When the darkness comes
the light of day is painful
the most brilliant hue of blue
makes you want to close your eyes and never open them again.
And when you do, you cannot close them.
Even the hollowing aura of sleep does not drown you the way the dullness does.
When you're disgusted by sincerity
and you run from happy eyes because they haunt you.
They seem empty, unreal, too alive.
The pulse in your veins makes you squirm,
makes you feel like the living dead because you know this isn't life.
This is the shadow of death when the sun is behind him and he is walking backward so that he grows on you and stays with you as long as you will have it.
Until you awaken from sleepless nights
and decide to breathe again.

Read the fourth stanza whichever way you want to, one column, two columns, one full stanza, etc.
Freedom was close to me.  
She never did want me to see.
A pain undone
That nobody could bear to run.
  
I went to a few concentration camps.
There were several big lamps.
They searched in the dark black nights.
They held all my frights.
  
Then came my pebbles.
One was round and marble smooth.
There was no dull for its color shone
I bid farewell to the dullness of life and the dullness of prison.
  
Size was fair in my twisted little game.
Pebble One.                           Pebble Me.
Pebble Two.                           Pebble Brother.
Pebble Three.                        Pebble Mother.
Pebble Four.                          And Pebble Father.
One was found.                     I saved my life.
Two was found.                     Welcome Brother.
Three was found.                  Hello, Mother.
  
Where was Four?
I would bother to save my Father.
There it was.
My hidden rocks.
One, two, three and four.
  
Some say that there is tricky feat called a cheat.
That is not what I am.
To cheat means one is beat.
  
I am not what beat is.
I am what a treat is.
Mother shall have her house.
Brother shall boast in his bed.
I will have all the bread.
Father will have freedom that is not forlorn.
  
The pebbles are what kept us alive.
It is as if we are stuck under a beehive.
One came out to sting.
With that sting it took every single thing.
  
The Russians came after many years.
I would have cried but I had no tears.
My life was fuller.
My soul gained strength.
Marion B.

such a beautiful mess, intertwined and overrun
overgrown and tangled and chaotic and fair
a swirl of thorns and dewdrops and earth
eyes that sparkle with petrichor and hope
hair with sunrays weaved and rivers entwined
bones which are not bones, but inky flora and mud
sculpted by the trees and the stars and the air
ephemeral glow and luminent dullness
smell the grass and the weeds and the stone and joy
hear the light and the rain and peace and dirt
taste the wind and the toxic petals and soul
see the longing and leaping and flying and warmth
feel the lucid colors and the pastel dreams
such a beautiful mess, unclothed and airy and loved.

{alaska}

I
Happy are men who yet before they are killed
Can let their veins run cold.
Whom no compassion fleers
Or makes their feet
Sore on the alleys cobbled with their brothers.
The front line withers.
But they are troops who fade, not flowers,
For poets' tearful fooling:
Men, gaps for filling:
Losses, who might have fought
Longer; but no one bothers.


                                   II
And some cease feeling
Even themselves or for themselves.
Dullness best solves
The tease and doubt of shelling,
And Chance's strange arithmetic
Comes simpler than the reckoning of their shilling.
They keep no check on armies' decimation.


                                   III
Happy are these who lose imagination:
They have enough to carry with ammunition.
Their spirit drags no pack.
Their old wounds, save with cold, can not more ache.
Having seen all things red,
Their eyes are rid
Of the hurt of the colour of blood for ever.
And terror's first constriction over,
Their hearts remain small-drawn.
Their senses in some scorching cautery of battle
Now long since ironed,
Can laugh among the dying, unconcerned.


                                   IV
Happy the soldier home, with not a notion
How somewhere, every dawn, some men attack,
And many sighs are drained.
Happy the lad whose mind was never trained:
His days are worth forgetting more than not.
He sings along the march
Which we march taciturn, because of dusk,
The long, forlorn, relentless trend
From larger day to huger night.


                                   V
We wise, who with a thought besmirch
Blood over all our soul,
How should we see our task
But through his blunt and lashless eyes?
Alive, he is not vital overmuch;
Dying, not mortal overmuch;
Nor sad, nor proud,
Nor curious at all.
He cannot tell
Old men's placidity from his.


                                   VI
But cursed are dullards whom no cannon stuns,
That they should be as stones.
Wretched are they, and mean
With paucity that never was simplicity.
By choice they made themselves immune
To pity and whatever mourns in man
Before the last sea and the hapless stars;
Whatever mourns when many leave these shores;
Whatever shares
The eternal reciprocity of tears

