It came as a wave
I was doing the back stroke
felt the clear water beneath me
it was calm at first
safe even
I didn't think about how deep it was
I didn't think about how dark it could get
I thought about how clear the water was
how warm the surface was
the moon and the sun fought to be my light
my legs went under
then my waist
then my arms
my body started to tingle
I only glanced
the depth was luring
I felt myself slip into the paralyzingly cold water
I couldn't feel the sun anymore
the moon laughed
the water wasn't calm anymore
it was time
my head went under
I had oxygen but it only lasted so long
my head felt light & I wasn't in control anymore
I seen creatures you'd never see at the surface
I drifted & didn't dare gasp
The jellyfish danced around me as I watched everything go black  
They just danced

Phantom Fierce Pierce

For Sally

Do have the courage of fear?
What!
You heard me.
Admit that we are all inhabited,
Admit that we are all inhibited.

Fear, the eleventh plague visited upon the Egyptians,
Nothing more paralyzingly complete.
Walking down an average day, an average street,
A median day, a medium day that a
Black disease from whence unknown,
And you are a froze shadowed chalk figure
Drawn upon the concrete, unable to move.

What would you pay, anything,
What would you give, everything,
Cleanse it all
Cut out the incisions
That with precision
Haunt your every
Waking and sleeping moment.
The deeds that did not get done,
The deeds that cannot get undone,
Both your undoing.

A plague on both, a plague on me,
My plague, unique to me,
Free me from this whatever the cost.

But it can't be arranged.
No devil to sell back the things
Of which you are ashamed,
No stain stick extant to guarantee success.

When the hollow is so great
You feel non-existent.

But you do not see what I see...
Courage, raw and plain, admits
These phantoms are not phantoms at all.

Those figures try to break you.
There is a beach, a path, where you know,
Safety.

Not easy to get there. The bus schedule unpublished.
But the bus line exists.
And you have the courage to wait, patiently
Until it arrives.

There is value here, if you read between the dashes
And the dots.

I see you for who you are.
You are the phantom fiercer piercer.

Shown us the way.

Why is the concept of being forgotten so paralyzingly terrifying to me?
Before the expanse of time,
none of us stand a chance of being remembered.
We will be swallowed up,
only be known as a statistic, a point of reference.
The thoughts we think are paramount
Quail before the laughing face of Time.
God will remember me,
so why do I care about what those on earth think?
Why do I care what people think?
What kind of sick ******* are we that we derive pleasure from others' pain?
Schadenfreude is alive and well
Unlike you and I
Why don't I throw up my hands
And succumb to the ravages of an indifferent Time
And an indifferent society
Why not let them win
Who values a game which is purposely weighted to one side
If not those who have waged something dear upon the outcome
The Ender inside me rejects the faulty system.

Why do I persevere for a "humanity"
which will never improve
In fact,
the more we evolve and know and comprehend,
The more apt we are to be heartless
Because why do we need a heart when we have a brain, Tinman?

Why do we care what we look like
Our bodies are merely
borrowed from the earth
And in the blink of eternity's eye
what we call ours
will belong to another

Why do we live in a world overflowing with bodies
And entirely lacking with people

Why can we satisfy any part of ourselves
by draping on borrowed emotions
Why is the false more alluring than the truth?
Show me an honest person
And I will show you an attractive one.

I am not you
you are not me
And we will never be
The same
Despite the pervading effort of our society
I will not be assimilated.

If we let people in,
They wouldn't hate
So why are we terrified of doing that
Is it because,
If everyone is in,
No one is
And in ceases to exist?

Why do we feel the urge to gloat about things we did not earn

Why does 1
Make more money than 2
Because his nose is straighter,
His hair is curly rather than straight,
Because 1 spends an eighth of his time in the gym
While the less attractive 2 spends 7/8 of his time
Screaming inside
At a society which has cut off its own ears that it can't won't hear.

Why are random genes a judge of worth
While character is a word so overplayed
It folded its hand long ago

Why is the face of a beautiful liar
Infinitely preferable
To that of a plain truthteller
Infinite whys
And a world which whispers
     Cradle me with your honeyed lies
     Assurances of past lullabies
     How do I trust what the mockingbird cries
     When even it runs from the skies
Why do so many see ourselves as bound and controlled by manipulated strings
When those strings are nothing but ropes with which we can escape

Why do we live on top of one another
Without deigning to know our prisonmate
Without so much as a spared thought
For the dead flailing beneath us

Why do I hold dearest to my heart
Past injustices
Counting them as the tiny, insidious proofs
That I am a good person
Because good does not exist without the bad
Relativity is the grip keeping us from sliding
Down.
Away.

