Remember

When we were kids and nothing mattered

Except for five minutes.

It was only relevant for five minutes.

And maybe I'm wrong and

I should've said yes and

I should've waited and

I should've known what to say and

I should've done the right thing.

But, what the hell is the right thing to do, anyway?

Is honesty that good of a policy?

The truth was good but sometimes it changed.

It wasn't bad, but it wasn't the same.

Maybe the truth does set you free, but

Only when it's way overdue.

You're a lot like me.

I forget it sometimes.

I've not slept in 33 hours.

I've been sick today.

My father is in the hospital.

My mother is hurting.

My sisters are scared and

I'm scared.

I know I'm being watched.

I Believe in Love

1 John 4:7,8
"Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love."

I do not believe the ultimate goal of our lives on earth is to end up in heaven. I don't care if I go to heaven; the existence of an afterlife should be irrelevant! Personally, I believe that the ultimate goal is to live your life on earth, and do so experiencing and giving the most love possible. I think that we should focus on changing things, making them better, giving people hope, and helping everyone laugh. The world is full of terrible things; famine, war, disease, poverty, murder, rape, and the list goes on and on. The only true way to overcome all of these horrible things is to love.

Love is the ultimate in human emotion. Love transcends all boundaries from simple fear to agonizing death. Love takes many unassuming forms, such as that between parents and children, mentors and students, one friend to another, and a lover and his beloved. From these bonds of love, are forged honor, respect, courage, dignity, loyalty, trust, honesty, patience and joy. When one ignores, denies, or doubts love, anger, fear, and pain are spawned. But again, love must champion all! It also gives us remorse and forgiveness! Love, perhaps, is the sole foundation upon which humans must build.

We must learn to love, embrace love, feel and respect the power it simultaneously has over and gives us. We should not fear this intense and beautiful and immensely strong thing, for it saves and protects us. We must be mindful of those around us, knowledgeable of the world of misery that incessantly swarms about us; not everyone recognizes and accepts love readily. We should be patient and kind to those who don't, and we should show them that, through love, one can be a happier, better person.

I firmly believe that a good human being will make it his duty to work to truly understand everything in its essence, using love as a guide on his quest, a source of strength, and an infallible safeguard. One should not love blindly, allowing others to harm and take advantage of him. But he should love with his eyes completely open to how ugly and terrible the world is around him. It is unwise to love so innocently and to give so easily, when not everyone is so open to this blatantly simple, yet somehow complexly elusive, fact. And by gaining this full comprehension, he may learn to love purely and without inhibition, regardless of how wrong everything else may be.

God is love, and to truly experience God, we need to love. God is in all of us, in the form of that simple emotion and action. Reaching God through solitude and vows of silence seem ridiculous to me. We are all God's children, and as a parent, he would expect us, as siblings, to not only get along, but to love one another as he loves us. God, just as many people describe love, is benevolent and self-sacrificing. It is pure and entirely good.

The purpose of my life is to love as God loves. To be kind. To be good. All this I do because God loves me, and I love God. It's only right to love all that God has given me; from my favorite tree in the park, to my family, from my abilities, to the stranger on the sidewalk. God has given me everything on this earth, and it is my job to love every single tiny aspect of it as much as I possibly can.

Do not be afraid of love.
Do not be afraid of God.

Common Courtesy

If you do not want me to do your kanji tattoo, let it be because you consider me incompetent or you have a preference for another artist. However, do not just mildly glaze over my portfolio, then decide against me, on the sole basis that I am female.

"Oh, quit griping. Get used to it. It's a reality of the business." Yes, of course it is. Being a female in this industry is a double-edged sword. For every neo-feminist or young girl that's afraid of being judged that specifically requests me because they feel more empowered or comfortable having a girl do their tattoo, is some jackwagon who insists on someone who is male, because a chick can't be trusted to insert their fourth illegitimate child's initials into their tribal armband.

I can't sit down and pretend it doesn't affect me. It doesn't completely bowl me over every time it happens, but it does happen to pluck a very fine nerve. Fortunately, sexism is a dying force in many aspects, and even then, I was never one to be on the frontlines of uterus-owning defense. I've always treated my gender, like I've treated everyone else's gender, as nothing more than a piece of description. There are certain stereotypes that are mainly apparent in either sex during rough, teenage, transitional periods or other times of hormonal off-balance; it's something we all can sit back and poke fun at. But never have I thought one's gender denoted his or her capabilities.

Then again, maybe I shouldn't take it personally. The very person who didn't want me tattooing her kid, is allowing her 16 year-old daughter to get her boyfriend's name tattooed on her shoulderblade...

Hades

Oh, how his deft fingers play upon my heartstrings as easily as an accomplished harpist plucks each golden string of his giant lyre.

That silver tongue softly stroking each quivering note as it rolls smoothly from between his lips.

That soul, that tarnished soul, entwining itself with mine, pulling its hair and biting its neck.

Like the vines of his presence forever cling and choke the everloving breath out of my very being.

I will not be free. I do not know if it is me fettering myself or if he, in turn, is the one grasping my ankle in the quagmire of emotion.

This billowing swamp of turmoil and blind hope. Optimism and tumultuous misery.

The promise of something that will never be, those poisoned pomegranate seeds.

Friends

Though your voices have always been tarnished with cheap recording devices

And your faces distorted through poorly focused lenses

You are there

And I know you are

I feel your kindred spirits moving around me in sorrow and jubilation

My heart soars with yours

Your fears collapse with mine

The Animal

Growling, rustling, pacing
A small circle beneath its feet
Bared teeth and claws
Ragged, shallow breathing
Inside its furry torso
It tilts back its angry head and
Howls

This animal howls
For those of its kind to answer
Its call
Just to be touched
To feel
To see, hear, and smell
Its kind around it

It rears back, ready to pounce
Hungry for attention
Longing for contact
It will tear through creating
Broken limbs and
Broken hearts

It opens its mouth wide
The toothed gap yawning to be filled
With flesh and meat
To feel full
Sustained and satisfied before
Howling once more
Before bedding down
For the night

Creep

When you were here before,
Couldn't look you in the eye.
There I was, in the far booth, by the front window.
My back against the cheap wood panelling,
Bass throbbing through my back.
I wish I were special,
You're so fuckin' special.
Two strangers, beauty and the beast.
Across from me, entangled in flippant conversation.
The hunger flickering in his furrowed eye.
Her detached laughter dimly haloed around them.
I want a perfect body.
I want a perfect soul.
All these voices flying around me
In a furious blizzard
Intermingled with drunken curses and
Dizzying laughter.
She's running out.
She runs. Runs. Runs. Runs.
This feeling lapping at my lungs.
The fresh smoke and the obvious fact
That nobody knows me.
What the hell am I doing here?
I don't belong here.

I don't belong here.