The cold glance of your eyes
Tells a story I've heard several times before
And of all the moments I've been frozen
It seems the past just won't erase
Or at the least ******* get warmer

Because bombs are funny things
They explode when you most, and least, expect them
And in all this friendly fire
And the sharpest of barbs that we've traded
It's clear that there's a bounty on my head

We tiptoe through these tripwires
Falling for these faceless and withered phantoms
And of all the nights we've been at war
And all the mornings the sirens chime
This is finally where my heart dies out

It took some time,
For our hearts to blossom
For our fire to truly rage
And for our dreams to

Reawaken

So now all I crave
Is you by my side
Your hand placed in mine
And various parts of your skin Attached effortlessly to my kiss

She is aimless.
He is distracted.
I am imperfect.
We all pour salt in our ***** wounds.

She is gravity.
He is weightless.
I am destitute.
Just a scream lost in the vacuum.

She is deliverance.
He is patient.
I am astray.
Forever a breath that stains the salty air.

She is aimless.  
He is distracted.
I am imperfect.
Still a coward lurking in bravery's lair.

I pull my heart straight from my chest
And place it inside a chest of drawers
The beating it once knew around you
Has now slowly petered out

I push my dreams from the precipice
And watch them shatter into shards
The blackness swallows every jagged piece
And sleep eludes my every chase

The mind is a terrible place to live
Full of musty air
Brittle furniture
And a screen door riddled with holes

Draped along the crown molding
Rest moldy memories
The shadows of mistakes
And chipped paint from tempests long ago

The bedroom is where she lies
But not everywhere that she lied
Empty as before
And empty as it will always be

The hallway where the walls collapsed
Where the claustrophobia sets in
Where echoes once rang
Where silence now has lease

The mind is a terrible place to live
Full of wasted years
Padlocked rooms
And a basement where the darkness sleeps

Tender helpless hands
Outstretched from the colossal abyss
That is love, loss, and lethargic lullabies

Digging deeper
The dirt is caking underneath my fingernails
Desperately clawing to find a God within his children

Yet finding nothing of the sort
Weary arms become numb and listless
Letting shadows consume the brief pale sunrise

Grappling with faith
Bleeding like horizons over porcelain eyes
Heaven, Hell, or am I straddling fences again?

Bravery before brevity  
Sanity has no sovereign, no direction, no pulse
And honor is a last breath escaping from dying lungs

Boots caked with mud
A broken key in the keyhole
And headlights that peer through cracked curtains

Talons dripping with blood
A heart stripped from its cavity
And headlights that burn through the blindness

Shirts stained with sweat
A souvenir lost by the side of the road
And headlights that cut through the devil's breath

Stars blanketing southern skies
A falling remnant of yesteryears
And headlights that have died from the overdose

Frivolous fairytales?

Frivolous fairytales, be ******
These goals are anything but lofty
I have owned my past mistakes,
But seems my demons still own me

Frivolous fantasies?

Frivolous fantasies, be expunged
Because the taste of your salty skin
Kept me dehydrated,
From outer layers to depths within

Frivolous affection?

Frivolous affection, be absorbed
By the heartless pit in your chest
For my blood is still flowing,
But this love needs laid to rest

If this atmosphere is casual
She is stark-naked in the aftermath
This pain is ever so gradual
Slippery slopes on a primrose path

She mails envelopes to Cloud 9
Always marked "return to sender"
Her parade is just an empty line, but
While skin is tough, the heart is tender

The Ferris wheel is broken down
But she prefers them stationary
Isolation chokes in this abandoned town
But breathing has now become secondary

She leaves her high heels on the carousel
Remembering every last heart she's severed
She glides past the carnival like a gazelle
And barefooted, skips into forever

These cracks grow ever wider
Opening, never closing
They breach the road of dawn's suffering

The steam rises in a barren winter
Warmer, and warmer
A preamble to a year of desolation

