You will be lonely
Whether in a party
Or, at night at home.
You will be lonely
Throughout your life
Till you continue to breath.
You will be lonely
With your love beside you
Or, with the broken pieces of heart.
You will be lonely
Among the dazzling star
Or, in the brightest sky.
You will be lonely
With the glass of wine
Or, with the bottles in hand.
You will be lonely
With the thousand tears
Or, with the longest smile.
You will be lonely
With the pain from the past
Or, with all the happy memories.
You will be lonely
In this time
Or, in the realms unknown.
You will be lonely
Till you learn the art of being alone…

Some days there is an ache
That ripples through my soul like an echo in an empty cave.
Where it started, I'll never know
But it seems endless on my empty days.

With his head in his hands
And his heart on his sleeve
He closes his eyes against the light of day
And against his quiet despair
He pretends it is not real

But part of him knows
Deep down amongst half-remembered dreams
Emotions that appear from nowhere
And linger
Every cell of him knows

He knows a loss without closure
A conversation without words
Dreams without endings
And hoping without hope

He hears a knock on the door
But no-one walks in
He puts his head in his hands
And his heart on his sleeve
He pretends it is not real

                                           By Phil Roberts

Crackling. Rocking. Crackling. Creaking and oscillating, a century old **Mahogany Wood seceded to the paSsage of time.
Particles of sand, confounded by the Peninsula’s chaotic, blasting breeze now revealed a shade of burnt tar.
   Outside of the second floor Maissonette, sways the rocking chair once warmed by Grandpa.
A Tactless, impatient, rhythmic Requiem Bashes near the wiNdow pane as the sunset falls Under the frame.  
                                                        ­    Empty Folklore presides like the Residue of a once lambent effigy…                                               SwOosh. Hush!
           Cocktails were a Preamble to lunch like diabetes to Nephropathy.
Corrosive Rhetoric seeped in to expose the ego of a Sommelier.
     A smile would Parachute down when you needed it like Nicotine to remind that no Precedent had been set, just an Anomaly.
                     Cutthroat beginnings, this was no Analog man.
        In grade school his Cosmos found Zion and “The world to come”.
        This baby’s Cradle, abandoned High atop a mountain was blown by a Chinook towards the Atlantic.
                “I was found swallowed in a stained Table cloth by Balkan children on a treasure hunt, with no Guarantee and no resignatIon. "
                     The boTtle narrates these chronicles and a smile parachutes down when you need it like nicotine.
                                          Dionysus Crafted his accounts while most Garnered his spiels with Snide.                               As they witnessed dream remembrance; he thought his memory was Presumably accurate, and although his tales were triFling to the gathering audience, they became his Heliocentric history.
            Calling me a young Galleon and handing me a map, Grandpa scanned his hand across the vast land
       guaranteeing trEasure would be found if I had no resignation.
               This Asinine assertion to my teenage sister Symbolized the Barring of her unheeding imagination by time and then a smile parachuted down just when she needed it like nicotine.


_TRF

I stare
at this screen as if unpracticed
Though my reaction anything but masked
So naive we can be to feelings abstract

I see*
You lack clarity to recognize beneath you
As if you really see, truly view
What it is I so badly wish to say, hope to do
Of all that surrounds, subjects, and subdues

I fall
Forward into the plot of despair
Who will hear me, who will care
But then I recall of one passively there

I shudder
To think of what you would say now
Watching you breathless, wanting for air
Made my own lungs hostile, for how unfair
That which I craved, you had to bear

I know
The cancer was quick, it took you well
I really was not sure how to tell
You
Now there's no chance, no choice
Oh, how I miss your beautiful voice

A fair price to pay
So much we must weigh
Everyone has their cross to bear
If only there were a scale for despair

I glorify the uncertain
Making myself the aversion
Till I'm blinded to God's sacrifice
There's nothing left to romanticize

"It won't always be this way"
Is the message they send
"I just want one good day"
What they can't comprehend

Cowered small, no reprieve in sight  
I wish there was anyone left to fight
Unarmed, all defenses have fled
To the constant unbearable noise in my head

These eyes, no longer my own
My heart changed its beat
A snake has a hold of my stomach
My body admits defeat

It's merely following suit
After all, the body trails the mind
Rage overtook that system
When my father decided to resign

You might think a job
I guess you would be right
Twenty-five years of marriage
Forsaken overnight

Now if you are uncertain
This was not foreseen
He was fairly content a man
Although a bit extreme

He had all he wanted
That was insufficient
So he went quietly searching
And one lie became malignant

As I reimagine the events
Not by choice or reason
I can't un-hear my mother
Her sobs weak, uneven

I struggle to relinquish
The semblance I have left
Of the life I knew just days ago
Before this unthinkable theft

From my window, I stare into the blue,
Without the faintest clue why,
You never come.

Time drips away.
My soulmate gone,
I’m not sure, she was ever here.

Lonesome George,
They used to call me that here,
Before I became the last.

The island fills with our empty shells,
I don't know how to escape it.
I dream of visiting the caves in France.

But I too, will soon become dust;
Perhaps, I already am.
Though when I taste the water, I do remember,

The feel of Fall's fluttering leaves, together.
And while the island washes us away,
My heart never forgets you.

A low-class man with a baby face took a smart pretty woman and made her a disgrace

He charmed her with his words; put her under his spell

Stole the sanity from her children and made their lives hell

Not a finger he laid on the broken kids but every word stung; the torture so brutal and children so young

A teenager already empty was beaten with the belt. She was confused but he didn't care when she cried or what she felt

The mother was his puppet. And he the puppeteer. The puppet was manipulated and her children lived in fear.

Her words were his and his word was law children try as they might his heart wouldn't thaw.

The puppeteer is poisonous and lives without a care.

He didn't work for anything... He just took what was there.

He lived with greed, the love for money and liked to scream and shout.

He took what he couldn't earn; seeking the easy way out

A loser who played mind games. Such an unhealthy mix. Flattering the vulnerable was one of his biggest tricks

The truth always surfaces. And that is what was done. When justice chased after him all he could do was run

Couldn’t grasp a report today… dear child.
My broadcast body tuned to this frequency
Wouldn’t turn the channel ‘mind so beguiled
Me and my ******* voracious tendencies
Like a blood clot in my brain these words are filed
This new sensation is my delinquency.

Let’s shut it off... and get away.
Flip the switch on my ten-pound nemesis
Can shoulders bear its weight day after day
So Long the time has come to finish this.

This child as pure as I am blight; Let’s both be free.
Don’t Plant the Red Fern angel, he has long to Grow
Son, here’s my soul, please interchange with me
Like the boy I wonder, “Where will I go?”
As I’m not so proud of my biography
Alright Jack, it’s time to Get on the Road with this show.
Hell is a library with only one book, The Inferno.

_TRF 12/13/16

He had a way
with a pen,
my friend
the part-time
con artist, full-
time drunkard
with twinkles
in his eyes
like stardust,
and wrinkles
from laughter
as loud as
a clap of thunder,
and it was
really a wonder
to watch him draw
his last breath
with such depth
like an outline
of a shadow,
a sinkhole
in the shade
on the side
of a dark ridge.

people walk past me,
not noticing the subtle hellos
no one knows the small,
fragile girl that sits alone at lunch
no one nears the girl who curls up
in the corner, avoiding the crowd