yesterday i asked
how the sunset looked
by you
and you replied that
it was "nothing special,
just blue"
and i couldn't help but wonder
if you've ever felt the same way
about me.

I find myself in a colder place
growing older, not wiser it seems
the light has subsided from my face
fixed in the stare of old dreams
a simple life I once desired
a partner and children to love
a haven from those who relent
who are mired
in the madness a few rise above
I grow slowly and silently into this place
of solitude and fear
that I am drifting too calmly
that I am hiding too well
for another to find me here

In the fragile hands of my little girl
who knows not the agony of my years
nor realizes the joy she provides
the balance her innocence brings
she holds a picture
framed in red oak
figures in black and white
posing beneath a gray tree
which no longer provides shade
on a hill no longer there
she talks to them in almost silent whispers
those who were gone before knowing her first breath
those I miss so desperately
she sets the picture back in it's place
and for a moment looks achingly sad
'tell me about them Daddy'
she says

Float it down the river;
a bottle with a note
full of fragile words and folded without hope:

"To whom it may concern,
I've grown weary of the worries -
worn down by the constant sound of thoughts spilling out of my head -
burnt out on turning down every opportunity to be saved.
One day, I'll get away,
but I'm in no hurry.
By the time you read this, I may already be dead,
but I might not be."

Standing in the sand with toes dug in deep;
watching the sun gleam off a bottle as it shrinks into the distance.
Goodbye to all the worst parts of me.

Hello horizon.

Throughout my life,
All the adults would tell me-
Follow your heart
Follow your dreams

But what I really wanted to hear was
**You know what, Megan?
Forget about following,
How about you lead?

Toxic lies
Coming out of your mouth
Your toxic love
Covering me in faux happiness
The toxic substances
I've had to consume
To get your toxic personality
Out of my head

Its hard pretending
not to know each other.
Because we aren't just strangers,
we're strangers with some memories.
We once shared laughs,
tears and
pizza together.
We can't act like ''we''
never existed,
when we both know we did.
...........

You told me not to go back
Alas I did not listen.
Into the past I went
Both fears and bad memories
Staring at me in the face.
Things I'd wish I'd never seen
Heard-
Or felt.
They want me to stay.

Forbidden to leave
And lost in the past
I should have listened to you
I shouldn't have gone back.

Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art—
    Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
    Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
    Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
    Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
No—yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
    Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
    Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever—or else swoon to death.