I don't know how to love you
Yet love beats within my heart.

I cannot stay with you
Yet I cannot leave

Why do you not ask me to
Speaks volumes that you do not want to hear.

As E.E. Cummings said
'Yours are the poems I do not write'

Only because I have already spoken every word which begged to be said.

Goodbye hurts more if you fight it. Healing in acceptance.

Your heart is the echo of your loneliness, it sets the practiced flow to your poetry and the undeniable sorrow of your prose.

Your unrequited love seeks out new partners with the deranged need of a ***** looking for the next score and with the same pathetic results.
Your crash between lovers' highs may lack the sour stink of the vagabond's putrid sweat yet the addict had the good grace to hide his broken soul behind doors, however flimsy;
You would rather celebrate your fractured heart, dressing your wounds with your words as the cheap ****** dresses her bruises with makeup and glitter.
She hates her john and dreams of a better way,
You idolize your ex and yearn for his or her return some day.

Yet I think we can all agree; drugs were the best thing to ever happen to the substance abuser...

I would build an altar with which to worship you,
    your beauty, your sensuality and your love.
You truly are an angel,
    my heart.
Such a remarkable woman.
You can never  know the depth of my love for you as words and actions alone cannot capture it,
    yet I will try.

I have become a man of habits.
Alarms wake me, coffee and toast.
Gym, morning texts,
messages to my monkey.

The crow knows no habits
Hunts and gathers, watches for prey
Does habit call for the roost of murders?
I know less than little.

I have become my habits.
Birds, birds, birds.
I'd do anything for her smile.
Whiskey breath and soft kisses are my
prayers offered to the night,
or day.
Feast solely on the moon and
you will not receive sustenance.  

The past is certain, and so it becomes my future.
So too, is it certain, that I will relive my past mistakes?

Questions without answers.
My habit.
The lord gave me the intellect to question,
but saw fit to withhold the courage needed to answer.
Providence only moves when you do.

Once upon a time
A bard told a tale so wonderful
So moving
That it was told and retold again and again
Across all nations
And in all tongues
This tale became the greatest myth
More believed in than any religion or god
It became a part of every culture
As important to our genetic make up
As any particles
As integral as breathing
Pumping through our very souls with each beat of our hearts
Yet this story's happy ending remains elusive
But such is the profound power of this yarn that men and women drive themselves to ruin yearning for its realization
And upon such an occasion are consumed by the fiery nature of the story never to be the same
This fable has a name
And it is Love.

What to write about?

Should I speak of my love?
It's continued development,
The lessons learned and hurts hastily covered with blue coloured bandaids and a kiss?
A favoured topic to be sure.

Shall I rhyme about lust?
Love's charm without the rust,
Your soft body beneath me a must,
That this need will fade, unjust.
Once departed, lacking love, this passion returns to dust.

What is left?

Hate does not touch me,
Not in this country,
Not in my city of cherry blossoms and sunshine,
Or darkly overcast skies coupled with soft misting rain. (Depression?)
Not today!

Death is a foreign entity.
I am not unsullied,
Yet I do think much more of this ***** than as life's bratty little sister.
Necessary,
Which may one day grow into something beautiful to be admired,
But for now is nothing more than crayons coloured outside of the lines.

I guess I should not write at all.

For what worth is there to put pen to paper,
(Finger to touch screen),
When my muse is silently humming a tune to which only she knows the words?
I can hear the rhythm,
My blood pulses with it's beat,
But I cannot glean the meaning.

Therefore I am done,
For this poem is about nothing.

I cannot speak for desire's fiery touch, nor can I speak against it for who listens to a hypocrite's tale and feels anything other than tired annoyance.

I will not offer any advice aside from the weary words of the twice, thrice, ofttimes fallen, yet who cares to hear the yarns of those that tried and failed.

All I can do is spout sad knowledge disguised as nonsense with the practiced ease in which Dylan spouts poetry and hope that you glean some semblance of the message therein and take not this crooked path of mine.

I am left lonely
Tired
Whimsical
Lost and
Empty.

I keeping looking for your words
Kind touch
Soft inhale
Hard kiss and
Laughter.

I do not know what to do
With myself
My time
This world
Without you.

It has been four days
Three sleeps
Dreams
Awakenings
Without meaning.

Come home sweetheart

Without you
I am dust
The space between
The last exhale
A forgotten lyric
Road sign that leads to nowhere.

Come home sweetheart.

You are both the light which chases my old shadows and the breath that snuffs out my flickering candle.

