Sew your mouth shut.
Those who complain are weak.
Only the strong have known true suffering, and the strong are in military fatigues.
Study what you want…
You can pick from
what you love,
what you hate,
or what will get you money.
But the job market has the final call whether your education was worth anything.
Go to work
Go to sleep
Go to work
Go to sleep
You will never have time to do what you truly want
And the job will never give you what you need.
Only more money to line your mattress with.
And enough barriers
Called responsibility
to never think of those things you once wanted
Ever again.
Blunt the cruel axe of reality
With alcohol and cigarettes
And pixilated depictions of ***.
I try to be an optimist.
My father thought my depression was pessimism
Then it was mourning
And now its any problem I have
With women.
And the aid for the suicidal,
The Granite State has none.
A bugged phone call,
Endless therapy
And medication. Over and over again.
While hot tears are unable
To reach my cheeks
Because my contacts eat them up
For lack of knowing
What I need to fill this void.
And the banging you hear
That keeps you up at night
Is not a monster in the closet.
It is me
Hitting my head against concrete
Because the state said my imagination
Was not conducive to society.
Dying in America is an expensive prospect.
So when I’m falling apart in America
Are they stopping me from dying now,
So I can pay for it later?
With no way to escape
Maybe I will turn to the last solid institution in America
The banks. And sink myself into glorious debt
To get away.
If not,
I will complete my transformation into an adult in America,
And buy a gun. How we love them so.
Luckily though,
I only need one bullet
And my name is on it.

Once there was a boy
Who became a cog when he entered the big machine
When he started to slow down and creak
They medicated him to keep him going
When he graduated with a Bachelor's he became a gear
And when he began to crack from the pressure
He considering protesting, but didn't because that's what it meant to be an adult
So when he finally snapped, people were surprised they hadn't seen the signs
And he spent three months in a white room
When he was released he sat on a stoop silently
No one knew whether he ever left it or slept or ate
Because no one noticed him
Except film students who would use him in time elapsing shots
So when he stepped in front of a bus one day
Only Jesus was there to stop him
And then he died anyway.

It’s 3 a.m.,
And I imagine the only other ones awake,
Are the tired, the troubled, and the lonely.
I’d be one of the last of the three.
It’s said, that as it gets colder,
People come closer together,
But I don’t feel anyone sleeping next to me.
If it was so simple,
I’d like to think I’d have done it long ago,
But Santa can’t fit a soulmate under my Christmas tree.
I’m beginning to think,
That even if you like someone for who they are,
And not just the relationship they can represent,
That you can be yearning for love anyway you can get it.
We are all; free-basing cups of hot leaf juice,
In place of a pair of hands.
Jonesing for a soft voice to whisper
Those three words in our ear.
Indulging in brightly colored bottles,
Of acrid smelling liquids, for a momentary high,
Only to wake up next to someone,
With whom we do not remember when we fell asleep.
Craving to have someone,
When we wake up at night, hold us,
And ask if we’re ok.
Desperate, seeking out strangers,
In shady places,
Trading our money,
For just one night of something different.
Or we reach out to anyone, someone
Or entertainment on a web,
To get some kind of escape for a time,
But we may yet regret later,
When we come back down from it all.
We pursue others even though we should know,
That we have no chance.
Really, we’re chasing after distant hopes, and fading dreams,
Of waking up in the middle of the night, with someone,
Who we feel lucky to be next to.
We fall asleep crying, with some voice crooning to us on headphones,
Because we were alone on Valentines Day.
We settle for people who we don’t really love,
Or who aren’t really the best for us,
Just because we think at least somebody cares!
We starve, and cut, and hate, and sweat, and scream, and wish to die,
Because we don’t feel that we are worthy to be loved by someone else.
And we cry, endless, oceans of tears,
Before the monolith tower of Seeking True Love that rises to the Heavens,
Because a cartoon mouse reached out from a screen and told me,
As his white-gloved hand took mine, that I could dream.
And endless bards and singers,
Inspired and gave us hope,
That somewhere out there was someone for us,
Someone who would make all the times
In which we bled in the name of our broken hearts,
Worth all the pain.
And so I dreamed about true love, and never stopped,
Even when the rope grew tight around my neck,
Even when I dropped the fifth bottles of pills into the trash can,
And even when I drew the razor blade across my flesh.
But I still hoped and I still believed,
And I still do today.
Is Love an addiction we have forced upon us,
Or is it the dreams that we chose to keep,
That force us to the limits of our tolerance for survival,
And in place of needles,
Kisses and words,
That we wish to keep?

In the waking hours of another time,
Man sees triumph over life itself,
On one shore, they cracked the code of being,
And on the other merged us with cold earth,
While beneath the ground, in vials brewed,
The outcasts and exiles released their emotions in skin renewed.

As man grew weary of the other side,
Plans were drawn and deals were made,
In order to control our unified mind,
And on that day, black ships blotted the sun
Monstrosities rained down, amalgams of man and animal,
And met with constructs of men who shined in the light.

While war was sewn throughout the world,
The underground heaved, and spilled out of their refuse,
With freaks that were the shed direct from emotion itself,
Zombies who could not speak such was their rage,
And men without hair, who could cure you with your faith alone.

While the world blew itself apart,
As the Changed raged and died,
Trying to show the other side that it had always been right,
Millions of people throw up prayers,
Praying that God would have pity on them all,
That he would not see fit to start the Second Coming.

And while the world is crashing to its end,
A small gathering descend to Earth,
Beings of other worlds and kinds,
And they slowly begin to cry,
As children with fire dance beyond the horizon,
And journey’s end.

One day while traversing in a far off land,
I happened upon a path in the road,
With no signs or direction it cut through the mountains,
And seemed to stretch into another world.

