All this air is getting so thick
With sick, powerful people, taking the open space all away
Concrete on the parks, we use to play
Imprison the mind until those dreams start to fade

We're fighting for oxygen
Suffocating on the stuff they make us breath.
We're fighting for oxygen
Make like the trees but, denied the ability to leave.
We're fighting for oxygen
They sold the air for a lot of corporate greed.

You wouldn't understand all the hands
Shaking ***** plans behind closed doors
You wouldn't understand all the rich
Switching winning sides of a poor man's war.
How can I respect this beautiful land
When it's governed by grease-palmed ******?
How can I respect these political felons
While I'm just fighting for oxygen?

They tell me to take a stand for what's right
In this place I still call free
They tell me to take a stand
"But only if it holds the same view as me"
I'm looking up to stars, light years from this place
Aligned to show a for sale sign on my face
They'd sell the earth I enjoyed living in
And make me fight for this oxygen

I've seen criminals act heroic,
Heroes walk as thieves,
Humans must be at a steady downfall
Because all I see are leaves
Tarzan stood half monkey, half man
Until he let all those apes escape
Now he's running with Specter in this primate land.
I play mario in a tanooki suit, as a statue would stand
Sure he could take on a world of weight,
But I still miss the days he wore a cape.
See because you only get one master ball to capture,
Still unable to catch a politician who isn't a lying *******.
I am backed by deep words quoted by Mewtwo
Even in minds they create from scratch, they won't believe you.

The heartless can swallow your heart whole
Leaving your shell cold, walking as a nobody
Created as a somebody glitched through the system like Xion
When no one remembers your soul what planet would you be on
Fighting for a right like Seifer  versus Leon.
I am looking at a world frozen like Shiva's diamond dust
With Eve pumping through my veins,
Getting stronger, selling all the Adam in my clutch.


You will never find me, how I look no one knows
I'm a master of disguise with a Poppit full of clothes
I'm storing all that I know in my roots
Collecting memories like wumpa  and paopu fruits
Stealing loot from crooks like Captain Hook
As time tick-tocks, in time we are all late
So follow the white rabbit, this red pill won't wait.

About twenty-nine thousand kids die everyday
And I wonder why I was blessed to grow up
Why did I get a chance to grow up,
In a roulette system of unfavorable odds
They let me have a life and tried to say
I should thank all my achievements to a god.
Don't take the little I earned
And say it wasn't mine to earn.

These days aren't all easy, the nights are a blur
I found the best friends in people who didn't know who they were
Growing up and forgetting to throw up their hands
Then defining themselves by jobs, they happened to land
****. Weren't we just kids, can you feel that?
Hold on a second, let me take you back.

Remember that time, back in Szumski's basement
We spent no time practicing, Mitch on drums, Clark on bass
I started singing, no stage, but it felt like a taste
Of what our lives would be like making it
Every wasted night, not a night felt wasted.
Not a night felt wasted. Remember?
Pretending we could skate and scooter
Even if as the summer's end kept coming sooner
We'd never admit we were doomed. To grow up.

We mostly split, seperate ways, that's how life plays
Speaking in tenses of old acquaintances, "I'm doing okay."
I wonder how often we really are okay when we speak that way.
A million thoughts a minute fly through my mind,
And if I'm being honest, sometimes, I just miss you guys.
In the past six years, I've felt like a failure, a champion,
A father, a loser, and all the others in between.
If growing up for you has been like it is for me
I'm sure you know exactly what I mean.

I wanted to write a masterpiece
Here's a page of my life,
What do you think of this?
Nobody is asking to read more
But if I didn't have these paper sheets
I don't think I'd be living anymore.
Here's the time I almost choked and died,
Ate the wrong thing and saw flat lines
And although I've written about it before,
Sometimes it feels like a war
So I write it again to pull that fear from my core.

I wanted to write a masterpiece
So my father might say he's proud
I spent my whole childhood working for it.
As an adult he gave me that line
And all i could feel was that he wasn't allowed.
My mother told me she was proud
And I felt like I was on skyscraper,
But when you're on top you can only go down.
No one ever speaks of your success
Until you're back broken on the ground.

I wanted to write a masterpiece
So here's 500 times I felt low
Here's another 500 I was able to grow
Here's every piece of life I've known.
Here's a masterpiece, I'll light it in flames
I'm just a human born to be lame
So keep the trophy I just wanted to play the game.
Get off that bench and quit the team,
We are all born from that same cloth
But I'm ready to rip the seams.

I wanted to be a masterpiece,
Not just a simple piece or a pawn
I want to be a masterpiece
Before they take me out and I'm gone.

A hundred marbles in dish,
A chance of fate to question with.
Fifty red and fifty white,
Fifty for my death and fifty for my life.
I close my eyes and extend my hand to reach,
My fingers brush the glass of each.
Afraid to look at either outcome,
If I see white, I breath for them.
If I see red, they agree with me, this is the end.

With sweat forming at my brow,
Three. Two. One. I open them now
It's red like crimson, red like birth.
Read like the paper that spoke my worth.
The rope behind was tied,
My fate was made as was mind.
It's time.

Thirty seconds I hung,
Thirty's seconds the rope did snap.
Questioning why they put me back
I guess lotteries play games like that.

