Wednesday, December 7, 2016

and also this one

This one requires some explanation: the words of the poem are written between and around many scattered solid black pieces on the page.

'Twixt these broken pieces my words run
And broken pieces are my words
They stutter here and there
And do not meet
Uneven rhyme and broken feet

found this poem whilst cleaning

Think you now to lock the door
Seal my fate to live once more?
This time you may have me caught
But I can wait, while you cannot

You think time will let me heal
But you just give more time to feel
The pain and sorrow don't go down
They rise, whilst in them now I drown

I don't want to cause a stir
Officer, don't save me, sir
Let me dive and drift and drown
One less stress to make you frown

Friday, November 25, 2016

Let Me Go

Let me go, let me go.
Those who love me,
Please let me go.

My heart is so heavy,
My heart is too full,
Please let me go.

You want me to live,
But it hurts too much.
Please let me go.

I don't want to hurt you
But I can't go on anymore.
Please let me go.

I cannot keep on being.
I'm so very sorry.
Please let me go.

Hey, You

There's a poem I like
It's called "Remember how we forgot?"
Only the title is relevant here

Remember how worried you were
Not even a week ago?
Remember how you forgot that?

I shouldn't complain
When what I expect
Happens
When I didn't want you
To worry, anyway

Do I have to start each day
By saying
"Hey I want to die"
For you to care?
Why don't you ever
Just ask?

One person asks.
One person worries
Because he asks
And I answer

I know this is selfish
I am selfish
I'm not the only one
With problems

I just want you to ask

But it's not like I
Didn't know this would happen
I knew it would
I counted on it
It's always happened before

I write "I'm closer to
Suicide than to living"
And everyone freaks out
But I write "I regret
Not stopping to buy a gun
To blow my brains out"
And it's crickets

I don't normally
Write poems at people
And at the moment
I'm not even sure
Who "you" are

But if you see this
Ask me how I'm doing

Love is never going to be the cure
But each love is
One more thing
To tie me here
Even when I hate those ties

It's easy to say
"I love you."
It's harder to listen to the answer
To "are you okay?"

Thursday, October 27, 2016

Oh Child

1. The first time your heart broke you were eight years old and you didn't know what was happening. Oh child, do you still believe your own hand wielded that sledgehammer?

2. When I see you, I have two thoughts: you are the strongest; you are the weakest. You are beaten down but parts of you remain unbroken and you hold your bloody head up with shameful pride.

3. If you're going to break, shatter the walls around your heart. Love is not the enemy for all that it keeps you here.

4. Maybe no one ever told you, but you're allowed to feel, even if all you feel is darkness and pain. No one told you you don't need fixing, perhaps; maybe all you need is those shattered walls, broken from the love hurled like explosives from those around you.

5. Oh child, let yourself feel.

My Apologies

- I'm sorry you had to take five seconds out of your day to read a Facebook post telling you I'm sad

- I'm sorry that made you sad for five whole seconds

- I'm sorry your fingers stutter on the keyboard because you don't know what to say when all you have to say is "I love you" but all you say is nothing

- I'm sorry I imagine belts and nooses, not kittens, when you say "hang in there"

- I'm sorry my accumulated years of pain became too much for you after a few months or less

- I'm sorry for not seeking help, for some reason I thought that's why I was talking to you

- I'm sorry I made you cry with that poem I wrote; I shed tears of a more sanguine hue while writing it, but sure let's talk about you

- I'm sorry your attempts to cheer me up make you feel like a failure

- I'm sorry for resisting your efforts to make me feel like a failure so you could feel better

- I'm sorry for working really hard to be my own genuine self, I am obviously doing it just to hurt you

- I'm sorry my presence makes you feel uncomfortable while I'm worrying I'll be shot this time as I attempt to pee

- I'm sorry I don't fit in your boxes, because after all all your other children grew up to become who you wanted them to be

- I'm sorry it hurts you when I want to die, your pain is obviously far more important than my own

- I'm sorry I unfollowed you on Facebook, I didn't realize you wanted me to pick fights on your posts full of vitriol and lies about people like me

- I'm sorry I keep talking to you; I've tried to stop but this thing called love or something keeps getting in the way

- I'm sorry I'm learning to be happy without Jesus

- I'm sorry you were wrong

To My Brain, You Asshole...Love, My Fingers

I wish I could do without you sometimes.
Without your dumb thoughts dropping pitter-patter from my tips in ink...and sometimes blood.
I wish I could turn you off and caress the keyboard only to slay fictional monsters and demons.

But only sometimes.

Because I know the words that bring tears and healing to others also come from you.
I know the darkness staining every inch of me some days is thanks to you.
I only move where you bid me and though so often what flows from me is pain I am grateful you give me the method to express that pain, whether that means picking up a pen or a marker or a scalpel.

