I have lived my life
As a monster
From an awful, low-budget, found-footage horror flick

Do not let our love be forged in sweet ease,
Nor should vanity be used as our base.
Let not our joy be a product of peace,
Nor should we dwell on our warmest embrace.

Let our love be a product of roughness,
Let it be steeped in our tears and shed blood.
Let our anger be the source of toughness,
And we will stand against the coming flood.

Let all the others take their unearned love,
With its ease and hugs, and their flowers, too.
So that when, as always, push comes to shove
We will stand as one, not apart as two

The flood will sweep away all the others
As we stand as the only true lovers.

No matter how hard the fall
I shall scramble to my feet.
But even if I have to crawl,
I shall never face defeat.

A life of leisure will not define me,
The scars that bless my body do.
Nothing worth having comes easily,
The best things in life ravage you.

A broken leg can be walked off,
A shattered skeleton will mend
The lungs recover from a cough,
So long as spirit never ends.

You don’t see what I see.
Someday soon it’ll all be worth it.

In ten years we’ll be lying in bed.
A child in your stomach and my arm under your head.
The dog supposed to be on the floor but he’s between us instead.
The tears of frustration you shed

Will dry into the text on your fresh new degree
You and I both know through everything that nothing is free,
But we can tear it down and restart, you’ll see.
And we’ll start a new world for just you and me.

We’ll burn down our debt and sorrow
And from the ashes will rise a new tomorrow.
Everyone will ask if our smiles are up to be borrowed,
And you’ll remember the challenges that were higher than Kilimanjaro.

We both know that we never asked for the task,
And it’s been hard not to drown ourselves in a flask
And wake up the next morning after a ****** and gruesome crash.
But when we’re down, the rewards are ours to bask.

You’ll see what I see sometime soon.
And when you do, it’ll all have been worth it.

Walking through a meadow, so slowly I journeyed.
And as I walked, I saw all that was.
I saw before me all that we have known and will,
The grand and dull, destructive and loving.

There was an old woman upon a log.
She looked kindly and loving,
But behind her were flies around an object I couldn’t see.
I walked on.

Further along was a beautiful mistress.
One who had known many a tantalizing sin.
She beckoned for me with a mesmerizing swing of her hips.
I walked on.

Upon a horse sat a man who shone with splendor.
His rings cost more than my house, and his wealth was distinct.
He held his hand out to me with a wide smile, offering me a place upon his steed.
I walked on.

An innocent hag with a rancid secret;
An unmistakably breathtaking concubine;
A promise of friendship and wealth.
I walked on.

Upon a boulder sat a girl alone
Her brown hair pouring out a gray cowl
She did not beckon to me, she did not call.
Yet something inside me stirred still.

I called to her and she looked up to me.
Hazel eyes shining with stubborn tears.
I held my hand out to her, and she took it willingly.
I sat down.

We didn’t always have to worry about things like this.
Getting scheduled for work on our favorite holiday, Halloween.
I suppose it doesn’t matter, since you wouldn’t be able to come down from school that day.
I guess we’re always busy nowadays.

There was a time when our biggest worry was the teacher moving our seats.
A time when missing a day of school meant we wouldn’t see each other.
And I think, though I may be wrong when I say this,
I think that we may have liked it that way.

Our favorite thing to do for a date wasn’t a fancy dinner.
We would get in the back of my parent’s car.
And they would drop us off at the park with a picnic basket and a sheet.
And we would sit by the pond and eat fruit salad and lay down.

That was when I fell in love with you, and stopped just having feelings for you.
You lay down with your hood over your eyes and your feet in the grass,
And simply rested. You just let yourself be at peace.
It was what taught me how to do the same.

Now, I sit here, miles away from you.
Watching you cry your eyes out on a webcam,
Because I have to work the day that we wouldn’t have been together anyway.
Perhaps it’s just a bit too much.

Growing up is a part of life, unavoidable and quick.
It cannot be stopped. One by one, we all have to accept responsibilities.
It is a vital and wonderful part of life.
But you know, it’s also pretty much ****.

She wore a plain black “V-neck” shirt and simple jeans with sneakers.
No make-up marred the beauty of her graceful features.
Yet she still outshone every woman who she passed.
Their caked disguises falling like glass.

It was hours until she gave me a passing glance,
And I felt my heart surge at the chance.
My mouth went numb and my throat went dry,
As my brain filled only with you and with I.

