We are imperfect products
placed in the midst
of an imperfect society,
a vicious cycle of perseverance
and failure:
constructed,
broken,
fixed,
and fixed again.

Airbrushed and painted
to perfection:
pale skin
flushed cheeks
slim legs
and a smooth mindset.
Opinionated only
on the matter of
superficial products –
glamorizing and embellishing.

Deteriorating enamel –
cracks in a varnished frame.
A scratched surface,
damaged to the core,
polished and glazed over.
Skin made paler,
cheeks more flushed,
skin and bones,
and a mind wiped clean.

Unachievable expectations
and inevitable failure
are enough to b r e a k
even the toughest material

d
o
w
n.

There is no screaming.
There are no car horns wailing
or tires screeching.
The many understanding
voices of nature
resound softly in my ears,
and that is all.

There is no hatred.
There are no greedy demands
or acts of malice.
The calm caress of a breeze
excites my moist skin
beneath the unyielding sun,
and that is all.

There are no people.
I have no mother to love
and no one to please.
The promise of solitude
weighs down on my mind
evoking sighs of relief,
and that is all.

I do not have to try.
There is no judgment,
and there will be no disappointment,
The unbiased acceptance
of the trees and the birds
silences my restless thoughts,
and I am at peace.

painted perfection
overrun by ignorance.
corruption-
in the form of societal
paralysis,
in the line of destroying
what others have strived
to achieve.
bathing in determination
to keep
them
down.
enablers demanding submission.
[STAY OUT!]
remain silent.
stale
and mold
in the deep recesses of
discrimination,
hatred,
self-loathing incognito –
a simple superiority complex,
inferiority at its finest.

living vicariously,
a fly on the wall
observes its surroundings.
a predetermined life
of insignificant actions,
destined just to live and then to die

the fly on the floor,
now dead and gone.
memory faded, life forgotten.
a shattered body
and an empty mind –
reflecting the world through vacant eyes.

swept into a dustpan
broken and cold
but no more now than it was in life.

False sermons:
lies given as life lessons.
The pseudo-righteous
committing sins behind locked doors.
They stand tall –
proud and egotistical:
the epitome of hypocrisy,
like narcissists preaching modesty,
thieves teaching integrity,
liars blessing honesty.
They’re glorified, romanticized:
god-like idols feigning purity,
using religion to manipulate,
abusing the devotion of the naïve.
Followers fall to their knees
in the name of their beliefs,
taught to them by gilded demons
dressed up in suits.
But eventually, their masks will crackle.

In death,
their veils will fall.

I've lost the faith
that I never had.

Time roars by.
It's four, it's five.
I'm up to see
the sunrise again.

A child’s tiny feet stepped tenderly upon papery leaves- moist with the early morning dew. Pale blonde curls bounced about her shoulders as her carefree head bobbed to cheerful, nonexistent music. A faint humming sprang from her lips and danced along the crude dirt road she was following home. Home, as in the four walls her family currently resided in, was a small, decaying, off-white trailer surrounded by other small, decaying, off-white trailers.

She had woken that morning, curled up in a makeshift pallet on the hardwood floor of a family friend’s home, one that very much resembled her own. The child sat up, gazed around the room at the small mountains of blankets and her slightly older sister, who seemed at that time to be ages in advance, and rubbed her tired eyes, frowning at the moody gray shadows cast about the room by the dreary drapes hanging above the window. Being only three years old, but having done it countless times before, she stood up lazily and let herself into the hallway, followed the sound of a familiar snore into the living room, glanced at the bald giant spread out over the shabby couch, and struggled with the almost too high doorknob of the front door before stepping out into the chilled autumn air.

The sun, reaching desperately through cracks in the ceiling of clouds above, reflected in small pools of vibrant blue as the girl judged the distance she would be traveling. She walked steadily towards her destination, allowing her clear eyes to wander about, falling upon flowers that appeared glassy beneath the morning moisture and the haggard bodies of hungry neighborhood cats with vacant eyes like frosted windows.

A child’s tiny feet climbed the few creaking steps to her front door before she let herself inside. Her delicate fingers ran up and down the wood panel walls of the hallway as she tiptoed to her mother’s bedroom. Curtains the color of a peach rose were hung above the two windows, and the light they cast about the room was warm and sweet. The air almost seemed foggy, surreal, with tiny dust particles floating in the soft rays of light that pierced the curtains and drifted into the room. The child crept gingerly past her infant brother’s hand-me-down crib and around the bed, peeking over the folds of the sheets to catch a glimpse of her young mother.

For a few short seconds, the girl stood there, leaning forward with her face mere inches from the woman’s, listening to the deep breathing that accompanies the unconscious. Without debating, the girl crawled into the bed and laid next to her mother, observing the soft features of her face, the light freckles scattered across the bridge of her nose, the tender pink of her slightly parted lips. Without waking its owner, a protective arm instinctively protruded from between the sheets and wrapped around the girl.

A child’s tiny feet brushed against her mother’s knees as they lie together in a sea of blankets. The mother slept, regaining the much needed energy to care for three children, and the girl watched her, savoring the comfort that encompassed her in that moment.

You sing along to your thoughts -
written and performed by another,
sinking calmly into the realization
that you aren't the only one
"going through a phase".
You aren't the only one
that longs for a new life,
and a new mind, and a new body.
You aren't alone
in your self-defined solitude.
Your sick thoughts aren't fresh.
They're ancient.  Cliché.
Unsteady minds like yours
have been diagnosed before.

