is this where
pain comes from

the unsettled mind
asking unanswerable

questions

millions of nasty neurons
twisting and turning

around each other
creating knots

blocking the flow
so all I can feel

is the constant need
to stretch myself

I crave death quietly;
a cotton blanket caressing me;
this life is one not meant to  
be.

Death, I would not seek you out,
but if you asked me for a dance,
I would.
Because I know without a doubt
Death would be another chance.

One letter can make you remember everything
And lead you to regret
Ever wanting the acknowledgment
Of what you never did fret

Take me back to when it didn’t matter
When I was an adventurous explorer
In a jungle wide
When I was younger
and never knew what next
When life went my way

Take me back to my bewilderment
Before my life went astray
Take me back to my ambitions
When life was as a mission to be played
Like soaring through the midnight sky
And blowing stars out like candles
When I could look at life
And say that it was easy
It was easier not for me to see.
It was when the joy of a single day
Could fill a lifetime of todays

But it seems as we get older,
The envelope gets stamped,
The shuttle falls out of orbit,
The nighttime fades to day,
And before you were ready to send the letter,
It evaporates into thin air
And the chance you had not taken
turns to sail away.

Andrew W.
1-28-20

I sunk to the bottom of the ocean once. Though it wasn't really all that grand. Everything that I saw was either shrouded in darkness, or a silty haze. The water was cold and the currents were violent. They ****** me too and fro.

Now, don't get me wrong, I like it there at the bottom of the ocean, it's calm and it's dark and it soothes the fires of a soul like mine. The passage there however is the part that hurts so much, for before you may sink into the silky silt of the ocean floor and become neighbors with the *****, you must descend through the turbulence and the dangerous anglerous fish that inhabit the places betwixt.

I suppose the hardest part about the journey is saying goodbye to the sunshine that you grew to love, after having spent time, from the ocean floor.

Someone drags you up and you see the sun and you start to laugh more, and you start to love more and everything starts to feel warm and beautiful again. You look at that someone that brought you up and wrought you into shape and  you see such beauty. They shine like the sun, no, they are even better.

But sometimes,

They abandon us.

That is not to say we are doomed to sink back down, they do not hold us here, as we do not hold them. We are free to remain on the surface with the sunlight.

Most of us choose to jump back in, though.

Let the ocean swallow us whole once again.

Some swim back to the surface, determined to, perhaps, be more than a friendly newspaper conversation with a crustacean.

However, many just live there, unwilling, unable, to go anywhere else.

I sunk, to the bottom of the ocean once. Or twice, and a few times after that. Always finding a reason to swim back, sometimes I am dragged back. No matter which way though and honestly, how matters not, I always end up back on that beach.

Waiting, watching the ocean. Wondering, pondering the possibilities and if I should wade back out and sink down once again.

The ocean surely is a frightful thing.

I understand now
Why I have always been a reminder of the ocean
The ocean because you can almost always tell how I'm feeling
The ocean because you can almost never see how I can be so blank
The ocean because I am always laughing or smiling
But  the ocean because I am a sad person
I see how much I am like the ocean
Because of my anger
Because of my strength
Because of my weakness
The ocean and I are two that are destined to become one sooner or later
I am one with the ocean that has beauty just as I do
That has mystified all those who come across us
I am a sad person who laughs all the time
Who is angry but is always smiling
Who is strong enough to keep her emotions locked inside but is too weak to hold it all together when things start to crumble
I am apart of the oceans crashing waves
I am the one who brings peace in her front pocket and the one who brings destruction in her back pocket
I am the walking waves of the oceans wrath
I am the walking beauty that holds death
I am the walking prison that holds everything in its path captive
I am the walking waves that no one can get behind
I am the one who's mind and heart go as deep as the oceans floor
If you see me please run and find shelter because once caught up in in the roaring water you can never escape
I am the ocean and the ocean is me

You paint kindness in your words
That tell stories and emotions.