Sick of being stuck awake,
I should probably bake a cake,
Stuff a file inside, then sit for an hour of wait,
Another hour to cool, use the tool to pry my mind from this cage
Blow out the candles, the world becomes my stage
But I fall flat on a crowd with button eyes, deaf ears,
Rusted mental gears, and smiles looking at me queer.
"Hi I'm Ryan, I'm a poet. I belong here."
Reading to a generation that skipped reading,
Stuck feeding off of the **** for free
Asking for another handout that a past life made them believe
They deserved, too delicate, while I stay thick like corduroy,
Poking fun like I should take some ilk, you're too soft
I destroy you, still drinking mother's milk, you're soft as silk.
Don't make me spell it out, we are cut from different cloth.

I've sat with my life choices happy as an oyster
In a month that doesn't have an "R"
People walk through the door and try to raise my bar,
You couldn't come close, don't judge those who trudge
Through mud and sludge then take a second to coast,
I'm still a star while others whack the green,
Barely even keeping up with par.

I don't even have enemies, I get angry with my own mind
That tells me I should be on a steady grind
Then find myself too tired to stay awake
Too awake to fall asleep, let's write it out,
I never was one to be good at counting sheep
I took to counting breaths, counting beats,
Never couldn't count on me, have a seat.
Let's talk it out and bake a cake,
Another file filed so I can free this cage,
I flee the stage.

If everyone acted as I do,
I would have a hard time finding myself.

I remember all those terribly awkward years
In a time capsule that dropped me right here.
I'd stay up with an unplugged microphone
Singing some songs about being alone
Writing so many poems of being unknown
How everyone looked so perfect,
They had a plan that seemed perfect,
They weren't like me, they weren't like you.
Masks of perfection that made me feel less than you
Questioning all of the life we've been through

I had a combination to a lock I still know
Even if it's to a door, now unknown
Down the hall you can find me, number 345
studying chapters in books on how to feel alive
Then graduate, jumping off that high dive
And we splash, knowing nothing
Praying we don't drown
Sick from the vertigo of a planet spinning us around.

Everyone looked so perfect,
They had a plan that seemed perfect
Just like me, just like you
With a mask having each the other fooled
Questioning how they made it through
I'm so perfect.
You're so perfect too.
My plan is, I haven't got a clue.

I apologize for what you read here,
Some people may not believe what they read here.
You see, my generation, is shot down on all accounts
I don't play a victim in this scene, I take a higher route.
They brush me off as joker, dreaming of waking up
I've been climbing trees for fruit but now I'm on the ground shaking them up.
I'm not looking for a handout as my career track shows
But who am I, among these gods, to deny a poor man clothes.

See I'm living in a world where, when I'm old and grown,
The social security I'm paying into will be unknown,
Men and women my age are going on war tours
Left their minds overseas and come back abandoned poor,
Still forgetting what god I'm supposedly fighting for.
I sit patient as they tax my metophorical tea
Then turn on the TV and see riots in the street
As if this history just isn't skipping a beat
I couldn't care less about your race or sexuality,
About your religious ideology, or the identity you see.
I'm looking you point blank and just asking if you're happy.
Because these streets look so bleak
While holding a connected world in my hands,
Still so afraid to speak because everything has to be
So contradictory and couldn't we agree
That my generation is bad
But the previous one raised me.

A lady I work with, she works eighty hours a week
Her old man's at home wearing medical bills as shackles on his feet.
She keeps fighting strong and he keeps pushing on
But they ******* them and take the cane their standing on
Maybe I'm naive but this system just seems so wrong.
You can tax me for education,
Take a dollar for someone's medical bills too
This money is so common, there's only one of you.
I'm not looking to pick a fight
I'm just stating what I believe is right
Throwing down my pen, cutting sharper than a knife.

Give me a beat to drift with
For the focus I need, I need my mind lifted
Out of this skull you try to pull me back
I don't lack attention because you don't hold my attention
This detention is too basic so I tend to twist it.
Give me a beat to drift with
To you its just noise, this is the soundtrack I live in
These words flowing out of me like a record stuck spinning
Praying I don't get stuck on these scratches
And detach from the needle, that I have my grooves in

I do the impossible with bass, battling my fears
Flashback to the tears of some years ago
Driving home from a job I just got let go,
Figuring out how to let my wife know
Feeling like a bird having its wings clipped
Give me a bass to break walls with
But here I am a force you just can't stop, sir
As I was taking that one test to change my fate
I was blasting  Watsky and T. Walker
With an inspirational message lasting
To the point that I walked out a ninety question wreck
And came out a certified pharmacy tech.

I'm clinging to these lyrics like my world depends on it
I don't even know what god to thank for the ceilings I hit
So I pray to a different one every night and love this life
Even as I lay here writing, I hear what another is writing
Pounding through my head, in a perfect reciting
Give me the words to widen minds with
I don't even know what god to thank for the ceilings I hit
So I pray to a different one every night with the love of my life.

How do you answer a five year old
When he's asking why we are alive
I don't have any statement solid enough that he'd be sold
Or why we aren't helping the elderly, hungry and cold.
Explain to a child humanity has taken a dive,
That today, people don't care if you survive
But I'm still strapped for an answer when asked
What happens when those planets align?
Looking into unsure little eyes,
Like "yeah buddy, of course it will all be fine"

It's hard to censor anymore because people want it raw
But then get insulted for what their kid saw
Even the kids shows are spouting crude jokes
Shaggy and Velma are dating
While I sit waiting for a classic mystery to begin
Teach them everything so young and so fast,
Their minds can't take it, gone in a blast.
The clock not missing a tick, the world spins

What do we win if we stop helping,
Selfishly, keeping more than they need
At the root of your thoughts,
I have to know what does your mind bleed
All these things and stuff, I'd give it all up
In a heartbeat, you can watch me do it
Lead by example and keep the rooms lit
But my son keeps asking questions,
So I keep retracing puzzle pieces on my finger
Until the answers for him perfectly fit

Dear Ana,

I feel like I've had you on my mind, this whole life.
I feel like you might take me from this family,
Suffocating me, cutting me out with a knife
It's hard for me to understand why you follow so close,
At times when I eat alone, I think of you the most, Ana.
While other demons take a backseat you will never be ghost
They called me a freak in school with you on my chest
And Ana the nights you felt closest,
Are the times I wanted to rest.

