You had a great life ahead of you
Knew exactly what you were gonna do
But the higher you rose, the further you fall
Now you realize you've lost it all.
'Cause when you stuck that needle in your arm
You got caught up in an evil demon's charm.
Now the drug's the master of your mind
Ruining all that it shall find

The drugs are rotting out your brain
Driving you insane
Addiction's locked you down in chains
So the demon takes the reins
Demon's Charm ruling you
Demon's Charm ruining you
Demon's Charm killing you
Demon's Charm rotting out your brain.

You cower an quake with endless fright
Never again will you see the light
The high has worn off, you feel the pain
Hurry it up, shoot it up again

You crave the fix,
You're feeling sick,
You need it quick,
Your shoulders shake and quiver
When you finally get your fix
The pleasure makes you shiver

The drugs are rotting out your brain
Driving you insane.
Addiction's locked you down in chains
So the demon takes the reins
Demon's Charm ruling you
Demon's Charm ruining you
Demon's Charm killing you
Demon's Charm rotting out your brain.

You say you're gonna quit
But there's a war inside your head
Should you cave and take a hit
Or something else instead
You know you need to get clean soon
Or else you'll soon be dead

Now in rehab, darkness is all you see.
The dark white walls surrounding you.
Only during sleep your mind is free.
The withdrawal is killing you,
Only comfort is how good it will be
When your tired mind is free.

The drugs are rotting out your brain 
Driving you insane
Addiction's locked you down in chains
So the demon takes the reins
Demon's Charm ruling you
Demon's Charm ruining you
Demon's Charm killing you
Demon's Charm rotting out your brain.

It was going good.
You'd kicked the habit
Then you relapsed
And your life collapsed   

Your psyche snapped
And now you're trapped
In an endless cycle .

Swimming in misery
Darkness imprisons you
Pain and loathing all you see
While praying to god on bended knee
To let the pain and misery end.

The drugs are rotting out your brain
Driving you insane
Addiction's locked you down in chains
So the demon takes the reins
Demon's Charm ruling you
Demon's Charm ruining you
Demon's Charm killing you
Demon's Charm rotting out your brain.

Your sanity is shattered.
You're broken and battered
Lost everything that mattered
Curl up and stare at the sky
Kiss your old life goodbye
Curl up and wait to die
The drugs killed and ruined your life
You now stand on the edge of a knife
While the demon runs through your veins

My generation is the technology generation
We are connected 100% of the time
My generation is the "selfie" generation
A generation of self love and positivity
My generation believes you can love someone
Even if they're thousands of miles away
My generation is the download generation
Music from every era is at our fingertips

They'll tell you all this is bad
They'll say we're a generation ruled by technology
And we are, but that's not a bad thing

My generation is the one being killed in the street
For the color of their skin
My generation is the one yelling "hands up don't shoot"
And reminding people Black Lives Matter

My generation checks social media
And hears about news before CNN or Fox
My generation uses pictures and videos
To dispute the lies we're being fed
My generation has the power to change the world

They'll say technology is ruining my generation,
It's not.
It's ruining theirs.

Devil's downstairs
at the neighbors
lil'
hole in the wall.

We're just sitting
ducks
in a government funded
housing pond.

& I'm too afraid
to sleep.
In my own slum.

Thank you, for ruining my life.

Your the one son being rebellious little darlings here comes
the sun drenching delicious but wait those cloudy days
watch out the hunters run ducking our heads like babies
wetting and water squirting beds getting too saucy
  ten O clock playpen the daring duck gourmet sauce
Orange you glad all her rich creme spread across
her penpals
Do you trust those gals too country slick on Newsweek

Getting paid he is the longest laid egg all grilled we are
not thrilled here is the "Chuckie Duckie" doll those *****
barbie collectors they are sitting duck Graphic Artist
Not one quack doll plastic surgeon duck lips she thinks
shes the hot stuff romantic "French" lips up the
"Eiffel Tower" splash splash she is out of cash
Those hot items presidential poll what a lost soul

Too much blue yes attention swan dancers Springtime
Not  the red attention yellow instead ****** please
I need a  journey not the "Attorney" such a ****** case
When you need them they always duck
When they have a new quack case they are ruining
my image
Duck tapesty Carol Kings youve got a friend

I'm feeling yellow homesick on your feather duck pillow
The same yellow tie a different atmosphere Go- Spa
She's flirting do you know where your going how is
life treating you he's giggling way too wild on her
goose chase
  Losing our grip down to her chicken bone hip
Duck season not much time for love being hunted

The Spa  la la ha have Merci' oh la la 'Disco Duck"
The wild ones the only ones quack- quack the
lonely ones
At the waterfront trip to "Chinatown" they let
them hang to dry but why Dad? They are better
like the delicacy shark finn soup we need a Spa
lucky green group Irish eyes are smiling stories
of ducks

I am  not buying do you see duck climb the
          "Eiffel Tower" yellow as a canary
All talk-talk is cheap lets talk French Mom walks
With her pretty duck handle umbrella we waddle
The penquin what a beauty swan feather pen
  But she's the"Prima Donna" look out!

The slingshot Marilyn Monroe wiggles out
                  The "Spa- Ma"
                 Don't  Scramble me darlings
                    Breakfast eggs cagefree
                     *          *          
My little chickadees organic brown on my gown
Spa duckies traveled the whole Atlantic town
The longest pond sleeping like "Rip Van Winkle"
twinkle twinkle
doublecrossed the street you get one dermerit
Sesame street Big bird how many words in duck
vocabulary quack- quack who get's the duck star

Mars from Men women go to the Spa like the bad
omen and they don't leave tap tap chop chop
I want it now!! Its now or never why does she always
get ugly duckling book delivered
Lazy goose she is the spoiled rotten egg how
do we love those  I apples
Carrots are for the eyes Mom always gets bird eyes

My little chickadees the Alaskan cute puppies
Big salute to the cutest duck feet "God Bless America"
  Visa  American Express Daffy Duck in Disney mess
the real picture "Mona Lisa" getting the duck
         Prime  chop minister
"Parliament Spa" prices so sinister
"Eat Duck and Pray" the  southern biscuits
more recruits

My cute rookies those duckier cookies another Spa day
So prim and proper teatime with "Queen deck"
  Alice in rabbit hole-Santa candycane poles cute chick
is homesick you better sent her money quick
The ducky bib the Chinese duck soup won ton
The feather fan she loves her Sushi roll Hollywood
Style California all duck drama
The best treatment duck made carpet

On the "Disney Hollywood" deck "Epcot"
On the futon what diction for a duck "My Fair lady"
Got the whole fortunes bed
The duck on the hill what a fool but the monk
Is the whole spiritual existence
The peacock's longest wait for lobster tails
centerpieces red bird Robin fly Robin Fly

Disco ball fancy tails she ended up up up to the sky
Her duck sunglasses a dozen ***** spin's the disco
The Duck Pop singer wants him back
High price or a short mack duck shooter attack
Food for thought homesick all saucy duck tie waiter
Cinderella rags to ducklings I went to "Woodstock"
Imagine me the teenager chick the duck split

Fill wing concert sky made a hit
The blues love is strange chick-lets are yellow
Like clock work what a duck work out orange          
        Duck handle umbrella               
 Duckies I pledge to you College Preppies
The chick feeder Ain't nothing but a hound dog
      Elvis heart breaker bird-brain feeder

  Moms duck sugar cookies
******* Jack one prize quack quack
 Huckleberry Finn paper boat old billy goat
  In the drowned mans eye holy ducks he delivered
I will blow you down duck horn the day you
were born
Having a third eye one duck Wendy 4 for a 4

Notre Dame church tragic but saved
   The  Easter yellow chicks
To Rome lend me your feathers no secret ears
Sticky Fingers she lost her writing finger in the
pond  OH! look whats beyond so kind
With her duckling apron dress he ducked
The chatty cat "City Dr Seuss"

Wearing duck boots those duck lips played her
like the fancy feast
The teachers pet the ducklings cute darlings
Spa cream she quite the flabber belly dancer
The ballet swan achiever "Spa One Day tripper"
The ugly duckling changed to beauty witch
Holy-land or duck pond Mickey's ears
                   Disneyland

Stand up daffy duck comedian Las Vegas
Godiva Peking duck soup flapping swishing
mess
The Big Ben red whose been sleeping in my
duck wing bed
The car stops he hiccups cute bebops
The guardian angel quack quack any luck
Yummy raspberry pie someone delivered

Christmas Scrooge all tears
New York lights camera I love my
        Serendipity chandeliers
Those duck tear drops last stop
Or you die__your still quacking
       Just in time said I
           Fly Robin Fly

     Saved my baby chick lovely
     Cradled her to love her
          Dr Seuss read

I can't get out
I'm stuck in this cycle
Over and over
Again and again
I make the same mistake
Because I'm too stupid
To realize
That it's my own choices
That caused all this pain
Well done, me.
I've succeeded at ruining
Everything

TO: romeo
you could’ve loved me but you didn’t and that kind of ******
TO: romeo
i wish we could go back to when we were still possible
TO: romeo
i’d rather be just friends with you than nothing
TO: romeo
see, we only worked when the gravity wasn’t on
TO: romeo
see, i could only love you from 5000 miles away
and we’ll always have the last city we trampled through
TO: romeo
see, i loved you, on other continents and always at the wrong time
TO: romeo
see, i’m not sure i loved you because now looking at you is like disconnect
and maybe i just wanted you because i felt so small,
without a hand to hold under
the heavy weight of history crushing in around us
TO: romeo
see, you make me feel like i’m eleven again,
listening to “you belong with me” by taylor swift and wondering
is that what love’s really like?
not realizing that the girl in the video was wondering the same thing
TO: romeo
so “if you’re wondering if i want you to;
i want you to, i want you to, i want you, dude, i always do.”
TO: romeo
i can’t listen to weezer without thinking of you
TO: romeo
i have this bad habit of tangling up the things i love with people i’m trying to,
i have this bad habit of ruining them that way
TO: romeo
i want custody of our song back  
i want you out of the baseline, hiding underneath the notes

Hello snorer, I hope you didn't sleep any poorer
when I stayed up all night typing this not-poem
I meant you no harm, but I had to stay up
Because I couldn't make music out of your obnoxiously loud cacophony of windpipe crap, er "music".  Time to not-pretend to absolutely hate your snoring under the guise of being perfectly okay with it for the sake of setting the tone a bit nicer to all who must hear it, so they can BEAR to, for otherwise it would be absurd.  Not as absurd as anyone hating to have aural drills applied to all their chakras all night, but still absurd enough to get a chuckle out of me (I hope it didn't wake your fine specimen here). It was never my intent, though it was always my ethical concern (if only everyone could be as reciprocal as you and I).   Oh, my not-pretend hatred is very thinly veiled.  I wasn't totally defeated by your snore-sound armies so that I couldn't type words, but I may have lost some of my desired effect due to the sometimes wincing distraction they caused to my piece of mind at this or that time when I needed it the most (even though I was awake, which is no crime if snoring at night and keeping me that way isn't).

