#styxxonfire
Is it true that the silence is louder tonight,
stretched thin across the miles of wire?
I can hear your breath, a ghost of light,
flickering low like a dying fire.
Do you hold the phone to your other ear
to hide the sound of what I fear?
Is it true that the map has grown so wide,
and the ink has bled on the lines we drew?
There is nowhere left for us to hide
from the distance that is swallowing you.
Your voice is a tether, frayed and old.....
is it still a hand for me to hold?
Is it true that you’re looking at the same pale moon,
but seeing a sky I no longer know?
You say that you’ll be coming home soon,
but your heart is already starting to go.
Is the "I love you" just a habit now,
a broken promise, a hollow vow?
Is it true that the room where you’re standing is cold,
or is it just the way that you’re speaking?
There are stories left in us, yet to be told,
but the foundation is tired and creaking.
Tell me the truth, even if it cuts deep....
is this a secret you’re tired to keep?
Is it true that you’re memorizing my face
from a photograph kept on a digital screen?
Because I can feel every inch of this space,
and the heavy, dark ocean that’s sitting between.
Are we just echoes of who we once were,
lost in a static, a frantic blur?
Is it true that you wake in the middle of dark
and reach for a side of the bed that is bare?
Or have you extinguished the very last spark
and found a new comfort in nobody there?
Is the ghost of my pillow a weight or a grace?
Can you still find my name in that empty space?
Is it true that the words are getting harder to find,
like stones at the bottom of a frozen well?
I am searching the labyrinth of your mind,
trying to break through this quiet spell.
Are we talking just to keep from the end,
or are you still my lover, my life, and my friend?
Is it true that you’re scared of the person I’ve become,
now that I’ve learned how to live on my own?
The beat of my heart is a different drum
than the one that you knew when the seeds were first sown.
Do you love the woman I am today,
or the one that the distance has carried away?
Is it true that there’s someone else in the room,
even if they are only a thought in your head?
Is there a flower beginning to bloom
in the garden we left, that I thought was dead?
Give me the mercy of being unkind....
don’t leave me waiting, and lonesome, and blind.
Is it true that you’re still on the other end,
or am I just talking to the wind and the wire?
I am waiting for a signal for us to transcend,
to pull our two souls from this circling pyre.
Is it true that you’re coming? Is it true we survive?
Are we still, after all of this, truly alive?
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 5
Feb 5, 2026 at 11:37 AM UTC
The clock on the wall is a stuttering heart,
Ticking away since you tore us apart.
No letter left sitting on the edge of the bed,
Just a cavernous silence where your "goodbye" stayed unsaid.
You walked through the door and you stepped off the map,
Leaving me caught in this permanent trap.
The "why" is a poison that sits in my throat,
A message in bottles that never will float.
I’m carving the air where you once held a flame,
And every slow pulse is,
"Bleeding your name".
I’m tracing the air where your shadow once stood,
Trying to hate you as
much as I should.
But the anger is hollow, the bitterness thin,
Compared to the vacuum you left in my skin.
You didn’t just leave; you erased the whole trail,
Leaving my spirit to stutter and fail.
The memory leaks like a wound that won’t close,
The deeper the silence, the sharper it grows.
I’m calling a ghost that has no one to blame,
While the ink in my veins is,
"Bleeding your name".
I’m staring at pictures that feel like a lie,
Searching for hints in the set of your eye.
Was there a secret you kept in your chest?
Or was I just something you had to divest?
The hallway is haunted by steps you don’t take,
And I am the vessel that’s destined to break.
There’s no closure found in this desert of gray,
Just a thousand more years of you walking away.
I’m shouting at heavens that don’t know my shame,
And the cold ground beneath me is,
"Bleeding your name".
The "sorry" I’m waiting for never will arrive,
It’s the lead in my lungs that keeps me alive.
I’m building a monument out of the "if,"
Standing alone on the edge of the cliff.
