..never knew there were worse things than dying..

"A man stepped off from his stoop out onto the sidewalk. Free from the peripheral shelter of his entryway, a gust of high Pacific wind licked his naked cheeks. For a scant moment he closed his eyes and inhaled, paying careful attention to the irregular heartbeat that thumped helter skelter beneath his ribcage. His lungs filled with cypress scented breeze as he slowly turned right and headed down the hill. His footsteps echoed between the chipped pea green wall to his right and the faucet of running automobiles to his left. After a moment forever lost, he stood upright and erect before the crosswalk, lifting his chin to gaze forth, his eyes locked on the stars. Without taking counsel from the stoplight that his chin so dutifully ignored, his feet commanded him forth, dropping down from the curb into the pocmarked desolation of the road. His terrified fingers grasped with a stranglers passion the lower lip of his pea coat. Step by step, his feet moved one in front of the other, as if on a balance beam, toward the opposite curb. Were his eyes to have ears, perhaps they would have strayed from the soft urban glow that blunted the stars. Rather his ears faced the shrill symphony on their own. The howl of horns, the screech of tires, the many voices yelling insults, and the ever erratic thumping in the center of his chest bade his ears wish for respite. Soon, his feet lifted him over the opposite curb onto the peaceful sidewalk, but not after near revolt from the remainder of his being. Sharply, he pivoted on his forward foot, spinning a quarter turn to his right. In his mind, a Spanish polka inhibited communication between his many parts, so his knees felt a new freedom. With the abandon of a racing Australian, they alternated to and fro, pumping perpendicular to his waste, propelling him forth. His chin needed to spy once again on the familiar ground, so it drooped, lazylike, to its natural position. With blinding electricity, neon signs raced past him on all sides, storefronts rounding into his periphery with each new lift of his Cossack knees.
At last his destination was reached. At once, stillness overcame him. Next to him lie the entryway to a convenience store. Behind the counter, a sinewy Kenyan chuckled knowingly, spitting between the wide gap of his yellowed grin. He raised a piece of parchment, waving it slowly left to right, before setting on fire with a rusty zippo.
The Spanish Polka ceased. At once all this man's faculties found eachother, acting toward one common and irreversible ambition. His leap instantly breached the stores entryway, his hands fast finding the wide forhead of the jesting Kenyan. Seconds later, a mere half skull rested in a bed of gore upon the counter. Quickly, he dipped the fired portion of parchment into the ever widening pool of blood.
Satisfied that this precious scrap had been extinguished, he opened it to read...."

"Is It Not Strange That Sheep's Guts Should Hale Souls Out Of Men's Bodies?"

Artemis was overjoyed. She sat facing west, watching the remainder of Apollo’s sluts push his pretentious fiery chariot down over the horizon. She reared her steed somewhere above New York City, needling through mountains with her huntress’ gaze. In the space of a few hours, her hunt would pull her over San Francisco, where she could visit that mad fool she took an interest in some months ago. Her stare gave a sneak peak of what was to come, though in extremely soft focus. She saw the bald outline of her interest, plucking with steely seriousity at some peanut shaped wood item with a rod stretching cords over the hollow at its center. There was something to this activity that put Artemis to rest. It certainly wasn’t the melody created from this exhibition, as the sound crashed with disarrayed chaos against the Rockies rather than assailing the stars. The mirage presented the possibility that this child was simply doing what he was supposed to. How Artemis had yearned for at least a glint of that from this asshole. She slid a great white arrow into the notch on her silvery bow, and launched it westward and out of sight. For a moment, she saw the blurred figure halt his activity and smile. Far off, she heard Apollo labor with great frustration as he tended to one of those damned harpies. The urban glow of New York flared with the charge of Artemis' delight.