Alternate Names for an Ex (Me)

1. Still on fire with no longer returned love

2. No longer rooted in past faith

3. Struggling to regain past brilliance

4. Boy with his breath still stolen by pain

5. More stable, and yet that razor's bite

6. Made in the likeness of the universe

7. Rejecter of summer's warmth

8. Still haunted by the spectre of other's beliefs

9. Needing only a spark to call back the darkness

10. A firework in the midst of exploding

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

I Should Have Stopped in Tennessee

Living is not hard.
It hurts
And it's exhausting
And I hate it
But it's not hard

On the other hand
Is that living?
Because I think
Maybe that's just
Breathing

I can breathe forever
I can eat
And sleep
And go through
All the motions
And my body will
Survive

But living?
Living involves things like
Peace
And purpose
And love
And hope
And at least one reason
To keep breathing

Dying is hard
Or maybe I haven't been
Trying hard enough

I drove through at least
Two different states
Last weekend
Where I could have
Walked right in
And purchased a firearm
I even had money, for once

But I didn't
Why didn't I
I regret not doing that

I have many bladed objects
And I'm sure I could stab
Myself to death
But I feel like a gun would be
A little easier
Take a little less effort
Be a little more sure

None of this nonsense
Where I might fail
Where I might just end up
Paralyzed, because I landed wrong
I was lucky to avoid that
Once already
I doubt I'd be so lucky again

If I had a gun
I could just put it to my head
And pull the trigger
And be done

That's all I want
I want to be done
I'm so tired
I can't do this
Why do I have to do this?

Breathing is not hard
I can breathe forever
But I'm so tired
Of not being alive

Monday, June 27, 2016

I'm Sorry I Assassinated Your Daughter

I'm sorry I assassinated your daughter
I'm sorry she had to die
I'm sorry her story had to end
Sometimes I wish I could give you your daughter back

I call it assassination because that's what it's called
When someone important is murdered
And I know she was important to you

I still remember the night she died
She had been dying for months
But I remember the final blow as if it was yesterday
She laid on the bed to sleep
But I was the only one who got up

I don't want to take your daughter's place, not exactly
I don't fit in that spot, I'm not daddy's little girl
She was never the clone mommy wanted
I can never fill the hole she left
But then, she never filled it that well either

I know that you still love her, oh so much
I know your faith calls for resurrection
But I assure you she's not coming back
All that's left is me, and I know I'm not enough
If I was enough, you would call me son
If I was enough, you would accept who I am
I didn't have a choice in how I was made, you know

I know I'll spend my life not measuring up to your dead daughter
And my life has a different trajectory
Than anything she would have known
But I keep living in hope that your love will transfer
And I keep being disappointed, yet still I hope

I know it's hard for you, that this strange man
Is wearing your dead daughter's face
But I'm doing my best to change it into my face
And I wonder, as I do, how long you'll call me by her name

I'm sorry I assassinated your daughter
I had to end her story
So that mine could begin

I'm sorry I assassinated your daughter
She had to die
So that I could live

Monday, June 20, 2016

Stutter

Words have always been my weapon
Oh yes
My power, my refuge...my prison
At times

Because I feel, oh so much I feel
And I am blessed, or cursed,
With the words to make you feel too

But sometimes words fail even me.
And I don't
I don't
I don't
I don't know what to say
Because I don't I don't I don't
I don't know what I'm feeling

But maybe if I try
If I put pen topaperandform 
L e t t e r s
Perhaps the words will follow

Because I need words
To tell me who I really am
To define emotions
To make them understandable
To make them bearable

The problem is that what I need
Doesn't yield to what is
And feelings don't yield to words
Nor words to feelings

And I die And I live and breathe and die again And break and shatter and fragment and who am I who am I Who am I what am I...

What are these
What are these tears
Sliding, dripping, squelching
Their salt-kissed way down my face
And off the tip of my nose
To land carelessly
On this green comforter that has known
Far too many tears for someone who
Doesn't. Cry.
And far too much blood

And oh I need blood
If I cannot have words
If they will not spill from my lips
Or drip from my pen
I must needs cut them out of my
Very skin
And yet and yet and yet
I must not.
Too much hinges on my supposed
Stability.

And yet I need...
I glance back at three pages
Just filled with words
But I have said nothing

I am not defined
I still feel
I am still full of
Incomprehensible 
Unbearable
Salt-kissed
tears

And I and I and I.
And I love
Oh how I love
And I will not stop
Have not stopped
Cannot stop
And it hurts
Oh it hurts
Because love is a fire
And I have spent more time
Being burned
Than being warmed

And I cannot cannot cannot
Feel this way
Where are my words
And why why why why why why

Have they deserted me?

Friday, May 13, 2016

Demons Run

Demons run
When a good man goes to war

Well then

Start running
I am going to war
I will fight

I will fight you,
Depression.
Even when you leave me
No weapons I can lift
I will fight tooth and nail
And claw and fucking
Blade, if that
Is what it takes

I will fight you,
Suicide.
I will live
And breathe
Yes, and learn
To do even more
You are the easiest
And the hardest
To fight
Because just being
Is a middle finger to you
But just being
Is so, so hard

But I will
I will fight
I will go to war

And
I
Will
Win

So start running