Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
 
Spenser Bennett Feb 2016
There's a war in the 2 A.M.
And I am not okay
I live divided between
the stars and the love beneath
I can't breathe in light
No, I can't breathe tonight

Am I falling down?
All the stars littered about
And I am not afraid to die
In the garden of the sky

Push it down
Swallow that startled sound
I'll be okay, it's true
Yeah, I'll be okay
If that's okay with you

But I can't breathe right now
No, I'm not breathing now
And the lights are spinning around
And around over my eyes, baby blue
Now...

Am I falling down?
All the stars littered about
And I am not afraid to die
In the garden of the sky


Tonight, tonight I am
Lost in this forlorn 2 A.M.
600 · Jun 2017
In This Moment
Spenser Bennett Jun 2017
In this moment I would run
Without eyes to see
Or lungs to breathe
I would run so far
For so long
And die as the sun must

In this moment I would live
With arms thrown wide
And a heart grown full
I would live so well
For long enough
To die alongside the earth

In this moment I am alone
As I have always been
As I shall always be
I am so alone
I can hear my heartbeat
Though no joy accompanies

In this moment I am awake
To the truth of existence
Nothing is permanent
I am so awake
I can hear the divide
Calling without a voice

In this moment the world turns
Without thought to why
Nor a reason to bear
The world turns gentle
As the oceans collapse
Against the endlessness

In this moment I would run
So fast and so far
I could lose myself
I would run forever
Without thinking of you
Without thinking of me
594 · Sep 2018
Scabs (Haiku Chain)
Spenser Bennett Sep 2018
Hello, I'm sorry
Always apologizing
I know, I broke it

Stay still, just one more moment
I want to capture
In my mind, your eyes tonight

Hello, it's pointless
Killing time until the wound
Scabs and heals over
592 · Jun 2016
But Right Now
Spenser Bennett Jun 2016
Bright eyes, tan skin
What a world that I'm livin' in
Dark hair, crooked smile
It shows up every once in awhile

But right now I'm young and restless
My eyes stay open and my mind is a whirlwind
I talk too fast so it isn't hard to leave me breathless
I think too much so I never get the girl's hand

Soon I'll be older, wiser
Hope I don't end up a miser
I'll talk less about myself and more about ideas
Care more about the world and what's left behind for my kids

But right now I'm gonna make mistakes
And take shots to the head to forget my heart breaks
I wanna be wild and crazy
But I know some day a woman's gonna change me

She'll show me what I never knew
About the world and myself too
And I'll show her all my poetry
And she might like it and say she thinks it's neat

But right now, right now, I'm going to sleep
Quick write. Wishful thinking.
568 · Mar 2016
Dream On
Spenser Bennett Mar 2016
I see strangers all about me
You saw strangeness all around you
The light bends through new leaves
Don't blend true
All that's blue whispers
Dream on little Ms. Q

It's only a short trip
And you won't miss
The small kiss
Or the blood drip

Come on
Come on
Say what you will
Move in for the slow ****
Hold on
Hold on

I'm sorry it took this long
I'm blue in my dead lungs
And you buried your sharp tongue
Deep in the silent song

Dream on
Dream on
Little loved one
Supreme beauty, my dawn
Breathe; pause
Breathe; pause
561 · Apr 2017
The Beating Heart of Love
Spenser Bennett Apr 2017
Fear is the beating heart of love
Love is the decaying root of indifference
Indifference is the overlooked cost of profit
Profit is the slow-burning charcoal of greed
Greed is the insatiable lover of suffering
Suffering is the quiet antecedent of fear
Fear is the beating heart of love
555 · Feb 2016
Transmission
Spenser Bennett Feb 2016
I want to learn how to smile in another language.
I want to burn but feel no anguish.
I'm so sorry for all those words I never said.
I'm so sorry I wrote all those love songs in my head.
513 · Jul 2017
Like Trains
Spenser Bennett Jul 2017
So, I'll lie awake on this rocky beach
With my head full of sand and bad memories
You told me you felt safe in the arms of evergreen
And I said I'd never go away until this spark became too much to bear

