Vices hold me in a grip
living is a ****** up game,
I mash buttons until I bend and flip
breakdown, take another hit:
I’ve relinquished my prime of life
wishing it was someone else’s fault
that I’m stranded on this island,
this is why I succumb to vices

It started as a wild ride
that turned into the spins
a religion of motion sickness,
wanting to stop but always caving in
it spirals through my mind
filling damage to the brim
emotions are meant to process here,
now they only dissipate in chagrin
as rueful ignorance catapults
this living hell to greater lengths
without having to lift a finger:
my self-inflicted violence,
a byproduct of vices

Left with no rationale to spare,
only a small bend in time where
my spindle of thoughts came undone;
it's here where I revel in self-despair
as a loser who
always failed to listen,
a captain without a vision
ready to drown in cognitive dissonance
because it’s easier to believe a lie
than to accept how life is:
where are my vices?

The tightness in my chest
conveys that I need to disconnect
sit alone, on a remote landscape
hoping the sound of rustling leaves
will sync with these shakes
and ease my deathless torment

As some quiet finally sets in,
introspection begins to surface
and it gets me wondering if
these thoughts of mine
intertwine with the pain that I keep
to manifest a life of anger and delusion
draping me in shades of guilt,
forever climbing up this hill

Closing my eyes paved the way
for understanding unrivaled:
an ineffable cause
to sit with nothingness,
I spilled into a void and suddenly
stopped drowning in sadness,
finding humor in the unknown
when a feminine hand reached out
with love, telling me to let go
and she shared with me
everything I wanted to know;

“There is no path to save yourself,
only transcendence:
answers can be begged for
but until you let go of precedence
and learn to listen for each breath
the tightness will never settle
within your chest”

Tired of the itch,
tired of the chase
looking for what I don’t have
while the world goes down in flames
making excuses about how it’s ingrained
when all it really takes is discipline
mixed with a little bit of pace

Still, I hover in the wind,
let me float back through
the wild fields of dopamine
where we all still take refuge
inside of a haze, fearing truth,
destroying self-worth
to secure temporary comfort

My energy is frozen in time,
it siphons into everyone I touch
with each heavy hearted step,
forging the very culture I am certain
is the reason life is so hard
because I’ve seen the depths
of my own broken parts
and still hear a voice in the back
of my head ring out:

“If reality is set in stone by
how you perceive,
and if you see the endlessness of it all
then why do you set store by
any so-called beliefs?
Isn’t that just habit underneath?”

I envisioned her being erased
as I slipped under this frozen lake
that will wash away our brokenness
by turning my bones into icicles,
clarifying the sum
of how I became
shrouded in midnight blues
and the bluntness
shakes my last gulp loose
until the earth is still,
leaving me a cliché
as I glisten with the moon

My thoughts flicker into a dream
where we finally understood
without being mean,
where our love had no consequence
and we did things for each other
not only because we should
until a nightmare arises
of living torn apart
in realization that I
never appreciated her
when she was in my arms

Now I'm sorting through decay
into a dimension of
fading memory
and things speed up
as my mind begins to race,
but was it ever my mind to behold?
Are we just visions projected
through those that personify us?

The concept of missing another
has left, where is here?
Her face dissolves,
and my last thought conjured
is a question of why
there was no emphasis
on other people or resolve
before I got lost in self-destruction,
looking for the sound
of her laughter

And now what remains
is unending fear
as this aura travels elsewhere
and a body absently sinks
to the bottom of Moses Lake;
goodbye dear

You look like the kind of person
that I could share silence with
and I’ve been made a fool
from reveling in this idealized mess
ever since the day that we never met

Only saw a face,
as it shifted through shadows
at your kinetic pace,
masked in a smile from
this wistful summer glare,
and intricate details that
long to match your auburn hair

Neurons started firing,
daydreams cascade and blend,
my infatuation twists and bends
into a proclamation of art
that recycles upon waking up:
my continuation of getting lost
about whoever /
wherever you are

Summer slips away
while I hide in my room
wasting time falling down
wondering if I’ll ever share
this wealth of love
I hoard on my mound
with someone besides myself:
a tragedy, curled up on the rug,
jaded by the compassion
that has been given up
and I can't get enough

I pinch in further to zoom
on the microcosm of my life
and see that it’s cropped into a frame
without resolve or anyone to blame
alone with the blinds drawn
frozen in a still shot
where I'm hiding from the moon
and it has me believing that
I might die alone
from lack of sleep
as I howl and brood

Morning breaks through
requesting me with warmth
and calling out to
wake me before noon.
I hear but don't listen,
instead I'll bask in this gloom,
listless

That surely must produce
some worthwhile art in the end
even if something will always
feel like it's missing

Sink into the void I’ve found
that appears as pointless
and you’ll find a requite of safety,
steady your breathing

Vacate needless self-help,
not all flaws require examination
it is sensible to be empty,
steady your breathing

When trauma is
held onto as a lifeline
we cling to its identity,
halting time in its tracks
helplessly watching
as our essence begins to rot
in a cell that’s only condemning,
steady your breathing

Find comfort through experience,
seek out the universal center
and its unaffected infinity,
steady your breathing

Nature has a heartbeat
we can synchronize with
by accepting her relentless mortality,
steady your breathing

Death is inevitable, a beautiful mess
it is the enemy yet also a friend
depression is the cause,
sufferance is the effect
and reminders of transience
are the master of anxiety,
steady your breathing

There is immortal freedom hidden
outside of tunnel vision
compelling us with a symphonic tune
to believe in life
and find acceptance in death,
to sing along with this chorus of
left and right /
beginning and end
where it then gives way to a verse
of chaos and symmetry /
repent and forgiving,
steady your breathing

Sounds perfecting the mirage
stuck in our peripheral
of duality in tonal form
so we can understand that true wealth
is noticing the difference
between what we believe
and what is reality,
steady your breathing