Poetry
The poems that follow are not complete; I’m yet to determine if an outpour as emotional as poetry can ever truly be completed. I don’t write in this form to inspire, I do it to understand myself and how life makes me feel. As such, the words below are edited frequently as I find their meaning in new ways. Poetry is a therapeutic process, one I have decided to begin sharing, not because I believe I have something important to say, but because I don’t know what it means to keep it all inside of me.
Searching for a mind in solid stone
The sediments pool into vessels
Of blood and ore.
The veins grab at cracking air,
Pulling it in for the thought.
My hands turn from one another and slide,
Gasping for connection,
Opening and hiding.
The rock has a texture like my skin,
Full of bones too sharp to buff away at.
They’ve all tried and so have I.
Each time I get here,
I’m stripped of my crew.
Their voices fall frozen,
Coating the back of my neck,
Parting my pores like needles,
Twisting condolences into blame.
Their collective shout without an echo,
Then it’s dark.
I want so terribly to embrace you,
To tell you that everything is going to be okay.
But how can I do that
When I don’t yet believe it and when
Your arms won’t move from where they stay.
The statue of my former self.
The hollow muse of a boy that once was.
The monumental creature of despair
Who I see in the mirror with longer hair.
What were you thinking?
The Necessary Disconnect
Poking rays through crystal blue haze,
The power they hold is just blinding.
The moonlight we crave
By mother’s frilled stave,
Passes fast and far past our green gaze.
The waves fall bowed down,
The glass homes shine proud.
The lantern swims by
Sat cradled in cloud.
I’ve outgrown my cave
That I’ve lied in and laid in.
I’ve been hiding with bears from
My borrowed reflection.
When I walk out the gape,
I’m pulled towards the sea,
As the creamy swirled cape
Tosses life beneath me.
Fragments of creation,
Debris of old adventures.
The loss of cool patience,
On the tail of crashed ruptures.
From the spoils and ruins,
Born is the steel.
I grieve the air I’ve grown in
And move on to what’s real.
Today is two years.
Tomorrow: a new age
With bright, live tears
Beside my broke cage.
The Middle
my timeline is coughing,
like a lung squeezing out.
it tries so hard to purge and throw
the infection that spreads
through my fibers like smoke.
it’s a battle i’m losing,
a slew of plugs i’m abusing,
a cycled sabotage i’m choosing,
yet i fight just the same.
somebody told me
the opposite of love is indifference.
i dig a hole around me
thinking there is a light to be found,
turn from myself each time
i pick up the shovel.
life is lived cheaply
if composed by quiet sounds,
the covering of his crime
only covers me in rubble.
the opposite of love is indifference
when a choice comes into view.
suddenly apathy and his jaded posse
scare me more than what’s true.
Wasted
fairies fly around
my head as it spins,
like a work of art
or a pile of shit.
i’m a careful cog
on a reckless wheel.
i’m a sunburnt slide
on a sordid reel.
if i’m what you want,
then you’re what i need.
grasp me by the neck,
drag me at your feet.
i won’t make a fuss,
i won’t kick or scream.
know how you like it
and i’ll be your dream.
a kiss of crisp air–
tossed through my window–
wakes me from a nap,
begs me to follow.
i know if i go,
i’ll lose my soft skin;
with one icy blow,
my bones will curl in.
Cold Feet
In my room
Tucked away,
I have a box of unmatched socks.
They sit there,
Crossed and still,
Long for halved wholes to fill.
I keep them,
Though I doubt,
Their stray twins will come about,
A reminder of the times
I would rather go without.
There’s a creature
In the corner.
He’s been clawing at my leg.
He asks me what I wait for;
I just know I have to stay
And keep searching without looking,
And keep praying til I believe.
Floorboards carry my weak weight
While I count what’s left to grieve.
Aural centricity,
Neural plasticity,
Core electricity,
Determine the flow,
As something frayed like the rain,
Puddled thin in refrain,
Feathers deeply outside of my window.
I should let the socks go,
Alone and wasting space.
I have pairs that I wear
That I cycle through the wash,
Coming out,
Bravely bare,
In a partnered love affair.
I keep the box around,
Barely pay it mind,
The forsaken have been crowned
As one of a kind.
I Have Words
i have words
so i guess i’ll use them,
to paint, to scrub, and to polish.
there is no closure:
it’s a spindle unspooled
bedding into the chasms of my brain.
i thought i could keep it wrapped up close,
where i can see it and feel it with my fingers.
but now i open my eyes
and all i see is rain
and the silvered satin ties
that stretch me despite my cries.
and yet somehow that feeling of pain
that chased me in circles for ages,
now lays by my side as a comfort.
i love him
and i should tell him.
but it’s a love he doesn’t share,
even when he says the words back to me.
though i hate to face the facts,
they’re better gone unspoken.
it’s a truth i’ve left unopened.
i have words
i keep in my head,
for if i use them,
I just might lose them.