sara left me on the 14th of may,
while my mentor laid dying,
while my debt went unpaid.

over routine coffee and cigarette,
she watched the flimsy fabric
of my flesh
catch flame.

she floated away
to ricochet off summer lions,
whose pride lies between their
worn thighs.

i planted heavy.
aged a century in a week of
wine, infomercials, and hospital
calls.

every mutual friend i asked
about sara's condition,
told me to leave her be,
cast me in creep status.

my beard grows gnarly.
my smoldered remnants
held together by cobwebs.
and everything i ever loved
is on its deathbed.

do you know
why babies scream
soon as their lungs
begin to breathe?

could you tell me
why old men smile
lying on deathbeds
exhaling life?

i think we gasp as
soon as we leave
our sole protection
that's when some of us
inhale hard, some
harder than others
and from then on
depending on
how much we let
into our lungs
we spend our lives
exhaling slowly
for days on end

until the end  
when we find ourselves
lying on deathbeds

we scream no more
no,
we smile instead
exhaling faster
because we know
we have nothing
to fear in life

after death.

- end

The rat-terrier
that I’d loved for
over a decade
has been dead for
awhile now.


Sometimes I miss that dog.
Sometimes I miss cigarettes.

My America is now
the go-to destination
for the suicide-bomber
or
The Mass-Shooting Machine


All of this national abomination
has become all too normal.
&
why is any of this
at all attached,
in any way,
to our
Easter-Sunday-Church-Going
morals?

Tragedy,
a travesty,
trustworthy humans.
-untrue-
mistrustful,
unworthy misogynist,
malcontents
lacking empathy.

Unpaid checks,
no gravity -
a lacking of grateful
hearts.


Our ears destined,
designed, dedicated to hearing
only the hurtful,
instead of the healing.

On the take -
take or be taken
fake or be faking-
make or be made-
scapegoated,
goaded into submission
leaving
us wondering
just what,
exactly is so bad
about hate.

I mean everyone’s doing it these days;
and no one seems to be doing it wrong.

Maybe that’ll change
once we’re on our
deathbeds.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2021

Fear too is an epidemic, it stretches out like
An incubation period for a kind of doom
Population control, whispered a silent elite
Who engineer our wallets, our GMO food, our futures

Ebola was a convenient way, of making us fear
Who we once were again, black as a Nigerian
We died alone in deathbeds, isolated plastic containers
For who we once were, our organs giving out

Infection was a spider hand, MSM gave us
False positives, but could the main-stream-media
Be trusted any longer? Wasn’t this just a matter
Of time, an algorithm set loose upon the billions?

Fear is that place, where people go in adversity
It’s hypnotic like an audience at a concert
It’s contagious how the will for self-preservation can spread
Fight of flee, but where to run, out of the cities?

The new normal is a kind of paranoia
While we watch the situation very closely
Every hour there is underground news about
Another case in another country, Ebola isn’t

Your grandmother that only likes good climates
She’s an engineered hypothesis of how mobility
Causes any true pandemic to become a flamboyant outbreak
The comet that signals black plagues has been seen

Fear too is a weapon, when you can’t stop the world
Because it’s too costly to do so, and you can’t
Tell the world not to fly because we’re too free
We left Africa a long time ago, but who among us
Would stand 20 meters from their open graves?

I think about old faces, you were a friend to me then
I try to think harder though, where have those memories been?
More faces coming through, sticking less with every pass
I can't say that I would hope that these new memories last.
Not in a sad time, not stuck in a place of hurt.
I just feel like I can't remember the good times to weigh the worth.
These new times, are something hollow, empty and void of feeling
No sleepless nights, but I find my self always staring towards the ceiling
So revealing, makes me notice my true emotions deep inside
Always telling jokes and laughing but right now we rewind.

I think about old faces, you were a friend to me then
I try to think harder though, where have those memories been?
More faces coming through, sticking less with every pass
I can't say that I would hope that these new memories last.
People say memories fade, others say memories last
I'd like to think that I could leave memories in the past
I don't want to cling to them like that's the only thing I have
But is it really bad? I guess you can say I'm home sick
Not missing my residence but missing where I've been
Reminiscing about the things that I have left on my journey
But they're not on their deathbeds, they're just on a gurney
Now do I save them, make sure that they are never forgotten?
If they start to fade for new memories should I stop them?
I feel like I need to answer quick, like I'm running out of time
I could keep stressing but right now, we rewind.


I think about old faces, you were a friend to me then
I try to think harder though, where have those memories been?
More faces coming through, sticking less with every pass
I can't say that I would hope that these new memories last.
I miss the days where I didn't have to miss my days
Where I could express myself in different ways
But this is today. Prattling words to my self
Not sharing my feelings, not sharing the wealth
I vent in stealth, not letting all the friends of me hear it
As if I'm ashamed, like I think my enemy is my spirit
You're hearing me in these lyrics, I'm embodied in the words you see
This is me in these lyrics, feelings and words, you see?
So if you're feeling my words, that means you're feeling me
So if you think that I'm a clown, this is the realest me
So this is real you see, no false words from the mind
I could keep on going but right now, we rewind.


I think about old faces, you were a friend to me then
I try to think harder though, where have those memories been?
More faces coming through, sticking less with every pass
I can't say that I would hope that these new memories last.
Where does the time go? I feel it slipping by me
I feel like my biggest problem now is I keep rewinding
So you may find me, reminiscing about the time before
Or catch me on a good day and I'll be rhyming more
Keeping myself in good spirits, while I find the path
Watching my life just add up, because well, life is math
Memories fade, because we subtract those things from the past
But it only happens to us, because we have something to add
So nothing is bad. Memory? I'll live all the good times with it in me
How much space do I have for the good times? Infinity.
No more time to rewind, I guess I have nothing left to say.
I guess the only thing left to do now is. Press Play.

The bows glided down, and the coast
Blackened with birds took a last look
At his thrashing hair and whale-blue eye;
The trodden town rang its cobbles for luck.

Then good-bye to the fishermanned
Boat with its anchor free and fast
As a bird hooking over the sea,
High and dry by the top of the mast,

Whispered the affectionate sand
And the bulwarks of the dazzled quay.
For my sake sail, and never look back,
Said the looking land.

Sails drank the wind, and white as milk
He sped into the drinking dark;
The sun shipwrecked west on a pearl
And the moon swam out of its hulk.