Why is it that words spoken can never be taken back?
Simple. We can never reclaim what was never ours.
You think you are original in your menial thoughts
What have you done but regurgitate the thoughts of your predecessors?
Rearranging the same letters
To form the same tiresome conclusions.
We are the worst type of plagiarists.

Why is the only thing propelling you a sense of duty
Why are you devoutly loyal to objects rather than the people who happen to hold them

Why

Why do we invent reasons to hate one another
We take solace in the loopholes which justify our hatred
That we may not be like the "monsters" we condemn

Why are "we" and "they"
Not just markers of distance?
Why must they be very real, ubiquitous mentalities?

Why are somber topics the common stuff of jokes
Because we have grown numb enough to empathy
To shun it in favour of a laugh?

Why is suffering so prevalent
When we have an excess of affluence
Are such extremes what define us as a race?

Why is a white lamb the symbol of pristine innocence
When innocence is slaughtered day after day?
Why are sharks abhorred creatures even though
Our vicious attacks
Far outnumber theirs
Do we idealize them that we may have a reason
An excuse
To assert our dominance over yet one more
To feel the joy of crushing them underfoot
Why do we focus on certain images
When the true image of our society
Is the person who occurs each day,
Who breaks
The answer is because we know
that we
Are at fault.

Why when confronted about the tiniest aspect of ourselves
We rear our heads in defense
Backing up against the corner of idiocy
The walls built upon the truths we have fabricated
Why are the swirling armor of falsities so comforting
And when pierced
We rebel
With every bit of the person we have built
Lashing out as does a dog chained its entire life
But even a dog
Which is after all "just an animal"
*Is not fool enough to delude itself into loving its chain.

Cheers to being paralyzingly afraid of death,
but saying,
"I can't wait for this day to be over"
Have a drink.
In celebration of the end of the day,
in melancholic terror for the end of your life.

You are not free
To love me

You are married
Legally, emotionally
Paralyzingly

You built a life
based on guilt.

And now you want me to be
part of your destiny

Beaten, harnessed,
pained, drained,

Following orders
Submissive borders

one of the most painful journeys
takes you to a destination you never intended to visit

you spend days engulfed in pictures and daydreams of bright colors and future memories

until one day you look up to a view so paralyzingly dull, not even your hope could see you through

Her eyes shiver with delight
green light flooding her lovely body
an arrangement of fluttering notes
laughter paralyzingly genuine always upon her lips
only passionate bright things in her face
her presence twinkles in the minds around her
This is how he sees her
always
a glimpse around every corner
at every “little party”
through the champagne haze and loud primary colors
her figure only grows more vivid with the night,
drawing him closer, his hand outstretched to the past.
Not even the grandest of golden gestures
nor any number of diamond faced companions
could make his world completely distracted.

She is no beautiful little fool.

If I listed out all of the things that have
Tripped me up
And troubled me
Truly my dear
You would never stop pitying me.

Take me backwards around that stop sign I split

My legs churn counter clockwise
To the backyard as kids

But I can't find a moment that will fit
The description
Of the happiness I sought as a prescription
And over took my kind
As an addiction.

I have to find the exact formula
To improvement
Because I can't keep living
In this whirlwind disaster
That has only begun to spin faster.

I have fallen into a
Petrifying and paralyzingly vortex;
The consumation of my years spindling around me.

I am wound in
Sloppy rings,
Sticky with sap and
Last nights spilt wine.

I've grown into where I  will remain now,
Regardless of personal preference.
Mostly I can settle for my comfortable domain
Of limited know-how;
But when my tongue trips
And my knees scrape on
Every protruding corner

I will remember
I am only living,

Hidden behind callouses
Of all those spitfire falacies
I was gullible enough to perceive.  

my bark has turned more
Into a disapproving grumble
When another inevitable wave
Comes to throw me under
In the tides of my troubles.

Perhaps I've grown accustomed
To the briney water rushing towards my ankles
And the gust that carries cold droplets
Across my hot, red face.

Let us jealously applaud
For those who trod on
Our aspirations,
And smile coyly knowing
We didn't let their
Questioning faces
Phase us.  

"****.
I grew up."
I wish I didn't say that so much.

At twelve I was twenty-five and
At twenty-five?
Well,
We'll get to that
if we can.

Regardless
I know that nothing's going to give me back  

Here,

now,  

              My short time.       with
you.

