i used to have this thing ... this wretchedness in me. me and betty
had it and used to love the word 'wretched' so when we saw a band
called 'the little wretches' it was this huge thing and the lead
singer fell in love with me and i had two good months of the most
amazing days followed by two painful years.

and each time ... well. i wouldn't call it 'resolve' or anything
resembling what you would call 'discipline' or 'strength'

it was wretchedness. just this angry refusal of what had been done to
me. this anger ... this beautiful, glorious, life-giving, laugh-
starting amazingly beautiful thing in me. just ... refusing to settle,
you know?

but i can't find it anymore. i know that during the initial
heartbreak, it goes. and i would cry and i would wail and i would
swear that i was done. that i'd never love again or whatever. but
after a few months, my heart would start to heal and i'd get an itch
and i'd get all angry and i'd dig up the yard or paint the bathroom
and i'd gather up all my dreams and i'd make it all good somehow.

but this ... i know four months isn't shit in the face of losing my
sister and i had just begun to really get over betty dying and losing
the dream that was tim when this happened and it's like god is digging
his heal in my back while i'm suffocating in a puddle of mud.

i don't think i'm supposed to get up again. i mean ... i know how i
used to think: "I'm not going to let this undo me"

but i'm 50 years old ... an age my sister never got to and it's like
all time fractured and split apart. i am glad she went first. i do. i
thank god for that. but did it have to be so soon?

and i know people have it worse ... and it just don't matter any more.
i feel like ... this is it. all the wretchedness ... all the
determination

it died with her. with betty. with tim. with what lolo and leo are
doing. with seeing my mom in so much pain. and work is exactly what it
used to be all over. no one listens to me ... so i've been there ten
hours a day. no lunch. same old shit.

everything you would say to me, i know.

what would my sister want? i know she would want me to ... enjoy
what's left of my life but i just don't see anything left. people
don't like me. they always tell me to shut up. they expect me to
perform miracles but treat me like shit.

i just don't see any future ... i'm just doing time down here now,
hoping i can outlive my mom so that she doesn't have to suffer the
loss of another child. i have no dreams for leo. or for lolo. they
seem content on destroying themselves.

i hate this new apartment. it's just not me. i can't explain.

i don't want this life anymore. i just don't. i wonder what people
used to do before tv. i come home and watch tv and go to bed early and
wake up and take care of the dog. if i'm lucky, i'll drink some liquor
and run the sweeper.

i got nothing left

all i think about is .... how much i always wanted to be married. that
was my one goal in life since i was a kid. and i imagine that still
happening and this gut wrenching pain comes bubbling up ... my sister
won't be there. anything good that would happen without her here to
enjoy it ... it's all shit. IT IS ALL SHIT.

i try to be grateful but the talent i was given was all just handed to
me to torture me. i had a taste of what it felt like to be deluded
enough to think i could save all the lost souls. all the souls that
god turns his back on. i would gather up. take them in. feed them.
dress them.

and yet they turned on me, too.

i will never get to replace her ... see. a man - you can replace that.
but the death ... there's nothing i can do. and fifty times a day i am
re-realizing that she DIED. and there's nothing i can do.

there's no light

the whole world is a blurred mess seen from teary eyes and a heart too
heavy to hold. and they say it gets better in time but i can't imagine
that. not with this.

and i never want anyone to love me ... i don't want anyone to hurt
this way. and i never want to lose anyone again.

it's the age - even though i know i have at least 30 years left ... i
panic as it will be spent alone. i never imagined not having my
sister. never. never. and i know it could be worse 'cause it keeps
getting worse and i think ... i just wish i could afford to do drugs.
to just dissappear ...

i watch the river go by and think ... how comforting it would be to
let it take me ... and yet i can't go. i can't do that to my family.
so i'm fucked. i'm stuck here.

it's gone ... whatever it was i had ... the thing that always had me
get up no matter how bloody i felt ... it's gone. and i'm gone. the
best of me is gone. the part worth saving is gone.

so forget about me. don't fret about how you abandoned me. about how
you came along and took more than you gave. the music ... just more
pain now. i know a girl who claimed to have an affair with you even
though her and her boyfriend had just bought a house and she wanted
advice from me! imagine! and i said "don't do it" ... and i knew how
stupid that would be.

for the great hand of god had spotted her from the stage and yeah. she
wrote to me after it was over and said "he ruined the music for me"

and i wanted so little. i wanted to 'create art' or some bullshit.
make something together. for me to think you'd ever want me ... well.
you confused the fuck out of me.

literally

so i don't write. i try not to think. i certainly don't want to feel
but there's only room for hurt in here now. such a big heart ... such
a huge wind blowing through it now

and the small slap of shudders