Long night
curtains dark the gloom
creak the steps to her sleeping room
solemn woman walks these woods
transforming limb and bone
in feathery flight she delights
to grace a moon swept pond
her whispers weave a song, to call her lover home
entwined they float the woodwind air
until the night is gone
Shapeshifter lights the darkness dawn
to shed the dreaming night
now slips away her lover
and fades the glorious swan

A sadistic outlook
I hide my fallacies and avarice in a sock drawer,
neatly placed next to my pill bottles
In the closet closest, I store the prospect of future casualties
Shuffled neatly undernearth media propaganda and the war in Uganda
I suffocate the tragedy of unknown victims in my display of malice
Muffled as they’re whimpering
Sociopathic symphony

Blackbird your wings like ashen skies
iridescent as blue morpho butterflies
the impaling of your sharpened eyes
all knowing, you cackle
shapeshifter Yaqui man
desert bird, a grackle

Stirring, you stare me down
shaking mesquite leaves to the ground
the air is thick grey sage
smudged with prayers of peace
a wish to cease
the wars we wage

a vision pure of heart
this message of love unfurls
breathe peace - peace
in this world.

My body and soul are not synonymous.
When I look at my body,
I still refer to it as she,
I stare into the mirror,
And she looks back at me.
You can regret her but please
Don't forget her.
We'll never be those kids again.
I can't wait to be someone else again.
I'm an anomaly, a shapeshifter.

We met on common land
Sharing a favorite band
We started holding hands
And I felt absolutely grand
Following your similar strand
But I began to feel ******
Once I saw you had planned
To burn me with your brand
You had my idiosyncrasies scanned
So you could start acting bland
Once I was on your nightstand

While trying to give me an *******
You put on a fake southern inflection
Thinking it’s in vogue to be Texan
You’re more like Rogue from the X-men
Spreading your shapeshifter infection
Trying to pass your suitor’s inspection
You hide your personality from detection
Like a jaded politician during an election
You give the people what they want
Until they love you
Your similarities you constantly flaunt
Until they’re subdued

Your metamorphosis
Informed my bliss
By eating from my dish
You fulfilled my wish
Of finding who I’m looking for
Not knowing what’s in store
Once I start to see more
Deep down to your core
To find an empty floor
Behind a locked door

Raised as a changeling
With trends ranging
From punk rocker
To athletic boxer
In a life where validation
Is another person’s creation
Needed for ego inflation
That’s given as placation
For your simple sedation

Now you’re a shapeshifter
Looking to ape misters
As you forsake sisters
For date blisters
Creating a friendless drought
So when you’re down and out
You need a man who’s devout
While I look at you with doubt

I come to you with problems
You can’t help me solve them
You just listen to what I say
And then press replay
A form of redundant consolation
So issues I don’t relay
To avoid your echolocation
While my soul is filleted

Your Houdini act
Voodoo genie tact
Garnered a time pact
By tricking a blind bat
Through a mind hack
Which gave me great pain
The size of a Great Dane
For a misery refrain
After you interest feigned
To enjoy my reign
But your interest waned
And you quit the game
Saying I’m to blame

Once I’m replaced
You build a new face
On the one you erased
For another embrace
While losing all grace
Looking for an ace
To take you away from this place
Where you’ll always remain
An abrasive codependent strain
Viewing relationships as games
Or obstacles overcame
You become the bane
Of another’s lane
Causing rain
In their brain

Your focus on mimicry
Is super gimmicky
Pretending I didn’t see
Your lack of personality
When you can only parrot what other people say
You become an amalgamation of those you date
Which isn’t the worst but definitely isn’t great
When we should just organically relate

Just one moment passed in time, a split second ticked by
something's changed...
My brain it tingles, something's sparked inside my mind
Was it the way the teacher taught me? The facts delivered to me?
Something has struck a cord within me, and I'm hooked
All my life before feels pointless, I did everything wrong
My passions have changed to something worth my time, this time

I rush home with a spring in my step, the autumn cold penetrates all but myself
I'll dive on my bed, open the laptop, switch it on
learn all I can, dig deeper for the core and branch out more
videos, images, articles, merchandise
my elation grows as the weeks pass by, I look forward to going home
All on my own, wasting my intellect on the activity alone

I'm sorry if I bore you, I don't mean to ignore you
I'm excited and frankly I've no intention to stop
I will rant and rave and sing the hymns
of my religious obsession, like a rabid televangelist
you'll never get how I feed on my fixations
they make me happier than even my own friends
They are my bread and butter