Funnels and masts went by in a whirl.
Good-bye to the man on the sea-legged deck
To the gold gut that sings on his reel
To the bait that stalked out of the sack,

For we saw him throw to the swift flood
A girl alive with his hooks through her lips;
All the fishes were rayed in blood,
Said the dwindling ships.

Good-bye to chimneys and funnels,
Old wives that spin in the smoke,
He was blind to the eyes of candles
In the praying windows of waves

But heard his bait buck in the wake
And tussle in a shoal of loves.
Now cast down your rod, for the whole
Of the sea is hilly with whales,

She longs among horses and angels,
The rainbow-fish bend in her joys,
Floated the lost cathedral
Chimes of the rocked buoys.

Where the anchor rode like a gull
Miles over the moonstruck boat
A squall of birds bellowed and fell,
A cloud blew the rain from its throat;

He saw the storm smoke out to ****
With fuming bows and ram of ice,
Fire on starlight, rake Jesu's stream;
And nothing shone on the water's face

But the oil and bubble of the moon,
Plunging and piercing in his course
The lured fish under the foam
Witnessed with a kiss.

Whales in the wake like capes and Alps
Quaked the sick sea and snouted deep,
Deep the great bushed bait with raining lips
Slipped the fins of those humpbacked tons

And fled their love in a weaving dip.
Oh, Jericho was falling in their lungs!
She nipped and dived in the nick of love,
Spun on a spout like a long-legged ball

Till every beast blared down in a swerve
Till every turtle crushed from his shell
Till every bone in the rushing grave
Rose and crowed and fell!

Good luck to the hand on the rod,
There is thunder under its thumbs;
Gold gut is a lightning thread,
His fiery reel sings off its flames,

The whirled boat in the burn of his blood
Is crying from nets to knives,
Oh the shearwater birds and their boatsized brood
Oh the bulls of Biscay and their calves

Are making under the green, laid veil
The long-legged beautiful bait their wives.
Break the black news and paint on a sail
Huge weddings in the waves,

Over the wakeward-flashing spray
Over the gardens of the floor
Clash out the mounting dolphin's day,
My mast is a bell-spire,

Strike and smoothe, for my decks are drums,
Sing through the water-spoken prow
The octopus walking into her limbs
The polar eagle with his tread of snow.

From salt-lipped beak to the kick of the stern
Sing how the seal has kissed her dead!
The long, laid minute's bride drifts on
Old in her cruel bed.

Over the graveyard in the water
Mountains and galleries beneath
Nightingale and hyena
Rejoicing for that drifting death

Sing and howl through sand and anemone
Valley and sahara in a shell,
Oh all the wanting flesh his enemy
Thrown to the sea in the shell of a girl

Is old as water and plain as an eel;
Always good-bye to the long-legged bread
Scattered in the paths of his heels
For the salty birds fluttered and fed

And the tall grains foamed in their bills;
Always good-bye to the fires of the face,
For the crab-backed dead on the sea-bed rose
And scuttled over her eyes,

The blind, clawed stare is cold as sleet.
The tempter under the eyelid
Who shows to the selves asleep
Mast-high moon-white women naked

Walking in wishes and lovely for shame
Is dumb and gone with his flame of brides.
Susannah's drowned in the bearded stream
And no-one stirs at Sheba's side

But the hungry kings of the tides;
Sin who had a woman's shape
Sleeps till Silence blows on a cloud
And all the lifted waters walk and leap.

Lucifer that bird's dropping
Out of the sides of the north
Has melted away and is lost
Is always lost in her vaulted breath,

Venus lies star-struck in her wound
And the sensual ruins make
Seasons over the liquid world,
White springs in the dark.

Always good-bye, cried the voices through the shell,
Good-bye always, for the flesh is cast
And the fisherman winds his reel
With no more desire than a ghost.

Always good luck, praised the finned in the feather
Bird after dark and the laughing fish
As the sails drank up the hail of thunder
And the long-tailed lightning lit his catch.

The boat swims into the six-year weather,
A wind throws a shadow and it freezes fast.
See what the gold gut drags from under
Mountains and galleries to the crest!

See what clings to hair and skull
As the boat skims on with drinking wings!
The statues of great rain stand still,
And the flakes fall like hills.

Sing and strike his heavy haul
Toppling up the boatside in a snow of light!
His decks are drenched with miracles.
Oh miracle of fishes! The long dead bite!

Out of the urn a size of a man
Out of the room the weight of his trouble
Out of the house that holds a town
In the continent of a fossil

One by one in dust and shawl,
Dry as echoes and insect-faced,
His fathers cling to the hand of the girl
And the dead hand leads the past,

Leads them as children and as air
On to the blindly tossing tops;
The centuries throw back their hair
And the old men sing from newborn lips:

Time is bearing another son.
**** Time! She turns in her pain!
The oak is felled in the acorn
And the hawk in the egg kills the wren.

He who blew the great fire in
And died on a hiss of flames
Or walked the earth in the evening
Counting the denials of the grains

Clings to her drifting hair, and climbs;
And he who taught their lips to sing
Weeps like the risen sun among
The liquid choirs of his tribes.

The rod bends low, divining land,
And through the sundered water crawls
A garden holding to her hand
With birds and animals

With men and women and waterfalls
Trees cool and dry in the whirlpool of ships
And stunned and still on the green, laid veil
Sand with legends in its ****** laps

And prophets loud on the burned dunes;
Insects and valleys hold her thighs hard,
Times and places grip her breast bone,
She is breaking with seasons and clouds;

Round her trailed wrist fresh water weaves,
with moving fish and rounded stones
Up and down the greater waves
A separate river breathes and runs;

Strike and sing his catch of fields
For the surge is sown with barley,
The cattle graze on the covered foam,
The hills have footed the waves away,

With wild sea fillies and soaking bridles
With salty colts and gales in their limbs
All the horses of his haul of miracles
Gallop through the arched, green farms,

Trot and gallop with gulls upon them
And thunderbolts in their manes.
O Rome and ***** To-morrow and London
The country tide is cobbled with towns

And steeples pierce the cloud on her shoulder
And the streets that the fisherman combed
When his long-legged flesh was a wind on fire
And his **** was a hunting flame

Coil from the thoroughfares of her hair
And terribly lead him home alive
Lead her prodigal home to his terror,
The furious ox-killing house of love.

