Sometimes I talk to this mirror,
That man never talks back
So I turn my back on him so he knows
How it feels to be alone.
But if I'm only reflecting on my own reflection
Maybe I'm stuck having his connection.
Collecting my thoughts without judgement,
Packing up my subconscious like luggage,
Letting it disappear into that sunset.

I've been hunting for good mental health,
Tracking the prints before the snow did melt,
When spotted, I speared it and skinned it.
Now look at this beautiful pelt.
Hands drifting across it's skin
I developed a deep understanding
Of why killing mockingbirds is a sin.

They say we dream of a perfect soul,
I think we just dream of feeling whole.

Do you know where the spirits sleep?
Just past the farthest trees you see
Down a withered path where willows weep
The tangles of trees hide the magic unseen
To eyes unwilling to learn new roads.
Just follow the trickles leading to a stream,
Letting your soul simply flow.

Swing from the vines in the rhythm your bones have felt,
But don't stray or they may also hang yourself
Be a person out here, be a being
Be whatever you'd like.
The pressures of city, melt with no others in sight.
Where the wind still whistles
And each star shines and gleams
Nothing is as it is but everything is as it seems.
It's perfectly perfect, the natural world, no one sees.

I'd rather dance like fool, than not dance at all
Kids learn not to jump for fear of a fall
But what is the pain of falling when you've felt nothing at all?
Do you know where the spirits sleep?
Take a walk, a run, or a skip
I promise if you do, you'll find them really quick.

Sometimes when I look at myself in a mirror,
I picture me up for bid at an auction house.
Describe the condition of the item,
All the buyers are coming out.
I am not exceptional, acceptable.
A twenty something Chandler Bing in present tense.
Look he uses jokes at his defense.

I see he functions pretty well
But the description has a lot tell,
If he should inhale a certain smell
He could drop dead.
It's like a wild card, the bids would start
Questions fired, they aren't going far.
How's his education, how about social relations?
Opening my mouth to answer,
They aren't waiting.

I heard he went to college!
Oh, I heard that he dropped out.
I heard he never misses work,
I heard that's the only time he goes out.
Does he eat, there isn't much meat on his bones?
Maybe he should grow ****** hair,
Maybe he won't.

I leave the mirror,
I have work in a moment.

The closer you get to the truth,
The more lost you will become.
Search for answers, there's a chance your
Entity within yourself will be undone.
Following this rope where it may go
Learning later it led to a noose.
Still follow those animalistic instincts
Until you're in too deep,
Wondering what that path would show.

Pay attention as you walk this way,
The sunflowers all turn their flowerheads.
Don't dismiss them, instead listen,
heliotropism shows you've gone astray.
Like oysters following a carpenter until dead
To a Walrus they had been fed.
Look around, the trees all look the same
Look around, walking in circles again.

Ensnared in what you had to know
Each limb entangled, being pulled
Every secret revealed in a flash.
Curiosity took a knife to ****** the cat
But satisfaction brought him back,
Keep walking until you find your home.

There is a place where we all go,
Beyond the light and smile shown,
Through the tears of hard nights,
And within the fire burning through determined eyes.
Yes, there is a place where we all go.

My place looks so different than yours,
You wouldn't even recognize it
And I can't grasp yours.
They are all beautiful and real.

We put up so many shields to hide ourselves
Most opinions are not lucid but fabricated
By how we were raised or taught to think.
Go to your place and find you.
If you can't smile looking in the mirror,
Stop smiling to please others.

Sing like no one is watching and dance and love it
If that's the you, that you love
People may laugh, but they will appreciate you
If you open the door,
Who knows who will walk in.

I don't speak from fortune cookie advice,
I speak from  the life I've created.
Ask them about me, please,
I'm crazy, weird, original, innovative
Spending every work day singing and dancing and love it
Because that's the me that I love.

I can't enter your place you go.
Truthfully, I don't want to, it's yours.
Own it and all the rest will follow.

Six people in every line,
I wait the time, it's really fine.
I'm sure they're busy, no need to tizzy,
The cashier looks dizzy in a rush.
While the man in front of me is getting flushed
He's yelling incoherently for all to see,
Apologies, sir, the rest of us
Have no place to be as you believe.
The line is moving,
placing everything on the conveyor
They're out of plastic so they bag in paper.
The cashier scans all of it in ten seconds flat
"Cash or card, sir?" I forgot my wallet.
Time to put it all back

I wonder what it's like to not "good morning"
Passing out without a "good night"
Some days the world will feel more lonely
Some days your head won't be on right.
The sun may hide behind those clouds,
The stars may not shine so bright.
You just need to keep going,
Everything will be alright. In time.

The **** clock is stuck on the seventeenth hour
A cold shower to wake up your mind
Eating ninety-eight packets of oatmeal,
It's the only breakfast I could find.
Nothing feels real without "good morning"
Tell me how to start this day
Stuck in my head so here I lay.

