Tuesday, January 03, 2023

mmmdcccxxi

The Endless Cycle of White Noise

aging strong, at its highest speed,
because i can better function
with the din of white noise,
whether awake or asleep
or attempting to find my way
from one state to the other.  as long
as the noise is at least as indecipherable,
is voiceless, non-verbal, as radio or tv
static, no station available.  just these
machines, three fans and an air purifier, 
almost always on.  once in a while, say 
every three or four months, i might flip one 
or more of the dials to off in order to allow 
for a more exaggerated silence.  radio
silence.  so that i may hear the “noises”
in my head (let’s call them thoughts),
which accumulate over time.  the 
white noises stopper them, keep 
them muffled for a duration until 
they become unmanageable.  this 
tactic works.  the noises in my
head almost never divert my 
focus.  with the white noise they 
dont distract.  this cacophony of 
various noises which can be separated 
into stacks, into types (i cant help but
do that if made aware of them)....
so, inevitably, this clamor fills my 
head to a point at which it must,
of course, be drained, swollen
as my head becomes.  my friends,
when i had any, found this telling.
maybe they understood my feelings
about intelligence. maybe not.
‘intelligence’ being brain build-up.
about smarts i feel strongly, strangely.
and this cacophonous assemblage
dulls whatever smarts i thought i
had, makes much more difficult the
very act of differentiating, of existing
in some sort of normalcy (at least one
that normal folks might suggest is so;
so much is relative, so normalcy, while
theoretically calculable, is difficult to pinpoint).
and so, once the switches have been
turned off, the excess noises semi-
identified, and at first put thematically together
to note for further evaluation at some distant
point, then to drain, then the three
fans and the air purifier, those mechanisms
that fill a tiny home consistently with inert
(untranslatable, indecipherable)
sounds, my precious white noise, this
motley crew of distraction is cut for enough 
time too smooth out the disturbing voices.  
and this internal chatter 
begins to slowly make its way 
down my insides.  it gets filtered, 
makes it through
my throat, my heart, 
all of my organs, until my 
more decipherable internal
clatter dissipates, evaporates, 
and finally extinguishes itself.
and when the voices make their ways individually 
down, by the time all of these distracting 
jumbled clumps reach my knees, i am free
of this cacophony, and each buzz-
whimpering thought is free of me. 
i flip the white noises back on. 
the hubbub of distracting voices 
can begin to accumulate once
again, without diverting
my focus, until
it is time to
drain and filter,
to cycle out these
“noises” once again.

defective