All through science she has thought about him, scribbling his name on the palm of her hand, doodling his name on the inside cover of her exercise book. The teacher rattles on about chemicals, about combinations, of numbers, but Christina isn't listening, she's gazing out the window at the sports field over the way, there where she and Benedict go some lunch times if it's fine and she's not stuck in the girls playground watching other girls play at skip rope or other childish games or chatter. The weather looks fine, the sky blue, clouds sparse. Good. Be out there. He will be there, too. Miss him when he's not about. A piece of chalk whizzes by her head and the teacher calls her  name and to concentrate and not daydream. She turns to the front and picks up her pen and takes down the writing on the board. The teacher scowls, eyes like hawk's. She saw him at morning break in passing by the tuck shop. He gazed at her. Sent tingles through her. Watched until he was out of sight. She scribbles in the exercise book, writes down the script on the board. Last night she dreamed of him. Had his photo under her pillow. Her head inches away from him. She pretended he had come to her room at midnight(the parents were downstairs still) and stood by the door looking at her. She told him to come closer and he came and sat on her bed. Seemed so real. Mere inches away. Hand near mine, pretended to touch. The teacher talks on boringly, she writes faster. The other kids seem to focus, make effort, look up, write down. At breakfast her mother was in a mood. Dark mood day. Moaned about state of my bedroom. Clothes everywhere, she said, books, paper, I won't have it. Christina puts down her pen. Inky fingers, pen leaks. ****. She wipes on a tissue, rubs away. Still stained. The other day she held Benedict's hand palm upward and read his lines. Wanted to see how many children he'd have or his wife. Couldn't decide. Wasn't sure. She liked his hand in hers, his fingers, the smoothness, the skin on skin thing. They kissed briefly, other kids were watching, making silly sounds, comments. She thinks her twin brother says things about her to their mother, not out of spite or telltale, but innocently in chatter over the dinner table or by way of idle talk. Her mother invited Benedict to lunch one school day. Studied him, questioned him. One of her black mood days. She managed to take him to her room for a few moments while her mother was out and showed him her bed and her doll collection and such and kissed quickly until they heard her mother's return. The lesson will soon be over. She cannot wait. Bored titless. She closes her exercise book and puts the cap on her pen and stares at the teacher as she finishes her talk. Her big brother has books under his bed. She saw one the other week while looking for his record player to borrow. Magazines of naked women. Piles stacked neatly. She removed one and opened the pages. She stopped at a page where a woman was kneeling dog like. A man was there ,too. She blushed, closed the magazine, shoved it back under the bed and went out of the room and to her own room. What the hell was that all about? She tried to push it from her mind. Her big brother had touched her in her room and she said nothing. The magazines were still there, she supposes, watching the teacher answer questions of those who were interested or pretended they were to get in the teacher's good books.  Hands rose in the air by those with questions of science. Christina ponders a question:  why do some women kneel dog like? She doesn't ask. Imagines the teacher's face, giggles from other kids. Best not to. The biology teacher was best to ask. But he will probably blush. So would she. She wishes time would fly. The sky is still blue. Clouds drift lazily. Her big brother lifted her skirt under the dinning room table and touched her leg. She said nothing, but stiffened, he smiled. Mother moaned about my untidy room, the ***** clothes under the bed, put in the wash basket, she went on. A bell rings from the passage, lesson over, thank God, she thinks, shoving her books in her bag. She goes to the washroom and enters a cubicle. The fingers are still ink stained. Benedict's name is written small there on her palm. She kisses her palm. She remembers the first time she saw him. He was new to the school, came just before Christmas. He stood in the assembly hall in a year above hers. His sister was in her class. They talked about him. She introduced him to her one lunch time on the sports field. They talked shyly, sat near, didn't touch, uneasy the first time. She left the cubicle, washed her hands, scrubbed her fingers with the white soap. Cleaner, still slightly stained. Try again later. She leaves the wash room and goes along the passage  hoping to see him. Crowds of kids pass by. A boy and girl by the gym door smooch, his hand on her thigh, her hand on his neck. But no Benedict. She stares about her. No. Not about. She moves towards the next lesson, maths, double, time passes, boring, wants to see him. The bell rings, next lesson, his sister walks beside her, not him, o if it was him, if only.  The passageway is dull, her life seems dim.

C'mon! Spank me like the naughty little girl I am!
**** ME! **** ME! Stop being a man!

See this? Right here? My tight little hole?
Put it right there, baby! Homosexuality makes you whole!

Put this on your tongue, this seed of pomegranate.
Have a little fun! Let loose your granite!

Ice shavings and ice cream, my sweet little angel,
Come closer, come closer, let me study your angels,

Put your **** in my mouth. I'll **** you off.
*** in my mouth, and let yourself loft.

I'm not one for chains and whips,
But I'm more than up for shafts and tips!

*******; sliding in; so sweet;
Pound me harder with your big, strong meat.

The good'ol in-out in-out ~ The rhythm of life.
The dullness of cream ~ the glint of a knife.

Petrifying pangs of pleasure; cross a prostate ~ pouring,
Sweetly like ~honey~suckle~ Alluring

Breathe, my darling, like music, like a breeze.
Like the blood in my ears; like the wind in the trees.

In the closet, we are allowed but seven minutes.
But that is not enough! By the time its up, I won't be finished.

So for now, my darling, put your lips on my cheek.
And allow me one, little, innocent peak.

Will you hold my hand
And stay true to me ?

Will you still talk to me..
When words I utter….
no longer make sense….

To say I love you is a painful effort
I am tired, this disease is killing me softly
I will not live long in this world..
Will you extent your hands to me?

What if I am no longer the queen whom you worship?
Will you still hold my hand?
Will you walk with me along the road of life..
When I am no longer able to stand tall
Will you hold my hands for me?

