What I wanted

What I wanted

Have you ever had a dream break your heart?

You were smiling when you were sleeping

Even though you knew

That was not the dream you should be dreaming

That dream should have been a nightmare

But lucidly you stayed there

Just so you could feel

Because it had been so long

It was just an ideal

Nothing that could ever be real

But the feeling though fleeting

Made you alive

When you awoke

You realized

The real world

Was a lie

And your attitude

On verisimilitude

Took a turn for the worst

Because while asleep

You thought your heart would burst

But awake it barely wants to beat

The biggest lie I ever told myself is

That this is not what I need

Simply

Because I thought I couldn’t have it

But now I crave it

Like Rapunzel

No happy ending

Antithesis

Antithesis

The population seems

To only have the capacity

To see two colors

Black and white

Good and evil

Right and wrong

This tunnel vision is necessary

Because those of us who know grey

Know that the world is a terrifying

Confusing ball of chaos

We are forced like slaves in hell

To make this world make sense

We buy insurance

We take vitamins

And we pretend we are safe

We monitor criminals

We pass judgment

And we lock undesirables away

We pretend that we are safe

We rely on religion

For a crutch or faith

Regardless it is our comfort

Our hope that all of this

Is not meaningless

We pretend we are immortal

We rely on science

We rely on results

But science is merely faith as well

Gravity is only a theory

And every minute we discover

How wrong we used to be

But be it health food, sweet angels, or test tubes

We all need a little light

But my light is grey

A chaos theory that comforts me

Knowing that nothing makes sense comforts me

One man’s terror is another’s serenity

What it comes down to is that

Light and dark are a matter of opinion

And it is your choice which you revel in

Unless you choose the grey

But be prepared for the world to spin

Out of control

Because seeing the grey is seeing the madness

There are only few that can handle it

But the universe would fall into disarray

If most did not choose between black and white

So what if you’re wrong?

What is you’re right?

A poem entitled These Hands

These Hands

 

We as artists have a bad habit

Not of thinking we can change the world

But of knowing it

And we are all searching for that little bit

Of immortality

Something that will long out live us

And come alive again

Every time

We enter the heart or mind

Of another

Whether we die in obscurity

Or in a fine mansion

Whether we are introverts

Or chasing celebrity

We are the same

This year has caused great insight in me

As hard as it has been

I have asked the question why

So many times

But never before have I asked what?

What matters?

What really matters to you?

And while these words are fine

And get me higher than I have ever been

It’s you

You who I love

And you who sees me for who I am

And manages to love me still

For every scar

For every scream

For every kindness

And every dream

You love me still

To thank you would be a disservice

As those words can never be enough

All I can offer in return

Is my own loyalty

My own love

My own promise

You know I have a knack

For breaking things

But I also have a talent

For picking up the pieces

So give me your heart

And as gently as I break it

I will heal it

You give me a chance

When no one else will

You breathe into me life

Even when I don’t want it

Your sacrifice does not

Go unnoticed

Let me leave you with this thought

I will carry you in every word I write

And I will hold you with these hands

These hands that change the world

The Process of Grieving

The Process of Grieving

D is for denial, but that was always more your bit than mine.

There is no letter for sleeping but never dreaming and only wasting time.

A is for anger, but I dropped that feeling long ago and yet I was never free.

For my anger burns but for you I have nothing but cold hatred that lives inside of me.

B is for bargaining and if I were to give anything of note

It would be every lesson you ever taught us shoved straight down your throat.

D is for depression and what an irony, long ago that gift was already given to me.

As you lashed out, I slashed myself and learned how to bleed.

A is for acceptance but if I were to tell the truth

It was long ago that I stopped grieving for you.

A poem entitled The Prelude Years

The Prelude Years

When you share another person’s childhood

And tumultuous teenage years

You see something rare and beautiful

That will never be seen again

Because there is a purity to those years

That will never recur

Before life has gotten to you

Before children and spouses

And other larger pursuits

Encompass your world

There is just you

And maybe a sibling or friend

To share nights

Of drinking too much coffee with

And only after eleven lattes

And a game of ball

Do you realize how unfortunate four a.m. is

I know four a.m. intimately

As I jealously realize you are asleep

Again

I hate you in that moment until

I take to your bookshelf and read

The tales you read yourself as a child

Nightmares and Dreamscapes

My old familiar friend

And so apropos for these strange times

When my nightmare is home

So I sleep on your floor

And the objects in my pocket

Take up room on your nightstand

I wonder as to what your nightmares are?

Are they made up of the way

That people look

When they underestimate you?

No, this is reality often enough

Why should is take up space in your sleep?

Or do your nightmares fade?

In comparison with your dreams

That you dream

With the imagination of a child

I cannot even begin to suspect

What that means for you

Not in a world

Where for my every nonsense

You have logic

And for my every dramatic tear

You have an answer

I see how we have grown up

And say things like

“Who would have thought?”