If love was a debt, then I’ve paid it in full,
With the weight of the tide and the moon’s heavy pull.
You’re a shadow in motion, a bird on the wing,
While I am the winter that waits for the spring.
I’m lost in a cycle that I cannot tame,
Every breath that I’m taking is,
"Bleeding your name".
Now I’m just a witness to all that we lost,
Counting the wreckage and weighing the cost.
The bed is too wide and the coffee is cold,
And I’m growing weary of stories untold.
The silence you left is a deafening roar,
Like the sound of a key that won't turn in the door.
I'll carry this hollow, I'll carry this ache,
Until there is nothing left inside to break.
The world moves along but I’m staying the same,
A heart in the gutter,
"Bleeding your name".
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 5
Feb 5, 2026 at 10:25 AM UTC
Holy Spirit, I beseech you to come right now. Surround me with your comfort, While I’m down. Lift me out of this place, I am bound. Holy Spirit, I beseech you, to come right now.
Heavenly Father, will You rescue me from the fall? Where I left, left You standing, did not heed your every call. With this plead of repentance, I surrender all. Heavenly Father, will you rescue me, from the fall?
My dear Jesus, I thank you for Your blood You shed. That washed me free from the sin, I inherited. From now own, I will serve you, run, run in your race.
My dear Jesus, I thank You for Your amazing saving grace.
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Jan 19
Jan 19, 2026 at 5:25 PM UTC
The shadows stretched across the floor,
A silent weight against the door.
I watched the world through glass and rain,
A master of the numb and vain.
I felt the pulse beneath the wrist,
A hollow beat in morning mist,
But found the truth in a bitter drive:
"That living is not being alive".
The thunder came to claim the sky,
To ask the soul the reason why
We weather storms we didn’t choose,
With everything to gain and lose.
I held my ground while mountains shook,
Beyond the words in any book,
And though the fire scorched the clay,
I found the strength to simply stay.
I walked the halls of my own ghost,
A silent guest, a hollow host.
I wore the mask and played the part,
While silence settled in my heart.
I chased the sun to feel the heat,
But shadows followed at my feet,
A truth I struggled to survive:
"That living is not being alive".
The seasons bled from gold to grey,
As I watched the years just slip away.
I stood amidst the crowd’s loud roar,
Yet felt as lonely as before.
The air was thick, the path was wide,
With nowhere left for me to hide,
Still trapped within a static drive:
"That living is not being alive".
I reached the edge where spirits break,
And felt the earth begin to quake.
I looked into the mirror’s stare,
And saw a stranger standing there.
I realized then, through grit and pain,
That breath alone is spent in vain,
If soul and spirit don't arrive.....
"For living is not being alive".
I chose the climb when the path was steep,
And kept the promises I had to keep.
Through every ache and every fit,
I stood my ground!
I stayed through it!
"Living Is Not Being Alive"
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 5
Feb 5, 2026 at 7:50 AM UTC
Through the halls of HelloPoetry, the cursor starts to blink,
A soul named Blue Sapphire dips a heavy pen in ink.
The screen is glowing softly, a blue and lonely spark,
As they spill the fractured pieces of a heart left in the dark.
It’s shattered like a gemstone, a million jagged shards,
Dealing out the sorrow from a deck of heavy cards.
The rhythm of the stanzas is the only way to breathe,
To pull the tangled heartache from the spirit underneath.
"It needs a mend," the verses cry, in metaphors of rain,
Searching for a needle that can stitch away the pain.
Each line is like a bandage, each rhyme a steady hand,
Building up a fortress where a broken soul can stand.
From the depths of the "Newest" feed, the words begin to rise,
Reflecting all the stormy clouds within those sapphire eyes.
But with every "Post" and "Publish," the cracks begin to seal,
As the poetry reminds them: to hurt is how we heal.
So keep the stanzas flowing, let the sapphire spirit shine,
For the mending isn't instant...