Down, down, down, under the ground,
Under the floating villages,
Turns the moon-chained and water-wound
Metropolis of fishes,

There is nothing left of the sea but its sound,
Under the earth the loud sea walks,
In deathbeds of orchards the boat dies down
And the bait is drowned among hayricks,

Land, land, land, nothing remains
Of the pacing, famous sea but its speech,
And into its talkative seven tombs
The anchor dives through the floors of a church.

Good-bye, good luck, struck the sun and the moon,
To the fisherman lost on the land.
He stands alone in the door of his home,
With his long-legged heart in his hand.

It’s strangely busy around the deathbeds,
as well it’s my last nightshift of the year.
I try to make no noise, can you hear me?
Push my hand, if you can, move a limb.
Your breath is so slow, please keep going,
monitors flash in time with the ventilator.
I’ll control the pupils, I know it’s blinding.
No one goes with their sparkling old eyes,
we are usually fading before we are dying.

We, the invisible reasons for your problems, blind ourselves to the
dismal inevitability that we will
suffocate because you refuse to stop
the pillaging of the future for the sake of your own ******* lineage being able to further itself and potentially give you a chance to again close your mind and scream as loud as you can when confronted with your own toxicity

We, the ones who humbly take the bludgeoning from your self-proclaimed pious hand, know these chains are only on your bleeding wrists and ankles.

We, the silent and the broken, know Santa Muerta by the nicknames she had in college and all accompanying wildness she brought in her wake.
We still will stroke your hair while you
throw your tantrums and wail about what is and isn't fair on your deathbeds.

We will burn the mattress and all while cheering you on on your flight into the night sky you ignored for a lifetime.

We, the servants of streaming digits and stewards of bottled stardust, will create stories about how it wasn't your fault and how you shouldn't be hated for bringing the world crashing into the excrement of wasted potential so our children know there was a choice to be made.

We, the overly polite pariahs pry laughs and love and lust and learning from looming catastrophe like Burroughs writing Naked Lunch with a glassy eyed stare that burned holes in the veil hiding the tide of partially coagulated blood and ******* that YOUR world preached as milk and honey.

We, the proof in the moldy pudding still finding time to rot, will burn tobacco fields in your honor just to dance while getting drunk on the breaths you'll never waste.

We, the lovers of questions and haters of creeds, let tears stream in the hope that they are not considered part of our body's 75 percent while fantasizing about your ghosts seeing them and the dehydration they may be in spite of and quiet your tired old yelling and shaking of fists at the clouds when overcome by the slight sadness that whispers "its too late" lovingly into your ear.

We, the lovers, the thieves, the reviled, the *******, the witches, the junkies, the ******, the reptiles and worms under the rocks society deems unusable and misshapen, will be the ones lifting the crowns off your corpses and throwing them high as graduates do when full of a hope only ever dashed by themselves.

We, the drooling monsters you vehemently deny anything besides the cramped closets or the space between bed and floor in childhood bedrooms, will be the Valkyries to descend onto the blood-choked battlefield you set aside for your souls to suffer on and offer you respite in the form of soggy bread and wildflower honey while  ravens and jackdaws bicker over the eyes and fingers of those that once showed us how to ride a bike or drunkenly beat us beneath our favorite trees or touched us in dark rooms in ways that would chase Love away from the shadow of our hearts until we finally climbed high enough to see it all as someone screaming of war and bravery while running from the sound of steel biting steal because their protectors talked so highly of honor and duty that it seemed as if it were God and Adam touching fingertips on the arched ceilings of youth. that, then was painted on the crumbling walls of abandoned houses they would secretly indulge on the forbidden fruit soaking pages of a faded **** magazines or up skirts of blushing  girls who put on their mother's prudishness until fingers pushed past
cotton and virtue alike to the warm center they both melted in.

We, the unsung and numb, walk in spirals while the complexity you rebuked as devil-born becomes the sigils of yet-to-be kingdoms bringing about golden age after golden age in the distant mists rolling over hills and valleys of memories of moments yet to coalesce into rigid experience.

We, the eyes weeping blood atop crumbling pyramids, have seen the walls you want to build in futures dissolved in the winds blowing dust over the dream-roads we skip down and how it resembles the one you built to keep your heart from breaking from the pressing mass of what you can't file away as noise or heresy or communist propaganda;
We drew throbbing ***** and dripping ***** on all the blueprints we came across and tucked them back into the secret compartments of wardrobes and roll-tops passed down through generations.

We, the keepers of the singing stones you traded for cheap concrete, will embrace the tiny souls you neglected out of ignorance to the existential snake oil pitch you broke every tooth biting down on all because the salesman reminded you of your drunk father or mother imposing their wills like you make shadow puppets dance on peeling wallpaper in the silence that ensued after they had passed out on creaky couches reeking of Lucky Strikes and spilled ***** while the shine of the staticky T.V. set covered them like the blanket no one ever put over their slumbering forms because of those infinite lists of excuses used to skirt the skirmishes of showing any kind compassion even if they alone were sole witness to it.

We, the pieces of self the deathbed "you" sent hurtling backwards through time to shine lights on the siege seething at the gates of what you stand for, are only holding those lanterns to show you that fleeing is futile and your death is just a hallway with a door that leads to the knowledge that life is not a cell to watch time morph into tally lines scratched into cold stone as if they were epitaphs for the seconds bet and lost at the roulette table crafted from any slave ship the ocean never swallowed.

We, the flames mimicking those dancing girls you longed to have squeal under the idea of your thrusting masculinity amidst the graffiti on the bathroom stalls in seedy dive-bars or the paupers playing prince you follow giggling with hope in hand like a bouquet of baby's breath and daisies for that one day they would stop and turn and smile so handsomely that your knees would shatter against one another and wedding chapels would bend down to tie tin cans to bumpers of beat up Buicks and Oldsmobiles your fathers give dowry and the crowd could watch "just married" poorly written in shaving cream on the back window grow small until it disappeared over the horizon.

We, the dreamers, are tired of sleeping and are in need of a old tree to swing from, to bury our dreams like beloved pets under, and watch as it lets its leaves fall to the hungry earth that is more patient then anyone closed eyed and humming ancient syllables beneath crooked branches could ever be.

