I told strangers about the way you left me
They got off the train and did exactly the same
I dozed off in class and imagined you to be there, holding my hand under the table or passing me a note
I knew it was my only choice
To resort to sleep just to see your face again
I feel myself forgetting you
Your laugh
Your shoe size
Your coveted heart
I wanted to own it
But I never let you give it away
You were too busy trying to return my own back to me
I shrugged in refusal, I told you it didn’t make a difference
I don’t breathe anyway
I don’t feel anyway
I think now I change my mind
Please call me
I want to see the face I want to forget
Bring my heart in a paperbag
Don’t sign your name
Wear new shoes, not your old white ones
I don’t want to stare at them again and remember all the times I did exactly the same
To shy away from that ******* smile
I don’t want to go back to trying to love you
Please don’t let me go back
Take my passport and bus ticket
I want to stay here
Wherever here is
Away from feelings I once tried to know
I tried too ******* hard, didn’t I?

I was made of glass
fragile and hollow by design
reflecting those around me
but never quite fulfilled.
I shattered, tiny fragments glistened
like tears
But still I felt nothing.
Sorrow slipped silently
numbing a soul hungry for all yet thirsting for none
I sat in darkness waiting
for you to see the sunbeams
glancing off the shards and think them beautiful
but you were blinded by so many splinters
that you could never imagine the whole.

It's 3am

I'm on the phone
No one's awake and I'm alone

It's 3am

The radio's on
Songs are played on lonely station

It's 3am

I'm in my bed
My eyes are open and sleep has fled

It's 3am

I'm on the balcony
The sky is dark and just quite scary

It's 3am

Some windows have lights
Could they also not sleep tonight

It's 3am

I'm still awake
When will life ever give me a break

Prior to our divorce, the echo chamber,
a blazed path of scorched earth where a mistletoe once grew;
I will admit, my mate was a sheep in wolf's clothing and I the opposite, an inside out porcupine.
We use to joke about it over a couple glasses of wine,
until our second therapy session, the grapes smelled sullen
and the joke was pronounced dead on arrival.  

I am one to never quit: a job, a duty, yet the car was totaled,
having just installed our toddler's seat, my hand was forced.
Holidays apart, a decade of predetermined calendars,
"every others", now omnipresent words
scrolled into our patchwork speech patterns.

It was a Thursday morning, extra early, for me at least,
when I discovered my wife's "extramarital affair".
Something the lawyers like to call it, doesn't soften the blow though,
it's not like say, taking steroids, counting cards or
drinking vinegar to pass a **** test.

Merely thinking back renders my breath useless, vision impaired,
while that car wrecks at the same high speed as my heart thumps.
Allstate, just write the entire ******* check out to cash, I'm bare,
this fate was All my fault; apparently I lost her along the way.

Easier to do nowadays with what, say everything nowadays.
Haven't gotten to the part where I,
"allegedly attempted assault", on her new lover.
I must wait for two inks to dry before divulging that burnt dirt:
one on our old divorce decree, but more importantly,
the other on her new marriage license.
FIN to be CONTINUED.

MY build to suit mind is designed for disappointing,
a warehouse space of dim lights, taunted by an l.e.d. retrofit,
TREPIDATIOUS, unable to sign my life's lease to own,
YEARS spoiled like produce, a dumpster gratefully digests.
I was 7, a little league southpaw, my arm, accurate on the mound.
PRACTICE of carelessly skipping stones over invulnerable ponds.
that day, the equation was misaligned, numbers squared roots and
CAUSED the answer to spawn seismic ripples of infinite affects.
it was the split second that was carelessly skipped and
THIS boy's vulnerable retina, the invulnerable pond.
although I was the expert marksman, I begged William not to Tell,
SO he blindly obliged my apple-shot withdraw request,
NOW spoiled produce my dumpster won't gratefully digest.
WHAT i regret most is not saying, William. Tell.

today, i say hello to you
only to say goodbye;
i'll find comfort in your presence
today for the last time.

you used to be my safe haven
my peace, my tranquility
but things are simply meant to end
and it's our time now, maybe.

with the peace we had hand in hand
came the anxiety in my heart
because even back then somehow i knew
that we would fall apart.

and maybe it's time to find comfort
in something that isn't you
because although you were the best for me,
i'll never be good for you.

so today, my love, i say goodbye,
the most bittersweet of words,
as for my mind now walks away,
my heart remains yours, undeterred.

hey mom, lately I haven't been okay
don't you see as you look me in the eye everyday?
the circles under my eyes are a little too deep
although nowadays all that I do is sleep

mom, last month, someone at school tried suicide
downing a bottle of paracetamol as he cried
I wanted to tell you about him, 'cause now he's dead,
but I remembered some of the things that you said

when the other day you were at the drug store
you heard someone overdosed on paracetamol
you laughed then you said, "why hold back at all?
why not drink poison? that'll work for sure!"