When I see your face, you leave me breathless,
My heart starts pounding with my mouth trembling
You pull me in and whisper "let's end this"
As much as it pains me not to succumb to your song,
I pull your arms from my neck then you're gone,
Gone in a person but there in a presence
But I don't agree to that fate, yet have come to acceptance

So Ana, you say you miss me and every meeting seems dire
The doctors, they tell me, you're bad for my health
Still until I expire you'll never retire
And Ana feels access holding my throat in
With one injection and slowly i count to ten
Now Ana be silenced for a moment
But still talking from within.
Ana never leaves but keeps quiet until it's a struggle again

To everyone born to this world with nothing
No social code, allowed to risk it all with no bluffing
While others get bored being handed their every desire
I spent my childhood days building dirt empires
Dreaming of the molds I was not cut out of
When I'd sit down with fellow folks talking of my aspirations
Most just laughed, brushed me off like I had no chance
So I fueled my fire with life's frustrations
My life works may never something tangible
But if you read every chapter of me, your hands would overflow

This world doesn't seem to understand my twisting mind
But at least I never looked at my dining room,
Thinking it's a great place to hang a clothes line
I'm taking jabs at my past but never dwell in that hollow home
Past these child eyes how much of me do you really know
If you were me, if you had to be, disrespectfully  some say they'd **** themselves
Take that negativity and raise myself onto a higher shelf

I find my best inspiration in music and staring out at stars
one of my favorite pieces I ever wrote was just about passing cars
I'm scared that people are being cookie cut all the same
In a Stepford  manner more messed up than Gerald's  game
They hand you charts and define you in a statistic
Like they already threw you the ball but you missed it
I'm here to breath life into a deflated man's scene
Don't let these demons destroy your darkest dreams
Spark a light onto who you want to be
In a sea of fish, be the one swimming up stream

When I was a kid
And the family walls were falling
I remember thinking it would all be okay
If I could just learn to wall kick
Stick the landing, while the world was crumbling,
I look for applause for still standing
But the truth is they don't see you for standing strong
Just enjoy the scene when that strength is gone
Disgree, I'm asking you to prove me wrong.

Show me the story of your high school friend who made it
Not the hundred that stayed in the mould and faded
Show me the car crash that was evaded,
The hero, who's past wasn't completely exploited,
The victim that didn't end up on that stage desserted,
But no, that human nature is too perverted.
Forget the man saved, here's more on the murderer
News casters will give you the gritty details like sheep herders

Maybe your world isn't simple to fix,
Just keep working, this life has no tricks
At the end of the day, you know what makes you tick
But before the world came crashing
I learned to wall kick
So while the struggle is as real
As the wheel you steer,
keep screaming until the deaf even hear

Please walk by me,
The music's cranked to hear my mind breath
I can't hear you and please don't remind me
I'm aware of the bass and snare
Keeping all other opinions out of there
It's not as simple as, "I don't care"
But at the same time I'm happily unknown,
So don't address yourself to me over here.
Leaving me in my own zone.

It's confusing, seeing me wandering by
See I'm happy, I'm laughing
You just don't have the formula to understand
That I have no master plan
I choose to dance with uncertainty
And I love it.

I love it like a random Wednesday drive
With no map, following clouds in the sky
The roads are the veins
To my pulse carrying me by
This is my zone, where I am alive
Don't squander my voice,
This place I've found is just mine
I'll stay here awhile, you can pass me by

If I could dance with all the shadows
In the night, when humans don't stir
In the softest, darkest hallows,
Squinted eyes, all the lighting blurs
Through the seconds of time passing
In moments, slept by most
It's not funny, but I'm laughing
To this little world, I am a ghost

Down the streets, uncrowded
I walked bustling places at noon
But in this witching hour,
The earth can be the loneliest room.
In dim lit lights, I see myself
Through mirrors of stores closed
The most comfortable I ever felt
As the softest wind just blows.

If I could dance with all the shadows
They'd want me all for keeps
The darkness would slowly creep
Taking me to the darkest gallows
As if I was theirs for them to take
So run and run all the way home
To a place so very known
Until the world soon becomes awake

If we stepped behind the beautiful curtains,
Behind the giant theater scene,
You might just see something real.
Evade the poker faces, looking into how people feel.
In my generation, where interest pops up like a notification
Searching for any sort of gratification, so they call us whiners.
That's fine, but you're missing the picture because you only see a screen.
I mean, we "laugh out loud" but stay straight faced
In an ever faster rat race, we stepped out of our place
Stuck searching for some real emotion,
Talking to a doctor who hands over some cure all potion
But it still isn't real, all the same, taking that blue pill.
Am I alone in actually saying how I feel?

In these games, I'm happy playing, I'm the hero
With no fear, conquering armies of evil.
Twin guns and blades, nothing safe from the raid
As I sit on a couch, in a button-mashing serenade.
I get why these people hide, how can I compare
To the digital remastered people they see on there,
Where miracles are a dime a dozen.
Look at me I'm breathing, to them it seems like nothing
But it means everything, they just stopped seeing
That the miracle they could be performing is actually just being.
Being everything you set out to be in a real life quest,
There's a billion people out there, there's isn't a you yet.

