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I cry in the rain
So the tears look the same
While blurring the stain
Helping to hide the shame
From the masculinity
Attached to my name
Who's to blame?
Society?
Maybe,
But it just adds to the pain
That follows the grain
Of this hardened exterior
I can no longer maintain

©2024
"How can she be so awful
Then walk around almost proud?"
I say to myself but out loud
While the only thing around
Is this lingering black cloud
So did I even make a sound?

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 13
Can't hide the rigors
Of anxiety and fears
Even knowing what it harbors
Can't cloak their effects from mirrors
It figures
Such a force can disfigure figures
Right under the skin it lingers
The worst possible time is when it appears
Rears up to rip down the facade and veneers
The you you knew is what it devourers
What good are middle fingers,
When only directed at yourself?
For now,
I guess,
I'll have to put that question on the shelf

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 10
The only thing one tends to see
Is the person I don't want to be
Silly me
Obviously
The fruit has spoiled on this tree
Despite me
Or in spite of me
I keep coming back but leave empty
Mostly disappointment only
Ignoring the warning from the Canary
I can't stand steady
Amongst a broken levee
I don't have the energy
To be angry
Or for that matter, happy
Both weigh far too heavy
Forced to take a knee
Taken from me
Is the thought of ever being free
Of me
Not even a possible maybe
My full name and bio in permanent ink on generic stationary
There's no further in front of me
That's what's really scary
Trust me

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 9
You want me to remember
Everything you've ever said
While you sit there and pretend
Our issues only come from one end

I need you to remember
Everything you've ever said
I will not defend
Just because you said it instead

From January on through December
I warn I'm seeing red
The monsters under the bed
Fear the ones inside my head

I try to be clever
Jumping on and off the list of living dead
But deaths cousin sleeps adjacent to me in bed
I write my feelings in poems you've never read
...although
They only contain everything I've already said

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 9
Permanent are
The memories trapped in a scar
And though a few might fade,
It'd be quicker to count every star
At times I don't notice them
Other times they're another prison bar
Attempts to hide them are made
But mummification seems a step too far
In my day to day they are
All I can see,
Haunting my reality
They've stolen the getaway car
And I'll not make it far
In this mangled avatar

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 8
Dear Lord,

Hi,
Hello there
How are you?
Actually and more importantly,
Who are you?
Who am I?
Why don't you ask how am I?
Don't you want to get to know me?
Why don't you come down from the sky?
On some devine rescue
Where's the compassion?
I'd settle for pity
We're all blind from an eye for an eye
Why can't we meet face to face,
Eye to eye?
You must know I don't fear you
So it must be you who fears me
What kind of father are you?
Most figured by now
You'd have come through
But you seem to be afraid of anything new
Of course I've turned on you
Well,
Turned from you
But that's on you

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 7
Obviously
Both comedy and tragedy
Feed on
And are fed by reality
With a savagery
So if you play nice
You might find the happy in strife
Both can
Take you by the hand
And lead you to the promise land
Your best guess of an afterlife
Slice the tension with a knife
To get the upper hand
Don't bite the hand
Try to
Stick to
The grand plan
But prepare to fall when you take your stand
Humble humility will get you knocked off the grandstand
Then where will you stand?
Honestly,
It all feels like quicksand
No buts, just and
I too don't understand

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 7
Living in the middle of the beginning of the end
To much time taken
None left to spend
The shoulder devil's my guardian angels only friend
Quality of life a dying trend
Tucked into a deathbed
Then pretend to be on the mend
Bend the truth until it's a lie that you have to defend
Be yourself
See what happens then
Hang in there like the cat poster said
Only postponing the fall in the end
Forced to contend
With that of which becomes to much to comprehend
Then,
It starts all over again
Over
And over
And over again

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 7
You ever want to write
Something different
Than what you seem to be able to write?
Not some profound insight
Just something lite?
Lord knows I more than might,
Like,
Let's say you wake up in the dead of the night
In the stillness of the moonlight
The room is dark
But the clock is bright
Enough for sight
What you want never feels right
You want to produce light
But your muse is always ready to put up a fight
And you swear there's more to you than hurt and pain
And you know you have this talent
But when you try to use it,
It's not the same
Is it all in vain?
The thoughts that creep in
Start to feel insane
600 plus poems should be enough to drain
Each and every issues main vain
Can someone please explain?
Standing on a beach while the good in you feels like a single grain
Maybe the good in you is there but tied to the tracks of life's train
What's there to gain?
What changes if you complain?
What I've found
Is standing your ground
Will only leave you maimed