"From Whose Bourne No Traveler Returns"

I think you may have some serious misconceptions about me. Naturally, people think "angel of death" and their minds fill with a bountiful harvest of cold dry air, skulls, dreary black cloaks, and bullshit. Well, I am here to attest that the only time I wear a big black cloak is after I fucked your mom. Just kidding. What I'm really trying to say is that I don't wear dreary black cloaks or play chess with pretentious Scandinavians on some beach with a swirl of myst about me. I am your only garuntee. And guess what? I garuntee a really good fucking time. How good, you ask? Think about Poison videos from the 80's (provided you can look back that far without all that Nevermind shit clouding your real judgement), and multiply that by 75. Then imagine impervious flights between mountaintops, fired by several lines of really fucking good cocaine. While your are spiraling carefree through the air, attempt your favorite yo-yo tricks in weaponlike fashion much like the heroic character in the old Nintendo game, GOONIES II. If you like women or men or anything else, think that they'll be really impressed by your actions, and overwhelmingly excited to watch "Raiders of the Lost Ark" with you. You may dive drill-like through whatever groundcover that may exist, but when you come to below, you will notice yourself in a landscape of florescent green at the foot of high mountaintops, with many midgets doing continual backflips. Very close by said midgets will be a remarkably charming Black homosexual Irish cleric. An arrangement of tables and chairs will be meticulously laid out in a circular pattern, with large pewter Goblets full of Absynthe. Elvis Presley and Janice Joplin will be performing a soaringly energetic version of "Take Me Home Country Roads". Seated will be all the smiles you ever knew, from every time and every face, with every lie removed. Amidst the center of this circle, I will dwell. You will sit and watch me whittle with your grandfather's knife a perfectly majestic Canadian Goose, which will explode into life and shit comically on someone in the crowd (who happens alot like Warrick Davis) much to everyones explosive delight. At which time, we shall have a pushup contest. Don't really worry about this. It's only a formality. An oppurtunity for me to whisper to you at every "DOWN" count, that its all really ok. That you didn't live for nothing, that your every exhale is still spinning the earth, and that pancakes need not be the width of a mil-spec parachute in order to properly hold blueberries. My gift to you will be an inate ability to dance a perfect tango, which you will show to the gathering with a perfect partner.

And this is only the introduction, get my drift?

Meet Me All By Break Of Day..

Strange stars hang in the night.

"WHAT MEN DAILY DO, NOT KNOWING WHAT THEY DO!"

***DISCLAIMER..TASTELESS WRITING, THAT DOES NOT REFLECT ON ANYTHING RELEVANT TO ANYTHING AT ALL...DO NOT READ IF YOU ARE MY MOM, OR ANY OTHER AUTHORITIVE FIGURE IN MY YOUNG ADULT LIFE...I FUCKING MEAN IT***

I am a pile of shit...literally. This is no fuckin' metaphor, simile, or uppity cracker ass literary convention. I am a big pile of feces with a crusty dried outer skin and a pumpkin pie fillin'. I reside here on the corner of Geary and Larkin on a piss caked sewer of a mutherfuckin' sidewalk. I see alot. I mean a fuckin' lot. You seen "Stand By Me?" That part where fuckin' Cory Feldman says "a pile of shit has a thousand eyes?" That nigga was all real talk, see. A thousand eyes is a fuckin' understatement. I see in three hundid and sixty degrees all up in this bitch, and have ever since I blasted out the scabby ass' that crack ass ho last week. And I'm still here. Shit. I share this sidewalk with more bodily fluids than Jenna Jameson had on them titties. That mess o' orange vomit over there, why this noddin' ass bitch with a syringe hangin' out his throat left that there on Tuesday. Can see the food stamp cheese and all that cup a' noodle shit. Puke, spunk, blood, piss, asspiss, beer, malt liquer, opium resin, syringes, crackpipe glass, used prophalactics, crystal, crackdust and weed ash all share my fuckin' house. Anyways, I just wanted to introduce myself. I may be relaying a little parable to y'all asses time to time. Till we meet again.

...If We Do Meet Again, Why, We Shall Smile...