My duties require feeding your warm glow with my left while placating the your angry breath with my right.

I am in. Committed in love
With you.

Couple of things you should know about me,

One: I don’t like you.

I don’t know you and I don’t like you.
It’s not your fault,
I have been programmed this way,
An overbearing, overprotective monarch of a father
Combined with school yard bullies,
Teachers, priests, mother,
Evil grandmother,
And bad 1980’s movies all combined to ensure that
I don’t like you.
Stranger Danger,
Go away.

Two: You don’t know me.

How could you?
I don’t know myself.
The ‘me’ you find presented before you is nothing more than layers of ******* piled one on top of the other,
By family, friends, school yard bullies,
Morning cartoons, Atari, broken hearts and a mind that never sleeps,
(Certainly never shuts the **** up!)
A product of a society
No more advanced in this age of information
Then when we crawled out of the proverbial goo,
Cheaply constructed, covered with flashy pleasing knick-knacks,
Prettily packaged and presented for your purchase,
Swipe your credit card debt here please,
Yet not build to last.  
I am lost somewhere deep beneath the ‘me’ that was chosen by
‘You’.

Once again I sit and weep as you pretend sleep.

I'm lonely but not alone.
Reminds me of a song lyric
Poetry to music
My sad poem repeats again
They say it's all in your perception
Yet I'm spending another evening by myself
Dinner for two? No. But I'll eat for two.
What pleasure there is to be found in food

I am torn by the sultry and evocative desire for peace in direct opposition of the raw steely taste of my emotions felt full for being left untamed.

Do I let slip the quiet sigh as as my mind transcends and leaves you all behind, a leaf floating on the breath of the divine?

Or do I let loose the dogs of war and feel life with crystal intensity and immediacy until I am consumed in the resulting conflagration.

I do not know.

Fishermen do not cast their nets hoping for anything;
Why do you?

Do you ask why the angel has fallen?
What is it the mermaids and sirens sing their song for?
Are jewels and princesses all the dragon keeps?
Who banished the troll beneath the bridge?
Do you demand an answer of your lord;
Why preach forgiveness in written word even while your children give voice to harsh judgements and incivility?

Where have all the faeries gone?
Who tends to their forests now?
Did the angels cry out as they were caste from heaven?
Do their wounded wings bleed?

Again,
Do you ask why the angel has fallen?

Or do you just follow the path your shepherd cut content with the fable he wrote, with your certain knowledge that all is right with the world.

Do you think of me when I think of you?
Is that your smile which greets me from the steam of my morning coffee?
Is it your caress which trails along my neck as I gaze upon the ocean?
Do you see my face as you listen to your song on the radio?
Does you head turn at the sound of laughter with the expectation of finding me there?
Is you who banishes the darkness of my nightmare visits?
Is it your voice which encourages me to continue when I have fallen?
When you close your eyes, do you hear me calling?
Did you catch my scent on wind and know my yearning?
Do you miss me when you walk out that door?

I'm struggling with a heaviness,
Not easily weighed
Or accepted,
Yesterday crushes me beneath failed dreams,
Our tears,
An angry ocean with a woman's name,
Yours.
Forgive me as I forgive you.
One day I know we will breath easy
As the regrets that choke soften with time.
Until then my burden grows as I add your name to the list,
An epitaph of the loving.

Mermaids cry with freshwater tears,
Dreaming of handsome sailors who do not flee in fear,
Or even mermen to share their dream with,
For mermaids are alone.

Sirens cry with silent sobs which no one hears,
For their voice,
Even lost and forlorn,
Would only entice further lovers to watery deaths.

Dryads tears drip heavy from leaves of great trees,
Their pain giving life to the forest,
Even as their love ensorcels their soul mates,
And their heart cries out the truth,
What is bound cannot be freely given,
And is forever changed.

Who is to say what is true and what is false,
Perhaps the angels who have fallen are you,
And me.

Stories and fables speak of our desires and fears,
What are the gods if not reflections of all that we find holy?
Does that not beg the question of who created who?
Is God nothing more than a combination of our eggs?
Some broken,
Never a dozen whole,
A reflection, however poor,
of our fractures beliefs.

And if we are fallen from grace and this life was deemed a sort of punishment then is it not our God given duty to rise above the suffering,
Deny the base temptations
And close the door on the face of hate?

I do not judge the fallen angels,
I count myself amongst them,
And we want to go home.

