"Red" Nathan Sawaya

I'm still above.

and in sudden panic she turned him down. Although not completely. she wasn't stupid. she needed him as a friend or even just an acquaintance rather than cut him off completely. She felt far from intimacy and wanted none. because she wanted to be alone. he had rendered her lonely anyway by taking her far from the people she wanted to be with: friends and family...and he did it in the name of love. so in her confession of love, the real thing, she went with him. through beautiful places, through horrific circumstances. But now she was tired and wanted to be home, where ever that be. She wanted to be with her family, her friends. So she got into contact with those she yearned for, but none could understand her. He stayed faithful throughout, she loved him but didnt understand what he was doing to her, what he wanted with her, why he had brought her to these places. it hurt so much. she saw her friends slip away from truth and she wanted less and less to do with it...truth. Although she once screamed for it like her body could not sustain her unless truth be found and truth be found worthy, and worth be found in living. But now it tortured her inside. The truth hurt. The truth meant her friends fell away and fuck happened. And chaos ruled her mind and she was still with him. although occasionally unfaithful. she knew this was love, she knew it was true, but the hope seemed to diminish. she was not willing to sacrifice the things he wanted her to, because the pain was excruciating. i have no strength left she whimpered. then have mine he breathed. he had the world for her but she hurt and didnt understand why he was so jealous, why he had changed her so that those she loved could no longer understand her thoroughly.

she began closing herself from him. talking to him less and he hurt. she still hurt but wanted, within her helpless stage, to inflict something. So she turned a little from him and weeped. she wanted to leave him but knew he was true, he was faithful. She didnt understand him completely but he knew her inside out. she wanted to die, because there is a place called heaven that he said she could go that is without pain, without tears, without despair. She had all and hated the present because of it. She began confiding in two others, both who were friends, both from different places. Both friends of her love. So she told them she wanted to leave him. They provided no truth but a little comfort, even that was a little stretched. But she needed truth. She confessed she could never deny him. she could never deny him, or his love. It was purer than she understood and she paused on the thought. where would she go? her children were waiting on her, she told them she'd return on sunday. it is friday night.

and she was in despair. despair. it touched her bones and her entire being violently shivered. He was beside her in no time but she moved from his touch. i dont want to be with you right now, i hate this loneliness. he says nothing. just stood with her, in the empty place.

she was independent and had the world before her, she was young and ambitious, she could make a name for herself perhaps even go to the places she wanted to go.
but who would go with her? who could she share her journey with. she knew only one and wanted just to turn from him because she needed a change of scene and he was all too familiar. She took a step away from him, acknowledging him but not affording him her attention. She stepped further and her feet were unknowing of direction and with little strength to continue. She didnt turn around but wanted something, and he knew, somehow, that she was weak and needed the comfort. He swooped her hand into his and held it firmly. she did not fight it. she closed her eyes, in relief and to contain herself. And it was suddenly warmer. And she couldnt remember how but she opened her eyes and was in his embrace and closed them again. She had love, she didnt need to see. She trusted him and the truth he held.

Heck that's soppy but the love story of half an hour ago. I have love, it is more than i should take for granted. heck it hurts. but that's inevitable, that's with or without him. if i hurt with him, i have him to comfort me and give me his strength. My friends who don't understand me, yes that's you, this is a raw story and my life. i think i swore somewhere there, in my hurt and frustration and despair, it could not have been explained by any other word i assume. now? im back on the messy trail that my Love wants me to travel with him. i am not alone and you still don't understand me. im just going to publish this before i re read it and astound myself. (punctuation and grammar and commonsense i was all without in this transcript of my <> life)

"yellow" -Nathan Sawaya.

release me. please release me.

She sat slightly forward, oblivious to the train's usual crowd of strangers, engrossed in her picture studded comic: "Young Avengers" (The? Young Avengers or just young avengers?). So i smiled, as you do in tinged jealousy upon viewing another content within their exclusive bubble of simple pleasures. I want my simple pleasures back!

