19th Nervous Breakdown

A late afternoon coffee, an iced one, leaves me completely lost and befuddled this evening. I mean fucking daft, disconnected, rolled over, strung out, jittery, unfocused, lazy, apathetic, and swimming for safety. I had some inspiring conversation today with my buddy and biz partner, Dan, a musician, about the moments out here when you notice, even if it's for 30 seconds, that everything stops, caves in and stretches out, rises and collapses, is pulled tight like a drum, but remains silent, no birds, no dogs, nothing stirring but the sky and the dark peaks take on dynamism, and move hunchbacked as if on water, stealthy, maybe rumbling from some underneath, the skin of it all broken apart, dots in your eyes, and you forget yourself, your awareness covers you like a shroud so that there is nothing left to perceive, nothing...at...all. And you are left standing there, alone and nothing, and forgetting and leaving, drifting, unburdened, weightless, green, unaware, needing water to sprout. And then your heartbeat, slow and relentless drums you awake, in the ears, in the eyes, yes, the backs of the eyes, it tickles, but you have vision you did not know you had, able to scale the black anthills and reflect the dirty copper sun, and gain in strength, the kind that makes you flare your nostrils in an understanding of invincibility, immortality, endless capacity, and you know you are in the superhero realm and can picture breaking bricks with your forehead, 10 wooden planks with your chopping hand, you can throw a ball of water in a whirlpool of sonar and awaken the fish to your cause, and then you see a woman in tight black leather, head to freakn toe, red lips softly pursed, and that's the moment you know, you know, know, know, you'll have to wake up, for real, or start laughing out loud because c'mon, this can't be real, can it?





So, I'm super frazzled, and I come across this picture of Mick Jagger, long-haired and contemplative, blown out. It's in the New York Times online in a box where there is a link to a story about a man who bought a Scottish castle after the sellers rejected Mick. Rejected Mick! And, man, he looks rejected in this picture, but it cannot be recent. He is soft-skinned and lightly lined, not craggy with deep creases that can hold whole tears. His eyes, though, are heavy, weighted, bagged, dull coal inside. He's wayward, staring out into the middle distance, woken up in the winter afternoon with one hour left of sunlight. He is old before his time (which is when?), frustrated, whipped by the journey, beleaguered, forlorn, he's lost some measure of love, he may have a song to write, but first he'll have to drop his head, and he's not quite done it. Almost, almost. Too much, he thinks. Keep it simple. Break me down. I'm black before dark. She is gone and I don't remember her. I've been doing this for too long. When will the wheels stop turning? When will I know?