The swirling nebulous
Breathes on its own
Filling each void
A muddled mess of memories
Swim with thoughts and emotion
A polluted lagoon of a life
The mind's eye clouded
By infinitesimal particulates
Each holding a moment of life
Each holding a piece of the puzzle of a person
Each begging to be noticed
The screaming silence
Renders a mind useless
Still, the heart will hold what the mind releases
The mind will hold what the heart releases
Should the cloud dissipate
Should there be room to think
What would happen to the pieces
Forgotten at will
Erased by need
Each tiny piece soldered into a whole
Or left to float on its own
Can it really be forgotten
Each particle is particular and matter matters

Soothing sounds of future memories
Pictures painted in the glory of pain
The beauty found in such ethereal places
Is especially so in the desperation
Emerging from watching the truth
Of the other side of elation
Never absorbing the joy in the mundane
Finding it exceptional
Only when threatened by the violence of truth
Truth is a reminder of fragility in all things
Manifesting itself in the clear consciousness
Of the possibility of pure anguish
The very thought of the mundane being temporary
Of that  routine being ripped apart
Shredded in terrifying facts of probability
Need vs want is a privilege
The truth is evil
The only freedom that can ever exist is truth
Faced with the amputation of what was once meaningless
Transforms the mundane to profound
There will always be loss
There will always be an opportunity to be reborn
Perception is reality
Mood is a choice
Absolute truth is a fallen angel
Yet it remains something for which to strive
Life in retrospect is not living
Biding time between bouts of honesty
Treading stagnant water
Fulfillment does not dwell in the in-between
Satisfaction is not born of boredom
The world that surrounds each life
Is only what that life has built in its down time
For there can be both joy and pain in all things
Both apathy and interest in each new view
Emotions are a powerful thing, as is logic
Yet if they never marry, there can only be lived a half-life
Peace is born in the unity of all that we are

Rip me limb from limb
In silence I will suffer
Absorbing the rending of flesh from bone
Happily
Thankfully
Repeatedly
So you suffer no more

She cries for his pain
Wishing to absorb it all
Without memory

The scenery changes
A new view
A new you
Cool breezes and a stiff drink
Every woman reminds you of her
There is no escaping the truth
A lie above all others
A heart ceased beating
Believing you never loved her
Too cool to care
Too weak to trust
A thousand miles in a new town
A new life
A new decade
And still
Every woman reminds you of her

Freedom is removed
The breeze listens with intent
And the walls have eyes

Crazy reared its many heads
Twisted shades of paisley swirls
Kaleidoscope emotionality
Rollercoaster of fear and love
Through the storms of mushroom clouds
An air of peace remained
For that ever-changing scene
Was founded in the purest love
The realest dream come true
No fear of insanity consuming truth
Truth is kaleidoscopes are beautiful
Never boring by design
There is peace in the knowledge
That crazy is exceptional, brilliant
To know a soul, exciting
And through it all
We traverse the universe as one
Riding the wings of insanity
Skiing across the seas
On the backs of narwhals
Simply because they are awesome

It's your love that reaches me first
Long before the scent of you
Or the heat of your flesh

It's your love that reaches me first
Before the soothing sound of your voice
Or your prose meant solely for me

Like distant tinkling bells
Or the scent of orange blossoms on a breeze
It's your love that reaches me first

Eyes close
As the moon hangs low
And the sun has yet to yawn
Exhaustion and cat naps
A clear blue sky
At the greeting of the dawn
Fifty-eight minutes
Does not equal slumber
Just enough to tease a dream
A break from emotion
Awakened anew
Nothing is in the extreme

For the very first time
I trusted freely
Loved universally
Spoke in open truths
I believed a heart
And words that moved me
When my cracks grew large
And my flaws were unflattering
Words bit into flesh
Backed across the line of beauty
Where distance its kinder
Than reality
When all perception is clouded clear
For the very first time
I trusted freely
and I learned quickly
As I am
I will not be loved

