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Alex McDaniel Dec 2014
There is something tragically intangible about space that makes it so beautiful,
infinite light years of nothing
out there to be explored.
it's terrifyingly real,
many have been there,
but I will never go.
Space is something of the subconscious,
you can only create and appreciate it's essence
in the prison of grey matter a top your head.

And though I've never been there I know
if I ever collided with a passing star,
I'd caress it's sides and combust into it's center.
melting,
blending,
becoming one.

how badly I want to sacrifice my soul into a black hole,
how sad it is that I'll never get the chance.

how incredibly similar space is to you
how beautifully intangible you are.

how badly I want to love you,
how sad it is I'll never get the chance.
Alex McDaniel Sep 2013
With a foot stuck between two trees,
thoughts fail to flow,
blood does too.

Which tree do you chop down,
to set yourself free,
or burry yourself under.

Could you just cut off the foot all together?
Killing two birds with one stone?
Surely you won't make the wrong decision,
or will you?
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
She tells you she’s going to sleep,
She doesn’t.
Instead she cries,
Not the soft somber kind of crying,
The heavy kind of crying,
The kind of crying that puts you in a whirlwind of emotion,
People say crying helps, this kind just puts you farther down under.

She cries because her dad, who was recently let go,
Stumbles through the door every night reeking of whiskey and tobacco,
And then goes on to bruise her,
As bad as he bruised his wallet gambling just a couple hours before.

She cries because her mom,
Struggling with a crystal **** addiction,
Abandoned the family,
And with it abandoned her heart.

She cries because she caught her boyfriend,
The only pure thing in her life,
With her old best friend,
Who’s probably the farthest thing from pure.

That night the clouds cry too,
It rains all night,
‘They understand me’ she thinks,
Tonight,
Maybe she will join them.
Alex McDaniel Jan 2014
His life is an air plane:
confined, cluttered and utterly boring,
inches away from him is euphoric beauty, but all he can do is stare at it blankly, watch it go by and wish he were on the other side.
It's not palpable beauty, it's as real as his dreams (non existent)
and as obtainable as the first class seats of life he so badly desires (hopeless)
If he were insane, the glass that keeps him from it may even laugh at him.
but maybe he is insane, because on his loneliest days he gulps down his disgusting cup of coffee and caresses the side walls of the plane,
cursing every little gritty bump and groove,
because they are everything that has ever held him back.
Even on his best days he prays and weeps, yelling out to no one in particular.
begging for the walls to melt away so he can fall.
Fall into the beauty he has envied his whole life,
where he can choke on the clouds and grasp at the sky as the plane slowly fades out of view,
where he can experience joy and peace, if only for a second, until he comes barreling down into a crater of land.
and if he dies on his final descent, at least he died happily.
Alex McDaniel Feb 2015
Treat your life like you are the thinly drawn apple tree
out side the window.
When the day is forgiving and provides you with light,
cultivate and grow, stretch your branches to the  sky,
show the world you are alive, provide shade for the less fortunate,
and bear fruit for the empty.

If the world is a portrait of darkness,
and the clouds become to thick as the temperature plummets,
change your perspective,
grow oranges and reds instead of greens
until the weight becomes to much to bear.
then free yourself and shed your pain,
leave yourself bare to world, embrace your vulnerability.
plant your roots, be strong.

Spring will always be around the corner.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
I’m dangling off the balcony, my sweaty palms and quivering knee’s make it that much harder to hold on. I look up and I see her begging me to come back, I’m so far gone that I can barely hear her cries, offering safety and love. The way moon light shines on her is almost enough, but then I look down, just for a second. It blurs the line between what’s real and what’s not. A take a second look into the dark pit of bad memories and new beginnings, it’s almost like whatever’s down there is mocking me. Small gust’s of wind feel like faint whispers in my ear, telling me to let go. Let go of friends, let go of family, let go of life all together. The voices in my head sounds so pleasing, so euphoric. So I drop, and at first it’s incredible, some of the best feelings and greatest highs I've ever achieved. As time goes on sometimes I look up at the balcony. I wish for my old life back, the voices are never ending though, always calling me to them. They need me. I need them too.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
I believe when we are born we start with nothing,
A blank canvas, in a less then colorful world.
As we go through life we meet people, friends, family and enemies.
Who ever they may be,
They all take turns painting on it.

