"I've never felt the lovin' of a man
but it sure felt nice when he was holdin' my hand."

And I wonder if men are really capable of love, of un-adulterated, selfless interest in another person, true care and concern. Gnawing somewhere at the tips of my fingers is the belief that you listen more than I know. Pulling on the stitches that hold me together, the broken nerves at every scar, is the familiar comfort of knowing that they all lie.

"Just gonna stand there and watch me burn?
Well that's alright because I like the way it hurts.
Just gonna stand there and hear me cry?"

Well that's alright because I don't expect any more. I don't expect you to last, to stay, to come back. I'm stuck here with the feeling that every(thing) I want never wanted me. And so I no longer want. It wouldn't change anything if I were to say that I wanted you to last, I wanted you to just maybe be the one, that I wanted to make it work. Circumstances wouldn't change, fate still rules.

Oasis: Outta Time

Here's a song.
It reminds me of when we were young.
Looking back at all the things we've done,
You gotta keep on keepin' on.

Out to sea
Is the only place I am asleep.
Can get myself some piece of mind.
You know it's getting hard to fly.

If I'm to fall,
Would you be there to applaud?
Or would you hide behind the law?
Because If I am to go,
In my heart you grow,
And that's where you belong.

Yes I'm out of time,
I'm out of time.

As part of your application for admission, a personal statement is required. We are interested in learning more about your background, talents, and experiences and how you plan to apply them to your education and future. Your statement may be considered as a positive factor to enhance your admissibility, as well as for scholarship consideration. Describe the environment you come from - for example, your family, community, or school - and how this environment has affected or influenced your plans for the future.

Let's take a drive down that narrow road,
over that shallow, muddy river,
where I used to fish for carp.
A fish that cannot be eaten
with any enjoyment.

Soon we'll pull up in that small town,
and I can show you the one White Horse
that's all this town has ever had.

And we'll discuss the validity
of the dentist who extracted the life
from his dear cheating wife.

We'll take a walk in the rotting leaves
in a forest where the trees are all that's seen,
to where that innocent girl lay among them,
raped and bleeding while we went about
our useless lives.

It won't take long,
to reach the glass walls of this fishbowl,
but don't mind me if I begin
to sob at the illusion of leaving here.

They say a small town has values.
But the only value here is
the ability to lie and cheat
behind a straight white smile.

Still waters run deep
but shallow pools lay stagnant
with muddy souls and
black hearts.

Here's what we call the castle,
with it's iron gates mounted on ancient oak.
Does this excess of wealth fool you?
The ladies and their pearls,
their diamonds,
their escorts,
Do you believe that there is beauty here?

Let's take a drive...and I'll show you a narrow mind.

Where do I take this pain of mine?
I run but it stays right by my side.
So tear me open, pour me out.
There's things inside that scream and shout,
and the pain still hates me, so hold me until it sleeps.

Just like a curse, just like a stray,
you feed it once and now it stays.

So tear me open, but beware,
there's things inside without a care,
and the dirt still stains me.
So wash me until I'm clean.

So tell me why you've chosen me.
Don't want your grip, don't want your greed.
Don't want it.
Tear me open, make you gone, no more can you hurt anyone.
And the fear still shakes me, so hold me until it sleeps.

Tear me open, make you gone.
No longer will you hurt anyone.
And the hate still shakes me, so hold me up,
until it sleeps.

I want to trace over the letters of your name with an ink that will not fade.

I want to run my fingertips down the line of your backbone and along your scar and the curve of your shoulder blades.

I want to discover the roads you have traveled and the paths you have chosen.

I want to follow you to where your dreams unlock the doors and imagination is your compass.

I want to be surrounded by your words, in whispers that comfort and requests that fulfill.

What do you call love? When it calls for you from a lost dimension.

The perfect day is always tomorrow,
and always seems to come up
a few dollars short,
too many miles long.

Shut me out and I will shut down.

We're living somewhere between
happiness and disaster,
spinning, yet not quite out of control,
just within reach.

Give me your hell and I'll show you my heaven.

Eternal rest can't come soon enough,
but do you believe?
If we must endure pain,
can we choose which stab we prefer?

Save my face and I'll smile for the flash.

In ecstasy I'll die,
in a picture of me
that smiles like nothing
is wrong...ever wrong.

You can write down your law but our sin is written on the walls.

You don't know how hard it is
to turn my headlights into West
and know that I can't go on
forever.