The chair in the corner rocks in rhythm
Monotone, creaking and shadowing
A ritual of maleficence that lives ever on

The clouds billow in the morning
Hastening, to a new day
They fill empty souls with a devil's breath

The distance grows ever wider
Opening, never closing
Breaching the walls of a windswept hamlet

The garden cowers into the earth
Retreating, for the sounds of silence deafen
Weeping for a dream that was never born

It's raining acidic dreams and satellites
Sheathed in shadow, she tears her veil
My feet are cut from all the rubble
My throat is clutched, I can't inhale

Empress turns her keel
As she sails further and further away
She is feasting on simple solitude
Like a ravenous bird of prey

The aperture is closing
Soon, no light will pass
She stares through my empty soul
Sharp as starlight and broken glass

Twirling a dress sewn by comet tails
Fabric of penumbra and white lace
I trip into the low gravity of her love
Forever drifting through time and space

She is delicate but stronger than you
You squander every chance at her trust
A boy is not a man in this world
Until he learns to temper his lust

Thoughtless words don't always
Fall on deaf ears
A mother says "think before you speak,"
And "Son, be wise beyond your years"

But you break every word and every heart
That you can fit underneath your feet
She cares, but you repay it
With heavy hands and affairs discreet

There must be some satisfaction
Some macabre endgame that you seek
She sacrificed every song, every dream
To birth child with bruises on her cheeks

Her fractures run deeper than the bone
You capricious stupid cur
She slips on sunglasses and grips the steering wheel
Every moment after is all a blur

Caught between the frost
And the mire of mediocrity
We're just passengers on failure's final ferry

We're courageous, yet hamstrung
By demons and daydreams
I've learned the cold makes these thin bones ache

And all this foreboding has drained
The little strength that I've managed
To collect from season to broken season

I tucked the past in an overcoat
Before I stepped out on the porch
Hobbling despite the crutches that I carry

Am I a witness to winter?
Or a simpleton of madness?
I loved you more than every "*******" muttered under icy breath

But I'm still struggling
Fighting against the weight of it

Simply...caught

Caught between the frost
And the mire of mediocrity

The sun is setting over this wonderland
Here I am, drifting along shame again
Using my dreams as the raft
And my heart as the anchor

I make landfall and plot a course
Blistered feet causing no distraction
My veins run with yesterday's toxins
Making my scars more visible than before

Anxiously, I await in the shadows
For the villain to make his grand entrance
My hands crave to clutch his throat
My eyes burn with fires of vengeance

The cost of everything he took from me
A debt that could never be repaid
I crouch behind misshapen branches
And inhale one spiteful last breath

But the cowardly ******* never shows his face
Leaving no print for miles around
Until, at last, in the rustling of summer's death
Autumn points her finger directly at me

.

Wake me, o' sun
Bring life to these hollow limbs
I have dreamt only in serenity
To fill vacancies left by nefarious thoughts

Dismiss my trials
Ye holy judge of my lungs
Stagnancy chokes at my breath
As I gasp for my heart's appeal

Make haste, calloused heels
Carry me o'er these fruitless hills
Thirst conquers these feeble bones
As this feral enchantment dissipates

Noon will be o'erhead soon
The heat has grated me into pieces
Fast are thou demons in pursuit
Faster is the hardihood of my will

Thou shadows mount, o' moon
Traipsing to and fro along my path
Free shall I be once the lanterns are lit
Macerated but finally triumphant

Somewhere along this path
They dropped you
Perhaps not on your delicate head
But they dropped you
Into a den of lions
Into bitter, barren, wasteland
Into a marsh of crocodiles
Into misleading quicksand

Princess, this is not the world
This is suffering
These are not the acts of love
These vultures are circling

Inexplicably, they brought you here
But conveniently don't give a ****
They sing songs of worn out excuses
Yet sacrifice their little lamb
But you are more than wool
You are more than mere circumstance
The gifts you have been granted
Should be far from piteous romance