Will I still be your princess?
If the gowns can’t fit no longer…
The mirror wont reflect me no more..
Not a beautiful string of hairs to comb…
Will you still keep your castle for me?

Will you whisper sweet words to my ears…
When my ears can no longer hear?

Will you still embrace me.. want me..
When I can no longer feel…

Can you stand my numbness?
My dullness? My clumsiness?

Will you still look at me..
If what you see is a piece of worn out artwork….
Which is no longer precious…

Do you still need me.
If the kisses are tasteless..
If the hugs are cold..
If the future is bleak….

Do you still need me..
when my visions are blurry…
… and you need to see for me?

Will you still hold my hand..
To walk to the beaches..
To the romantic theatres…
To all the places in the world….
Will you carry me..
When my feet are too weak to walk?

Will you?

when I cant hardly breathe my last breath….
Will you still hold my hand?

Will you hold my hands?

One Love,

two love.

three love. fourth?

an overflow of love, do i really need more?

a grateful dullness fills my mind.

my three loves are fine; for now so am i.

I fashioned myself a dress of black lace;
Dark and elegant, epitome of grace;
Soft on my skin, caress like a lover's,
My comfort, my design, a haven of covers.

They called it macabre - filled them with unease;
Dangerous, they said, termed it a disease.
And yes, I'm unwell, but darkness is my veil -
A reprieve from hell, solace without fail.
I am the tailor, the sculptor of shadows,
The reaper of melancholy my art sows.
And yes, it is odd, fragile, morose -
The marble thorns of an obsidian rose.

The judging whispers that follow in my wake,
Can't comprehend I do this for my sake:
The sharp edges they call jarring and cold -
They are my palace, impenetrable stronghold.

Where others see emptiness, I notice lace,
The gossamer threads of a misty embrace;
They are but blind to the kingdom of nothing,
Only see moats, and wall canons jutting.
My castle of ghosts, the court I control,
Those remain hidden, deep in my soul.
The siren song, my foggy lullaby,
The velvety clouds on which my thoughts lie.
It is morphium, made in my mind
Embroidered dullness only I can find.
The words bounce off my protective bubble,
Your bombs shatter into a gray rubble.
I blow it away, along with my fears,
I got good at this, during the years.

Give me some credit, I am no fool,
Where others would drown, I can rule;
I know not to freeze, when water's too cool,
The fire you'd burn in, I use as fuel.

Yes, it's a thin line, I know it best,
But I'm a trapeze-artist, can pass the test;
A veteran of trade, the air is my nest,
I've learned to live without getting rest.

And I know my limits, how far I can press,
Worry you not, I've survived on much less.
I'm not glass, disperse your concerns,
If need be, the lace to razor wire turns.

At age five Lincoln was taken from his single mom, who would hit him constantly, and put into a foster home that already contained 4 other boys, all older then himself. He was so frightened; Lincoln had spent all of his life up until this point alone, in isolation and fear. While this new home eliminated the isolation he still spent most of his waking hours in tears. There were many people surrounding him but no one to trust. He had “parents” who only wanted his welfare check, “brothers” who only wanted him as a punching bag, and a social worker who only saw him as another lost soul amongst thousands.
By age 12, Lincoln had been in 6 different homes, all the same as the last. His first had taught him to be afraid, his second had taught him not to trust, his fourth had taught him to run, and his fifth had taught him to fight. He learned that some things are good to be true in his sixth home. He had the perfect family, a loving mom and dad who actually cared about him, but then everything changed. His new “dad” lost his job, and everything fell apart, stress tearing apart a couple and Lincoln being shipped off to yet another new place.
He was thirteen and living in a group home for boys. He felt the push of pressure and loneliness, and found a love for the taste of alcohol and craved the dullness it brought him.  Lincoln was bullied constantly and certainly fought back, he had learned from his first mother the ability to use his fists to let out some of the anger, the rage that wouldn’t go away.
Soon, the aggression building in Lincoln would prove to be too much for the system and he would be cast away, labeled as “hopeless” and sent to a juvenile center to be away from the “socially acceptable” people.
Only sixteen now, and already Lincoln had built a criminal record. Years of low self-esteem and insecurity leading to a life of substance abuse and ****** knuckles. No one looked at him and said “Now, there’s a good kid.”, but instead mothers quickly hushed their children asking “Why is his face bleeding?” or judgmental looks at the tattoos crisscrossing and covering the scars he was to ashamed to let anyone see.
By eighteen, and out on the street, he wandered from place to place staring out with blank eyes, hoping that someone would look into his eyes and see all of the pain and maybe, rescue him, but all anyone ever saw was just a punk who should stop smoking  and just “get a job”, as if it were that easy. As if, anyone had ever taught him how to lead a life that didn’t end up in prison.
On Lincoln’s twenty-first birthday, there was no one around to celebrate, no one to smile, no one to care. He sat on a lonely bench wondering if his birth mother was somewhere out there knowing that today was his birthday, or if she was even alive. He thought about his father, thinking maybe he was leading some luxurious life not even knowing that he had a son out in the world, all alone. He held onto the hope that maybe if his father knew he existed that maybe he would care.
But inside he knew, he knew that noone cared, and no one ever would. No one would ever be concerned about the boy who never knew love.

