it's mad season here
& the trolley's
on fire;
her follies were not
strong enough
to keep the car on
the wire

the paintings have
chipped,
much akin to her
mentality
all senses long
since flown
as she broke from
her reality

"it's hell here on
this earth,"
she whispered to
the storm
but on it raged
& on it raged
with no hope yet to
be formed


& she could never quite
forget about
Mars

"the lightning may strike,
my love;
but someday it will all
be ours."

I can't help but to
lend a bit of
laughter
to the things that try
to ****;
the things that try
to deliver
me to my maker in
bows
& ribbons

little do they know
for thirteen years I've
competed heavily against
them

& I always aim to
win

but still they come, the
trials and the errors
lilting one by two
by four
by twelve

they wait for me when I
am weak
& my demon takes
the helm

I can never escape
the swell

the raging, burning tide
she laughs now,
edging towards the
shore

& all that aches inside
my blood
could never sate her
more

and I pray and I pray
and I pray and I pray
and I pray
just to get up
from this *******
floor

something about how the day
hovered above
& around; it
perched
upon her shoulder


jaded comes as jaded grows
much more so when
you're older, the
vultures ever
closer
than she could be
to his breast

god, why can't she
put this ****
to rest?!


this sick sick
sad sad thing
living deep inside
her chest

"if you've ever
stepped out into
the sunlight
& felt it trying to
bring you to
life
& you sensed the
kiss of it on the
edge of your shoulder,
yet still did not
react

you've lived a similar pain as I

"& if you close your eyes
does it always
seem like
nothing's changed at all"
if you've ever felt
your organs writhe in pain
with every day that follows
a hard night
& swim right back to
the bottle again

you've been dealt a similar hand as I

& if you've ever loved
so intensely
to see that love built
its own pyre
& lit itself ablaze;

leaving
you with the
ashes


you might not have survived either

if you watch closely;
cautiously,
it all simmers deep into
the knife
& the chalice
you can only compel
the limbs that still long
to be held
without consequence
of malice

& oh, how it still simmers
in you, baby.

we lay our weapons
down as our
kisses melt to frowns
to wonder if we just might
need them, maybe

can we control that path?
can we trim up all
the edges
to avoid the ****** bath?

you plot your grave
far from my skin
& my armor is too small
for a heart so
flushed with sin

when will we raise the
shield again?
for yet, my love...


I cannot let you
win.

the clock looms above me
& ticks into my
blood

they say when you feel
"empty"
you should have
another one

but when fortune would
not have me,
fate took me by
my hand

they said when you feel
"empty"
you should find a place
to land

but fate's intangible
grasp; it tricked
me--
led me down a
cursed path

they whispered if you're
"empty"
you should use some of
that wrath

now I stay inside my
chamber
pleading, sobbing for
love lost

they say when you feel
"empty"
you're probably paying
a cost

but I still sing into
the autumn wind;
my soul its
melody


I said I feel so
"empty"

dear gods please
just let me
be.

when I went to New Orleans last year I
visited the Voodoo Museum.
aside the lobby that had an area for
tarot/palm/misc. readings.

while I waited to pay for a mojo bag
filled with herbs and blessed for
protection and power;
a man walks in.

he looked like hell.

he rang for the reader
& she let him in.
they seemed familiar with each other.
I could just faintly hear him
beyond the curtain.

"I got the worms. I can feel them. they're all inside me!"

she then began to discuss remedies
& all I could think was,
"this must be a show." the privacy curtain
didn't conceal their conversation.

it wasn't until much later,
closer to recently,
that I began to realize...

...the worms are very real.

& they eat us from
the inside out.