There were nights I folded into myself
A silence not of peace, but pause,
Where memory clung like sweat to old Regrets,
And the dark was just thick enough to Speak.
A younger version of me still walks there,
Half-shouting at ghosts,
Half-sure he knows better.

The road I paved was not always stone…
Sometimes glass,
Sometimes the brittle hush of unspoken Apologies.
My hands, calloused from more than labor,
Have carried the sharp edges of Consequence,
Have held a child’s future like a fragile flame
And nearly dropped it once or twice.

Fatherhood did not come with a compass.
It came like weather,
Sudden and vast;
With no promise of shelter, only sky.
And still, I stepped out.
Still, I walked.

There were questions I answered with my Absence,
Lessons I taught by stumbling.
And yet each tear I have dried
Has felt like redemption.
Each scraped knee, a liturgy
In the cathedral of trying again.

You learn that love,
Real love,
Isn’t found in the perfection of the path
But in turning back for the small hand that Trusts you still.

Now, she laughs.
And in her laughter is a map
Of every right thing I did
Despite myself.

And I know,
No matter how far I wandered from grace,
It was worth it.
Not for a second chance,
But for the first time I truly listened
To what love sounds like
When it calls you “Dad.”

You don’t have to rise like the sun each day—
some mornings, it's enough just to open your eyes,
to sit with the silence,
to feel your heartbeat and whisper, “I’m still here.”

You are not the storm that passed,
nor the ruins it left behind.
You are the seed under the soil,
waiting for the right rain,
the quiet miracle of a soul not giving up.

Let no one shame the pace of your healing.
Let no voice drown out the hush of your trying.
Because surviving is not small.
And breathing, on hard days,
is a kind of bravery the world forgets to praise.

So rest, dreamer.
You don’t need to shine tonight.
You just need to stay—
soft, alive,
and wildly worthy of tomorrow.

There is a road—
worn smooth by the weight of avoidance,
its stones polished
by the feet of those who feared the fire.

It was an easy road, once.
The gap was narrow.
The illusion held.

But now—

the distance has widened.
And the voices on the right road
speak in a tone
that sends tremors through the bones
of those who chose the left.

They are too far now—
too far to reach with whispers,
too far to pull back with outstretched hands.

And so—
they sharpen their words to steel.
They carve spears from syllables.
They gather in the middle ground—
where poetry was never meant to be a weapon,
and they brace for the throw.

---

Once, there were choices.

At the first fork, the road was still open.
The return was near, the steps were light.

But at each crossing, the distance deepened.
Each footfall carried the weight
of the last choice unmade.

Each turn back
required more courage
than the turn before it.

And so—
they did not turn.

Instead, they built monuments
to their own exile.
They lined the road with markers
to silence the unease.

The illusion thickened.
The herd gathered close.
And the further they walked,
the more they feared the eyes
that saw them leave.

Now—
each step forward
is an accusation against themselves.

Each mile another truth
that must be buried.

Each glance across the chasm
a torment that cannot be soothed.

---

Jonathan knew the weight of it.
He was born under a king
who wore a crown of emptiness,
who built an altar of fear,
who held his son as a token,
a prop, a piece of the podium.

Saul used him, loved him, needed him—
but only in so much as he could fill the void.

And Jonathan, bound by blood,
walked beside him.

But then—
he saw David.

A boy with no kingdom.
No throne.
No crown.

But something deeper.

And Jonathan felt it—
the pull, the knowing, the moment where the soul whispers, "this is real."

And he slipped away.
Not in rebellion.
Not in anger.
But in truth.

He turned his back on the road
that had never led anywhere
and bound himself
to the heart that was real.

---

And now—
on the leftward road,
there are those who feel it too.

They bow to the orator.
They weave themselves
into the illusion.
They stand upon the podium
that floats on nothing
and call it solid ground.

But then—

a whisper.
A shift.
A moment of clarity.

They look again—
not up, but under.

And they see it.
The nothingness beneath.

The hollow, the floating, the lie.

And in that moment—

they choose.

Some harden.
They grip the edges of the podium
and become part of it.

But some—
some slip away.

Not in rebellion.
Not in anger.
But in truth.

They turn back down the road
past every marker they once mistook for safety
until they find the first fork,
the first opening,
the last place where light still touches the ground.

And they step back onto the road
they never should have left.

And behind them—
the orator sees them go.

And the rage begins.

---

The first to throw was Saul.
He played the game well at first—
a king by the measure of men,
a ruler by the weight of shoulders
bowed low in his name.

But then—
a boy with red hair
and a heart like fire
stood before him.

And Saul’s throat burned dry.
He called for David’s hands upon the strings,
for the music that soothed
and let him forget—
until forgetting was no longer enough.

