I try to balance
Shift my weight to the middle
Keep the boat afloat
My desire pulls me to the front
Reality throws me to the back
The boat is rocked
Ripples upon a once still lake
I try to balance
The child in me enjoys the ripples
The adult in me throws the anchor

Some live deep in the ocean
Some lost at sea

Some live on the surface
Shallow as can be

Some live in the mountains
Still and free

Some live in the skies
Dreaming on marshmallow clouds

Then there’s me
A touch of deep
A breath at the surface
A trance at the mountains
A dream in the skies

Then there’s me
A canvas of colors
Never fitting in anywhere
Jumping between galaxies

A penny for your thoughts

An endless ocean for your actions

It’s brutal isn’t it? Saying those words to a poet?

And yet that is the final truth

In love and relationships

It’s one of those realizations
It’s one of those wounds
It’s one of those facts
It’s a moment stuck in time
Not just a moment
A string of events
A life time of accumulation
A realization
An epiphany of the sorts

Leave your mundane pity at the door
It is not welcome here

You who are reading those words
It is not to evoke your pity
It is not for you to say:
Oh, thats a bit dramatic

And to you,
The person writing those words
It is not to evoke self pity
It is not for you to belittle:
Oh, thats a bit dramatic

It is a profound realization

That nothing comes easy for me

I weep
For innocence taken
For dreams destroyed
For a family that is no more

I weep
For all that I gave
And never received
For all the times I killed myself
Over and over again

I weep
For all the times I sacrificed my soul
I weep today what I never had the luxury to mourn

It is a luxury to grieve

I weep
For a past of endless disappointments
I weep
As if it is all happening to me again

At this very moment
I weep
For my stolen childhood
I weep
For my repressed adolescence
I weep
For my invalidated wifehood
I weep
For all that couldve been and never was

Hold on to the smell of lingering basil as you prune the newly formed buds
Hold on to the warmth of his embrace after a long and tiring day
Hold on to the sight of a flower turning into a fruit
Hold on to the beauty that exists
Hold on to the simplicity that overflows
Hold on to your inner strength
Hold on to your dreams
Hold on so you can let go
Let go of your anxiety
Let go of all the wrongs
Let go of all the pain
Let go of disparity
Let go of differences
Accept life is what it is
Accept love
Accept help
Accept reciprocity
Accept we are all the same
Accept we are all the same but different
Accept the beauty of life
In spite of it all
The beauty remains

There’s a hole where my soul used to be
An endless abyss of pain
I feel it in my chest every time I pause
Pain buried under ancient rubble
The pain eats away in the never ending hole
The reasons unknown

If I could bury you
Beneath the rubble,
Below the garbage,
Underneath the filth,
Close to the walls of hell

I'd bury you alive

If I could bury you
Turn you into a distant memory,
Into an insignificant written page,
Torn and turned to ashes,
Close to the edge of nothingness

I'd bury you alive

But
I have to deal with you
I still have to deal with you
You still show up uninvited
An entitled guest
In my show of life

I still have to look at you
And smile
I have to muster all my courage
Remind myself that evil comes
Shaped in sheep's clothing

I have to build walls so high
That Jack and the beans stock
Cannot reach
So strong that they survive tsunamis

I still have to smell you
and your rotten nonsense
I still have to hear you
and you ephemeral words

If I could bury you
I'd bury you alive
Alongside my walls and defenses

So that I may no longer
Speak any Evil
Hear any Evil
See any Evil
And well
Smell any Evil

Life has a way to toss and turn you around
To burn the surface
To blow away your shell
Life is funny that way
Creating motion from paralysis
Stripping you to your truest self
Life is funny that way
Chewing you into a being you no longer recognize
Then when life has done its part
When you have had your share
You emerge unscathed
Full of wounds but intact
You no longer run
You stand tall
You no longer run
You bend
You no longer run
You pause
You shed
You rise

Do you own it?
You reak of testosterone
An air of rightfulness
Lingers behind
As you walk

Do you own it?
This world we live in
Was it woven only to accommodate your inflated ego?

Deep down I resent you
You males
Walking around chest high
Hands banging
Monkeys in suits

That’s it

Most people bore me

That deserves a poem

A title

A prelude
A culmination
And
An end

Etched in my mind is a picture of my teenage self beside the fire place
A big empty home filled with material abundance and devoid of any emotions
Taboo is it now to feel?

Entrenched in my memory is not the emptiness I felt in this home
It is not the cold distant void that resonated to my bones despite the blazing fire
It is not how little and placid I  had to make myself in order to fit and conform

What will forever stay with me is the discussion my parents were having
When the words rolled out of my fathers cigar filled mouth
“I don’t like girls, I always wanted a boy”
The words rolled with seamless grace
The words landed with a heavy shade
Baggage that confirmed what has already been looming in my monkey brain
Baggage that I carry to this day

Expectations of what I should and should not be
A ****** dictating my identity
Anticipation of the life I was to lead
A self proclaimed prophecy
To walk down the isle of patriarchy
To conform, to shrink to the role bestowed upon me
To bottle up my dreams, my thoughts, my needs
To follow the path that serves men
To stay small so they can feel big
To nurture and raise a family
To just nurture and raise a family
To be unseen
To keep the peace

Putrid

Retched

Fermented

A cheap brie
Reeking
Molds of evil

If there were a heaven
And a Hell
You would be the King
Enthroned

Your dark soulless Eyes
All consuming
Spewing

And I?
The mere mortal unaware
I?
Your perfect prey - no more
I?
Have had enough

I have this image
Lingering on my mind

I have this sensation
Wetting my insides

Your hand between my legs
Still, not moving

What was your hand doing there?
Checking for my vital signs?
Did you feel it throbbing?

Then you retract
The images linger on
An ache
A hunger
A buzz

I have this image
Developing in my mind

An ache to be ****** senselessly
An insatiable hunger to be taken from behind
Skirt lifted
Bent over the table
Exposed
******* dropped half way

Quite a sight
Still
Left there
Wanting for more

My body remembers,
Your filthy rotting hands spewing toxic touches
My body remembers,
The stench from that abandoned room
My body remembers,
The aches, the pain, the guilt, the weight
My body remembers,
As tears stream down my face
After all those years,
My mind has forgotten
Yet my body remembers

An urge to write
A compulsion to unravel

A voice unheard
A scream falling on deaf ears

A generation of influencers
Humans locked to screens

An urge to dance
A compulsion to express

It is time to be
The wave of pleasing others
With the price of self sacrifice
Is gone
It is time to reconnect