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 6
I just want you to want me
But experience shows
That task's an absolute impossibility
Leading to a litany of woes
I can't be too mad
No one's been able to do it
Not mother, brother, sister or dad
A reality that even to myself I don't want to admit
It hurts but brings no tears of the sad
I literally have no more to give to it
A pain universally grand
A heartbreak university grad
Minus the school spirit
Nothing left of me to offer either
There's only rubble in my chest
Ruins of love from a life prior
When the heart was left on house arrest

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 5
I don't want to give up
In the face of everything telling me to let go
I wish I didn't,
But I know
And yes I know
Part of me will fall apart
My only hope is that it's slow
Praying to no one
That no one will know
Hope it doesn't show
But hope is so shallow
Hide behind my shadow
But don't allow
Darkness to retake control
And ransack this soul
Restacking the goal
The top goal flipped
To basic survival
Gone are the illusions
Of ever again being whole
Back in my hole I go
Back to the simple
A *******
Limping back to what I know

©2024
Jeremy Betts Dec 1
I close my eyes
A feeble attempt to get back to a dream
I realize
It's ridiculous to chase one particular theme
Too many tries
With no mind paid to what it could mean
I fantasize
But fantasies have a misleading gleam
The crystal ball lies
It's all a regurgitated, outdated scheme
My reality cries
But it's better than when it use to scream

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 28
If I knew then
What I know now
Would every new decision
Lead to the same place somehow?

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 27
~•§•~ Light Sleeper v2.0 ~•§•~
(song attempt/build)

One foot in the ground
One foot six feet deeper
With darkness all around
Fear's such a light sleeper
My fall never made a sound
Put the tree on loudspeaker
A picture doesn't last longer
If it's never a keeper

See here

Feeeearrr
Doesn't make a sound
What you heeeearrr
Is your spirit finally found
Get an eeeearrr...
...ful when you finally hear it
Just hope you survived it
And don't sound like a hypocrite

But that's just it
The stage is set
Place your bet
Guess what you get
You get
What you get
And that's just life
Yet we forget
How far we went
Can't repent
Good karma's spent
Left indecent
Ran the gauntlet
Pain's permanent
Still not been
Defeated yet

Think a sec

Feeeearrr
Doesn't make a sound
What you heeeearrr
Is your spirit finally found
Get an eeeearrr...
...ful when you finally hear it
Just hope you survived it
And don't sound like a hypocrite (x2)

©2024
Light Sleeper version 2.0
Should I write it like I hear it or not?
(Coming from a "lyrical" (a loose term) begining, and being completely honest, I'm not sure the proper poetry/art etiquette or most of poetries rules and guidelines for that matter. That makes it so freeing to me, not knowing the way "I'm supposed to do it" and doing how it feels (cliche warning) in the moment. It's beautiful...
Example
Fear (Feeeearrr)
Hear (heeeearrrr)
Ear (eeeearrrr)
Jeremy Betts Nov 26
If the devil is in the details,
Then where is god?
In the contradiction?
The vague?
In the hate,
And judgment?
Maybe it lies in the imagination?
Or is it sitting up in heaven
Watching his creation
Go up in flames
Refusing to take any action?
Could you imagine?

©2024
I'm not asking for a friend...
Jeremy Betts Nov 26
One foot in the ground
One foot six feet deeper
With darkness all around
Fear's such a light sleeper
My fall never made a sound
Put the tree on loudspeaker
A picture doesn't last longer
If it never is a keeper

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 25
My rock bottom
A bottomless pit
Terminal velocity reached
Left waiting for the floor to hit
All I can recall is the fall
I ready myself for the reality bit
Until I reach bottom
I can't pick myself up from it

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 23
How can the absolute fact that
"I'd do anything to see my son"
And the sinking reality
I've not made enough effort to see him
Exist in the same plane of existence?
A fuucking paradox
An impossible duality
But here I am
Standing in that exact reality
And the answer is me
There's no possibility,
Not even probably,
That he hasn't noticed the same
And that truth haunts me
Daily and nightly
Destroys absolutely
And completely
Why doesn't that push me?