Don't let fear stop you from your dreams,
Even if that dream is just speaking out.
You may be blessed with a gift,
But that doesn't mean to stop achieving.
Life is fleeting while your stuck sleeping on devices
This is your life. It's beautiful.
Don't waste it.
You only get one, look in that mirror and face it.
It isn't as fat, ugly, or odd looking as you assume.
If you can't face your soul, you're doomed
But if your reading this there's still time,
This is a new chapter, this is the last one's last line.

Even if I leave this demon on an island in the past
I feel like my mind will still be attached
They hit me with adrenaline pens in a panicked blur,
A fifteen minute relief pretending to work on a cure.
Looking through the eyes of a rabbit
Every harp string starts to hum
Staring over these oceans that begin to turn to ***
Try to convince me, by casting all these spells
But this water isn't fixing anything when they poison all the wells
They tell us to keep sailing, despite the brutal winds
As the sun is fading, the tide is setting in.

Look at me and say, "you're an inconvenience to us"
Like my soul is insignificant, blowing away like dust
My only privilege asked is that you let me breathe
In a room full of untrust, still they don't let me leave
My voice starts to wheeze, they don't listen.
I'm in a position to beg people to let me breathe.
My heart rate quickens, wishing I could just be freed,
A time bomb around my neck, no one holds the key.

I smile for today, the sun is shining, keeping storms at bay
Even if forcasted, Armageddon is on its way.
Don't expect the kids to sit inside, let them dance in puddles
You can't go along for the ride living in these bubbles
Avoidance is simple, but I'd rather take a chance with trouble
I'll smile all the while, until the day I meet my death
I'm in a position to beg people to let me breathe
But you won't hear me speak a plea until my dying breath

I quit my job today
it's like gaining a beautiful freedom,
Wouldn't you say?
To wake up, In a world free from the clock in, clock out
I didn't leave a note, I just walked out
Honestly, I'm smiling with no doubts, no regrets
Even more honest, it's been five minutes,
I haven't even gotten in my car yet.
And I haven't had a chance to dissect these decisions.
I got a wife and son at home, they don't even know,
I don't even know what I was thinking,
Sit down for a minute, I'm getting blurred vision.

I'm taking some time for myself today,
Those bills can stack like dominos,
They fall, I didn't plan to pay them anyway.
I'll play these video games and become a legend,
Sodas will pay me to represent them
I'd be a sellout in a second, that isn't even a question
Just as long as I don't need to get out of bed, then I'll be fine.
It's alright, keep telling myself, it's alright.

I retired from my job today,
I gave my title away
What will I do without this purpose?
What is there, now, for me to seek?
I'm trying not to freak out
Honestly, my nerves are shot, my brain feels so tired
Even more honest, I'm driving home to try to explain to my family
That really I just got fired.

Once there was a boy all dreamy-eyed questioning  where in life he'd go
Now, he is a young man and still he doesn't know

How far would you go to save the world?
How far would you go for just one?
Would you sail through the darkest of waters?
Would you feel the heat of the sun?
there's beauty out there in the clouds
With suspicious peace lurking in the unknown
If ambition without limits was allowed
Tell me, how high your mind would have flown?

There's galaxies seen in wondering eyes,
Formality imploding your dreams
Have you sewn all these elegant thoughts
Society tries so hard to pull at the seams
You have a spark, they envy so terribly
They'd ****** to tear it apart
But shine, like innocence, even in the darkest of dark

The rain was made for dancing
Trust kids, they have it so right
When the room turns pitch black menacing,
They turn on their night light.
If you are lost and have seen no sun for a while
Unsure of what tomorrow will bring,
Start simple and put on a smile
Attitude can change everything

What are you trying to say,
Lately I've been asking myself.
It feels like my thoughts are too piled up
With only a feather to dust these shelves
Sweep these images off of my chest
Left scraping together this disorganized mess.
I'm having trouble with my fan base,
The trouble is I don't have a fan base.
Stuck in a position of not knowing what I want to be,
I know who I am, now let's look past me.

I've been debating religion and stuck in an uncomfortable position
Of calling most the church goers hypocrites
Only following the rules when the shoe fits
Then gossip in the back of the pew
about a man with more struggles than you
Hung up on other's demons, while pretending to smile
We send them to a mental trial, tell the next person
Next you leave them exiled, pulling some godly ranks.
Ask me to come to that place, I'll say no thanks.

It's another lakeshore day, it's another late night
Taking a breath of the wild at 2 am through dim light.
Sitting in the same room, with a little time to type
I'm stuck in my thoughts but unable to know what to say
So I'll leave this on an ironic tone
Yesterday, my father wished me a happy father's day.
But his knowledge of me stands unknown.

The stars looked really bright tonight,
To be honest I only saw them for a minute
But I saw them all the same, look up
Maybe they're out where you are too.
There's something peaceful about this world
When the crowds part, our hearts march  in silence
If my words were leaves with a pen for a tree,
If I drop this pen does it really make a sound?
Among familiar faces yet, no one is truly around.

I worry about the state of people's minds
In these hot Arizona days, I find
It odd to give a beggar water
And be scolded, as they may not really be in need
If a person sits injured does it matter the context of the bleed
Don't worry I've got a bandage to spare,
You won't take away my image of a  world
Where people sincerely care
So play me for a fool, I'll wear a jester hat
Spewing out a stupid joke for the insecurities I mask.

