I rest.
To not wake.

It comes and it goes
The ebb and the flow
Words like water
Moon mother, sun father
The cycle of days
A myriad of ways
To be alone
To atone
Words are like air
No promiscuous care
Suffocating quiet
Internal riot
Speech comes like earth
A child like birth
Doomed to die
The precipice of why
Language is fire
Motivation, desire
Burning the land
For what's not in hand
The elements convene
To what does it mean
An emotional dream
An altruistic scream

Now gather close and lend your ear,
I’ll tell a tale both strange and dear—
Of salt and glass and love gone pale,
Of one who served in Fish Jail.

A tankman by the name of none,
Just “Tankmaster,” the warden’s son.
He walked the rows and knew each fin,
The grumpy cod, the lion’s grin.

He wore his keys like jangling pride,
With boots that sloshed from side to side.
He spoke to eels, he joked with rays,
He knew the sea in landlocked ways.

The place was bleak, a briny tomb,
All buzzing lights and filtered gloom.
A place for fish too odd to show,
Too fierce, too big, too wild to go.

A seahorse thief, a pouting shark,
A tuna once struck lightning's spark.
Each tank a tale, each fin a crime—
He kept them safe, and served his time.

And oh, the peace! The sacred drag
Of daily rounds, of soggy flag,
Of filter hum and crabby chat—
No storm could shake a life like that.

But then one day a box arrived—
The tape was torn, the air contrived.
It bore no label, bore no name,
Just stenciled letters: S.A.M.

Inside she crouched, not beast, not girl,
With skin the shade of oyster pearl.
A filament above her brow
Did twitch and glow—but none knew how.

Her form was human, more or less,
But wore the sea like Sunday dress.
Her teeth were sharp, her smile wide—
A maw that angels couldn’t guide.

She tapped the glass, but not for aid—
It felt more like a masquerade.
She watched him back. She knew his gait.
And something shifted in his fate.

Now Tankmaster, once firm of tread,
Found footsteps drifting soft instead.
He passed her tank with careful grace,
Avoiding, yet... returning face.

Her lure would glow, a golden thread,
That shimmered just above her head.
It danced like flame, but cool and slow—
A phantom pulse, a wanton show.

It flickered once when none were near,
A signal soft, a beckon clear.
And though he knew the predator's way,
He lingered just a breath too gray.

She shifted hues, an artist bold—
From violet dusk to kelp-leaf gold.
She'd mirror him, like rippled glass,
Her moods a mask no man could pass.

She watched him more with every day,
Her colors swelling like a sway.
He told himself it meant rapport—
Not instinct, not a practiced lore.

And though he saw her needle smile,
It struck him sweet, not full of guile.
For predators may grin with glee,
But he was not her enemy.

He dreamed of light beneath the waves,
Of eyes that saw and hearts that craved.
Her glow became his north, his myth—
His compass in the ocean’s drift.

By night he found excuses thin,
To mop the floor or check a fin.
And every time, he’d catch that gleam—
The pulse, the flash, the clever scheme.

His rules grew loose, his grip grew slack,
The Tankmaster had turned his back.
She hadn’t begged, she’d never asked—
But oh, how sweetly she unmasked.

And when the lights above went low,
She pulsed again, that siren glow.
He knew it then—though far too late—
He’d nibbled clean upon the bait.

They say some love is loud with heat,
With pounding chests and lightning feet.
But his was slow, like tides that turn—
A creeping ache, a patient burn.

He’d watch her float in silent grace,
A stillness draped across her face.
She mirrored him in shape and shade,
A ghost of all the things he’d prayed.

Her aquaskin would blush and bloom
In tones that made the whole tank swoon.
And every shift—a secret told,
A myth half-sung, a promise bold.

She showed him things no fish had shown—
A mimic curl, a moaning tone,
A pattern traced in reef and limb
That spelled out, "you belong with him."

He told her tales of years gone dry,
Of losses stacked like cages high.
She’d pulse in blues that swore she knew,
And shift to amber, raw and true.

And when he laughed, she turned to jade,
As if to say, “You’re safe, you’ve stayed.”
She never spoke—no word, no vow—
But love, he swore, was here and now.

She swam in rings around his core,
And whispered with her glowing lure.
Each day he stood a little less—
Each night he dreamt of ocean dress.

And oh, those dreams! So sharp, so wide—
He saw her walking at his side.
On land she danced with human poise,
But still her teeth—still sharp, no noise.

He pictured homes beneath the waves,
Where kelp would sway and time behaves.
He saw a place where both might live—
If he would take, and she would give.

Then came the night she did not shine.
Her lure was dim. Her hues, benign.
She drifted slow. Her glow grew slack.
He thought she’d gone—she floated back.

And in that hush, she pressed her hand
Against the glass like silt and sand.
Her gaze said, This is not a game.
Her silence carved into his name.

“I cannot stay,” she didn’t say.
“But you could come. You could obey.”
“You could unmake the world you guard.”
“Unlock the tanks. Unmoor the yard.”

And he—our man, our warden proud—
Felt something snap beneath the shroud.
He whispered, Yes, with breath unsure.
And followed her beyond the door.

The night was thick with ocean’s breath,
A hush that smelled like brine and death.
The Tankmaster moved like a prayer,
Unlatching doors with tender care.

The pumps went quiet. Lights went dim.
The jail gave up its bones to him.
He breached the final safety line—
Not for escape, but love divine.

S.A.M. awaited in the drain,
Her lure aglow, her eyes arcane.
She did not speak—she simply turned,
And through the floodgates, silence churned.

He followed barefoot, half-aware,
That salt replaced the county air.
His boots stayed dry. His lungs stayed wet.
And yet, he hadn’t drowned. Not yet.

She led him past the harbor’s bend,
Where sea begins and maps must end.
She said, in colors, “This is home.”
And gestured down through dark and foam.

He nodded once, and left the shore.
No suitcase. No regrets. No door.
His name dissolved like sugar glass—
The last to call him “master” passed.

Down, down they fell through ink and hush,
Through ruins dressed in coral blush.
Where whale bones served as banquet halls,
And lanternfish lit shattered walls.

Her kingdom was a fractured reef,
Built not of joy, but loss and grief.
Yet still she smiled, with glowing pride,
And swam along her darker side.

She crowned him with a band of ****,
She fed him silt and urged him, “Breathe.”
She curled around him, fin to chest,
And whispered lies that felt like rest.

And he, now gilled, now hollow-eyed,
Declared her queen, declared her bride.
He carved her name in drifting sand—
A vow no air could understand.

The sea grew thick. The current rough.
But he was hers. That was enough.
He gave his breath. He gave his will.
He thought it love.

He does so still.

The Queen below was radiant,
But never still, nor covenant.
She shimmered strange from hour to hour—
A tide of charm, a pulse of power.

At first she wrapped around his chest,
A song of kelp, a weightless nest.
But soon her glow began to shift—
From tender teal to cold and swift.

She twirled with others near the wrecks,
With ribboned fins and flexing necks.
She sang to creatures fierce and free—
And barely once she glanced at he.

He watched her from a crumbled spire,
His chest a forge without a fire.
She used to pulse in time with him—
Now colors danced for something dim.

