I look around me
I find myself in a graveyard
There are people walking aimlessly
The way they walk
The way they talk
Makes me wonder if I too am dead
Their eyes robbed from light
Pulled, plucked by a bird without wings
Their lips
That once danced with smiles and anticipation
pulled down by the weight of their regrets
Their legs
That could once carry them to everything they could dream
Shaking with every step
I watch them tiptoe as if they are playing hide-and-seek
Hide-and-seek with the things that led them here perhaps
I look around me longer
And realize that I know their faces
I wander, I wander, I wander
Until the names of these faces are before me
They are etched in stone
I find myself in front of a line of tombstones
Lined up like broken soldiers waiting for their fate
I read the names of every person I know out loud
Until I can no longer mutter a word
I need to find my way out of here
Before I wonder too long
And find the tombstone with MY name on it

Someone in between
My reflection stares back at me
My face is painted with the word "but"
I spoke truth and love softly
But those that spoke loudest were heard first
Perhaps I'll never feel whole
A face drawn with ink
Almost art
But the rain smeared the image
A girl that was pretty
But only when she was sculpted to be what others wanted to see
Someone in between

Her fingers tangled up in someone else
The same fingers that drew a line
A line I tried so desperately to cross
The difference between
Loving her
And being loved by her
Her eyes
Once steadied on me
Closed shut
Yet it was me who could no longer see
Her face
Disfigured by distance
Distance in her wants
And in my love
A face that lived so often in my head
I could reach inside of me and touch it
Unrecognizable
Nothing left to show
Her fingers
Her eyes
Her face

Fading

The moon held me close
And only in her arms could I see what I want
She dipped her limbs into the ocean
I kissed the water
I dove forward into the sea of solitude
Only to find myself in the reflection of her ripples
I reached for her when the street lamps would speak
When their lights would guide the way
I collapsed in her arms
And she would carry me
The stars were my stepping stones
And my heart kept the pace
She took my tears and sent them to the clouds
She walked me through the places that perished
And held me on the other side
When skies grew dark
She would greet me
And it was only in the dark that I could see her staring back at me

Sadness comes
I look the other way
I find peace in the places where the light creeps in
Because even shattered windows are better
Than ones that have been boarded up
I find myself in a room without lights
No switches, no bulbs, no windows
I bleed from the glass I attempt to push through
The glass of a mirror
The glass of a window
I'm stumbling in the dark
My skin
Too fragile to fight against the edges
I lay buried in the dark
So long that I'm no longer able to see my hand
See the window pane
See the hope
I tell myself that light will come
Over and over until the words in my head
Spill out of my mouth and into the walls I can no longer see
I've seen the light before
I've held it as my hands bled
I buried it in the deepest parts of me
It was during these nights
When the light would cradle me
I could sleep at night
And step forward without falling
But by morning the light was gone
I guess someone else needed it more than I did

When she died a part of you did too

His voice that rang like shimmering church bells
Fell oceans deep
A  water well
In the darkness of what was
Broken little pieces
From up above
Departed; Leaving
Stories retold
Smiles retrieving

When the skies are blue
I'll look for you