Have you ever wished upon a leaf?
Never ending, never breathing
Never stopping, never ceasing
Whistles and whispers
Red leaves are picked up off the road
The cracked, riveted, chipped road
Made of asphalt and ice
Wiry and spindly
The leaf soars through the air,
Joined by sunset orange and
sunrise yellow counterparts..
Have you ever wished upon a leaf?
Leaf piles bigger than bushes and mounds
Causing laughter abound and high spirits
Getting everywhere, getting damp
Rains pouring with a melancholy force
Petrichor rising from the ground
Filling every orifice with the smell
Have you ever wished upon a leaf?
A last wish, a final wish
Of love, of hope
Of happiness, of success
A meaningful wish, a last-ditch wish
That maybe, in the end, everything
will be okay?

Fiery Reds dimming to a glimmering glow in the sky
Clouds stifling their cries with a light rain only slightly quenching the agony the fire left in them
They burn in the moonlight
Jagged scars on the moon giving it a sinister smile,
Invisible to those who see with their eyes
Bright as day to those who know how to look
Causing the shiver down your spine when you're alone at night
The feeling of breath on your neck when nobody is apparently there
The unrelenting fear persisting through the most spectacular of times and the most devastating of events
The loneliness seeps through my eyes
My ears
My nose
My mouth
It's everywhere
Eating me inside and out, destroying all that's left
*Where is the end?

I remember a time when I looked at you and the chocolate brown black holes
of your eyes drew me in,
When I wished to dance among the stars in your brain, tracing constellations
from your neural pathways.
A time when the attraction of your beautifully imperfect face was more powerful than
the most powerful intermolecular forces,
and there was nothing I wanted more than to prove that it isn't ionic bonds that are the strongest, but love.
With you.

Now, there are no stars performing their fiery routine in the depths of your eyes,
no gravity to **** me in past the point of no return, as I used to be.
Nothing.
Empty space is all that remains of the intergalactic event that occurred in my mind.
What happened?


I remember the darkest corners of my universe being filled with temperatures and light in immeasurable quantities,
When I loved you.
When the wires in my brain were shot from the sheer energy of this force.


Now, having been reconstructed, no such forces pass.
My universe is once dark again. Speckled with lights of reason and logic.

As it should be.


I don't know what happened.


But, it's...



*.....finally......

Sunrise rays peek over the horizon
Illuminating the red-speckled landscape
Swaying in wind, flowing as the sea
Lovely, and symbolic.
The red rose stands out among the tulips and weeds.


Sunrise rays peek into the window,
Illuminating the bedroom in disarray.
The woman wakes up, half in her dream.
She dresses herself up, and leaves for work.
Her red dress stands out among the suits and coats.

Sunrise rays peek into the cave
Illuminating the dusty, smoggy rock
Sparkling and gleaming,
A diamond against coal.
The red jewel stands out among the shale and limestone.

Anger at myself, rising to the surface
This is all too familiar
The usual urge to hurt and fight
directed inwards.
I expressed this in a very bad way.
I ruin everything, I'm so dumb.
I've probably lost a friendship
due to my utterly pathetic weakness.
*Can I do anything right?

What you don't know kills me,
And it's far too late to say.
My feelings are a stupid thing,
They've always been that way.

Holding back tears is always hard,
Especially in front of you.
Looking into your eyes I see stars,
But with you, I always do.

Today I had to say goodbye,
I've never been good at it.
No matter how hard I try,
I'll always cry a bit.

I shouldn't miss you as much as I do,
Even though my departure is nigh.
But if our friendship is good and true,
I needn't worry-why should I?

I really haven't treated you right. It's unfair.
And yet you still put up w?ith me. I owe you so much.


You've been through hell and back. I wish I were nicer.
Instead I only added to your problems.

You'll shrug it off, say it's okay. But I know it's not.

