We are asked
we think we are asked
it feels like asking
to commit, to decide
to love/have/hold while
inside we’re nothing
have nothing we think
are not even close
to knowing ourselves
nothing close to being
who we are or should be
should know, should see
when we look at our own
reflections, at moments
in time, at sliding slipping
features and smudged
characteristics…at
the yawning breath
of time, we are asked
we think we are asked
it feels like asking
to commit to know
when we don’t know
when we can’t know
when we are everything
and nothing, mixed and pasted
on paper, we are asked
by life by people by time
to commit to a course, a
direction without compass
or map or knowledge…
…and…
…we do, we jump, we reach
we hold our collective
breath and leap headfirst
into darkness into the
emptiness
that used to be
where our hearts
are and say
with tremulous
soul…I
love…
…you.

Mindless
Miss America
she dreams of
darkness drowning
lapping pools of
sadness, shaping dunes
swirling eddies, she
dreams of darkness
drowning running
falling
tied in knots
of choices of
voices of lost and
running emptiness
she dreams
of darkness…watching
sad streets, immobile
homeless men
always men
talking to shadows of
pieces…of
American dreams
of darkness
drowning
she casts a wide
net…watching motionless
and rising falling
moving in
and out like breath
mindless and scared
she dreams of
darkness…a new day
only marginally
different, statistically
invalid…it is a day
dreamt dark
a shallower deepness
found nowhere
else, the damned
forgiven
while she imagines
streets of men
connectionless
not really there
dark and drowned
shaped and tied
up with the
American Dream

This is interesting. The other evening I was leaving a charity business event and talking to a person I know, not a friend, more like a mentor (but not really) as he waited for his car (I’m a subway guy, natch). Basically he’s someone I’ve known in business for a long time. At any rate, as we were talking about the evening and various other things, he suddenly turned to me with a hand on my shoulder and asked if I thought he was a kind person. “Haa ha”, something to do with a girlfriend” he said, and I replied, very quickly, that no, he was not a kind person.

He was taken aback.

“What do you mean I’m not a kind person? I talk about kindness all the time, I do these charity business events, I give my time and money to help people…what about me isn’t kind?” His tone was pleading but I saw no pleading in his eyes. As our relationship was in its second decade and we’d been frank and honest most of that time, I replied as frankly and honestly as I could. I answered “I say you are not a kind person because I have never actually experienced any kindness from you. I have never seen you being truly kind…spontaneously being kind to any person, animal or thing. I have never seen you pick up a check unless forced to by business decorum, for example, or unbidden, reach out to help another person who needs it but has not asked. That’s not kindness, that’s strategy…that’s how psychopaths act.”

I continued “I also have never seen you acknowledge a waiter or bartender or car attendant—and especially your employees—with anything other than the expectation that they are doing a job for you. I don’t know anyone who also knows you who could provide evidence of any situation where you were spontaneously kind…only kindness forced by the circumstance, social or business. Again, that is strategy, not kindness. Kindness has to be spontaneous, it has to be a rote or automatic response or it isn’t kindness at all.”

His expression never changed and, in fact, was going slightly toward a smile, I felt, so I went on, “You are a brilliant person, in many ways and especially in business, but you are not a kind person, you are not someone who’s first thought is not your own but of those around you. I hear you talk about kindness and all the things you do related to kindness but have seen zero evidence that any of it exists…not real kindness…it all seems staged. I’ve seen you use words of kindness as a means to manipulate people and events toward your goals—not that you were ever being “unkind” of course, you are not an unkind person—but still it wasn’t kindness that motivated you. You always seem to have a plan, an end state that you’re driving toward and, honestly, kindness has nothing to do with you getting there.”

I was done so simply stopped talking and he hadn’t said anything the entire time. In fact he said nothing for another full minute when suddenly his face went into total smile mode and he clapped me on the shoulder and said semi-conspiratorially into my ear “Trevor, you’re more and less right than you know…and let us leave it there.” And he walked away, smiling of course, toward the valet to get his car.

Interesting, yes? But not the truly interesting thing, I think.

What is truly interesting is if you replace the “person” I know, in that conversation, with any “religion” and you replace “kindness” with “connection to god” and you’ll find that it works the same. Not exactly but it works the same.

Think about it.

Religion constantly talks about its connection to god yet can never show any evidence that this exists. Religion does not spontaneously do anything unless it helps religion first and foremost. Religion has an end state it is driving toward and it will say what it needs, and use whomever it must, in order to get there. Everyone knows about religion and what it says about itself over and over…but no one can show any evidence that supports its claims.

Religion, it seems, is the perfect psychopath.

