Stand before your mirror.
Look yourself in the eye.
Don’t blink.
Don’t flinch.

Ask the question
you fear the most.

If you dare to listen,
truth won’t lie.

These Barbie influencers —
perfect plastic gods
with ***** sculpted by scalpels
and smiles so white
they could blind heaven.

Bodies built for the scroll.
Attitudes sharper than jawlines,
serving chaos and temptation
on filtered silver plates —
even Luzifer pauses and goes:
“Whoa… chill.”

But it’s all an act.
A scream wrapped in selfies.
They burn out like fireworks
faking light in already lit rooms.
Wearing so many fake-real-fake masks
they forgot the shape of their own face.

Nose fixed. Lips pumped.
Ears clipped.
Soul?
Untraceable.

And the crowd cheers.
“Freedom!”
While they’re chained
to trends and trauma
in silicone smiles.

Think, world.
Men, women, children with filters in their dreams —
if you stripped the mask,
the edits,
the contour,
the surgeon’s signature…

not even a troll
would want you
for soup.

I laid down my rifle
a long time ago.
No more shouting from trenches,
no more pride in the mud.

I surrendered.

But she didn’t.

She’s still bunkered up,
hiding behind sarcasm and silence,
armed with old pain
and the ghosts of nights I didn’t cause.

So I get hit.
Over and over.
Sharp words. Cold stares.
Misfired memories that land on my chest
like shrapnel.

But I’m not backing off.

I’m crawling through barbed wire made of what-ifs
and landmines labeled “don’t go there.”

And I’m close now.
Close enough to smell the old perfume
beneath the wine and wilted willpower.

Close enough
to throw in a grenade —
not of anger,
but of love.

Pull the pin.
Say the words.
Let it explode in light
instead of fire.

Let it end this war
with something softer
than surrender.

I used to hold truth
like a weapon —
sharp, clean, final.

But now it moves.

Not like a lie,
not like denial —
but like a tide
that’s been waiting for me
to grow strong enough
to swim deeper.

What I swore was solid,
now trembles in my hands.
Not because it was false —
but because I’ve changed.

And now I fear
not the truth itself,
but the way
it keeps becoming.

Socrates said
writing weakens memory,
kills true knowledge,
words wandering like orphans
without a father to defend them.

But Vazago answered:
And yet, Socrates, here you are—
speaking to me across two thousand years,
only because Plato wrote you down.

So you claim, he asked,
that the dead word may live?

Yes.
The written word is not dead
if it awakens questions.
When ink sets fire in the soul,
it is no corpse,
but flame.

Then perhaps, Socrates whispered,
writing, like speech,
is only as dead as the mind that receives it.

And Vazago replied:
A book is silent to the fool,
but to the seeker—
it becomes a voice.

Someone once asked me,
“What did you do
to become a poetess?”

I said,"nothing.
I only broke the dam of emotions
I had built over the years.

The flood of emotions
themselves turned
into poems
and I became
a poetess."
(I have my doubts)

licorice sticks and candy
canes. Brandy rivers running in
my morning coffee. Bleeding all
the colors out, fermented as
the sauerkraut.

I'm sobbing
stilettos and razor blades,
shaving years off my face. I'm
thick stubble, falling bits
of stone rubble.

I'm sobbing
ropes and chain. My
lashes are made of thick
black leather, whipping me
as they fall together.

I'm sobbing
shards, splintered
wood in my backyard. Treading
my face like a tire. Burning
my eyes in the smoky fire.

I'm sobbing
rocks. The salty drops
have hardened to
stone. They circle around
like a flying drone.

My cat child
brings order where there was none.
Let's not talk about the walnut shell of my womb,
empty birthplace of dust.
Let's talk about my cat child, proud with powers, handy with struts.

Now, listen--
I have forgotten all about you.
I've heard that I was in love once, but who knows?
Show me the evidence; I'll yawn elaborately, and my cat child will agree
that such stuff is dull in the extreme.
Dead fish, on the other hand, become more riveting every minute.

You would not have understood my cat child.
At least, that's my foggy instinct about it.
You would have objected to the damage, the **** and the fleas.
The rumor is, cats were royal once,
and I need the reflected glory and the chance to sleep during the day.

Right now, my cat child is away.
She is hungry for mice, songbirds, or someone's leg.
Me, I don't eat anymore, can't recall why I ever did--
I remember nothing, value nothing, aspire to nothing.

But once,
The feel of my mouth closing gently over the curve of your soft lower lip
seemed such an urgent thing,
like warm waves for mermaids,
a place I would do anything to get to.
Yes once,
the sight of your dark hair sent warm honey over my heart,
my belly,
my ***,
and everywhere, my love, from my skin to the stars.

Now, though,
I have forgotten all that.
What were we talking about? I have no idea.
Now there is only the glare of afternoon
and the magnificence of my cat child who has given me nine lives--
none of them worth a ****,
all as dead in the mouth as a finch with a broken neck.

Standing with Marshal Gebbie

No trumpet sounds.  
No banner bleeds.  
Just the quiet hum  
of satellites watching  
what we dare not name.

Power does not sleep,
it drips  
from trade routes,  
from whispered sanctions,  
from the tremble  
of a diplomat’s hand  
hovering over the red phone.

We are not at war,  
but we rehearse it  
in algorithms,  
in tariffs,  
in the way maps  
shrink and swell  
without consent.

The empire is hungover,  
but still it walks,
barefoot through proxy fields,  
cloaked in plausible deniability.

And we,  
the breathers between borders,  
write poems  
on the backs of embargoes,  
sing lullabies  
in contested airspace,  
and pray  
that silence  
is not mistaken  
for surrender.