I'm predictable in my unpredictability
whatever next, when will I take my next life step
it's my favourite band, my favourite film, favourite book, favourite creature
it's a subject most curious, it's my talent, my skill
whatever form it takes it's forever my best friend, my consistent shapeshifter
and the old loves never truly leave me, it's an amicable breakup
forever in my heart it resides, old flames join new flings when things are getting quiet
I don't know how I'd survive without obsession in my life
Most folk's lives seem boring, they have holes where passions lack

It could be days, it could be years
one day that tingling feeling will happen once again
a new fixation forms...

Imagine tugging at a loose thread on a sweater, expecting it to break off, problem solved...
but instead that thread unravels and unravels until the sweater is a sweater no more,
but rather a mess of string in a heap on the floor, a chaotic tangle that
resembles the contents of my brain when someone asks, "how was your weekend?"

My thoughts are replaced with the blare of static on TV and I can't hear myself think, so I say what I imagine a person is supposed to say, a preprogrammed response I construct for situations like these when my brain decides to check out...

Because of course the only time my mind -stops- is when I really need it to go, not when I'm laying in bed at 2 a.m., fixating on that cringey thing I did four years ago.

But anyway, I would tell you about my weekend, except it seems that the wires connecting the language part of my brain to my mouth have been cut. My weekend probably ****** anyway, but I manage to say, "it was good." And even then, those three words struggle to get past my lips, and any words more revealing hit the backs of my teeth like a car colliding into a brick wall.

By now the elmer's glue holding me together is losing its grip, so when you tell me about your weekend, the words wont stick. How your breath is wasted on me, when I can't concentrate on not falling apart and on tales of your tomato garden at the same time.

On the surface I look so cold; my painted on smile is a thin sheet of ice, concealing the puddle that hides underneath, one that the sun can't reach --
People will often say, "if it helps, you don't seem anxious". I want to tell them that anxiety is a tormented ghost that drags its dagger like claws across my skin at night, whose presence I can always feel but never see. A monster that feeds on vulnerability, and knows it will never starve.

But, I don't know what to say, so I stare at my hands. Because making eye contact feels like facing a lion, and facing a lion means facing death. But then there are times that death doesnt sound so bad, because I know that as long as I'm still breathing, anxiety finds a way to make that hard for me too.  

Anxiety is a broken appliance that the store wont take back, the Annabelle doll that returns from the trash, so it made a home of me instead. And in return for the shelter I give, my heart pounds like its full of angry bees when I finally press 'send' on the 8th draft of a text message I've been working on since yesterday and I want to hide, but why bother? when in a game of hide-and-seek, anxiety always wins.

It is my shadow during the day and my blanket at night, one that that drapes suffocatingly around my shoulders while I'm pacing the kitchen in the dim glow of the stovelight, worrying that the next day could be the " someday " that the ones I love finally leave me. On these nights, anxiety comes to my rescue everytime. It slithers up my back where it can softly whisper into my ear : "I promise you, chelsea, I will never leave"

Don't be
A mole.

I hate moles.

They burrow
And
Scavenge
And
Live in the
Dark.

Thats just
What you did
To my heart.

You burrowed
Deep,
Down to the center.

You set up camp.
And I didn't know
You were a mole.
I thought maybe you were
A
Straw,
To ****
Bad things
Out.
So I kept you warm
And waited calmly for the
Bad stuff to
Dissapear.

But I realized
That
You were a
Magnifying glass,
To emphasise
My flaws

And you were
A
Seam-ripper
To
Pull the patches
From where
I had already healed,
To make the scabs
Bleed
Again.

And I thought you were
A
Jigsaw
And you were broken
So I could fix you
And put you
Together.

Like a
Vase,
Easily
B
r
o
k
e
n.

And
Then
You left me.

Like a
Tooth
Full of
Cav it ies.

That
Space
Next
To
My heart

No longer full.
And you
Didn't depend on me,
No longer a tapeworm.

I miss you.
Like
You
Were
Mine.

But you were
Never
Mine.