You held out your hand and said "Hello, I'm me."
And I took that hand and asked if you were free.
At first you stared at my blunt question,
But eventually giggled and said to get you at Eleven.

I thought you meant AM, but I was proven wrong.
As we ventured around the town all night long.
We kissed in front of every single shop,
and despite the sun coming up we refused to stop.

We stood on a dock in a closed public park,
Too far in on this journey to dare disembark.
But as we watched the sun dot the trees,
You told me how great your night was with me.

And now when you walk and you garner their envy,
You do it as you walk hand-in-hand with me.
I've never had so many people staring.
But if it means another night with you, I'll take the glaring.

You know well of the twisted dreams I sometimes have.
Where the surreal and realistic battle for control.
There's always something wrong there.
I remember one dream when the sky was green,
and another where the sun was gone despite the rays beaming down.
But one there was one that stuck with me.

I awoke and went about my morning.
But when I saw my parents, their faces startled me.
Particularly because they were upside down.
I continued on after confirming my ****** orientation in a mirror.
The sky was the ground and vise versa.
I drove to your house on the roof of my car and parked in your attic.
Descended the stairs to your floor and entered your room.
And you sat up on your ceiling, looked at me once and said,
"Ah! Your face is upside down!"

I reached out to grab your hand
Trying to pull you down, only to be pulled up.
And at the moment, my orientation became true.
And I realized. I was the one who was upside down.
So I climbed down from your floor and joined you
Because if everyone is upside down, then nobody is.
And ever since that realization, I've always been scared at night.
That I will enter my dreams and be standing on the ground.

Do you ever stop to think about it?
The improbability of you and I?
Like a summer snowman, or an autumn breeze in the spring.

That what we truly are.
A pair of snowmen holding hands as we stare down the sun,
Daring it to try and melt us.

But the autumn breeze is strictly you, my love.
Tossed leaves stuck in your hair
As you look off at something that has you distracted.

Such beauty you hold, such elegance.
How shameful it must be for the other women,
That day that they realized they aren't you.

The leaves cling to your hair, but you don't mind.
You're looking over the water in the glistening lake.
I brush your hand and tell you we should go.

You come back to reality and see the sun beginning to set.
The day is done and we have things to do.
Filthy responsibilities and abhorrent work.

Not yet, you plead. Just a bit longer.
The sunset is so beautiful.
Perhaps the sunrise will match it as well.

We humans are not capable of isolation.
We need to hear each other’s voices,
Feel each other’s touch. We cannot
Skate by in life without others by our side.

Those that try inevitably fail.
As loneliness presses in on them,
They crumble like the humans they are,
Leaving nothing behind whatsoever.

Perhaps the meaning to life is not wealth
Nor admiration, nor fame, nor recognition.
Perhaps all it is that we have been placed here for
Is to learn of love and trust.

Truly, would it be so shocking to discover
That this whole time, we were supposed to love?
That we were not here to be alone and survive,
But to unite together and thrive?

Look, no more swimming to the bottom of the pool,
Or looking in the closet for what you know isn't there,
No more trying to hang out alone because you know you'll never be cool.
And man, google it, bleach tastes like ****, and you know you'd be missed so quit.
Sit and follow bit by bit as I list what you're in, because all I have to do is reminisce.
We've been there, man, so cut the crap. We'll draw you a map to get to your cap,
Your maximum capacity.
To be what your Dad could be before he started chasing secretaries behind your Mother's back
and lost his dignity as the dignitary of your household.
We see what you do and what you've lost, you paid the cost of false love and we know.
My friend, we know.
There's no reason, no rhyme, but it doesn't help to whine, nor wine.
We've been there, and we'll tell you, it gets better, my friend, we promise.
It deteriorates and decomposes at a fast rate that keeps you up late as you miss your mate, the one you believe made you great.
But you were great before the ***** walked out the door shaking what brought you there to a fake amour.
There's no reason to sit and cry by the fireplace and wait and waste until your waist is eight,
just because a girl you tried to date couldn't relate to your place in the world.
We know, my friend, we know. And we know it gets better.
So pick yourself up off the floor and dust off that kitty sweater.

What is to say of Destiny?
Is it not what we make it?
Why, then, must I cling to ideals?
Clearly, there is an answer.
My Destiny is my own.
It answers to my call alone.
There is no man behind the curtain
Pulling his levers and pushing his pedals.
Who is to say that I do not control my own life?
Perhaps there should be no definition
The word Destiny should stay blank.
Our decisions are our Destiny, and our choices are our own.