I'm not lost,
just wandering,
through these opaque windows,
and somehow back home.

Is there nothing I can do for you?
Age has withered appeal for me
as you stare at her, and she becomes
a girl without pain in her eyes.

I'm broken again,
losing track of where I've been
and where I found myself,
in-between the layers of your skin...

...I should have stayed.
I should have gone
when angels rent their lungs,
but sin asked me to think of him.

I'd lay your burden down, only
to prove myself weak, and to speak
your thoughts would be
to fulfill your prophesy.

I'll never admit that my face
comes from your dream
(or was it your wraith?) or the
bottle that floods your future.

But still I cannot let you go,
cannot fall asleep, as I fear
that you may sublimate
while I dream of holding you.

-Kate Gubert

You must be made of glass,
the way you break
and don't bend.

The way you shatter,
the way you turn so cold,
so quickly.

You must be made of glass,
the way I can see
right through you.

Like I'm looking in on you,
staring into empty space,
but still you break.

I'm exhausted from handling with care,
in this "look, don't touch"
relationship.

You must be made of glass,
the way you scream and ring
when run my thoughts around you.

The way you polish,
so as to show no soap
stains on the set table.

You must be made of glass,
the way you can cut me,
the way you make me bleed.

You must be made of glass.

-Kate Gubert

[Rough Draft]

Raindrops speckled the car windows of one of Al's Premium Yellow taxi cabs. The light from uniformly spaced sodium vapor lamps hid in the drops and ran with the streams. Why do roads that lead to airports always run through ghettos?

Second shift let out in two hours. She hoped that in that time she would be eighteen-thousand feet above ground with no way to turn around. She didn't want to answer the call that would inevitably come when he got back to apartment 23B on Walnut Ct. She didn't want to explain her absence and the empty closet in the place they called "home." Not that home had had any meaning to either of them in a long time.

"'Scuse me, ma'am. I know I'm not supposed to do this, but it's been a solid ten hours for me today. And, see, with me going to the terminal and all, I know there's gonna be folks needing a cab. And, well, I haven't had a smoke in quite a while..."

She waited for him to finish.

"Ma'am, would you mind awful much if I had a smoke? I wouldn't ask, but you seem like such a nice lady and all."

"I don't mind. Doesn't bother me."

"Oh thank you ma'am! Bless your heart."

"It's alright," She thought. It's alright. Just like he had always told her. "It'll all be alright. I'm here. Don't cry." But was it OK to cry now? Now that he wasn't there? Was it OK to cry now that it wasn't all alright anymore?

There was a note lying on her side of the mattress, written in black ink on the back of last month's cell phone bill.

Danny,
I'm sorry. I meant for this to all work out, but it just seems that we can't. I can't. I'm done trying. You always told me that I run away from my problems. I know, I always try to run. But this time, there's nothing for me to run from. There's nothing here for me anymore. I know it sounds foolish, but it's true. And please don't miss me. You killed me a long time ago, and I've been gone all this time. There's nothing to dwell on. Please just let me go.
Sandy

The cab driver's cigarette glowed in the dark emptiness of the cabin. As he ashed out the window, the embers faded and fell like shooting stars, burned up and worthless.

by Kate Gubert

"We love in vain, narcissistic and so shallow... We love your face, we'd really like to sell you."

I'm not used to having something to lose. Something worth keeping. Worth hanging onto, no matter what the reason.

"I'll be as honest as I feel. I feel like I'm getting more paranoid cause I'm hearing things and they never turn out real... I gave up on the past cause it's unforgiving."

The past; I tried to suppress. I stripped it of its name and chased it into the deepest corners of my memory, to the darkest corners. I manipulated what it meant to me and turned from pain into illusory victory. I convinced myself that that was what I too wanted.

"That's when I said 'I love you...but I'm not the answer for the questions that you still have."

Things I feel I need to tell you...not because I expect an answer. I know there is no explanation. There is no reason for why I let everything go. So much more than you know. Without a thought, without a care. I fully expected you to take what you wanted and never return. Maybe that's why I still feel that I owe you more.

"So you sailed away, into a grey-sky morning. Now I'm here to stay..."

So they all left. And left you here. And who would blame me for clinging to you, the only one I've seen in the light of day? The only one I've held for longer than a high.

"I can be so mean when I wanna be, I am capable of really anything, I can cut you into pieces... Please don't leave me."

These are a few of my favorite things...