I will remember you. You were funny, and you were there.
That's all one can truly ask for, isn't it?
You, Sir, will not be forgotten.

You're different. Distinctly so.
When I first started talking to you, everyone you met was playing the same track on repeat.
I was no exception.
I lost your trust just like everybody else, and I legitimately lost sleep over how much I regretted it.
That didn't change anything, of course.
Why should I be treated different?

I learned a valuable lesson from it. I just wish I hadn't.
Because then I could have learned it later. And known you better.
But that's the thing about lessons-they're effective most if they cause pain.
I'll miss you. Your amazing writing abilities, your sarcasm that was actually funny, your unbelievable dedication to academics..and your running. Because it all tied you together.

I will remember you.
There's no way I couldn't.

You were always quiet. Reserved. Cool and collected.

All that went out the window when someone learned who you truly were.

I feel lucky to have learned a fraction of it.
Your writing abilities make me wonder what website you're ripping these from because holy s**t nobody's that good. It always leaves me wanting more.

All good things come to an end, of course. Including my time knowing you.
But I'm going to leave with a lot of regrets from last year.
If I hadn't been so **** stupid, maybe I would've gotten to know you better.
I wish I could have.


Your piano skills are dumbfounding. I think my mouth dropped open and remained that way the entire duration of your song during the talent show.
It makes me sad that you don't play more.

You have given me a fresh set of memories to enjoy. I will cherish them.
And I will remember you. I promise you this. As much as I've broken every other promise, I will keep this one.
I will remember you.
Always.

I am indebted to you, truly. For being there when nobody else cared.
For dozens upon dozens of nights filled with suffering, loss, tears, and blood.
For being my go-to listener. For teaching me to help myself and love myself.

Of course, you originally listened. And that's what I needed.
But things got worse. And then you finally told me that it's not enough. I need to actively help myself.
Naturally, I didn't listen although I should have.
It took 3 weeks of no contact for me to realize how ******* RIGHT you were. Of course you were. You always were. And still are.
Of course, I tried to help you too. I was a good ear (even though mine aren't), and over the years we've built a friendship specifically designed to last, if not the rest of our lives, then a VERY long time.
We know each other. But I especially feel privileged.
To have known someone as talented, beautiful, caring, funny, helpful, supportive, independent, and intelligent as you (although you don't really think you're that last one).
Our relationship was more electronic than anything.
For the past three years, I've disliked that more than anything else about our relationship.
But reflecting on it...maybe it was right.
Perhaps it was the only way it would work. We were in only partially connected social groups, and our personalities weren't really well designed for a more face-to-face relationship that I've developed with others.
Looking back on it..I don't think I would have had it any other way.
I cannot thank you enough. I really, truly can't. So I won't bother to try. I will look forward, and only forward, as you've taught me to do.
Because it does get better. We'd both know. We've seen each other grow out of our problems, laugh at them, and then deal with the new ones. Finally, we've reached a point where we're both happy.

Isn't it splendid?
While I will definitely miss seeing you (because hell if I don't find you really attractive), I won't miss you nearly as much as I will miss others.
With others, we talk about how we'll stay in touch, but rarely do we actually do so.
With you, I know I'll keep talking to you. Our relationship will continue to grow, and my departure is perfectly timed-our relationship has reached a level of trust that cannot go much higher (if it did, it'd kinda get really weird and awkward and personal).

So I view this as a bump in the road more than anything else. Our friendship will continue.
And I will remember you. I will remember you as you grow to chase your dreams that seemed light years away but are now in our atmosphere. And with your head in the clouds, it will be comparatively easy.
In short, I love you. I will miss you. I will never forget you.
And I will look forward to a lifetime of correspondence.

Words cannot describe my feelings towards you,
Although, hell, I'll certainly try.