*******, Diana, for everything you’ve done.
For getting a hold on my friend and ******* out his fun
For doing to his happiness what a vampire does to blood
For taking his healthy heart and crushing it into crud.

He used to be optimistic
Before you turned him Chauvinistic.
I promised I’d refrain from calling you a *****,
But thinking on it now, I’d say you’re nothing more.

Now he puts on a façade of a smile
And we hope he’ll be better after a while
But we cannot reverse the things you did to him.
You left with his heart and his world became grim.

You’ve nothing left to say to our friend
You insist that this is the end
Now that you switched to another man like changing the channel,
We all say in a chorus, *******, Diana.

We used to be so close,
But now you’re just a ghost
Of your former self,
Collecting dust on a shelf.

We’ve both changed greatly
And though we tried to rekindle lately,
There is no hope for what we had.
There is no way for us to go back.

You only contact me if things went wrong,
And cry about it to me all day long.
When we used to spend hours on end
Talking about the trouble we were in.

We would spend school days
Spinning in the sun rays.
Never paying attention,
Then talking in detention.

We would be on the phone
And you would be prone
To crying your eyes out
And swearing while you shout.

Now we never talk,
And we never walk
Through the mall on Mondays
Or around the parks on Fridays.

Perhaps someday, we will reunite
Even though all we ever do is fight
And in that time we’ll rediscover
The greatness we found in each other

Tell yourself that you're just tired.
Tell yourself that it was the yawn.
But don't tell that to us. We saw the tear.
We know.

Try not to let us know about it.
About how you still think about her.
About how you stay up until 5 AM, sobbing into your pillow.
We know.

Stop acting so ashamed.
As if it's a tragedy that we know.
We've all been there, many times.
We know.

Tell yourself that she doesn't bother you anymore.
Tell yourself that you don't want to call her this second.
But don't tell that to us. You're lying.
We know.

Don't tell us you were listening to Star Cecil again.
Or pull that bull that you just miss your dad.
Tell that to yourself, because you will believe it.
We know.

We've all been there.
I've been there, he's been there, she's been there.
You aren't alone in the least.
We know.

You will find not one soul on this earth,
Who doesn't understand your feelings.
Because practically everyone knows.
We know.

Stop crying into your pillow.
Get out of your room and take a shower.
Forget her, and get on with your life.
We did.

Another night of nothing,
Except for me, cold coffee, and books.
It's what I prefer, to be truthful,
So it's not as bad as it looks.

It isn't the most exciting thing,
But there are things that are certainly worse.
I could be out drinking and driving,
And then stuck in the back of a Hearse.

It's me and my trusty computer,
Playing more video games.
I'm the epitome of a teenager,
But I find myself free of the shame.

I'd spend all of my Saturday nights,
Bunched in a similar way.
And if my had my choice about it,
I'd do it during the day.

Poems are
Not
Done just by
Starting a
New line
Strategically, just
So that it
Seems that you are
Being deep and
Cannot finish any of
Your complicated
Thoughts. So please
Cut it
Out.

Unfolded is the storybook, the words come out in a flood.
Out pour the words more important than my blood.
The thoughts, the words, the movements and actions,
Flee from my mind and leave not a fraction.

Unfolded is the storybook, the words come out in a flood.
Congealing on a pool beneath me, consistency of mud.
The characters say goodbye as they fall, shouting out their curses.
A swan dive thrown to somersault as they leave my thoughtful person.

Unfolded is the storybook, the words come out in a flood.
Creativity lessened to match the drunk ones in the club.
unable to express myself, brain melted in a heap.
A blank slate of emptiness, thoughts ever obsolete.

Unfolded is the storybook, the words come out in a flood.
Leaking onto the ground in a sickly, sticky sludge.
How do they stand this emptiness, this awful lack of thought?
Dying, slowly draining, I feel as if I've been shot.

Unfolded is the storybook, the words come out in a flood.
Left with nothingness, a flower without it's bud.
I've become an empty, dried up pen, not sure what I was thinking.
Slipped into a dark below, a pirate ship sinking.

Twenty line poems, she asks. Twenty lines.
Twenty lines? I haven't got time.
I can't write on command, I've tried.
Especially not with my compulsive need to rhyme.

Compulsively, repulsively, I'd rather rhyme internally.
Butterflies flutter by, I watch them for eternity.
Eyelids begin to droop, asleep I would prefer to be.
Regretting waking up never has occurred to me.

