It's simple to you

It's not for me

I'm sorry that that's an issue

We gather again tonight
Friends coming together
Enjoying the one hobby we all share.




So why do I feel dread?

A thousand things you'd never do
Have become the thousand things you're doing.

But I get it.

She means more to you than I do.
More than I ever did.
Because to you she's a woman.
And that's the one thing I'll never be to you.

A glare bores into the back of my skull,
I can feel it when I look away.
It exudes more pressure each night and day
And leaves my nerves too full.

Whenceforth does it spring from?
This gaze that drills deep into me?
Why must it lie where I cannot see,
Intent on making me numb?

I'm left adrift in an auburn sky,
Horizons choked black by dust and ash,
Flung up by frustrations and actions too brash,
And ever-longing wishes to die.

And all progress crashes down.
Despite everything I've worked at,
I'm beating myself up again.
Maybe I just like the pain?
Every effort of progress falls flat,
Every day a chance to be faulted for a frown.

I could write of cheer, happiness and joy,
About a victorious game, or a brand new toy,
But to do so would be to lie.

I could write of the depths of misery,
Once again venture to that deep, grey sea,
But to do so would be to lie.

Today
Was just a day
And for once, that's not so bad.

By my own will, I am undone,
This truth I cannot deny.
Sins that I cannot condone
Run rife in me as I continue to cry
About ev'ry misstep I've taken
In this life I've long since forsaken.

Dreams of love, success, and joy,
All these things are nothing now.
As fate befell the walls of Troy,
So too am I laid low.
Though now I can hardly see your face,
I pray you take me to your warm embrace.

Away from the troubles of this world I see,
Where the wishes of the poets and dreamers
Are trampled underfoot of wishes to be free
Of the sycophants and their schemers,
Take me where my troubles seem large,
And hold me there, let me recharge.

Then, finally, when all is light,
When my body feels akin to a feather,
Take me away on your sunset flight
To a land I need not weather.
Hold my head close to your chest,
And praise me for trying my best.

You look the same as you always have.

So why does my heart beat so fast?

I thought myself stronger.

But none can be.

Love.

It
Truly
Is
Stronger
Than
Every

Single


One



Of

­


Us

A fictional home,
In a fictional town,
Walls and fences made of data,
Without any tangible meaning.

Yet it's here it happens
Without fail, every time,
My eyes fall on the mat on the floor,
And they grow misty with tears.

Faulted over and over
For making a personal sacrifice
What, exactly, turns your glare so dark?
Do you see an insult or a takeover?
Or do you think this is some meaningless vice,
Just the beginning of an inferno's first spark?

Neither of us is happy here.
What part of that is unclear?

A pit far deeper than I know
Is all I care to measure now.
Am I destined to mourn so?
Too many things I choose to disavow.
Yet, I'm fully aware of this.
Why must I embrace this abyss?

Sometimes my words flow easily and free
Yet this past week I've been stunted and vapid.
I find myself disappointed in me,
Wishing for a recovery too rapid.

My words have been small, I'll admit that
But they're all still words that I mean.
Even if my poetry is flat,
I hope my heart can be seen.

Is it wrong?
My identity?
Love cannot exist in guilt,
I know how I'm seen;
I'm not that.

I can see through time

This should make me fear
Yet absolutely nothing
Is all I can feel.

Even amongst friends
I just cannot stop shaking;
The sky, it is dark.

To me, a weakness,
But time continues forward.
Fear, forevermore.

She always felt too many things,
For anyone else and herself.
A good deed's a reward in of itself,
Yet she drowns in the pain it brings.

How long can this heart keep beating;
It's valves clogged with webbing and dust?
Doses of envy, gluttony, and lust,
They dig deep within; they sting.

A moment's joy is stolen away,
Any hope of love long since forgotten,
Her soul overgrown, gnarled and rotten.
It's within silence she chooses to stay.

Feelings renege by living causality;
A defence against feeling too much.
Those desires for contentedness, joy, and such,
Could only make way for apathy.

A smile can never survive
It's own self-awareness.

Bright colours fade over time.

Time is long behind me.

A simple task.
A thousand repetitions.
I know it like the back of my hand.
Perhaps that's why it's a comfort.
Again and again,
Assurance that I know one thing.
Unscrewing, rescrewing,
My yellow wire to keep me grounded.

All my screwdrivers are insulated.

A sheet upon a sheet with a thousand more,
Clogging up spaces and fields galore,
Sealed together by blood and disease,
Yet scattered and thrown by a gentle breeze.
These remnants are a danger.
To myself, my family, any stranger,
So they'll be disposed away.
Yet frequency means the stack will stay.

