I am Lex
And I am Alexandra.
I am not “baby” or “darling”.

I have more flies in my house than friends.

I am eighteen years old
But I feel as though the number should have an extra zero.

I am a student in more ways than one; of school, of the universe, of the stars in the night sky that I used to swear you hung all on your own for my eyes-
my gray-blue eyes with specks of yellow light around the pupils that make it look like I have always just been dancing in the street lights.

My pupils expand like black holes when my serotonin levels even out.

I am so short that I could pass as a pixie.
Five feet and one inch of metaphors that are so deeply rooted into my bones.
My ribcage knows truth like you placed it in my lungs for me to breathe in.

My hair is so indecisive, it changes colour biweekly.
I was born blonde.
My brother was born blue with a cord around his neck.

Every night before he goes to sleep he asks me to scratch his back.
I am older than he.
I feel that I am older than most.

I like old things.
If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.
I need someone with an old soul, I’m all Elvis and vinyl and Marilyn Monroe.
I could listen to Paul Simon’s “Live Rhymin’” on phonograph until I drop dead.

I wish it were winter all year long
But I don’t like being cold.

I collect tattoos like fireflies in mason jars.

I’m on pills that are supposed to make me happy.
I don’t think I’ve been happy since 2009
and I miss Her every day.

I’m more scared of life than death
but I no longer want to embrace dying.
Sometimes you forget to breathe just for a second, and then you realize
what you would be missing.

I think my depression is sort of like that.
It’s like being a bird and you’re the only one that can’t fly.

Nonetheless, I wish for stillness.
For peace, for fun in flatlines.
I wish for summer days by the lake
and no cell phone service.

I yearn for California.

I love reading so much that if I got paid for it,
I’d be a billionaire by now.
If you look into my eyes you could probably see traces of Sylvia Plath.

I wonder sometimes why she stuck her head in that oven.

I like vegetarian sushi, so basically just vegetables.
I was a vegetarian for a long while but then I decided that I wanted a hot dog.
I still regret that sometimes.

I’m afraid of frogs but nothing else.
I like to watch scary movies with the lights off.
I love to sleep, but I’m an insomniac.
And most of the time Melatonin doesn’t even knock me out.

I don’t believe in God but I believe in ghosts.
I don’t believe in hell but for Her sake, I hope there’s a heaven.
I believe in science but the class makes me want to rip my eyes out.
Except if it’s astronomy.

My parents usually depress me.

I believe purely in art.
Give me art or give me death.

I want to be a poet.
I want a living poet society.
My name is Lex
And this is 2013.

"Thus fought the heroes, tranquil their admirable hearts, violent their swords,
resigned to **** and to die." – Jorge Louis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths

stoic labyrinthine sparrow-bone;
there is a slalom down your gullet,
bayonet curled around your neck,
you have a beak, you are *****-smooth,
have rubble for skin, an emaciated infinity:
everything is fractal so eat your words
they are you are your rusty toenails
every footstep is a holocaust there’s
genocide under your neurons,
watch them flex and shiver.

you have soft plastic lips,
there is a vacuum in your gullet,
a box cutter carving
through your adam’s apple:
epileptics are just indecisive,
when they seize hold their tongues
they are their words you are a god
are oppenheimer and shiva,
pick favorites it doesn’t matter
it doesn’t matter it doesn’t matter
flex and shimmer we are just neurons
flatlines are not ghoulish nooses,
paraplegics are just cowards,
move with conviction each step
is a genocide, you have wooden
teeth and woolen wings,
thrashes are a velveteen sunset
an edible fog, your stomach
is a stomach do not eat the fog
just know that someday it will **** you
softly and swiftly.

it doesn’t matter it doesn’t matter:
infinity is not recursive
alive is not our default state
once is the only route
blood makes the blade holy
if you cut me i will bleed,
i won't blame you just know
you were only ever
that very moment.

It's that train again
The one that takes away the pain
When you jump.

The platform flatlines
Timetable times
Appear in your head
Four thirty seven it said
It was late.

You had to go
Other things on your mind
Who was to know that trains were so kind?

On another line at another time still there
Unwilling,unable to share
And anyway nobody there if you did.
Another beat,another pump and the train's late
No jump
Not today.
You go away and get on with things
See what tomorrow brings
Maybe the sun will shine
Maybe the railway line
Will disappear.