Why is this so hard if I love to write?
My mind is blocked and the paper remains white.
Put on my Converse and lace them tight.
I'll find inspiration tonight.

Remove me from the house, I'm going for a walk.
Runner jogs by in silence, preferring not to talk.
Step over smeared concrete art drawn in colored chalk.
No birds awake in the night to mock.

Surprisingly, the air is cold.
This Florida heat was getting old.
That giant orb of heated gold.
It's cold elsewhere, I've been told.

Today, I saw something.
Something that left me speechless.
And even to this moment,
I can’t get it out of my head.

In my Spanish class, there is a boy.
This boy is a Senior, and will be graduating in two days.
He isn’t very sociable, and I’ve only talked to him a few times.
But the teacher loves him like her own son.

The boy is a very unfortunate boy.
He wears the same clothes very often,
Since he can’t afford new ones.
And never really has supplies for school.

He is a large, dark-skinned boy.
He keeps to himself, and rarely speaks
To anyone else in the class,
Except for the teacher.

He sits and talks to the teacher all class period
(Assuming we aren’t doing anything in class)
And she listens intently, as if he is the Pope
And is passing the word of God unto her.

I've talked to him only a few times before.
Once, he noticed that I was upset over a personal problem
He convinced our teacher that I wasn't feeling well,
And asked her kindly to send me out so that I could get fresh air.

Nobody really ever talked to him.
Eventually, the seats in class rotated,
And I was moved away from him.
He was allowed to stay next to the teacher.

Through the year, it continued.
He wasn't extremely intelligent, but he wasn't unintelligent either.
He would try his hardest in all of his school work no matter what,
And most of the year could scrape by with a C.

Apparently, he had legal troubles at home
Where his parents had a few physical altercations.
He was out for a few days, and then came back
As if nothing had happened.

In my school, the Senior class leaves before the other classes.
Maybe it is the same in other schools, I'm not sure.
The Seniors graduate in two days,
And the boy is going to be leaving.

Today, the bell rang to end the class.
I was late packing up, and was in class for a few extra seconds
The boy was still in class as well,
Looking at our teacher.

He walked up to her and called her name.
She looked up from her desk and smiled
They talked as if they were great friends for a moment
And then the boy looked very sad.

What he said next was heartbreaking.
"You were my best friend this entire year.
None of my other teachers really cared about me
They thought I was just another kid who didn't care.

But you always helped me, no matter what.
When I was struggling, you would go out of your way
To make sure I understood what was happening.
Without you, I wouldn't be graduating."

He paused to wipe a tear from his eye.
"I just wanted you to know
That you were more loving
Than my own parents at home."

The teacher didn't respond.
She stood up from her desk
And wrapped her arms around his neck
And hugged him like he was her own child.

Neither of them spoke,
But I could hear them both
Gently crying into each others shoulders.
Saying more than words ever could.

I left the class without saying a word
But the sight still hasn't left my mind.
The sweetness, the sincerity of his words,
And how overcome with emotion they were.

It left me choked for quite a moment,
And I had to force back tears before I went to lunch.
When I got there, I sat down with my friends.
And told them what I saw.

I excluded their names,
Not wanting to tell everyone their business.
And did my best not to tear up.
My friends listened intently.

One of my friends was dumbstruck,
And another started to tear up as well.
The others stayed silent, which spoke volumes.
Except for one, who simply uttered "Whoa."

And it's still in my mind.
The large, misunderstood boy
Being hugged by a loving teacher,
Who cared for him more than his own parents.

If I want my work to shine,
Or if I want it in your mind,
Or if I simply have spare time,
I find it's best to make it rhyme.

I find it easier to gleam
Exactly what the poem means.
Or at least it makes it seem
That I had some sort of scheme.

But sometimes I get lazy
And my hands get lazy
And my mind gets crazy
Due to rhymes, mainly.

It makes it much harder,
But I'm a rhyme Martyr.
Or a rhyme Guarder.
Just like James Carter.

It gives my poems shape,
And helps me to create
A vibrant landscape
And provides an escape.

I have a camera.
Therefor, I am a photographer.
I take pictures of whatever I see
And upload them onto my facebook.

Look, I put this one in black and white.
Aren't I artsy?
My mom says I should open my own website.
I took a close-up of this flower.

I have a pen.
Therefor, I am a writer.
I write about the first thing that pops into my head.
And make sure I don't think about it.