A death in New York, the city
slept for once, the moment noted
only by passing, by shards of news
embedded in flowing rivers of ice
and snow…the sound of that one
dry and desiccated leaf struggling
to hold onto that one tree—without
other leaves—on that one village
street where snow leaned on fences,
cold white shoulders pushing against
black iron, against the push back of
reality…a grasping and rasping
sound as wind vibrated it against
the concrete like bark of that
one tree…while an anonymous wind
wound its way from the upper east
side, canyons called avenues,
through side streets of small stores
and large buildings…past places
where actors called out in darkened
theaters, where the lights were warm
and the air frigid…a simple wind
provoked by nothing, moved by physics
rubbing against a single leaf
on that one tree, creating a small
seesaw sound, a tiny frequency of
motion outside a bathroom window
unheard by the ears of the dead man
on the floor, ears that once heard
more than most, orbited eloquence
and suggested melancholy…the leaf
sang it’s song, it’s only song
grasping rasping holding on to that
one tree…on that one village street
in the city where he fit the best
and lived until he didn’t and was
never an anonymous wind.

I was reading about a dead guy, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and another guy who might or might not be a pedophile, Woody Allen, and also about a few guys I read about in the paper who died recently around here in NYC. Guys who have names no one remembers and did things that all of us do now and then. I also saw a piece about a guy who did something extremely bad to a lot of people but he did so quietly and was only recently found out. Another guy saved a woman from a burning car.

I don’t remember his name.

And if you think you’ve got this thing I’m writing all figured out about how I’m going to rail against celebrity as being the fluffy version of pigshit (it is, by the way) and that crass commercialism for commercialisms sake is evil and bad, bad, bad, well, of course I’m going to fuck with you now. I don’t care about any of that. It doesn’t mean a thing to me.

Not even a little bit.

What I’m thinking is that Mr. Hoffman and Mr. Allen (and Dylan Farrow for that matter) and the two dead blokes from around here as well as the objectively bad dude and the reasonably heroic one are pretty much all the same to me. Meaning that they are not “me”. Like you are not me. Like the Queen of England is not me. Like a dying 3 year old being eyed by a vulture in Sub-Saharan Africa is not me.

Or any of the approximate 7 billion other people on this planet who are, to a person, not me.

The thing is that when It really comes down to it, when it matters whose heart is beating, then it is me that I think about. Certainly not from a “who’s better” or “who’s more important” aspect but from a “who do I control” perspective. Oh I’m sure that many people think Mr. Hoffman was an important guy as they probably did for Mr. Allen (and Dylan Farrow for that matter) as well as the two dead blokes, etc. As well as the opposite with many people disliking in various ways, all of those people.

My point is that they have nothing to do with me living this one life that I have on this one planet where I find myself. Nothing. In fact, more so than that…absolutely nothing.

100,000 years ago when we were just starting to form groups and were transitioning into agrarian societies, we knew about, probably, less than 30 people our whole lives. That’s “knew about”…we actually only knew (in the sense that we communicated with them regularly or were responsible for them in some way (daughter, father, son, mom)) less than 4 or 5 people (tops!) our whole lives. These people had a life/death effect on us in various shades of importance because they were literally extensions of our own capabilities. We used them to extend our reach, our gathering and our hunting…

…but then planting crops and establishing boundaries for territories, villages, food storage, etc., went and fucked that all up.

Villages got bigger and turned into towns with governments and rich people and poor people and society started being a thing with people who ran things and wanted to be known for doing so. Word of mouth segued to news pamphlets to newspapers to radio to TV and now 24/7/360 wall to wall, can’t evade, round the clock, in your face EDUTAINEMNT!!

And we’re forgetting…

…we’re forgetting that there is only one person ever standing on the savannah, there is only one person ever waiting for rain, or looking for signs of a wild pig, spear in hand…there is only one person ever staring at the sky wondering why, and how big, and how small…there is only and forever

…you.

Regardless who else died…is a pedophile (or not)…is evil or good…there is always and forever…

…you.

Take care of that person. Expend your energy on that person. Treat that person as if it was them on the front page, them in the spotlight, them being viciously hunted through the press…

…and the universe, the world we stand and live on, the other people around us…

…they will take care of themselves.

Believe. Go. Do.

~TrevorZen

So, post-coital Saturday morning, lying in bed with the Russian somewhere after dawn and before noon, we’re having an amazing conversation ranging all across the immense tableau of human thought. I am absolutely enamored by her intellect and the capability of using it and there is nothing that proves this over and over like pillow talk, lazy half-awake musings on the world, the universe…the innermost recesses of imagination…

…flashes of brilliance…

…anyway, laying there as we’re talking, I mention that it is exactly this circumstance, this experience that I will remember on my death bed. Not some groovy-ass TV I once had, not the 12^th or 14^th car I owned…not any of the houses I’ve lived in…but this feeling, this wide and deep intellectual connection except that…
…later I can never remember a single fucking one of those flashes of brilliance. Not a single sound bite…not a word.

As I’m telling this to the Russian, I mention that maybe I should get a tape recorder, or digital recorder, and set it to voice operated so that in the morning it’ll capture all of the amazing and deep thoughts that get spawned. Or maybe, I add, one of those court reporters, a stenographer, to capture every word. The Russian laughs and then says “And if she’s hot, then we can have a threesome…”

…and I say…
“but she’ll have to promise to shut up…”

Flashes of brilliance I’m telling you.

