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K David Mitchell Feb 2012
What shall it be this time, m'lady?
Another turn upon the rack?
Tie me to four horses?
Lay stones upon my chest?
I can see your king wickedly
smiling as I gasp for air.
With each bark of laughter
he lunges for you and begins
to plant drunken kisses all
over your sweet, perfumed body.
And I am forced to watch.
Is that not torture in itself?
Ask yourself if the punishment
actually fits the crime.
I made the wrong decision, my queen.
I forsook your beauty for a
***** barmaid's.
By your tears, I know you feel
my great wound just as much.
So as the headsman places
the great singing axe upon the
base of my neck, where I often
dreamed of you kissing me
so tenderly, I want you to
know that I will always--
K David Mitchell Dec 2012
All these feelings, heavy as lead,
Come back like bullets to the head.
K David Mitchell Sep 2013
For you, it's easy.
Bat your eyes and you can have your pick of anyone.
But for me? Not so easy.
What I have I no longer flaunt.
Now, I show it to the people who I love more than anything.
I gave it up for you, if you care to recall.
What made me unique, what brought me to you in the first place.
I actually gave it all up for you.
You can say that I still have my smarts, my brain.
But no one falls in love with intellect anymore.
How shallow we've all become.
It's just another "pro" on the list of whether
or not you should maybe **** him,
and then be done with him.
Now I sit here with an old man's regrets,
wistfully thinking about the glory days,
when I am no more than nineteen years old.
From time to time, I wonder why.
Why did I ever do that for you?
I will pick up the broken pieces of what was
once my soul's joy, and I will become whole again.
I will become unique, and valued, and loved,
by someone, anyone, other than you.
Sure, you might see me in my return to happiness,
but, let's be honest, you probably won't.
You'll be too busy,
batting your eyes
at everyone
but me.
K David Mitchell Jan 2014
at 4 AM you’d think the monsters would be sated
having preyed on all the other sleepless souls
but still they come pounding on my door
they have found me
or what is left of me
and they are shouting for my blood
for what else do i have to offer but that
she took every part of me
that was worth something
thank god i still have my blood
maybe now
they will leave me alone
K David Mitchell Jan 2014
an unbearable icy wind is plowing
down the darkened city streets
i pull my coat tight around my neck
and fumble for my lighter
for some reason i think the embers
smoldering at the end of a coffin nail
will keep my body warm
my hand doesn’t seem to mind being
chilled to the bone because now
i seem to live only in those spasms
of fire and giddiness in hope
of being brought to the edge
and having the courage or the stupidity
to jump off
but all the streetlights jeer at me
flickering as i stumble homeward
and i cannot help but feel that i too
am slowly being burned
around the edges
K David Mitchell Apr 2014
what is it about love
that makes a man psychotic
and fills his eyes with darkness
and endless hunger
as if a demon has come
and taken hold of his soul
to bend his mind toward
things he would not dare think
they say that time
the great conniving thief
takes everything away in the end
but the only way love can decay
is when the last drop of blood
leaves our cold bodies
i wish i could tear off my skin
and have it over and done with
but i must bear this madness
though it breaks my very bones
and rots me from the inside
i must tame this demon
though it would see me bent
and bowed and broken
this is a war that cannot be won
by exorcism or by force
it is a war that is fought slowly
each day a new battle
until the very last day
and they put me cold in the ground
i just hope when that day comes
she doesn't show up
at my funeral
K David Mitchell Apr 2014
there are these moments
these moments of pure delirium