A toxic miasma
An infection in my blood's plasma
It obscures my mind from view
Impossible to push thoughts through
But my poetry will persevere
I don't care for caution against severe
Repercussions for forcing myself to think.
I will not allow my art to sink.

Oh ****

And Lost Nothing For It

I Have To Say

I Feel a Bit ****.

Esoteric rants about meaningless interests,
Taken from too far within to be ignored by
Every person I've pushed my words onto, have
Reared themselves into yet another group.
Nobody can be forced to speak, or should,
And yet I'm casting a line again and again,
Learning slowly that I never learned to talk.

I've looked back over the last month or two.
Read everything I thought to put down.
Sometimes I hype too much about the little stuff,
Or go into too much detail about things being rough
And the metaphors? I really went to town.
But reading it all, I bore a smile too.

Because I can see me getting better.

A frayed tendril of pathetic string,
Run taught above my head.
A blade of dismay, terror, fear;
Standing in perfect contrast to everything I want to be.

'Tis nought more than a fickle thing,
Not a feeling to be felt or a word to be said,
Yet it continues to hinder me here.
It's the waiting doom that awaits all goodwill I'd set free.

A twang of snapped twine,
Again and again and again and again,
It all falls down yet remains in place;
Tying up it's own phantom madness to strike deep within me.

Unpredictable, I was feeling fine,
'Till the blade deemed to split me in twain,
And once again tears stream down my face.
Drowning in a selfish torrent of fog through which I cannot see.

I wish I could see you all,
And learn everything you've done
Since I burned every bridge available to me.

I was young, foolish, too blind to see
How much I could ever miss everyone.
My path of progress was a long fall.

Perhaps I'll reach out again, one final time;
Though the river is wide and I cannot swim,
To reopen doors, it's worth the risk.

The cold shoulder I turned was far too brisk,
I was a fool to cast out life on a whim;
Alone, reaching new light is a long, steep climb.

But now, as I write my way through feelings,
I begin to second-guess my hopes for contact.
Why would any of them want to hear from me?

Perhaps I should set my anxieties free,
Accept these desires as far too abstract
To ever hope to work in real-world dealings.

A compromise, then, I can do that much.
Reveal my face for those who'd seek to look.
And stand by waiting for new bridges built.

If not, then I'll just carry my guilt,
And return my pain to that ancient sketchbook
That I filled with regrets and sins and such,

And then I'll keep moving, down a path yet unknown,
Leave my pages of pain behind for those who care;
I no longer do, I prefer my positive side.

Every mile or so, I'll lament bonds that died,
But I won't retreat to my old, barren stare;
My bitter past is but a crown of thorns,
And the future ahead is my throne.

A thousand thousand voices clambering for attention,
That drown out every thought within my silence,
Forcing me into a corner of pain and apprehension,
Lest I lose control and act in violence.

I want no part in causing you pain,
But my o'ertightened grip is slacking,
As I push rationality through migraine
Yet find myself completely lacking.

The constant noise.
It hurts.
Never-ending noise.
Always hurts.

Around and around I relive this life
Sometimes as your best friend,
More often as your wife,
And we cycle round without end.

Around and around I climb that hill,
Where I first found you lost, afraid, and alone,
Cradling the empty heart I intend to fill
With joy and acceptance as you have my own.

Around and around you move on again,
To live beyond the world I can see through my screen,
But I won't let your absence cause me pain;
I'll see you again through this computing machine.

A cool number
Lots of opportunity
But I'm trying to write positively right now
And it's 1am
and I have nothing.

64 Zoo Lane is playing on repeat in my head.

Overdesign can **** a dream;
It's tearing my plot straight down the seam.
But it's okay to take a step back.
Maybe it is just focus I lack,
But I have more ideas.

And it's okay to work on something different.

You stand there, in front of us all,
Proud to be exactly who you are.
You never seem afraid of the fall
From such heights above me so far;
A horizon stretches out afore us both,
But there's only one hand reaching for it.
You've one in the hand of a romantic oath,
And I've tied mine away, deemed unfit
To ever hold another so close.
You open to a full sprint, chasing the sky,
Leaving me with the path I chose;
I never had that strength to fly so high.

Upon friendship's fields
A moment of ridicule
Makes my life worthwhile

Misery breaks for apathy,
As dwindling strings fray to nothing.
I sit, motionless, encouraging atrophy,
The desire o'ergrowing for an ending.
Twenty three long years amount to nought,
A botched birthing the height of success,
Even to the eye of astronomers who sought
To catalogue ev'ry star despite any duress
Have long since stopped scouring the sky;
My light was fading too long ago.
Opportunity is there, albeit twice shy,
But there's simply no interest to follow.
My life has been one of selfishness, sin,
Now isolation comes baring its toll.
That lifeforce that balanced on a rusted pin
Has resigned itself to topple and fall.