Your muse: a frumpy feminist who doesn't even like you or your poetry; a clipped-face mean-hair nag of a PC hag, a harridan of the nanny-state who inspires boring identity politics-driven free verse. Your muse smells nasty and has bad teeth. She voted for Hillary and loves Maya Angelou. Your muse barely tolerates your tepid unpoetic soul but she smiles a fake smile and lies to your face. Yours coerced you into publishing that e-book no one ever downloads. Your muse is unamusing, unmusical and moos like a cow. Mine mews and purrs like a sleek feline friend while sinuously scribing heroic rhymed couplets in the air with her tail. Yours grunts superficial Haiku through her snout then heads for her feed-trough in the mire. Your muse is a  dumpy data-driven bureaucrat who recites in a monotone to 3 medicated listeners at the yearly event. Your muse hired a social media specialist to market her product that no one wanted. My muse has no Facebook page because she want no Facebook page..

My muse is ergonomically sustainable in exquisite ******* epiphany. My muse laughs eternal rivers of lyrical light over the fact that your muse made you recite that silly stuff at the poetry slam. My muse loves me almost as deeply as I love her. Her ethereal body embodies all philosophy. One tiny point of light refracted from a single facet of her diadem will vaporize your merely mediocre muse. My muse is beloved of all true poets, for she stepped forth from the riven crown of the lyrical Father himself to bathe in the wellsprings of holy inspiration. You are utterly unworthy to even fantasize about kissing my muse's beatific, shining and holy ***. You wouldn't recognize MY MUSE if she knocked your post-modern skull with an Alexandrine sonnet. My muse gazes upon you for a millisecond and you writhe like an academic insect pinned to a collection board. My muse sneezes on you— and you get published in Atlantic and people yawn. Your muse makes entire English Departments nod off and then wake up and leave work early. My muse gets me high, drives me home AND pays my bail. In cash. My muse is an orthodox blood-washed Christian saint, elect of God and alive forevermore, shining wisdom personified, mother and sister and daughter of lyrical love. Yours is a lying crypto-Marxist troll who had to pay an ogre to artificially inseminate her and even then she could only conceive misshapen dull-witted free-verse freaks who whine about micro-aggression while they limp to the nearest safe space where they curl up in fetal position and scrawl confessional existential incoherent dullness.

My muse rocks. I love her more ever since she kicked your muse's unpoetic ***. I choose my muse so you lose.

To love the dawn.
Not the sunrise,
But the moment
The black, gray world
Morphs to color.

To love the dawn.
Not the daybreak,
But the dark blues
As they emerge
To make color.

To love the dawn.
Not the morning,
But the changes
From the dullness
To a pale sky.

To love the dawn.
Not goodbye moon,
But hello life,
When greenery
Gives way to red.

To love the dawn.
Not hello day,
But a rainbow,
Every dawn.
Birthing color.

Here standing again
at the edge of the cliff,
struggling against the
force of the wind.
Drenched and cold,
thinking and wondering
what to do.
This is what I was seeking.
I wanted to feel the
storm in my bones.
Fearing what I want and
wanting what I fear.
Desiring and yearning for it,
yet distanced myself from it.
Never been more sure
about changing than now.
Angels are busy working and
trying to show visions
of heaven.
But here am I clawing the
ground trying to get hell for you.
Now I have to stop struggling,
for this striving and toiling are not
yielding desired fruits.
I'm so breathless from all this
going up and down
trying to make it work.
Rest is not so bad after all this
rigours of running around.
Dullness has taken over the heart
of one who suppose to rule.
Stagnation cannot be tolerated
and condoned or we all go down.
Change is needful urgently.
It is time for you to learn the balance.
I bring from the east,
I bring from the west,
I bring from the south,
I bring from the north
the power of balance.
It begins in the spirit.
We can balance anything.
Our voice, our work, our body.
You can even balance your sadness.
First you find patience.
Perhaps you will meet patience in this
sunlight and become good friends.
I will tell you again.
I will tell you again and again
until your inside knows.
It takes a long time to learn the art of balance.
©2018,Emeka Mokeme. All Rights Reserved.

She was a dainty little one, that's what her mother
used to say, but now she wasn't so young.
Time was a tide that had flowed over her hair once
blonde and flowing down her back now a shimmering grey.

But she had noticed a decline in the world of those of
mature age, clothes were drab ugly and grey.
So much unattractive clothing made by the mother of
modern age dullness. Trying to sweeten the *** by calling
each a different name

The Ashen Collection:  It fell from the clouds and landed on you.
The Pearly Collection:  Even beauty doesn't need colour

Were they not color blind? Ok maybe a few were, but
this was just horrible, it was like wearing cement.
Just as stiff and ghastly to even wear. This just made
people look frightful in dismal clothing not suited to be
seen in the light of any day they walked out in it.

So I had to make a stand, I had to keep this dismal color
from tainting the eyes of a younger soon to be older
generation. I had wrote to the fashion designer by
Email, what just because I'm old doesn't mean I haven't
got skills. Her name is Miss Grey Bottom....

