Watchmaker

It has come up again and again

In my list of strange phobias and fears

That I am terrified

Terrified

Of clockwork

There is this Steampunk notion

Of dirigibles in the sky

And Rube Goldberg mechanisms

That run living servants

That drives me to screaming delirium

It always brings to mind images for me

That doctors are liars

It is all special effects

We have no blood or beating hearts

We are filled with shining metal gears

We tick and whir and wind

As I thought about this

It occurred to me that perhaps

What I really fear is perfection

This idea that maybe God

Really is a watchmaker

In a very literal sense

And we are merely bits

Of tiny, working, perfection

My childhood was held together with

Twine and foolish optimism

And now the more I look around

I see that we try to sterilize the world

We bleach it white and perfect

We make it so

That nothing can besmirch what we believe in

That hurts me

Give me a dirty room

An unmade bed

Give me a wrinkled shirt

Show me illegible hand writing

And let me believe

That we are flawed

Let me know that the darkness

Has not been cleansed with antiseptic hand gel

I can’t stand the thought that my beautiful shades

Of grey would be turned

To something so ugly

As false white

If God is a watchmaker

If we are nothing but gears

Tell me that some of us run

A couple of seconds too quickly

Some of us are missing parts

And they cannot be replaced

With the newest factory model

First Heartbreak

Our first heartbreak is not our junior high crush

It is our parents

Our mentors

Our teachers

Those we hold high

Those placed on pedestals

Built from our hopes

I remember looking at my sister’s face

The day she sent me away

She couldn’t meet my eyes

And I thought

I have no one left to believe in

The hardest part

Was how human she looked

As she tried to keep her tears

From falling

The truth is that

Idols fail

They break

Sometimes they even have

The sheer gall to do something so terrible

As to die

To love a eidolon in a palace

Seems without risk

Until we see them fiddle

While the kingdom burns

But this realization allows

For us to see

That we

Who may also be worshipped

Are just as flawed

Each of us may live

To see ourselves become villains

And the love and worship

That we give and take

Never comes without risk

The pain of that broken pedestal

Is like no other

It scars in a way that reminds

That aches

It is the most difficult lesson we learn

About consequence

And the actions we take

Hero Worship

Life is often so ugly

So cruel

We tread sadly

With heavy footsteps

Hoping that

Perhaps

We will see a light

In the distance

With broken hearts

Barely beating

And eyes searching

We hope

We look for grace

We look for a savior

Sometimes one comes

A white night

On a powerful steed

But are we truly saved?

Being carried

Away to a gilded cage

Where we must play the victim

So the hero may triumph

Real heroism comes from

Within

It comes in a whisper

A moment when you realize that

You can take the next step

Not carried like a child

But putting one foot in front of the other

That is the triumph

That makes you the hero

Place your faith not in the savior

But in your own heart

Scarred but still beating

?

What if you were given the chance to have the answer?

Any answer

Would you take it?

What if you didn’t like it?

What if it wasn’t what you thought?

And you were faced with undeniable proof

That you were wrong

We build these straw men

Then we research

“Proof”

That agrees with what we think

Or destroys what goes against it

We don’t want answers

We want to be right

And even more than that desire

We want to do battle

We want others to be wrong

And to be punished for being so

Why are we so scared to take a chance

And say “I don’t know”

Why is the unknown more terrifying

Than dying

For a belief

A belief

An idea

A concept

We grasps at straws

Because with nothing to hold onto

We would drift away

Like milkweed in the wind

All we have is what we hold dear

Real or not

Proven or not

Belief

Take a risk

Listen

Question

And just for a moment

Imagine a world where we could all believe

Without the war that it wages between us

And that being wrong

Does not bring about inevitable destruction

If reality is perspective

Then anger is elective

And we have a choice

To see through a million eyes

To live in a million realms

And in each one

What is right

Is a question

Do you want the answer?

Measure

Life is like a standardized test

We compare scores

Success or failure

Is determined by a statistic

But we are more than just percentages

Yet we are all terrified

The fear of not being good enough

The pain of seeing others

Do things that we cannot

When did we become

Numbers

I learned long ago

That these standards

Do not apply to me

My definition of success

Has nothing to do with

What someone tells me it should be

Truth is triumph

I am excellent at failing

In that I take pride

I will not fill in the bubbles

I will not drink the kool aid

All I want is a silver moment

Where I am only myself

I have been weighed

I have been measured

I have been found wanting

And I smile

Knowing that

There is no power over me

In that judgment

Lessons

My parents did not give me many gifts

They did not instill in me morals

They taught me nothing

Except

To be selfish

To be a victim

But I am

And always have been

A rebel

So the way that they showed me

Was thrown away

They made me an outcast

Not just in my family

But everywhere

And it was the greatest lesson

I ever learned

The realization that

There was nothing wrong with me

But there are terrible things

Wrong with society

Was like a breath exhaled

That had been held for so long

Different

Freak

Loser

These are things I wore on my sleeve

With pride

Being the girl from

The wrong side of the tracks

The one who had rumors about her

Spread like wildfire

Made me laugh

I was the sober drug addict

I was the virgin that slept around

Very few knew the poet

Very few knew the compassionate heart

That I hid so well

Who would want to blend in?

Who would want to be told what they should be?

I don’t think outside the box

I live outside of it

Freedom is my greatest power

And it will be pried from my cold dead hands

So here is a line I will likely never say again

Thanks Mom and Dad

Your rapacious behavior

Taught me who not to be

And now I know who I am

Old Friend

Hello old friend

You’re here again

Not that you ever left

You wake me in the morning

You keep me up at night

Invisible

The caress that makes my skin crawl

There is no escape

That I can make

You are a cage

Rusty and damp

With hands that creep in

And touch the deepest part of me

And so few understand

That those hands

So ice cold

So burning

They squeeze

They twist

They break

My body and soul

And they will not be ignored

They feel glee

At my tears

They encourage depression

I laugh as people

Say that there

Is a lesson learned

All I have been taught is to suffer

Pills

Diagnosis

Frustration

Anger

No escape

Invisible

Pain

Hero Worhsip

Life is often so ugly

So cruel

We tread sadly

With heavy footsteps

Hoping that

Perhaps

We will see a light

In the distance

With broken hearts

Barely beating

And eyes searching

We hope

We look for grace

We look for a savior

Sometimes one comes

A white night

On a powerful steed

But are we truly saved?

Being carried

Away to a gilded cage

Where we must play the victim

So the hero may triumph

Real heroism comes from

Within

It comes in a whisper

A moment when you realize that

You can take the next step

Not carried like a child

But putting one foot in front of the other

That is the triumph

That makes you the hero

Place your faith not in the savior

But in your own heart

Scarred but still beating