How each person paints on our canvas ultimately,
Turns us into who we are.
These colors shine bright and bold
In our actions, personality and finally our legacy.

Embrace the beauty in it,
Let it define you,
And don’t be afraid to paint your own strokes,
Because nobody else can tell the story of your canvas,
Except you.
Alex McDaniel Jan 2014
Tough times;
not because my cash is low
but because I enjoy engulfing each bill in flames,
just to admire the glow.
Or maybe I like the sound of the flame,
the red crackle on beat red coals.
It could be out of fear from the metaphorical screams,
bellowing from government buildings,
as the flame crashes down on their precious dreams.
Maybe it's just the light the death of each dollar provides
since everything else is deep, dark and demised.
Like the night time sky,
your lies,
even the finger that runs down your unfaithful thigh.
Everything. Dark and incomplete.
like the singed hole on green George Washington's upper left cheek.
But the real reason I like to watch money bake,
because it shows even greatest things in life must hit a new low,
and step up to the stake.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
On a night when fireworks go off as fast as the thoughts in my head,
High wasted shorts toy with the eyes of over confident males,
And new home cooked memories fill the air,
I'd feel a lot more "free" if I was spending it with you.
Not really sure if I like the way this came out, what do you guys think?
Alex McDaniel Nov 2014
She was the destination,

a opening, a pinpoint
that stood out on the map
of claustrophobic road ways
and broken down dirt paths.

As they all intersected,
each one trying to out do the other,
she stood alone.  

They weren't like her,

Sure,
more feet had traveled along them each day,
than eyes that had ever been laid upon her.

But that's what made her special.
the roads were only appreciated in passing,
she,
was were civilizations built their homes.

Men from the farthest corners of the earth,
searched for her.
but she locked her feelings,
the directions to her soul,
in bottle and casted it off into the ocean.

I never really liked the water,
but my life was never worth living with out her,
So I've spent years searching the ocean floor,
hoping,
praying,
that one day my foot will stop abruptly
on a glass bottle,
and her heart would be mine.

I'd travel past the roads,
smirking at their insignificance
as they blurred by in the rearview mirror.

I'd hike up cliffs,
chop down trees,
where ever it might take me,
till I could see her,
and finally,
be
at
peace.
Alex McDaniel Sep 2013
Let us run where the clouds call out our names,
like a wife looking for her lost soldier,

Where the sand bites at our toes,
and the sun ignites our face
letting us know we are, in fact, alive.

Alive,
not just living.

A simple mind puts one in front of the mirror,
and ignorantly see's the other.
Completely ignoring their differences.

Everyone lives,
everyone follows the lunch line,
in and out, everyday,
Mindlessly shoveling the newest trend down their throats.

You're never truly alive,
until you throw out what society gives you,
and create something for yourself.

Something new,
Something beautiful,
Something that is,
you.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2014
He stands a top the moss covered hill
as he looks down on the world that
he used to quiver at with fear.
His eyes scan the grey horizon that feels
as indifferent and numb as the emotions
that race through his veins
the mist from the ocean underneath
engulfs his lungs.
His knees buckle as he becomes weak.
He used to be afraid of the world toppling down on him,
But this afternoon he topples down on the world,
from his mossy perch.
Either way the result is still the same.
Alex McDaniel Dec 2014
some picture life as a labyrinth
a maze,
concrete
and exact.

they claim we spend our time here looking for that one final answer,
the way out.

but the irony is that there is nothing at all that makes life concrete or exact.
so as the walls of the labyrinth crumble in your mind

see,

that life is an ocean
an infinite high tide
where the salt stings at the whites of your eyes
and throws your body like a rag doll into its shadowy depths.

there is no knowing where it will take you,
in the end,
when the storm desists,
some may end up on a beach with everything they've ever wanted
and some with nothing at all.

we are at the mercy of the tide,
that in itself is the horrific beauty in life.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
Don’t cheat on me ever,