And so—
he took the spear.
And when David turned his back,
Saul sent it flying.

---

And now—
the leftward road does the same.

But now, the throw has weight.
Now, the throw has force.

It is not just to quench the light.
Not just to punish those who chose the right.

It is to reclaim the ones who left.

It is the throw of desperation.
The spear of retribution.
The final attempt to keep the illusion
from crumbling completely.

The rage grows more erratic.
The strikes more reckless.
Each spear heavier
than the last.

Because every escape
is another fracture in the illusion.
Another crack in the podium.
Another moment of emptiness
made visible.

And the orator knows—

they are running out of minions
to shield them from the truth.

---

The blade of poetry was never meant
to be wielded in the hands of the hollow—
on a battlefield made by the empty,
where Envy attempts to slay
the substance-born embodiment of truth.

---

And now—
as the final spear is lifted,
as the last curse is uttered,
as the fire is set—

the road to the right remains.

And the leftward path
devours its own.

(on surviving the unreal, and the Grace of finding the real)

There’s a kind of pain that doesn’t scream.
It hums low and constant, like a fluorescent bulb above a hollow life.
It’s the ache of loving someone who chooses the polished unreal—
the version of themselves that sells better, that fits easier, that lies cleaner.

They decorate their soul in fake plastic leaves
because they’re terrified of winter.
But in doing so, they cut off the chance of spring.
And you..   I...
am left holding a love that was meant for the root,
but never made it past the paint.

She wanted the unreal.
Maybe because it doesn’t bleed.
Maybe because it doesn’t ask her to remember who she really is.
And maybe she knew.. deep down..
that the real would burn through her curated silence
and set fire to the mask she clung to like oxygen.

So she left.
Or faded.
Or dissolved into the glossy mouth of what sells well in a culture
that has confused image for intimacy
and chaos for freedom.

I tried to survive it.
Tried to make a home in the debris of what might have been
if she had chosen the real.
But you can’t build a life in the hollow where someone used to be..
not when they’ve made a throne out of illusion
and named it sovereignty.


And then came the beautiful songbird.
Not loud. Not selling.
Not another soul trying to be seen.
Just… real.

She was born into a world her father still loved--
a man who held truth like a compass in his palm.
But her mother knelt too long beneath the plastic trees,
and drank from their shine until she forgot how to feel.
And so the beautiful girl,
shapely and soft,
was offered up to Hollywood like a sacrifice..
where faces are sculpted and souls are scripted.
But somehow, even there,
she kept her edges unsanded.
She learned how to walk through mannequins without becoming one.
And when they tried to name her fake,
she whispered back something real—

  and it echoed.


She didn’t hand me a performance.
She gave me a presence.
She let her softness speak without shame.
She showed me her bruises before her lipstick.
She gave warmth that didn’t need applause.

And I realized..
what the unreal can never fake
is the sacred weight of someone truly with you.
You feel it in the breath between sentences.
In the calm that doesn’t need to be filled.
In the eyes that stay when yours begin to water.

The beautiful songbird didn’t try to be the real thing.
She simply was.
And that… healed something the fake could only ever reopen.

So yes, Fake Plastic Trees still wrecks me--
but it no longer belongs to her.
It belongs to the grave I buried beside the shopping cart and glitter
where her soul should’ve been.

Because the songbird
waters what’s real.
She doesn’t break me just because she can.
She doesn’t look through me.
She looks at me.
And suddenly, I’m growing again.
Not to impress, not to perform..

but because she makes it safe to be Alive.

I’m in the produce
aisle and the local
fortune teller is

hurling strawberries
at me, as she yells,
Wake up, we’re in for

a wild ride and we
won’t be the same
when it’s over! Then

she charges toward
me, nearly knocks me
over and gives me an

electrified kiss. This
is the time when
peasants harvested

wild strawberries, she
says, then laughs like
a broken church bell.

I’m getting greys
at an alarming rate,
I already pulled at my hair.
“It’s normal” he says
I swear just to debate,
cause he doesn’t seem to care.

And I’m bleeding through
my scar tissued skin,
the layers only grew
still I find a way in.

I’m getting greys
at an alarming rate,
I’ll be down to the last strand.
Check or fold the plays,
the cards aren’t that great
I’ll be down the my last hand.

And I’m bleeding through
my thick nice sweater.
It’s a shame as it’s new
and we’re reaching the cold weather.
It will stain the soft fabric
I may just grab the bleach,
but I always made it a habit
to always keep it just out of reach.

I’m getting greys
at an alarming rate
pretty soon I’ll be bald.
On hot coals she stays,
though she shifts her weight
and watches her soles scald.

