The structure of paranoia

I've known a few people who always thought someone was plotting against them when something unfortunate happened. If they lost a belonging, they'd immediately say it was stolen and start blaming family and friends. If their pet got sick, they'd say it must have been poisoned by their neighbor. One of these people had been diagnosed with a mental health condition involving paranoia. But from an emotional perspective, it makes sense why a person might prefer to believe they're being attacked than to think random circumstances are causing harm. Even though it's upsetting to believe someone is out to get them, it provides a distinct reason for what happened and a target to fault. It gives the person a sense of control, even if they think somebody *else* was in control. And it stops self-blame or undirected blame, which leads to sadness. Instead that is converted to anger, which feels more organized by offering a goal.

I'm not saying this is a reasonable or productive way to respond to bad circumstances--it's not. But it's understandable why somebody might gravitate toward that reaction.

Social media time travel

I wish there was a social media network to connect us to people from different times. And before anyone says "books", I mean in a reciprocal way. A Facebook-like service to communicate with others from the future, or the far distant past, or with relatives the way they were before we knew them. Or even with a friend who completely changed; to talk to them when they were different. It would ret-con the universe and completely screw up our timeline, but it would be so damn interesting and cathartic before time starts to eat its own tail and the aliens have to show up and fix everything.

Another playlist poem

Under the bridge, Jane says
“You don’t look back in anger
if
the nature of reality
is nothing to believe in.
I prefer wonder
the waiting for the good life
black snow
and
learning to fly
underground.”

Song titles: “Under the Bridge” and “Snow” by RHCP; “Jane Says” and “Underground” by Jane’s Addiction; “Don’t Look Back in Anger” and “The Nature of Reality” by Oasis; “Nothing to Believe In” and “The Good Life” by Cracker; “Wonder” by Natalie Merchant; “The Waiting” and “Learning to Fly” by Tom Petty; and “Black” by Pearl Jam.

Playlist poem #3

"I learn to fly with my alien girl
under Saturday's black hole sun.
A riptide of sweetness,
she's the phantom of the disco
with an audience of one."

(Written using song titles by Foo Fighters, Tacocat, Fallout Boy, Soundgarden, Vance Joy, Toadies, Glamour Assassins, and Rise Against.)

Playlist poetry

Today I came up with a game: Writing poems made almost entirely out of existing song titles. 

It could be a poem, or a statement, or a short story. It can be as serious or as silly as you want. It's okay to use your own words to connect the song titles when you construct the sentences. Don't use the same title twice in one poem. If you don't keep playlists, just write a poem/short story/sentence using the names of whatever songs come to mind and would fit together.

Here's mine. I capitalized the first letters of the song names.

"Today, us New Years Saints
Stutter a Connection,
a Whirring Holy Touch.
Welcome to the Church of Rock & Roll."

(Titles: "Today" by Smashing Pumpkins; "New Years" and "Saints" by The Breeders; "Stutter" and "Connection" by Elastica; "Whirring" by The Joy Formidable; "Holy Touch" and "Welcome to the Church of Rock & Roll" by Foxy Shazam.)

Here's another, from the same playlist:

"Graveyard Girl, the Initiator
cordially invites you
to Come Join the Murder
of American Society."

(Titles: "Graveyard Girl" by M83; "The Initiator" by Fefe Dobson; "Come Join the Murder" by White Buffalo & The Forest Rangers; "American Society" by L7. Yeah, my musical taste is all over the place.)

Feel free to try this.

The collective

For the collective "they"
Life until adulthood
is a continuous string of "no"
Until they inherit the word,
Raise it tenderly as their own.

Who are "they"?
Never named
as anything but
"They think"
"They say"
"They won't let you"
Woven omnipresence.

Threads cinch when
You feel the "nos" seep into your pores,
and say them to yourself. 
Fabric rips: a realization
As They say,
there is no "I" in team
but
There is a "me" in "them"
and the nos
are beginning to bleed through.

Pluck them out 
Splinters sting, but
the "Yes" grows back
Healing 
Stronger for anyone else
who still wears "no"
under their skin.

Lost and lucid

Lucid dreaming is an awesome gift when you have no sense of navigational direction. Last night I dreamed about getting lost, but it was okay because I just scrapped the whole landscape and made a new one. That would be an amazing ability in real life--but only for the person who had it. It would really suck for everyone else.