When you were a young child,
you wore your naive head in the clouds.
The vastness of space was your limit,
there were no social norms to worry about.

Growing up they told you,
you should pretend that you don't care,
so when your hopes would get devastated,
disappointment could give you a spare.

And now you find yourself wondering:
when did I stop following my ambition?
The thing you regret most when you die,
is your passion's creeping omission.

Besides, how can you ever win a game,
that out of fear you did not participate in?
Without your dreams you're a soulless ghost,
like a concaved snake's skin.

If only you're bold enough to walk your own path,
alienated and without an established map.
You will soon realize that your passion's just waiting,
for your courage to close the gap.

Mr. P.  Showed me the first time,
And now placed before me, Mr. J
I questioned your state,
While you laid there like a piece of slate.
Thin you were with the apple in your neck.
Tempted for a bite like in the book of Genesis,
A sin you might say, but what the heck.
They didn’t care for they put you in a partial wood and glue box,
Then they stole your money like a masked fox!
Opening your velvet lids she exposed them both,
Pressing all around, for she had to make sure.
Just in case you could have been saved
From some kind of a cure
A bowl your pupil turned
Something you gave me to eat from
Milky white yes they were,
Something else they did tell me,
And I didn’t even have to look that far.
With her clipboard and her pen
She marked all the things outside and then within.
Doors now closed and stained instruments are now touched
Thick blue rubber latex gloves are passed around
Pre prepped he already is,
What’s next I then wonder?
A quick slice of a scalpel
Now exposes what was under.
Hooks seven layers deep
Removing something you now couldn’t even keep
Like pulling a worm out a fish’s mouth,
It then popped out,
“Look” He just snagged himself a trout.
Putting your trust in something better then Big Ben,
If it seized up, what would you do then?

(CARSr.5-31-12)

The truth behind my absence might scare a few
People will turn a blind eye, because I am not part of their crew
I sit alone in a teeming room
Look up, you won’t find me there, I left to soon

My silent dwellings concaved, keep me sane
The noise within these walls, prevent the pain
As they stroll by me everyday
I hear them say...

"The light is too bright
For someone with poor eyesight
Dim it
For he will give you a fright!"

Spread the love, Stop the hurt
I am different

Introvert.

turn on a sixpence

i slipped on your silhouette,
as i crept in your shadow.
Obscured in your umbrage,
an abundance of dark.
Opaque mistakes clouded,
our nebulous hearts.
I shaded your colours in grey tone,
to take home,
your essence in plainclothes,
and our monotone goals.
I was your eccentric apprentice,
You were a trip to the dentist,
pulling me out of comfort zone.
I had decayed in ways,
concaved incisors seen better days,
yet in spite of my enlightened phase,
the sweetness of life took me away in a chain of abuse of penny chews and the absolution of front page news.
I choose me,
I choose you.
Now if i misstep,
i’ll turn on sixpence;
and my value to you will continue to grow over time.

Sharpeville, 21 March 1960
"The native mentality does not allow them
to gather for a peaceful demonstration.
For them to gather means violence."
- Lieutenant Colonel Pienaar

1.
We went with wrists ready
For metal shackles
To clench
Their cold grip
Onto fire hot skin
Boiling with white rage;
The appropriate rage.

This situation has justification
In the predications they hold true
Where to some
Human is synonymous with
******* nature,
Dangerous and hungry for
Light white blood we
Must be caged
To prevent the massacre
We could create.


2.
A child’s body is not a hurdle.
But when fleeing,
Feet pounding on dirt paths,
Black with dark blood, leaking
From shafts of taunting revolvers
And throats of the permanently
Silenced,
What do you do but run?

5,000 bodies bound together,
Melding flesh with flesh,
Fusing unhinged bones to bones
Still cradled in their skin,
Line the street where
Puddles are forming next to
Concaved skulls emptied
By misinformed bullets.

Last thoughts and worries
Are forever splattered on faces,
Tracing red lines
On skin
Sooty black,
As dark as nights will be.

