F**k Your Picture Perfect Sunrise

I... don't know... it's good.

Chapter One

Dirty child in the
dirty streets of a
dirty city.

And they say home is where the heart is.

Posters damaged in the wind on
light posts defaced by graph in a
dirty city.

Tell me you can still see the beauty here.

Decaying buildings lining
dark alleys hidden within a
dirty city.

Is it any surprise they found her body there?

Infected needles in the skin of
the hollow and the broken in a
dirty city.

We've reached the Golden Age of Hopelessness.

Chapter Two

Trying to light a cigarette
in the relentless wind.

Thin coat not enough to keep
you warm in this weather.

Crunched into a ball to try and
preserve what little body heat remains.

They walk by without so much
as a pitying glance anymore.

Empty bottle of cheep poison
reminds you of blissful ignorance.

Decide to kill time by
trying to obtain another.

Without a single coin to use,
put into action your five-finger discount.

At least if you get caught,
you'll wind up somewhere warm.

Hand grasps the strongest percentage,
feet quickly moving to the door already.

A cry meant to stop you,
a threat meant to scare you,

but neither work and
you're already back into the cold.

The taste is awful,
but it will do.

Just pretend it doesn't burn and
it won't take long to work.

Numb from cold,
numb from this,

numb from everything
and anything at all.

Now back into the ball to
stop the world from spinning,

each breath brings another
rise of sick to your mouth.

Let it out and cry from
the patheticness of it all.

Fingers clench the dirty snow,
don't feel the frost bite setting in.

Teeth bite down on your bottom lip,
hard enough to make it bleed.

And it burns but at least you can feel;
and it hurts but at least you can feel...

Sight comes and goes and
you're lying in what you've just rejected.

Thoughts come but mostly go and
you wish for a black out,

to just not think anything at all,
not be aware of anything at all.

How could you have made it here?
How could you have sunk this far?

And in your dreams, you see the sun,
you see the world that awaits you.

Roll over and try to sit.
Turn your face towards the sky.

And one day you will see
those f*****g gates they speak about.

And one day you will be
free from the binds of life.

Chapter Three

And don't deny you feel it
squirming around inside you;

the fiending monster lives within you.

In your hand,
in you pocket,
you hold what it craves.

You hold the key to it's silence.

Escape to the alley behind this
dilapidated structure,
once home to so many,
now hollowed out by
a life-consuming fire.

[Oh, how warm you'd been,
standing across the street from the blaze.
And oh, how you miss the heat on your face.]

You're eyes are so use to the dark,
you can see where few can breathe,
and you move your way through trash
and debris, to the corner of the world you
know best.

The smell of decay is barely noticeable to you anymore,
just another condition of living in the charred remains where
many became melted to their floors;
an imperfect union of flesh and concrete.

Your teeth bite down hard
on the rope you have become very close with,
feeling the monster raging worse than before.

Within seconds you have the needle to your skin and
within another few seconds are on cloud nine,
or maybe cloud eight-and-a-half, at least.

Maybe you're hungry, but you don't care.
Maybe you're cold, but you don't mind.
Maybe you're feeling like one more hit,
and so you indulge.

Swinging from rain cloud to rain cloud,
you pick up the same needle from the ground,
without knowing when you'd even dropped it,
and almost forget about the rope.

There's nothing quite like this,
you think.
There's nothing better than this.

Staying true to the term "slammer"
you don't even take aim,
just jam the dirty f****r into your arm
like you're trying to rip the vein apart all together.

And maybe you are

You let it all settle in,
feeling like falling and flying at the same time
is something quite strange,
feeing like living more than ever before but
being so brain dead can't be f*****g normal.

How can so much nothing feel so good?

Each breath becomes a little harder to take,
each heartbeat is farther apart in time than the one before.

And this is how it end, you think,
And this is how I'll go.

And you don't know if you'll live or die,
And you don't care about it anyway.

Get your fix and shoot it up,
feel the liquid heaven running through you,
taste the sweet fruits of your pathetic ways,

feel the climax of the ride before the full-speed drop straightens out.

And then get off,
feet back on the ground
and knees soon following.

Back to fiending, needing, craving.
begging, stealing, searching.

Maybe it's not so bad that you're going.

Going, going...
coming back suddenly in the worst way...

Shaking, shivering, cold but hot but nothing at all,
skin paler then the unearthly queen of the night,
eyes rolling around but you still cannot see.

Searching for something to hold onto,
nothing but the rope and needle,

have to end this pain somehow,
have to end it before you derail this runaway train.

Wrap fingers around the cylindrical object and pray that
it's killing point is aimed towards you
(you cannot see, you cannot feel, you cannot be, be, be...)

slam the thing into your neck
into the jugular,
into the

....

cannot finish thought...

...

the world starts to fade out
while you bleed out
and you...

out.

Author's Note

This isn't finished.... nor edited.

