It is as important
to recognize
what love isn't
as it is
to know
what love is

mistake not
lust
ego-driven
crush
flash flood
rush

nor need
the kind
that scours
the bones
licks the marrow
clean

not apathy
silent killer
complacent
acceptance
of less than
we deserve

violence
physical
verbal
control
love is never
these

it is
easy breathing
reflexive
vital
doubles down
no surrender

love holds
through heat and cold
sick and old
when age
erases my name
from your memory

I will come to you
fresh every day
someone new
different wig
ravish-me dress
old-lady hot

we’ll have a little fun
with the time left
at least you’ll die
thinking to yourself
*still got it
with the ladies

Everyone has this identity of what we are meant to be, but it does not come naturally. We must learn how to make it evolve.

This need festers deep inside our body and soul; making it hard to breathe, feeling as if you’re going to combust spontaneously.

In this very moment, the perfect epiphany wakes you as if in a deep sleep. It gives you the urge to write everything, especially your goals and dreams, hoping this will feed the want inside.

Everyone’s feelings of the want come differently.

For me, I feel this passion to make the earth quake enough to move mountains, in such an incredibly unique way.

To run as far as my legs will take me, until I feel as if I’m going break.

To love my children as gracefully and understandingly as I humanly can.

To grow in knowledge, while learning as passionately as my mind will grant me.

To let go of the hate an anger of the world.

To let it slide through my arms, down my finger tips, and into the ground where it belongs.

To not hurt others, but instead be a voice of kindness and strength.

To be what others are afraid of seeking and fighting to see.

To let go of all the animosity and pain, and fly free.

To harness and meditate the things that will feed my soul.

To dress strong and full of beauty as the women I venture to be.

By this I will go far. It’s not a question or a maybe; it is a statement to the world that this is who I will be.

Shattered shattered the light
******* the gaze into an empty well
Producing sounds is all that's left
Expanding darkness absorbing
I stepped in its direction
Reminded of the void so familiar
Darkness so soothing
Like a dream of non existence
Like the sound of eternal silence
Then smile came
And it was
Alive

Borderlines
        of love and lust
crossovers from uncertainty
                 to trust
How we travel
vast countries
in search of living
We forget that taking in
                           is also giving
We strive to reach
and forget ourselves
our process breached
                 in heaven's wells
And I am drowning
                in this murky sea    
submerged in this place
                 of mystery
Sometimes darkly
Sometimes bathed in
              sweet strata of light
Sometimes wrapped
                closely inside
gentle tendrils
of night
All the while speaking
the language of
       awareness and fire
my words heated-up silk
dripping molten desires
I throw to the winds
relics of ancient spells
conjure my heaven
          to chase out the hell
Polish off the dust
and shake out my soul's fabric
         air out my cells
Fill them up
          with new magic
And as I continue
      to break down these walls
         and spin off into
the astral spheres --
    I do my best to emulate
picking ripened fruit,
plucking sparks
         from the cosmos
so I may live
without
fear

G'day from prison!*
(before I knew he lives on):

I see you there, My Maple.

Your little skirts; your peroxide hair.  Sweet, quiet Maple... I see your fishnet, maroon, little sweater. How I loved that thrift-store garment; it gave purpose to us both. For you, an excuse to see, without being seen. A voyeuristic excuse, for myself, to see without being seen.

If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t be here. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t know this.

I picture your starkness. Dark, ten year old Maple. Listening with wide eyes - as I validated you.

As no one else had before.

I nurtured that Goth infatuation that no one wanted, fed you music: your Evanescence covet. Your black fingernails... Even then, I understood what no one else could.

Yummy, tasty, Maple.

How good you smelled; how fresh you smelled. Clean, and sad. Searching for reassurance. Searching eye's, searching for me.

Searching for someone. Anyone. A real person; content to SEE you, and love you anyways. Not like the rest; all of them - who'd only ever cast you aside - pick you last - call you names, spit in your face, lock you out and alienate you; who’d kick and shove you.
The *someones behind why you, at age ten, began to wish you were dead.
I was there, and I was your best friend.

Me.

I was the best friend you'll  ever have. Someone who loved an anomaly, and understood, and loved you best; over your mother - your sister - I told you I had a crush; a crush for only you.

10 years have lived and died between us.

10 years without me.

And the weight of time has yet to alleviate.

You still wish you were dead.

I still feel your warmth; the little bundle of you.

You.

You in your cozy, blue bed, with your
curious eyes and porcelain face. I would slip five dollar bills under your pillow; tell you, “I’ve hidden something secret.”  

I adorned you with money, pampered you with special trinkets, allowed rare privileges disproved by your mother... A mother who hadn’t a clue you’d worshipped angry rap since the age of eight. She didn’t know. You idolized Eminem. She’d yet to learn his name. You wanted to see 8 Mile; your mother said no – Rated R – so it was our little secret.

But you betrayed our secrets, didn't you?

We have no secrets anymore.



I see you there.

The soft, supple skin of your back . . . of your stomach . . . and of what lay below.

“What’s down there?” I’d inquired.

So enamored, exploring the secrets of your little body.

My demure, sad Maple.

I was your one and only true companion.

I was your one, and only friend.

Yet, here, in this cell, you will never see your best friend again.

You will never have a best friend again.

For in this cell, I have nothing left, but to remember.

I have nothing left but to write.

All my love, my presents, my company. All to end up here.

Here, behind bars.

And the weight of time has yet to alleviate.

You still wish you were dead.

But you and I - we've become synonymous.

Together, forever.

Just as I said, ten years ago. For, no matter what, my existence will always define you; and yours - you will define mine.

Forever.

You'll never be rid of me, and you can never leave me.

For I'll never leave you.

Our bond is solidified.

Perpetually.

Together forever.

Ten years. Eleven, twelve. The calendars change, but you and I? We’re right where we left each other.

So you'll never be anything. Anything at all. Anything else but mine.

The weight of time won't ever alleviate.

And you STILL wish you were dead.

- Thomas Gregory Brown, G'day from prison