I love when the words start to flow and I realize how silly I was to try and sound like the other guys

I come alive

In honor of the others collectively existing, trying to
be something
clawing their way up and down the so called ladder, trying
to remember
the last time they did nothing and felt good about it.

Like is it just me or are so many millennials struggling with trying to be self made
doing the million jobs at once type thing.
It’s like, of yeah I have a day job at a clothing store but…

It’s easy to choose not to write

in place of distraction,

to dismantle creativity through the justification of consuming information for inspiration.

Who am I kidding, I’m addicted to what society has been spoon-feeding me

though I have not been robbed of my awareness.

I hold onto that with a firm, fearful grip.

Since quarantine, I downloaded an app (how contradictory, I know)

that has motivated me to pick up meditation daily

and it’s working.

At first, I was fighting the desire to exist in blissful ignorance,
giving into the autotuned emotional responses of a shadowed soul.

Now I’m not…

I want to sound like the other guys. You know,

the elegantly cynical

the eloquently intelligent

the ones who call out government

in wire rimmed glasses

the romantics

the struggling artists that are getting published and put up

on pedestals

and praised for their perfect collection of pencils and worn out leather

but I feel like a desperate girl lost in between Radiohead lyrics and trying to sound smart
though i’m really just regurgitating information I read in the Guardian and forgetting my own voice

because my own voice just rants and perpetuates the issues i’m arguing against

like maybe…

I have begun to lose track of the days in which my home state of Oregon has been under quarantine. However, like many I assume, I am counting not the number of days, but other looming numbers that have come to mark our existence. The number of coronavirus cases and death rates; the number of days its been since I was in contact with that person I thought was infected. …

November 22,
or something like that.

Lovely cafe in which I do not know the name,
next to another European clock tower
and a bell that strikes upon the hour
tick tick ticking away the seconds that make up
Evy and I drinking lattes and eating cakes in
a foreign place.

Wandering along the slippery cobblestone path,
an indulgence, a tiresome dance
between coffee and beer and long mornings sleeping with
the cold air
coming in through the window.

This place has decorative tiles,
imperfect concrete walls supporting high ceilings
abstract paintings for the contemplation of the consumer
the ponderings of an…

We’re all isolated in different ways.

I am one of the privileged. Though I am laid off, I received a stimulus check and unemployment benefits. Some have been unable to coordinate with their state’s unemployment office, while others are not eligible for aid at all. I live with my partner and two roommates, so I can socially interact, give hugs and share a bed with someone. Others experience quarantine by themselves.

My grandma is one of the lonely. She has been a caretaker her whole life. She has seven children and over 20 grand and great-grandchildren (I lost count years…

It’s no mystery that the genre-defying producer and DJ, Liam McLean, better known as Joker, is one of Bristol’s finest. He’s been an integral part of the dubstep and grime scene in the UK and beyond for over a decade. It feels unsatisfying, though, pin-holing him into the “dubstep and grime” scene; his tunes expand far beyond the confines of genre.

Joker’s talent and enthusiasm for uncanny electronic music began in his teenage years. Under the wing of one of Bristol’s most influential, DJ Pinch, he quickly grew to be recognized alongside the likes of Benga, Skream, Caspa and Rusko.

…

It’s a whimsically ludicrous endeavor
running through Barcelona with no money
drinking turmeric milk and honey
with an injured friend who
fell from her bicycle in the rain
an insane dance of laughter and pain
shared on the bottom bunk
in a little corner room, in a hostel en Grácia.

Spilling wine on my patterned button ups,
my youth
getting me into all the best and
most uncomfortable situations at once.

Absorbing the moment as my body does
the rich 98 cent bulk wine
I fill in my glass bottle each night,
sauntering on down to la frutería
la carnicería, la…