So at work the other day (yesterday) I googled writing competitions, with my ambitious hopes high for winning a significant cash prize. Poems and short stories.....my oh my it's been so long. I browsed through the previous year's winning poems for one of the competitions in america (foreign entries free!) and was in total stupor. Why? Because clearly the winner's were a class and a billion beyond the occasion, and so it seemed, was their writing style and use of words. I understood NONE of it. It made NO sense at all to me, and i wondered what the definition of "poem" was. I don't think it was grammatically correct half the time and humoured not the love-of-rhyme within me. Thus, my giggle and potential of being the first foreign entry to win some stunning $10,000 dollars (or some stupid amount like that...american dollars i might add) for a few verses of words cleverly strung together! No worries there, it all follows suit, it's just an idea that can fill the grooves God fashioned in me.
...
WAHAHAHAHAHA! mercy mercy! God would have had every part to play if by the slightest chance i even got an honourable mention!
**whispers heavenward: I wouldn't complain with an honourable mention...
eh heh heh!

Remind me of what matters in life.

Because i don't want to care about anything else. Especially if it doesn't matter.

The doctor said: "Are you alright? That temperature is high and it seems your mind is escaping though the fever in your fingers."

I saw the heavens open today.
This funny guy came in but left having made an impression in the hearts of the children in the room. And my dear friend brought himself to the alter, by the lifting of a hand no higher than his head but high enough for God himself to reach down and touch the heart of a hungry soul. He might have probably been the last person I imagined, and so much brighter was the hope that strengthened me i cant even begin to describe. And it's under control. What? Everything. It's under control. Oh oh, are you sure? Yes. It is under control, trust me.

I do.
Leave no leaf unturned. Let no plant be left unwatered, let no ground be left unseeded. Let no person be without hope.

Let your ravenous hungry drive you for more, for excellence and not leave you weakened.

The sky today is not without clouds, but beautifully positioned for the picture perfect effect. Last night was not meant to be awkward, so it wasn't. you aren't meant to go looking and bringing matters into your own hands.

The reflection in the water tells you nothing about yourself and is easily disturbed.What are you looking for? Why are you looking over there when you know it won't help you. Did you want confirmation about that? It will not help you. I didn't want you to feel that either, but i couldn't protect you, i couldn't even protect myself. You do know we will survive this. Better yet, we'll rock this stupid world. All those movies we watched about the end of the world. Imagine. What makes your world super? What makes your life worth living...and if it weren't so, how would you fair? What if the whole world needed you to keep running, though you felt your calves burning, your thighs on the verge of explosion and you head throbbed of unexplainable chaos. What would keep you running. Would you value your life and justify the pain of surviving and with what reason? Whose opinions matter to you? Whose opinions do you breeze over? Why do you strive towards the goals you strive towards? Who does it benefit? Why do we live like this?

Oh...oh is that why?
Really?

That there is my list of suitable first date questions. Is the person worth staying with and how desperate are you for a companion.
Why?
Wahaha, is he/she an easy scare? Oh, in that case, what are you wasting your time over? Flimsy relationships never helped anyboy, anygirl. Says the date virgin.

Oh oh, but that isn't "nice". What happened to giggles over cutsie wit and stunning dress codes? Nah, me neither.

Am i going mad? No, just wondering what drives people nowadays. Apparently sex. But oke, what can you do? If you can't fight em, join em right? For the select few who don't place "the one" in high regard. I salute you! Wahaha, these days my friends go crazy and i wish they hadn't. Because i dont want to loose you to some fiasco relationship you were too busy trying to build to see it was a unsustainable building project. Don't set yourself back. Forget the opposite sex. Oh, and don't consider swinging the other way either, that's just ridiculous! WAHAHAHA, quote me here upon my attaining of a boyfriend somewhere in the next millenium. But its a far prospect right now. The only boy-girl relationships i see my friends involved in irritate me. Yes, you know who you are. I do think your an idiot. But i love you, so do what you want, i just dont want it to end in tears. All I can hope is for the best: you both end up sharpening each other in the iron-sharpens-iron instance or you both fall upon mutual realisation, you weren't meant for each other.