She only speaks whispers that the wind carries away
She's a shapeshifter in my company
Makes me feel more alone the more that I say
Your foothills, so empowered, rolling astray
The transcendence she leaves in your wake

Her tender lips speak false secrets
Through silt and clay they filter out
From the freckles of your face and the dimples of your vowels
You are my purpose, my therapist
In your presence I am sinless

Watching your walls crumble down
With swollen tear ducts
I am escaped
Your lies are safe with me
But your prison is not

Hello my name is Jo and Im a shapeshifter
Hello Jo
I change when Im around him
He makes me someone who gets drunk
He makes me into a person willing to forsake those most important to me
He makes me into the worst version of myself
He is my father
He uses everything he's got to overpower everyone else
I learned my shapeshifter habits from him
Thats why Im here
To say enough
To put a stop to my shapeshifter ways

Fetch is a cat.
Independent, comfort loving, needy.

Fetch is a raven.
Wise, trickster, loves shiny things.

Fetch is a mouse.
Hungry, afraid, seeking.

Fetch is a dolphin.
Smart, fun loving, caring.

Fetch is a dog.
Loyal, loving, playful.

Fetch is a dragon.
Strong, dangerous, hoarding.

Fetch is me.
Obsessive, focused, relaxed.

What I'm imagining isn't considered pretty
You don't want to know where you're sitting
What I'm imagining isn't considered pleasant
We're inappropriately using a pheasant
What I'm imagining doesn't go with God
And is laughed at because it's odd

Into my life they peer
Trying to insert fear
My owl head on a swivel
My rabbit ears perked
When people don't act civil
And decency is shirked

I needed answers
For my cancer
I find them in love and pain
They both seem the same
I begin to view the rain
As a type of gain

Everyone knows love's scorn
Which leaves me torn
I can't help but feel my situation differs
Something about the rejection seems stiffer
So I become a shapeshifter
To avoid the hate gifters
To avoid bearing the shame
Of being called names

I know other people have it worse
Sometimes that feels like a curse
I can't gauge the importance of major events
In my life
I don't know whether to think they're intense
Or just right

Maybe I'm just being dramatic
But these instances aren't sporadic
When those that I love
Push and shove
I start to wonder if I'm broken or stained
Until I realize we're all burnt by love's flames
We all have a path to travel
And they're all made of gravel
Our feet become sore
Which affects our core
We find people below us on the totem pole
To know how it feels to treat someone cold
For when our enthusiasm for love has faded
It's easy to become jaded

There are things we're ashamed of
That morph us into something unrecognizable
In which we should be truly ashamed
In the mirror we look the same
But our actions are toxic
We become radioactive
We see where our stock sits
And become merely reactive
And it's hard to find grace
After being punched in the face
But one must remember punches come in all forms
And we must not punch back to survive the storm

Restructured
The fiber of my being
Reordered
The placement of my priorities
Reconsidered
The core of truths validity
Realigned
My moral compass and sense of duty
Rediscovered
The spark of my life and ingenuity
Recommited
                          Life

Shapeshifter
Girl of many faces
Got lost
In between transitions
What is your true form?
Carefully crafted masks
Set out in front of you
Which one
Will you wear
Today?

-jt

i wear your sweaters when you're asleep & i wear them when your not home to remind me of who i am;
your girlfriend, your fantasy, the love of your life;
but suddenly my mind wonders who am i without you?
i've lost myself inside of you, i've buried myself deep beneath your ribcages & made home inside your chest;
but then i remember i never existed to begin with because i've always been a shapeshifter.
twisting & morphing into what everyone else wants me to be, forgetting that i have a body, a mind & a soul all of my own;
feeling guilty for taking a second to breathe through the bars on this jail cell window.
i've been laying on the floor like a carpet,
letting everyone walk on me & pretending that it's completely acceptable;
& i've always hosted the parties to give myself a sense of control when in reality all i'm doing is serving people.
but please, my love, don't misunderstand me;
my love for you is always here inside of me even if it's gone into hiding;
this illness clouding my brain has been growing from a pinprick into a wrecking ball;
turning everything into black & white as if i'm living on a zebras skin.
you always loved the yin & yang symbol, well that's how my mind self-destructs;
for anyone who doesn't know, the yin & yang symbolizes the good & the bad, with a little good in the bad & a little bad in the good;
a small light in the dark & a hint of shadow in the light;
except the way my mind works, there is no flicker of a flame in the darkness & darkness does not exist in the light;
at least that's how my mind perceives things...
when i'm treated with love & adoration, my heart suddenly beats & you are an angelic being i am undeserving of;
but then again i never deserved any form of happiness, according to my thoughts;
when i am treated with abuse & neglect (or what my brain tells me is abuse & neglect), i shut down my emotions & once again become a ghost to my own body;
but then again this hollow numbness is the home i grew up in...
i don't remember much of my childhood & sometimes i wonder if that's a good thing;
was it to protect myself from the horrors that i'm not sure even existed,
or was it really a wonderful childhood that i purposefully forgot so i could give all the blame to my family?
i don't remember much of my childhood but i know i forgot it to relieve myself of some of this pressure;
some of this pressure that pushes down on me every minute of every day;
how do you expect me to feel when every feeling i ever expressed was shoved back down my throat because it was too inconvenient for someone else;
how do you expect me to speak when i was trained to bite my tongue because i was always too intelligent for anyone else's comfort;
how do you expect me to live when all i've lived for was to satisfy the needs of those around me so i could feel worthy of the air in my lungs;
& when i say "you", i don't mean you, just you as one sole being, i mean everyone;
everyone i've ever met has expected something of me;
whether it be my body, my mind, my skills or my words,
my heart, my thoughts, my possessions or me;
& you my love, you are everything to me despite my contradictive actions,
because you're the only one who has ever taken a moment to look at me dead in the eyes & ask me with pure love & selflessness
well what do*  you  want...?
*...i wear your sweaters when you're asleep & i wear them when you're not home to remind me that you love me as much as i love you.
& you may be the only person that could truly know who i am.