All the trees you climbed and kicked and fell in love under have died from too many hearts around intials being carved into them or were used to make fascist pamphlets you yourself passed out at churchs mistaking the mask with bone structure or the river for the people it swept to sea.

We are laughing;
like a loving mother at her clumsiness on display in her cackling child and not like the crowds gazing at the sideshow stage as the curtains pull back and stage lights illuminating John Merrick's flesh and the intricate dissonance it lent to minds.
Minds that afforded only sips of bliss as monotonous stints on factory floors but were preached about like they were some heaven-sent golden cobblestones laid lovingly all the way
to the beach where Heimdall will one day sound his horn, one foot feeling the grit of the edge of the world and the other washed clean for the grave we will all step in.

So, all these words, all these images, all of it is intended to be a moon so all the stagnate tide pools that have forgotten their origin and the freedom they used to give form to lesser forms they forage forgetfulness from.

We, the ones beneath you on the climb to the summit of our collective potential, beg you to think of something beside yourself when taking a ****.

It is not just ******* in the wind if there isnt wind and we are right below you and dying of thirst.

It is not an inalienable right if someone else is deprived of the same.

It is not Heaven's gate if the brilliant gild has a melting point or if it remains latched to any soul's approach.

It is not "liberal *******" or a myth if whole flocks of birds fall from the sky or schools of fish wash up on beaches while people snap photographs for their feed.

It is not "god" if love dispels it like smoke hanging in the kitchens your great grandmother sat in and told you about a witch shapeshifting into dogs without heads to scare drunks stumbling home because she was a ******* racist.

It is not just food if someone's organs fail from starvation that even the worms and flies are free from.

You wave your banners and let your war-horns echo and you wear your ignorance as armor.

We, the eaters of life and death, will chisel a name into stone and pick your bones clean if you think we should march to the sounds of drums and trumpets just because you were stupid enough to think it was anything other than your masters convincing you to whip yourselves ****** because "at least God hath been kind enough to give you a purpose" or "he works in mysterious ways".

**** that.

Look at what it has brought out of the swirling sea of " all that could be" while you write the same song about how shiny and numerous the scales of the prize are.

We are not responsible for pillaging God's bounty.

We are the bounty and our emptiness and lack of foresight are in jeweled bowls at your feet, but in your hubris you believe it to be the slaves that come to wash the dirt from between your toes.

We are Death and She is the wet-nurse that will give us intimacy to fertilize our hearts by refusing us her breast but turning our heads to your silhouettes shambling off the edge of existence far off in the distance only a decade or less could be confused for.

[AS ONE VOICE WE SING/SANG/HOWL:
Lux amor potentia restituant propositum dei in terris.]

As if it were as easy as holding the hand of a dying tyrant afraid they cannot the luminous terminus while wearing your father's face as a mask to trick radiant angels or the contortions of gods reeking of struck matches by those trembling and their swirling black hearts closed to the breeze carrying leaves celebrating their liberation and caressing a cheek they were too ashamed to kiss when opportunity was their ally.

We shouldn't hate these piles of skulls all parroting the same axioms to those who only show up to add another or leave an empty bottle turned into a candle holder, wax dripped down the neck and froze before any trace of tallow could finally unite with the dirt it longs to become one with;
icicles hanging from the eaves of abandoned asylums.

This place was supposed to be alot of things but that is what lead THEM to drown in the sound of buzzing bees, birdsong, and abundance in all directions.

I suggest we stop trying to squeeze it into a shoebox we scribbled Promised Land on and just let it be the open armed paradise it inherently is.
Let it be the heart and home as well as the hostile territory because it is only ever that and what we wont find in any Oracle's Prophecy.

I'll end my rambling with a question and it's answer.

How do you turn a police station into a hospital and a schoolhouse?

Burn it to the ******* ground.

A bird glides gracefully whilst the discolored leaves are aflutter
   In the wind that rocks the cold rotted wood of the window's shutter;
   All while the obstructive trees cause the wind’s speech to stutter.
   Yet she still howls with an intense pressure on me chest; I can barely utter
   My feelings toward this heavy air of eeriness about me—
   Nearly as heavy as the insignificance in the noose of the tree—
   A decomposed mutilation of all that is good, hung for all to see—
   A shriveled neck and half-dissolved eyes that still long to be free—
   The blood long lost, the body now pale—why does it stress?
   Why is life in its eyes, why does it shrug off Death’s caress?
   And as the sun is fully blotted by the black clouds, unfatigued,
   A hot stench like the enhancement of rotten fruit—yet I am intrigued—
   Descends upon me with the force of a vise equipped with knives—
   ‘Tis the horror of what only the spirits of the dead can contrive.
  
   And visions—horrible visions!—overwhelm me and present terrors:—!
   Rain steadily falls and patters incessantly upon an accursed Earth;
   Surrounding the hanging man are graves—and so begins the second birth:—!
   The tombstones crack and crumble into hundreds of jagged stones;
   An earthquake manifests quickly, and violently rattled my bones
   And remorselessly disembowels the Earth of the trees’ roots;
   Suddenly far more prominent is the awful stench of the fruits;
   An unsettling revelation is brought to my undivided attention:
   The tombstones’ collapse and the earthquake are not in relation,
   But the earthquake is a result of monsters unleashing their power.
   And the tombstones—but what of the tombstones’ fall?
   Startled, I see that replacing the hanging man is a voodoo doll,
   Dancing with its tiny limbs and smiling nonstop, locking its black eyes
   On my horrified self; I cringe and tremble in this demonic guise.
   A screeching note erupts from its unmoving mouth; it hovers in the air
   While I am frightfully dehumanized by the doll’s inexorable stare.
   While the screech lingers, the wet soil of the graves shifts quietly,
   The noise of splitting, wet dirt drowned out by the screech of cruelty.
   As it becomes clear the voodoo doll’s dance is one of conjuring,
   ’Tis revealed to me that the tombstones fell because of remembering:
   The dead do not believe they should be remembered, reflected upon...
   The second birth’s process is agonizingly long as I become wan.
   But before I nearly faint—and leave the visions—I receive an unwanted help:
   The doll’s gesticulations are directed toward me; even so, she raises Hell.
   My mind is frightfully clear to see all before me, and the dizziness has left.
   Oh, why these visions? Why with this horrible curse I am blessed?
  
