The fungi has started to grow again,
coming from inside, rotting within.
My eyes scan the room from left to right,
there's nothing interesting,
anywhere found in sight.
I remove myself to explore and play,
into the forest I go, around midday.
As I wander and wonder,
my thoughts twist around me, causing a fluster.
All of this just because of,
some guy.
It's not your normal fungi,
it's the kind that if you touch it,
it will rot you from your delicate finger tips
to the very light that is your soul.
The kind of fungi to ruin your night.
So as I lie here, accepting my fate,
that evil demon comes creeping,
to smile in my face.
I'm all too weak to continue on,
finally letting go of myself, collapsing like a fawn.
My skeletal remains,
shimmer in the sun-
reflecting light like the barrel of a gun.
It's hard not to notice that toadstool right there,
growing from what would be my hair.
The fungi still loves to decay,
what was once me
One,
Very
Cold
October
Day.

she was as cold as the winter
            full of frost and bites on her delicate skin
            always wearing a scarf bearing cold colors
            but she is as intelligent as the raven
            and her potential is to not be underestimated
he was bright as the summer
            a ray of sunshine that his heart has captured
            his eyes as warm as the trees and the earthy soil
            a goofy smile and a cheesy laugh he can hold
but they both wondered to themselves
            from a distance of a single season that separates
            and puts them apart
            ‘what is love with its warmth and frost’
through the frights and scares
            and the hope of light at the end of a roller coaster ride
            to the seemingly never-ending valley of lilies
            and through the glaciers of darkness
that’s what love holds for us
            it is heaven or hell or whatever it is
            a paradise worth finding
            or a purgatory waiting in chains
it is a letter full of something
            or maybe even nothing at all
            chocolates and daisies?
            forget about it
the season that separates the wondering opposites
            it is the fall of the two for the other
            it could be the literal fall
            or the ‘falling head over heels’ kind of fall
love does not matter on your gender
            nor does it matter not on your preference
            it just matters that you have someone to count on
            or maybe even a shoulder to cry on
it is like the aroma of a coffee bean
            the scent so attracting yet when tasted
            you may or may not decline it
it is also like the essence of vanilla
            sweet and innocent
            but will be missed when it is gone
love is like when you’re the toothpick
            seemingly strong and firm at first
            but with a snap
            you can easily fall to the merciless ground
it is sentimentality
            a chemical defect found on the losing side
            for not throughout this journey
            will you always find peace among the storms
it is the range of numbers from zero to ten
            for the happiness, as all emotions do
            may fade away due to the negativity
it is the whisper of students among corridors
            soft but can easily be caught
            full of gossip or full of truth
            but I could choose to believe neither
            because that four-lettered word
            made people less of what they once were
love, it can break you
            yet, with such irony
            it could mend you
            and it would be the person who destroyed it
            who would come back
            to make you feel whole again
no more holding hands in the hallyways
            or even deserted places
            that seems to be ‘romantic’
            for these are just creepers
            and things could flip upside down
with just a snap
all those things they say about love
            not all of them could happen
            from written words of our imaginations
            to the writing of it onto parchment with our pens
            it is what we wish to happen
for this world could ever be so harsh
            to the bad but especially to the good
            that we find another way to escape from it
and so summer and winter never met
            never did they cross their boundaries
            for the cycle of the seasons
            is like love
there would be battles won in the frost
            a dose of happiness in the spring among birds
            the moodiness of both in the hot summer
            and the transition and neutrality that autumn gives
for even love
            must be known to have its routine.

When I was a child
I got told my heart was the size and shape of a fist
so I grew up using it like one.
The masochism I have developed
caused an opening for something destructive
and you slipped right through it.
And unable to deny your sweet prowess
I granted your re-entry without hesitation.
I threw words at you
praying to god they'd hit you in the torso
because your empty chest cavity
needs to be filled with something.
My words bounced around in your ribcage
until it cracked one of them
and flowers sprouted out of it
allowing a place for the words to rest.
Wrapping my arms around your body
feels a lot like a snake killing its prey
because you don't see it coming
and when it happens,
I squeeze you until you give in.
If my heart had knuckles
they'd be ****** and bruised
not because of the beating its taking
but because it's trying to break free from my chest.
Every time you're near
it won't stop fighting my ribs
and now I get why it's called a cage.
My heart is an untamable creature,
relentlessly fighting for what it wants.
But i'm learning to forgive your ribcage
for being closer to your heart
than I ever could be.

Sometimes I think back to the time we spent at school.

Hard plastic chairs, short desks and shorter attention spans.

We were children:

Indoctrinated with dreams of quiet homes and large offices. Of fieldwork, pride and gold-gilt fame.

We said that we would be doctors, lawyers, scientists, astronauts.

Never-mind the adult's delighted laughs! We reveled in mirth and wonder.

Now we say that we would be seeing doctors.
Needing lawyers.
Blood-shot eyes scanning tabloids that preached SCIENCE as if it were medieval magic. No, brother, correlation ain't causation.

How wonderful would it be to someday see humanity dance among the cosmos? Weaving between invisible holes cut into the pitch vastness of space.

Now we accept our jobs with a grimace and a sigh.
Uncomfortable as they may be, we've got bills to pay and loans to ignore.

We're all waiting for something to come after.

After puberty. After degrees of debt. After—

After we aged. Fragile from years of effort.
Snapping our backs to the rhythm of our daily commute.

I don't know what comes after, brother.

But I sure as hell didn't sign up for this.

Sunday morning,
the air froze, the dahlias
once bloomed angry,
now they shiver and sigh.

Autumn breeze, faint but still,
the padded ghost-steps
of your laugh, running wild,
like vintage photographs;
scattered Polaroids of
my memory - a smile here,
a grimace there.

How the heat of
emotions buries itself
in the clothes of yesterday,
How difficult it is to
fetch from the seams.
The needles only *****
at a faint feeling.

I wonder; do you forget me
as winter forgets the living?

Because once an old man
told me I had sad eyes

Sunsets melt to chalky lines,
like cigarette stubs, they died
when you met her.

These days only my fingers
remember summer,
I touch the hearts of others
to warm them too.

My voice wind chimes,
the eulogy of the storm,
when I breath your
name I shudder...

And listen-
because I am in
the echoes
of her, of us.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the ***** bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the *****, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free?  Not me?
Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, *****'s, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The **** and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again!