The Constricted Soul

Sleep is a death,
O make me try,
By sleeping,
what it is to die:
And as gently
lay my head
On my grave,
as now my bed.

Sir Thomas Browne

“Experts in ancient Greek culture say that people back then didn’t see their thoughts as belonging to them. When ancient Greeks had a thought, it occurred to them as a god or goddess giving an order. Apollo was telling them to be brave. Athena was telling them to fall in love. Now people hear a commercial for sour cream potato chips and rush out to buy, but now they call this free will. At least the ancient Greeks were being honest.”

Chuck Palahniuk

To thank you, jealous heart,
I put you in the ground.
The driver rides the rain,
the trumpeter he sounds.
As blood is to the root,
as silver to the crown.
Take it as you may,
my love has gone away.

Then it all comes to nothing,
then it all comes to nothing.

To break you jealous heart,
I build to tear it down.
The timber from the walls,
the make up from the clown.
And dirt is to the grave,
as water to the drowned.
So long to my slave,
my wheel’s beneath the waves.

Then it all comes to nothing,
then it all comes to nothing.

Soulsavers

Everyday, Grandma would come into my room
And I’d hear her say, “Rise and shine.
The world is a window that holds a sign
“There’s help wanted out there somewhere, young man!”

So I rose and I shone.
I put on my shoes and I was gone.

See, Grandma bought me my first phone.
She said, “Don’t bother calling the people who care,
Call the people don’t.
Don’t bother calling the people who have taken up the fight,
Call the people who won’t”.

And I learned at a very young age
Where my Grandma’s rage came from.
The entire congregation would nod,
Never ask Grandma about God.

I’d argue with her everyday
All she’d say is, “Go down to the store
Buy some light bulbs,
And when you run out, buy some more.
Because the light at the end of your tunnel needs to be maintained.
You can’t let it be stained by their beliefs are better than your beliefs.
And you can’t agree to disagree, because they’re fucking wrong!”

“It’s not the strong who have gotten lazy,
It’s just that your vision is a little hazy.
You’re not sure what it is you want,
But what you’ve got is all you need”.

It falls to greed
For every hypocritical church goer
Who won’t walk past the beggars
‘Cause they can’t spare a dime.
Grandma said, “Fuck them,
I don’t talk to God ’cause I ain’t got the time.”

And yeah, it struck me as strange.
Every time I walked past someone
Who stopped to ask me,
“Hey can you spare some change?”
Because yes, I can. But you see
I don’t carry change around in my back pocket.
I don’t wear it around my neck on a chain in some locket.
I keep change on the tip of my tongue
so i can climb the rung
of a ladder to a better place
I forgot about saving face
grandma told me “Save your grace”.

I keep change in the tip of my pen.
And it seeps out every now and then,
In spurts of angry ink that make me think,
Maybe the writing on the wall could use a little revision.
Grandma told me, “Stop trying to calculate the difference between people.
People don’t need division”.

Gotta stick together.
Gotta love each other.
Father, brother, sister, mother, uncles, cousins, aunts,
Forget about the chance, the cheers, the jokes, the jeers.
After two-thousand years, you’d think we’d know by now.
Grandma said, “We will only find equality in our number of tears.”

And she was right,
Because I don’t know what injustices you’ve suffered,
Based on size, sex, race, religion,
Or the political pigeon shittin’ on the shoulders of
us versus them.
Like in Bethlehem,
When a man said, “Hey I could be wrong,
But can’t we all just get along?”
No! So we nailed him to a tree, see?

Justice isn’t justice,
It just is.
And I can’t change it,
You can’t change it.
So we’ve just gotta try to rearrange it.

And I could offer you this miracle.
A chance to see,
A chance to see what I see.
To see the way that people see me.
Because if seeing is believing,
And you see what I see,
Who would want to see anymore.
But I’ve got a little surprise in store
For every man who looks upon me with judgment in his eyes,
There’s a woman who looks upon me with wetness in her thighs.

I’m the world’s greatest overweight lover.
And you might just laugh.
And you might just scoff.
My bones are made from sticks and stones
And names just piss me off.

Grandma told me, “Young man,
You can’t be concerned with whatever it is they’ve got,
Because the only reason they think they’re beautiful
Is the same reason they think you’re not.
And, young man, you have beauty beyond measure.
You are a treasure entrenched in this earth.
You can’t let strangers determine your worth.
Rise and shine!”

So I rose and I shone.
I put on my shoes and I was gone.

See, Grandma bought me my first phone.
She said, “Young man, from time to time,
I too need to smile.
Would you do me a favour and keep me on speed dial?”
Yes, Grandma, I will.

And still, to this day, I can call her up
And hear her say, “It’s a game!
You play, you win.
You play, you lose.
You play!”

“Rise and shine!
The world is a window that holds a sign,
There is help wanted out there, somewhere.
But young man, if you are playing to win,
The first thing you have to do,
Is apply within.”

- Shane Koyczan , encore

Acquire a brand new personality and join the miserables

Conform now and freely accept a perpetual chronic disease

Consume with pleasure until you are infected and rotting inside

Invest in your lonely future and suffer if it’s sold out

Claudio Rivera-Seguel