But if you take away a single thought from me,
Look up at the stars tonight
Maybe they're out where you are too.
You can never touch their beauty

In the moments before she leaves
When her hands sweat bullets
With full anticipation of the future to be
She looks in the mirror, worried.
She looks out the window, he isn't there yet.
She looks back to the mirror,
Her hair is a mess, she fixes her bangs to one side,
She looks again outside, he isn't there yet.

She's pacing, wasting time in anxious
She notices her make-up smudged
While he's driving down the road
Looking in his side mirror to judge
Why she agreed to an evening
Leaving him self-conscious of his soul
His eyes meet his eyes and in his own gaze
He feels he could swallow himself whole.
Pulling into the driveway,
He inhales deep and says
"Don't let this one get away"

He walks to the door feeling his pulse
She walks to the door trying to breath slow
He thinks she's going to look perfect
She thinks he's going to look perfect
She turns the **** and pulls
The ending, time will only show.

When you start, everything is wide open,
Your actions are completely limitless.
Hold onto that feeling for a moment.
As soon as you move, direction is created,
These moves have purpose even at random
Structure begins to form around them.
Are you a king? Are you a pawn?
Look closely, are they really that different?

I'll tell you the difference, if you'd like.
A pawn can move one or two spaces ahead
Some may make it to the other side,
But a king, a king can turn back if he wanted
For when he dies, that's the end of the ride.
With a queen going every and anywhere
And a rook keeping straight in his sights.
Remember, your actions are limitless
So when you move, be sure to move right.

My father wished me a happy birthday.
My father wished me a happy birthday.
My father wished me a happy birthday,
And I wonder if we will ever speak outside of that.

Hold a door for someone with their arms full
Hold a door for someone with no arms at all.
Hold a door for a mother, a father, a child
Or someone who may not be here for a while
Hold a door made of glass, of steel, of gold
Of old wood and splinters in the freezing cold.
Hold a door for a stranger and a stranger may hold one for you
It seems so rare that we help, be the exceptional few

Give your hat to shield someone's eyes from the sun
Give your shoes to someone ready to run
Give your attention when someone speaks their heart
And your heart to someone who needs attention
Give something that may mean little to yourself
But to someone else may be a beautiful blessing

Say hello to a person preoccupied with life
Date with intention of a husband or wife
Make people feel special, they'll appreciate your time
Say the words that make sense even if they don't... never mind

All the beautiful people I'll never be
Walking on these crooked paths and
See right through me, I see right through you
Who am I? I'm beautiful, you're beautiful.
And I find it scary, we define ourselves only by words
Found in every standard dictionary.
What's your beauty making you a freak?
Before you speak, understand, you don't need to speak
That quality may only be seen, and no word can describe
Why, in this world, you are perfectly unique.

Or maybe you got out of the house today,
With a crippling fear that you might deteriorate
If someone looked you straight in your eyes,
But you're still out there, anxiety building, coasting the tides.
A victory to me may be your every day life
So if today all you did was get out of bed
Instead of fighting a constant strife in your own head
I'm rooting for you, do everything that is you.

All the beautiful people I'll never be
Are just as broken, believe me
We all have a closet full of skeletons.
Dance with the bones, come into your own element
I'm alone in a room with a circus full of elephants
Juggling knives and flaming clubs, then turn them all to doves
They throw peanut shells and I dance in a deadly dust
Flying until I fall off this adrenaline rush.
All the beautiful people, will never be me.

There's an old house up on Jennings Street
In a yard so overgrown, you can't see your feet
A vine grows up the side and a shed near the back
With a door that doesn't meet the frame and track.
A hole in the roof, houses a family of Bluejays
Who chirp and play as the world passes by
Babies jumping off that same roof, learning to fly
Untaxed by the society seen in people eyes.

Some say it's haunted, others say just condemned
But inside those cryptic walls is a place few have been
Once you've entered, time stands very still
Every creak tells a story and the air is thinner with a chill.
Musk and dust cover where a family thrived,
Before this technology that made us so unalive.

I wouldn't dare to move a single thing
I bring only what my eyes recall.
This place was not my place, not even my time
In a body I only borrow, who am I to call anything mine?
Others blinded by greed, believe they are owed this history
So as I left this house I locked the door, to save the mystery.
There's an old house on Jennings Street
Leave it be, it's perfect.

My mind is like crank, turning out ideas
Look around this room, no cobwebs here
The door is always open, I'm hoping you see me
As just the same as you, a man with little plan
But still stand for whatever belief I hold,
The fact is all the gold in the world
Isn't worth your integrity, regrettably,
Some can be sold, I stand before you
With a five and a seven, still never fold
I'm that wild card, that was hard to shuffle,
Feathers covered in oil and ruffled,
The secret is I've got ridges, Forget being religious,
You're a god, make a miracle, they may shun you,
Like a man believing in a world that's spherical.
Still someone has to climb that ladder,
At day's end you can look in a mirror
And it may not shatter.

Life is good, the hell of today, it fades.
Put down the rope and take up knot - tying
Similarly, the people who look down at you for not trying
Are not trying to see how hard you are trying.
It's not worth crying to the same lace pillow case
About that dream you believe you aren't good enough to chase
Fads and trends blend until you can't tell them apart
But real passion is only found in heart and reflected through eyes
In an adult world, that part of humans seems to die.
Alright. Jump and possibly fly.

Build people up with dreams like legos
And let go of the expectation of current standings
The runway may not be clear but you don't need landing
Plan for the best, the worst just ends in a hearse
Believe me, I've been unbreathing.
A good night, I fly into?
drag me from my flesh, I'm not leaving.
Don't believe me, I'll almost die twenty times with a heart beating.
I'm not leaving.
You'll have to **** a soul from my soles until this ground swallows me whole.
Still this body will never go cold.