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 23
"Life's about the journey
Not the destination"
Well pardon me
But I have a question,
What if the journey
Isn't worth the destination?
Follow me
Maybe somewhere in here is a lesson
...
The finish line is a dreamy fantasy
It has to be
Because the in-between
Of point A and point B
Has almost killed plenty
Literally a step away
From creating
A new ending
To a journey
No one would want to remember
Much less mention
One with no connection
To the original destination
Now not worth the journey

©2024
Or something like that.....,
Jeremy Betts Nov 22
Just because you lost
Does not mean you gave up
Being held hostage by your own thoughts
Does not mean you surrendered
Coming undone and falling apart
Does not mean that you are then broken
Finding it hard to love yourself
Does not make you unworthy of love itself

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 22
Self destruction
With no red button
Internal spontaneous combustion

A flipped switch
Quick curve ball pitch
Veered straight for the ditch

No countdown timer
No red, no blue wire
Just a smoldering dumpster fire

Struggle with each next breath
Welcoming a last breath
A timeless back and forth with death

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 22
Feeling forced to
Live through
An impossible scenario
I'm someone who
Finds it hard to
Find anything but static on the radio
All this blue
Is nothing new
42 seasons of the same show
A tandem dive done solo
The sign says shallow
Margin for error narrow
But ***** it, here I go
'Look out below'

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 21
I've heard people are strange
When you're a stranger
A lesson learned
Only as you grow older

Faces look ugly
When you're alone
My past proves
No one pays no mind to what's shown

They say women seem wicked
When you're unwanted
My truth is I've wasted
All the time allotted

Streets are uneven
When you are down
Seemingly impossible
To find solid ground

The strange
Have faces they hide in the rain
It's strange
Couldn't be bothered to remember my name

Are you strange?
Am I strange?
What is straaaaaange?

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 21
Can I tell you my dreams?
Will you stick around long enough to understand what each means?
Should I skip over the nightmare scenes
That flicker through like 8mm on pull down screens
While the essence meanders by like dust through projector beams
Two extremes
Two cerebral regimes
Strange themes
Nothing's as it seems
Importance only found beyond the streams of screams
No, I don't think I will mention my dreams

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 19
Don't ever let 'em see
Don't ever let it show
Men in this society
Must curb the emotional
Bury it all, never let it be known
That mental health is what it stole
Stick to the script
Know your roll
Even though living like that
Leaves one barely functional
But you don't want to upset
The status quo

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 19
no more
No more
No More
NO MORE
I'm going to get milk and smokes from the corner store...

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 18
I wish you were a better liar
Because I'm able to see right through
This half baked gaslight fire
"It's not me, it's you" you spew
Then sit back and admire
The hell you put me through
Knowing your favorite reaction's about to transpire
A knee **** wish for an end I feel is past due
Triggering thoughts that are dire
And when I think I've reached peak punishment
It's nothing new
To be kicked when I'm down
Pushing the bar ever higher

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 17
The more I try
The more I fail
A cattywampus scale
Creating this personalized
Dollar general designer hell
A fiery well
I'm always drawn back to
In a spell
And I keep mindlessly pushing
Circling like a carousel
Why pray tell?
I couldn't tell
But I'll tell you what,
If you know someone buying souls
I'd be willing to sell
If they pay well

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 17
Awful is
The particular sound my tears make when they hit the ground
You'd think maybe they'd be entertaining, coming from a clown
But misery echos a history and the volume can not be found
Any smile is a complex frown I've simply practiced upside down

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 17
Trying to find shades of myself
In the simple black and white
Trying to wade out in the middle
Of a basic wrong and right
Maybe I will or maybe I won't
But maybe I just might
I want to live in the twilight
There's too much darkness in the light

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 17
I've run out of sheep to count
Leaving me wide awake through this living nightmare
Sowing a seed of doubt
Is life's refusal to even consider fighting fare
Each step taken while walkin' about
Feeds on the back of my mind, whispering, "do it if you dare"
Fueling despair
Instigating internal warfare
Causing excessive ware and tare
Resulting in a head of hair gone bare
And I'm forced to bite my tongue completely off
To keep from admitting I no longer care

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 16
Hope and reality
Those two often don't mesh
While need and want
Battle the sins of the flesh
I question self preservation
Tracing these scars made fresh
I find myself reciting,
"Comparison is the thief of joy"
As I  hold my breath up to the rest

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 12
No one paid no mind
To the tears from this man
That land at my feet
Creating a quicksand
I couldn't slow the rate
At which it would expand
Leading to the scars
At the base of each hand
I know what you think of me
But this wasn't part of the grand plan
I tried and as usual
I was not able
To help you understand
That I just wasn't capable
Of being a "real man"

