guitar
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sunshine today. I just want it on my face. nothing heavy happening for me. so I will skate. when I’m moving, there is no time to think, or feel bad about myself or anything.
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I think people see me differently than I see myself. it’s like I see myself as a giant fuck up, but now and then, here and there, I don’t know, I get the feeling that I matter. I feel this way when I’m playing and singing in group or some hole in the wall, even…
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against all real evidence things have feelings, too. they don’t love in the human way, still: my thrift shop sweater, faded red and out at the elbows, has a story. I try to imagine the places it has been and who wore it before it was mine. the torn-up Adidas are retired now but they still trash-talk to me from the…
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when I was little, this straight-laced little kid, I sang in church all the time. the choir loft at St. Veronica’s seemed very near the sky. singing enveloped me. there was no sense of performance or judgment. no pressure. I just sang. I was aware of religion. I can’t say I understood much about practicing…
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sometimes I think the only place I can make a song is when I’m at the grocery store, listening to the sound of people while waiting in the checkout line. I keep an eye and ear open for what people cast off: half-sentences. corner store English. if the timing’s right, I’ll catch a major blowout between…
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the thing I most dreaded when I began making songs at age 12 was being killed in a classic Brooklyn hit-and-run before I could create a world-famous masterpiece. not so much anymore. these days I don’t sit and wonder if my next song will make me famous, or whether someday critics will consider it a…
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yesterday I swapped the everyday for staying at home, to hum and strum, and make music without being noticed. a day by myself, to do only what I love to do the most. I didn’t feel lonely, or miss anyone, or wish I was somewhere I was not. some might find that sad. but why is allowing myself,…
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if there is a heaven — pretty sure there is one — it must be something like the boardwalk at Coney Island at 4 PM on a beautiful spring day, the Atlantic Ocean on one hand and Deno’s Wonder Wheel on the other. The annual Blessing of the Rides ceremony takes place today at 10…
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I work at a donut shop in lower Manhattan. between shifts I earn extra income as a server. a few times a month I’m also a nighttime dishwasher. I pick up some part-time work at Macy’s Herald Square at Christmastime, and I have stood on 6th and Broadway with an ad board over my neck,…
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a walk in the park/my heart goes bang bang, thinking of you/I shout at the East River hoping it will shout back/where do you go at night, is it to the one who calls you, the one you love/when I thought that me and you will end, I/didn’t think it would be like this,/a thousand…