Well… here we are again.

I went out for drinks at the local pub,
thinking maybe I wouldn’t be invited
because you’ve been happier with other people.
And I know you’re happy with them…
but I feel like a dog chained to a post,
no sign of its owner ever coming back.
Left behind by you. Again.

I’m sad. I’m angry.
But more than anything
I’m numb.
Numb to what I give,
numb to what I am.
Because you’ve shown me, time and time again,
that I contribute nothing.
Absolutely nothing.

I’m useful when it suits you,
and invisible when it doesn’t.
Used when it’s convenient,
discarded when it’s not.

My chest aches like a wound,
a pain that refuses to heal.
Do I really mean nothing?
Am I even anything at all?
What worth emotional, monetary,
Do I hold in your eyes?
Maybe something,
Probably nothing.

You’ve shown me in your absence of care.
And now, worse
You’ve crossed a line.
That I thought friends at least
Would never cross

You hurt me. Physically.
I showed my best friend the bruises.
The one person I trust most in this world.
They were outraged.
I cried into the phone
as their voice cracked with anger for me.

And I am terrified
terrified you’ll do it again.
Terrified the bruises will grow into something more.

Maybe that’s all I am to you
a bag to be punched.
A thing to dig your nails into until I bleed.
A stool to climb on,
a vessel to pour your relief into.

Every time I ask
to share something,
anything as simple as a film,
or a meal,
you say you’re busy.
Already have plans.

But then I see you.
See you watching a film,
ordering food
with someone else.
Someone new.

And I’m done begging.
Done giving willingly,
When I only see you in scraps,
in borrowed moments,
in the silence between your excuses.

I’m mourning a loss
That hasn’t even been buried yet.

I’m close.
So close to walking to the river,
Again.
To swim into the void,
to sink into the end that should have come
long ago.

These last few years
the best and the worst
will have been my everything.

And maybe in my absence,
you’ll finally gain something.
Maybe then,
I’ll have been worth… anything at all.

Maybe…

I hate myself…
for not telling you what you did to me.

From that moment on,
I couldn’t see you as someone who cared
because you didn’t.

You were drunk.
Shouting at the world,
how it had wronged you,
how it had stolen a life
that was never yours to hold.

And you hurt me.
You held on until I bruised.
My arms, my legs painted in blue and red
You held on until every drop of love,
every trace of compassion I had for you,
was gone.

From that moment…
I saw you as someone else.
Someone I cannot meet in the eye
for fear that if I do,
I won’t be able to breathe.

Suffocated by that night.
The pain I left go unsaid,
The hurt I left go unheard,  
The dignity you stole.


You took the friendship I gave you…
and crushed it in your talons,
the same claws you drove into me.

“my poetry to protect me”^



an ancient teenage lyric
haunting comes, no longer shielding,
a gossamer consistency ironclad,
a tissue-thin papyrus,
my poetry to protect me

a clarinet reed, capable of swinging  
a highest pitch voice for turning
blades of clean steel clean away,
now stunting blunting no more,
indeed!

re-formed my shield, re-purposed,
into a stabbing instrument offensive,
my poetry comes to ***** tearings in my
worn thin fabric tapestry, woven from
excuses of why I can’t, why I couldn’t

this is life

moats becoming drowning pools,
castle walls, people entrapments,
wrecking machines, bombardier hurling,
medieval defenseless against modern,
rhymes giving way to free verse onslaught

too late to apologize to myself, my words,
my protectorate, island redoubt, now ruined
by doubts treachery breech-birthed from within,
these verses hollow point bullets re-engineered,
Caesar’s words re-versed, you’re the victim Brutus
as well

1:52 AM
Mon May 18
June 2020
Manhattan Island