A wickerman of red wax
Flaming eyes, and flaming head
A chariot of blood for a king
An entourage of love for the prince
I ask of you
To love yourself
And say to me
Igni Ferroque

I am ignorant and selfish
A shattered heart, a broken branch
A circle of the world, bright and fading
A thunderstorm, a spark for a life
If you ask of me
To love myself
And say to me
In Absentia

Electricity runs in my blood,
Painting the trees a more vibrant green,
Than the unburning eye can see.
The taste of the air.
The burn of ice in my lungs.
The charge under my skin.
The world moves in slow motion,
But my heart beats fast in my chest,
And I feel warmth run to my upper lip.
The red is startling,
Sends my mind into fright,
But I soon relish in the feeling.
Seemingly alive for the first time.
Seemingly dying.
The feeling of birth and death as one.
The feeling of life and decay as one.
The feeling of adrenaline and sleep.
My hands are shaking.
My hands are shaking.
I got blood on my sleeve.
I want it in my mouth.
I put the fabric in between my teeth
And ****
But I can taste no copper.
I am trembling,
The chalk lodged in my throat.
I am flying high,
So high.
And know it will pass.
I am Icarus flying by the sun
I am Daedalus, ashamed of his failure
My fingers do not craft wings,
But words.
Endless, nonsense words
That my mind deems sensible.
But I am Newton.
But all things must fall,
And gravity has it’s hold of me.
It never brings me down gently.
All things must fall.
Even stars must fall.
Even stars.
Even angels.
Even lovers.
I love it,
love.
I love love.
I love to love.
I hate to lose.
I miss it.
I miss loving.
I miss falling.
I miss the natural drop.
This is artificial,
Electricity holding my wings aloft.
The wind whispers no poetry.
This is not beautiful.
This is not harps and angels.
This is not making love in the hay fields.
This is not a dive off of a cliff.
This is the bass in my ears.
The whispered hush in my head.
The shaking of my desperate legs.
And I hear the beat drop.
All things must fall.
All things must fall.
Even girls must fall.
Even boys must fall.
Even the place between must drop to it’s knees and beg.
See me.
See me.
Watch me as I burn myself to the ground.
Watch me hit the ground.
All things must fall.

Sweet silver tongued,
she walks by the bay,
invites all the gulls and the pipers to play.
She stretches a hand and th'overclouds give way.
She understands we all ache to obey.

Singing a song,
a ballad or two,
With wild abandon our volume, it grew.
Shushing and laughing we trip on the sand,
Cacophonous four legged marching band.

We sit for a moment,
Silence envelops, almost drowning the waves,
and I see
she is standing with anger,
anger that sends young men to their graves,
and is turning to me.

When her heart speaks,
it speaks oh so clear,
The sound of her voice echoes on in your ear.
Basorexic,
I admire her frame.
Mild alexic,
analytical games.

She leaves me alone,
and up on the hour,
the mood itself crumbled, acerbic and dour.
After she's gone I am tangled in gloom.
In the dusk of the sea
all the sailing ships spoom.

Walk by myself,
I sit with my face tilted up to the sun
beneath the crawling sky.
Heart torn to bits by
the wretched words spat out
before it begun
and you tell me not to cry,
livid and restless
from every ling'ring sound.
I close my eyes and I
try not the hear
this masquerade I have found
pecking and crowing, oh

please leave my mind.
For once, please be kind.
It seems that our long-fated stars weren't aligned.
Every love letter left patiently unsigned,
remains as a stain of a heart left behind.

Dust smudges my glasses
and your freckles burn my skin.
Through panes of glass the colours swirl,
bright hue of your skin,
deep brown of your eyes,
all things you own and I may never possess.
Differences in feel of fit and flesh,
knuckles on bone,
knuckles on lips,
lips on lips,
lips apart, breathing in the dirt.
Dirt in lungs,
in ribs,
in flesh,
in agony as the sun burns on.
But the dust smudges my glasses
and I cannot see.
You freckles, spots of ash, burn holes into my heart.

