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666 · Apr 2012
Writer's Block
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
This writer’s block is heavy; it sits on my chest and becomes my test for the taking, pressing my emotions to the point of breaking. Ever taking, ever testing a man’s will to take quill in hand and fight the parchment in a battle of pen strokes, curves and lines. This stalemate enemy in my shattered time holds the battle line and controls the destitute thoughts, controls the ideas I brought to bear. Tear them free from the grasp of this, my enemy, and scatter them lightly across the pages, creating symphonies without a sound in an arrangement of profound rages. They are rambles, rants and raves and nothing more, with no winner, no loser, and no settled score. There’s nothing to be won. Yet here I sit, nervously undone with uncertain hands that shake, for what came so easy to me was so easy to break. So thoughts may move in circles, to occupy the wandering mind for mercy’s sake, to shake the tree and make fall the fruit thought to be lost, thought to be beyond cost, that which was free under the skies. Because the ability to sing of heroes, of villains, of love and of lies was never mine to have, it belonged instead to my soul. A thing once made whole, once broken, that when stirred is outspoken, and bleeds across the lonely paper dolls to wander freely in the halls of lost dreams. Covered in the dust of forgotten themes that seemed brilliant once, though never shared by the trepid heart that wouldn’t dare, for some things are better left unsaid. Unread words of dread that seem to repeat over and over, coming back from the dead to seek their exposure. And I am somewhere in the middle of it all, somewhere lost in my mind and I am enthralled, I can only watch this opera to its final verse, lay my hands across the keys and give control to this curse, like a once proud ship tied to the docks, this is what it is to have writer’s block….
Sean Kassab Dec 2012
I wanted to write you a love poem Honey
I wanted to tell you in so many beautiful ways just how important you were to me

But you know…

The more I thought about it
The more my words escaped me

There were just so many things I wanted to say

I worried that if I made it too complex it wouldn’t sound like me at all
I became afraid that you wouldn’t understand what I was trying to say to you

So I typed…

Deleted…

Typed…

Then paced back and forth thinking of what to say
Because who knows me better than you do?

I must confess that I came up with less than I had planned on
So let me just say it plain

I love you like a cat loves a laser pointer!
654 · Apr 2012
Fortress Heart
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Fortress heart
Guard your ramparts
And lock your gates
Shiver behind your defenses from fate

The pain and hate
That hewn these walls for your protection
Offer only the chance for reflection
And the avoidance of pain

Though fear walks with no name
Among these hallowed halls
With hymn and whisper

"no one may enter here"
It says in the dream
"It's dangerous"
"It hurts"
"I'm afraid"
"NO ONE MAY ENTER HERE!"
It screams

So it goes on
And so it seems
That beat after lifeless beat
The impenatrable stone home
To the heart afraid of pain
But desperate not to be alone moans

It wails
In the elegant jail
Of it's own design
650 · Jul 2012
A Pucker Factor of Zero
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
Incoming rockets
Falling
Down
            Down
                        Down
To the US Army Barracks
Where they
Pound
            Pound
                        Pound
And the people scared and screaming
From the
Sound
            Sound
                        Sound
Of the
BOOM!
                 BOOM!
                                  BOOM!
Are running
Round
            Round
                        Round
Some people started yelling
HIT THE
GOUND!
                    GROUND!
                                          GROUND!
But for some it was too late
They looked like
Cheap
            Ground
                          Round
We answered in like kind
And bombed the
Town
            Town
                       Town
Until the smoke had cleared
And bodies could be
Found
            Found
                        Found
When the fight was over
They gave the
All
            Clear
                         Sound
So we all went back to bed
So we could
Lay
         Back
                   Down
This is an attempt at trying something new, not sure what yet. I do that from time to time so don’t beat me up too badly. It is a poem written about an actual artillery strike that happened at Taji AB in early 2011. We received 54 rounds of 107mm rockets and 80mm mortars in 30 minutes directly to the living area across from the medevac helipad. Our paladins (155mm artillery units) returned fire until the barrage stopped and after the accountability and casualty reports were done there was nothing for us to do but go back to bed. Another scar, another day in the life…
647 · Apr 2012
Scar Tissue
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
I see you there,
In the dark by the phone,

And when I see you I feel safe....
I feel alone.

