Good dog Max, always sits and waits
for the dogwalker, who comes every day at  8.
Leather leash around his neck, they go round and round the block,
the same route every day. He’s got no shoes and socks
to protect his padded feet, that were meant for grass and hills,
and there’s no chance to run and fetch a bird his master kills
(though that’s what he was bred for).
And from 9 in the morning, until every night,
it’s the same small apartment, floor of wood and walls of white.
Sometimes they lock him in a cage, so he won’t jump on the bed;
Max sometimes wonders if he’s alive, or dead.
He barks when they come home, and they tell him “shush.”
To hide his shame he gnaws a bone, or gives his bowl a push.
Max, depressed and fat, died before his time.
A prisoner locked in solitary who was guilty of no crime.

I crawl on all fours,
as the darkness descends.
The only light left,
seems to waver and bend.

My hands are on fire,
and so is the floor.
I can see the orange glow,
as it burns at the core.

There is no rhyme or reason,
no discernable flow.
I start to crawl faster,
but I don’t know where to go.

My eyes start to throb,
as my head starts to pound.
Something runs from my mouth,
and drips to the ground.

The copperish taste,
tells me it’s my blood,
and I fall on my side,
with a sickening thud.

I stare into darkness,
and wait for the end,
but down here in the pits,
it’s how each day begins.

They take your memories,
in the beginning at least.
So that each day is as scary,
as the first brutal feast.

Ripping and tearing,
they eat you alive.
Till there’s nothing but bone,
and you wish you could die.

Then it starts over,
and you're crawling again.
Trying to get away,
as the darkness descends.

They gave back my memory,
so I’ll remember the pain.
So I’ll remember the sounds,
that drive me insane.

My side starts to blister,
but the worst has not begun.
I can see all their shadows,
as the beasts start to come.

Ripping and shredding,
my flesh breaks away.
I beg them to stop,
but they do not obey.

An eternity of torture,
is what’s in store for me.
Imagining the teeth,
that I’ll never see.

There is the one girl that speaks
And when she is at her peak
You sit and think about everything you missed
or the people who coexist
But its towards the end of her speech you’ll cry
Trust me you will never find out why
You might look back and realize
That every word she said was a lie.  
-the one who spoke in sunsets
Then comes the one that thinks
She’ll think even when on the brink
Of mental insanity
Oh the humanity!
What will happen to her?
She only sees the blur
Of what her life could be
If only she were able to see
-the one who needs glasses
I felt bad for the invisible
The one who was never able
To make herself feel seen
Maybe I was just mean,
But no matter
She was only a scatter
Of what made a personality
Unfortunately, hers lacked finality.
-the one who I thought I knew
The one who felt
Was who I got dealt,
I saw her at my lunch table,
And wondered if she were stable.
Her eyes sparkled a delicate no.
She was always able to bestow
Emotions of what she wanted onto others,
She never was able to recover
Once they left out the front door
With her lying on the dance floor.
-the one I left on the dance floor
Finally, there is me,
For so long I was lost at sea
But I came back to shore
And Oh!, I just adore
What I have become!
I don’t want this to be done.
I refuse to go back to how I once was
Because
Lies I can never untell,
Because
I’ll never forgot my mother’s face
Because that was never who I wanted to be
And all three years were agony.
      -the poet who wished for better

Don't tell myself
You are the reason
Don't tell myself
There is another way out
Don't tell you
To put this into reason
Or to try and work it out
Want to work it out all on my own
Because the exceeding yet
Tortures pleasures
I get from the
Guilt of having you as my sin
Right or wrong
It won't go away
A pain I long to forget
To take it away

"You'll be fine," They told me.
"It'll be okay," They said.
But did they hear the words they called me?
Did they hear the things they said?

Have they lived a life of torture?
Perhaps they've felt deranged?
Have they gone and hid in the corner
wanting desperately to change?

Why are there people like this in the world?
They bring you down to the ground.
The way they bring you down hurts and it is hard to ever get up again.
Something restricting your strength.
Overpowering your body.
A strange feeling of guilt mixed with anger builds inside of you.
But the lack of strength limits you to take any action.
So you just lay there on the ground.
Crying.
Until the pain eventually goes away...

i have not felt for some time now,
my barricading skills are better than i’d like to admit,
and i cannot remember the last time i stepped outside of them.
i misunderstand the difference between conquering, and suffering
because in one,
you win,
and in the other,
well,
it is easy to be swarmed with grief.
i wore grief like a badge.
but in both,
to conquer you must suffer first in order to know what you are fighting for.
i have yielded nothing but emptiness in my hands as others swung their daggers and swords
scraping my surface as prologue,
then finally slivering down to my bone as epilogue.
but my story is not over,
my barricades are crumbling stone by stone
and maybe my sun will shine again,
but i am a force to be reckoned with because queens will conquer,
and my legacy is just beginning.