When she held me, I felt like an earthquake,
shrapnel cutting quick to the bone.
I’m disaster, an unknown
kind of danger is the most dangerous

When he held me, I felt like a riptide,
all control ran out the door.
With the *** and cappuccinos
I felt out of place in my new home

When she held me, I felt disgusting,
every move my own betrayal.
Yes, she hurt like a gunshot
but I did this to myself

When he held me, I felt strange,
like I should give my whole self.
He never asked, I’m thankful.
I don’t want to ruin everything else

When she held me, I felt like a secret,
like I was something small and wild.
In a room of screaming children,
we were something invincible

He never held me, but that’s alright.
Someone tell him I understand.
Take it slow, like we’re new friends.
I’m alive for once

No one touch me, I don’t want it.
Stop breathing down my neck.
My throat fills with *****,
But the hands never rest

No one touch me, leave me alone.
Stop pressing on my back.
There are thumbprints on my wrist bones
and handprints on my thighs

Don’t touch me when you aren’t here.
So many years have passed.
Is it trauma? I don’t care.
The filthy feeling always lasts

Don’t touch me when you aren’t here.
Nobody ever has to know.
When you’re sitting by your lonesome
Nobody cares, you’re on your own

Nobody cares, you’re on your own

You look me in the eyes and spit,
          And I kick dust on the wet spot on the ground.
This is how we are, a conversation; you never cared to call me something like my name.
           I never cared to see you in any way but under my boot with blood on your teeth.
               There is no moon above us, even when the sun’s gone to hide at the nearest bar.
This is not a war that can be won with pickets and strikes.
The only way to end the battle
                                                Is that someone has to die.
        A standoff only ends when one is left standing, it’s the rules,
but you never did care for rules, and breaking is easier than bending.
               You never apologize and I never want to hear those words come out of your mouth.
            The sun’s gone to hide at the local bar and it drinks whiskey shots like water.
It has seen us fight.
            The moon doesn’t want to come out, stays tucked safe in its bed.
It has heard stories.
                         Only the stars act as referee, calling out which one of us died better.
            It’s all an act, a ******* contest, and you sure are good at wetting the ground.
                 I’m better at covering up where the bloodstains were,
                         stain chicken feathers red as the sunset, Please, I ask you,
Let him win one last time.

                               The hourglass broke, the sand mixing with the red clay,
And you claim to know that his time is up.
                 I claim to know that you’re a lying ******* who takes what isn’t his.
                        And you claim that I’m just a child,
                                           but children don’t know why their knuckles are
bleeding
                                           and children don’t get why their jaws hurt
                                           and children only bleed when summer is restless
                                           and children never pull real guns anyway.
          You brought a knife to a gunfight,
                 a gun to face the firing squad, a one child firing squad,
                    knees stuck together with blood and chicken feathers.

Please, you ask me,
Let me win one last time.

                     And I learn that breaking is easier than bending;
And I learn how my name sounds on your lips.

They always ask questions
                Over and over again, questions are asked.
My lips a constant question mark, my hands a fleeting moment,
                 my hair ******* in thoughts I never question.
whether I am asking for knowledge or release or death is uncertain.
                               The last two are not mutually exclusive.
                                                             My bones are restless.
When she dips into the spaces between your ribs, digs out flesh and words with claws
                   I often wonder if you can even feel it.
                                        But my hair is too messy and requires my attention,
      My hands are too chapped for me to do anything but lick the cracking skin.
We are not an answer, and questions are not lifeboats.
         The sea is not afraid to toss and turn in its bed, drowning nightmares beneath it,
                                                             ­             But who are they?
                            My lips think they know, but they say nothing,
pinched into silence by something different than us, but not bigger.

                                       When our knowledge makes manifest something like peace
   I return to my whetstone, press my teeth to the grain, and wait for the storm to put me to sleep.