He called her name in bubbles bare,
But water doesn’t carry care.
She laughed with lips he’d once believed,
And left him like the rest—bereaved.

His body changed in silent ways—
A fading man, a fish half-raised.
His bones grew soft, his voice grew mute,
His purpose crushed beneath her boot.

One morning brought a mimic form—
A copy of his old, worn norm.
It swam in loops, a cruel ballet—
While she watched, then turned away.

He found his heart inside a shell,
A fossil soaked in personal hell.
He held it close, then let it go—
There’s no heartbeat that deep below.

He tried to love her still, in bits.
To catch her gaze in passing fits.
But she had gone where lures must lead—
To newer mouths, to fresher need.

He lay beneath a reef of teeth,
Of suitors stacked in shame beneath.
And still she smiled. And still she danced.
And he, the fool, remained entranced.

But one day came the breaking tide,
The pull that said: “You’re not her pride.”
And with a groan and shattered limb,
He rose from depths that once held him.

His skin peeled back to something raw.
His lungs returned in gasping awe.
He kicked through bones and tangled moss—
Through everything he’d loved and lost.

He reached the surface, torn and thin.
And when he gasped, the world breathed in.
But even then—though free from harm—
He felt the echo of her arm.

He broke the tide like thunder’s crack,
The ocean screaming at his back.
His limbs were torn, his vision grey—
But he had left. She made him pay.

The air was knives. The sun, a blade.
Each breath he took, a price he paid.
But breath it was, and sky was sky,
And gulls don't lie the way fish lie.

He crawled ashore on beaches sand,
A place untouched by S.A.M.'s hand.
The moss was wet, the earth was kind,
And quiet tried to calm his mind.

He walked alone through cedar groves,
Through fog that curled like ocean loaves.
No more the hum of filtered lies—
Just wind and soil and open skies.

Yet still, by puddle, lake, or pond,
He’d feel the ache of something fond.
A flicker here. A whisper there.
Her glow still danced behind his stare.

At night he’d dream of reef and wreck,
Of tendrils coiled around his neck.
And some mornings, he’d almost swear
He missed the silence of her stare.

But he stayed dry. He stayed alone.
He healed in moss, in bark and bone.
He found new music in the rain,
New prayer in fog, new joy in pain.

And once beneath a storm-split moon,
He stood atop a coastal dune.
And far beyond the cliffs and kelp,
He saw a flicker—small, but felt.

A single pulse. A distant gleam.
Too faint to chase. Too real to dream.
He smiled—not wide, not full, not proud—
But soft, and small, and not too loud.

Not joy. Not rage. Not even grief.
Just quiet peace, and firm belief
That some survive, though torn apart,
And carry teeth marks in their heart.

Jackie left on a cold, dark night
Telling me he'd be home
Sailed the seas for a hundred years
Left me all alone
Now, I've been dead for twenty years
I've been washing the sand
With my ghostly tears
Searching the shores for my Jackie-oh

And I remember the day that
The young man came
Said your Jackie's gone he's lost in the rain
And I ran to the beach
Laid me down
"You're all wrong", I said as they stared
To the sand, "That man knows that sea
Like the back of his hand, he'll be back
Some time, laughing at you"

I've been waiting all this time
For my man to come
Take his hand in mine
And lead me away to unseen shores
I've been washing the sand
With my salty tears
Searching the shores these long years
And I walked the sea forever more
Till I find my Jackie-oh

Jackie-oh
Jackie-oh
Jackie-oh

dust forgets the footprints it holds
stars bleed themselves dry for nothing
and still, we sing.

we sing with broken voices
through neon that buzzes its last apology
through gravity that pulls and lets go like tired hands.

we sing because the mirror lies,
because the air tastes of plastic prayers,
because the dreams are old enough to crumble when touched.

we sing for the ghost casinos,
for the red velvet burnouts,
for the craters we once thought were gardens.

we sing not for remembrance,
not for mercy,
but for the small, aching pleasure
of being real
in a world built of reflections.

the lights flicker.
the neon dies.
the song drifts
into the empty dark
like a spark too small to see —
but still, it burns.

and for once,
that is enough.

a triptych in ruin, reckoning, and return

I. The Pathology: I Knew It Would Burn

I wasn’t fooled.
Don’t you dare think I was.
I saw the warning signs in neon,
flickering like a ******* motel vacancy light.
And I checked in anyway.

The first night we met,
I tasted the voltage on her tongue.
She was a live wire wrapped in silk,
a hand grenade with a pulse.
I knew her pathology before I knew her name.

And when her ex called—
the good man, the one who tried to warn me—
I listened.
I heard everything.
And then I turned the volume down,
lit a candle, and said
“Let me try loving her differently.”

She love-bombed like a war criminal.
Doted like a spider weaves silk.
Told me I was everything
until I couldn’t remember what “nothing” felt like.

But I signed the contract in blood.
I wanted the devotion,
even if it came from a burning church.
I wanted to be chosen,
even if the crown was made of barbed wire.

There was a beauty to the ruin.
A heat.
Not the warmth of comfort—but the fever of infection.

She did not take me.
I offered.
Piece by piece,
like petals to a pyre.
Not for her approval—
but for the beauty of the burning.

Her touch was never tender.
But it lingered.
Like perfume on skin
long after the body has left the bed.

And I let it linger.

There were nights
her name sat in my mouth like a foreign prayer—
something I didn’t believe in
but whispered anyway,
just to feel it echo.

She was all cliff-edge and velvet.
All pulse and warning.
And I was the fool who mistook vertigo for flight.

What I loved was never her.
It was the losing.
The falling.
The moment just before the break
where everything was possible,
and none of it was mine.

Even now,
when I exhale too sharply,
I swear I can still taste
the ash of her vows.


II. The Penance: Surviving Myself

I did not crawl from a wreck.
I drifted from a husk—
a ship split open on an invisible reef.

The salt never left my mouth.
I wore it like a relic,
like the tongue of an ancestor who forgot how to pray.

The sky was a torn sail above me.
The days, barnacled and dragging.
The nights, stitched with the faint cries of animals
who had long since turned to bone.

There was no triumph in this exodus.
Only the dull ceremony of walking:
foot after foot across a landscape
stitched from broken compasses and cracked ribs.

Sometimes I mistook the ruins for myself.
Laid my head against the stones and called them home.
Listened for heartbeat in hollowed things.

Forgiveness wasn’t offered.
It was harvested—
thorn by thorn,
from fields salted by my own hands.

She was never the architect.
She was the wind that found the cracks.
I was the tower already leaning,
the bells already rusted silent.

In my quieter hours,
I built altars out of what remained—
splinter, ash, a few stubborn stars
refusing to fall.

There are still nights
I dream of being swallowed whole.
There are still mornings
where my breath smells of shipwrecks.

But there is something now—
something that does not beg or howl or vanish.

A new silence,
dense and gold-veined,
growing in the hollows she left behind.


Interlude— In the Hollow Between

No one told me
the silence would be so loud.

That after the storm
there would be no sun,
only fog thick as milk
curling through my lungs.