---------------------------------------------------­---------------------------------------------
Dear Miss Grey Bottom,

As I am one of less years than more, it would be appreciated that
these years are filled with friends amusement and children's laughter.
I see though that your clothes line has been hitting the scene,
Yes I'm hip with the lingo..

I ask that you add a little color to this line of mature wear
due to the numbing effect it has on those wearing it?
There is no color in there face, no smiles just blank eyes.

At This time were most alive, we need the vibrant feel of life
in our daily lives. Not the mundane clothes that numb the senses.

Yours Sincerely,

                           F.G
-----------------------------------------------------------­-------------------------------------

I waited and waited, well ok I waited two weeks, ya don't
know how long you have left, it was like waiting for paint
to dry under the ocean. But I waited I even shrank an inch
in the time I wasted. So I thought I would do something about it,
as more and more were just walking around in dismal
clothing draining what little youth they had left. So I got a
few of my crew, and we got our design on. Front loop,
garter stitch, knit left loop, there so many weavings that we could
tell you about but now the first piece was finished.

"Try it on, it was an mixture of all our creativity, so we got
Mr. Robin he was 65 years old and had such cute rosy checks..
He looked puzzled?? "What's a matter Mr. Robin? Half his head
was sticking through the top of the jumper, not worried about
messing his hair or lack of...
He then preceded to tell us that it looked like a unicorn had
thrown up a rainbow on it.. "Oh, Colourful metaphor,
and then he proceeded to dance, I think he was break dancing??
He had good moves for his age.

"Ladies it itches so very badly, “I wasn't dancing,
"It feels like I have ants in my pants, crawling around
this jumper that I must take off now...

Sighing and regaining his composure,

"I never knew I had those kind of moves still in me,

Giggling slightly, he then folded the jumper.

He politely put it on the table, saying that if each did a
singular design, their own creation that it would be an art piece,
each a creation of their colourful imagining.
But please, please not in wool, try other fabrics.
And with this ladies of knowledge weaved there ideas together.
Two months later and quite a few pennies spent they produced
their own line of vibrant colours fulfilling the gap where drab,
grey clothing had drowned the feelings of an older generation
needing colour in this moment of their lives.

It now felt like what once was missed entered their lives through
the creations of these vibrant grannies.  But as there designs were embraced by the [silver mains] people of older graces.. The dullness was fading, and a certain lady didn't approve of such sunlight in
those that once wore her garments now being used as wash clothes.. Miss Grey Bottom was sullen for her plans to make the word
feel as she did, sombre in thoughts that weaved into her designs.
But she wasn't giving in  without a fight, she brought out new collections that had a hint of silver grey a hue not colour but
not as bland... but this was a start, its was called the;

Cloud collection:  Everyone has a silver lining..

Fashion Granny smiled, as she knew that seeing those of
Mrs Grey bottoms age infused had slightly changed her,
and with that they made more clothing to invigorate those
of climbing years..
Reviews were steadfast from those wearing there line:

Mr Whitehall:  I love the colouring of your clothing, it was
like it was made for my personality.
                                        Thanks F.G

Miss Waterson:  I feel like a millions pounds, this line enriches
my life every day I wear it.
                                        Thanks F.G

These were but a few of the thousands of reviews they were
scoring at 4.9 out of 5 stars in the reviews and the grannies smiled,
glad that they brought some reflection into their collection of clothing.
There was a knock at the door, and to all there surprise none other
than Miss Grey Bottom.

"Hi grey, about time you answered my email,  
Said her sister. Yes Miss Grey was fashion Grannies sister,
older by 10 years 2 months and 3 days.

"Why wouldn't you answer my calls and emails??
" I was really worried about you and those clothes so
gloomy yet I could tell the beauty was trying to come out
with those beautiful lines,

She just stared at her sister in silence and then, noticing
a tear she wiped it with her thumb tenderly holding her sisters
face. Miss Grey burst into tears and Fashion Grannie held on
to her sister, they hugged for what seemed like forever before
Miss Grey composed herself. "I have missed you so much,
Fashion granny smiled,
"Me to, you silly sausage, 
 
She introduced her sister to all those who helped her with
the colouring and design of their brand F.G, then they sat;

"Your my sister I didn't want to burden you with my
problems,

Fashion granny lent over and kissed her sister forehead

"You silly sausage, that's what family are for,

With those words a smile eclipsed Miss G B's face,
a smile rose across her sisters remember that beauty
that she once knew returning to her sisters face.

"Well you have me and my crew as friends now..

"Your crew, giggling aloud Miss G.B couldn't
even frown for she was for the first time in a long
time smiling, laughing.. Even though tears were
falling they were of happiness, not sadness as before.

Three Months Later,

The world had become a brighter place as sisters
and friends created art woven from cloth and not
only for those of silver locks, but these were hip
grannies they were weaving for the younger crowd.
The first show was about to start and they looked
out to see if many had come to see the new line,

A unicorn had thrown up a rainbow collection:
         So much colour you'll see rainbows in your sleep

It was an international hit, and the grannies were so proud
of what they had done not a singular person, but as close
friends. They carried on with this until they retired which
was not as far away as you'd think. But they had made new
friends and two sisters had once again found each other again
both thinking of how proud there mother would be now.