3.
Sixty-nine lay dead.

A rock they said.
When interrogations
Took place
A rock they said.
Empty hands laid
Palm in palm
But a rock they said,

This, they said, sparked
The worry
That made it right for them
To make bullets fall
Onto us like metal raindrops
From an angry heaven
Hungry for black skin
And black blood.

Hands digging into earth
For retaliation,
For blood they said,
But everyone else said,
The rock that flew
Was in hands white as light
As bright as the day was
They say.

If the rocks they said that,
Spurned uniformed egos,
Flew from ground,
To air,
To gunned men like they said,
Does it justify the dead?

Walk
Dear Mr. President-
I think it’s time we talk-
See I walk in that same stilled motion-
Engraved in my soul-Sir-is the same old theory notion-
Handed a dripping blood star spangled rag of devotion-
I hear the anthem play as I make way through this sandy ocean-
Yet I have compromised for the life that I have chosen-
Sir-
I am frozen-
Stuck among the simple brainwashed component-
Wondering where home went-
And they say home is where the heart is-
But what if the heart has left home-
Then it’s been condoned-and postponed at the emotion that should have been so home grown-
Yet I am so alone-
I’m surrounded by thousands of drones-Moving in illusions to the beat of contemporary confusions is leaving the stink of retribution and the contusion on the spirit of this institution Keeps proving while correspondents are continuously reviewing the inability to honor the constitution-
So with all due respect-sir-what the hell are we doing-?
I am losing my G-d **** mind-While patient politicians predict the estimated time-
And in the mean time-Bullets fly by brittle bodies-Rotting minds wait for mind-full plotting-Knowing knowledge knocks simple logic-And it is chronic-
And I don’t mean the kind you smoke-But more so the kind that poke jokes by late night hosts-
So when the hell did is this war become a show?-
My soul it lays defeated-physically-mentally-and emotionally-depleted-
I am bleeding-
Needing a reason to keep on breathing-Dreaming of a moment when my mental torment becomes dormant-And I am no longer fending-but feeling-Kneeling-Screaming-Asking-
The Lord for a meaning-
These fatigues have me stressed and fatigued and this disease it seeps deep into my sleep-And I just creep hoping my weary feet don’t lead me to a concaved grave that bleeds-
As trails of remorse stream down my cheek-
I plead-
With you Mr. President please set precedence consider my wishes relevant I just want to go home to my residence where Corrupt Cooperate Capitalist no longer have this regiment-and the elements of peace sir have a higher percentage than that of the deceased-
See-
These dog tags come with body bags perfectly delivered in a neatly folded flag-And the fact remains Sir-it’s an endless game-Sir-we are trying to conquer a region we can’t maintain-Sir-So I ask you to refrain-are youth from being slain-Please-let wisdom reign-Indulge in peace not in pain-Please sir-go against the grain-in that stilled motion-I walk the same-
If you recall Sir-
I voted for change-

she sits - eyes darting side to side,
eating the atmosphere, chewing carefully,
rosebud mouth moist, lips open a space,
hands fidgeting in her shallow concaved lap ..
woman leans forward to stroke wayward
tendril from wide forehead - a sign of excellence

to some just that, to others smart phrenology;
tendril defies maternal meaning to spring
like a diver from top board thrill
to fall once more upon laughing brow,
how young child loves the tickling touch
she never receives from mother -

she who urges piano practice, eight to ten,
dancing lessons, eleven to one,
geography, history and Latin tutelage
with woman ancient her and morbid more,
afternoon alternate curriculum and oboe,
catechism, times-tables, spellings parroted..  

when night calls child to sleep,
she curls her softness into a knot, tight
and unforgiving, ******* tears from
sea blue eyes so they weep 'pon Egyptian
cotton sheets to dilute the ***** drips of
progidy’s day by day nightmare..