Well, I did ask you if you'd mind if I typed,
I did tell you that you could tell me if its quiet purr of clicks would bother your precious sleep
But I never felt a need to be concerned, because whenever I
was typing, I heard you snore, and whenever I was in the heights of
some new discovery or epiphany, your sharp sudden thunderstroke of near death
corrugated metal vibrating in the torrent of some sudden gale force gust of wind.

These were signs to me of your restful sleep.  So I simply didn't worry about your sleep.  I was certain that my electronic beeps were every now and then music to your ears, just as they were to mine.  This is because in the midst of these I heard you snore, and when you snored, I took you to be asleep.

Ah but then again, then again, these are fanciful constructions which simply say that what is wonderful for me should be just fine and dandy with you, at a bare minimum, and on those grounds of very unsymmetrical attitude about right and wrong I would have to begin my music tirade of words as well.  But I don't view justice and propriety along such selfish lines as these.

What I see is that duplicity is your thesis.  I have anecdotal accounts which are marvelous to behold first hand, but the details of the absurdities cannot be done justice in the language of men, for the intensity of such insanity can only be borne lightly by the frailest frayed ends of my sanity for having lived through your acoustically maddening inanity.

You didn't ever admit to me that my noises were not music to YOUR ears.  Indeed  you claimed never to be bothered by them because you never voiced up against them.  I suppose you might as well voice up against them in the street as well if it turns out not all of you snorers-go-a-viking types like to hear my mouse clicking away like a tapping noises on a metal plate in your skull.  Sorry if it is another non-snorer-who-must-stay-up-late-and-so-be-occupied person whose nocturnal joys were misinterpreted as direct assaults on the dignity, spirit, or just basic mental viability of your wounded snoremonster troop of anti-late-stayer-uppers, because in fact, we used to be sleep-at-night-entities like you, but that was before you showed up, thoracic marching band in tow.  Marching bands are musical also, to some people.  And for some all hours of the night are perfect for a marching band.  Who am I to tell them otherwise.  

Well let me know the next time a marching band is given special permit to come through your neighborhood at night, and I'll be glad to point out to you the first Snorer'sville, because only they should be expected, in all justice to live with the macroscopic manifestation of their personal narcissistic paradises.

Let you all go to your own place and form your own nation, and see if you can consistently demand everyone else find music in your ****** and accursed racket!  But until then I expect some of you will have to take the damage returned by the growing number of people who are very much tired of living under the horrors of your infliction upon us, your demonic and evil tyranny of mind-crushing hate that is your ****** noise.  We will do yoga and breathe, and stretch, and some light calesthenics to relax and seek some focus and composure, whenever our spirits require, and this will be unchallenged by you so long as you are asleep, and it will be unchallenged by you so long as you are awake too.  For in the latter case you are already awake (and so still are we, usually) while in the former case it is far quieter than your snoring, both in its valleys and peaks.  And moreover it has not kept you up, but in fact I have noted that you wake yourself up with your own music when it reaches a certain crescendo.  

Unless you want to say that those crescendos are some sort of involuntary complaint about MY crescendos of spirit, when I start typing about 20% faster than normal, with perfect focus and accuracy while reaching an aesthetic pleasure approaching ****** as I realize that it is almost unerringly in the midst of such an experience that I hear your crescendo resound. And since it was no more intended to be a distraction for me, then surely my music must have also gone undetected by your ears, as well as your spirit. Or is it fairer to say it was the very cause of your crescendo, or at least its inspiration?

Therefore I needn't worry that it is I that is keeping you up, even if for only brief stints at a time, especially by comparison to my all-night vigils.  Not so, but it is you who are so enraptured by my occasional laughs or giggles as I edify my weary, sleep-deprived mind on some bit of morale boosting entertainment.  With headphones on of course.  It's also courteously plugged into the computer to prevent my favorite bit of Judas Priest from hurting your ear drums, or else overstimulating your music appreciation centers, which are verily attached to your ear-drums by a nerve bundle (and what nerve you all have there).  This means I've spared you too much distraction from any already-abundant music of the spheres effect you may be savoring which might have emanated from my bumbling around in the dark (to keep the lights out of course, after all people are sleeping).

Yes but that is a minority of you perhaps, who would lie about that and in fact who ought to say that our nocturnal emissions are not what you'd call restfully mind-relaxing crickets in the dead of night with an occasional hoot in the distance...  But they are a minority, the rest of you are so definitely in good faith.

But then why do I always run into those of your tribe who have strange and unethical habits, such as destroying others' lives by ruining their one perhaps most preciously personal and inalienable need second only to air and water, and that is sleep.  It is, in terms of acute necessity, in many ways more needed than food, though in the long term food catches up.  But food catches up only because not eating food is a  lot like not getting sleep, but just a lot more intense on the body when it drops to some critical point because we know from experience it is on raw nerves that we can go for a while in search of food, but if the food can't be found (perhaps because of our lack of sleep ruining our cognition in some way), then we will not eat, nor sleep, because we'll be dead.  

But either way, we'll be dead, for lack of sleep kills, both directly and indirectly, if suffered over a short time and/or in a diluted form over a long time.  That would be poetically commensurate to the sadistic similitude of the types of snoring sounds with the types of ways to die from being deprived of sleep according to two modes (acute and chronic), over many keys of incident, accident, lost opportunity and ill-stared fate, all of which can be mapped in some way back to that auditory persecution of our very souls of which your kind are in some swelling numbers quite proud.  Just think of all the car accidents, work accidents, altercations, fits of rage, inability to concentrate well or sometimes at all, and other life-damaging conditions of the mind, and also of the body, which accrue from lack of proper and healthy sleep at night!

Good thing for most of you though, right?  Because surely our music is also sweet, and I really hope I've inspired many to face this need for equality, and be on their guard against any unjust whining or groaning from those who seem in point of fact to value their sleep just a good deal more than they value anyone else's.  Not only because they really really love to get those zzz's but because they think that in the natural order of things, before people suddenly went mad and evil, people went to bed and slept well even partly BECAUSE of this brachio-esophageal orchestral lullaby.

But we'll be on our guard against those complaints, because we know you have plotted to take to the streets against us to defend your noisiness-all-night-every-night rights.  So we'll be on guard to defend ours, TO THE LAST FIBER OF OUR BEING.

Because you insufferable ******* are cruel, and cruelty no one should abide.  No one in my world, in my society of people, will be allowed to inflict cruelty on another person, nor be callously prejudicial in their own favor when injuries do occur because of their actions merely on the grounds that the damage it causes coincides with the fulfillment of a need on their own part, even while that fulfillment is of a need which is obstructed from satisfaction in the other part, and by THAT VERY SAME REASON, so that your sleep depends on keeping others awake.  UNLESS you can somehow con or coerce them into developing some form of Stockholm Syndrome and confuse the torment you inflict upon them with a sign of your love and wonderfulness to be around.

Yes, I know you hear me typing now, through your well-behaved proxy.  I feel it. If not he per se, then in a parallel universe not too far off, there's a version of him who does.  Perhaps not the one I know now, on day one of having moved into this room, but perhaps one represented in this universe by someone who has found himself in some sort of circumstances found later on during his stay, this mixed with the fact that familiarity breeds contempt... He'll start making some righteous demands of some kind, and I might not be in a such a good mood about that due to lack of proper sleep, and this will coincide with said contumacy against my own rights (such as to breathe, type, surf the net, or do other nocturnal things other than snoring which might keep others up).

As to that last point in parentheses, snoring is an activity which you perform in conjunction with your getting sleep, and it therefore means not well for your notion of fairness to say things as they are, and simply say the truth, which is that your getting sleep deprives others of theirs, but it can be logically deduced.

It can also be logically deduced that the don't give flying **** if you don't like the fact that we don't like your ear-**** night after night, which is a good name as any, but should perhaps at times be amended to body-demolishing soul-****** of a mortally sinful nature, and with an ethical incongruity to good character of a person to maintain it, all the more to sings its praises to us and call it "good poetry".

My mind is my world and it feel like it's all stopped. It's all stopped and instead of everything coming together and falling into it's place, I feel like everything's collided and I can't make sense of a single thing. I feel I've become numb in the process. That I know I want to cry, but I don't know the reason, I don't know why. I feel pain, but I can't find the root of it and pull it out and rid of it for good. All these smiles around me and I can't seem to give one back without the reasoning being, it's polite to smile back. I can't feel my legs, I can't feel anything but the pain and this time it's consuming me whole. Makes me want to dig myself a hole, 6ft deep and lie there. That's where I believe I'll find peace. Away from everything and everyone. My conscious is ruining me, ruining everything. Ruining the world I've created in my head. I think I've gone crazy. I feel like a bad peach and I'm no good to or for anyone anymore.  My face is long and sad and looks like it's gone through a good run in the mud, or piles of mascara is you want me to be literal. I think I've lost my soul and now I'm just a walking corpse. I don't know what I am, I don't know what I'm doing. I just feel.

Mirror, Mirror,* on my wall,
I just want to be thin, pretty and tall.