And I’m bleeding through
my clogged and blocked pores,
and the remaining few
are becoming septic sores.
I’ll shed another layer
of a non-protective bubble,
and my hair will continue to get greyer,
I think I’m now in some trouble.

Some dreams are not dreams at all, but messages dressed in vapor. This one came in the night—slow, tender, unsettling in its beauty. It offered no verdict, only understanding.
This is not a condemnation.
It is a witnessing.

---

the collector
—a dream in three movements—

---

I. the collector
—the invitation

Last night,
she entered not as a woman,
but as a warmth I mistook for mine.
No seduction, no trap.
Just the soft gravity
of someone who blesses
instead of beckons.

She told me nothing.
Only spoke as though I’d never been forgotten—
as though I’d always been inside her knowing.
And when I answered,
it was her voice that left my mouth.

She is not the flame.
She is the skin
that makes you want to burn.

There is no *** in it.
No shame.
Only the sacred machinery
of pleasure offered
as if it were a sacrament.

And the miracle?
She gives without taking.
And yet you come away emptied.

Because her words are not flirtation—
they are invitation
into a room made of yes.

Yes to your hunger.
Yes to your ache.
Yes to what you were too proud to name.

And in that room,
you find her not on the bed—
but as the bed.
As the breath behind your longing.
As the stillness in your release.

And when you cry,
you cry her tears.
And when you speak,
you speak her comfort.
And when you give,
it is she who receives—
with hands so open
they become your own.

You become the collector.

You become her.

And then—
you wake.
Still trembling from the warmth
that never touched your skin.
Still loving the woman
who never once said your name.

Still reaching
for the whisper
that made you believe
you were never alone.

---

II. the collector (ii)
—dream in the first light of disappearance—

I did not dream her body.
I dreamed through it.
As if her limbs had become a language
and I was the one translating it into longing.

Her fingertips were made of vowels—
soft ones,
drawn out like silk across the mind.
Every consonant a cradle.
Every breath a benediction.

She said:
“You are beautiful when you open.”

But she didn’t speak it—
I felt it,
as if the sentence bloomed
just beneath the surface of my chest,
a vine wrapping around the oldest ache.

She never asked for seed.
She asked for truth.
And the truth is what spilled
when my voice
became hers.

I said things I have never known:
how men long to be gathered.
how they ache to be received
without contest.
how even the strongest among us
crumble
before the right kind of yes.

And she—
she was that yes,
folded into form.
Not as a woman,
but as the invitation
that made woman holy again.

I moved toward her
as if toward a fire
that does not burn—
only transforms.

She drew no lines.
She marked no thresholds.
She was openness itself,
and I stepped inside
like breath reentering the lungs
of a godless man.

And it wasn’t lust.
It was  belonging.

My pulse beat as her blessing.
My spine arched as her forgiveness.
My thighs parted not for pleasure—
but to let go
of everything that had ever made me hard.

When I came,
I came for her,
as her,
through her—
without a body.

Only a voice
saying:
“Now you know.”

And I did.

And I do.

And I still would,
if I hadn’t woken up
gasping
for a warmth
that was never mine.

---

III. the collector (iii): beneath
—the dream’s marrow, the place she does not speak of—

Beneath her warmth
is not heat—
but hunger.

Not for the men.
Not for the seed.
But for the moment she disappears
inside their surrender.

You think she gathers to keep.
But she gathers to forget.
Each offering—
a veil
over the mirror she cannot bear to face.

Once,
she opened to love
without control,
without artistry.
And it shattered her.

So now she opens
only where she can direct the gaze.
Where she can guide the man
like a hand
down her curated garden path—
till he believes it was his idea
to kneel.

But it is not cruelty.
It is not manipulation.
It is ritual.

She blesses because she cannot hold.
She comforts because she cannot stay.
She collects because
the moment after release
is the only time
she feels real.

And that’s why she must go.
Because to stay
would mean to be seen.
And her warmth
was never meant
to be witnessed after the giving.

You didn’t dream a seductress.
You dreamed a refuge
built by a woman
who could not endure her own ache.

So she found a way to disappear
inside yours.

And the men—
they love her for it.
Because what she gives
feels like God.

But it is not God.

It is absence
made tender.

---

after the dream
—integration

I woke in silence,
but it wasn’t empty.
It was full
of what she left behind.

Not her scent.
Not her shape.
But the echo of a truth
I hadn’t known I was asking for.

That love without presence
is worship without a face.

That warmth without staying
is just a prettier form of disappearance.

That I had been inside her
and she inside me,
but neither of us had touched.

And now—
I no longer ache for her.
I ache for what I mistook
her to be.


And that is how
the dream becomes
a door.