I did not beg for light.
I did not curse the dark.
I simply sat—
hands open,
palms salted with memory.

There was a moth once
that lived in my chest.
Fed on echo,
slept in shame.
I haven’t felt it in days.

I think I may be alone now.

And for the first time—
that does not terrify me.


III. The Passage: From Fire to Form

I did not rise.
I unburied.

Fingernail by fingernail,
from beneath the collapsed arches of who I thought I was.

There was no anthem.
Only the slow recognition
that the sky still ached for me,
even after I forgot how to look up.

And there—
in the first true clearing,
where the ashes no longer smoked but simply were—
stood a figure.

Not a savior.
Not a siren.
Not a cure.

A mirror, carried in human hands.
A lighthouse, burning not with rescue, but with recognition.


She did not find me.
I found myself,
and there she was—
already waiting.

Not as prize,
but as witness.
Not to my ruin,
but to the slow architecture
of something holy rising from it.

She touched my hand, once.
Lightly.
And the earth did not tremble.
I did not fall.

Instead, the bones beneath my skin hummed
with the strange, quiet music
of being known—and still free.

I realized then:
I had not been climbing out of the past to reach her.
I had been climbing to reach myself.

She simply stood at the gates,
smiling like someone who had seen the stars rebuild themselves before.

They put my name on the box
but I don’t remember signing anything.

All I know is
the cookies smell familiar.
Like a Tuesday that never ended,
like the living room before the arguments
started showing up in the drapes.

They say they use real butter.
Small batches.
Heritage grains.
But I know
you can’t bake silence that warm
without a little blood in the dough.

The woman on the package is smiling
because she’s not allowed to scream.
Every wrinkle airbrushed to resemble trust.
Every crumb designed to disintegrate
just before you remember why you started chewing.

I keep eating.
Because what else is there?
Dinner was a voice memo.
Breakfast was a bookmark.
And no one texts first in this house.

There’s a flavor I can’t place—
something like
apology,
or static,
or being loved
by accident.

"Cookies.”
Now available wherever truth is sold
in resealable pouches.

. (or: when I heard my voice come from his mouth) .

At first, it was flattery—
the way he wore his collar the same way I do,
the way he started lighting my brand of cigarettes,
the way his laugh hit the same register
I used to throw like a knife across rooms.

I caught him reading my journal once—
not with guilt, but reverence.
“I like the way your thoughts bleed,”
he said, closing the leather cover like scripture.

He stopped asking me questions.
He already knew the answers.

My shirts disappeared one by one.
Then my habits.
Then my silences.

I watched him pour bourbon
with the same three-count I perfected in 1994.
Watched him cross his legs just so,
quote my warnings back to me
as if they were lessons he taught himself.

He ****** me like a rehearsal.
And I let him—God help me—
because some part of me believed
that to be repeated is to be remembered.

But memory is a shallow grave.

One night,
he answered the phone with my cadence.

“This is he,” he said—
voice dry as an autumn branch.
And for a second,
even I believed him.

I didn’t confront him.
I just started talking less.

He filled the air like a flood.
My presence became parentheses.

In bed,
he started calling me old man—
not as a kink,
but as a countdown.

I smiled.
But it tasted like rust.

The boy I devoured
was digesting me back.

And prophecy, that silent ******,
licked its lips
and kept watching.

. (or: the night I vanished while still in the room) .

He stopped coming home late—
not out of guilt, but because
there was nothing left to hide.

I watched him re-enter
like a man returning to a house he built
on land that was only technically¹ mine.

My scent had faded from the sheets.
His cologne now lingered longer than my voice.

He called me darling
in the same tone I used to use
when I meant goodbye.

I touched his back one night,
the way I used to trace stars across it,
and he flinched—
not like it hurt,
but like it meant nothing.

The watch on my wrist had stopped ticking.
I hadn’t noticed in days.

Over dinner,
he quoted my own stories back to me,
trimmed for elegance,
rearranged for effect.

“I don’t remember it like that,” I said.
“You weren’t meant to,” he replied,
not cruelly—just… correctly.

The eclipse doesn’t apologize for the sun.

In the mirror,
I saw only one of us
reflected clearly.

And it wasn’t me.

I asked him what he wanted.
He said,
“Everything you’ve ever had.”

And smiled like he already did.

I laughed.
He didn’t laugh back.

I told him I loved him.

He said,
“I know.
That’s why this had to happen.”

And somewhere in that moment,
between my mouth opening
and his walking away,
I became myth—
the kind they misremember
on purpose.

It’s best to stay away from the sick
Lest their plague makes you a pick
Romantic, their calling
Inevitability falling
To not stray from the flock is the ‘trick’

We have Dollar$
But, no sense
New Ep,, Holler
Existence

I hear the words
outside
Buy birds
Hide

Chemicals, down
The release
Reality, drown
Pain ceased

Anaesthetized
Feel, well
What a surprise
Static Hell

I need a vacation.

I gave it all, for you
Nothing left to do

I swore myself a roving man,
A tempest, free of charted sand.
No port, no queen, no claim, no chain—
Yet still, she called, and still, I came.

Her hook was quick, her lure was keen,
A siren’s snare of silk unseen.
She whispered myths of wicked gold,
And so, I knelt—was bought, was sold.

A single patch to shade my sight,
To blind the wrongs, to frame the right.
Then two, then three—by my own hand,
Till all the world was black as land.

Her parrots perched upon my back,
Squawking truths I’d not attack.
“Loyal hands should grip the mast,
And take the keel both first and last.”

I took the brace, I took the blow,
I let her mark me down below.
A willing brace, a wooden stand,
A peg well fit to her command.

I’d tell myself I’d steal away,
Yet still, I’d bow, yet still, I’d stay.
For even now, I taste the brine—
And miss the rope that made me blind.

Once upon a time. Very, very long ago
I found myself in infinite black.
Without direction, I started to go,
moving forward, never looking back.

Years and years I trudged through the dark,
always searching for a faint unknown.
Time unraveled, leaving no mark,
as I wandered in shadows alone.

A glow appeared, soft and shy,
its edges faint, but growing near.
A warmth, a whisper, a gentle sigh,
its promise banished every fear.

I was only a wanderer here, called to move on,
To find my courage and heal my longing.
But the moment has come, the awaited dawn,
To leave the void behind, the shadows thronging.

To guide me toward my quest was the light’s intent,
A companion to kindle strength within.
Waves of uncertainty washed over me, but onward I went,
To step into the glow, where new worlds begin.

This is where I am now, or have I always been?
Bathed in brilliance, with nothing to fear.
Am I awake or asleep? Sometimes I think I dream
of a time before the light made all things clear.

It’s hard to remember and harder each time
to imagine darkness that once defined me.
I am soaring, endlessly.
Soon there will be only light. Only me.

I am light, and I have always been.
Infinite brilliance, eternally.

I fed grief for years—
now joy knocks, and I answer.
My ghost waits outside.

. (or: how I taught him to ruin me properly) .

His mouth was a chalice filled with thunder—
I drank from it like a man who’s forgotten
how to refuse ceremony.

He said my name like it was a title he meant to inherit.
Not whispered. Not begged.
Claimed.