Mirror, Mirror, if I change my hair,
Maybe someone will start to care?

Mirror, Mirror, if I starve myself,
At least I’ll be beautiful, forget my health.

Mirror, Mirror, if I cut my wrist,
Will I feel like I exist?

Mirror, Mirror, don’t you see?
What you show, is ruining me.

--To Rudyard Kipling


The Sword
Singing--
The voice of the Sword from the heart of the Sword
Clanging imperious
Forth from Time's battlements
His ancient and triumphing Song.

In the beginning,
Ere God inspired Himself
Into the clay thing
Thumbed to His image,
The vacant, the naked shell
Soon to be Man:
Thoughtful He pondered it,
Prone there and impotent,
Fragile, inviting
Attack and discomfiture;
Then, with a smile--
As He heard in the Thunder
That laughed over Eden
The voice of the Trumpet,
The iron Beneficence,
Calling his dooms
To the Winds of the world--
Stooping, He drew
On the sand with His finger
A shape for a sign
Of his way to the eyes
That in wonder should waken,
For a proof of His will
To the breaking intelligence.
That was the birth of me:
I am the Sword.

Bleak and lean, grey and cruel,
Short-hilted, long shafted,
I froze into steel;
And the blood of my elder,
His hand on the hafts of me,
Sprang like a wave
In the wind, as the sense
Of his strength grew to ecstasy;
Glowed like a coal
In the throat of the furnace;
As he knew me and named me
The War-Thing, the Comrade,
Father of honour
And giver of kingship,
The fame-smith, the song-master,
Bringer of women
On fire at his hands
For the pride of fulfilment,
Priest (saith the Lord)
Of his marriage with victory
**! then, the Trumpet,
Handmaid of heroes,
Calling the peers
To the place of espousals!
**! then, the splendour
And glare of my ministry,
Clothing the earth
With a livery of lightnings!
**! then, the music
Of battles in onset,
And ruining armours,
And God's gift returning
In fury to God!
Thrilling and keen
As the song of the winter stars,
**! then, the sound
Of my voice, the implacable
Angel of Destiny!--
I am the Sword.

Heroes, my children,
Follow, O, follow me!
Follow, exulting
In the great light that breaks
From the sacred Companionship!
****** through the fatuous,
****** through the fungous brood,
Spawned in my shadow
And gross with my gift!
****** through, and hearken
O, hark, to the Trumpet,
The ****** of Battles,
Calling, still calling you
Into the Presence,
Sons of the Judgment,
Pure wafts of the Will!
Edged to annihilate,
Hilted with government,
Follow, O, follow me,
Till the waste places
All the grey globe over
Ooze, as the honeycomb
Drips, with the sweetness
Distilled of my strength,
And, teeming in peace
Through the wrath of my coming,
They give back in beauty
The dread and the anguish
They had of me visitant!
Follow, O follow, then,
Heroes, my harvesters!
Where the tall grain is ripe
****** in your sickles!
Stripped and adust
In a stubble of empire,
Scything and binding
The full sheaves of sovranty:
Thus, O, thus gloriously,
Shall you fulfil yourselves!
Thus, O, thus mightily,
Show yourselves sons of mine--
Yea, and win grace of me:
I am the Sword!

I am the feast-maker:
Hark, through a noise
Of the screaming of eagles,
Hark how the Trumpet,
The mistress of mistresses,
Calls, silver-throated
And stern, where the tables
Are spread, and the meal
Of the Lord is in hand!
Driving the darkness,
Even as the banners
And spears of the Morning;
Sifting the nations,
The **** from the metal,
The waste and the weak
From the fit and the strong;
Fighting the brute,
The abysmal Fecundity;
Checking the gross,
Multitudinous blunders,
The groping, the purblind
Excesses in service
Of the Womb universal,
The absolute drudge;
Firing the charactry
Carved on the World,
The miraculous gem
In the seal-ring that burns
On the hand of the Master--
Yea! and authority
Flames through the dim,
Unappeasable Grisliness
Prone down the nethermost
Chasms of the Void!--
Clear singing, clean slicing;
Sweet spoken, soft finishing;
Making death beautiful,
Life but a coin
To be staked in the pastime
Whose playing is more
Than the transfer of being;
Arch-anarch, chief builder,
Prince and evangelist,
I am the Will of God:
I am the Sword.

The Sword
Singing--
The voice of the Sword from the heart of the Sword
Clanging majestical,
As from the starry-staired
Courts of the primal Supremacy,
His high, irresistible song.

This jealousy is killing me.
Eating at my soul until there's nothing left but this burning, consuming jealousy.
Listening to you and knowing that I'll never be as good as you,
I'll never live up to the standards you've set.

This jealousy is ruining me,
Ruling everything I do.
It's taking hold of my brain,
An iron grip I can't break, because I'm not stronger than jealousy.
I'm not stronger than the monster that's been tearing me apart since the day I first saw you.

This jealousy is breaking me.
Beating down the walls I put up to convince myself I can be as good as you,
Tearing down my defenses to tell me just how much better you are,
Just how high the bar is set,
Just how far away from it I'll always be,
Just how fast I'd give everything to have what you have.

This jealousy is killing me.

I don't know how much longer I can last.

I was your 'girl' and your 'wife'
But then the storm came ruining the both of us
And I woke up naked and lonely
This was how I turned out to be your cold meat.

I could speak all day on how I have faith
Yet
Truth is,
I don’t have faith
I would like to believe I trust myself
Yet I barely put an ounce of love on that shelf
I don’t have faith that the right person will come and take my love
Because I am scared
I am scared that if I gave into anyone
That if I even trusted my love with you
That it’s just going to hurt that much worse when I let you go
I’ll have that much less faith in myself the next time I even try to love
I’m scared that you’ll say all these nice words to me
And possibly mean them
But I won’t trust myself
And blow the only chance I had at loving you
I’m scared that if you saw who I really am you’d leave
And want nothing to do with me
And in all honesty I really couldn’t blame you
Yet I could blame myself.
I could have faith that all my friends right now are loyal
That they would never talk about me behind my back
I could trust them with anything
I wouldn’t even be ashamed
Yet I have been played
And most of yall just sit there and smile in my face
It’s like getting on a plane ride
And trusting in the pilot to fly me safely
But then the rumors come like birds flying into the engine
Then down goes the plane
Because there is the same flock of birds flying back my way
Why won’t they just stay in their cage?
Don’t any of you realize
You’ve made me this way
Do it again lie to my face you’ll be another bird ruining my plane
The true friends are the pilots
Trying to guide me out of the bird’s way
Yet instead they get brought down with me
My real ones don’t deserve this
I’m the one who need to take the blame
I have a couple of parachutes
Hopefully they’ll escape while they can
I’ll stay though because the day this plane finally crashes
I hope those little birds will finally realize their damage
So much for flying this plane to heaven
I could have faith in myself
But I am not going to lie to you because I need you to have faith in me
I have been hurt
The kind where you stay up at night
Wondering what you did to deserve this
What is your purpose
Do I even belong here
Does anyone see my tears
I loved and I trusted
And that just got me here
Questioning everything
Everyone
I know I am hard of hearing
But it seems like I’m not the only one who can’t hear
Or do you choose not to listen?
These are the same people I’m supposed to have trust in?
Have love for
Tell them everything every little sore
If you could see my heart
You’d ask
What’s that little clump on the floor?
Where’s yalls heart at
I don’t see them anymore
All I hear is she’s this or he’s that
All this makes me mad
Why can’t we just love each other
Is that so bad?
Is it so bad to accept each other
No matter gay, straight, bi, or trans
No matter the color of skin
Not matter what music they listen to
Or if they fit in with a trend
Can’t we all realize
Everyone needs a friend
Everyone needs to spend
Just a little more time seeing who I am
Who you are
Who he is
Who she is
Who we all are
Because that is what we need
To be able to have faith in each other.

They say, in the wheel of life, you'll spend half your years rising to the top and the other half tumbling to the bottom. I guess they got it all wrong. I believe life is a crooked tire that can never roll up and down. Pretty sure, it is nailed to the ground where weeds could grow to entangle it forever. Until now, what they keep trying to say remains a puzzle to me. Perhaps I can never understand what they mean. Or maybe I just won’t. Why? Because from the moment our eyes opened for the world, we’re already stuck down below and I’m afraid we’re trapped here in this limbo for all eternity.

We’re just simple people living an ordinary life. Like every family who seeks refuge from the storm, we do have a place we call home although it’s not much of an architectural delight. However, for some reasons, I find our roof appealing like a real work of art. Patches of cardboard embellish the underside while a combination of tarpaulin and ad posters works in harmony to provide an extended shelter. On bright mornings, we’ll wake from the sunbeams piercing through its many gaps. On rainy days, however, the sound of raindrops falling from the gaps down to our water containers serves as our wake up call.

To jumpstart ourselves for another day’s challenge, we could either eat breakfast (if there were any), or just sing our skipping meals away and spend the rest of the day with sacks of scraps and rubbishes on our back hoping to make a good deal with Mr. Gomez, the junk shop proprietor. He reminded me so much of my father but without the alcohol problem and violence, though. During nighttime, we bring with us our drum to sing carols on the lonely streets. If our feet become too weary to walk, that’s the time we head home. We rush all together, eager to count the coins we’ve collected that night. We make sure to put a plastic cap underneath two of our table’s feet so that it won’t lean uncontrollably and spill the tiers of ten, five and one peso coins we’ve dedicatedly piled over. Then the next part does the trick. A portion of our collection for the night goes straight down a big jar and joins in the many others which fill more than half of the container. The remaining part is used to buy supper to save our hungry tummies from
shrinking again. However, during slack nights when drivers and busy people decided to become miserly, we’re fortunate enough to have a pack of noodles for supper. But if we ran out of luck, we just set our untidy beds ready and drown our raging stomachs to sleep. I know there’s not pretty much but this is where our lives revolve. And as they say, life must go on no matter what.