Princess, take off your tiara
And set sail for superstition
Cause the only road they paved for you
Is yellow bricks to perdition

Having fallen into trances before
I am no stranger to the spectacle
I am just a thimble
And you, my love
You are the needle

Together, we sew the regal robes of this affair
With silver heartstrings tout and bare
I am perched on electric fences
And it's true, my love
You are the current

Leaving steps behind heavy feet
These stitches are losing their strength
I am neither a bridge nor water
But I drown in blue, my love
You are the anchor

This loft reeks of expired sunlight
While eastbound clouds obstruct my view
I am no stranger to my senses
But it's no use, my love
You are the senselessness

Send me in a new direction
Where your footsteps tell me that I belong
Rain-drenched hair, dirt under my nails
And desperate futures locked tightly in a box

My dreams are all in foreign language
And my compass spins around aimlessly
The way back under your peaceful sky
Is accompanied by storms and bittersweet memories

I can't erase the past, so I will paint anew
This trail has been mired with ambivalence
For through the games we've won, and the stakes we've lost
My love for you has never failed

Therapy is a drenched raincoat
In this holy war of insignificance
I have no fear of these falling leaves
Tangled webs, or mangled governance

I scale the sky with winter's hands
I wash my face with summer's pesticide
We still revel in these accouterments
While quarrels fade with the coming tide

Fraying edges will tell of my road
Crumbling youth will sing of my songs
I am vindicated in saltwater seas
As falling stars shall right all my wrongs

Tell us your witty tales, bard
Don't leave us whimpering and suffering
On the other side of this pale, pitiful, world
Tell us anything to ward off the demons
Tell us something to make the ale taste better
As we swim where dreams and nightmares clash

Drench our sorrows with your songs, bard
Send all the soldiers and waifs home tonight
With wrinkled smiles on forlorn faces
Strum your chords as we gambol about
Hit your notes as we hit each other
And laugh spitefully at fate's cruel jokes

So you say there's nothing wrong
With a little blissful ignorance
Where steps we've taken are blissful
And ones we've mistaken are ignorant

Leave it to us to find imbalance
While carrying the weight of the world
No regard for the avalanche we've started
With silent stares and broken dreams

I think there's something wrong
With this blissful ignorance
You pay no mind to the way we languish
Cracking beneath these heavy footsteps

Steady me
Steady my hand fast
This is collusion
Between my future and past

Four walls
Four walls closing in
This is claustrophobia
Smothered by the man within

Scratch marks
Scratch marks adorn the ceiling
This is desperation
To escape a hopeless feeling

Drops of daylight
Drops of daylight peer through the cracks
Is this overambition?
Or another panic attack?

Liberator
Liberator, don't leave me paralyzed
Quell this nebulous thunderstorm
And help my spirit to arise

Calloused hands.
They are a mother's fallacy.
She trades her beliefs, and the missing pages, for the acceptance of her counter-culture.

Bleeding families.
They are a father's destiny.
He devastates, and intimidates, his circle of trust from the inside out.

Off-key lullabies.
They are a daughter's inheritance.
She is born into subsistence, watching television instead of daydreams.

Frivolous fantasies.
They are a son's one-way ticket out.
He is carefully reckless, boldly reserved, and he will begin the cycle again.

Circles, and now I am dizzy
Faint pulse tells me to right my wrongs
To spill my soul into the void of space

Circles, and now I am weightless
It seems a shame to leave this world
To the sick, sheltered, shame of its own devices

Circles, and now I'm incomplete
Drifting further from myself, I am staring
Into the eyes of a broken down satellite

Circles, and now I'm forgotten
The truth is a vacuum in which I don't exist
While my fingers grow numb at this endless cold

Circles, always circles*
Encircling time and encircling throats
There is no more life, and there is no more death

The mind can only think so much
Before it wanders
Before it dampens
Before it derails

The heart can only take so much
Before it withers
Before it crumbles
Before it falters

Sever the ties before they tighten
Sever the stems before they bloom
Sever this love before I shatter
Sever these memories that loom

Because the mind can only think so much
Before it wanders
Before it dampens
Before it derails

And the heart can only take so much
Before it withers
Before it crumbles
Before it falters

Arsonist!