Honey is beauty in the eyes of bee holders
With a hive that's guarded by many soldiers
But for me, my love, it is coffee, mate.
In a red container and a label reading Folger 's
No time to brew, so I chew grounds in my teeth
About a half tub a day, let's be honest, I don't sleep.
No 40 winks, not a one, in a blink, that day's done
And I only wrote this because I found the wordplay fun

There's spiders crawling up my back
They walk beneath my skin
Following my veins as tracks
If I give in to the itch and scratch,
They'll only go deeper down it seems
In a whack-a-mole, I'll never win
There's no cut to end the scene
A T virus living within me
Too young for this vaccine.

There's a dagger digging in my side
Giving a twist every five minutes or so
As hard as I've tried, I can't remove it
For a few weeks then I guess it resides
I don't know if they can tell me
Why I always throw dice and end up
With such luck of drawing snake eyes
But they seem to be on the slither
Scaling quickly up and down my spine

There's a room that's been spinning a bit,
A headache for days that just won't quit,
I'm losing focus and maybe you noticed
But I'm trying hard not to throw a fit.
I'm anxious and truly I don't wish to mingle,
I'm twenty - six and I have the shingles
And my roof is leaking a bit.

I feel there are few times where I can just lie,
Lie under a large tree with no other purpose
A million things to do yet, I am doing none
Carrying a mind with no thoughts, not one.
With leaves acting as net catching the sun
Slowly rising up, knowing that time is done.

The wind felt really great today
You don't stop to think about it much
I guess your world grows, the world falls out of touch.
I made my choice, to release myself
Among best friends, sea salt ice cream still melts
I don't regret it, not even one or three hundred days,
This is our roof top, not a better place to fade.

It really was just the three of us,
I guess before me, it was just two
Among thirteen, who knew, I'd look just like him
And he looks just a little like you.
We can meet again someday,
In Twilight, just like now, just like then
On off hours, letting light and darkness in.

I am a nobody, you are a nobody too
Still, we make the heartless whole,
Sitting on this ledge with no souls
I can bring that boy back again.
I'm a a nobody but I'm part of something more
Remember me? I'm just some memories
Created to restore.

What if it all came crashing down?
A single blue-green marble hits the ground
No one notices at all.
What if you disappeared?
Packed up and moved clear out of here
No one notices at all.

It's okay. Pay attention to the change.
You can change a lot, it can change a lot,
To know that someone knows you exist
Take a good look on how strange it all looks
And everything you missed , staring at your shoes.
Even a stranger, you never knew, is a lot to lose.

Dance on crowded streets, with no music,
Keep the beat, playing in your head.
Worry about how others see you,
When you're gone and dead.
Give the world something odd to talk about,
Be something new people thought about.
On these cracked sidewalks that begin to look the same
Change the game, change the world.

What if it all came crashing down?
A single blue-green marble hits the ground
What if you disappeared?
Someone may notice you aren't around

These kids are like dragons
Their flames will only drag them down
All the talk is cheap,
Actions only happen on softened ground
As my mind and eyes get heavy
I've been swimming where reality and dreams meet
They say tragedy is dying in death but I don't believe,
Tragedy is never attempting to live, I don't believe
You should give only 30 percent of your mind
To find if the dreams you believe is something you can achieve
And the start only takes a start to begin.

I know what it's like to give it all and still never win
When your account is in red and car running fumes
Selling all of my things in these rooms
Just for the comfort of having a roof
But Ryan, what if it isn't enough and you lose?
I refuse, to put those thoughts in my mind.
You want all of those doubts?
Fine, what if I die of anaphylaxis  tomorrow
What if I don't have a breath to borrow
And I just turn blue.
What if this stress breaks me down
And I forget all the things that make me live
That's just as much true as all of the positive
So why do they scream all these nightmares on the news
But never show all the dreams pounding through

They want you divided, they want you weak
Push down the kid trying to speak
Tell him he's ignorant for having childish morals
Attack his grammar, leaving sides in a quarrel.
Forget the issue for fighting, they bring in their own issue for fighting.
In a rich man's war, it's all the poor biting
Until the world is bloodstained, we scatter from lightning.
Why isn't anyone asking why we are fighting?
These flames are only going to drag us down.

That look when you say everything is fine
And you're lying with every fiber
Call me a lier, surely I'd deny it.
Don't even try it, look deep in my eyes
We hide the truth, really we don't hide it.
People like the version of a complete person
They just gloss past an aversion
Written on their lips pursed,
Just never spoken by the person.

Listen, you don't even need to listen
There's pain written on expression,
The real thoughts we don't mention,
Those are the ones, no one pays attention.
Singing loud in times of screaming,
Reality slipping so then speak of dreaming.
Writing out the pain instead of bleeding.
His father died, he says his father's fine.
She's knows but lets him go in lie.

This is not the first time I wrote these lines
But how are you?
I just say I'm fine.

I carry a house on my shoulders,
Some bills have been bogging my mind,
I've had a tub overflowing for some time
With a smile and bags full of boulders under my eyes
I can't complain, sir, I'm doing fine.
Not fine in the sense, that I'm doing bad
Yet, don't want the atmosphere to be tense
But fine like life is a struggle, no clouds are in my sky
Unless it's raining, in which case we dance.