child needs, child yearns for what she
does not know, kettle drum heart throbbing..
longs to run in meadows mossy bright,
longs to see dirt under sweetheart nails;
in dreams she rides ponies *******
and soars sky, dances clouds, kisses moon..

but then, morning vivid with sane insanity
she wakes in an open cage, in a different room..
rebelled, she did, small fragile six year old;
today, today, today her mind is empty,
hands fluttering butterflies, eyes bright, innocence
faded, but  laughing..laughing..laughing, free.

i am a skeleton,
with crumbling bones
and an irregular beating heart
on the brink of collapsing.

i am an ice cold silhouette
of a girl with sunken eyes
and shriveled lungs
slowly shrinking inside
my concaved chest.

my hips protrude like shards of glass,
shattering onto the gaps between my thighs,
and my collarbones
are sharper than knives,
slicing and dicing
a year off my life everyday.

i am a rotten corpse,
with worn out ribs
and a cracked spine
disintegrating into nothing but
ash and dust.

this is what death looks like.

i am not my own.

I used to dance alone in my room
I’d spin the spun black under needle
And turn till my walls became one
I’d stretch my face in strain
And mimic pain in movement

I’d measure arms and hands to
The waver of the music
I cried in concaved chest and
Screamed in legs splitting air,
Laughed in fingers spreading wide
And collapsed to the beat’s final throe

I became a simulated symphony, and
So became each dance;
My afternoon secret
I’d forget words and
Mesh into mangled body melody

mmmmmm those hands droning guitar and
a distant voice
in verse,
drumming, drumming

My body curled around each syllable,
Both in question and answer

It was pain, yes
It was heartache
Yes, it was beautiful
But I soon realized
It was not mine

- c

Fields of foliage green, with endless dope yields
streams of wasted life, Churchill's empire threadbare, poverty and ***** of its dignity.
I wish I could bury the soundless whispers that I seldom resite, turn off the light and with pride retire.
I see conceived walls of destitute junkies, rejected societies and abused deafness of blind philosophy, I highly rate the nostalgic plea.............
Postwar shadows of hidden government policies that call, I will, I shall, I will never.
Dust to dust, neon lights and queues to the other side, Cheque books and empty ink pens of thoughts i wish to re-sight a wasted life cannot do so............
I sentence you to a death of insanity, and still the concaved walls molded from the backs of bodies once leant, Rocking and craving I shall, I will, I know I'll return.

You had heard, and so the story ran. From where
The hills begin to rise, and then sink the ridge
In a gentle *****, down to the waters edge. Who would
Strew the turf with flowery herbage,
Or curtain the springs with green shade?
Who would sing to the Nymphs?
Can any man be guilty of such a crime?
Singing swans shall bear aloft to the stars,
Heifers browse on clover,
And swell their udders, to my song.
The Pierian maids have made a poet,
But, however, I trust them not.
I sing nothing worthy of my Emily;
Cackle as a goose among melodious Sparrows,
And here by the flowing streams,
Earth scatters her varied concaved hues;
Here white Orchids bend over cave,
Vines weave shady bowers.
Come to me; let the wild waves lash the shore.
You've heard me singing alone,
Beneath the cloudless night. My measure bathed
In loves sway; do you keep my words?

Why art, do I gaze at old constellations rising?
The stars to make fields glad with corn;
And gift grape upon the sunny hills.
Time robs us of all, even of memory; oft as a boy
I recall that song I would lay the long
Summer days to rest. Even voice itself now fails me,
Now the whole sea-plain lies still,
And eerily silent; every breath of the murmuring breeze is dead.
My last task this…, to win my dove.
Relieve me of this burden!
Can I trust my streaming eyes?
Or do lovers fashion their own dreams?

