Twenty-four.
A number just one before
twenty-five.
A number that signifies
one quarter
of one-hundred,
-in this case-
years of age.

I've circled the sun so many times
that time itself has begun to blend together:

Days spilled into
                       Weeks cascaded into
                                                    Months plunged into
                                                                                  years; incalculable.

I neglect to mention that throughout it all I have,
in fact,
been vaguely happy at worst and genuinely blissful at best.

And so I say to thee;
If on your birthday you cannot breathe,
If every moment is lost with ease,
I implore you, see the cost of these
things-and learn to set yourself free.

Temptation tastes like tangerines;
Sweet-**** and tingly,
yet the strongest flavor of all is regret.

The rain comes down like tears from her Eyes in April.
Her Smile is a crack in the street after a long Winter.
Her Mind is crumbling like a sandcastle on the beach during August.

"I'm fine..."
No I'm really not
"I'm happy I promise!"
Another lie
Why do I lie?
I guess to hide them from the horrid truth of the pandoras box that is my mind...

Tomorrow looms as if it is a storm cloud. Perhaps I should ask what will come of this storm, or perhaps I should just wait it out...

You know when the storm hits it will destroy everything in it's path.

But remember destruction always brings new growth.

Tomorrow looms as if it is a storm cloud. But as far as I know, storms always end with a rainbow.

T is for the way that you cry upon my shoulder when he doesn't treat you right
O is for the only one i see regardless of how blind you might be to it
X is for the crossing we came too so many months ago
I is for just how much I love you even if you can't see it
C is for caring about you even when we came to that crossing and we cried together in the night because we failed to march on.

Poor bluebird...how late you were to your own party;
I see her standing there on the dance floor, alone.

just Turn and see me, Oh please just turn, lets give that Crossing another shot, I need you Can't you tell?

Coffee daydreams,
Burnt beans-
Ripped seams,
and holy jeans.

Not Jesus jeans,
No-silly things
a state of being-
Made in my genes.

From Constantin-
Opal rings
to all the things
That leave me aching-

-My personality
      is split
           between
                what I believe in
                     and what I belong in.

                          A war of the worlds-
                               Neither of which
                                   are the best of either.

Welcome* to the dragons den...

Nobody ever told me when I was born,
That there would be times when the place where I was welcome would fill with fire...
My mother was diagnosed with cancer when I was very young,
She passed away when I was nine...
My father blames me everyday, he calls me a curse

So now I believe that I am worth nothing...

When I was 13 my soon to be stepmom had a stroke,
She was euthanized no more than 2 months ago...
My father blames me everyday, he calls me a curse

I am sure of it now I was an accident...

Today was my birthday, My father called me an accident...

You have no idea dad...no idea...

The air swirls above me a charcoal black tainted with moonlight:
Why am I awake I whisper aloud...
The pills didn't work again,
Time to take more I guess...

1 Pill
        2 Pills
                 3 Pills
                          4 Pills
                                   5 Pills
I remember you said never take 6,
But black is my favorite color, you would know...
6 Pills
The air swirls black around me one last time as my eyes close forever.

*Goodbye

Why is it the Moon stays with the Earth?
Why is it that gravity, the weakest of all the forces can hold two Giants together?
Yet chemistry, one of the greatest forces of love, fails to hold so many together...*

Thoughts at the cusp of tomorrow.

Perhaps one might wonder why the world is filled with people whose only emotions are hate and rage...

Where have those that care gone you might ask?

*Oh they are still there, they just hide from those that hurt them.

"Carve the iron from my bones"
I wish there were another way

"Mold me, clay-like, into the idol of your adulation"
My skin burns from murderous hands

"Things bend and break at your wanton will"
Skeletal snapping fills the dusk

"Drain me of my marrow by 'morrow"
I'm running out of wishbones to believe in.

"I won't be me by morning"
But that's ok, because I've only ever wanted to be you.