Together with the three most important persons of my life, I continue the journey for a better living. Along the way, we try to search for the good things out of life’s bitter truths. We never let misery **** our hopes and dreams. Instead, we work harder and tougher. Take Islay, for example. She’s cheerful,
clever, aggressive, talented, a model of hard work. She’s got most of everything. Well, except for height, probably. I wanted to be a doctor so I could help the needy. Islay dreams of becoming an elementary teacher. She said she really likes kids and teaching them would surely be a more exciting thing to do.

Then there’s Nova. Her looks may require you a little more time to think and consider, but she has a good heart. However, she gets a little, uhhm, what term do we use for an unsociable person? That’s it! She’s a bit of a Killjoy!

Islay and Nova caroled a store swarmed with drunkards. It was always Islay who’ll find every creative idea and propose it convincingly to Nova, who in turn hesitates and rejects it but then ultimately respects it in the end. Islay always has the winning edge. Maybe that’s one of her abilities. Her convincing power deserves a credit to the list.

The two didn’t mind the ***** that welcomed them. Inside her mind, Nova asked herself how many people could waste their money on a doze of liquid or spirit that can poison their mind and bring them to imminent danger. If only they have given it to the poor and needy, they could have saved a lot of lives instead of ruining their own.

But Aling Nena, the wicked storeowner, unleashed her witchy wrath to the two. She looked at them with eyes of contempt, of prejudice and disgust. She accused the two as jinxes and blamed them for the
store’s unprofitable end. If only she could look at herself and discover a chest of shimmering blame, she might shrink into shame. Islay and Nova ran off not because they were afraid of Aling Nena or the drunken men but because of what Aling Nena said to them. They cannot defend themselves from such
an attack. How could they when they were surrounded with eyes of ridicule?

And of course, there’s my dearest sister, Juaning. We’ve only got each other since our mother’s death. It has been months already. Juaning was still 15 when mama left us. She’s 16 now. It’s been quite a while and I know she misses mama a lot like I do.

And so they fought life’s bitter realities. They begged and implored to the unconcerned passers-by, almost falling to their weak knees for one very important thing - to live. But even if the three of them were sitting, lying, and rolling down the cold pavement, these people with more graces just pass by without even sparing a glance of concern. Wouldn’t it be happier if they shared their God-given blessings? But as the day continues, they have to endure the hunger, the contempt. Because other than filling their
hungry stomach, they have a sibling, a friend to support.

That’s my part of the story. It has been months now since I caught a serious illness which bound me
to this bed, flat on one’s back, weak, inutile, and useless. Every time they come home, I wish I was with them to taste the sweet and feel the pain, not just a good listener to their stories of survival and moments of friendship. Someday, I’ll become strong again, and this curse of a disease shall be gone.

I woke up to the longing for water. I’ve never been this thirsty before. I called out their names but my voice just echoed deep in the four dark walls of our crooked house. With no one to help me, I summoned my strength and decided to get a glass of water by myself. But my legs aren’t as strong as my will. And as I attempted to stand, they betrayed me. I collapsed and plodded down the floor. Luckily Islay came and helped me get back to bed. She scolded me for being careless. I cried. I can’t help it. I pitied myself all
over again.

The cold evening wasn’t a problem for Islay. Seeing me cry like that crushes her heart. I know, as a friend and a part of our family, she wishes the best for me. And that’s why she’s still out there in the middle of the night, working late to earn more for our better future. She ignored the chills and the exasperation. She knows she has to work harder and she’s more than determined for it.

But something happened to me while she’s away from home. I cannot move my body, not even my mouth. Tears just fell from my weary eyes. And before it’s too late, Juaning caught me unresponsive and paralyzed. My sister cried for help. Nova sprinted to get the jar. Juaning told her what to do. And wasting no time, Nova rushed to the nearby pharmacy to get me some medicine, and most probably to save my life.

But Nova’s effort was in vain. Prescription drugs cannot be bought that easily. The pharmacist closed down the only lining of hope for me. The security guard felt pity on Nova and he suggested her an alternative decision that will change our lives forever.

Islay was still busy serenading the busy streets with her chants of joy and sweet hums. But the clouds become unwelcoming. And by the sound of the thunder, big droplets of rain started pouring down the highway. She ran as fast as she could and sat on a corner where she thought of something deeply. She hugged the drum that she was carrying for five hours or so and tried to remain calm in the presence of the bad weather.

After half an hour, Nova came back with a pouch of medicine on her shaking hand. She handed it carefully to Juaning whose faith and hope were hanging to the tiny bottle of miracle.

Days gone by and my condition wasn’t going any better. It turned out that my medicine was consumed to the last drop. Still I remained immobile and my hands are going number by the days. Slowly I was losing hope. I wish they weren’t mad at me. I’m trying my best to live on. That’s why I’m still here. But Nova shared something worth listening to. She revealed how and where she got the medicine.

It was from a quack doctor on a stall put up on the corner of Rizal Avenue. She said he was well versed and very convincing. And that she spent all of our savings for a bottle of deception. But we can do nothing about it. We did not have formal education. We were fortunate enough to meet kind children on
the streets who would try to teach us something they have learned from school. We would attempt to read newspapers and the description in the carton boxes we spread beneath the Badelles overpass.

Nova cried in guilt and shame. Islay was still angry at her, and it can be understood. My sister, Juaning, comforted Nova with a promise that everything will get better in time.

December 27. It was my birthday. And more than anything else, what I wish is for the four of us to be happy. Nothing in this life is more important than seeing everyone you love smile with absolute
happiness. Juaning never forgot her job and that’s to buy me a cake. Every year, they will try to surprise me with every creative possible way. But that’s how their surprises become predictable with my age.

They sang me a birthday song. But this time, they were the ones waiting for a surprise. As my sister was about to hand me the cake waiting for me to blow the candle, she noticed something she was least expecting for. My lips are pale and my eyes are shut from the light of the world. I caught my last breath and before I gave it away, I left a smile on my face that can never be changed forever. That is how I want them to remember me. Not that heck of a frown clown whose audiences are stricken with sadness.

They say, in the wheel of life, sometimes, you'll spend half of your years rising to the top and the other half tumbling to the
bottom. Maybe they were right. It was then that I’ve come to understand what they were trying to say.

Our life’s wheel revolves around things way beyond just money, food, and shelter. It is about the moments you spend with your loved ones, friends and family that will be forever carved in your heart. We can never know when our life here on earth will be over. So let us cherish every bit of it. And for me, even if we skip breakfasts and eat only noodles for supper, I have realized in these last fleeting moments that my life has always
been on the top of the wheel after all.

His Funeral was today.  Well, his wake rather.  It was in his old colonial home on Elm Street, a bought of irony that Paolo would never get.  Anyway, it was an odd set up at his house. Family and friends downstairs in the living room, acquaintances and honorable mentions meandering through the hallways clearly more interested in the intricate little floral patterns that adorned the wallpaper than how his family was holding up.  The company of the house was split, everyone either legitimately full of sorrow, or completely full of ****.  In everyone’s grasp either handkerchiefs or hand grenades it was as if the invitation read “Come see it to believe it!” In the study across the hall a small memorial was set up.  Big cards, tons of photos, some flowers, anyone who actually cared stayed there and stared at his once happy face, who knew what it looks like now.  
He had died of some sort of overdose, one that destroyed his heart, so he would have looked fine in an open casket.  The doctors say it was *******.  I don’t believe them.  Paolo had his fun in college, ***, *****, sure, but coke?  There’s no way.    The services weren’t to take place for another two hours, so his family rolled him onto the second floor balcony.  It was actually his dad’s decision, something about a “disgrace” and not wanting to look at his face.
Apparently his mom had felt bad letting her dead son chill on the porch for a few hours, so she rolled him across the hallway to his own room him and kind of laid him out on the bed, as if letting her baby boy take his eternal sleep where he’d have had most of his shorter ones.  
Picturing him lying up there was the first negative connotation I ever had with the image of him on that bed.  He had that kind of headboard that when we started getting at it the bed would hit the wall with each rhythmic movement.  Steady and almost tribal as our bodies danced to the ever increasing beat of a talking drum.  Our clothes off and our skin glazed with sweat it was like my own personal method for getting high. Now don’t get the impression that our relationship was based purely on a physical connection, we’d been dating for three and a half years, the love was there all right.  
We had met in the strangest of ways, through a mutual friend that I was kind of, almost, sort of, but not really having a “thing” with, you know?  Cisco was his name.  So we were together one day and he, being the adorable spaz that he was, had forgotten that his own birthday party was that same night.  He asked if I didn’t mind tagging along, it was a celebration for him and two friends whose birthdays followed his in sequence.  
This had been going on for several weeks, and I know we weren’t dating but I still had a feigning interest in the guy.  So we arrive to this girl, Cristina’s, house and I noticed this other boy almost immediately.  In a backwards cap and pair of boot cut jeans he was jumping around, tossing his arms, right in the middle of reciting some hilarious anecdote to any of his friends who hadn’t heard it yet; even those who had seemed riveted.  He was so full of charisma and with such assurance.  Besides that he was kind of cute so, though pathetically, I tried flirting with him for the rest of the night; he didn’t really catch on.  We left that night without having exchanged more than ten words between each other, I thought I’d never see him again, turns out I was wrong.  
“Broadway CAREols.  Show others that you care by enjoying a night of with your favorite blend of Christmas ditties and Broadway biddies” And before you ask, Yes, I did come up with that title, I think it was great and it was at the top of each flyer in big red and green letters and if you asked me “If you could do it again…” I would do it the same each and every time don’t judge me.
It was a show I had to direct for a community service project and of all people he played the piano for my show.  Only me and several other girls made up the cast, and I knew how easy it was to mistake a positive attitude for flirtation when it comes from a handsome young man.  He ran the music over three or four times individually with each cast member before the night of the show, but when Paolo and I worked that night he stopped me and just sang. For me.  
Each night after rehearsal I had to give him a ride home, I was a year older and thus had my license a year sooner.  I’d never mind allowing myself more time to bask in the glow of his perfectly understated confidence, so I was happy to oblige.  Technically Connecticut state imposed a law forbidding new drivers under the age of 18 to be on the roads past 11 at night.  My mom, being a government employee, really stressed this one.  His house was a solid ten minutes drive from our rehearsal spot, and my mom often warned me to allow myself enough time to get back home before 11.  What started as me beginning to drive faster and faster during the trip home ended as a routine each night, where I would finally allow him to step out of my car just as the clock read 11:00 PM.  
Our first kiss was in that car, my first uncontrollable breakdown was in the car, hell the first time he told me he loved me was in that car…right at the lip of the driveway.  I learned to ride my brakes perfectly to the point where I could park just beyond the edge of the sidewalk yet just before the point where the porch light would flash on, reminding his mother that his son is out past ten on a school night.  It was so warm.  I’ll never forget the cadence of his laughter as it trailed off, seamlessly merging with that next statement “Anna, I love you”.  I could have sworn the porch light went on.  