I love you.
although, as I used to say so often, "not that way." Purely platonic (as I routinely reassure everyone).
To say you've been a big part of my life is an enormous understatement-
You've been there as long as I can remember.
It's only recently that I've grown to truly appreciate you,
from laughter and jokes via Google in English class
to whispered secrets in orchestra.
You always told me those secrets with a smile on your face, even though
they were impossibly sad.
Why?
Was it because you wanted to look like you were saying something normal?
Or was it because you didn't think you could say it without crying, so you forced yourself to smile?
You saw through me in my darkest hours,
And managed to forgive me time and again.
I owe you so much.
You're beautiful, talented, funny, and strong.
And he  broke  you.
He took your heart.
He cherished it, made you feel important.
And then he shattered it into more pieces than there are stars
(of which you claim to not be good at writing about).
...twice.
And still he ignores you, which requires both arrogance and selfishness at levels so extreme,
Odysseus would tell him to get a grip, and Caesar would be disturbed.
..
And you deserve so much better. I want to remind you of that. He's nothing, he doesn't deserve you and he never will.

To forget you would be a heinous crime,
One I will never be guilty of.
Whether it is tucked away in the expanses of the universe inside my head,
Or stored as ones and zeroes in the conversation records of many a different software, accumulated over the years...
Or in the papers, which you will be in someday, with that kind of writing talent.
How could I possibly forget those chocolate eyes which tell me so much when you tell me so little?
How could I possibly forget those nights in Italy, when everything went to hell and you just couldn't take it?
How could I possibly forget these memories that you've left me? Some of my favorites?
How could I possibly forget you? You beautiful, talented, special, powerful, selfless, kind, funny girl?
I will miss you more than anyone else.
And I will remember you.
When my new dark hours come, I will remember what you have told me.
I promised you, after all. And I keep my promises.



*Especially yours.

Le Chatlier's principle only goes so far-
My system will not return to equilibrium.
There is too much stress-socially, academically.
Emotionally.

*What is one to do?

Your dreams are where your heart is
They're more fragile than life itself
Over and over you cast them aside,
only to find more
Now, rest in peace
Pounding impulses defile the things we wish for
and the more we forget
the more we remember again
In this beautiful, cruel world
all I can do is ask why we're still alive
Oh, with our strength--and our weakness--
What are we going to protect if there's no sense
to anything anymore?

Unknown are the names
of the flowers that have been trampled
Birds have fallen to the Earth
and long for the wind
Prayers won't solve anything
Only the will to fight
can change the here and now!
O pigs who laugh at the resolve
to walk over corpses to move forward
Livestock complacency? False prosperity?
Give us the freedom of dying,
starving wolves!
The humiliation of being caged
is what triggers us to fight back
We hunters slaughter prey
beyond the castle walls,
consumed with surging bloodlust,
as our crimson bows and arrows
pierce scarlet holes into the twilight.

Tear tracks form, as they used to.
Blood seeps out, as it used to do.
This facade couldn't last.
His soul, my soul;
The charred, cracked, screaming remains of it:
Pleads for death.
It has been through Hell and back
My heart trudges on, a tired, weary activity
My lungs wheeze, struggling to perform the most basic tasks
*and why should it have to continue?

There was a purpose to it all. To the man who just missed his taxi in New York, to the young child hopping between rocks deep in a forest, on a bubbling stream. Just as the city pulsed with life, seeping through cracks in the pavement repaired just last week, in the wheels of the taxi driving away and in the man's curse under his breath...
Just as the city pulsed with life, billions of trillions of ideas and thoughts and galaxies in heads thinking about their coworker one cubicle over who mentioned offhandedly to their friend about not having plans this Thursday evening, about whether their mother had remembered to take their medication this morning because she always was forgetting and did she realize how much easier it would be to hire a servant for these things...
Just as the city pulsed with life, as did the forest, a snake slithering between the dancing shadows from the shaking leaves, the child unaware of this impending surprise until the moment of impact, yielding a sharp report and a mad dash for an exit...
So did the forest, birds swooping between branches swaying ever so slightly from the gust caused by the boy's speed, one train of thought, one heartbeat racing to catch up with its feet...
So did the forest, with billions of trillions of thoughts and ideas in heads wondering about whether the snake had bitten him or not, about whether their grandmother had remembered to take her medication this morning because she was oh so forgetful and Daddy did always say they needed a maid since he was always busy and Mommy left...
So did the forest.
Feet flew, wheels sped.
A puppy, patiently waiting by the window, tennis ball in mouth, for her buddies to come home. Her older dog companion had fallen asleep in the wait.
And in these moments, of waiting, all with one destination...they were already together in their minds.

