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Marie Dec 2018
I'm a poor psych student majoring in emotions- lots of them- and awkward missed opportunities.

I guess you could say I'm unstable and in need of a massive outlet

Or I just need to grow up...
Kryptonite Dec 2018
breathe in
put your lids to rest
would you dare to
hold in the fear
of all forgotten

put your lids to rest
do you hear waves
do you fear the dark
within the clouded mind
your harrowing thoughts

beneath those vivid images
you so desperately escape
lies quietly fluttering dreams
and if you are willing to see
within a shrouded cave below

quaint a little box,
innocently awaiting finding
familiarity in its sense
its owner long gone
holding the spark
you search.
Jeff Gaines Jul 2018
Hello everyone,

  I'm so very sorry … I feel horrible doing this, but I have no choice. You see, I have published my first book on Amazon/Kindle! This piece (and many others) had to be taken down because they do not allow published material to be available online for free. (Go figure) I wanted to leave the shell of the posts because I felt compelled to leave all your helpful and loving comments. (Silly sentimental, I know), but I also didn't want to just have the pieces disappear without an explanation. I feel bad enough as it is!

  I owe ALL of you so, SO much for all of your reads, love, and support. It was YOU that gave me the gumption to FINALLY get off my **** and publish! Thank you all for the warm comments, camaraderie, and encouragement! I will still be here, reading, uploading and just being the Rascal that I am. How could I EVER leave you guys?

  The book is called “The Way I See It – FictionPhilosophySoul Food” and it will be FREE for the first few days on Kindle Select, so watch for it, if you are interested. I hope that you go and grab it. If you do, I would also hope that you find it worthy, you would leave me a good review. That will help me get in the public eye! Soon afterwards (2-3 days or so), it will be available in paperback. I will be building my Author page tonight (12/21/2018) and my website finished first thing Monday!

Find the book(s) here: www.amazon.com/author/jeff.gaines

Or find the book(s), and all about me, here: www.JeffGaines.world

  Soon after, I also hope to have my first novel (a supernatural thriller), called “Wanderer” available as well!

  Wish me luck!

                                Big, Biggest Love,

                                               Jeff Gaines
Being a Lighting Designer/Director, I was blessed with landing an ongoing gig with a Producer from Jamaica that put on several large Festivals in Jamaica, The Bahamas and several other Caribbean Islands. For 5 or 6 years, I found myself going to Jamaica 5 times a year or more and several other islands the rest of the year.

Mostly we did huge, multi-day festivals Like Sumfest, or Sting or the Air Jamaica Jazz/Blues Fest. But we also did The Bahaman Jazz/Blues Fest and several Comedians, like Sinbad, on other Islands.

I was also the first guy to do "Rock-n-Roll-type" lighting for Carnival in Trinidad. Prior to my friend Scott and I, they had only used what we call "Flat White Television Light". We brought all the tricks and Moving Lights and Strobes and Fog and well ... that's yet aanother story for another time. The people LOVED it ... and to this day, THAT is how it's done there every year. It makes me SO proud.

This story is about how Jamaica touched me. It helped me find myself in a way I never saw coming. You see, I had gone there on vacation several times before I started going there for work. This essay is mostly about what happened to me in those first trips, before I was going for work. It really is a mystical place and and is very dear to me, as you just read.
Krysta May 2018
I think therefore I am? Does that mean I am what I think?
Can’t I practice what I preach
or must I be bound to the thoughts
that produce themselves
show unwelcome
with no signs of departing
leaving me heaving and seething
that is not who I am
I am who I want to be
who I decide to be
so how do I explain what I have become
is this really me?
Sad and lonely and scared to be free
maybe for a moment
but I’m on my way
to my self
"your thoughts are who you are"...what about the thoughts that just pop up uninvited? Cheers to determining who you are yourself.
I flick trough the poems
that I've forgotten that I've written
and i read about,
how I feel tortured and belittled

A journey of three years
a very long time
that had flew in front of my eyes
and here I am now
wondering

where did the time go?

it saddens me to say
that I am no different
I wish I had progressed
but I guess it makes no difference

this proves to me though
that life indeed is so hard
because who would've known
that in such a long time
I would've made no progress

still the same
broken
shattered
saddened
anxious
sensitive
loving
lonely
sh­y
dreamer

person that I guess I still am
M Dec 2017
love me, love me, please just love me...
i promise that i will love you in return! (this is true)
i can find unique beauty in everyone and everything

i'm not asking you to fill this ragged hole within me. it's been patched up before
you don't have to do anything really (am i lying?) but your love is enough (is it?)

i'm sorry, maybe i'm just making excuses
maybe i'm just needy- but this love, this love is genuine i swear
my love is always different; everyone[thing] is different
(does that make it the same?)

scratch that
i can't expect this from anyone but myself, or maybe mom and dad  (why am i cringing)
...that ship is still at sea

you're just so beautiful to me (or do i need to be told that i am?)
M Dec 2017
I felt fake,
   so I stopped trying to be
   anything.
Now, I feel like I am
   nothing.
Mark Lecuona Jul 2017
You know you might could just do it
Do your own thing
But nobody’s gonna’ pay you for it
It’s only a way to pay yourself

Go ahead and be you
It’s not easy being different
But it’s easier than being something else
Don’t pick the wrong version of the story

When you decide to breathe again
I hope you’re the one who’s there
When you decide to speak again
I hope you’re the one who cares

It’s time to quit pretending
There’s nothing but pain there
It will happen soon enough for you
But now you belong to your own heart

When you decide to see again
I hope it's you standing in the mirror
When you decide to love again
I hope it's my heart that becomes nearer
Jas Apr 2017
Up at the top
Hands in the air
Raising our glasses
In a silent cheer
To celebrate the things we've done
The resolutions we'll make,
The disruptions we caused
Shots fired in our wake.

Houses piled together
No room to breathe
Visions of death
Poison in our dreams.

There are the rebels and the gays
The fearsome and the rays
Of sunshine.
The thoughtful ones
The glass slippered girls
And the sneakerheads.
It isn't much
We aren't royalty
The most we can do
Is have the things we think we need
In our dreams.

Money can't be everything
But it sure seems
To be that way.
Instead of leading the way
We dig it up
No one walks on sidewalks
We all stay in the streets.

In the future
I hope instead
The streets will close at 10
And we'll all be in our beds.
Because if something happens
And we all go
Who will remember us when we're dead
If all we did
Was steal sneakers from weaker men
And spend spend spend?
Todd Monjar Mar 2017
Fierce swept demons of rage and turmoil; expecting their want yet receiving disloyal resistance.

Never satisfied from the thirst of unrelenting desire for certainty, frustrated in fits of insanity. The beat continues…

Dissipation is anti-climactic, unsatisfying to a gluttonous hoarder of familiarity. Never quite becoming the salve.

So lay down and succumb to the soothing velvet of green moss and the intoxicating tumble of liquid solitude; enveloping and layering a thickening skin of joy.

Imagine a melting slide of pure being, unquestioned and reminiscent into a pool of weightless flutter; ecstatic without direction and blissful in anticipation.

All that exists now is breath and the pinpoint endlessness of possibility.
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