Such a beautiful little shapeshifter
A modern day siren
It's hard to picture her face now
She's so distant
I loved her
It's wicked how fast my heart grows attached to those I frequently see
It's as if she ignores the wary signs
She just jumps
Victoria was special to me
A real life movie
She opened doors to hinges I knew not existed
Party... people... alcohol
She had connections
She had problems
I took them all
I didn't think that one day that beautiful one would shift on me
She was an adapter
She played a role to get what she needed
She could be as soft as a kitten
As helpless as a mouse
Clever as a fox
Angry as a bear
I had seen her become many things but the day she changed
I couldn't recognize her
She was this form I had never seen before
Though her face is distant in my mind
I still get a chill in my spine
From the memory of her presence
Sometimes it makes my bones ache

I couldn't help but feeling alone within the crowd
Even when the lights went out I didn't feel too proud
Even when you kissed me, and in turn I kissed you too
I felt quite forgotten and this feeling wasn't new
I forgot to mention that my heart was full of wax
I thought that you could melt it but you stopped it in its tracks
Maybe if I wasn’t just a figure on display
Maybe it would help to find some happiness one day
I can't change the message, I can only change the words
I can't be a tiger if I’m just a mockingbird
You stared into my eyes, but these orbs could not foresee
That all they'd get was sorrow as you walked away from me
Since I’m just a petal on a rose to tear apart
Maybe if you find it you'll no longer need my heart
What will it become without the one to keep it beating
Sacrifice the love and when the love comes back its bleeding

You ensnared me like a dog in its cage
Locked me down in your cellar
drove to my estate
told my son it would be okay
Massacred my family with my face
And made sure to replay it for me everyday:
recorded the depravity so I could see it on tv
-Said to me:
"I know your heart is bleeding.
I will set you free when you watch,
Without shedding a single tear."
-I remained locked up for close to a year
I needed to know why you would trap me here
just to let me walk away
when you finally released me at gunpoint;
I learned to keep my tears at bay
Your response when I pressed for a reason:
        
               "...its just a game I play."

You set lives on fire then set us free
How many suicides have you kept as trophies?
Does it tingle like a wet tongue on your neck,
When you rip a life apart?
Presenting to us the imploded pieces
Like a perverted work of art?

You psychotic shapeshifter you sicken me
You serial-stealer of sacred space
You think the human race is a plague
So you became, "The Locust-Eater"
Playing out macabre fantasies
With such swift shifts of physical features
You delight in deriving such clever machinations
To deceive us ...
...but can you deceive yourself?
Underneath the bone and sinew
- you are still just YOU
...even though you masquerade as everybody else

How can I spot a chameleon in a kaleidoscope?
Belay your false colors.
Show me your true shade.

I studied you
Created a secret space- like you
Where I could stash you safe
Poured through claims of being kidnapped
By a being who could change its shape
Corroborated their claims-by the dates
Of misdeeds they were framed for
-And when they took their own life
In my research I found a smoking gun
-In your case your kryptonite
You must regress to your real skin
         once every month
So i set out ...
picked just the right target...
...and started to hunt

To lure out the chameleon...
I captured something...
      