mom, I looked it up, it only takes fifteen tablets
fifteen of paracetamol and it'll send me straight to a casket
mom, what if I were that overdosing teen?
if I take only fourteen, would you tell me the same thing?

mom, I've been starving myself - I hardly eat
I don't know how I'm still managing on my feet
that's fine anyway, you told me I should go on a diet
so go on and tell me that I'm fat, I'll just keep quiet

hey mom, my arms are lined up with slits
but you're worried about if my clothes still fit
so I'll keep my mouth shut, I won't make things bigger
maybe if I tell my friends I'll feel a little better

mom, everyone keeps telling me I'm depressed
that I've got all these emotions inside me supressed
I only listen to you, mom, and I ignore the rest
after all, doesn't the saying go "mother knows best"?

mom, if I wanted to die, what would you do?
'cause if I tell you, I feel like you'd just say, "me, too!"
don't worry, mom, if I'm suddenly gone one day
I've learned to hate myself because of you anyway

mom, everyday is becoming a little too tough
I'm just holding on 'til I can cut deep enough
maybe it would be a nice surprise for me and you
if killing myself is something I finally do.

She rises and falls like a reposed breath
before an entire world's visage
in her encircled arms.
The incandescent glow of the stage
has an intoxicating quality to it,
the music being
something liquid, viscous.

As notes thrum in tender and soothing caresses,
her legs supple, twirl like petals
cascading under the weight of raindrops,
giving way to a lush surrender
steeped in a language of love and need.
Her very fire
and impassioned soulfulness
lifts her up above the crowd itself,
burning for all to see.

In this moment now
her timelessness enraptures me.
Another part of myself awakens to her grace
and renders me
gratefully whole.
A sense of euphoria slow dances its way
from her being to mine,
consuming every piece of my body
in a fiery bloom—
charging me with
a crackling, electrifying force
unlike my mere own.

I can see now
that this is what she was born to do—
to be on pointe, seeing everything.
Any instances of worldly fear
is left to the dying.
The rhythms of her old pains,
tribulations of past destructions,
are now buried beneath her feet.
And her radiant smile while she dances
still speaks to me gently—
that to be free
is to be wonderfully lost
in her waltz with destiny.

© BT

temptations wear me,
frothed cloth and feathered clinch,
hallow helium exhaling smoke rings,
glass ripe with flames.

*****, *******, rescue me,
powder and fog, won't you let me see.

cut the line,
don't sweat the shirt,
this great escape,
for what it's worth,
memories,
lost to dirt,
hear these pleas,
fear my hurt.

*****, *******, rescue me,
powder and fog, won't you let me see.

with a draw i write,
forget my body,
forfeit my mind,
bring it back around,
to cul-de-sac town,
alarms wake my dreams,
i'm lost and found.

Dragging sheets over head during the dark of night
Slipping away, crawling into the mind's cave
Sequentially tumbling into the dark chasm
Million-mile, feathery fall through a grey abandon

Upon landing scenes start with a glowing sky
Swirled in blue, red, purple, yellow and black
Somehow familiar, I'm sad but never scared nor cry
A house sits empty, tall and alone
Upon a hill where an empty tree decays
Tended, yet desecrated and dry
Don't go inside... Don't go inside.... No, not alone
Deep wells awash with ghosts and faceless ghouls
Shells of scenes you never want to see
My nightmares and wanton dreams

The wind slides thick across the terrain with an audible scream
Down the hill is a black frothing stream
Surrounded by naked women and wild men,
****** and killing, each other over and over again
Familiar faces start to stare as I pass the heathen fire and fare
Glowing insects lounge like lanterns, witnessing their share
Sudden cold hand grabs me, trying to force me to participate
But closed eyes make no contact; I thrash with teeth bared,
Clinging with dried torn hands and lost hair
The black stream saves me by dragging me under
Until I slowly disappear

A cave with a pool reveals the next stanza
Wooden dry dock and blue water give a purple glow
A girl sits there with a boy, his shadow on the wall is a crow
Cawing, he has a voice that I understand and know
She, a snake body that sheds and rapidly grows
The couple melts and I suddenly slow down, down, down...
Deeper this continues to go

I wake up in a bed, but it's not my room
White lights above and dark faces ahead encircle me
Trying to inject me with my doom
I beg and scream
"This isn't my intent, this wasn't my desire!"
But it's all my fault the past was doomed
Thrown punches and scrambling for a door
I find the walls fall and the lights glimmer no more
The floor sympathizes and surrenders
Sees the pain and turns to a warm pool
Dazed, I float on to the morning's shore

Endless nights of fantasy and hedonist to the core
I'll be thrown from the night into fantasy once more
Don't envy me or the source of my quill's tone
I hide all the monsters under my pillow