Thought Catalog published an article I wrote: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2011/lex-luthor-and-the-war-on-science/

Thought Catalog posted an article by me: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2011/five-movie-video-games-id-play/

Cutest Living Creature On Earth?

The slow loris is—and this is incontrovertible—the cutest living creature on the face of this planet. Its eerily gargantuan eyes seem to stare into your soul. Its tiny human-like hands are simultaneously creepy and adorable. Its owner tickles it, and it reacts like a fat kid getting a full body massage. When it sleeps, it lays sideways with arms outstretched like a drunkenly passed out frat boy. You think, ‘This is not a real animal. This is a Stan Winston animatronic device,’ but no, it is fucking real, ladies and gentleman. Never have music and images been so perfectly matched together as in this video.

Would you like a slow loris? Would you like to cradle its soft squishy body close to your chest as you fall asleep, staring into its glassy soulful eyes the size of two basketballs? I certainly did, and so I googled information about acquiring this jungle beast. Allow me to inform you on some of the characteristics of a slow loris unseen in this charming youtube video.

Slow lorises never stop pissing. Yes, the slow loris marks its territory with urine. Constantly. For the entirety of its life.

Slow lorises like to bite your fucking hand. They like to bite sometimes, so the people who kidnap them from the wild frequently rip their canines out. Unfortunately, without their canines, the slow loris can’t consume its natural foods, and so they die from self-loathing and starvation.

Slow lorises are covered in POISON. The slow loris has a smelly toxic gland on its elbow which it likes to lick. Afterward, it coats its entire body in the toxin. No big deal.

Slow lorises bite down and never let go because they want you dead, asshole. The slow loris is notorious for biting down on your hand and refusing to release its jaws. According to Wikipedia, “Animal dealers in Southeast Asia keep tanks of water nearby so that in case of a bite, they can submerge both their arm and the slow loris to make the animal let go.” No wonder these guys have no qualms about ripping their damn teeth out.

Slow loris bites are toxic. So after licking its toxic elbow juices, the slow loris will probably bite your hand (because it hates you) which will cause a painful red swelling. No, it’s not fatal, but it will illicit a degree of trepidation.

Slow lorises die of being pissed off all the time. Being stuck in a cage all day and night stresses slow lorises out, and they hate it, so they die. It doesn’t help that they’re most active at night while owners are usually asleep or that they’re susceptible to infection and excessive bleeding due to a network of veins close to the skin. Over time, the ongoing release of potent stress hormones, illness, and intense feelings of existential despair will cause them to die.

Slow lorises are illegal to own. Maybe I should have just started with this one. Yeah, so you can’t buy them unless you know a shady motherfucker in the Phillipines. Even then, they’re endangered, so the karmic retribution from the universe would be severe. For me, it’s enough just watching the youtube videos over and over until the voices in my head stop screaming.

Normal Face

It’s important to always make sure

That your face is your normal face,

Your normal everyday regular type face,

That it’s not contorted grotesquely

Into a scary face or a weirdo face,

That your tongue is inside your mouth

Where it typically sits behind your teeth,

That your eyes are staring ahead

And not crossed or rolled up inside the skull,

That your cheeks are not filled with air,

Not puffed out like chipmunk cheeks,

That your mouth is closed firmly,

Not hanging open or dripping saliva,

That your eyebrows aren’t raised

Or moving up and down for no reason.

Your face must be neutral in most situations

Like standing in line or talking to a girl,

And you must check constantly

To secure it against sudden insurrection.

Take a photo of your normal face

To construct a standardized system

Of measuring the normality of your face.

Use your tongue to check for tears.

Imagine your face muscles as a delicate machine

That must be carefully monitored at all times

Like a Japanese nuclear power plant on your head.

But sometimes it’s hard to know for sure

What expression your face is making.

Run your hands over it like reading Braille.

Feel the familiar contours and fleshy hills,

The folds of skin and moist shadows.

What is your face doing now?

Hollywood Blockbuster

When our family’s Christmas home video

Was released in movie theaters across America,

I sat in the back rows of each screening,

And watched everyone watch me

Open my presents.

I receive a Cinemark gift card from Gamma,

And the audience roars with applause.

I receive a gray polo shirt from Sean,

And the audience whistles and shouts.

I receive a pair of skeleton gloves and a fake moustache,

And the audience shrieks and bangs their heads together.

I drink eggnog and blink intensely at the camera,

And the audience jumps to their feet.

An old woman begins weeping.

A teenage girl passes out cold.

A boy shits himself with joy.

They can’t stop clapping.

It wins every Oscar,

Even the one for best foreign film,

Even the one for best animated film,

Even the one for best adapted screenplay.

And even the one for best special effects

This is a story I tell myself

When I’m editing my family’s home videos.

Is it really so ridiculous?

I’d go see your family’s home video.

After all, even a trillion dollar budget

Can’t buy honesty.

I have a painting at the Under $500 Exhibition at the Luminarte Gallery in Dallas this Saturday at 7PM. The address is 1727 E. Levee St.  Dallas, Texas 75207.

I'll be reading poetry at some dealy this next friday. Here are the details if you want to come see me. Quite frankly, I doubt I have any friends who would pay ten dollars for poetry especially when I'm only reading one piece for three minutes, but it sounds like a damn poetry circus, so should be interesting.

Friday, March 11 at 6 to 9 PM

ft great poetry and story telling by :

Buddy Wakefield (International Poetry Slam champion)
Joaquin Zihuatanejo (International Poetry Slam champion)
Richelle Gemini Scott
Ethan McClure
Infidelix
Brad Pike
Naidle Alexander Wieters

ADMISSION IS $10 BUCKS. CASH ONLY! ALL AGES.

Location: UNT - Golden Eagle Suite (The main building at UNT with the student bookstore in it. Suites are on the third floor. Parking is free but read the signs to make sure.)

Chernobyl

After the explosion came the clean-up:
The firefighters tasked with extinguishing the reactor,
Felt pins and needles on their skin,
Tasted metal in their mouths,
Which later scientists would realize
Were burning radioactive dust particles.
These firefighters stood for hours
In radiation 40 times the lethal dose.
They puked and shit themselves,
Dizzily stumbled around the roof,
Skin inflamed in a strange red rash.
All of them died of radiation poisoning.

And then came the debris clean-up,
They brought in American robots to move objects
With advanced grabber arms and retractable scoopers.
When the robots failed,
Their fragile circuitry fried like onion rings
They sent us into the disaster site
To toss radioactive cylinders with our bare hands
Back into the nuclear reactor pit.
They called us “the bio-robots”.
In the cold nuclear winter, we raced
Across the plant’s roof as if on fire,
We had only one minute at a time to work,
One minute to move a nuclear rod
Or four fifty pound stone blocks
Or clear debris from the roof with a tractor.
One minute before seeds of cancer
Bloomed in our guts like flowers.

Helicopter pilots dropped chemicals on the reactor.
Two pilots died of radiation poisoning.
Three men drained boiling radioactive water
From the cooling tanks.
Two of these men died of radiation poisoning.
We raced across the roof like children playing a game.

Bio-robots they called us.
Someone has to do this job, they told us.
We have to be brave and do the work
No one else dares to undertake, they told us.
We are national heroes, they told us.

But years later, while she sleeps next to me,
I run my hand over her curved belly,
Imagining what sort of nightmare monster
I’ve planted inside her,
What three eyed Gollum grows there,
Like a living breathing cancer.
Can I love a brain dead husk?
A half-human half-octopus?
I was so brave back then,
And now I’ve never been more afraid.