My thoughts are building like legos
Head burning like el fuego del infierno
Life is calling me, stuck waiting on my turn.
They ask me about passion, what happened?
I'm getting back on track, hadn't you heard?
If all I do is write when free, I hope these words
Will someday sprout me wings
Like birds who talk but we hear them sing.

I linger with my fingers rewritting what I've written
Been called a failure, unrealistic.
But I truly can't be quitting, sadistically
My mind comes back to a poetic side
That drives the rest to put down
What's on my chest, investing time,
To tell, without a sound, this story of mine
In hopes you see my heart in every line

All things in life can be so fragile
Make or break the worlds we know
Entering the darkest days hold up a candle
Reaching light for a path to show
If any were to enter where stars could be rewritten
Can you imagine where we would go?
Anywhere, I know.

Some days it's really hard to exist.
Wake up, turn on the figurative light
Blurring colors with awakened eyesight
As my reoccurring thoughts resurface,
You won't be here for the holidays.
**** my father, I'm not him, I am.
My hair looks a mess, get dressed.
"You've got this" I think to a mirror image.
Hand to the glass like art not finished.
My self-esteem feels diminished.

Listen to an instrumental to gently let the words flow
Out of a skull that's crying too deep
Anymore I've just been straight faced, lost,
My life has a price, tell me the cost please.
What's the number they wrote on my head
I need to know if it's more alive or dead.

Let's let it spill tonight, let's really tell them.
I'm not doing ok, the cuts on my arm
Are not representation of any self harm
But a child I feel I'm failing, I'm failing.
I had a dream that I sunk in too deep,
Felt a push and that sprouted to a leave.
Screaming names like any can be worse
Than the ones I already call me.
I'm still afraid I'll suffocate, not metophoricaly
My lower back is still killing me
But I don't tell because it's just not worth it
Go back to work, the only thing making me not worthless.
I wish my words held any worth at all
To anyone reading, don't fall.

Somedays I wish I had the words
For what makes me feel the strongest things
But I'm afraid they don't exist.

What would I do for a million dollars?
How much time would I let them have?
I could tell you it wouldn't be worth anything,
But security, let's talk maturely, I'd do anything sir.

You want a man killed? Sure.
Who is it I'm wacking?
Sell paraphernalia to people?
Okay, how much are we packing?
Give them all my integrity
Give them everything that makes me, me.
Chain up these arms and pretend to be free.
Sell them my name, Ryan Maroni? I use to be.

I thought about it all for a bit
With a pen in my hand, a chair where i sit.
Looking over the contract, riddled with clauses.
Hand stutter shaking, making my grip tight
I put the pen down and paused.
Then riped up the paper with all of my might.

That look when you say everything is fine
And you're lying with every fiber
Call me a lier, surely I'd deny it.
Don't even try it, look deep in my eyes
We hide the truth, really we don't hide it.
People like the version of a complete person
They just gloss past an aversion
Written on their lips pursed,
Just never spoken by the person.

Listen, you don't even need to listen
There's pain written on expression,
The real thoughts we don't mention,
Those are the ones, no one pays attention.
Singing loud in times of screaming,
Reality slipping so then speak of dreaming.
Writing out the pain instead of bleeding.
His father died, he says his father's fine.
She's knows but lets him go in lie.

This is not the first time I wrote these lines
But how are you?
I just say I'm fine.

Pack up the tree before Christmas
I won't need it this year, that's clear.
No tidings, no big wishes,
Santa isn't coming or Saint Nicholas.
Watch a virtual fireplace to escape
The silence, crackling fake firewood.
I couldn't hear sleigh bells,
Milk and cookies, they aren't laid out
Carolers caroling please just stay out.

I won't be home this Christmas,
I don't know what home is right now,
So how am I suppose to decorate with holly,
Play that part and feel all jolly,
Push the feelings down, wear this smile around
Listening to the cheery sounds
But I'm not feeling cheery now.

I'm not stalling, you get it from the words I've shown
This Christmas, I'll spend alone

People get odd when you're nice today,
You must want something,
What's your angle to a compliment
What's the meaning to the time spent
Picking someone up even if they aren't down?
Spreading hate, I just don't relate.
There's enough of that, here's a smile,
Feel free to spread it around.

I'm only weird in the sense you made me that,
Ok fine, I am weird but, not for being polite.
The problem is good people sat back
While hate spread like a shadowy night
They don't dance, they look to destroy lives.
Hate your self image, make you feel worthless.
Clean off the mirror, you are perfect,
To each their own, you are perfect.

Imagine if we made love normalized
The same way we judge each other's eyes
In present tense, I'm a childish believer
But the air is getting way too dense.
Shake a stranger's hand and take a chance.
They might need it more than you know.
They might need it more than they show.

I'm sick of you, you shackle me
Metal teeth that lock still laughing
But don't break, it's unsafe, you see
Have to take this thing to hell and back,
Its dangerous, they do insist.
I'm chained to you like a sick Saw game
With a rusty blade, I cut right through.
Only to still have you glued.
Right here.

When your limbs did break,
I would push them back if still attached
That double latch that wouldn't clasp,
My fingers couldn't bend like that.
Call some help, a medic stat!
Forceps push into a snap.

Now that I have you mine again,
I want to rip you right off and then
Show them I can live without your chains
Tell them I could find a better way.
I'll show you just to leave you in this grave I made.
You aren't my demon but I still want you slain.

He's been down for a couple years
An understatement, he had downed a couple beers
He strolled into the usual place around two,
Saw a new face ******* pop as he sat down
Waving to the crew, sitting at his bar stool.
He liked to talk of the past when he was low,
Lend him an ear and he'd let you know.

A second drink, but each was ordered double,
In came the usual young couple,
He knew the young man pretty well,
A new girl a week as far as he could tell.
He played the first date lines many times,
Memorized compatible astrological signs.
The girl seemed nervous, heart in race
Should he tell her, her date's a snake?
It probably wasn't his place.
Another empty glass to waste.

This place was home to his homeless world,
The same men squabbling in quarrells,
The same broken parents trying to raise
A child in the life he'd come to know a maze
Lost men and women feeling down,
He took his drink to numb the sound.
As the stranger at the table stood to go,
He wondered if this was a face he'd come to know.

"Table for one", he replies with a smile
The waitress sighs and leads him to a seat
He orders a soft drink, sipping slow to think.
An old man sits down at the bar while his ice cubes sink.
The man speaks about wisdom he hoped he knew
About a life that he just walked though,
How money made wealth but not riches
How he thinks back and just wishes,
Speaking to a lady in back doing the dishes.

His plate is brought out hot,
He sticks a fork into a bite
As a couple sits down to his right
They've only been dating for a week,
She speaks and he holds onto each word
He's nervous beneath the surface,
Sweating bullets but holds on with a smile,
She feels the same, pulse pounding all the while
The man takes another bite wondering
Where they would be a year from now.

He looks around to see,
A mother talking with a child about two feet tall
Why it's not ok to draw on the walls,
A woman on her phone who is lacking self-esteem
So she cries at night while she's alone,
A couple of men discussing sports
Getting too rowdy so the manager has to escort
Them out the door, he'd seen enough.
He pays his bill and heads for the door.