If ever there were hands
to steal the stars from the sky
Let them be mine
For you, I would try
I would give you the moon
And the trees and the sun
I would black out the night
And hide away with you
From everyone
If the rain fell too hard
or the cold chilled your warm heart
I would be shelter for you, always
And we would never be apart
I have grown in your garden
With our love as my seed
You are my greatest treasure
You are all I need

Love lied to me
About the beauty and the ecstasy
Looked me straight in the eyes and lied,
Now I sit vacant and red-eyed as I watch my heart die inside
Wondering where it all went awry
Love lied straight to my face
Stole away in the night without a trace
Abducted
Left me with nothing but nothingness in its place

When I'm feeling low, I just want to get high.

Sometimes I feel
Like a dying rose
Missing your gentleness
as my eyes beg to close
Aching for the way
your eyes caress me
the way you inhale me
and longing for your hands
to remove the thorns from me
Plucked from the garden
Your eyes start to harden
Lonely from losing my petals
Under burden of a heavy heart
There are nights without you
That feel cold and so dark
Rushing into fitful dreams
While the rest of the garden sleeps tonight
But I look forward
to the warmth of morning
the end of uncomfortable needing
and a brand new start
Please allow me your light
Only you can make it all right

Just as soon as this blows over
Just as soon as we get back under the covers
Just as soon as we get high
Just as soon as we learn to fly
Just as soon as we take a breath
Just as soon as we learn to accept
Just as soon as we have space
Just as soon as we have our own place
Just as soon as we slow it down
Just as soon as we come around
Just as soon as we allow each other to "be"
Just as soon as we can clear out the clutter and see
Just as soon as I stop burning and worrying
Just as soon as he stops controlling and hurrying
Just as soon as we put it into practice
Just as soon as we get active
Just as soon as our hearts speak louder than our voices
Just as soon as we make better choices


What about now?

Disappointment in your eyes
Because my delivery cuts you to the bone
Retreating from the war
In hiding just to be calm
The only safe place is when I'm all alone
Tired of fighting and taking it back
Tired of the fear and wringing my hands
The sickening feelings I feel waiting for the next attack
Displaced and disenchanted
Homeless in my own home

How can this last forever when forever hurts so much?

He pressed forward
beyond the worry
beyond the wonder
endured the pain

He pushed further
past the horror
past the heartache
into the vein

He left his ashes
on the altar
in the alley
near the stone

He cut her name
into the flesh
into the future
into the bone

strings of stars
delicate bones
the length of her locks
kept her chained and at home
trapped in a tower
of silence and stone

tendrils of fantasy
once drew him to her
now cut short with defiance
and wicked laughter
here now is the truth
not the vision you held tight
cruel thorns pierced my heart
and blinded your sight

the innocence of fantasy
long lost in the dark
blonde locks stained black
and scars where there were sparks
think twice the next time
you wish a savior would come
a better way to save yourself
would be to use your legs
and run

I've loved you for 22 years.
You're tattooed into my skin.
You put a black diamond on my ring finger.
And last night,
although you're still alive and breathing,
although I love you more than life,
I became a widow.

I'll never remove this ring.
I'll never remove my R tattoo.
And I'll never be the same.

May you always be
This precious to me
My sweet, darling lover
You take me over
So powerfully
Lie still with me sometimes
And when we walk, hold my hand
When I am hurting or angry
Try to soothe and understand
With each goodnight kiss
You seem to grant my every wish
Just give me your love
Keep me always in mind
And I will be the softest refuge
your heart will ever find

Deep, velvet darkness summons me
Although she will only tease and taunt
A black cloak of restlessness
Leaving me sleepless and filled with want
So many nights draped in such sweet longing
The taste of your skin on my breath
Hoping that this ache never ends
A dream we share that will surpass Death

Visions of a better life
A better day
A better love without decay
Room to breathe
Soothing relief
Renewed belief
Something to cure this pain
A magic pill or a drink
Time to think
To see clearly what's beyond
The dreary walls
The haunted halls
Cleanse my mind
of the memories
Something to help me, please

True love breaks your heart into pieces like nothing else.

Here is where it all begins
Back to the wall and in tears again
Feeling confined like a caged bird inside my glass coffin
Singing and pleading to be heard every so often
Oh how this silence, so deafening
Feels safe in its cruelty and listening
No fear and no demands within these walls where I wallow
Just control and defiance and feelings and words swallowed
I swear to myself "This is the last time."
But I prefer broken fairy tales over nursery rhymes
You said "Do what you need to get your mind right."
So I lie in wait on the promise of your fated, fantasy kiss
Here in our stifled and shielded unwedded bliss
Night
.... after night
      .... after night

We should be meeting in the middle
It should be like that all the time
But sometimes it hurts more than a little
When the darkness obscures the line
It's a sinking feeling
When all we're doing is clinging to the floor
Lowest of the low
Like there's no fight in me left to fight for
You can only go down so deep
Before you have to come up for air
Now I lay me down to sleep
Whenever I wake I hope you'll be there

It appears that I've gone dark again
Same familiar cage, same old cell
Lost inside my personal hell
Light a candle to show me the holes
This is how to deal with it
This is the only way I know
And it's just as well
Running into walls
Putting out fires
The edges of my heart are scorched
Torches lit and flickering at the pyre
Everywhere I turn
It's like a maze and I'm amazed
Should just give in to the burn
Torch it all
Let it all go
Instead of feeling frozen, fan the final flame
A cauterized and sterilized shell of my past
Nothing but embers, ash and shadow
This is the only way I know

I want to stop ____, but life has other plans.