Reviews

[Lukas]

Okay, then. Here, I could not find anything stylistically that I considered to need improvement, therefore this review will only look at the content of this story.
It begins, in chapter one, with a simple development of the atmosphere and setting of the story, and it becomes clear rather quickly that this story will involve heartache of some sort... but to be honest, there is no better kind of story than one that creates an overcoming sensation of complete desolation. Near the end of the first chapter, there is some very clear foreshadowing when it is asked whether it would be "any surprise they found her body there?" This statement seems to seal the deal, ensuring that following will be an ultimately tragic tale. Every odd paragraph of the first chapter utilises an interesting repitition technique, whereby the term "dirty city" becomes the final of a trio of lines that become the visual structure for what is to follow. The emphasis on this emblematic "dirty city" becomes very important, as it symbolises the sufferance of the main character and the forlorn conditions she faces. The final line, "We've reached the Golden Age of Hopelessness", is a solid and profound conclusion, meant to sum up all that is and ever will be in this "dirty city" of "decaying buildings" and "infected needles". Overall, this first chapter is the most symbolic and complex of the entire story (however, this does not mean that the rest is not well done- this is to be discussed, however). It creates a mental framework for the events that are about to occur, or that have already occured and are going to be retold, in memory. The environment, we are to be sure, is pathetically fallicious to the main character's position in the world, and therefore provides us with a teasing glimpse of a sad and pitiful tale. To be completely honest, those few first lines were some of the most potent I've ever read.
Chapter two follows as much as a story can, and althogh it becomes a very quick and fascinating read, there is not much to say for this section. The work of the author tends to be very minimalist in structure and content, therefore all the minute and seemingly-unimportant events become paramount by the end- this, I must say, is commendable in the least. From now until the end of the story, the lies an important element of pathos (that is to say, the arousal of a feeling of pity for a certain character) which seems to fog the air between the reader's eyes and the page. This may sound negative, however, this fog almost becomes part of the world we are reading of, and thus, we become more absorbed: things seem more real, more painful, yet subtle. The chapter ends with the character looking up at the sky, hoping uselessly for something better, something to look forward to; this becomes terribly bittersweet, contrasting with the hopelessness of the scenery and situation the character finds herself in. There also seems to be a hint of dramatic irony in the works here, as if we, the readers, seem to /know/ that the character will not see any better future; however, she can only guess and hope.
And while the thought has entered my mind, I would like to comment on the common style of the author as characterization. In almost anything I have read by the author, espcially of recent, there is only one character, nameless, and the story details a very small aspect of that character's life. There is rarely a backstory, let alone a reason for anything at all: this is the minimalism I seem to rave about so much. This is also what I adore in the author's work: after going through voluminous literature that examines every aspect of our living existence, it becomes refreshing to read something that looks at a /single/ human experience through the eyes of the beholder, unmuddled by superfluities and excessive verbosity (for some reason, post-revolutionary French literature comes to mind... no offense to the authors of Napoleon's legacy, for they /are/ great... but there are just so many words...).
And back onto the story, chapter three follows much like the previous in style and structure, except if remains the longest of the three. All the previous qualities that made the story beautiful remain, including several previously-unmentioned sections that contain a certain song-like quality... these little interjections of euphony make the read even more pleasant, and exemplify the talent of the author at eloquence of words. Consider the paragraph,

Your eyes are so used to the dark,
you can see where few can breathe,
and you move your way through trash,
and debris, to the corner of the world you
know best.

This is one example of a section that flows so beautifully off the tongue, and makes the read all the more entrapping.
And now, finally, we reach the end of the story. Despite the absence of much emotive language (a few bits here and there, but nothing over the top), the emotionality of this section is unbelieveably powerful- probably due to the story's subtlety and sublimity. I find the single line, "searching for something to hold on to" to be the most potent, simply because of the apparent desire, for a single second, to save herself, to hold on to something solid and real, something to destory the nightmare she has fallen into. And in a characteristically realistic fashion, we are virtually led through her fading phases of consciousness and finally into darkness, where her final act of defiance towards herself has awarded her. The ending is tragic yet expected; however, the expectance of tragedy does nothing to diminish the power of the tale. We are left, at the end, feeling empty, like something is missing, and we desire more, wishing to understand... and in an ironic twist, the author takes what her character has suffered and imposes it onto the reader. Ultimately, this short story is tragic and beautiful, and very, very well done. I absolutely love it.

[DMCMaster550]

Whether or not this piece is finshed nor editied this thing is completely freaking amazing. Very good all of it, it starts off so well and just keeps you hooked until the end and once you reach that you're wanting more more more just like your character here wants more of this 'liquid heaven.'
As a major fan of the noir genre I had a very strong feeling of the genre within this, the metaphors, how it starts dark, brooding, setting a pathway of tragedy and the fairly dark unhappy ending. Loved it great work :)

[Chaotica]

awhh thank you

[The Devil's Own B***h]

If you'll excuse my language: F**k this is good. It's unlike anything i have ever read before and I just kept wanting to read more. I've never been in any sort of situation resembling the one you write of, but yet you make me feel like I was the one experiencing every emotion.

Fantastic write!

Josie