Rain on my roof and your arms surround me,
Fire-colored leaves and your hands hold onto me.
Pink and black packs, spent; they taste like you,
These are a few things that remind me of you.

Soft white light and a slight breathless tremble,
Blue Moon, green eyes and the image they assemble.
Invincible desire, built so strong but unseen,
These are a few of my favorite dreams.

Fear of failure, needlessly kept you awake,
I never really leave you, part of me you'll never shake.
Frozen pain melts when spoken, and you kissed mine away,
These things I love most, I am never be able to say.

When empty darkness settles,
When self-doubt confines,
When I'm feeling sad,
I simply remember that you are mine,
And then I don't feel so bad.

-Kate Gubert

I'm falling,
and I'm not denying it,
or trying to grab your hand,
cause this time,
I just might fly.

(I just need some space to spread my wings)

When my dream started, I was looking at pictures in a newspaper article of a girl covered in blood. She was crawling on the ground, half bent over, with blood pouring from her mouth and covering her eyes and nose. A man was chasing after her, beating her down with a long bladed knife. As I was being read the article by an enthusiastic, high pitched male voice, a doctor was wrapping my chest in white cotton bandages. The man reading the article was telling me about the incident related to the picture I saw and I soon caught on that I was the girl being stabbed. The man had come into my room while I was sleeping and though I don't remember anything, I had the wounds all over my body to prove that I was the recipient of over 20 gaping knife stabs. The article ended by saying that the victim (myself) died within a day after the attack. However, the article was only just written. I seemed to be the only one affected by the prediction that I was to die of my wounds within a few hours. The doctor told me that I had lost a lot of blood and that I would feel better in a few days and to replace the bandages regularly, although there were no stitches.
After resting for the remainder of the day, my family took me with them to a show downtown. The city was full of lights and we parked in a huge parking structure. Once we parked, I didn't feel so well and decided that I was going to walk home instead of going to the show. My family said they would meet me at home after. I stumbled down the ramps of the parking structure in what seemed like hours and somehow made my way back to our house. It had flooded and the ditches along the road were filled four foot deep with running water. I slipped as I was walking up our driveway and fell into the ditch. My jeans were ripped and shredded on the right leg and I was soaking wet, cold, sore, and muddy. After gingerly crawling into the house I attempted to change into some dry clothes. Blood had seeped through my bandages and was making my clothes stick to me. The wound that was bleeding the most was a gash running horizontally on my left side, just below my arm and stretching a quarter of the way around my body. As I unwrapped the length of bandage, I felt the hole in my chest, where my heart should have been, fill first with air and then blood as the opening gaped to about three inches. I was wondering why I had not gotten stitches, why I was not at a hospital, and why no one seemed to care, or even realize that I was dying.

"She knew there was something magical, something powerful, something mysterious about him that she couldn't explain. But it still came as a surprise when he reached up into the sky, pulled down the stars, and made a little heaven right here on earth."

[Work in Progress]

It's all about illusion,
It's all about dreamless nights,
It's all about not making you cry.

It's painting a picture,
coloring in all the blank spaces
between us.

You know were fine
because I talk like your mime.
Though I may fall on my pride
(I say you pushed me,
but we can never agree)
it's just like you to say I'm fine.

I've gotten back on my hands and knees now,
only to crawl back to you.
Like your clown,
"You're almost like her"
is one of the sweetest things
you'd say about me.

I'm out of time,
to feed your distraught self-esteem.
Your preaching machine
stood me in your lies.
Now I breathe you out, and
I spit them out.

(You don't want to hear me say it,
I don't want you to hear me say it,
I don't want to hear you say it,
but you never will.)

You think you're smarter than me,
with armor on your back.
I changed before you noticed
I confess,
you were too much help.

I gained a thicker skin towards you.
Something we don't talk about:
cause my friends, they
lift me up when I'm feeling down.
Something you never did for me.
Please don't take this to heart.

(You asked me to say it,
I never wanted you to hear me say it,
I don't want to say you heard it,
but you never will.)

Let's take a chance,
go far away today,
never look back again.
Baby, if I left, would you leave with me?

You're the only one keeping me
here anymore.
We'll get a head start on the sun,
disappear into the night.
Let's use the lights of L.A.
as our guiding star.

We'll make this whole town talk
but we'll be too far gone to hear.
Do you think we could?

I'll promise to never turn back,
if you'll follow that thin white line.
Would you go all the way with me?

