If you see my potential
If you see how I can change
If you see the amazing things I could be
Please leave now

If I show you my scars and you think they can heal
If I have a few pounds you think I can loose
If you have faith my income can grow
Please leave now

If you know I could be all you want me to be
If you know I can overcome all of this
If you know I can become the man you want
Please leave now

If you see differences but not shortcomings
If you see unique oddities that add to my charm
If you describe my quirks as adorable
If this version of me is complete enough for you
Then stay a while

I stand alone
Frozen, frightened, without power
Can I stay the course for one more day?
Perhaps one more hour?

This pain is gripping
Can I make it one more day?
The loneliness is crushing
My familiar habits could take all that away

Forty-three years I've been like this
Never jailed nor hospitalized
All this time, I've managed to get by
But for a wounded soul and tearful eyes

Too proud to ask for help
Too weak to make it without
Can I stay the course for one more day?
Will I be beaten by fear and doubt?

Maybe I can slip across the line
Maybe just for a day
I know that's a lie
Perhaps I can convince myself anyway

Every moment that goes by
I miss her warm seductive gaze
Couldn't we dance one more time
For an hour or a couple of days?

I know that won't work
This sickness she can't heal
Perhaps peace lies only
Is in the taste of the gunsmith's steel

I've been to a meeting
Actually four
There, I saw something else
Do those people have something more?

These people who meet
These people who share
How could they help me?
Why should they care?

To them … I'm a stranger
To me … I'm a shame
So why the warm embrace?
Why do they even remember my name?

They talk of a Higher Power
Can such a thing be?
But the question is moot
He would never want me

I fell wounded to my knees
A prayer slipped out
My vision a bit clearer
Less blurred by fear and doubt

If I ask for more
Will He grant it to me?
Maybe wisdom and courage
Perhaps acceptance and serenity

But if God is just
I should be punished without end
Instead ... a glimmer of hope
Instead ... a way to begin

Now, could I tell this in the rooms?
No, that's too naked - too daring
But maybe I'm wrong
Perhaps this is the stuff of sharing

I fell in love
with the magic of stringing words into letters
and putting them on a piece of paper
I fell in love
with the blank between my words
that were not quite as empty as it seems
They were dark matter of feelings
that remain an enigma to me, until now
when words fail me, there were always the tiny blanks
that were not quite as tiny as they seem
they were nebulas of feelings
too complex to describe with just mere words
And though I may not be a poet,
I fell in love with spilling words on paper,
creating my own universe when
my voice failed me

I fell in love with the art of poetry

shakespeare once said
“the world is a stage, and we as actors”
but we are not just actors, we
are also the scriptwriters
except things don’t always go as planned:
sometimes we don’t get our happily ever after
and sometimes we find ourselves
in a different dimension altogether where
all you know is pain not because
they decided to rewrite your favourite scene
but because they stole the oxygen from your lungs
as they punch a hole no one else but they can fill
and you are left
gasping for air you can never breathe
as long as they are gone
and you know that you will never be able to breathe again
but it does not stop you from
hoping,
yearning,
wanting
for that one day
when you are in their arms,
and you can finally
breathe again

My councillor once told me
that living was just like walking
we learn to walk through life and sometimes
we accidentally knock into things

and some of us,
we might learn to avoid knocking into things
or grow stronger so we break whatever we knock
but some of us might continue tripping on rocks
and after knocking things,
over and over and over again,
we get tired of falling and scraping ourselves
and we find that we soon fall into despair

and maybe one day, some of us will learn
to break our obstacles or avoid them
but some of us?
they never get up.
some metaphorically, some literally.

