The other guys in my weekly men’s group suggested during our last meeting that I make some art or write some poetry at work when I feel overwhelmed and stressed as a way of helping me retain my sense of creative identity while in the cage. The challenge has been finding time to do it.

Today I happened to wind up with about ten minutes to spare at the end of my lunch break. I also happened to have my sharpies and pad with me, which I typically don’t. I’d brought them with me because I hadn’t had time to draw this morning before work and was hoping I could find an opportunity to do at least a little something to keep my commitment to my therapist to make some art every day.

The series of three drawings above is selected from a set of five I made in that little ten-minute window at the end of lunch today. They are ordered in the same sequence in which they were created. Taken together, they make for a pretty accurate representation/summary of my reality at work. I continue to be amazed by the information that expresses itself when I simply let my hand move the pens around on the paper.

Today’s poem on video, “present time”, was written back in late November and recorded in early February, both of which feel like a lifetime ago as I’m writing today.

I suppose it’s appropriate that I post this video today as this is my last day of “strange freedom”, as I put it a little over nine months ago, before starting a new job tomorrow. I’d love to say I’m excited about it, but I’m not. Relieved that I’m not going to go completely broke, yes. Grateful that I have a way to support myself when so many do not, yes. Happy that I’m going to survive, yes. Excited, no.

These last nine months have been a wonderfully productive time for me. I’ve grown by leaps and bounds. It was absolutely necessary that I take this time with myself, for myself and my own work, and I have no doubt about that. Even so, it’s been a huge drain financially to go without an income for nine months. And once again I have failed, for whatever reason, to translate my most heartfelt passion into livelihood.

I still believe there is a need for what I have to offer. My life would actually be a lot easier if I didn’t believe it. But need and demand are not the same thing. There may be a need. I may be right about that. However, there doesn’t seem to be much of a demand. Or perhaps I just haven’t figured out how to deliver what I have to offer to those who would find it valuable. Or maybe I haven’t fully defined it yet.

When I left my last job nine months ago, in all the uncertainty I felt about what my future might hold, I was sure of one thing: by the time I either found another job or ran out of money, my second book would be out. But Scapegoat’s Cross remains as it has been ever since September 2009, a completed manuscript with no artwork and no path to publication. This is one of the most difficult realities I have to accept as I prepare to move back into cubicleland.

A couple of years ago, I wrote:

Writing, for me, has always had the qualities of a trance, a charm, a spell. It requires a suspension of disbelief on my part: the suspension of my disbelief in myself. It requires me to believe that what I have to say, and how I’m going to say it, will be meaningful and interesting to others. This is a fragile state, magical and mysterious, that can last for moments or months, in which every word matters and every thought or feeling might last forever, if only I’m quick enough to catch it.

At some point, the trance always ends; the charm fades; the spell is broken. My words, thoughts, and feelings seem ordinary again, and there’s nothing left to write.

I feel like that wonderful trance I’ve been in since Iron Man Family Outing began to resurrect itself in September 2007 may be coming to its end, not because I have nothing left to say or nothing left to give, but because the material realities of my life are beginning, once again, to overwhelm my inner vision. I’m simply not going to have the time, the energy, and the opportunity for writing, and for the deep self-work that is the foundation of the writing, and I know it.

Furthermore, I seem to have maxed out all of the channels I’ve been using to draw new folks to my work. Readership for Iron Man Family Outing seems to have peaked and, as I said previously, Scapegoat’s Cross is still dead in the water. The outer side of my work seems to have stagnated and now I can feel the inner side beginning to shut down as well.

Musician Joe Strummer once said, “Songs don’t tend to come to you if there’s no outlet for them.” This has certainly been true in my experience. When I feel I don’t have an appropriate outlet for my work, my creative flow just stops dead. Maybe that’s not happening now, but it sure feels that way to me.

In any case, today is my last day of freedom, freedom that no longer feels strange, but natural. Tomorrow will be different.