When I feel you
I feel my injured soul
And see scars that match my own.

Cut to the bone
Sitting with you
In the only chair in a burning home

Waiting for eyes that see
My heart isn't made from stone

And though damage has been done
It wasn't me,
I'm not that accident prone.
638 · May 2012
Seam Ripper
Sean Kassab May 2012
Ripped apart at the seams, the pain, the screams, heavy breathing and dreams, the raven on razor blade wings. And there you dance on golden strings, the marionette of my nightmare things and all things shown to be true. And there you are, right there where I left you, and there you are, right there where I loved you.
632 · Apr 2012
Give and Take
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
I poured the gas and you struck the match and we danced in the satin flames of billowed sheets and romance. Meeting touch with touch, in feather light mercy and a scent of leather, teathers to bind wrists twisted and silk ribbon blind. Out of our minds! Driven mad by a daring caress, the words repeated, "yes," "yes," "YES!!" And dare for more than this! Touched bodies writhe with each burning kiss, each passion taken, given, stolen and cry out! Body on body heavy, break the levy and let flow the river! Back arched bending to the giver in the rising heat, moan, tense, collapse and repeat until the fire is doused in the flood of our exstacy, seen by the light of the rising sun from the window next to me.
625 · Jun 2012
Pyre
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
Melodies play in the passing days of grey with remorse in the notes of woe. The Sorrows tune, which flows in the colors of anger and shame! The forgotten names, that hang the heavy head hang to end in rope and rafter and regret. Pallbearers hoist the match stick man, yet strike the flame and consume the land, smoldering blood to ash.
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Angry Onion of doom
Teeth that eat the tomato
Laugh in your bowl of spaghetti

Cuddly sheep
Eat the lions and weep
In front of the candy store

Bored circus clowns
Faces painted
With laughing frowns
Drive away in your fancy car

Have I gone too far?
Has it sunk in and made sense
Or have I lost all sense meaning?
Just like politics.
594 · Jun 2012
Wishing Well
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
I stumbled upon a wishing well while walking through the woods. It told me it’s fair warning and I nodded that I understood. It told me I could have three wishes but careful I must be, for what I really ask for must be something that I need. It told me I could ask for things I want for myself or others. It said I could be rich and famous, or give the best to my sons or daughters. To that I said “hey take it easy, I just want a drink of water.” I didn’t come here seeking things, so you really shouldn’t bother.  I’ve made my life with my two hands and it isn’t much but it’s mine. I have a small house and happy family and they are doing just fine. See some people have the lives they want and don’t need anything else, so give me some water as a good well should but keep your wishes to yourself.
594 · Jun 2012
Back Stabber
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
Sing to me a story of a thousand hungry knives, and a thousand innocent backs, and a thousand angry lies. Then sing me the destruction of a thousand mangy lives, the broken hearts that bled for nothing through a thousand crying eyes.  The river of tears created was a thousand miles wide, and you could swim to your death in your vainest efforts never reaching the other side. There is no escape from what these knives do, no place to run and hide. So sing to the music you must face, or you will die without your pride. Because when the knives are ravenous they’ll have their taste, but it won't be from the front or the side.
588 · Jun 2012
Boogey Man
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
Boogey Man

When I was a young boy, I had a fright
That Monsters would come out at night
And that they’d eat me, I was sure!
But my parents helped me to endure

They showed me while the lights were on
That the Monsters were all gone
In fact they had never really been
So off to bed I should go again

But sleep did not come easily
And I would lay awake nightly
Wide eyed, hiding under the covers
Until exhaustion won eventually

In the morning I would awake to find
That it had all been in my mind
And that there was nothing to really fear
So I grew up believing it clear