It happens line by line.
Michael Powers
""STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 3
Feb 3, 2026 at 2:29 AM UTC
The static hum has finally died away,
That hollow echo of a thousand gray-scale days.
I spent a lifetime locked inside a stare,
Breathing in the ghost of cold, recycled air.
I built these walls of salt and jagged stone,
To prove that I could feel just fine alone.
But there’s a shivering deep inside the chest,
A rhythmic beating waking from its rest.
It’s the friction of the heart against the cage,
The turning of a stained and heavy page.
The anesthesia’s wearing thin and bright,
And everything I buried is screaming for the light.
I felt the gravity pull me to the floor,
A sudden cracking of the cellar door.
No longer drifting like a wisp of smoke,
I felt the moment that the silence broke.
It’s a violent kind of mercy, this return of skin and bone,
To feel the sting of every scar I’ve ever called my own.
The world is loud, and sharp, and colored red,
A symphony of things I should have said.
I’ll take the salt, the sorrow, and the heat,
To feel the pavement burn beneath my feet.
No more the ghost, no more the hollow shell.....
I’m ringing like a strike against a bell.
The ice is gone. The flood is at the door.
I am human. I am hurting.
I Am Ñumb Ño More.....!
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 5
Feb 5, 2026 at 9:23 AM UTC
Why would I go back to the gutter and the grey,
To the Misdirection that led my spirit astray?
Why would I feed the wolves that live in the dark,
Or blow out the candle to hide from the spark?
Why would I crawl when I’ve learned how to stand,
With a heart made of iron and a fire in my hand?
I’ve tasted the salt and I’ve swallowed the dust,
Why would I offer the shadows my trust?
Why would I build up a kingdom of light,
To be a beacon for those lost in the night?
Why would I reach through the static and screams,
To sew up the edges of someone else’s dreams?
Why would I offer the truth and the bone,
To make sure a stranger isn't walking alone?
Because I’ve been the Addict, I’ve been the slave,
And I know that a kindness is what truly can save.
Why would you ever think I’d do anything else,
Than burn down the heavens and conquer my hells,
Just to stay by your side when the world falls apart,
And shield the soft rhythm that beats in your heart?
Through the "Fire of Styxx" and the roar of the gale,
My promise is anchored; it’s not meant to fail.
After all that I’ve broken and all I’ve been through,
Why would I do anything... other than love you
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Feb 3
Feb 3, 2026 at 10:18 AM UTC
You read the lines and say they’re not my own,
You claim a cold machine composed the song,
Because the structure stands like polished stone,
And every comma sits where it belongs.
You think a robot mimics human pain,
And cannot see the storm inside my brain.
You do not know the war I wage with text,
How letters flip and dance before my eyes,
How every written word leaves me perplexed,
A code I cannot break, however wise.
I have the vision burning in my mind,
But symbols are the trap that keeps me blind.
So yes, I use the tool to clear the ****
To straighten out the rows that I have sown,
I let it fix the spelling you can read,
But all the blood and grit are mine alone.
It is a crutch for legs that cannot walk,
It is a translator for how I talk.
A server farm has never felt a loss,
It hasn't cried until the throat is sore,
It never had to carry any cross,
Or pace the carpet of a lonely floor.
It simulates the math of sounding smart,
But cannot simulate a broken heart.
I pour the concrete; it just smoothes the top,
I build the engine; it just turns the *****
And if the power grid should ever stop,
The story would remain entirely true.
For every feeling screaming on the page,
Is born of human grief and human rage.
So judge the grammar if you feel the need,
And doubt the syntax of the lines you see,
But know the spirit that you stops to read,
Did not originate inside a PC.
The spell-check is the mask I have to wear,
But underneath, the soul is standing bare.
Michael Powers
"STYXX ON FIRE "
Jan 18
Jan 18, 2026 at 6:27 AM UTC