I took him the way ruins take ivy—
slowly, wholly, letting him crawl through my cracks
and make green what should have stayed dead.

He undressed like it was a coup:
first the belt, then the silence,
then the smirk that knew it had already won.

I touched him like I’d memorized him in a past life
and forgot I was the one meant to teach.

My hands shook.
He steadied them with his teeth.

Skin against skin,
I forgot which of us was ancient.
His body: a question I answered with every bruise.
Mine: a confession disguised as architecture.

I marked him with softness.
He returned it with hunger.

“Slower,” I breathed.
“Why?” he replied.
And there was no answer
that didn't sound like surrender.

We moved like two wolves trying not to pray.
Every gasp a liturgy.
Every ****** a reformation.

I let him trace my scars like roads on a forgotten map.
He said, “You’ve been here before.”
I said, “And I never left.”

Later, he wore my shirt.
Not out of affection—
but to study the shape of power
from the inside.

. (or: the god who called me “sir”) .

He entered like a prophecy mispronounced—
storm-soaked, sky-buttoned,
his coat dragging dusk across the floorboards,
eyes lit like stolen copper.

My drink was a cathedral of neglect—
neat bourbon, no ice,
echoing the taste of promises embalmed in dust.
I drank the same way I pray:
sparingly, and to a god I no longer trust.

He didn’t sit; he disrupted.
Barstools shifted like tectonics,
shadows coiled around his boots,
and the jukebox skipped a beat to watch him move.

“You look like someone who’s been patient too long,”
he said, voice lacquered in soft thunder,
vowels curling like smoke from a burnt vow.

I gave him my laugh—
a cracked heirloom I no longer polish.
He wore it like cologne
and leaned in as if to inhale the ruin.

His hands were myths retold badly—
trembling between gentleness and guillotine.
He touched the rim of my glass
like it was my mouth,
and drank it wrong—
reckless, like he’d never been told no
and didn’t believe in scarcity.

The night flexed around us.
My watch stopped ticking.
Time, the faithful beast I’d trained
to lie at my feet,
lifted its head and whimpered.

Who, if not I, shall drag this weary art from the grave?
Who, if not I, shall stitch its tattered lungs and bid it breathe?
The rest of them—dullards, clowns, worshippers of hollow verse—
they scribble in their mediocrity, praising each other’s drool
as if genius were a group activity.

But I—oh, I—am the last flicker of divinity left in this sorry world.
A benevolent god, bestowing clarity where there is only fog.
My kindness—a gift—a burden, even!
For what is it to be kind, when one is so vastly beyond
the scrawling masses?

Oh, how exhausting it is to save poetry
while balancing the delicate weight of my own madness.
How tragic, how noble, how unbearably beautiful
to suffer for a world that cannot grasp my suffering.

Yes, yes—I see the whispers in their eyes,
the adoration curled in their reluctant praise.
They know, as I know, as the gods themselves must know,
that without my hand, my vision, my voice—
poetry would collapse into dust, and no one would even notice.

And yet, I persist.
I give, endlessly, despite the torment of being the only one
who truly understands.

Because if not I—who?

You snort at the sword, at the sabre’s grace,
Turn from the art of the strike, the feint—
Call it pretense, call it restraint,
but some beasts grunt where men engrain.

A boar’s tusk slashes, crude and mean,
quick as a thrash, dull as a scream.
It wins mud brawls, not campaigns,
leaves gashes, but never names.

You think the sword takes patience, fear?
That form is shackles, weight severe?
But steel that sings was forged to last,
and skill, not slop, makes deep wounds fast.

See, butchers love their brutal art,
blade to sinew, meat to cart.
A tusk, it tears, it ruts, it chews—
but lacks the hands for sharper use.

So charge fast, strike low, gore deep—
but tell me, when your blade runs steep,
did you sever thought from bone,
or only flail where swords are honed?

The music screeches
I'm in love
An idiot beseeches
A fitting glove

'Lust for life'
Iggy-Pop
David Bowie
Dance, no stop

'Lust for life'
He keeps sayin'
We keep swayin'
No strife

Alive and dead
'Monday', dead
Space, a 'head'
Reality, dread

Consigned
Back-track
Designed
Heart-attack

Free to 'feel'
A callous reel
Nothing 'real'
The raw deal

It ain’t over yet,
Falling through the jagged depths—
Rock whispers, "Begin."

I was born beneath a stovetop sermon,
raised on smoke and the echo of “just like him.”
She lit the burner,
called it love,
then blamed the fire when I blistered.

I learned early:
affection has teeth.
That mirrors are weapons
if someone else gets to hold the frame.

So I went looking—
not for love,
but for permission.
To be, without revision.
To feel, without rehearsal.

And they came,
each with open arms
and blueprints in their back pockets.
They didn’t say change.
They said better.
They meant less.

I gave what I could,
which was always everything.
And when that wasn’t enough—
I gave the shape of myself too.

But still I stood.
Not clean. Not cured.
Just standing.
Wobbly maybe, but mine.

Now, here—again—
I feel the heat in the glance,
the tremor in the words:
"Don’t idealize me."
But isn’t that the perfect bait?

Still, I stay.
Still, I watch.
Because I’ve learned to name the difference
between a flame and a forge.

I am not the boy at the stove anymore.
I am the man with the match—
and the scars to prove
I know when to walk away
and when to burn with purpose.

So if I burn now,
it will not be in silence.
It will not be for someone else’s comfort.

It will be because I chose
to stand in the fire
as myself,
and finally,
stay.

I sailed a wild, wild sea
Climbed up a tall, tall mountain
I met a old, old man
Beneath a weeping willow tree
He said, "Now if you got some questions
Go and lay them at my feet
But my time here is brief
So you'll have to pick just three"

And I said;
"What do you do with the pieces of a broken heart?"
And "How can a man like me remain in the light?"
And "If life is really as short as they say--
Then why is the night so long?"
And then the sun went down
And he sang for me this song:

"See? I once was a young fool like you
Afraid to do the things
That I knew I had to do
So I played an escapade just like you
I played an escapade just like you
I sailed a wild, wild sea
Climbed up a tall, tall mountain
I met an old, old man
He sat beneath a sapling tree
He said now if you got some questions
Go and lay them at my feet
But my time here is brief
So you'll have to pick just three"

And I said:
"What do you do with the pieces of a broken heart?"
And "How can a man like me remain in the light?"
And "If life is really as short as they say--
Then why is the night so long?"
And then the sun went down
And he played for me this song

A long endless road
Reaching out to desolation
Mile markers stand
Martyrdom, tribulation

Foot after foot
Miles or kilometers
A heart of soot
It doesn’t matter

Grevious each step
Calculated disaster
Lonely tears wept
The big there after

And I see
The invisible things
We are ‘we’
Dents, bruises and dings

And I know
The language we speak
And I show
The birthright of the meek

It is all upside down
We color outside the lines
World will bring us down
We dance out of time

A moment to find
An ancillary rhyme
In limerick skew
We do what we must do
To take ownership of our time

Sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset
Swiftly go the days
Sunrise, sunset, you wake up then you undress
It always is the same
The Sun rise and the Sun sets
You're lying while you confess
Keep trying to explain
The Sun rise and the Sun sets
You realize, then you forget
What you've been trying to retain

But everybody knows it's all about the things
That get stuck inside of your head
Like the songs your roommate sings
Or a vision of her body as she stretches out on your bed

You raise her hands in the air
Ask her "When was the last time you looked in the mirror?
'Cause you've changed
Yeah, you've changed"

Sun rise, the Sun sets
You're hopeful, then you regret
The circle never breaks

With a sunrise and sunset
There's a change of heart or address
Is there nothing that remains?