Now I know it may seem like I don’t care for his being dead right now, but the thing is, I did something.  I did something really bad.

You see, I had mentioned that he was up in his room, right?  Still, stiff, simply waiting to be brought down in a few hours as the catalyst to another round of tears.  Now don’t get me wrong, I did my share of crying the night before.  He’d been in the hospital for only a few days and when they told us he was dead…God, he was just so young, two years into college, the friend you have who was chasing his dreams down with a brand new pair of sneakers.  That kid the whole town knew because of the multitude of silly town functions he attended.  He would always insist.  Every other weekend was one silly thing or another “Oh you’re gonna love this.  Two words – ‘Poetry showdown’.  If you can’t take the heat, don’t stay in the kitchen”
The day of the funeral I just had to see him.  I snuck up the two floors to his room on the third floor.  As I neared his door at the top of that final flight of stairs each creak of the floorboard seemed to resonate through the house, followed by the hollow silence of my stillness.  I paused with each step as if stepping in larger spans of time would make what I was doing seem less suspicious, should someone hear me.  Upon touching his doorknob I felt an immediate chill. I couldn’t tell whether it was some ghostly feeling of being in the presence of a dead person, or the fact that the thermostat had been turned down to keep his body prime for viewing.
I held my breath as I opened the door, and blinked a couple times when I saw him.  He was wearing what everyone else was in downstairs, black tuxedo and a dark tie.  I know he would have scowled had he known he was going to be buried in a constricting penguin suit.  We had a conversation about it, you know?  Out on Academy Hill, right in the middle of a picnic. We were in enough shade that his transition lenses were only half tinted, and when he sat up, it was abruptly.  Pushing my head off his chest he kind of leaned in to the cemetery in the distance and pointed out how sad it is that no one really ever gets the chance to choose how they want to spend the rest of eternity dressed in.  He would have preferred his puma sneakers, still white after seven months, his striped green and blue socks, his only pair of ripped designer jeans and that express shirt he loved so much because it showed off his natural physique.  
I moved closer, inching toward him at first, then quicker as I broke through a place where I just relaxed, and for a moment he wasn’t dead.  For a moment he was just sleeping, all ready in his fancy get up simply waiting for me to wake him up.  I found myself sitting next to him, my eyes cast downward, half expecting his gaze to meet mine, and while stroking his hair I got an idea.  It happened quickly, and I kind of have a problem with acting upon my impulses, it’s something he used to criticize me on that and I never really improved.  Without thinking I threw open his drawer and pulled out what I knew he’d have wanted to be dressed in, should he have gotten the chance to create a will concerning his death-wear.  As I pulled of his starchy shirt my hand brushed against his chest, chilled as the room was, eerie as nothing else.  I finally got him down past his pants and saw, of all abominations, that he was outfitted in a fresh pair of tighty whities.  God, it’s as if the funeral home was asking to be haunted by his tormented soul.  I found his single pair of silk boxers and reassembled him in the way I knew he’d have wanted to be.
So great, now everyone will think I’m a loon for having desecrated his body.  Well what do they know; I’m the only one who ever really knew him! But how the hell would I explain it to his parents when the pallbearers march in and there he is, laying face up in his street clothes?  
This wasn’t right.  He didn’t belong here, he needed to be somewhere comfortable, someplace he enjoyed, not sitting upstairs in a suit with the lights off and the air blasting.  He hated the cold!  Certainly he would have hated a hundred people staring at his dead and lifeless shell, and he would, without a doubt, hate being six feet under, pushing daises at the Nichols Road cemetery.
I wrapped my arms around him, and as the building adrenaline made my breaths deepen I inhaled several moments of ecstasy off his clothes that still clung to his musty scent.  I lowered him gently to the floor and took care as I dragged him across the carpet to his door.  After fumbling, for what felt like several minutes, on his door handle I got him onto the awning introducing the stairs.  I even made it down the first flight of stairs without freezing up at the tiniest creak when I heard someone coming my way.  ******, they must need to use the bathroom, why couldn’t they just use the one downstairs like any normal person?  Without hesitation I throw open up the window near bottom of the stairs, heaving myself and him, sending us tumbling onto the garage roof.  Ignoring my probable bruises I spring up and slam the window behind me while taking special care to hide us both as far away from the bathroom window as possible.
Sitting up there, my heart racing, I felt his hand in mine and it was probably because my palms had gone clammy but I swear for a span of time he was alive again.  I closed my eyes and felt the breeze in my hair and was transported to a place where I spent a single moment in each day we ever shared.  Each beach side sandcastle, each afternoon spent cloud gazing, those same afternoons turning into evenings of star gazing, each and every night spent utterly and irrevocably lost with this silly boy that chose to love me.  
I was torn from my oasis as I heard the bathroom’s occupant exit and continue downstairs.   Knowing that my van was parked on the other side of the street I pushed his body as close to the edge of the roof as I could without his falling off and let him be. I hopped back inside and ran downstairs, but not before flying through the doors of the memorial and interrupting his mothers eulogy.  In an act of sheer brilliance I mustered a few tears and tore out the back door.  Everyone figured I was just so taken away by his death that I couldn’t stand to be there anymore.  Who knew anxiety could be mistook for remorse so easily?
I ran down the driveway, losing the grace I had composed in my dress in high heels the moment I slammed that door.  I jumped into Emmet, my van, because only crazy people drive around in un-named vehicles.  
I pulled out of my spot, nearly ruining the paint job on both my and his Uncle Ed’s car.  I flew my trunk door open and set the third row down, the general idea being his landing securely in my back seat.  I reversed up the driveway with the precision of a surgeon and the speed of a leopard right back to the edge of the garage where I had tossed his body.  I jumped out of my car nearly forgetting to put it into park before I shut off the engine.  I barely got halfway around my car before becoming transfixed on his hand, hanging off the gutter as if reaching for mine to grab hold and pull him to sweet salvation.  I jumped up a few times, unsuccessfully before I took off my shoes and got a good running start.  I flew up, grabbed his arm and ****** towards the car in a sideways downward motion.  He nearly cracked his head on the pavement coming down, he would have too if it wasn’t for my body breaking his fall.  I got up, too distracted by the sheer volume of my own heart to realize the pain I felt.  I shoved him into my back seat, slammed the trunk, stumbled into the car, stuck it in reverse and stepped on gas without even putting my shoes back on.

I told you I had done something bad.

I know I should be sorry
I know I should feel bad
Because here I am doing the thing
I said I'd never do again.

I said I wouldn't hurt myself
But that's been ******* all along.
The only thing that kept me clean
Was knowing that if I slipped
I'd be hurting more than just me.

But now I'm sitting here
Like I have so many times
Tearing at my skin
For a glimpse
Of sweet relief.

In the grand scheme of things
A few small scrapes
Doesn't make a difference.
It's nothing dangerous
And it's not hurting anyone
It's just a way for me to silence
The monsters in me.

I don't care anymore
About taking care of me
I'll do what I want
Even if it kills me.
I'll do what I want
Even if it means
ruining nine months
Of a fleeting fantasy

Constant, consistent, consuming
Devoid of all control
Relentless, redundant, ruining
I must never reveal my soul

For only I know
How far I will go
Can't let it show
I've never felt so low

your blood shot eyes
so red and round
their juicy plumpness compels me
to eat my baby tomatoes

the pungent smell
of your ***** second-hand smoke
fills me with desire
for some beef jerky

the sickly sight
of your slimy, greasy hair
leave me desperate with longing
for some succulent string cheese
when you scarf down your food
as if the world was ending
i can feel my partially digested turkey sandwich
make its way back up my throat
and spew out
all over your yogurt
ruining it

calculus.


(co-authored)

The irony of mankind,
They maketh technology to better their lives
And yet,
Their technology
Is ruining their lives....
The irony...
As tis they couldst use that wired technology for healing
They use it for bombing and killing..
As tis they couldst use it for connecting
The fact is
They've all gone unconnected!!!!!!
Hiding behind some screen,
Forgetting what an old fashioned phone call is.....
Connection, man thought this technological advance wouldst do.
Disconnection is what is hast really brought them......

The irony.....


©Brandon nagley
©Lonesome poet's poetry

Life
                                                            ­    has
            a
                       funny
     way
                                           of
                                  
                                ruining

      
                                                      Lives.

A man enters a flower shop
and decides on some flowers
the florist wraps them up
as the man puts his hand into his pocket
to find the money,
the money to pay for the flowers
but at the same time
suddenly
he places a hand over his heart
and falls

As he falls
the money rolls around on the floor
and the flowers fall
with the man
with the money
and the florist stands there
as the money rolls
as the flowers ruin
as the man dies
it's obviously all very sad
and she really should do something
this florist
but she doesn't know how to go about it
she doesn't know
where to start

There are so many things to do
for this dying man
these ruining flowers
and this money
this rolling money
that won't stop.

At morning I begin to feel
At night I begin to think
My heart starts to drown
My life starts to sink

I get images in my head
Confusion I cannot define
Jealousy ruining my life
Wanting you all mine

At morning I begin to think
At night I begin to feel
Are you really mine?
Is this fake or is this real?

