Churning in, the way you spoke, it was intoxicating in this
                  violent way that,
                                                overall
   ­                was entrapping
and shook shivers down the spinal cord of
                                                                ­           my conscious

Big wolf,
                gaping jaws,
                                       drooling maw
                                                             ­   Why are you teeth around my throat?
May I pet your mane
in reverence, sleeping in my wake
                                                            ­  dissembled, disjointed, disappearing
Great beast,
                     claws of rusted iron,
                                                         teeth of glass
                                                           ­                      Why are you paws crushing my throat?
                                    Sickening sugary words! Doing
anything                    for love? for attention? for what?

Clutching, never letting go,
                                               devouring whole.

Not a day in your life, war have your eyes witnessed
You lay safe, secure, in your ignorant pocket of peace
But their memories play before your eyes and their nightmare dance on your eyelids
The chop of the fan blades remind you of the planes, menacing overhead and dropping fire from the sky
The popping of kernels from the microwave wring forth panic-- Duck! They’re shooting! Duck for cover, you fool!
The book, it merely fell, but was it truly a book? Or was it the boom of an artillery cannon?
Screams of glee mingle into screams of pain. Your best friend, why don’t you reach out and save him? He’s only a few yards away. He’s in such pain, don’t let him die alone. Don’t let him die like this. Don’t let him die.
Stepping in the puddles makes your skin crawl. You remember their blackened skin, rotted flesh. You step out of the water quickly.
The open water is calm. Peaceful. Under the surface you can see them, the submarines. You move away from the shoreline.
Your friend, hugging you from behind-- it’s their hand, just their hand. There was never a knife. They are your friend. Or are they?
The memories. They’re not yours. Whose are they? Why do they tremble like tenor in your mind, ingrained in your DNA?
The blood on your hands is not there, open your eyes!
The jungle, the desert, the forest, the wasteland. You’re not there, you were never there.
The blood on your hands is not there, open your eyes!
Now the dark, it's suffocating. This is not your world of cracking rawhide and dirt. You were not there, this is not your reality. That white jacket should not make your breath hitch! That burning cross should not terrorize you so!
Now the dark, it's suffocating. This is not your world of fabric stars and canvas trucks. You were not there, this is not your reality. That red armband should not make your breath hitch! That fire should not terrorize you so!
Not a day in your life has this world brought its ugly head to look you dead in the eye and breath upon you, noxious breath liquefying your lungs and dissolving your eyes.
You are safe-- that blood on your hands is not real-- you are safe-- this is not your reality-- how it terrorizes you so!
These memories are not your own.
These memories are not your own.
These memories are not your own.
They are theirs, their memories, and you see them every time you close your eyes.
These memories are not your own.
These memories are not your own.
These memories are not your own.
They are not yours and they never will be.

It happens
when one wants it most not to. A gap
a sliver
a c h a s m           of the deepest, the darkest, the most unfathomable

blackness.

It y a w n s ...
    open in a matter of milliseconds
its lips sneaking up under unsuspecting toes.  They
f
a
l
l
   in a dizzying
                           downward
                                              drop
  o  ­  n    i    g
b   u    c    n                       and br eak in g  
on the thorny outcropping of the

     blackness
as if there were jagged teeth.
                                                  It closes then.

It leaves only an ugly scar to remind that something has indeed transpired
although the information of what exactly
is lacking.

It happens in an instant
this gap                  this sliver
this c h a s m              of the deepest, the darkest, the most unfathomable

                         blackness.

Broken machine built of bones and blood, on the bruised backs of those
                                                           ­                                                          I love
your blind eye is nothing short of malevolence
a violence
in the silence
Shriveled stars saturated in the salts of my missing seas, swapped with the sterling structures of silver and steel and stealing sanctuary from
                                                            ­                                  those I love
your blind eye is nothing short of malevolence
a violence
in this silence
Your peering perverted glance peruses with privilege over the pain
                                              of those I love
passing over that which you don't wish to witness
your blind eye is nothing short of malevolence
a violence
in your silence
My mind in massacre and mutilated matter, mashed by the mincing malice of Man
                         disregarded by the Masses
                                                                ­         and cast aside like that calloused
                   carcass
Cacophonous promises in the cavernous mouths of cowards
                                                                ­---
Rejoice! Retribution in the form of a rub out, ridiculing, self-reliance
               the righteousness of Rule
Ricocheting off of divinity and running through
                      the Heart of those I love
Find my falling fears, fickle in nature, on these fallowed floors and feel the ferocity of it
                            fulfilling their prophecy, futilely fighting back the firing of hatred
                at those I love

Fall to your knees!  Condemned to continue the cycles of the crowds and cower in the corners of your own crimes
                               For those I love so, for those I fear for, for those I cry
                                       for, for those I live in,  for those I hate so
Your blind eye is nothing short of malevolence!
a violence
rests in your silence
which hurts
for this vice I won't
forgive you
never forget
                                   Those I Love