Perfect. By: Hannah Ostenberg

Puffed out cheeks, sunken eyes, raw throat, salty tears that run down my dry skin,
I am perfect.
Dry thin brittle hair, nails that are chipping away, Bruises litter my paper thin skin,
I am perfect.
Thigh gap of an inch and a half, Concaved stomach, hip bones sharp like glass, ribs so prominent that when my thin cold fingers run over them feeling every dip between, they could be strummed like a one of a kind vintage guitar making a sad melody,
I am perfect.
Heavy chest, Short breath, Numb limbs, Cold skin,To weak to get out of bed,
I am perfect.
Make up painted face, fake smiles, Daily lies, “I’m not hungry, I already ate, I’m ok, I‘m fine, I‘m just tired”  
I am perfect.
I am perfect,
I am prefect, Perfect at lying.
I am perfect.
I am perfect, Perfect at dying
I am perfect.
I am perfect, I am perfectly killing myself, but to the outside, to society, I’m just….
Perfect.
By: Hannah Ostenberg

The Lost Letter of Love-

The thunder of the busy street makes love to the vicious voices that plague my mind. Reminisce of a forgotten love still shower my inner most thoughts. Passion that once overwhelmed my life is now my reason for exhaust. The shimmers that once lit my ambition and drive now hang lightless, darker than the deepest secret. Yet the frequency of lost desire still induces the most intoxicating substance. Arms grow weary caressing forgotten times, the tears that once grew a river, are now dry beds of torment. The beautiful dawn plays in coalition with the residuals of a distant song. “Goodbye my lover” plays in harmony with the neglect of reality. Not facing demons yet displaying affection to them. Indulging in virtues once restricted by political propaganda. I am her vicious vendetta, her thoughtlessness, her absence. I lay on a bed of needles enjoying the aguish, suffering in satisfaction. The destructive thought of deserving such a decisive decision allows my mind to become a rag of lost emotion, wiping tears from the concaved steps that once bread a whirlwind of radical love. A canvas stained recklessness paints a picture of a destined solitude. No regret orchestrates a symphony of percussions, streaming beautiful sound through the hills of total regret. Awake becomes second nature, slumber slumbers with the lack of motivation to ignite the calm. Insomnia hums in a melody so righteous that the religion becomes the man. A hollow shell of broken ambition sway in the wind of self desire. The cries of the night become intoned with the cries of truth.  Instinct maps the course of self-withered illusion, illuminating the “why us” cause. A foundation of happiness holds the weight of a pessimistic engagement. While optimistic scavengers prey on the depths of endless souls. Disappointment rectifies all signatures of a so-called love. Remembering a once forgotten future claims its stakes as the eternal right. The moon holds desperate for the fortune of the unfortunate son. Unsettled disputes, take a toll on broken bodies. Broken wills dance in the limelight ignoring the forgotten pain, a laugh of retribution becomes one with inexplicit content. While saying “I love you” becomes that of explicit context, searching for the meaning between the lines. The lost letter of love shapes like the clouds in the sky only resembling something it never can be.

RICHARD ITSKOVICH

It's a quiet autumn where
your footsteps were felt last.
A cool breeze blows through
the emptiness of a concaved ribcage nest,
where once a summer boldly raged
and now the snowless winter takes its rest.

© fey (03/09/23)

you see, i've developed the front of a sheep and mind of a wolf
and concaved into myself like an irregular polygon because of the
people who roughly handled me like a last resort, never to fit in
and always to be confronted with my imperfections. these hands
are midas's opposites, converting beauty into the beast, scavenging
the bone marrow of others to keep me alive. the wall i've built up
makes the wall of china look like a scaled down model, because
the difference between jail and my ribcage is absolutely nothing.
they come hand in hand like best friends and i wish to drown the
sorrows building up in my chest with a tsunami with metaphors
that speaks of safehouses where people exist, not annihilation.

- kra

It was in the way your chest
concaved, convexed with my pulse
and with our ******; our bodies

beat rhythms into the walls
and floors; I was shaking
as your hand held up the arch

of my back. I looked up and wished
it wasn’t you so badly, I cried
and you wiped away what you saw

to be a bead of sweat from my cheek.
It was January and the heater
was broken.