If, as I suspect, my well is running dry, I may not post again for a while. In the event that I’m correct about that, I’d like to leave everyone with these three thoughts:

* Men are hungry for ways to access their emotions safely. No man wants to open up and be shamed or scared into shutting back down again.

* Poetry is both undervalued and underutilized as a means to move into the heart of our experience, especially for men.

* The other men I’ve met (and I met some amazing men at Mike Lew’s male survivors workshop yesterday) who are working to recover from childhood abuse are some of the bravest men on the planet.

I hope I’ve done something to bring the truth of these three statements home to some other people. Men need understanding and encouragement if they are to do better. They need to be seen as they truly are. We all need that. We all deserve it.

I still believe there is a different life, a better life, a wholly and completely natural and heartfelt life that serves my needs as it serves the needs of others, waiting inside me to be lived. But I won’t be living it tomorrow, or the next day, or the next day. Perhaps that life is still out there somewhere in my future, but now there is only now.

I wake up with every misstep
every lost opportunity
every time I dug in my heels
wrong or right
and wouldn’t budge
and every time I wasn’t there
wrong or right
for someone else.

I watch my skin turn to paper
and my hands to dust
the sun goes
up and down
up and down
faster and faster across the sky
everyone and everything
is older than I think.

we all sacrifice ourselves
and our lives
to something
there’s no avoiding it
that’s the deal
that’s the bargain
that’s the way life works
like it or not.

but do we really know
what we’re sacrificing ourselves to
do we really understand
why we’re doing it
what it’s gonna take
what we’re gonna get
and what it’s gonna cost us.

I used to wonder
why I was alone
but now I know.

I put truth
above all else
and now truth
is all I have.

(PDF version)

the many ghosts of used-to-be
my loyal long-time companions
have drifted off and faded away
dissipated like a morning mist
leaving me here alone
in the blinding light of present time
weighing the merits of truth versus mercy
as I watch the pages of the calendar fly past me
like fallen autumn leaves
blowing down a dead-end street.

time is a train going faster and faster
nothing behind me
nothing before me
now there is only
now.

(PDF version | Video version)

today I don’t poison myself for a pension
today I don’t soil my spirit
today I don’t split my soul.

yesterday I was
lightning in a bottle
a watermelon on the vine
a rocket on the pad.

today I’m a rusty old pile of railroad spikes
tossed together in a heap by the tracks
wondering why the trains don’t come anymore.

today I’m quiet
today I don’t speak
today I listen.

today I walk the circle
that leads to the center
from the outside
to the inside
and back again.

today I know that I’m only a sparkle of sunlight
shimmering on the surface of an ageless sea
today I hear the blade cutter in the distance
but I know it’s not for me
today I know the scariest thing I’ve ever known
that I can’t make my life
the life I thought it would be
not today
maybe tomorrow
but not today.

(PDF version)

my skin remembers
slap of the flyswatter metal wire handle.

my tongue remembers
bar of soap shoved in my mouth.

my hand remembers
spilled milk on the first day of first grade.

my stomach remembers
crying in front of everyone ’cause I lost the fight.

my knee remembers
wait for me daddy before I fell + broke my leg.

my feet remember
please teach ricky how to skip
pinned to my kindergarten shirt.

my chin remembers
falling out of bed into a
daddy’s mad again hot sunday night.

my nose remembers
can’t breathe comic books in ragweed darkness.

my fingers remember
building model rockets in a cool summer basement.

my neck remembers
father’s hands closing tight around my throat.

my ears remember
mother screaming stop it dick stop it.

time passes but nothing is lost
I can’t fool myself
my body remembers everything.

(PDF version | Video version)

my mum (say a little prayer for her) is 90

My mother is a crumbling building.

My mother is a rusted out car up on blocks
in the front yard whose engine is sound
and who longs for the thrill of the highway.

My mother is a story that doesn’t know how to
be told, and doesn’t know how to end, and
doesn’t even know what the superheroes could
do to help save her.

My mother is a boat on its way to Europe
in a thunderstorm.

My mother is a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie.

My mother is an Angel Food cake.