Then I went to school one day
And bought all the lies the teachers gave
In fact the older I got in life
The less I saw with my own eyes

I got a job that would make me a man
Where I ended up deployed to foreign lands
And in the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan
I saw the terrible nature of man against man

Those visions hit me across the face like a smack
In fact I’d say they brought me back
All the way to the days of my youth
Where suddenly I realized the truth

That Monsters are very real you see
They walk and talk
Just like you and me.
Ok, this peice has been edited twice now LOL, Hopefully I got it where I want it to be.
587 · Apr 2012
Walls of Jericho
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Angel take your breath now and blast the trumpet's rage to tear at the walls. Red chord crumble the tone, abandoned sorrows and crashing stones, defeated army of no one marching no where alone. Cold sweat, pale skin, cold sins to atone, in the arms of grace, of flesh and bone, and a kiss that outlasts time healing time after time.
580 · Apr 2012
Etched
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
I walked barefoot across the nameless tiles, littered with remnants of the stained glass windows of my broken dreams. I walked for lifetimes, or so it seems, over the twisted kaleidoscope of my wishful thinking and failures. Embracing the pain in the hopes that such beautiful shards would leave beautiful wounds. The footprints left in blood were my history scrawled across the nightingale floor, like so many broken swords washed upon the shore, forgotten by the hands of slain warriors in their rusted armor and bones. Left alone with nowhere to go, when you were the home I came to know. Those stone walls that sheltered me from the cold protecting the ragged edges of my tattered soul, which long since crumbled to dust. Leaving me exposed to the graceful storm, the whipping wind and driving rain. This is my life, this beautiful history of pain.
571 · May 2012
Just Maybe
Sean Kassab May 2012
Maybe today will be the day
The day I save the world
The day I save myself
Maybe today will be different
Maybe I’ll rescue children
From a burning building
Maybe I’ll feed the hungry
Maybe I’ll compose a song
That unites humanity
Today the possibilities
Are endless
So maybe
Just maybe
I’ll do something great
Something unimaginably heroic
Or maybe I’ll just shut up
And eat my breakfast.
570 · May 2012
Whispers
Sean Kassab May 2012
Whisper archane to my thoughts
Wind of gales
To bend boughs of oaken wood

And there I stood
Patient among the grove

Alone

A prisoner to a world I can't call home
Driven by rage turned sour
In my Hour of solitude

Tomorrow's ghosts
Lust and live today

So fleeting in their time

*So magnificent...
568 · Jun 2012
Tempest
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
A miracle struggles and takes flight from my chest in each meeting of your gaze, open eyes that look upon open eyes, the passing glimpse that halts time and sets fire to my reality. I adore that I adore and clutching hands to chest fail to contain the flood.  Emotions spilled forth as swelling surf to surging seas of feelings unknown…until this moment spent lost in those eyes. The heart is a storm, beating behind a curtain of flesh and blood… thundering, running as directionless as a derelict ship in uncharted waters on an empty horizon. Beautiful lover, whisper like the roses between parted lips and speak the song of angels grace with a look of innocence. Hand in hand to swim until we drown in this flood. For though I hunger for your kiss, I starve for something else, need something so much more. Light my world with a smile and lift my heart with a touch, a kiss, ablaze in an embrace…amazed. The moth and the fire dancing on the burning wings of elegance…
568 · May 2012
White Washed
Sean Kassab May 2012
I saw a white dove
Upon a white fence
I pondered upon this
And what it might have meant

While down below
Alone in the white snow
A white rabbit was born
Looking somewhat forlorn