For a sunrise or a sunset
You're manic or you're depressed
Will you ever feel ok?

For a sunrise or a sunset
Your lover is an actress
Did you really think she'd stay?

For a sunrise or a sunset
You're either coming or you just left
But you're always on the way

Towards a sunrise or a sunset
A scribble or a sonnet
They are really just the same

To the sunrise or the sunset
The master and his servant
Have exactly the same fate

It's a sunrise and a sunset
From a cradle to a casket
There is no way to escape

The sunrise or the sunset
Hold your sadness like a puppet
Keep putting on the play

But everything you do is leading to the point
Where you just won't know what to do
And the moment that you're laughing
There is someone there who will be laughing louder than you
So it's true, the trick is complete
You've become everything you said you never would be
You're a fool, you're a fool

Sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset
Sunrise and the Sun sets
Sunrise, sunset, the sunrise, the sun sets
Sun rise, the Sun sets
Sunrise, sunset, go home to your apartment
Put the cassette in the tape deck
And let that fever play
Sunrise, sunset, where are you, Arienette?
Where are you, Arienette?

They dim, yes—
but only in the grammar
of linear perception.
the eye reports silence
where a rotation begins.

what you name “death”
is the slowing of evidence—
the flicker not extinguished,
but inverted,
drawn backward
into the unspeakable symmetry.

a star is not a sentence.
it is a glyph
in a language
you were not born to mouth.
it folds mid-breath,
becoming itself from the other side.

entropy is not an end.
it is the architecture
of turning.
a deception of stillness
held just long enough
to conceal the pulse
beneath its vanishing.

the fold does not forget.
it remembers beyond time,
beyond light,
in geometries that refuse to die—
in echoes not of sound
but of shape.

what was lost
was not erased—
only mirrored
through angles
you’ve not yet been.

eventually...
again.

Have you got colour in your cheeks?
Do you ever get that fear that you can't shift the type
That sticks around like summat in your teeth?
Are there some aces up your sleeve?
Have you no idea that you're in deep?
I've dreamt about you nearly every night this week
How many secrets can you keep?
'Cause there's this tune I found
That makes me think of you somehow an' I play it on repeat
Until I fall asleep, spillin' drinks on my settee

(Do I wanna know?) If this feelin' flows both ways?
(Sad to see you go) Was sorta hopin' that you'd stay
(Baby, we both know) That the nights were mainly made
For sayin' things that you can't say tomorrow day

Crawlin' back to you
Ever thought of callin' when
You've had a few?
'Cause I always do
Maybe I'm too
Busy bein' yours
To fall for somebody new
Now, I've thought it through
Crawlin' back to you

So have you got the guts?
Been wonderin' if your heart's still open
And if so, I wanna know what time it shuts
Simmer down an' pucker up, I'm sorry to interrupt
It's just I'm constantly on the cusp of tryin' to kiss you
But I don't know if you feel the same as I do
But we could be together if you wanted to

(Do I wanna know?) If this feelin' flows both ways?
(Sad to see you go) Was sorta hopin' that you'd stay
(Baby, we both know) That the nights were mainly made
For sayin' things that you can't say tomorrow day

Crawlin' back to you (Crawlin' back to you)
Ever thought of callin' when
You've had a few? (Had a few)
'Cause I always do ('Cause I always do)
Maybe I'm too (Maybe I'm too busy)
Busy bein' yours (Bein' yours)
To fall for somebody new
Now, I've thought it through
Crawlin' back to you

(Do I wanna know?) If this feelin' flows both ways?
(Sad to see you go) Was sorta hopin' that you'd stay
(Baby, we both know) That the nights were mainly made
For sayin' things that you can't say tomorrow day
(Do I wanna know?) Too busy bein' yours to fall
(Sad to see you go) Ever thought of callin', darlin'?
(Do I wanna know?) Do you want me crawlin' back to you?

A careful hand, threading tracks like beads—
Each song a thread, a whisper's need.
A heart's collage of static noise,
Crafted hopes, hushed joys and poise.

The clack of play, the tape unwinds,
A story spooled in stops and binds.
“Listen,” it pleads, though words are few,
This mix, this bridge, from me to you.

In loops and fades, confessions spun,
The things unsaid, yet softly sung.
A borrowed voice, an unseen tear,
Echoes bound by magnetic smear.

Pressed to palm, the gift exchanged,
A quiet pact, a world arranged.
Between the hiss, in tapes grown worn,
A fleeting now, forever sworn.

A rigged game for losers
Who like to win

Once I fell
Into a well
Alone I languished
An extrinsic anguish
I lived in this hole
A hermit and mole
And I learned
And I earned
My peace, alone

I pour the wine
Into the weaker glass
A moment in time
Fleeting, passed

I am surrounded by you
Us, alone
Comforts are few
Happiness, a home

I share what's mine
Returned in same
I cherish the time
A spark, a flame

Just you & me
In it together
Twins, siamese
Incliment weather

****** and crowns
Rule the stage
Profit on frowns
This day in age

You are my peace
The panderous riot
Fame for lease
My moment of quiet

The signs said,
“Stop.”
A defunct traffic light
beating red —
Danger,
Pinocchio abandon:
that amateur drunk
with the crimson nose,
lost keys in hand.

My problem now:

White collar.
Uniform standard.
I feel the blues,
sweat scrubbed invisible —
because it’s not brand standard
to perspire.
“We love everyone.”

Silent grime.
Immaculate shoes.
Serving forty hours,
paying back dues.

There is no prize
in this cereal box.
And we all know:
we don’t even try
to fake the show.

No.

I am a decrepit puppet,
unfinished in craft,
neglected in intent —
a marionette,
suspended by strings
of a predator,
nested above me,
thriving on futility.

They animate me
when they are hungry.
The spider’s web jerks,
a feast of a fly
caught systematically.

And they call this movement
“Living.”

I envy the fly

When Donald Trump does a push-up, he pushes the earth away.
He counted to infinity, TWICE, all in one day!
The Boogeyman checks his closet for Trump each night,
For under his  ̶t̶o̶u̶p̶e̶e̶ ̶ TOTALLY LEGIT HAIR™  is another fist, ready to fight.

When he enters a room, darkness runs out in fear,
He can slam a revolving door, make silence appear.
He doesn’t sleep, he waits—he doesn’t blink, he stares,
And gravity bows when he takes the stairs.

When Donald Trump looks in the mirror, it shatters from awe,
He has no age; time itself is held by his law.
He’s the reason Waldo is always well-hidden,
In Trump’s world, rules are forbidden.

