Worn, ******, raw
The goad wounds, but she
Can't stop kicking
Breaking rules, hurting self
Desperate for freedom
Tired, scared, trapped
A sheep caught in wire
Boundaries meant for protection
Frightened, she fights harder
Worn, ******, raw
Barbs dig deeper
She's killing herself
If she could just hold still, submit
The Sheperd would set her free
Though thorns pierce his brow
Worn, ******, raw
The whip wounds, but He
Surrenders freely
Not me, I can't
The white flag I've spent
On a blood-soaked attempt
To bandage my own wounds
Feeble waste it was
Masked, they're still there
Worn, ******, raw

Singing in falsetto...
Not singing at all...
Leaving Kauai
And returning to the
Urban of:

Big fish in a little pond
Or the little fish in a big pond...

I left Kauai and
Upon leaving
I was notified:
Crows are being introduced
On the island of Maui...

Trickle of people
a river a sea a rip...
First impressions of new york

The smells of new york
Like stink
Like children playing
In the sandpit *******
For yellow calcium
My rotten tooth
And 36 tongues to lick it...

My flight was supposed
To leave at 6pm
With a 11h layover
So I went tripping
Looking for Little London
And some familiar Essex
But no no I didn't find it

I actually walked toward
Myself the tallest giraffe
But still not enough tall buildings
To give me orientation
While the avenues exposed
The long enough direction
Shorty came shortest
Cutting through the Labyrinth
Ever so slightly

And I could never have thought
To find so many crazed folk
Because that's how you make
Caramelised walnuts
With enough sugar and butter
And to my count:
Pulling and tugging me into
The twilight with two nights and
Threw days of waiting for
Ugly duckling quack...
Lost in this symphony of sounds
I truly disliked or rather
I didn't like new york
I didn't not like new york...
I just remembered new york
Being important when 9/11
Happened...

But when I took the Kazakhs and
And Uzbekhs through
The chill of selling counterfeit
Purses
And Times Sq is so blatantly
Not Trafalgar
It's a "square" that's not a square
With otherwise all the other square
And oh god the ⬛️
The the the...

As a sketch this will have to do...
What was I supposed to be expecting
When life truly happens
On the outskirts of the city
But on the outskirts of new york
People live in wooden  houses
Like it's an imitation
Of Scandinavia
And there is so little imitation
Of England since no one
Has a back-garden no flock
Of grass...

From JFK I emerged out
Of the rat serpentine at
circa the Rockefeller ...
became mesmerised by sparrows
Didn't see any pigeons...
London is full of them!
Central London is filled with pigeons!
But New York?
In the centre of New York?
Sparrows!
Sparrows of New York!
At least in London
There's the Pigeon Mafia...
But not in New York...

The people of New York designed
The city so that the pigeons
Have no orientation
But sparrows do...
I think that the Empire St building
Looked like a pencil sharpened
Not really tall...
As one urban rat speaking
To another urban rat...
What was my greatest
Observation of New York...
city, regardles of the architecture
and the busy chomp chomp
Chummy eating gorge
I witnessed the standing WTC 3
and the memorial gaping hole
But then only metres away
and entire street of street vendors
Selling Al-Qaeda spiced grub
like the incision happened
but only 100 years later will
New York remain untranslated
Just like the war on terror
Happened for the people
who enjoyed a 10 sec prospect of:
What?

On the subway
on the outskirts
Near Jamaica Centre
too many names and also too
few: whatever 21st and 5rd
arch to no avenue no view...
there was but the little me
and the little sparrows
And I think that was most
Wonderful, staggering
Staggering to make these buildings
Fold... a city of such magnitude
that allowed sparrows
but deemed pigeons lepers
Unwelcome...
There's only this much to remember
About New York...
the sparrows on
6th Avenue between west 47th
and 52nd streets...

They say sticks and stones may break my bones
But her words
They've cut me deeper than a belt or switch ever could
They've left their sting, their wounds, their mark
Not on flesh where any eye could see
But hidden, secretly
On my broken wounded heart
Strike by strike, their tone, their sound
I'm broken, beaten to the metaphorical ground

This 'strong-willed child'
'Stubborn' and 'determined'
Was a scared, lost little girl
In such a big, frightening, noisy world
Longing to be hugged and held
But the looming Tyrant only
Criticized and sometimes yelled

The once-bubbly child fell silent
Learned to bite her tongue
So the words don't come, that lead
To punishment and correction
The price she paid, the feeling
Of belonging and connection seemed
A worthwhile fee to find protection
Alone, isolated,
Wordless perfection

waking up in a haze,
wondering what day it is.

nights blurring into the next,
trying to pull myself together.

lost, confused, wondering:
what the hell is wrong with me?

is this just a phase?
is this post-traumatic response
or recovery?

because everything seems
to go too fast, or
way too slow,

and i think
i'm gonna breakdown.

stupid toxic tendencies,
i keep trying every day,
and it's oh-so exhausting.

imagine an enemy,
only you can see—

man vs. self,
back to the basics
of healing and discovery.

fighting the bad thoughts,
just to get another day.

so tired and over it,
i gotta claw my way out,

or i'll never truly be set free.

Daddy somebody shot that man
I heard this eleven year old say
I didn't really understand at the time
I just knew a man was dead

But with the years that followed
I came to learn how much he meant
To this world in its great need
And how well that time was spent

He preached of equality he preached of peace
As he spoke of man as one
He marched his way down city streets
Facing adversity with the face of love

He was done with all the hatred
That fills so many lives
To him color was a vision
Of equality in his eyes

A life so young a life cut short
By the wicked in us all
Will you stand with me and follow him
Will you heed his righteous call

To call every man your brother
The way Martin Luther King Jr. did
To keep the vision of this visionary alive
A reality in which all mankind should live

The way that we perceive the world
‘s entirely depended upon
The way we wish it to be perceived,
and what glasses we don
Though from time to time,
we do not realise which we wear
Or we might forget at all
that they are even there
And then we think that what we see,
is clear as day and true
Discounting other eyes that view
the world not as we do