Cold, you fanned flames into my stationary heart
Hover close, and don't move so quickly
I can't escape the realization that I need my scars
Leafing through the scattered ashes for a reason
Loving you through more than warm seasons
In event of disaster, scurry back to where you feel safe
Nevermind me, I am only here to
Garrison your defenses and save you from me

Fear what you don't know
I could never chase blizzards while I'm burning
Raiding fortresses with a simple stare
Every word, every machine, where your heart used to be

Slowly
Surely
Inevitably
We gather round to sing perpetual praises
While subtly taking jabs at the merry masters

Their chatter is chaos in our hearts
And in our ears it rings endlessly
Their balance is impeccable
But we possess unbreakable destiny

Dying
Rotting
Finitely
We dissolve into the soil of meager meadows
And evolve into cedars of circumstance

These roots will become our legacy
And proof of their coveted love
The branches will become our sanctity
Reaching worlds beyond these frail bodies

If I had been around in '41
I feel I would have mattered more
Made a handful less mistakes
And fought for lives on foreign shores

I would have championed for freedoms
For colors beyond my own skin
To speak and worship freely
To be free from the fears within

I would watch my innocence crumble
At Bette Davis and those starlit eyes
How Rita Hayworth would corrupt me
With legs made to victimize

The day I'd enlist to serve my country
How scared my mother would be
Sitting in her morning chair all evening
Pretending there were no tears to see

Maybe my father would actually notice
A young man that needed his time
A boy that needed a little shove
To dream bigger than the painted lines

I would have worked til' my fingers bled
To see Joltin' Joe hit safe in 56
To witness the magic of Beantown
And Teddy Ballgame getting in his licks

I can only imagine my heartbeat
Holding her hand in the freezing rain
Knowing tomorrow, I'd be off to Hell
Knowing I may never see her face again

I would've taken the A train with her
Just because Ella and Duke told us to
Danced her up and down Sugar Hill
Til' there was only one thing left to do

We would've driven a coupe by starlight
Til' we were running only on dreams
Break into a farm at the edge of town
And lay silent til' roosters screamed

I would have left my fedora in the backseat
Kissed her lips and swallowed my doubt
Waved from a train headed for Carolina
Feeling knots I'd only read about

He wants to sail to the stars
Grab onto heaven's gate on his way by
Yet he burns with anger
Love no longer orbits his heart anymore

The words, like meteors, fall from his careless mouth
There's no comet's tail to ride on anymore
For he's burning with anger
In a world where no one can hear him scream

The dust of his dreams loiters aimlessly
Adrift in the vacuum of everything
And he has finally burned out with anger
A brilliant supernova fading into black

There is no longer a tomorrow
Because the cradles have all been emptied
Our guardians have abandoned their posts
Rock-solid patience, now chiseled down to envy

Distractions are now our consciousness
Sense once was endangered, yet now extinct
The young and innocent are now buried
Just because a father didn't stop to think

Please put the world on notice
Appeal to their stubborn sense of humanity
Because some things will never change
When it comes down to all this pride and vanity

- *Some Things Never Change (STNC)

Tethered to an illusion
He'd rather sink than swim
Abandon all six senses
Rather than feel desolation again

Tis' no crime to trace one's edges
But falling off is a different matter
Shame is a seaworthy vessel
Sailing on oceans of greed and clatter

He rappels from throne on high
Storms heed no man's command
An avalanche of fears behind him
Ahead, a bleak and lifeless wasteland

But seams don't tear unless they fray
Utopia costs more than infinite gold
Ambition built this city of avaritia
But he watches it crumble beneath the soul he sold