that happen as you wake from a dream
when everything around you
seems like its alien
as if its all still part of the fantasy
and you are bewildered
right up until the alarm sounds
directly in your ******* ear
and shatters the illusion
but insomnia is what happens
when you just cant sleep
you are not allowed to dream
or to have peace from the insane
quibbling of the thoughts
that have miniature wars
inside your head
this is when delirium becomes reality
when you can no longer
distinguish imagination from truth
you are a slave to a perpetual
waking nightmare from which
you cant escape
i am a zombie now
i am delirium itself
i feel like i am watching myself
like my life is some ****** sitcom on TV
and i all i want to do is change the channel
but i cant
i just wish i could fast forward
to the part where i finally
find peace
K David Mitchell Jul 2014
i really did love you
thats why i let you into that
dark wet spot inside of my chest
and thats why i let you
choke my veins and arteries
until the lack of oxygen
left nothing but a dizzying
imprint of your face
burned into my brain
should you ask me now
(not that you would ask,
pride was always your
gravest sin)
i would tell you that you
were like a drug to me
and like most drugs
the crash was a nightmare
i have detoxed every part of me
that you poisoned
and the imprint you left on me
is nothing more than a scar now
an ugly reminder of the final
bullet you put through my skull
should you ask me now
it would surprise even me
just how much we
never happened
K David Mitchell Feb 2014
the road seemed to stretch to infinity
as i squinted to brace my eyes against
the falling snow which stung my cheeks like needles
it was a graveyard of bicycles and cigarette butts
and for a fleeting moment i saw a discarded
bouquet of red roses rolling down the street
petals began to peel away in the bottomlessly angry wind
joining the eddies of swirling flakes and being tossed
into the air in a dance of such sadness and beauty
these are the nights i will remember
the cold nights of bitter walks deep into the urban tundra
the endless nights i spend searching for an answer to my call
which seems to freeze in my throat before it leaves my lips
the nights of hoping that someone has superhuman hearing
and wants to find me and read between the lines
where there is enough space to draw me a map towards home
i only wish it were as simple as falling apart
and being picked up by the wind
K David Mitchell Jan 2014
it seems so hard tonight
to let my blood drip onto the page
words turn to ash in my mouth
and i am left with nothing
but the sickly taste of tobacco
and a bitter pill to swallow
the walls of this tiny room seem
like they are closing in as fast
as the madness that guides
me through each dark night of the soul
i am surrounded by the bottles
that sing the songs of all my failures
and if i listen closely
i can hear the taxis buzzing by
the taxis that cart off one-night stands
and lonely hearts and drunken fools
and fools for love and the ones
who were much too late to the party
or too sober to enjoy it
but still i envy them
i feel old
as if the pages to my story
have been written already
and the cover says nothing except
he tried
K David Mitchell May 2014
i used to marvel
at the palpable love
between two souls
who were rooted
in each other
but that wonder
has been replaced
by sickness
**** it all
i will say it here and now
for myself and all
those who cannot
admit it themselves
i am deeply ill
and nothing short
of salvation can mend
my shattered spirit
i am adrift in open water
waiting for you to
throw the life preserver
but i know you have
already promised
redemption for another
so it is here i will float
until my body cannot
take the beating from
the waves any longer
or until the cold
saps all my strength
and i sink mercilessly
into the jaws of the deep
having the ocean
eat my bones
sounds better than
leaving them
to be worn slowly away
by hope
K David Mitchell Aug 2013
I.

