You blame me for what happened,
Don't you.
I guess it's okay...
I blame me too,
If I wasn't there,
She still would be.

If I had locked it up...
she wouldn't have used it...
and then,
You'd have no one to blame.

It's okay,
I've secretly claimed this fault for my own anyway,
Shoulder'd the burden of it all...

It was my gun,
after all...


If I'd come home just a little earlier,
If I'd been the son I should have been,
If I'd swallowed my f*cking pride and just told her I loved her,
My mother may still be here...

You blame me for what happened,
I understand...
It's okay,
I blame me too...

The desperate search,
For some familiar earth.

The rise of the uncontrollable,
Until we resort to the toll of will,

The anxious blade,
Is the friend we made.

In our trying times,
That made tunnels of our eyes.

When our dice fall upon the zero,
There's no telling where we'll go,

Except to our secret place,
Where we've hidden our friendly blade.

Pain to distract from pain,
Just another color in our endless rain.

Ashamed of what we've done,
The scars we bear,
Are proof that we've won.
Because we were there.

Because we're still here.

For the memories of those who aren't,
Now would warrant a graceful tear.

For our brothers and sisters in arms,
and the arms who've bled,
we're the ones who know...

Just how strong we are.

You've made it this far,
There's no telling where you'll go

~Robert van Lingen

Coming to terms with the tears,
The knife shunt into my side,
The days wasted,
And the years gone by....

Who was I, then?
Where am I now?

Beneath me the ground shakes unrelentingly,
The objective to set me falling.

My heart stands up on its own two legs,
And walks away from the strength I'd spent years rebuilding,
Only to stare at what tore it apart in the first place,
Enthralled by the fact that it's all history,
But then he just speaks to the mind,
Then he, too, joins the nostalgic glare.

Now it's as if it were yesterday.
I need not open up wounds that never even closed.

I simply forgot they were bleeding.

You will read this,
We will cry,
At the silence,
Between you and I.

The formalities which we call normality,
Would bring others to tears,
As if we don't...
But we do.

Silently,
To ourselves,
We allow our minds to scream in our eyes,
If only because we have no other option.

Gracefully we strip away our minds until all that's left,
Is who we think we are,
All to this, though we are never satisfied.

With a straight face,
We release our streams of tears,
And allow no one to see the hells we face.

Our needlessly numbing mind drags on,
Our nemesis in ourselves,
But we can't tell a soul.

"It's not that hard."
"Just think positive thoughts."
and the best,
"I could do it, why can't you?"

They think us lazy,
When all our energy is spent fighting ourselves.

But,
Here,
We find our kin,
Where we extend our silent sympathies,
With the written words,

I understand.

Greetings, it is merely I,
   He who breathes despite the lack of air,
   Gasping at a tenuous breeze.

I'd call this breath of redundant utterings,
   A practice of utter futility.

The breadth of my wonderment at the crushing silence graced upon my deafened ears,
   I stand fast as the verbal stone is cast upon my fragile being,
   Your callousness resounds within my vacancy,
   Occupied by none other,
   Confined within my ceaseless selflessness,
   Even if it is imperfect.

I am merely a soul.
   Cast 'pon the mercifully unforgiving earth.
   Borne brazenly to those who are willing to listen,
   At the risk of those who won't.

******'d herein I lye,
   Gazing 'pon the relentless monochrome.
   Searching for any guiding light.

I am merely a man,
   Searching for a home.
   I am merely the mind within which I reside,
   I am,
   Merely,
   Who I am.

~Robert van Lingen

What hath I done to earn such disdain?
   Thust'ly I'd treated thee with an utmost courtesy,
   And yet,

I'd call this breath of redundant utterances,
   A practice of utter futility.

The breadth of my wonderment at the crushing silence graced upon my disbelieving ears,
   I stand fast as the imperceptible stones are cast upon my fragile soundings,
   Your callousness resounds and rebounds within my vacant battleground.
   Occupied by none other,
   Confined within my ceaseless, if imperfect, selflessness,

I am merely a soul.
   Cast upon, or down'pon the mercifully unforgiving earth.
   Borne brazenly to those who are willing to listen,
   At the risk of those who won't.

******'d herein I lye,
   Gazing 'pon the relentless, endless skies.

I am merely a man,
   Searching for a home.
   I am merely the mind within which I reside,
   I am,
   Merely,
   Who I am.