-

It was the worst kind of death. Not the physical death-no, this was much worse than that.

This was the death of souls. Hopes, lives, dreams, crushed, exterminated, obliterated. It was the death of everything it meant to be human.

Emotions didn't exist. Numbness was an inevitable factor of this horrible place. There was no escape.
They didn't have to worry about escape. No person, no soul, no spirit survived the factory of death.
As all factories do, products were made. In this case, the products were the mindless, numb, empty shells of what were once lively, happy human bodies. Every year was a fresh batch, ripe for a more advanced death factory. There was no reason for it, either. Money ended up being lost for the factories of death. There was no purpose. No escape. No heaven. No hell. Endless purgatory.

Suicide was illegal and impossible, since it was  *a crime to destroy government property.

One after another, everything piles up
Is there an escape?

Clank, Crash, Thud. Machinery. Ever. Working.
Glimmering sparks dance in the gaps between the flames of the metal.
There has never yet been as beautiful a sight as that of infinite possibilities.
And, yet, as it always has, the sparks begin to take a definite shape.
The shape constantly evolves, with five definite points connected to a central.
The gleaming sparks no longer have a mind of their own, and a human shape is clear.
As soon as this is apparent, the sparks vanish as suddenly as they came.


It had been done.


Given the blueprint, machines were able to do something previously thought impossible; Give a hunk of metal life.

DNA had been replaced with binary, muscles replaced with circuits. And yet, it was alive. it was conscious of itself. What a scary and beautiful thing, that wires can replace veins and steel can replace bone.

And yet, as if nothing had happened, the newly formed man stood up, opened a door, and stepped out into the real world.

the*                                                             ­        must
     angel                                                          ­      love
          of                                      ­                             the
                wind                                     ­                       sky

                                   ­                          __        
____---------------------                   --------------------

for when                                                     so does the rain
       the wind dances                                          so do the leaves
           so do the clouds                                            and so does the air


the                                                                  for
  angel                                                               win­d's
   of                                                                  ­ path
     wind                                                             winds­
    must                                                              and
   love                                                               twi­sts
  infinity                                                              forever

-------------__-----------------------------­------------------

The angel of wind?                                             I hope she is happy
                            she must be violent             up in the sky
         for tornadoes                                                twisti­ng and churning
                               and cyclones                      I hope the life she brings
     do the earth                                                     through windswept seeds
                             lay bare.                               Grows in her heart.


-----------____--------------------­-------_-_



                                   the angel of wind is one of redemption
--

Open the ornate gates, what do you see?
I see spinning stars and dancing galaxies.
Lower the drawbridge, what do you find?
I find a beautiful place ravaged by time.
Unlock the palace door, what is inside?
I spot rolling green hills stretched far and wide.
Look into my eyes, what lies within?
Inside lies a boy with patience wearing thin.

What do you see? What do you find?
*What within do you think lies inside?

Dear Light,
I can't imagine a world without you! It'd be very dark.
You're so Near to the end, and you've been working so hard. You should be more Mello, some would **** for your abilities.
On an unrelated note, have you heard R.E.M. recently? I love them to death! You should try them, even if you don't have an eye for that sort of thing.
I'll love you till the end,
-Misa

Bodies start to rack up left and right
Your twisted ideal fueled by might
You're so wrong, you can't be serious
But as I watch you slowly turn delirious
*You can't play God anymore, Light.