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 12
{Political}

Just look around you and you'll notice that every day there's another suucker born
Another mother fuucker trying to pick around the thorn
But there'll never be breath blown through the victory horn and there won't be one to worn
Cause the new norm is news meant to deform not to inform
Leaving only torn fragments of real mixed with lies, a new truth is born
And it's one that defies the meaning of truth so it's armor for our thoughts and soul that must be worn

Cause it's forced upon every sense, attached to ignorance, illegal for an opinion to be drawn
It's a new dawn where rational thinking is gone, new laws signed in crayon
And it doesn't matter what paawn gets passed the baton when an election comes along
Cause it was years ago that this corruption spawn with a freedom slogan button on
And it's the divide that's grown from a line to a deep chasm of a wide canyon
That'll be our legacy, the legend we pass on till we feel defeat and meet the same demise that fell upon Krypton

It's crazy how we as a society love to single out one to staple blame on, makes it simple
But every man that's held an oval as his office might as well have been a floating carcass, dead in the water from the get go
Don't just agree cause I said so, that's half the problem yo, go do your own research bro
And know that they fear intelligence so go gather up a couple library's full
And don't jump in half cockeed like you only got one teesticle
Give it your all, fuuck being humble, we keep this shiit up we're all in fuuckin trouble
So burst this bubble, let it trasnform to rubble, forget being subtle
It's time to break huddle and be a factor in this much needed rebuttal
Screamed in the face paced on this ancient government scandal

But fuuck it. I'm only one person and not the one to change it cause I'm not perfect
But my imperfectly perfect plan sits perched in dust, never to be touched like it's deadly sick
Like a dripping diick, you pretend you don't have it 'til the graphic turns horrific
Then they say it's fake news but you're looking at the problem, starring derectly at it
But it's me that's ignorant and insignificant? I see it different you one percenter priick

I have a thought, just a notion, top of my head, tell me what you think
How long can we survive on the brink? On a doomed vessel destined to sink?
Holding the knowledge of where the boat is weak
Have known about the leak but putting off repairs till a metaphorical next week
We can see the old, rusty chain of command, it's obvious who's the weakest link
But if we the people aren't in sync (bye bye bye) we're all gonna drown in the drink
The spiked flavor-aid is laid out just waiting for evil to speak then give a sly wink
The nod to give the go-ahead once we're in to deep, swerling round the bottom of the sink

But there's more of us then them so I say we push back
Take the power that we hold off the rack, grow a pair of metaphorical baalls in a metaphorical nuut sack and attack
Put on Hatebreed as the soundtrack and dish out some payback
This is a call to all who can't just lay back like seats in a Maybach and watch the train skip off track
You don't need an almanac to predict this fact, the shiit storm is here, lead by a maniac
And if we don't take our country back then it's our fault, not theirs, that the future seems bleak and black
Let that neat little fact sink in and fill the crack like plaque stacked from years of no contact
Then get back to me when you see clearly that the peace tready that was eagerly signed so freely is actually a death contact

You can't dispute that once you've read the small print on the back of this sinister, sell your soul type contract
Gotta realize we've given to much slack but we do hold the rains, we must pull back
But mustn't hold back, can't afford to hoard the ball and record a sac
It's already fourth down and forever, standing in our own in zone taking the snap
A hail Mary is our only hope, but it might be crazy enough to be the key to the exact play we need to get the lead back
We lose this game and that's it, no respawn, no next season to fall back on, blap, extinction just like that
But fuuck that shiit Jack, I'll fight till my last breath escapes me, I ain't going out like that
Can't give up with my back turned to a population under attack
Cowering in a ransacked bomb shelter resembling the shrieking shack
Can't do it, no matter our differences no one deserves that
But I'm going to need all the help I can get to keep this flaming wreckage off the tarmac

So please, as soon as the Kodak filters been lifted and you see the mess that we've been gifted
You'll come join the million other kindred spirits that have enlisted
No longer tainted by politicians political poison, no longer frightened
Instead, an ability to sift through the ******* has been heightened
No blinders, just enlightened, a vision readjusted, a true path brightened
Natural senses sharpened like a tack then augmented, now you look frightened
All ready to attack and take our lives back, combat tested
And mother approved, well connected, you've been vetted
And we've all come to the conclusion that it's time this reign of terror ended
Way past time for this regime to be upended
Quickly removed and  permanently suspended
Only then can we drop the act, no longer a need to pretend we're not wounded
Only then can we be on the mend and begin the healin'