(What do you wish you could stop doing, but you can't?)

The light leaves my eyes
in the wake of silence
Yet, the noise in my ears
is deafening
The pounding of my heavy heart
Defiant
Covert punishment
Tired of being tested
of being tempted
of being bested
So tired
But sleep won't come tonight
Not without a fight
I'll watch the hours pass instead
with unfeeling eyes
from an empty bed
while my need for resolve is slowly swept beneath forced phrases
Empty gazes
Frozen faces
Like thousands of silent, crawling insects
My mind and my body are restless
This is the sound of
refusal to accept
the denial
and the disconnect

Church bells on the evening breeze
Heavy hearted, ill at ease
All I want is your precious kiss
Save me, my Love
It's your touch that I miss
Bring the smile back to my face
Escape with me from this tearful place
My emotions are tattered
Mind filled with confusion and scattered
Take away what I need to erase
Give me hope and infinite trust
Tie my wrists with blood and lust
Tell me that you'll never run
Light my way despite the dying sun

do you ever wonder
what waits around the corner?
that dark smile that bleeds right after
your muse believes in you,
then leaves you while you have laughter
and laughs at you that much harder?
this blessed curse of happiness
the feeling of that shoe about to drop
the one where you can't quite rest easy
the car without brakes to make you stop
and the muse, she keeps on laughing
while you think you're really happy
in those moments when you think your dreams might come true
silly you
do you lose your muse when you're happy?
because i do.

In the dream, there was a pit in the middle of  the floor of a pitch black, empty room with peeling wallpaper of an indistinguishable color or pattern; charred fragments of paper floated on the hot air.

The pit was a giant, jagged hole in the weathered and blackened floorboards surrounded by smoldering embers. If you dared to look down, you could see traces of a winding staircase seemingly made of ancient, crumbling stone and black ash. The glow from the lava below was very nearly choked out by the ever-present black smoke that covered the walls and the floor...it filled the air in forked black ribbons.

I stared, terrified as my body hovered over the hole as if by some demonic, magical force that kept me suspended in the air about a foot above the floor. I wore nothing but a *****, tattered white gown, turned grey from the soot.

Barefoot and scarred, sunken eyes and a tangled, black mess of hair that met my ****** fingertips. I could literally feel my broken soul and my broken heart. They felt like brittle bones.

I was hovering over a pit of lost reason and lost purpose. I was ready to dive right in.

In between the raindrops
In the cracks where the ceiling stops
The lost hours that connected the night to the day
Dragged kicking and screaming back to the start
So many unfamiliar faces
Unwelcoming, unyielding traces
All of the off-limits places
I will never, ever let go of
the empty spaces you fill in my heart

Aren't you tired of "getting through it" again and again?

Dread.
It's usually the same.
Panic and anxious breath and
dread.
     dread.
          dread.
One day, I always say, we will want something better
Something healthier
Absent of accusation and blame and misperception
Something that lifts us up beyond this hurt
Allowing us to remember why I risked everything
Why we thought it was worth what it's worth
And why we hurt people - for years
Just to be together
Fate decided to twist our guts into knots instead of granting us peace and togetherness at last
Replaced by isolation and burning tears
And now Tuesdays are those confrontations with fate
Do we spend the rest of the time we have building walls, favoring hope, or taunting hate?

I know I'm not everything you expected
Maybe you lost hope long ago
I just hope you never regret it
And that you know I love you so
Can't take us back to the beginning
Can't rewind your mind
To those days when we couldn't stop grinning
All the time we lost, left behind
All we have is the now
And sometimes we forget how
To just be
To let it bleed the way we used to
I want to just try
Because for you, I'd bleed myself dry
I'm willing to keep up the struggle and the search
I don't care how much it hurts
If it will help you cut away the weight that drowns you
Instead of cutting the beautiful skin that surrounds you
Let it go
Let it go
Let it go
Because now that I know what I know
It's too close for comfort
Give it to me if you must
After all, I'm the one you trust
So let me take the pain that you've been buried under

The night ahead lays open like a rose
I can already feel the absence of my ecstatic throes
Crushed and forgotten like discarded clothes
Without you, my heart waits in restless repose
My far away eyes trained on distant shadows
Anticipating the warmth of our many tomorrows
How effortless the effort is to be so close
To know you in a way that no one else knows

The coming of dawn
And my mind lingers on
The set of hopes and dreams
We keep building upon
With every touch of your hand
I better understand
How much of yourself
You give to our plans
These long, quiet nights
Spent bathed in your light
Still living on your essence
Waiting for the time to be right
I want you to know
As we learn and we grow
That your arms are my home
There is no place I'd rather go