We met in middle school
And you helped this riddled fool
Through my little duels
Becoming an indispensable tool
As a burden carrying mule
But you recently found someone more important
And I feel I can’t afford it
So I want you to abort it
Or them to be deported

You attempt to shield
The way I feel
With a third wheel appeal
But I need the whole deal
To stay on an even keel

We have so much history
So it’s a total mystery
Why they claim victory
When they seem sick to me
But you’re not picking me
Even though we connected as kids
You now want to get rid
Of all that we did
On another’s bid
I see my stock slid
Down your priority grid

I explain it’s up to us
To stop the succubus
But you say I must
Quit my fuss
Before I bust
Your friendly trust

It hurts my sense of pride
When I feel I’m defied
So I make you decide
And you choose the less aggressive side
Creating a divide
As I run and hide
From a newcomer’s stride

Treat me like I’m royal
Or be branded disloyal
Your relations I’ll foil
With malicious toil
Becoming angry and bitter
Of new additions to our litter
Exclaiming they slither
While I rapidly wither

Why does this bother me so much?
When did you become my crutch?
How did I fall
Into a pit so banal?
Do you want me around?
Because to you I’m bound
Hearing your glorious sounds
Makes my heart pound
So I feel like I’ve drowned
When you’re not in town
And I travel an empty path
After doing the toxic math
Of your subtraction wrath

I wanted you selfishly for myself
Which wasn’t good for your health
So you set me on the shelf
Because I never knelt
Or weathered welts
Of humility
Now jealousy is filling me
And I let it willingly
So you’re the one billing me
By slowly killing me
With correction
Through rejection
Going a new direction
Beyond my detection
Away from the detention
Of my arrogant prevention
Of your social ascension
Which was my intention
To hold all your attention

So now I’m all alone
I probably deserve it
Our friendship had grown
I should’ve preserved it
But somehow reversed it
Because I’m so worthless
And value you so highly
Yet I refused co-signing
Treaties you were writing
I wrote off as whining
And now I am finding
Loneliness binding

Donald Trump claims torture is effective
He says, “Believe me, it works”
But if somebody were to torture him
They could get him to say torture doesn’t work
So perhaps torture is effective
But to what end?
I just wish he’d keep that in mind
... Or maybe I don’t

We met on common land
Sharing a favorite band
We started holding hands
And I felt absolutely grand
Following your similar strand
But I began to feel ******
Once I saw you had planned
To burn me with your brand
You had my idiosyncrasies scanned
So you could start acting bland
Once I was on your nightstand

While trying to give me an *******
You put on a fake southern inflection
Thinking it’s in vogue to be Texan
You’re more like Rogue from the X-men
Spreading your shapeshifter infection
Trying to pass your suitor’s inspection
You hide your personality from detection
Like a jaded politician during an election
You give the people what they want
Until they love you
Your similarities you constantly flaunt
Until they’re subdued

Your metamorphosis
Informed my bliss
By eating from my dish
You fulfilled my wish
Of finding who I’m looking for
Not knowing what’s in store
Once I start to see more
Deep down to your core
To find an empty floor
Behind a locked door

Raised as a changeling
With trends ranging
From punk rocker
To athletic boxer
In a life where validation
Is another person’s creation
Needed for ego inflation
That’s given as placation
For your simple sedation

Now you’re a shapeshifter
Looking to ape misters
As you forsake sisters
For date blisters
Creating a friendless drought
So when you’re down and out
You need a man who’s devout
While I look at you with doubt

I come to you with problems
You can’t help me solve them
You just listen to what I say
And then press replay
A form of redundant consolation
So issues I don’t relay
To avoid your echolocation
While my soul is filleted

Your Houdini act
Voodoo genie tact
Garnered a time pact
By tricking a blind bat
Through a mind hack
Which gave me great pain
The size of a Great Dane
For a misery refrain
After you interest feigned
To enjoy my reign
But your interest waned
And you quit the game
Saying I’m to blame

Once I’m replaced
You build a new face
On the one you erased
For another embrace
While losing all grace
Looking for an ace
To take you away from this place
Where you’ll always remain
An abrasive codependent strain
Viewing relationships as games
Or obstacles overcame
You become the bane
Of another’s lane
Causing rain
In their brain

Your focus on mimicry
Is super gimmicky
Pretending I didn’t see
Your lack of personality
When you can only parrot what other people say
You become an amalgamation of those you date
Which isn’t the worst but definitely isn’t great
When we should just organically relate

I am haunted in my sleep
By a series of surreal scenarios
I have a nightmare problem
A mare is a malicious goblin
And the night is when he visits me
He straddles my chest
Until my brain divests
All my hopes and comforts
Replacing them with fear
My body he magically steers
With his mystic voodoo potions
Through the mountains and oceans
So I wake up cold and wet
And a negative mood is set
For all day I constantly fret
Worried of the goblin I’ve met

My tormentor rides a steed
Through the field of dreams
Of my unconscious stream
Showing me sights I’ve seen
And that my plight’s unclean
By displaying giant girders
Keeping me trapped with murderers
And people I love
Giving me shoves
My dreams compare pain
To dying in an airplane
How many miles will it travel
Until my brain finally unravels?