Lovely words meant for another
A heart alone again
Shadowed by the bright reflection
Of your love for her instead
Romantic notions mused by her
In words meant once for me
Now, my eyes steal glances
Of a love I never meant to see
And so I wish you worlds of joy
A lifetime of togetherness in love
Truth be told, I mean each word
As it's you I'm thinking of
So I read all your romantic notions
Of your love for her instead
As I sit here in the darkness
A heart alone...again

Tears fall
Unheard, unseen
Unfelt, and unnoticed
Still I cry
As broken am I

He has a she, a her, a heart not mine
I could not keep his ego fed
Sharp jagged words, on black and white pages
Here is where the story bled

So weak is the mind
That the heart feels drained
Evaporating love in respire
Pretending inviolate love
Has a place here
Ascension of the soul
Negated by nocturnal verbosity
Insipid words of discontent
Exacerbated by the irrationality of emotion

Pandering for untruths
Like for like
Follow for follow
A thousand people who don't read
A thousand people who don't care
The occasional polite word
There is no satisfaction in falsehoods
One heart given out in truth
A word to show connection
One real follow over thousand barters
To touch another in honesty
To help another feel
That is the beauty of poetry
It breathes in those who read
A gift from soul to soul
Yes, that is
The beauty of poetry

Clocks tick in silence
Each second stretches longer
Than the one before

+One year
+One month
+One day
We share one soul eternally

We are not that, they, them, or us
We are I
We are me
We drag others behind us and call them friends
We surround ourselves with people who think we are more than we see
With people who are less than we
For alone, I am...invisible
Unseen, it remains unreal
Masks of faith
Worn out by the faithless masses
There is truth in the worn out, "I am nothing without you"
In We, I matter
In We, I exist
Without an audience it isn't a show
We are I

Pushed back across the line
The line between *** and love
Loving you no less than yesterday
Wanting you more with each insight
Caught between your fear of intimacy
And my abundant affection
Missing the way you want me
Wanted me...
Want me Still?
Berated for loving you
Jagged dagger wounds heal slowly
While loving you no less than yesterday
No apologies for purposeful pain
You proved yourself right, though you are so wrong
You just don't want to know
Remember me with affection you were too afraid to show
Think of me often, and realize
I love you...still

Vowed forever
Forever ago
Still my love stands
It can't be settling if it's real
Or so I allowed myself, too readily, to believe
Princes and fairytales are to be outgrown
Taught independence and choice
By a society that has given up
On the higher meanings in life
Yet, here you are
A heart that beats as mine does
A soul that is part of my own
A person complete with me, in me
I am whole
I have seen the past
I believe in the future
I have finally been found
Without being allowed to believe
I was ever lost
We are as one through time
But this time,
I have been found vowed forever
Forever ago

Visions of a backlit childhood
Of golden-haired halos and shadowed eyes
Slideshow in flashes of painful yesterdays
For those still unfamiliar
Longing to hold the child as he cries
Those tears cannot fall in confusion's void
And fear darkens all roads 'can be seen
Still here, in their nightmare,
Like it was my own
Is a truth told in smiles and jellybeans
Long since gone away

What do I have on this empty white surface
This wordless page mocks my pen
There is no life, there is no death
There is only... (dot, dot, dot)

Emotionless indifference pulled to the unknown
A course not yet plotted
A map, as yet, undrawn
Precision of thought can't connect the dots
There is only... (dot, dot, dot)

No fear or apprehension
A new world awaits
The first step, a new life
Still, there is an unwritten story
And I am mocked by this empty white page
There is only... (dot, dot, dot)

The outline of lips puckered in the bright pink hues of lust
The slow blink of a gaze that drinks in a vision
The gentle touch that ignites the fire
The air heated slowly with growing anticipation
The love that infuses a soul