Oh, i like to pretend i know all. I don't. My own morals don't travel further than the vicinity that my conversations create. Personally, this world of sex-is-love-so-rock-n-roll has drained most innocence from me and tires me frequently (thus my NEED to accept the strength, that flows like oxygen in blood, in the love of my Savior). I try to act otherwise. Stop judging me. Are you laughing or smirking at my overflow of thoughts? I am. I'll probably reread this and be horrified at the freedom of my fingers to type out my musings and narratives of life.

Only because i have nothing to hide, nothing to loose. 'Cept your high opinion of me. WAHAHA, im a dreamer arent i? ahhh, wish i could have this conversation with you in person. we just dont have time anymore. That and i forget to create opportunities. I think i've said quite enough.

Good evening gentle ladies, gentle gents! (who am i kidding, who's gentle nowadays? ;)

They drank and were merry

It's been about a week and a few days now...i think, that i havn't slept in my own bed. i've been making myself comfortable and knocking out in the spare room. For no particular reason other than the bed's bigger and the doona's warmer. Although in rebuttal, i don't take up much of a bed and a single fits me fine, i also overheated last night with the heater and doona working too well together. So, there really isn't a reason for me to take refuge in another room. I think i just wanted an empty space...my room, my lovely clutter is beginning to overwhelm me (i never thought i'd hear myself saying anything of the sort!). I actually wouldnt mind right now, just living in a rather empty house. Because the disorder in my mind is enough right now that my perspective's beginning to change. Clutter isn't all that fantabulous. That said. I'll begin.

It seems the bottle is quite the icebreaker. I watched it dissolve quickly the walls and resolve of the minority. I watched as a few attempted to forget about troubles, as rumour had it: the bottle brought temporary relief. I watched one tempted, and resisted my own shallow temptations. I watched another withdraw a little thanks to the embarrasment she felt concerning her lower alcohol tolerance.
But the place was jolly, jolly off folly. But jolly none the less. It wasn't one of the greatest parties ive been to. I've been to better parties that were more fueled by alcohol, thought i don't know why they were better, perhaps due to my familiarity with the people. I was quite the stranger here. only knowing about a third of the inhabitants of the medium sized house tonight. I made lots of friends, though i doubt any of them would be meaningful-as terribly sounding as it is. Perhaps two: Vanessa and Cheryl. I don't have a point. I wanted to write a story on alcohol. This is a documentary more than anything, im so tired my imagination is given insufficient energy to accrue anything equivalent to a decent story. but i needed to write something.
i have nothing to hide do i?
goodnight.

What's beautiful about hard rubbish day is the wonder about the treasures people refuse and the curiosity about why. Then there's the quick thinking that goes on behind hungry eyes that decides whether to or not to retrieve 'that' there, because it looks handy or you know someone who might want it. On driving back past the same spot you recently resisted, you then wonder who took it and begin to ponder upon regret. So now, it is starting to get darker and there was a chair that i saw that looked beautiful in passing, and that cried "take me! make me new!".

SO off i go! To find it! My sister accuses me of hording. I don't believe in the word! One man's trash is now to become my treasure! What's not to like about hard rubbish? It's like op shop rounds that come to your neighborhood...free!

i don't know what happened today. But i feel clean, like things are off my hands, even though i still hold onto the same responsibilities. Like ive been brainwashed or had amnesia or something. Like parts of my memory feel distant and don't connect like they should.

So I drove to my placements and was surprised by no cars i saw, save one. i knock on the door. Thought i'd come at 8am like yesterday instead of 9am. apparently they weren't open. So i drove home, i had forgotten things anyway. another 15minutes later, i still need petrol and this blanket of panic just wraps itself around me. So i scream, literally, and allow my knees to buckle under invisible pressure. I lay on my beautiful-but-dusty floating floorboards and whimper silently to the only one who could hear me and my complaints about life.