-C

Across the sea my lover awaits me,
Its funny you see how many might agree.
Perhaps she'll run to my side,
She'll kiss me on the cheek and hop in my car.
Of course then we'll go for a ride,
Only stopping for a few drinks at a bar.

Upon these far flung shores my lover waits for me,
Just how long she'll wait we will have to see.

10:00 P.M. "Goodnight mom, goodnight dad!"

11:00 P.M. ZZZZZ

12:00 A.M. Awake with a start, can not sleep, go for a walk.

12:36 A.M. Arrive home, go back to bed, still unable to sleep.

1:06 A.M. Pop pop papapappapappapa pop pop pop
What was that noise? gunfire? No not in Urbandale, impossible.
From mother and fathers room, "That was gunfire...should we call the police? no someone else probably has lets go back to bed..."

5:40 A.M. "Ring Ring Ring"  *Two police officers were killed ambush style, one on 70th and Aurora the other on Merle Hay and Sheridan.

My decisions have shaped me,
They have been decisive in my life.

Deciding whether or not I'd take the cigarette,
Whether or not I'd take the shot.

Decisions make up half of your life,
The other half is out of your control.

I Didn't decide to have an abusive father,
One who hits me, bruises me, breaks me.

But here I am, an angel fallen from heaven,
Wings broken not by my own decisions but by others.

Clumsily, cluelessly, capriciously;
Varying walks of life, and such varied
ways of walking. Crawling and or quickly-
they advance through the concrete corridors.

~Completely unaware of the outside world
or anything other than themselves, for that matter.~

The issue lies in the wanting of more.
I've not much left to give and I'm sickly
'cause everybody's got their friends-big leagues.
From me to you, its not simple. Like harried
marriage; marred and probably charred, but

this is war-
~extra judiciously~

What a guy,
Me oh my.
His hands move fast,
Makes me want to cast,
A line into the water avast,
Ye matey he is the most ashen fellow
My god sometimes he looks quite yellow;

When the trumpets blare,
He gives them a stare,
And the words we fear,
He says just loud enough to hear,

I have never been so disappointed in my life,

Oh boy what a tear.

The lies in my eyes are as bright as day,
Yet you follow.
The heart that's been beaten to much to even bother to beat itself,
Yet you try.
The mind set on believing that he is nothing and will never be anything but nothing,
Yet you don't give up.

This never-ending passage way of corrupt hearts and broken promises,
Yet there you are.

It's funny how life has a way of giving things to one that they do not deserve,
Yet here we lie, together.

Your eyes are my sinkhole in which I get lost, but it isn't a bad lost, no.
It's the kind of lost that makes you feel like you're walking on clouds, the kind of lost that I wish to be.

Your eyes are my sinkhole,
*Yet I have never been so alive...

Me*
I'm a sapling kicked, snapped in two where the heart turns blue.
To you I'm a chance taken, A chance for love to again bloom from my infertile heart.

You are my true love, the only one I see.
The one for me, won't you be?
Do you get *me?

The pen, his instrument of self destruction. He holds it between his feelings and his lies. Perhaps if you look closely you will see that his ink is running out.

What's left of his ink bleeds out onto the paper as if his own wrists were slit by the words that he writes...

The one that bleeds the longest is usually the one who smiles the widest.

Your third eye is closed,
Shut by the constant
Wave of conformity
thrashing around you.

They say that your memories prevail over all other things.

These memories that hold every experience and idea that your brilliant mind ever brought to life.

Painful ones, sad ones, joyful ones, wistful ones, all this because your mind is a vault.

Watching someone die changes you, for the better or for the worse that's your choice.

I've watched someone die; in fact it was one of my best friends whose last breath fell from his lips with the words "I'm sorry" drifting on the stale air.

My mind has stowed this memory into a vault and has never once let it out to play.

Now, it is playing.

His face, the way he smiled and made you laugh, his name rolled off the tounge like water.

My happy memories are hardly enough any more...

How about the time that I was mentally and emotionally abused by a woman who I believed loved me for me.