I have ye to thank,
all ye actors and poets and marvels
(and DCs and everything in between)
for I have lived with ye, and amongst ye,
and ye have gently inspired genuine genius
in all ye holes in the wall
and all ye pens and strings and voices.

I thank you for the endless memories
of conversations of unnecessary furor and consuming hysteria
of brilliant surprises from elegant unknown talents
of tossed salad people and places and history and interaction
of a night lost in glowsticks but preserved in pictures
of a time my time in between periods of blank walls
of a blinding bolt forward in presence of mind.

For was it you
who told me about your grandfather
a man so brilliant that a mere conversation with the dean
at sixteen granted him admission to Columbia?
who told me of Canadian interlocutors
intimately engaged, only after your party had left?
who told me of amazing cliffside adventures
in education and nature's nomenclatures abound?
who discussed my heritage against that of a concrete world
of exploding dreams and collapsing stars at once,
where you take a bite but might get the proverbial worm?
or you, against that of a simple hicktown
where tractors run tandem with buicks in school lots?

Might it have been you
who watched with me psychedelic documentaries
and named canaries after variations of drug store medications?
who gallantly tolerated my most obnoxious outrageous disgusting
interesting unaffected out-of-their-mind friends?
who took me to absurd spots at absurd hours to breathe absurdity,
then churted we'd go, back the building we'd known?
who brought me in groups to feast on uncomfortable meats,
but between the awkward and networked gossip pipelines,
were enjoying the food and friends and flattery?
who drunk on dreams, droned on into darkness,
and dripped into ears of a man in his cave,
a man playfully perplexing you by pondering preposterous?

It must have been you
whose beautifully woven music reached my ears,
enveloped my being, seldom alone, and even when solo,
scattered brains with banter and brilliance combined...
who, with an open door and wide smile,
welcomed me to the mind's great opera house,
and gave audience to my own logical saga...
who in the weekend's weak end became crazy dazed amazings,
lazing in listless lack of activity, or senselessly celebrating
sins and kinship, all ways seeking erasure...
who gave me so many names against the grain,
jrosay or nerp or j or jackattack or just plain jack,
your classmate hallmate roommate or just plain friend...
who sat and sang and slew, dragons myths, moods,
and hit and clicked and ripped and spilt, toxins, guilt,
and hurt and failed and walked with me...


at least i hope it was you
you who paved platforms and bridges to raze amazing
and left vast caches of spectacular aptitude
or you who spread brilliance like plagues defined loosely,
grossly self-aware in great stares of embarrassed arrogance
and defeated demons crying freedom and bleeding love
you gave worlds great engravings, new meaning
to be me in new worlds new dreams new things
nooses spread shredded across mind fields
you lovingly led leaders over languid anguish
dangled carrotsticks and heritage bringing peace
you found you finding a place in space in winding time
under universal roofing aloof of stinking sewage
found a truth around music and beauty

shopping cart hearts that gather dust and poetry
blissful obituary tears splashing across my memory
loco rangers of brilliant oblivion armed with toothy news
slaying my molded upbringings refreshing genius

fair chance soul trade and daylong flatlines
double barreled shotgun roulette
blank charge buckshot
noisemakers both

that trigger
firing
you
?

I am like a plane

I read somewhere or heard somewhere
I think on NPR

about what it's like to see the world!
from a plane window.

Imagining is having the sights before you!
from a plane window.

The clouds and the blue blue blue
It's the atmosphere.

Dear God! You're actually flying
Except you're in a whites only plane.

Oh! If only it could be bottled and given to the masses
Ms. Marlowe introduced me to Prometheus.

To search for a way
to have what you imagine in yr dreams and in books and hopes
to be before you
is a ropebridge.

It only snaps in the movies baby!
If you're any different
and it snaps for you,

you got death.
Which is what you wanted all along,

no?

