     s$
        .d""b.                impulse reality press no. 168
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     $$ $$                      "A Letter and Some Poetry"
     $$ $$                           written by kreid
     $$ $$                           released 1/14/02
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LINEAR: you can include my story or just the poems.  hiya...

dear linear,

     kreid here.  i like your 'zine.  too bad the scene is dead...

     anyway, what can i do besides write a t-file, right?  perhaps the second
(or third) coming of the 'zine scene's greatest living author will activate 
the scene... some kind of revival.  i sure hope so.  no, seriously, i do.  i
care.

     oh - to my beloved fans: hi!  i am back.  doubtlessly you are all 
wondering where i've been for the past five, six, maybe ten months.  well, 
it's a long story.

     the obligatory here's-where-i'm-at-now update follows.  you can skip 
this part if you don't care.  but know this -- the moral of the story: DRUG 
ADDICTION SUCKS!  GET HELP.

     to put it quite simply, i was addicted to heroin, and couldn't muster 
the energy to write.  i was too busy scoring drugs and getting obliterated.
when my best friend od'd this july, a sort of scandal erupted and i decided,
one way or another, that i needed to get clean.  so i've been in rehab!

     uh, here.  in the spirit of keeping this t-file interesting: FUCK! CRAP!
ANARCHY!

     i apologize for appealing to the lowest common denominator.  fuck all, 
i'm a people's author. it's my nature to insult your intelligence - it's for
your own good anyway!

     i detoxed at home, cold turkey, vomiting profusely all the while... and
when i was healthy enough to walk again, of course the first thing i did was
run off to new york city and wander the streets for six days, high on smack.
that was in august, during the big heat wave.  that wiped me out pretty 
quick.

     so i checked into rehab, first in new jersey, followed by another 28-day
stint in california -- at the betty fraud center.  now i'm in port townsend,
WA, at a halfway house, doing my thing once again.  taking a class, tutoring,
writing for a newspaper, going to AA, etc.

     short-attention spans, bear with me.  story's almost done.  here's a 
non-sequiter: SEX DISEASE TELEPHONE MISERY PLANKTON HEART ATTACK...

     sobriety is all right.  but enough about me.  as for my writing, which 
you are all highly interested in: i'm writing a novel.  more on that later.
i started it in my disease and am going to finish it clean.  rock.

     and, uh, here's some poetry.  here's the meat.  my submission...

THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE

1

half-hearted hoping for something
at the halfway house waiting on nothing
a withered and wet cigarette smoking in an ashtray that’s floating in the 
 ocean

she’s been sleeping on the beach
she stares out like an actress on a stage
she’s been talking to strangers
hanging out with men ten times her age

are you waiting on something
or just proving a point?
hey beauty, we see you
a little too often
a little too often to say you’re not crazy
it’s okay with me
crazy and patient is okay for a long time
a long time’s okay with me

oh sadness
some day you’ll get what you want, oh dear
what shall become of your charms?
your face like a milk carton baby will sizzle
into alka-seltzer, apathy, and doubt
which does not stand out in a crowd
talking to strangers is okay

2

her hand’s in the pill jar
she’s hard to the core
she’s fast as a freeway
cold like a whore

the best things in life, the best things in life

she’s running on treadmills
she’s always got more

whatever, whatever
a slow death is better

so get busy living:
one foot in the grave

grandmother had cancer
john od’d last week... you see what I mean?
a long time’s okay with me

her tears anesthetic
can make it okay

I couldn’t keep her away, cuz it’s beauty
it’s sadness aesthetic

whatever, whatever
a slow death is better

3

it’s sad to see that someday we will be running away
to a land-locked and lonely ashtray
passing the days
with faces familiar and friends that we see on tv
godforsaken perfect harmony
sex is the key
sex is misery.  let’s fuck each other in the street!

I’m going out
painting the town
when I get home, you’re going down -
I bought you a ring
I pay for this house
you better not fuck around

it’s you and me, baby
and sex is the key
locked are we three
in perfect harmony

the best things in life are free

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   the clever thing to do here would be to put some sort of copyright. no.
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