I know what it's like without "good morning"
I bet a lot can say the same
Put on my clothes to slave away,
I'm trying to keep my world all right
Until I put my head down
Passing out without "good night"

I've been having a war with my bathroom door
Cleaning my closet feels like a waste
When I have all this dirt on my face
I keep wearing my mind on my sleeve  
Look at the mess the brain matter started to leave
And the fiends only stopped knocking because
I never lock these gates anymore
All these thoughts mentally start to swirl
Stuck arguing with myself
Unravel my second being like Professor Quirrell
Now who's got the stone to make me melt?

They make work miserable, act unique they'll smash though
"Here's a black suit, black shoes, now that's you"
Act passionate and we'll laugh at you or stare
Until you have no personality to share at all
Now take a pat on the back and another task to attack
But we won't pay you any extra for any of that.

I'd rather melt with these snowflakes
Than be a powder keg of suppressed emotion
Snap my fingers in a quick motion
And blow up these baby boomers
Then assume I don't have my mind in check
While you drink through pain a wreck
I'm two hundred percent proof, you sit loose
About as real as hi-c implying it's juice
If my twenty year old body ******* this world
You made her a *****
And she was only looking for a better player to score

If you can affect one person, it's worth it.
Your story, your hurt, your love.
Show them where your heart has sat with purpose.
Nervously posting my pen to them,
Hoping they see some truth to what I've said.
No I'm not a trend setter, just writing letters
Looking to clear my head before bed.

I never plan to be much a super man,
Most days I barely slip by as Clark Kent
Laughing off the world in a joker's lie
While I bury all of these deep thoughts inside,
Just to flip the coin, more relatable to Harvey Dent.
Only to deduce that I suffer from self-abuse,
Making me a basket case, Harley Quinn.

But if all ever live to do is inspire you
To take a risk and follow through
On any shot you've potentially got
Then my mission in life has come true.
In spite of living in the darkness,
I want to shine light instead.

I stayed up late tonight,
last night too,
the day before that,
caffeine cranking my gears,
family making me see days through.
on the coldest nights, where I feared failure,
I looked to my right and always knew
I'd fight every battle with you.

I get stuck and erase parts, I felt wouldn't fit us well.
imagine all the lines deleted, the things I never tell.
the illuminated nothing that strangles at my soul,
it speaks to me in phrases yet I never let it be whole.
as I walk down this hallway, a hallway of five feet,
to a room I know contains the best thing I'll ever meet
Don't ask me which,
I couldn't choose, they each have me in a hold
so tightly I am wound, I would let all else go.

I'm a child for being lost in here
I'm a man for walking through the door
looking at most of you, I wonder what you are.

I got a message today that said:
"Hey Ryan, I know your father.
Did you know, you look just like your father?"
Oh, you know my father?
I don't know him at all, he never bothered.
I'm not the child he ever wanted.
But when I look in that mirror
And see his face, I wish I could waste myself.

I know you didn't know, it shows.
He talks like he was there, which isn't fair,
I receive a message once a year
"Happy birthday" I don't get why.
Just to say to himself he tried?
The only thing I can say are ours
Is every one of those mental scars
That get ripped open in his name.
Sixteen years so far of feeling lame.

You know my father?
Can you tell me...
Does he answer when you call?
When you write, does he answer at all?
You know my father?
That's nice to hear, I don't.

This is my sanctuary,
A blank page where I exist.
Where the waves can crash me down
Just to feel the water pound, perfect.
I've been thirsting but, don't drink.
Starving without something meaningful to sink
My teeth into and grip hold.
I'm an old soul stuck in this body I captured,
A sold soul stuck waiting for my rapture.
Don't look at me here, look at you.

If these walls are holding ghosts
At what point do I flow into them too?
At what point do they host my reflection
And in what direction am I wired to move?
Could I be the old grooves in the wood
Waiting for some simple symphony of motion,
The water dripping from the leaky faucet
Still dreaming of being an ocean?

Could I just be these simple bones?
Being pulled by an imaginary fate I trust
Until that reckoning to unknown,
From ash to ash, dust to dust.
This is my sanctuary,
A blank body where I exist.

There are times to be scared
In them, rational thoughts drift from your head
The times when news comes that appears unfair
And all the crazy, wild fills you instead.
I know it, you know it. I hate it.
Take a breath.
In an ocean of waves, some are meant to swim
With a storm on the horizen, the outlook is grim.
Take a breath and hold it. For a second and release.
You can make it, I can make it.
This is not how I die,
It's much more surprising for the life I've led.

You won't take me alive, sir.
To be clear, you won't take me at all
Look into my eyes, Storm.
See the walls I've made fall.
Don't come any closer, truly, I mean no harm.
But come at me, I'll attack thee.
Until my sanity is long lost,
Every bone I've been blessed, will shatter in just cost.
Take a breath. Take a second.
Think hard about your moves, you hold such might
But I hold a will with everything to lose.

There are times to be scared
When my hands shake without end
Truthfully, I do my best to hide it
Try as I might to hold it in.
I take a breath.
With water just below my mouth
I've been submerged deep in water
And turned that downpour to a drought.
I don't want to, you can make me.
Because, although, I'm scared of the sea
Make no mistake, I will make the sea fear me.

It's too hot in the day to go outside
It's too cold at night to stay alive
It's too late to sleep but, too early to be awake
My eyes are too tired but my mind's cranking thoughts
Work days are too long, mentally too shot.
I bet you felt this way too,
I bet you do.