I knew I saw them
I could have sworn
And more flakes fell
On the ground to adorn

It painted quite the picture
I must say I’m enthralled
But thinking about it now
Perhaps I saw nothing at all
567 · May 2012
Sweat of the Brow
Sean Kassab May 2012
Muscles straining, rigid steel bands working, the man machine grinding his gears, turning the strength of years into toil. His blood begins to boil. Sweat upon sweat, blood and tears, till death return him to soil. And for what was this sacrifice made? These wages paid in time passing, age amassing in wasted years and fears of death. Fears of last breaths, jagged and gasping, eyes wide and scared, that remember laughing in those pleasant fields of fire. The open rolling desire that love embraced erased our anger, our hour of ire, and covered us in it's shelter. The shodow of it's promise given that while we're alive we have the hope of truely living, truely loving. Hand in hand to kiss the souls and never feel the cold. Never let it go, never let it go! That one precious thing that suffering subsides, suffer the sting and sing in a voice of grace in this race against minutes and seconds that steal away our hearts and the bonds they hold to eachother.
565 · Aug 2012
Ammo Can Lunch Box (10W)
Sean Kassab Aug 2012
You can always tell which kids come from military families.
562 · Jun 2012
Home Sweet Home
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
I have a home,
It is my safe place and my refuge
Where truth lives freely
And where trust is currency

It is the table
Where meals are shared
With extra servings of joy
And washed down with laughter

Located in a place called love
Where it never rains
And though it can be cloudy at times
The sun shines through in the end

And music plays there
In the form of conversations
And silly jokes
That makes me smile often

So yes, I have a home,
Not because I bought a building
Of wood and bricks and mortar
But because I married a friend.
This piece is a work in progress still, don't be too harsh on it guys
562 · Apr 2012
Trigger Pull
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
I streched the spring.
Then put it back.

Closed the reciever
With a click and a clack.

I charged the handle.
Then let it go.

I counted my rounds.
Twenty nine in the mag.
One in the hole.

She felt the same.
Cold and steady.

I felt no shame.
Cold and ready.

The air felt heavy.

But something was new.
Some mechanical remedy.

My magazine was full.
And I could face my enemy.

with a 2 lb. trigger pull.
559 · Apr 2012
To Live by the Sword
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
I sit here looking out at him
From across the distance
I can see his eyes
He is looking at me too

I am the infidel he fears
The invader of his lands
In a war waged by politicians

There’s a sheen of sweat
Beading on his forehead
His beard gently swaying in the breeze
It’s almost tranquil

As if time stopped
Just for me
And in that second
Hours tick away

The sun gleams brightly
Off his white head dress
And the whites of his eyes
As they widen

He is yelling something
Though I don’t understand
I don’t speak his language
Don’t really want to

But I see him

I wonder if he’s a husband
Or a father
I wonder what he did before this
I wonder would it matter

Because I know he is the enemy
They told me so
Then put me here

All these thoughts
All these observations
Happened in an instant

In the time it took
To level our weapons
At each other
From across the distance

His is an AK-47
It looks old
It looks dangerous
Pointed at me like that

I pulled the trigger
And walked away
He stopped yelling

And I knew
If only for a moment
That one day would come
When someone would look at me
From across the distance

Would they have similar thoughts?
When my day came
Would they understand the words?
As I yelled them

Would they know?
That their day would also come?

Or am I the only one
Who understands?
That this is what it is
To live by the sword
550 · Jul 2012
Finding My Self
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
I found myself looking in the mirror again,
I wanted so much to admire who I saw there
So I started looking for reasons to

I knew I had to be honest with him
He was looking right at me after all
So I had to be fair in my comparisons
Of good and bad things that made up my life

I counted them off, the good and the bad
I have to admit I wasn’t pleased with the results
I guess it could have been worse though

I made the resolution then
To do more good things in my life
Change, after all
Doesn’t have to be a slow, painful process
All it takes is the initial decision
And a little courage…
A thing not easy to come by

But possible

I promised to come back to that mirror
After some time
And check with that guy again
Hoping my results would be a little bit better
When I checked within myself
And looked at who I had become

