I miss writing poetry. I miss looking at the stars and feeling it. Listening to something meaningful. Making a connection with a faceless Other and dreaming of a distant heart. This is our live transmission.
Turning back a decade of pain and avoidance. Cleaning out the insults and downward voices that have gummed up my ears. Removing the deadened heart that’s been in my mouth like a ball gag. To breathe and listen and speak again.
Tonight, I saw stars. I saw the Old Man. He nodded and smiled, as permanent as the sky. His belt and scabbard bisecting the trapezoid of his life. Uneven, off-kilter, forever moving, forever in action. I’m perpetually drawn to him, gasping in awe when I see him, standing agape in bliss to see that, twenty years since those night fields of my college years, he is still there, still making his appearance during the cold months to nod his head and do cartwheels through the sky.
I miss the stars. I miss the sky. I miss the night. I feel, right now, that I need to reclaim my inner voice and scream into the cosmos. That connection with the Others. The Live Transmission to those who would hear and listen. I miss them. I miss myself. I miss the night.
Coffee shops. Coffee shops are killing me. I do my best work in solitude. Alone, undistracted. The pretty girls, the pressure boys. The crush of crowds and tables and chairs and parking. Difficult to focus.
My best work? Alone in my sodden bedroom. In the corner of an unfurnished apartment. Dim light, orange night, inner sight, willing fight. Arkadelphia. Greensboro. Texarkana. Before the mean-mouthed faceless few. Before the shat rooms. Before the hate boards. I was me myself before I listened to their dead transmissions. I wrote crap but felt it gold. Decades hence, I’d be glad to return to that dross-coated trash. It had yearning. Desire. Need. Transmission. It’s a lot better than being deaf-mute. Better than retention. Better than withdrawal.
If it requires being on the edge of insanity, then I would dive through the windows of the cuckoo’s nest. Creators are touched with the hand of insanity. The Creator of all this is obviously touched. Obviously. I myself have been touched, and I am obviously crazy for staying silent.
Sliding sideways is still motion. Still motion.
The Old Man is still in motion. He misses me. I miss the stars. Austin has plenty of bright stars, but to see them you have to look below the sky. My soul needs them back above the horizon.