Instead she took my heart and twisted it into the shape of gun that fired into my mind the day she left.

My memories were scrambled, turned inside out, unfixable;Broken. Beyond. Repair.

I have so few happy memories left untainted, so few.

Everytime I get sad it doesn't just stop; it spirals, uncontrollably, and quickly into Oblivion.

My memories have been tainted, I recommend you hold on to every one of the happy ones you've got left.

Good luck...

How do I exist?
questions of reality;
At night and alone.

I sit here and write
in a room too dark, not white.
Minus love and minus quite
-a lot of (other) things-

I built this chair I sit in
in this room too dark, not white.
A place I've never been in,
-and that is not alright-

I built the desk too.
Mahogany wood and burnt tears;
A brew of epic proportions. It's true.
-and you, I fear, are soon to disappear-

Anxiety in my extremities
a familiar ringing in my ears,
I just wish it would all freeze.
-But that certainly won't stop these tears-

And I doubt much of anything will-
or would

Warmth on the back of my neck, the sun beating down on the scorched asphalt.

I'm waiting for something, for someone to get here...Oh is that them in the distance?

The shimmering mass moves closer and closer, it's so close I could touch it!

My fingers glance along the edge and I feel a warmth on my lips and then, it is gone.

Whatever it was it was moving to quickly to hold on to but there is a feeling of longing inside me.

I find myself whispering under my breath *please come back...i need you...

When I first met you, your eyes shone with the beauty of the stars twinkling above me.
As time passed the shine began to fade, as I got to know you I learned of why.
Why, I ask...do people beat upon you?
It was as if I was watching your world burn
I lost you for a while, and for months on end I wondered if you were ok...
The next time I saw you, it was as if your heart was as cracked as the sky before a storm...
Why, I ask...do people beat upon you?
I wished to help you more than anything else But I never got the chance
Now as we sit here in limbo, I watch your heart bleed the tears your eyes will not shed.
It
kills me
To see you this way...

Genetically predisposed to be overtly critical of everything
while also severely hindered by crippling social anxiety.

I've never been to therapy
nor a psychologist
not even a mystic-
and I know the last one's probably  
a fraud: but the effort is, at least, somewhere near
sincere.

Adjacent, perhaps.
 
I might even be riddled and rotted
through and through,
by the experiences that have shaped
my soul
yet I know-
that I still know nothing
at all.

If there's truth to my reality, and it's not some story I've concocted,
then the reality is that I am simply me, and I have certainly NEVER...

been to therapy.

Shredded in parts-
That piecemeal heart
Her gorgeous art

Peace
Piece
Pees
P’s

Four meanings
Same sound;
Seem familiar?

Cold air hits the cheeks of the boy as he runs from his dreams,
The laughs of the other kids come from behind him,
*****, ******, ******! Those are the words he hears as he runs faster and faster trying to escape.
Some of his friends fall off the tightrope, some hold on with only one finger.
But he keeps running and running and running.
He takes one last look behind him and witnesses one of his best friends slip and fall towards the Earth.
Falling, falling, falling but no noise ever rises from below. That was when the boy changed…

Every morning had been a struggle, but now it was as if he had the strength to do anything...he was invincible. But his friends were not... His friend’s ghost, the one he had lost, the one who had fallen. It was as if he appeared in every dream, his eyes so full of pain as if he was still alive. This broke him apart inside, but the mask on his face kept his family and other friends satisfied. But every once in awhile, his mask would crack and his friends would ask, “Are you ok?” And his response varied from yeah, I’m fine to of course you know me...
But
He
Was
Lying,
And
Nobody
Could
Tell...
But one day he decided to throw away that mask and just live his life. His friends saw his pain and instead of laughing they comforted him. He slowly shedded all the weight he carried on his back like the titles of ******, ******, ******, ugly, none of that was true and he knew it...

His friend’s ghost visits him less now, but when he does there is so much less pain in his eyes. *Instead there is happiness, because his friends haven’t fallen with him.