Fools fall in love
May as well pray to a unicorn
Or look for heaven under a rainbow

Your heart is a fragile vessel
Do not fill it least it burst
And leave you curled upon the kitchen floor
Tears unchecked do nothing to assuage the pain

So sit alone at the beach
In love with yourself
Don't betray it.

You speak of forbidden love
And relish in its passion,
Like a fat sow rolling in ****,
You cannot smell the stench,
Of your joined betrayal,
You couple with immorality.

Go home to your true partner,
Cast away your paramour,
There can be no happy ending here,
There is no love where there is no innocence,
I know as I once danced late into the hot nights to this very same song.

I could show you a skeleton path littered with the corpses of past lovers,
Empty shells of who they once were, skin shredded by snakes, leaving the stench of our distaste behind,
A litany of curious choices,
A dirge of the fallen's passion,
But you will not listen,

For your ears are deafened by the drums of need,
The screaming voice of your own conscience,
And the death rattle of your lost integrity.

The human heart is very fragile indeed.
Yes it is capable of holding and exuding such fiery passions as to consume you whole,
Yet can it not be crushed underfoot with a wayward blow meant to push away rather than injure or the sweet kiss of fare thee well from the object of your eternal desire?

Love is not the monster that hides beneath your bed, rather under your sheets where you wistfully dream of your prince, your knight, the girl next door or the **** *******.

Love is the creature that hunts for your immortal soul not by night but rather captures and enraptures you in the brightness of day with a single smile and words that only you amongst the billions in this world were meant to hear.

Love is not the answer, it is the question in the truest sense which poets, songwriters and the daft have spent eternity trying to unravel, it is a puzzle without end for the missing pieces lie within us all and can only be found in another.

And the creator in all his glory housed such a curse as a gift within the most fragile of vessels yet we stand shocked witness each time our hearts break.

When the sun sets and madness comes to play.
I pray for you,
Please don't be far away.

The wolves howl as they hunt their nighttime prey,
I often ask,
Do they fear coming day?

I travel alone yet I am not lonely,
I close my eyes,
It is your smile I see.

I put these poor words to digital ink,
My sentiments;
Hello Poetry link.

Yours was once the voice I yearned to hear,
The face I looked for when I woke
And my favourite reason for smiling.

An addict to my phone only for checking to see if you messaged.

You don't message anymore.

How did to become reality that I no longer share every moment of my meaningless day with you?

Who speaks with you now?
Who fills your free time with mindless chatter coupled with the loving whispers of the devoted?

I don't.

I am left to wonder where we went wrong;
If love is not enough then what,
My dear,
Is the ******* point?

I can see my pain mirrored in the wet tears that fall from your shocked eyes.

Neither saw this coming,
But it was my 'strength' that ruptured the fissures of our personal issues.
Cracks allow the sun to shine through?
No; cracks are what love falls into,
Lost child in the well too deep for cries for help to be heard.

Leaving me a shell, empty of hope,
You, filled with regrets
And us just another tragic tale of love gone wrong,
But I am not Romeo and you are not Juliet
Thus we must live with our sweet parting.

I broke again today.
Mind caged behind emotions
Not of my making,
Not of my choosing.

The tempest whipped up
By foreign deities
Which reside inside
Whom do not mask their hate.

I cry out for your help
Even as I strike your hand
When you reach for me.

Yet you stand resolute
In the wake of my broken fury,
Birthing new love within me
As I find strength in numbers
For I am no longer alone.

The lone wolf mythology is a ego driven shield behind which hides the shy and the wounded;
I have resided in that den of pretend solitude only to rage at the overwhelming loneliness as the need for companionship screamed and beat fists from inside of my chest, the heart hammering at my ribs to be free of its proud prison.

The need for individualization and a removed identity is just another drug to poets and artists; where else to find motivation if not within our personal tragedy still wet from the drink and tears, and blood spilled from hearts never quite mended, soldiers of love who feel in a way the common man cannot, will not, for who better to put pen to paper the raw emotions of man if not those who are lost in their feelings like maggots writhing in forgotten butchered meat, wounds that will never heal yet can only be seen in the wary yet wide open eyes of the addict yearning for the next high, not for the warmth and caring that is love rather for to the hurt and the harm and the inspiration that can be found there.

I do not wish to dream,
For dreams are illusionary life,
Peopled with phantoms of the living
Reflecting our awakened mind's
Fears, lusts, hopes.
Vanity flavours the subconscious.

There is no rest here.