My mother is a nature lover, a fresh air lover,
a flower lover, a great view lover, a sunset lover,
a people lover, a very gentle soul.

When she thinks about herself my mother’s
brain is a wasp nest, her nerves are an
electrical fire, she feels like a racehorse
locked inside a burning barn.

My mother never meant anyone harm.

My mother is a caterpillar that is restless
in the cocoon and wants to be a butterfly.

David Jewell

David’s fine spoken word piece “grandfather” is a great companion to the above poem.

I’m surprised to discover a published version of my book that is somehow different than the published version I know in waking reality. Either I never knew about this alternate version, or I’d forgotten about it somehow. Sometimes it was published by me and sometimes by someone else. The alternate version of the book typically includes material that didn’t appear in the real book, such as additional poems, different artwork, and/or commentary on the poems with notes for readers.

Each time I’ve had one of these dreams, I’ve puzzled over its meaning without developing any sort of useful conclusions. But about a week ago, I had another dream that followed the same pattern, and this one came to me with something new: a direction I could use to investigate the dream in waking reality.

In this most recent dream, I find two alternate versions of my book that I’d forgotten, one of which contains “some additional ‘lost’ material from the same period that I didn’t include in the original book.” The dream ends as follows:

finding these alternate versions is exciting for me
I’d completely forgotten about them and now I want to go home and
dig out the old imfo archive box
to see what else I’ve forgotten I had.

The “old imfo archive box” to which I refer in the dream is a real physical object in waking reality, a large box in my closet containing everything I’d saved that was produced during the creation and publication of Iron Man Family Outing. I’d packed this stuff up and taped the box shut years ago, and really had no idea what was in there any more. But I felt clearly directed by the dream to pull that box out of the closet and explore its contents, whatever they might be. And I was excited that I finally had something tangible to help me follow up on the information that had been presented to me repeatedly over several years in this ongoing, very puzzling series of dreams.

A few days went by and the dream slipped out of my consciousness as I fell back into the usual “rush to nowhere” routine of the workweek. But as the weekend approached, I remembered the dream, especially the direction I received at the end, and I made a commitment to myself to dig into the closet, find that box, and open it up. I had a strong feeling, though, that I shouldn’t open it on a weeknight. Something told me I needed to wait until I had a nice chunk of free, open time for this job.

I cracked the box open two days ago and what a surprise. I found all kinds of stuff I’d completely forgotten, including early versions of the manuscript for Iron Man Family Outing that are substantially different than the final version that was published. One of these versions (marked V4 Jan 1990) contains original commentary by my friend, the remarkably talented David Jewell.

David had provided one of the original sparks for the book by leading a poetry workshop that I attended. After the workshop ended, I continued to write and he continued to encourage me. As a matter of fact, he was the first person who told me, “You’re writing a book.” After working through several versions of the manuscript, I reached a point at which I felt I had something that was finished, and I asked David to review it for me and give me some editorial guidance.

I’ve known all along that David played a critical part in the creation of the book, but until I read through his commentary on the V4 Jan 1990 manuscript this weekend, I must say that I’d forgotten what a valuable role he played as an editor. His feedback was wise and honest, sometimes cutting, sometimes humorous, but always generous and always pointed in the direction of improving the manuscript. He commented on what worked for him and what didn’t, suggested I restore some things from previous manuscripts that I’d deleted, and pulled me back from going over the edge with pieces that were too raw, too alienating, poorly centered, or underdeveloped.

I didn’t agree with everything he said, and I didn’t follow every recommendation he made, but the difference between the V4 Jan 1990 manuscript David reviewed and the book I published is substantial. As a result of David’s feedback, I cut, rearranged, and restored some things, and I wrote a whole lot more new stuff.

Probably about a third of the final book was written after David’s feedback. I also made some major revisions to a poem called “fused at the wound” which has turned out to be one of the most popular pieces in the book. In its original incarnation, it was about twice as long, and David’s comments motivated me to tighten it up, which was obviously the right thing to do. I can say without any reservation that Iron Man Family Outing, in its present form, would not have existed without David Jewell’s input. So, thank you again, David.

