The victims deal with the abuse.
Then when they get enough courage to leave, they have to go into hiding.
Afraid every-time the phone goes off, that it is them.
Every-time someone knocks on the door, they wonder.
Have I been found? Will I have to move again?
When they go out, they look behind them constantly making sure no one is following them.
Careful to post any information on social media, so they cannot be cyber stalked by them.
A friend request on the internet makes them suspicious, wondering if that could be them.
Someone who is friendly sets off alarms, wondering if somehow this person could be related to their abuser.
The victim did not ask for any of this yet, the only way to survive is to leave and hide.
Forever wondering if they will be found and put through the abuse again.

Being real is hard
as opposed to being fake
as opposed to being bubbling plastic, mask this
look past my plausibility
soft body
teeth mouth throat
eyelashes,
heart
fake
styrofoam
empty
deserted
these eyes are what I have to offer now, these ears
If you had reached me earlier, I would've had more
to put at your disposal:
my devotion
my hands
my feet
my sanity
my presence in this day, for this conversation
my heart, soul, and chapstick
but I've said too much.
If you had reached me earlier
I swear I would've given you the rib-cage straight out of my chest  
before your lips were halfway open and asking--
I know I would've been in your veins before fall
But I can't worry about your veins now,
I've opened too many of mine
and what I'm trying to say is honey,
My heart isn't full enough for me to pour it out to you every night.
You know I wish I could

Maybe** it’s stupid for me to think
so optimistically about us.

Us.

We.

Two different letters
With potentially two different
meanings.

I just don’t understand how such a
beautiful human being can exist.

There weren’t any signs to show
me how you felt about it.

Maybe I meant something
different when I talked to you.


Or maybe you weren’t honest
to yourself about how you felt.

But boy oh boy will I be honest.

I loved everything I ever had
with you, and I always will.

God help me, I've tried
to get you off my mind but it's
i m p o s s i b l e,
especially when the memory of you,
your body pressing me firmly
into the grass, uncaring of the lingering rain-damp dirt,
is still burned into my brain
every time you double text for my attention.

The graze of your tongue,
against my own,
a motion so languid, a feeling so warm,
a taste so sweet―

you're like molasses against my lips
sliding, impossible to ignore, down my throat
and dragging with you the words
I can't seem to spit out

and I'm grateful for the soothing relief,
the way your syrup coats where I'm raw:
a glaze that leaves sweetness in its wake
where usually there's bitterness,
both from the coffee that wars with an insomniac's exhaustion
and the way I feel about feelings.

And that's all well and good, for a while.
After all, who doesn't have a sweet tooth these days?
But once the molecules in my throat
have melted away, gone is the glaze that
sweetened the taste in my mouth, and the dark thoughts in my mind;

smothering the taste of coffee with syrup
doesn't remove the stains from your teeth,
and then the more you do it, you find yourself with cavities
and heart disease.

SUMMER MARCHES IN
(Movement no. 1)

It comes crashing down
like doom.
A martial fanfare
begins a long conversation
questioning fate,
arguing for the human condition,
and for death's open invitation,
which we dare not deny.

WHAT THE MEADOW FLOWERS TELL ME
(Movement no. 2)

Their blooming voices
are oboes and lush violins.
The sun is surely brassy bright
in the sky above.
Radiant alpine flowers
and woodwinds
from deep within their burrows
make the case
for a music well tended
and serenely fed
by sweet springs emerging from the depths
here below.

WHAT THE CREATURES OF THE FOREST TELL ME
(Movement no. 3)

The life force
tends to run amok.
Yet things do not fall apart,
the center still holds.

And though it is mundane -
pedestrian, at times -
we cannot deny the joy in this life,
nor do we wish to.

But know, traveler,
that submerged in every caldron of joy
is a small *** of darkness.
And it will find you
or you will find it -
not only because it is fated,
but for the sake of your sanity.

WHAT MAN TELLS ME
(Movement no. 4)

Here darkness sings.
Again the plucked string.
O Mensch!
You tell the tale!
You take this story
back to the mountain.

A woeful tale you bring,
but it is gilded with joy.

A chorus exalts your condition.
Deep is its grief,
but joy is deeper still.

WHAT THE ANGELS TELL ME
(Movement no. 5)

Bimm Bamm
Bimm Bamm
the children's choir
sweetly intones.
And what, pray tell,
do Angels have to say to us?

I've heard about love
I've heard about emptiness
I've heard about absence
without presence,
about nothingness and the void.

But I have never heard such singing!

WHAT LOVE TELLS ME
(Movement no. 6)

Sweet the air we breathe.
Pleasant the sights before us.
Words are stilled,
anxious thoughts banished.

There is nothing on Earth
or in Heaven
that disputes this sweet resolution
all the parts made whole
Nothing that could possibly
speak against it
(though French Horns will have
their interests heard).

But here it is.
The end.

O Mensch
come to your last and best
resting place.

Also sprach Gustav Mahler.

I take two,
double the suggested dose
but as I look at the clock
and notice the time
I get tempted to take more.
For it’s 2:18 a.m.
And nothing else will help me
at this point