The solemn sea swells
Consuming the sorrow
Black petals drift into
The vast ocean of souls
Bad news and crushing blows
Drowning out in the undertow

Too often, we wish for things,
which fill us full of regret.

Too often, we become the things,
which fill us full of dread.

Too often, too often,
this nightmare persist,
Too often.

Too often, I am at the mercy
of this madness.

Too often, it swells within my heart,
incapacitating me.

Too often, I lay in feverish pain,
a prisoner of anxiety.

Too often, too often,
I wander into darkness,
Too often.

Too often, I become this awful wretch,
this terror

Too often, I beg,
to be set free.

Too often, and its always,
Too often enough.

The dream thickens and my eyes grow dim.
They drown in darkness and light becomes thin.

The lids become heavy, and I cannot swim.
I sink below the surface, sleep begins to win.

Farther I fall to madness and thoughts are now grim.
Prying my eyes open, as penance for my sin.

The Sun was a no show.
Raindrops begin to bead off the brim of my straw hat.
This beat continues until it slurs into a stream.
The thought to leave never crosses my mind.
Downpours are downright hypnotic, magic made real.
The eye of the heart opens to the rain's musical incantation.
And there it stands, the doorway to infinity.
Inside is surely unknown, but to have the great beyond exist,
within the turning of fingertips is unreality itself.
I suppose the power of this muse lies in its mystery.
Yet still, I forge endlessly onward to annihilate the enigma of it all.
I'm sitting here, in the rain, watching these words turn about.

Today, I am walking the path of the infinite self.
It is a road that stretches forever inwards and outwards.
I unravel,
I cross the rubicon,
I contain multitudes,
The door in the sky opens.
A hand reaches down and pulls me through it.

I become a face in a sea of many:
A swimming ocean of everything I’ve been and yet to be.
A dream floating on the sleepy universe of impossibility.

I accept this smallness.
Then I reach inwards and offer a hand.
I become whatever self I require.

Every word falls deaf
Soundless songs depress, suppress
Any ability to breathe music (of my own)
An empty vessel, ravaged,
Through a torturous fountain of
Words: letters, syllables violently clawing
(Towards the Sun, any inkling of light)
Spewing in such a horrible way
Just to once again find relevancy
To flow like waterfalls, nurturing
The saplings of the low valleys
To bloom, and flower into peace and
Be Reborn.

Do I exist as the Day before
The serrated edges of brokeness
Distort any resemblance once known
Light dips endlessly into the gaps
Hoping to find a reflection to the surface

Darkness is the suture to the shattered
Weaving together ruined flesh
Inhaling deceit, runs waves of despair
How much can be replaced
Before I am lost in the night.

My falling out with the Cartographer was not absolute.
Though it's easy to notice when the deep gravity of the Universe,
has been reduced to the mundane whispers of the ordinary.

The strength of loyalty is tested in these blind walks of faith.
As the world unfolds beneath my feet, the mind too does wander.
Hidden worlds vibrate between reality and fiction.
I map this microcosm of the known, to reach the ever after.

And so it goes that in my purposeful aimlessness, I'll find the road back.
Every excuse will always be, but letting go will set me free.
Free to once again entangle creation's creativity.

a bird born in the city
may not know of the forest.
a bird born within the concrete jungle
may not know, but they share emptiness.

a bird born in the city
may have its belly swell.
a bird born in the crossroads and high towers
may feast forever and never fill.

a bird born in the city
may call it a home.
a bird born amongst alleys and avenues
may sing, but often crows.

a bird born in the city,
flies with wings far from what is known.

The universe used to whisper dark melodies,
in the secret garden of mind.
Seeds were sewn with thoughts that were ravenous for the wicked sound.
Each idea bloomed into insidious beauty, humming a haunting tune of its own.

When dusk set on the infinite, the ghastly chorus set too.
Silence boomed, poisoning the life of creativity.
What grew now, was gnarled indifference, a green of dark envy.