How is it that I am now so softly awakened,
My leaves shaken down with music?--
Darling, I love you.
It is not your mouth, for I have known mouths before,--
Though your mouth is more alive than roses,
Roses singing softly
To green leaves after rain.
It is not your eyes, for I have dived often in eyes,--
Though your eyes, even in the yellow glare of footlights,
Are windows into eternal dusk.
Nor is it the live white flashing of your feet,
Nor your gay hands, catching at motes in the spotlight;
Nor the abrupt thick music of your laughter,
When, against the hideous backdrop,
With all its crudities brilliantly lighted,
Suddenly you catch sight of your alarming shadow,
Whirling and contracting.
How is it, then, that I am so keenly aware,
So sensitive to the surges of the wind, or the light,
Heaving silently under blue seas of air?--
Darling, I love you, I am immersed in you.
It is not the unraveled night-time of your hair,--
Though I grow drunk when you press it upon my face:
And though when you gloss its length with a golden brush
I am strings that tremble under a bow.
It was that night I saw you dancing,
The whirl and impalpable float of your garment,
Your throat lifted, your face aglow
(Like waterlilies in moonlight were your knees).
It was that night I heard you singing
In the green-room after your dance was over,
Faint and uneven through the thickness of walls.
(How shall I come to you through the dullness of walls,
Thrusting aside the hands of bitter opinion?)
It was that afternoon, early in June,
When, tired with a sleepless night, and my act performed,
Feeling as stale as streets,
We met under dropping boughs, and you smiled to me:
And we sat by a watery surface of clouds and sky.
I hear only the susurration of intimate leaves;
The stealthy gliding of branches upon slow air.
I see only the point of your chin in sunlight;
And the sinister blue of sunlight on your hair.
The sunlight settles downward upon us in silence.
Now we ****** up through grass blades and encounter,
Pushing white hands amid the green.
Your face flowers whitely among cold leaves.
Soil clings to you, bark falls from you,
You rouse and stretch upward, exhaling earth, inhaling sky,
I touch you, and we drift off together like moons.
Earth dips from under.
We are alone in an immensity of sunlight,
Specks in an infinite golden radiance,
Whirled and tossed upon silent cataracts and torrents.
Give me your hand darling! We float downward.

It withers

near a bare
tree,

under skies
filled with
gray.

It withers

with tired petals
amid dullness, and

rain.

I see it wither

here.

I see what

remains.

Poor haggard

thing

with no place to
go.

I see it wither here

without
ever seeing
it

grow.

They will try to take the words
To tame the language
To anesthetize
Censoring
Limiting
As we lose one word at a time
We will forget
The next generations won’t miss
What was dismissed
And the flowers won’t bloom
The sun won’t blaze
The orange haze will fade
Dullness will set in
In the forgetting
Identity will be lost
Compassion will be lost
We will be lost
In the censorship

Red Cup Red Cup, colorless backdrop
Just filled with water as its poured with the last drop.
Red Cup, Red Cup all packed with water
But the Red cup gets picked up and cracks at the bottom.
Red Cup, Red Cup, but black and white all around
The man holds it up and a drop falls to the ground.
That drop that drop, like a slow motion  flood
Is thrown to the ground with an ominous thud.
Red cup, Red Cup, now past its peak fullness
As the man sheds a tear for his entire life’s dullness.

It chills like fire
It burns like ice
It's dark like day
And so bright like night
It's an oxymoron
That makes paradoxical sense
It's a pseudo-pseudonym
Filled with disguise, thick and dense
And it's become a fine mess
In the years I've been gone
The acute dullness
Of the field seems so wrong
But the change is the same
And the routine is ever-changing
And this name has no name
As we look for what we can't see

Old man stands alone,
shirt undone,
hair silver and lifting,
the sky begins to split.

The storm enters
not with cruelty,
but with memory,
that deep breath before
the world unbuttons itself.

Thunder cracks like bones once young.
The rain walks sideways,
then vertical,
then all directions.
He does not move.

Was the storm that raised him,
not his father,
not a stiff lipped god behind a pulpit,
but this:
a violent choir of wind and water
tearing through the trees like language
he always understood
but never spoke.

Remembering it in his legs,
how the wind,
long ago,
swept him off roofs,
out of dry judgement,
into open roads and beds and truths.
How lightning never hit him,
but always pointed
and directed.

He once chased it,
barefoot,
drunk on youth and refusal,
beautiful clouds, black and blooming.
giving permission
to crack open,
wiping dullness off the skin
that last coat of sleep.

Now, old and alone,
he feels it again,
that holy silence between the strikes,
that rush of air through the ribs,
the kind that makes love and sin feel small.

The wind doesn’t ask where he’s been.
The rain doesn’t question strength.
They just take him in,
pulling his bones into a long, level song.

No one watching.
No one shouting him back inside.
Only black clouds
reaching low enough
to press their foreheads to his.

In that communion,
the unspoken pact between man and squall
he closes his eyes,
and lets go
of names, of time, of answers.

Only the storm
knows who he was.
Only the storm
still loves him for it.

Her eyes
Were always
Full of mischief
They sparkled with delight,
And always had
That special glint in them.