Another amazing discovery was an envelope containing all of the notes and sketches produced in the course of my work with another extraordinarily talented contributor to the project, Austin artist John Dolley. (I wish John had a web site so I could link to it, but I can’t find one for him.) My collaboration with John was perhaps the most purely fun aspect of the whole project, and seeing all that material from the time we spent working together really brought a smile to my face.

I’d met John a couple of years prior to writing my book and seen a magnificent sketch he’d made of a scene from a dream he’d had. Little did I know that this was just the tip of the iceberg as far as John’s talent as an artist, but even so, that sketch made a big impression on me. When I needed an artist to develop some illustrations for my new book, I remembered John and contacted him. I gave him a copy of the finished manuscript and a few pages of notes about my ideas regarding artwork for the book. I remember being anxious, wondering what he’d come up with, wondering if it would be a good match for what I’d written.

I needn’t have worried. John’s first set of sketches showed me immediately that he got it, that he understood what I was saying with the book and what it meant. I was amazed at the resonance and sensitivity toward the material that his drawings demonstrated, and I knew this partnership was going to work … not just work, but elevate what I’d written to a whole new level that I’d never foreseen.

About half of John’s original concept illustrations were right on the mark. He nailed them the first time, right out of the box. The other half didn’t work so well for me, but I had some ideas of my own. John was completely open to my suggestions and feedback. Not a trace of ego in this guy. He used my notes and very crude drawings to rework the portions of his presentation that I didn’t like, and he did everything, down to the finest detail, right to my specifications.

It was such a joy to work with John. And he worked hard, drawing numerous thorough renditions of the Iron Man … from the front, from the back, details of various parts of the armor. He’d show me what he had, I’d give him some feedback based on my vision of how things should look, then he’d revise until I was happy. Amazing. Probably the best experience I’ve ever had working with anyone, on anything.

John also took Polaroids of all sorts of things as references for what he was illustrating … trees, clouds, buildings, furniture, and numerous poses of me, standing in for the Iron Man. John was a total blast to work with, and seeing all those notes, drawings, Polaroids, and all the rest brought it all back to me. Thanks again, John. Your work really made the book.

I found all sorts of other things as well in my journey through the archive box, including a nearly final version of the manuscript that included my notes from the dozen or so early readers from whom I’d solicited feedback. These folks also made essential contributions to the book, as it was their feedback that helped me determine the ultimate shape of the book with regard to the final set of poems and the sequence in which they appeared. There are too many names to list here, and many of them have moved out of my life and on to places unknown, but I send my thanks out to each of them for their generosity and their help.

Among my other discoveries in the big box was perhaps the biggest surprise of all: a folder containing about fifty unpublished poems I’d written during the development of the book that I’d chosen not to include in the final version. I was stunned. I’d been under the impression for as long as I can remember that I’d used just about everything I’d written. I knew there were some pieces I hadn’t used, but not fifty!

I’m still in the process of reviewing and evaluating this cache of forgotten work. If you’ve ever listened to a CD reissue with extra tracks that weren’t included at the time the original recording was released, or checked out the deleted scenes from a movie on DVD, what I’m about to say won’t come as a surprise. There’s a reason why some of those fifty or so pieces were forgotten in that box for all those years: they’re not very good. Some are underdeveloped. Some are little more than glorified journal entries. Some are nonsense word streams that say nothing and go nowhere. Some are aimed at targets that don’t matter to me any more. And some are just so over-the-top raw that it’s simply not reasonable for me to expect another person to read them. I can barely read them myself.

But, as is often the case with the extra tracks on the CD or the deleted movie scenes, I also see some pieces that may have some potential, maybe a dozen or so. Some of them might need a little tweak or two. I couldn’t see myself writing most of them now, but I’m finding some things I like, that still make sense in the time and the context in which I wrote them, and I may release some of these forgotten pieces, my “Iron Man Family Outtakes,” in some form one of these days, perhaps here on the blog.