Now the mountain came to us but we couldn't climb
Because, because our perspective was at odds with the even keel of this sinking ship
And oh I couldn't hear one more word about that anchor called forgiveness
Because, because forgiveness is just the gateway to forgetting and I won't forget

No, I won't forget you
Even when the world crashes down around my ears
Oh, heaven is coming down here
I know the angels sing their perfect songs but if they,
If they aren't singing of you I don't care to hear

But I hear, I hear angels cursing loud like
Like trains in the still night
Blowing decibels like churches
Towering tight against my eyes
They sound like
Screeching eagles clawing at the track
But they refuse to see that there's no going back

Because we said we'd never be this way
A silent promise in the deafness of anger
Said we'd never be this way
But I kept my fingers crossed
Like, like, perpendicular lines still hot from the friction of use
I'm burnt all down my insides
Because, because I know there's nothing in this world that can keep me from you

Even death concedes that I just won't turn blue
She watches me wait for you
In a forest made of ash
Whispers sweet nothings about the comfort of the black

But I refuse, I refuse to give in
And I won't forget to forgive myself
You always told me that comes first
The world is easier to live with if I can learn to live with myself
But I can't keep living this life without your help

So I'll wait by the ocean where salt water rises to tug at my feet
You'll be nowhere and right here because I just can't let it go
There's fear in the moon, that crazy old man is looking for us
I never knew what for
Pushing and pulling the sea until we can't swim anymore

And the waves will pull me under
To the depths where I'll await your forgiveness
When I'm deeper than the darkest indigo
Oh, I'll be passing through Atlantis
And I'll tell those sunken people of you and your eyes like a sunrise without an ending
These words they won't comprehend

And they'll never forget my tales of you
Long after I have passed
And their stars aren't the same as ours
Just lights passing in the distance
But they'll name them all after you
And your forgiveness

Oh, please forgive them
Bring them back to light
Give them my sunset
And hold me to the end of the line

Where the rocks aren't so sharp
And the ocean ain't so deep
The train is coming fast
And I can finally sleep
494 · Jan 2017
Oh and How
Spenser Bennett Jan 2017
It comes and goes
Wind and laughter
Does it matter
No one knows

Bend to break now
Gutter phenom
Hated Hinnom
Oh and how
489 · Jul 2017
Nod
Spenser Bennett Jul 2017
Nod
She's so chemical, substrate, synthetic love
I never wanna taste her again
But I know I'm gonna taste her again
Because this is chemical, I'm not man enough

Veins twist and throb, aching for pulse
She only comes to go, leaving me alone
Let the blood flow
Let the girl go

Dependence, despondence, arriving all at once
A hard postdrip, and I'm dope sick
Wake me up with the sidewalk
Where I fought off concrete

And she's watching me breathe
While I'm dying in the depths of her sea
Blue love, no warmth comes
She's  not a disease

She's chemical, endo, morphonic reprieve
And I'm nodding along without a beat
I'm nodding off

And I'm nodding along



Nodding along


N
  od
      din
           g
al
    o
      ng
N
     odd
             ing
o
  f
    f
471 · Jun 2017
Shadows Dancing Familiar
Spenser Bennett Jun 2017
I heard there was a dancing man
Somewhere deep inside
A cave lit only by candles
And that he didn't realize how
The world could be so bright
Because all he knew was shadows

You told me a story once
About a little old lady who
Lived inside of my left shoe
And I never wore it again
So she wouldn't have to keep
Rearranging her bedroom
I wonder if that's how God feels
About inhabiting me

See there's a lack of something
A wondrous nothing really
That I hear humming at night
Lying in tossed sheets and
Hoping the world isn't as dark
As it wants me to believe
It is