        That I think you might love.

You wore Anessa's life like a glove
Was she to be your masterpiece?
You committed a crime so brazen- as her
it went viral within a week
you stole her child in the darkness of night,
Anessa's husband- that child's father
Must have been filled with such awful fright
He called authorities, you fabricated stories
you turned the victim into a suspect
Over a single fortnight
Not long after he was killed
in a drunken bar fight

As Anessa you were spotted months after
Ignoring a green light of a busy intersection
Parked in the middle of the road
Placed their child on that busy street
Then sped off in the other direction

Anessa was blindsided when you finally
let her go
Oh, i bet you waited with bated breath
For her self-removal from the world?
You ensured she would never again
Get to hold her baby girl
But Anessa never gave in
Did her steadfast resolve
feel like I rash upon your skin?
Where it festered forming feelings foreign
to a fiend such as you?

You scratched that itch
Began by sending her anonymous gifts
Even started shifting into her too
Stalked her waking moments
by engaging her as a stranger:
all the while unaware your sick infatuation:
Had put her in danger

I'm counting down the clock
I kidnapped maybe her or You
I left my address at Anessa's house
A note saying, " this is a game I play now too."
Soon now: a month will have passed
And it all comes crashing to A head:
at last.

So shed your skin
Prepare to fight
This vendetta ends here:

Tonight.

There is a lighter
          
           Just

waiting to ignite.

A knocking at my door
A knot in my stomach
Anessa...( or is it You)
bound beneath my floorboards?
I peer in the peephole then pull You (Or Anessa) out of that hidden hole
I drench us both( for every second You stole)
I  pour it all over
( my life will never be whole)  
I douse everything in here in gasoline
Confess your sins
(before the fire finds them out)
Its time to come CLEAN!!!

And it seems:
I will be dipping my hands in red tonight.
This will all end in the worst way.

I open the door
let Anessa( or You) In
She runs to my captive saying,
"Where do I begin?"

"I made something of my life
after it let me go
At first, it caused the Locust-Eater misery
You see it toys with humans:
ones it knows are weak
I was so meek and feeble before we met...
Yet,I'm the one person it failed to defeat
Its game gave me strength i never knew...
... resolve had always,somehow,eluded me
I do believe its games are vile...but,
They are necessary?
Please,**** me instead
"...but let the Locust-Eater free"

the captive Anessa(or You)
begins thrashing their feet
I yell," which one of you killed my family?!"
They both calmy respond:

" Me."

The lighter flicks in my hand
I'm unable to speak

A month has passed
Which one is the one I seek?
They both insist I let the other go
And you should know:
it slips from my hand
The lighter(like my grip of reality)
falling faster with exposed flame
adhering to the clear rules of gravity

The two Anessa's embrace.
They both begin to burn.

False colors from the chameleon fade out.
Hungry flames swallow me whole.
I am( am I?)...
seeing the Locust-Eater's true shade:

This is how I take control.

-

I met a boy who's shy
as a fox. He has hair thick
as it's fur. Eyes big ,
round and glow. I met a
boy who's free and wild
like the untamed wolves
who roam around the woods
in the silver moonlight. He's
the boy I love. The boy that
i saved from shapeshifting
in the dead of night. One kiss
before midnight stopped his
body from aching and shaking.
It stopped his bones from
cracking and breaking. One
kiss was all it took to cure his
curse. But he will always remain
my little wolf boy. The boy I
met when I was wondering lost
in the dark. The boy i touched
before he shifted into the
creatures of the night who
hunt for prey and mark their
territories with their paws
and claws* ~

I spent most my life fitting in
Shapeshifter in my own skin
To squeeze to whatever size
Matched the proportion of everyones lies

I often find my heart lies with the lads
And I find I related more than my body should
And other days I find I align with what my mother would be proud of

The confusion sickens me    
I feel like a freak
A shapeshifter in a circus
One who crowds gather to gawk at
It feels like they stare and mock my absurdity
It rips me apart to feel so different

And I have been told that it is for attention
But please know that no one would wish this confusion on themselves only to be looked at with disdain
I am me and that is simple and plain

this empty form with simple sound
is filled echoes amplify the space
they occupy but lack  the grace

to be both honest and profound
as keepers of spirit and pace
this empty form with simple sound

becomes the whole complete and round
that we desire more than the chase
of life itself marked on each face
this empty form with simple sound

I am a shapeshifter in these unfamiliar lands,
fitting myself into crooks and edges of photos I’ll never belong to,
forming myself into images of what the people want.