Whether it's her or me,
My thoughts get jumbled on the way out.
My tongue forms intricate knots even the most
Skilled rope expert would be hard pressed to undo.
The silence drags on, and it makes my brain screech
Nothing comes out, what finally does
Is the equivalent of Bieber writing music for Beethoven...and I find
My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations.

From spinning galaxies colliding in intergalactic bursts of light traveling millions of miles every hour, to dying stars fueling the birth and rebirth of new civilizations and planets, of new life, of new beginnings, from the infinite multidimensional plane of the universe that's the palate for these swirls of light and heat
To the intricate workings and cognitive enigmas of love, the springs and cogs of joy, the blackened cogs of sorrow, covered in soot
To the formation of billions of these unending universes that, in time will flourish or wither...
The distances between these universes are huge, yet traveling these wide expanses take trillionths of billionths of seconds, and the celestial dance between universes of ideas, galaxies of concepts, black holes of love and despair, quasars pulsing pure energy everywhere, everything coming together in a spectacular array of light and heat...universes within universes spin and dance in my brain and neurons fire as galaxies die, pathways travelled as planets are born, and nerve endings stimulated as supernovas fueling them...all of this for one idea. Millions upon millions of universes are born and die in my head, and because of it the universe doesn't seem so small..after all, billions exist in our brains.
Yet, in all of that, these dazzling arrays of light are compressed into infinitesimally tiny spaces...it's not surprising that something's lost in the process.
It's amazing to think that so much is in our heads, that so much happened in our heads for us to realize so much happens in our heads, that  so much happens for such simple ideas...the sheer amazement that should be felt is painfully lacking.
The perfection of the stars is lost on paper.

Something's lost, between the beginning of a universe, the birth of new stars and systems, and between our final actions. It's lost in translation.

I have entire galaxies in my head, but I speak mere stars.

The most beautiful and perfect thoughts, instances,
Can be, with the right mind, turned into a grimy, mushy slime,
Or lost completely.
The most lovely and flawless sounds,
Can be, with the right ears, twisted into
Unintelligible gibberish and gobbledegook
Or missed completely.
The most divine and impeccable sights
Can be, with the right eyes, morphed into senseless shapes and forms,
Or avoided completely.
They're never kept,
Always lost on me.
I'm a bad game of telephone, a malformed lump of coal once surrounded by others.
Pressure wouldn't settle for anything less than the best out of them.
What works for them breaks for me.
I'm a bad game of telephone.

The number of years it's been,
The number of times I've tried to join you since,
And the number of days left until your memory is celebrated.

I love your smile that I work so hard to get
I love your eyes that tell me so much when your words tell me so little
I love your hair that flows like silk in the wind (how cliche of me),
And I love your laugh that's musical in tone.

I'm so sorry for it
One thing after another
Piled like our Italian dinner plates
Him, it, her, everything
And you deserve none of it.
You're one of the closest to perfect beings
I've ever had the pleasure of meeting
I wish I could be there for you
But I just end up being annoying and unhelpful,
And, I might also mention,
Nervous around beautiful people.

What will it take, for this old mind to break?
How much stress is too much?
Do I dare find out?

I wake up in morning, feeling strong like bear.
I take off shirt to shower, chest is covered in hair.
I brush my teeth with *****, and drink all the rest.
That is the way I know that mother Russia is best.

Every time, I'm disappointed
I shouldn't be, because it means I care too much about you.
You couldn't control it and even if you could, it doesn't matter
You've already done too much for me,

*But I'm selfish

There's something missing,
Something lost.
We never speak about it, but we both know it's there.

Something that we both so desperately need.
It's just not fair. It really isn't.
Something that we can help each other with.
Why does everything have to be so wrong?
Something that will make us happy.
Nothing ever goes the way it should.
Something that will solve all our problems.

