I must say that these last couple months have been interesting since I found this site.
It has given my an inspiration to let more of my words out and to search for all of your words.
So far I am amazed.
We won't save the world but at least we can show how similar and different, light and dark we are.
We are the soul of this age and I don't want a single person here to foget that.

Keep up bearing your souls.
We all have something to say.

And as always I will bear my soul to you as well butl leave it up to the viewer what might be seen.

Your lover, brother, and other,

Joshua Haynes

Hello Margaret,
this is a message for the future.
I bet I look like a real loser,
but this was the past.

My darling,
I'm sorry I can't be with you.
But if I was, you'd be dead too,
I had to stay behind.

Now I know you're probably confused,
but there's so much to explain.
I just want to assure you,
that I loved you.

Hello Margaret,
please listen to your mother.
Don't pick on your brother,
you're a family.

My darling,
always hold your mothers hand.
Don't go out in the wastelands,
the radiation will sting.

Now I know you're probably confused,
but there's so much to explain.
I just want to assure you,
that I loved you.

My darling,
I made this video for you,
in case I didn't make it through,
the nuclear apocalypse.

My dear Margaret,
no matter what you go through,
remember I always loved you,
Sincerely,
your dad.

Silently and scrupulously looking at my dad for a minute, I asked,
"What is it like to get old?"
He turned his attention away from the computer screen
Met my gaze
Took a deep breath in, and began,

"You don't realize just how fast life goes by, until it's gone.
One day, you look in the mirror, and realize that twenty years have gone by.
It's a different person in the mirror than what you expected.
Some days, I look at your mother
And it feels like I've only known her for a few months.
Other days I look at her, and she's just so different from the woman I met.
We've grown and changed so much together.
I am, to this day, learning new things about her,
And all of them make me love her more.
Yeah, she can't cook for ****, and she talks in tangential circles
Which I just can't keep up with.
But since day one I was smitten with her.
And to this day I'm surprised that she actually chose
To spend the rest of her life with me.
Getting old with the right person makes getting old bearable."

I know someone who finds solace in ballet shoes
                A boy who strums his secrets to guitar strings
Someone that spends his waking moments with glazed red eyes
             As if facing this world cold turkey
                       Isn’t even an option.

For boys whose fingertips shake
                Like the burning end of a cigarette
And girls whose smiles resemble
Car crashes waiting to happen
A cacophony of shattered noises
             And those of us who feel guilty for the
                     mere act
                           Inhaling air
                        And exhaling poison
So we spend lifetimes holding our breaths

   Until we burn our lungs out trying
            To warm our hearts
            With something other than the fire
           That burns out in a smoky haze

Until our eyes become rivers,
flowing oceans
That cry out a thousand melted glaciers

Our tongues speak ruined languages
We read everything backwards
Curse in Latin
Make oaths in Russian
So whatever we say sounds beautiful.

So that our hands wont have to learn permanence,
affection
consolation.

In a happy reign there should be no hermits;
The wise and able should consult together....
So you, a man of the eastern mountains,
Gave up your life of picking herbs
And came all the way to the Gate of Gold --
But you found your devotion unavailing.
...To spend the Day of No Fire on one of the southern rivers,
You have mended your spring clothes here in these northern cities.
I pour you the farewell wine as you set out from the capital --
Soon I shall be left behind here by my bosomfriend.
In your sail-boat of sweet cinnamon-wood
You will float again toward your own thatch door,
Led along by distant trees
To a sunset shining on a far-away town.
...What though your purpose happened to fail,
Doubt not that some of us can hear high music.

I've started to feel like
these poems that I write
are becoming the footnotes
to my life.
I mean, think about it.
Every event, every emotion:
See bottom of page.
Because that's where the
truth is, where it always lies,
at the bottom,
forever at the bottom.
You have to dig until
your fingers are bleeding,
until your nails are broken.
But, I swear it'll be worth it.
Because I know that
these words that pour from
my brain through my arm
to this pen on this page
matter - I don't think
there's anything I've
been more sure of.
And so I'll dig,
until my fingers bleed
and my nails break
because this is it.
This is my one chance
to tell you the truth,
to tell me the truth
and I'm going to take it.

Ive 'nunquam magis sentiuntur solus* is Latin for
                                 I've never felt more alone.

I only learned Latin because
For some reason, I think that if I say things in the root of most languages,
I'll find most of the roots to these feelings.
But... Cogitationes strangulatus.
It's funny. Saying "thoughts stifle" in latin, merely sounds like cognitive strangles.
                                Not that it's any different, really.
It just sounds so much more like what I want it to be.
The English language has a hard time
Catching the depth of things
without sounding like it's trying too hard.
I want to be able to say something once, just once,
and be done with it.
To stop ruminating on you and find peace knowing that when I say
Reliquum aliud nihil est dicere
I don't just mean "there's nothing left to say."
I mean that *I've said everything I needed to say.

"Why one writes is a question I can never answer easily, having so often asked it of myself. I believe one writes because one has to create a world in which one can live. I could not live in any of the worlds offered to me – the world of my parents, the world of war, the world of politics. I had to create a world of my own, like a climate, a country, an atmosphere in which I could breathe, reign, and recreate myself when destroyed by living. That, I believe, is the reason for every work of art.
...
"We also write to heighten our own awareness of life. We write to lure and enchant and console others. We write to serenade our lovers. We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospection. We write, like Proust, to render all of it eternal, and to persuade ourselves that it is eternal. We write to be able to transcend our life, to reach beyond it. We write to teach ourselves to speak with others, to record the journey into the labyrinth. We write to expand our world when we feel strangled, or constricted, or lonely … When I don’t write, feel my world shrinking. I feel I am in prison. I feel I lose my fire and my color. It should be a necessity, as the sea needs to heave, and I call it breathing."
('The New Woman', 1974)

It's not hard
To find people
Who party
Like it's still 1991
There will always
Be the girls
Who get
Decked out
Get drunk
And pick fights
Guys who flirt
With your skin
On the dance floor
Who take you
To their place
Showing you
Something
You've never known
There will always
Be additives
That make you
Have a great night
Or send you crashing
Without any hope
Of holding on
People take the ride
And it spits them
Out like chewed up
Sunflower carcasses
To live is to be
Free, they say
You give a bird
Too much fly room
And he'll wear
Out his wings
You can dream
About the ***
You'll have
And the girls you'll
never meet
But after all of
The drinking
The smoking
The good time
You still go home
And you still lay in
Your bed
And you still get up
In the morning
With a hangover
And you still feel
Like you are the
Only person
Like you
And you still
Want to be able
To sit around
Without having to
Think about
How lonely you
Really are
Even though
Every night,
You felt like
You were
A exploding
Star