I am an outsider to the only world I know,
scrambling at pieces to create the perfect picture,
stitching memories to build the perfect home.

I’m a foreigner in my own skin,
searching for a way to express myself,
craving for a place to find myself and call it home.

You came as a friend,
Twisted into a lover,
and left a stranger.

Like passing seasons in a year.

i run
blanket tied loosely around my neck
mom says
i could choke
but i do not worry
if my cape gets caught i will shift
down
down
i become a frog
i leap, and my legs soar behind me
if i am snatched
by a bird
i will outstretch my arms and glide
down
down
a mighty hawk
i bellow, and the world turns to stone
if my wing
is clipped
i dig my fingers
down
down
anchoring with tiger claws
i pounce, and the villains fall
almighty
conqueror of nature
i relent, and the blanket falls to my feet

shapeshifter, son drunk
& changing skins.
he digs up skeletons of a spanish battalion
buried
by tigers on the garden key.

suncresent
spray of blood & oranges.
new-fangled sailors once soaked
in madness.
now just starvation.

the viking speaks:
in limericks of new world poise.
his antler woven mask,
set nicely upon the shore.

seod, turtle lord
of space & time, appears only once
every lunar eclipse. bound by treatise
to the jellyfish triumvirate.
his acolyte,
bolivar t. shagnasty,
wanders the mainland in search of water
or meat of trees.

kindness
of men turns to dust & belly worms.
forgotten, the plants mutate
into root-rich empires
of fish & figurine.
million year armistice.

dr. samuel mudd,
shackled years to tide-slab &
fort jefferson. he
purifies the island of its yellow
shivering death.
hospital key.

fastforward hundred plus years
through mudd lifeline:
battle weary sneakers,
spokes sung by strum of card, the bmx
stridden boy & his
teenage mutant ninja turtle mask.

Stranger that you are
Paraphrasing my dreams
Circumnavigating my thoughts
The Compass aligns towards Neverland
Meet me nowhere
I’ll be there

Sailor that you are
Running before the wind
The tide is turning
Time to walk towards the flood
Breathe underwater
Merge with the waves

Falling star that you are
Shooting though my universe
Bursting into millions of light beams and diamonds
Crystallizing reveries
While feeling you explode
Inside of me

Taleteller that you are
Reinventing fairy tales
Omniscient narrator of myths and fables
Shapes and colors animated under your breath
Transcending space and time
and gravity

Delusion that you are
Echoing through the corridors of my head
I keep your words as treasures
Your glance as a souvenir
Nonexistent memories reappear
Holograms form matter
Intercalating to reality

Golden Silverware,
Sits Ontop Of Broken Shards Of Fine China,
A Candle Stick Lays On The Floor,
The Wood Stained With Misery,
Because She Passed,
War Broke Out,
Hearts Being Punctured With Stakes,
The String Of Sanity Starting To Break,
A Rose Picked From The Universe's Garden,
Then Set In A Vase With No Water,
A Watch Ticked Like A Metronome,
Conducting Life's Organized Chaos,
Every Heart Break Orchestrated,
And Every Death A Crescendo,
The Subjects Attacked Without Looking Back,
Taking The Shapeshifter's Life,
Because They Needed To Have An Excuse,
Other Than Being Misuderstood,
To Distroy Her,
More And More Innocent Lives Were Taken,
Just Out Of Fear,
In Daft Decision,
Most Of The Village Was Whiped Out,
And One Of The 13 Left Out Of 350,
Was The Queen's Killer

let me just sweat it out
better yet, push it out, let it out
with cigarettes without a doubt
i won't enjoy them as much
this time. i configured my fingers
into a figure eight but leaning
sideways figuratively speaking
now days nothing i say is not figurative

