Time unfurled
a single yarn from the hem of a sweater
pulling apart the fabric of it.
Light consumed all darkness
until even the word shadow
held no weight.
The heavy weights of fear,
depression, and the impenetrable bruises
of lifelong aches,
melted,
like winter snow being touched,
at last,
by the spring sun.
A room awaits, made for me:
a coffee ***,
always full and warm with welcome.
A leather bound journal,
with ever-ready pages,
and a pen with ink made from my own veins
that always knows what to say.
An old fashioned is served up promptly,
at 7pm,
when my mother greets me at my door
and curls up next to me on the couch
we talk and laugh,
for hours inside a minute.
Candles glow with ambered remembrance.
Music plays the odes to journeys taken.
My grandfather fishes by a river nearby,
teeming with bass,
and I glimpse the child he never was
smile at me.
Every morning the ocean of my backyard
kisses my feet as she waves hello,
her salt no longer bitter.
I greet the blood of my blood
and bone of my bone upon the shore.
They wear faces that, through centuries
still resemble my own.
We tell stories around bonfires
of the legends that we were in our time.
My soul is made tangible.
I touch the fringes of my warrior spirit,
caress the edges of my creativity.
I dance with the stars before dawn
upon a floor made of crystalline moonbeams,
and marvel at how green,
how delicate,
how infinitesimal,
is the Earth below.

Caught in the moon's dead white gaze
I’ve paid my dues.in kind,
To be sent off in this black parade.

Come now, swing wide those gates
A myriad of colors drained in white bouquets

Should the rain come,
Wash over the lye stone, erode my face
I’ve cried into the pulpit of my maker’s feet
To weigh my sins against my deeds.

Walk into this hallowed empty
Gray billowing fog upends me
Lost wanders scream but it’s deafening
Can’t hear the sound of their pallid fingers scratching.

Madness incurable—
Dead eyes mercurial
Set upon dim light,
But the veil from here to there is impervious
Birth me like a newborn
Walls clamping breaking my new form.

I’m drifting further out to sea,
In an endless ocean walled off in opaque white
No horizons to warn me of the fall,
The long way down,
Where the magma ravines wait to strip my flesh
Naked and razed, undeterred but afraid
Will I ever see you again?

Let the rain fall,
Impervious skin along the casket door
My claustrophobic bed
Final in my rest.

Consciousness is the ideal—the lens through which I experience life.
I see a cup, a beautiful one. I hear songs as I eat pineapple.
Each part of me coexists in total sense, yet meaningless.
And I cry—because I am living.
And living makes me happy?
That’s why I cry: because I am conscious.

Each step is complex, yet simple.
Smelling the air, filling with breeze—
it makes me feel squished, but in a good way.
Every thought has a factory behind it.
But what if there is no grand scheme?
What if things are just thinging—
a path we all made, walking forward because we can?

I will die. I know.
It makes me sad.
But that sadness—
that sadness is the happiness
I feel because I am alive.
So is consciousness an apple?
Or am I the apple?

Are we one?
Are we all?
When I die, is it the darkness?
Or the light?
Is it Buddha? YHWH? Hades?
Or just a mimicry of my imagination?

If consciousness is the apple,
am I truly consciousness?
But if I am the apple,
and I die today,
is there meaning in everything?

If there isn’t—
then the sun is a dancing snake
with seventeen eyes,
and no one can change my mind.

But if there is meaning,
then all truths are real,
and there will be no perfect.

Perfect is like beauty—
it is its own dictionary.
I see beauty in green grass and a world of blue.
Someone else sees it in a girl with long eyelashes.
So someone can be perfect.
But no one can.
It sounds like a paradox, but it isn’t.

You can be someone’s perfect—
but are you mine?
And what of the other eight billion people?
Do the ant, the lion,
and the baby giraffe have opinions, too?

Is consciousness a camera?
Or is it the apple again?

And how can God create in His image,
but not make perfection,
if God is perfect?

“I” is a character.
“We” is a symbol.
And I—I mean I—
I would rather live a meaningless life
than be a story with meaning.

Because in a story,
I am conscious,
but not living—
just controlled
by the puppet man with a beard
or the blue man who holds the world.

No, no, no.
Maybe it’s just a quote.
Or maybe it’s nothing at all.

So is the apple—
the one we know as consciousness—
sweet?
Or sour?

I think...
we just eat the apple.
I mean just one.

If it’s sweet—smile.
If it’s sour—
smile when the next one comes.