The evening wind rattled with blustery zest the Victorian multitude of San Franciscan Windows. Their rattle was heard high above, where Artemis sat in contemplation upon her gleaming steed. Every now and then she'd fire a white bolt across the moonscape, decorating the sky with pale streaks of meteoric joy. The world rested beneath her in a deep, thoughtful peace. So heavy were the thoughts of the hour that her mad, dashing custom halted in delay. Too many minds groaned to be heard.

Her child sat in solitude below her, masked beneath the turreted rooftop. Man made artifice of such fleeting nature could never keep her separate from his ponderings, so close in spirit were they. She felt his thoughts drift to a small, fertile plot short hours from the river they call Ohio, in a hilly tree covered upland. Here, in the shadow of bright limestone towers and far green lawns, he saw the faces of his friends. People he missed dearly, with whom he hadn't spoken a great time. Their inate understanding of his nature, their appreciation for his qualities, their acceptance of his flaws, and their genuine and mutual desire to see him again all lived hopefully in the memory of their smiles. He strongly desired the opportunity to work with them again, crafting spectacles of humanity unadorned with the cumbersome demands of commerce and profit. To create life as it should be. To bear the brunt of gales and snows in small cozy halls with warm attire and hearty laughter. To fall madly into the glorious summer tumults. To be with family again...

Artemis had no clear understanding of what kept this longing child from executing his will in the matter. Some object of weight and importance, some challenge or lesson tethered him to the west. She appreciated his ties to the lovely selfless beings he knew in his surrogate home, with whom he'd spent the previous forty eight hours in a delightful explosion of mirth and glee. Nonetheless, some clear test remained, some obligation of tremendous significance and principled relevance. Where the boundaries of this test lie, there was no clear answer. From her own confusion on the matter, she could tell her frustrated son couldn't figure it out either.

So she sat with him for a time, sharing with him what little wisdom he could decipher. She then galloped east, where a more mature night required the potency of her guidance.

...And There We Live As Merry As The Day Is Long...

Apollo was most pleased. All morning long, new fire sprites, freshly delivered from the Delphic Oracle (now hidden from the eyes of men) met their divine deflowering by he, lighting up the sky with fire normally reserved for revelation. Now he sat, wreathed in golden flame, peering down at an occasion most to his liking.

A great assembly of mortals milled and laughed outside a modest home within a great white city. Every face wore the deep wrinkles of wide grins, and every voice rang with melodic beauty. Coals were lit, delivering the savory scent of fire cooked delights up to the very feet of Apollo himself. It appeared that Dionysus levied a strong blessing on this gathering as well, as many cups found welcome homes in highly raised hands. Some minstrels struck up music, moving the great audience deeper into the throws of their merryment.

At the fires stood that particular man Apollo had punished only a week prior. He felt this man's behavior a might bit peculiar, joyously hoisting his fellow revelers skyward with alarming regularity. Clearly this man took pride in manning the fires, basking in the clouds of smoke that issued forth from the grills. His hands seem to move through the flames without injury, as if the blaze itself took ally with his effort. His dignity swelled each time he passed off a finished meal, eagerly awaiting the blissful expression that predictably followed every first bite. Apollo chuckled at the simplicity of this being, though he did notice some absence stayed the full bloom of his rapture. Nevertheless, Apollo marveled at the relentless energy of his mirth.

The afternoon wore on, though Apollo's interest did not stray. He decided he would light the occasion until he heard the wild hoof beats of Artemis' steed. Strange rituals took place, where participants pressed themselves (with the aid of others) over large metal cans fitted with pumps, while a great mass counted how long the said participant could hold a hose in their mouth. Apollo stood stunned with how many individuals, male and female, did this. The mob delighted at the juvenile fervor this created, while some seemed flat incapable of standing afterward. He wondered why.

The hoofbeats sounded in the distance...As the crowd cleared, Apollo noted the words "Cinco De Mayo" etched on the glorious ground.

"Artemis must put this occasion to rest," he thought. "Were I to command the night, I would see that it never end..."

He noticed his fire sprites getting restless...