Never to see the white light.
Mask of desperation and doom,
Cursed since the womb.
Locked in a soulless battle,
Will I feed upon mortal cattle?
Fangs sharp points intrude,
I find they have become crude.
Wallow in this plight of misery,
One with shadow and mystery.
Falling gracefully to bended knees,
My sanity, crumbling flees.
Bound to this immortal life of pain,
My existence to all a bane.
Calling out to any who may hear,
Desperate that some life is near.
Save me from my restless torment,
Years I have endured, yet dormant.
Face the greatest fiery threat to my kind,
My weakness now I see as a sign.
Delicious warm life sustaining nectar,
Once mankind’s greatest protector.
Gained mortality only a whisper,
Granted because I am a shifter.
Lulled to my death,
Taking this last breath.
My entrance to any heaven forbidden,
My immediate hell-bound doom now unhidden.
This unchosen descent not willingly made,
Still the demise will be the same, will not fade.
Forgetting these decades
Multitude of facades…
One last glimpse of natures delight,
The sun slips from my dead sight.
© Copyright

-Christina Worrell

High above and brave;
Taunting the waters below.
With this bridge we have conquered
Open spaces
And Time opens its wings
To let us pass without aging.
Who ages on the bridge?
No one.
Children are arrested in a state
Of wondrous apprehension.
The old forget gravity's pull
On their brittle bones.
It is a marvelous thing that connects
Our world to
Middle Earth and Rivendell; the great
Castle of Gormenghast, Narnia and
The fathomless depths of Cthulu; the
Temples of the Oracles; the lost rock
Walls of the Necropolis; the emerald
Towers of Oz; the Memorial to Krypton
In the Fortress of Solitude; the waters of
Lethe; the expanse of Midgard and the
Rainbow Bridge; Mount Olympus;
Daedelus' Labyrinth; the Inferno, the
Purgatorio and the Paridisio; the dark
Forest's of Pan; and the broad field's of
Chiron.
And the galaxy of stars, of worlds destroyed
And created by your Will, that shapeshifter
Of Prima Materia that stretches out in
The limitless space that is your mind.
This ancient construction of arched
Rock, mankind's greatest achievement
That draws the curious, the adventurous
Without verdict or punishment, and gives
Them the ability to walk on air, defeating
The current of death that rushes
Obliviously below.

You shapeshift
in my dreams
and whichever
shape you take
fits perfectly
with mine.

~mce

Explaining my depression to my mother: A conversation

Mom, my depression is a shapeshifter,
One day it's as small as a firefly in the palm of a bear,
The next it's the bear.

On those days I play dead until the bear leaves me alone,
I call the bad days "the Dark Days".

Mom says try lighting candles,
But when I see a candle I see the flicker of a flame,
Sparks of a memory younger than noon.
I am standing beside her open casket
It is the moment that I learn everyone I will ever come to know will someday die.
Besides Mom, I'm not afraid of the dark, perhaps that's part of the problem.

Mom says I thought the problem was that you can't get out of bed.

I can't, anxiety holds me a hostage inside of my house inside of my head.

Mom says where did anxiety come from?

Anxiety is the cousin visiting from out of town that depression felt obligated to invite to the party.

Mom, I am the party, only I'm a party I don't want to be at.

Mom says why don't you try going to actual parties, see your friends.

Sure, I make plans, I make plans I don't want to go to.
I make plans because,
I know I should want to go,
I know sometimes I would have wanted to go.

It's just not that fun having fun when you don't want to have fun Mom.

You see Mom each night,
Insomnia sweeps me up in his arms dips me in the kitchen in the small glow of the stove-light.
Insomnia has this romantic way of making the moon feel like perfect company.

Mom says try counting sheep,
But my mind can only count reasons to stay awake.

So I go for walks, but my stuttering kneecaps clank like silver spoons held in strong arms with loose wrists.

They ring in my ears like clumsy church bells reminding me that I am sleepwalking on an ocean of happiness that I cannot
Baptize myself in.

Mom says happy is a decision,
But my happy is as hollow as a pin pricked egg.

My happy is a high fever that will break.

Mom says I am so good at making something out of nothing and then flat out asks me if I am afraid of dying.

No, Mom I am afraid of living.

Mom, I am lonely.

I think I learned that when Dad left how to turn the anger into lonely?
The lonely into busy.

So when I say I've been super busy lately,
I mean I've been falling asleep on the couch watching Sports Center
To avoid confronting the empty side of my bed.

But my depression always drags me back to my bed
Until my bones are forgotten fossils of a skeleton sunken city.

My mouth a bone yard of teeth broken from biting down on themselves.

The hollow auditorium of my chest swoons with the echoes of a heartbeat.

But I am just a careless tourist here
I will never truly know where I have been.

Mom still doesn't understand
Mom, can't you see

That neither can I.

Night and day
Suddenly I am a shapeshifter
I dream in turns