When I was a child my mind was ratchet like a plane in turbulence
it is rickety
the space between Trinidad and Tobago makes me readjust my insides and outsides

Climbing Climbing he shakes and flatlines
He becomes a hero he knew all along

Modern Medicine can make freed slaves become the mothers and fathers of the rice cripsies

1/29/2015
princeton thursday night
all out of coffee
and, sitting by wood slats of the
sad sunroom i
smile at a dead beetle

set the record down on
helen forrest and all she does it talk about
how she loves so madly

the sun sets on the west
sourland bramble downwards the cul-de-sac ridge
was in my line of sight long walks

but pulmonary bruises like the radiators
and that was in what? october? april?
no. april's too early

i close my eyes in bed and
i still hear that ****** song
enraptured i sink back and

i open again i open!
i can't afford to die or lose
same thing, just yet

i have dorms to sneak into and
cigarettes to put out,
more lifetime flatlines to complain about and

drain pipes to stand next to and
grass to sink into when it thaws and
unexpected phonecalls from past men
to receive.

month long in absentia you never called me first and now
i gotta go flip this record over, man.
stand up down the stairs off the bed
remind me not to blink for too long.

Hold fast to that which is good-
sheets in clenched fists
bodies churning fast then-
minds blank as emergency room flatlines.

Render to no one, evil for evil-
spread out wide, butter on bread,
before you like a deer in headlights
humming in shared solitude.

And deliver us from debts- as we-
forgive our debtors.
Each wall collapsing as we tumble down-
down, down- a cushioned fall.

And lead us not into temptation
a jolt of the lungs- intake of air
sweet like sugar on the tip of my tongue.
Motions liquid, silky.

But deliver us from evil.
Oh God! Please save me- as hearts
pound to bones- playing nerves as harp strings.
Oh God! please save me. Save me.

We met for coffee; well,
I had coffee and she had tea.
Her pics didn't do her justice --
Chin prim
Lips cursive
Skin that swam under mine,
Making the porcelain creamer cup blush.

She claimed
she had a quarter million members
That followed her.
it's good money she reasoned,
But not gloating;
More matter-of-factly.
Off the cuff,
I asked for her stage name.
She explained that she blocked NY
For work and family reasons,
Assuming I had asked so to
Watch her perform later
(Which isn't altogether untrue).

She measured every utterance,
Teleprompters behind eyelids
Feeding her perfectly crafted lines.

I use the Golden Ratio when I webcam
She said, as she sipped her tea.
I consider it an art -- or
At least that is what I tell myself.
I asked her to elaborate.
She said she was somewhat conflicted
About whether or not it was immoral.
But she was so even
With her response,
Almost as if it were compelled
By a formality
That was now checked off her list.

Her body language taciturn
Asleep, idle, screen-saved
Waiting waiting

Curve and line
Coffined for now to slake desires anon -
Her numbers in slumber, confined
Waiting to be crunched,
Flatlines Animated by pitchblack revelry
With one click

Turning them.

She said she liked to watch others
ya know, To see how they move.
She would even watch it at work,
Open in one of her browser tabs.
She took notes.

Lines triangulated
Liminal spaces given, hidden.

Digital lipstick smears
Tattooing amygdalas firing --
Allow them to slip in
Only to slip out of them
With an X.

We talked for an hour
And then left the café.
She asked me over.
I said not tonight --
The words coming out
As if willed by something
Outside of myself.

She walked off into the dark
And I kicked myself for saying no.

Her curves beholden to math --
Gyration of hip and waist,
Arms tendrils configuring, cavorting,
Slave to an inner-whorl
twirled and twirling --
One single objective truth, now
A convergence of secreting plurality
Into beauty and beauty and

That night I ****** off thinking of her
And came so hard
I pulled something in my back.

In between sleep and waking life
I transcended
Something.. I felt

Turned.

Bat on window sill
Still as the unflinching
Lidless abyss --
Then a quarter turn of its head --
Its beady eye catching streetlight --
Careening it off into a nonplussed
Night of nights.

is that hemlock with your words
numb and nice wisdom demolished
one sip
gone into Hades
where flatlines collect
irrespective of  consequence.

is that your tail
behind my back
checking out my misdemeanors
collecting the wild oats
that I sowed
in silicon valleys?

don't mistrust me
i paid the price of hell
to be here in this paradise
fishing for jonah
and
the great whale.

come let us lay together
in this poetic swamp
encapsulate
our doubts in tupperware
tightness, move on into
no explanations required.

© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved, a month ago

⚠️Trigger Warning: The following poem contains subject matter pertaining to self-harm, suicide, and voluntary psychiatric hospitalization⚠️
~

This is not my first heartbreak.

I've had many,
and I've certainly had worse.

Although,
at the time,
my heart would have plead
irreparable.

(If only I knew
what was to come
two years later--

but there's a poem
for another day.

In fact,
I believe
you've read it.)

