I’ve been playing this game
for **** near twenty one years
and long ago lost track
of my wins and losses

I simply got caught up
in the winsomeness
of all that is

Why keep a tally
that’s callous and rigid
with the infiniteness of living at your fingertips

How do you sleep at night?
Are the blankets pulled too tight?
Is the room ever just too bright,
or do you find it fits just right?

And how do you get through the day?
When there’s so much you never say?
When the colours bleed to grey,
or do you like it just that way?

I’ve been playing scrabble with each thought,
cursed to babble ‘cause I was never taught
to speak out loud what plagues my heart
It’s not like I’m proud that it ends before I start.

How do you sleep at night?
Does your mind put up a fight?
Do you loathe every ray of light,
or is it out of mind and out of sight?

And how do you get through the day?
Tornado’s in your wake and at bay.
Casting me to the abyss to stay,
as long as you choose that way.

I’ve been playing scrabble with each thought,
known to dabble in whatever I got.
Doing things so foul I would never do,
to buy a vowel and then another two.

How do you sleep at night?
I put up such a gallant fight.
Bleeding knuckles, holding on with all my might.
You’re asleep and I’m greeting first light.

*** tha **** outta’ hea

There’s no set way to elate
it’s all relative
we know that

(Thanks Einstein)

What makes you happy
now
make it a noun
persons places things

‘Being happy makes me happy’
is an acceptably weak answer
what makes my face glow?
have a reason
hold onto it’s grip

Tell me,
How many sips does it take,
How many puffs does it take,
How many pills does it take,
How many cuts does it take,
How many attempts does it take,
To feel the way I do?
To hurt the way i do?
To be the way i am?



© Copyright Tyler Atherton

Amid the verbose magicians
Seeking kinships
And sailing deep into their arduous mists
Watching them peddle their afternoon
To a handful of smiling children holding their breath
Amazed in gentle body trick

The older men of age
Leaning deep into their creased chins
Stroking the grizzled fat
Blinding light of soul
Staring down the barrel of life
Striking the enemy one last time
And yet smiling
sober,
Met of match,
taking care of their kids.

Then there's the cold-clocked dudes
On the phone pushing buttons
In a button-up raglan
Lost indistinct
the promised land
The golden shores swept away by
inconvenient time
Left shopping in an auto mall
"Won't you look at the time?"
7.07 APR
Boy what a steal!
And Steve maddened and screamed
As the lines blurred instinctual between opposing teams
And the oven dinged a great alabaster slant
Leaning towards the new millenitants

Rise up!
***** the wheel
Turn the axel from pistons
To alkaline metal
And doubt with great monumental
Quality
That the machine borders all
And we cannot retreat

And while I sift bouyantly between the waves
Searching the puzzle piece within the molecules
Reconnecting with the things
And representing
dreams on a 66 hertz screen
I call rather failing
Towards a black rocked shore
Towards the sweet Dorigen
Of my dreams
Finding an integral of time
And space

And calculating the intangible *****
Of my desmise
With the imaginary constiutent
Of that lighted mind.

Why can't I remember?
I'm blocking it, why can't I just-

Who hur-

Where did it-

Why would they-



Sorry, what were we talking about?

It has already died inside of you,
the feeling you had,
the voice whispering pretty words,
little dwarf inside your head,
he got depressed, he's anxious, your inner voice died inside of itself.
And you are running through the people, trying to reach dwarf inside of the stranger,
once you reach the other's dwarf, soon you find out, that's what you needed, dwarf's help. And you keep worrying about the dwarf who keeps yours safe, and eventually that's you who suffer the most, as it's not the dwarf who is dying now.