Five hundred days, I've written,
About whatever came to mind,
Or eye, or hand,
And some days I struggled,
To find new words, new truths,
New sights, new sounds,
New concepts or new ideas.

And sometimes I put it off,
(Like these words I write right now)
And said "I can do it tomorrow."
But I never want to give in,
For I refuse to admit I have run out of inspiration.

I never will.

Everyday I see new things,
From different angles,
Through different filters.

I will not run out of words,
For at least another half-millennium,
And by then, why stop there?

Look me in the eyes,
And see the real me,
See me beneath what you're told to see,
Look don't just see what you believe,
In these holes in my defense,
I will let you find my soul,
Open with naked honesty if only,
You would choose to see it.

I'm not afraid to admit the truth,
Though am scared of what you'll say.

I won't avoid being honest.
Just because people have told me I should lie.

I refuse to live in secret, no matter the cost,
My soul is open to both change and attack.

I will not hate you for hating me,
But I live in hope that you might one day understand.

The endless blue has hidden again,
Cowered behind the grey,
Though yesterday bold,
Now shy and afraid to be seen.

American spring has gone back home,
The British clouds back,
To take control,
And remind us we are a kingdom, not states.

Laid-back afternoons are over now,
Making way for the stress of reality,
No time to close your eyes,
No time to look around,
Sit at a desk and write through the spring,
Ignore the seasons,
Sit and write what they say.

I can feel it still,
Where the blow should have hit,
Where the marks on my wrist from the rope should have been.

I can taste it still,
Where the fire should have been,
Where the blood in my veins should have choked and died.

I can hear it still,
Where the screams should have called,
Where the ring of metal should have ended it all.

But I can breathe it still,
When the air fills my lungs,
And heart can beat and race and fall just as it always did

My head burns with the fires of the past,
With the scramble of words round skull,
Faster and faster, truth ricocheted off lies,
And smashed against the ever-crumbling screams,
That won't stop looping
And looping
And blurring
And looping
And with each stale copy another shade lost,
Another angle forced into the frame
Of a single photograph I saw maybe once
Of a child with hope in her eyes
And a teenager with no light left imposed upon her
Until it all blends into one.

One soul, one past, one future,
Not enough.

Your username and password,
To learn of the world,
Your e-mail address,
To access your friends,
A 4-digit PIN,
To start out your life,
A captcha test,
To be yourself,
The world behind a lock screen.

In silence motionless,
But dancing with his laughs,
Rising with his spirits,
Falling with his heart,
Each wrapped around his soul,
One a hint of his truth,
The perverse meaning behind his words,
The other joining the first as his laughter shakes his smile.

To only know how to ask,
A question that he can't help but,
Chase after with such light and dark in his eyes,
That won't stay still for long enough to write down.

To only know how to forget,
The questions that he ignores,
And clatters past without balance nor reason,
For the joy of careless haste.

To only know how to speak,
The words self-censored not self-centred,
To shout and scream and giggle at himself,
For no f*ing reason.

To be free-formed and free from self,
J'aimerais être libre!

Yes...
I wrote in French...
Why not?

A new world,
A freer place closer to the Earth,
A place built around nature not on it,
And the ways of life that here have been forgotten.

A world of choice,
Where boundaries are wide and blurred,
Where my decision is mine alone - unquestioned,
And there's enough space to be myself.

Could we go somewhere?
Would it be running from life?
Should that be the way?

This path we take, we follow,
Our feet between the potholes,
Half-filled with water,
Half-filled with mud.

The loose stones bite my soles,
And shift my weight away,
Half-over my ankle,
Half caught in time.

We're laughing, talking of things,
That shouldn't make us smile,
Half-crude, too much detail,
Half-rude, but meant in jest.

Sometimes, we break away,
From the pointless, from the fun,
Half-serious serious topics,
Half-broken broken hearts.

A silver back, with gold above,
It glints in foreign sun,
Purest but still, blackened outside,
Until scratched away to show the shine,
It smokes from inside and burns at touch,
Until the crackling stops,
And it becomes nothing more than,
A lump of metal.