Prologue

He rose slowly out of the burning bath water, savoring the heat that reddened his skin and sent wisps of steam rising around him. He was intoxicated by the feel of his hot flesh and the sense of finality that surrounded this moment. He was acutely aware of the purpose
that sat upon his brow like a halo of hope; the purpose that had been missing these past four or five years. He didn't bother to drain the water from the tub as he stepped out, loving the cool tiles beneath his feet and tasting each drop of water that dripped from his elbows and hair.

The air was shimmering and for a brief moment he thought might pass out from the pleasure of simple awareness. He toweled off lightly and combed through his hair before returning downstairs to where she lay. Concealing the smile that threatened to betray his knowledge of her duplicity, he crawled beneath the covers and shut his eyes.

She trembled next to him, half fear-half ecstasy, and she was too preoccupied to realize that she wasn't angry at him anymore. Her right hand clutched the kitchen knife under the pillow and last minute pleas of future regrets fought a wild battle in her mind. The smile rose unbidden to his face, uncontrolled. He could sense her apprehension, could smell her sweat. Seeing his grin, that fucking shit eating grin of his cross his face- the anger welled up again and her vision went bloody as the knife jerked up and into his chest. She laughed hysterically as she stabbed again and again. His eyes winked open and gazed into hers. She dropped the knife, falling backwards, terrified.

"Escape!"

The word bubbled out of his mouth on the crest of a wave of blood, and
his smile grew even bigger, as he died. She alternately laughed and cried, huddled in the corner of the room, underneath their wedding portrait. No one in the family had thought it would last. They were right, but no one could have predicted this outcome. Her feral eyes glazed slowly over, covered by a transparent veil of insanity. Soon they mirrored his, staring but unseeing, dead but still alive inside, somewhere.

He knew he had won, but not yet what his victory held for him. His
sense of purpose faded from its orgasmic/euphoric glory into numbness as he was hurtled from this world to the next. Multicolored flames sprang into existence and chilled his blood as they fanned over him. He noticed with some shock that he no longer held a form of flesh and bone. Transparent, translucent, ameobic was what he had become. A different awareness washed over him, alien yet wise. Images that he had once known as past, present, or future strobed before his -`vision?' (he no longer had eyes) - and he knew time and existence as it was- completely simultaneous, no paths to go back or forward upon, just the point that was/is/will be -constantly occurring.

(from untitled work, 92)

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Rant Independent

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Your life is only every thing that you make it, make of it..

It is only as fulfilling as you want it to be. It is only as happy as you
choose to be. Circumstance is only perhaps 10% of your entire experience
the remainder is the result of how you live your life and how your actions reflect back upon you.

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NO EXCUSES.

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Do As Thou Wilt, but don't expect any one to care for the explanations you give them for YOUR faults. Don't expect them to care. You don't care to hear of their problems, do you? Except as a polite pause in your moanings to them.

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NO FUCKING EXCUSES DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

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The Government isn't out to get you, Just your money; Your Family doesn't hate you, they just don't like you; Your life doesn't suck, You Suck. So the next time you feel like crying on my shoulder, I'll be there, just don't expect much sympathy for your own failures.

And as for that 10% beyond your control, Get over it. Survive. Rebound. Regroup. Take control of your own life, let those who are ignorant remain where they are. Take care of yourself and everything else falls into place.

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CKB 5/7/95