Borderline blasphemous and a challenge just the same, a tune of antithesis finally became.
The garden sang its own song in finality.

His eyes drew back into endless darkness.
The smokey storm of features which raged
Where his face should have been struck lightning
Down my frozen spine, entangled by this sight.

The man peered into me, which his empty gaze.
Black holes which in their plainness, tore away sanity.
I wanted to ask him, I wanted to know, but words lost me.
He laughed a madman's laugh, faceless or not, he smirked.

This devil, came and went, only seeking a name.
He stepped out into the night, a frozen gaze, and into nothing.
A creature haunted, without voice for his destruction.
I know he will return, screaming death until words find him.

Suppression weights heavy in my hand.
Holding the bleeding,
beaten remnants of my essence.

Outstretched, stripped from my chest,
clinging to the soft ideals
of a peace to never come.

Words of hatred, poisons I have made
created in failed attempt to love.
Piercing me, debilitating daggers
wounded, body broken.

All energy exhausted pulling
farther from me the strings attached
to what was once life.

Heart in hand, destroyed mantle
of my physical being, beating slowly
Crimson paints the floor.

Instinct shields this torn entity
to protect the last connection
the undying belief in love.

Each verse is loaded ammunition
An arsenal of words preparing for war

Locked and loaded, these stanzas are ready
To fight the ****** battle, in a War of Words

Each spoken lyric, is a shot to the temple of Ignorance
Muses and medics line up to infuse their knowledge

Reload and repeat, the bards sing of Revolution
A Libretto for freedom, in unison from the Voiceless Nation

I walked out into the nothingness,
Lamp lit, with a little lively flame.
Darkness decided to swallow us.
I fueled the lantern, to feed the light.
But as it burned brighter, darkness grew hungrier.

There was an acceptance, to let it be.
I knew that this was the time of darkness.
Extinguishing my flame, I waited for dawn.
I waited and waited, for the midnight black,
To churn into that dark purple hue,
Kindling further into the volatile morning vibrancy.
Such a time never came, as I said
These were Dark Times.

The Land of Light could not, would not
Interlope here, and such a thing was fine.

I drink deep from the reservoirs beneath her tulips
Soft is my sweet demise,
As I follow her eyes
To the cherry blossoms,
And that babbling brooks
Reassuring me, that I'm far away home.

I smile, with sun kissed cheeks
For when the music drifts away like distance
The tenderness of words on my ears
Rewrite all of this pain into poetry

The Eclipse dawned shortly after sunrise
Though clouds decided to swallow her gaze
A supernatural dimness filtered the horizon
Some things occur and are felt deeply
Others often, can be never felt at all.

I felt the surge of madness.
The Dark Moon plunge her auras
So deliberately into my mind.

Irises became dark full circles
Reflecting the wonderfully insidious Luna
Her Eight faces shone as dancing disc

She sings, inviting visions, mayhap delusions.
What was seen before, and thereafter
Are stories of the beginning and end.

Gifted, with a sinister sight, malevolent.
But boundless, togetherness, solidarity.
All at once, with every I, to ever be.

In that moment I knew, that feeling of knowing,
To without any reasonably conclusion,
Have an unyielding sense of where the pieces lie.

And that tasteless grain of alabaster, so profuse
Raining even harder now, the ground a pathetic mixture.
Blood, mud and betrayal.

Two strangers, one in bed with the **** of the world
The other, with an unamused smug, hating the other.
Pausing, the rain stops, checkmate.

For all of an eternity, how does one not know self.
And upon becoming one with filth, why was it so?
In envious conclusion, I sleep, relinquishing control.

He rummages to the forefront, having prepared.
Having mastered this scenario hundreds of time,
So seamlessly did he maneuver.

Casting away the mask of my failure,
To carve forward his dominating force of hand.
This personality, so fiendish but still me.

Spring decided to take this year off.
The winter was brutal, blanketing roads,
Living up the mayhem of snow and ice.