This is the first heartbreak
I feel everywhere--
a cataclysmic aching
that I am certain  
will reduce my pulse to  
flatlines.  

This is my first anxiety attack.

My fingernails scrape violently
at my collarbone
as if they are looking to fulfill
some distant, unadulterated urge
to tear myself apart.

(They are digging
for what whispers beneath--

a dying thing.)

But I cannot
escape
this Incarceration;

I cannot
escape
the shuddering confines
of my own body.

So
I tear away
my clothes
until I am left
in just my underwear.
rocking myself back and forth
like the mad girls
do in the movies.

(Is it true?

Have I gone mad?)


I run the shower
even though I don't have
any intention of showering.

I do this only so my mum
doesn't hear me sobbing,
the sounds of which
are concealed by
the water's blaze.

The room fogs over--

and all the world
is a mist.

and suddenly,
I don't know
what to do with myself.

and suddenly,
I don't give
an absolute ****
about what happens to me
anymore.

For this simple reason, I decide to go to the hospital.

Take away my  
dignity.

Take away my
independence.

Just promise-
******* promise me--
you'll take away the
pain too.

You don't
(of course).

"Please don't tell me you're here because of a boy."

This is one of the first things--
perhaps even the first thing--
the doctor says to me.

"What? Did you think the two of you would ride off into the sunset and live out the rest of your days on some faraway island?"

(Something to this extent,
yet still not an exaggeration.)

See,
to doctors,
broken hearts
are a ridiculous waste of time.

They prefer to deal
in broken things
they can easily
cast and bandage
in fluorescent colours
upon which all the people
you know can then sign,

"Get well soon."

But there is no one to sign
get well soon
across the
war-torn
latitude of my chest.

Because no one truly believes
there is anything for me
to recover from--

they can't see it,
so it mustn't be real

(right?)

Thanks
for cutting a girl down
when she's already bleeding,

(literally,
and I've got the scars
to prove it.)

Doc,
don't ya know
it was never about
just a boy?

It was about
yet another instance of
rejection
I was forced to add
to my repertoire
of not-good-enoughs,
yet another loss
magnified
by my ailing brain.

(what came first--
the plague,
or the boy?

Do I even have to
provide a ******* answer
to such an obvious question?)


Doc--
I know what
type of person you are:

an egotistical *** hat
who thinks mental illness
is inferior
to Physical Illness

cuz

it's all in my head
it's all in my head
it's all in my head

right?

Doc,
what if I told ya
"It"
is always trying to **** me?

What if I told you
"It"
wants nothing more
than to reduce my pulse--
my broken heart--
to flatlines?

Would you take back what you said?

(probably not).

My heartbeat drops
-Fitbit flatlines-
Senses overheat,
I plummet and do not resist.

a chronological sequence
a capture of moments
kinetic art of reality
through complexity & clarity
meagre for bland eyes
cynics with heart beats
but flatlines
in indulging in
the cacophony of life
- align the body & mind
with the glimmers in sight
before the grim reaper
emerges with his scythe
snarling - but of course
it's the nature of life.

As they catch up,
the bass starts bouncing.
Your fingers gallop across her skin.
Weary-eyed; you pick up speed.

Your heart a steaming engine,
whispering heat from each ventricle.
Pumping into overdrive exhaustively.
Yet, she allows you one last ride.

You give it all you got.
Blood flows madly.
Her eyes light with excitement.
Everything passing blurs.
Absolute serenity.

The motor flatlines, exhausted; empty.
They have you; it's all over.
You're her favorite song, galloping gently.
She's the temperance to your gluttony.
Fallen into arms, the two sob infinitely.

"time heals all wounds"
Oh how wrong I find that.
Sure, the mind may bury the wounds, cover them in scar tissue,
lessen the pain,
but never heal.
Sometimes you're the one that ends up getting buried.
Each secret, every guilt ridden action acting like shackles,
causing the wrists to go raw,
every conscience thought acting like the worst witness, accuser.
Nobody wants to feel like this.
Nobody should have to.
Nobody wants to live like this.
Nobody should have to.
So why does my mind
plague me with thoughts of
self mutilation mixed in with memories
whips, chains, belts, coat hangars, heated metal, wooden spoons,
frying pans, baseball bats, tools not meant for this so called "discipline".
I can't distinguish what actual anguish I truly experienced,
everything feeling so vivid,
so real.
While the physical scars, abrasions,
evidence
of what actually happened has healed, faded, washed away.
Every broken bone, torn muscle, bruised bit of flesh has mended,
even the severest of them, through the help of physical therapy.
But no conditioning can help you outrun
what you have firmly planted between your ears.
Trust me, I know what its like
to not be able to trust your own mind.
Long before I take my last breath, heart flatlines,
whether it be a bullet piercing my skull,
razor blades carving up and down my forearms,
or sleeping pills that permanently take effect,
but believe me that a sad soul will **** a man,
long before a gun is loaded, knife sharpened, bottle filled.

