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 Nov 2014 Dan Stevens
JR Potts
An absent father's failure with an inhaler in hand

Insecurity seething from his skin

Manifesting it's self as bulbous red abrasions on his forehead

A heavy breathing child who's eyes were often aimed low

His expectations for life even lower

A little over weight but not enough to concern his pediatrician

He cut gym class a lot because of the showers

Now fourteen he had seen a few ******

He knew he didn't match up

It was better that no one knew he thought

He went on living like this

A pale shadow hovering in the halls

A faceless nobody in the background of someone else's group photo

A ghost who was only noticed by those who tortured him

Bullies like sharks can smell blood in the water

And he was chum

I still vividly see the feeding frenzy

I still remember the day we were told he took his own life

NO shrieks, NO cries, NOT even a whimper was heard

Almost a concerted sigh of boredom

That night there was a party

Not to celebrate his death

But an apathetic gesture of his nonexistence

I attended as was socially expected of me

Even wore a smile

But my mind wrestled with his suicide

I thought of how much I hated him

I hated the smell of his weakness

I hated the 'poor me' attitude

I hated him for taking his own life

Leaving me to feel guilty

That I had done nothing to help him

As if I was responsible in some way

...
 Jan 2014 Dan Stevens
Jacqui
Fear and panic sweep over me.
I need to move
but I'm paralyzed by my need for normalcy.
One pop of a pill and it will drift away,
and I will sleep.

But sleep is for the weak,
or is sleep for the week?
That's what my body
bounces back and forth between.
There is no middle.
No start.
Eventually an End.

The inner meaning of desire
bounces from my heart to my head,
as if it is the ball in a pin ball machine.
I try to fight off this anxious feeling,
though it is a chemical imbalance in my brain.
Why do I fight with the chemicals in my body?

I fight to feel normal.
I fight to not rely on a simple pop of a pill that my doctor gives me.
She tells me to take it when I need it, she trusts me.
Sometimes I feel that trust is too much.
Because this anxiety is a metaphor for life,
and I know that problems cannot be solved, by one simple solution.
I fight to be strong.
1/9/2014
 Jan 2014 Dan Stevens
JR Potts
I need more sleep
but I need more you
how can I choose
when both are as real
as they are true,
if I must sleep
then I shall dream,
dream of you
 Dec 2013 Dan Stevens
JR Potts
I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I've never had a good job
I've never owned a nice car
and I don’t buy dinner.

Your mother will hate the way I dress
your father won’t trust me
and your girlfriends won’t ever be impressed
that you got me because

I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I drink too much
I smoke too many cigarettes
and I like to get high sometimes.

You’re right to think I’m crazy
you’re wrong to think I’ll ever stop being so
and if you ever thought you could change me
than you’re two cans short of a six pack because

I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I’ll make you nervous
I’ll make you uncertain about your beliefs
and I won’t ever apologize for being me.

You'll cry
you'll hurt
and you’ll try
to make it work because

I am the man you love
but I am not the man you marry.
Originally written: 06/10/13
 Nov 2013 Dan Stevens
JR Potts
Everything is nothing and nothing, everything therefore neither can exist as absolutes. What you are now is but a moment and this moment shall pass. We as humans cling to these instances with exhausting desperation. We yearn for them to last eternally but it is only because we dream of the infinite that we hold so tightly to our experience. Like a slow poison we watch ourselves betray our former figments, the people we were suppose to be slip from our grip, descending forth into the people we are to become. My tone may suggest an attitude of anguish but this reality, my reality is not one of judgement. It is far removed from good and evil, it just is. Leaving only my brain to decipher its worth but outside of these illusions of measurement; I know something is happening, the who, what, where and why may escape me but I am convinced that something rather than nothing is occurring.
The experience of stimuli is the only revelation of mine I dare to brand with the label of truth.
Our certainty of the laws that govern today are but manifestations of our misunderstandings and will become subjects of satire tomorrow. If man is to live sanely he must not carry himself so seriously in regard to his follies of days past. He must laugh with the comedians, the jokers and the jesters.
For laughter is the medicine of the mind and the metaphorical heart.
Today you are you, yesterday you were someone else and tomorrow you will be a stranger to yourself.
What does that mean?
You are not who you think you are.
To some this is tragedy, to others a great relief.
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