I'd like to tell you a story
It begins in 1492
When dear old Christopher Columbus
Sailed the ocean blue

He landed on what he thought
To be the country of India
He stumbled upon a group of people
Who appeared to be indigenous

Because these native people
Happened to be where he thought he was
He called them all "Indians"
&& somehow that name stuck

They welcomed his group with open arms
Even offered them their feast
Unaware that deep inside
They were but wolves, dressed as sheep

Columbus && his crew
Soon ravaged the land
They took what they saw
Then they took full command

Of the people they found
On the land where they landed
They felt they should rule
So they stepped in, heavy handed

They murdered the people
Who had taken them in
Set fire to their villages
While the victims watched with their kin

Flash forward to the future
It's now 2016
It's been over 500 years
Since the overtaking by the regime

Future settlers decided
To let the survivors live on
They designated them small areas
Of what had not yet been robbed

These Native Americans,
Generally keep to themselves
They get by living off their land
But now they need your help

The Sioux of Standing Rock
Are being horribly mistreated
The state of North Dakota
Is poisoning them without reason

A pipeline has been built
That runs through this Native territory
When Bismarck residents didn't want it
It was rerouted, how discriminatory

People from all over the country
Are seeming to agree
They are making the commute
To protest peacefully

In defense of an oppressed people
Who only want to live
But the government is stepping in
Even blowing off some limbs

"Let them die, they're not like us"
the message the administration is sending
It seems that after all this time
The battle is never-ending

What exactly does it take
For people to see eye-to-eye?
In the end we're all just human  
We kiss, we laugh, we cry

So if you have a heart at all
If you know that this is wrong
Please join the Sioux in their mission
By coming together, we can be strong

Sometimes I smell your hair
and pretend to lay my
chest against you

like on those nights after
building  a pine  fence
around the yard

of  a Baptist preacher’s
house in Georgia
forty miles

from cold beer and café pie,
and then I remember that
was 20 years ago

before you and me
drove different
highways.

Scratches on the wall, each one a tiny indention of my life. The bars that I look through are not my prison. The thoughts inside my mind are what hold me. Remembering the tears of my children as I was lead away in chains. Hearing the screams of my mother as she disowned me in anger. Feeling the separation from the emotional ties that bound me closely with the ones that used to love me. Knowing that someone else is filling the void that I left in the wake of my incarceration. Each scratch in the wall, is a day off of my life. Each mark in the hard concrete reminds me of the things that I should have done. All I am doing is marking time, in a prison of my own making.

i wish you'd cut it out, causing me all this misery
you found cutting my heart out pretty easy
it's like bending over backwards with a paralysed spine
i'm in agony every second we talk and you're doing fine

you were nothing to me for so long but now it's like i need you
and i hate you for making me feel so dependent on somebody but god i love you
and it's killing me, it's killing me to think about how easily you could leave me
interspersed between moments of numbness, i'm overwhelmingly angry

while you're curling your tongue around double ended swords sheathed in honey
my chest is throbbing with all the wounds i'm hiding under fake smiles and hoodies;
you make your silver tongue's stab wounds seem sweet
it's only after you've inflicted them upon me that i realise i'm no longer standing on two feet

down on my knees and you're bringing out the worst parts of me,
parts i never knew existed, parts i hate, parts that are so unbearably ugly
it's no wonder i can't sleep at night when i'm standing in the mirror, looking at what you've done to me
if internal suffering had visuals i'm sure my torso would be littered with scars, bloodied

but i'm still here, drinking in all your affection and willing myself to believe there's no such thing as alcohol poisoning
and for every laceration, there's a flutter in my heartbeat as your lips chase away the churning feeling
you're so seductive, i'm starting to understand my father's love affair with red wine
i never realised how intoxicating love could be until i wanted you to be mine

Never, will I ever say "I love you"
Never, will I ever say "I want you"
Never, will you know how I feel for you
Never, will you know that you've let me go

Never, will you know that you made me cry
Never, will you know the pain that you've caused me
Never, will you know that you're my only happiness
Never, will you know that you changed my life

Never, will you know how insecure I was
Never, will you feel the beat of my heart
Never, will you try to take me back
Never, will you imagine our life together

I stood afraid to love you
Completely as you needed
So I kept my distance
Ensuring our romance was defeated

My reflection darkened
In your sweet eyes
By another's shadow
Such a hard compromise

In their eclipse
I felt atoms tall
I apoligize for everything
I hated feeling so small

I know now what I should have done
Taken the dive
To show you I was the one

I am a chasm of subtleties
I wish someone could see.
But poignancy doesn't catch the eye
like an unchallenged face,
chained to a first glance:
smart, pretty and worthy.
A list of attractive adjectives
I've heard before
left me with nothing
but my tenderness to hold onto.

My body
feels small as I
stare at the the cracks in the
ceiling and
I am so small in my
loneliness,
my body shrinks and my
eyes glaze;
sandpaper tongue
and dry eyes
breathing stale air
and the cycle goes over and over
crumbling and
cracking and
splintering,
stumbling in darkness, my
body numb and also

Aching.

I'd ask where you are but
I don't even
Know who You is and that
is perhaps the most
painful part.
Or maybe it's that I'm so
        alone
in my loneliness(no one quite
seems to recall
t heir I solation)

Trees and grapes
I resolve to not need to
solve it;
I need no u's and
know you's