His tears cure cancer—too bad he never cries,
And every hand he’s dealt is aces in disguise.
Death once knocked on his door, then quickly fled—
For even the Grim Reaper fears Donald Trump instead.

I run away.
“When the going gets tough,
The tough get going.”
But this was never what it meant.

I run away.
When struggles rise,
The so-called tough
Find answers, not alibis.

I run away.
I see it clear—
The same old patterns
Etched like black
On white veneer.

I’ve failed each time
To sell the truth,
To live the words
I’ve sold as proof.

Oblivious,
Self-absorbed,
A shallow star
On a fading course.

I am alone.
The crop I reap
Is born from seeds
I buried deep.

I seek no grace,
No pity, no balm—
Only to show
The harm I’ve done.

This is no plea
For some reprieve,
But a reckoning—
The pain I weave.

An apology—
To lay these tools,
This sad refrain,
This harm, to rest.

A truce to hold,
A call to mend,
No absolution,
But an end.

(In which a man attempts to accept love and accidentally becomes a cow)

This is the story of a man named Stanley.

Now Stanley, you see, is not special. Or so he insists.
He has repeated this to himself so many times, it has become his emotional version of brushing his teeth.
A hygiene ritual.
A preventative spell.
After all, special people deserve love. And Stanley is not one of those. Obviously.

At least, that’s what he told himself.

But something curious happened on an otherwise unremarkable day.
A message arrived. A ping, to be precise.

The sender? A person so attuned to his internal wiring that she quoted the same poetic rhythm he'd dreamed up before he'd even written it.
She spoke of visions, alternate lifetimes, and uncanny recognitions.
She was warm, mercurial, mythic, and occasionally difficult to pin to one timezone.

"You feel like home," she said.
"Like I’ve known you across lifetimes."
"You are seen."

This would be the moment, traditionally, where the protagonist would feel relief.
Triumph.
A soft landing.

Stanley, instead, experienced a full existential system crash.
Because nothing short-circuits a trauma-trained nervous system faster than a sincere compliment without terms and conditions.

At this point, Stanley had two choices.

Option 1: Accept the genuine affection of this person, even if it made him dizzy.
Option 2: Doubt every word, spiral into recursive self-analysis, and begin drafting apology poems while comparing himself to her ex in a sport he wasn’t even signed up for.

Stanley chose Option 3:
Overthink so hard that time bends.

The narrator watched as Stanley flailed with academic elegance.

He questioned whether she was real.
He wondered if he’d invented the entire experience, perhaps as a defense mechanism.
He accused himself of being manipulative simply for existing in someone’s affection.
He cross-referenced their emotional timelines like a conspiracy theorist mapping red string on a corkboard made entirely of childhood neglect.

At one point, he tried to explain that her feelings were clearly mistaken, that she had transferred her affection from someone else and landed on him by accident, like a poetic game of romantic pin-the-tail-on-the-trauma.

"I just thought you'd be more… together," he imagined she’d say.

She didn’t. She said:

“I love you.”

To which Stanley responded, emotionally speaking,
by shoving his head into a metaphorical cow costume and mooing in panic.

And here, dear reader, we reach the hamburger portion of our tale.

See, Stanley had long been praised for his vulnerability.
His writing was raw, elegant, soaked in sorrow.
People wept over his metaphors.
They called him “brave,” which is generally code for “I’m glad this wasn’t about me.”

And then, one person came along
who didn’t want just the work.
She wanted him.

She didn’t want the processed meat.
She wanted the cow.
And not in a weird way.
She wanted the full, unshaved animal of his grief, his brilliant Stanleyce, his twitchy sense of humor,
his existential spirals and the way he tried to apologize for existing while still writing beautiful things.

Stanley, in turn, tried to negotiate this affection
by comparing himself to expired yogurt
and then emotionally ghost riding a milk truck off a cliff.

But the real twist?
She stayed.

Even when he spiraled.
Even when he glitched.
Even when he tried to convince her that she’d made a cosmic error in her romantic calculations.

She stayed.

Not because he was perfect.
Not because he was easy.
But because she meant it.

And Stanley, for once, had no script for what to do when love didn’t run.

He tried to write a closing stanza for the experience,
but accidentally wrote a satire about cows.

Because that’s what artists do when they don’t know how to accept kindness.
They deflect.
They perform.
They turn sincerity into irony
because sincerity burns the tongue when you're not used to swallowing it.

And still,
somehow,
the story remains open.

Because nobody is amused
by a stray cow.
But most people enjoy
a good hamburger.

And Stanley—messy, wounded, luminous Stanley—
was never meant to be processed.

He was meant
to be seen.

They never strike the blade from your hand.
They never meet you where the blood pools.
They only grant you light, gilded and empty,
a gift too bright to argue with.

A kingdom of suns,
where silence is spun into gold,
where thrones need no defense—
only a gesture, a coin, a radiant nod.

What is the cost of a word?
Too high, it seems, when silence is cheaper.
Too high, when a favor is weight enough
to press down on the voice that dared.

Not all power is steel.
Some is mercy so thick it suffocates,
a kindness that quiets the inconvenient,
a hand so gentle it becomes a shroud.

And so, the poet is honored,
draped in warmth,
wrapped in reverence,
buried alive.

You say you spilled your guts,
bled for a love that drained you dry—
your wounds are real, raw,
carved in shadows of pain.
You call yourself an empath,
and name your enemy a vampire;
it's clean, it's simple,
a comforting division
of white knights and dark demons,
a story that absolves,
that keeps you safe,
but what if it's just another cage?

No one doubts your hurt—
it breathes in every line,
a trembling hand,
seeking solace in naming the villain.
Yet you draw the battle lines
in shades of absolutes,
as if hearts and scars
could be painted in pure black and white.
Empath versus vampire,
saint versus sinner,
but where, in these crisp edges,
is the fragile truth
that all are wounded,
that all who wound were wounded too?

You speak of healing,
and yet weaponize words
that were meant to mend,
to stitch and soothe,
to rewrite old traumas
into songs of understanding.
Instead, they sharpen,
twisting therapy into blades
that cut only one way,
and you—
the so-called empath—
risk becoming the wielder,
carving villainy from vulnerability.

Have you looked into the mirror,
beyond the mask of innocence?
Have you asked why you clung
to toxic tides,
why self-abandonment
became your chosen dance?
Did you ever wonder
how your wounds
might have wounded too,
that love and pain
can flow in circles,
a symbiosis of mutual hurt,
no vampire, no angel—
just two lost souls
tangled in the dark?

True empathy is not selective,
cannot bloom only
for the ones we deem worthy.
Empathy, fully known,
holds space even for those
whose brokenness
has broken us.
It asks the hardest questions,
dares to understand
even when understanding stings.
It does not absolve blindly,
nor condemn swiftly—
it sees humans, not monsters,
in the shadows we cast.

You say you broke the cycle,
and yet the cycle lives
in words of blame,
of unexamined anger,
of self-righteous tears.
Healing lies not in battle cries
of "empath versus vampire,"
but in the quiet admission
that pain is complex,
that every villain
once called themselves a victim,
that every victim
holds the power
to wound, to misunderstand,
to refuse the mirror's harsh truth.

