So you left and I got into a car and drove up to the hills
I drenched my eyes in the green hues of the trees and
Drank the misty air
I filled my lungs with fresh emotion and said,
"Oh boy, where have I been?"

I put my feet in the water, and felt the feelings gush in
I felt my cheeks turn wet and my eyes raining
And you come flashing into my mind--
Yes, I regret it--
I regret you

You arise from phoenix ashes and hide beneath the bed
You are a knife stuck in my chest, twisting in with every heart beat
You are a lost opportunity and a scar on the wrist
You are my lost love

So what if you are sorry, you think I care that I have become
A part of the dust neath your carpet, struggling to revive
Yes, I would like to hurt you, and hurt you so badly
You feel the need to caress me again

I drove up to the hills, a place where you are not
And I realized, that happiness is really just sitting down and eating
Cheap Chinese out of melamine plates and putting your feet in the water
And thinking we'll learn from our mistakes

The morning started with a shower
Arms braced against the wall in a kind of supplication
Pushing hard so damn hard you want to fall
You let the water wash your  dreams and pain away

The morning started with you leaving
Saying I'm so nice as you walk out the door
I know your tired cause we didn't sleep
I remember your whispered promises that were quickly disposed of

The morning started with you lying next to me
While I played Rilo Kiley
So close I could touch you but I could tell you didn't want to be touched

"Sometimes in the morning I am petrified and can’t move
Awake but cannot open my eyes
And the weight is crushing down on my lungs
I know I can’t breathe
And I hope someone will help me this time..."

I played it in a moment of honesty
My one true expression as I watched the distance grow between us
I wanted to fuck you again cause I hoped it would mean something
Thank you for teaching me that the third time is the charm and the fourth is for sleeping not fucking
It's hard to find this kind of rejection early in the morning. Thanks for staying open late to accommodate me.

The morning started with me laughing  at you when you said where's the underwear?
Writers can laugh at painful parallels and prophesy true unintentionally but not uneventfully
It doesn't help me not want to fuck you again
So we fuck again for the third time. The last time.
You kiss less when your not drunk

The morning started with some smoke and water and generic Advil
Proscribed to all the fallen like vitamins
You look good naked
Next to me
I wonder what this morning will bring?

This morning started with me inside you the second time
You made me cum inside you like you wanted something that I had to give
Maybe love maybe pain -you did like to be hurt
You didn't remember that I said I want to hurt you less cause I actually like you
I choked you cause you wanted it more than me
I feel like Kriegers robot arm sometimes
Perhaps we could just affix a cock to the arm and I could be replaced
Go on vacation to the city of lost whore sluts
I hear the buffet there is wonderful

The morning started with me inside you
On the kitchen floor
I threw you up against the wall too hard
You fell down so I took you right there
On the linoluem Under flourecent lights
You were so tight and tender and tough
You fucked me desperately like you hadn't been getting enough
Sorry for banging your head up against the fridge

The morning started with you next to me
Both of us drunk
You kissed me right
Out of the many there are few that do it
It's a weakness for me and dangerous to believe in the power of knowing through a kiss
You dry humped me like a dog on speed
It felt good
That and the kissing
I said no
I wouldn't fuck you
Like I said before
You said it had been to long
That you never did this
I said I needed to wait
That I liked you
I didn't want you to be just a fuck
Not just for you
But for me
Sometimes even seasoned whores need to feel special
I said that I'd fall too quick
You can be very persuasive

The morning started with me on the couch with your friend
We had makers and he had Jameson
He called it neat but it had Ice
I didn't say anything
You told him that you knew me for a long time and that i was gay
In retrospect it probably helped that I talked about color and carpets and paintings and poetry
I tried not laugh as we tried to pass of our little deceptive parody
Sure it was successful but what does it really say about me that he'd believe it
Oh the irony of pretending to be gay to get a girl
The things we do
He left after a long soliloquy on decorating and fashion
I think you might be like me and sometimes confuse the facts of your friends and stories with your dreams
I thought your adept practiced and surreptitious deception was endearing
I wanted to kiss you all night so I was glad he left
After he was gone I told you in the bathroom that I wanted to kiss you all night and you dropped your pants and peed in front me
You looked at me like no big deal and said what I don't care
I really starting liking you then

The morning started at the bar the night before
You sat down and smiled and flirted with me
You told me I would have to wait a year and a half to fuck you
As we drank way too much and both grew more beautiful and gracious with every ounce of liquid forgetfulness

The morning started the night before at your work when I hit on you cause you were laughing and smiling and had a little halo

The morning started like any other morning
With lies and  rejection and sweetness and passion and loneliness
If I knew I was going to be used like this
I would have used a condom
Not to just protect against the std's but to protect from intimacy
I hope I won't fail on both counts
A little worried
That's why I write this story

Azrael Always James
© Copyright 2013

Eyes melted shut.
Have you heard the sound or felt the burn of a cigarette being extinguished on your skin?
Have you ever compared pain to pain?
Emotional vs physical.
No winner ever declared though that is what makes it beautiful, and ugly.
We praise beauty on the outside and ugly on the inside.
Sharing the left over love for ugly on the outside and beauty on the inside.
That is why sad songs journey through my heart and out my brain.
They are simply experiencing the emptiness that remains in such a full world.
A full world full of fools.
The emotional killed the physical as we continue to perish to a point of no return.
It can heal with time, though just like burns that turn to scars on your skin, emotional scars never fully leave.
That is the point of this poem.
To remind you of the burn, that sang for a scar, in order to appreciate the rain.
That laughing and crying spare no difference, and I love that we are all fucked up.
For indeed, in some way, we are all fucked up.
Though fear not the unknown, for that is everything, and nothing.
A beauty all can access to make emptiness feel at home.
A home that can keep your heart safe and show you love in the darkest of times

It's a shame to see someone reach a moment when everything is so overwhelming that they'd prefer to cease their breathing  than to feel it for another second.

It's even worse to understand that the only time you actually see it is after a blade or a bottle of pills; or maybe a gun or some rope.

You only know it when you read the scrawled out goodbyes of the quiet girl who seemed to have everything right in life.
But still you never truly know.
You never truly feel her pain.

This is for the ones who couldn't make it.
For the ones who had it hard and couldn't push on.
Those who fought with everything they had until there was nothing left.
The ones who felt they were never good enough, or that no one cared.
And for the ones who were never given a chance.

I'm sorry for the hate you endured, the pain you felt, and the people who didn't see. Or those who chose not to.

I'm sorry for the moments when all that was holding you back was a song, or a band, instead of a loving hand.

I'm sorry we couldn't be there.
You are not forgotten.

Rolling words, like dirty tires
asphalt slabs, wasted hours,
Nights alone, feels like home,
you were never very good to me.

Broken plastic, phony dreams
pipe tabacco, cracking seams,
slower step, promise kept,
you were always my summertime.

Sparks have faded, ashes cold
gates left open, secrets told
too late to talk, let's just walk
things are easier once I get high.

Wait for winter, wait for rain
or fall forever, ease the pain
too many ropes, it's all a joke
you broke my fucking heart though.

Pull together, shrug the want
friends don't know, friends still taunt
you will break me, you won't save me
No one knows how many times I've tried to die.

But it gets better, so they say,
when he held my hand things felt okay
people leave, hearts greave
I've never been so good with changes

Skys are bluer, my heart is sad
you're doing good, and I am glad
but it hurts to know, you're glad to go
Like you forgot we promised forever

today
with your camera pointed at my face
all glistening with humidity
and puffed hair
i felt wanted

today
with your cello aimed
at my violin
i felt harmonious

today
with your smile dancing across your face
caused by my words
i felt appreciated

today
with your body beside mine
i felt alive

The onset was a subtle thing;
a clumsiness, a loss of grace.
She who had been strong and proud
was, suddenly, listless, out of place.
A weakness in a muscle here.
A spasm in a tendon there.
The prognosis, like a hammer strike
to the unsuspecting steer.

First came the cane,
Then came the chair.
Long before them
Came the fear.
The loss of strength
And motor skill
Lou Gehrig’s illness
left just her will.
Yet with that will she loved her man
Wrote a book with just one hand
Saw as much of the world she wished,
left them wanting one last kiss.
Then, when breathing became a chore,
She didn’t do it anymore.
To be surprised by death, she felt
Was the best way to manage
The hand she was dealt.

I am smoker, thats what I am.
And it makes me feel good.

When I sit at a bench,
and watch people pass,
With smiles on their faces or scowls as well,
And I love to share a square with someone unknown,
As mine and their story pours out while we both take a drag,
To me that is living and having a good time.

I am a smoker, thats my addiction,
Others hate it, but to me that is love.

Infatuated with nature and its conflictions,
I'll rise really early to watch the sunrise,
The pretty pink colors juxsaposed with purple,
Birds, planes and cars all rushing: rushing somewhere,
Or nowhere at all, I just sit there and wonder,
With tendrils of smoke soaking my clothes,
I do not care to rush, I am a smoker.
Watching in silence trying to witness,
Something worthwhile and great,
While others are worried about being late.

I am smoker, that is my passion,
It might be wrong but it feels so right.

When I go somewhere beautful,
new, old, familiar or strange,
I light up a stick, and blow smoke at the sky,
Blow smoke at those faces, sharing the sight with me.
I will buy a new album and share it with a cigarrette,
While the headphones blast and soothe,
My hand comes to my mouth,
And feeds it its poisons or nutrition.
Call it malicious, but my tenure on this earth,
Wont be so much longer than it is expected.

I am a smoker, that is my sin,
I try to kick it, but it comes back.

Once I did not smoke for six months,
And i felt okay, as I watched others enjoy,
that which I loved and cherished at one point,
But after I abandoned her, my habit that is,
I asked her out once more,
and has not left me since,
She takes care of me when im happy or sad,
When I have been a good boy or bad.
She loves me no matter what,
Even If i did leave her once.
But I will leave her again,
Maybe today or when it has been enough,
But right now I will finish this pack,
And see what comes after.