Deep breaths only multiply the weight
Of the question that's lingering in my chest.
I rise,
Against the counteractive distraction
Of avoidance.

I hear the words come out in short blurbs like a stop motion cartoon,

"So...excuse me mister,
there's uh,
something I've got to do."

I'm stumbling up to your room
And betting
On the mood
And the moon.

C.e.M.

Ive found myself at your door again
The dusty, leaf riddle square of Tiannamen
I felt less like a body and more like a pathogen
A lung piercing javelin when you try to prove your masculine

I knock three times and get no answer anxiety fills my molecules more aggressive than a cancer; crumbling my composure like a tank that's panzer
voices chanting violently in my head like they were a cantor

I go for the doorbell but have no luck
I find a piece of tape over it with a note that says it's stuck
with a little smiley face that I know you wrote you're the queen of this castle and I'm just drowning in the mote

Just as I faded into a sense of self doubt and started to walk away from your house I noticed a blur walking down the stairs, a beautifully crafted creature twilring her hair
not a single of the seven world wonders could ever compare

You know that feeling that starts stealing and revealing you from the inside out leaving you kneeling when that person you love, you crave, you need comes back into your presence an energy that comes back with a vengeance; double homicide, no parole life sentence.

The pure essence of her atomical presence raises questions to the lessons you had already taken suggestions on to fill your objections to this paralyzingly beautiful connection of affection leaving you in an antagonizing state of introspection to this abduction of seduction that's like a bed from ikea with no ******* instructions

You keep your eyes on the ground as you greet me but I don't notice because I'm doing the same, I like your shoes by the way. I like your everything though so I guess you could be dressed in nothing but rags beauty is something that you just can't lack.

We took a drive as we often do and slowly midnight turned into two and small talk is all that has creeped out of our mouth spiders of pointless ******* anecdotes all throughout.
I stop the car and we sit there in silence both of my fists begin to tighten; controlling the water in my eyes like I'm ******* Poseidon I didn't know this talk came with a hyphen

I turned to her angerly

as we speak it's like you can't even look at me I eagerly made your life so ******* leisurely and all you ever did was ******* commit thievery and decievery when all I ever wanted was just to be treated ******* equally

YOU KNOW how hard I've tried how many nights I've suffocated into a pillow and cried how each and every failure a part of me died black dhalia on my chest heart cut open wide

It sounds like I'm just trying to be dramatic but this always seems so ******* systematics you always take an oath that I thought was Hippocratic you act like my hopes are way up in the ******* galactic

You came back every time when it was too late and I had to pretend I was filled with hate while the weight of your sadness flooded my limbs and I couldn't see straight

you've pressured me into hatred and I feel so ******* degraded because no one can save this I've called friends late at night asking for help because I've swallowed every last bottle on the shelf

you've made me forget what I like and how to breathe and how to feel and how to see the world in color. you made me lose friends and burn bridges and lose jobs and success.

where was this ******* interest when I needed it most why is it I can't ever reach the peak of the mountain but I always get close? WHY THE **** IS ROMANCE JUST A GHOST DISPOSED AND DECOMPOSED

WHY CAN I BE THIS WAY AND STILL CANT SUCCEED WHY AM I THE ONE THAT NO ONE EVER NEEDS WHY DO I ALWAYS PLANT THE SEEDS OF FLOWERS BUT ALL I GET IS WEEDS

I told her to get the **** out of my car before I drive it off a ******* cliff I've tried to read you but you're a ******* hieroglyph I don't even think 26 is an age I can outlive that was the exact moment I know my soul went stiff

a few years went by

I went through my drawers and pulled out a pen my chest started to sink and fill with phlegm I started to second guess but when push comes to shove...

I started the letter,

Dear Love

Do not want to assume
       But it consumes our daily lives.
How can we act or
                       Not act
Without some assumptions?
                Maybe we call them something else
To put our ill seeking minds at ease.
              Want to just do it
                                     Go for it.
                                          Conquer it
But paralyzingly fear the consequences
            Ultimately we are all just individuals
                                    Sorting
Through this Chaos we have created
                 How are we supposed to know what is Best?
Let yourself be you,
                            be in the situation,
                                                               do not analyze.
Because the thing is,
                       When are we not learning
                                     Who we are?
Simply just choose.
                                 Make an action.
   Just.  
             Decide.

**Oct 5, 2013

having anxiety and depression is like being scared and tired at the same time. it's the fear of failure, but no urge to be productive. it's wanting friends, but hate socializing. it's wanting to be alone, but not wanting to be lonely. it's feeling everything at once then feeling paralyzingly numb