Song of love, twisted by welling darkness.

Vengeful art, practiced with vicious subtlety.

The softest lips whispered the hardest lies.

She exhaled an evocation of ethereal dreams,

Whose only prophecy was eternal sorrow.

Love is bitter from age and neglect
Chains to bear breaking my back
Eyes deceive, thoughts betray
Tongues lie, souls decay
Words, like fire, torture and burn
Fire is soothing, pain must be earned
Ears distrust like lifeblood flows
Time is unending, destructive, and slow

I'm older now,
something
I wasn't before -
I could throw myself away
to hide myself
from what scares me
the most -
But maybe tomorrow,
when I'm an older man,
will speak differently
than what I can

this silence between us,
is like an egg,
the answers we seek is inside,
but we're just too scared to break it.

Colors in a Kaleidoscope

Colors in a kaleidoscope
separate yet blended,
midst a turning and twisting
towards independent unity
of new and merging patterns
in a future long hoped for
on the crux of being realized.

James E. Roethlein copyright 2020

The Beautifully Brutal

I have no pretty paintings
of flowery poetic expression
to delight the senses,
or panoramic vistas
wrought in iambic pentameter
to lighten the human heart.
I emerge from shadows
as a Phantom masked in red,
revealing the dark and despair,
of a world seen
through obsidian eyes.

James E. Roethlein copyright 2021

My Manner of Muse

My manner of muse
(rampant in the soul)
is cancer and medication,
my blessing and my curse.
I stand starved for affection,
a rose ripped of its petals,
having only bleeding thorns
dipped in tree toad toxin.
Do I poison you all?

James E. Roethlein copyright 2021