He won't say he knows
what it's like to  
shudder in horror at
himself.

He won't say he understands
the frozen fear and inability to
control his own mind,
the unbidden beliefs that don't go away.

He won't say that voice
in his head, isn't very little
and he can't help but argue
against himself, who isn't really him.

He won't say that it's not
alright when the evening is dying in
splendid shades of soft autumn
and he's unable to see it.

He won't say he gets what it's
like to be frozen in the corner of the room
huddled in ball of silently screaming limbs,
eyes closed because it takes too much strength to open them.

He won't tell his friends when the
noise is yelling and freaking out
over a grade that has become his world
and it's stressful enough without them saying it doesn't matter.

He won't say
wouldn't it be nice...
to be happy?
Yeah, that would be.

He won't tell his friends
in blazing daylight that seems to single him out
that he wishes it would stop.
Please, make it stop.

He won't tell them
anything at all.

it was a season of beauty
pick any one,
they flowed from one to another,
two birds flying somewhere they'll never be.

She had honeyed smiles and syrup eyes,
smooth and slow, content whispers and
galloping grins.

She had lovely hips and straight,
thin arms with short fingers,
soaring words flying through
candle flames.

care to see,
beyond the depths of
your ocean and
your stars,
they murmured into
each others ears.

and simple it was
in a complex sort of way.
going to a place they'll never be.

it was incomprehensible
inarticulate
maybe that's what he loved
him for.

the dark, cobweb corners,
and rusted wheel spokes
that
crisscrossed his eyes.

he loved him unspoken
unreliable
and maybe
that's why he
stayed.

While searching for unladen skies,
he came across a magpie resting in
a clear patch of swept dirt at his mangled feet.
(and here the story begins, don’t you think?)
Wait—
Do I intimidate you?
With my silken sashay of solicited yet lavish and rattled ramifications?
Complicated, complex logic behind words you don’t know—
words like sonder, opia, and undulate,
euphonious, sempiternal, and sisyphean.
You called them ‘fancy words’,
as if they are dressed for a masked ball and
in elegant suits and dresses, or someplace in-between,
they are dancing the waltz across marble mezzanines behind grey crenellations.
I’m not asking for the meaning of life or great quintessential and quaint questions,
but yet you ponder what’s after death before looking upon my countenance.
Do I require an irascible attitude in ninth grade, forced to be seen,
a scathing cascade of inward curses, each more extensive than the last?
(*******, *******, *******, and a variety of words meaning **** and ******)
So ashamed to fail, as though I belong to a singular meaning and no other.
I tell you now, I am not
crisscrossed with sultry language and full of your ‘can’t’ attitudes.
Whether I make you work or lie in agony over a line,
the job is to provide not pain, but—
understanding, comfort, hiraeth, empathy,
a place for anger, loneliness, emptiness
and inexpressible language…
but as words are only one facet to this endless complication,
I think you should pay attention to the small things.
But I won't dictate your life,
I’m only a broken magpie confined to earth,
Clothed in feathers and ultimatums.

I’ll look up and see a wasp
Or a bee, hunting around,
Ready to die.
Collaborations simplified in rivers abreast
Oh, the shores of Lethe are so delightful
With their ash marked eyes and solitude beggars
Potted plants of desiree, coal jutted shouts cross
Blanket crowds shoved in a bruised corner
With a madman screaming something about
Lasting generation and forced collaration.

See the basket cases? Claimed they were
From the devil, Dee did, muttering about kingdoms
and collard greens
With her stuffed, shrunk coat waddling round the
same Dickey’s, a corner from Westboro Baptist.
And kitty corner from the statues no one’s taking down
Cause Mr.White said nah son, that’s not right
As he bombed Bethel Baptist one more time.

And these shores are so delightful, don’t you see?
Harpooned sticks and scarecrows, oh sorry,
I meant social expectations, but who cares anyway?
Wondering why we all say “i want to die’,
Have you looked at the government mandating
People inhuman, or the money situation,
Should be on the news, but
No we here at Fox and CNN don’t believe that’s important.
Say, I don’t think we should have Onion headlines
On the New York Times.
So we say ‘i want to die’ and the Gazette tells us
it’s those **** video games again
or maybe it’s the stigma and lack of empathy from
The Powerful.

And you hear on the street,
“****’s ending this country,”
Sorry, I wanted a break from all this ******* noise
From a country pulling apart at the beaten seams
Of another unwritten book.
Anger, you’ll say, irrational, I’ll add,
But pointing at the statue in the park

And you wonder why all those wasps
And bees we look down on, the gerbils and
Hamsters
That we never pull a punch on
Why they escape through the way they know how,
Why, wouldn’t you too? But that’d require empathy, sir,
And apparently you lack more than morals, sir.

Look, there’s Dee, getting her collard greens
In her stuffy, shrunken jacket,
Round the corner from Dickey’s and cracked roads with
littered breezes blowing past cars open windows, honking and
brazen calls.

Welcome to the Lethe shores,
Don’t worry, you won’t remember a thing,
Slipped a bit of Liquid X in your alcohol.

Tin’s in the shed
So is Auntie who drinks too much.
I often wonder, who’ll go first—
Mary Jane or the boy next door.

The sky was shedding tears yesterday,
Who died? Or rather, who didn’t?
Music rhythm swaying kids in the clubs
And overdoses treated as criminal thefts

There’s a crab cake on the table,
Don’t know what it’s for anymore.
No one’s left to eat, no one’s left to eat
And I’m stuck in utter agravity.

These lungs we share, saturated with
Drugs trying to revive,
And drugs trying to pitch overboard
I wanna just lay down and

Forget the stars
Forget the moon
Forget the seven billion souls

Cursed pits under eyes of
Grey scaled photos to hide
Paintings of blacked blue
Look, there’s God standing over all

Saying nothing, saying nothing.
See any miracle? huh, neither do I
Cause I’m not sure whether direct opposition or
Indirect consultation ever shaves away Alex’s eyebrows.

There isn’t an ounce of bread left
To feed those seven billion souls, isn’t that
Right? Cause waste from hearth is worth
Less than their left pinky.

**** tired of this mess
We livin’ in a cupboard, in
A kitchen full of paper thumbs and
Punctured eyes.

Here’s to the girl who hates repetition.
Here’s to the eyes that always wander and
Here’s to the nights where she lived on a little longer.

Here’s to the skies that bloom with ambition
Here’s to the heart that races over the word no and
Here’s to the girl who never might know.

Here’s to the gun in her head, loaded with ammunition
Here’s trigger rusted with wear
Here’s to the heart strings yet to tear.

Here’s to the broken and shattered rendition,
From hells unbidden and noise unridden
Here’s to the girl who remains hidden

Here’s to the walls lit with a fiery ignition
Here’s to the times of late night fruition
Here’s to all that ****** repetition.