As anyone who knows me can attest, the process of taking Iron Man Family Outing from conception to completion was quick and easy compared to the challenges I’ve faced in the years that followed trying to get it out to readers. In the last eighteen months, this project, dormant for so long, has undergone an incredible and completely unexpected resurrection, and I’m grateful to everyone who’s contributed to that process. Eighteen months ago, with boxes and boxes of my books sitting unread and useless in my closet, it would have been incredibly painful for me to open the “old imfo archive box” and see all those artifacts of a time when my book felt so alive and full of potential.

But now, with so many copies of the book out in the world, in the hands of so many people, I have a greater sense of completion with regard to the project and to many of the original experiences that motivated it. Helping others move forward through their own issues is a great source of satisfaction and validates my original vision for the book. Consequently, I can explore these long-forgotten keepsakes, remember my good fortune in having been blessed with such talented, generous creative partners, and enjoy my memories of that extraordinary time in my life.

And once again, I have to thank my dreams. The Iron Man Family Outing project began for me with a series of dreams, so it seems only fitting that a series of dreams would call me back to the artifacts of its creation, and at the right time. I wonder if my dream series about alternate versions of the book has reached its end, now that I’ve opened the box of long-forgotten artifacts. I guess that, as in all things in life, time will tell.

spirituality is a vibrant awakening consciousness
a deep and present awareness of ourselves
of everyone and everything around us
it’s knowing that our words and our actions matter
even when no one hears and no one sees
it’s listening to the heart and the mind and the body
to moon stars sun and trees
to wind fire rain and earth
to animals and plants
to dreams and daydreams
to grief and anger and hunger and sex
to all of the feelings we’ve been told not to have
and all of the thoughts we’ve been taught not to think
in the right balance
in the right time.

spirituality demands critical thinking
it requires curiosity
a desire to know what’s real
a willingness to strip off conditioned patterns of perception and habit and belief
layer by layer
regardless of personal cost
because otherwise
truth and truthfulness are lost.

spirituality is facing the mysteries of life and death
without hiding from questions that cannot be answered
and without the comfort of tall tales passed down through a million dark nights
it’s knowing that we are not alone
because we’re all here together
and it’s all up to us
together.

(PDF version)

I’m in a wild place
squatting naked next to a lake
no other people around
maybe an animal or two
it’s peaceful here
I see my reflection in the water
the face looks cro-magnon
or perhaps neanderthal
but I feel fully conscious
it’s an experience of
wholeness and awe
wonder and peace
maybe my first visit to earth
in a human-like body.

priest

pre-columbian central america
I lead and perform religious rituals
human sacrifice
vivisections
I inflict terrible agonizing physical pain on others
I perform these cruel acts without malice
but also without compassion
motivated by a religious conviction so deep
that it completely disconnects me
from the reality of the suffering I cause.

heretic

europe
middle ages
my head is being held underwater
some religious authority
is attempting to force me to admit something
or perhaps recant or repent some blasphemy
next
I’m in the woods
hung upside down from a tree by my left foot
as punishment
for contradicting the established order
it’s a form of crucifixion.

zealot

europe
1600s
I’m a member of a religious sect that practices self-injury
I drip hot candle wax on my back
I cut myself because the pain “brings me closer to god”
I shove hot pepper up my nose
to make myself sneeze
“to get the devil out”
I allow myself to be mock crucified
when I’m 24 I hang myself “to be with god”
I’m found hanging
from a wooden beam in one of the rooms of the monastery
I am dead
the walls and floors are made of stone.

simpleton

colonial new england
I’m mentally impaired
my neck and hands have been locked in wooden stocks
as punishment for looking at a pretty young girl
my consciousness is primitive
I feel bewildered most of the time
but I find comfort and solace
in a direct experience of nature
standing in a meadow
awes me
calms me
fills me with peace
I have no concept of why I’m being punished
but I have no ill feeling toward anyone about it either.

diplomat

japan
late 1800s
I’m a japanese diplomat
working to open my country to contact with the west
I want to bring the two halves
east and west
together
I want to build a bridge between
old ways and new ways
I hope to be
an ambassador to the future.

assassin

chicago
1920s
a dark alley at night
I’m an enforcer for the mob
a tough guy
a hit man
but this time
someone’s put a hit on me
the nose of a revolver
kisses the skin behind my left ear
someone pulls the trigger
bye bye.