All I see is shadows
Dancing against the rock
Strung up by my ankles
When the blood rush in my
head became a familiar face
I knew you would too
That's the way it seems to go
All the love we never knew
We needed finds us
Somewhere between hopelessness
And calling it quits

This is what we've come to
A warm beer and a
Cold kiss goodnight
Nothing loving about the spite
I hear it in your voice
When you say you won't ever leave
I never said you were the only one
Oh no, you're not the only one
But you're the only one I want

So stay here with me
A quiet place where we can sleep
The world is coming for you
And I can't see the shadow so I
I know it must be the truth
That's gonna take you away from this
Empty nest and refill me with emptiness
She'll never leave those whom she gazes into
She only waits for love to leave again

The permanent impermanence of loss
Keeps me hanging on to a
Foreign hope of a traveler's kindness
Don't let go, there's nothing to look through
Only you
With a blood rush to the head
And shadows dancing familiar
Plato's Allegory of the Cave
Little old Lady  that lived in a shoe
A God-shaped Hole
If Work Permits - The Format
Something something...the abyss gazes back... -Nietzsche  
"I only stopped by to look through ya"  - Chance the Rapper
470 · Dec 2018
IX
Spenser Bennett Dec 2018
IX
All shall not last forevermore
Patient is the knock of Death at Life's ancient door
Let me gaze through the window a while more
Until Living becomes, as compared to Death, a bitter chore
461 · Oct 2018
So Long, So Far
Spenser Bennett Oct 2018
It's another pointless night in a semi pointless life
Devoid of light and aching for strife
I'll wait for the courage to give up on hope and turn out my eyes

There's movement and there's heat somewhere outside the door
I've been there, so long, so far before you graced the sweaty floor
The dancing fools and turbulent intellectuals made dim by another and another one too many
How they abandon themselves forever, an escape they embrace unconditionally, so ready

In the deep night from which I abstain, you're out there waiting
For someone better, for someone to fit a malformed mold
While I sit debating the merits of another new love or an old affair that's always failing
In my favorite chair, guitar in the corner, the words I sing seem cold

This isn't real, I tell myself, it's a finger in the dam
There's water leaking through, it's always coming for you
How long can you stay here, denying the inevitable, let it be broken
Let the flood wash you away, wake up as someone new

Because change is worth the pain
Because theres more to life than waiting to die
Because she isn't waiting for you
Because she never will
So pick yourself up and carry yourself home
Wake up as someone new
442 · Oct 2017
Waiting
Spenser Bennett Oct 2017
Oh, I've been waiting
And imitating
All the ways I should've been

But now I've no idea
How to be a real person
But you're showing me
And I'm learning

Take me by the hand
And make me better
Show me how to stand
To make me better

Oh, I've been waiting
for a sign dictating
How to find my way back

But the map is old and faded
The roads look like rivers
Even ink can become jaded
After the compass' last quivers

Take me by the mouth
Did it make you better
Take away the doubt
To make me better

Oh, I been waiting
It's true. Waiting
For someone like you
439 · May 2019
Norepicurus
Spenser Bennett May 2019
For what pain may bring
We suffer more of our fear
Pain is but a fleeting, physical thing
While fear lingers on for years

Say what you must of Epicurus
Call him what he must have been
A coward, a heathen, a hedonist
He rejected all but the pleasurable sins

For pain is a sin, against the happiness of spirit
And fear is as well, however, against the fortitude of mind
Run far from pain, avoid all who dwell near it
But fear, I say, you must embrace lest courage you ne'er find
437 · Sep 2017
Lovey-Dovey, Starry Eyed
Spenser Bennett Sep 2017
You make me lovey-dovey, starry eyed

Color me down, hold my love inside
I want to feel your love tonight

You make me radiate, I feel my aura; deep and bright

We don't have to complicate, let love decide

Destination unknown, but we're side-by-side

You're my favorite song. I sing it all the time.