It's two a.m. laying down, I feel inspired
You can keep the fame, the money, and whatever
I look to you and hope to be admired
Just a clever kid trying to make ends meet
Every time I pull them closer, they change the game
So friend have a seat, don't ask for a nickel or dime
While you're in my place, I promise you'll be fine.
I hold my own, I carry my weight, this life is golden
All the rest is a roll of luck and some fate
Rereading my own self and feeling great
While few others offer me their time and that's ok,
I'm already amazing, you'll believe me someday.

It seems unfair that I outlive my peers
As I get older, that will become deeper, i fear.
Today, I push with every muscle in my drive
Tomorrow, I may just live to survive.
It's been sitting on my head, the first friend i made,
Already made a leap to an early grave.
Free to be free but death has us enslaved
I'm talking to the walls but they ignore me still
Stuck awake and it all just feels unreal.

Ryan drew a monster,
The monster murdered Johnny.
Ryan erased the entire scene in time
To let him hide the body.
Where the chalk lines outline
A crime they never found a sign
Or direction to get a lead.
The chalkboard had a crooked smile
Silently speaking of its feed.

Johnny said he drew a monster,
Once upon a time long ago
Said he spoke the words to me
But those are lies and we all know.
Had he seen the monsters he left
I bet he would've tamed those beasts,
Instead, in present, now they feast.

I go down this lake shore from work to home
Ten minutes to recover my mind, to where I'm going.
It's been alright, some nights I just want to write
Then crash on a pillow with blankets pulled tight,
Awake to a blank page with an LED light.
Smile to push that aside, with dark circles,
Speaking the truth that I'm trying to hide
But I promise I'm alright.

My mother sometimes worries, I'm stuck getting buried at work.
Eat a lunch at my station on a twelve hour rotation.
Don't worry, I can't say I'm in a hurry to work life away
All the extra just keeps the bills at bay.
Back on that lake shore, I'm soaring each day.
Today, I woke sedated and hated the feeling of dealing
With each public problem until Ryan solves them,
Another one is floating my way.

I sail through the breeze with a little unease
But the wind has me all the same.
And I hope you don't find like I,
as if I don't have much time
So pay me no mind, I still fear the end of my game.
I clock these ten hours of chore
Just to drift down that lake shore and find my way home again.

I might be just a distraction
Like flowers during hard times
Giving a funny quip to obtain reaction
Then falling back into line.
It's a bit obnoxious, leaving me a lack of real
I can only imagine how everyone else feels.
The goofy kid who opens his lid
just to laugh at himself and what everyone else did.
That's how I play it in my mind
That's how it plays in theirs too.

A one note joke spoke is funny
Until it's being told the hundredth time
It was quirky and a little punny
But best to leave a dying joke to die
Don't laugh, it encourages attention,
Walk past, leaving me no mention.
It's humorless and rumor is
I do it for self-defense and deflection,
The room is heavy and I hate the tension.

I might just be a distraction
Like an ice cream cone,
A sometimes treat worth a smile
But you don't miss it when it's gone.

Remember when you would grab your favorite record?
The snaps and pops as the music would start,
Jumping up and down on the floor,
The dancing made the record hop,
Those scratches made the record stick
With that 45 adapter to capture that one song
That kept you spinning, spinning until gone.

Remember that cassette in your car
Over played to a point of obsession,
The tape would squeal to teach you that lesson.
The tape would unwind at the worst time.
Like a surgeon you grab a pencil
Spin it around until every piece of film
Hits the reel back into place.

Remember the CD you played,
Laying down in your bed
Did you look up at the ceiling?
I looked through the artwork instead.
Scratches only came while carrying it through life
Until something new comes into light.

I'm listening to these files,
Dragged and dropped to device
Every song sounds flawless,
Every song in lossless flac
But to let that original record keep spinning
I'd give it all back.

I pulled my colors from their storage
Red, blue, yellow, purple, green, and orange
The case they sat was old,
With rust and squeaky hinges.
Painting fruit: Grapes, apples, and oranges
******* the colors up through syringes,
Precision causing anxious twinges.
Picturing perfect afterimages
But my art just makes me cringe.
I rhyme well but, shouldn't try to paint an orange,
Placing my supplies back in storage.

Sometimes,
Sometimes I just don't know
Buried my hands in my face,
Breathing in a rhythmic flow.
Kicking my heels to go home
But Kansas was a place i did not go.
Can't speak without defensive joke.
You've been looking at a personality
But in reality, you've just seen smoke
Don't choke on the vapor or you'll vaporize
The main disguise I hide behind.
Behind the eyes that calmly sigh
My mind is cranking into overdrive.

I look into a mirror in a life-filled light.
Hair a tangled mess,
running fingers through it as I write.
if I pulled the stress through dead skin cells,
I'd bald tonight.
I've got scars upon thars like Sneeches
So Mr. Mcbean I'm looking for help
I'll pay a penny to remove the roofing defects.
If I seem to be speaking a bit crazy,
You must not have read the pretext.

If you had read me like a book
And shook the cover loose
I wonder what chapter I'm on with you.
Surely, every book had begun
I've got you rising in suspense
But while I know, I'd never tell,
The surprise at the end.

