Don’t go popping black balloons.

The red or orange ones are better.

I’m not emo anyway || huh.

Crusty white knuckle streets streaked with overhead lights.

Humming poles holding slap tags to slump on.

Newspaper, media, graffiti.

We need to find lovers who can read us.

Fake love but you got you’re hand out.

Take all the time you need I don’t mind to watch it bleed away.

I got no place to be faded.

Can’t hate the game we just play it but.

Birthdays, parties ballon’s aren’t fun.

Yesterday, today, tomorrow.

Friends of fair weather they find me junking round town.

Scrap a little scratch || ten smacks.

Pop!

Don’t go popping black balloons.

The other colors are better.

I’m not impressed in anyway || huh.

Dingy metal beams stretching overhead block the lights out.  

Echoing musky hobo writing thats slept on.

Red face, man scape, hipsters.

We need to find a place that expects us.

Real love but it’s from wash outs.

Given enough time it goes away I don’t mind.

I got no safe space to qualm your jaded eyes.

Just play along even though we hate them.

Everything’s cake, celebrating but balloons aren’t fun.

Blood, substance, sorrow.

Hospital bed, my friends they find me foul weathered I quit junking round.

Scratch it inside a little but it gets scraped || ten smacks.

Pop!

There was a shoe
Black and white tartan pattern
Woven ***** white laces
That walked
In aimless directions for its master

The rubber sole sturdy
No matter the terrain
Of homeless encampments
Rocky back alleys
Snow climbed inside the bare foot

"Can you bring me some socks"
When you called that winter afternoon, the sun fading
"My toes are so cold"
Our house but a mile away
And you almost die at my feet

Three burly sheriffs showed
up at my neighbors
house yesterday.
Scowls on scarred faces.
Tattered lives, tarnished
brains.
Five minutes later,
they were walking my
friend out in handcuffs.
He shuffled, head down.
Autumn frowned and the
leaves scuttled away in
disgust.

Today, the vultures swooped
in, picked the bones of all
his earthly possessions that
littered what was once his
front lawn.
Jackals, and hideous
hyena faced men and
women took the last of
his things.  

Even though he was
arrested, he still
grows.
and although they are
free, they die more
daily in their own
private evictions.
I've seen more
humanity at a
hanging.

Ferrel cats creep
under porches
to escape the  
rain and snow.
Some have half  
a tail
or a missing ear.
My cats watch
them from the
safety of
the warm house.
They chirp, and
stare.

I wonder if
these pitiful
orphans once had
a home and
knew love.
Did the owner
abandon them to
be unburdened by
empathy.

I wish I could
save those wild
cats,
those princes of
the alleys.

Sometimes, they wander
over to my porch.
I put a can of
tuna out.
They look at
me with cautious
green or golden eyes.
I tell them,
it’s going to be
Alright.
I know it’s a
lie.
Winter is coming.
But I feel  
better for a second.
And that’s all that
matters in this
playground of a
world.

Don’t you think?

King!
My coronation was a trial by fire.
A heavy orchestration of pain casted upon me was my test of ascension
mechanisms of a divine imagining
that which has stretched me beyond thresholds of innocent humanity presented me another edge to my identity
sharper
Cutting deeply into my flesh, that divides like the most tender choice
yet
teaching me equally valuable lessons  
furthering my progression, in life.

The throne is uncomfortable to me.
They lament to me, constantly, that I will “grow into it”
this, abominable seat of my dubious existence here
it’s vast backrest, comprised of a fallible love
petrified skeletal appendages – arms
and various metacarpal complete with long, gnarled, and bony fingers.
It does, whenever I should take a seat, reach into my back, to give a malicious massage to my soul, yet, it does become a shield, of sorts, protecting me from the multitude of tormented souls that fall behind me.
My back
it becomes stressed
all the while I am approached by the denizen of our lower realm.

In such
I am a mastermind to the humbled classes
the discarded region of society’s social classes,
wherein the poor persists, without fruition, in attempting to escape a den of poverty,
akin to the various ways that obstreperous children may try to exit a room secured by vigilant adults
just to reach a room filled with never-ending sugar.
This realm, it is where I am directed to guide.

My crown
oh
it is cumbersome and burdensome upon my crest
heavy is this appointed ornament
to me it is a compliment to the curse
to them – it is a highly important adornment.
Unbeknownst, however, to the masses that wander under moonlight shows,
it slows my pace
akin to stepping double-time through moonlit painted snow
cold.
At times, it causes me to perceive that I am entertaining them,
a frost king
it penetrates my flesh and bones
corrupting my other sanities
now, no doubting or second guessing
hands, that gripped my head many moons prior delivering me from my greatest vessel, were immediately replaced
Excruciating!
I can recall
the unfathomable pain that saturated my newly emerged head
crowning into light that glared proudly from high above - divine!
My departure from a blessed, blood and sweat drenched ***** concluded with them crowning me.

I stand triumphant still
Moses would smile feverishly upon beholding the liars I have killed
Souls that I have saved.

She graduated the highest of class
remove my concern and the drugs would have taken her away
he could have walked away
a worker with no employer
his jobless gains
were too weak to sustain.
The child was a storm between he and the weary lover
filthy, she always thought
lack of maintenance and how the sheets wore their stains
though, he never gave up
his loyalty to his firm – begotten her diamond rings
six mouths that, gleefully, devour his sufficient gains.
lo
remove my torment!
That he could behold my struggle
lo, if I had failed to set an example he would have walked away

Oh!
My throne and crown are brutal to me
agonizing
acknowledged
appreciated
in life I will persist to possess my position gracefully
children now grow as men of learned minds
therein those gloomy alleys of sordid squalor
I serve with, merely, the shards of a broken, yet, celestial knowledge
and, I pray, the most high father will accept my offerings, from my most meagerly harvests.

Lo
most high father
my coronation was a trial defined by struggles
of survival
of the most furious fires!
I am ready!
I think.

Jonah Singleton 2024 ©️

The lights i live by Are not disco lights
They go red , amber,green
Red man , green man
Does movement or stop
Fill my crippled paper cup
I like the light it crackals
But I live by is darker
Lives beneath my skin
Were I am dead
Maybe one day
It will be my disco
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Do you have 50p
Really i need 20

I have never felt it in a place.
Only moments, with people I loved, in fleeting feelings that were shown.

But never had there been a space.
One I called my own.
Never had there been a place I could truly call my home.

I've been a wanderer it seems,
through each and every bed.
I've been a walker in their dreams.
I've been a lost soul, only visiting instead.
A lonely ghost to host.
A momentary thought in their head.
A passing ship at most.
A book that won't be re-read.

But never had there been a space.
One I called my own.
Never had there been a place I could truly call my home.

I'm a vagabond, one second here,
Then doomed to disappear.
Hoping to be opaque, but only coming out sheer.
A changeling, an outsider, missing the in-between.
Losing all my magic, till there's none left to be seen.

But never had there been a space
One I called my own.
Never had there been a place...
Because I'm never
                           never
                               home.

in the park, the homeless stamp their feet in the cold

as the snow drifts down through the city

onto leafless trees, painting winter branches

white and still and voiceless