It’s tough to write a happy poem.
The poems about the nasty,
Gritty,
Gut wrenching stuff-
I got it down.
But a happy poem?
That’s gonna be weird.

I think it’s because growing up,
In the home and life I did,
I learned not to hold on to the happy stuff.
To not feel the good feelings for too long.
The happy moments were far and few in between,
And when I had them I was scared to enjoy them,
For fear that enjoyment would be taken advantage of,
Used,
Broadcasted.
When I felt happy moments,
I did my best to hide and push them away.

There were moments though,
Where amidst all the pain and suffering,
There were moments I was brought comfort.
There were moments that made me want to live,
Want to go on,
Search for something better.
These moments were brought by two furry ears,
Eyes with the closest shade to my own,
And a long furry tail.
Yea, I’m talking about my cat.

And now the poem has taken a sharp turn from meaningful,
To just absurd.
Right?
That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it?
Dude, this chick wrote a poem about her cat.
Her ******* cat.

These moments aren’t when my cat was being funny,
Or playful.
There are a lot of those memories that I enjoy.

These moments are the ones where I’m sitting on the stairs,
My hand pressed to my mouth,
Suppressed sobs shuddering through my body.

She’s selfish,
She hates us,
She hates me.
She doesn’t deserve any ounce of pity from me,
I meant every word I said.

You know that’s not true,
She is your daughter,
You should care.
You can’t just freeze her out,
She isn’t one of your old college friends,
She needs you.

She doesn’t need me,
She doesn’t want me,
And I don’t want her.

Okay.
You know what,
Fine whatever.

I can only hold on to the hope that she was lying.
But even in those darkest moments,
Listening to my Dad try to defend me,
Just to give up and walk away.
Listening to my Mom,
Throw my name around in the mud,
And stomp all over it in her New Balance Sneakers,
Canni was there.

Animals have a queer way of being there right when you need them,
And Canni is one of the best.
She’d sit there patiently,
While I willowed away into nothing,
The sharp,
Biting feelings of pain,
Echoing in my head.
Those feelings took me down,
To a deep, dark place,
Where there was no feeling.
No feeling happy,
No feeling sad,
No feeling hurt.
There was no feeling at all-
It was safe.
But she brought me back.
She’d rub against me,
Nudge her head under my hand,
Nip at my arm if I didn’t pay attention to her,
Or even just sit there next to me.
She’d listen with me,
Her tail flicking back and forth,
Like she couldn’t believe what was going on either.

Maybe she was trying to distract me,
Maybe she just wanted attention.
Either way,
She made me care when I had nothing left to care for.
She gave me something to hope better for,
Gave me something to work harder for,
Something to get me moving out of the dark,
Hopeless place that had become my heart.
If not for me,
Then for the small animal,
That cared enough to know when I was happy,
And when I was sad.

My cat is the reason that I know love today,
The reason I have feeling today.
And for that,
I can’t thank her enough.

Awake in my bed at five a.m.
My true love beside me
My new love upon me
What a wonderful feeling it is
As I watch the flame that lights my darkness
And the new tiny candle we made
The room may be dark
But my heart glows
It is good to be a father

I was once a young girl,
cast aside by my father.
No gift was I to him
instead, merely a bother.

The man who should have been
the first love of my life,
he took half my heart in hand
and cut it with a knife.

For years I denied the theft,
content in my mistrust.
Yet the rest of me died at my own hand,
in leaving my heart to rust.

Ages I spent mourning this death,
never having been more wrong.
Now I see my heart remains,
my true love was me all along.

My father’s watch,
I notice stopped.
His movement ceased
to turn the cogs,
that spin the gears,
which move the dials,
that give the promise
of a while.
 
The watch now mine,
but still it’s stopped.
It sits inside a precious box.
The frozen hands,
my father still,
his whispered breath,
his secrets kept.
Regret, regret.
 
One day ready
to wear that watch,
I’ll move the gears,
start time again,
in good knowing
the hour I’m stood
will come to be,
eventually.

For William and Meredith


For treatment of panic and anxiety disorders,
short-acting anxiolytics are generally recommended
to provide temporary bursts of clarity
but should be reassessed periodically for
usefulness and concerns regarding tolerance,
dependence,
and abuse.

Xanax releases dopamine into the brain
to function as a neurotransmitter to send signals
between nerve cells
including reward motivated behavior
and pathways known to reinforce addictive neuronal activity

Perhaps to build her,
you had to break yourself
amongst the glass of that summer day.
Leave her waiting for your hair to peek
around a weathered edge
toward a forgotten living room corner

You are still her Patron Saint.
A long shadow cast across a small ghost.

She still screams at the sky to stop raining
beats her fists down the path
to the house of death
unceasing, and changeless.
Prodding a dull,
familiar
wound.
One that leaves its mark,
with pain felt more
from memory
than from anything else.


Withdrawal and rebound symptoms commonly occur and
necessitate a gradual reduction
to minimize the effects of discontinuation.
Not all withdrawal effects are evidence
of true dependence or withdrawal.

Recurrence may suggest no more
than the drug having the expected effect
and that,
in the absence of the drug,
the symptom has returned to pretreatment levels.

Tell me how you are feeling,
Or tell me to go.
Say its none of my business
Or I don’t need to know.

Tell me what’s going on,
Or tell me **** out.
Say it or text it.
Whisper or shout

But silence is hurtful -
Though it may seem absurd -
Every unwritten sentence
And each unspoken word.

Cowering in the corner, the boy began to cry,
******* in the gloom.
Searching the room
As his father slowly went by.

His father’s reddened ******
Caught under the weak bedroom light
His genitals pink and bright,
Like a swollen crucifix hanging impudently.

“Out my boy.” He called
In a voice that to the child
Sounded like thunder, ill-tempered and wild.
“Daddy needs you.” The father bawled.

The father’s affection was a wound
That disfigured body and mind
Care sullied, love unkind-
First loved, made love to, then wholly ruined.

His father’s hand jabbed the gloom
And laughing cruelly pulled him out
“I knew you were somewhere about.”
Dragging him through the room.

The child at first whimpered,
Then was muted. As his father began,
Through his small body the pain ran,
Biting his lips, the boy quietly simpered.