It isn't what we had that keeps me up at night
Those memories will stay with me
It's what might have been, but drifted away
All those things that will never be
There is a resounding finality to it
Sending chills down my spine
A chapter closed, but not fully written
A heart not fully mine
I long for you in the deepest night
when self-deception is not a choice
I'd like to say I'm over you
But I don't have a voice
The words choke up, blocked by some
burst of feelings in my throat
Closed eyes, the world is gone
I am on the sea, a lonely boat
Sailing away from you, and your world
I'll never come back home
Your face follows me across the blue
I realize it's all I'll ever know
I wanted so much more! you and I
We were what should have been
And I long inside the mystery
That will never have an end

What I want more than anything
is to live Nowhere.
To have no stakes set,
no roots-
just move with the wind
like a pioneer-
follow the sun as it sets,
and even knowing the futility,
try to find it.
I want to be a nomad,
both spiritually and physically.
To be finally and gloriously free
from all the ignoble trappings
of a world obsessed with neon
and gold trimming.

Instead of paintings I would have
the silver-braced sky and cold, green
mountains of Colorado;
instead of statues, the golden-clay
mesas of Arizona;
instead of fine crystal,
the emerald-clear waters of the Keys.
I will befriend every creature
and soak in the beauty of
self-creation that is our earth.

Instead of billionaires, I will count
the dirt-smudged, air burnt faces
of Tibetans as my compatriots;
their hearts are more open.
They are more at peace with
themselves living in huts
than the rich in their enclaves of
steel and stone.
Instead of a church, I will find my
worship in the temples, the
incense scented high-chambered rooms.
The steady sound of om is more
pleasing to the ears than hymns.

I will find joy in drinks and drugs,
in the wide variety of intoxication
provided to us not by chemists,
but by the earth itself.
I will complete that joy by sharing these
mediums with others-
experiencing new reality, new feeling.

And when it comes time to die,
I will rest somewhere open,
with the stars above and the earth below;
I will lay me down,
I will sleep,
untroubled, fulfilled.

I think, perhaps, that I
may have been born for a different time
Maybe my soul rested too early
On an infant never meant to be me.
I look around, and it seems so strange,
People dig for shallow ore; I seek a deeper vein-
but those who skim the surface are rewarded
It seems like all my hopes are thwarted
by our reality, such a subtle thing,
that defines who we are by how we gleam
with gold and glitter, all so transient-
I think friends and memories are more significant
Everyone calls accepting this reality "growing older"
So you become less of yourself? Get lost in folders
and numbers and binders and paper; and days
are slipping by, as you're getting paid
For what? To own a house you never see?
Drive a nice car to a place you hate to be?
NO.
No, I say, this is a better solution:
NEVER. GROW. UP. That's my resolution.
****. Fight. Dream. While you're still young, retire.
Throw all your junk out and set it on fire.
Move to a place that you've never been.
Make friends, fall in love, and then do it again.
Never get settled; never set down your roots;
always try the new, and I tell you the truth-
You'll find you live richly with far less wealth,
and your life will have meaning-one you gave it yourself.

Blinders descend beside my eyes
I must focus only ahead
Staring at me as I lie in bed
I am held down firmly, hands tied

My spirit groaning with the weight
Small fear grows larger, amplified
Can't look away no matter how I try
From this demon I cannot sate

Heartbeats quickens; I stand, pace the floor
I watch moments like hours gradually pass
Breathe, try and calm, pray for no more!
Limbs seize, surely I stand at death's door!
Until with time comes reason at last
And I sleep like a soldier come home from war

When you are coming off drugs, when you are held down by the crippling force of anxiety and pain; when your eyes are finally open and you see your life for what it truly is, all of the things you run from catch up with you. Like a strong surge caused by a hurricane, it washes over you, and the tide tries to pull you back underwater, back where it is safe. Back where the comforting numbness and cold of unawareness can smother your senses and put you back to blissful sleep. You never learned to deal with this reality, the actual discomfort of being alive on planet earth, with all its beautiful anguish and fear. It is hard to see from this point all the wonderful things about life, the things that get the rest of humanity through every day. The bliss that can come from living is obscured because you are still underwater; you can see it, just barely, like sunlight through salt water. But it is so, so far; it is hard to believe anything more can actually exist.