And I kept finding myself thinking
Have you looked in the mirror lately?
I mean really looked?  
Did you admire who you saw there?
Because it’s never too late
To change…
550 · Aug 2012
Oceans Unknown
Sean Kassab Aug 2012
It just so happens that I have a hammer and a bag of nails, a couple pieces of wood, and some canvas for making sails. So I might as well get started, after all I have much to do. Though building a ship is the easy part, what’s hard is the open blue.
546 · May 2012
In a Darkened Room
Sean Kassab May 2012
Eyes lost to silken darkness
Sold in trade to skin's sensation
I feel the touch of cherry lips
As soft as day dreams kissing the wind

Quicken the breath and exhale shaking
Body shuddering
Trembling

Strong hands gripping soft flesh
Gently
Hungry
Starving
Ten lonely wolves running cautiously
Through forests unknown
Blindly moving

Dancing to tomorrow's song of yesterday
Embracing bodies kissing deeply
Lost to the moment
There is nothing else

Only this

Only now

Only you

Soft hands glide across my skin
The satin sharks that swim the expanse of me
Devour me gracefully

Desires burning in wild eyes
Black blind flames and uncontrolled breath
Shivering hot skin
Pounding heart

Control long lost
To arousal
And crushing need
546 · Apr 2012
In a Glance
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
A vision so lovely,
A chior of angels songs,
Swimming in broken glass.
Reflected in dark lonely eyes,
A heart peircing stare.

Vulnerable at a glance
And in a word, powerless.

What fragile beauty
That binds my thoughts
Completely,
Trapped in this gaze of wonder.
539 · Apr 2012
I the Hunter, May
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Drag the cast away chains and shackle the dreams of beauty to hunger and sorrow. Furrow the earth, iron manacles and rattle your warnings, ****** hands dripping yesterdays blood on tomorrow. Panic, frenzy, and scream the sparrows song; from a hunter's whispering lips, hunter's heart, hunter hollow...
538 · Apr 2012
This World of Mine
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
This world is my city,

A school of piranha, swimming in a sea of tears.
Razor teeth and gaping mouths,
Each more ravenous than the next,
Feasting on the fears that flow from my veins
In the brilliant colors of doubt,
Leaving me defenseless.

This world is relentless.

In its cold gaze of disdain,
Leaving a stain upon my soul,
Which made me whole,
Made me cold,
Then broke me to pieces
And left me crying in my sleep.

This world is deep.

Like an ocean of night skies,
And I am drowning in it,
With downcast eyes
Trying so hard
To be the man I remember,
In a past I wish I could forget.

This world is regret.

In the unfulfilled promises
Carried by the hands of yesterday,
Holding sway over the bulging seams
And fabric of my reality,
Sewn in heart strings, that once severed,
Allows me to break through.

This world is you.

And you are everything in it,
While I, the unwelcome stranger
Wish only to stay a while longer,
A sacrifice to danger,
And in remembrance, linger
Of the ring upon your finger.
528 · May 2012
The Hidden Beauty
Sean Kassab May 2012
Hope, faith and clouds under night stars and shining gods see me walk over bottomless holes, the barefoot faithful soul treading upon snow white darkness. Travelling the doubting one's road with no one to blame, as marks of pain heal unashamed, with disregard that life may be hard, but I hope one day you'll see beauty in these scars.
524 · Jul 2012
Staying The Same
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
I am the tiger that hides from himself, eating my stripes to become something else, in a jungle of my own design, where I’m trapped in the thorn vines of enemy time. Yet I, in time may change my views, staying the same by trying to become something new. Like Icarus with wings of wax, until my self-destructive choices made me fall too fast; into a past that seems filled with sorrows. Another crash landing, where I find myself in tomorrow. “Tomorrow” a word that seems deceptive at best. For tomorrow is only a past that I have not lived yet, but the memories will be there, still be piled on the shelves, just another day of wishing I was somebody else.
523 · Apr 2012
Senses of You
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
If I could touch a song.

I would want it to have your face.
I would want it to touch my heart.
I would need it, my saving grace.

If I could hear a dream.

It would laugh lightly with shining eyes.
Running feilds of gold and crimson.
Running thoughts, in a racing mind.

If I could taste a miracle.