Walking along the basalt path,
I saw the world become a colorful plain,
Stretching and abounding in every which way,
I seemed to float on a river that was not even there.

And suddenly, I came across a great tree,
With a large snake a twain the branches,
And beneath in a shallow spring,
Were draped men with eyes red from crying, and faces dark for lack of sleep.

I approach the tree and humbly bow,
Drawing attention from the snake,
I hear a soft hiss near my ear asking,
“Why do you bow to me?”

I say: Good snake, I mean no harm,
I simply bow to avoid you biting me, and injecting your hateful poison,
For I am trespassing upon your land,
And only wish to be polite.

The snake laughed as only a snake can,
And leaned down to me,
“Young man you are welcome upon my land,
For you see these men are here by choice.

These men are here by choice and theirs alone,
And I shall not lie,
They begged for me to poison them,
Because misery is their new life.

My poison has rotted their brains to miserable husks,
And now they relax and wallow oblivious here,
Thrown here by those they did once trust.
I sit and watch them because I am curious to know.

I am curious to see if they simply forget where they are,
Let go of the side and fall into the pool and die?
Or if they will give in to my poison,
And keel over and die?

However none of them have let go yet,
For as miserable as they are they know they are not alone in this pool,
Even though they do not feel it they know there are others here,
And misery is company best served.”
I continued along until I saw two shapes in the distance,
As I neared I saw what seemed to a large stone,
And the other, from the look of the shadow,
A needle.

When I approached I saw two things at an impasse.
What I first mistook as a stone was a large cloak,
That was in fact occupied,
But by whom I could not see.

The other was simply a mirror,
A plain old mirror,
With I humbly took time to admire,
My own visage.

To which I said Good Morning,
And I was echoed in reply,
And to my surprise,
Whoever was in the cloak spoke as well.

“ Do not look into the mirror,
Do not speak, or it will speak back to you,
And with every word you say, it will twist and repeat,
Until you no longer know, if the mirror is you or if you are the mirror.”

I then turned to look at the piece of glass,
And it seemed to explode before my eyes,
Until it became a plethora of eyes, eyes that were mine,
And within each one I could see a malice and hatred that was beyond my design.

This creature then, I ventured to my quiet companion,
Why is it here?
“It is here because it hopes that one day,
A man will come and in his loneliness begin conversing with it.

And while they converse and his loneliness is eased,
The creature will creep oh so silently,
Into his head, and will whisper,
All the dark things he has dreamed since he was made.

And he will whisper all day and night,
Until the man can no longer distinguish his own voices,
From the ones in his head.”
I suddenly became afraid and turned my back on the demonic glass.

So why are you here, I asked the cloaked man.
“I alone can keep this beast here,
Because I will never speak to it.
And as long as I am silent towards it, it can never conquer me.

You see, I am scared,
I am afraid of people; I find them difficult to trust,
And what they may do to me worries me so,
Just talking to you now, is making my hands shake.
So silent and afraid of people I may be,
By sitting here I hope that I may do the world some good yet,
Do not weep for me; I am lonely, yes,
But I can only believe, that it is better to be alone and hale, than among others and hurt.”

I tried to offer the poor man, a sign of my appreciation,
But he shied away from my hand,
And not to seem rude, but when I looked back at the mirror,
I ran as fast as my legs would carry me.

I then came, to a sea of tall wheat,
A field, a beautiful field,
Endless it stretched beyond my eyes,
And seemed to meet the horizon.

As I was walking through the grass,
Almost lost in a trance in the summer sky,
I saw a glorious sight.
A man dancing through the grass.

His face was shining with a smile I so rarely see,
And his features were more than a man, an Olympian was he,
He leaped and laughed, and sang aloud,
As the wheat erupted in sweet smelling smoke, from the fire that alit were he fell.

I approached him,
Astounded by his glee,
And asked him of his fire,
And how such a phenomenon could be.

He hugged me, in such a tight embrace,
And roared with such laughter when he saw the surprise on my face,
“My friend, it is the summer and such a happy time!
I am alive; I am afire with the sun’s light!

And as the sun shines, so do I
But I must make the time last, from morning to night,
Because I am ever aware that with every moment passed,
Winter is sooner to grasping me yet.

And when winter comes,
My smiles will vanish with sun,
And my body will become frozen,
A black and tenebrous mess, for I will always be close to death.

But do not fret, for now, I am alive!
So let us dance, and sing
Drink and eat,
For no matter how time passes, the sun will always rise again.”

No matter how much fun it could have been,
My friend was sad I could not stay,
And so I walked on,
And found the ocean that has no name.

So I passed underneath all the magnificent waves,
And saw all the faces of people I loved forever,
As I drifted towards the horizon,
And passed between night and day.

How Edison and Tesla warred
To be the first to capture light.

A replacement for fire
And an ode to the sun.

Guiding travelers
Across sky, land, and seas.

Balming my hungry skin with rays
When I’m jonesing for the sunshine.

Bringing life to what was once still
Shadows dance across glowing plains.

Illumination to our world
No longer constrained by dawn and dusk.

The power of storms harnessed
To fuel our weapon against the dark.

Transcending to be hopes beacon
Against all fear.

Miniaturized to be as small as a dot
Oh how we hunger for our light.

How I tire of only going on planes
      To travel to places where all I do
Is follow the directions of a sickly sweet travel book
       Picked up from a bookstore that has never been anywhere.

How my eyes hunger for new places
    My feet to be numb from too much walking
My lips and tongue ache to speak with new people
     And my being longs for new experiences in a strange land.

Were that the butterflies in my stomach
       Could grow teeth so that they could break free
I would rein them in with rope woven from my hopes and dreams
       And follow the horizon until I find the right place.

Somewhere adventure is out there
        Waiting for me.