Its forced, like a crow bars metal bite
Against the cold surface of my heart
Where the anxiety pries,
Hard against my insecurities,
All my bad dreams, and
Old deeds done and buried, regretted
And carried to their graves,
Never to be replicated,
Torn from there spot
At the bottom of my heart,
Blood spills, crimson dripping
Down the concaved prison.
And with all the feelings that have risen
For no good reason I feel ashamed.
When I was dyeing but survived,
I wish I had just closed my eyes
And drifted to whatever end
Suits me best and sooths anxieties
I hold in my chest.
To feel free for
Just a single day,
Be free of me and this
I confess is the brightest
Of all my pipe dreams.
Not scared with the panic of my anxieties,
always chasing me.

Tonight I sleep in the sky and fly with the stars
Shedding behind the old worn skin of the days past
Entering the safest place, my mind
And meeting the most encouraging person, myself.

I used to scream silently into the dead broken night
In the now concaved woods, that once enveloped me
And now that I have found the freedom to drop the rust covered blade
I am able to feel the pleasures of the ice cold rain

My newfound strength uplifts me
As my real self comes out, quivering with fear
I am not child nor a woman
I am a transgender man with much to live for and much to give

I maybe young but my eyes are old
I was raised to be an adult before my time
I shall rise to the occasion and give the love I have
While still leaving some to be received

I am sick of a greedy world full of pain and suffering
I am sick of my sarcastic, pessimistic values
I am dreadfully tired of the life that was handed to me
And I am ready to start anew....of my own and by myself.

Dear something to remember
Dear nothing that I knew
Was it clearly a reason to give me a clue
I’ve reworked the works of past lives
Calculated numbers to exist with mine
To reminisce on such a sweet accomplishment
Known as greed to another man’s treasure
Where thoughts could not coexist
But exist if not measured
Where jubilance is false and apt to do
Walls concaved with no place to move
Well if it’s so weird to think regardless of nothing
Then shall I cope with what’s to come?
Or have walls never been where they are or were
To a place that was never done

Three days absent of sleep.
Three days deprived of food.
Three days without direction, function, and moral collection.
Three days spent swallowed whole in the depths of plausible correction.

Oh my sweet, I fear no fate can contain this inevitable fear
buried tightly within my chest.
Concaved isolation,
bitterness consumed the best of me.

72 hours of solitariness.
72 hours of repression.
72 hours of apprehension.
72 hours of loss of consciousness.

Whispers of evergreens
chant to me.
Beige stained sheets become
nothing more than a distant memory.

Three months without you.
Three months desperate for lips,
which once caressed my *******.
Three months stripped of scalloped palms, and
crazed for circles traced across my neck.
Three months craving ocean eyes
softly speaking, “we’ll be alright.”

Warm baths filled to the brim
creamy, and delicate skins
while Chopin’s ballad danced in the twilight.
Forever delude us.
Forever spoil us.

Still 13 weeks without you.
13 weeks craving the vibrations of gentle breath,
humming me to sleep, silently sooth me.
13 weeks without fingertips tangling fine locks,
morphing into screams of our names
13 weeks without sideways smiles,
rich and modest, but assertive with simple grins.
13 weeks lusting after charcoal hair nuzzled in my chest,
Alluring arms wrapped around me.

The burden of our romance weighs my mind.
Yet, let us go make our visit, I say
to yellow smoke that lingers on streets and window-panes.
It’s time for indecisions, maybe a hundred visions with
Intoxication to bury us, exhilaration to uncover us.
There will be time to wonder, “Do I dare?
Do I dare fall back into the abyss of my mind?”
There will be time,
‘till voices wake us.

You were bright wildflowers running through forest green fields,
showering the world in sunshine, and I was the rain.
I was dark nights filled with rolling thunder and electric energy, and you were peeking through the clouds with your sunbeams.
Lilac skies and shady trees, I decided that purple just wasn't my color.
But who could ever want a sunflower in a bush of roses?