sketchbooks are supposed to be for sketching,
but sometimes my thoughts come out in words or color.the shapes in my mind don't form worldly things and my brain can't comprehend itself.I am a dormant volcano full of anxiety and too much love for this world.I find comfort in the nothing that consumes me, for that it all I am.Dust, an insignificant particle in the eyelashes of society,I still pity myself and hope I disturb a tear just for my sorry existence, but it dries up in the barren desert of lies being fed to the masses.Sick of the monsters within. It's 1AM now and I’m the only one with a conscious thought of blood staining my veins with life. Oxygenated life.Held by the elements that we hold inside of us.I yearn for the release of sleep that will slingshot me around the sun again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, until the earth's pulse flatlines, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, until we are destroyed by creation, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, life to death, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, until death yields to creation, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again until it all stops….

So Many ... CLAIM ... !!!

They ... Want To HELP ... !!!
But ... Seem To Me ...
To ... " Help Themselves " ... !?!

From ... " Charities " ...
To ... " Families " ...
Who Help Long After ............................

..... " TRAGEDIES " ..... !!!!!

Even Those In ... " Poetry " ...
Seem RELUCTANT ...
To ..... " Use Me " ..... ?!?

Because of Words ...
They Hear Me Speak ...

Black and White ...
Have ... FEAR FILLED Eyes ...
When They Hear Me ... Use A Mic ....

I'm Sure In Truth ...
It's NOT Just ... " Me " ... !!!!!
But Those Who DON'T ...
Use ... PROCESSED Speech ...
And ... REJECT Joining ...

..... PHONEY CLIQUES ..... !!!

They Seem To ... Like ...
How Things ... Now Are ... ?!?

... " ILLITERACY " ...
  
From ...
Class To ... Bars ... !!!

Their ...  Form of HELP ...
Hasn't ... Got Us Far ... !?!

My ... Use of Speech ...
Ain't Always ... " Street " ...
And Doesn't Always ...

... Frighten Peeps' ... !!!!!!!

But Nowadays ....
That's How You Reach ...
Youth ... Whose Lives ...
FEEL .... Incomplete ....

I've heard this said ....

"Virge, kids would,
really, love your words !"

And Now I'm Finding ...
It's ... " The Youth " ...
Who Like ... My Stuff ...
And Think It's ... " COOL " ... !!!

So Now I'd Like ...
To Work In ... Schools ... !!!
And Touch These Kids ...
With ... DIFFERENT Views ...

That's ... A Start ...
But ... Uni's TOO ... !!!!!

Because They Are Deemed ...
To Have The Youth ...
Who'll ... Run The World ...
And Make ... STRONG MOVES ... !!!!!

But Now I've Got To ...
Go To ... SCHOOL ... !!!!

To Prove That I ...
Can Teach The Youth ...

So Much For ....
These ... FUNDED Groups ... !!!

Are They ...
Trying To ... " Help " ... ?
Or ... FILL THEIR BOOTS ... ?!?

Just Like ... MANY ...
... " Aid Groups " ... DO ... !!!

I'm Now ... " Confused " ... ?
And May ... " Refuse " ...
To Do What's Right ...
And ... HELP The Youth ...

While ... Parents Cry ...
Into ... " TISSUES " ... !!!!!

The ... " Poetry Scene " ...
Is ... FILLED With Dreams ... !!!

But ...
Run By ... "Those" ...
Who Are .................................................. "unseen" .......

They ...
FLY Through Here ... !!!

And ...
FLY Through There ... !!!

But ...
Never Seem To ...
Be ... Prepared ...

To ... Bring Those In ...
Who Are NOT SCARED ... !!!
To ... Speak Their MIND ...
Through ... CLEVER Rhyme ... !!!!!

And Use The Truth ... !!!!!
To .... " Reflect Times " ....