4hours later here i am. feeling like a little bolt in my mechanics snapped and somehow, miraculously, i still work. Although it is all very delicate inside me so that I cannot even assess the damage, just knowing that maybe if it weren't for the hands that hold my shape together, i shouldn't be as oke as i am.

SO here, lets toast to life and thank God we're all oke, or appear to be.
And i have that mildly amused smile that so clumsily plastered itself on my face that informs me that my tantrum had good potential of being a mental breakdown. Wahahaha, don't be concerned, I don't write here to get sympathy, but for my own reflection and maybe a little to tell those who remember i write. God's dealing with me, my mechanics will be back and working beautifully in action very soon. I'm just a little broken right now (a little broken enough to be considerably broken) and my broken mechanics disarm my ability to pretend. Thus I feel no shame in letting my state be known. I am in dire need of a savior, because i keep needing salvation. Turns out i always had him. I just forgot what he could do for me and forgot i couldn't do it myself.

They say laughter is the best medicine, oh the cliche's seem always to fit perfectly! Let me see you smile! It'd do me more good than you understand!

A cigarette and a half

The static of the day seemed to fuzz everything around me. So in my form of protest for the overly rushed day I made a sharp right from the footpath and parked myself on wooden bench after letting my 3 kilo bag of everything fall abruptly with a thud at my feet. My spine quickly forgot ideal postures and sighed in the weight of the day sagging to my left, with my head cocked likewise. I checked my watched with minimal movement and as my eyes left the ticking hands, they came upon the young lady sitting on the root of a thick and stocky tree. She saw me see her and we both looked elsewhere. But my eyes strayed again to the stranger sitting a little left off being directly opposite me 2 metres away. She held a cigarette lightly between her index and thumb and sucked from it every 12 seconds. I couldn't seem to break my trance because her movement was hypnotising me. Her addiction to the smoke made me long for a relief in my own hustle and bustle. The smoke seemed to dance in slow motion, allowing capture into the stranger's tight lips and then falling in smooth distortion out of a cave of darkness, beckoning me to follow. It was probably a whole 34 seconds that I pretended I was minding my own business and not being fascinated in the slightest by the smoke and its way of curling sofisticatedly around the young lady's well defined stature.

Then, as the shrunk white stick gave her one last satisfying heave, she dropped it and stepped on it and then, to my amusement, whipped out another. She looked at me and placed the new cigarette between her two pursed lips, fitted her hands in her jacket pockets and stood up and walked towards me, opposing the light resistance of wind and the leaves it threw at her. She nodded to the space beside me and I shock my head in reply. She sat down beside me and took her hands out of her pockets, retrieving also a scratched zippo. And in a 3 second continuous motion, she flicked out a flame and lit the new cigarette within a protective cupped hand before clamping the flame shut. She sucked long from the new one and removed it from her mouth, pausing for 4 seconds before offering me her source of comfort. I return a grateful smirk and receive the offer. My fingers numbly explored the brittle stick as the dilemma of whether to investigate the temporal comfort or not turned restlessly in my mind. So she broke my silence and spoke.

"You probably don't want to get started on one of those," her voice travelled slowly, protruding my thoughts. I look up with a hint of confusion and then resolve. "though your first won't get you hooked, your first five within a week will."
"I'll take your word for it." I replied as I sighed out my first mouthful of thin, wispy grey. Then second, and third. "I have 4 and a half til addiction then, hey?" I laugh while returning the half used comfort stick.

...

The ride home was smooth and without hiccups. But for the rest of the evening I could not separate the wretched aftertaste from my tortured taste buds.

I decided it was not the cigarette that was comforting that day, but the young lady who offered it in the kindest gesture that echoed "we're very much related, here, take my advice". Ahh, the people do only what they know, even if it doesn't work. We exchanged contacts and keep in touch every once in a while, turns out she's a reformed schizophrenic and good company.

I wanted in the wrong order.
Now? I want it to be righted.
Now I want nothing outside of you.
And everything else is worthless to me if it doesnt help them, if it doesnt bring me closer.

day 2 of my new life... i mean same life, new feeling
and i'll love again.