we lie awake
we lie when wake
we lie and wait
and then abate

You don’t know how it feels.

When you are cut from your lifeline
like an apple being picked
when it isn’t fully grown.
When you are replaced
with hard plastic and metal
where bone should be.

You probably want to know why he hates you.

It is because he has to learn how to walk again.
Because you can’t run like I could.
Because you can’t kick a soccer ball like I could.
Because you can’t make him itch like I could.
Because you are a reminder of the infection.
The infection...
that took me away from him.

I was made with him.
You were made for him.

You took six weeks to be created
I took nine months.
I was his first step,
You were a puzzle piece
that didn’t quite fit
You had to be forced
by people in white masks and blue gloves
They couldn’t touch you and
neither can he.
So instead you lay on his bedroom floor.

And I will not feel bad for you because
I am lying in a medical waste bin.
Waiting for my turn to enter the fire.

This
is
my
hell.

I miss him,
will you tell him
that I miss him?
Let him know the feeling is mutual.

I understand if you tear this up
there is no warmth in you.
No blood will ever pump through you.
Trust me, I get it.

When the heart dies, it is buried where it belongs.
Being hugged by its fellow vital organs.
it’s just like taking a nap
they say.
But when I die,
I am surrounded
by other dispensable body parts.
We are the forgotten few.
People do not have funerals for finger tips.
It feels like I am being eaten alive.

You can’t tell me I should feel bad for you.
Or that I should feel sorry for you.
Because I was alive,
I was moving
and you
are plastic.

Just,
tell him goodbye for me.

I guess it's time to reveal the truth,
It's not like I've been lying to you

but I haven't really formally introduced
myself to you, and I've been thinking

It's time to let you in so I can offer
you a cigarette and you can

drink my finest wine while I tell you
that Grizzo is something more

than a childhood nickname that stuck
to the bottom of my shoes like

parking lot gum, or your grandmother's
lipstick on your cheeks, you see

I was quiet, shy, and entering puberty
when people started calling me Grizzo

Some people in high school and college
didn't even know Bryan

Which is funny because I didn't know
myself either but I knew Grizzo

mainly because people expect certain
things and I keep my word

so when I told them I would jump
off the roof, they just stood around

drunk, but not as drunk as me,
No one expects to see Crazy in action

But at least once they do they never
forget the time you jumped off the roof

and hit the ground at 3 in the morning
so hard that your glasses flew off

and the only thing you broke
was your pride, or how you would

always answer everything with "**** it"
because if life ***** you might as well

get your nut too

Camel Crush Bold cigarettes in an ashtray
and Jameson on ice with a splash of water

These things can help the words on
late nights or lazy afternoons

Sometimes the best lunch is
a tapped Porter or Stout on special

and putting down a few lines
on crumbled bar room napkins

This is his old habit, this is how
he needs to come out from time to
time

Grizzo isn't all ***** and giggles
though because as much as I want

to be tough, be a hard ***, always be right
I'm weak, I'm fragile, and so ******* wrong

about all the things you need to be right
about in life, but I'm turning 29 soon

and I think I'm finally starting to get

why the light needs darkness to shine
why love needs hate to thrive,
why Bryan needs Grizzo to write.

I, in a field amongst my peers;
We are so similar
Almost all the same-
We grow together
From the soil beneath
Our stems, our roots
Combining, clustering,
We are all connected.
     I feel like I am different though,
     I have my own stem
     My own hue of pink
     My own pretty petals
     My own green leaves
     My own movement
     My own form of life.
I realize there are others
That look like me,
That grow like me,
That sway in the wind as I do.
     But I also know that
     I am my own flower-
     I am not like the rest-
     I am an individual.
This field of wildflowers,
Filled with stems and petals
That may seem the same-
Yet so exceptionally different,
Is simply a community.
What makes this vast meadow
So whole and complete,
Is every distinct blossom
Coming together-
Creating a natural
Convergence of unique,
Beautiful, living beings.

They call me a ****
Tell me I’m a *****
That I’m fat
And that I’m ugly.
Yet they don’t know that when I go home
I hear it all again.
The students voices echo in my mind.
The long sleeves I wear to school
even in 90 degree weather
covers the scars.
I try to become invisible,
to walk by unnoticed,
but it never works.
They sense my presence and lash out at me,
Like a wolf on it’s prey.
I go home and cry myself to sleep.
Every night their words echo in my ears,
never going away.
Messages with the same words heard every day.
Suggestions of killing myself.
It wouldn’t make much difference
Just one less person crowding the halls.
One less person silently screaming inside.
One less person to believe I’m worthless.
Tears stream down my face as she ***** the gun.
The song that originally saved my life begins to play.
I close my eyes,
and with a deep breath he pulls the trigger.
The only thing left of me being the note that I wrote.
“I’m sorry...I can’t do this anymore”
with blood splattered across the pages.

