He was walking home
Ticked off with a broken nose
They stole his things
And with no shame
Left cuts and bruises
Head to toe covering him
No one gets his mind
No one really tries
He hides in the closet
When he gets home
In fear of his intoxicated father
His leather belt
Swinging from his fist
The boy cries in bitter isolation
He can't trust anyone
With no safty
He fears for his life
His mother was killed when he was five
Nine years later
He just wants to die
Multiple times he's tried
Every one of them
He survived
His wrists bleed for releaf
His skin pulls tight
Then it's released
He tiptoes out of his room
This for the last time
His father asleep in the chair
He looked pail
His chest barely moving
If you weren't paying attention
You might think he was dead
The boy got an idea
Such a melancholy idea
He went in to his father's quarters
Peaking under the bed
There lay a box full
Unsold meds
A knife in the kitchen would be his weapon
Nothing but a sigh let out
His father was soon to be no more
His heart pounded
His mind thundered
With anger and pride
"This is for Mom!"
He screamed with tears in his eyes
A knife to the chest
He fought the man
Pushing further and harder
He worked fast
The eyes glazed over
Both fear and joy filling his heart
Into the bathtub
Pills in hand
He turns on the water
He uncaps the bottle
Putting it to his lips
Up turned
He sinks down
Letting the drugs take their toll
Gone
******
Suicide
This was the price
For freedom
For justice

Oh Great Haiku in the sky
Send sweet releaf from tears you cry
Our minds are barren
Our papers dry
Flood our seeds of poetry
A harvest soon approaching
A festival of frowns & smiles
All are welcome, Men, Women, Child
From there to now and then
We feast upon the blessed poem.

You never touched me
Yet I can feel you close by
As strongly as if
You had done it many times before.
The past life regression
Takes me down the path
Of 17 challenging lifetimes
In which you were
The apple of my eye
In all your forms and tempers
Now I know we messed up
As I listen to your trembling voice
In the other side of the phone
I met you 3 years ago
Yet it's the first time I hear it
Your voice, low and hollow
As that of a man
Who has been torn and battered
And grew stronger in the wrong way.
Yet it is firm when you say

I never stopped looking at you. I just couldn't take it anymore

The pull was just as strong on this side of the ocean.
Now it will never work out
The way we imagined
And it doesn't have to.
We have always been stronger
Together than we ever were apart.
Know that I don't blame you
I say to you in the softest tone
A sigh of releaf
I know what I did
That's all I needed to know.
I've walked in your shoes
They fit me just fine.
But I hope you felt all the blisters
As you walked in mine.
I know we'll always pull through
I smile as all the Messages
Fall in their rightfull place.
I was never lied to
Not in the spiritual realms
You've fixed what you broke
I'm more whole now
Than how you've ever known me.

I'd kiss the palm of your broken hands
But that would mess you up ever more.
When you're ready, I'll be there
And you'll always be right here
In my heart.
Just not in the way we imagined.

Walking home through the
aspen grove, I paused on
the path's edge, startled by a sound
I had nearly forgotten.

At the breath of a breeze, the treetops
shifted and shimmered like a shoal of fish
as all the spring-fresh woods let out
a sigh of releaf.