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Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
On December 20th 2010 my father didn’t wake up. They said it was from a mix of medications he swallowed in the night. I envisioned a child eating candy in the dark hoping their mother wouldn’t find out. This was different. He was taking pain medication from an accident he endured years before and died alone. He had woken up every day prior in pain, and yet he stumbled out into the cruel world, and did his job to make his little money, and carried on with life. That morning when he didn’t wake up my sister found him. The alarm had gone off, and off, and off but he did not wake. She found him all alone. She’ll  carry that until the day she doesn’t wake up.
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
I grew up under the street lights
No cellphones
Our mothers called and we came home
Got my face bit off by a dog once
And I got the scars to prove it

Walked the streets like zombies
Loitering every chance we could get
When my father died my sister had this face I won’t forget

If this is growing up it’s not fun
To have aged but not have grown
Watching the ones you love go until your gone

Cheap headphones around my neck
Was never the cool kid
I took what I could get

I was the weird kid in high school
Still had times I won’t forget
Looking back it makes me laugh

If this is growing up it’s not fun
To have aged but not have grown
Watching the ones you love go until your gone
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
Young fools tiptoe in the dark
The moonlight dancing on their skin
Naked, vulnerable to the night
The stars their only witness

Clothes crashing to the floor
Bare to one another
Shy no more, they embrace
Only but for a second to have a taste

A toe shatters the cool still water
The ripples retreat outward
A night swim commences
Ambitions tossed aside

In this man made body of water
Two souls swim with the devil
Playful splashes give way to passion
A reflection of youth floats away
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
Haven’t seen you writing in a while
Been stuck inside your brain
Painting pictures of your pain
The thing is your not a painter
None of it makes sense

Your supposed to be a writer
You  threw away your pen
Haven’t seen you writing since
Angry for no reason
Shouting at the wall

Started a fire in your apartment
When you set fire to your poems
Fire department said you were lucky
Landlord evicted you
So you live back home with your mom

She tells her friends “your recovering”
They say “from drinking?”
She says, “No, from art.”
Your not yourself anymore
Not without your work

You write from time to time
A word may escape from your mind
Find its way to paper
Only to find itself alone
Thrown away back into the void
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
Said, “hey dad I’ll see you around.”
But I never did
You said, “Life gets better.”
But it never did.

Had a funeral
The whole family came
Never saw some of their faces again

Olivia’s  crying cause she’ll never get
Her father/daughter dance
She gave Eli your name for his middle
a walking tribute to you.

They said you went to Heaven
What’s that do for a kid?
Give hope to adolescence?
When I got older
I wish they never did

When something good happens
I point up to the sky
As if you had something o do with it
A small white lie

Don’t worry I learned to tie a tie
And to kiss a girl
To drive a car
And to drink to forget you

They said you went to Heaven
Said I’ll see you there soon
20 years later
Sometimes I think I see you
waiting just past the moon
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
They told me I have to grow up
as I’m throwing up the night before
all over the floor

Standing there watching the show
like I’m some sideshow freak
no idea the day of the week
or who I am anymore

Heard someone say rehab
so I tried  flying into the sun

Turns out it’s not a small world after all
No matter where you go
you’re past will follow
it’s a hard pill to swallow

They don’t teach you when you’re young the older you get
the easier it is to fake a smile
I stuck around for a while
just to show face  
                
Someone said they loved me
so I tried to run
but I flew too close to the sun

Turns out it’s not a small world after all
No matter where you go past will follow This life can be hard pill to swallow.
Anthony Esposito Apr 2022
Awakening
Quiet rumblings
Sleeping monster wakes inside me
Crawling out my spine
It’s in the very words
I use to hurt you

Keep your sudden movements tame
don't let it smell your fear
Quiet just be still
It’s complicated

I’ve been awaked
A Violent selfish fiend
Hibernating in me
It’s wide awake

Stumbling through the void
I’m afraid of what’s to come
Frighteningly excited
For what’s to be done

Just lean into it
Accept the sirens call
It’s taken hold of you
Embrace what’s to come
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