Death cradled her sunken cheek
her breath became haggard  
he held her limp hand
As her carcass wilted
her soul bloomed

Father looked away
Never to shed a tear
But to put on a mask
Over his devilish grin

They all were inferior to him
Drizzled the wrong paint onto
The canvas of life
All of their pastels
Appeared grey

He wished
She would have
Died
In his arms
His cold eyes
Watching as she slipped
Out of his grasp

Submerged in the river
Fish for forgiveness
Sins washed clean

Burn
Ashes to ashes

She only loved one

They loved many

My house smells like banana bread
I made it before shutting down
With just enough energy summoned
I watched the top turn brown
I focused my mind on being numb and
lied when I said I'd been fed
because all anyone notices is
My house smells like banana bread

He pictures her chestnut hair falling delicately onto her petite frame,
her small nose twitching when she laughed.
He imagines her creamy smooth skin and perfectly rosy cheeks.
He envisions her breathtaking eyes, that glimmered in the morning sun,
that were sheen, freshly fallen dew.
He closes his eyes and reminisces about her gleeful laugh that reminded him of gardenias blooming
and the way she twiddled her thumbs when she was nervous.
He misses her kisses that brushed across his cheeks like a butterfly flapping its wings.
Tears swell in his dark eyelashes, and his blue eyes turn a milky grey with despair.
Thinking back to the day she told him she was ill,
the agony he felt in his chest arises yet again.
He remembers the day her gorgeous hair started to scatter onto the floor,
the floor he would lay crumpled on for a week after
that collected his pearly tears
and cooled his splotchy cheeks
he thinks back to the days that she said she was fine
but wished to die.
Her emerald eyes started to fade in the last couple days of her life,
a sweater that had been washed too many times.

An unoriginal thought or idea that is profusely overused.
I adore them.
I slurp them up
a child slurping spaghetti.
I savor them
Pity those who ridicule them
Cliches are our core
the thoughts we all have, the emotions we all feel.
A cliche is human.
feel the same and think the same
A cliche is human nature on a page.
So completely unoriginal,
So completely beautiful,
And so completely judged on being who they are.

If there was a fire in the kitchen,
You started when I slept
If your eyes were grief-stricken
I'd hold you as you wept
If the orange singed my skin
And you were holding the match
I would take care of your sin
And let you disattatch
If my lungs became cloudy
And your makeup turned grey
I’d profess my love loudly
And let you fade away
If there was a fire in the kitchen,
And you wanted me to burn
I would only save our vision
And let you go in return

I've never been one for worshiping
yet I say your name like a prayer
to love you is akin to believing
to love you has never been fair
because I've never been very patient
but for you, I'd be a saint
my heart has never wanted containment
yet you hold the key to the cage
I've yet to be called selfless
but I would sell all my possessions
to talk with you for a second
before I ascend to some kind of heavens
I don't believe in cosmic interaction
but by some higher decree
I've succumbed to all attraction
and pledge myself to thee
And maybe my honesty is brutal
but I love you just as hard
even putting it into words is futile
without you, my soul would be charred
you have become my enchantment
my pre-modern obsession
I utter I love you in a chant, and
would stake my life for your protection
So yes, I'm not a believer in most things Kismet
but for you, my love, I find myself wholly in it.

One day I wrote her name upon the sand
Reminding me of staring at her grave
I try my best to purely understand
The way she swayed within the crashing waves
And on that melancholic day, she passed
Sorrow spilled slow, into the boundless sea  
Her soul flows within the water spread vast
The sand swept away, I must let her be
But oh I want her more than life itself
Her voice in ocean breeze, a symphony
I cannot arrange her life on a shelf
Never forget the day of infamy
But somehow water washed away her name
I will seem ok, but never the same

I wish you the best
The life you want
Without me
I hope you find the happiness you've been pretending to have
I want you to flourish
I really do
I want you to lose yourself
And then have to find yourself
I hope you do all of this
And then realize
That while you were reinventing yourself
Throwing the old you away
You threw me out
For I was apart of you
That you will never get back
I hope the thought of me
Keeps you up at night
I want you to wonder where I am now
And never get the satisfaction of knowing.
So this is my goodbye, forever
For it's not the goodbye that will hurt you
But the flashbacks that will follow.

Blonde, unruly waves, falling recklessly unto her petite frame
Dull mahogany eyes, stripped of life
Soft lips turned down
Like she doesn't quite remember how to smile
A summer tan spreads across her baby skin
Covering every inch of her tired body
White linens
Make her a lady
Strangling her true identity
Young face
Wise mind, old soul
Not amused by the childish games of summer
she has seen too much
Her childhood lost
Eyes opened
To the real world.
Inhaling ribbons of grey smoke
Letting it seep into her cells
Holding it in until her lungs scream louder than her mind
The burning red ash is the only color in her grey life
The embers float down the dirt road
Leaving a path of lost innocence
Every step she takes
Another piece of grey residue
Dropped
She watches the rolled paper
Shrink
Until it almost burns her fingertips.
She does this for a sense of control
Letting it shrivel up
Watching what will eventually **** her
Die in her hands
She stares endlessly at it
And drops it onto the gravel
Stomping it out with her white church shoes
Until the bottoms are black.
And she becomes one cigarette closer
To disappearing into the smoke she breathes.