It is comforting to know that there are things bigger than you and your personal pain. That the sun will continue to set and rise with or without you. That there are millions who suffer far worse and live through each day with that struggle. If they can open their eyes each morning, pick up that ever so heavy burden, and walk with it smiling, so can you. There is something indomitable about the human spirit, something unspeakably powerful. Inside you burns a will to live that is stronger than any drug, stronger than any pain, stronger than any fear. The power to defeat what you face is already within you. It resides inside you, deep down, silenced and shuttered; but it will rise again, as will you. There is very little you cannot come home from. Even if you are all alone. Even if your pain must be silent and you must shoulder it by yourself. You are human. You are strong.

And the sunlight is there above the waves, waiting to warm you. Waiting to welcome you back into life. There are only better things ahead.

Hold on.

We sink ourselves in the debauchery
Because in the dark, we can't see ourselves;
Because it feels so ******* good;
Because it makes us feel something.
Sobriety is a crushing reality designed to be escaped.
It's about the danger of being a runaway;
The beautiful, ****** pleasure of letting go,
Casting off,
Leaving behind.
For just those few rushing moments we fly.
It feels like flying when you fall.
There is always a floor,
But all good must be weighted,
And we accept the price.
It is good to leave all things behind for a time.

I am not a traditionalist;
I believe newness makes more sense.
So I make it up as I go along,
and my footfalls make a sort of song
rending silence till sunlight appears
And dew spreads like the sweet earth's tears.
Some stories are written, some left untold;
I'll write my own, before I get old.
There comes a fork in the road; decide-
I take whichever one feels right inside.
When you have no destination, any path is fine.
Some think that's a negative; I think it's sublime.
We put too many expectations, constraints on ourselves.
It's not good to worry; it's bad for your health.
Sometimes I wonder if human life is so short
because we spend it anxious about the hours we hoard.
That which you hold closest will slip through your grasp,
and our lives are so fragile, brittle as glass.
It's better to wander this world without direction;
let things come to you-and stop chasing perfection.

Do not mistake my kindness for weakness;
My silence for approval;
My smile for contentment;
My outside for my inside;
Desperation hides vitality
Discouragement, a new resolve
It is often in the darkest places where hope shines brightest
Especially in the eyes of those who are most eager to find it.

I left this old world in the shadows of yesterday
Slipping silently, contentedly into tomorrow
I closed my eyes and held hands with nothingness
and slid my feet into the abyss
Calmly, stolidly moving forward into the unknown
I watch the starlit sky for the red-rimmed dawn
Every moment on the road behind a song
drumming in my veins as my heart beats
faster in the anticipation and wonder of it all

We're dancing formless into a void of our own making
Carving silently into creation these silent similarities
These constants that connect us, the wild and free
animal that is humanity.
We don't speak of how we are the same person
Ignoring the fact that internally, we all desire
at least one or most of the same things.
The external differences are so demanding, pressing on our attention.
We can't let go of the old. We can't let go of most anything.
But in those quiet moments, we recognize ourselves
hiding so plainly in the soul of someone else
And in those sublime, religious moments, we realize
we're all just holograms, dancing into a void of our own making
Carving the connections that will one day make us one.

If I told you what I really felt,
Would it make a difference?
Maybe to me,
Maybe not at all,
But definitely not to you.
Are there any words in all our languages
That could combine-
Any configuration,
Any grouping of sounds and meanings
That could grip your mind?
Words don't mean anything.
Words are useless.
Thoughts, emotions,
When will we become fluent enough to speak what we feel?
If I told you what I really felt, would it make any difference?
Not at all.

Brilliant blue, swimming in an ocean black;
pinprick of light barely visible from distant planets,
the sweet, living dirt on which all our hopes,
dreams, plans, history, and future reside.
Fragile, but strong, older than time,
our home.
Swinging in wide ellipse around brilliant flame,
small yet full to brim,
our Earth.
When the men of the future finally bid goodbye
to this, our green oasis in the darkness,
will they shed tears?
Will they remember the violent history? the blood
and tainted soil? the tears of mothers?
the schemes of politicians?
the passing quandaries that envelop us now,
but will be meaningless then?
Will they cry to leave our home behind?