It's a lot of words to say one thing,
Empty drivel of a life unlived through,
But to shout the truth till I hear angels sing?
That's the one act I simply could never do.

"You don't need to worry so much"
Yeah I'm aware of that. That'll really calm me down.
I'm happy you rebooked that overdue meeting for me.
The panic of waiting was getting bad.
I haven't had an attack that bad in months.
But really.
******* Stephen.

There's a girl in my mirror
And she cares about me.
Far more than I ever did myself.

Her eyes are as blue as the purest river,
And the light inside dances ever free.
She's happy, without love or wealth.

Her smile is as bright as a starlit sky,
She's beautiful, because she's happy,
Far happier than I've been myself.

And she's reaching a hand out, a little shy,
She wants me to take it and finally see,
That our happiness comes from ourself.

Because that girl in the mirror is me.

If only I could comfort you,
And be a shoulder to cry on.
If only I could be there for you,
And be a warmth you can rely on.
If only I could brighten the sky for you,
And become something you can depend on.

Alas, I cannot,
Seems I only know how to make it worse;
I simply cannot
Understand why you choose to keep this curse.

As long as I've breath in my lung,
I'll continue putting this pen to page.
Until my final word is sung,
I'll break down my metaphorical cage.

Even if it's small right now.
It'll keep me grounded.

I know not how to justify
Any concern my own life brings me.
Nothing I'm living through
Can top the horror that awaits.
I wished we were better than this

I crave that touch, akin to ice,
Prickling skin to skin, yours against mine,
The wind threatening to entice
As it blows past my hairline;

It carries your voice like an echo,
Akin more to souls upon the hills
Than this ghost that makes my heart beat so,
Compelling me to strengthen my wills.

But the dead must stay dead
And I cannot restore the soul I've shed

It's all I'll ever be;
The hairs I missed and the blood I drew,
It's the truth I wish I couldn't see.
It's pain to be replaced with pain anew,
An endless cycle, a nightmare,
Living as this creature, this mutt,
Consistently choking on rancid air,
Throttled in hemp I can't cut;
This hell will never end.

If I could choose to rewind time
I wouldn't fix a mistake or crime.
I'd spin one day around and know,
I need ne'er again fear tomorrow

Oh, tim'rous beastie
This wind is too much for me
Do not fly away

The mirror reflects a life eternal,
A thousand scars entirely internal,
Mortal instants of existence persist
In entrapping souls that cannot resist
The pull of the desecrated altar
Upon which the faithful can only falter
And fail to live a life that has an end.
And so they pretend.
They pretend and play at mortality
As if they were more than an abnormality
Of an unending perception of time,
Trapped in a moment, or a rhyme,
They continue to temper their voice,
As if speaking it was ever their choice.

Perhaps I could solve all this,
These problems we're drowning under.
People around me are faking bliss,
As if their worries don't tear them asunder.
But it has to weigh on them too.
I'm not the only one gasping for air.
They've strength to put on a brave face, and do
Everything they can to survive a life unfair,
Maybe I could too, had I that drive,
The flame within to see my hopes flowered
Into something that makes me proud to be alive,
Or maybe, I could finally be a coward.

I had a poem ready, a light-hearted ode
To identities I'd rather have,
And lives I'd like to live.
But in hindsight seems insensitive,
Simple references to machines of war,
Turn from what was implied.
Because the inference is the key
And right now such things are taboo,
Not from some self-important sense of justice,
but because of the nightmares we're about to live through.
I can only pray;
Wishing this isn't what we are.

An infestation
Roaches defy purity
Yet it continues

I can think of nought with more power
Than that which can convey so much.
There's beauty and simplicity to a flower,
So too in horizons, and seas, and such.
Yet it's language that hits me here,
And brings endless tears to my eyes;
They can convey such joy, rage, fear,
Emotions that I used to despise.
Yet I've learned to appreciate what's afore me.
Love has a power I can't begin to see.

Yet I can't feel a solitary **** thing

I can still recall how my heart sped up so,
Yet the image of such surprises me.
Am I still capable of love? I don't know.
My eyes have been open so long, they can't see.

I've gone back and reread them,
Those words I wrote for you.
It was from this heart they did stem,
Yet to me now, it all seems untrue.

I remember that I remember loving you,
But in the years gone by my love has dried.
What would that I could choose to imbue
Another soul with what has since died.

But I can't remember how to love.
I can't be certain I can still love.