When I close my eyes I pray for darkness.
I wish to escape into the black,
Silk tendrils of the lost tickle my fancy,
Easing my ever chattering mind
Into micro deaths of sweet silence.
I do not exist,
Neither do you,
Nothing.
It is here that I find comfort.

Solace in the forgetting.

If breaking hearts were a sin then I would condemn nearly every woman I've ever met to eternal hellfire.

If love is the purpose then you my dear are the soft hands which open the gates of heaven and guide me through.

What chance have we to know each other no matter how intimate we are when we do not take the time to know ourselves, intimately.

What cannot be found alone certainly cannot be discovered together.

The journey of two must begin with one thus though we travel together we remain in many ways be apart.

I cannot speak for you yet I can say that I do not yet know me.

Like bees to honey is how you draw me to you,

I become lost as you capture me in your hungry gaze even as I find myself within the universal depths of your bejewelled eyes,

And other cliche nonsensical phrases.

I love you.

I have loved,
I have loved,
And I have loved again
Yet every time I am astounded
At how much love there is within me
To give again.

I love you the most.

I'm a bloke in a suit on a train to last year's realized dreams no more content to arrive at tomorrow than yesterday.

My mind chalk full of plans and strategies for a better me because Michael taught in an unforgettable hymn that the path to world change begins with a mirror.

Yet it is not peace or culture and religious tolerance that bubbles through the frothy brim of my troubling mind but you.

I love you woman.

What worth this life and it's lofty goals full of meaning and well being where only careful deliberation will carry us from misstep and disaster if we do not have each other to share in the glory and the gore.

You put more effort into your job.

Think about this.
Let it sink in.
You don't love your job.
Often you don't even like it.

You don't look forward to it.
You don't write happy status updates regarding it.
But you do put more effort into it.

You dress nicer.
You're often kinder and quicker with a compliment for your colleagues.
You're nearly always on time and considerate of others needs and wants.
You do your hair, put on a suit, paint on some face.

Imagine if you did that for your family and loved ones.
Imagine getting up in the morning and making the effort to look your best; no lulu lemons or tank tops and shorts.
Imagine putting on a pressed shirt or dress just so the person you love can see you looking great.
Imagine showing up on time for friends events with a small gift in hand.

Imagine caring as much about the people you love.

Your look as the door closed between us,

Haunts me.

In search of enlightenment
I stumble.

EMDR handled my childhood traumas,
Small pebbles can grow into landslides if not checked.

Buddha's mindfulness allowed for some insight,
But being aware of my behaviour does not always lead to course correction,
My personal OnStar can merely suggest direction,
As I am only a passenger on this ride.

I am left strained.
I can see the road
And the beautiful sun set.
I can feel you beside me,
But I do not trust,
I fear
If I look too closely
I will find you gone.

And so I continue
My search for enlightenment,
My lasting hope is
When this journey ends
I will find you there.

I am not the author of my thoughts nor am I the poet whose poems you read.
I am only a vessel through which life exists; a witless witness of what befalls this body and mind.
Please excuse my false pride,
Forgive me my claims of titles and names.
I am merely the ghost in the machine within which I experience taste, touch, sight, smell and the chaos of clarity of mind.  
I once knew with the certainty of the lost that I was the master of this universe,
Now I bow my head in pious recognition of defeated acceptance. Life is not to be lived,
Life is to be survived.
Free will is a conception of man's need and desire for order in a land where particles too small to be seen or felt rule with the supremacy of god.
We are nothing more than fish in the sea unaware of the ebbs and flows of the ocean around us in response to a moon we cannot even conceptualize.
There is peace in that thought;
If you can accept your insignificance you will realize how little that lost love matters for what is love but a micro atomic reaction to a cosmic event that happened light years from earth,
In which you were the victim of a joke you can't even understand.

It is in the night
That your sobs turn into
Moans,
Where pain gives way to
Pleasure,
As our bodies intertwine
To find the love
That our hearts
And minds
Lost.

I sit alone
The sun beats down it's heavenly warmth,
An angels breath that does not touch me.

I sit alone
You answer my call but the miles between us cannot be measured,
In metric or imperial,
And will not be breached by our muted conversation.

I sit alone
Cardboard pizza and cola
Do little to ease the turmoil within,
I miss you,
You smile,
Your face,
Your love.

I sit alone
Even as the world sits with me.

I speak poetry when I dream of you as I drink a dram.
My words are poor.
I don't give a ****
Cause last I checked I'm still your man.