I buried my face
in the folds of your shirt
and inhaled the soft scent
of your cologne.

In that instant, I knew –
more than anything else –
that I could suffocate
in your arms

and die happy.

The leaves are falling
in love with the ground against
their own dying will.

Crude naked figures
stand against a white backdrop
painted by the snow.

Kaleidoscope rain
drops distort the newborn buds
of flowers to come.

Freckles on a young
child’s sun-kissed skin whisper
of long summer days.

Musty brown boxes scattered about the floor;
this one – unyielding wood,
the next – coarse carpet.
Somber drapes wave goodbye,
wistful and grave
as tears stream down the windows.
The house anticipates abandonment
and screams aloud at the wind’s embrace.
She rocks and trembles
beneath the heavy downpour,
another vagabond companion.
Tiny hands coddle walls in an attempt at comfort.
They try to understand the pain
of being left behind,
because they know the pain
of leaving – all too well.

These boys follow boys
playing dress up as men
playing dress up as soldiers –
seeking refuge in uniforms
and helmets and ignorance.
Because war is glory
and freedom is love.
And it’s the thought that counts,
so if we’re killing in the name,
then ****** is justifiable
and slaughter is understandable.

They fight for their families,
but their good intentions
are caked in blood –
in every crevice and every corner.
Because war is hell
and freedom is an illusion.

So they come home
haunted, shaken
by the echo of phantom gunshots,
seeing faces in the black
of the night,
because they can’t sleep
after witnessing the life
of a young boy blink
out of existence –
at the flex of a finger,
and the twist
of an already warped mind.

Our boys go on journeys –
young and unafraid –
and return, not as men,
but as ghosts – as wraiths,
feeding on their own regret
and parasitic guilt.

Why do we indulge
in man-made hell?

Is death too much to ask
from a god I don't believe in?

We lay together,
breathing heavily –
our chests rise and fall out of rhythm.
I try to synchronize them,
timing my breath to start with yours.
But your lungs are much larger
and your breaths much deeper.
So we lay together,
breathing heavily –
out of synch with each other,
but content nonetheless.

We're all abortion should've beens.
Been forced in
to life to school to work to debt
And for what?
To have been alive?
To have loved and lost?
We. aren't. living.

Why can't our lives be weighed
before we've lived them?
I should have been judged
before my birth.
Would I then have been dismissed? Allowed not to exist?
Take me back to 1995
and abort me.

On occasion we like to be alone,
and soak in the comfort
of our own independent existence,
but we just can’t stand
the idea of loneliness,
the harsh cacophony of silence –
bouncing against the hollow walls
of the abyss we voluntarily
stepped into in the first place.
In that darkness
we find ourselves anew,
but like death,
is change not inevitable
when your past is
forgotten,
and your ghost
f  a  d  e  s  
like memories ostracized
in the blackest corners
of our vacant,
unforgiving minds?

I am just sad.
In this moment,
I am grounded
by distress, I am
bleak and I am anxious.
But later, I will
brush away these
harrowing feelings
and smile.

I am just so sad.
Today, I cannot seem
to find happiness.
But tomorrow I will
wake up and feel better.
It may take some time,
but eventually I will rise.

I am terribly sad.
This week has been hard.
Time has taken itself,
and I’ve been eagerly
awaiting its end.
Next week will be easier.

I am not just sad.
I’ve been trying my best
to pretend until
I don’t have to,
but I’m not seeing
a happy ending,
I’m not seeing
a bright future.

I’m so tired of being sad.

When I was sad all the time
I had this delusional belief that 
once I had someone to hold on to –
someone to love
and to be loved by –
that I would be happy. 
But now that I have you,
and I hold you as often as possible,
I know what it's like to be pushed away.
And now that I love you,
you're the only thing that has the ability
to make me this sad anymore. 
And now that I know
what it’s like to be loved,
I'm too afraid to let you go.
Because, to be honest,
I really just don't want
to go back to being sad
all the time.

I hate knowing about your past.
Kissing you and knowing she has too,
touching you and watching the gears turn
as you compare –
and knowing I can’t.

I hate seeing her in the hallways,
knowing you’ve cherished that face,
adored that body.
Seeing her and knowing that
she wants you back,
and that you may feel the same.

I hate thinking about you
thinking about her.
Glimpsing memories of her love
in the sheen of your eyes.

He made me question you.
Not that I didn’t already have my doubts.
I knew you didn’t treat me well,
although you were, by no means, abusive.
And you loved me.
Although, I only knew, because you
occasionally said it aloud.
He made me feel good.
A man that cannot make me laugh
is not worth the time of day,
and God, did he make me laugh.
A man that I cannot relate to,
could not steal my breath away,
but I know exactly how he feels
on cold, desperate mornings
when he must force himself
to get out of bed,
and doing so is an accomplishment
all on its own.
He did not have to tell me these things,
because we share those mornings,
just as we share a love for poetry,
our vice and our savior,
our last attempt to create something good.
And you, you could make me laugh,
but more often you were the cause
of those cold, desperate mornings,
and you did not understand why
I slept in as late as possible
and lay in bed staring at the ceiling
for hours on end.
And you did not understand
that sometimes I needed to be held together,
because I could not manage to do it on my own.
But he knew these things,
and I didn’t have to waste my breath,
to try and get him to understand.

I have this fear
that if I leave
you’ll think I don’t love you
and never did.
But I promise
that you’re the only thing
I’ll miss in this place.
And God, will I miss you.

I can envision it now.
My hollow future
haunts me.