There is a sadness that I know,
a deep, crippling sadness that makes me freeze
in my tracks, as though the devil, smiling, were before me.
There is a girl that I know,
who I definitely don't deserve,
but I think about her every day of my life.
Once upon a time, she was mine,
and I was hers, and life was full of love.
That desperate kind of love.
That beautifully desperate kind of love.
Maybe it was because I was too young to die
and too scared to live. Maybe I was afraid that at the end
of the drive I was going to be kicked curbside,
abandoned at the corner of "How could you?" and "I still love you,"
just like the last time my life was full of love.
So maybe I did it before she could do it to me.
Maybe I felt the distance growing palpably between us.
The letters filled with X's and O's and clever sign-off's had stopped.
The small tokens of love which I had never been kind enough to return,
had stopped.
Maybe I was afraid that we had suddenly skipped fifty years,
with nothing to talk about but the fact
that I had grown tiresome, boring,
and had become someone that was just tolerable.
I left her. Anger in my heart, tears in my eyes,
I left her. I don't think that I wholeheartedly wanted to, but I did it.
I sat on the ******* winning lotto ticket, and I threw it to the streets.

II.

To this day, I want to kick the **** out of that scared little ****
who sat there, watching her weep and make the sounds that still
curdle my blood when I think about them.
And I do remember them, so vividly.
Because how could anyone forget the day that they crushed someone's soul?
When I went back to find that winning ticket I had
so carelessly thrown away, the numbers had faded.
The ink had run from all the raindrops, all those heavenly tears,
that had fallen on it.
Irredeemable.
An ocean of my grief would not be enough to express how sorry I am.
She's gone now.
Thousands and thousands of miles away.
Now all I can think about are things that poison my blood,
that make me ******* fall to my knees in pain.
Who might be kissing her.
Who might be sharing her bed.
Who might wake up next to her in the morning.
Who might treat her like the beautiful angel that she is.
Who might love her like she is magic,
because I know,
I ******* know that she is.

III.**

All that I'm left with now is a sickening, maddening hope that
when she returns, we might try to light the fire again.
I love her too much to let go.
When she graces me with her smile, I feel as though I might
weep out of joy.
My soul dances to the rhythm of her laugh.
Though her eyes are the color of the sea in the middle of a storm,
there is so much warmth behind them.
I would lay myself down in front of the fire of our love forevermore,
if she would only let me.
Lord knows I don't deserve her,
Lord knows that I am irredeemable,
but I just don't think I can last much longer without her.
O!
K David Mitchell Feb 2012
O!
If I had honest eyes I might have seen you.

I might have noticed how the light
Simply bounces off your messy hair.
I might have noticed the dimples
In your rosy, rounded cheeks.
I might have noticed how angels
Dance at the corner of your lips
When you grace me with a smile.
I might have noticed the calmness
Emanating from your crystalline eyes.
I might have noticed the cheery glow
Around your entire corporal form.
I might have noticed how you
Glide gracefully along the floor.
I might have noticed the perfection
That is so utterly and completely you.

But my eyes are deceitful.
They wander and want.
Too late have they repented.
Like the poor, jealous Moor,
I can only say:
O! O! O!

Too late have I seen what I have done.
K David Mitchell Jan 2012
I.

Physics has told me that we are in flux.
But where is the phi, without I?

Calculus has told me that we are asymptotic.
But where is the limit, if I can't be in it?

English has told me that we are star-crossed.
But where is the light, if I am not right?

Chemistry has told me that we are entropic forces.
But where is concord, if I am ignored?

II.

You think you're such a *****,
But can't you see that I want your disease?

You think you are worth nothing,
But can't you see that you're invaluable to me?

You think you are alone,
But can't you see that you and I have to be?

III.**

On and off, like a light switch.
But still you have me wrapped,
right around your slender finger.
I slipped into euphoria, once upon
that lovely night, when we had
finally tasted what we were missing.
The ruddiness of your lips and
the tangled golden mess that you
call your hair sizzle quietly in
my mind. I have not forgotten.
Nor do I want to. I cannot be sated
by another. But you find it so easy
to eat the hearts of the already ******.
You spared mine, though. I wonder
why. Each hiccup in my chest alerts
me to the monster that rages within.
It wants you. It still wants you.
Eat it, if you must. I offer it freely.
Upon a silver platter.
K David Mitchell Mar 2014
do i really have to wear a sign
so you know what im feeling
or does the hunger in my eyes suffice
i wonder if can you see me at all
if you can see the facade of a heart
that ive placed on my sleeve
the heart that was made from
too many mistakes and
too many lies
but if you look close enough
if you and only you look close enough
you will see that it is frayed
at the stitchings
that it has been worn down from use
and abuse
if you cared to look close enough
then what i would show you
would not be a sham of a heart
i would rip myself open
and show you the real one
the one that breathes your name
the one that pumps desire
the one that truly beats and has been beaten
and god has it been beaten
if you asked me to
i would do that for you
but i have a feeling you will forget me quickly
much more quickly than it took you
to climb into bed with him
K David Mitchell Feb 2012
Through your blue eyes I see it all.*

I.