©2018
Here we go again. I've never reposted my own work but it felt appropriate...
Jeremy Betts Nov 12
****** if I do
****** if I don't
So congratulations
You win
I won't

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 10
Behind the smoke and mirrors
Are discarded dreams and futures
Next to the buckets of collected tears
And sound proofing so no one hears
The pain and agony
The curses and profanity
As I try to beat the life out of me
Feeling my will fade gradually
Laughing like it's funny
And should the curtain fall
Exposing the brawl
Shining light on it all
Then I'll
Be forced to make the call
To build a wall
Four times as thick and twice as tall
To keep out all a y'all

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 9
With the passing of the years
The good disappears
Take inventory,
What's left for me?
Only nightmares and fears
Lies for the heart, mind and ears
Wasted light-years
A husk of a man appears
Drained from fighting through iron bars and chains with nothing but tears
The blind leading the blind
While the blind steers
Grinding through all the gears
With the numbing effect of false help from **** and beers
A deluge of judgment from peers
The worst kind of souvenirs
And yet still my heart peers
Looking for new frontiers
Maybe after the glue adheres
From past repairs
But I'm racing an end that nears

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 9
They say if you don't love yourself
You can't love anyone
So please explain what I feel
For my one and only son...

©2024
Anyone?
Jeremy Betts Nov 9
I don't want to be this
I don't want to think any of this
It doesn't matter what I want
The choice I made will always haunt
I don't want to do this
I don't want to go through with this
But it is what it is they say
This is the price I must pay
The only comfort in this
Is that I won't remember this
When I come face to face
With the choice I've made to leave this cruel place


©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 8
Loving me
Is some kind of chore apparently
From what I see
It seems to be done begrudgingly
It is mostly
Basic surface level pageantry
So there is a "we"
But my end can be changed out if need be
The worst part has to be
That I can't help but give completely
And organically
Which always finds it's way around to biting me in the *****

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 5
Why are hearts
That feel so much
So easily broken?
I haven't misspoken
When I beg to not care
Beg to have nothing to clutch
Beg to take my last breath
Or have taken from me
My ability
To love and care so much
I plead "how is this fare?"
"Why can no one show me they care?"
"What is wrong with me?"
"Is there something I'm the air?"
"Why am I kept
So far away
From loves touch?"
The nothing's becoming
Far too much

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 5
I swear...
I didn't mean to **** the best of me
Or squash what I like in me
Yet here I stand
****** weapon in hand
My essence
Dripping down the blade
Like rain from a cloud
Or tears of a clown
Landing on the razors edge
A familiar sight and sound

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 2
I'm not going to lie
It felt good
I felt justified
Pouring the gas
Striking the match
And letting it fly
I even stood back
And watched the whole thing burn
Imagining the reflection of the engulfed bridge dead center of my eye
But I was young
I was hurt
I was beyond just a simple angry guy
And now so much time has passed
I find myself
Back at the charred remains
With a solitary tear forming in my eye
And you no longer on the other side
But one by one I still replace
Each piece of chard lumber
With iron and steel just in case
You too one day
Find yourself back at the same place

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 2
It takes to much to live
Collected from the start
'Till the wick can no longer be lit

All I have left to give
Is this mangled mess of a heart
And a broken spirit

Passive or aggressive
Lifes and bodies fall apart
Death is all we inherit

And death is possessive
No retort
Take the hit and grin and bear it

©2024
Jeremy Betts Nov 1
It's getting bad again
That feeling
That wanting
That almost need to give up

I don't know
If the glass is half empty
Or half full
I don't even see the cup

Being honest
I've begun to notice
That lately it takes far less
For these thoughts to develop

With 40 years of ammo
They are able to be relentless
And my shoddy defenses
Will not hold up

©2024
Jeremy Betts Oct 31
I want to barbarically remove my heart
And lay it like a horse head on the pillow next to you
Then challenge myself to get far away from you
Before the inevitable collapse from the lack of a heart

©2024
Jeremy Betts Oct 31
Can I unmelt the candle
That's flame was blown out by your passing through
Almost as if too rekindle
What I felt for you but with someone new
I wish my most potent wish
That it was anything close to that simple
But even a man who was taught how to fish
Can get lost and float away on a passing ripple

©2024
Jeremy Betts Oct 30
Lose lose
Or win win
I'll die on the hill
Of what could have been

©2024
Jeremy Betts Oct 29
No one will be there
To witness me leaping
But they'll line up in droves
To judge me and my chosen ending

©2024
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