When the truth is

Me

I would have

It is no surprise to me or those who knew us

That you grew up to have children

And I remain the eternal child

A poem entitled Dark Inspiration

Dark Inspiration

Two a.m. is for writers

When the world sleeps

Our souls come alive

And we are forced under threat of anguish

To obey the demons inside

The ones with the silver tongues

That croon write, write, write

We are puppets on strings

And they laugh as

They make us dance

In the real world

Knowing that

We will always come back

Because there is nothing like the way these words feel

The highest of highs

They are silver in our veins

We take our injection with a smile

And grin at the pain

Some call it talent

We call it obsession

We ignore the world and commit

Unspeakable transgressions

Because the birth of words

Is an abomination in the form of a scream

It haunts our dreams

It lowers our self esteem

With each crumpled ball of paper

We are convinced we have failed

Upon the cross we hang

In our palms are nails

Yet it is worth it

For every page that we save

Every syllable that lets our heart beat

For each adjective we would gladly bleed

Writing is not art it is lunacy

It is the madness of staying hidden

Only to crave to be seen

So call to me demon and I will obey

Be it sickness or genius

I love my blood on this page

A poem entitled Tick Tick Tick

Tick Tick Tick

We speak of time

In prose, conversation, and rhyme

Yet we so often forget it is a valuable commodity

The clock ticks

Marking each moment until eternity

Some cruel cosmic joke that is linear

Leading itself into the realm of finite

Time, so benign

Until you find that it can bite

It keeps its secrets and keeps them well

And laughs at the plans that lead us to hell

Time is a construct we created ourselves

And now we are slaves to its power

As we count every minute and monitor every hour

It has become nothing more than a fact of life

We are rats in a maze searching for the prize

But in the end that prize is our demise

Time is a killer

Through eons, and seconds, it sets the snare

And we can’t resist

Willing we enter

Because it is there

It is unstoppable

It is inevitable

And our only defense

Is grace

To face the clock

Accept the ticking

And know that age

Is nothing more that the unwilling gift of time

Wisdom and grace

You can call it pointless

Our inevitable death

You can rebel against the heart that beats within time

But it will do you no good

Until you can face the hands of the clock and bend them to your will

Till you silence the ticking and feel the still

That comes to you when you have time to kill

And linear is nothing but a simple line, drawn in pencil

A creation that is an erasable line

.

A poem entitled The Whims of Trees

The Whims of Trees

 

The trees are bare

No colorful costumes of fall to adorn them

Yet in spring they begin again

An endless cycle of death and rebirth

Or so they would have us think

But we know nothing of the whims of trees

They are foliage to us

Barely living

Never thinking

Just another entity that we underestimate

I am a tree

Something for passersby to look at

Something for them to think

You poor fool

You don’t even know what they are looking at

Some think I scream for attention

When in truth I beg for the bark and leaves to protect me

But the trees they stay in place

And I travel the road to nowhere

Searching

For what?

Will I know what I find it?

Or does the road hold such allure

That I no longer care what I find

The street signs point to melancholy

And I follow

I follow

I follow

A poem entitled Solitude

Solitude

 

Fragile from years of listening

My voice has grown tired

Of telling the tales of trial and tribulation

I want to sit alone with solitude

And stare into its depths

I long to be beneath the brilliant night fall

Following the instinct for flight

I would dive into the stars

Lose myself in the abandon of the galaxy

To run my hands through moonlight

To fall asleep with sensation

Listening to the breath of an open window breeze

I need to taste the Technicolor rainbow

Of imagination on my lips

To escape the textures of reality

To descend into a deep indigo ocean

Of pure thought

Until there is only my solitary heart beat

A poem entitled Love is a Mental Illness

Love is a Mental Illness

It started out with mutual hatred

Misconceptions that lead to harsh words and avoidance

Years passed

And our understanding was that

It would last forever

The times our friends forced it

Was the only time that we ever spent together

Then something clicked and we began to speak

The meeting of our eyes sent chills through me

Even though you remained oblivious

Trapped in the clutches of insignificant others

Our shackles were affection that smothered

And passive aggressive manipulative tools

That kept you from me and me from you

Then we became royalty

Prince and Princess of Darkness

Suicide pacts were made

We just needed a wagon and the perfect day

But a freezing night

It lead to a first kiss

And windows covered in sleet

That moment changed me

Years later and I still kind of hate you

Even though no one else can make me laugh like you do

Sometimes love talks too much

Sometimes love doesn’t pay attention

And dare I mention

That there is no fight

Like the battle that descends like madness

Between two people unwilling to give in

Unwilling to give up

Sometimes I love you so much

I could smother you in your sleep

Sometimes love is unconcerned

That your mind is screaming

And your heart is burned

Only to be the salve

That you so desperately needed

And sometimes love is selfish

And you feel like you are alone

I am still working on the remedy

But just know that I see

And I adore you silently

So let’s live like college students

For no children will come

We will mock each other

And yell at the top of our lungs

When we are not even fighting

We will make mistakes

That we will regret

And the best of those haven’t happened yet

We will fail

We will forgive

Frustration is a given

Pain is how we know that we live

And that is what love is