Dancing to the rhythm of our own beat, melodies floating soft and sweet

Like painted time, swinging hips, and our moving feet

Slow and steady, heart beating fast as our lips meet

Call it love, call it ecstasy
Call it you and me
Call it everything we need
Written in collaboration with love
431 · Oct 2017
Brand New, Used Up
Spenser Bennett Oct 2017
It's been covered in dirt
Cracked and torn apart
But I promise there's a value
I can make it worth it for you
Just wait it out
Let me polish it once more
Scrape away the grime
Chip away the lingering salt
And that bit of blood that dried
To present to you
A brand new, used up, beaten but beating heart
421 · Sep 2016
All We Cannot See
Spenser Bennett Sep 2016
You said I was
Blind to all the
World as we fell
Deep through love
But babe I promise
My eyes are open
Wider than the starry
Night in which I swim
I can tell you don't
Believe in me or my
Dreaming but love I
Know one day you'll see
That there is more
To this than vision
Allows us to believe
It's something deeper
Than you and me
I can feel love
Humming so soft
So sweet
Do you know of
Happiness
And what we can achieve
If only we could fall
Asleep but tonight
I think I'll stay awake
And dream of
All we cannot see
420 · Mar 2016
L.I.F.E.
Spenser Bennett Mar 2016
Life
Is
*******
Exhausting
392 · Sep 2017
Hands Held
Spenser Bennett Sep 2017
I too walk with the hand of doubt
Held tightly in mine
Though the whispers and fear
Of what could go wrong
Do not hold sway
In my ears
Nor my heart

I do listen
And I do entertain
What pictures they might paint
But I do not concern my eyes
With their idealized imagined pain
For the hand of love
Rests gently in my right
392 · Sep 2019
Re: Rain
Spenser Bennett Sep 2019
I will not yet cede to your silence

-

To see myself with eyes so foreign
Unbecome, the weight and my headspace
These false faces, presented, applauded
Such suffocation, lift away, could I

Walk aside your healing
Inside, I'm dreaming
Wealth of empty numbers
Shade is but a feeling

All is fleeting, so it must
And yet the image remains
Of the dawn at dusk
Oxidize your heart now, hold trust

Stir your heart, give up my ghost
Should you find yourself awake and alone
Don't reach for my hands, you've come to
An isolation I've always known

--
Foot falls in a garden
Ash aloft on a high wind
Covet not abiding
Covered by untying

Frayed cloth of your choosing
I'll wake to an empty air, Confidante
Capture every inkling, promise I'm still breathing
Your heavy eyes disbelieved
How readily I held to grief

My lonely light!
How heaves this life?

Across every green, I call mine for peace
Don't say it's not to cleave
These bones and leaves; yellowing

Let go, let go, let go
Come winter's cold

---
Sacred? Quite!
A savored cry

Forgone for the forest
Should your water rise but for us

Our hands have held the heat
How we burnt the seed

Oh, for the prophet
Some did profit, some did weep

Ache and ardor of an armour
Wake and wander, suffer should the summer
Never cease

