The Underbelly Whisperings

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A Shitty Little Cocoon

A Shitty Little Cocoon

He drank a tall can in a bar in the morning. America is a great place to slowly kill yourself by pursuing ur base desires. Which is why he liked it. True freedom has to include the choice to kill yourself, especially slowly and painfully and at the expense of the rest of taxpaying public. Portland didn’t feel much like America though. Not the gritty, raw America Gorno was looking for. It was more…

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Battle Arena

This story first appeared in Water Soup #6, August 2017.     Mikey came home from Battle Arena in the black box. This was not the desired outcome. Ideally, fighters came home in their human body. Maybe the lost a finger or a leg or hearing in their left ear, but the always hope was that sons and daughters returned most resembling the physical self they left with. Mikey had been Headshot Hero for…

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Hot Knives, Blades, Knife Hits, and Spots Daniel was lying on the floor a lot, due to the pain in his ribs, a lump that seemed to float in his torso, clicking and rubbing and popping whenever he moved or stood up.

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Preferred Listening

Having to wear the stupid little vest was bad enough, but the godawful huddles in the morning, they were the worst. The morning manager, Colin, held aloft a yellow edition of Hey Nostradamus! and told us to remember the book was fantastic. “For the adventurous reader,” he said. “Make sure you highlight that it is Canadian and very unique,” he said. I hated Douglas Coupland a lot in that moment.…

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Faded Out Revamped

Faded Out the lit blog is back

check it out at faded-out.com

and submit at [email protected]

yahhhh

[theunderbellywhisperings]

Endless Cup Max and I weren’t on such great terms since I broke off our bromance and moved in with Marley.

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What’s worse

is it looks

like the “process”

needed another process

to exist in the first place

meaning the “process”

really never had a life

of its own

meaning any one with

a pen is totally

full of shit. 

[theunderbellywhisperings]

boy asks

"why are the nights so long

and the days so dark

i.e. the sun never appears

only creates a sky

filled w/ a lighter shade of grey?"

the mother says

"we are in a cold spot in the universe."

the boy realizes

this might be a long relationship

he is bound to endure

because she's the only 

one who's provided

an answer.

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the opposite of xenophobia

anyone living in

suburban canada

terrifies me

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it’s called big picture thinking

which I’m pretty sure we should all give up on because it's done nothing but start religious holocausts or bombs being dropped or an endless array of pompous, self-absorbed shit created for the sole purpose of being watched, like jacking off in public. 

[theunderbellywhisperings]

who the hell is t(h)om jones?

I know some stuff about him. He's written a few books of short stories, He won the O. Henry in the same year as DFW, he was a finalist for the Man Booker. He's been a Marine and a boxer. He taught at the Iowa Writers Workshop. He didn't publish his first book until he was 48. Also, he has diabetes and (maybe) epilepsy.

I'd love to know where the hell this guy is and what he's doing. I want some more stories to read. Maybe Brad Listi can find him and interview him. 

                           Thom Jones' Writing Is From Deep Within the Pits

"He's obsessed with his blood sugar, which is dangerously low, and his caffeine intake, which is dangerously high. He envisions himself dropping dead in the back yard while mowing the lawn, and calculates how long it might take to discover his body.

He lights another Kool, wondering if this is the one that finally gives him the cancer, and says: 'Life is terribly sad.'"

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Drowning. Go Away.

I woke up angry today

for some reason

or maybe I wasn’t angry

when I woke

but once I started to move

I felt like

what is the point/

why do I keep going in circles?

and how many times have

I gone past this exact spot?

and how many times

have I felt inspired

in the quiet moments

anticipating

coming sleep

only to wake up

amnesiatic,

breathless,

like no matter how

deep I inhale

it’ll never be enough

to make drowning

go away. 

[theunderbellywhisperings]

And until we are able to focus on something other than the end, our days will be spent getting to know well the feeling of going in circles. 

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failing as a millennial

I just figured out how to CAPS LOCK on my iPhone

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these ghosts

when I say

past do

you think

old news

and when I say

history is

it something

along the lines of

barbaric/savage/plague?

  What do

our ancestors

say,

their thin skins

melting under the

earth?

  I imagine at least

one of these ghosts

hovers over

our cloned

landscapes.

  with the inertia

created

there’ll be no stopping

even when we reach

the point

where everything was

supposed to be ok. 

[theunderbellywhisperings]

anybody can do that

it has become cliché

to write about your ideals,

it is too obvious for the sensitive

artist

but also the rage now

is total self-absorption

and the thing I find funny

about that

is since

we’re all hardwired for

narcissism all we

can do is compete

over who does it

the best/most effortlessly.

  it’s like when I’m supposed to congratulate

complete strangers for having children,

a biological

imperative

not even intiated

by free will

but by the pull of hormones

blowing up

in close contact.

  I don’t see

what’s to be proud of,

anybody can do that.