Flashes. Of. Brilliance.

Always know this …you have a choice.

It may be a shitty choice or an obvious choice or even what seems like an impossible choice but always, always, always…you have a choice. There is an old saying that there are only 2 things that are unavoidable, death and taxes…but that’s a lie. While it’s true that you cannot choose to avoid death (yet!), you can definitely choose not to pay taxes. Of course there’s a good chance you’ll go to prison, be bought for a carton of cigarettes and ultimately change your name to Phyllis but…you have the choice.

However…knowing that you have a choice is absolutely required prior to making a choice…otherwise it’s just a random event…and that gets you nothing valuable. Believing you don’t have a choice about something…anything…is the choice you make to accept randomness as a way of life. That the simple throw of a die or the spin of a wheel is how your life is controlled.

Randomly. Not by you.

You may believe that there are many things in your life that you do automatically, that it isn’t random at all and that you have no control over those reactions. “He pushes my buttons and he knows it!”…”She intentionally makes me mad!”…””That goddamned traffic made me run that red light!”

“What she said…made me hit her…”
Whatever you think about these being automatic, uncontrollable reactions…you are wrong to think that. Everything you do is a choice…any particular choice just may have been made years ago and you are simply repeating it because that’s the easy thing to do. Being aware that all are choices is hard, it must be learned and it must be practiced. You always have a choice and when you realize this, when it truly sinks in and takes hold…

…it will fundamentally change the way that you view the world…

…and you will be amazed at the choices you’ll make.

Believe. Go. Do.

~TrevorZen

Consider this, you’re in the kitchen and you open the refrigerator to get something to eat. As you stare at the food the cold air starts to slide out onto the floor around your feet and you start thinking about whether you should actually eat anything. You start to consider the pressure that society has on you to be thinner, more fit. The innumerable messages you’re bombarded with every day about what your body “should” look like. Suddenly your cell phone rings from the living room so you go to answer it. Forgetting that you’ve left the refrigerator door open, you stay in the living room to talk to a friend.

What happens to the cold air in the refrigerator?

Does it continue to flow out even though you’re not there to witness it? Do physical events continue to occur regardless your attendance or you even knowing that they occur? Of course they do, and have done so for billions of years. Look at the planet around you and see the continuing evidence of this being true. Reality does not need humans to experience physical events for those events to be true. But, a bigger question…

…does the societal pressure to be thin and in shape stop once you stop thinking about it?

The amazing thing is yes, it does, because that pressure relies on you knowing it intimately and having it be a part of your consciousness. It cannot effect you if you do not know about it or know about it in enough detail for it to be relevant to you. You do not feel the pressure to exceed in school like a Japanese student does in Tokyo…unless you ARE a Japanese student in Tokyo.

The point is that these pressures, these thoughts that we think are akin to physical events—immutable and unstoppable—are nothing of the sort. They are merely patterns of synapses and axons in our brains that we’ve mapped to specific ideas and thoughts we have.

Nothing more.

And these ideas and thoughts are so impermanent that they can be wiped away —once we know and believe that it is possible—thus allowing us to fundamentally change how we see and experience life. Fundamentally change our personalities, our strengths and weaknesses…

…who we are.

Now go close that damn fridge door, you think we’re made of money?

Believe. Go. Do.

~TrevorZen

Spent my tips on coffee
no money for a cab
gotta get home some way
With just the money I have

Worked my ass of slinging pies
serving slices to Joe, Cindy and Jack
now I’m done, it wasn’t fun
and I have to try to get back

Oh lord oh lord oh lord…
I have the pepperoni & mushroom
double cheese blues

She wanted something we didn’t have
got mad when it wasn’t there
she cried and cried, I wish she died
the pizza game is just never fair

Smelling like mozzarella and sauce
every night and every day
just trying to make it through
but the only thing to say…

I have the pepperoni & mushroom
double cheese blues

Oh lord oh lord oh lord…
I  have the pepperoni & mushroom
double cheese blues

Slice here and a slice there
pepperoni, sausage or Canadian ham
All I know is that I’m done, I’m done
and I have to find a cab

Spent my tips on coffee
no money for a cab
gotta get home some way
With just the money I have

Oh lord oh lord oh lord…
I have the pepperoni & mushroom
double cheese blues

Oh lord oh lord oh lord…
I have the pepperoni & mushroom
double cheese blues

I watch
time sliding past my
sightline, a motion
an emotion dull groaning pain
too long too far
she has been gone
146,000 heartbeats
and breaths…slowly
reminding me
shadows
sweeping
across the floor
chasing the hours
creating an empty
stain on skin
on tongue
she left for a moment
stayed
a day, a week, too
too long away from sight
from me
I watch myself
feel lower
lower
she is gone
and my eyes long
to see her
breath her in
empty the silence
between us
fill the holes
heal the wounds
stop the
dull
groaning pain
until she returns
with coffee
and
bagels.