1) empty bottles that clink as you wade through them. you drown in an ever-increasing pool of bottles

2) puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks. i want to pour coloured powder on her cheeks. i want to trace every single stream

3) eardrum rupturing music. he screams along to it. they become indistinguishable from the music. he enjoys being a part of something.

4) a lone figure next to a lake. they hug their legs. nothing moves. everything is completely still. if you listen closely, you can hear their heart shattering into the tiniest fragments. they try to keep it together. an internal war rages. but nothing moves.

5) the buzzing. hair falling to the ground. a blank stare and tiny smile

6) you are a tiny dark speck, against the looming white landscape.

7) the lingering taste of coffee. a lit cigarette dangling from between fingers. flecks of ash fall to the ground.

8) submerged into the deepdarkbluebutmaybeblack ocean. everything is dulled.

9) a neatly folded stack of clothes in a washing machine.

10) putting your fingers in between your legs. you are in front of a mirror. you watch yourself

11) a body falling apart into several meat-sized chunks. they are stapled back together.

12) clay masks.

13) lose strands of hair tied together in a trash can

14) refusing to follow the rules.

Fleeing from the shackles of yesterday,
trickling down to a catharsis
at the slender neck of the hourglass,
the golden grains dribble down
to create my present.

My days out-flowing
the forgottenness of the past
creating a newness
that explodes in every cell!

Crack a smile
You are miles away from trouble
Doubled is the distance
When our insanity is humbled
By an infinite unfolding of things

How long has it been
Since the universe sang to you
The stars chime in
With gladness for the fact
That you are still around?

Come now
Unravel that belt you have tied
So tight
Around that blue well
That speaks in wisdoms
Kick the chair from 'neath your feet
To step into new kingdoms
Of hope

The truth is that
There is plenty to be done
And so much time to do it in
It's when we wish it all at once
That we forget the go-between

The sorrow twix the laughter
The pain before the meaning
The tomorrows post-disaster
The gain after the teething

It's that non descriptive feeling
Like the cat that got the cream
The sunrise out of darkness
I call it hopamine

This is a true, but amusing tale,
Hope your laughter does not fail,
'Tis a saga of a cockatoo,
Of life, he held a jaundiced view,
At the going down of the sun,
Cocky embellished his own fun,
And at the rising of each dawn,
Cocky's catharsis our ears did adorn,
The parrot kept talking, none listened to he,
Cocky had such a vivid vocabulary,
All starting with "F...ing C...'s"!
We heard his morning matins, you see,
His vespers were hard to believe,
'Twas sociolinguistic acquisition, prithee,
His jaded look at society,
Swearing is cathartic, but so lazy......

Art is my salvation
a gift to cure my soul
Catharsis from creation
Pens and brushes
make me whole
Laughter lends its colors
to a dark and dreary Life
Light invades my spirit
and eases what was strife

Did you know
you can dance
even when you're sad?

It may seem inappropriate
to shake your hips
while your heart is exploding
But I swear-
some of my best dances
I did with my heart in a sling
and my soul in a cast.

Draw an invisible circle on any surface,
turn up music that flies in the face of your sorrow
and give it up to the sky

The worst that will happen?
you'll break a sweat
The best?
try it for yourself
moonwalk through your despair
and get back to me.

Dance.
Even when you're sad.

The only
Time I learned
Of your sadness
I read it like
Braille
On your body
It was
Knitted in
Your muscles
Carved into
Your face
Woven into
Your hands
And it made me
Sad to think
That our
Unseen horrors
Like
Silence
And loss
Are such palpable
Afflictions
Our bodies
Bear

–learning how to heal myself, Sarah Gray Isenberg

July 2016

I don't want to be strong today
I want to be weak
I don't want to stay positive today
I want to cry
I don't want to talk today
I want to punch
I don't want to be kind today
I want to wallow
I don't want to write today
I want to hug

I want to run away
Abandon everything that I've built up

I want to tear down my own creations
The products of my pain

I want to let go of everything
Throw myself into loss williningly

I want to start again from scratch
Or not start again at all

I want to blow through the sky as a cloud

I want to wander with my feet damp from the dew of the grass

I want to feel the cool night air
The glow of the moon bright on my skin
Illuminate those stars in my eyes again

I want to burn down my house
So I can leave no traces

I want to vanish back to where I came

I want to become life itself
One with all once more

I want the sun on my back
the rain on my skin
the breeze in my hair
the chill in my fingertips

I want to be no more than a spirit
A wandering soul
Seeking nothing and losing all

I want to leave this place
break loose from all my bonds
and start again as if I never had a 'before'