See, people don't realize you only get one shot
To ***** up your life with every atom you've got
And listen to many past generations
Then continue to make the mistakes you've been making,
I'm not being sarcastic, it's wonderful.
Seriously, I can't think of a better time to live
Sadly, people give all they can give
To a digital internet, no disrespect.
But stop posting and really live, disconnect.
Stop taking pictures and videos to show others
Who cares if acquaintances  like or love it?
It's your life, do you love it?

I've heard from strangers for years say, go get published,
So I ask if they'd buy a copy, they say no
It's not their thing and they feel out of place
Then tell me why your advice was to put my money to waste?
Even fans wouldn't offer me a spot
On their shelf or their wall, so just leave me here
You don't need to encourage me at all.
I'll write until my fingers turn to nubs
I've been ***** all my life, no matter how hard I scrub.

"Stop writing" says one-half of my mind
"Just quit it's a useless skill, just biding your time."
While the other half tells me to get back on my grind
Not using what you have is like the sighted walking blind
I'm the head case that got thrown into chaotic box
With a fox in socks, but I've got a lot of time on my hands
With all these rusty old clocks, just ask Mr. Knox.
He'd say I'm still off my rocker,
Been a poet since skeletons started stalking,
Been writing since the doors got so jammed, they stopped locking.

So judge me, we aren't seeing through the same eyes
On streets where eventually it all dies
I've been my own therapist, philosopher, psychologist.
All I've got is the skin on my back, I gave away my clothes
No one knows where this rabbit hole goes
I bring shame to even hatters being this mad
You'll need a lizard with a ladder to climb to the mindset I've had
Welcoming all into my Wonderland.

I'd grab the devil by the horns
Just to say I rode that bull
Never born legends, but molded to heroes
Life chisels  children to men in seconds
Beckoning demons, only time will tell your battle
With beetles in bottles or a half-million headed hydra
The sword is yours, own that fight, own the right
To go out into that good night

Hannah doesn't dream,
That's what I've heard at least
She lies in a small cold bed
Where sugar plums aren't dancing,
Closing her eyes behind her head
She sleeps until the morning fills
The room with anything but black
Standing up, another day, just trapped.

Hannah doesn't dream,
Not a sheep, a blink, or wink.
But last night she made a song
To the drips of the bathroom sink.
She told me of a real place,
Unlike the dancing going through my skull
It sounds like home, only more magical.

Hannah doesn't dream,
She sees the beauty in the awake,
The sky, the sun, the leaves,
The whisper as the wind cuts through the trees.
Hannah doesn't dream,
She doesn't need to it seems

I'm not a poet, not an artist.
I can't say I've broken walls.
You won't read me, won't like me.
I won't be a quote you end up reciting
In ten years to friends in a quip
As if I could be slipped into normal conversation
As if my fame has any relation to my body's
Descent into the ground, I will still stay unknown.
Except to notebooks where dust has grown
Accustomed  to being undisturbed.
You won't read me.

Have you ever been so tired
That your mental state is on a high wire
In a twisted dance with your heart and your brain
Until they both fall back and everything's drained
Your eyes strain to fixate on a thought
Until you realize the very thing you conspired,
That you visually try to admire, isn't tangible
Until you stand to pull out above all
End up in a stall because the rhyme scheme seems too clean
So you write right from the heart, am I wrong?
But the mental flow won't let you go so you must carry on

While the world dances with stars in its head,
I'm looking at ***** of fire, millions of miles from my bed
When perspective gets dissected, a frog leg is still a frog leg
Or the lead led out of my lead pencil still leads a lead trail
Until I halt my hands a minute for my thoughts to catch where my mind leads
But never using a pen, because the ink just bleeds.
In the sea, I've seen people seem to just wash by,
I stop with a life boat asking around to see who needs to get dry.

If you play with fire, I'd say you might roast mallows  
In a dry wooded hollow, you may end up wallowing in flames
But where's the adventure when everything stays the same?
Until every comfort zone has never grown so much
People don't even say hi, barely let elbows brush
The rush is incredible and can be delicious at its core
To stick with the original metaphor
How else would you ever get a s'more?

Walking onto this stage,
Feels more like a cage to a faceless audience
They're out there looking for answers,
They're asking what you would do
Until you wake up and there isn't a soul in the room
Except the walls are personified and they're screaming at you
"What's your life plan, kid?"
"That's ridiculous, you should just quit."
"You can do more, even your best is a dead end street."
"Wipe the smile, this is work, you don't deserve to enjoy it."

I quit trying to ever write for anyone but own
So why do I feel like the crowd keeps growing?
They keep asking where I come up with the words to continue,
This eidetic memory makes me relive everything I've been through
My future self is making these poems take form
I'm Link and this is my Song of Storms.
So when I take a breath, I know my time isn't due
Felt the warmth of the day, made it a night without harm.

Standing out on this stage,
I realize this whole image is useless,
Throw down the mic and give a face to the faceless
I don't have much time, don't make me second guess if I waste it.
It's funny, the nameless strangers tell me I'm killing this game.
The people who speak frequent act like the hydra has 50 heads unslain.
I'm confused how people seemlessly seem to relate success with stress
They're ****** I paved a path without losing my mind
These walls can scream all they want
I'm self-made and made it my own, the audience is blind.

Tell me about your god
All those miracles you saw and all about his peace
I come into an open discussion and people get disgusted
Because I don't see what they see
Please tell me then, how do rapists run free
They tell me the devil's in the details
So why does it feel like the devil is telling the tale
Throw an isolated quote at me, that's getting stale
I'm spiritual because I know my actions have matter
The ladder most people with strong religious convictions
Put themelves high above others, damming the victims,
And calling their own sins a story of fiction.
At least the cross I bear is mine with no indecision.