There in the closeness
A hairs breadth away seems a million light-years
The sweetest air fills lungs in hurried breaths
A quickened heartbeat drowns out the world
The mind twists and sways in thoughts that soon become a blur
Melded into emotion, into heat
And time stands still

Drawn like magnets to fill the gap
That electric blue spark lingers behind a gaze
Current runs high
Feeling the blood rushing through the smallest veins
Every cell electrified, every hair on end
The weakening of unwanted defenses
That moment the body and soul acquiesce
And time stands still

In the stroke of a cheek
The almost intangible sensation of gliding on smoke
Rising as the embers burn from within
And each breath fans the flames
Proximity feeds passion
As time stands still

The past, erased methodically, deliberately
For there is only this
This birthing of eternity
This moment when the tentative brushing of lips
Burns into soulful coalescence
This one reality
This moment
When time stands still

He found it in a box of things of days gone by
Took it out and loved it though it was old and missing an eye
He took it to his bedroom and tucked it into bed
He gave it his favorite pillow to rest its weary head
When I tucked him and saw my oldest childhood friend
I was torn inside of memories of days that had to end
I took it from its resting place and hugged it to my heart
Tattered and ragged I tried my best to fix its broken parts
A new eye and some sutures, fixing all its wounds of old
I tucked it back inside the sheets so it wouldn't feel the cold
When he awakened in the morn, he came running in to me
Holding up the teddy bear who was fixed miraculously
I told him that it was my very best buddy when I was a child
And asked if I could hold it once, for just a little while
I told him how his eye was lost thanks to a neighbors dog
And how I dragged him through the woods chasing hopping frogs
And then he said how he was fixed all like magic overnight
And I said that's because he found a friend to hold him tight
So now he has my bestest bud from seeming eons past
And he was healed in loving arms of a new friend meant to last

In black and white across the screen
The sun, peeks over the mountainside
The bright white orb shines through the black leaves
The sky in light gray
And it's the dawn of a new day
One picture snapped on a whim
And hope is caught on the horizon
The camera blinks in time with perfection
Emotion caught on a breeze
A view into the soul of the man behind the moment
There is peace in this place
A picture, a snapshot of insight
An infusion of peace
And the smile on the face of a stranger looking at a screen

Hues of blue and gray
With a succulent sweetness
That begs to be savored
In the briny waters off the sea
They lead a life unseen
Scavengers in warm water
A lazy afternoon
Wire mesh and day old fish
Chicken necks on a string
Baited traps dropped in left in wait
Edgewater shallows and a lot of time
One by one they come
Chasing that string to the shore
One by one they come
Pull up the trap and catch what you can
Fill the bucket with sweetness
There is nothing quite like
A blue crab Saturday afternoon

removed due to publishing rights

Will repost at the end of contract term.

Thank you for reading

:-)

A quiet life
A country life
Where the grass sways in the breeze
And the hues of green signify the beginning of balmy nights
A far cry from the city
Gone are the endless vibrant lights
Gone are the 2 a.m. trips across town just because they make the best doughnuts
In this place of air almost too clean to breathe
They stroll
A traffic jam is four cars at a stop sign
Battling rules of the road with polite hat tips of "you go first"
Fast feet and hot dog carts
Italian ices on every corner
Fifty-six blocks to a destination
A world of choices
A billion footprints at a time
Stoplight crowds of sneakers and pantyhose
Everyone is invisible and naked at once
The green haired freak and the business man
The limos and the gypsy cabs
The excitement only felt in a world of possibilities
The difference between pick up trucks and bike messengers
A hundred miles for supplies
Or fifty-six blocks of everything under the sun
Soot filled pores and too much traffic
Street sounds to sleep by and a world of opportunities
Crickets and junebugs
The world closes at eight
Nightlife turns into Wal-Mart and Taco Bell
The slow pace of growing grass
The warmth of a winterless Summer
Wishing for a trip across town at 2 a.m. just because they make the best doughnuts