Wasted romantic fantasies.
My heart upon a dish, a knife driven through it.
I met someone with oceans for eyes once before,
But her fair, golden hair turned to vipers, venom dripping from sharpened fangs.
I watched those snakes devour my soul.
While they digested that little broken piece of my existence,
I could feel the blood flowing out of every orifice of my body.
I grew cold.
But that Gorgon only giggled cruelly.
The vipers hissed in time with her poisonous laughter.
Already, my veins were turning black.
I watched her glide away with heart in claw,
As I fell to the cold, hard, unforgiving floor.
To me, the floor whispered,
“There’s no one to catch your fall this time.”

II.

I am a clock without a craftsman.
Hands forever immobile.
Forced to feel time but never realize it flowing by.
Too late.
Always have been, always will be.
I am the Could-Have-Been King.
Being with you, Athena, is almost as bad as being without you.
With you, I see the kingdom I could have had.
I see the godhood I could have attained;
All it would take is one kiss from your divine lips.
Yet I know they do not belong to me.
And so my hands are idle,
As is the rest of my body. My heart. My soul.
You claim that my hands are made of gold,
That I leave gilded fingerprints.
If only you knew how bloodstained they are,
Soiled by a thousand envious dreams.
You would not want these hands upon your face.
They sear my own eye-*****.

III.

All the Meanwhiles, the Never-Weres, the Only-Ifs,
Have taken up residence in my dreams.
They labor to build a perfect city,
Where you and I reign supreme.
Let us sojourn to our ephemeral city, on the moon,
Where we can watch the Earth spin, grow old, and change,
All through the tubes on our television sets.
We shall name the terrestrial river outside our palatial boundaries;
It shall be called Time.
It will be harsh year round on the moon.
The water may never reach our lips,
But at least we would satisfy each other’s thirst.

IV.