I won't ever let you escape from my brain
You're bound to my mind, pulled tough and restrained
A mere trace of your scent I won't ever forget
Not saying I love you is my biggest regret

I miss you dearly, your laughter, your perfume, your face
I missed you even more when you went to your mums place
Reeking of *****, I was always drunk and rude
But it was always forgiveness instead of sued

Looking back on our past it's clear to see
That you were the only women meant for me
The only way to see you once more is to pull it
So I can't wait to eat dinner with you, after I eat this bullet

whenever the time comes
and i know it will soon
i won’t have followed my dreams
i won’t have the time too
nor will i become who i wish to be
my dreams are nothing but that
a child-like dream to become something
i will never be
i will never be satisfied with who i wish to be
furthermore, i will be just that,
a daughter
a girl without a soul
a girl without a dream to live for
if however, i were to die a son
the dream would have came true.

Existence, Nevermore.
From birth to the grave, fast or slow, it comes the same.
Nevermore.

Joy or despair, you lived a life, at the end of your road, as always, nevermore.

It does not rush, nor waste your time, it follows you slow and calm, until eventually, nevermore.

Memories flash, love and loss, a warm hug to go, then it fades, and next, nevermore.

Young or old, ready or not, it's okay, just a gentle sleep, rest well, nevermore.

What happens next?
Unknown.
Welcoming.
Peace for all.
Nevermore.

“When I die,
return me to nature.
I don’t want to be in a wooden hug,
that’s as dead as I’ll be.
I want my hands gripping grass,
and my lungs filling with dirt.

Don’t give me flowers,
if they’re not planted
on my last blanket.

One day I’ll die,
until then, I’ll enjoy
every second of being.”

A.V.

Here I am in comatose
Damnedest man I did so boast
Paralyzed from fear I swore
Succumbing to eerie voices galore
Here they whisper, there they shout
Forgotten longings in endless bout
Obsidian spires do so climb
Monoliths rising to the ashen sky
Molten magma in a blazing doom
Had I one wish it would be for you
Blind and petrified I do become
Only to hear a chilling song
Come back to me so she says
Or you will be stuck in choicely dread
She says so true and warningly
But I could detect a wanton glee
Had I a voice I would so cry
Come save me darling my dear divine
I had not the eyes to see
Barren wastelands singing to me
Thuds and croons echo all around
Was it a corpse or am I nightmare bound
Ever so close they are I feel
So I thought to pray but my legs fear to kneel
Abandon all hope they scream and plea
Singing Devils wrath is waiting on me
When I see him I will hold true
And tell the Devil to take her too

The stars aren’t so innocent;
Those surrounded in the twilight's dark
But when they all die off,
Who really witnesses their final spark?

They live in harmony, though with death –
As I stare at them following their emptiness;
If I must fall out of place, I’ll embrace that fate
Like a shooting star, taking the task with gladness;
Neither entering nor departing, a dark breath,
That quietly escapes out of my collapsed chest.

While my skin dissolves into dirt –
The very cradle of humanity’s birth;
My wet tears will burn scars upon my cheeks –
Never truly separated from things; but also,
never attaining the true meaning of peace.

                                      I’m all but a piece.

Collapse in me like a calamity
We break bones like friends break bread
Suitable to eat all the fiction we leave
Leave no crumbs upon the porcelain
Dripping from the maw,
It’s a gathered storm we twist in the rain
Cyclic sick, motion parody
Parroting in the air we see in our periphery.

An animal touch
Gnawing through the skin
Gnashing at the veins
Tapping ancient knowledge from within
Tasting the copper essence, thicker than buttermilk
Oat notes inside iron smell,
Rust color dyed under the fingernails.
This is what I meant when I said
I want to get inside you.

Collapse in me like a black hole
Supernova laser beams bouncing through the temples
Lobotomize consciousness in conscience bliss
Constant this, a battle waged with no winners
If I take it, what would you give
And if I give what would you take?
Would the odds meet even?
Would the world cease its grievance?
Coastal in the irony
Serfs off the shore.
Surfs up collected Moores
Served up in pallid doors
Serve up to pad the wallets, sure.
I’m not immune to your history,
Hang me for my skin tone and pedigree
Take my culture and use that pasta to bury me.

Infinite waters,
Drain my colors
Paint me a new face,
Bring me to Zion
Let me see my creations
Batter me in heinous
Fry me with jealousy
Greed bleeds in green envious eyes
And I doubt you realize…
I only wanted to love the best in you.

Collapse in me like a crumpled page
Wrinkled and discarded
Rage billowed in dried ink and crude letters
Words cursed from the spittle of angered throats
Vibrating viral vehemence through the echoes of a time
No longer sated in the universes we’ve depleted
In still-born births upon our rotted stage
We play alone.

Collapse in me!