I've looked through a screen in a room and spoke with a man
Five Hail Mary's and an Our Father, now I am cleansed land.
Look down where I stand, tell me I'm saved.
Tell me how saved I am, yet I felt more enslaved.
Leaving the hopeless to feel like this is God's plan
You were suppose to beaten and cheated
It was written in those ancients sands.
Sifting you out and clipping your wings
But keep praying for what these past hardships bring
And don't forget to donate to a priest who lives like a king.

I mean no hate by ideals I've written in my head
Just remember, the double standards, haunt you in your bed
I've looked to a sea flowing into that unknown
I got in a small boat and parted it on my own
You won't take the might I've shown and say someone else is to blame
The same goes for the failures and mistakes
I take me for the all of me that I am
In the face of these demons, I never ran.

Did you ever just lay awake?
If you haven't, I'm sorry.
If you haven't been kept awake from your dreams
Or lost a wink from the anxiety of unknown
I don't think you're doing life right.
The feeling of being exhausted
kept awake by all the forces in your head
It's awful but it's in moments like this
You remember how wonderful being alive is.

I hate waking up in a scared sweat.
I'm more relieved my nightmares slide away.
How many times have you died in a dream?
It's not as many as you'd think,
If you really thought about it I mean.
I've heard it's good luck though.
I'm afraid of winning the lottery in my unconscious
It may be the worst real luck I ever see.

Whatever the case, you're doing great
If you're on top of the world,
Soar as far as that streak runs you.
If you're in a terrible slump,
Rock that pit like a champ.
Don't ever stop being,
Simply being whatever you are.
**** it's perfect.
Why do so many people mold themselves
Don't do it. Be happily, you.

They say that the best heroes
Always hit an early grave,
The ones fighting for freedom
Spend their lives being enslaved.
Only the darkest tragedies
Open eyes to real change.
Pay attention to the little things
Like a soft smile on a face
Or the sound of crashing from the waves.
The best advice I ever heard,
Live life like it ends today.

They say that the best heroes
Fought for someone else to feel brave,
The ones fighting for freedom
Removed everyone else's cage.
Only the darkest tragedies
Make everyone see we are all the same.
Pay attention to the little things
Like the warmth from being embraced
Or the sound of calming rain.
The best advice I ever heard,
Change is never too late.

The best advice I ever heard,
This life is what you make.

How come we have to die
To show up in someone's mind
You can have a thousand friends
That all showed up after the end
Who pretend that they were there,
Who pretended that they had cared.
All the people standing over my hole,
I'm staring at you from six feet down here
But if this life isn't, why believe death is fair.

They keep speaking of tragedy
Being the only way to really promote peace
Cooking enough enemy meat to have a feast
But the enemy is me when the enemy is you
Both told we are right, both believing it's true.
When we both fell to the floor its only then we knew
We truly only have one life to lose.

Remember being kids? Remember where we lived?
Living the only place we could afford to go,
Spent eight years getting out of the mold
So when this anxiety and panic even try to take hold
I use those cards I was dealt to never fold.
Im not asking for a thing because everything
I ever had was mine
And if it all fades away that's absolutely fine
The memories are the only thing I won't leave behind.
And that's absolutely fine.

She washes over me like the tide,
The water feels cool on my skin
The salt burns from within.
I'm lost in the sands of time,
As the world goes rushing by
I can exist for a minute here
If I just close my eyes.

She crashes down like waves
Pulls my hands and sways
Watching as that world fades.
Does she see this place from miles away
Is it just a dream we create
Or is it life for another day?
Tell me what you see in me.

As the night falls, waters recede
As the sun sets at the sea,
So did the day where everything. Felt right.
A little piece remains there, I believe

An older lady came to the pharmacy
To pick up her oxycodone twenties,
Her copay wasn't much money,
Double counted a hundred twenty
As close to me as you stand,
I explained her doctor prescribed Narcan.
In case of overdose, one spray up the nose
Can save yourself or someone else.
She twisted her face to me real funny,
And said "What do you take me for a druggie?"
She took the vial, left the spray
As I waved with a have a nice day.

She felt accused by me, in a huff,
Threw the pills up in her cabinet.
As fate would have it, her granddaughter
Came over and spotted the bottle with red cap.
Imagining the high if she could get that,
Imagining the euphoria as she stole that.
Sneaking off into the bathroom
Downing tap, she consumed a few.

Something wasn't right, her breath felt light,
Disoriented trying to read the label,
Hands shaking, feeling her body dive,
She saw the number twenty, thinking they were fives.
Unresponsive, her grandmother runs in
With the sound of a heavy crash,
She waits for paramedics who arrive at last.
Only to announce, nothing to be saved
Now she digs a grave for pride over a nasal spray.

She dances on ivories
To a small bar dreams came to die
Closing her eyes as each digit sweeps
Becoming sound as fast as her fingers fly.
Hoping her music will set her free
From a town she lingered too long.
She plays them the song she's felt
In every bone, letting the piano tell
The words she's too afraid to say.

She dances on ivories
Live on a stage with attention of many
Looking for familiar faces but doesn't see any.
Her music takes her places far and wide
Everything she wanted, still it doesn't feel right.
Adored by her fans in a personal spotlight,
Loved for her sound, shaking countless hands
Thousands fill the stands as she's grown
With each show, she feels more alone.

She dances on ivories
For her family listening to her play,
Telling her children if they try to be,
They can be anything if they practice everyday.
"But listen, no matter how much you grow
Don't ever forget this is your home."