This is going to be kind of like a journal entry. I never keep a journal,
but I feel like doing it, so I'm going to do it. It's like, the first step in a
long line of many, mini steps. Almost ready. I feel like I should stretch
out before I start. Ballistic. You know, like a fighter or something.
Okay. Here I go.

Right now I'm stuck in this little bubble. I got put here by some trouble
just a few years ago. Man, it was ****** up ****, like the most ****** up I've ever been in. Life, as they say, got the best of me. **** came first, then beer all day er'day, spending my living living with some ****** up ***** who's bad with money. We matched 'cause I'm ****** up. I ****** up, 'cause I shut up. First time lifestyle collaborator, so it was like, man what-am-uh-gonna-say? I feel love and I've been conditioned to just ride that **** with pride on your ****. Don't tell me I don't know what I want man. I've got my head on straight. Don't hate. Haters can't appreciate romance, bro. Come back when you learn that, yo. I don't blame the drugs, so I kept 'em when we left together, but
in different directions. Live-in gone. Foundation rot. Suspension shot.
****! **** **** ****! I hit ground with my teeth. Instead of asking
for help when it was needed I took help that kept me breathing
till I could ***** my head on almost too many terrible months in
the future which I never thought I would see in fruition, and I admit
in volition that (cough) (cough) I almost lost myself totally, ******* stripped of the holy one and only. One and only.

We've. Received. Bad vibes.

So now there's nearly nothing to my name unless you count the
meter it retains. But I've got flies in my pocket that I sprinkle
for pepper in my popcorn bag. There's no space for me here but
there's vacancy in the matrix. And I see the signs lit up. Being
singular not enough? I'd rather be rich and ubiquitous than poor
and bored while I whittle the days away, feeding my head with
whatever's left from original message I received. I've opened that **** and I tried it on for 23, pressed to impress but it wasn't me.
Listen when I say it, 'cause I'm serious, now that my name is
worthless what could it hurt to burn some synapses and knight
myself? After all I don't count on being rescued from this hell.
What's my name? Anything will do. But it's got to be very memorable
and cool. How should I glow when I get outta this cocoon? Take
it to the Max. Normal won't do, 'cause it's gotta be catchy for the
TV and YouTube. I won't be a copycat, no, never. It's just gonna be the
me that I've eternally received only under my belt, tight to the
extreme.

Like. The lost. Before.

When your fingers move
within the betweens of keys,
white then black, scaling
and tumbling through and over
knuckles and joints and wrinkled
imprints does your chest flutter
arpeggios and dance along
with tender pale-pink ballet
slippers balancing, spinning
in a reflecting room of mirrors,
the echoes of a pentatonic scale
the pounding of parallel chords
nudging your toes exactly right,
do you forget your wives and daughter,
both Emma’s, when you let the genius-flow
and the grand piano waltz
with your soul,
do you fall in love with something
more I cant describe
in verse, delicate Debussy.

stress I’m not like the rest. hell half of what you hear these kids write about is me I’m all that they have in there lives. no dad, no mom, no home, there best friend is drugs, cigarette burns in the rug. **** all they wanted was a hug. stress is doing its best swinging a sledge at your back hoping you’ll crack. these kids don’t see there are ways to rid themselves of me. but they just are to blind to see the guy who will take that heavy bag off your back for just one fee. tell him how your day is. whats on your mind. anything because he cares. but nobody is in the line with zero wait time. no they all just keep to themselves walk along as there back cracks.

Is today the day
you'd put that mask away?
Everyday out
is an evening at the masquerade.
Give your persona a rest
let the anima come out to play.
Then come over here
say all those things you want to say.
Will you take the load off your chest
so that you can stay,
or strap the mask back on
and slowly fade away?

With a warm breath on my neck, she kisses my shoulder
I could feel my cold winter pass, as my dream comes true at last
generous is she, as she has revealed my open chest
as her face nuzzles and grins a little as her blue eyes
look into my piercing glaze,
with tenderness and care she gives herself ...

She poured herself as blood, to give my heart the desired love
her blood boiling in me, an unfamiliar feeling came over me
I could feel her course through my veins, pulsating my soul
our bodies shudder as we partake in our transfusion
the feeling was so overwhelming, I wouldn't dare stop it now ...

Sweat drops on my tongue, tasting the liquid of her passion
mouth to mouth we breathe into every swelling kiss
our palms meet and take hold, neither one not wanting to let go
with nothing but candles burning,
our naked shadows exposed on the wall
we shared every inch of each other,
with a serpent tongue I roamed
I knew her before the night was new ...

Enriched by her delicate beauty, the simpleness of her love
she rests upon me, her breath so long
her intense wetness, scorching my love as she moves
the grinding of pelvis to pelvis, so deep so new so raw
releasing with pleasure with a deluge of sweet nectar
in only in a dream, she healed my very soul ...

Debbie Brooks 2014