Athena, send your owl unto me.
Make me wise.
Make me worthy.
Bid me come, and I shall never falter.
Never again.
Throw that Medusa’s head into the flame of our passion,
And watch with sinister glee as the snakes writhe in agony.
Raise the blessed chalice to my lips,
Let me drink of your glory.
Only send me word,
And you would have me forever.
K David Mitchell Mar 2014
i have never seen a blacker night
than the night that i stood at the edge
of the boardwalk in one of those
sleepy new england coastal towns
i peered out into the freezing darkness
expecting to see lights up and down
the harbor but there were none
that wanted to be found
it was winter
the time when things should be dying
or at least on their way out the door
and there was not a soul walking about
only a solitary fishing boat was moored
with its blinding headlights on
but no one sat in the captain’s chair
for a moment i wondered what it would be like
to steer out that metal monstrosity
into the absolute darkness and solitude
that is the sea
so vast and unforgiving and wild
where fair weather can turn to **** on a dime
where the waves can swallow a man whole
all in terrible silence
for a moment i wondered what it would be like
to be that man trapped beneath the surface
of the blackest water without a lifeline
but then i remembered
i dont have to be underwater to drown
so i put out my cigarette
got in my car
and drove home
K David Mitchell Jan 2014
It was a suicidal Prince of Denmark—
Hamlet was his name—who observed that sleep
eternal held not agony or pain, but release:
a bittersweet dream, a postmortem peace
into which we awake that may,
or may not be, what we seek.
I have not crossed that final bourne,
not rapped upon Death’s chamber door,
but I have often wandered into sleep.
My dreams are quagmires of blazing fires,
of shadows, of my dark desires,
of landscapes, always shifting, out of beat.
And yet she is always there,
standing, staring, wind blowing through
her chestnut hair, so close that I could
feel her breath upon my cheek.
But when I raise my hand to touch,
to stroke, to hold her ghostly form,
she turns her head, and glides away,
and I can almost hear her speak:
an insubstantial whisper—
but one so sad and sweet that, if I could,
I would choose to linger long
in that realm of sleep.
But choice, in dreams, does not exist;
I do not choose to search for her,
I do not choose to weep.
And when I wake, I see her face;
her knowing gaze has scorched my soul,
as if to say, “It has always been this way,
for me to run, for you to seek.”
Though I would, like the poor Prince,
purchase quiet with bodkin bare,
to dream, perchance to sleep,
I would do it only if I could, forever,
be lost within her amber stare.
K David Mitchell Mar 2014
she is out there
somewhere in the fog
that hovers over this city
so damnably silent and dark
while in my head
there is no quiet to be found
my thoughts clamor as if
they are an army sent to destroy me
and again i find myself awake
so cursedly awake
beyond the witching hour
oh what witches are out there
hiding in the fog like her
waiting to whisper sweet nothings
into the ear of the next poor soul
who is betrayed by beauty
beauty that burns the eyes
and scorches the soul
and turns what was once a sane man
into a howling animal
for here i howl into the fog
like a lunatic escaped from the asylum
cursing and shouting her name
with disgust and desperation
with remembrance in my heart
and painful lessons in my brain
all at once i feel it
i feel the war that rages on in my veins
between hatred and love
and for the life of me
i cannot make up my feverish mind
i cannot seem to understand how
there is a witch roaming freely in the fog
and yet i am the one
being burned alive at the stake
K David Mitchell Aug 2012
“Don’t fly too near to the sun,” he had warned me,
as he strapped the wings across my eager back.
“I won’t. It will be fine,” I said, planting two feet on the ledge.
Looking down, I saw the swirling darkness of the world.
I swallowed down my fear.
But inside me, a sunbeam yearned to break free, to fly away.
To fly to an oasis in the clouds.

“Wax and feathers,” he told me, “that’s all it is.”
That’s all it is.
That’s all it ever was, all it ever shall be.
Wax and feathers.

The sky had called me by name,
and as I flew above the withering old artificer
who outstretched his ancient hand in a gesture of goodbye,
I knew I would never again see the face of men.
Only the faces of angels.
Of gods and goddesses.

The wings had lent my body a buoyancy
that I never knew had existed in the world.
Wax and feathers.
I danced and pranced and swirled and twirled into the sky,
all feelings of weight and import gone.
I had left the world behind.
I traded it all for a bit of wax and some feathers.

The feeling of bliss began to melt as soon as the wings did.
Panic struck me in the skies,
and as I looked below me I saw everything there ever was.
Everything that ever shall be.
I struggled to keep the flame alive within me.
But I fell.
Like Lucifer to the bowels of Hell,
I fell.

I ripped through clouds,
madly spinning in the air.
I glanced towards the sun above me,
growing smaller with every passing moment.
I prayed.
For the first time in my life, I prayed.

I could feel the Earth rising up to meet me.
“This is it,” I thought.
“This is wax and feathers.”
I closed my eyes.
Imagined what the old man would have said.
And I made peace.

But to my surprise, when I opened my eyes,
I was being held to the breast of an angel.
A winged figure of ineffable beauty.
I was flying with her, this perfect creation,
this embodiment of purity and divinity.
In her soft eyes I saw the moon and stars,
all eternity and space stretched out before me
in long pools of silver and white.
Her glowing golden hair was not of the world I knew,
but rather crafted out of the sun itself.
It lent light to everything.
A wave of euphoria passed over me when she
turned her gaze upon me, the human boy
in her merciful grasp, and smiled.

I belong to her.

Never again will I play with wax and feathers.

— The End —