Small, little planet circling a sun,
solar system in the arms of a spiral,
one of millions in a galaxy that is
one of hundreds in a cluster that is
one of billions in a universe-
we are so small,
and it is beautiful to be so.
Product of billions of years of chance-
expansion from a single point, energy
bringing destruction and creation in
symbiotic, chaotic harmony.

In a few more billion years, our home will be gone,
and the universe will not be changed greatly
by the absence.
What will become of the Humans,
that precocious species that once inhabited
a starspeck, and thought they were
the center of the cosmos?
Will we have survived our self-destructive tendency
to **** our fellow man?
Will we be standing in gleaming vessels,
watching the sun expand and
consume our Mother whole?
Will we cry to see our old home burn?

Hamlet was wrong in his famous inquiry,
"to be or not to be,"
for being is only the precursor to
feeling.
"To feel, or not to feel",
that is the true question.
Is it better to submit to the cacophony,
the constant white noise that is
monotony,
just so in a rare moment,
the monotony will crescendo into
dynamic bliss?
Or, is it better to quiet your soul?
To burst the internal ear,
and lose both cruel agony and
rapturous joy.
To pass this short journey with
no injury,
to never be stifled by the everlasting
repetition-
would it not be worth the brief,
incandescent moments of beauty?
If but we could separate the two!
If but we could feel the sweetness of one,
lacking the sting of the other;
but no,
like the seasons, every autumn's glory
must give way to winter's wroth.
We must choose.
Is the reward worthy
of the sacrifices to be made?

I want to stand a patio in a city full of lights,
sharply dressed with wits half-dulled,
in a restaurant with black-tied maitre d's and
no prices on the menus.
There's a smokey-eyed blonde by my side-
a girl who's far too good for me, who has
that rich blood and
finer tastes-
her black dress and careless smiles leading me
deeper into temptation as
we both drink like we have
something to forget.
I want to sit there with her smoking the
high-class cigarettes with gold-leaf
embossed filters,
not talking, just absorbing
just enjoying.
I don't want to be rich.
I just want to be so much more than I am.
The most crushing reality of humanity isn't the
life you lead;
it's all the lives you aren't living.

Perfection: skewed over the years;
in our quest for longevity,
in our denial that good things do end,
we have tried to make perfection
into a permanence.
We chase it all our lives:
the perfect car,
the perfect lover,
the perfect relationship.
We've forgotten somehow that
perfection isn't a state of life.
Perfection isn't normal.
Perfection doesn't exist naturally.
Perfection is something we create,
and like all things humans make,
it is temporary.
Perfection is a moment to be lived in-
a glistening diamond moment that
we get to exist in for such a
precious little time.
We breath in and are filled
with satisfaction,
that most powerful ******.
We glow in our souls
until it radiates from our faces.
It is the second right after a first kiss,
when you draw back and look into your lover's eyes.
When all things are brimful of possibility and all
futures are open to you.
It is the moment after you achieve
something you worked for your entire life.
Something you bled for, lost sleep and friends
and years of your life over.
It is the second when your child
screams and draws breath for the first time.
When you see reflected in their tiny face everything you were
and everything they will be.
We are perfect in that one moment.
Of course all of it will end.
Your girlfriend may leave you behind after a time.
She may break your heart and carry it with her,
leaving you scarred and unable to love again.
You may lose everything you've worked for
in a single, capricious moment.
In one simple, thoughtless mistake.
Your child will be with you for a time,
but they will grow old and leave you,
never to speak to you until you are on death's door.
Still,
as we sit on our unbelievably vulnerable world,
one of billions in a universe full of singularities and solar flares,
comets and quasars,
evolution and extinction-
Shouldn't we just be glad that the moment happened,
instead of realizing it will end?
Life has so very few of these anomalies of perfection;
enjoy them while they are there,
do not miss them when they are gone.