Lift the veil to reveal the face beneath.

I think I should write more.
My head is fuzzy with the unspoken words
Of the nameless creatures whom
Spew forth nonsense and melancholy.

Purge. Now there is a word!
An emotional release not unlike
Coming to fruition.

There it is again,
Lust and *** and tulips
Not daffodils, certainly not the rose
Are you as lost as I?

Aimless spurts of feelings
Thinly covered with sheets of paper
The ink like blood, seeps through
A stain of truth that no one can see
Except you, my love.

You look at me and you see an enemy.

I look at you and I see a man who needs enlightenment
But one too afraid of his god to look for it.

Your hate could be the death of me for my compassion cannot hope to compete with a god.

Yet I am here
If you need a friend.
Where is your god?

I tell myself not to message you.
What good would come?
Our paths diverted
Separate roads for separated
Souls.

Yet I see your smile when I awake
And sometimes when I'm down
Like a beacon of hope
Guiding this ship home.

But you are not home.
And I am no sailor
Tackling the elements
And winning my way.
I am drift wood
From a wreck lost way out to sea
Long, long ago
Under a listless moon
And the only witness
Drowned with me.

So I will not message
And the letter of my heart
Will remain unwritten
Floating with the wreckage
Which is me.

I wrote a poem of love.
I wrote of you. I tried. But the words would not come.
I am not a poet.
This is not my poem of love.
Rather words written and meanings lost.
You are my poem of love.
I write you with every breath.

I cannot make you feel beautiful.
Perhaps if you could for one brief moment,
With one softly drawn breath,
See yourself through me,
And behold the magic you carry within you,
As your friends,
Your family,
And the many strangers who pass you each day do,
Perhaps in that moment,
You would change your perception of yourself for an eternity,
For yours is a beauty that touches everyone,
Except you,
But perhaps through me you could come to know yourself.

Can I be considered a good leader if those that follow ultimately fail in my absence?

Is the artist only as good as the canvas upon which she brings her creations to life?

I suspect not.

Therefore I am a failure as my legacy is covered in the blemishes of the fallen. Viaducts down, Rome sacked as what once was great is now nothing more than tales told by those who choose to live in the past.

But I am young.

Thus I return to the scene of my crime, hastily departed, left reeling, a drunk short a drink and a sympathetic ear, and I begin anew.

Perhaps this time I will impart some wisdom to allow those that can to light their own path, so that this time when I depart they will stand resolute and face the coming dark with the certainty of knowledge, of awakened minds.

Wish me luck.

Your sad eyes awaken a need within me to heal the heart which cries tears poorly hidden by the night rain.

Who left you out in the cold?
Whose harsh hands left those marks upon your skin?

Something in me wants to save you from your chosen fate;
Lean into my protective embrace and I promise you no hurt shall ever visit you again.
We both recognize that lie;
The saviour is nothing more than the precursor to the persecutor,
I would lay you upon a cross we built from your past misfortunes and misdeeds, and the understanding which thinly covers my hate.

Better I offer you nothing now but a friendly smile,
And leave you, alone, cold in the rain, waiting for the man who bruised your face,

I would batter your soul.

Can you know love while your heart seeps in hate?

Bloodied and bruised lips,
I enjoy the taste of iron passion in your kiss.
Tears filled with too swiftly spoken words and
feelings never to be expressed well up then slip out and over,
leaving salty trails of dried up promises, of joy of pain.
Dark smears of mascara mark your otherwise flawless face.

I can read your need.
Our stories are intertwined and older then the cave paintings depicting hunter slaying prey,
and just as primal.

Sing me no sweet lullabies.
Rather pound me into the moist earth with your crescendo,
your dirge,
a harpy's cry coupled the siren's song.
My lust will answer in kind.
Rising proud and *****, a soldier standing tall, fearless, with yearning gaze searching the worlds between us, welcoming you, the enemy, more friend than foe, into a dance designed to wound,
Cupid's arrow through our heart.

The only peace we will know will be the quiet of the field when the battle is done.
The only victor the carrion crow,
a ****** of beaks to pick over our shredded skin, our false pride, our misconceptions.

It's not the bride who cries on this wedding day.
White virtue walks the aisle splendid with beauty that shines from within, sending my ghosts screaming as they are replaced with a spirit far more profound.

My knees shake as I lower myself to worship you at your alter.
Any more sacrifices and I'll be dead. I am laid bare before you, every layer pealed back, raw meat for the knife.
I await your tender kiss.