This is my poem without words
        my poem of images enrobed in
    oppressive silence like the
        pressing of a Salem witch
    who is really just a girl in tears
   and a bonnet:
You asked what I would do
    if you died and I said
  "I would have you cremated and
   I would have your ashes,
    at least a bit of them, mixed
         into a bit of red glass
    fashioned into a heart-shaped
  kiss and
   I would wear it around my neck
        on a silver silk chord . . .
             a silver silk chord . . .
             except when I venture out on
              a date with a familiar stranger
            because you will not
                                              have been introduced and
               the rest of you
   I would sprinkle here and
        there to haunt the old brick
buildings I love and the sharp angry
mountains you love and
                              here and
        there to feed the verdant
grasses our toes haven't ever moved."
    You raised an eyebrow
        askance, saying,
  "You've thought about this quite
     a bit,"
but this is a lie I let you hold
    a pork bun of a brown bird with a
        backward-bent wing
which you rest in a wooden puzzle box
  wrapped in a velvet pouch
    sewn into a heart-shaped pillow
      locked in a three-sided room
and on the ceiling
   a hand-painted truth:
        I never thought the choice would
  **be mine.

I often sit back and wonder
How the world got this way
Who decided to corrupt it?
Who invented war?
Why we are programmed to hate?
To ****?

Why do we let our demons have full reign?
And why does no one stop it?

Imagine a world of peace.
Can you?
Because I can't.
Not anymore.
Not like this.

It's passed the point of no return.
And everyone is aware.
And no one is stopping it.

I just want to stop it.
Stop it cold.

Why **** when you can create?
Why hate what you can hold dear?

I love every dead citizen,
Of all the countries,
I'm too terrified to visit.

But even more,
I love the man pulling the trigger,
Who has to live with the guilt,
For the rest of his life.
Fighting a war he doesn't believe in,
For a country,
That won't ever love him back.

Now tell me,
Was your military discount,
Worth the blood of thousands?
Was it?

How do you sleep at night?
Tell me.
Because I barely get a wink,
Knowing these people exist.

How did the world get this way?
We're just all products of fear.
A school is just a factory.
There is no education anymore.
And I'm tired of living this lie.

Pull the wool back over my eyes.
I'd rather sleep
With the rest of a thousand sheep.

And turn my head to the slaughter.
Turn my head to the corrupt.

I'd rather carry on.
Not doing a **** thing to stop it.

So tell me, now.
Who is really pulling the trigger.
You or me?

*You or me?

Eight hours of mindless torture
on a little three hours of sleep.
I feel suffocated and alone,
in a sea full of children.
My body wrenches, I’ve puked and shaken,
but that doesn’t matter to the authorities.

It’s about grades and status.
It’s all about status.
Mother demands me to be "popular."
Grandmother regards me to be,
at the absolute finest,
The best in front of others.
"Friends"  insult pictures.
What I want doesn't matter;
My "status" must be as tall as a tower.

It’s all about status in a world full of lies.
So what if I sit here and shake,
all that matters is that I don’t fail;
it doesn’t matter if I die.

I can never save you and I am terrible with
golden-haired girls with penchants for
shiver-shiver-shudder-lightning,
right through their bloodstreams
and I am a creature of ink and adrenaline
and that is all my bloodstreams have in them
and I can never save you and I can
only say I love you
and how many love-love-love-yous
can you devour before you feel content?

You've got scars on your wrists
Blood on your fists
You try to cover the hole
In your soul
By filling it with alcohol
Your smile has faded
As your heart becomes degraded
Darkness has followed you
Starvation has hollowed you
Life has become pointless
Faces are emotionless
No one cares enough to try
To help you when you cry
You're so full of grief
Death has become a relief
You welcome it
And it welcomes you.

You are finally free...
*Where is the humanity?