i. (2010)

there are eighteen scars in a row above your wrist
pallid and shameful and white as bones and you’ve
counted them
(still do)
under the sheets with your lips moving around whispers

they remind you of empty hallways and
the cacophony of your steps on blue linoleum
and that you are alive the way your breath in pale clouds does
on especially cold days


ii. (2011)

sometimes you dream of colours
(soft and animate and comforting) but
there is only red against the ivory
of your wrist
you’ve read the stories, you know
about the wolves and what happens to girls in red

there are eighteen scars in a row
and you breathe
and you bleed
and you keep counting

iii. (2012)

you don’t sleep much anymore
you fill your nights with the synthetic emotion
of words and films instead and
bury yourself in their comfort
their fabricated sadness

a substitute for everything you should have felt
there is an emtpiness inside of you, a vast
pale space inside your chest
your breath can’t fill

iiii. (2013)**

you tell people you’re mending
not even you know what that means
sometimes you trace them
(quietly
and with closed eyes)

and there is only the white of your skin
and the press of your fingertips
and you breathe
and your blood keeps pumping

Show me the sunshine and I’ll show you the heat.

We can teach each other many things.
Like how to dance on the moon.
Or when to pick the perfect apple.

The night calls out more names than I’m used to.
But you show me how to listen carefully.

And you hold my hand through it all.

Your eyes are closed, but I’ll guide you.

We’ll set the sails and carry on.
Open mind, open sea.

Where time and space don't matter.
Only our lungs can move us there.

Light the match and watch it burn.
Show me what you know…

And I’ll lead you to it’s finally resting place.
A proper funeral for a necessity.

Nails and screws.
Built on nothing more than hope and faith.

I’ll save you from the nightmares at dawn.
So hold on.

Sand and sea.
Salt and air.

Though the air tastes of sweetness.

We sat together in your bedroom
Watching lesbian ****
You salivated at the grotesque display
Of the spread channel from which you were born

You once told me you were disgusted
By the male physique
You showered with your eyes closed
Or risked gagging over the bathroom sink

Among the girls you were popular
They stared at you to pass their day
Your mind was filled with their numbers
My mind filled with words I couldn't say

Senior prom snuck up on us
But you found a beautiful date, indeed
I asked an ugly girl to accompany me
And out of pity she agreed

We danced in the converted gym
Under a gaudy mirrored ball
I was stuck between you and her
With my back up against the wall

Afterwards we went to your house
Your parents were away
And their unlocked liquor cabinet
Only heightened our desire to play

Our dates removed their prom gowns
Then helped us get undressed
We drank till we couldn't stand
And fell to the floor in a heap of flesh

I finally saw you naked
A beauty my eyes could hardly see
You were a God among mere mortals
And even lesser men like me

My date's eyes were filled with lust
And I smelled the alcohol on her breath
I performed the perfunctory motions
And sank into her depths

As your date's head bobbed under the blanket
Your moans of pleasure steadily increased
I was energized by your proximity
Which was the sole reason for my release

We left our dates to sleep
Within their sated bliss
Already you wanted another girl
You could ***** and then dismiss

In the kitchen we finished the bottle
And talked of our recent conquests
Together we shared crude jokes
Made at the expense of the opposite ***

An awkward pause followed
And you gazed into my eyes
I felt the alcohol take effect
And placed my hand upon your thigh

Your mouth then met mine
And our tongues were lost within
Your hands trembled as they explored my chest
You didn't know where to begin

In a mirror you caught your reflection
And fell from my embrace
You said I was disgusting
And spit right in my face

In anger you pushed me away
Asking for forgiveness I dropped to my knees
You said that soon everyone would know about me
Because in this town gossip spread just like disease

At home it hit the hardest
I was my mother's boy no more
My father called me a disgrace
And kicked me out the door

Rejected by friends and family
I have no reason to stay
I'll buy a ticket to another town
Somewhere I can keep my memories at bay

I'll rent out an apartment
And decorate my pastel painted walls
I’ll furnish my new life with a phone
That I know you'll never call

I'll find myself a new group of friends
Someone who understands
The exquisite pain of being
Of falling in love with an ignorant man

I wish that my dreams
Weren't haunted by your face
I wish that I could fall asleep
Without clutching a pillow in your place

I'll listen to bitter love songs
Because on pain I can rely
I'll learn to hide my emotions
And laugh when I really want to cry