I've scorned and derided,
Needled and spited,
Those, who are closest to me.

I've cheated and lied,
Vilified and decried,
Those, who are closest to me.

I've toasted many glasses
With strangers in places
Where I shouldn't have been.

I've smoked and laughed,
Admired strange ***
In lands where I cannot be seen.

But mention your name,
And all seems so vain,
Those promises I failed to keep;
The losses that haunt me in sleep.

Despite confessed sins,
My transgressional whims,
I know I've always been true;
And when I bow out,
My whisper will shout,
*Above all, I've always loved you.

Far too long he has slept inside my head
He weeps for me as we lay in bed
I wanted no more than to die by his side
By all your commandments I have abide
But please do not ask of the price I've paid
For I must sleep in sheets you've made
But Lord, obsolve him of my sins
And I will throw his ashes to the wind
Help me accept the passing of his soul
He is the one who took upon much of this toll
For far too long my lover has been dead
For far too long I have slept with guilt inside my bed

It is a fallacy we all believe.
As we vehemently exclaim six words
to prove the chastity of our thoughts,
to fill our pride with self-validation,
to ratify our existence with falsehoods.
"The Devil made me do it!"

"The Devil made me do it!"
I bitterly laugh at your blundering gaucherie,
as you lay blame on an eons old transgression,
as you smote the sinnerman flying with flames,
as you called him out for your own actions
impassioned by heresy.

Impassioned by heresy
You sought to relieve yourself from perdition;
brought upon by perjury declared,
brought upon by authenticated truths,
brought upon by the duplicity,
of your favored reverent ideologies.

Of your favored reverent ideologies
which is to laud your skirmish against evil
in order to remove yourself from auburn eternity,
in order to induct you as a citizen of argent fields,
in order to orchestrate contempt towards another?
Is there no truth to you?

Is there no truth to you
now that perfidy imputes your entirety?
as you declaim in front of paradise lost,
as you coerce to regain what is rightfully deprived,
as you throng duress by intoning your delusion:
"The Devil made me do it!"

"The Devil made me do it!"
Its recurrence is maddening to Him
while you, in all your sentience, chose to act unbecoming,
while the celestials perched on your shoulder bawl,
while He that you blame does absolutely nothing.
It is a fallacy we all believe.

Death never forgets.
Your sins will find you out
and come home to roost
So, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked:
for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap

A million sandlewood candles from
the quick checkout at Sephora
could not mask what we have
done here. Not all the *****
in the world could seize my
dripping mind, which always
seems to pour down the
drain for you and your
stupid ignorant
wild and lewd
cruel and deliberate
enchanting, invigorating—
I sit behind you in math
class and you hold
his hand.
He met me at East 79th
and fifth,
“I think she’s cheating,” he says.
“What a *****.” I say, shaking my head.