If my words were like a gun
There would be smoke coming off my tongue
I don't think about life during a sunrise,
During a sunset or a star showered night.
I think about life eating a plate of nachos,
Drinking too much coffee with my wife.
I know in a big picture, I don't make the portrait
But when they torch these walls, I'll help restore them.
I can keep calm with a poker face like you,
But truth is, I'd rather be a joker getting wild with the twos.
I'm one of the few honest liars left
And we don't rattle. We don't rattle.

It's an odd feeling knowing the words,
That keep me up at night,
Won't matter once they're out, still unheard
Only said as the emotion lingering in my head.
I lie in bed putting my thoughts to rest
Sliding my finger to turn the page
Back to the real world behind the stage
Of a notepad and metophorical pen
Because a digital thought looks neat,
If only you saw the backspacing eraser
Scribbling out all my waste you'll never meet.
But we don't rattle. We don't rattle.

I'm sick of being the good guy,
With intentions that you may like.
I'm tired of being supportive,
Because sometimes you really aren't right.
I'm afraid if I open the cage,
The lid won't close quite as tight.
If I let this world see my rage,
They will see me in a different light.

I've wrote about my father before,
It's been a war that I've fought since ten
But I was sick of seeing a devil play victim,
So I wrote him one last letter
And deleted him out of my life again.
I can curse in times when I'm ******,
It's real ******* nice to be free. I promise,
the next person who thinks I'm looking for privilege,
When I talk of my allergies.
Will get uppercut so many times they will only look up to see,
I'm a survivor, not a victim
So kindly shove off if you'd please.

People love to be supportive,
They read one thing I wrote,
You should get published,
All these people would love it,
Would you buy a copy? Well, no.
But imagine who would!
You might make fortune and fame.
That's funny, I will save my money,
But I love the dreamy game
I should tell, I know who would buy it,
Even if I don't publish, my mother still loves me the same.

I'm eating microwaved pizza with only oven directions
Cracking open a bottle of whatever is in the clearance section
Thinking over my life decisions and selections
Feeling like they spun me until I lost sight of direction
And please don't take me wrong, I don't speak with aggression.
I speak like an old man, passing advice to a child
Playing this life like a movie with a half-smile
It ain't all bad but, the bad has a longer echo
Giving you time to dissect those tragedies to death
Don't waste your breath on what can't be changed
Simply because, it can't be changed.

Remember, as you read my heart, that I'm the generation
With an entitled mind, with every door open, yet they're all empty inside.
they don't listen, no one listens, just continue to position us as victims.
I'm not a victim I just want a chance.
The same one you got, with the same promises you sought
My social security already has a plot in a grave I'll never see
So if you can explain what entitlements will I ever see?
I don't even own these clothes, my home, my life
They'll tax my mind if I don't write clear into the afterlife.

If I protest in a peaceful manner, I'm a coward
If I come violent, I'm a threat
If I keep my mouth shut they pretend I don't exist
So tell me how to exist by your terms?
What's acceptably respectable, you choose
because it seems I've learned, no matter what I lose.

An old diner to sit down,
Chuck's bodies are digging out the grave now
Who's got time to try to lie
When the boss had a niece
Until you blew her brains out from behind.
Quiet.
They don't know that, slow the roll back.
Take a breath and compose that,
"You don't know anything" face, show that.
Shake your head no, Sam.

Randall tells a lie to buy some time
But why?
Does it matter when evidence is climbing up
Like ladder to expose the truth.
If the bell tolls, Chuck, it's rung for you.
Keep that calm face for now,
Knowing you tied your own noose.

It's too late to turn back on anything,
It's too late to turn back on everything.

We don't speak the same language,
Cultured different, made out to be strangers.
I'm a human, you're human. Let's change this
Perception of devalued nature.
My race doesn't determine my worth,
I denounce every advantage they gave my birth.
Take my heart at the value of my whole,
Tell me, what color is soul?

Forget our looks, judging any as a felon,
You think it's a crime to have melanin?
Every parent wants their child to make it home
If they aren't up to trouble, leave the kid alone.
Offer money to women to devalue their ***,
That's a person you treat only as flesh.
Don't dare make any feel less than whole,
Tell me, what color is soul?

If your religion is speaking for peace,
Your beliefs are positioned with me.
Quiet, listen and I swear you would see
Your enemy is not what you believe.
All any want is decency,
To be spoken with respectfully,
Still we strike others down so low.
Tell me. What color is soul?

Some days it's really hard to exist.
Wake up, turn on the figurative light
Blurring colors with awakened eyesight
As my reoccurring thoughts resurface,
You won't be here for the holidays.
**** my father, I'm not him, I am.
My hair looks a mess, get dressed.
"You've got this" I think to a mirror image.
Hand to the glass like art not finished.
My self-esteem feels diminished.

Listen to an instrumental to gently let the words flow
Out of a skull that's crying too deep
Anymore I've just been straight faced, lost,
My life has a price, tell me the cost please.
What's the number they wrote on my head
I need to know if it's more alive or dead.

