I won't take back the path I took
And I can't change the ground it shook
To face the earthquake of tough decisions
And the natural disaster of life revisions.
Nothing takes the earth apart like looking to the past
To remember the different kinds of love that wouldn't last.
I'd tell you ours was different, but the rubble begs to differ,
Each night I rest in the freezing makes my bones grow stiffer.
We're a dying race.
God is showing us our place.
We aren't all we think we are,
We won't survive without a scar,
But maybe we can climb out of this abyss,
If as a species we remember this:

We respect the rain, as she falls by design,
But neglect the lightning and pretend extinction's fine.
We stand in awe as snow falls asleep on the ground,
Everything's peaceful until we're frozen like the snow all around.
Desensitized to tragedy,
Immune to life and gravity,
Death becomes the living
And apathy keeps giving.
Will we step up, get up, and prove the flesh is wrong,
Or lay down and stay down, to admit that we're not strong?
How could we let hope die in vain,
And, without a fight, return to the dust where we belong?

Life seems well composed, happy and satisfied,
Until we face the wind that blows, and scramble so much to strategize
Just to protect the house we've built,
That stands so proud until the lilies wilt
And prove that all along, there was nothing we could do
To keep the hurricane from killing the righteous few.
Myself not included, there are honest men,
Though we wonder where all our leadership has been.
Now's the time to step up and do what's right,
Our lives may flood, but we won't drown without a fight.

We respect the rain, as she falls by design,
But neglect the lightning and pretend extinction's fine.
We stand in awe as snow falls asleep on the ground,
Everything's peaceful until we're frozen like the snow all around.
Desensitized to tragedy,
Immune to life and gravity,
Death becomes the living
And apathy keeps giving.
Will we step up, get up, and prove the flesh is wrong,
Or lay down and stay down, to admit that we're not strong?
How could we let hope die in vain,
And, without a fight, return to the dust where we belong?

We fight pain and constant pressure until the top explodes,
But we won't give up until we've exhausted all the roads,
Looking for a way out, preferably the best,
But if that fails, we'll make do with any of the rest.
It's hard to see with the ash impairing our sight,
But even in darkness, through fire, we strive for what is right.
The only way to keep the magma from burning through the earth,
Is to show the nature around us what righteousness is worth.

We respect the rain, as she falls by design,
But neglect the lightning and pretend extinction's fine.
We stand in awe as snow falls asleep on the ground,
Everything's peaceful until we're frozen like the snow all around.
Desensitized to tragedy,
Immune to life and gravity,
Death becomes the living
And apathy keeps giving.
Will we step up, get up, and prove the flesh is wrong,
Or lay down and stay down, to admit that we're not strong?
How could we let hope die in vain,
And, without a fight, return to the dust where we belong?

Maybe nature is the trees and all the flowers
Or maybe it's the sum or lack there of of human powers.
You decide what you defend and what you think is true,
Because it's passion and conviction that truly define you.

We respect the rain, as she falls by design,
But neglect the lightning and pretend extinction's fine.
Death becomes the living
And apathy keeps giving.
Will we step up, get up, and prove the flesh is wrong,
Lay down and stay down, to admit that we're not strong?
Or will we, so soon, return to the dust where we belong?



--Emily Rutledge

Dear broken one,
We hear your cry,
I understand the hurt, I won't ask you why.
We are the ones who know your story,
There are one who walked that road before me.
Now I'm with them and we're here to be your safety.
We're just trying to get you home safely.
We're all still hurting, and we live with burning scars.
We're the ones that look up and know that heavens gained some special stars.
We're the ones that made it through the night,
The ones that the difference between "said" and "done".
So we'll walk you through to see the morning light.
There's nothing we can say to hold up your walls
But we can be the protection as each one falls.
We've seen that ocean of insanity
And cried out to humanity
For a saving grace,
But the "strong ones" turn their face
And neglect the fragmented mirror on our hearts,
They sweep the pieces beneath the rug as our reflection falls apart.
We've felt your resentment, we used to feel alone too.
But we realized there's an army of fighters that feel the way we do.
The world will never feel the ambiguous pain eating through the bottom of your heart.
They'll try to heal you but they won't know where to start.
This ship is unfixable, we all feel like we're sinking anyways.
The truth is, we'll patch each others weakness and float on for brighter days.
We've been where you are.
The top of that cliff used to seem so far
From the bottom of the abyss, now all you can see is this.
Darkness rising
Pain still paralyzing
A deep we can't explain
An unforgivable stain
A darkened heart
A fear of knowing what it's like to completely fall apart.
That laundry list
Of brokenness
Feels like it's grown to be a string
Wrapped around our throats overwhelming us with everything.
You can look out into that abyss
And lose your sense of direction.
You can look into the void and lose your soul's inflection.
But Angel, we know what it's like to fall.
None of us want that for you at all.
You look into darkness and feel alone,
But the congregation behind you has grown.
We're an army, facing this battle together,
We have to recognize that things can't **** forever.
We're all standing with you at the top of the cliff, looking down.
Please try to see the million people all around
Who feel you crying.
We're not trying
To tell you tomorrow will be alright,
Because not a single soul heals quickly over night.
It's a long way to recovery,
But when I realized even strangers love me
The burden was no longer my own,
The weight of the world was no longer made of stone,
And we all carried together,
That fear of failure, and the fear of forever.
If we needed to be taken, we'd be dead by now,
So we have to keep moving, taking the next step somehow.
I believe in you. I have faith in your existence.
We're all here to back you up, and fight with against life's resistance.
The worlds big and scary, dark and unforgiving,
But take it step by step and together we'll see the strength and joy of truly living.