What is love?
Baby don't hurt me...don't hurt me...no more...

Sometimes song lyrics are so truthful,
They tell the story of my life they really do..

I am broken in two you know this,
Don't you?
Perhaps I don't show it well enough.
But I know if i did you'd call me crazy and leave...

What is love?
Baby don't hurt me...don't hurt me...no more...

Even the simplest things hurt sometimes,
A single misspoken word sends chills down my spine,
I know I'm not perfect, don't try and tell me I am.
I'll never believe you because my whole life I have been misunderstood and ugly.

What is love?
Baby don't hurt me...don't hurt me...no more...

Go directly to go, collect 200 dollars,
That isn't really how chance works though is it.
I took a chance on you...fell in love, with you...
You didn't take the same chance on me,
It was like you were locked in mortal combat with the words pain and suffering, and I was the bystander.
I knew deep in my heart I could change that if I tried hard enough...
I'm sorry...
It wasn't hard enough...
I still remember the night you called me up crying because you'd broken up with the one you "loved"
I remember when you said you hated me, I remember when you called me on halloween night and said you loved me. Just how fast my heart went when I heard those three words. It was insane.
I was insane thinking I could get you...
But hey I took a

*chance...

Alcohol is the devils brew,
I will never drink beer,
I will never get wasted...

His breath is sour,
His voice is raised,
My cheek stings from a slap...

Poison spills from his lips,
Alcohol spills from his bottle,
Fire spills from his eyes...

Though I can't blame him,
His father beat him as a child,
He grew up with it...

Shut the **** up you mother ******* liar!
I didn't do it dad I swear!
Shut the **** up I know you did!

Running,
Panting,
Crying...

I fall in the snow,
I can't feel my feet,
My hands are bloodied...

Alcohol is the devils brew,
I will never drink beer,
I will never get *wasted...

In every dream I have you are there, awash with silver moonlight...
Your eyes shining like stars in our own personal universe,
Our fingers intertwine like galaxies webbed with love and longing.
Our bodies pull closer to each other with the strength of black holes, whilst our lips meld together like new suns.
We stay like this orbiting each other until morning comes...

Get out of my house!
I hate you...
You won't go anywhere you **** idiot!
I don't understand...why father do you hate *me?

You see my mind is as scarred as my wrists.
Abuse
That word is more family then my father.
Failure
Its my middle name.
Mistake
I am one.

His words leave open wounds on my mind,
Fresh blood oozing through the cracks in my mask.

Hey I'm fine I promise!
I'm fine!
I'm...
I......

I'm scarred and this is my story.

Home is where the heart is
That's what they always say.
I've seen hate and love and to my own dismay
Families broken by the very thing they live for. This

Very idea that builds and binds us to a social contract
Of how we are supposed to feel and act.
For me, I deny their existence until it comes crashing down
Upon my shoulder that I hold so high.

Take for example gravity,
The weakest force known to man
But still it holds planets together.
Then there is love...

Love: the strongest force of attraction known to man.
It holds more mass and meaning than the most dense star,
And drags people in faster than a black hole,
Yet it can't hold people together, I wonder why must that be...

A troublesome tempo
that I so coolly kept
locked 'way inside my chest
for far too long-
Brought forth in time, at your behest.

Those silvery eyes must truly be
like slivers of marbles made from the
dawn high. As if an angel -in perpetuity-
had plunged from the heavens
directly to me.

She is soft, like the beat of a butterfly's wing-
and her hair, it flows like water in the wind, though
the greatest thing of all
which will, or won't, appall,
is by luck alone I've somehow become her beaux.

And truth be told,
She's got me sold.

There is so much more to me than meets the eye,
I’m like a punch bowl spiked with too much liquor.
One mixed drink later and my feelings are all over the place,
Bipolar, ADD, Depression...All these labels on me.

