I have lost
all pride
all vanity
all reason
all sense of self
All that is left
shown to no one
is this trembling mass
of flesh and bones
Gone is the sweetness
and the light
Peering at the world
as if already beyond the vale
Everything is detached
solace is a myth which
is no longer believed in
But the grave refuses to
claim it's prize
Saying no, not yet
You have not suffered enough
Fingertips ******
digging the fetid soil
trying to escape into not out
and after so much labor
not a dent can be seen
as if the air above it
flays the skin
in resistance to the attempt
I am lost
and only you stand before me
the path I walk is gone
there are no signs
there are no omens
the voice of intuition stilled
you are a fortress
built up around me
swallowing all sound in the
void of silence
Though I scream I hear nothing
Though I pound and claw
no stone moves
How much longer will you hold me
in this prison?
I cut off my hair rather than
deem to let it down.
If I must be trapped soundlessly
here
I will not make it easy for you
to come to me, sneaking in the night
You must tear down the walls
yourself
Destroy what you have created
and nurse the wasted self
back to the beauty you
imagined would be waiting
when you placed me
in your museum.

Oh Balm of Gilead
Where are you?
My tongue is swollen
from misuse
If it bled or decreased
every time it betrayed me
I would no longer possess one
Vows of silence
broken so suddenly
me thinks it has a mind
of it's own
To break promises
carved in stone
and stained with blood
from the sacred living heart
Why can you not hush?
Must you waggle so?
Have you not learned
that you are the cause of so much
pain and misery?
Obviously not
and the lips, the lungs
they are your cohorts
Relishing in the the noise they help
you make
Rejoicing in it, whatever the
consequence of such
idiocy proclaimed
as if the whole universe was
created
to hear your donkey braying
Silence is more valuable,
more poignant
than all the treasures of heaven
If only the Balm would stick.

I have broken the seal
all the jumbled inside my
hand
bottlenecked in my trembling fingers
pours forth suddenly
and my blood ink stains
the pages black
This is the Great Flood
and the Black Death
This is the Renaissance
and the Dark Ages
That cusp of breathtaking proportions
where the long winter
is broken
and the dawn after the
longest night is come
The promise of fresh air
which does not hurt the lungs
Of warmth which pulls the sting
away from the frozen flesh
whispers through the soul
and the wait which
needs must happen
until Spring arrives
is even more agonizing
in it's first promise of arrival
than all the misery
the dark silence
ever
could
afflict.

Dreams hold more truth than
any reality our waking mind
can construct
Pretense holds no sway there
it is stripped bare
and shoved beneath the naked light
The consciousness of daylight
is a lawyer
it bargains holding air in it's
hands
as if that were a poker hand
with all four Aces.
Dreams do not need to
play such petty games
they have all the facts
can show you the minuscule details
our Sol Counselor
would prefer be kept under the rug
Dreams delight in the bizarre
and show us what's
behind the curtain
door #3
and down the rabbit hole
all simultaneously
If you relax into it
take a bite
take a sip
make a deal
all while walking through the poppies
You'll see
Oh, you'll see
You'll definitely, finally, truly see.

My words have been stolen
as I put my heart upon the shelf
quivering in it's sudden new position
cold and vulnerable
outside of it's bone prison
which gave airs of security, protection
what a mistake, that.
The daggers ****** between
proving the weak points of the
flesh to be real
and not phantoms.
After a long talk
we both decided it would
be safer on the altar.
It seems my argument
made sense
since my heart agreed
wholly and without reservation.
In the night we have long
conversations
my heart and I
calling to me from it's new
residence
asking when it can come home again
weary of the cold
and trembling when a stranger
walks too closely by
I reassure - even when they peer
closely at the jumble around you
you remain invisible
my voodoo is that strong
It agrees with a wet, thumping sigh
wistful and nostalgic
for the incessant whispering
of the Siamese twins
named, unoriginally, the Lungs.
It wonders what treasures
the gurgling idiot stomach
is dissolving today without judgment
(unless, of course, the stomach is throwing a tantrum
and decides to toss everything back out.)
I understand
these are the musings of an *****
misplaced
who misses home and forgets
the pain which drove it away.
If only my brain would forget
that old library
huge and dusty as a mausoleum
never throws anything out
just shelves it and adds it's placement
in the card catalogue
(If only it would upgrade - cross-referencing and rediscovery
would be easier.)
However, the librarian holds grudges
when the heart has been
played with too roughly
and keeps the pain files on her desk
constantly rifled through and
shuffled, reshuffled, shuffled again
"One day I'll have enough to write a book"
she mumbles over the complaints
of my heart as it bleats and moans
about it's new home
She doesn't hear it - it's too far away
from the Central Nervous System
for the message to be transmitted
in the proper form.
When she remembers
that ole librarian of my brain
where the heart has gone
she stops to listen
and in anger over it's pathetic pleas
she cries
"We have not learned
So you cannot return
If I did as you request
We would take back up the quest
And we all know...
He -
He -
He... "
She breaks down in literary sobs
reminding the heart of
the nature of it's exile
and why
it's truly
for
the best.