Especially with that monster

Don’t even look

Cause looking leads to flirting

And the second you start flirting with the monster

The sooner he’ll be in your arms

Tearing you to pieces

Tears flowing down your face,

A face that once held the smile of an angel

A smile that I worked so hard to see

Don’t ever cheat on me with the monster

Because that sly silver blade,

Can do more damage than any man ever could

And just like my hard work,

He sends your blood and your dreams

Down the drain
Alex McDaniel Aug 2014
There's is a rusty orange clad brick building
perched upon a mossy green hill
everyday day we sit in the same seats
and look out the same glass that locks us in
and gaze down upon the hill
hoping,
searching for something more out of this life
something that fits our desires,
something we will never know.
Because they say the more we are sedentary,
the more our intelligence will grow.
Surely they have it all figured out all wrong
what they have created is  
a cold hearted machine.
A machine of memorization,
A machine of 'the right way'
the 'only way'
of 'yes please's'
and never of 'no's.'
They say if one morning we decided to turn around
and never look back we would drop dead.
But what happens when my house forecloses,
because no one taught me how to handle money?
What happens when I turn to pills to keep me alive
because no one told me the basic skills of survival?
What happens when I am out on the street,
frigid and alone,
with a cardboard box and a bottle of liquor as my only two friends?
Will algebra help me?
What about Chemistry?
Will those pain staking hours of note taking
help me pick up the pieces of my life?
No.
Surely then I will be dead.
Gone.
Along with my intelligence
and my creativity.
Six feet under
that mossy green hill.
Alex McDaniel Sep 2013
If writing was a drug,
I think I would need,
Rehab
Alex McDaniel Jan 2015
He was a mountain,
pieced together with jagged edges,

forever frozen in one place as one of natures accidents.

She was the sunset,
pink and radiant,
full of life,
reborn from the heavens every morning,

when she moved no one said a word.

Often she would spill over his summit,
wiping herself around each peak.

Tourists came from every where to appreciate it,
they pulled out their cameras ready to capture her beauty.

To him it was never about her, but the both of them in that tiny black view box.

Together they made a stunning picture.

When the picture of them was show he was always the destination,
she was the accessory, the edging that just happened to be there.
Whether it was an infection of greed or true love, the mountain became obsessed with becoming a seven by ten kodak pinned on a wall.

In fact he loved it too much,
eventually the sunset went away and he was left cold and dark.
The Ocean won her over, a warm, unchanging calm who's personality seemed to engulf the world.