(PDF version)

perhaps we swim with some bigger fish
forms of intelligence far in advance of our own
or maybe just
different
beyond our understanding if not our perception
we may perceive some of them as predatory
we may perceive some of them as benevolent
but no matter how old or powerful they may be
none of them are gods
they’re all instruments of evolution
nothing more
nothing less
just as we are.

(PDF version)

you can’t hold any of it.

we don’t own anything
we don’t get to keep anything
not love or money
not friends or enemies
and certainly not
time.

my life will become
someone else’s life
my memories will become
someone else’s memories
even my face will become
someone else’s face
sooner or later.

someday I’ll be a fish again
and I won’t remember
the taste of a hook in my mouth.

someday I’ll be a baby again
trying to stand for my first time
falling down and getting up
over and over til I get it right.

someday I’ll be a tree stump again
nothing left of me but my roots
watching the other trees rise and fall
slowly fading to dust and dirt.

someday an arrow will take me down
pierce my heart
empty my life
finish me
and when it does
I’ll be an arrow again
the arrow that pierces
someone else’s heart.

(PDF version)

tonight he dreamed of a reunion
with all of his high school peers
no one had changed too much
then he woke up
and realized
everything had changed.

while he’d been struggling with how it was
and dreaming about how it oughta be
everyone else had been getting on with it
getting married
having kids
building careers
making money
growing up.

now the arrogant aging wonder boy
looks in that yearbook in his head and sees
doctors lawyers businesspeople
bosses owners academics
masters of government and commerce
kings and queens of the corporate world
wily investors
and more millionaires than he probably realizes.

he jolts awake at four in the morning
sweating
heart pounding
no wife
no kids
rented apartment
lousy job
a few thousand in the bank
wondering if there’s still time to turn it all around
scared to death there isn’t
worried it’s already too late
worried that the same reverse jedi mind tricks that got him here
will keep him here.

so here I am at four AM
in the dead quiet of the dark
the only sound I can hear
is the ringing in my own ears
peter pan at midlife
plus a few years
wondering what the hell happened
where it all went
the former smartest guy in the room
mister know-it-all
a victim of my own inner hype
narcissistic
grandiose
egotistic
idealistic
moralistic
unrealistic
overcompensating underperforming
king of the world
(population: one)
slapped down by time
and my own inflated pretensions.

even my dreams lie to me now
no one got older
nothing has changed
plenty of time left …

wake up sleepy man
time is ticking
am I gonna get real
or
am I just gonna get old
or
is it too damn late now anyway
no matter what I do.

(PDF version)

sometimes I wanna blow my brains out with a dictionary
pull the trigger
and let the words flow out of me
like blood
until they’re all out there
in a big messy puddle
once and for all.

every day it’s the same
creativity versus the clock
human time versus machine time
feelings versus schedule
dreams versus work
soul versus survival
how can I win.

(PDF version)

(PDF version)

this culture
this system
this machine in which I am living
in which we all live
is not a friend to dreams
or to people who have them
there isn’t enough time
and everyone is moving too fast
to remember their dreams
much less record them
much less consider them
much less play with them
much less
understand them.

a culture that throws away its dreams
and its dreamers
is lost.

must go
time to rush
rush to nowhere
and nothing
and then home again
to sleep.

how much of what I know
will I forget today.

(PDF version)

“I find that in order to write songs the way I did, I have to have an unlimited amount of time to just stare out of the window, to go and do whatever I needed to do.”

- Nick Lowe, from Distinguished Crooner Nick Lowe, in Solo Concert

“If you bring forth what is within you,
what you bring forth will save you.
If you do not bring forth what is within you,
what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”

- The Gospel of Thomas, v.70, quoted from The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels

In a previous post, I said that my writing process demands a certain amount of open time and open space, without which I simply can’t do the work properly. But that’s not the whole story. The creative energy that expresses itself in my writing process is very strong. In many ways, it defines me. I can’t just turn it off or ignore it. There are consequences.