   I am met with the most terrifying sight of all; my heart quickens.
   As the rain falls harder and begins to puddle, my blood thickens
   And very nearly ceases to flow as I watch the dead come to life.
   Gnarled fingers, some broken and some missing, ignore Death’s inflicted strife.
   Fingers—disjointed, protruding in random directions, treelike;
   Grime under the fingernails—fingernails, chipped or long spikes;
   Hardly any flesh on the old, ***** bones; muscles dripping off.
   Bodies, mutilated by natural decomposition, burst with raging coughs
   From the eviscerated Earth, black with age, red with dried blood.
   The dead, limping and holding what organs they still have, slip in the mud,
   Fall, fill their empty ribcages with it, and scream as limbs are torn away;
   Scream, as they are free from the grave, the path that led them astray.
  
   Oh, the feelings of dread that are eroding my scarred mind!
   What awful horrors have I stumbled upon, what did I find?
   One undead woman is staring at me with unfortunately soulless eyes;
   A few long hairs messily fall from her shriveled head, infested with flies,
   And her eyes—oh, her eyes!—are as small as raisins, wrinkly and white;
   They hover in her sockets, the skull only half-covered—pure fright!—
   With dead skin. Why is her toothless skull grinning mischievously?
   Is she enjoying my terror that leaves my trembling grievously?
   Abruptly, the still, deformed grotesquerie releases a sickening gurgle
   And violently shakes, as if under some overwhelming mental struggle.
   Her jaw falls open, unattended from the necessary muscles’ absence,
   And screaming laughter flows out of her agape mouth; malevolence
   Seeps from it in the form of pitchy black smoke and tightens the air.
   And all the while is still her unfailing, gut-wrenching stare!
   Her chest, dilapidated from the Earth's engulfment of her, explodes—
   A black skeletal hand, emerging from the body that was its abode—
   A demon, a black skeleton, blood gushing from its mouth, fire in its eyes—
   And tattered wings spread as the screamer takes to the hellish skies.
   It hovers around the dancing voodoo doll, circling her,
   Worshipping the smiling thing that was sewn with maleficence and fear.
  
   “But what are these things?” I ask as the undead congregate.
   “Is this how horrible life will be beyond Hell’s gates?”
   But it is made revealed to me that the people are eternal
   Inhabitants of Hell—Hell inside me; the spiritual realm is internal.
   “Why do they gather around the doll and bow in submission?”
   But, to my dismay, there is no answer to this deathly war of attrition.
  
   “Vultures!” I hear, a thunderous, wicked voice from up above.
   “You do not know what you are to believe, or what to love!”
   The dead dance in slow, uncoordinated movements, circling
   The doll. Even the shadows ominously flicker, no longer lurking.
   The black demon floats and gestures to the moaning dead,
   Beckoning them to rise from their permanent deathbeds
   To chant and flail their measly arms in worship of the voodoo.
   What have I done to be cast into this dangerous world askew?
   “You are a vulture, searching helplessly for something to feast
   “When the desperate hunger is turning you into the demons’ beast.
   “And when the food is gone, you search for your next dying idol.
   “For you, the inevitable conquest for falsities will never be final.”
  
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
  
   The room of a once peaceful dwelling is a victim of an apocalypse:—
   ‘Tis as if it has mutated into the imagery of a drug’s dangerous trip:—
   The walls are bent in, threatening to collapse under the pressure;
   Books are shredded, shelves are upturned, and obliterated is the dresser;
   Blood drips from numerous cracks in the ceiling and paints the walls.
   ‘Tis many moments of being awestruck before I realize the mirror calls.
   Vision is blurry, a hollow ringing sings, and my surroundings fade.
   My legs of jelly drag my heavy body into the dark hall’s shade.
  
   I yell at the sight in the cracked mirror, but my voice is painfully missing.
   It appears as if my entire face is losing its grip and is slowly slipping.
   Gravity’s grappling hooks have taken a strong hold and are pulling.
   The entirety of my eyes is almost visible from the disturbing lack of coverage.
   My jaw refuses to rise back up, as if the muscles have lost their leverage.
   It adds to the terror—how unsightly I am! How revolting!
   I am no longer human but an otherworldly, disgusting being!
   A scream that is not my own bursts from my agape mouth and shatters the mirror.
   It deafens my ears like a knife; I feel the fiery tearing of my vocal cords.
   “Vulture,” I vaguely hear but clearly curl my dry, thin lips to.
   “Go, find your food, find your idol, bathe in what you think is true.”
   Violently, desperately, crashing into walls with wild, uncontrollable limbs,
   I purposelessly search for the spirit that will welcome my immovable sins.

i have this pain in my heart
because he left me
so i feel hate for him
a hate so big that it can ****...
my father my dear father
the ******* that i hate as much as i love...
i hate him because he left me
i hate him because i hate him
i hate him because he's the person because he taught
me how to hate
hate is such a powerful word that has alot of thought
into it
i hate him i wish he would just die
i hate him i wish he would feel what i feel
he is what gets my blood boiling for hate
he taught me how to love and hate at the same time
he taught me the word hatred in my heart
and i hate him with all my heart
if you ask me," Nessa, why do u hate your father?"
i wouldnt have a good answer or a right answer
because to be honest i dont have an answer for such a
question
i just feel this pain in my heart for him
and i hate him
because i cant have him back and because i dont want
him back
im the type of person that usually keeps her feelings
inside no matter what...
so this is one of the truest things i have ever
written
while these tears mark my cheeks
i know that im crying truly because of him
i wish he would one day think and cry for me the way i
cry for him
i want to see him crying and regretting that he lost
his daughter to something so stupid and selfish
a father is supposed to be there no matter what had
happened
i thought i had a hero
and true father that i would say, "wow, my father isnt
like alot of other peoples' father"
"im special"
but i guess it was bound to happen
i wish you could feel everything i feel
the pain i carry with me as i walk the streets or when
i write a poem
or when i simply hear a song
i cant even hear a slow jam without it reminding me of
things that have happened to me
and alot of it makes me cry because i end up hating
you even more
why dont you close your eyes and think for a second...
then just ask yourself...
"am i a good father?"
because i ask myself alot... "am i a good daughter"
and i know im a *****
i know i am
i take no offense in calling myself that
because ive lived up to being a ***** and let me be
that then
it wont do nothing but make me stronger...
i mean im here right?
im living... not happy but im living...
and its cuz of you
cant u feel?
when i cry dont you feel a little discomfort in your
day?
how about in your night or in your sleep?
do u feel anything?
i guess not because i havent received not one phone
call
not one message
not one concern
nothing from you
and i dont want your money
maybe sometimes i feel like i do need it but as my
tears roll down my cheeks and land on my lips,
i answered my own question...
i dont need your money
and even if i did and you were to give it to me i
rather die
i want nothing from you
when you are to walk me down that aisle ....
i hope you have feelings because you'll be crying that
you wont be that man walking me down the aisle...
one day i know that you will feel everything and maybe
even worse than what i feel...
i know this world aint cruel enough to just let me
pass with all this pain
but hey maybe im mistaken.... maybe you do feel and
think at home... but i dont care
because it will make no difference to me
whats done is done
and i wont forgive you
and i wont forget what u did
what i will do is erase you ...
the memory that was
but shouldnt have been...
R.I.P. father...
you're not gone... yet that is...
but i say "rest in peace" now because i know you and
me will get to our deathbeds with this hate...
and honestly i hope you are the one to bury me ...
cuz i dont wanna bury you ...
because imma shed tears of love hate pain and anger...
but to finish it off... imma spit on your grave and
walk away ...
even with tears down my cheeks...
imma spit the same way that you spit on me...
(figuratively speaking) and walked away from me when i
needed you the most...

