My brother has rocks in his eyes.
He calls them gemstones and minerals and more I can't remember.
We tease him sometimes; "they're minerals marie."

His lover has two halves, the manic one
and the depressive one.
She's carrying his child, even though they aren't married.

Her brother fought against the excessive use of drug use in his family
being a rebel by doing well, being responsible.
but he was held down by his brother, and now he's the worst addict of them all.

His brother makes games. And music. And he writes poems. And he's rarely sober.
He's had life handed to him on a silver platter. He's handsome, smart, fun.
He's fun when he's sober.

His lover came from across the globe. When they were younger, he married her to let her come live in his country.
Her mother is a life-long ******* addict, and she dreads turning into her mother.
But it doesn't stop her from doing every drug imaginable. Her addiction has turned her lover against her, as well as most everyone else.

She used to be my lover, a long time ago. When she was younger, she had such fire in her heart. A passion unrivaled.
That's when I found my love for stories, for poems and tales of myths and strange legends in far away lands filled with wild magic.
I envied her passion, and to this day I still can't bring myself to show that kind of fire.

But I am trying now. I am practicing, writing whatever comes to mind.
When I sit now and look at the words I've spewed onto this noteblock, I think I understand.

I love my family, even though they don't know of my pain.
I love writing stories and poems, even though I lack knowledge, experience and most of the time, motivation.
I love people, even though I am gripped by terrible anxiety whenever interacting with them.

I'm writing this to myself, as well as to you; even though many things scare you and make you hurt, I hope you never lose your love for the world.

The night silence screams in my ears after I startle awake.

Another nightmare.

The crying whistle of iron, wood and fletching echoes in the night
Memories of a dead mother sinking in a sea of vibrant autumn leaves
dead eyes commanding me to run
but I don't run

The girl needs me.

Tanya, child of chains, of blood, of regret, of sin, of... hope.

She taught regret like its something I lost
Like it wasn't torn from my chest and replaced with hammers
and blades and chains and blood dripping in silence

I see in her eyes a seed, something that grows in a land that hasn't seen green in a century
And footsteps in the night herald our death, heed my words, a life of such misery and cruelty brings only misery and cruelty in return.

We tear our skin on greedy grasping and groping thorns
fleeing the howls another night again

Black hair like the stars were plucked from the sky just to give something to liken it to
Brown eyes that sound like chains rattling on stone, so I don't forget my promises.
She speaks of hope, as if it's something tangible and abundant, enough for everyone.
But like a stubborn candlelight in the winter night, fighting the wind for survival, it does warmy my heart.

Perhaps the road does not have to end.
Perhaps we have bled and fought and wept enough, and we have finally paid our dues.
Perhaps we can find it in ourselves to find forgiveness for the wicked things we have done, and if not, at least we have found forgiveness in each other.

Perhaps life without pain is possible.

...

The night no longer screams silently, but speaks the hidden language of footsteps, of drawn daggers and ill intent.
Years turned a child into the promise of a young woman.
The promise of a life lived in peace.
But as I know, the enemy of peace is the cutting midnight whistle of an arrow, and the earth itself opening up to swallow anything I hold dear.
She sinks into a sea of dead leaves and tides of blood.

It was not a ******. It was a theft.

A theft of the last good thing in the world.
The last star in the sky, snuffed out, to leave all in darkness.

A theft of a promise, made to a naive child in early summer.
Where once a promise stood, now a blade named Vengance.

A theft of lives, not one.
But regret was not something I lost. It was torn from me. The ones who gave me my hammers and blades are the ones who took my child.

And now, I go to return my hammers and my blade.

And to take back my regret.

My anger never tasted like fire.
It is not smoke billowing up from my throat.
It is not a raging inferno inside my chest burning my reason away.

My anger tastes like winter.
Like icicles forming in my veins and fingers.
Forcing me to breathe harder, move faster
because if you are still you are not living.

But I can count the times I have wanted to live on my own two hands.
Incidentally, most of those times have been during the winter,
because in the winter I am cold enough that I can't differentiate between my anger,
and my normal state of being.

This year, we had no snow, and spring is slowly starting to creep back into the world,
and yet my fingers are cold, and I see my breath in the air
So I remain still.