There was maybe one day, green grass,
Wind between a whisper and a scream.
Ending as quickly as it had began.

Freezing rain to Summer sun.
The heat beating, sending the cold packing.
And Spring nowhere to be found.

No April showers, or blooming flowers.
Just the ice and fire, no place inbetween.
Autumn, will be long overdue.

That was no ordinary lightning,
I knew that much for sure.
The walls shook with violent vibrations,
Echoes of the beastly ritual below.

Through flashes and thunder,
Archaic broods of badlanders rose.
Each strike tore open the seems of
Conceivable imagination.

This is not the first time.
This storm is without end.
Some will know it for the darkening it is.
Others will hold it secretly within nightmares.

The marvel of space
Is that much of what we see
Are snapshots of fallen
Wonders of cosmic creativity
The beauty exist in the moments
Almost frozen in relativity

That in the night
Looking up into infinity
Standing on this blue world
Nothing is as it seems

Fascination consumes me
The very idea that this instant
You or I are in constant motion
Hurtling through space and time
Galaxies exploding through
All that is and ever was.
Star systems racing around
This is paradoxical

To be stuck in a moment
Gravitated to the gaze
Of this divine universe
While simultaneously
Speeding through the canvas
In our own piece of the marvel

Friends, foes, fiendish woes,
I kneel before the Universe.

The ability to adapt is the ability to survive.
Foolish me, attempting to try old catalyst.
The past is a faulty crucible.
The same tricks won't work twice.

In this foresight, the key is carved.
Inspired by the rites of yesterday,
But honed in forge of tomorrow.

The derelict, latency of change has arrived.
So have I, molded by will itself, to wield it.

Rocks fall with each bey and beckoning
That stone hands shutter, dying
Rigid time, makes bone brittle
Pebbles of broken pieces
Stain crimson into the urn of the Earth

Chanting inaudible death hymns
The mother of rubble weeps
Her tears churn, with blood
And the sediment of the fallen
Into the blackened mixture
Exploding with fire and magma

Rising now, half broken and devil
With a narrow cage of brimstone
Twisting to a swollen brow of madness
Reigns down hellfires and Infernos
Laughing as the ancient muses
Strum the Fire God's Libretto.

On speaking of maddening, madness
Zero down on this pounding, pounding
Of onset betrayal in my heart.

Friendly faces turned crooked smiles,
As my mind contorts them in denial
Believing in an imminent threat.

Panic blooms a wildfire of doubt,
The voices inside scream and shout.
Now we wait for the arrival of death.

This mystery, this sickening
These shades of kin, just don't fit in
And surely I'm losing my mind.

There is no plot, no grand scheme
To steal away my blissful dream.
But paranoia knows better, it must.

In the space between madness
I wait. Patiently.
For the cold, univiting kiss.

Unreality had started to set in for weeks now.
And all the while knowing a simple sentence could cure;
I ran from the words that I feared to conjure.

Today I thought of the might of the pen.
While stronger than the sword, its duty is at its end.
Most of my writing is on screens and keyboards.
How many generations before its metaphorical might,
Is something that new writers lose sight?

These days, I visualize all words written, as reality's stitching.
A way to dress the wounds of waiting.
A way to hide from a world of my making.

Fingertips reach out against the forgotten wood.
An old wicked tree, gnarled with memories.
It seemed only moments ago, each groove
and every ridge was known.

A palm outstretched delicately, hoping to feel,
pressed against the rot of fading time.
The wounds of the mind run deep.

The hand pulls back, steadies it’s rage,
erupts into useless follies.

And still stands no closer to remembering.

I'm a green eyed
Sharp tongued devil
Born for Heaven
& destined for Hell

Finally..I wake from the dreamless wakefulness,
supposing that now, this is all real.

And how is such a harsh reality met?

By staring down Death’s corridor.
I don’t take the first step, I imagine that
is still quite some time away.
Though this time, it is much more than a glance.