Let's let it spill tonight, let's really tell them.
I'm not doing ok, the cuts on my arm
Are not representation of any self harm
But a child I feel I'm failing, I'm failing.
I had a dream that I sunk in too deep,
Felt a push and that sprouted to a leave.
Screaming names like any can be worse
Than the ones I already call me.
I'm still afraid I'll suffocate, not metophoricaly
My lower back is still killing me
But I don't tell because it's just not worth it
Go back to work, the only thing making me not worthless.
I wish my words held any worth at all
To anyone reading, don't fall.

The job is done now, see.
You let your mind start to race,
Where a clear conscious once stood,
Death sits calmly in its place.
You look in the mirror to see a bit clearer.
How did we get here so fast?
Retrace a memory from the past.

In a job you didn't like,
You took for your family, that's clear,
All the cards were laid just right,
I can hear that phone ringing from here.
Miss Fitch was coming in hot
So you came back screaming on that wire,
Took a job in shady dealings.
One phone call and you're fired.

Now you're home, act natural.
Smile at all those right places
It was a trigger you had to pull,
Inside an internal war, he faces
Just don't look back, that's the present trick
Or your own mind may make you sick.

I'm not a nobody or no one
But I'm not much a someone either.
You'd remember me at a mention
Yet forget me just as quick.
Saying my full name, rolling off your tongue,
Like an old sticker, still I don't stick.
When I'm needed, I'm convenient.
When I'm not, I simply fade.
It's ok, it's probably for the best that way.

I'm not a nobody like Emily
But I feel we would see eye to eye
She would be a nobody and I would be an I
If the public were all frogs,
Maybe I would be a fly?
We wouldn't be a pair, that's fair
But quiet, banish us? They still might.

I'm not much of a someone like you.
Not to say I wish I was.
I'd be too nervous to tell the truth
Trying to do the things a someone does.
While everyone knew how to be,
I left to leave, simply being a me.

I smile when someone reads my work,
I drown in happiness with a "like"
A clever comment makes me smirk,
But what really fills me inside,
Is when someone sees my face
The one I hide behind my words
And simply relates.

I use to be in a poverty line,
Food stamps and insurance for a bit
Telling people I'd pick up, it was fine.
Got sick real quick of sitting with people
Who just simply sat.
Once I picked up my head, friend,
I promised I'd never turn back
And if I can beat those odds for me
You can beat those ones for you.

I made a career selling drugs,
From a white collar to scrubs and back
Don't listen to my grandmother,
She will tell you that I haven't been using my potential
But she doesn't read everything I wrote
Everyday with this pencil.
As if money equivalates value,
As if the paycheck is a reason not to be you.
Some people don't see behind the scene
Like the whole audience isn't caged,
Like every performance isn't staged.

I can't stress enough to follow your dreams,
Be responsible with responsibility
But a career is just a check, silly.
A passion is worn in a fashion on the heart
Worth it's weight in gold,
Speaking whatever art from your soul,
I take care of mine, so don't mind
Because anyone can be a god
And beat those odds that beat you down

When my school closed, I was in 5th grade,
We all stood outside with balloons.
The older kids understood,
The younger ones just played
The principal made a speech to say
How wonderful this place had been
And the amazing things we'd do someday.

They played a couple songs through stereo
I can't remember which one's by name
But the ending, I do remember just the same
Each of us with a balloon, released that day.
But the story you didn't know was one I've never said
I untied my string, quickly, the balloon floated away.

I ran to the classroom, and cut it up
Thirteen pieces for thirteen classmates.
Waiting for everyone to come
But, wouldn't you know, no one came.
I kept my piece for many years
Throwing it out all but recently
My meaning was left at Saint Mary's
And none have heard that until today.

Somedays I wish I had the words
For what makes me feel the strongest things
But I'm afraid they don't exist.

We all have a friend
Who didn't make it very old
Whether you were there at the end
Or somewhere in life's between
I bet you would give your weight in gold
For a chance just to see them,
For one more night out in the world
Or even just a small talk.
All you have is a short mental walk
Through the times that seem too small
Stuck in a place without you at all,
And I wonder how you're doing
Wherever you are.

I made my first friend in second grade,
He was the kid who seemed to always find a way
He learned to ride a unicycle
Making his own parade.
He got me out of my house in the middle of fall,
Went swimming in my pool,
While the algae was stuck to the walls.
It was freezing and slimy.
I'm sorry your world was unwinding
And I wish I would've known you more.

I don't have the right words
Because truly none of them are right
I've thought about the fact you aren't here
On quite a few nights.
I send my regards to all you knew,
I'm sorry to say a part of my childhood
Feels like it passed with you.
This is the only way I have to show
I miss a man I barely got to know,
My old friend John O.

Cars are flying down the 41
Like everyday, one hits another one.
Pretty soon the cops will come
Delays will stay consistent,
Fatality they say over those radios.
You're running late for work
Thinking these jerks need to move
A blessing you can have those thoughts,
It wasn't your life death did choose
But no, we don't think like that and
Oh, there must be something we are owed.

A man goes to the doctor to get an answer,
Confirmed it was cancer so he's told.
Radiation could save his life,
While he holds his breath to hear the price.
Ten thousand a month, now he knows.
Choosing to survive to not be able to survive.
But no, we don't think like that and
Oh, there must be something we are owed.