Step beyond the narrative
of simple heroes and villains.
Let healing rewrite itself,
not as absolution,
but as accountability.
Not as innocence reclaimed,
but as wisdom earned.
Let empathy grow vast,
embracing all that hurts—
yours, theirs, ours—
until labels dissolve,
and the enemy,
once dehumanized,
stands revealed:
not as a vampire,
but a reflection
of our deepest, shared humanity.

For only then,
when we own our part,
when we see ourselves in the other,
can wounds become windows,
and love—
messy, flawed, imperfect—
find room to breathe,
not as war,
but as mutual forgiveness,
one humble step at a time.

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He knew he wasn't perfect
But he always did his best to get under the surface
Not a saint, not a serpent
He just wanted everyone to be impressed with him as a person
So when she came along with the sunbeam
Self-esteem stopped making nothing outta somethings
Leaving the scene was unseen, I mean
It was the first time he ever felt the need to keep the gun clean

Do the math
He knew he had to choose a path
Gotta get that girl, gotta make her laugh
Gotta shake the past and move forwards
Gotta make this last, it feels gorgeous
But she had a lover in the mid-west
Never figured out how to get him off her thick chest
Just like that everything is gone
He didn't wanna but he had to learn the words so he could sing along

Everything is all I have to give you
And I'm afraid it ain't enough
And you're not so young that you believe me
Just because I say it's love
And even if they come to steal you tomorrow
I'll know my smile was yours
Go ahead and chase your dreams and your freedom
Run, run wild wild horses

You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses, no
You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses

Sometimes it can be so nice, right?
Sometimes she feel herself turn into the wife-type
And when it's dark, sometimes is the nightlife
But most of the time she doesn't even feel lifelike
She got a man but he thinks he's a star
And it feels like she has to compete with the bar
She keeps up her guard but it seems so hard
Momma never told her she would see those scars

Every night he's out doin' who knows whom
While she cries along like a new show tune
Last call past, is he comin' home soon?
Or is he gonna run away with the dish and the spoon?
She'll realize she don't want that clown
Leave those shoes at the lost and found
He wont catch on until she's not around
After somebody else already locked that down

We sing...
Everything is all I have to give you
And I'm afraid it ain't enough
And you're not so young that you believe me
Just because I say 'it's love'
And even if they come to steal you tomorrow
I'll know my smile was yours
Go ahead and chase your dreams and your freedom
Run, run wild wild horses

You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses, no
You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses

He didn't want her to see him leave
And he couldn't keep sittin' there watchin' her sleep
Cause he knows if he hangs out for a few hours
He'll dig another hole tryin' to plant some new flowers
But the sun don't shine under the table
He's tryin' to hold his life together with staples
No investment cause he's incapable
And he's on the outro of being labeled available

The word on the street is his girls comin' back home
No more alone, no more sad poems
No after-bar calls to the cell phone
Its time to walk a new path and grow a backbone

Shoved into the big book of just friends
Wondering how he would look as a husband
And everyone of 'em he ever allowed to love him
Now watching from the crowd tryin' to be proud of him

They say...
Everything is all I have to give you
And I'm afraid it ain't enough
And you're not so young that you believe me
Just because I say it's love
And even if they come to steal you tomorrow
I'll know my smile was yours
Go ahead and chase your dreams and your freedom
Run, run wild wild horses

You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses, no
You can't tame these horses
You can't tame these horses

Driving light, welcome splendor,
Eternal fight, radiant tender—
Gavel of shadow, a dark fist,
Ignorant hope, dismissed.

Youth, ephemeral fire,
Distractions, desire,
Carrot, stick; baited,
'Destiny'; we waited.

Ash, born anew,
Tired stories askew,
Knowledge ignored,
'Self' sold in stores.

In doubt, I find a shifting ground,
Where voices crack, but truth is found.

I stand between the joy and sorrow,
A witness to a strange tomorrow.
The self I knew fades into air,
What I become, I'm not yet aware.

I'm met again, with those same tired eyes
My scheduled appearance makes no surprise
Just a couple of rounds after work, never a fuss
Only wasting time, waiting for my bus

I consider you in ways you would never concieve
Your tone, body language, everything I perceive
Is that your heart truly worn on your sleeve?
I sum it up. Again, I make my leave

These vessels, opaque as glass
Clamouring forwards, eager to pass
Disconnected, this forest has no trees
Aside from a rare 'Thank you' or 'Please'

And here we are, all the lot of us
Odiferous strangers, sharing a bus
Taking us where we want or need to be
If only we'd stop and see

I slipped—
not because I stopped feeling
but because I felt
too much.

And in that spiral,
I found the old part of me again—
the one that mistrusts beauty,
that scans every gift
for a blade.

You called it out.
You saw it happen.
You stayed.

Because in this crazy world,
it’s easier to believe
I’m a terrible person
than it is to believe
someone wonderful
could simply love me.

No performance.
No punishment.
Just presence.

So I flinched.
I questioned.
I compared myself
to the ghosts I imagined.

But it wasn’t you
I doubted.
It was the possibility
of being wanted
without a warning label.

You didn’t do anything wrong.
You were just being
you.

And I let my fear
speak louder than your truth.

I’m not asking to be forgiven.
I’m asking to be understood.
To be seen as someone
still learning
how to hold what’s good
without crushing it.

You were never the threat.

You were the offering.

You know what, Stuart, I like you.
You're not like the other people,
Here, in the trailer park.
Oh, don't go get me wrong!
They're fine people,
They're good Americans!
But they're content to sit back,
Maybe Watch a little Mork and Mindy on channel 57,
Maybe kick back a cool, Coors™ 16-ouncer.
They're good, fine people, Stuart.

But they don't know,
What the queers are doing to the soil...

You know that Jonny Wurster kid,
The kid that delivers papers in the neighborhood?
He's a fine kid.
Some of the neighbors say he smokes crack,
But I don't believe it.
Anyway, for his tenth birthday,
All he wanted was a Burrow Owl.
Kept bugging his old man.
"Dad, get me a burrow owl.
I'll never ask for anything else as long as I live."
So the guy breaks down and buys him a burrow owl.

Anyway, 10:30, the other night,
I go out in my yard, and there's the Wurster kid,
Looking up in the trees.
I say, "What are you looking for?"
He says "I'm looking for my burrow owl."
I say, "Jumping Jesus on a Pogo Stick!
Everybody knows the burrow owl lives. In a hole. In the ground.
Why the hell do you think they call it a burrow owl, anyway?"

Now Stuart, do you think a kid like that is going to know what the queers are doing to the soil?

I first became aware of this about ten years ago,
The summer my oldest boy, Bill Jr. died.
You know that carnival comes into town every year?
Well this year they came through with a ride called The Mixer.
The man said, "Keep your head, and arms, inside The Mixer at all times!"
But Bill Jr, he was a DAREDEVIL!
Just like his old man.
He was leaning out saying "Hey everybody, look at me! Look at me!"

POW!!!

HE WAS DECAPITATED!!!