We've got our backs against this dead end,
it's just us against the road.
There has to be a better place,
where skies are blue,
and the dreams we dared to dream,
we can make come true.

Baby, will you leave with me now?
Cause I don't know how much longer
'till the dream leaves without me.

Everclear: Learning How to Smile

Five miles outside of Vegas when we broke down,
Threw my keys inside the window and we never looked back.
Got all drunk and sloppy on a greyhound bus.
We passed out, all them losers they were laughing at us.
I will never let them break your heart,
No I will never let them break me.

We got lost in Phoenix, seemed like such a long time.
Seven months of living swimming on those thin white lines.
Did some time for selling acid to the wrong guy,
Life just keeps on getting smaller and we never ask why.

Why there is no perfect place, yes I know this is true.
I'm just learning how to smile,
That's not easy to do.
I know there will come a day
When we can leave and just go running away.

We was broke outside of Philly when the storms came.
I was working in New Jersey, hitching rides in the rain,
You was happy talking dirty at that phone sex place.
Life just keeps on getting weirder for us every day.

You say there is no perfect place, I say I know this is true.
We're just learning how to smile,
That's not easy to do.
We both live for the day
When we can run away.

Oh baby we can leave and run away,
Yes we can leave this place and run away.
We can leave it all behind like we do every time.
Yes we both live for the day
When we can leave and just go running away.

Five miles outside of Vegas, five years down the line,
We got married in the desert and the sunshine.
I can't handle how the hell it happens every day,
When you smile and touch my face,
You make it all just go away.

Yes I know there ain't no finish line, I know this never ends,
But I'm just learning how to fall, climb back up again.
I know there is nothing perfect, I know there is nothing new.
We're just learning how to live together, me and you.
You know I live for the day
When you say baby lets just run away.

Excuse her if she laughs too much,
she's just nervous and afraid.
She's never seen this side of you,
never felt the warmth of words.

Excuse her if she looks away,
her eyes, they tend to stare,
but she's no fool, no, not her,
her conscience wouldn't dare...

to allow soft words fly.
Her lips are firm,
her walls are strong,
but her eyes, they want to cry.

So excuse her if she falls for you,
you tripped her up, you see.
All that kindness would surely kill,
she's dead to apathy.

Oasis: Live Forever

Maybe I don't really want to know
How your garden grows
I just want to fly
Lately, did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks it to the bone

Maybe I just want to fly
I want to live I don't want to die
Maybe I just want to breathe
Maybe I just don't believe
Maybe you're the same as me
We see things they'll never see
You and I are gonna live forever

Maybe I don't really want to know
How your garden grows
I just want to fly
Lately, did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks it to the bone

Maybe I will never be
All the things that I want to be
But now is not the time to cry
Now's the time to find out why
I think you're the same as me
We see things they'll never see
You and I are gonna live forever
We're gonna live forever
Gonna live forever
Live forever
Forever

"Do you believe in magic?"

"I believe in love, is that the same thing?"

"do you believe in second chances?"

"I believe in new beginnings...and moving on."

"If you have a will, is there a way?"

"If you have a will, you will make a way. I have no will, I have no dreams, no desires, no passions. There is no way out for me."

"They say the only real tragedy in life is young people going before their time."

"They don't know that the real pain is within those left behind. The tragedy is knowing that young people die."

"So there is a difference between knowing and happening?"

"In other words, ignorance is bliss."

"Should we strive for ignorance, then?"

"In order to achieve bliss? No. To become ignorant would be to forfeit the joys of accomplishment, the awe and wonder of knowledge and the pain and beauty of truth. The greatest loss would be the loss of caring. Compassion knows, feels, learns. Bliss is not only ignorant, it is oblivious."

"You said that you believe in love..."

"Everyone believes in love. It is really not that complicated. Fleeting, yes. Abstract, definitely. But love is easy to give and even cheap. Think of trust...trust is earned and built on actions. Love is built on emotions. You can not hang on to love. If people would just accept it for what it is, they would begin to appreciate it."

"Then there is a greater price for trust?"

"A relationship survives on honesty, trust and respect. Must survive on these three. Love will come and go. Honesty is a choice resulting from a sense of right action. Trust is earned. Respect is a form of honor, a duty of humanity. Love, on this earth, is not reserved for good. Evil men can love and evil things can be loved. Goodness is not found in love alone. Happiness requires more than love."