I live in a flurry
Of a world of worries
Where I must always scurry
So when I sleep
I need to escape
But the goblin creeps
In my meek state
It causes deep hate
The inability to relate
And a singular choice to deflate

Negativity has me bested
When I’m not well rested
From my mind infested
After the demon tested
The bed that I’ve nested

The nightmares I’m catching
Seem to get quicker
The pain that they’re hatching
Makes my light flicker
While I hear trolls snicker
As the time on my ticker
Keeps counting down
No matter how much I bicker
I still hear their sounds

The demon imp
Gave me a limp
To make me a wimp
Cowering from the flak shroud
That is my black cloud
The goblin slapped down
I want to back down
But there’s no back now
Once my mind’s a packed town
From all the goblins I’ve found

Time is fleeting
Winter is weaving
Coming and leaving
Stunning the seething
Gunning and bleeding
Running from needing
Honeys for breeding

The rabid and bitter
Look for a babysitter
But find Hades’ River
In a shady grifter

A timeline
Sidelined
By bribe buys
And tribe lies
Of pride cries
Decides why
Defiled guys
Have wild eyes
And exile ties
With bile tides
Of vile vies
For a piece of the pie

Those who worship aggression
Follow their idiotic impressions
From charismatic rally sessions
Of one-sided lessons
Based on dejection
Contracting an infection
Preventing self reflection
Halting their progression
With thought deflection
For emotional protection

So the recent challenger
Is the event calendar
Becoming a pal ender
For the scowl senders
Who’re foul lenders
Or growl at tender
Tower menders

My debt’s share
Of fresh air
In death’s snare
Is best spared
But pests stare
With test glares
So I get scared
And let blare
My fret fair
Nightmare

This emergency
Of an inferno sea
Must be urgently
Purged from me
So I can see
The way to be
Hate free
And not flee
From interacting

But the clients and buyers
Are tyrants and liars
While times are dire
The pirates set fire
And hydrants retire
As the world perspires
And starts to expire
The heart of the empire
Has parked the choir
And sparked this mire
Into a funeral pyre

So I can only hope
This lycanthrope
Likened trope
Will not poke
The bear we host
Who cares the most
Of the scares of ghosts

This reason to sell
Season of hell
Treasonous spell
Deletes the smell
Of seeds that fell
Who need to tell
Their creed is well
Yet we see the intel
Warning they’re bitter incels

The dimmer mention
The sinners’ tensions
And interventions
As an interception
Of their own reflection
Not passing inspection
Like a class in detention
They mask their perception
With political inventions
To explain the inception
Of their constant deception

Alone without friends
They follow the trends
Of political bends
As they like to pretend
They’re here to defend
But our country descends
Into a dead end
Of a red blend
When the ref spends
All his time deafened

The cows graze in their pasture
Subservient to their master
Who doesn’t move faster
To help avoid disaster
So the cows are on their own
To deal with snow
Those all alone
Completely froze
Yet those who know
To use the warm glow
Of company that showed
Survive temperature lows

The cows used to solitary grazing
Now begin embracing
To fight cold air they’re facing
That is life erasing
While frost is lacing
The grass once worth tasting

The winter refuses to yield
As snow builds in the fields
The cows’ cohesion is revealed
As they protect their veal
And forget to steal
To connect and heal
During this ordeal

In times of inclement weather
The cows huddle together
Like someone pulled a lever
That won’t stay locked forever
So eventually ties are severed

As summer comes
The dumber numb
Thinking they won
Soaking up sun
Knowing winter is done
They divide into ones

A flow line
Of the bovine
Slow grind
Shows flies
Grow wise
With no size
They devise
To go for eyes
Cows go blind
In their mind
And cannot find
Their herd in time

Pretty soon the irritating fleas
Give them mad cow disease
As they don’t look to please
But put the good on their knees
While they’re hiding in trees
And biting with absolute ease
Seeing the absence of immunities
From their lack of community

The lost independent
Weather defendants
Become repentant
When they hear encroaching
Thunder clouds approaching
The cows become hectic
From a storm electric
Their formation eclectic
So they feel unprotected
But a fence was erected
So they can’t join the dejected
And this lonely life they elected
Is sadly reflected

The lasso angler
Hassling wranglers
Unmasked as stranglers
Bring the herd together
As they pull a lever
That’ll stay locked forever
As the cows’ heads are severed
And the horns in their head
Stick around once they’re dead
As we eat what they were fed
While they made their own bed

If I saw a man casually walking down the street
I most likely wouldn’t consider his wants and needs
He probably doesn’t want to be bothered by a stranger anyway
But if he were visibly dying; bleeding, maimed, mortally wounded
I would feel inclined to help him
And he’d probably be grateful for my gesture
So when do I stop leaving him alone
And start helping him?
Where is the line between
Someone in need of help
And someone in need of privacy?

I used to think the line was physical trauma
It makes sense to try to help someone if they’re bleeding
But then I considered how painful emotional trauma can be
Then I thought everyone always needed help no matter what
But that seems like a platitude
I can’t help everyone all the time
Especially because people need to develop trust in me
In order to even want to receive my help

Maybe he’s bleeding
Because he’s believing
The end of his breathing
Will ultimately be relieving
Or maybe he’s maimed
With an attention aim
Of getting my name
Into his game

My dramatic yet pragmatic fear
Of my heart getting speared
Makes me stave off peers
Yet I crave them to be near
So which way do I steer?

This man on the street
Should I wash his feet?
Give him food to eat?
Pretend he’s a blank sheet
That can’t speak?
Is putting him on the shelf
A form of giving him help?
Or am I just worrying about myself?
Because deep down privately
I want to give him privacy
To avoid the possible piracy
His violent virus breeds

Does he want my company
Or is he actually hunting me?
I can’t tell at first glance
Giving me the worst chance
He’ll reject my cursed dance
With an arcane church stance
Or a negative mentality
Or a lack of personality
I can’t fathom the totality
Of all the possible modalities
That’ll lead to my fatality
So why should I even try?
Should I just let him die?