I just wrote a poem about my ex.
We dated for over three weeks.
She broke my heart so badly.
I think I'll write a book.

I have a brush.
Therefor, I am an artist.
I slam my brush onto the canvas.
My art is very abstract...

I'm not sure what these paints are.
What in the hell is a "pastel?"
I get my paint from Wal-Mart.
I think I'll put this on eBay.

I'll dive down, my dear, down deep.
Dive down in a dastardly dive to the depths.
Past the Pacific's specific pretty swells and pests.
Placed in purgatory, pressed by pressure in peculiar places.

Be I broken? Be I busted? Be I brought to the bottom of the sea?
Be I beaten? Be I baffled? Be I back broken and sinking to the bottom of the bay?
Sinking? No, not I. I am not sinking, so say I am simply swimming and singing songs.
Slyly say that I swim with swagger, never sadly screaming, but sighing in my soaked sarcophagus.

Literature literally leaps, like a lioness letting lemurs leave her licked lips.
Books beg to be broken open by bored bosses and brothers and all others.
Poems practically pray for people to pick open pages of Poe and other ponderers of personification.
Metaphors make mothers and masters master their manipulative messages.

Similes smile slyly and smother the selfish and selfless alike like a snake or slaughterer.
And on average, only an artistic artificial android with an arsenal of all arithmetic and knowledge knows,
That though they thought that they could think like the theorizing thinkers,
Nearly nobody knows never to neglect knowledge, whether on rope knots or nautical knots, neanderthals or Narnia.

I am sick.
An illness of body, an illness of mind
Of illusion and time.

I am sick of the body,
Weakened and frail
Exhausted from the tolls of my days

I am sick of the mind
Slowed and stressed
Destroyed from the tolls of my days.

I am sick.
An illness of thought, an illness of inaction.
Of regrets and what-ifs.

I am sick of thought,
Because it brings me little good
And only makes me regret

And I am sick of regret
Because it makes me think
Which leads to what-ifs


Truly, without doubt, I am sick.
Truly, without doubt, I have an illness
But there are things more severe.

I am sick of mind, of body
I am sick of thought, of inaction
I am sick.
I am sick.

I pass you in the halls
And it reminds me
Of what we once were
And of what we now are

There were times when we would pass
And your face would brighten
And we would embrace
And the world would melt away

But now, your expression remains emotionless
And we act as if the other is just another anonymous character
And all the nights of holding each other and being there for each other
Just never even happened.

In truth, I have no right to be upset about this.
I moved on first, after all.
And I don’t regret it.
Not one bit

I move on to someone who treated me right
Who listened, and actually spoke, unlike you
Someone who can make me laugh
And I am happy, which I certainly never was with you.

And my mood has already changed
From solemn to serene
For, in the midst of writing, I realized
That you are gone

And then I smile
Because you’re gone, and you’ll stay gone
Oh, how I wish you could see this smile.
How I wish you could see this smile…

This smile is in place because
My brain just realized
That it doesn’t really mind if you're gone.
And all it cares about is that you stay gone

And now my heart realizes that it doesn’t care either,
Because it isn’t beating faster like it used to at the thought of you
And my eyes don’t want to look at you, so they are indifferent.
My entire body has forsaken you.

My arms don’t want to hold you
My legs don’t want to run to you
My hands don’t want to caress you
My soul doesn’t want to know you.

My entire body has forsaken you
As you had forsaken my love
With the coldest of scornful feelings
And no regrets.

And I sit, and think of you
And what we once had
And I know that, if I tried, I could get it back.
And I could have you back to how you once were.

But the thing is….
I really don't care.

Let's break the planet into shards.
Let's do with ease what they call hard.
Let's make a mansion out of cards.
Let's make the ocean burnt and charred.

Let's turn an ounce into a pound.
Let's take a square and make it round.
Let's make it so no one can frown.
Let's go swimming underground.

Let's make a city on the moon.
Let's make the sun go down at noon.
Let's make what never happens happen soon.
Let's have winter on the first of June.

Let's fall in zero gravity.
Let's give away the world for free.
They say it's impossible, but they don't see.
Anything is possible for you and me.

the horn starts sounding,
my head starts pounding,
the whole world's surrounding,
off these walls i'm bounding,
the walls of the city i'm founding,
from this there's no rebounding,
they just wont stop hounding,
my problems they want me expounding,
everything's confounding,
me this is astounding,
their questions are resounding,
until I hear their echoes sounding,
And so,
I let them know,
And then they let me go.