And for the record, I remained tethered
to the living.

But to go on, that must be the work of Mask.
For how could I?

Yes, I resolve this ordeal to Mask.
Absolve myself of responsibility,
for was he not always in control?

Steady now, it is a burden for us both to bare.

The fiend stood before the threshold,
with a wicked gait.

High above the rooftops, with darkness
flowing from his cloak of nightmares.

The claymore cementing his sinister
disposition, neck crooked high.

Rage, his helm, that devilish crown,
slithering all the lies into me.

This throne, my flesh, he claimed again,
the marionette of his madness.

I walk heavy, with the burden of his pain,
swiftly he barrels through the jungle.

Through all the winding and weaving,
destruction has found its home within.

The King, his slave and the broken,
words are whats left to save us.

But he too, has stolen such things away,
for what am I without them.

Speed is relative.
I have begun to lose myself.
Everyday seems slower, the faster I go.
I punch the gas pedal and feel nothing.
I'm not after a rush, but the null is so strong.

Lately, I have felt more alone than ever.
A circle of love, holds me in high regard.
And yet, they seem so far out on the fringe.
This real me, in this real world is hollow.
Beneath in dark shadows, deep in the core,
Is a detached, dissociated self, I pity him.

Nights have become restless.
I lay awake, tossing and turning,
Ever out of reach of a rejuvenating slumber.
Sleep is dreamless, which is hell.
Even nightmares offer some insight,
A certain clarity of clairvoyance.

Perhaps, as I strongly feel, change is coming.

Two crooked razorbills fluttered past
The old oak tree on Bell's Grave.

They buzzed and crooned, in perfect pitch
For the necromancer's song.

Not to be outdone by the deathsinger's,
The skies opened up in torrential hymns.

As the Earth drowned in sinful peace,
A young man began to dance his fortune.

Feathered fellows, pouring rain, innocence.
A tune long forgotten in this worn grove.

Yet still, it was good, it was grand.
The honesty of death was pure.

Adrenaline and Pain,
They've brought me back to the dark waters,
Wading inside, the struggle to stay afloat.
The King, his legion, rise from their depths.
Ghouls scream, inciting a riot of mind.

The calming presence of self, helps me resist,
But this King brings corruption and death.
His fiendish aether crawls through my veins.
I suffocate under the torrential wickedness.

Once again, I rise, not my self.
Another medium for his crown of lies.

Oh star child, oracle divine
Help me decipher these visions of mine

So vibrant and vivid
It seems I'm committed
To madness

Work your magic
Read the heavens
Or the skies
Do you see truth
Or is it demise.

I beg you dreamwalker,
Seer of wonder and youth.
Bend my lost and fevered mind.

I was once stone
The naivety of my hope
Induced a wonderful illusion
Of a changed world, just on the horizon

This rock, and its sediment
Held the key to my ignorance
Never noticing my erosion
Caused by the hatred of men

So tell me doc
How much time have I got
Before this world overtakes me

I'm asking, I'm shaking
Cause I feel my mind breaking
Lock me up, I'll swallow the pills

But please doc
Throw away the key, overdose me
Ill tell you, these demons won't leave

Written words unravel spools of knotted truth
Unbound, I succumb to the overflow of thought
This pen, a fury of violent strokes, lashing lies
Waist deep in the tide of self reflection's revelation

I hold on, desperately, to the obelisk of false odysseys  
Watching words overturn the bastions of ignorance
Caught up, in the undertow, I begin to drown in the sea
Swallowing this sullen reality as I gasp, hopelessly for fallacies

The clouds overlap
Into cities of bridges
With rivers of indigos
Painted in the sky, as the
Evening begins, early now
Autumn has come.

The hand rose petals of ripe red.
A fast bloom of rotten revenge,
Stemmed only from gnarled thorns.
Sage runs strong into crimson.

Reaping, what is sewn or shown.
This paradoxical thought has flowered.
Was it first the pain or was it desire.
Trim the fray or overgrow in vain.

