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Aug 2010 · 812
seven puzzles, four pieces.
Jackie McMahon Aug 2010
focus is lacking in this life I've been packing
I'm going on a trip out of my mind
and I'll take a gun, you know I've fired one?
but, only at tin cans, aluminum, to be exact.
Even so, the tin man would be okay -without a heart I'd say.
To live outside of feeling would be to dream and not wake up
to this nightmare
but then again we find our blood sometimes just to know if we are real
we take the pain sometimes to remember how to feel.
I'd rather bleed than love, to believe the painful conspiracies rather than what you might think of me.

What if I told you that this was all a dream?
Theres only you, there isn't me.
Why wouldn't you run and scream?
I'm not broken, I'd just rather not believe in me.
I'd not waste the postage on such a thing.
If the world is flat and everything is fake, am I here, or is this just a poker face?
Seven different puzzles, four different pieces, read them in fragments
oh -you'll never understand.
beats me.
Apr 2010 · 907
i think i should be caged
Jackie McMahon Apr 2010
something is so wrong here it physically hurts
i think i could be fixed, you know. i could tell someone, they could fix me.
I think it could all go away
oh I'm so convinced. and oh, how perfect it would be
pure transparency
i'm so much uglier on the inside, if you can believe that...
And its fixable I swear it probably is, but
i'm scared of what i might become
I could be fixed, you know
but then i'd lose it, all of the beauty,
i'm sure i wouldn't be able to see it anymore...

So I'll stay broken
i told you, i'm masochistic
And so far form what you could ever think
you don't get it, no, not even you.
I'm sorry, I might have lead you to believe there was beauty here.
Gosh, if you only knew...
if you could understand, you'd run
like i want to
don't you see by now?
I've never said so much **out loud.
handwriting makes everything pretty, even when its ugly typed...
Apr 2010 · 785
And for my friend...
Jackie McMahon Apr 2010
I can't say these things out loud,
or they will swallow me in their reality.
And I can't write about situations containing you and me
because you're the only one I trust
to read my poetry.
this is a weird, new take... hmm.
Feb 2010 · 1.0k
In order to fall asleep
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
I'm surprised, by what I let slip
"I want to cut my tongue open, and watch the blood drip."
Something here is incredibly wrong,

We're the same person, I swear,
but we're total opposites, like an oxymoron
or trying to read through a mirror.
Like that "***** at my school who died from an overdose of oxycotton."
She said so matter of factly.
As a matter of fact, his funeral was today.

I wonder who has lives outside of this one,
and what other worlds are like
I wonder if you notice coffee's bitter taste
I wonder where his is, and his stupid talent thats going to waste

When you lose your glasses, its harder to see
and when you lose your thoughts, its harder to be.
We only notice the problems of others, if we've been there ourselves
The only ones who notice, are the ones who understand.
But if you keep quiet, they won't cut you by the wrist
or take you by the hand.

"what does domestic violence mean to you?"
He said: "they don't ******' listen" and
I wanted to punch him in the mouth.
Jaded or not, I'm not going to like you,
as much as I thought I would.

If you know the answer, then the question is never good.
Don't mettle in things, if you don't think he should
Full Force Frontal Banger.
Oh, to fly..
More than a fender ******, to slap the face of the sky.

Its a simple wish, to cut my insides out,
and watch them squirm like worms for fish
For an answer you know you don't want to hear
The sounds of a head on collision, and the wind in your ear.

If you want to fall asleep, darling, you've got to close your eyes.
thoughts thoughts thoughts.
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
It’s a nightmare, its like everything was frozen here.
And I know you’re scared, but its involuntary,
I can’t stop this shaking.
I’m shivering because the frozen time gives me chills.
Cause when I come back to this place
I’m reliving former years yesterdays.

Its so much easier when I’m there to imagine
so much I can’t possibly fathom here.
Cause the static in my head makes it hard to get away,
I was sitting right behind you anyway.
The static in my head echos only the tempo and whip of your voice,
29 lashes, or is it 39 to the floor?
The only sound is here, everything else is covered in static,
or possibly dead.

I can’t shake this sound, I can’t keep my stomach towards the ground.
I’m shaking so hard, I’m violently trying to shake it.
My stomach is coming up through my throat and its yours for the taking.
I thought that maybe, I don’t know is was a stupid dream I guess.
But maybe, it’d get better when I left.
The thing that scares me the most is that I’m gone,
and I’m on my third page.
The thing that scares me the most is that I’m tripping through nightmares,
and its getting harder and harder to wake up.
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
It started with a phone call
Sent my hands shaking
Like his did, laying on that hospital bed
Like my voice did, the next day when I lied
About the truth.
The Truth.
The truth is that I was terrified
I was confused, I was hurt,
I was furious
And He was there,
but he wasn't…
He was there on that hospital bed
He was there with his hands shaking
He was there, his body convulsing
He was there, his wild blue eyes darting about the elevator
he wasn't there at all…

