A sample of How to Laugh in Ironic Amusement During Your Existential Crisis
How to Laugh in Ironic Amusement During Your Existential Crisis
Poems + Memes
James McCrae
Thought Catalog Books — New York • Los Angeles
Copyright © 2021 James McCrae. All rights reserved.
Published by Thought Catalog Books, an imprint of the digital magazine Thought Catalog, which is owned and operated by The Thought & Expression Company LLC, an independent media organization based in Brooklyn, New York and Los Angeles, California.
This book was produced by Chris Lavergne and Noelle Beams. Designed by KJ Parish. Special thanks to Brianna Wiest for creative editorial direction and Isidoros Karamitopoulos for circulation management.
Visit us at thoughtcatalog.com and shopcatalog.com.
Made in the United States of America.
ISBN 978-1-949759-40-2
All poems and art created between late 2019 and early 2021 in New York City, Los Angeles, Austin, and Mexico.
“While looking for the light you may suddenly be devoured by the darkness and find the true light.”
— Jack Kerouac
All Too Human
I woke up inside a human body and now I can’t remember who I’m supposed to be.
*checks ID*
I have a name, a social security number, an occupation, a bank account, but it feels like I’m forgetting something. For example, how did I get here? And why am I currently crying on the floor in a state of subtle terror?
My human avatar is nice enough. The fractal high-fidelity biological craftsmanship shows impressive signs of higher intelligence. So why do I feel the nagging need to rip off my skin and merge with the great mirage?
Some god or advanced AI hiding behind the simulation curtain must certainly have a sense of humor.
Am I stuck inside a cage? Or is this seemingly stable 3D stage merely a shadow artifact cast by the light of higher mind?
*scans hyperspace for an answer: none found*
What sort of unsupervised science experiment is this? I demand to speak to the manager. Or the aliens.
Maybe I slipped and fell into the wrong dimension.
Can I outsource my thoughts? My brain only gets me into trouble. Maybe I should start microdosing mushrooms. Or get a life coach. Or a lobotomy. The more answers I seek the more questions I find.
How strange it is to be anything at all.
I could have sworn there was something important I’m supposed to be doing, but now it escapes me. The meaning of life is a hard mantra to memorize.
Did my soul incarnate on a sacred mission or am I trapped inside the spinning wheel of karma? Am I part of the inside joke or am I the punchline? Either way I’m not getting the joke. Maybe I need a better sense of humor.
Oh well. I guess I’ll sit down in the sunlight and enjoy the sensation of breath in my lungs and grass between my toes, here on this living planet, halfway between the jungle and the stars.
First figure: “I feel strange.”
Second figure: “You’re standing on a spinning rock in outer space for a fleeting moment before your body dissipates into the ether. Literally what is normal?”
The homesick
alien in me
recognizes
the homesick
alien in you.
Open
What I want is to open up,
to merge my body
with the energy vortex around me,
to clean my subconscious closet
and burn the clutter in ritual,
to open my vocal chords
and hear the universe expanding,
to inject my veins with sunlight
and bask in my aura’s glow,
to become my breath
and exhale myself into Times Square
and wait for strangers to inhale,
to hallucinate the story of myself
until I open my eyes
and realize I was dreaming,
to dissolve
into particles of awareness
and wake up inside a womb.