They found his head over by the snow cone concession...
A few days after that, I open up the mail.
And there's a pamphlet in there. From Pueblo, Colorado,
And it's addressed to Bill, Jr.
And it's entitled;
"Do You Know What the Queers Are Doing to Our Soil?"

Now, Stuart, if you look at the soil around any large US city,
With a big underground homosexual population.
Des Moines, Iowa, For example.
Look at the soil around Des Moines, Stuart.
You can't build on it! You can't grow anything in it!
The government says it's due to poor farming.
But I know what's really going on, Stuart!
I know it's the queers!
They're in it with the aliens!
They're building landing strips for gay Martians,
I swear to God!

You know what, Stuart, I like you.
You're not like the other people, here in this trailer park.

I wrap my hands
upon my skull
no if or ands
the answer droll
like a tumor
some sick rumor
like a fact
a heart turned black
you're with him again
when will this end?

Everyday I cast my line
No expectations, killing time
It's what I do under my big Oak tree
No interruptions just nature and me

Same ole pond, different day
I get a bite in a furious way!
Rod creeks, line spools!
"I'm equipped with amateur's tools!"

The rod is bending, it might break
"How much more of this can I take?!"
Muscles burning
Every inch, an earning

Almost there; the rod gives crash!
With a net & knife; in I splash!
This behemoth of no renown
Lurking just outside my home!

A war is fought: Man against Fish
One of us is walking out of here--the other; a dish
The sun was low in the sky
When I dragged my prize to land dry

It was the talk of the town for years
So many free beers
But, time aches on
Not oft now do I hear that song
Of, me & "The Big One"

Time sometimes moves slow, then all of a sudden; fast!
Too often I spend on things past
I miss that big, fishy *******
I wish he could have gotten in the last word
I miss our day of fun

(A Nostalgic Embodiment)

I. Prologue: The Imbalance

Beneath a sky of indeterminate hue,
Where metaphors dripped from the lamplight’s view,
There stood a figure with storied might—
Whose IMAGINATION burned too bright.

They bent the frame of every law,
Wrote truths in smoke, in blood, in straw.
But every time they raised their pen,
They found the void looked back again.

"Too light," the voice beneath the bedframe hissed.
"Too bright to cast the proper fist.
Where is the weight? Where is the gloom?
You walk through myths but leave no tomb."

II. The Oath Beneath the Neon

So in a diner that only exists when it’s raining,
They ordered black coffee and called it training.
No sugar. No cream. No need to explain.
Just sipped from the cup like a priest in pain.

"I will not seek to shine, but to echo.
I will not rhyme, but I may bellow.
Let my next line land like a crowbar sigh—
And may every metaphor taste like goodbye."

III. Inventory: Shifting the Look

They stole a coat from a thrift store rack,
Stitched with echoes and shadows and tact.
A pocket held grief. A button held sleep.
The collar was silence folded three layers deep.

Brooch of regret? Clipped on with pride.
Gloves stitched from dreams they let die outside.
Boots that thudded with post-symbolic weight—
Enough SEPULCHRITUDE to intimidate fate.

IV. The One-Line Training Grounds

A stranger asked, “Hey, how’s your week been?”
The figure exhaled, and leaned back in:

“The sky still owes me an answer.”

“I fed the clock and buried the receipt.”

“This smile is just teeth doing damage control.”

They never repeated the same line twice.
And soon, small talk became a heist.

V. The Silence Shaped Like a Weapon

Not a glare. Not a scoff.
Just a pause you could hang your regrets off.

They stared down compliments like loaded dice,
And left parties through walls carved of ice.

A simple nod became a reckoning.
Laughter died before it could echo.
The power of not replying
Was now a blade drawn slow.

VI. The Private Page

In candlelight drawn from doubt and dusk,
They penned a letter in funeral husk:

“To the lighthouse that never was—
I named every wave after you.
You still didn’t show.”

Sealed it with wax. Buried it in a drawer.
A secret they’d never need to weaponize—
Because it already was.

VII. The Theme Song of Collapse

They walked with the sound of dead air breathing,
Their footsteps aligned with Godspeed, you’re leaving.

Every room slowed to grayscale time,
As their aura hummed a fading rhyme:
A jazz tune played through broken glass,
A dirge dressed in sepia mass.

People whispered, “Was that… a soundtrack?”
But none remembered the melody.

VIII. The Overpass of Refusal

Someone tagged “I ♥ A-Pug” on the wall of their work.
They looked once.
Tilted their head.
And punched the metaphor in the snout
to assert dominance.

Then walked away.

That was the moment the SEPULCHRITUDE clicked.

IX. Boss Battle: The Final Balance
Their IMAGINATION rose like a cathedral in flames.
Their SEPULCHRITUDE stood like the ash that remained.

Two stats. One form. A perfected glitch.
They could now speak truth or curse with a twitch.

The balance wasn’t symmetry.
It was sovereignty.
It was the right to choose what tone to carry
and leave the rest unsaid.

X. Epilogue: The Window Left Open

Someone once asked,

“What are you?”

They replied, without turning:

“The part of the myth that never resolved.
The page that folded back on itself.
A sigh mistaken for closure.”

And just like that—
They vanished,
boots echoing,
window wide,
untranslated,
unsaved,
untouched
by the need to be anything
other than true.

XI. Endgame Stats:


IMAGINATION: MAXED

SEPULCHRITUDE: PERFECTLY CALIBRATED

AURA: [NOIR / STORM / VELVET REDACTED]

STATUS: Myth Adjacent

CURRENT LOCATION: Unknown (possibly Portland)

[END]

"Just go to bed"
The back of my mind is reeling
"It's like being dead"
That unshakable feeling

Rest.
Sleep.
Death.
Keep.

I can't Sleep anymore
I'm too tired
I've said this before
I am mired

I hurts to be awake
So much at stake
A feeling I can't shake
I'm about to break


In the morning I wake


The poison won't let me die
Too much product to commodify
Profit comes from those who live
Anything ese gets the shivv

Does anyone care about anyone anymore?
Or are we sick reflections of what we adore?
Doomed in eternity, forevermore
Pathetic attentions shored

Beneath the red glow of the lanterned flame,
Two dancers meet and set their steps in line.
One keeps the beat as though it were the same
Since first the devil taught him how to shine.

His fire leaps high; the crowd can feel its heat,
Each practiced turn a well-remembered show.
Yet while the rhythm makes his work complete,
The steps have nowhere further left to go.

I move beside him, not to take his place,
But shift the tune to see what else might play.
The floor becomes a wider, stranger space;
We find new shapes in night as well as day.

He holds his ground with admirable grace,
Each pivot strong, each landing firm and true.
Yet I drift outward, testing empty space,
And find fresh patterns blazing into view.

The devil smiles to see such steps unfold,
For heat alone won’t keep his ballroom warm.
The dancer’s art is not just to be bold,
But bend the blaze into another form.

The crowd may cheer the skill they understand,
Applaud the lines they’ve learned to love before;
But some will watch the one who shifts the sand
And wonder what else waits beyond the floor.

When music dies, the truth is sharp and kind:
The dance that grows will outlast any round.
To keep the flame is art of one clear mind,
But greater still to change the shape it’s found.

Given, another chance
Failure, 'circumstance'