It started with a phone call
Your mom is coming, you have to go.
It must be an appointment
i couldn't think of one…
Is someone dead?
well no, not really...
We're going to the hospital
The hospital? I thought that was only for babies and old people
OCD, what's that? Oh, I mean, "O.D.'ed"
Same difference?
not really, no…

The next day, I lied.
I couldn't tell the truth,
The truth was hiding
Behind hospital doors, and hands that shook.
Hushed voices carried the truth in tones too low to be heard.
The truth attacked me at night
In memories that sent me shaking
Shivering so violently my mom got scared.              
The truth was blue
The truth was screaming at me
From the blue eyes of my brother
When he looked at me, and asked what it was like.
Not that he looked at me,
not really…
Feb 2010 · 1.0k
Color me poetry
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
Red white and blue
cloudy foggy blue can't quite see through, but
cutting through this impossible blue is pure white
blinding white of porcelin skin that's never seen summer time, and-
red, the color and brilliance of blood
slices through the blinding white
and she fades to black.

black, the absence of color, the abundance of relief
I needed relief she excuses, I just... I needed it to bleed
never meant for it to happen this way, she's addicted to the silver
not the silver lining on the clouds,
because storm clouds don't have a silver lining
when they're only black
and she can't differentiate between the colors
when everything is blue
a foggy mist she can't see through

she's just trying to break through, maybe even cut through
but all you see are the scars on your arms,
so stunned by your own assumptions you can't see through
your own fog, to the words on her lips
bandaged cuts can't keep her silent,
her sweet voice slowly seeps through:
this is my story, this is my song,
and if i were you, i'd never sing along.

because her favorite color is red as the relief spills through her veins
and the scars it leaves behind tell the stories
of regret that she can't run from
but she keeps on running,
cant catch her breath, can't catch a break
she paints pictures in colors of crimson,
on her arms she paints her life scene by scene
the pictures always change, but the captions stay the same:
"I, I needed it to bleed."

red relief comes in a line,
you cringe at her scars, but only she can feel them
sweet crimson relief, she can finally breathe
see, the scars on her arms tell a story in red, white and blue.
doesn't want to admit it but shes addicted to this feeling
she runs her fingers over the scars,
this is her 3 dimensional healing
and she, fades to black.
this poem is significantly less, because it was written for a class.
Feb 2010 · 584
whose to say whats broken?
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
she said to me
"just turn up your headphones, and dont think about it"
dont think about it?
well I dont believe they've made headphones that strong.
but I swallow my tears and turn up an angry song.
a song that screams, but not quite loud enough.

cause I can still hear the sounds, to this day I can hear the sounds.
of the table breaking,
the spirit dying,
the walls crumbling and the love fading.
"broken home" doesnt mean its really b..r..o..k..e..n.
we can fix it still.
I swear we can fix it

a naive heart can look past the scars on the arms,
and the writing on the ceiling.
the porch lights faded,
and the mail never comes,
the wounds are still tender,
it hurts too much to fix them now.

tear stains, like fresh blood, both leave a salty taste.
whose to say which brings  more pain?
the grand old trees cast shadows on this broken house,
to hide the parts we're not proud of,
fresh paint covers old scars,
and thoughts all but forgotten.

like a child playing games,
if you cant see the scars, then they're not really there.
until people start to walk your wall,
and the concentration breaks.

memories flood the pages of the paper you use to hide the wound,
a pen supplies the pressure.
when you write enough,
you lock it up in the parts that no one can see.

turn your headphones up and dont think about all the uncertainties.
wrote this kind of a long time ago..
Jackie McMahon Feb 2010
If I wrote a symphony, who would hear me?
If I wrote a book, would you take a look?
I don’t understand the constant novel of out lives,
the narration of our thoughts.
I don’t understand how you see life or how you see me.
The poetic discord that is our thoughts, the cymbals of our lives crashing together
do people think the way
I do? Surely, but who?

The fascination that comes
Could it ever be undone?
I’m confused on how I breathe, just being me,
I can’t escape the constant beating of my mind
my heart would skip a beat
if my pen did not teach me how to breathe.

And I’d like very much to..
Go through life as a paintbrush,
sending color to the darkness and the light,
to make a beautiful mess of this place.
To paint closed eyes open to a world that I can see,
to bring this vision out from inside of me.

But I don’t
Want to scare you with how I think
The monster consumes the air I breathe is ink.
Exhaling words on to paper that surrounds me
the chaos that controls my hands and lifts my feet
and takes me on a ride,
never far enough away from this constant I create.
This wonderland of absence to the fake.
My dreams make more sense when I’m sleeping
it gets hard to tell when I’m awake, even then I can’t help but shake. Trembling monster inside me, can’t hide me.
I’m lost. But I’d rather not find me.
Out loud

I’ll write it all down,
trying to match the rhythm of my hand to the pulsating thoughts in my brain.
Does anyone feel this way?
I’d like to show you…
I’m bleeding. Dripping. Painting a scene.
Oh, I’m painting a scene.
Its SO LOUD I wish it would SHUTUP
Shutup and let me breathe, I am painting, painting a scene.

Step into my eyes, I dare you.
I wrote this, so please don't take it.

— The End —