-

All my life I have felt a vacancy
All apartments, B, all apologies
Still you suffer not my kindness
Syl, I cede to you; your silence
Be as it must be
Heaving fore she breathes
389 · Apr 2016
Time
Spenser Bennett Apr 2016
She drew her time
Like water from the well
And she waged her war
Against her private hell
Behind her eyes
386 · Sep 2018
No Substance, No Weight
Spenser Bennett Sep 2018
I have nothing to say
I have nothing to say
No words to complain with
No complaints to give words to
I have no joy to be spoken
I have no wisdom to impart
I am a vessel half empty
I am a fish tank half full
There is nothing wrong now
And yet it doesn't feel right
Am I actually feeling anything
Am I happy
Am I sad
Am I lost in what I am
I have no passion
I have no goal
I can accomplish anything
I can accomplish nothing
These strings are ropes
Tie me down right
I am bound by conventions
That I was never told
Or at least never in a way
That could be understood
This is the future
Where everything is wrong
And everyone is right
And no one is listening
To the voice inside
Because their ears are filled
With screaming and fire
And hatred and selfishness
Even mine are burning
I am not immune
Welcome to hell
You had no choice in coming here
And by God we will guilt you
For even thinking of choosing
To take yourself out
And call you selfish
And bemoan your loss
And ask ourselves what we could have done
But we won't ask you
Before you make the choice
Because we don't care
We're rats
And this is our ghost ship
It might be sinking
It might be sunk
But ****** sure if you
Matter more than me
Or them or us or ideas or civility
We'll eat you alive
And then blame you
For not being strong enough
To hold back both the terror
And the flame
This place is empty
There's nothing good now
That is new
All we are is dancing
Shadows around the fire
No substance, no weight
385 · Jun 2019
Wisteria
Spenser Bennett Jun 2019
All that is good
All that is golden
Will live in our hearts
Unlost, unbroken
372 · Aug 2019
West[word]s
Spenser Bennett Aug 2019
Caught no eyes for Reds
No stomach for butterflies: words I
shoulda never've said
My hands are waisted
Lungs ablaze, torched by low water
Levi's
Modern man, I am, so suspended
All my lives, always I've been dependent?

I have no ears for nothings,
No matter how sweet
A nose ain't for roses nor pale concrete
Better served in service towards
Some dream, c'est fantastique...
A matter of mind, weighed Large Above
Kerouacian seams
Borne back, never to cease
My bones; clattered and battered an American beat

Some soul for a saving, suppose
No faith for the golden fleeced,
Howe'er a lion takes the meat, God knows
Of heart, I weigh much
But suffer no touch, unfeasted on an Appled iCore
How vacant must one be!
For life to give purpose, for Heaven to speak
How persistent a rose from a Sidewalk's end grows
Yet unlike a bull, I'll cane no Calgary
Thoughts on how obsessive consumerism and the overreach of advertising chip away at our ability to be human. I guess. Or not. Your call.
371 · May 2018
Head First
Spenser Bennett May 2018
Separate the skin
Like the sinner and the sin
Head first into the sea
The salt rushes in

Are we living this right
With our ears clasped tight
And our souls like fire
Without the light

Bury your head
In the sand instead
And maybe you'll see
All that you've bled
Wasn't your blood to bleed

Have I lost my way
Is this what it takes
A little break,
A 96 hour stay

Promise me this
You'll make it quick
I'm on the edge
Don't miss
369 · Apr 2019
Goes On
Spenser Bennett Apr 2019
Fail me now
Oh, these little things
I'm sticking on
Gravitate, I will
Slow, sinking feeling
I could be so much better
Make it mean
Abating heaven, sing
Welcome home
Heart stained sleeves
So unentertaining
The way love goes
Scared shitless moments
All of life is falling
Back to the day I met her
366 · Aug 2017
Anhedon
Spenser Bennett Aug 2017
Like a power outage of heart
The food will spoil
The lights stay dark
365 · Sep 2017
Right Around Eight
Spenser Bennett Sep 2017
I have a habit
Of leaving places
Right around eight
Without direction
But I guarantee
I'd drive 12 hours straight
Just to see your face
My Amazing Grace

I'd only ask for a little rest
From the fugue of death
I'd wipe the sleep from my eyes
Kiss your cheek
When I rise
Sneak about on bare feet
Down to the little kitchen
To bring you
Some coffee or tea

And the days would
Never drag
and the nights would
Burn with passion
But we both know
That the dawn is
Waiting
And I must go
But I don't want
To without
Making
You smile one last time