But if you looked closely enough
You would see
Swollen rims
From crying herself to sleep.
That sparkle
You'd think you knew so well
Was merely a mask
For the true dullness
And lack of hope
Within.

And perhaps
If you looked longed enough
You would see
The very beginnings
Of a supressed tear.

If only
I realised what was going on
In her eyes
Before it was too late.

Do not look at me like that.
With those eyes that see only what is shone to you.
And you accept all of it.
No questions asked.
No logic, no reason to seek.
No.
I am not just an object you can look at.

Do not look at me like that.
With the judgment of their thoughts
That you so shamelessly replicate
in your feeble, feeble mind.
No originality.
You bore me in your dullness.
No.
I am not who you think I am.

Do not look at me like that.
With ears filled with their whispers.
I can hear them too, you know.
You're not very discreet.
No.
I am not defined by the stories they say.

I am not an open book,
Or a single shade,
Or a monotone.
I feel nothing for their interests.
I am not alive in their ballads of woe.

I am alive in myself.
I am the abstract, I am the obtuse.
My colors, range to infinity.
My stories have happy sad tormenting everafters.
I do not care for their hollow affection or their false ratification.
I am unattached and I breathe fire--
in.
out.

I'm ablaze in my little place of ease.
Even alone, I have found my love...
She was there along.
Residing in me,
It was always--
me.

*I am myself. That is enough.

We had something special. I mean, that’s what they all say in the beginning. You spend so much time building up a city, sit on a bench and realize, “well, ****, the lights are blinding.” And that’s what happens. People spend so much time creating what they think they want. and when they’re stuck with it, they close their eyes the entire time in disappointment. Here we are, sitting on a park bench wishing we lived somewhere in the country where we could actually see the sky, touch it, taste it.

We wanted more, but we stayed quiet. Mostly we wanted different, but instead, we started apologizing. You apologized for everything under the sun. The way you clicked your gum when you were bored, how you talked to yourself when you were stressed, the way you walked further ahead than me. You were hurrying ahead of me and I never understood where you were trying to go, but I knew it was away from here. I wanted to say something, anything, to break up the monotony of the silence that enveloped us. But I stayed quiet. I didn’t want to argue, just scream.

“I want to go home.” You finally said one evening. “I hate these **** lights and I can’t sleep knowing the city is awake.” I wanted remind you that you had insomnia, that if we lived in the country and the world fell asleep as we laid our heads on our pillows, you’d still never be able to sleep. You’d probably say the silence was too loud. I could never win with you.

We created something so electric, so terrifying and you were closing your eyes through it all. “If I can’t see her, she can’t see me.” Right? Not. I saw you, I witnessed your every move. But, I stayed quiet. I let you pack your things into boxes without question. I let you fall asleep on the couch for weeks. “I just can’t sleep. You breathe too loud.” You’d say. I felt a scream inside of me. Insomnia. You had insomnia. And of course I was breathing loudly, I was dreaming of drowning. And you were the ocean. That’s how it started feeling from then on.

I wondered where home was for you? With your parents? Where they could tell you about all the wonderful things you could’ve done? I knew that wasn’t it, but I also knew home wasn’t here either. In this city with a thousand stories. In this city that never sleeps. In this city where things are always happening. I began wondering what I didn’t know about you, but I began wondering, mostly, what I didn’t want to know. How when you can’t sleep, you sigh and toss and turn. Toss. Turn. Sigh. Turn. Toss. Sigh. Sigh again.

I sat on a park bench. Alone this time. Staring at the billboards, I closed my eyes and gulped. I tried to forget the awful color of the boxes that surrounded our my home. I tried not to think about how you forgot to say goodbye. I wondered what you saw when you closed your eyes? Because I saw lights. And I smiled. Because you hated the lights here, I began to love them. I began to love crowds in small rooms just out of spite. I started opening my eyes, asking questions, speaking out when I agreed with something, speaking up especially when I didn’t.

Insomnia wasn’t contagious but I think you gave me every symptom. My doctor told me to lay back on the coffee and maybe take NyQuill if it got worse. How was I supposed to pinpoint when I would miss you, though? I couldn’t. I reached for the phone before I could find the NyQuill, dialed your number. Like riding a bike, it’s something you don’t forget. I winced as it rang, I shuddered when you answered. I had so much to say, I had rehearsed this.

“Hello?” I felt my bones realign into the way they were when we fell in love. Perfect form to fit beside you in bed without disturbing you. Perfect form to hold your hand without getting too close. A perfect structure to love you without saying much of anything. I gulped. I wasn’t at a loss for words, words were at a loss for me. I reminded myself this. I wasn’t at a loss for you, you were at a loss for me.
“Hello? Who is this?” “I don’t think either of us have an idea.” When someone is quiet with you, you begin to memorize their voice. You didn’t have to love me to know what my voice sounded like. You had to love me in order to listen to me. There’s a difference. You sighed, “Oh, you” There was a sigh on the end of the line and I thought about the way you’d do this when you couldn’t sleep. Toss. Turn. Sigh.

I hated it like you hated the bright lights and the city.

“If you don't need anything, then stop bothering me.” I shivered at the harshness of your voice. And sighed myself. I started from the beginning, in screams that echoed throughout my home. I went on and on and on and on and on about everything I had ever suppressed until I heard the dullness of a dial tone mimicking me. I pressed end.

