If consistency makes an artist,
then I shall never be one.

If it is pain,
then I once was one.

If it is love,
then why am I not still one?

Is true happiness not enough to fill an artist?

Is there more inspiration to be found in the dark- when there is nothing to see and everything to feel?

Has any artist ever been truly happy?

Must one suffer for their art?
More so, must art be a burden?
Then, was Christ, himself, an artist?

(My God, the burden he had to bear.)

Was Nietzsche right- that, poets exploit their experiences?

Why do we deprive ourselves of contentment, of sleep, of peace of mind?
Why do we **** our own bodies, poison our livers, starve our own souls in the pursuit of a muse?

We are, all of us, restless,
half-empty,
half-witted,
half-hearted,
fools,
that have fallen in love with pretty words.

Idolators, we are.

Sometimes, I wonder, if we're afraid that silence can ****.
Or that, if we're not screaming at the top of our lungs, we're not alive.

Idle pens are handicaps.
Idle minds- cancer.

We're all dying not to become utilitarians.
Ugly.
Artless.
lifeless?

We'll die just to hold onto the shadow of our own hopes and dreams.

If it is commitment that makes an artist,
then I shall never be one.

If it is wreck-lessness,
then I once was one.

If it is thoughtful articulation,
then why am I not still one?

I now know that,
I am not an artist.

I will not break my own heart.

I will not cut my own throat just to amplify my voice.

I feel like fanning flames and falling apart. Like, playing hours and hours of the saddest songs. Because life is an unfinished lyric, and nothing makes sense anymore.
It's drawing conclusions from empty wells and pretending to see that this love story holds any hope for you and me. When all that's left are empty holes and unfilled depths, because you can't fill me in and I can't fix this mess.
And looking back is like sitting on our hands and feeling we've struck gold. When all we're really doing is staring at the dead end of a gravel road.

black top hats and heretical clowns
surprise! the circus is back in town
ladies and Gentlemen- we've a show tonight
so bed the kids and dim the lights

hotel ballrooms and cheap champagne
silhouettes of Falsehood and the infamous Fame
a gallery of harlots and libertines
blessed with the curse of controversy

suicidal salvations and casualties
religion built the bomb that burned the buildings
a ballet of East making martyr of West
they pulled their own trigger- shot themselves in the chest

creaky pulpits and dusty pews
a prayer to be one of the Chosen Few
but holy water won't cleanse these Sins
in time, all shows must come to an end

so bed the kids and dim the lights
it's time for a panicked revival tonight
clasp your hands- bound by rosary beads
baptism- your wants, prostitution- your needs.

laugh with me
at these childish mistakes
innocence is bliss
...or so they say.

for we are young
but not quite as free
as this, our love,
demands us to be

for you must live
and to live, must leave
and a companion to you
I cannot be

but I cannot ask
for you to stay
"I'll wait for you"
is too easy to say

but soon we'll look back
on these memories
for love stories like this
make life worth living.

summer was bittersweet
as she tasted independence
and limped on broken limbs

she learned the landscape of other bodies
drank the wine of foreign tongues
crippling beautiful souls, a mere ******* herself

she bared skin, grew out her hair
as she kissed a boy she had wished she could love
she tossed and turned to nightmares of dreams now come true

she discovered the duality of loneliness
and the complexity of affection
while soaking up the sun on florida beaches

now she's left with the remembrance of september sweethearts
and nights filled with uncontrollable tears
she asks herself if she regrets a single moment...

of a bittersweet summer vacation...

she could say she was sorry, but she knows an apology isn't what anyone is looking for.

bittersweet, she can't say this isn't what she wanted after all