You were bright early mornings with rubbed sleepy eyes, and coffee with sugar, while I was black.
Tasteless and bitter, your cheerful moods sent me spiraling, and I was grasping for the misery that always kept me company.
Your words were sweet, like sugar, and left a bad taste in my mouth, like a poison I downed to drive out the sound of your voice in my head.

You grew flowers inside my lungs, and although they are beautiful, I can't ******* breathe.

I'm gasping for air, air, the lone reminder that I am free.

I was dark hair and dark eyes, with a heart that was chained to my independence.

You were so bright, and I destroyed you in fear of losing another.

But this universe is vast, and this earth is small, and instead of exploding, I concaved.

You should have known better darling, *I'm just a black hole.

Sad and sunken, sloppy
Reclining in their paperback seats
Heads lolling forward like they are made of
The rags they are clothed in.

Rags they sleep with. Clutched like a child's
Blankie to hold them down on the
Concrete bed made from their cold and hard
Voice,
But soft words, that built their bones
And concaved skulls, empty but

Open like a bowl to be filled,
Like their stomachs will remain unfilled,
Like their stomachs
Decaying,
Un-used and un-taught.

Soft, sloping, shoulders,
Slick but slump tongue,
Too heavy at the base of their throats
To speak and sigh,
They sway in their hollow frames
And sink lower in the cold.

over 95% of the ocean has been undiscovered, and
i wonder if i'm the only one who is so curious to
see the unknown depths where sea creatures adapt
and confine to the dark, it is a wonder that they
have not had any second thoughts about the sunlight.
i wonder if i'm the only one who is so curious to get
into the minds of these creatures, who are so afraid
of the light as i am. maybe they're not afraid at all.
maybe they have grown accustomed to the darkness.
perhaps it's a way to hide and shelter from the predators
so the most vulnerable do not become the prey as i have.
i wonder if i was destined to be the sun and yourself
the ocean, the world's biggest juxtaposition. maybe i
wasn't careful with my high and mighty position up
there on cloud nine and abused it, because all i do is
reach for the safety of your ocean, and wish for the
calm waters to envelope the parts of me that just
leaves third degree burns and people rubbing aloe
vera onto their skin. when i reached down to grab you,
the waters in the ocean shifted vehemently, and the sea
animals concaved into the darkness of the waters i may
never get to touch. over 95% of the ocean hasn't been
discovered, and i know only 5% of what the ocean
has to offer. over time, you have become a close
relative to this metaphor. i've went from discovering
95% of your brain patterns to only 5%. i am merely a
whirlwind of rain in your hydrophobic world, and
all i want to do is be your umbrella even if the rain
is acidic and burns me the way i burn everyone
else and leave people rubbing aloe vera onto their
skin. to this day, i have navigated only 5% of your
uncharted waters, and some days i want to swim
further down and risk swimming in the same sea
with the sharks just to figure out the type of person
you are. that's what being friends with you now feels like.

- kra

Hovering around the Cold White Dragon I review my day in calories
120
12
50
100
And pounds
1
2
3
5
I feel the weight
Heavy
Overbearing
Crushing
I see it in my face
In my flesh
In my cheeks
In the places where
I wish they concaved
I feel the spaces in between
My ribs
My thighs
I feel the sharp jut of
My hip bones
My collarbones
My wrist bones
The Cold White Dragon
Is calling to me
It is yelling for me
It is in my brain
It is in my eyes
It is in my sight
I kneel and give in
To the Cold White Dragon
Once again.

