How can I hope to hold contempt in my heart
When there's such a beautiful sky above me,
Painted strawberry honey
On a canvas I can only dream
To touch?

--
Fill my days with sugar and smoke,
Demons in my peripheral
As I'm staring at blank screens
With my head full of thoughts
And "Maybe tomorrow"s.

I've got hair for days
And it tangles into everything I do,
Though scissors scare the life out of me.
Gets into my figure eight weeks
Cycling through the same routine.
Sleep, work, home, sleep, work, home, sleep.
Guess I never really adapted to change well.

Feigning knowledge of the written word
Even when my tongue twists
When I make casual conversation.
Feigning polite kindness
And spitting poison when they all
Have their back turned.
Feigning contentment
Even when the anxiety builds at
The sight of responsibility.

Spots on my hands,
Spots in my eyes,
Spots in my memory;
Not sure which bothers me more.

Maybe everything.
--

There's a thought that haunts me
In the mornings
When the sun peeks through the curtains
And it blinds me
And the coffee is burnt
So I take a morning dose of
Smoke to mute my taste buds

It haunts me at work
Where my smile is as fake
As the honey tone of my voice
But they'll believe it
And buy two for two fifty anyway
Because I've asked them oh so
Nicely

It plagues me in the evening
When I've settled down with a brush
In my hand
Painting abstract strokes with
No road map
No idea where they're going
Just a current of blending colors
And lines

It strikes me at night
When I'm closing my eyes
And willing myself to sleep
Though the sheep don't run home
Because the path is drenched
In regret

That thought
Which haunts me

And itches at me

And runs laps through my mind

Is that I've never felt peace
In someone's arms

Never felt so fulfilled
To touch someone

Never had words powerful
Enough to describe it

The thought that harrows me
In all the hours I know
Is that I've never known
Love

Echoes of memories ricochet in
These old haunts of mine
Where the poison hasn't touched
And the only name I know here
Is Tom Collins.

Did we consume too much?
Did we stay too long?
Did the haze of the high
**** us dry?

It must have stolen
All the marrow in my bones
Because now, I am empty,
Listening to these ghosts for acoustics
While the seat beside me stays wanting.

Some days, all it takes is a whisper

A stray thought. A smokelike wisp

I want to drown in the silence of my life

Gentle like this snowfall

I count the threads of my grief quietly

Writing in tandem with this sorrow that roots itself in the pit of my stomach

I promise I am not all of this; or rather, this is not all of me.
I am flesh and bone and laughter and full.

But there are days when the static claims the nerves under my skin and the ache throbs in my soul.

Those days, these days, I come to you

----------

they always mention the sins of our fathers
but never the trauma of our mothers

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