The sum of the toil will pay up,
You'll see once I'm set free.

My name, in their voices, uttered.
You'll hear once I'm gone from here.

My words on the shelves and headstones,
You'll read and the warnings heed.

Once I've doused these seeds with my blood,
You'll see how they'll turn to me.

Until then, I'll remain the unknown, the weird,
one more lamb in the field one more cog in the wheel.

With unfazed gaze, we've stared
through screens, their screams, we've shared.
And weak our wills have fared
when to those flames compared.

Another fire's now lit,
as one more throat lies slit.
Averted hearts are split,
and naught a course seems fit.

And those who hold the rein,
know not of grief or pain.
Unmoved their souls remain
as doom begins to rain.

Yet how are we to act?
when odds are all but stacked,
subservient to the fact,
Our world's been bled, *****, sacked.

The rinsed-out certainty of facts,
And played-out character of acts.
The milled down thoughts and weighted pasts.
Have left us barren, hardened hearts,

We’ve long sought meaning beyond that,
But with our failed effort sat.
We searched in color, music, art.
And gave ourselves to brand new starts.

But few found solace from the plight,
And went to God, in all but spite.
Fewer still found truth in rites,
And chanting songs at candlelight.

Yet others longed for all things bright,
The gilded, minted, stacked to height,
But found a dreadful side to light,
Akin to Icarus in flight.

And still asunder our hopes lay,
Aspiring, writhing, in dismay,
All meanings lost there in the hay,
Abound with needles, prickly, stray.

To the boldness of them,
may it never end.
Those who go in blind,
trusting you'll be kind.

Lives being gifted whole,
to another soul.
By those who jump in hope,
others hold the rope.

To you brave of heart
muses to all art.
For whose love is raw,
I remain in awe.

I found you in the creaking of my soul,
In the plastered walls of my being,
mended, restored.

I found you in the creases of my mind,
like an heirloom, lost to time,
priceless, treasured.

I found you in the emptied halls,
like echoes from afar,
singing, laughing.

I found you on the roads I walk,
the ones that bring me back,
to the sheltered warmth,
of loving hands.

Have you seen them?
The bruised souls,
With darkened circles, baggy eyes,
Building castles in the sky.

Have you seen them?
With weighted smiles,
Writing poems in the dark,
Picking flowers from the park.

I’ve known many of their kind,
With the stunted, broken stride,
Sinking deep into their thoughts,
Reaping seeds of tragic loss.

There’s no romance to be told,
Little triumph in the mud,
Yet, as one can mend the bone,
So, can too one heal the soul.

It is safe, down in the hole,
But there´s much still to be known,
So, allow the buds to blossom,
and the darkness to be gone.

I have this list of things,
many ruinous, mundane things.

  -2 cokes,
  -1 bread,
  -existential dread

I write them as they come,
tapped into existence by my fingers,
in a rush.

  -People’s,
  -Places’,
  -Dog names

They bask in the otherness,
that brings them together.

  -Heartache,
  -numbers,
  -reminders

I feel protective of them,
the mishmash, ugly family of things.

  -Mom’s birthday
  -Father’s Day
  -“I want to go away.”

Because I made them, and they know me,
the real me.