Fools blather about the glory of the fight
And don’t hear the mothers crying at night.
The wives of those marauders on the roam
Cry because their husbands can’t come home.
The children of these battle-addicted men
Go away, eyes ashine, never to return again.
And still the moneyed few, urge on toward
Yet those godlings never pick up a sword.

Mandates from government palaces abound
But not as many as the dead on the ground.
People are expendable to the military,
There are no pensions in the cemetery.
It’s all about honor they tell the press.
Leaving someone else to clean the mess.

Fight for liberty and freedom, they say.
They really mean die for them every day.
It’s all about profit and always was.
It’s that and no more noble cause
When a nation not being attacked
Falsely claims they’re striking back.
Then goes on to leave thousands dead
So they can wear a crown upon their head.

If you see no words of shame in this
Then you have found what is amiss.
These people are not motivated by grace.
They have the look of evil upon their face.
They already own most of what is here
But they keep a running tally all year.
As too much is not enough they crave,
Even if that puts us all in our grave.

(Inspired by
a lifelong stranger)

These chronicles slinked from her chassis
– the mythomaniac;
she sold every copy.
Stories only fabulists could ink,
sealed within her schticks.
She enthralled every reader;
her cossets: spellbinding.
The husk of an angel
masked
THE Pariah within.
Caped in pretense,
lidded,
she skulked.
The blossoming killer…
Come
Hither.

And yet.

Your web of lies was spun so thick
It's you,
up there,
Ensnared.
You wrote the rules, cunstructed the game, invited the whole world to play.
But in the end
it was YOU
who
lost.
❤️

As I lie in my bed In the middle of the night, my memories come,
And go twisting my moments
Into dark memories.

Hunting me every night saying;
The words I never spoke,
And the things that lie before me
Taking shape of people I know.

Taking over, making me mad
With the false images of the forms they take.

Taking my soul part by part  the thought of death reaching, feeding,
on my pain and despair.

can I replace the new with old and call it new, or is that false representation?

will you sue me if I throw in a few past words and sell them to you as newer and better, more reliable, even though they might not be?

what about if I offer to steal a few glances to keep your thoughts scrambling for more?

can I seal a few letters with my Amsterdam red lipstick, to prove that there isn't a word I wrote to you that didn't come straight from my mouth, even though a few, ok all of them probably didn't?

after all, it is real, right?

-Julia Aubrey Rhodes-

I am a hallowed out book
An ornate casing that should hold beauty between its walls
Instead, emptied of emotion
And often filled with drugs, *****, and unthinkable secrets

My pages are torn out
The words that should be used to express my thoughts have been desecrated
I will never be complete again
Where my story once was, now fragments of pages with sazerac stains are found

The few memories left wrapped around the flask when this whole mess began
Were soon torn off in desperation
And rolled into funnels to fuel late nights' bad decisions

I can tell you how to write sad poems,
all my favorite songs that make me cry. . .
I can recommend movies that end in a suicide note
or books, where the character never does learn how to fly.

I would lend you the eyeliner that is most smear-resistant
for the days that you have to sneak away to the public restroom, lock yourself in a stall, and finally let the emotions out. . .
I can talk about my old car and the boys I've kissed in it
and how they took advantage without a doubt.

And yet I will always say I'm doing good when you ask
and promise there is a brighter side to life
because you do not have to be clever to make yourself a mask,
there just need be a (false) sense of contentment in your eyes.