Growing up and knowing you give me sighs of bliss,
Didn't you say we're Patroclus and Achilles?
That  we are one soul abiding in two bodies,
Just for you, my best friend, I will make a promise.

You said that if Patroclus' fate's same with mine,
You'll try to make Achilles' fate same with thine
Our corpse lying next to each other would be sign,
Of a true, intimate friendship that is sublime.

Bringing those memories we made in Macedon,
The celebrations of battles we've always won,
I never lost, because I'm with you, Hephaestion,
My only defeat's when I lost you and you're gone.

I am just a general, and you are a king,
We have this love, but this love can do us nothing,
Love is not all that both of us will be needing,
You need an heir, we need wives we'll be marrying.

But even though now I have an heir and a wife,
It would be still you and me in the afterlife,
Even if it means I will be stabbed by a knife,
I'd love you, even this kind of love is not rife.

But even if we died and left this world early,
In separate deathbeds, we made love intimately,
Even if I made my last hurrah without thee,
You kept that promise, that nobody promised me.

For God so loved the World…
Why? How? Does He see the same World that we live in everyday? Do His eyes see the same people? I cannot believe that they do…
We are everything that He is not, complete opposites in every way.
We are ignorant and arrogant. We see something beautiful and immediately cut it to pieces to find out what makes it so radiant. We are hateful and self-centered, thinking only of ourselves even alongside the deathbeds of others. We are destructive and self-absorbed. We only help the needy for a tax credit and a clear conscience.
We curse and condemn and never give our actions a second thought. We tear each other down to build ourselves up.
We lie and we cheat and we steal and we ****. We torture and torment in the name of boredom. We rob and we pillage and we **** and we raze, leveling the achievements of our own for the temples of posterity.
We live in a world where dog eats dog and beasts eat God, and He goes on, loving us just the same.        How? How can anyone love something that is so perverse; so malignant? We burn what we do not understand to ash instead of observing and wonder why our neighbors stockpile gasoline and flame retardant clothing…
Love thy neighbor as thyself and hate each other, it’s alright, as long as you hate yourself for being like your neighbor and hate your neighbors for being like you.
We are the worst that the universe has to offer, yet the creator of all has still decided to bestow his love upon us? Why? How must His eyes see our wicked race to continue to feel that way? We are nothing more that wicked mud, and deserving of nothing more than a harsh drought followed by unending windstorms.
Bring on the sun and the winds. Wipe this plague from the face of the Earth. She will not miss us, just as your neighbors will not miss you.  
But please, dear God, do not stop loving us, for we are merely children with money, nuclear toys and a strong dependency on anti-depressants, and we know not what we do.

a brief confession:
until now,
i have written my best friend into a storybook heroine, untouchable
and our friendship one of puzzle pieces falling in place perfectly
i love her beyond words
and love makes you romanticize everything
but i want to show the truth
because incredibly, it is even more brilliant

sure, we have the happy story of meeting in summer camp, bonding over crafts and a shared love of books
and in most ways, what we have is simple and pure and obvious
but in all honesty, our true bond was not born in beauty or the sunlight
it was born ******, fighting, and dangling by its umbilical cord over a bottomless abyss

see, we were first stitched together in battle
opposite sides of a wound that drained us of tears and dark poetry
emptying pens stolen from a slate-eyed boy whose skin never seemed to be fully closed
we were surgery in a brightly lit, white-walled classroom
taking turns as his dialysis machine
until one day, we finally looked up
and realized he was stealing all our oxygen

on the homefront we were dissection victims,
perfectly preserved insides laid out for the world to see
so that no one would think to look for the secrets hidden beneath our sharp tongues
we were ***** donor and receptor,
and she gave me bone-marrow strength
in return for my rib-cage to cradle her overworked heart
both of us breathing heavily from the same pair of tired lungs

we were bandages on each other's wrists,
painfully tight tourniquets to keep our souls from leaking out with the blood
we were interlocked fingers between our deathbeds
and silence on either end of the telephone
too afraid to speak the truth aloud
but even more afraid of hanging up
instead letting our quietness drown out the silence

other times, we were barely contained sobs in a 2am voicemail

we were long periods of no contact
passive-aggressive silence
bottled anger that was too heavy to carry for long
over reasons we no longer remember

yes,
our connection was held together by bruised knuckles, scarred skin
but though it was often ugly and rough and messy
it also saved my life

All written on the calendar
Crumbling in my pocket
Is only a  forsaken air
Of the Sometimes you scribbled

And all the photographs
Hanging since the execution
Serve as the deathbeds
For our soon-to-be  autumn

There is no red thread
Falling from the sky tonight
Just a stained glass I forgot
To put back in order at last

I have no watch
Slithering around my wrist
For time has escaped your fate
And I shall be in charge

All for myself

I am out here only to remind you
That our eyes are only as rough
As the heart long shredded
You comforted them with knives instead

The eyes we used to pair
Never peer into the lonely couch
That sung old ballade
Together no longer