Suckle little roots, undying doom
Eternity's flora in the poet's stalk
Blood cursed words, ancient fret.
The seed of grudge is the heart's regret.

The winter blues are rich with gloom,
twisting my heart with apathy.

And perhaps shame too, let it not hide behind the weather.

Is it this dark obsession or some hidden transgression?

All the lessons learned, but failure is all that remains.

What road is left, I cannot see between the flickers of my dwindling flame.

******.
Slips out of white lips
I lose my ****.

Blood boils.
I hate the word
It ties my tongue
But, I get it.
Didn't always
But, I get it now

A reclaimation of hate,
Black skin shining
Owning the power of a word.

The biggest fear that I have as a writer,
Is that I will inevitable recycle old ideas.
Whether this is done consciously or not,
I fear of the complications it may bring.

Does it represent an evolution of past thoughts,
Or is it a compromise and the death of innovation.

Inspiration strikes invariably, but there is novelty.
Yet, this feeling looms, that I'm near the end.

I'd like to believe that I will forever spark creativity.
That as I have always done, new flames will blaze.

But there is too much doubt that a good thing,
Won't keep going for long, and its been long.

Admitting that feels good, and until that time comes,
If it comes at all, I'll have to trust the words in me.

The Real World,
That is a matter of perspective.

The places I travel each night,
Those are real worlds, all of them.
The entire spectrum of realities
Every vibrant life lived.

This dull world, this emptiness
It is but a mirage, a specter , a shadow.

I walk through this dream,
A captive in a phantom world.

Knowing so much more exist.
But seemingly forever out of reach.

Snow skates on the highway home.
Zigzagging, Crisscrossing, Somersaulting.
White dust in a balancing act between,
Winter Winds and Momentous Metal.

I carry the guilt of remembering the dead
In fear that if I don't, who will.

This tug of war between time and memory
Brings fatigue to my soul.

Anger has long passed, leading the road
With forgiveness at its end.

Though, in celebrating life, I can't help feel
The weight of every conversation.

That dangerous, infinite, path of what if.
Decisions and indecisions that brought death.

Answers may never be found, though I hope,
To relinquish this guilt of remembering.

I consumed the man in the mirror
Who stared so emptily into me.
The gaze which split this body into two
He is just but a whisper, long forgotten.

I could not tell you when,
But his weakness was delicious.
As he faded, I only saw myself
Nameless now, until the dawn begins.

I too, eat his words, wondering where
My own will be found.
Suppose a tear is shed, running slowly
Down my cheek.

We wonder, when we will find
Ourselves.

The black bird returns to the grove.
Its wings clipped, its pride stripped.

The black bird wretches a horrid chord.
Its song defiled, its depression wild.

The black bird offers a stifled dance.
Its passion shown, its fate honed.

The black bird finds a fractured peace.
Its freedom bound, its sanity found.

I remember his memories
Sometimes they are mine
A world of attrition
Skewed by rosey lenses

I felt his pain as they shattered
I felt the burning cuts in his hands
I felt that strong grip as he held the pieces
Just as I felt his strength wilt

He tried,
But feeling for the first time
The physical suffering brought on
by a conflict of emotions unresolved
Led the poor boy down a road
An avenue to bleed out the hate
To break the skin that trapped them in

Short term relief
For long term grief
He sought me out
And asked with a plea
To take his life, and set him free

Sometimes I hear him,
In the back of my head
But no, he isn't dead
He wills himself day by day
To not pull the trigger
Of the shaking gun of deciet.

Forever and a time ago, I too, was lost.
All of my losing, has brought me here again.
Between a catalyst of change and horror.
I'm on the cusp, I feel it coming, soon.

Again, I fall within all worlds, all their pain.
This edge, this faltering belief of hope.
It tears into me relentlessly, pleased.
I await the words to free me, shackle breaking.

Though, time in its infinity, is running out.