It would sweetly linger on my lips.
Sugar and forbidden fruit.
In the passion of a longing kiss.

If I could see eternity.

It would end in strawberry hair.
Emerald gems that stare at stars.
Skin so light, skin so fair.

And if I could sense a heart beat

It would be hidden among the roses.
The gentle red of silken petals.
The thorns, and the promise that it poses.

All these senses I have told confused.
If I could say it and be true.
But if I could write a poem.
I would want it to look like you.
522 · Jun 2012
Medicated
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
She couldn’t take the pain so she popped another pill, the small relief compounded thus to override her will. And as he walked away she cried and popped another pill, she felt so alone again that she popped another pill. She sat in that lonely room for days, and on the window sill, was another whole **** bottle so she popped another pill. Her friends began to worry so and asked if she was ill, she lied and said “of course not” then she popped another pill. Her days were made of chewing them then swallowing and still, it wasn’t enough to ease the pain so she popped another pill. I should have taken action but instead I just stood still, so as her life began to fade I popped another pill. After time she passed away and was buried on the hill, still dressed in black I cried for days and popped another pill. I never took the chance to tell her how I really feel, but now she’s gone and I’m alone just popping god ****** pills.
517 · May 2012
Pawns and Princes
Sean Kassab May 2012
Politician politician why do you lie? Why must you kiss our babies as they cry. Then smile seated in power with greed beady eyes as you take then deny. You who represent us as we gathered far and wide, lead us and were to stand beside us in life. And now suffer us strife that we chose you to be the one, held silent under the heel of your jack boot and the barrels of your guns. Is it fun, for you to hear our gasps as we pawn our **** for the rising cost of gas? And feel so truely alone as the banks forclose our homes? Yet we will continue to drive on, on our own, for we have no fear of being overthrown.
512 · May 2012
Need
Sean Kassab May 2012
Steal my hopes, steal my dreams. Set me adrift with sails aflame in broken glass seas. Burn me down sweetly, gently break my bones, cut me in kindness just don't leave me alone. Tear this flesh, strip it from its home, just don't leave me alone, just don't leave me alone...
512 · Apr 2012
Iron Butterfly
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Cry like rain drowning deepest sorrows and fly broken butterfly, wings of steel colliding. The heart's unsung sonnet of pain, a song of refrain in a concert of anger rising! Burning and seething the broken heart's bleeding for the one left behind, left alone but surviving.
507 · Apr 2012
One Night Stand
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Tears fall as diamonds to dark earth
Rusted ground where I was found
And from which I was made
The slave of self saved

By a touch
And the kissing embrace of a lover taken and given

Madness driven
To the shallow sorrows of tomorrow's hasty dawning
Spawning hopes
That crackle in the fires of want as embers
Faintly remembered

Each as the next, the same
No glory, no fame to be had
Yet we were glad!

In the moment of atonment
That moment of sin among women and men
Where hunger feeds desire
Feeds hunger
Feeds want

Ravenous need seeds the garden of greedy thoughts
And all for naught when the night is through
There is only me
There is only you

Our union desolved by time always moving
The unforgiving criminal
That robs us of what may be
Leaving beautiful memories and emptiness
Awaiting the new night
The next dance
And our chance to love again.
502 · Jul 2012
Take Out (10w)
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
Three little words that mean so much...*"Let's Order Pizza"
Don't blame me, the devil made me do it lol
500 · May 2012
Of Pride and Promises
Sean Kassab May 2012
I tripped and fell one day,
over a broken heart where it lay in shades of grey.
So consumed was I in my own dismay
that I did not see it,
though it could see me.

It had been cast aside....
or more likely, it had been set free.
Perhaps it's scars were the fee,
jagged as they were.

I mulled over the thought
as I nursed my broken pride.
I dusted off my jeans and picked up that heart,
cradled it tenderly, offered it a ride....

"Where will you go" I asked,
"I'll take you there if I can.
Though the journey may be long,
for I am just a man"....