It's like that between us I think
You getting infuriated
Me constantly paying the price
You causing me to change colors
Black then blue then deep magenta
A nasty chartreuse color spreads
The lengthy process of healing
Even when I shouldn’t have to
I shouldn't have to take your fist
Splattering crimson blood around
I shouldn't have to wake up, gasp
Because your gnarled hand is clenched
Nails digging into my frail throat
I shouldn't be weeping silence
Iron and salt wash down the drains
I shouldn't bow down, begging you
I should say no to your abuse
Stand physically, mentally
No to your beautiful ice eyes
That stay a worn denim color
Even when you beat me maroon
Like your evening bottles of wine
No to you and the games you play
No to your brutality, and
the colors you force upon me
Me who once loved and cherished you
Me who convinced my own **** self
That I deserved it, all of it

The poppy fields, with their vibrant red bodies
And velvet black eyes, peer at the sky.
Liquid light, melts
Sand falling
Off the edge of the horizon
Scarlet and merigold,
poppies and sun,
The ideal backdrop for his return
He stands stagnant, perched on top of the hill, arms spread wide,
As tiny toes trample up the flaming ridge.
He drops his duffel, green for the badge he served,
Into the meadow.
Praying its memories sink into the rich soil.
They tackle him, embrace him in love.
Forcing him to the ground
Shoving bliss down his throat.
He holds them tight.
Tears blur his vision,
As a dandelion dress
Glides towards him.
She floats above the red, a bumblebee fertilizing the poppies.
Her pecan locks dancing behind her in the wind.
He sees the ring, the one he gave her,
Ensnared around her fourth finger.
She bends down,
Gracefully pulling the children away.
So she can see his face.
She wipes away his tears,
As her own fall down her dusty cheeks.
They embrace, her body crumbling into his.
Her lips, sweet maple syrup.
He stares at her,
There was no beauty where he had been.
The only red,
****** skies.
The only yellow,
Jaundice, in the sick bay.
He didn't remember true beauty
Until he saw her.
She is the blood in his bruised burqa veins,
the breath of fresh air,
That he will **** deep into his soul,
Whisking away
The dunes weighing down his heart.

Some days silence is utterly stunning
The aspect of talking without a tongue
No mistakes made to send people running
No pointless chatter chaotically sung
And some days I wish the world would just hush
Finally, people can listen for once
Maybe we slow down, forgetting the rush
Pause the media and behold a bunce
Or maybe our world is now too far gone
Silence affixed to the staticky past
No longer do we hear the birds at dawn
But then again nobody ever asked
Whatever happened to the quietness?
It’s muffled by our own self-righteousness

Sometimes, right before I drift
into a melancholy sleep
After my tea and nostalgia
Before I succumb
to the depths of my dreams
I imagine you gazing into my soul
Zipping open my skin
Cracking a door in my ribs
Just to caress my ****** heart
Sometimes I wish
you would fall asleep on my chest
Match my heartbeat
to your circadian rhythm
And I’d create a playlist to our tempo
Sometimes I think about your warmth
And imagine setting my thermostat
To feel constantly at ease
Or I think of your lips
as rose petals
And make a note
To go to the market for a bouquet
Sometimes I let a tear
Slip down my cheek
And see you
Swimming in my ocean
Bathing in my sorrow
Making me clean
Sometimes I think of you
When the darkness
Engulfs my room
And imagine it’s your
Morning coffee, black
Gliding down my throat
Sometimes, as the colors
Enter my eyelids
And the film reel starts to play
I picture you at the projector
Guiding me into slumber
Molding my mind to be yours

He weaved throughout concrete aisles
Collar up
Chin down
Avoiding bodies
Ravaging through
Piles and piles
different sizes.
I can vividly recall
The broad-shouldered
Black coat, he pulled out of the rack.
Analyzing the quality
Glancing slightly at the tag,
Slightly enough to where he thought I didn’t see.
He held it up against his chest
Nodded
And handed over the ironed dollars in his pockets.
He watched her closely,
The cashier,
Ensuring the coupons were valid.
We walk out,



He wore it daily
Guaranteeing every dollar would be put to use.
He wore it over his church clothes,
And his bulletproof vest.
Pulled down the sleeves to hide his tattoos for job interviews,
And pulled them up to show drunken women his “story” after his eighth can of Budweiser.


He wrote his will on a  Shoney’s  paper napkin
Giving me everything, including the coat and the map of its story.
He described the location of every hole, every tear, and every patch
With a story attached to each imperfection

I remember one patch vividly
It covered the tear of a barbed wire fence, as he ran from the “bad men”


When you grow up in the sector I grew up in
You have different fears than most children
Most kids are scared of the dark or of clowns
We were scared of the “bad men”
The men our fathers told us about
And our fathers were never wrong

The men that prowled the streets
Eyes of lead
Spewing bullets from their tongues when they spoke


Flaunting their colors,
Badges,
And Entitlement,
With every heavy footstep

They were the men with power
hearts filled with ammo


They were my father’s only weakness
Only fear

They were the police…

20 years later I stand beside them
Everyday defending the people just like me

every morning I grab my holster and my badge
I stare at the coat hanging by the door
And understand the error of his ways
The police are not the enemy
And I am not him

The coat collects dust.