I am at this place where sound is energy-
where color has mass and taste.
Every moment is a glorious adventure,
balanced on the fine line between joy and madness.
I may be insane.
I might have finally lost my mind.
I don't care.
I am bliss and freedom in this moment,
encapsulated by the rushing wind
of my own thoughts as they sail by
visceral, anthropomorphic.
As layer by layer all I know is taken
not by force, but gently,
I discover truth hidden beneath.
Obfuscated no longer,
I am god of this moment-
I am the All-Seeing Eye.
-for just a moment.
A moment that seems to stretch across
the history of the universe,
as I am blinded by the birth of a billion suns...

As waves of cigarette smoke waft
lazily into the form of tigers,
the fever pitch waves adieu-
like the distant memory of an ******,
it leaves me tired but fulfilled.
Time to reflect.
Time to absorb what I've found.
There are no adventures greater than those in your own mind.

There are times when loss seems unbearable,
Like when you walked out of my life;
The vacuum like infinite space grew between us,
A universe of despair.

It's not so much the pain as the silence,
The cool bedside and place on my chest
Where you used to lay your head
When we slept.

I took you for granted, and I pay now;
You come to me still in dreams,
Leaving me awake in dark hours,
Tossing and wishing.

You are doomed forever to exist in a part of my mind,
I cannot send you out, you burrowed too deep,
Now I feel the holes in my soul
Acute and diseased.

It's the fear that strangles me,
The thought that there will never be another like you,
That no star could shine as bright as you did,
Lighting my life.

I miss you terribly, like a caged bird misses the sky;
Wings now clipped, I can no longer fly away,
Into the blue expanse that was us,
The pure perfection.

All I can now do is beg you, don't judge me too harshly,
For the sins I committed, the mistakes of youth;
And know that I always loved you, more than this world,
And I forever will.

It could've been one second, or a million years
Time is illusory, pushed to the side
I miss every one I've ever loved
The ones that don't even remember my name
In these days beyond what I've left behind
I feel like a sailor, standing on the docks
I'm watching the white-cloth sails unfurl
Every ship is leaving the harbor
All full of adventure and hope
All moving forward
I'm left behind to sustain myself on memories
To live life alone in a place I hate
My heart is on the open seas
But my feet are on land
I'm not unhappy
I'm not happy
I'm just here, stuck in between everything.

I've shouted questions at the sky-
Hard ones, nearly unanswerable-
hoping against hope that somewhere,
Something might answer.
I've screamed until my throat grew
hoarse from the effort,
and stared up,
waiting-
wishing-
begging
for some kind of answer.
A sign.
Anything.
But there was only silence, ringing
deafeningly over the black expanse.
The stars went on shining as they had before.
It was then I realized.
The Cosmos doesn't care about me.
The Cosmos has cares of its own-
Forging stars and galaxies from dust;
Compressing the very essence of time into
unimaginable singularities;
presiding over the evolutionary cycles of
innumerable lifeforms.
Why would it care about one,
comparatively insignificant life,
on a world teeming with it,
in the outward spiral of a
galaxy very likely filled with other life.
It was then I realized.
Maybe I should look out for myself-
find the answers I seek on my own,
give up/leave behind my fear of the unknown,
instead of expecting the answers to be handed to me.
It shouldn't be that easy.

We are star dust compressed by millions of years,
By eons of adversity,
Molding us, pushing us,
Until we became what we are.
Though our lives are short,
We are dreamers,
Our eyes constantly drawn upward,
To our origination.
We are the creators;
We bleed through quantum time,
Sculpting our universes as we see fit.
There is no sacred or forbidden.
Little circles constantly spinning.
Fate and choice intertwined,
Captives of our freedom,
Prisons of our own design.
Lilting strings harmonically ringing,
Over gulf of time;
We are integrally conflicted,
Oppositionally aligned.
We find hope in our struggle,
Love in darkness,
Peace in weariness,
Comedy in tragedy.
We are quantum creatures.
We exist between the lines.

Do we ever exist in more than just this moment?
Or is the person of the next moment a stranger,
Created for that second, and
Annihilated for the next?
Should we worry about anything, then?
Should we even care?