I just don't understand
Why you could love me
A girl so deeply insecure
In a world of  jealousy

PAST arthritic decrepit elderly female wearing traditional black southern Mediterranean clothing long silver hair braid sits in stiff wooden chair

PRESENT handsome athletic 21-year-old male soldier in tan uniform stands at ease

FUTURE eye-catching 32-year-old female wearing spaghetti-strap dark slate gray slinky cocktail dress 3” black Italian calf heals long loose brown red hair red fingernails lipstick



act 1 scene 1

PAST (clasped hands) you’re ruining everything

PRESENT get out of the way old woman you don’t belong here anymore

PAST (hands gesture) you think you’re making things better look around the earth is a toilet of human errors accidents self-destruction violence greed corruption horrible secrets

PRESENT be quiet old woman silence hear me shut the **** up (short pause) what? you think your former oppressive hierarchies were better

FUTURE talk ***** to me

PAST shush up girl

PRESENT let the pretty lady speak

FUTURE (coquette stride across stage) i have a vision a world where everyone is equal living in harmony shared respect appreciation for each other we’re entering a critical crossroads extraordinary passage in time

PRESENT you hear what the pretty lady said

PAST she’s baiting you hook line and sinker

PRESENT (male bravado stance) you wrinkled bitter blind old woman can’t you see feel this critical crossroads extraordinary passage in time

PAST i know a black widow when i see one

FUTURE who you calling black widow you old witch

PAST i remember when food was good natural cows chickens lived happy neighbors were neighborly you could walk home at night without looking over your shoulder or stick out your thumb hitch a ride or if you drove up to a stop sign no one was in front of you people greeted each other as they passed it wasn’t that far back just 50 years ago

PRESENT ***** you old woman i don’t know what time that was what were you some privileged person

FUTURE let’s order pizza

PAST who can eat at a time like this

PRESENT pepperoni and mushroom

FUTURE mushroom tomato basil no meat

PRESENT cool

PAST you’re escaping into comfort food immediate gratification

FUTURE why must you judge everything

PRESENT i’m with pretty lady pass away old witch let the future and me figure this out

PAST don’t say i didn’t warn you all this banter has exhausted me i need a little nap (she tilts head closes eyes slumps in chair)



act 1 scene 2

PRESENT (swaggers up to eye-catching female) perfect now you pretty lady and i can get more familiar with each other know what i mean

FUTURE what do you have in mind

PRESENT pardon my straightforwardness i’m shooting for 69 you know what that is

FUTURE hmmm uhh yes i know what that is

PRESENT you mind spreading open those long lovely legs of yours and let me see what you got hidden there

FUTURE you think you’re man enough to see what i’ve got hidden here

PRESENT oh yes ma’am

FUTURE lie down on your back on the floor

PRESENT anyway you want it i’m glad to oblige you ma’am

FUTURE (lifts dress to waist and stands over his head) like what you see

PRESENT oohhh you are a beauty my mouth is watering please let me have a taste

FUTURE (bends knees squats above his head sinks pelvic area into his face) give me your best shot soldier boy

PRESENT mmmmmmm (long pause)

FUTURE ease up (pause) it’s a delicate flower slow gently treat it like an intricate story plot construct it carefully strong foundation listen to my breathing heartbeat feel my muscles flex follow mounting rhythm by rhythm building to crescendo

PRESENT (long pause) how am i doing

FUTURE terrible (stands ***** drops dress walks away) you’re all over the place no skill discipline direction you need to be more precise more anticipatory more presence of mind less messy rashness

PRESENT no girl ever told me that before

FUTURE probably because she was so grateful to see your face down there she would not think to ask for more but i’m the future and my needs are more demanding

PRESENT you sure do smell and taste good ma’am may i please have another shot

FUTURE listen up soldier boy i know understand you you’re a man with needs that torment you i think you have been going through this long before i knew you i see through your tough veneer i have an idea what haunts you

PRESENT what do you mean what haunts me

FUTURE maybe you didn’t get enough love from mom dad was never around none of your teachers at school knew how to get through to you now look at yourself soldier boy you’re fighting a war inside and out trying to save something that can’t be saved the world is changing faster than you can keep up do you honestly think your life and labors will have any effect on me

PRESENT i don’t understand

FUTURE i’m on the horizon you desperately need me (pause) and i don’t need you



act 1 scene 3

PAST shut up i can’t get any rest around here can’t stand hearing all this drama gibberish

PRESENT you’ve been listening (pause) you heard everything

PAST i’ve heard enough to make my stomach turn sour i don’t need to hear any more of this crap

FUTURE (flexed posture eyes glare at elderly female) don’t give me reason to trash you

PAST you think i’m afraid of you

FUTURE i mean it old witch i’ll annihilate you

PRESENT what’s happening here i don’t understand let’s all just chill

FUTURE stay out of this soldier boy it’s between the old witch and me

PAST (stands from chair raises arms revealing long black shawl) you think i am a feeble old woman or witch as you like to call me but my power goes beyond your imaginings wherever you go i will follow track you down haunt you infect you with your errors accidents self-destruction violence greed corruption horrible secrets

FUTURE shut up shut up you’re ruining everything (frantically rushes to edge of stage looks out searching audience paces back and forth hands cover ears)

PRESENT i’m lost who do i believe listen to

PAST (spreads arms out like wings) you want to know about the future i’ll tell you i can see right through her lies it’s a world devoid of fish in the seas or creatures in the forest instead industrial farming complexes producing genetically altered strains of cattle pig chicken flavorless fruits vegetables grains toxic black oceans toxic black skies stifling temperatures coastal cities swamped swarms of vermin parasites oh lest i forget trillions upon trillions of humans and robots robots!

FUTURE (abducts arms) but what about my beautiful vision a world where everyone is equal living in harmony shared respect appreciation for each other

PAST you’re in love with your own deceptions foolish woman you can’t possibly believe the sins of the past will ever let go of you

FUTURE that’s it you ***** you die (attacks old woman’s throat strangling)

PRESENT (intervenes pulling enraged female off elderly female) please stop this fighting stop your hostility

PAST (coughing choking trouble speaking) it’s up to you now soldier boy what will you do

PRESENT i need fresh air i have to go get away from here goodbye to both of you

FUTURE not so fast

PAST in a way we’re all joined at the hip understand soldier boy now lie down on your back on the floor there’s something i’ve got hidden if you’re man enough to see (lifts skirt hem)

FUTURE i want in on this

PRESENT oh god

*****, *****, *****.

You can feel their skin on yours and you can't escape.
You're so scared,
But this is what you did, and now it's your fate.

You gave it all away when you were young and naive,
Not thinking of how things could possibly be.

Now what about her?
The one you love,
The one you would die for.
She's saving herself for you,
And you can't do that,
Because you gave it all away years ago.

You cry now,
So ashamed of who you've become,
What does anything matter if you're ruining everything you love?

You didn't know things would turn out this way.
You gave everything away,
Not knowing you'd be here today.

Clutching the grass,
And tearing out your throat with your screams.
You gave it all away,
And it didn't mean a thing.

But try to explain that to her,
You didn't mean it,
And it wasn't even real.

But you did it,
And that's all we need to know
You did it,
And now they have to go.

You're alone,
And no one can hear you scream,
"IM SORRY FOR WHAT I DID,
I DIDNT KNOW WHAT IT MEANS"

But you're tainted,
And you're no longer pure,
You have to live with what you did,
And there is no cure.

No cure to turn you back,
And no cure to make her stay.
What you did is unforgiving,
And you live with it today.

Save yourself for someone that's worth dying for, don't give it away.

One scarlet tear, makes it clear which drops from her cheek to the ground which burns away as acid, toxic, became lifeless in an instant
Emotions of any kind, are to ruin ones mind, ones soul from something more beautiful, clean and without any malicious intent,
Ruining what's best in us, corrupting inner peace with disturbance,
Free from bonds or feelings one would live alike the the moon; Elusive, with a cycle which turns and decides to recycles once again,
But what would be a life, free from the trouble of emotions, heartache
pain and agaony, happiness and glee with experiencess worth more than a soul could ask for, wish to be repeated, forming what is YOU,
Would it be a curse ? A blessing ? Would it be wise to purify onesself,
All these questions remain unanswered, as the world spirals it's transient, lifely joyful axis around our golden shining star, the sun,
Purity comes sinfree, cut from temptations of every meaningful term,
Then it would mean to give up anything, everything in solace, simply to remain free from an act or even a thought of unrighteousness,
Empathy would be lost in a purgatory of pure furies which knows no heart, or mercy for this matter, a life spend alone is an answer to this,
Oh servant, will you burn away like the flower in the heat of summer by achieving this purity you strive for just to call yourself better ?
After all, the joy of emotions is for all to experience
After all the love of light is for all to bear

~ Umi

Ripples of intention on green water,
Little drops of dissonance in a modal symphony.
How ugly they seem, ruining the serenity.
Yet what would it be without them?

An ocean without waves,
Sterile and alien:
Merely air turned bitter and dingy,
Like a stagnant fog in silence.
Could we call it the sea without that gentle murmur,
A mother's reassuring whisper
To her frightened babe?
And the stay of the light on a featureless mirror,
Nothing but a cruel reflection
Of grotesque perfection?
Not the sea, but a purgatory,
Ugly in every impeccable detail.

It is only with amorphous intention,
Impressions of consciousness,
That the golden sun can play
In the dimpled sand, the swaying grass,
And the eyes and souls of artists alike.
It is only in the imperfections
That beauty can truly be seen:
Admired for its perseverance
In the face of nature's adversity.

Where else would raindrops fall?