It spoke to me then,
so clear and sincere
"I care not where I go,
though may it be away from here.
My master before you was cruel and a knave!
In this briefest of kind acts
I feel I've been saved.
Will you be my new master?"...
"Words of disaster, hush now" I say,
for I am not king
nor prince,
and you are no slave" I replied...
The heart cried.

"Thank you kind sir
for your warmth and the ride,
am I heavy?" it asked...
"No" I lied...

for it's burden was great
and had been carried for years,
this crushing weight seemed too much
for only one to bear.

"It's cold out here" I said,
"have you nothing to wear?"

"Nothing" it said
"for I have been laid bare...
and left alone in the dirt".

"Then please you take my shirt,
may it cover your hurts
if only for a while,
I'll tender your wounds
mile after mile
until you heal".

"Who are you"? It asked of me
"are you even real"?....

"I am no one" I said,
"though you know me to be real,
for we are the same."

'I have not a game,
nor a name,
nor a plan."

I am no one" I said,
"for I am just a man".....
494 · May 2012
Passing Time
Sean Kassab May 2012
The clock tick tocks
As second fly by
Like ships form the docks
As they are untied
And dashed against jagged rocks
They sink and die
As present turns to past
In the blink of an eye
So cherish each moment
Each “Hi” and “Goodbye”
And paste on that old smile
Wear it proudly and wide
Because one day too
Your life will subside
And all that’s left
Will be the memories
Of the time that we bide.
490 · Apr 2012
Fist Full of Sand
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
Cling to hope, frail as it were, even steal it if you must, and from every corner of every dusty room remember! The memory of those things, long forgotten, those paintings of rust, which left to time, became the ruined dances of moths and canvas. Or perhaps they were the chances we so desperately longed for, gone the way of all fleeting things, to take back the laughter of the child of spring. Listen carefully, as the echoes sing and the sun blond hair so fair in its youth brings a smile so fair in the truth, under the tone the ticking clock rings. Count slowly the second hand whispers, seconds as scriptures till the hour departs. Draw me pictures inside pictures of broken hearts, with broken crayons from a box with a broken lid, just like you did when we were broken kids.  Just like the arguments our parents hid, to spare injury to our glee, now you disagree, and then admit defeat with me. Look through the eyes of someone else and see so many things I hate in me. Yet we cling to these things desperately, with failing hands, afraid to let go, afraid of the holes they’ll leave in our soul. They’re now lost to us, leaving us cold, or is it simply our loss of control, like a fist full of sand. The rivulets that pour through the crevices of the fingers of our empty hands, leaving only the few grains that linger for the empty man who stands on legs of strength borrowed, in the hopes that his memories may survive the morrow.
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
Somewhere high up in the trees
Under a canvas of midnight and laughing stars
His music dreams on a moss covered bough

He is my friend and has always been
Known by everyone during the day
And by the setting sun he is forgotten

Huddled safely in that lofty place of his
Feathers ruffled against the subtle breeze
He waits for dawn in the rustling foliage

And when the sky is aflame
With the breath of a new day’s morning
He will sing again in those precious tones

And we, those of us who had forgotten
In that day will remember him
And in his songs
We will remember what it means to be alive.
486 · May 2012
Falling Softly
Sean Kassab May 2012
I am fallen
Like dark angels
Feathers burning

Laid to rest in passions killing fields

I am the sacrifice
On an altar of silk
Slaughter the lamb

I am the skin you touch
With razorblade fingers

Cut down the chains of defense
March to the gates of my desire
And burn them to the ground.

Let loose the hounds
Gnashing teeth
And bite to break skin
Taste the pain sweet

Strike the strings of the body acoustic
And play the concert
On a trembling stage of tensed flesh
Muscles aching

Straining

Pulling

Surrendering

Play the concert
Play minstrel play!