I also have to provide for myself financially, and while my writing process has produced some well-received results, it has yet to provide any significant financial support for me. As a consequence, my life feels like a constant tug-of-war, with a huge horse pulling on each end of the rope. One horse is a writing process that demands lots of time but produces no income, and the other is an income process (i.e., job) that demands lots of time but produces no writing. And I’m the rope.

A while back, a friend told me in an email that she was envious of my writing ability. In my reply, I said:

“Don’t be too envious. A lot of the time it feels more like a curse than a blessing to me because I want and need to be writing and creating daily, but have almost no opportunity to do so. I have to sink the best part of myself into making a living five days a week because the system in which we live considers my real work to be essentially valueless. I’m tortured, miserable, angry, and creatively stifled most of the time as a result. It’s not a fun way to live.”

Now I have to admit that my friend happened to catch me on a particularly frustrating day near the end of one of those maddening workweeks that was taking just about everything I had to get through it. On a lot of days, I would have thanked her for the compliment and left it at that. But the essence of what I said in my reply to her was true.

My situation for the last 20 years has been, to paraphrase Charles Bukowski, “go crazy or starve.” I take the least heinous soul-crushing job I can find to support myself. I work as long as I can, going more and more crazy day by day, until I can’t stand it anymore. Then I quit and go into starve mode and do the things that make my life worth living for as long as I can without actually starving (although I’ve come pretty close a number of times).

Every morning when I wake up and don’t have time to write because some meaningless job is demanding its daily pound of flesh in exchange for a little more survival time, I feel like I’m terminating a pregnancy. It’s absolutely wrenching. I start the day sad, furious, and hopeless. This is one of the main reasons why I stopped writing, or even thinking about writing, for years. I just couldn’t stand being so distraught and angry every single day. It wore me down and turned me inside out. So I blocked the energy and stayed depressed all the time. I felt like a zombie and a traitor to my own life. But I got through the day. And I didn’t starve.

About a year ago, a convergence of important events in my life reignited my creative process, and I’m grateful for that. I feel alive again in ways that I haven’t felt for years, yet I still have the same old problem: most of my days belong to someone else. I have to give myself a creativity abortion every morning to keep food in my belly and a roof over my head. My life is not my own.

The one and only reason I was able to write Iron Man Family Outing is that I hit the “go crazy or starve” point in my job at IBM and I chose starve. I had no thoughts of writing a book; I just knew that I was hours away from a major breakdown and I was going to lose my mind, literally, if I didn’t walk away from that situation, then and there. I’ve been at that point several more times since then and I’ve hit the starve button again to save myself each time.

I’m fifty now and I don’t have the hot skills that used to set me up with jobs whenever I needed money. I might not have wanted those jobs, but I could get ‘em. And the economy is … well, I was gonna say weak, but I think weak is too weak a word for what’s going on right now. So I’m trying to do my writing work and hang on to my income-producing work while somehow keeping my sanity from leaking outta my ears and my soul from fleeing my body in frustration.

I took a one-week break from the job this week in an effort to take some of the edge off the crazy, and it helped. But I also found myself trying to cram as much writing as I could into this tiny little one-week window of open time, so I can’t say it’s been a relaxing week. I finished a couple of pieces (I think … I keep nibbling at them) but it was hard work and I felt like I was on the clock the whole damn time.

No matter. I’m just thankful I had a little time and space to write. And I’m thankful I didn’t have to starve to get it this time.

sure wish I had some time to sit with last night’s dreams
seems like there was a big one
but I’ll have to let them all go
again
like friends I forgot I ever had.

keeping everyone too busy to sit with their dreams
or even remember them
is one of the best ways around to keep us enslaved
we’re slaves and we don’t even know it
living and working and dying
in someone else’s dream.

(PDF version)