(you-)
stop making me worry about you
stop doing dangerous things to yourself
when you know I can't be there to stop you
stop making ****** up choices
and being with people who constantly hurt you
you told me to not be her cigarette (she put me out anyways)
but look at the place you're in now
isn't it ironic?
the exact thing we swore would never happen (you swore)
is our reality a month or two later
please stop ruining my life
because I hate that I still care (can't stop)
after you ****** me up
so badly (not recovered yet)

you--
stop being so distant (like I was to you)
stop not caring as much as I do (like I did to you)
why don't you love me like you used to?
why don't you want me like I want you?
why do you make me feel cliche?
it makes me sick to type this part (your part)
and I wish I could shake you
and be completely honest
I want to be who I was
when I was with you
I don't want to be this way (my way)
I want to be your baby
please stop ruining my life
because it's been a year
and I think about you
just as much (it's gross and I feel 13)

you---
stop drinking for ***** sake
I'm not in your life (for the better (but probably not))
I can't babysit you when you're drunk (anymore)
I don't even know what happens to you
and it ******* kills me
how am I supposed to know if you're okay? (are you?)
how am I supposed to know if you're safe? (please be)
I hate that everything blue reminds me of your room
when we were washed in watercolors
with the lights off and your hand on my waist
please stop ruining my life
because now when anyone touches me
I feel numb and I wish it were you

I wish I could clean your wounds
I wish you'd love me like I love you
I wish you'd stop drowning yourself in *****

please stop ruining my life

Endless nights are passing, shadows lurking upon one another, one of greater darkness than the other, just waiting for pray alike a spider,
Fingernails possessed by a woman, sharper than knifes, almost alike claws they are an ornament to her delicate looking sweet body,
Her ****** devotion, driving her mad in a moment of distraction from deep within her split mind, time stands still, meaning is lost,
What's left to hunt in a place in which a monster causes rampage ?
Wasting no time, she seeks her next victim, drenched in impurity.
Approaching it the girl pretends to be gentle, caring yet worried but in truth she had only one plan, to feed of its despair, its infinite pain,
With crimson tears of both joy and fear of what she had become, the gal greets it to the end of its already shortened life after she gained trust, respect, maybe even a little love in this blazing hell with no sun,
Knocking it over she ramms her nails into the flesh of his face, piercing through while making sure he is not able to gain any motion,
Softly, in a slow cruel yet elegant manner she rips off chunks of it,
A distorted scream fills the room, laughter accompanies it as she loses herself to this waving melody of pain, questioning wheter or not to be replaced by the transience they have named life, or wether to live on,
As soon as he stops screaming she cuts through his cheek, getting stuck, breaking away her nail to set her hand free once again,
Nine knifes remain in there after all, surely that would be enough,
Clapping her hands in glee her next motive was a skillful punch to knock him out after her satisfaction of ruining his face had reached its peak in a riot of unexplored, absolutely undefined emotions,
Awaiting the awakening of her pray the lunatic sharpens her nails once again, now they would go on to the second act of her crime,
Tortured with true or false of this action she decides to take a stand
*******, simply to draw on the blood drenched body with cutting marks of the finest lines in an art of lunacy, a nightmare,
Recurrance in emotions, recurrance in her actions, for her it's "fun",
Act 3 has come close, it was time to rip him open and reveal his treasure, for what she actually wanted was a heart she never had,
Straight cutting to the mans chest it had been done, all what was needed now would be to break his rips to fully expose his insides,
Ah, phantoms of a long past, as the present burns away with cuts,
The symbol of hatred had achieved her final destiny, at last that is,
Each ***** was either ripped off and thrown out in fury or devoured immediately in her hunger she felt whilst working,
Hanging him by his guts she takes everything out till he is hollow,
Lifeless she watches him rot a little, having crushed his bones,
What was left when time is moving once again in a realm of light ?
Her crime goes unrecorded, unnoticed as the corpse became fuel for the fire alike hell, until her twisted mind drags her to do this again

~ Umi

“Big change, huh? Bet you could take some awesome shots here, Max.”

Max nodded, only hearing the last part of Warren’s sentence. Truth was, she was distracted by how beautiful this place was. If Max stood at the end of the street, she could get a killer depth-of-field perceptive image by aiming towards the long and skinny winding roads being enveloped by the building’s shadows. San Diego seemed to flourish with art and photography culture, and great opportune shots to shoot photographs.

“Earth to Max.” That seemed to knock her out of her thoughts. *****, focus. “Are you going to go swimming with me and Brooke?”

From the look on Brooke’s face, she was hoping to God that Max said no. Brooke is the relationship equivalent of a boa constrictor, and she wasn’t sure how this hasn’t dawned on Warren yet. “I’m not sure. Maybe. Let me unpack first.”

After Kate dropped out of going to San Diego Comic Con last second, Max was nearly going to join her when Warren practically begged her to come. Coming back to the present - equipped with her suitcase and messenger bag - Max lingered behind the couple by several feet. This was her way of trying to avoid the reminder that she was third-wheeling with a boy who used to have a very awkward crush on her and his salty girlfriend.

“I’m going to go down to the pool.” Warren said, sliding his key card into room #228, turning his head to face Max before opening the door. “Maximillian, are you sure you don’t want to join us?”

“Like I said, I’ll think about it.”

The moment the three of them walked in, Brooke and Warren beelined for the restroom with their bathing suits in hand. Once they came out, Warren had a blue and black plaid board short swimsuit on whereas Brooke came out with a highlighter-colored graffiti two piece.  “Alright, Mad Max. We’re out of this joint. Catch us at the pool if you need something or want to swim. If not, we’ll be back in an hour.”

Max waved them off, digging through her bag for that bathing suit. The crimson colored ruched one-piece vintage bathing suit sat abandoned at the bottom of her matching vermillion suitcase. Down below at the pool area, she could hear screaming and laughing and splashing of the pool water. Max got up from her suitcase, and opened the curtain enough to look out at the hotel pool. Several other people were down there, pushing the time limit very close to closing in an hour from now. Come on, Max, you’re really going to let your whole adventure be ruined by the usual high-strung Brooke?

**** it.

Max nabbed the swimsuit from the hidden corners of her suitcase, stripping herself down to pull the swimsuit onto her body. Once the swimsuit was on, she turned her waist feeling the soft fabric conform to her small but still vaguely prominent curves. Max can remember Mom always saying that she looked good in red, so she recommended a red one-piece since Max doesn't have the confidence to show her stomach to anyone.

Well, except her best friend Chloe. They used to take bubble baths together as toddlers so it used to be the most natural thing in the world to get dressed in the same room together. It must have been a better time, where there were no insecurities. Now Max has trouble calling her up without her finger freezing up as she attempts to type the very last digit of Chloe’s phone number into her phone.

As Max turned around in the mirror, she noticed how her lack of a rear end was a lot more distinguishable in red. Wowser, Max thought, this looks really good on me.

“Wowser.” Max said aloud to her reflection, and threw on a bathrobe.

It must have been ten minutes into Warren and Brooke swimming when Max opened up the pool gate, entering the vast perimeter of the pool area. There were significantly less people around the pool, where most of the people still inside the pool area were kids our age. “Max, you’re here!”  

This made two teenagers stop in their tracks as they were opening up the pool gate at the other end of the pool to leave. One of them whipped around so fast that it was a blur of blue hair.  “Wait…”

“Is that…Max Caulfield? It looks a lot like her.” Rachel asked to Chloe, who hung her jaw open in disbelief. No ******* way.

Furrowing her eyebrows, she watched Max drop the robe on a nearby chair. Like an awkward penguin, Chloe watched her best friend waddle up to the pool edge & cannonball into the waters below oblivious to the two girls standing at the gate watching her. “You’re going to wake up the neighbors and the owner of this hotel's parents forty miles away, Warren!”

“Do you want to go say hi to her?” Rachel asked Chloe.

As Chloe decided on actually going to surprise her, Max's friend said something that made Chloe change her mind in a split second.

“How would you know? Besides, you’ll eventually forgive me for that once you meet the entire cast of Star Trek tomorrow, Max.” Warren yelled at Max, and Chloe did a small grin as she turned away from her best friend, closing the gate on both of the girls.

“No. Guess the oblivious nerd is going to Comic Con too.“ Chloe took one last look at Max before going back inside the hotel with Rachel Amber at her tail. "Do you think she'll recognize me in cosplay?"

"Probably not. Unless I drop the bomb on you guys."

“Shhh. I don’t need you ruining my surprise party, *******.”

Max, Brooke, and Warren weren’t in the pool for long, since Warren bumped his head into the side of the pool while doing laps with Brooke. They had to get out, and put an ice pack on Warren’s sore bump on his head. “Now how am I going to cosplay the 11th Doctor? I need to gel my hair back, but I have this gargantuan bump on my head.”

“We’ll figure it out, sweetie.” Brooke said, and Max nearly gagged.

Max went back to the hotel room first, since being around Brooke made her want to strangle her.  This whole third-wheeling thing was annoying, and Max was regretting coming alone without Kate as her faithful chauffeur. Nonetheless, she wasn’t going to let that ruin her trip. She was here to have fun. And to take a bunch of photographs, of course.

The next morning around 4:00 am, Max was rudely awoken by Brooke who shoved her in her shoulder. “Get up, Max. We’re leaving in thirty minutes from now.”

Was that necessary? Max thought, crawling out of bed. From the bathroom, she could hear Warren fretting over the mammoth-sized bump on his head as both of them got dressed in their cosplay outfits. “Okay. That hurt a lot. Ow, ow, ow.”

“Oh, is there anything I can do to help?”

“Shut up, guys.”

Feeling slightly irritable from the loud ruckus Brooke and Warren were making in the other room Max rolled out of bed. She rustled through her suitcase for a pair of skinny jeans and a white t-shirt with the print of a doe on the front. Once she had her clothes, she stood up to walk into the restroom to change when she noticed the ending result of both of her companions.

Brooke’s multicolored dark hair was pulled down in waves framing the scarlet dress with a black belt fastened around her waist. As for Warren, his usually shaggy brown hair was gelled back for his cosplay. She had to admit, he looked handsome in his mahogany jacket, red bow-tie and matching suspenders, and the cotton collared button-up he wore underneath. For a cosplay of The Eleventh Doctor and Clara Oswald, it was quite impressive how close they looked like the actual characters of the TV show Doctor Who.

“Take a picture of us, Max!” Warren said in a chirpy voice.

“On it.”

Max pulled out her camera, and pointed it at the couple who held up peace signs together. Once the picture rolled out, the couple split apart to put on the finishing touches of their cosplay.  As for Max, all she had to do was throw on her clothes. There wasn’t a lot of work in dressing up like normal people. Besides, she’s never really been a fan of cosplay.