Time might not wait for us
No, there's no stopping her
But I will work for us
It only gets better
Let me show you
How you make
Me feel
Alive
In every single way
My Amazing Grace
355 · Aug 2017
Thrum
Spenser Bennett Aug 2017
Crush the night against your senses
Forget the pain of dawn and life
Return to veiled simplicity
Reveal yourself to true Heaven
354 · Jul 2018
Less Than Glory
Spenser Bennett Jul 2018
Keep this at arms length
A heart beat away from death
Every moment, every second
Keep me at arms length, babe

If I get you, I got you
But there's more to it, so
Forget the world, forgive the mess
I promise I'll clean it up before I go

Woke up haloed and healed
But I don't believe that story
Shut my eyes, go back to bed
I want something less than glory

Keep this at arms length
A heart beat away from life
Never again, never the same
Keep me away from the light
333 · Aug 2017
Unseen Dance
Spenser Bennett Aug 2017
Now the lights dance
A hidden folly
Just outside my vision
As you wait for morning
Under the stars of Ursa Minor
Can you hear their laughter
Rising above the crescent moon
Do you know they aren't laughing
No, not at you
Nor anything in particular
Merely to laugh at all
To feel that joyous abandonment
Of all serious inquiry and thought
Let them laugh
Do not fear the dawn
For you must rise with it
Fear not the coming months
For they fear you
Like a spider
Or a snake
More so
And if you react with dread
They will react with violence
Laying low their own existence
To end yours
Watch now
As these stars drift a little more
They do not fade
No
They just move on
Until the night comes again
But they are never not alight
Only your pale eyes
So bright and true
Cannot capture them
In the wake of Sol
But they dance
Oh, child do they dance
Just outside of your vision
329 · Sep 2017
This Distance
Spenser Bennett Sep 2017
Close your
turned down eyes.
Let this parting be.
Goodnight. Sleep well,
my summer smile.
Winter waits,
as do I.
It might be awhile
until dawn
but I am patient,
you are kind.
Close your eyes,
let time slip by.
In the morning
you will find
this distance
to be gone.
I will hold you
once more
before the world
knocks soft
upon your door.
312 · Feb 2022
Poikilotherm
Spenser Bennett Feb 2022
Sweep and swen your filthy floor
Awe dreams of nothing anymore
Wend the sea, creep to dawn
All red, all dark, all gone
Spenser Bennett Sep 2017
Time is an ocean lashing
Against the skin of shorelines
Kept apart from
Everything she loves

Meander amongst the currents
Each day brings new love

Heaven waits without worry
Over those golden moments
Meet me there sweet grace
Ever after the evening comes
296 · Jul 2017
Tell Me
Spenser Bennett Jul 2017
Tell me this, do you believe God'll make you pay for heaven?

Tell me this, do you believe there's ever been a debtor that was free?

Tell me this, buddy, ol' pal, oh friend of mine, would you face the hungry lion when you could pay the docile lamb?

I didn't ******* think so.

Now let me tell you something you ain't down enough to know,

The lion and the lamb are brothers of the soul.

One'll take your life in a ****** hurry!

The other'll watch you die real slow.

So tell me this, are you free?

Tell me, are you willing to bite the hand that feeds?
188 · Apr 2022
Bloom
Spenser Bennett Apr 2022
you are too easy to long for
with eyes clear as dawn
I watched grass shiver
heard the wind's whispers
of you in your full bloom
how I long for that view
163 · Feb 2022
Over Wounded Earth
Spenser Bennett Feb 2022
I see color in black and white photographs
Sad songs bring a smile to my face
I love waking up to look at the stars as they come out
And I find the truth of love wrapped up in doubt

Is there a strength I'm missing
Here in my weakness
Is there a light I cannot see
With my eyes ******* up so tight

It's a mystery without a resolution
Only answers without questions
I never asked to be this way
I thought you'd never look my way

Hear all that silence amongst the static
Feel the heat of you across the vacuum of space
The void that speaks like a rain cloud whispering love
Pouring salt over wounded earth

And the rain will wash it away
Wash it so far away
I do not want to feel anymore
I cannot stand this weight of yours

— The End —