There are few responses that fit when you fall away
from all the things you love most.
After so many reinventions, so many changes
I don't know who I am anymore.
I thought I knew what I was chasing, but
in the end, I was wrong.
I've changed directions and I can't get back, even
to where home is a distant memory.
I can't recognize my surroundings, the world I
built with my choices.
All doors are locked and windows closed,
walls are padded, eyes are dim.
I don't want to die trapped in my own foolish
insecurities and mistakes.
I don't want to become just a soldier, marching
this lonely road to the end.
I hate looking in the mirror and seeing my own
accusing eyes, reminding me.
Rip and tear, claw and bring to ruin this palatial
tower of misrepresentation.
Wear my fingers to the bone with insignificant
self-promises and fleeting hope.
I will be free one day.
Silence the voice of failure and my near silent
misgivings that cut the hamstrings of hope
and push me deeper into the prison of
despair and self loathing.
I will be free.

Players on a wide open stage,
we are all characters in a story
old as time.
Passing faces all hold meaning,
full of history, past
and opportunity, future.
Complete lives, deeper than our own;
yet we dismiss them.
Nation boundaries are ink on a page.
There is no difference from one to another;
we are all human.
In our souls, we all seek the same concept:
A reason.
It feels like madness for a purpose
to just simply not exist.
Consciousness lusts for a justification.
The pain, blood, death;
love, joy, hope, and
dreams, all beg the question:
"Why?"
Weighty to accept, the void.
The sheer lack of answers.
Religion, careers, economics,
physics, psychology;
all of it invented to attempt,
to try as hard as we can
to find a reason.
As always, the smallest moments
hide the largest truths.
Every person experiences it,
though they may not understand.
The reason for us,
for life,
is plain, unconcealed for all to see.
Every religious fanatic;
every businessman;
every politician, scientist,
drug dealer, bank robber,
terrorist;
every person has a moment
where eyes lock as they pass
on the street.
And they understand in just
that tiny moment.
The reason we live is us.
It is other humans.
Relationships; love.
Our exploration of everything,
the wide, beautiful universe
together.
There is no other reason.
There is no need for one.

The road of life is long, with few detours.
There are very few who will walk it with you until the end.
Most of the time you will be alone;
Even more of the time you will be lonely.
You will not want to walk on.
Many days, the first step from your bed
will be a battle.
Your dreams will almost certainly die.
Your hopes will almost certainly not be realized.
Your grand plans will be forgotten,
left forlornly on the wayside as you
plod on.
Your heart will close in time.
Love will rage through like a wildfire;
you'll be caught up in the glow,
the sheer energy,
but, in time, it will burn out,
and for miles, you'll be walking on embers.
Everyone you care for will eventually,
unavoidably let you down.
And many nights you will lie awake sleepless,
wondering
"Why?"
"Why am I here?"
"What reason is there to go on?"
"Is there an end to this?"
And you will answer yourself
"YES."
You will find that power, that spirit.
You will make that first step out of bed.
You will dream a better dream.
You will hope a brighter hope.
One day, you will follow a plan that
fulfills you in ways you cannot yet
imagine.
Your heart will reopen wider.
Love will recreate you, and you'll dance in the flames.
You will forgive and learn to trust again.
And many nights you'll fall into decadent sleep
thinking "How"
"How did I survive?"
"How did I get so lucky?"
"How could I ever be sad?"
"How could this ever end?"
Life is equal part suffering,
equal part bliss.
The key is to find the joy so clearly
hidden in hard times
to get you through the pain,
And remember the hurt in the good times,
to make you ready for the next struggle.

We all have things we carry
As we walk this lonely road,
Burdens of the past are heavy
But dreams are a crushing load.
So we take Tomorrow and put them there
But he cannot stand,
Small and unprepared
Not meant to hold our plans.
So he falls and breaks all our hopes
Dashes all our designs,
The shattered glass we can't repair
No matter how we try.
It is then we learn a lesson
By looking down the stony path,
Our dreams may be tough to carry
But they will survive only on our back.
The past cannot hold us
Because it is written, unchangeable;
And tomorrow cannot hold our hopes
Because it is intangible.
We look down at the road we're on
And we slowly realize,
It is best to stay in the present
Where we've been standing the whole time.

