Seven Cardinal Confessions
Lust- It wasn't just my dick thinking, but she was just a means to an end. In the coffee shop she made a convincing proposition that sent my stomach into knots for a month. I must of have convinced my self it was pure, ignored the complications, but truthfully I welcomed her destruction as a redemption from the February numb I had known before. From there it went beyond a mere sexual release to a deeper sensation of ownership, a competition, a prize for the taking. A year and a half, or two, of spiraling decadence into an essential emotional tug-a-war of what I had mistaken for love. The nuclear winter of those memories still linger in my mind from time to time.
Gluttony- Most of it is blacked out, the whiskey shroud that doesn't lift until morning at the alarm blaring madness of being late for class. I was pale faced and red eyed, fervently clicking my pen against my book when Dr. Fraunhoffer stopped her class and asked if I was O.K. Her voice was muffled out by the brain shattering ring in my ears, I nodded my head while last night's acid washed memories flickered.
I was nauseated and whoever she was wanted to go to breakfast. I told her I took a Tylenol P.M. rolled over and fell asleep.
When Meredith came home she stepped on broken glass, and saw the living room in ruins. CCR was skipping on the stereo and I was passed out, drooling in the chair with my feet hanging out the window.
There is too much to recount, essentially alcohol is the catalyst of my vices.
Greed- I saw this second hand through my Aunt, who married into wealth. Her house had chandeliers, grandiose oak staircases, maids, servants, and butlers. She was the envy of the family and my mom always made crass remarks after leaving her house for Thanksgiving dinners: "She gets to go on a damn cruise while I raise two kids", "Never worked a fucking day in her life", "She always got everything she wanted". I remember I was in her intricate garden when I saw her through the giant glass windows in her wheel chair, withered and pruned. A month after she died of colon cancer, her husband had already remarried.
Sloth- The flickering reflection of the T.V. off my Dad's glasses. My Mom staring at the yellow wall. My Brother's head under the covers to block out the light of the afternoon. I'm in the shower for hours, sitting cross-legged, watching the water spiral down the drain. This one I know too well, the sin of sadness, a cancer. It weighs down the air around me like a rank stench I've grown used to. To fight it, to fear it is the elemental motivation of my life, the reason I write, study, work, everything. Although I'm swimming frantically against the undertow, it is to only delay the inevitable. My dad's T.V. gets bigger every year, my mom has hundreds of crucifixions on her wall, my brother has the most comfortable bed.
Wrath- When I left it was out of spite for her, and more importantly out of her spite for him, but when my dad offered to live with him when I was fourteen I couldn't resist. So in July I made a phone call that left my mom in a frenzied bawl that still echoes in the lulls of our short conversations.
Envy- The reason I learned how to play guitar was for that look I saw in her eyes as she gazed towards the stage. Her pupils were technicolor, her mouth agape, and I was drunk in my army jacket, deep within the booth stirring my drink with a straw. He leaned in towards the microphone during chorus and winked at her. She placed both hands over her heart, and I took another shot.
Pride- I fell two thousands miles because I arrogantly believed I had grown beyond all pettiness. My mind had painted a picture of rational friendships, intelligent people, and opportunity that I'd never known before. It had almost seemed too poetic, A passage from child to man. I had gone full circle and wanted to show my talents off. But I cried as I fell, hit the wild dust and found myself in a dingy apartment with childhood friends turned strangers. I had been stretched thin and abandoned an angel. Two thousands dollars took me as close as I could get, but still the horizon grows dim as it gets to be late.
In the medieval ages there were monks, that would build walls around themselves to create complete silence and darkness just to hear the voice of God. There they would live in prayer and wait for a whisper.
Gluttony- Most of it is blacked out, the whiskey shroud that doesn't lift until morning at the alarm blaring madness of being late for class. I was pale faced and red eyed, fervently clicking my pen against my book when Dr. Fraunhoffer stopped her class and asked if I was O.K. Her voice was muffled out by the brain shattering ring in my ears, I nodded my head while last night's acid washed memories flickered.
I was nauseated and whoever she was wanted to go to breakfast. I told her I took a Tylenol P.M. rolled over and fell asleep.
When Meredith came home she stepped on broken glass, and saw the living room in ruins. CCR was skipping on the stereo and I was passed out, drooling in the chair with my feet hanging out the window.
There is too much to recount, essentially alcohol is the catalyst of my vices.
Greed- I saw this second hand through my Aunt, who married into wealth. Her house had chandeliers, grandiose oak staircases, maids, servants, and butlers. She was the envy of the family and my mom always made crass remarks after leaving her house for Thanksgiving dinners: "She gets to go on a damn cruise while I raise two kids", "Never worked a fucking day in her life", "She always got everything she wanted". I remember I was in her intricate garden when I saw her through the giant glass windows in her wheel chair, withered and pruned. A month after she died of colon cancer, her husband had already remarried.
Sloth- The flickering reflection of the T.V. off my Dad's glasses. My Mom staring at the yellow wall. My Brother's head under the covers to block out the light of the afternoon. I'm in the shower for hours, sitting cross-legged, watching the water spiral down the drain. This one I know too well, the sin of sadness, a cancer. It weighs down the air around me like a rank stench I've grown used to. To fight it, to fear it is the elemental motivation of my life, the reason I write, study, work, everything. Although I'm swimming frantically against the undertow, it is to only delay the inevitable. My dad's T.V. gets bigger every year, my mom has hundreds of crucifixions on her wall, my brother has the most comfortable bed.
Wrath- When I left it was out of spite for her, and more importantly out of her spite for him, but when my dad offered to live with him when I was fourteen I couldn't resist. So in July I made a phone call that left my mom in a frenzied bawl that still echoes in the lulls of our short conversations.
Envy- The reason I learned how to play guitar was for that look I saw in her eyes as she gazed towards the stage. Her pupils were technicolor, her mouth agape, and I was drunk in my army jacket, deep within the booth stirring my drink with a straw. He leaned in towards the microphone during chorus and winked at her. She placed both hands over her heart, and I took another shot.
Pride- I fell two thousands miles because I arrogantly believed I had grown beyond all pettiness. My mind had painted a picture of rational friendships, intelligent people, and opportunity that I'd never known before. It had almost seemed too poetic, A passage from child to man. I had gone full circle and wanted to show my talents off. But I cried as I fell, hit the wild dust and found myself in a dingy apartment with childhood friends turned strangers. I had been stretched thin and abandoned an angel. Two thousands dollars took me as close as I could get, but still the horizon grows dim as it gets to be late.
In the medieval ages there were monks, that would build walls around themselves to create complete silence and darkness just to hear the voice of God. There they would live in prayer and wait for a whisper.