But it won't happen. And I don't think either of us knows why.

Nothing does.

Try as I might
You just
Won't
Let
Me
Escape

No matter what you may say,
About it being fine,
it's really not okay,
And we clearly both know why.

Her happy wasn't happy. She didn't have happy.
She had sadness.
Or she had nothingness.
and the nothingness was so much worse than the sadness.
Feeling nothing at all was worse than the most excruciating pain she had ever been through. It tortured her more than all those nights of crying herself to sleep. It ate at her more than all her tormentors' words. And it left more scars than all her cuts.
Her happy wasn't happy.
It was sadness,
because the alternative was  *nothingness.

Ones who are skilled go by unnoticed;
While the unskilled ones get all the attention.
Why is that, I ask?

The dream I'm so desperately chasing,
My only remaining wish,
The one thing I would die for?
Not going to happen.
It's simple statistics.

The goal so near yet so far,
My only purpose in life,
The one thing I can't live without?
Not going to happen.
It's simple statistics.

The reward unlike any other,
My only hope and dream,
The one thing that actually matters?
Not going to happen.
It's simple statistics.

The most important thing,
My only remaining hope
The one thing I truly need?
Not going to happen.
*It's simple statistics.

It won't get any better.
It will only get worse.

Life is a Machine for Pigs
The best of us are
Slaughtered
Sliced
Cooked,
And served
To the worst of us
who are simply ignored
by the torturous
Machine
for Pigs

The best of us
upon The Arrival
of the Machine
Slowly begin
a Dark Descent
A spiral into
Neverending Nightmares
But nobody
is there
To hear
our Cry of Fear.
The worst of us
Are not deemed
fit for the Machine.

and so,
the best of us,
The Lost Souls,
The Last of Us,
are still subjected
To the Machine's
Mental
Ominous
Evil
Lasting
Purgatory
that is the Machine
for Pigs.

Dear Mark,
You have an uncanny ability to make me laugh.
So many times I have been in the darkest of places,
To be brought back up by another video of yours.
You thank us, me, for subscribing and supporting you,

But really, you shouldn't be thanking us.

We should be (and are) thanking YOU
For helping us
For saving us
For making us laugh
For making us happy
For making us forget our troubles
For your continued dedication
For your hilarity
For your generosity
*For everything.

Not much can be said
For a teacher who dislikes their job
Who would rather be elsewhere,
Who teach because they ended up doing it
Instead of enjoying it.
For a teacher who dislikes their job
In a way, does not, can not, and should not teach.
They don't teach, because they do not inspire students
They can't teach, because they can't inspire their students
And because they can't inspire their students, they shouldn't teach.

Nothing to write
Nothing to say
Nothing that inspires
No thoughts gone astray

For weeks on end
I haven't entered this site
Nothing came to mind
I simply could not write.

But now my pen is fresh
With new ink, to stay
Now I have reason to write
Now I have things to say.

I want to revisit those nights
Way back when
We would stay up until 2
Just talking, laughing effortlessly

That would be the perfect birthday present.

I also want to revisit that night
When we turned from people we knew
into good friends
I don't know exactly when it was,

But that would be the perfect birthday present.


I even want to revisit those nights,
My darkest hours,
Because even in the worst times,
You could make me smile.

That would be the perfect birthday present.


But then I realize
Our friendship is one to last
One I will have
For years to come

*And THAT is the perfect birthday present.

I gaze into your deep eyes with dismay,
Inside I see a lost soul gone astray.

“Anything I can do?” I dare to say,
You shake your head, like you mean to say “nay.”

Deep inside, I can tell that you meant “yay,”
I'm sure that things won’t always be this way.

I notice your hurting, for you I pray,
That you recover fast, with no delay.

I remember the times we used to play,
In the backyard as kids, for the whole day.

You were so happy, but that’s gone away,
Perhaps next time you grin, your cheer will stay.