I lay
With folded hands and sealed, cold eyes.
You won't hear a complaint,
Nor whimper,
Nor breath escape from these
Pale blue lips.

Icy skin,
Clad in a snowy pall.
The room is warm with candle light,
Stuffed with the comfort of the mourners.

They found my body in the trenches,
With nothing
But a glassy tear across my face
Like a shooting star,

And a smudged smile.

I'm tired,
Tired of being tired.
Tired of swallowing pills
Just to get through the day.
There has to be more to life
Than this,
Right?

May God free me:
From the toxicity that was taught to me
By a dysfunctional family,
From the stagnating repetition of solitude,
From being a prisoner of my body,
And from being a slave
To depression.

Grant me strength.

When i close my eyes,
I can still see the glint of blue
In your eyes.
How they mesmerized me,
Laced with beauty
And danger.

He looked into a mirror.
He saw:
A punnet of stereotypes and problems
All untidily wrapped
in raggy, baggy clothes.

He went looking for answers.
But all he got from following people whose faces were plastered with a mask
Of indifference and apathy,
Was criticism.

Criticism that neither helped nor encouraged him,
Instead grinded him down inside.

My job is my passion,
I have all I need,
My wife is my life.
Truly, God has blessed me.

But one day,
I came across an old-fashioned mirror.
It was cloudy and dust-ridden.
I stood before it and could only see
An unrecognizable, blurry outline.
Strange, right?
But upon closer inspection,
There it was,
An unmistakable wraith of my younger,
Troubled and melancholic self.

I saw him trapped and suppressed
By the insurmountable suffering
That rained down like a monsoon on him.
I felt everything he felt,
I carried the same lifeless ****** expression that he wore,
And our tears fell in tandem.

I reached out beyond the magic mirror,
I looked him dead in the eye and whispered to him that all his suffering would eventually bring him peace,
And reassured him of the existence
Of a light at the end of the seemingly-unending tunnel.

My words were cliche in the extreme,
But,
I let my sincerity, love and care
Sing a song of hope.

And by the time my song reached had reached its end,
The cloudy tears in his eyes
Began to clear.

Sometimes i wonder:
Are you out there,
Somewhere,
Craving the excitement
That came with the light brushing
Of my skin against yours?

Burning low long past midnight,
Slurring long past sunrise.

Time passed,
And so has the metaphor of you,
The perfect you,
That i seemed to cling to so hard.

But every now and then,
In a dream, or abstract fantasy,
I still see your lush lips
Muttering dreamy words.

When your mind stumbles
across an image of her
And a smile creeps up on your face;
When her tears prompt you to take action;
When her eyes can turn water into milk
Laced with honey
with a determined gaze;
When you can't imagine a greater pleasure
Than standing there,
Liplocked with her:

You've found yourself a sweetheart.