| Tuesday, October 22, 2002 |
I happened upon this article about the publishing of excerpts from Kurt Cobain's journals. I think it's sad (I don't know if that word has the weight it needs, but it seems the best word--simple and heavy). Like many people my age, I found the news of Kurt Cobain's suicide sad and shocking though not altogether surprising. But I didn't feel sad in the same way I think a lot of people did. Not sad in the "he was such a young, talented artist who threw it all away -- who knows what he might've accomplished" way (though that is certainly sad, too) or in the selfish "now I'll never get to see/hear him play live" way. I was saddened by and for Cobain because of how much he must've been hurting.
Now, I'm not exactly a huge Nirvana fan, but I grew to appreciate their music a lot. And I'm not a dreary dreamer Sylvia Plath type who romanticizes suicide...but, when he died I felt compelled to write a poem about what happened. While I have to agree (in theory) that suicide is stupid and a senseless waste, I have a great amount of empathy for anyone who reaches that point of sorrow, loneliness, and desparation in heart and mind that ending it all becomes the only solution--the overwhelming thought and contemplation of every moment. That kind of despondence takes on a life of it own--blocking out everything else. At that point it's not about thinking or choosing--the urge to end the hurt becomes all-consuming and controlling. All other feelings become null and void. That small voice somewhere deep down inside saying, "Just hold one more day to see what happens--it could get better..." is drowned out until...bang! You become the late Kurt Cobain. I remember watching Nirvana play "Unplugged" on MTV and thinking how sad Cobain seemed. I just saw such all encompassing kind of sadness--it is still readable upon reviewings of the show. Now, as I read this article on MTV's website with the excerpts, I feel it again. Tempting as it was to read his words (maybe we're all searching for a little meaning, a clue, as to why his small inner voice stopped arguing for "one more day") and I did...I know it is voyeurism. An abuse of sorts--defiling the dead. Reading what was never meant for us. And so I close with the same words the article quotes from one of Cobain's journals... "The most violating thing I've felt this year is not the media exaggerations or the catty gossip, but the rape of my personal thoughts. Ripped out of pages from my stay in hospitals and airplane rides, hotel stays, etc. I feel compelled to say 'f--- you, F--- you' to those of you who have absolutely no regard for me as a person. You have raped me harder than you'll ever know." [ ] |
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