Rise the tempo
Rise the rythm
And spark the fire
In a room darker than black
With flaming sappire eyes

Burning blue suns that stare at the soul

Hands that bind hands
Fingers laced
Palm against palm bodies touch
Glistening sweat

Breath against skin
Hot as white ice,
Chest against breast

Whisper a dream to me
In a shaking voice
Tremble
Cry out
Collapse exhausted

Turn your head
Look in my eyes,
Look deeply and see me
Look deeper and save me
Burn brightly in the eyes
Of your fallen Sinner
480 · Jun 2012
Without Pictures or Words
Sean Kassab Jun 2012
Sometimes I feel that my life has been lived in stages. Each moment is as separate as dead birds kept in rusty cages. Scattered at the bottom where they fell to remain wasted and it’s all been written down to create a book, with blank pages. I have never seen behind your masks and may never see your true faces, but I know who you all are, you’re the same person from different places. We all want to believe we’re different, but regardless of our gender or our races, we have all endured the same; the strife, the struggle and the rages. Add the love and laughter and the scars collected over ages and still all that we’ll have left from this life is a book filled with empty pages.
476 · Jul 2012
Lost, If Only For a Moment
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
I was feeling a little lost so I started looking for myself, I checked under all the couch cushions and behind the books high on the shelf. I even checked the laundry and behind the draperies, but I came up empty handed, it seemed it wasn’t meant to be.

I couldn’t be found anywhere, at least anywhere that I could see, but I knew that I would soon find out, I had too eventually. When my persistence paid off, then just maybe, if I kept looking there I would surely be, I had to be around somewhere, but for the life of me, I just couldn’t remember what I had really done with me.

I retraced all my steps so I could try to see, if I could find a clue or catch a glimpse of me. At least a little something, so I could have some peace of mind, but I didn’t give up looking, because I knew that in my mind, I had to pop up somewhere, I would, it was just a matter of time.

I knew it was important too, the me that I had lost, I knew that it was something that to me was beyond cost. So I scoured the whole house, from top to bottom, looking for what was mine, and wouldn’t you know it…of all the places…I was right here the whole time.
475 · May 2012
The Book of Us
Sean Kassab May 2012
I have this book that I love to carry
I take it everywhere you see
Inside there are no pictures
Only stories of you and me

It’s bound in hope and memories
But its pages give it form

See, some are tattered
Some are torn
Some have become faded
Some are worn
And some are stained

But what remained
Was a history
The day to day telling of our mystery
That took forever to figure out

But even after all this time
I know without a doubt
That this book was really based on you
And I’m glad I filled it out.
461 · May 2012
Hush
Sean Kassab May 2012
Whisper like the leaves of autumn, falling to rivers flowing behind the kiss of lovers. The wind whipping hushed secrets from their branches in the color of gold and fire. The color of desire, burning behind the embrace of a decades undying promises, life, passion and truth told in the timing...
456 · Jul 2012
Weather Forecast
Sean Kassab Jul 2012
I turned on the T.V. to watch the report on the weather, it made me think about myself, my life and my future. It made me ask if I should live in fear of things that haven’t come to pass. Or should I live my life for the moment, try to enjoy it with a laugh? You see, it’s impossible not to think about what may happen to us tomorrow, there may be a storm, or a flood, maybe even a death or some other sorrow. Maybe you’ll be lucky and it won’t be all that bad. You could find love, marry a wife, have kids and become a dad.  It’s all speculation of course, just like the man reporting the weather. We don’t know what will happen later, all we can do is try to live better. The future isn't set so no one knows what it will bring. I guess you could say life's cloudy…with a chance of anything.
453 · Apr 2012
The Pessimist View
Sean Kassab Apr 2012
This coffee cup is only half full.
Like the world around me.
Like the people who invade my day to day.
GULP
****!
Now it's empty.
449 · May 2012
A Matter of Masks
Sean Kassab May 2012
Lighting fires in a tempest heart, the burn I so well know. Seeker of sun, run, take flight to evade the edge of your own razor tounge! While I, betrayed by the red hot blade of your words, found my fate. That I came this far just to feel your hate. So close did I stand so long unnoticed, a man of stone, using smiles to hide my broken bones.
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