And in our last supper at this foul home
I have seen nothing of the love
On your half-painted dinner plate
Or the hope you incinerated behind my head

But I have missed you
Too far alone
Under these cold empty tables
Godforsaken

I am out here only to remind you
That our eyes are as big
As the heart you’ve demolished
That is now rising from the dead

And with that
I can only see the world
The way you forgot
Our last prayer before bed

Ah,

I’m leaving home
Watch out for the stars
They are lone wolves
Feasting on others

No one is home,
I have set ablaze
All the forlorn dolls
You have loved

You will never go back
And I shall do the same

No one is home,
The windows are barred
The hearts are locked
And the walls are full of corpse

i feel much safer with animals
than people, i tend
to close off
when i'm scared
of crowds
or
another human being
and
what's going to happen
in an encounter
that is real
and somewhere along the deathbeds
i forgot any other way to be
i guess it is the unreal i'm afraid of

life seems long, it's not
real or nothing
that's all i can survive
silence i can do
but true
silence
not the silence
barb-wired
with lies

denial cannot keep death away
and in the meantime
suffocates life
god has gotten this
longtime prodigal-thief,
petri dish
of strange
and deadly
parasites,
ready to be
alive

ready to be part of a revolution
of values, a conversation
of justice, a
consciousness
of peace
and
love

despair
and fear-of-failing
have broken my legs and back and neck
for long enough,
i do everything
knowing
i will fail

and that's okay
because you know
this really is not about me,
not at all

i'm ready to be happily lost
in the jungle of life
because i am
happily found

These golden lights that dance upon
Cast from the amber montage of the autumn leaves
Through their colors they vivify us below
And with a graceful fall, sweet death they greet

And as they lie on their deathbeds
The vibrant bed they form for thee
This tragic beauty worthy of a tale divine
Their fate, our feet it meets.

The other day I was offered a cigarette and I simply shook my head.
I watched my friends light theirs between chapped lips, with a piece of menthol candy wrapped in plastic on their other hand.
With their wrists bent and their mouths open, I observed them inhale and exhale cancer, as I welcomed it into my nostrils.
I refused because I despised the idea of being the center of attention and I recall the vendor looking at me with her wrinkled forehead, wondering if I would agree to my "first" cigarette. And I didn't.
Yet in return I felt eyes looking at me, speaking to me, saying things like "That was uncool of"
I remember immensely focusing on the ashes that departed from the sticks and staring at them as they crashed into the muddy waters.
Every flick and drag was a subtraction of the overall years planned ahead for them. A part of me wished I could be in their shoes,
Because they were a step ahead of me, dragging them closer to their deathbeds.
Frankly, I thought of dying way more than any of them.
I am the one who is supposed to be nicotine infused, I should be the one composed of soon-to-be cancer cells and packs of cigarettes for future use.
Yet I stood there, slowly becoming a victim and a product of their secondhand smoke and abuse.

n.j.

they say that after awhile,
words start to lose their meaning.
"i love you"
"i'm sorry"
"i'm sober."

you told us that you've been sober for four years,
and that statement was more empty than the glass bottles in your closet.
more empty,
than the pill bottles in my dresser drawer.

my mom never looks me in the eyes,
i think it's because if she did it would make her feel like he never left,
she says i'm just like him,
that the reason my body is a tornado on fire circulating around this earth
is because i was genetically predisposed to disaster.

if only she knew,
that i swallow pills because the line between intoxication and love
becomes as blurry
as his vision after trading places with the bottle,
that i understand the comfort of not being the only thing that's empty at the table.

sometimes my heart feels like it's a volcano,
ready to erupt out of my chest,
like there is lava in my bloodstream.
some days the pills make me feel like i'm playing a game of russian roulette,
except the possibility of death has never been enough for the addict to change.

probably because when they're sober the only thing they want more than to be high is to be dead.
and maybe being farther away from the ground
distracts them from the fact
that they are walking on the surface of their deathbeds.

and no, i am not scared to die,
i am scared that i will live long enough to follow his legacy,
that the only time i will ever feel love is when my body surrenders to the bottle.
that i will only know love as the shadow casted by intoxication.
that one day i will spin out of control,
and set flame to everyone i love.

mom,
"i love you,"
"i'm sorry,"
"i'm sober,"
except she has played this game of two truths and a lie before.

Eyes like a car crash
I know I shouldn't look, but I can't turn away.
body like a whiplash
salt my wounds
but I cant heal the way
I feel about you.

COVID-19
It has changed all the lives it hasn’t yet claimed
Too many deathbeds held souls in empty spaces  
Innocent, isolated individuals
With their visitors crying in the hospital parking lot instead of their hospital room
As if goodbye wasn't hard enough

It has changed the way we grow  
Children won't know how to share
Instead they will have “disinfect” ingrained in their young brains
Carrying hand sanitizer like a shield, a barrier against the germs
Taught to fear others as though they’ll **** us themselves

It has changed the way we consume
Online shopping to the point we don't remember what's in packages
Spending money we don't have
Sanitized carts and Purell at every entrance of the stores that have opened
Grocery shopping sparks anxiety like never before

It has changed the way we love
Zoom calls and FaceTimes are as connected as we can get
The inability to remember what it feels like to be in another's arms
We stand six feet apart, not knowing how to act
Trying to read the millions of emotions held within each others eyes

It has changed how we dress
Forgetting where you've placed your mask is just as bad as your keys
Face covers scream isolation
Smothering smiles, turning us all into faceless creatures
But somehow the mere thought of the pandemic feels more suffocating

It has changed the way we exist
Instilling a new fear into the next generation
A new urgency in the medical field
And overall, a new norm that makes unity unbelievably uncomfortable.

S.S.

