Alright, I'll confess it.
I would change everything about you.
Your bangs should sweep left to right,
Not right to left like you have them now.
Your cocky half smile quirks too much
So I think you should tone it down.
The way you shrug one shoulder then the other
In some comedic fix of antipathy
Should be more pronounced and firm.
I'd like it better if the shoes you wore
Weren't the same pair day after tired day.
Oh, and I think you're better looking
If you'd try to wear any makeup at all.
Really. Anything would help at this point.
I would change everything about you.
The way you talk, the way you walk,
Your affability towards people,
Your desire to learn and know the world.
I would strip you of everything you are
And have and know and love
And make you into someone new,
Someone different, someone...whole.
Because with all these not so bad qualities
I see in you through your wary eyes,
Are a host of demons lurking
In the black parts of your soul.
And I would rid you of them
For they haunt you and scare you
And turn you into someone I don't know.
If it means all the things I love and cherish,
All the quirks and smirks that make me smile
Must die in bloodshed as well,
Then so be it.
I would change everything about you.
If it meant that the things that drive you mad,
That tear you away from my side
In a fit of chaotic turbulence,
That make you cry uncontrollably in the dead of night,
Would all be expelled from your being,
Then I would gladly give up
The person I love
In exchange for someone else.
For I would rather you be someone totally different
And still holding my hand,
Than to see you drift further and further away
Into the darkness of your mind.

We sat in quiet whispers--resigned and frozen
To the wrought-iron slats--shoulders touching,knees barely bumping,
Shivering in the sojourn of our anxious intentions...
We were in default wait mode
And it was the waiting that tinged the tension.

You referred to me as your Jaded Juliet--
Impulsive innocence of perfect porcelain,
Protected within my world of privilege and power,
All feigned sophistication at fourteen.

I regarded you as a renegade--
A rouge in Romeo's guise aloof, unattainable;
I longed for your street-smart savvy swagger,
Thought of you as my iron-hearted hero at fifteen.

We huddled with few words--motionless for hours,
Wrapped in false facades of our uncomfortable indifference...
Feelings and fingers  entwined in the fantasy realms
Of our imagined lust and nervous satisfaction.

My head at war with my heart--fidgety and flustered,
In that feet-twisting,breath-hitching moment of madness,
With the cold creeping into my words of nauseating embarrassment,
I brandished them as loud, unweildy weapons of awkward....

I blurted out "I  l o v e  you," and meant it,
To sodium arcs reflected in your copper eyes--
Staring transfixed, as brilliant uncirculated  pennies--
Marveling at the 297 ways to make change for one dollar,
But absolutely no way to alter those words.

Suspended--swirling, and writhing like wraiths--
They floated as feathery plumes of breaths ...
Within the icy, silver stillness,
The scheduled snow fell as the hush between us.

My mother keeps dropping hints
About the increase in size of my waist
About the decrease in space between my legs
"Are you really going to eat that?"
"You shouldn't be snacking that much."
"If you're hungry, you should probably just drink water."
"That won't digest well if you eat it now."
"You know that's going straight to your gut."
Sometimes in the silence of our house late at night I can hear her whispering, "You're not good enough."

I love you too, mom.

I am drowning in a sea of anxiety...
Wait maybe I should put that differently
I am buried beneath worry
Well not so much that...
But I am definitely distraught
And at the very least I am very confused
About what you do to me
I mean here I am minding my own business
Trying to convince myself I am content in my loneliness
And then you show up
Seeing my efforts as all in vain
I'll have you know I was fairly happy pretending I was happy all along
And by fairly I mean not at all
But I had learned to hide that foot note deep enough
That no one would know
But you did didn't you
You saw how hard I was trying
To maintain the face
That I put on to cover the me that I didn't want to be seen
I tried with such desperation
Because truth be told I find it ugly
I have spent a vast amount of time
Looking and investigating the inner parts of me
And I really find it disgusting
Yet when you gaze through my facade I feel comfort
That you can look at me and not be afraid
Or revolted at what you see
Which confuses me more

Graveyards bother me,
All those lives, silenced,
All that time, the memories,
(We were loved too once, you know,
we enjoyed life, see you soon!)
This aspect runs cold in my blood,
I can almost hear them chuckling,
He knows, Paul knows, (hello!)
Sure, their voices are in my head,
Their whispers, ancient stirrings,
Laughter from ages gone, dead,
Yet they call to me, taunt me,
Dead flesh and bones haunt me.
A full life, reduced to a dash.
I know I'm not ready, not yet,
Too much to do, to write, to share,
I shudder, walk away, dry mouthed,
No life without death, none,
Graveyards bother me.

© Paul Chafer 2014

We cannot prevent people from falling in life
Blinded by our own salted skin and crunching bones
And only notice the wounds on someone's face
when they knock on our door
and ask if they can borrow a plaster

I can only watch you with deep s y m p a t h y
when your scarred heart gasps for breath
if only I can heal your p a i n
if only I could catch you whenever you fall
but I'm just another helpless creature
expecting myself to be m o r e
and guilt appears faster than rain on car windows
and my heart goes up in the flames of grief
the guilt grows damp before my eyes
plasters do not heal w o u n d s
want to bury them deep down with me
your misfortunes are mine
My crooked heart knitted to y o u r s
And I just want to say that I'm really sorry
for letting you f a l l
I should've hold your hand more tightly
I couldn't swim and you jumped in

                                                             ­                  and I couldn't s a v e you

we always know everything afterwards
so we cannot prevent our people from falling
We can run as fast as we can
but time is faster than realization

                                                    ­              We are either  d e a d  or  l a t e.

No combination of perfectly sought out words could ever come close to comparison of the poetry your eyes speak to mine with only one unsubdivided glance.

  I now understand what they mean by "your my favorite book."

  Only, your not a book. Your a flowing scatter brained poetry piece.

  From where I'm standing, I don't think I'll ever reach the end.

  maybe their is no end.
Interminable depth in the drowning midnight blues.

  Quite frankly, I could continue, without fail; reading my favorite poetry piece incessantly.

Love me tender,
he cried,
smiling,
vengeance,placed behind his eyes,
he smiled some more,
as he called her a *****,
for the second time this week.

She packed her bags as she left him again,
his woman noticed the tears pouring down his face,
such shame and disgrace,
he was wearing so much pain.

Yet again,
She unpacked them all,
put them away,
naively believing,
it wouldn't happen again,
course it wouldn't,
she couldn't leave,
not again,
not for the second time this week,

Sorry said he,
he said,
I promise,
Truly,
I do,
Never again will I beat you black and blue,
I love you.
And once again he did!

The bruise on her eye the result of a tumble,
so he said,
As he gave her a steak,
to stick over her swollen eye,
(C) Livvi