I was lethargic in lullabies

spotlight saturated and speechless

concaved cushions and dim lit kingdoms

fell away inside a chemical nap

I came here hoping for clarity

I found the same chaos rebranded

Imagination measured in concrete stretches

factories inspire assembly line portraits

The painters where all noble fiends

sketching skies for pleasant company

Still these habitats prove overwhelmed

exhausted figures faint from consumption

Familiar anatomy
Familiar tragedy

Calming colors on a brickwork spread

I move through their pauses

A mind full of static
A pocket full of amphetamines
Artificial antics from plus sign suitors

While supplies last the mind will not grasp the severity of such resolve

Unless it's contrived and longs for the fringe

Accommodating dust damp bunkers and fallout nooks

Temporary ploys  
Projectile toys

What savage means for elation

Reality conducts seamless sickness

primitive surgery for existing

Confusion now for these faces and graces that perpetually stream

Conclusions now for a sigh that never speaks

I woke up laughing

tripping over notions of full circle lunacy

Reminding me why I never sleep

With the sky’s blood stiffening
                  & plugging the holes in its felt fabric
I admitted what I’d known for a bit too long.

It was 19:24 when I told my best friend
                  how I’d had an anxiety attack in Poetry 310,
how I’d pulled back from the terrible ricocheting
                  bullet whizzing into each synapse, an attempt
to distract my analytical thought patterns seizing up &
                 found my limbs convulsing without command,
my breaths zipping past my lips, 100mph in a 30mph zone.

My father had emotionally abused me & I found out
                  about 14:00, staring at a wealth of information,
how emotional abuse affects kids and I was gazing

into my own scars with chewed up cheeks.
Do you know instant inabilities, froth the mouth,
lashed to ceiling, concaved roundabouts? Belligerent
                companions,  I thought didn’t exist, not like this.
Not like how I’ve been told. Hadrian, short for Josh, short
for Navan’s boyfriend, at least in most stories.
It was almost 22:00 when she snapchatted me, eyes broken:

I want to commit suicide. It was 23:02 when the police called,
& 8:47 when she thanked me. The blood,
my blood, braced for impact, was this going to be my first time?

Do you remember your first friend’s suicide? I haven’t yet.
But waiting is nostalgic, counting taps of my foot.
Bleating for help, cry wolf, cry & die. Stonewall had enough
death seamlessly woven into history textbooks. Say,
maybe I ought to up & lie about tension riddled bodies when
my parents materialize. Afraid’s a word I studied
until it memorized contours of misshapen, looming, dried out

pride. Baked in the imprint of my fingertips, bruised, bashed,
cantered to lissome ledges overseeing basket-sized lakes.
Now it’s 14:58 & the lights won’t turn on & tunnels don’t mind

loamy silences with crippled arteries.

Depression is a cage.

In the brilliant turning of foliage, a ripe green to a fervid red, a weighty dread follows close as a shadow
and grows longer,
tenacious.
I'll be cajoled into six sides of jointed aluminum
shrinking on the daily
until my lungs are flat and stiff as a starched collar.
My chest is concaved, a ******* wound.
I am prisoner to my elements.
Stockholm syndrome
And I can only succumb
to the unsettling security in immobility.
This cage provides my structure,
and I grow accustomed to it
Giving in to its indifference

A dismal awakening in
six moons
and the hatch door springs open.
I'm anxious and cursing the piercing golden beams for
my muscles have atrophied
and a faint memory of bipedal motion comes rolling in.
The cage disappears
But I'm weak, immobile still and
resentful of this freedom
and the work it requires.
Slowly I wiggle my toes, I turn side to side
and listen for the cracks and pops of my fragile frame, harnessing a solar energy.
Feeling returns, filling the concavity in my chest.
Im flooded.
Free now
but timid
My skeleton is dusty from disuse
I stretch and cry out.
Tendons, ligaments regaining their power
Breath returns and
I turn towards the Sun and exhale fully, sending sparks flying.
In respiration, though, I note that static fear, warning me that my liberation comes with a debt.
I am eternal animate obligation.