Tourists came, staring in awe at the ocean,

and the sunset just happened to be there.
Alex McDaniel Oct 2013
You stare through her broken window, with peaceful, pondering eyes.
You realize the window is not the only broken thing, in the distance, you hear a lonely lover's cry.  You move a little closer to see where her shadowy figure lies. In one hand you see smoke, as a pair of lips go in for a ****, in the other an empty bottle. The devil has no doubt played a malevolent joke. You want to yell out "No!" as she goes to cut her wrist, but your voice is over powered by a strong, thundering hissssss. From there it gets a little crazy as you stumble and tumble, things start to get hazy. Next thing you know, you wake up in bed, "where did the girl go? It feels like I've hit my head." But as you get up and look into the mirror your face turns white, filled with fear. As you look at your red wrists and the broken bottle on the ground, you find the girl you stared at through the window, is staring right back at you now.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
My mind yearns for some sort of rebellion,
Something that makes me unique,
Something that lets me stand alone on the island of individuality.
Anything that holds me back does not belong
Anything that hands power to me does not either
I need an ice cold slap in the face to get me back to reality
I set my alarm but my dreams and ambitions out beep, bing, shout or scream any noise it could
muster up.
The rope between heaven and hell is very thin
If spending countless hours writing,
About my heartbreaks, rejections and victories with the blood from my heart as ink
Make the rope that much stronger
Then that’s what I'll do
Maybe one day,
They will sit in a cafe for middle aged hipsters
with the title Best seller pasted on for everyone to see
Until then all I can do is,
Dream
Alex McDaniel Sep 2014
Time moves like a wounded solider tip toeing on shattered glass
Each hour is a new bullet hole in the delicately paper-mache'd memories that cloud his withered psyche.
Each minute he's forced to watch indifferently as hope and craving rush out of the freshly open wounds, leaving his body in the form of thick crimson blood.
Each second brings a new broken bone
scattered pieces of you along the bathroom floor.
They find their home next to the empty bottle of whiskey,
another lost cause,
another part of the puzzle,
that will never be found.
Alex McDaniel Jan 2015
a man walks a tight rope,
the wind does kart wheels across his nose
reminding him of unwelcome territory
and the rope complains bitterly about how he's unfit for the job.
holding the balance of one man's life is too much for me it scoffs.
the man laughs.
life? he thinks.
what a unfortunate thing to be a part of.
Alex McDaniel Aug 2013
What would life be like with no time?
No order?
The reality is we are salves to a inanimate ticks.
second by second,
minute by minute,
Hours, months and years all hold us prisoner.
We eat, sleep and plan our life's around these numbers.
If there was no time would our mind feel forced to eat at certain times? We could sleep on our own schedule,  live our lives under the stars and sleep under the sun. With no time also means no age. Less labels, less you're too young, you're too old.
More equality, more freedom, peace and happiness
No time.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
I am a puzzle,
When completed I am a masterpiece,
But now I sit here unfinished at the hands of a five year old.
I am the half bitten cookie,
That the five year old left out on the table to be tossed in the garbage.
I am an ice cube,
That unfortunately missed the cup and now lays on the floor,
Still strong and solid but partially puddled in sorrow.
I am an old bridge,
A few years ago I was glowing with beauty,
Now I sit here broken, unusable and instead of glowing,
All I cast is a dark and lonely gloom.
I am our love,
Something that could be magical,
But instead is a chess game of emotions never to be finished.
You are that five year old,
Leaving me in the dust unfinished and broken.
Alex McDaniel Jul 2013
I hate my past, I hate everything about it, I hate how this shadow of darkness, Puts shade over things that are bright and beautiful, I hate how it holds me back, It's tattooed in my mind down to the smallest details.
Unremovable
Alex McDaniel Oct 2014
Poems written in blood
Maybe he just needs some one
To break off the shadows
Alex McDaniel Oct 2013
I can't come to terms with the idea,
that I will never be what the world wants me to be,
I'm a writer.
Writers become english teachers.
Not business men, not scientists.
Certainly not successful,
Not by everyone else's standards at least.
But maybe I love the way the leaves fall and the moon shines,
Just a little too much,
and maybe a get lost in the dazzle of your eyes,
Just a little too much
Maybe I can't stand being normal,
Just a little too much,
and maybe,
Just maybe,
It's me who needs to change,
not the world.
Because,
If the leaves stop falling,
the moon stops shining,
and your eyes stop dazzling,
I guess I am just,
*normal
Alex McDaniel Jan 2015
Souls
Tossed in the furnace
Beaten, burned to a crisp
Till they scream to be taken out of the
******* hell hole that is adolescene.

Taken out
Minced into fine peices
Hung out to dry  in the prisons of useless social conformity.

Lost
In the game of emotion
the game that you're not supposed to win.
Alex McDaniel Feb 2015
lonely eyes fall on deaf ears

-a six word story
We
Alex McDaniel Feb 2015
We
We could slip into the lake and lay there mellowly

We could float on the will of each other alone

If you are scared of shallowness,
we could drown into one another and find comfort at the bottom

If the water becomes unsettling we could lay out by the mountains and melt away the past on just the serenity of your smile.