There's a child starving out there,
Elderly with no place to go.
People with nothing still wanting to share,
As you read, someone lost their home.
But no, we don't think like that and
Oh, there must be something we are owed.

All these broken kids, want a parent's pride
But once you hear those words
They still fall short, in the void so wide
Spent your whole life, questioning why.
I can't blame me, you barely know me
And for every night that I felt incomplete
I did my best to try, try so hard to never be you
If only you knew, I hope some day you see.
The only real conversation we ever had,
Was me having hard times, you said you're in therapy,
Even then you didn't care for me.
You felt bad for a moment, but I've spent 15 years in a moment.
For every chance you're given you drop it.
Time for a game, time for a job, time for a second marriage.
Time for your children? Those washed up excuses are getting lame.
Forget it, I'm healed, here's for the rest of us.

For the mother, getting beaten and bruised
Don't stay for the kids
Leave for the kids
A marriage is the least you have to lose.
No matter the hobby, the job, the passion
For the kids, try to match their excitement.
My generation isn't lazy, we're outcasted.
An Internet of people saying your dreams can't happen.
For the kids, build them up, make hope outlast them.
For the mother, verbally bashed to feel useless
It's simple, you aren't useless.
For the father, stay active, protect your family,
You do matter.

I'll cut the poetic verse to tell a short story and I hope it gets passed around. When I was ten, my sister was fourteen. My parents split up and while I was young, I remember a lot. I remember struggling to get by with my mom and sister. My father was quickly in a new relationship. His soon-to-be new wife and he would spread a million stories about how she talked badly of him which even got around to my teachers in school. It's funny, she never said anything bad about him, we didn't want to go with him on the weekends because he was pushing for us to sleep at his new girlfriend's house. It got to a point where when we would call my father, the new woman would pick up the phone and tell us not to call him. So many years later, my sister and I still keep an open door for him. We are facebook friends and whatever (I don't have his phone number, I messaged him a few years ago for it and he ignored it). Occasionally, I get a message asking how I am and I always respond, he reads my response and never writes back again for months or a year. He wishes me a happy birthday and father's day on my Facebook to keep up appearances or something but truthfully I don't know him at all. My sister got a house a couple years ago only a short distance from where he lives and even after many invites, he still hasn't  visited. This is the same guy that to strangers seems like such a fun guy, I've never met. And every part of this involving me really doesn't matter but, I wish he would see where my sister lives and I wish he gave a **** about her becuase she actually cares that he wants nothing to do with her. And to any part of this that is called fabricated, I remember everything and so does she.

They want to know what I want to see
Before I kick the can.
I'm just hoping to see tomorrow,
I'd be happy with just that with the life I've ran.
I've borrowed time more than twenty times
No need to remind, I'm blessed in cursed flesh
And if that casket in the back of my mind
Isn't enough to get me choked up
I'm not sure I would deserve to be re-woke up.
I'd public speak a hundred times to a stadium crowd
Than to watch this body into the ground.
I don't want to see the wonders,
I just wonder if I will live to see old age.
Turn the page.

And to a father to me, for years wasn't around,
Whatever the case, the man I am is my own,
But I give you the permission to be proud.
I watched my life get uprooted, still grown.
I promise, my kid will always have solid space.
Even if it takes me digging ditches,
His life won't be ditched for another.
He's the precident for a family hindsight me wished.
I'm a character unforgettable to strangers as I've flown
To most relatives I'm a complete unknown.

I don't look for any pity, the opposite of it
Look over the city, making every hit.
I'm a walking statistically non-existent man
You gotta kick it up because yes you can
**** the chains that you think hold you down
But be aware that when you find success
The crickets turn to fake friends saying
They have never not been around.
And that's even worse than silence sounds.

A woman walks through a store with a couple of kids,
She doesn't know yet  but she only has a week to live,
While a man at the register is getting ****** because he can't
Buy case of energy drinks using food stamps
While right outside the store, an old lady is being mugged
The crook runs right past a couple who just fell in love.
Meanwhile across the street a biker jumped over a ramp
A bus honks at him carrying a camp of kids
Who are all starry-eyed and don't even know what it's like to live

It's funny, the moment I'm sitting in
Stopped the world for the moment
To let all these little things sink in
Its funny, most people aren't watching our fall
If this whole place disappeared,
I fear no one would notice at all.

A kid brought a gun to school the other day,
While one played hookey, all his friends blasted away
Now he has guilt just for lying and surviving
showing that the worst thing isn't always dying.
Most people are more scarred of public speaking than dying
I'd rather stand on a podium inspiring peers
Than have anyone crying wishing I was here
It's funny how it all seems simple when I'm looking in the rear

It's funny, the moment I'm sitting in
Stopped the world for the moment
To let all these little things sink in
Its funny, most people aren't watching our fall
If this whole place disappeared,
I fear no one would notice at all.