If you want to count dressing up as pirates with her best friend Chloe on Halloween five years ago cosplay, then yeah, Max has cosplayed several times before.

“Max, hurry your *** up. It looks like the amphitheater is getting crowded from here.” Warren yelled from outside the bathroom door towards Max, who sloppily tied her shoes.

As they exited out of the large double doors of the four star hotel, Warren and Brooke took the crosswalk, pointing out people cosplaying as characters from TV shows or video games. They were smiling and laughing, leaving Max to third-wheel again. Instead of lingering on it, Max put in her headphones and turned on Crosses by José González tuning them out.

“Where is the line?” Max asked Warren as they approached the crowded complex filled with restaurants on one side and the amphitheater on the other side. Tents were set up here, even.

“This is what I call natural selection. If you come prepared with prior knowledge on how this works, you can conquer this haphazard looking line.” Warren spread his arms out, motioning towards the crowd that was rapidly growing in size.

“Let’s go, Warren.”

“Wait!”

Like an octopus, Brooke latched onto Warren dragging him into the depths of the growing sea of people. After three painful hours of waiting, Max felt the crowd start to lighten up around her as excited but deafening chatter filled the air of the surrounding herd of people. Everyone was clamoring loudly, quickly rushing into the open doors with their San Diego Comic Con day pass thrown around their neck.

As soon as Max received hers, she eagerly threw her day pass around her neck. After buying a small breakfast sandwich from a booth, Max decided to start people watching. Some of the cosplays made her laugh like the Darth Vader cosplayer leading a conga line of faithful storm troopers, taking long confident strides.

Max took several photographs of several different cosplayers, ranging from Doctor Who, Scott Pilgrim vs The World, The X-Files, Breaking Bad, Undertale, Magic: The Gathering, and Family Guy. When it started getting crowded, she got up from her chair and entered the large archway into the convention center filled with colorful tents and cosplay galore.

Wielding her camera bag close to her waist, Max carefully maneuvered her way through the sea of people as she took a look at the booths. Suddenly, the throng of people became too much for Max. An elbow into Max's side pushed her into the left side of her waist, throwing her into a booth.

“Hey, are you alright?”

Max’s eyes glanced up towards a blue-haired girl cosplaying as Pris from Blade Runner, who had grabbed her waist. Something about her was actually kind of familiar, however, Max couldn’t tell. “You hit that table pretty hard.”

Max felt the warmth from her waist leave slowly. “This crowd is suffocating. I need a place to breathe around here. It’s too claustrophobic for my liking.”

“Are you alone or something? Because I could always use company in my tent. It gets hella boring inside this tent sometimes.”

“Do you say that to all of your customers?” Max asked, chuckling nervously at the blue-haired cosplayer’s comment.

“No.” She mumbled something under her breath that Max didn’t quite catch. “I mean – unless you’re uncomfortable with it. I’ve seen people faint multiple times from claustrophobia here.”

Since her head was bent down over a sketch she was doing in a journal, the only way Max could tell that the girl was blushing was by how red her ears had gotten. The realization that the girl became a nervous wreck all of a sudden after that comment had made Max’s day already.

“Maybe you’re right. I should just sit down. There’s no places to sit around here, though.”

The blue-haired girl patted the armrest of the empty fold-out chair behind the table. “This is Rachel’s chair, but Rachel is helping out with the convention rave for later. She’s on the committee or some ****.”

“Coworker?”

“And an annoyance at times.” Max went around the table, taking a seat in the chair the girl patted. It was itching at her brain that there is something about this girl that is so nostalgic.

Suddenly, a long brunette-haired girl billowed through the back curtains of the booth, where Max saw a tattoo chair in the back along with an extended table with clutter everywhere. “Chloe, do you have my phone? I really need it right now.”

Wait a second. “Chloe?”

“Great. Thanks a lot, Rachel. You ruined the element of surprise.”

"No ******* way!"

After Chloe handed the phone to Rachel, Max followed with her first impulse, throwing her arms around Chloe. Immediately, Chloe laughed as Max nuzzled her head into Chloe's shoulder blade. Max could feel the initial excitement pounding in her chest as Chloe tightened her grip on her as well. “Get a room, Chloe.”

“I will shove this combat boot so far up your *** –”

“Okay, I’m leaving. I need to call Frank and see when he was going to get here.” Rachel stated matter-of-factly, then added as she was leaving, “Hope you have a fun reunion.”

Once Chloe let go of Max, she held onto her arms staring into her face. “Wowser. This is crazy. You’re dressed as Pris from Blade Runner. That is definitely my ****.”

“I hope so. Someone asked me if I’m cosplaying Ramona Flowers from Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Now I will accept that misunderstanding because Ramona Flowers is my woman crush.” Chloe glanced over at Max, changing the mood merely by narrowing her eyes at the brunette. “Alright, are you going to explain why you didn’t call or text me for five years?”

It was so sudden that Max suddenly felt inferior to Chloe. "I'm sorry. My parent's decision to suddenly move to Seattle wasn't my choice."

"That's not a good enough reason." Chloe attempted to change the tone of the mood lighter, since this wasn't exactly the place to discuss that. "So what's up with you? Living it up here in San Diego or something?"

"I - uh - moved back to Arcadia Bay. Two months ago."

"Without a phone call, telling me that you moved back." Chloe pressed her lips together, annoyed. "Nice one, Caulfield. That's just ******* peachy."

Max started to get a little irritated herself. "Look, I'm sorry. Can we just drop it?"

"I’m sorry, Max. I don’t want to be the ******* to ruin your day. In fact, this was the complete opposite impression I was going for. If you want to punch me for being such an annoying rat, go right on ahead.” Chloe pointed at the bicep of her left arm.

I shook my head – chuckling as Chloe kicked back her chair – propping her feet onto the table cluttered with various types of artwork. There was a dozen pieces of art here, but I noticed Chloe was really into abstract watercolor paintings. Mostly Chloe did sketches of characters from TV shows and video games and painted it in watercolor. One of the paintings in particular caught my eye.

Of course – like all of Chloe’s paintings – it was strikingly beautiful: In front of an obsidian background was a butterfly with eye-popping azure wings. One of the wings seemed to be slightly blurred to give more definition to the closest wing. “Wow, you’re a real artist.”

“I’m also a tattoo artist. If you want to get a tattoo, just hit your girl up. It’s on the house for you.” Chloe said, holding out her arm to show me. “Rachel helped me with both designs.”

Chloe had a beautiful sleeve on her arm and a tattoo on the top of her hand of a red chrysanthemum. Max traced the red ribbon detail on her arm tattoo with one finger, making Chloe shiver. “Dude, you can look, but you can’t touch the tats.”

“Sorry, it’s beautiful.”

“Hopefully it will still look beautiful when I look like the human equivalent of a raisin when I’m 80.” Chloe joked, holding out her arm in front of her face. “How about it, Max? Wanna get tatted up by your best friend Chloe? It might be a great experience for you, hippie. No gang related tattoos, though.”

“Yeah, because I’m totally a part of a gang.”

The smile that lit up Chloe’s face sent Max into a comatose state of delirium. Her eyes focused in on Chloe like a lens, taking shots in her head so she didn’t forget this moment with her best friend. For once, Max was having fun. “You’re still a ******* geek. That’s good news.”

“Always.”

Chloe shook her head before getting up. “Alright, so do you want a tattoo or not? This is your final offer, Max. Don’t let it go to waste.”

“I don’t know. You know I’m scared of needles.”

“Still?” Chloe grabbed Max’s shoulders. “Come o

I am sorry for ruining all vaginas for you
I hope you can recover eventually
She said

I hate to burst your **** bubble
But I’ve slid some lies between your thighs
When howling at your moon wasn’t so much praise
As it was longing for a change of ***** scenery

People change?

How I feel right now
is like when one time I was sick
And my parents recorded a show I watched
so I could watch it later
And at the end of the show
there was a number for a contest to go to space camp

I called that number
It was disconnected
I always find out the important stuff
A little late

I cried that day

I just wanted to go to space camp

And I just wanted someone to love me like a black hole
A warm black hole to put all my love into
**** me in and fix me like there’s no turning back
I mean in the darkness of space
They all look the same
All yank at you turbulent and fiery head rush passion

I mean we all love the same

So I am sorry I overshot your Venus
To crash land in Uranus
A semi-purposeful curious passion

You coulda yelled ****
We felt like ****
When we walked away

Parts of me have always been missing
And I tried to fill the gaps with you
Problem is when you might be gay and are fighting it
Your closet is a ******

Not your fault your beard looked funny on my ****
You can’t wear a person like an accessory
I can’t slap her like masculinity till I feel straight again
Some things aren’t right
I’m not right
And you are so messed up now
Because you have this superpower to turn men gay

You can’t turn men gay
You can only remind them of the pain that lies
In lying to themselves when they know
None of this feels right

None of it will

Dear former lover
Former black hole body
Former holder of my confusion
And filler of my empty spots

I ****** up by ******* you

I ****** up

Ex therapist
She who must not be named

For taking such a meaningful
Experience from my life

You could care less

No female friend
Ever came

Well, thanks anyway
I could care less

You ruined things

Thanks again
For ruining things

Bleh

Constitution pollution:
the constable ruining
the ******* consecration

A soluble solution:
grape sipping blood
letting to fully bless
the humors

By Arcassin Burnham

At times,  when times,
When I fight beside the people I wanna trust it ends bad.
Making rumors,
rumors that'll make you **** yourself and ruining things that you had.
Quiet and shy,  shy now even still incased in the big old brute of a shell.
I've been hurting inside, inside of my mind, lost in this mean matrix,
Can't you tell.
My exes lie beside me,  keyword lie,
And I will never trust another girl again.
Filling pieces,  pieces of my heart I threw in the trash in desperate dens.
Love is another form, forms of weakness,
Don't you let it all go to your big head.
Lives are on the line , the line of destruction and you feel your life is so dead.