Not an inch of this world is safe
I couldn't imagine living in this beautiful ill ridden place.

you walk around with your held high
and your laugh ringing out
clear and fake
don't think i don't notice.


the guilt's shadow is in your eyes
and you hide behind the smile mask
stretched and forced
don't think i believe it.

but when you write your lines
and your mask falls away
shattered and broken
you know this is what you deserve
chapped and ageing
don't think I've forgotten
(what you did to me)

I feel too empty to be.
Half-formed thoughts seep out of me,
Draining the grains of individuality,
This last hour cowers slowly
To an end.

“Tap,” beckoned the door,
A, “knock,”
And signature I’d never forget –
Cross the “t’s, “dot the “i’s,”
An empty night’s forged check
And liquor paved path to be,
To bed, it’s her, it’s her.

It’s also 3:10 AM,
Better than PM,
Where I’m still awake,
Still at work,
And as always,
Annoyed by the nuisance of
Another.

I don’t say “hi,”
And far from reluctantly,
She grabs a beer,
The only cold one I’ve got,
Frail fingered, cry-stain eyed,
And fresh off the ultimate high,
Love, and again.

She hovers to my room,
A natural,
Where she walks with closed lids
Guided by music that’s
Remnant and
Leaking phantoms
From speakers spiting souls –

And it’s
The song she always played,
And it’s, “ours,”
Once a favorite of mine,
And it’s now if only a melody,
Destroyed by repetition and her
Obsession with “echoes.”

I endure.

Am I friend or foe?
It seems you don't quite know,
But I would like to before I go.

Everything I put out is
An extension of me.
Like the fruit at the tips of the tree --
The fruit is my gift to thee.