Do you ever question who you'd be if you weren't you
And your past was someone else's and never knew what you knew
Would you still have the same beliefs, probably not
Currently they seem undeniable but they sold and you bought
If you lived across the world it might mean nothing at all
But no one is paying attention, no one's watching us fall

Sitting in a circle, we were just sixteen
A few dumb kids figuring what this life would mean.
Andy says he's going to community college,
Jimmy is going out of state,
As if these plans were going as perfect as they seem
Matt took a year off trying to search for knowledge
I took a similar rope just waiting for fate
As if we can succeed just stuck in a wait.

Andy took general courses, working a minimum grind
He stays up all night, caffeine pills keeping him online.
Jimmy got a degree in something with no market
Thirty grand has him working two jobs
Feeling like seeking education left him robbed
Cleaning up after the generation that cut him off
Matt and I keep passing ideas that we never do
Thinking school might be worth it
Still deciding a future  but even the new
Leaves a taste of the same place we knew

A few average kids didn't stand a chance
Took a few different roads all led to the same
If you have the experience, you lack their degree
If you have a degree, it's two years experience they want to see
So nobody trains you and nobody learns
Now they have a following believing the world doesn't turn
I'm so lost in these politics I can barely find my way home

Some days

Some days I want to travel,
Have an exciting adventure
Unravel the globe real slow
And hold adrenaline in my palms.
Some days I wish i was something
More than this body dragging me around
More than the clothes setting a status
As the gravity keeps me on ground
Looking up to people who only look down.
Instead of the ones who pave paths
Regardless of anyone coming around.

Sometimes I lay on the floor
Mapping out my mind on the ceiling
Only to run out of ink and out the door
then the rain is still pouring in.
Sometimes I get lost in a game,
In a world quite unlike my own,
Where I play a hero and dragons are slain
All in the name of a throne.
Save the world only to remain.
Unknown.

Some days I wish I could be anything
Move mountains in a moment of time
With one arm I could swing
And make this whole world mine.
Seamlessly craft it and watch it with care
In the air, I could watch it be grown.
But some days, like today, I am tired
And would just like to go home.
Save my world and remain.
Unknown.

There's no streetlights on my street,
Not a single person walking by,
The kids are all stuck in school day time
The adults are stuck on a slaving grind
It's just one of those nights and one of those smiles
Where the situation is serious
But you can keep calm for a while
And in the silence of a night like this
You're totally in it.
I can't explain it better than that
Hopefully you understand.

I watch a movie that I've watched,
At least ten times before
for a familiar peace of mind
Barely watching, fighting a mental war
But, the cinema still rolls in a ritualistic way
Laughing at the parts
that make me laugh each time it plays
You know and I know it's going to be okay
Yet honestly I need a moment to unwind
And that is perfectly fine.

The hard times in life, they don't come at dark times
They come on a sunny Friday without a cloud
In a second of a moment everything can change
That's not always true, but it's true enough
Some meaningless advice from me to to you.
It's strange that you change from reader to reader,
I stay the same as naked as poetry
Keeping emotion raw and a flow with these words
I pull out of my skull in a second to say,
in a second to say whatever I feel like saying.

Tell them a story kid
Show them a world brand new
Or a looking glass unseen
Show them the world as you see it

You better make room at the top,
If not I'll push my way into the crowd
I'm not going to stop, not asking if I'm allowed.
They'll read my name in the paper, watch me.
I'll be the reason you spit your morning coffee.
That odd kid made a best seller,
That weird kid sold up and isn't so lame.
Unfortunately they still don't know my name.

I've been chasing a beautiful success
Long before you even had a cerebral cortex,
The problem with you is you're thinking backwards.
I'm a different sort of intellectual awesome
If you can't see that, I'll saw you in half
Starting right at the corpus callosum.
Or I'll just keeping being me
Tap the first domino and watch the rest
Scattering across the floor in a mess.

I joke about never making it there
I'm afraid I'll never get noticed
The truth is, I write everyday
Just to hope today is the day
That I wake up to minimal fame
And someday, someone will write me a letter
To tell me how something I wrote
Made their life change
But today I'll stay unnoticed

This is for the hill
I tried to learned to ride a bike on
But instead learned to skate
Where it evened out at the bottom
But I always hit the brake too late.
For the neighbor that let his dogs loose
To come at me and give chase,
You made me fear dogs as a kid,
Learning to fear people in present day.
For the tree I was too afraid climb
After we moved from that place,
They took it away
Then changed the street name
If nothing ever changed,
nothing would change.

This is for the basement apartment
Where I learned nothing gold could stay
While I slept, the mold would grow
Eating through the things I did know.
Looking up from where I lay
Knowing I'd be somewhere better someday.
For my mother who gave solid ground,
My sister who bought me surround sound
So I turned that **** so loud
That it shook the walls of the house
Making my thoughts just drown
Shouting the words while no one was around.

This is for the days where I felt real low,
This is for the side I only show
In the words of my thoughts
Hoping someone saw, not feeling alone.
For the days I work towards my dreams,
Where inspiration screams from my pores
And I'm sure of my future,
Pouring from a pen.
Listen I know my destiny, I give what's left of me
To a passion so pure, this can't be imagination.

I wanted to paint my soul
So I dunked both my arms into blue and green
And threw them onto the canvas
As the liquid splattered, light gathered
Out of the sheet and danced the room,
Only giving me its sight then zoomed
Back into the place it had come.
Before it dried, I spread my hand across,
Letting the bright colors smear and run.

