Paved was his road with the golden bricks,
To the glory and to the fame.
Yesterday's hero sits quiet and low.
Promises of future lies shattered like broken glass.

Lonely and crippled roaming in,
Gutters like a shadow of his past.
Reminiscing along nostalgia's lane.
Telling the children stories is his only joy.

Shyly sneaking through crowds,
Almost unnoticed passing by.
Prince of misfortunate fate is he.
Enduring poverty's yoke,
With a bitter sigh.
A Beggar Hero he is.

Once a brave captain now but a
Fallen knight of misery and pain.
Starving through days and freezing through nights.
Seeing the young soldiers walk by with a mocking smile.

Slowly. Slow pace
Over a few days
It was drained and went missing
I don't know what it is

Slowly. Slow glance
Over a few cracks
It has left before it went missing
No string left, only wax

Slowly. Slow breath
Over an endless depth
It had dug as it went missing
Given up on my strength

I fall

As a child I'd dream of running away,
Nigh unto winter and not too far,
From Dad’s and Mom's, where I used to play
But which was now bitten hard.
A barn in a field was just one dream,
An old one where no one ever came.
Delight by myself, attainable seemed,
Where I could rest and collect my name.
Russet woods and graying woods,
Fueled fantasy and desire,
For simple things must do some good,
In corrupt towns, soul is renewed by fire.

This is the Last Straw –
and Something About Sacred Buckets of Holistic Ice Water

****** predators, human smugglers
Starvation in the Sudan, civil war
in Syria, mass executions in China
Journalists murdered almost everywhere
Fashionable infanticide, homelessness
Unemployment, urban terrorism
Mass ******, school shootings, wildfires, racism
An unstable national government
Anti-Semitism, border desperation
Riots, arson, ecclesiastical corruption
****, alcoholism, historical cleansing
Skinheads, abuse, Khardassianistas
Volcanos, the death penalty, free verse
Affluenza, Jerry Springer, The View
Herbal tea, antifa, anti-antifa
And the soul-******* existential despair
Of inspirational singer-songwriters:

Nah, not a bit worried about plastic straws

But I must go now; The Voices are telling me
To pour a bucket of ice water over my head
(As long as it’s not a plastic bucket)

time is the best sugar-coater; retrospect is a master con-artist.
like sugar and honey and smoke.
like all the things that catch in your throat and make it that little bit harder to breathe
               like her lips on your neck in the dark when your tangled brain is permeated by the space between her thighs and the only constant is the soft hum of the speakers.
i only believe in astrology when she is answering my calls.
when my rising sign indicates that i will wake to the smell of her apartment
i believe in the tarot readings my friend gives me on her bed when i am underneath her.
                                  anatomical; catastrophic
a symphony of vulnerability and sapphic contentment.
i am not a connoisseur of intimacy, i take what is given to me
yet this
her
there is something about the way that she holds my gaze that makes me want to analyse her birth chart whilst she makes tea in the kitchen whilst we try and convince ourselves that our lives are only falling apart because mercury is in retrograde. (again)
the nights spent passed out whilst everyone else cuts lines on the breakfast table, the bottles in the sink and the side glances.
it was messy
you
were messy
i am a mess.
it’s smoking someone else’s cigarettes out your window and pretending that your thighs are not the pillow that i dream of resting my heart on.
i will ***** out pretty and soft words about your smile your mouth your tongue
when you’re around i hold my coffee in my mouth for just that little bit longer, long enough to stop me spitting out the fact that somehow you wind your way into every ******* thing that i write.

i sit with my heels up on the chair rail



she says my feet are nice



&



we talk about the sandal marks

on  otherwise brown toes



she wears flip flops

&

we reminisce over summer days