“Are you ok?”
Yes of course
“You sure?”
Yes! (No)

Depression hits me like a train sometimes,
Just out of the light and into the blue.
I mean, I am like the train in a sense,
My problems can’t find room on the inside anymore so they cling to me on the outside…

“Are you ok?”
Yes of course
“You sure?”
Yes! (No)

My tears fall like rain from my clouded eyes,
It’s not drought season yet dear.
When will it be?
Will it ever be?

“Are you ok?”
Yes of course
“You sure?”
Yes! (No)

It’s finally light outside,
The clouds are gone.
“Hey you? Wanna go for a ride?”
“Sure just hold on!”

“Are you ok?”
Yes of course
“You sure?”
Yes!
This time I am...

On a hot day in July I stood with my hands in my pockets and my mind in the clouds. It felt like I had the world at my finger tips and perhaps for the first time in a long while, I was happy.

Surround yourself with friends and family, let go of all of your dark thoughts, because I did, and look where it got me.

It is on starry nights like these that we look upon the sky with wonder in our eyes.

Nights like these that lips crack apart and form the smiles of countless children.

Nights like these where hearts are broken... and mended...

*Come young one, for morning will arrive soon and we have much to do.

A knife sharpened not by grindstone but by the words that flow from the mouths of ones peers.

The blood drips a pitter-patter rhythm on the floor

Your skin splits where the knife meets it, the immense feeling of euphoria as the blood flows down your wrists.

The Tears fill your eyes as you know you've failed

The knife drops from your hand and falls to the floor covered in blood.

You can feel your life slipping away from the slits in your wrist

Your knees buckle under the weight of your problems and you fall upon your hopes and dreams.

You cry tears of hatred and self-loathing while you lie bleeding to on the floor of your bathroom, alone

You stand up with wobbly knees and cover your wrists with a shirt to staunch the bleeding.

*Finally you can feel your mind putting the mask over your face that tells everyone, "I am ok..."

Can you feel it?
The Moons tears?
Falling onto your face...
Touching your soul...

With a heart broken so many times,
It's a wonder you haven't...

Can you feel it?
The Moons tears?
Catching in your hair...
Sparkling in your eye...

Take my hand if you want to live,
Because I know I do...

Can you feel it?
The Moons tears?
Filling your heart...
Leaving no holes...

~Driven to make decisions
that decided the fate of me~

~I've entered into twilight
Left alone with only debris~

~Believe me when I tell you
there is nothing - like being free~

~And if you ever hear it
That sound we've come to know,
there's nothing could prepare you-
-We've got nowhere left to go.~

I promise,
Give up;
I will never
Love you.
I will always find a way to
Hate you.
It makes me sick thinking about how people could,
Even find it a joy;
To spend time with you,
I will always want
To tell you that,
It makes me happy.

A series of un-
Fortunate events, they say;
can change your whole world

There was an old man of Des Moines,
A little thief stole all his coin;
But he cried, 'little thief,
I will give you much grief!'
That oh so poor man of Des Moines.

The wine stained his lips like
blood
His eyes a wild red full of hate
spills
He doesn't throw physical punches  
not
He hits emotionally and shoots holes in your confidence
just
Love is only a word he knows when he isn't drunk
from
His anger is your burden
open
What did i do wrong father
wounds
you were an idiot...
*it spills from your soul which has been shredded by the same people you cared about

Cold sweats-forgotten regrets
miscellaneous thoughts about
all of the rest of my ****** debts
that I don't even owe to you, or anyone else,
for that matter.

For this matter, it doesn't matter what I think
or what actions I take, or don't take,
wishy-washy is my middle name
and sometimes
-it feels like you hardly know me-
my greatest friend: anxiety.

You've ground my teeth to dust
and creaked my bones the last,
I've done crawled out of bed
-which for quite long you've asked-
Take a long look at all the nothing
I've amassed.

Lately my years, they've blended together.
An amalgam of my bittersweet thoughts
too tasteful so that taste itself becomes meaningless,
a blur of flavors, a blur of time, a blur
in the sole blink of a singular eye-

-General-eyes-d Anxiety.