I drew pencil lines around the fine nothingness
But they insisted to create, instead, a bridge
From one side to the other, there I laid,
Swearing I could feel wind, in the light,
The middle of the bridge swayed
Over the sea of blue and meeting in green
Magically moving at that in between.

Cutting my hand, not too deep,
I let myself drip and the liquid creeped
Into the work that was myself,
Disappearing among the colors I felt.
This was me, a soul, puncturing the middle,
Making myself whole.

It's amazing, I write with intensity
Waiting for people to read my words
Hoping they will understand the density.
They sleep on my mind
And the same grind that kept me awake at night
Is the same one that people don't bother to shed light.
This is the only way I know to express myself,
Keeping a semi - manic, lunatic head on shoulders
With belt around my neck to hide the stitches
Where I attached this Pandora box of a boulder
With twitching fingers tapping on ivory keys
To maybe pull these chains off my body with ease
Before they choke me again, almost feeling free.

You toss up your nose at those with outward demons
While keeping your own inside, imagine if people could see your innards.
Think about that, next time someone walks by with track lines
Begging for cash and think you're much better.
I got this job, I wear a tucked shirt and tie
But outside of that, I see little difference from you to I.
My own endorphins pump through my veins
Until I close my eyes from exhaustion, mentally drained.

It's amazing, I seldom talk with intensity
People laugh at the defenses I put up mentally.
I've got walls like China, you'll never get to me.
I'm smiling while thinking about my debt,
I'm laughing unsure if I'll ever make it.
I see why you sleep on me,
I sleep on me too.
If we've only talked in passing,
I'm, at best,  a stranger to you.
So hi, my name's Ryan
But you can call me the dream fisher too.

The one where the car is underwater,
And the pressure starts to creek
While the water seeps through cracks,
The cold pooling at your feet
The seat belt is stuck and you pull with might
The air starts feeling thinner, lungs are tight
You break free, as your strength comes back,
The windows each begin to crack.
Remember,

Swim up, it just isn't your time.
Swim up, while there is still light.
Swim up, don't stop.

The one with six chambers
Five cold and one burning hot
Spun with a flick then a click
Tell me how much danger can drop
At the hit of a hammer all other sound stops
The lottery doesn't play nice, son
Sometimes he bangs out like a gun.

Swim up, it just isn't your time
Swim up, don't stop

Right before the world ends,
I wonder if people will still hate,
If they would try to fix the mess
Or simply still cast blame.
I wonder if they'll forgive old pain,
Let hurt fall from their chest,
Or be angry until damnation came
With every thought they had left.

Right before the world ends,
Would you care which people came from where?
Would you care about documentation
For those who wanted better life and found it here?
Would their skin color make them less human?
Would you hate them, would you dare?
What about ****** preference?
Do we hope they get scorched too?
I'm a dying human, tell me what are you?

Right before your world ends,
Did you think about the traffic jam,
How much money you had earned,
How about your makeup and hair?
I bet you thought of someone you loved,
Hoping to see them there...
Right before the world ends,
You'll never see it coming
So why not make that change today
Instead of filling the world with hate.

I sit in a room with a pen and a pad,
Was called a failure by most,
I needed to show the potential I had.
The same people that turned into ghosts
Were the same who said they were glad
I never gave up, they were cheering me on. Thinking on my past, everyone was gone
No one wanted to see the levels I was thinking.
I'm sorry, I can never give up on dreaming.
If all this life is, is a nine to five,
I don't feel I am even alive.

You can work a soulless job, don't get me wrong,
Everybody needs some cash for food,
But working your life away seems wrong,
That concept isn't new.
They'll tell you life is all about money,
Material greed that keeps you running
Still the heart of your body wants something
Deep down you know the truth.

Your worth is only measured in printed paper
For someone to cut you down with later.
Week after week you get that paycheck
Still questioning if you have their respect,
Still questioning if you have self-respect.
Until the day, they need you, you don't need it.
However today, I sit with this pen
Digging deep for the inspiration
Not to quit.

I went to use my voice as I awoke
But as the words were about to be spoke,
A hundred knives poked into my throat
Each syllable gave a jab and poke.
Quietly, I laid in bed, not speaking another note.

I went to my medicine cabinet
Grabbing a handful these and those,
The water on the stove is bubbling
To a cherry flavored packet of bovine bones.
Reading an article telling to drink the mixture,
Looking into the bowl, I whispered, "no"

My head is starting to pound,
Eyes starting to feel heavy and thick
Hearing only a heavy pulse for sound,
I think I'm starting to get sick.

Here splits the wings that flutter
Every situation butterflies,
Then I say I'm in control.
Ryan, hold the dice in your hand.
Ryan, let them go.
Do what the situation requires,
What if I just said no?
I'm just the backstage hand nobody knows.

They say I'm more than a paycheck,
But my only function is payment.
How much do you make?
How much is your worth?
The statements feel interchangable
Go back to work, don't dream in the wake.
Have a nice day, the smile is fake.

All the pretty things around me
Remind me, I'm nothing,
I don't want your attention
Just use my life as a lesson