That’s when everything went quiet.

You hated noisy, crowded rooms, the city, the bright lights. Now me. You had it all wrong though.

Because here I am in the middle of the city that never sleeps staring at the nights and listening to the voices around me. I wanted to hear everyones story, but all I could hear was your voice telling me to stop bothering you. Your harsh tone, the way it cut through the silence of your small home in the country. I bet you can’t sleep there either. I bet you blame it on the crickets being too loud or the moon being too bright. I was drowning and you were sighing over and over again as if to say, “Great, another mess to clean up.”

Just so you know, you have insomnia. Just so you know, I can swim. Just so you know, there’s a difference between listening and hearing. We choose what we hear. Just so you know, there’s a difference between looking and seeing. You can choose what you see. You can’t keep your eyes shut for months and expect them to be accustomed to the bright lights when you decide to open them.

And there you were,
Black and white.
Emotionless: No excitement, no euphoria, no sadness, no fear,
Void of art, void of darkness, void of light.

How easy it is to be distracted away,
From you, from that of which is so important,
Yet your dullness can be compared to a lonesome tree which for a hundred years had had no sway,
Or a handsome husband who is nothing but impotent.

How deep, how dull,
And yet attractive to some.
And in these wee hours when the very air seems to lull,
And I slowly drift off hoping to tear through the fabric of space and time,

I pray I don't get distracted.
Because to understand that very dullness,
Is to conquer and to finish what I started,
And to blossom in all a nerd's fullness.

There are voices I hear
that are unusually clear, it's quite an awful racket
What do you mean? I hear nothing
You don't?  I hear something
Me? I can hear only quacking

They argue and bicker
I swear I get sicker each and every day
I think you're crazy, my son
He's fine, Obi Wan
Guys?  These ducks are coming our way

The least I can say
is that on rather slow days, I listen to combat the dullness
At least someone's not bored
I'm a Sith Lord!
Oh crap! one those ducks has a cutlass!!

It could be worse I suppose
but they always impose on the moments of silence I cherish
Man, he wasn't joking!
Those ducks are force choking!
If we don't leave, we're all going to perish!

One day I know
They'll finally go, and my sanity I will gain back
Quack quack quack quack
Quack quack quack quack quack
Quack quack quack quack quack quack quack!


*sigh

straight from heaven itself..
we fell
just fell straight down into the darkness.
our angel wings were pure..
they slowly became engulfed into the filthiest black as we fell further with gravity
we fell through the trees
the sharp branches slit our skin and scratched the feathers of our wings as we fell
we shattered the earths surface..
we sat staring at the strangeness...
these gentle wings drooped downward around our bodies..
softly they brushed the cracking land we sat on with their gentle tips
..the tall trees hunching their claws over us whispering curses of deceit
we once shook with fear
but now this became our realm of comfort...
porcelain tears formed at the edges of our eyes
our tears never reached the ground
these hearts that once existed
sadly crystalized
our cold stone hearts stopped beating..
our eyes turned into glossy black marbles...
we could stare right through your soul if we wanted
we were
vulnerable
deepened with sadness
a sadness that was reflected through our eyes
an emotion so deeply piercing a rusted fork trying to stab through a rib cage in a repeating jabbing motion wouldn't even compare.
longing for something that we never found.
the maps to happiness were burned with the fire of hatred
hair lay over our black mirror eyes
our radiant halos diminished radiation
they dimmed to dullness..these delicate auras we cherished
yet they were replaced...
replaced with a black aura and a pair of distorted glazed horns
those twisted manifestations
I watched them arising from that pretty little head of yours as it ruptured your scull
we matched and it made me smile
I think I felt a certain beauty for these creatures we became
our eyes glossed and down cast
we do not look up to the sun anymore because it did not exist
the moon was my favorite, it spoke in tongues
take my soul and stash it 6ft under with the decay.
we manifest the lurid .
you and I.
imperfection must have a place to go with its own kind..
because nobody wants un-ordinary
you are the only one who understands what I feel...
because we feel together..
we fell together..
we are defected as two
but we can love each other..
we love each other in this distorted form of beauty.
this frozen air representing a noose choking the trachea
the thick fog blurring our sight from paradise visions
that loveliness that we are restricted to see any more
but, this vision of darkness suits my  emotions better.
we will call this place home sweet home.
this place filled with fear.
for we cast it like a spell upon the land.
this solemn forest of decrepitude
not just evil..but conniving.
we just add onto this darkness of confused, and mentally abused.
we will find more people and start designing their headstones with their bones like name tags.
you and I.
to create our own universe of this ugly beauty we define.
together we fell.
together we will fiend.

Exiled, banished,
Sent down from your throne in heavens gate
to the torrential dullness of earth
the mear morals around me would call this "paradise lost"
yet I refer to it as my paradise found

For were the angles to be banished to earth
what may one state the difference be?
If there be such beauty in this world as you-
heaven doth speak out of sheer vanity

as to call itself the epitome of prosperity?
and forth to label itself paradise

for as far as the mear mortal known as I
true paradise lay not in gates of pearl,

yet rather in your heart of gold