Times That WARRANT ...

******* LINES .... !!!!!!!!!!!

WELL Designed ...
And YES ... " REFINED " ... !!!
To HELP Our Youth ...
To ... STOP The Crimes ... !!!

Leading To ....
PREMATURE ... Flatlines ... !!!!!!!

Why ... " Decline " ... ?!?
To Use ... Such Rhyme ... !?!

Time Just ... Rolls On........................

You CAN'T ... REWIND ... !!!!!

And Time Right Now ...
Is .... " Running Out " ....
While Groups Like These ...
Are ... " Making Pounds " ... !!!

And Getting Grants ... !!!!!

To Do What's Right ... ?
And .... ENERGIZE ....
Our Youth To LIVE .... !!!
A ... POSITIVE LIFE ... !!!!!!!

By Using ... Those ...
Who Write ... Good Prose ...
And KNOW ABOUT ...
Life's ... HIGHS and Lows ... !!!!!

From ... Taking Dope ...
To .... Snorting Coc' .... !!!!!

Because ....
Things Like These ...
ARE NOT A Joke .... !!!!!!!!

And ... Have Left ...
MANY Young Hearts ...

...... BROKE ...... !!!!!!

It's ...
CLEARLY TIME ...
To ... Utilize Rhyme ...

If You ...
Don't Believe Me ...
Ask .... Stephen Fry .... !!!!

He ...
LOVES Poetry ...
As Much As ... I ... !!!

From Classics To ...
Contemporary Styles ...

When Rap's Done WELL ...
It Drives Kids ..... WILD ..... !!!!!!

And When ... " Applied " ...
To ... Children's Minds ...

You ... May Just Find ... ?
They'll ... REJECT Crime ...
And Be CONSTRUCTIVE  ...
... With Their Time ... !?!

These Words of Mine ...
Are YES ... " HEARTFELT " ... !!!
  
But ... Wonder When ... ???
These Groups Will SMELL ...

The Coffee ...
And Will ... REJECT Tea ... !!!

And Utilize ... My Poetry ....
Cos' Words I Write ...
Are Worth ... Money ... !!!

And ... NEED TO BE ...
Passed On With ... STEALTH ... !!!!!

Cos' Right Now ... I ...
DON'T LIKE The SMELL ... !!!!!!

of Those Who CLAIM ... !!!

They're ... Trying To ...

....... " HELP " ....... !!!

ice in hand
she suffers,
then flatlines,
then conquers it,
then vanishes.

An untitled Document is
a story waiting to be written,
a play waiting to be acted,
a song waiting to be sung,
is an ice cold beer waiting to be drank.

An untitled document
is a way into my soul.
But i must warn
you before you take a sneak peek….

Let me remind you of
your family
your friends
your freedom
your life.

Let me remind you that
when … if you take a look
you may never come back.

Not because you don’t want to
but because my bright and colorful soul
is just a mask
a thick deep mask.
Really my soul is mad,
Creepy
Nostalgic.

My soul is
why your mother told you
not to talk to strangers.
My soul is why you
were told to keep on the sidewalk.

My soul is an
alarming chilling thing
that you cannot  intimidate
because it'll tumult you with a look.

My soul can **** you
my soul
will keep you on your knees
my soul will have you begging
for a second and third and 100th glance

my soul is as addicting as ******.
My soul is ******.
It bubbles under fire
and you get a rush when injected

But You'll always want more until you die.
Unlit you breathe your last breath.
Until you're weak pulse flatlines.
Until the foam gargling out of you mouth finally stop.
Until your heart beats its last beat.  
Until your smile finally disappears.

It Seems That...
MANY Place WEALTH...
On A... HIGHER Shelf...
Than Their Personal Health... ?
  
So I Guess They Can’t Tell...
That This May Not Serve Well... ?!?
  
ESPECIALLY Now...
That Corona’s Around... !!!
  
Or Maybe It WILL... ?!?
If Becoming... ILL...
Is Something It Can Fix...
By Using Dollar Bills... ?!?
  
It’s Something I Learned QUICK...
When My Mum Became Sick...
  
Because Wealth of Health...
... Is NEEDED MORE...
  
Than Grabbing Cash...
Like Some Kind of Street *****... !!!
  
Now I’m NOT A Man...
Who Ignores The FACT...
That... In This World...
Cash Needs To Be Earned... !!!
To Cover Yourself...
And To Live Live WELL... !!!
  