There is but one truth on which you can depend
Through all my hard life it has never proven untrue
No matter who else you may call a friend
The only person ever worth trusting is you

Yourself is the only one who will see you through
Every situation, no matter how dire
You will find your friends waving adieu
They will leave you to fall when you're walking the wire.

But, "my friend would never", you say, but you lie!
Remember my words when they say their goodbye.

Why have I never gotten past you?
Even now, as you fade into the nether
of the past, I desperately try to
hold to the effervescent memories of you,
and as it slips through my fingers, I
feel the loss, loneliness, and yet-
I never want another.
I only want you.
I don't care:
what you've done
where you've been.
I just know that I love you.
That is enough. It is too much.
I know I will never love again, because
after you, all other love will be pretend.
I cannot have you; I will have no one
and the winds will blow my love across the sea.
I hope you feel it in the salty beach breeze,
feel it in the warmth of the sun.
I hope every time you get goosebumps,
you realize it is my embrace;
every birdsong is my declaration,
Every whistling wind,
a soft whisper.
I hope you know that even until time dies,
through the endless reincarnations,
I will carry my love to that end-
until in blissful Nirvana in ages come, we are one.

What do you know about being locked up in time?
This whole world's a phase with a vicious design.
I'm a loser by all counts but at least my life is mine.
What do I care if I can never climb
out of this pit I created?
I dug it myself.
With some good medication
and some criminal help.
If I'm a lost soul then I don't want to be found.
I'd rather be lost in clouds then have two feet on the ground.
I doubt myself sometimes, and it's a deafening sound.
But I shrug that **** off, let myself drown
in the wisdom of youth
and the brilliance of folly.
It's ambient, the noose
when you're tripping on molly.
I'm a perfect example of many opportunities lost.
**** it, at this point I don't think of the cost.

I'm so jaded I get faded and I'm weighted to this cadence and the fragrance of this basement where complacent I'm a vagrant.
I'm fighting to keep writing while I'm sedated seems I'm slated to this existence of persistence
where this all is so futile a world that's so brutal-
I can't breathe in this apostasy of mediocrity I've become.

Closure is a fiction,
A word created to try
to make us feel better;
A desperate attempt to hide
the festering wounds
we all keep so dear.
The ones we hold on to,
cling to, out of fear.
No matter the method,
the hole never will close;
we try to patch it with band-aids,
but underneath, decompose.
The ghosts of futures
we will never know
continue to haunt us,
where ever we go.
"It is better to have loved and lost",
a greater lie never spoken.
Romantics leave us husks,
empty and broken.
We settle for someone,
when are wild days are done,
and we regret forever
the loss of that one.

We are hopeful; we are loud
We are nonperishable,
Cyclic, changing-
Remolded constantly in a crucible of
re-understanding; unrelenting
Unvanquished, not even by death.
We are caring and wishing
dreaming, fulfilling
We are breath, in and out-
One, two, three:
Leap without looking
We are above all, hopeful
in the face of adversity
To be human is to hope.
To be human is to dream.
To be human is to be,
never to become, but just to be
Like wind ever moving,
seen and unseen-we pass
through one life to the next
leaving impressions behind.
We are purposed in that our purpose is
a thing to be found, to be sought
and even if it remains lost,
it becomes apparent at the end.
But even the end is a beginning.
There is no such thing as a wasted life;
no such thing as wrong
no such thing as right.
There just is, and whatever is,
is up to us to find.
We may never know where the big bang came from
or what was before.
But if we're lucky, we may one day know ourselves.

Because there are stars,
because there are cool winds rippling over mountain lakes,
because there are bird songs and blooms;
because you reflect in these things:
your beauty,
your kindness,
your gentle demeanor;
Because you bring hope like a scent where other women leave ****** perfume,
Because your teeth glint like alabaster and fill the room with a tsunami of joy when you smile,
Because your voice could melt the coldest man's heart-
           because your life is like a song I've heard my whole existence, always on the
           edge of my hearing, waiting to fill my being with its melody;
Because of all of these things, I know you are there.
I will find you, where ever you are.
Just hold on.