I see lines of you in the silhouettes of the scurf of a world without you
I hear your voice calling my name:
In empty hallways,
Serenades,
And odes written on deathbeds,
Declaring that your final words should "I love you"
And as I lie dow unfamiliarly in a bed without you,
I curl up and imagine that you are here,
And as I drive back to you-- home, across dark landscapes,
The headlights of the oncoming traffic reflect off my glasses and beam through dark air,
And your voice calls my name one final time in the lonely hotel room behind me

he wasn't much on saying so
but it made its way onto birthday cards
and deathbeds

I think somewhere along the road to Hell and back, I decided that protecting myself was just not worth it anymore.
Not because I wasn't worth preserving, but because I realized that I would take a beating regardless.
I'd rather live taking every chance I can to be happy, and embracing those chances that work out with the passion of the dying, than
Pull my punches, hide my feelings, and end up with regrets.
Because, the secret you learn when you finally hit bottom,
When you get your choice to continue existing or give up?
We are all dying.
Quickly and slowly, we are all hourglasses glued to the table.
We have a set amount of time, slipping away second by second.
What we do with it makes us who we are.
Whether we realize that it is simply not worth having regrets determines whether on our deathbeds,
Five minutes from now or 90 years,
We smile in remembrance or cry in bitterness.
You can take that trip to Hell. We all can.
I do not believe I am special for having made it, and come back.
I think I have simply done it earlier.
Trying to keep myself from getting hurt? That's just a lost cause if I ever saw one.
And pointless in many many ways.
I am aiming to make my hurt mean something. To make it count.
To make it worth the joy I get from never ever ever holding back.
It's just not worth it to me to hide behind pride or fear.
I've been there, near the end, and I know how much it *****.
But there is always a choice.
And those who risk everything for love are strong enough to make it,
Even when life brings them to lose all of it and stand at the decision between continuing and ceasing.
The gift of pain like that is that we find that there is something to continue for.

Willing to give you so much

Buy you a rose for no reason

To lend you my ear
if there's anything on your mind

To lend you my shoulder
so you can let it all out

Make you laugh when you need to

Kiss your cuts and make you feel better

To tell you 'I love you' everyday
until our heads hit our deathbeds

Pouring my heart out for you on to paper
While I cry out all my tears
and bleed out all my blood
You should probably know
that you mean the world
and more to me
Though none of this
matters 'cause you're in the arms of another

8:47PM

Why is life worth more than death? Why is life more important than death? Why have we deemed death so bad? Does it get its negative reputation because its unknown? Because it's different ? because it's not something we can dabble in? We value life and despise death but without death life could not be. We exist because of life & death. They are one not two. We are scared of death because we are unsure of it; time ,time is a concept created by us to a sense of organization a sense of control in our lives. We do this for the future, we work , we study, we save , all for the future. But when is the future? Will it ever come? When will this utopia of a future end? How will we know when this future has come? We live towards a future we work for a future , we believe we have time until the future. But what if the future never comes? The future is the biggest lie life tells. The future is nonexistent. The future will never come. And when we are in our deathbeds we regret not living because we were supposed to “live” in the future. But the future never arrived and death came too soon. We accuse death of ruining our lives but did we ever live? If we spent our time working for this lie of  a future we never got to live in the time we did have. We merely survived. Should we stop surviving and start living instead? Should we give up our focus on this utopia of a future?
From childhood we have been condition to live life for the future. As kids we start imagining , planning this wonderful future. But for many that future will never come. They would die before they got to really start living-

he is fire
and i am cold
sit back and admire
cause our love is gold

solid as the ground beneath our feet
free as the birds above our heads
with each other we are complete
hand in hand, until our deathbeds

Expectations.
Standards.
Rules.
Conditions and Catches.

Listen up Eating Disorders!

Your expectations are contradictory! You want girls to feel so ashamed of their bodies that they starve and shove their fingers down their throat so that they'll live to be happy. You know better than anyone though that really, you just want us laying in our deathbeds.

Your standards are stupid! You think you can put each individual girl into one category. A category that is labeled "so-skinny-each-individual-bone-pops-out-with-no-effort."

Your rules are torture! Rule 1: Exercise until you pass out. Rule 2: Start off "in reason" with restriction. Rule 3: Cut out all processed foods. Rule 4: "You like what you see?" Keep going! Rule 5: Why not cut out all food? Rule 6: Develop fear foods. Rule 7: Eat everything because you're so hungry your insides are burning. Rule 8: Oh no! You can't gain weight! Go shove your fingers down your throat! You must get rid of the food! Rule 9: Restrict again because you can't see anything but a monster when you look into the mirror. Rule 10: Speaking of mirrors, do at least 3 body checks a day. How big is your waist? Can you wrap your fingers around your wrists? Do you have a thigh gap? Rule 11: Cry for hours because you "accidentally" looked at the scale for the 20th time today. Rule 12: Start over and repeat until you end up in the hospital. "You'll never be sick enough though!"

Your conditions and catches confuse us! You have these conditions, but there's always a catch! "You can have that one candy bar, but you must lose 13 pounds this month!" "You will be happy when you reach your goal weight, but you should set a second and third goal weight just in case!" "You will have so many friends when you're actually underweight, but you must lose all the ones you love now first!" "You can get help, but it'll make you feel worse because then you'll see that you're weak!"

ENOUGH!

I'VE HAD ENOUGH!

What do you want from me?
Why am I not good enough now?
Why do I have to wear a size 00?
When will you stop killing all these sweet girls who just want to love themselves?
When will we stop hearing you yell at us because we want to go out to eat with our family and friends?
Why can't you stop casting all your imperfections on all these perfectly imperfect girls?
Why do you feel like you're not enough?

                                           Sincerely, We-Are-Enough

I'm enough.
I'm enough at any size!
Yes I'm obese.
Yes I want to be smaller, but I have to do it healthily and without the guidance of "Ana" or "Mia" or "Ed!"
Ana, Mia, and Ed will only tell you lies.
Lies that will tear you apart!
You must listen to those around you who want to help you!
I know it's hard, but it's worth it.
Happiness is real and possible, but these eating disorders don't know what happiness is!
You are enough!
You are perfect at every size!
You are so much stronger than this illness!
You are not weak for eating a granola in fact, you're not weak for eating a pint of ice cream!
It'll all fall into place.
This illness will not take you!
I promise, you are enough!

I see the sorrow in your eyes
I see the sadness in your smile
You try to hide it, you try to be strong
But deep inside I see your pain

Love me like we are lying on our deathbeds
I'll take the pain away
I know it hurts but I'll be your therapy
I'll be your escape

If you would let me, I could mend your broken heart
Like a puzzle, I could piece you together
In return I would give you a piece of me
So maybe one day, we could both be whole

Remind me why
We're stuck in this world
Of stressed quietness throughout
Constant motion
And when they try to mention
Age, their sickened view of innocent
Reality, but not really
And feign surprise when they send us to our
Deathbeds