But Wellness of BEING...
Leaves Money REELING... !!!
  
Because When You’re BLEEDING...
It’s NOT MONEY You’re NEEDING... !!!!!
  
It’s A Level of... HELP...
Where Wealth AIN’T Felt... !!!
That’ll Help You Survive...
And NOT Create Flatlines... !!!
  
These Days I Find...
That WEALTHY Minds...
Are... HARD To Find... !!!
  
In These Troubling Times...
Now Affecting Mankind... !!!!
  
People Are STRANGE... ?!?
And Find Wealth In Ways...
That CLEARLY AREN'T Humane... !!!
  
There’s A Wealth of Brains...
Being Mentally DRAINED... !!!
  
... Including MINE...
But That’s Okay And FINE... !!!
  
Because Where My Wealth Is...
  
Is In Writing Lyrics...
And Poems Like This...
That Allow My Mind...
To Show A Wealth of Rhymes...
That I Now Design...
That... Lyrically SHINE... !!!
  
WITHOUT FINE WINE...
Or The Need of GRIME... !!!
  
Because My Wealth Is CLEAN...
And NATURAL Like GREEN... !!!
That AIN’T Money Know What I Mean... !!!
  
It’s The Type That Smells...
of... HIGH QUALITY... !!!!!
  
So My Wealth ISN'T Seen...
In... CERTAIN Scenes...  
Where Their Wealth of Verse...
NO Longer Serves Hip Hops’ PURPOSE... !!!
  
To Explain The TRUTH...
To The Young Black Youth... !!!
  
Whose Wealth Now DRILLS...
And Nowadays... KILLS... !!!
  
Just Like This VIRUS... !!!
Whose Wealth Has Invited...
  
... FEAR To Be RISING  ... !!!
  
Because of Advisement...
Now Needing RETIREMENT... !!!
  
We Have A WEALTH of LIARS...
Who Are NOT Good Friars... !!!
Whose Wealth Would Seem...
To Now Spread DISEASE... !!!
  
The Type That Feeds...
On... HUMANITY... !!!
  
Technological Feeds...
And New World Policies...
To Feed Wealthy Tyrannies... !!!
  
There’s A Wealth of Dreams...
Now Feeding Nightmares...
To Keep People SCARED... !!!
  
And Now UNPREPARED...
For What’s Coming NEXT... ?!?
  
While My Wealth Injects...
... HIGH Intellect...
As Well As Common Sense...
In My Use of Poems...
  
My Wealth of Thoughts...
Are Those That Are Born...
From A Whole Lot MORE... !!!
  
Than Inciting Wars...
That Have... NO CAUSE... !!!
  
My Wealth Enlists...
My Mind To THINK... !!!
  
And To RECOGNISE...
That Life Now Finds...
Itself In A Bind...
of DECEIT And LIES... !!!
  
And VIRUS Vibes... !!!
That Are TAKING LIVES... !!!
  
Well APPARENTLY... Right... ?!?
  
My Wealth Invites...
The TRUTH To SHINE... !!!
  
So REJECTS... Denial...
Like We Should Paedophiles... !!!  
And NEW AGE Styles...
Now Confusing Young Child...
  
From Masks To Gender...
To The Type of Agendas...
That Are Fed By PRETENDERS...
And IGNORANT Mentors... !!!
  
My Mind Now INSISTS...
On REJECTING These Things... !!!
  
So Instead Now PERSISTS...
In Creating Scripts of Poetic Lyrics...  
That Seek THIS THING...
  
Where WISDOM Lives... ?!?
  
Because Now I Think...
That Where Wisdom Exists...
  
Is........
  
“Where My Wealth Is”...

beautiful silence
beautiful pain
we're only human
we're meant to dream
lost in a life full of mistakes
we do what feels right
then fall with no grace
chased by the sun
escaping flatlines
dreams are a curse
wake up you're alive

Avoid loud and aggressive
persons, they are vexations
to the spirit:    "Desiderata".

   Every time one sees the
   the strangled banner we
     think of George Floyd
     which makes us vexed.

         Stars are explosive
         military metaphor
          markers on maps.

         Stripes are flatlines
        graphing  genocidal
          deaths of millions.

      When you want some-
      -thing all the universe
        conspires in helping
    you achieve it.   "Coelho".

     Making America Grate.

    "It's what we all wish for”.