good at something. I may not be the best, but being good is enough to earn bragging rights. Let me talk about these things. Let me be happy for me. Let me look down on people. Let me spit at people. Let me laugh at people. Let me be arrogant and proud. 

For once I want to be a douche. I want to fire and forget. I want to do things and not think of the consequences and just move on. I want to forget I have a family and not live my life for the family. I want to get whatever I want, be whatever I want, become whatever I want, and not think about the effects of them. I don't want to think about everyone else's feelings anymore. I want to start thinking of myself for just this once. Let me be an ass to everyone around me and not be bothered. 

For once I want to be alone. Let me be free of labels and stigma and fear and discrimination and hate. Let me be the only Man in the world. Let me be free of judgement. Of cock-stares. Let me be in peace. Leave me the fuck alone. No noise. No talking. No back-stabbing. No rumors. No gossips. 

For once I want to be like my father. Let me be irresponsible. Let me be abusive. Let me be a dick. Let me rage whenever I want to at whatever I want to. Let me kill. Let me beat up anybody I want. Let me spend all my money without any guilt, buy anything just because I want to. Let me be the one taking money from everyone instead of giving, despite me making the most in my family.

For once I want to drink. Let me smoke up. Let me chase. Let me trip. Let me see colorful paintings on the walls melting. Let me wake up to another day like the one before, always seeing paintings on the walls melting. 

For once I want to dig my nose in public. Let me fart the silent killer in the lift. Let me sit with my legs raised in the restaurant. Let me drive on the wrong side of the road. Let me sit in the corner of the house I don't own and dream of being a zombie-slayer. Let me not need medication to stay alive. Let me take food off of stalls without paying. Let me screw that neighbor's hot wife and not need to pay.

For once I want to have the parking lot I want, whenever I want it. Let me have green light on all the roads I pass through, when I pass through them. Let me have red light whenever I want to send a text message. Let me have whoever I want whenever I want. Let there be traffic jam when I want to be late and no traffic jam when I'm rushing. 

For once I want to feel alive. Let me do the things I think is right at that time, no matter how silly and idiotic they actually are. Let me have no remorse, no fear, no regrets. No books to tell me what I should and shouldn't do. No need to earn respect of anyone. No need to be good at anything. 

For once I want to die in that little corner of the back alley of a druggie-infested street. Let me go without having to think what would my family think of me, what would my friends think of me. Let me not have a proper burial. Let me have none of it. Let me rot into nothingness and let nobody miss me.