It was quiet strength that did you in.
Your belief that pain was simply the cost of life,
You had been crippled for so long
Leg straight and fused,
Tremors assaulting your once strong hands,
Still you coped.
You pushed through.
As if to laugh at the hand you had been dealt.
Like you were betting the house would go bust.
You fought.

You fought getting out of the your truck at the doctors office
You fought when they forced you into a sleep study
You fought when they ran a chest X-ray to rule out pneumonia
And when they said cancer
You fought

Who cares that they said Stage 4.
Cancer didn't know who it had picked its newest fight with
It didn't know your 25th wedding anniversary was two weeks away
So you fought
Because it wouldn't take this from you
You wouldn't let it,
Stubborn ******* you were.
You fought

You fought
Having purchased a card for the special day
Having it delivered by a friend
In tears she read and she knew
You had fought
And on that following day we sang you to Heaven
There was Power in the Blood
As you found Amazing Grace
And as your last breath escaped
Tooth then Lip.
I was reminded
You fought.

Perhaps love should have its own pronoun
With me being so unfamiliar with the feeling it seems that the pronoun would at least be more respectful.

Maybe it needs a more formal title
Like Mr. or Ms.?
So that I can convey my respect for it as an emotion
As well as our unfamiliarity with each other.

Should we agree on the gender as a whole?
Would it be confusing if I used them interchangeably? As in,
"Well I thought I was in Ms. Love once but it wound up only being infatuation."
Or
"I saw that she's in Mr. Love with the guy who is great at that one thing again."

Perhaps Ms. Love isn't for me to know,
It's been so long since we were introduced.
Maybe we'd hit it off next time though?
When Ms. Love and I meet face to face.
And maybe that next time we'd go for a coffee?
And then sensing her willingness perhaps a follow up meeting
Sans interview.
Where we could share stories
And utilize our first names
And then she would tell me of her dreams,
And I would interpret them for her.
Only to have her become super clingy
And ask for a ride home
And then force me to listen to hours upon hours of incessant babbling about everything and nothing at the same time.
And have her repeat the same stale story over and over and over again
Only for her to forget the ending to the only joke that she knows mid punchline.
Then again
Maybe I'll just stick to formalities,
Ms. Love.

Always wrong
With what I thought
was just a song
All the demons fought
But I was losing all along.
Words unspoken,
Lyrics broken
Until our words pour out
telling all that life's about.
I give my life. Whole. Devout.
Passion never running out
No fear. More pain. I conquer doubt.
A child's life changing route
Altered dreams
Tearing seems
You see her changing teams
As she rejects all she knows.
Life goes on, wind still blows.
She may regret the path she chose
But at least she stepped.
The found the ledge and finally crept
Right of the cliff
No bones stiff
She was this:
No doubt in her mind
She had to be bold; be one of a kind
And now she's stuck
Straight out of luck.
Caught in a storm the sun may never fix
So she'll scream her lyrics and hope the story sticks.


A symphony
Of modern sympathy
Music sounds
And steals away simplicity.
A soul isolated
Thoughts so innovated
The idea her mind created
Was shot down.
Brought down
From the sky
A dreamer left to die
But as she looks up through her dying eyes
She sees the questions in the passers-by
As that fake curiosity took the time to wonder why
the dead bird never left the nest.
You shot her down and took away her best,
You stole the gold and made a cavern in her chest.
What's it like to be the voice that could have stood behind,
But instead you disappeared the back-side of a whisper in your mind.
So tell me, what's it like?
To know you could have been the one to drop the mic.
But instead you said nothing and hid behind your apathy,
I hope your life ends happily.
You could have been the voice to stand behind my music,
But instead you hid behind a whisper,
And became the one who killed it.

Do your tears reach for the floor once they meet your gently sculpted bones,
Or do they trickle down your cheeks and follow the leader down the rustic road they call your neck?
Do they kiss your collarbones the way I one day dream to?
Do you wipe them from their origin with your weathered fingers,
Or do you wait until they are kidnapped by the clothing you've begged to keep your body warm?
Do they ever leave your eyes at all, or do they hide behind your perfect crystals
to share a space with that beautifully complicated mind of yours?
Will I ever get the chance to see you wholly,
Or get the chance to plant romance in your eyes.
Will I get to allow the tears of joy to fall with grace,
Or wipe the tears of sadness before they stain your skin?
Will lie awake until tomorrow passes away,
Or will I sleep through my hopeless romance just to see another day?
--Ourfirstfarewell

The sun woke up
and followed its destined direction.
Light covered the lake
like a layer of protection
and danced with its droplets
like love ever after.
But when night came,
she silenced their laughter
and the two spoke softly,
water and light.
They grew in their love
as they danced through the night
and when the  next morning came
and asked for her hand,
she knew there would never be light like his
to cover the land.
--Emily Rutledge