clause for peace now a trolls ignorant fiesta once was widely traded now is slaved for civilized postering concaved into subjugated plasticized lies while elite have feast what's left shinking privileged every color doing battle on market floors flooding sea shores and healthy cells with waste on sale to the hospital war or jail spend for more wars effectively killing eachother live life less in such haste compete "wasted turn" no ones gain insane pushing away any chance for lost causes stooped vessel of pollution deplete indigenous snuffed out sell fruit from carts pushed away health wealth gentifified packaged **** genocide resulting right to life bid lost television lies create comedies laughing blinding crys for cheers and sigh at the sports show snorting blow emerged  **** show cancer feeding frenzy hardly know care apathetic slaves lost aren't brave enough leave the lie hide more die stay destroy leave save absolutely nothing slow suicide these charities steeling minds hooked on prime time continue do nothing duped for some fiat money doing something captalism scheme elitist ******* conned amerikkkian screams gagged out choke knees master anything you want just feed more ***** Babylon here again keep buying what they're selling ******* cowards echos for eons ensuring the repetitions needed idiots eventually listen remeber trying save from utter ruin lifetimes this nightmare all cave for swinging door looking nice at what price cheap thrills much sacrificed borrow you'll pay back twice in sorrow respect life common place for fellowship and development of kind things not this savage conflict of interest for the few who hoard the riches blind eyes see a different reality when smoke is cleared and in mirrors you see another being just trying as you to be apart something uplifting under the weight of it all we must crack storm casteles pillars empires will fall until that day we'll never have a chance learn share in it all until  empires fall We'll continue to craw for all existance until resistance cripples the few who have been bullies to all

All work and no play
seems to make up my days
as I slave away
to a concaved system of change
I wanted to grow up until I didn't
and there's a demon on my shoulder just sitting
making my outlook is bleak which is fitting
but don't mind me he claims I'm just sipping
a drink to help me think
as I blink
the world fades
into a stage
a masquerade
where we all stay
in the void
it's a ploy
that we convince ourselves is fine
if I had a dime
for every time
that I claimed I could fly
I would lift my wings and do so

myself
with me
as I go
in the same shoes
though they’ve
grown larger
through the years
are miry
and full of tears

I carry
my pain
deep inside my chest
my chest concaved
and that shaved years off
my life

I carry
the past
in an hourglass
looking at the grains of sand fall
slow on the days I’m restless
faster on the days, with you
till I shattered the glass
and all the grains spewed

I carry
the weight
of this world
upon my back
like a gunny sack
filled with rocks
and obnoxious things
on such a petite frame
till I cut the strings

People live their whole lives in denial,
The influence that they have surrendered themselves too,
The wicked ways of desire,
Teardrops,
Trickling and splashing,
Moving and growing,
Consuming and consumed by the waves of my heart,
Silent tsunami raging and turning into a war inside,
So that a tilt of my head turns the rushing waters through my tear ducts,
I hold my head high,
For I may never make a move,
My chin must stay broad to the sun,
Never swivering my lips,
My jaw says speaking words of relief but they never find home,
They search forever,
The amazement of ability,
Concaved and twisted,
Thrown into the wind,
These morals that I used to sit on my shoulder,
The pedestal I sat on until reality,
Or a dangerous mockery of it kicked me off,
Now, this weight I feel on my back is crushing,
My stomach cramps,
My knees five out,
My spine cracking and I used everything I have,
To move forward,
To live in a vigorous tyrant,
Giant hole in the wall that my fist could not help but make,
The laws of gravity pulling me down,
Holding on, Crawling, Limping,
My willpower,
I whisper words,
"Let Go, even for a second, Let Go"
And so I do
My head hangs down and as it does
These tears apart of something more than anyone can see,
They fall onto my keyboard
Splashing the keys and sparking up,
Misguided, unworthy hope
Things might get better as I shoot you a text,
With no response to match it,
"Hi."

I was born a windstorm
with a squall as my blanket
and a scud for a cap I’d spent hours
taking a blustery nap.

I met you in a blast.
You were such a shock wave –
two spirits concaved
in a tempestuous puff we doused the light

a tumultuous rush had us blacken
the white
blow after blow, we were a flurry
I was your gale; you my eddy
The turbulence worn thin
as a wafer

I ate you for breakfast
and deadened the flavor
now you hang over me as mist
and I stand as a tempest
in need of a kiss.