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Jeremy Betts Mar 15
In this unholy battle,
We're acceptable collateral?
Why is this accepted?
It's not even ethical

Distract, create a spectacle
Like, oh I don't know,
A traveling circus
Call it a big tent revival

Keep your intellectual
To an abysmal level
View who believe you
To truly be the cesspool

From car to front door, time to mingle
A hive mind kicks in, single file
Resembling a slaughterhouse line
Cosplaying as unaware cattle

Only the needy need the label to be biblical
Instantly non consequential
Tell me, who's more feared,
A specific god or his devil?

Is it possible be honest though?
Any chance of pausing the show?
And collectively admit
The only truth is...we don't know

©2024
A M Ryder Dec 2021
The first step is
Radical honesty
With ourselves

We don't intervene
We invade

That's not
"Collateral damage"
Those are
The corpses
Of children
And their parents

Ours is not defense
Ours is war
Gabriel burnS Jul 2017
Wonder how they came up ahead of me… she’d been leaking information to the enemy. A double agent. She loves me but it can’t be helped. It is her nature. Well don’t you know, my seductive charming spy mistress, that the fuse is lit. Your behavior, a recipe for calamity. We might be the epicenter, ground zero, but no one shall be spared. Everyone involved will be affected. A 360 degree firestorm of shrapnel. Just because. You needed more… to feel more beautiful, more wanted, more seductive, by more parties. Never enough. More.
Love lies spilling guts, from the mess up still partially beautiful. Face almost calm, not contorted. Pain is numbed as she disintegrates like vapour. But we’ve become a desert and it will not rain back for centuries.
prosy
Karen May 2017
Flickering fate
An end
Love has deemed me worthy of itself.
Hence, I must embrace all that may comes with it.

This is only the boasting my eyes and smile speak of
Another crown bestowed without a knack
A start
What a wondrous sight.
JGuberman Sep 2016
Perhaps it's my memory
which troubles me
when I carry it around
like a chip on my shoulder,
waiting to have it carved
into a marble bust of Justice
in the hope that
something good would come of it.
Although in our time
the only thing it becomes
is its own caricature and nothing more.

Perhaps it's my memory
which doggedly trails me wherever I go
even when I wish to lose it in the hills.
I carry it
like a credit card
without an expiration date,
with a limitless line of available credit
extending back through the centuries,
to be summoned
at a moments notice to pay off any debt
no matter how ancient
for a pound of flesh can no longer
be considered good collateral for any loan.
Flesh has become cheap
as has life
and the interest rate is never
high enough to sustain
the sanctity of either anymore.
Michael DeVoe Mar 2015
They are the kind of raindrops that hang around for awhile
The ones that laugh at your coat
Get your shirt wet anyway
The kind that if it weren't so **** cold outside
You'd really like to stand under them for a while
The kind they make those slow-motion-water-drop-hitting-water videos out of
Those
And all I'm doing with them is watching
Watching them fall on windows
Watching them tear apart the littered receipts on the sidewalk
I'm watching them tear leaves from cherry trees
And wondering if they listen to Beethoven or Slipknot on their way down
Portland is always so far away until it rains
Then even here in this farm town
Everyone finds their North Face
And these raindrops remind me of something
Not our first kiss though
Or the tears
Or the leaky faucet
Or the day we did nothing but watch the Discovery Channel
It just makes me think of you
And how I never knew if you were there to water me
Or tear me apart
How I never knew if it was a Rascal Flatts day
Or an Evanescence day
How I never knew if my hand on your cheek would be a turn on
Or a trigger
How bad days had ringtones
And good days were just waiting for the call
These raindrops remind me how close I am
To the only city I've ever loved in
How far I am from ever getting over you
And how incredibly jealous I am
That moving on seems to be easy for someone who does it so often
I can't let go of the damage you've done
Even though it's clear now watching the rain
That you were just falling
And I was just in your way
A collection of poems by me is available on Amazon
Where She Left Me - Michael DeVoe
http://goo.gl/5x3Tae

— The End —