Shadows falling
I scale back the grip on the reigns
Her smile possesses me,
It forsakes me, then retakes me

Careless caregiving
I cannot fathom my own peril
For her slender fingers entice me,
They chase me, then erase me

Stave off regret
For another hour, two at most
Her voice is beautiful slander,
It directs me, then infects me

Tempestuous
Building shelter is my priority
For her storm consumes me,
It supplants me, then replants me

Shallow beauty lingers
In these simple tears along the fabric
Frosted hearts no longer beating
Broken seasons no longer static
Revered footsteps echo
Like the faintest of dying whispers
Open my mouth to utter nonsense
Venomous voices sound like blisters
We are granite and gravity
Stepping stones to greener pastures
Bass and treble evolved as one
An aria of glass on the brink of fracture
Glancing over a shoulder
To sing of subterfuge and serenity
Drop your octaves, and drop your weapons
We bear arms to prove our empathy

Upon releasing my grasp on my childhood fears
I turn them over to the quartermaster
A burly fellow exhibiting a sneer with no rival
And as I watch, he packs them tightly in duplicity's pouch

The walk back down these stairs made of rotting ash
Is now much more precarious than I remember
For time is traveling at such dizzying speeds
That my balance has become flimsy in its disrepair

Despite the rapping of nightmare's hands at my door
I saunter over in stupor to let unwelcome guests inside
Unleashed, they frantically invade every crevice
Leaving just fractions of those who once roamed these dusty halls

There is now but a dim candle on the cupboard
Its remaining light grows meeker by the day
I gather all that glimmers to my eye, as dull as they may shine
And set foot for the only world within my reach

Savor the first time
Savor the first day
Savor the first kiss
For the rest are all mired in shadow

Savor the first touch
Savor the first heartbeat
Savor the first love
For the rest shall haunt your waking dreams

Savor the first symptoms
Savor the first fever
Savor the first mistake
For the rest will paralyze every achy limb

Careless steps have taken him
To the intersection of light and fantastic
For "tripping is the sport of younger men"

For all gathered here, we spectate
Until our eyes have pierced the darkness
To witness the most unattainable dreams

He is thin, pale around the eyes and lips
The world weighs heavy on his heart
As the pressure slowly suffocates him

He hastens to his feet, nimble as the men of yore
Releases his tongue from the clasp of his teeth
And finds a song, rusted over by years of silence

I am innocent, so I run
Their pursuits are foolhardy
I catch briers
On my clothes
On my flesh
On my soul

At last I stumble into a clearing
My lungs expand like a supernova
Senses disconnect one by one
Losing my sight
My taste
My smell

I collapse into oblivion
The memories blur like salt and water
An aching rises
In my stomach
In my chest
In my throat

Gather them around now
This spectacle grows like dandelions
The guillotine is being sharpened
But I am still innocent
And I am still running
Therefore, I am still free

Bright lights beckon
Whispers draw like siren song
The vagueness of this horizon
Pulls at strings
I never knew were attached

I hear the rumble
Of my heart across the ocean
The impatience of this existence
Tears at chains
I know all too well were attached

But I can't stay here anymore
I no longer want this point of view
The urge for motion
Is growing far stronger
Than the gravity in this town

From a narrow perspective
Empires collapse
Not because of breached walls, but far, far within

In the aftermath of a gavel's echo
The moon shifts
Leaving us in a constant effervescent imbalance

There are soldiers pacing
Left, right, left, right
Halting our progress in the arc we're set upon

This red sky is draining our blood
Like fleas upon our flesh
Drab and scattered visions, unyielding to good intentions

Brave soul slithers away
A python with no fangs
He flees and fades into swollen glands of fallen visionaries

Leashed curses wrench loose
Boulders fall on empty heads
We are more near to barbarism than we first guessed

Fire, spreading, unfurling
Left, right, left, right
Untie these bonds, and we will watch them all burn