I am Going to Clone Myself Then Kill the Clone and Eat It by Sam Pink
My rating: 4/5 cats
You will be my friend until I say something to you in person that frightens you.
that’s pretty much what you need to know going into this book. it is a collection of poetic musings by a bipolar writer that really captures the highs and the lows, and expresses them in a way that feels claustrophobic but also fresh and lovely, even when the subject matter does in fact become frightening
there are moments of desperate tenderness:
–I wish I were the person you imagine yourself to be because then you’d love me and never let me go.
–Every new relationship is made of cotton and I am a bee that is on fire, lost and ready to land.
–When I touch my face to yours, I think, “This is our first mistake.”
–I’m looking for someone to spend time with
but I can’t afford too many hellos.
self-loathing:
–And I saw my reflection in a lake and I waited for it to freeze a little bit so I could break it with my boot.
–My ideal date would involve painful silence. My ideal date wouldn’t involve me.
–If I ever decide to shoot myself, I’ll make sure to stuff my mouth with confetti, so it looks pretty for no one.
–And I lie down on your carpet so long that you think I will stay forever but I get up and I see the indentation in the carpet and I get jealous and say, “I am no longer needed here.”
and flat-out aggression:
–And I fill my mouth with mud and put broken sticks in the mud and while you watch TV I bite you and bruise your arms and leave my name and address by the bruises so people know who gave them to you.
–Sometimes I wish I was a hair on your body because then I could be close to you but not have to say anything.
And sometimes I wish you were a hair on my body so I could cut you with a razor and not get in trouble.
–Turn you around and hug you. And slowly slip a knife through your back so it comes out the front and pierces me and we die connected.
–After I jump-kick your face, I will kiss it. There will be many kisses—an amount that eventually becomes annoying and vaguely frightening.
–And your broken skull is not a puzzle, it’s just garbage.
–Until I die, the world is the yard, composed of hands reaching up to shake mine.
And I am the lawnmower.
but then there will be funny little stories like this one:
At the DMV, while I waited for my new license to be printed, a lady walked in with a stroller. At the same time, I noticed a sign on the wall that read: No eating or drinking. I turned to the lady and motioned to her kid. “Excuse me ma’am read the sign,” I said. Then I realized she wasn’t going to eat the kid, she was just watching it or whatever. But you never know.
i really loved this collection. i also love john frusciante. and i think if you listen to niandra lades and usually just a t-shirt
while reading I smash my smile against yours (my favorite piece in the book), you could actually catch bipolar disorder with no previous disposition. and then you could write like this.
Lie down; it’s time for me to walk over you and call you a bridge I no longer need.
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