Rest Easy

Enter Groucho Violent,
star of the nerves and streets,
a double threat if there ever was one.

His reputation precedes him as witty enough to turn a phrase and hard-knuckled enough to know when to admit defeat in the face of a petulant and pernicious foe who, in all likelihood, believes that their position of power has been handed down to them from the LORD ALMIGHTY, and any little rivulet of diarrhea that escapes their corpulence is to be rendered an earth-shattering development in the field of extrapersonal material management, now and forevermore.

Groucho is no stranger to the justice-enforcement arm of things. When his even-keel demeanor and righteous self-taught martial arts techniques combined on one fateful and blustery Flag Day eve, the Justice Jab was born. If you’re still unfamiliar with the singlemost effective crimefighting maneuver ever concocted by man or beast (in Mr. Violent’s last-ditch effort to uncover the overall reason as to our lack of humility when confronted with reasoning), you have some real catching up to do.

The Justice Jab is a miracle worker when the recipient of said jab needs to be awoken from the haze that they’ve come to accept over time, through sheer laziness and self-disrespect. The haze’s effect causes but is not limited to: depression, sluggishness, flatulence, lack of interest in things one would normally enjoy, unjustified sporadic agitation, and death. Such a disconcerting malady comes as a direct byproduct of this world we’ve inherited (through no fault of our own). Rather than face the music, the vast majority of we, the privileged few, have chosen to consume the content created specifically to manipulate our emotional and physical dependencies more efficiently and cheaply than cocaine ever could.

So the next time you see Groucho Violent
meting out swift street vengeance,
you can rest easy
knowing that he’s doing humanity a service.

Advertisement

Decade 1: Commence Year 10/10!

9 years are officially in the books, and year 10 has now begun!

While 9 years doesn’t constitute a full decade, it does indicate to me that I’ve been persisting at this thing for a little while now, and I should use year 10 as the renaissance year, so to speak.

In a nutshell, it’s been a wild ride through my 20s. I’m grateful that I’ve been able to chart my growth on WHARVED. Here’s a breakdown of the most relevant personal highlights!

——

Year 1 (12/20/10 – 12/19/11) — blog establishment / major quarter-life crisis / discovery of WHARVED’s power to inspire me and help me recognize the value of my expression

Year 2 (12/20/11 – 12/19/12) — completion of undergrad (with only one hiccup, due in large part to WHARVED’s stabilizing influence) / first job out of school

Year 3 (12/20/12 – 12/19/13) — first job transition and subsequent disillusionment with the system / begin restaurant industry experience

Year 4 (12/20/13 – 12/19/14) — death of family dog / leaving the nest

Year 5 (12/20/14 – 12/19/15) — complacency and unawareness lead to regrettable circumstances, true fear and remorse ingrained in psyche for first time / bipolar 1 diagnosed

Year 6 (12/20/15 – 12/19/16) — much upheaval / beginning of 108-poem numbered series / Cubs win World Series (!!!!!!!!)

Year 7 (12/20/16 – 12/19/17) — completion of 108-poem numbered series / accepting fate of who I am only after trying to get too cute about it / move out of first apartment / NEW ERA marked consciously / Straitjacket Series conceived

Year 8 (12/20/17 – 12/19/18) — Straitjacket Series terminus / financial ruination and regret / learning daily feeling of toil in earnest / new idea EXPLOSION as genuine life is easier to access

Year 9 (12/20/18 – 12/19/19) — Continuing with genuine living and explosion of ideas / transitioning to exploiting skills and affinities for financial gain, as profiting is now imperative / 10,000 views!!

EXTRAPOLATION!

Year 10 (12/20/19 – 12/19/20) — Hindsight is 20/20, BUT if trends continue, year 10 will constitute a combination of the renewed idea explosion with a bit more of an organizational acumen (due to necessity, mainly). This will also be the year in which I turn 30, an age that I’ve heard is significant. One pledge I’ll make to myself, as I find myself looking over this chronology, is to take it all one day at a time. Just try to make an effort of some kind; you don’t have to do everything in one day, and you certainly don’t want to go about trying to reinvent the wheel.
Commencing year 10 means that I have 9 full years under my belt, and I can honestly say that I’ve continued the same thread of artistic exploration for this entire duration. There are dips and dives in productivity, but I always gravitate back toward WHARVED as my anchor in choppy waters. I tend to feel that I’ve strayed away from my truest self when I don’t focus on my WHARVED output, and it’s been made obvious in my personal history that I need this particular outlet for expression.

I also hope to have my 5,000th distinct visitor to WHARVED this year, which would be quite a milestone for a minimalist poetry blog in the 21st century.

As of this very moment, I have 1,145 posts labeled “poetry” on WHARVED (drafted and/or published), for a yearly average just above 127. Not too shabby, I says to myself [I says]. I expect to have at least the same amount of output, so as to continue the marvelous trend of exploration and continuous growth.

I’m forever thankful to you, the reader, for being party to my compositional and philosophical ramblings here. I’m only going to work to make even more things for you guys to enjoy, and perhaps on a more consistent basis (how many times have I said that?)!!

So let’s all raise a glass and have a toast for WHARVED!

Cheers, people!

-Aidan

%d bloggers like this: