It won't be long now
It will happen soon
I'll be getting over you any day now
I can feel it

That loathsome ache will soon be gone
This feeling of suffocation will subside
I'll breathe again
I'll finally feel at peace

I won't feel that gripping
all consuming fear
The panic that has been my companion
ever since you left

No...I'll be letting all that go
Any moment now
I'll be free....
It's coming

The last bit of you
will soon be gone
No more pain....but..
I wonder....if maybe...

Will I miss you?
When I finally let it all go?
Will I miss it?
Should I just...keep it a little longer?

Perhaps I should still think of you
Only every once in a while....
Just for as bit.
For just a little longer...

constant contradictions
harsh words with a gentle kiss
cold eyes with a playful touch
a short fuse with tender love
always in defense mode
ready to attack, to attach
to a tone or a word misspoken
and my skin is thin
and my heart easily broken
yet I build makeshift armor
and pretend to be a hero
while you build and destroy walls
and you swear that you
love, love, love me

you fall down, you have no choice but to get back up.
when you get back up, you lose something; a piece of your strength, energy, will... something. keeping on is not free.

you spent the day in bed. too exhausted to get up. you're so sick of bed. your body feels angry for being so still. you just didn't have it in you to move around today. this is fatigue. it isn't fair. in fact, it's cruel.

there is no feeling good anymore. there are what some poor souls refer to as "good pain days" which is just another way of saying
"I know what it's like to be in such bad pain that you want to die, and I'm just thankful today's pain was at least not the worst it has ever been"

you're on no kind of schedule. it'd be a blessing just to eat and sleep at normal times, with some regularity. you feel like crap all the time. you gain weight and lose muscle. you feel weak and heavy.

lie in bed. peace of bedtime is a foreign concept,  your body aches to be comfortable, and you may doze off for 3 seconds before jerking awake by inconsiderate muscles that don't really care that you haven't had a solid hour of rest in 2 days.

pills are a blessing and a curse. relief and side effects. they allow you to rest and they mess with your brain. you'll get so sick of taking pills and you'll begin to hate them for needing them.

the very best you see in your future is surviving. that's what fibromyalgia is. your job is getting through the days of pain and exhaustion, the physical and mental detriments that come with it. your life is a fight, and you are so, so, so, so tired of fighting. you always, always, always feel you have no more fight left in you.



you're 21 years old and you fondly and bitterly remember a time (not too long ago) when you thought some things in life would just be givens; career, family, adventure, accomplishments.... health.

you're 21 years old and you learn that you get none of the above. you're too tired, you hurt too much, and this disease seems to only get worse... it seems to have taken everything from you

and then it takes some more.

Didn’t I ever think to be authentic
collecting words, snapping photographs
exclaiming I am enamored with language and art

when honestly, I am merely a fraud
to what I love. My hands aren’t stained with ink,
my eyes aren’t trained to learn new techniques
paper is not my friend nor is a roll of film
tossing around in my bag of nonexistent records that
I actually love my hobbies.

I feel that I am not quite
an owner of my interests,
stealing passion from others and wishing
they were my own.

Plumped rouge with pigment
her lip fills to graze the *******
intent to disquiet the likes of de Sade
autografted with ocular detachment
should a Marquis wish to harness
the song of the morning
within a bandolier of Seine
to ensnare any bustled Persephone
gilted by discharge of ions
into a ménage of torment
through the Porte des Lions.

Hers is the tincture of doxy
caramelized and debrided of naivety,
empowered by the eve of invention,
swollen to curves and grounded in Paris.

Illumination defies pervasion
down to every gear and pulley
she has hushed through mechanization
and lulled by steam,
swaging a cacophony of flickers
encased in glass by the Lady’s watch,
where every rivet of her plate glisters silken
reverberation in cascade,
elegant, caged, and towering,
outspoken in silence,
ever challenging the Champ de Mars.

"Paris by Gaslight," written by Dionne Charlet, is the title poem to be featured in the upcoming steampunk anthology Paris by Gaslight, the third anthology in the By Gaslight Series from New Orleans small press Black Tome Books.  Look for the first two collections of poems and short stories set in Victorian Times, New Orleans by Gaslight (ISBN 9780615801186) and Cairo by Gaslight (ISBN 9781516961528).  Both collections feature poetry by Charlet, under the pseudonym Dionne Cherie.

Die
Because the world
Why?
Because the world can't allow it
                           Now

I see color
In the darkest
And I know life and love
I see generations
Heard stories
Felt death

Live
And words
Live
And life
Live
And money
Live
And all conniving interest yell
Live

And fight

Tomorrow
In some forsaken sandlot
In some unforgiving parking lot
In some hell
I'll find heaven
In death

Live

Because tomorrow's brighter sun
Found a cloud
And only one way.around

Live