We could

Oh how we could
Alex McDaniel Nov 2013
One day I glanced in the mirror,
and what I saw was hard to believe,
there was not just one person in my glaring reflection,
there was two,
who was the other person?
to my satisfaction,
it was you.
You wrapped your beautiful self around me,
and said "Baby don't fret."
I suppose we are one now,
and I have no regret,
because simply put,
you are perfection,
And I have come to love everything
about my new found reflection.
If you're reading this, I hope you know how special you are to me and how much I love being with you
Alex McDaniel May 2014
Every time he looks in the mirror
he sees the devil staring back
with a malevolent sneer
he sees death in his eyes,
all the lies he's ever told
everything he's not supposed to be
and everything he will never know
he sees a kid, supposedly filled with glee
but he knows all he really is,
is a poisoned **** just trying to grow.
A ****,
trying to blossom in a world filled with trees
everyone knows that bees never pollinate weeds.
Alex McDaniel Feb 2015
Trying to find the right words is like super gluing my mouth shut,
igniting fire works in my esophagus and praying that the seal won't break,
so my throat can implode on itself
and my mind can boil until skin and bone and washed up empathy can't contain it. So my cranium can crack outward. So my thoughts can combust in a crackling display of bright reds and electrifying yellows for everyone one to ooo and aaahh at.
Maybe then you will comprehend the depth my emotions for you
Alex McDaniel Sep 2013
Being sad is a waste of time,
Think about it,
You are not a god,
You can not control anything,
Bad things are going to happen,
You're going to cry, It's only human nature.
Sometimes you need to let your demons out,
So let them out, get it up, brush the dirt off your shoulder
and smile.
You only live for so long,
Don't waste your time being angry about what could've happened,
Focus on what can happen.
Alex McDaniel Mar 2015
Who was it that robbed you of your voice?

Who's slithery hand reached down your esophagus and tied your vocal cords in knots?

Who was it that locked up your soul?
Chiseling your emotions into solid stone.

Who was it that twisted the curves of your smile upside down?

Was it old man winter who painted sorrow in your eyes more accurately than Picasso?

Or was it an even older man, the creator, the man that rules everything? Was it he who told you not to be happy?

Ah I know,

how could I be so blind.

It must have been the imperfectly formed face staring back at you in mirror that's causing all this trouble.

It must have been me.
Alex McDaniel Nov 2013
One warm, peaceful, night at a bar down the street,
I ran into an elderly man
who's uncountable wrinkles and scars,
told the stories of one thousand men.
some of sorrow and some of joy
As I took to the creaky stool next to him,
he blew out a puff of smoke from his cigarette.
his fingers curled around the smoke,
almost like he was trying to grasp it
like he had let go of too many things in his long past,
and letting go of one more, even something as meaningless as cigarette smoke,
may have pushed him over the edge.

Next his eyes caught mine,
he leaned over and handed me a rose,
"deliver this to my wife." he whispered
"she's ill and I do not travel well"
"I have not admired her beauty in quite some time."

He was different and mysterious,
but that only intrigued me more,
I nodded and took the rose,
attached was a address and a room number:
Saint Anne's Hospital

Upon arriving at the room,
to my shock there was no one there!
just thousands of thousands of roses
and a note that read:
R.I.P to my beloved 1920-1963

Fifty years later and some how this crazy old man had never given up hope.
Not once.
Not on his wife,
or the love he had for her.
We all could use a little of him in our lives.
meh
You
Alex McDaniel Nov 2013
You
That one wonderful hug,
Made my whole entire week,
You came to my side and picked me up,
When the stress began to peak,
It was like knifes in my side,
Knowing I couldn't see you,
I dropped my mind somewhere in the darkness,
Till everything around me turned a sad blue.
These last couple days there's no more blue.
Just a whole lot of love.
And a whole lot of you.
Alex McDaniel Nov 2014
How beautiful it is to lock your self inside
to turn the volume all the way up
and let the words of your favorite artist,
your most compatible soul, paint the bathroom walls,
with tranquil melodies.

How free it feels to let each note fill the recesses of your mind,
until you are hollow no more

How rebellious it must be stand in the spot where you and him made love, and let the warm shower water cover your icy veins and open wounds with embrace and dignity

How badly you want to scream and shout and declare your anger unto the world,
how badly you want to shatter mirrors and forget the memories,

Well darling, shatter away,
Graffiti the walls with words that make you cringe,
rip the doors off their hinges,
ignite the memories in flames till your mind is burning,
not for the past,
but for something new
something grand.

Throw the ashes in the ground and let them cultivate and grow,
into something they were never capable of being.
break down the barriers.
defy the odds of what this cookie cutter universe of fallen stars and broken dreams has to offer.

You're not like them.
you're not a fallen star,
your edges are never stagnant
you're like the sun,
you rise
you fall
you have your lows
but even when the shadows off the night lurk in,
we still see your glow.

— The End —